Chapter 12
Chapter
Brisbane reached to open the door and a boy appeared, slender and small, perhaps eight years old, although it was almost impossible to say with certainty.
His physique was slight, but his eyes had the watchfulness of experience, and I fancied not much escaped his notice.
He was dressed in clothing that was worn but scrupulously clean, the mark of someone who cared for him.
“Thomas,” Magda said firmly, “these people wish to ask you questions. You will give them the truth.”
He made a swift reply in Romani, and Brisbane answered him back in the same. The boy’s expression was one of frank astonishment as Brisbane explained to the rest of us what he had said.
“Thomas wished to know what business Magda had with gorgios, and I requested he speak in English out of courtesy to the rest of you.” He made a further remark to Thomas in their language, and I heard the word “poshrat” again, this time delivered with a smile and a gesture towards himself.
No doubt Brisbane was attempting to win the lad’s confidence by sharing the fact of his own mingled ancestry.
The boy continued to look wary but nodded and waited expectantly.
Brisbane looked from me to Stoker and made a gesture of encouragement.
“Thomas,” I said gently, “you sometimes go to Highgate Cemetery, do you not?”
“Sometimes.” His gaze slid from mine, and I realised extracting information from our young source was going to prove a delicate matter.
No doubt, like most Romany lads, he spent his time bent upon activities that would earn him a coin or two.
And no doubt these activities occupied an area of rather dubious morality.
“I presume you go there to make money?” I suggested.
He shifted and Magda jerked her chin at him, silently ordering him to respond.
“Flowers,” he muttered finally. “I collect flowers from the graves, miss.”
“To what purpose?” Lady Julia asked.
“To sell,” was the blunt reply. “I cut them and tie into nosegays and sell them to passing ladies.”
“How very enterprising,” I remarked in perfect sincerity. It was a little distasteful to think of him selling grave offerings to the unsuspecting, but one had to admire his entrepreneurial spirit.
He grinned at me, showing a smile missing two front teeth. “I make good money,” he assured me.
“I can believe it. Although I suspect the groundskeepers at the cemetery do not approve?” I ventured.
He shrugged one skinny shoulder. “They chase, but they are slow.”
“You must be a very observant young man,” I told him. “To elude the groundskeepers and the constables? As well as the people who are laying the flowers at the graves.”
“I know where to hide,” he said. “Many such places in Highgate.”
“You must also see interesting things from your hiding places. Did you see a carriage not long ago—a carriage with a dead man?”
He nodded, his eyes widening. “Yes, miss. The carriage is at the kerb for such a long time, I think it is waiting for something. But there is no driver and no horse. So I think perhaps it is empty, and if it is empty—” He broke off with another shrug.
“If it is empty, perhaps there might be something worth taking inside?” I asked.
“Opportunities are gifts from the gods,” he answered solemnly. “One must take them or the gods will think you are ungrateful.”
The child referred to the gods, but Magda had a crucifix in her caravan, and I had seen candles dedicated to Saint Sara-la-Kali.
I realised then that the Roma must wear the religion of their adopted country lightly even as they held firmly to their much older traditions.
How very callow we seemed as a nation in comparison!
Our Anglican church had been in existence less than four centuries, but the Romany had been worshipping the dark-skinned Sarah at her shrine in the south of France for two millennia.
“But rather than something to sell, you found a dead man,” I said.
Thomas nodded, his face clouded. I reminded myself that for all his worldly-wise maturity, he was still a child of tender years. “Tell me about the carriage.”
“It were nice enough. Private, but with no markings. Black, the trim picked out in dark green. One of the windows were down, which was what drew my attention, it being such a cold morning.”
He paused a moment, then began to speak again as if reciting, slowly and with precision.
“He was dressed well and a gorgio. He was the age of that man, I think,” he pronounced with a nod towards Stoker.
“He was neither thin nor fat, neither tall nor short. His hair was light brown. He were clean enough, close-shaven, but the smell was terrible. His eyes were closed. He looked peaceful, and I thought he was asleep—that is, I thought he had been sick from taking too much wine and were sleeping it off.”
“How was he positioned?” I pressed. “What was his physical attitude?”
“Relaxed, miss. Lying back, he was, with one hand to his chest. No ring upon it, or I’d have—” He broke off, colouring slightly.
“Naturally you would have taken it,” I suggested. “If a man is careless enough to sleep in public, he must be reconciled to losing his valuables.”
A ghost of a grin touched his mouth. “Exactly that, miss. As I say, I looked to his hand, but there were nothing on it, and I might have had a go at the cufflinks but that I saw the—” He swept a finger to his neck, indicating where the puncture marks had been.
“Go on,” I urged.
“Two holes, small ones, in the neck. And blood, staining his collar.”
“What did you do?”
“I heard the constable coming on his rounds, so I leapt from the carriage, and I ran, miss.”
“Very sensible,” I told him. “What did you do then?”
“I went into the cemetery, to a place I know where the constable cannot find me. I waited a long time, and I was afraid.”
“Afraid the constable would find you this time?”
“No, miss. Afraid the demon that had killed the man would come for me as well.”
“The demon? What demon?”
He turned to Magda and rattled off a lengthy sentence in his native tongue. She questioned him sharply, but he pressed his lips closed and would say no more. Magda muttered, then turned to us.
