P. Elrod - The Hanged Man

“It’s too absurd,” she muttered, realizing she never wanted to touch those things ever again. She bundled them up and shoved them into the inadequate wastepaper basket by the small writing desk.

She spent some while in the washroom at the end of the hall, scrubbing blood from her hands and trying hard not to think of lines from Macbeth .

I should be weeping.

She was alone, she could allow herself to break down and grieve for her father. The distress of the last hours were enough to lay anyone flat for weeks. She’d learned that emotional injuries were every bit as damaging as physical wounds and needed longer to heal. Some never healed at all, the poor souls bearing them for life, bleeding out day after day.

I don’t want to be one of them.

She’d have to release it.

But feelings were not like water from a tap to be turned to flow and turned to stop. Perhaps actors could do that, and certainly self-serving criminals she’d met in the course of her trade were adept at conjuring grief in an attempt to deceive Readers or gain sympathy.

Alex could not call or force such expression. Her training at the Service and her lessons from Master Shan had taught her control and defense, lest the emotions of others take her over. It was of no help in dealing with her own. She’d shut down. At some point the barriers might lift. Or not.

“Just have to wait and see,” she said to her reflection in the washstand mirror. What a sad face it was that looked back, almost a stranger’s face, and she could hardly bear looking into her own eyes.

* * *

Changed into a practical calf-length woolen walking dress, with a carpetbag packed with necessities for the next few days, Alex descended the stairs, her steps tired and heavy. Brook met her halfway up to take the bag, and she gratefully let him.

Lennon had helped himself to the port she kept in the dining room cabinet, but she didn’t mind. He was a guest, why shouldn’t he? He finished off his glass, left it on the entry table, and jerked his head toward the back of the house.

“Something to show you,” he rumbled, taking up a lighted candle.

She followed him to the kitchen. He pointed at the mudroom door, which opened to the mews behind the row of houses.

“You keep that locked?” he asked.

“It was when I left tonight.”

“Check it. Both sides.”

He held the candle as she inspected the lock. The flame blew out shortly after she opened the door, but lasted long enough for her to spot new scratches in the brass. She felt a tightness in her chest and pulled away.

Lennon struck a lucifer and relit the candle. “Floor.”

Smears of mud, hardly noticeable unless you looked closely. Mrs. Harris would never have left without a last swipe of the mop. She took pride in having a pristine, mouse-free kitchen.

“You’ve had a visitor,” said Lennon. “Brook and I went through the place again, cellar to attic. Near as we can tell, some cautious chap hid in the cupboard under the first-floor stairs. There’s a bucket been overturned he could have sat on-”

Alex shot from the kitchen and up the stairs to see for herself. Her sanctuary violated-she wouldn’t have it, by God.

The cupboard was general storage for that floor, where Mrs. Harris kept cleaning supplies and their attendant tools. Alex couldn’t recall the last time she’d bothered to look inside. It was just steps from her bedroom.

When she’d centered herself, she lifted the latch and opened the narrow door, braced for anything.

Almost anything.

She was unprepared for … nothing.

Physical objects were tidily in place, except for the tin bucket resting overturned in the middle of the floor. She eased in and widened her internal senses bit by bit, seeking some trace of the person who had been there.

A closed space, someone sitting, waiting for who knows how long, there should be a remnant of emotion. Patience, impatience, excitement, boredom.

Nothing. It was an absence, a void.

“What’d the spooks tell you?” asked Lennon. He’d come up more slowly and, as before, held quiet until she was done.

“It’s like what I didn’t find at Harley Street. That same emptiness.”

“Maybe he is a ghost.”

“I don’t speak to ghosts, Inspector,” she said wearily.

“The other kind. There’s human ghosts walking this world right enough. You see ’em but you don’t. Beggars, street Arabs, moppets selling ribbons and violets, those poor devils with carts who shovel the road waste. They’re there, solid as you or me, and no one notices them.”

“But they all have emotions. Nothing is here. Nothing. Even animals leave emotions I can track.”

“Do you now? Never knew that. Well, then, whoever was here is a cold ’un to the bone or one of those clockwork dummies from the seaside, put in a copper and he tells your fortune.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Those things are in cabinets and have to be wound up.”

“I saw one with legs once. He could stand, take off his hat and bow, move his head, give yes or no answers.…”

“But no walking around. No such thing could scramble over roofs and down ropes or pick locks-or need to rest on overturned buckets.”

“So what we have here is a human ghost. There’s some cold customers out there, little tweak. You’ve not been at it long enough to meet any and if you’re lucky you never will. Maybe this one is colder than the worst of them.… He’s done for your pap and it looks like he’s after you. Service hokery-pokery’s useless here. Eyes open and ears sharp, same as the rest of us.”

Had there been no attack on Lord Richard, Alex would have completed her report and been released to come home … to …

The tight feeling in her chest increased until she forced it away. Panic wouldn’t help. Mrs. Woodwake had been right; Alex could not be alone. Given a choice between the Pendleburys and a traceless killer-

“Time to leave, Inspector.”

“Thought you’d never say.”

Under Lennon’s approving eye, Alex slipped a box of cartridges for her revolver into her ulster pocket and shifted the weapon to the reticule she now carried. She locked the front door, cognizant that it was not likely to keep out a determined threat.

She’d written a note for Mrs. Harris, extracting a solemn promise from Lennon that he would deliver it personally. Under no circumstances should Harris or any of the household return home until Alex came to fetch them. They could leave messages at her office. She slipped in a few crowns for their expenses.

Brook checked the street, announced that it looked to be clear, and hurried them into the hansom. He hoisted up to his perch and snapped the reins, taking them north, then doubling back and doubling again.

“Don’t look as we’re being followed,” said Lennon. “Suits me; I’ve had all the excitement I can stand.”

Alex, jammed against him in the small space, felt his body relax.

“You look all in, too.” He produced a pocket flask and offered it.

“Inspector, I’ve had more drink tonight than in the last year.”

“Best make up for lost time, then. Or are you one of those finger-wagging pledge-poppets?”

She accepted the flask and took a mouthful of something foul that made her gasp, but the heat was welcome. “Not at all. It interferes with my abilities.”

“Sounds a good thing, to hear others talk of ’em. Every spook chaser I ever met wanted to be rid of their abilities.”

“I wouldn’t be me without them.”

“Sure you would, but havin’ a different job or married off to some bloke bereft of all sense.”