What the Devil Knows Page 8

  And it occurred to Sebastian now as he stared up at the facade of that death-haunted house that something similar was playing out again. The seaman Hugo Reeves had been butchered in Five Pipes Field in St. Paul’s Parish, while Sir Edwin Pym was murdered in an alley off Nightingale Lane in St. George’s Parish. A coincidence? Or a deliberate, clever use of London’s archaic system to keep the authorities divided?

  “My lord!”

  Sebastian was gathering his reins when he heard a boy’s shout.

  “Lord Devlin!”

  Turning, he saw a half-grown lad pelting down the lane toward him, one elbow cocked skyward to clap a hand on his hat and keep it from flying off as he dodged workmen and stray dogs and women with shopping baskets. In his other fist, he clutched what looked like a sealed missive.

  “Message for ye from Bow Street,” said the boy, gasping for breath as he skidded to a halt beside the curricle. “I like t’ve never found you, m’lord!”

  “From Sir Henry?” said Sebastian, recognizing the magistrate’s hand as he reached to take the message the boy was holding up.

  “Aye. They found another dead body, my lord!”

  Sebastian broke the seal and skimmed Lovejoy’s terse message.

  The dead man was Nathan Cockerwell.

  Chapter 15

  Jesus,” said Sebastian on a harsh exhalation of breath.

  He stood with Sir Henry Lovejoy at the entrance to a short dead-end alley just off Cinnamon Street near the river. The surrounding brick walls were black with soot, the stench of urine and rotting produce eye watering. Seagulls circled, screeching overhead, and he could hear the hulls of the ships knocking against the wharves with the inrushing tide.

  Nathan Cockerwell lay sprawled on his back half-buried beneath a pile of rubbish at the end of the alley, his arms stiff at his sides, one leg bent at an awkward angle. His blood-soaked powdered wig lay beside his smashed nearly bald head. His face was a shattered mess, his eyes wide and staring, his head tilted back, and his mouth agape. The slit across his throat was deep enough to cut to the bone.

  “Who found him?” asked Sebastian, his gaze drifting around the noisome, squalid space.

  Lovejoy held a handkerchief to his nose. “A rag-and-bone man looking for something to pick up.”

  “I’m surprised he didn’t simply strip the body and go on his way.” Sebastian forced himself to walk forward, his gaze on the muck-smeared cobblestones around the dead magistrate’s head. “I don’t think he was killed here,” he said, eyeing the collapsed pile of refuse and the surrounding brick walls. “There isn’t enough blood.”

  Lovejoy came to stand beside him. “I suppose that makes sense. Who in their right mind would go wandering down a dark alley with a butcher on the loose?”

  “When did he go missing?”

  “Last night, although the servants didn’t inform his wife until this morning. I gather she makes it a practice of retiring early and does not like to be disturbed.”

  “Whereas Mr. Nathan Cockerwell obviously did not make it a habit of retiring early. Do you know if he shared his colleague’s taste for young prostitutes?”

  Lovejoy cleared his throat. “I believe Cockerwell’s passion was for dogfights.”

  “Sounds like a pleasant chap.” They watched a fly crawl out of the dead man’s open mouth, and Sebastian swallowed, hard. “Is his wife able to talk, or has she drugged herself into oblivion with laudanum?”

  “As a matter of fact, she’s asked to speak to you.”

  Sebastian looked over at him. “She has?”

  Lovejoy nodded. “Cockerwell seems to have told her you’re assisting Bow Street’s investigation of the recent murders.”

  “He told me to my face that I was wasting my time.”

  “Yes, she said that. It’s part of why she wants to talk to you.”

  * * *

  The Middlesex magistrate’s impressive town house lay in Princess Square, not far from Pym’s house in Wellclose Square. Most magistrates were wealthy enough to live comfortably, although not extravagantly. But Nathan Cockerwell’s house—a late eighteenth-century brick pile with private stables and an extensive garden—oozed extravagance.

  “Gor,” said Tom as Sebastian reined in his horses at the corner. “That’s ’is ’ouse?”

  Sebastian handed the reins to the boy and jumped down. “Suggestive, isn’t it?”

  Cockerwell’s newly bereaved widow received Sebastian in a grand parlor crowded with rosewood furniture, massive oil paintings in gilded frames, and a collection of Chinese porcelains that would have delighted the Prince Regent. She looked much the same age as her late husband, stout and gray-haired, with a slablike face, a small nose, and small pale eyes. Like Sir Edwin Pym’s daughter, Mrs. Cockerwell did not appear to have shed any recent tears. But unlike Katie Ingram, the magistrate’s widow obviously possessed a good supply of mourning clothes. She was decked out in a heavy black bombazine gown, a black cap, black gloves, and a black handkerchief she clutched theatrically in one hand. The other hand was fisted around a bottle of smelling salts.

  “Lord Devlin,” she said faintly when he bowed before her. “So good of you to come. I fear you find me quite unable to stand.” Both her accent and her diction were noticeably better than her late husband’s. She waved the black handkerchief toward a nearby chair. “Do, pray, be seated.”

