Andrew Pepper - The Last Days of Newgate

And people spat on his dead body.’ But there wasn’t any fight left in her.

He let go of her neck and wiped his hand clean with a handkerchief.

Sullen and beaten, Polly told him that the girl was hiding out at a small lavender farm owned by James Wren on the river at Isleworth.

‘Did you tell anyone else about this?’ He slapped her hard around the face with his open palm. She bit her lip and licked off the blood.

‘Answer me.’

‘No.’

‘You mention this to anyone and I’ll kill you. Do you understand?’

She stared at him, humiliated, but as Pyke left she didn’t once mention the forty pounds he owed her.

Sir Richard Fox’s private carriage, an old-fashioned wooden cab adorned on the inside with silk window curtains and velvet cushions, was pulled by two horses and driven by Gaines, a sour-faced man who seemed to resent having to transport Pyke to his destination, as though the act were somehow beneath him. The carriage transported Pyke through the traffic along Oxford Street and past crowds of people milling around the huge plate-glass windows of new luxury stores. The recently macadamised surface afforded them a smoother passage, as they passed parkland adjoining the Uxbridge Road and Paddington’s grand-looking terraces, decorated with pilasters and ironwork balconies and finished with stucco.

Past Bayswater and Holland House, they rattled on new turnpikes into the countryside, with small farms replacing the West London mansions. The city, which always seemed endless when you were in it, now felt as insignificant as a twig dropping over the edge of a waterfall.

Out here, Pyke felt a sense of release that he had not experienced for a long time. He had once served for three years on the Bow Street horse patrol pursuing thieves and housebreakers along turnpikes and across open land and had, ever since, hankered for country air.

As a boy Pyke had witnessed the execution of two men who had murdered a man travelling to a lavender warehouse in Feltham. Now, many years later, he was journeying to meet a girl hiding out on a lavender farm in nearby Isleworth. Idly mulling over the web of connections that criss-crossed people’s lives, Pyke found himself returning to the murdered baby and wondering what might have become of its life, had it lived.

As the frozen landscape flashed past him, he tried to remember what his own father looked like but could not summon forth a picture in his head. Often, he had watched as Lizzie tended to George, her bedridden father, and thought about his own father and mother and whether it mattered that he knew little or nothing about them, whether it hampered his progress through the world.

They found the entrance to Wren’s farm with little difficulty and Pyke alighted from the carriage, instructing Gaines to wait in the same spot for his return. He decided to approach the farm itself on foot, not wanting to give away his position and frighten the runaway girl.

Keeping an eye out for man-traps — metallic contraptions that could snap one’s arm or leg — Pyke undertook a preliminary tour of the farm, no more than a couple of acres in total. It was early March and there were no workers to be found anywhere. The ground was as unyielding as marble. There was smoke rising from the chimney of the main house, indicating that the owner and his family were perhaps still living there. If Mary Johnson was hiding on the farm without Wren’s knowledge or consent, then it meant she had taken up a position in one of the two small greenhouses situated on the river side of the farm. Pyke dug his hands deep into his pockets, to protect them from the cold, and hid himself in a large bush that offered him a vantage point to both greenhouses.

He did not have to wait for long.

Mary Johnson was too frightened to speak.

In a ramshackle building that was both a shed and a greenhouse, she cowered under her blanket like a whipped dog. There was no warmth in the building and Pyke wondered whether she had already contracted pneumonia. Her brown hair was straggly and wet, her freckled skin almost translucent, and her lips had turned an eerie shade of blue. Her frame shook underneath the blanket. Under different circumstances, she might have been attractive, but on this occasion Pyke felt only pity for the girl. The smell of stale cut lavender was as oppressive as the freezing temperature.

Pyke explained he just wanted to find out what had happened to Stephen, Clare and the baby.

‘And who are ye?’ A boy who had introduced himself as Gerry stood guard over the girl and stared angrily at Pyke. He was a lantern-jawed adolescent, with freckles and thick tufts of ginger hair. If sufficiently frightened or provoked he might have been a dangerous adversary, but after Pyke had explained who he was, and that he just wanted to talk with Mary, the lad stood aside and let Pyke have a proper look at her.

Pyke repeated that he had no intention of hurting either of them. He just wanted to ask a few questions. Mary didn’t even have to answer him directly. She could just nod or shake her head, as appropriate. He asked whether she could manage to do that. She looked up at him and nodded once. Pyke removed his wool coat, bent down and placed it over her shoulders. He saw her smile.

‘From time to time, you’d stay with Stephen and Clare in their room in Miss Clamp’s lodging house.’

Mary nodded. Now, with his view of her unimpeded, she did not look any older than sixteen or seventeen.

‘And Clare was your cousin.’

This time she spoke. ‘She was older than me. My da and hers were brothers. After Mammy died, when I was just a girl, Clare would look out for me.’ Her brogue was soft but distinctive.

Pyke waited for a moment. ‘It can’t have been easy for your family, her running away with a Protestant.’

The surprise registered in her eyes but his comments seemed to embolden her. ‘I can’t say any of us were too delighted by the idea but, then again, we weren’t the problem.’

‘You’re saying it was his family who caused the difficulties?’

This time she held his gaze. ‘You’ve not spent any time in Ireland, I’d wager.’

‘Is it that obvious?’

That elicited a thin smile. ‘I was going to say you wouldn’t understand but I suppose that’d be stupid.’

‘So when his family, Stephen’s family, found out about their. . attachment. .’

‘Stephen’s not like them. Weren’t like them, I guess.’ She made no effort to conceal her pain. ‘His da was a big Orangeman in this wee village in County Armagh. So was his uncle and so was one of his brothers. All Orangemen and all bristlin’ with hate. Fact that Stephen turned out to be as normal as he was, that was a genuine, God-given miracle. They’re mean people, Mr Pyke. Full of hate and resentment. Never accept our right to live in our own country. Myself, I don’t much care for any religion.’

‘But they cared, didn’t they? And that’s the reason that Stephen and Clare came to London, to get away.’

Mary nodded. ‘No one would marry ’em in Ireland. For that matter, no one would marry ’em in England neither. Not ’less one of ’em converted.’ She shook her head. ‘Look, Mr Pyke. Even though Clare and Stephen mostly grew up in the country, they came to live in Belfast. It’s a busy town, a port, in Ulster.’

Pyke just nodded.

‘It’s not a bad town, as towns go. Quite open-minded, compared to the country. But even in Belfast, they weren’t far enough away. .’ Her eyes started to well up. ‘I don’t guess you can ever run far enough away from that kind of hate.’

‘Only his family, the Magennises, they found out about Clare.’

‘Moment that she and your man heard of it, they were on the next steamship bound for Liverpool.’