Justin Richards - The Death Collector

He was running on the grass so as to make no noise. The house was a dark shape across the gravel drive that ran around it. As he came round the side of the house, Eddie could see a large room jutting out of the back as if recently added. Light was seeping round the edges of huge blacked-out windows. A thumping sound made him stop abruptly. The sound stopped too, and he realised it was his feet. He was no longer on grass.

Eddie stopped and looked down. He was on a narrow gravel path which seemed to run from the house towards the trees. Or rather, as the moon dipped out from behind the clouds, he could see it led to a small hut positioned just at the edge of the wooded area.

As he drew closer, he could see that the hut was much bigger than he thought. The whole of the front was a large wooden door with a heavy iron bar resting across brackets to keep it shut. It was too heavy for Eddie to lift.

What was behind the doors? A coal bunker perhaps? Storage for garden tools? Eddie pressed his ear to the rough wood. There was something inside. He could hear it. He strained to work out what it was. A puffing, rasping, regular rush of sound. It lasted several seconds then stopped. After a pause it came again.

The clouds parted to reveal the moon, and in the increased light Eddie glanced back — to see the guard with the gun coming round the path from the front of the house. Quickly and quietly, he slipped round the side of the hut. It was built of brick, he realised — solid and substantial. He waited a moment, then made a dash for the trees.

The man continued his patrol, oblivious to Eddie’s presence. But Eddie was not watching him. He was staring back at the dark smudge that was the hut. What had he heard? Was it the sound of a train on the underground perhaps? Maybe there was a tunnel close to the coal chute or whatever was behind the doors. Or maybe it was water rushing through a sewer.

But no matter what Eddie thought it might be, nothing could displace his first impression. The thought that it sounded like something breathing.

Eddie was exhausted when he finally climbed into bed. He fell asleep almost at once, dreaming of fog and monsters and men with guns.

He was wakened by the light streaming in through the open window and the sounds of London. Carriages clattered past in the street outside; paper boys shouted headlines; someone cursed loudly. And an enticing smell of bacon wafted up the stairs. It was the smell that revived Eddie and which reminded him where he was. He hadn’t bothered even to take his jacket off, so he went straight downstairs.

There was a small kitchen at the back of the house. ‘Something smells nice,’ Eddie announced as he went in.

George was standing by a little stove. He flinched visibly at Eddie’s voice and almost dropped the frying pan he was holding through a wrapped tea towel.

‘Dear Lord, you gave me the fright of my life,’ George said when he had recovered a little. The bacon hissed and sizzled in the pan.

Eddie was laughing. ‘I could see that.’

‘How did you get in here?’

Eddie frowned. ‘You gave me use of the room. Said I could sleep in there.’

‘Yes, but you weren’t there last night when I got back from escorting Miss Oldfield home. I thought you’d be waiting outside.’

‘Can’t help that.’ Eddie leaned over the stove to inspect the bacon. ‘There’s not much in there. You not having breakfast, then?’

George moved him aside. ‘I didn’t know you were here.’

‘Must have got back after you then,’ Eddie said. ‘You can get in through windows as well as out of them.’ He pronounced it ‘win-ders’.

George was about to respond to this when he was pre-empted by a loud knocking from the front door.

‘Might be the postman,’ Eddie decided. ‘I’ll go and see.’

‘You will not,’ George told him firmly. ‘You will stay and finish cooking my breakfast.’

‘What about my breakfast, then?’ But George had already gone. So Eddie picked up a dirty fork from the wooden table in the middle of the small kitchen and helped himself to a rasher of bacon out of the pan.

Augustus Lorimore paced up and down in front of a display case of stuffed birds. His face was pale and drawn with anger. ‘This Protheroe,’ he snapped, ‘is making enquiries about Glick. And he has seen the body. He is a nuisance.’

Blade kept his expression neutral. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘Him and his friends.’

‘We don’t know that they are friends, sir. It could be a coincidence. Archer works in a different Department at the Museum.’

Lorimore paused, turned towards Blade, gave a snort of derision and then continued his pacing. ‘Of course they are in league. You saw Archer and Protheroe together at the Museum the night you failed to retrieve the final volume of Glick’s diary, did you not? And Archer has been here — to this very house.’

Blade knew better than to argue. He had also caught the emphasis on ‘failed’ and he knew his life hung by a spider’s thread at this moment.

‘No,’ Lorimore continued, ‘they are in this together. And this street urchin who deceived you. And possibly others.’

‘But what do they want, sir?’ Blade hazarded.

‘The same as I, of course. They want it for themselves, or to deny it to me. It doesn’t matter which. I must have it.’ His eyes burned as he fixed them on Blade. ‘And they have this page from the diary. A clue, it must be, to where Glick hid it. I have spent years tracking it down, tracing it to Glick, realising the clue would be in his private diaries. I must know what he did with it, and for that I must have the diary page, Blade — you understand?’

There was an old man at the door. He was wearing a full-length dark coat, and silver hair poked out from under his hat. Sir William Protheroe peered at George through his small round spectacles.

‘I’m glad to find you at home, Mr Archer,’ he said. ‘May I come in?’ He did not wait for a reply, but pushed quickly past George and made his way into the living room. ‘Is that breakfast I can smell? Capital. I feel as if I could eat a cavalry charge.’

Somewhat bemused, George closed the door and followed his uninvited guest. He found Sir William making himself at home in George’s favourite armchair. His hat and coat lay discarded over the back of the small sofa.

‘I’m sorry,’ George said, ‘is this about the job you mentioned? I’m afraid I’ve not had time to give it much thought.’

Sir William waved his hand dismissively. ‘No hurry, dear chap. It is the weekend after all. And I don’t suppose that dolt Mansfield has even mentioned it to you yet, has he?’

‘Well, no, sir, actually he has not. Do you think perhaps I should mention to him that I have spoken with you?’ George wondered.

But Sir William Protheroe seemed preoccupied. He sniffed, his forehead crinkling as he frowned. ‘Is that burning bacon I can smell?’

George left Eddie in the smoke-filled kitchen with instructions about clearing away and washing up. It had not actually been the bacon that Sir William had smelled burning, as that had all been eaten by Eddie. But he had simply replaced the empty pan on the stove, and the fat heated up until it burst into flames, which Eddie thought wonderfully exciting. George had remained calm enough — just — to throw a wet tea towel over the pan, and lift it off the heat.

‘And you stay in there and clean up the mess,’ he told the boy. ‘I have things to discuss with Sir William Protheroe.’

If Eddie replied, his words were lost in the drifting smoke.

The armchair was empty when George returned to the living room and George saw that Sir William was standing by the bookcase in the corner of the room. He was examining the spines of the books there.