  “Thank you.” He adjusted the long tails of his coat as he sat. “Please accept my condolences on the loss of your husband.”

  She tilted her head back against her chair and closed her eyes. “You’re too kind.”

  He found himself hesitating. “I could come back another day if you find it too distressing to speak to me n—”

  Her eyes popped open. “No. No, what must be done, must be done.” She struggled to sit up straighter. “Mr. Cockerwell was telling me you’ve agreed to assist Bow Street in their investigation into the death of Sir Edwin.”

  “I have, yes. Although he seemed to think my involvement unnecessary.”

  She waved the handkerchief again, this time in a dismissive gesture. “Mr. Cockerwell was always an independent-minded man.”

  “I understand he knew Sir Edwin Pym quite well.”

  “Oh, yes. Knew each other from the time they were lads, they did. Started as bricklayers together.”

  Sebastian blinked. “I hadn’t realized that.”

  “And both were churchwardens for St. George’s, of course. My father—he was the rector at St. George’s back then—thought I was mad, wanting to marry my Nathan. But I knew he’d go far.”

  “And so he has,” said Sebastian, his gaze drifting around the overstuffed, expensively furnished room. Or rather, he did go far until someone bashed in his head and dumped his body in a back alley.

  He was wondering how to approach the questions he’d come to ask when she forestalled him by saying bluntly, “I know who killed him. Know who killed them both.”

  “Oh?”

  “It’s that new vicar at St. George’s. York is his name, Reverend Marcus York.”

  “The reverend quarreled with Mr. Cockerwell?”

  “Oh, yes, quarreled with them both—Sir Edwin, too.”

  “Over what?

  The handkerchief fluttered. “Everything!”

  “Could you perhaps be more specific?”

  A spurt of annoyance flared in her beady eyes. “The control of the vestry. The poor rate. The workhouse . . . There was very little that horrible man didn’t gripe about. It’s been going on for years.”

  “I thought you said Reverend York was new at St. George’s.”

  “That’s right. He only arrived ten years ago.”

  Only.

  “I see. And has the reverend had much interaction lately with either Mr. Cockerwell or Sir Edwin?”

  “Yes, of course. York was pinch
ing at poor Mr. Cockerwell again just last week.”

  “About what?”

  “Mr. Cockerwell never said. But I’ve no doubt you can discover it easily enough. You’re supposed to be good at that sort of thing. Or so Mr. Cockerwell said.”

  “When he was complaining about my involvement in the investigation of the recent deaths?”

  “That’s right.” She fixed him with a fierce stare. “You will look into it, won’t you?”

  “Oh, yes.” He suspected she was far more interested in exacting revenge against a longtime enemy than in actually finding her husband’s killer, but the “new” vicar of St. George’s certainly sounded like someone Sebastian needed to talk to.

  “Good.” She leaned back in her chair again, her eyes sinking half-closed. As far as she was concerned, she had accomplished what she’d set out to do. He was now being dismissed. “If you would be so kind as to ring the bell to have Jenny show you out?”

  Sebastian rose to his feet. “Of course. Thank you for seeing me at what I know must be a difficult time for you.”

  She gave a regal nod. “He’s a beastly man, that reverend. It’s past time he got what was coming to him.”

  “No doubt,” said Sebastian, and left her there, a faint smile on her full, self-satisfied face.

  Chapter 16

  Hero arrived at the Bloomsbury Foundling Hospital shortly before eleven. A sprawling three-story-high redbrick complex that lay just to the north of Guilford Street, it was a “hospital” only in the word’s old-fashioned meaning of a charitable institution offering “hospitality” to the indigent. Its existence was a testament to the humanity and hard work of an eighteenth-century sea captain named Thomas Coram.

  Coram had been so horrified by the number of dead and dying infants he saw abandoned in the streets of London that he decided to do something about it. Petitioning the King for a charter, he immediately ran into headwinds from conservative moralists who believed that rescuing foundlings would serve only to encourage sin and debauchery. But he eventually managed to round up several dozen prominent aristocratic ladies and their lords who agreed to lend their respectability to his venture. For a time the Foundling Hospital thrived as the fashionable philanthropy, with everyone from Hogarth to Handel helping raise funds for its endowment.

  Lending one’s name to the cause was still relatively fashionable—the Prince of Wales himself had recently served in the (purely honorary) position of president of the board of governors. But generous donations were somewhat less forthcoming.

  “I wish we could do more,” said the Reverend Reginald Kay, the hospital’s plump, white-haired little chaplain, who—with an eye to a possible generous donation—had enthusiastically agreed to escort Hero around the famous chapel and elegant administrative rooms. “But the need is so great and our resources are so small.”

  “How many foundlings do you take in every year?” asked Hero, their footsteps on the wooden floorboards echoing as they walked the length of the institution’s impressive gallery of paintings and statues, all donated by various artists and patrons. It was from this gallery that the Royal Academy of Arts had been born.

  “None, actually.”