“He saw someone in the graveyard. A witch, he says.”
“A witch! Why does he think she was a witch?” I demanded.
Magda shrugged. “She was dressed all in black.”
“It is a cemetery and black is the colour of mourning,” I reminded her. “Every woman who goes there is dressed in black.”
Thomas burst out with another stream of Romani. Magda listened attentively, then translated. “He says she watched him leave the carriage and enter the graveyard. When he noticed her, she put a finger to her lips, a warning to keep his silence.”
“Can he describe her further? Any distinguishing marks or peculiarities?” I pressed.
Thomas considered, then gave Magda a rapid answer, his hands sketching the air above his head.
“Her hair—it was very black, as black as night, he says. And she wore it piled up on her head in an old-fashioned style.”
“Where did she go?” I asked.
Thomas shook his head, his reply a mumble.
“He did not see her again,” Magda explained. “He ran to his special hiding place and waited until he thought it would be safe to leave.”
Brisbane, who had been content to let me lead the questioning of our young witness, leant forwards suddenly and fixed the boy with a piercing gaze. “What did you take from the dead man?”
Thomas shied like a frightened pony. “Nothing,” he said flatly, but he would not look Brisbane in the eye. Brisbane leant nearer still, pitching his voice even lower. There was no menace in it, only a calm evenness that was somehow worse than any threat might have been.
Thomas started to speak again, but Brisbane shook his head slowly, allowing a small smile to form. Beside me, Lady Julia gave an involuntary shiver.
To my astonishment, the boy reached into his pocket and retrieved something.
He threw it in Brisbane’s direction before bolting from the caravan.
Brisbane caught the object neatly in one hand.
The door banged closed and Stoker rose to give chase, but Brisbane waved him off.
“The little devil is frightened enough. Besides, if you were to give chase as a gorgio, there would be a dozen Romany men standing between you and the lad even if you caught him.”
He opened his hand to examine the object Thomas had thrown.
It was a small bag sewn of printed fabric, an old scrap of cotton, perhaps, or a bit of calico, held fast with a knotted drawstring of plaited thread.
Brisbane opened the bag to peer inside, but did not disturb the contents.
He passed the bag to Magda, who scrutinised as he had done—by sight only.
They exchanged a few words in Romani before Brisbane nodded. “What is it?” Lady Julia asked her husband.
“We call them putsi,” he explained. “Many traditions have them. The bag is a sort of amulet, apotropaic in nature. Such bags are filled with any number of things meant to convey luck. The string was knotted seven times, which is also significant. Thomas would have recognised the purpose of the bag when he found it on the dead man. Taking it was not meant to bring him profit,” Brisbane finished.
“He would have kept it for the sake of the protection it offered.”
“Precious little protection it offered to Maurice Quincey,” I observed.
Magda had been peering into the bag as we spoke, careful not to disturb the contents. “It is not good to trifle with another’s magic,” she said, reknotting the bag and handing it back to Brisbane. “Particularly a witch bag.”
“A witch bag?” Brisbane asked. “Are you certain?”
She nodded. “There is a small medal inside—the front has the image of a man with a cross and a raven.”
“Saint Benedict,” Stoker said suddenly.
Magda gave him a look of approbation. “You know your saints.”
“I know this one. My mother wore a medal of Saint Benedict until she died. It was buried with her.”
“What is the significance of Saint Benedict?” Lady Julia asked.
“The reverse of the medal,” Stoker explained. “It always has a series of letters.” He broke off and screwed his eyes closed as he thought. “VRSNSMVSMQLIVB,” he recited.
“What is that? Some sort of code?” Lady Julia’s nose wrinkled up in charming perplexity.
“It stands for the Latin ‘Vade retro Santana! Nunquam suade mihi vana. Sunt mana quae libas. Ipse venena bibas!’ ”
“ ‘Begone, Satan! Never tempt me with your vanities! What you offer me is evil! Drink your poison yourself,’ ” I said slowly. “A rough translation but near enough, I think.”
“It sounds like a prayer of exorcism,” Lady Julia replied.
“That is precisely what it is,” Stoker told her.
“Such tokens are created with an eye to protecting one from malevolent spells,” Brisbane added. “Many Romany make and sell them.”
“Is it possible to trace this one?” I asked.
Brisbane glanced at Magda, who shook her head.
“No. The fabric is not remarkable, it may have come from anywhere. And the contents are what one would expect to find in a bag for protection—dried vervain and a small iron nail. There is the medal, which is common enough, as Stoker says. Also inside is a bit of salt and the foot of a black rabbit. Anyone might have made this.”
Stoker turned to Magda. “You are certain it is not one of yours?”
She sniffed. “I prefer peppermint to vervain.”
“I wish Thomas had not left us so abruptly. I was not finished questioning him,” I protested.
Magda waved a hand. “It is of no consequence. He will say nothing more to you. He is frightened.”
“Magda, I assure you, we would protect him from whoever murdered this fellow,” Stoker told her.
“You cannot protect him from forces beyond this world,” she said, crossing herself.
Lady Julia emitted a little sigh of exasperation. “We came for the name of a murderer, not talk of demons and witches.”
“You came for information and you have some,” Magda reminded her as she pointed to the charm bag. “The man who carried this was afraid of some malevolent creature. God help you if you find him.”