Justin Richards - The Death Collector

‘So what did she say?’ Eddie demanded.

Liz was looking out of the window. When she turned, George could not make out her expression as the light was behind her now. ‘She said that her husband, her dead husband, had come home and taken the dog for a walk.’

There was a moment’s silence, broken by Liz’s nervous laugh. ‘Father did what he could to comfort the poor woman. But she was distraught.’

‘As you say,’ George agreed, ‘a dream. A waking nightmare. She missed him so much she thought he had come back.’

Eddie was thoughtful. He stood up and walked round the room. ‘What about the dog?’ he asked at last.

‘The dog?’ George almost laughed out loud. ‘Who cares about the dog?’

Eddie was looking at him excitedly. Then he turned to Liz. ‘Was the dog there?’

‘No,’ she admitted. ‘No, I didn’t see a dog, I must confess.’

Eddie was almost breathless with excitement now. ‘So maybe this Wilkes really had taken it for a walk.’ He paused before going on: ‘You see, that old man Blade was after had a dog,’ he said. ‘And that was on Clearview Street.’

George frowned. There was a coincidence here, but was it any more than that? He was trying to see the significance, if any, when he realised that Liz was no longer paying attention. She was looking out of the window again.

‘There’s a policeman coming to the door,’ she said.

They had talked of going to the police, of course. But after her experiences with the relatively mundane matter of a missing wallet, Liz was adamant that without some solid evidence they would get no help.

‘I was hoping to find the Reverend Oldfield,’ the policeman said when Liz opened the door. ‘I know it’s early,’ he admitted.

‘Indeed,’ Liz told him. ‘He is still asleep. I am myself an early-riser,’ she added by way of explaining how she came to be awake and up and dressed at the crack of dawn. ‘Can I help? I am his daughter.’

‘It isn’t a pleasant incident, miss.’

‘An incident? What can you mean?’

‘Well, I’m not sure yet, miss. Probably nothing. I think I disturbed the men. I wasn’t really sure what to do about it as it seems there’s no real harm or damage done.’

‘Some sort of damage?’ Liz wondered. ‘Where?’

‘Well, not really damage miss. I saw two characters making off through the graveyard. Maybe they were just taking a shortcut. Only, well, one of the graves looks like it’s been disturbed. I gather that Reverend Henderson is away, so I was advised to inform your father. I’m just going off duty myself,’ he went on. ‘But if the Reverend wants to take a look for himself, there’ll be someone there until eight o’clock. We’d appreciate his professional opinion.’

‘Thank you,’ Liz said. The constable touched his helmet, and turned to go. Liz stepped back to close the door. ‘Oh, constable,’ she said quickly as a thought occurred to her. ‘Which grave is it that has been disturbed?’

‘It’s a recent one, miss. Over towards the Galsworthy Avenue side. No headstone yet, of course. But I gather it’s the grave of a gentleman called Albert Wilkes.’

Eddie and George made their way to the graveyard while Liz went to wake her father. It seemed best to examine Albert Wilkes’s grave as soon as possible, and George was conscious that despite his lack of sleep he was due at work at the Museum in a few hours. With luck he would be able to find a quiet store room and catch forty winks.

They walked briskly, Eddie leading as he said he knew the way. ‘Do you live round here?’ George asked him.

The boy glanced at George, a lick of dark hair poking out from under his cap. ‘I don’t live nowhere,’ he said.

‘Everyone lives somewhere.’

The boy grunted. ‘Fat lot you know. You’ve got a house or something, I suppose.’

‘Well, yes.’ There was something in the boy’s manner that made George almost ashamed to answer. ‘It was my father’s house,’ he said.

‘You got a father too. That’s nice.’

‘I did have,’ George replied quietly. ‘Not any more.’ Eddie looked at him — not a sideways glance of contempt, but with an intensity that made George feel even more uneasy. ‘That’s sad,’ Eddie said. Then he looked away.

‘I just meant you seem to know your way around here,’ George said. It sounded more apologetic than he had intended.

‘I know lots of London.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘What’s that mean?’

Eddie had stopped, and George had to stop as well to answer. ‘It doesn’t mean anything.’

‘I don’t expect you to like me,’ the boy snapped. ‘I don’t expect you to worry about what I do or where I sleep or where my next meal’s coming from. You got a house and home, so that’s all right.’

George stared at him. He had no idea how to respond to this sudden outburst. He could just agree with the boy and walk away — a lot of what he had said was certainly true, and George felt no pricks from his conscience about how he lived. But somehow, despite everything — even losing his wallet — he felt caught up in the boy’s life. They were linked now, both entangled in a mystery that if the lad was right threatened their lives.

‘I do like you, Eddie,’ he said quietly, without even realising he was going to say it. It sounded trite and awkward, but he realised that it was true. There was something about Eddie Hopkins. If nothing else, the boy was a survivor, and while George didn’t agree with the boy’s morals, at least the lad had some.

Eddie stared at George for a long moment. His mouth moved as if he was about to speak. Then he glanced down at his feet before suddenly slapping George heartily on the shoulder and grinning at him. ‘Let’s go and see the grave robbing, then,’ he said.

It was raining when Liz eventually got her father to the graveyard. A fine drizzle that was almost a mist, and which seeped into Liz’s clothes. Her father seemed not to notice as he prodded at the turned earth with the end of his stick and muttered quietly to himself about what the world was coming to.

‘You say that the constable was going to meet us here?’ he said at last, his forehead wrinkling like a tortoise’s.

‘He was going off duty. But he said there would be someone.’

‘Probably idling about somewhere,’ her father decided. ‘You stay here, I’ll go and find the fellow.’

Liz watched him set off towards the nearest path, leaning heavily on his stick. She was tempted to follow, but she waited until her father’s shape was blurred by the rain. Then she walked slowly over to where George and Eddie were sitting on the wall of the graveyard.

Being cold and damp was nothing new to Eddie. He could feel the rough brickwork of the wall through his trousers and shuffled slightly to get more comfortable. He watched the old man walking unsteadily into the mist, and then Liz came over. They had been forced together by circumstance, and he had stolen from both George and Liz. He quite liked them — well, the woman anyway. The man was quiet and dull and difficult to understand. But Liz was open and honest and she hadn’t turned him over to the police when she could have done.

What worried Eddie was that neither of his new associates seemed willing to accept Mrs Wilkes’s story. For Eddie it was simple — if the woman said her husband had come home, then she must have some reason for saying it. Even if she thought he was dead. And he was sure that he had seen the old man himself — dead and walking.

‘We should dig this Wilkes bloke up,’ he pronounced as Liz reached them.

‘Why?’ George wanted to know.

‘To make sure he’s still there,’ Eddie said.