Chapter 2
Chapter Two
Rain had poured from midday to early evening, a torrent, bucketing down so fiercely at some moments that the windows of Vine Street station had rattled.
Detective Inspector Gideon Pierce intended to depart the station at a reasonable hour and had looked forward to seeing Electra all day, but the final details of a recently closed case, and all the paperwork it entailed, had kept him later than intended.
By the time he lifted his head and glanced at the wall clock, the sky was still dark with storm clouds, but the downpour had diminished to a faint patter against the window glass.
Gideon stood, stretching the muscles of his back, and heard laughter filtering in from the hall. Not a typical sound at Vine Street. A moment later, Constable Braithwaite rapped at the threshold of his half-opened door.
“Pardon, guv. A few of us are gathering at The Black Bell to wish good tidings to Eames. Thought to ask if you wished to join us.”
“What’s happened to Eames?”
Braithwaite offered Gideon an uncharacteristically bashful smile. “He’s to put his head into the parson’s noose next week.”
Eames was one of the station’s desk sergeants and did his job with scrupulous aplomb, but Gideon hadn’t known the young man was due to marry.
“Thank you for the offer, Braithwaite, but I’m afraid I have a prior commitment.”
At Electra’s urging, he was dining out to mark his birthday, a day he rarely wished to give much thought to.
“Please give Eames my well wishes for his nuptials.”
Gideon couldn’t help a grin as the young man departed. Marriage was something he rarely pondered, yet he had always imagined having a family one day. A rogue and, likely unadvisable, thought came as he set his pen aside and stood, then went to retrieve his coat and hat from the hook near the door.
Did Electra ever plan to marry?
Before he could slip an arm into the satin-lined garment, Constable Thacker appeared in the frame of his open door, expression grim.
“A body’s been found, sir. Lying on the pavement in Mount Street. A well-dressed gentleman, according to the patrol constable’s report.”
The Mayfair thoroughfare was a respectable one, the townhouses along it claimed by the wealthy and titled. News of a body found on its streets would be in the papers within hours.
Gideon donned his coat and glanced at the towheaded constable, who clutched his rain-speckled helmet in his hands and watched him expectantly.
“Lead the way, Thacker.”
“Since it’s less than half a mile, sir,” the young officer said once they exited the station, “thought a walk would get us there quicker, sir.”
Gideon nodded and felt a trickle of rain slide down his neck and catch on his collar.
“I also had the desk sergeant send for a carriage to collect the gentleman’s body once you’ve seen it.”
“Good. Who found the body?” Gideon asked.
“Patrol Constable Clegg. He’s waiting for us.”
Gideon asked nothing more, but his mind had already begun arranging itself around the series of questions that he sought to answer at the start of any investigation.
By the time they reached Mount Street, the rain had slowed to a few errant drops, and Gideon was grateful to see that Clegg’s presence had not caused any onlookers to gather. Perhaps the rain kept them at bay.
The uniformed officer turned at the sound of their approaching footsteps.
“Evening, guv. Thacker.”
“When did you first come upon the body?” Gideon asked as he looked down at the dead man.
“A little before six, sir. I had just commenced my top-of-the-hour patrol.”
Gideon lifted his pocket watch. It was not quite half six now. He was due to meet Electra at the Redmaynes’ to escort her to dinner, but that would all need to be postponed.
The body at their feet was sprawled, face up, arms akimbo, and with one leg caught on the other. And, oddly, a rain-soaked and blood-stained kerchief had been arranged over the dead man’s face.
“Did you arrange that handkerchief, Constable?”
“No, sir. It is as I found it.”
Gideon bent down on his haunches to get a better look. The kerchief appeared well-cared for, with neat creases and a monogram stitched in gold thread on one edge. It looked to be double Ps with an interlocking decorative swish around them.
He lifted the edge of the damp cloth, noting that the man’s eyes were closed.
His drenched clothing was seemingly undisturbed upon first glance.
He looked to be middle-aged and was clean-shaven and wealthy, judging by the rings on his fingers and a diamond cravat pin glittering in the gaslight.
This was no robbery. Even if it had been thwarted by a pedestrian interrupting the attack, why kill the man and then stop to cover his face?
There was blue-gray pallor to the man’s skin and a faint streak of blood at the seam of his lips. Based on his clothing and valuables, Gideon suspected he resided in or had been visiting a townhouse in Mayfair.
“Let us make an effort to identify him. Has anyone in these townhouses been questioned?” Gideon asked Clegg, then glanced up at the fine residences lining the street.
“No, sir. I thought I’d await your arrival and then begin knocking on doors.”
“Start now, Constable.” Gideon glanced up at the door closest to where the man lay. “Start with this address and then those on either side of Mount Street. Determine if anyone witnessed what happened or if anyone knows who this gentleman might be.”
Gideon flicked back the lapel of the dead man’s overcoat. Beneath his waistcoat, his white shirt had been soaked with rain, but it hadn’t fully washed away the blood. The pink-stained fabric was a darker shade near the center of his chest.
“Stabbed, I think,” Gideon murmured, pointing to neat slices in the waistcoat’s embroidered fabric.
Thacker hunched down on the other side of the body. “Yes, there. You can see the tears.”
“And here as well.” Gideon pointed to other neat vertical voids in the garment.
He slipped his hands into the man’s coat pockets and found a pair of gloves in one and a few coins, including two gold sovereigns, in the other.
He examined his waistcoat pockets too. One contained a pocket watch on a chain that ran through a waistcoat buttonhole.
The other contained another kerchief with the same embroidered initials as the one laid across his face, its fabric bloodied due to its nearness to the wounds on his chest.