  She drew up before Raphael’s Massacre of the Innocents and swung to face him. “What?”

  “When the institution first opened, they hung a basket outside the gates with a little bell attached, where desperate women could leave their infants. But they were quickly deluged with hundreds and hundreds of babies. The governors frantically applied to Parliament for funds, but by the terms of the grant they received, they were required to take every infant that was offered.” He shook his head. “It was madness.”

  “How many babies are we talking about?”

  “Fifteen thousand in four years.”

  “Good heavens,” whispered Hero.

  Kay nodded. “It was hopeless. They had to change the rules. Now infants may only be presented by their mothers at certain prescribed times, and the mothers must prove to the satisfaction of the directors that they were of good character before they, er, fell into misfortune.”

  “So the babies you take in aren’t technically foundlings?”

  “Not anymore. Their mothers are always known.”

  “And can the mothers ever get their children back?”

  “They can, yes, if their circumstances change. A careful record is made at the time the infant is surrendered. And the mothers typically leave some token with their babes—a locket, perhaps, or a marked coin. Sometimes it’s only a piece of ribbon or cloth, or a verse written on a scrap of paper. We’ve quite a collection, I’m afraid. They’re heartbreaking.”

  “How many of the women manage to reclaim their children?”

  “Some have,” he said, his face tensing at if to hold back a flood of unwanted emotions. “But not many.”

  “And how many infants do you take in every year?”

  “As many as we can. The children are sent to foster mothers in the country until the age of four, but we have space for only six hundred children here. After they return from the country, they stay with us until they’re between twelve and sixteen years of age, so . . .” His voice trailed away.

  “So less than a hundred a year,” said Hero.

  “Oh, yes.”

  “And the thousands of foundlings you no longer take in? What happens to them?”

  Kay spread his hands wide in a helpless gesture. “The various parishes deal as best they can. Not all of the baby farms are bad.” He paused a moment, then added, “Just most of them.”

  There was a late eighteenth-century act of Parliament that required all parish children under the age of four to be raised in country houses situated at least three miles from London. The thinking behind the law was good—that such infants would be more likely to survive in a healthy rural environment. In practice, the parish workhouses signed contracts with “baby farms” that were seldom if ever inspected and regularly killed most of their charges.

  And no one cared.

  “Of course, the foundlings are only part of the problem,” said Kay as they moved on to stand before a bust of Marcus Aurelius. “The number of children orphaned in the city every year is shocking. I’ve heard that one out of every three London children will lose at least one parent before they reach the age of eighteen.”

  Hero glanced out the window at the long covered walkways that fronted each dormitory wing. The arcades were decorative, but they also served a purpose, for they were used as rope walks. It was here that the orphaned boys were put to work at a young age making rope to help support the facility. “And how many lose both parents?”

  He shook his head. “That I don’t know. But in the truly wretched areas such as St. Giles, Bethnal Green, or Wapping, it must be nearly one out of four, surely? How can any city handle a problem of that magnitude?”

  “I’ve heard the major cities on the Continent have systems in place.”

  “Do they? I wonder how successful they are at keeping their children alive.”

  “I don’t know,” said Hero. “I understand the survival rate for children in the various parish workhouses is shocking, but I’ve never heard just how shocking.”

  The reverend sighed and looked away, his face solemn as he stared at Hogarth’s depiction of Moses brought to the Pharaoh’s daughter. “A survival rate of ten percent is considered average, but for some it’s more like five percent.”

  “Dear God.”

  “If they’re old enough, most orphans would rather take their chances on the streets—and, to be honest, they’re probably more likely to survive there. Of course, the boys typically end up becoming thieves, while the girls—” He broke off and cleared his throat. “Well, the less said about that, the better.”

  Hero found her gaze drawn again to the scene outside the window, where the rows of little boys worked to braid rope, their
hands red with the combination of biting cold and rough, scratchy rope fibers. In the course of researching various articles on the city’s laboring poor, she’d interviewed dozens of orphans who were eking out wretched existences as street sellers, crossing sweeps, and ballad singers. Some she’d quietly helped find respectable employment or, for the really small ones, foster homes. But she knew the number whose lives she’d touched was woefully small, and the size of the problem suddenly struck her as insurmountable.

  In some ways the lives of the Foundling Hospital’s children were pitiable. Abandoned as infants by desperate mothers unable to care for them, they were raised as babies and toddlers in country foster homes before being subjected to the rigorous discipline of an institution and then apprenticed out somewhere between the ages of twelve and sixteen. But in truth, these were the lucky ones.

  They weren’t dead.

  Chapter 17

  St. George’s-in-the-East lay just to the north of Ratcliffe Highway, on that ancient ridge overlooking what had once been marshland but was now the teeming, squalid morass of Wapping and its docklands. The church had been built early in the eighteenth century in an Italian Renaissance style with Byzantine flourishes. But its once-white stones were now black with soot, its distinctive pepper-pot towers crumbling from lack of maintenance. The churchyard stretched away to the east, long and narrow and filled to overflowing, for this was a poor area where people lived hard and died young.