She smiled at him bleakly. “I do not know who it is, Thomas. Perhaps it is someone’s daughter, or even someone’s maid. Maybe I have normally seen that face under a lace cap? Hair makes a lot of difference, you know. But if I see her again, I shall send a messenger to you within the hour. You said you found this photograph in Godolphin Jones’s house, in his camera? Why is it so important?” She glanced at the picture still in her hand. “Is the rest of it indecent? Or is there some other person in it? Or perhaps both?”
“It is indecent,” he replied.
“Indeed.” She raised her eyebrows a little and handed it back to him. “Motive for murder then. I presumed so. Poor creature.”
“I must know who it is!”
“I appreciate your desire,” she said calmly. “You have not need to reinforce it.”
“If everyone were to go around murdering witnesses to indiscretion-” He was frustrated almost beyond the stretch of his temper. He was now nearly sure she was concealing something from him, if not knowledge, at least strong suspicion.
She cut across him. “I do not approve of murder, Thomas,” she said staring up at him. “If I remember who it is, I shall say so.”
He had to be content with that. He knew perfectly well she would say no more. He took his leave with as much grace as he could muster and went out into the thickening fog.
He spent most of the rest of the day inquiring, with the picture in his hand, but no one else was prepared to admit having known the woman, and by dusk he was cold, his legs and feet ached, there was a blister on his heel, and he was hungry and thoroughly miserable.
Then, as the fourth hansom cab passed him without stopping and left him islanded under the gas lamp in a sea of icy vapor, he had a sudden idea. He had temporarily forgotten all about the other corpses, presuming them incidental. They had all died naturally; only Godolphin Jones was murdered. But perhaps there was some bizarre connection? Horatio Snipe had been a procurer of women. Could his clientele have included Godolphin Jones-either for his own appetite or as subjects to photograph? Perhaps that was his particular fetish-lewd photography.
He ran out into the street, shouting at the next cab as it approached, and reluctantly it pulled to a halt.
“Resurrection Row!” he bellowed at the driver.
The man pulled a fearsome face but wheeled his horse round and started back, muttering angrily under his breath about darkness and graveyards, and what he hoped would happen to residents of such places if they hired cabs they could not pay for.
Pitt almost fell out at the other end, shoving coins at the alarmed driver, and strode down along the barely lit pavement to find number fourteen, where Horrie Snipe’s widow lived.
He had to knock and shout loudly enough to make a nuisance and send windows opening along the street with cries of abuse before she came to the door.
“All right!” she said furiously. “All right!” She opened it and glared at him; then, as she recognized him, her expression changed. “What do you want?” she said incredulously. “ ’Orrie’s dead, and buried twice! You oughta know that! It was you w’ot came wiv ’im the second time. Don’t say someone’s dug ’im up again?”
“No, Maizie, everything’s fine. Can I come in?”
“If you ’ave to. What do you want?”
He squeezed in past her. The room was small, but there was a fire burning strongly, and it was much cleaner than he would have expected. There was even rather a good pair of candlesticks on the mantel shelf, polished pewter, and lace antimacassars over the backs of the chairs.
“Well?” she demanded impatiently. “I ain’t got nuffink in ’ere as isn’t mine-if that’s what you’re thinking!”
“It wasn’t what I was thinking.” He pulled out the picture. “Do you know her, Maizie?”
She took it between her finger and thumb gingerly. “An’ what if I do?”
“There’s ten shillings in it for you,” he said rashly. “If you give me her name and where I can find her.”
“Bertha Mulligan,” she said, without hesitation. “Lodges with Mrs. Cuff, down at number one thirty-seven, straight down on the left-’and side. But you won’t find ’er at ’ome this time o’ the evening. I shouldn’t wonder. Beginning work about now.”
“Doing what?”
She gave a snort of disgust at his stupidity for asking. “On the streets, o’ course. Probably up in one of them cafes near the ’Aymarket. Good-lookin’ girl, Bertha.”
“I see. And does Mrs. Cuff have other lodgers?”
“If you mean does she run an ’ouse, then I says go and look for yourself. I don’t talk about me neighbors, same as I don’t expect no gossip about me, nor poor ’Orrie, when ’e was alive.”
“I see. Thank you, Maizie.”
“Where’s my ten bob?”
He fished in his pocket and brought out string, a knife, sealing wax, three pieces of paper, a packet of toffees, two keys, and about a pound’s worth of change. He counted out ten shillings for her, reluctantly; it had been a promise made in the heat of discovery. But her hand was out, and there was no going back on it. She snatched it, checking it minutely.
“Thank you.” She closed her grip on it like a dying man’s and put it into the reaches of her underskirts. “That’s Bertha, all right. Why do you want to know?”
“Her picture was found in a dead man’s house,” he replied.
“Murdered?”
“Yes.”
“Who was it, then?”
“Godolphin Jones, the artist.” She might not have heard of him. Probably she could not read, and the murder would be of little interest in this quarter.
She did not seem in the least surprised.
“Stupid girl,” she said imperturbably. “I told ’er not to go posin’ for ’im; better to stick to what she knows. But not ’er, would try to better ’erself. Greedy, she was. I never like things on paper, meself; only leads to trouble.”
He grabbed at her arm without thinking, and she pulled away sharply.
“You knew she posed for Godolphin Jones?” he demanded, holding onto her.
“Of course I did!” she snapped. “Do you take me for a fool? I know what goes on in that shop of ’is!”
“Shop! What shop?”
“That shop of ’is a number forty-seven, of course, where ’e takes all the photographs and sells them. Disgusting, I calls it. I can understand a man who wants a girl and can’t get one for ’isself, like what ’Orrie used to provide for; but one what gets ’is fun out o’ lookin’ at pictures, now that’s what I call un’ealthy!”
A flood of understanding washed over Pitt, and a whole world of possibilities opened.
“Thank you, Maizie.” He clasped her hand with a warmth that positively alarmed her. “You are a jewel among women, a lily growing in a rubbish yard. May heaven reward you!” And he turned and charged out of the door into the thick darkness of Resurrection Row, crowing with delight.
9
Alicia first heard of the death of Godolphin Jones from Dominic. He had spent a morning with Somerset Carlisle, going over the names of those they could count on to support them when the bill came before the House in a few days’ time, and the news had come, whispered from servant to servant around the Park. Carlisle’s kitchen maid had been keeping company with Jones’s footman and had been among the first to hear.
Dominic arrived at the Fitzroy-Hammond house before luncheon, looking breathless and a little white. He was shown straight into the room where Alicia was writing letters.
As soon as she saw him, she knew something else was wrong. The joy she had expected to feel evaporated, and she was aware only of anxiety.
“What is it?”
