CHAPTER SIX
The wind howled and spat gusts of rain across the faces of those unfortunate enough to be outdoors. What had been a warm, breezy day of clouds mixed with sunshine had devolved into a moonless, algid evening. The temperature had not been nearly as frigid when Thomas Abbott had departed the Customs House headed west on Lower Thames Street. He had turned right onto Botolph Lane and dodged into the Hare and Hounds Tavern just as the drizzle began. Upon leaving after a period of nearly three hours, he shivered and turned his outer coat collar up around his neck. He had not been quite prepared for such a drastic change in the weather, and particularly not to be outdoors in it. He turned into Monument Street in the direction of London Bridge.
His meeting at the Customs House had reassured him that his business dealings were intact and would remain profitable, despite the rather sudden and shocking development of the murder of his partner, Sir Andrew Fraser. Abbott would be happy to relate the former news, in spite of the latter, to his financial guarantor, Lord Bertram St. John, the Earl of Canterbury. Lord St. John was undoubtedly among the ten richest men in all of England, and had achieved such status largely through ruthless enforcement of his financial dealings.
Bad news in the ears of St. John in an affair such as this would certainly lead to Abbott’s downfall, the end of his political career at the least. While a downturn in the particular sort of trade these men were engaged in would mean ruin for Abbott, there certainly would be other Members of Parliament clamouring for the opportunity to take his place in such an arrangement, far beneath the salt as it might be. Thomas Abbott was not a man of great fortune and relied on his ability to bend the ears of political allies and even enemies occasionally, to further his prospects. This talent had served him well in establishing himself as a conduit for political favours, particularly in the fields of appropriations and customs. It was, in fact, this peculiar aptitude that had caught the eye of the Earl of Canterbury, who alongside Sir Andrew Fraser, sought in their business dealings uncommon degrees of blindness of eye and deafness of ear in certain quarters of the civil power structure. It was thought that Abbott, given his position among those powers in addition to his unremitting avarice, would be the perfect candidate to conceal and further such illicit business dealings. The eerily conspicuous death of Sir Fraser, however, had the potential to unhinge the enterprise as a whole, and to bring the full force of the law crashing down around the remaining members of the cabal.
Once he had reached the bridgehead, it was with such thoughts contesting for his mental energies that Abbott failed to hear his name being called from a stoop behind him. Finally, he turned as the voice shouted loudly enough to cut through the tumult in his mind.
“Yes?”
“Thomas Abbott?”
“Yes,” answered he. “Who is there?”
“A messenger,” came the steely reply.
“Reveal yourself,” he called into the shadows.
“I carry a message from Aileen Clarke,” came the steely reply.
Abbott pondered the name for only an instant before the blood froze in his veins.
“ Aileen Clarke? ” he muttered.
“Yes, the very same.”
Abbott began to back toward the bridge slowly. “You can’t have a message from Aileen Clarke—”
“And why is that?”
“It’s impossible,” he muttered to the figure behind the shroud of darkness.
“Is that so?”
“Quite so—show yourself, I demand it!” A hooded figure emerged from the shadows. “Who are you?”
“A little bird,” came the frigid reply.
“Show me your face,” Abbott demanded as the figure approached him.
“Do you wish to hear her message?”
“Tell me and be gone.”
“She wishes you to join her beneath the earth.”
With that, Abbott turned and ran, his lungs burning with every inhalation. The bridge was deserted, aside from a lone drunkard lying face down under a gas lamp. “Help, help,” cried Abbott as he approached the prostrate indigent. The rapid footsteps of the cowled messenger neared until suddenly the lights of the city all flared and then faded to black. Abbott could feel the cold pavement under him but was unable to move. He heard heavy breathing atop him for what seemed like a lifetime. The dark figure began pulling at Abbott’s coat, finally rolling him over onto his back to get the overcoat out from under him. Abbott shivered and sobbed quietly from where he lay. Suddenly, the phantom stood atop him, only the whites of his eyes visible through his mask.
“You, Thomas Abbott, are a murderer ,” the caliginous voice stated through steady breaths.
“I don’t—”
“In fact,” the apparition continued. “You are much worse than that. I dare say there is not a name for the form of evil to which you have been a party.”
“Pray—”
“Miss Clarke sends her regards,” and with that, his throat was slit.
The shadowy figure deposited the Minister of Parliament over the railing and down into the frigid Thames before covering the sleeping inebriate with the coat of the former man. With a look in both directions, he was off toward Tooley Street and back into the darkness from whence he had come.