Thacker glanced around where the dead man lay, then took a closer look at the body. He lifted the edge of the man’s overcoat.
“There, sir.”
Gideon bent to see a glint of silver and reached beneath the man to extract a slim, etched calling card case. He suspected it had slipped out when he’d fallen. After flipping it open, he fanned a few cards, all of them bearing the name of Percival Pennington, QC and an address on Mount Street.
The man had been a senior barrister, one appointed by the Crown as legal advisor. In all likelihood, he would have handled important and complex cases, earning more than most barristers. Thus, a home in Mayfair.
“Have Clegg knock on the door at number twelve,” he said, slipping the silver case into his pocket.
Thacker stood and rushed off to find the other constable.
So the man had been a few steps away from his home when he’d been stabbed in view of the whole street. The killer had either been very bold or very reckless.
Gideon studied the man’s bare hands, looking for any indication he’d fought off an attack.
His right one lay palm up, and the fingers of his left hand were clenched in a fist, but there were no apparent abrasions on his knuckles.
No bruising or cuts. Gideon peeled the fingers of his left hand back, and his brows arched.
The gentleman had clasped something as he breathed his last. A crumpled piece of paper. Gideon tugged at the sodden paper carefully, hoping whatever ink it contained hadn’t been washed away.
But once he’d freed it from the man’s grip, he found it wasn’t a letter or a note penned in ink. It was a calling card, with a gilded design around the edges and one name engraved in black at its center.
Gideon clenched his teeth as he held the water-soaked card between his thumb and index finger. The name Electra Poole stared up at him, with her Russell Square address printed in smaller font below it. His pulse picked up speed, thrumming in his veins.
The calm that he steeled himself with at the start of an investigation seeped away, and he couldn’t seem to tear his gaze from Electra’s name. His mind spun, grappling for any reason a dead man might be clutching her card in the last moments of his life.
As he stood, footsteps approached quickly from down the street, and a plump woman wearing a mobcap, dark gown, and apron let out a screech as soon as the body came into view.
Covering her mouth with a trembling hand, she gave Constable Clegg a single nod.
“You recognize this gentleman.” Gideon offered it as more statement than question.
“I do, sir.” She nodded again, then clutched her apron in her hands.
“This is Mrs. Coyle,” Clegg put in. “The housekeeper at number twelve.”
“Can you confirm his identity, Mrs. Coyle?”
She gave Gideon a grief-stricken look. “He is the master of 12 Mount Street. Mr. Percival Pennington of Lincoln’s Inn.”
Mrs. Coyle’s gaze fixed on where her employer lay lifeless at their feet.
“What can I do for him?” Her voice shook with a thread of panic.
Gideon stepped closer, all but blocking her view of the cadaver.
“We will arrange for Mr. Pennington to be taken to the mortuary, Mrs. Coyle.” Only when she looked up at him, and he was certain she would heed his words, that she wasn’t too lost in grief, he added, “I’ll wish to question the staff and any family at home in Mr. Pennington’s household.
It would help me a great deal if you would go and inform them.
Who else resides at number twelve aside from Mr. Pennington? ”
Mrs. Coyle lifted a kerchief from her apron pocket and dotted at the tears on her cheeks. “Miss Lucy Faraday, the master’s niece and ward, and his younger brother, Lancelot Pennington. He resides at Mount Street, now and then, as well.”
“Very well. You may return to the house, Mrs. Coyle, and I’ll be with you and the other staff directly.
” Gideon lifted his watch from his waistcoat pocket again.
Only minutes had passed since he’d last checked the time, but each of those minutes drew him closer to the hour he was meant to meet Electra.
He wished to go and speak to her first, but that was a foolish impulse.
He could glean facts about the deceased from the household staff now. That would help determine how he should proceed in his pursuit of answers about who killed the man.
Gideon strode up the street, glancing at the gutter flowing with rainwater, just in case something had been dropped by Pennington or the person who’d murdered him.
He found nothing, and by the time he’d returned to where the two constables stood guarding the body, an enclosed black carriage approached up the other end of Mount Street.
It slowed beside them, and the driver stepped down to shake Gideon’s hand before turning back to collect a canvas stretcher.
Gideon recognized the man, Mr. Palmer, a carriage driver employed by the coroner’s mortuary.
“May I remove the deceased, Inspector?”
“Indeed.”
Both Gideon and Thacker assisted to lift the body of Percival Pennington onto the stretcher. Once he was off the ground, a dark pool of blood, previously hidden from the rain, began to spread out across the wet pavement.
Thacker helped the driver lift the body into the rear of the carriage.
“How soon before a police surgeon can conduct an examination?” Gideon asked.
“I wouldn’t expect until the morning, Inspector.” Palmer secured the rear carriage doors, then tipped his hat at Gideon and Constable Thacker before resuming his driver’s seat.
“Assist Clegg in attempting to rouse someone in each house in this row and the opposite, any that are within view of this spot,” Gideon told Thacker. “We can at least take initial statements and determine whether anyone witnessed what happened here tonight.”
He was keenly aware of Electra’s card in his pocket and that he would, once again, soon be questioning her about the details of a murder investigation.
Everything in him wanted to go to her immediately, but he could not allow sentiment to derail him.
“I’m going to speak to the Pennington’s staff and any family members who are in residence.”
What did Electra know about this man? Gideon didn’t want her tangled in another case. The prospect of dinner with her—as friends, or whatever she would allow them to be—had been almost too appealing to come to fruition.
Most of all, he prayed her name wouldn’t be dragged through the newspapers like it had been during the Becknell case the previous year.
He’d do whatever he could to shield her this time.