point to Scape when I saw that the bright-eyed creature that had looked at me from the cell's drain-hole had now become bold enough to investigate the toe of my boot with its small naked paws. It scurried away when I leapt with an involuntary shudder from the bench.
'That's right,' said Scape, linking his arm with mine. 'You can trust us – really.' He pulled me towards the brightly lit corridor.
'But-' My protests collapsed; the cell's darkness drove me into the hands of my enemies. The gaoler, markedly more respectful now, placed a twine-bound bundle in my arms. As he led us away, I recognised it as my clothes, still damp from the river, retrieved from the church of Saint Mary Alderhythe. Beneath my prodding finger I felt the circular outline of the Saint Monkfish coin inside my wadded-up waistcoat.
Outside the grim walls, I stood blinking in the morning sunshine that, at various points in my nocturnal quest, I had despaired of ever seeing again. Scape opened the door of a brougham – the same I had seen outside Saint Mary Alderhythe – and guided me up into it. No sooner had I sat down than I became aware of the vehicle's other occupants. Seated across from me were the enigmatic Lord Bendray and, restored to her feminine finery, Miss McThane. I endeavoured to ignore the signal of her lowered lashes and slight smile as Scape found his place next to me and the brougham jolted into motion.
I gazed out the carriage's window at the London streets passing by. A one-legged crossing-sweeper hobbled out of our path and tugged respectfully at his cap; perambulating costers and stall-keepers alike were arranging their merchandise for their customers' inspection; the city buildings and population had regained that apparent reality of which the vertiginous night had robbed them. This bright diurnal world had seemed a phantasm, existing only in deluded memory, when the dark waters had been swirling over my head or I had been running from the church where piscine physiognomies gaped in horror at a clanking priest and choir; now those night events slid together in confusion as I tried to recall them. I was too exhausted to sort the real from the false; sanity often consists of knowing what not to think about.
I looked up from my fatigued musings as, with his brown-spotted hands folded over the head of his cane, Lord Bendray leaned his cadaverous face towards me. 'I wanted to express my deep appreciation to you,' he said in a septuagenarian quaver. 'For taking upon yourself the blame ensuing from our little, ah… church social. Hehheh-heh.' His amusement at his own witticism evoked a spasm of coughing that lasted nearly a minute. He dabbed at his phlegm-spotted lips with a handkerchief before speaking again. 'I had always received excellent service from the senior Dower, but had never expected such loyalty from the son as well.'
I had not the slightest idea to what he referred; I had never seen the name Bendray in any of my late father's account books. As to the night's events at Saint Mary Alderhythe, it now seemed the path of wisdom to dissociate myself from them by proclaiming my ignorance about what intent, if any, lay behind them. 'I'm sorry, your Lordship,' I said coldly. 'I don't-'
Scape's elbow had dug sharply into my ribs, expelling my breath and thus silencing me; his blow had been concealed beneath the fold of his greatcoat. I looked around into his face and saw beneath the blue lenses the threat of further violence.
He turned towards Lord Bendray. 'Mr Dower told me back at the gaol – when I went to get him – that he was feeling kinda exhausted. Been a long night, you know? So he doesn't really feel like discussing things right now.' Scape brought his ingratiating smile around to me, where it hardened in place. I kept my tongue still.
Lord Bendray had taken no notice of any of this byplay. 'A pity,' he said, leaning back into the brougham's leather plush. 'I do hope, then, that he'll accept my invitation out to my country estate. You'll find it most restful there, Dower. And, of course, there is so much business we would be able to discuss at our leisure – propositions I'm sure will be… most interesting.'
I received a hidden nudge from Scape. 'Ah… yes. Yes, of course,' I said quickly. 'Very gracious of your Lordship, I'm sure. However – I'm not sure I could get away right now.' I could in fact envision no more dreadful prospect than being spirited away to some remote mansion, there to be further mauled by this man's lunacies, without even the benefit of the constabulary's timely intervention. 'Pressures of business, you know. Yes; very busy time for me. The watch trade always picks up this time of year-' I caught, from the corner of my eye, Scape's frowning glare, and bit off my rattling elaboration.
