Fatal Enquiry

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

It had been a long and eventful day and it was time to go home. Somehow, being away for a while had cemented the house in Newington as home in my mind. I missed its denizens and wanted more than anything to be there, and now, finally, I stood at number 3 Lion Street, Barker’s private address, where I had lived for the past two years.

Holding my breath, I turned the doorknob and stepped inside. The hall looked the same. There was the hat stand with its array of sticks waiting to be used, and the standing clock by the stairs. The house smelled of beeswax and lemon oil and the must of old books. Everything was prepared for the return of its owner. My advent was inconsequential. Hard by the entrance, Jacob Maccabee’s door opened and he emerged with his sawn-down shotgun pointed in my direction. The first time I’d met him our butler had pointed this same shotgun at me in defense of the house.

“Oh, it’s you,” he said, lowering the gun. “Thank Hashem.”

The man looked shattered. His eyes were hollow and dark and he looked thinner than when I’d seen him last.

“It’s good to see you, Jacob,” I replied. Then I realized I had called him by his first name. I’d always called him Mac before. It was what Barker called him. When I was sore at him, which was most of the time, I called him Mr. Maccabee. I suppose I had actually been concerned for his welfare.

“Where’s the Guv?” he asked.

“He’s gone underground. I know he’s worked out some plan, but he’s keeping it to himself. I was arrested and released, pending my trial for assaulting an officer of the law.” I noticed his hands were shaking. “You look as though you’ve had a hard time of it.”

“That dratted Nightwine broke in here with members of the Elephant and Castle gang. They burst in through the back door when I was on my knees polishing the linoleum. There was a half dozen of them at least. They locked me in my room, and kicked me about when they got bored. They stayed for several days, eating everything in the pantry and drinking all the beer. Worst of all, they used a jimmy and broke open the safe. I don’t know what they got away with, but they were exultant. I’m sorry I couldn’t stop them.”

“No one expected you to stop them,” I told him. “You’re not a bodyguard and things can be replaced. You know the Guv is not sentimental.”

“Still, I should have done something.”

“Where’s Harm?” I asked, suddenly thinking of Barker’s dog.

“He’s outside guarding the house.”

I strode down the hall and opened the back door. Harm came waddling over the bridge, looking neglected, but basically sound. I bent down to wait for him and he brushed up against my hand, a trifle warily.

“Hello, boy,” I said, scratching him behind the ears. “Looks like we all survived the ordeal.”

The Pekingese sniffed at my laces and wagged his tail absently. He was Barker’s dog, but he tolerated me, at least enough to spend half the night on the foot of my bed most of the time. Having finished the inspection of my trouser legs, he went to the front door. He scratched against it and then resting his front paws on the door, looked back over his shoulder at me with his chocolate face and a half-hopeful, half-miserable expression as if to say, “Will you produce him now?”

“I’m sorry, boy,” I said. “He’s not coming home just yet.”

The dog lowered himself again, heaved a snorting sigh, and then made three circles before settling himself in a ball in front of the door.

“He hasn’t been eating,” Mac said. “He’s skin and bone beneath that coat of his.”

“No less than you,” I pointed out. “You’re looking decidedly gaunt, the pair of you.”

“Sometimes I forget to eat when it’s just me in the house,” he admitted.

“You should go home for a day or two, let your mother stuff you with latkes and knishes, and for heaven’s sake, get some rest. You’ve got bags under your eyes as large as gladstones. As for you…”

I crossed over and passed my hand along Harm’s dark back, which I noticed had lost its sheen.

“Dr. Llewelyn prescribes a pâté of chicken livers, your favorite treat.”

The dog looked at me with those bulbous eyes and his ears pricked up. I’ve often wondered how much of what we said he understood.

“It’s, uh, good to have you home, sir,” Mac said. He and I had had our differences in the past, but there are times when we must all pull together.

“There’s only one ‘sir’ who lives in this house, Jacob, and he’s not here right now.”

“This was a rough one,” Mac continued behind me. “Having them in the house-”

He was about to go over the edge, I realized, and he would hate himself for it later. I had to say something quickly.

“Mac,” I interrupted casually, my back to him. “Press some coffee for me, would you? I haven’t had a decent cup since I left.”

“You’ll have to drink it black, I’m afraid. The cream has curdled.”

“No matter,” I said. “I prefer it when I am working.”

He teetered for a second and I had no idea what to do if he broke down. After a moment he composed himself again.

“Very good. Where would you like me to serve it?”

“Oh, I’ll be poking about. And none of that weak, watery stuff, mind. We’ll need it stout, the way Etienne makes it.”

“Of course.”

He went into the kitchen while I crossed to the library. A few of the books had been pulled off the shelves, but otherwise, it had remained untouched. I was gratified to know the one room I considered a sanctuary in this house had not been spoiled by Nightwine’s gang. Then I went into the kitchen. It was evident that they had spent most of their time there. Etienne’s copper pots were strewn about, food baked in them, much of it burned on. The sink was full of glasses and crockery and the room was in general disarray. It was not like Mac at all to leave a room in such a condition. Normally, he is a dynamo. Occasionally, I have come downstairs in the middle of the night and found him working. It had been a day or two since Nightwine’s men had left, yet he had not so much as washed the dishes. What had he been doing all this time-staring into space? Our cook would go on the rampage if we did not try to clean it up.

