Doing as he bids, I enter a nursery, the cheerful yellow wallpaper now hanging limp from the walls. Games and wooden toys litter the floor, a weathered rocking horse put out to pasture by the door. There’s a game in progress on a child’s chessboard, the white pieces decimated by the black.
No sooner have I set foot inside than I hear Evelyn shrieking in the room beside me. For the first time Derby and I move in concert, sprinting around the corner to find the door blocked by the red-headed thug.
‘Mr Stanwin’s still busy, chum,’ he says, rocking back and forth to keep warm.
‘I’m looking for Evelyn Hardcastle, I heard her scream,’ I say breathlessly.
‘Mayhap you did, but doesn’t seem like there’s much you can do about it, does there?’
I peer over his shoulder into the room behind, hoping to catch sight of Evelyn. It looks to be some sort of reception area, but it’s empty. The furniture lies under yellowed sheets, black mould growing up from the hems. The windows are covered in old newspaper, the walls little more than rotting boards. There’s another door on the far wall, but it’s closed. They must be in there.
I return my gaze to the man, who smiles at me, exposing a row of crooked yellow teeth.
‘Anything else?’ he says.
‘I need to make sure she’s all right.’
I try to barge past him, but it’s a foolish notion. He’s three times my weight and half again my height. More to the point, he knows how to use his strength. Planting a flat hand on my stomach, he shoves me backwards, barely a flicker of emotion on his face.
‘Don’t bother,’ he says. ‘I’m paid to stand here and make sure nice gentlemen like you don’t do themselves a misfortune by wandering places they ain’t supposed to go.’
They’re just words, coals in the furnace. My blood’s boiling. I try to dart around him and like a fool I think I’ve succeeded until I’m hoisted backwards, and tossed bodily back down the corridor.
I scramble to my feet, snarling.
He hasn’t moved. He isn’t out of breath. He doesn’t care.
‘Your parents gave you everything but sense, didn’t they?’ he says, the blandness of the sentiment hitting me like a bucketful of cold water. ‘Mr Stanwin’s not hurting her if that’s your concern. Wait a few minutes and you can ask her all about it when she comes out.’
We eye each other for a moment, before I retreat along the corridor into the nursery. He’s right, I’m not getting by him, but I can’t wait for Evelyn to come out. She won’t tell Jonathan Derby anything after this morning, and whatever is happening behind that door could be the reason she takes her life tonight.
Hurrying over to the wall, I press my ear to the boards. If I haven’t missed my mark, Evelyn’s talking to Stanwin in the room next door, only a few pieces of rotten wood between us. I soon catch the hum of their voices, much too faint to make anything out. Using my pocket knife, I tear the wallpaper from the wall, digging the blade between the loose wooden slats to pry them free. They’re so damp they come away without objection, the wood disintegrating in my hands.
‘... tell her she best not play any games with me, or it’ll be the end of both of you,’ says Stanwin, his voice poking through the insulating wall.
‘Tell her yourself, I’m not your errand girl,’ says Evelyn coldly.
‘You’ll be anything I damn well please, so long as I’m footing the bill.’
‘I don’t like your tone, Mr Stanwin,’ says Evelyn.
‘And I don’t like being made a fool of, Miss Hardcastle,’ he says, practically spitting her name. ‘You forget I worked here for nearly fifteen years. I know every corner of this place, and everybody in it. Don’t mistake me for one of these blinkered bastards you’ve surrounded yourself with.’
His hatred is viscous, it has texture. I could wring it out of the air and bottle it.
‘What about the letter?’ says Evelyn quietly, her outrage overwhelmed.
‘I’ll keep hold of that, so you understand our arrangement.’
‘You’re a vile creature, are you aware of that?’
Stanwin swats the insult from the air with a belly laugh.
‘At least I’m an honest one,’ he says. ‘How many other people in this house can claim the same thing? You can go now. Don’t forget to pass along my message.’
I hear the door to Stanwin’s room open, Evelyn storming past the nursery a few moments later. I’m tempted to follow her, but there’d be little value in another confrontation. Besides, Evelyn mentioned something about a letter that’s now in Stanwin’s possession. She seemed keen to retrieve it, which means I need to see it. Who knows, perhaps Stanwin and Derby are friends.
‘Jonathan Derby’s waiting for you in the nursery,’ I hear the burly fellow tell Stanwin.
‘Good,’ says Stanwin, drawers scraping open. ‘Let me get changed for this hunt and we’ll go and have a word with the greasy little bugger.’
Or perhaps not.
26
I sit with my feet on the table, the chessboard beside them. Cupping my chin in my hand, I stare at the game trying to decipher some strategy from the arrangement of the pieces. It’s proving an impossible task. Derby’s too flighty for study. His attention is forever straying towards the window, towards the dust in the air and the noises in the corridor. He’s never at peace.
Daniel warned me that each of our hosts thinks differently, but only now do I comprehend the full extent of his meaning. Bell was a coward and Ravencourt ruthless, but both possessed focused minds. That’s not the case with Derby. Thoughts come buzzing through his head like bluebottles, lingering long enough to be distracting but never settling.
A sound draws my attention to the door, Ted Stanwin shaking out a match as he surveys me from above his pipe. He’s larger than I recall, a slab of a man spreading sideways like a wedge of melting butter.
‘Never took you for a chess man, Jonathan,’ he says, pushing the old rocking horse back and forth so that it thumps on the floor.
‘I’m teaching myself,’ I say.
‘Good for you, men should seek to better themselves.’
His eyes linger on me before being tugged to the windows. Though Stanwin hasn’t done or said anything threatening, Derby’s afraid of him. My pulse is tapping that out in Morse code.
I glance at the door, ready to bolt, but the burly fellow is leaning against the wall in the corridor with his arms crossed. He offers me a little nod, friendly as two men in a cell.
‘Your mother’s running a little late on her payments,’ says Stanwin, his forehead pressed against the window. ‘I hope all’s well?’
‘Quite well,’ I say.
‘I’d hate for that to change.’
I shift in my seat to catch his eye.
‘Are you threatening me, Mr Stanwin?’
He turns from the window, smiling at the fellow in the corridor, then myself.
‘Of course not, Jonathan, I’m threatening your mother. You don’t think I’d come all this way for a worthless little sod like yourself, do you?’
Taking a puff on his pipe, he picks up a doll and casually tosses it at the chessboard, sending the pieces scattering across the room. Rage snatches me up by the strings, flinging me at him, but he catches my fist in the air, spinning me around as one of his huge arms crushes my throat.
His breath is on my neck, rotten as old meat.
‘Talk to your mother, Jonathan,’ he sneers, squeezing my windpipe hard enough for black spots to swim in the corners of my eyes. ‘Otherwise, I might have to pay her a visit.’
He lets the words settle, then releases me.
I drop to my knees, clutching my throat and gasping for air.
‘You’ll come a cropper with that temper,’ he says, jabbing his pipe in my direction. ‘I’d get it under control if I were you. Don’t worry, my friend here is good at helping people learn new things.’