Andrew Pepper - The Detective Branch

‘You look well,’ he said, shaking her hand. She did, too. Her pale skin was as free of blemishes as he remembered, but now she wore her ginger hair in ringlets, some of which hung down, framing her face.

‘I read about Godfrey’s death in the newspaper.’ She waited and bit her lip. There were tears in her eyes. As Felix’s nanny, she had shared Godfrey’s apartment for a couple of years, when Pyke served a sentence for the non-payment of debts, and afterwards when he had travelled to Jamaica, and the two of them had become close.

‘Thank you for coming.’ He looked into her eyes and felt a small tug in his stomach. ‘I know Godfrey would have appreciated it.’ In fact, Godfrey had always chided him for breaking off their attachment and had often said that he would never find a better or more loving woman.

‘What you said at the graveside… It was very moving.’

They stood there in silence; Pyke thinking about the last time he’d seen her, the tears she had shed. ‘Have you seen Felix? He’ll want to say hello. You won’t believe how much he’s grown up.’

‘I know. I was talking to him just now.’

‘He still misses you.’ Pyke stopped himself before he added that he missed her too but he wondered whether it was true. He did miss what they had all once shared, especially after Emily’s death. She, Jo, had helped them through a difficult time, and he still owed her a great deal.

Her cheeks coloured slightly. ‘How are the two of you getting on?’

‘Oh, you know…’ Pyke hesitated. ‘Felix has discovered truth and beauty. I, on the other hand, represent all that’s ugly and debased.’

That made her smile. ‘Don’t underestimate how much he loves you, Pyke.’ She waited, her eyes not quite meeting his.

Other mourners were waiting to offer him their condolences and Jo moved off without shaking his hand or saying goodbye. About an hour later, he saw her again on the other side of the room, this time chatting to Felix. Pyke had had a few glasses of claret, and gin, and felt a little giddy. A pot-boy wearing a black apron passed carrying a tray of drinks and Pyke took one more and poured it down his throat. It caused him to shudder. For a moment he had to hold on to the back of a chair to steady himself. It was funny that he should be thinking about Jo more than Emily, he decided; that seeing Jo should have unsettled him so much.

Later, he noticed that she was putting on her coat, as if preparing to leave. Outside, it was raining and Jo had pulled a black scarf over her head. Pyke caught up with her in front of the hotel. Startled, she began to say something but Pyke took her wrist and pulled her towards him. Jo tried to wriggle free from his grip and looked up into his face, hot and indignant. He didn’t see it or didn’t care. He cupped the back of her head and pulled her into a kiss. He half-expected her lips to part but they remained closed. Stamping on his toe, she shoved him in the chest and took a step backwards.

‘I’m married,’ she spat, her eyes burning with anger.

‘Married?’ He hadn’t even bothered to check whether she was wearing a wedding ring.

‘An officer in the Fifth Hussars. Peter Hind.’ There were tears in her eyes now. ‘I had a child of my own last year.’

‘I’m sorry. I didn’t…’ He couldn’t bring himself to finish the sentence.

‘You always have to ruin everything, Pyke.’ She gathered up her skirt and raced across the street to a waiting hackney carriage.

As he watched her go, Pyke thought about what he’d just done, the awful humiliation he’d visited upon her and himself, and he wondered why, having hurt her once before, he had felt it appropriate to accost her in a public place and reveal himself to her, once again, in all his unthinking ugliness.

Two days after the funeral, Pyke returned to work at the Detective Branch. He’d been gone for almost ten days but somehow it felt longer. For him, it was as though the whole world had crumbled. Meanwhile, in terms of the investigation, little or no progress had been made. Hiley was still at large and the coroner’s verdict in the matter of Charles Hogarth’s death had not yet been overturned, although now it was hard to see how this might happen as Pyke had learned from Whicher that Hogarth’s body had been stolen from the family’s mausoleum in Kensington, apparently by resurrectionists. He had also found out that the coroner, and the porter who had discovered Hogarth’s body in his office on Gracechurch Street, were both missing and had been for several days. Pyke didn’t believe for a moment that resurrectionists had broken into the tomb, but without a shred of evidence to the contrary, he had no choice but to hold his tongue. He couldn’t even dispute the cause of death, at least not officially, because to do so would be to incriminate himself. Instead, at a meeting with Lockhart, Shaw, Wells and Whicher (who was the only one he had told about the crucifixion marks), Pyke told them they were now to treat Hogarth’s death as suspicious.

‘It’s my working hypothesis that, like Stephen Clough, Charles Harcourt Hogarth was murdered and that to spare the family any shame, and perhaps to obscure the man’s involvement in our current investigation, the coroner was persuaded to record the death as he did. I can’t prove it yet and I’m perfectly happy to be proved wrong on this matter, but I’d like us to proceed as though Hogarth died in suspicious circumstances.’ Pyke looked at Wells and then Lockhart. ‘At least until the coroner has been found and can determine otherwise.’

Pyke knew he had to be careful: he couldn’t come out and definitively state that Hogarth had been partially disembowelled and crucified. But at the same time, and given that Hogarth’s corpse, the coroner and the porter had all suddenly disappeared, there was sufficient evidence to at least raise questions. Charles Hogarth had been killed in one of the most horrific ways imaginable and yet his death certificate suggested he’d died of a heart seizure. How had the true cause of death been kept quiet? More to the point, who was sufficiently motivated and resourceful enough to be able to cover this kind of thing up?

‘Hypothetically, I’d also like us to proceed on the basis that the murders of Guppy and Hogarth might be linked. Jack, you’ve done some preliminary work to try to determine whether the two men knew one another.’ Pyke looked hopefully at Whicher.

‘It’s not out of the question, of course. Guppy was rector at St Botolph’s and Hogarth’s office was just around the corner on Gracechurch Street. But at present I haven’t been able to establish any connection. I asked a few discreet questions and it certainly doesn’t seem as if Hogarth had any business with the church or even went to church himself.’

Pyke nodded. ‘I’d like you to keep looking into Hogarth’s affairs — as discreetly as possible. I don’t want his family complaining to Sir Richard, at least not yet.’

Whicher’s face was lined with worry. He knew that someone — Lockhart, Shaw or Wells — would relay this hypothesis back to Pierce and maybe Mayne, but there was nothing he could do about it.

‘Is it merely a coincidence that Guppy and Hogarth died, or were killed, on exactly the same dates as the two boys, Johnny Clough and Stephen Gregg? Perhaps. But let’s not forget that Guppy and Clough were both beaten to death with a hammer.’ Pyke hesitated, deciding not to say anything about the precise manner of Hogarth’s death. ‘Frederick here worked on the investigation five years ago and he assures me it was a meticulous and thorough affair. He also assures me that they got their man. Morris Keate was tried and found guilty of killing those boys.’ Pausing, Pyke looked up at Shaw and saw him nod in agreement.