Laura Schlitz - Splendors and Glooms

“Please, sir — it’s Constable Hawkins, isn’t it?”

The child spoke prettily, with just a trace of Welsh accent. All at once the constable knew who she was. “Why, it’s David Fawr’s little girl!” he exclaimed. His face softened. “What are you doing out so late, miss?”

Lizzie Rose dodged the question. “It’s good of you to remember me, sir. I was wondering”— she stuck her foot in front of Punch, who was trying to mount Ruby —“if you’d heard any news of Miss Wintermute. The young lady who was lost. I wondered if she’d come home.”

The constable’s smile faded. The last week had not been an easy one. Dr. Wintermute was a wealthy and important man. He had contacted the Home Secretary, who had made it clear to the police force that Clara Wintermute must be found soon and found alive.

“She has not,” he said shortly.

Lizzie Rose’s face fell. She looked down at the leashes in her hand. She hesitated, and the constable took a step closer. “Here, now, Miss Fawr! Is there something you want to tell me?”

Lizzie Rose met his eyes for a moment and then looked away. He took her arm and half led, half pulled her to the nearest streetlight. He stooped a little to peer into her face.

She looked tidier than she had the last time they met, though her efforts at sprucing herself up were rather sad. Her bonnet strings were new, and she wore a matching ribbon around her collar. The feathers on her bonnet were waterlogged, and her coat was threadbare.

“You followed me from the police station, didn’t you?”

“No, sir,” said Lizzie Rose. “That is to say — not exactly. I had to walk the dogs, you see, sir.” She averted her eyes, looking to the dogs for distraction. Pomeroy squatted and relieved himself heartily. Lizzie Rose, wincing a little, retreated to the utmost length of the leash. The constable kept pace with her. He spoke almost coaxingly.

“Now, listen to me, Miss Fawr! If you’ve something to tell me, I want to hear it. It don’t matter what it is — I won’t be cross. Just you open your mouth and let it out.”

Lizzie Rose raised imploring eyes to his face. “‘If it were done,’” she quoted, “‘then ’twere well it were done quickly.’ That’s from one of Father’s plays, and it’s true. If there’s something I don’t want to do — cleaning up after the dogs or clearing out the larder — it’s better to do it as fast as ever I can. So I thought I’d tell you that Professor Grisini — oh, it sounds like nonsense! — but there were other times when children disappeared, and he was there.” She took a quick breath. “Mrs. Pinchbeck told me Grisini was in Brighton eleven or twelve years ago, when a little boy ran away from home. And then Parsefall said there was a little girl who vanished — only that happened four years ago, in Leeds. And both times, the coppers — I mean, the policemen — questioned Grisini. They must have thought he had something to do with it. But in the end, the children came home again, so perhaps it doesn’t mean anything, and I shouldn’t trouble you. But I thought it was queer, sir.” She gulped. “And I thought perhaps I should tell you.”

Constable Hawkins said slowly, “And you thought right, Miss Fawr.” He fell silent, digesting what she had told him. Grisini, with his foreignness and flamboyance, had made a bad impression from the first. During the last few days, Constable Hawkins had questioned the inhabitants of Chester Square and had found them above suspicion. The Wintermute servants appeared blameless. His thoughts had come to rest on Grisini more and more, if only because he had no one else to suspect. “Perhaps we ought to search the house again.”

The girl took in her breath. “Oh, but she isn’t in the house! We’d know — Parsefall and I. And the dogs would know. If she was kidnapped, she’d have to be somewhere else. So I thought I ought to tell you that after the puppet show on Clara’s birthday, Grisini didn’t walk all the way home with us. We — Parsefall and Grisini and me — dragged the caravan as far as Wellington Square, and then Grisini gave us sixpence and told us to go the rest of the way by ourselves. That wasn’t like him. The caravan’s too heavy for just Parsefall and me — and Grisini doesn’t hand over sixpence for nothing.”

“Did he say where he was going?”

“No, sir, but then, he wouldn’t.” Lizzie Rose wrapped the dog leashes around her hand. “Mr. Grisini doesn’t explain himself, not to us. He tells us what to do, and we do it. But I can’t help wondering if he was looking for a place to hide someone. If he were a kidnapper, I mean. He’d need someplace to keep Clara hidden — a stable, or an empty house, perhaps.”

The constable considered this. The girl’s theory was far-fetched, but it was not incredible. There were plenty of half-wrecked houses in Chelsea where Clara Wintermute might be hidden. It might make sense to search them — and to have Professor Grisini watched and followed.

He dug in his coat pocket. “I said I’d give you half a crown —”

It was a mistake. Lizzie Rose raised her chin and reproached him with her eyes. “No, thank you, sir. That isn’t what I came for.” She gave the leashes a jerk, gathering the dogs into a pack. “Good evening, sir.” And by the time the constable had found the appropriate coin, she had gone, her dignity hampered but not overcome by her retinue of unmanageable dogs.

Eight nights after his daughter’s kidnapping, Dr. Wintermute sat inside the family mausoleum, waiting to pay Clara’s ransom.

From the outside, the mausoleum looked like a small Gothic church. Inside, it was cramped, dark, and bitterly cold. Narrow shelves for coffins lined three of the four walls. Dr. Wintermute sat on the center platform, which had been erected for himself and his wife. One day, they would lie together in peace, surrounded by the children they had lost. Four of his children were already entombed here; whenever he turned his head, he saw the caskets that held their mortal remains. Dr. Wintermute thought of how Clara had dreaded visiting this place, and he set his jaw. If Clara came back to him alive, he would see to it that she was never forced to come here again.

He had received an anonymous letter three days ago. The writer had instructed him to go to Kensal Green Cemetery on the fourteenth of November. Dr. Wintermute was to hide himself in the family vault until dark, when the cemetery gates were locked. At midnight, he was to go to the road overlooking the Grand Junction Canal and listen for the sound of someone striking the brick wall with a stone. That sound would lead him to the proper place to cast the ransom money over the twelve-foot wall.

For the hundredth time, the doctor raised his hand to his breast pocket, checking to make sure that the packet of money was still there. Ten thousand pounds. It had not been easy to raise so large a sum without attracting the notice of the police. Dr. Wintermute could only pray that he had been successful and that no police officer had followed him to Kensal Green. The kidnapper had warned him that any attempt to consult the police would be punished by Clara’s death.

Clara’s father was no fool. He understood that the arrangements gave every advantage to the kidnapper. Until the next morning, Dr. Wintermute could not leave the cemetery. He would not catch so much of a glimpse of his daughter’s captor; he had only the kidnapper’s word that Clara would be released after the ransom was paid. Nevertheless, he had determined to follow the instructions in the letter. It had come with a spiral of glossy hair: one of Clara’s ringlets. The sight of that curl had robbed Dr. Wintermute of his last shred of common sense. He could think of one thing only: if there were any chance that Clara could be set free, the ransom must be paid.