“What’s become of Etienne?” I asked.

“I assume he came to the door, found it bolted, and went off in a huff. You know how temperamental he is.”

“Well, I see we have some work to do here,” I told him. “Let me continue looking around.”

The bed in my room and the other guest rooms on the upper floor had been occupied, and the contents in the lumber room pulled out and examined very closely. Afterward, I mounted the stairs to Barker’s aerie afraid of what I would find. I was relieved that Nightwine’s men had confined themselves to the lower rooms. Perhaps they had assumed this was an attic.

The parlor beside the front hall contained the safe, a twin of the one in Barker’s office, save that it was covered by a painting of Isonomy and his jockey. The painting had been taken off the wall and the safe had several holes drilled in the front plate. It was empty inside, of course. At least they hadn’t used dynamite. I don’t know how much they got away with, since it was the Guv’s private safe.

“We should get the Persian carpets cleaned,” Mac said cautiously, setting a cup of coffee in front of me after I had come back into the kitchen. “I know a place that does that, though they don’t advertise. Then we need to see about the gardeners.”

“Look,” I said. “You’ve been shut up in this place for too long. How would you like to stretch your legs a bit and act as a messenger boy, in a hansom cab, of course?”

“It would be nice to get out,” he admitted.

“Of course. Get a bialy or some gelato. Have your hair cut. Take the night off if you wish. Go see your mother and father in Newgate. Do you know where the gardeners’ barge is? We’ll need them back here in the morning.”

“Of course I know where the barge is!” he insisted, still a trifle touchy.

“Good, then,” I went on, as if he’d said nothing. “When you return, we’ll get this place in shape, so when the Guv comes back everything will be back to normal. I’ll help.”

“All right,” he said.

“I’ll watch the house for a while. Frankly, I could use some time alone.”

“But you haven’t eaten dinner,” he protested. “And I must heat the boiler in the bathhouse.”

“Believe it or not, Mac,” I told him, “I was able to feed myself before I met you and I might even heat a boiler without blowing up the garden.”

“I changed the sheets. Someone slept in your bed and moved your books around.”

“I hope he left a better-educated man than when he arrived, but I doubt it. Anyway, hop it. Get something to eat.”

“There are so many things to do, now that they’ve gone.”

“None of which need to be done tonight,” I told him.

He nodded and went into his butler pantry, returning a minute later with his homburg hat and a long coat. “If you’re sure, then.”

“I’m sure. See you tomorrow.”

After he was gone, I took off my jacket and rolled up my sleeves. In spite of what I told him, there was work to be done. In the back of the larder I found some tinned foie gras. Harm was in the kitchen watching me work, so I took down two saucers and some digestive biscuits, and between us, we finished the tin. Afterward, he rolled on his back and slept on the flagstones, waking up from time to time to inspect my progress.

When I was done I thought I deserved a cool bath in the bathhouse. On my way through the garden I stopped and listened to the sounds of night in Barker’s potted Eden. Water gurgled, crickets chirped, and somewhere I heard a bullfrog adding a bass note to the melody. It was my first moment of peace since that dreaded telephone call a week earlier.

A half hour later, I returned to the house and went up to my room. Throwing on my nightshirt I climbed between the sheets of my bed. My own bed. It felt so good to be home. It occurred to me that there was a price for my freedom, and the Guv had paid it. He slept rough so I could be in my own bed. He went without, so that I could eat. He lived with a price on his head so I could go free. I was a grown man and shouldn’t let someone else pay my debts. It was time to start earning my keep.

I awoke to the sound of Mac moving about in my room the next morning. I pulled the pillow over my eyes just before he threw the curtains open and bathed the chamber in light from the east-facing window. Everything was getting back to normal if he and I had already begun torturing one another.

I put down the pillow slowly and looked at Barker’s factotum. Mac had seen a barber yesterday and had purchased a new yarmulke with silver stitching. He wore a new collar and cuffs as well, and though he was still rail thin, he didn’t look as ill as he had when I first walked in the door.

“Is Etienne here?” I asked, hoping against hope.

“I’m afraid not,” Mac said. “I’ll bring up some hot water so you may shave.”

“You really needn’t bother.”

“I’ll bring up,” he repeated slowly, “some water so you may shave.”

“Thank you, Mac.”

“Not at all, sir.”

I was twenty-two and still entranced with the process of shaving. The beaver brush and silver mug, the straight razor, and the leather strop all had their allure. The hot towel, the ewer full of steaming water, and the cake of soap whipped to a froth. There is something challenging about starting the day by putting a lethally sharp blade to one’s throat.

Downstairs, I started a fire in the stove and made coffee. Most of the food was gone, but there were still eggs. I made an omelette for myself, and though it was rudimentary and not approaching the sublimity of one of Etienne’s creations, it still took the edge off my hunger, which was all that concerned me.

I looked forward to going to the British Museum, which, in my opinion, did not even qualify as work. If I had been off that day I’d probably have gone there, anyway. The Reading Room might qualify as my favorite spot in London. It represents to me the height of beauty, comfort, and scholarship all brought together under one beautifully domed roof. Why would anyone want to leave it?