Lord Bendray's chin wrinkled below his child-like pout, as though he were enduring the refusal of a playfellow to come to a birthday fete. 'Well,' he said, gazing stoically out the window, 'I do hope you'll be able to see your way clear.'
'I'm sure,' said Scape heavily, 'that Mr Dower will give it every consideration.' He leaned closer to me, displaying my pallid reflection in his dark spectacles.
There was no further conversation; I was let off with my bundle of clothing in front of my shop, and the brougham clattered hastily away. Before I could turn my key in the lock, I heard a sharp yapping from behind. I turned and saw Fexton's terrier, somewhat dust-covered from running behind the brougham, looking up from the pavement. Its tongue lolled panting from the side of its mouth as its bright, expectant gaze held on me.
'Poor wretch,' I murmured as I bent to scratch behind its up-pricked ear; the animal wriggled in pleasure. I was not alone in having had a tortuous odyssey through the night. The dog had been clever enough to transfer its innate loyalties to me once it had perceived that its master Fexton had been murdered; then that faithfulness had drawn it along to every station to which I had been forced. No doubt it had been waiting outside the gaol when I had been released.
'Well, then; come on.' I pushed the shop door open and bade the animal enter. 'Fellow campaigners owe some civility to each other, I suppose.'
Creff hurried downstairs to greet me. 'Thank the heavens you're back, sir! Most worried, I was… when they came and told me – what's that?' He peered down at my companion, busily engaged in scratching himself with a hind leg.
'That, I have been informed, is a bell-dog. Find him something to eat, will you? I'm sure the poor creature is famished.' I shuffled past him and laid my hand on the railing of the stairs. 'And leave the shutters down; we shan't be opening today. I'll be retiring to my bed for some time.' I shifted the bundle under my arm and wearily pulled myself up the first step.
'Your pardon, sir – but there's someone here as wants to see you.'
I halted and looked back at him. 'Here? Surely you turned any callers away-'
'Oh, no, sir; I tried, but I couldn't; she was very form a-double, you might say.'
A formidable woman, here, to see me; my gaze travelled up the stairs to my parlour door. For a moment I quailed, thinking that perhaps Miss McThane had somehow managed to be transported from Lord Bendray's brougham where I had last seen her. 'Did she give a name?' I asked.
'A Mrs Trabble, sir. She wouldn't state her business. Said it was a matter of some… ahem…' His voice sank to a whisper. '… delicacy.'
I could well imagine. I could feel the blood draining out of my face as I contemplated the prospect of confronting such a visitor. Mrs Augustina Trabble, in her role as founder and leader of the Ladies Union for the Suppression of Carnal Vice, had made considerable impact of late, both in London society and in the popular press. Rumours of her assaults upon the titled habitues of London's demi-monde – the result of her moral outrage and complete fearlessness – were rife; had she not in fact confronted the Prince of Wales himself in his box at the El Dorado music-hall in Leicester Square, and upbraided him for the poor example he had made of himself to the lower classes? (Other stories went so far as to attribute the fire that made smouldering ashes of the establishment to her doing.) There was likely not a cigar divan in the whole city where her name was not cursed by swells impatient with her interference in the pursuit of their sordid pleasures.
But what did such a daunting figure have to do with me? I had no idea. Perhaps – the best that my poor tired brain could imagine – merely a request for a donation to her organization's good works? The installation of a gaslight in the alley behind the shop, the better to discourage its use as a rendez-vous both romantic and mercantile in nature? There was, unfortunately, but one way to find out; with faltering tread, I mounted the stairs.
'Mrs Trabble.' I closed the door behind me. 'I'm honoured-'
'Sit down, young man,' she said sternly, indicating the chair across from her.
Her intimidating gaze skewered me to the faded horsehair upholstery. A large woman, in unornamented black bombazine; there seemed to be enough of her great bosomed presence to make two or three such as myself; a fierce square jaw, as though a block of granite had been interposed between the brim of her feathered hat and her
