Andrew Pepper - The Revenge of Captain Paine

‘Here.’ Pyke knelt down and held out his hand. ‘It’s Milly, isn’t it?’

Her pale, liquid eyes widened further, as though trying to make sense of what was happening, and then she nodded.

‘Do you remember me from earlier today?’

She remained rooted to the spot, her unblinking eyes never leaving his, even for a second. Had she seen what had taken place? Did she know that her parents were dead?

‘Milly, I want you to come with me. Can you do that?’ He extended his hand out a little farther. One thing was certain. He couldn’t leave her there.

But she didn’t budge.

‘Did a man come and visit earlier this evening?’ As he said it, he wondered whether she could understand him.

The match had died but he could see that her expression was blank.

‘Here, girl, give me your hand.’ He was practically under the table with her, their hands almost touching.

‘Did you steal those two keys from a chain attached to my pocket earlier today?’ His missing keys seemed trivial by comparison but he still needed to ask her the question.

She gave her head an indignant shake.

‘Did you see what happened in here?’ He lowered his voice to a whisper.

Her stare glazed over but her eyes remained fixed on him.

‘Here, Milly.’ He took her hand and pulled her gently towards him. She didn’t try to resist.

‘I don’t know what Emily’ll say,’ Jo fretted, as Pyke emerged from the room next to the nursery where he’d just tucked Milly up in bed. Milly still hadn’t spoken a word to him, but when he’d said goodnight and made to leave the room, she’d whimpered in a way that suggested an attachment had already been formed. The poor little girl had shivered in his arms throughout the entire journey back to the hall. Pyke had woken Jo up, to explain the girl’s presence in the room next to Felix’s, but Emily wasn’t expected back from Birmingham for a couple of days. Gently Pyke closed the door and turned to Jo.

‘We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,’ he said, quietly. What he wanted to say was, What other choice did I have? Her parents were murdered. Their throats had been slit. I saw them with my own eyes. Their blood is on my boots. But even though he knew Jo well, and liked her, he didn’t think it appropriate to share his thoughts with her. He looked away and tried to swallow. His throat felt dry and scratchy.

Once Jo had returned to her room, Pyke crept into the nursery and watched Felix sleep for a while. He liked to do this, if work had kept him late and he hadn’t seen his son for a while. After a few minutes, Felix stirred, rolled over and looked up. ‘Father?’ He sounded alarmed.

Pyke told him not to worry and to go back to sleep. He had always wanted a sister or brother for Felix but somehow it had never happened. Now when Felix woke up, there would be a girl, a few years older than him, in the room next door. Briefly Pyke wondered how the lad would react to this development, whether he would welcome it or not.

Leaning down, Pyke kissed him on the head.

He thought about telling the boy that he loved him but the words wouldn’t come.

There were three police constables and a sergeant, from H Division in Stepney, all wearing their dark blue, swallow-tailed coats, matching trousers and black stovepipe hats. The sergeant, a ferret-faced man, cleanly shaven with pimples on his chin, took charge of the situation, banging on the door of the cottage with the end of his truncheon and, when no one answered, gingerly opening the door with his hand. The other policemen followed him, leaving Pyke to bring up the rear. The sergeant, who had treated his revelation about corpses with weary scepticism, turned to him, arms folded, as if to affirm the rightness of his initial suspicions.

‘No bodies here, sir.’

Disbelieving, Pyke looked down at the spot where he had seen Freddie Sutton and his wife the night before. The sergeant was right. The bodies had been moved.

‘But you can see the blood,’ Pyke said, bending down to indicate where the marks were. The floorboards had been scrubbed clean but some of the blood had seeped into the wood, staining it a darker colour.

‘It could’ve been blood.’ The sergeant looked around the room and sniffed. ‘Could’ve been any number of things.’

Pyke wanted to grab his lapels and shake him. ‘Two people were killed here last night. Freddie Sutton and his wife. I saw them. Their throats had been cut. I want to know what you’re going to do.’

‘Anyone else see the bodies?’

‘Is that relevant?’

‘Perhaps you’d like to tell me again what you were doing in the neighbourhood last night, sir.’

Pyke removed one of his boots and held up the toe to the sergeant’s face. ‘That’s their dried blood. I trod in it by accident.’

The sergeant glanced at it, unimpressed. ‘I’ll make a file of your claim. Leave me your name and address and I’ll get back in touch.’

Struggling to control his anger, Pyke pushed his way past the other constables and stepped outside. A small crowd of onlookers had gathered to see what all the fuss was about.

‘Two people were murdered last night. Did any of you see anything?’

He heard a few gasps and some frightened looks and then one by one they turned their backs and walked away, until he was left staring at a black-and-white dog that wagged its tail and barked at him.

But Pyke’s morning didn’t improve when he finally turned up at the bank. In fact what awaited him there left him dazed and disoriented.

William Blackwood met him in the banking hall, his expression pale and sombre. ‘Have you heard the news?’

For a moment Pyke thought Blackwood was talking about the two murders and he was about to shoo his partner away when he realised he had to be talking about something else.

‘What news?’ The skin tightened across his face.

‘The whole of the city’s talking about it.’

‘Talking about what?’

‘Edward James Morris threw himself off the viewing promenade at the Colosseum last night. He’s dead, Pyke. Morris is dead. He killed himself.’

Pyke had to steady himself on his partner’s shoulder. It felt as if he’d been hit over the head with a cudgel.

Morris, dead. The words wouldn’t cohere with images in his head. He could hear the old man’s voice booming in his ear; and if he closed his eyes, Pyke could still see his grinning, big-boned face.

‘Of course, this will have implications with regard both to our investments in the Grand Northern and the loan you recently agreed with the company.’ Blackwood stared at him without blinking.

Pyke grabbed Blackwood by the throat and pinned him to the wall. ‘A good man has died. Can’t you leave it at that for the moment?’

But as soon as he’d thought about it, Pyke knew that Blackwood was right. He let him go and wiped his hand on his coat sleeve. There was the small matter of ten thousand pounds. And the missing key.

Suddenly Pyke felt nauseous, searing panic seizing his entire body until he could hardly breathe. The key, the loan, Morris. A pattern was emerging and it didn’t look good for him.

‘Go and get your key to the safe and meet me downstairs in the vault,’ he shouted at his apparently bewildered partner.

Five minutes later, Blackwood joined him in the vault, holding his key. ‘Where’s yours?’ he asked, frowning.

But Pyke’s heart was beating too fast to take any notice of what his partner was saying. He took the key and inserted it into the safe’s door, twisting it a full rotation until the lock had opened.

Pulling open the heavy iron door, he quickly scanned the contents of the safe and felt his tension ease a little. It didn’t appear that anything had been disturbed. But he still wanted to check the documents he’d placed there the previous afternoon. He’d put them at the back of the safe and he had to reach in almost with his entire arm. Behind him, his partner was holding aloft the lantern, curious to know what Pyke was looking for. As far as Pyke was aware, Blackwood knew nothing about the ten-thousand-pound loan he had made privately to Morris. Kneeling down, he peered into the safe, his heart quickening. The documents, including the contracts and the deeds to Cranborne Park, were not where he’d left them.