Antonia Hodgson - The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins

I stared at her, speechless. Is that how she saw her son? As a tiger ? He was not a predator, for God’s sake. He was a boy. And between her pride and my neglect, we had lost him.

‘I have a suggestion, Mr Hawkins. Kitty tells me this morning about Alice. About her dress. Covered in blood…’ She raised an eyebrow.

I nodded, struggling to keep an even expression. I understood her meaning. If I was willing to accuse Alice of Burden’s death and use the dress as evidence, I would be free to leave. Otherwise – I would not escape St Giles with my life. I pretended to consider the proposition. Rubbed my face wearily. ‘Yes. Very well.’

I rose to my feet, turning to the window. It was still dark, but the roofs were covered in snow that glowed in the moonlight. Gabriela rose too. She was very beautiful in this strange half-light. I had been watching her for so long that I hardly noticed the scar any more, though it cut so deep through her brow, and down to her jaw. She leaned closer, and for a strange, fluttering moment I thought she meant to kiss me. But no, no – I caught the tightening around her eyes. The sudden set to her mouth. I leaped back just as she sprang forward, pulling the brooch from her chest. Not a brooch but the hidden top of a dagger, slid between her breasts.

I was a good man . And she had not believed me.

She swiped again with the blade, and I threw myself back, stumbling towards the balcony. The dagger sliced along my arm. I felt a sharp sting and then warmth as the blood began to flow. She was shouting now too, calling for aid.

I barrelled through the door out onto the balcony, groping desperately for the ladder. And now the household was in uproar – I could hear cries from below as Fleet’s men responded. The first footsteps upon the stairs. A moment later Eva ran into the room.

‘Ma!’ she gasped, her face white. ‘Ma, no!’

Gabriela spun around, distracted. I grabbed the ladder and flung it across the gap. It hit the roof opposite with a dull thud, knocking away a patch of fresh snow. I had to clamber up – it was the only way across to safety. But all Gabriela had to do was snatch the ladder from this side and I would fall. I hesitated, clutching my wounded arm. And suddenly Eva pushed her way past her mother, throwing herself between us.

‘ Eva! ’ Gabriela snapped, furious.

‘ Go! ’ Eva hissed.

Without another thought, I clambered on to the ladder. It bowed under my weight, rocking a little with no one to hold it steady. I inched my way along, terrified that Gabriela would shove Eva aside and I would be tipped from the ladder to my death. But no, here was the rooftop ahead of me. I flung myself up on to the icy timber. The ladder scraped from the roof and crashed to the ground.

I lay on my back, the sky spinning above me as the cold air caught my breath. Snow melted through my clothes. Stand up, stand up. I rose carefully to my feet. Rooftops, stretching out far into the distance. Frosted rooftops, ice sparkling in the halflight. I put one foot out and it skated ahead of me. One careless step and I could break my neck.

On the balcony below, Gabriela was pointing up at me. One of Fleet’s men clambered down to collect the ladder, rested it against the house below me. He began to climb up to meet me.

I slid carefully to the other side of the roof. There was a balcony below. I jumped down, then dropped from there to the street, landing heavily on my hands and knees. I pulled the dagger from my coat and ran down Phoenix Street. If I could reach the Garden, the market traders would be filling the piazza. Fleet’s men would not risk attacking me in such a public fashion – it was not their way.

The streets were quiet and I must have seemed half-crazed, even for St Giles, with my dagger in hand. Who would risk attacking a man under James Fleet’s protection? And then, as I turned a corner he was there, in front of me. I ran straight into him.

We stared at each other, the one as surprised as the other. And I thought of the man behind me, only a few paces away.

Fleet recovered first. ‘Hawkins. What the devil…’

‘Gabriela. Sir, you must go to her now. She’s in danger. Run, sir, run!’

A tumble of words that made no sense. Only that I knew now his one weakness. How much he loved his wife, and the lengths to which he would go to protect her. Gabriela. Danger . It was enough. He didn’t stop to wonder why I was in St Giles. Why I was running in the opposite direction. He thought only of his wife. He ran towards her, and I fled through the streets, faster than I had ever run in my life.

As I reached the turning to Long Acre, I was almost crushed beneath the wheels of a vegetable cart. I leaped to the pavement, panting hard, my heart hammering against my chest.

‘You stupid arsehole!’ the cartman yelled over his shoulder. ‘Almost killed you!’

I waved my apologies. People were staring. My stockings were soaked and ripped from my scrabble across the rooftop, my wig and hat lost in the chase.

I didn’t care. I was safe – and I had the truth. Now I must decide how to use it.

‘You must leave the city. At once.’

I leaned over the hot punch and breathed in its steam. ‘I know, Betty. I know.’

We were hidden in a quiet corner at Moll’s. I’d sat at this table many times before, nursing a sore head after another night’s debauch. But it was not liquor that made my head pound now, or my hands shake. I reached for my tobacco and built another pipe, conscious of Betty studying me hard under those thick black lashes. She knew that I had run foul of Fleet’s gang, nothing more. Anyone who knew Gabriela’s story would be in danger, and I had no wish to put Betty’s life at risk.

I drank a glass of punch in silence. After the exhilaration and relief of my escape, here was the crash back down to earth. I should go home, pack my belongings and leave within the hour. But home meant Sam. I couldn’t face him, not yet. I couldn’t bear to look into those black eyes and see the truth staring back at me.

I had never felt so angry before. My body was shaking with it. I had witnessed cruelty before – even murder. But James Fleet’s crime, and Gabriela’s… surely even God couldn’t forgive it. They had corrupted their only son beyond all hope of return. A boy of fourteen. If I reached out and told this story to the man at the next table, his head bent low over his Daily Courant , he would shrug his shoulders. Some black-hearted villain from St Giles raises his son to be a killer. What of it? What news was this? Sam had lived among thieves and murderers all his life. Why should any of this matter? Son of a whore, son of a cut-throat gang captain. If any boy had been born and raised to kill, it was Sam.

But there were other paths he could have taken, with that sharp, inquisitive mind. He could have been a lawyer or a stockbroker or a physician or an anything he damned well chose, given time. And now? Even if he escaped the rope, those paths were closed to him for ever. He had stolen into a house and stabbed a man to death. It would shape the rest of his life. How could it not?

How could a father want this for his son? Even a killer such as James Fleet – did he not dream of better for his only boy? And I wondered – did he send Sam to me with an order to kill Burden? Or had he simply placed him next door and waited for the inevitable act? Did he think that absolved him of the sin? No – Fleet would care nothing of absolution. He was a murderer many times over. He must have ordered the boy to do it.

I thought of Sam creeping around the Burdens’ home at night, knife in hand. Practising . He’d confessed in that one word, but I’d refused to hear it. He’d tiptoed into Burden’s bedroom, ready to strike… only to find Alice Dunn curled up next to her master. An unexpected complication. He couldn’t kill Burden in front of a witness – she would have woken the whole house. So he’d waited for another night, when Burden was alone – then thrown suspicion on poor Alice.