The Meaning of Night

‘Good evening, Mr Glapthorn,’ said Fordyce Jukes. ‘I trust you’ve had a pleasant day?’

^*[‘Death is certain’. Ed.]

^*[The Wandering Jew of legend. Ed.]

^*[The monumental gates, in the Egyptian style, that lead into the cemetery. Ed.]

^*[Isaac Watts (1674–1748), the Dissenting divine, poet, and hymn-writer. The cemetery, laid out on the former Fleetwood-Abney estate, had been opened in May 1840. Ed.]

6

Vocat^*

The conviction that Fordyce Jukes was my blackmailer would not leave me; and yet he had not been at Stoke Newington, nor had any attempt been made by any other person or persons to make themselves known to me – except for that tap on the shoulder, that unsettling sense of gentle but firm pressure deliberately applied. An accidental brush by a hastily departing stranger, no doubt. But not the first such ‘accident’ – I still thought of the incident outside the Diorama. And not the last.

Why had Jukes sent me out to Stoke Newington, if he had not intended to reveal himself to me there? I could reach no other conclusion but that he was biding his time; that the second note, summoning me to the interment of my victim, had been designed to apply a little additional twist of the knife, which I would repay with compound interest. Two communications had been received. Perhaps a third would bring matters to a head.

I kept a close eye on Jukes from that moment on. From my sitting-room window, if I placed my face close against the glass, I could just see down to where the stair-case gave onto the street. I observed him carrying in his provisions, or passing the time of day with the occupants of neighbouring chambers, sometimes taking his mangy little dog out for a walk by the river. His work hours were regular, his private activities innocent.

Nothing happened. The expected third communication did not come; there was no soft knock on the door, and no indication of an unravelling plan. Slowly, over the following days, I began to gain ground on my enfeebled self, and, with returning strength and concentration, emerged one morning after a sound night’s sleep – the first for a week or more – to rededicate myself to the destruction of my enemy.

Of his history and character you shall know more – much more – as this narrative continues. He was ever in my mind. I breathed him in every day, for his fate was anchored to mine. ‘And I shall cover his head with the mountains of my wrath, and press him down, / And he shall be forgotten by men.’ This is an untypically fine line from the epic pen of P. Rainsford Daunt (The Maid of Minsk, Book III); but there is a finer by Mr Tennyson, which I had constantly before my mental eye: ‘I was born to other things.’^*

On the Sunday following the interment of Lucas Trendle, I called at Blithe Lodge, as arranged, and was shown into the back parlour by Charlotte, the Scottish housemaid. I waited for some little time until, at last, I heard the sound of Bella’s distinctive tripping tread on the stairs.

‘How are you, Eddie?’ she asked. She did not take my hand, or kiss me spontaneously, as she might once have done, or even proffer her own cheek to be kissed.

We exchanged the usual pleasantries as she sat down on a chaiselongue by the tall sash window that looked down over the dark garden below.

‘Well, then,’ she said, ‘tell me what you’ve been doing. Things have been so busy here. So much to do, and so many things to think about! And with Mary leaving – you know of course that Captain Patrick Davenport is going to marry her! Such excitement – and so brave of him! But she deserves it, the dear girl, and he does love her so. Kitty has a new girl coming tomorrow, but of course we never know how these things will work out, and then Kitty herself has gone back to France, and so it falls to me to conduct the interview, as well as everything else, and you know that Charlie is to go to Scotland for her sister’s confinement …’

She twittered on in this inconsequential way for some minutes, laughing from time to time, and curling her fingers around in her lap as she spoke. But the old light in her eyes had gone. I saw and felt the change. I did not have to ask the reason. I could see that she had considered, in the cold light of day, what I had told her at the Clarendon Hotel, and had found it wanting – fatally so. A tale told to a child; a demeaning, absurd fantasy of a paste-board villain and his mysterious henchman – one of my mother’s stories, perhaps, dusted down for the purpose. All to hide the truth – whatever hideous truth it was – about Edward Glapthorn, who was not what he seemed. It was only too apparent that she had taken ‘Veritas’ at his word.

Charlotte brought us tea, and Bella continued with her trivial banter – I sitting silently, smiling and nodding from time to time as she went on – until a knocking on the front door announced the arrival of some member of The Academy to whom she had to attend.

We stood up; I shook her unlingering hand and left by the garden door. She had been a dear friend and companion to me; but I had not loved her as she had wished me to do. I had sought, out of deep regard, to protect her from hurt; and, if my fate had been otherwise, would have married her gladly, and been content to give myself to her alone. But my heart was no longer mine to bestow on whom I pleased; it had been ripped from me by a greater power and given to another, against my will, and would now remain in her possession, a poor forgotten prisoner, for all eternity.

The next day, feeling tetchy and out of sorts following the previous evening’s conversation with Bella, I sent a note over to Le Grice proposing a spin in the skiff that I kept at the Temple Pier, to which he immediately agreed. Our plan was to row up to the Hungerford Passenger Bridge, take a little lunch at his Club, and then row back. The morning had broken fair, though with a brisk wind, and I sallied forth to meet him with a lust for exertion.

At the bottom of the stairs, the door to Jukes’s room stood ajar. I stopped, unable to help myself.

Across the street I saw the distinctive figure of my neighbour, his rounded back towards me, disappearing towards the Temple Gardens with his little dog in tow. He had not meant to leave his door open, of that I was sure, a careful, crafty fellow like that. But it was open, and it was an irresistible invitation to me.

The sitting-room was a large, panelled apartment, with a little arched door in the far corner leading to the sleeping area and washroom. It was comfortably furnished, with evidence of taste and discernment that seemed to sit ill with the walking, breathing Fordyce Jukes. I had often wondered, as I gazed down on his comings and goings from my room in the eaves, what mental world the funny little creature inhabited; to see such wholly unsuspected illustrations of that world palpably adorning the walls and shelves momentarily distracted me from my immediate purpose.

Adjacent to the door of his bedchamber stood an elegant glassfronted cabinet containing several exquisite