Whitechapel Conspiracy

“Never mind how much,” Leah said sharply. “We’ll deal with that afterwards. Fetch me some water and the ointment. The man’s in pain! And he’s bleeding all over his shirt. Do you know how hard it is to get blood out of good cloth?”

Pitt knew where the pump was, and the ewer. He went out of the back door and came back five minutes later with the ewer full of water. How clean it was he had no idea.

He found Leah and Isaac together, heads bent, talking quietly Samuel was sitting back in a chair, his eyes closed. The conversation stopped the moment Pitt came in.

“Ah, good, good,” Isaac said quickly, taking the ewer. “Thank you very much.” He set it down and poured about a pint into a clean pan and put it on the stove. Leah already had the ointment.

“It’s too much,” Leah demanded, her voice low and fierce, her fingers clenched on the jar. “If you give all that this time, then what about next time? And there will be a next time, never mistake it!”

“We’ll deal with next time when it happens,” Isaac said firmly. “God will provide.”

Leah let out a snort of impatience. “He’s already provided you with brains! Use them.” She moved fractionally to place her back to Pitt. “It’s getting worse, and you can see that as well as anyone,” she urged. “With Catholics and Protestants at each other’s throats, and dynamiters all over the place, each one crazier than the last, and now talk about blowing up the sugar factory …”

Samuel sat patiently and silently between them. Pitt leaned against the dresser.

“No one’s going to blow up the sugar factory!” Isaac said tensely, with a warning glance at her.

“Oh? You know that, do you?” she challenged him, her eyebrows arched, eyes wide.

“Why would they do such a thing?” He kept his tone calm.

“They need a reason?” she demanded with amazement. She lifted her shoulders dramatically. “They’re anarchists. They hate everybody.”

“That’s got nothing to do with us,” he pointed out. “We look after our own.”

“They blow up the sugar factory, it’ll have to do with everyone!” she retorted.

“Enough, Leah!” he said, finality in his tone. Now it was an order. “Look after Samuel. I’ll find him some money to tide him over. Everyone else’ll help. Just do your part.”

She stared at him solemnly for several seconds, on the edge of further argument, then something in his face deterred her, and without saying anything further she obeyed.

The water reached the boil, and Pitt carried it over so she could minister to Samuel.

An hour later, in the privacy of the room Isaac used to work on his books, Pitt offered him a contribution of a few shillings towards the fund for Samuel. He was unreasonably delighted when it was accepted. It was a mark of belonging.

Tellman said nothing to anyone about his interest in John Adinett or his conversation with the cabdriver. It was three days before he was able to take the matter any further. Wetron had spoken to him again, questioning him about his present case more closely, wanting a detailed accounting of his time.

Tellman answered with exactness, obedient and unsmiling. The man had taken Pitt’s place, and he had no right to it. It might not have been of his choosing, but that excused nothing. He had forbidden Tellman to contact Pitt or take any further interest in the Adinett case. That was his fault all right. Tellman stared at his round, smooth-shaven face with bland, dumb insolence.

By late Tuesday afternoon he again had time to himself, and the first thing he did was to leave Bow Street, buy a ham sandwich from a peddler, and a drink of fresh peppermint, then walk slowly up towards Oxford Street, thinking hard.

He had taken another look at the notes he had made during the investigation and had seen that there were several spaces of time, often as much as four or five hours, in which they did not know where Adinett had been. It had not seemed to matter then, because they were concerned with the details of the physical facts. Where Adinett had spent his time seemed to be irrelevant, only a matter of catching all the details. Now it was all he had.

He walked more slowly. He had no idea where he was going, except that he must pursue something definite, both for Pitt’s sake and because he had no intention of going back to Gracie empty-handed.

Why would a man like John Adinett go three times to a place such as Cleveland Street? Who lived there? Was it possible he had odd tastes in personal vice which Fetters had somehow discovered?

Even as he said it to himself, he did not believe it. Why should Fetters care anyway? If it were not criminal, or even if it was, it was no one else’s concern.

But perhaps Fetters had discovered something about Adinett which he could not possibly afford to have known. That would have to be something criminal. What?

He increased his pace slightly. Perhaps the answer was in Cleveland Street. It was the only thing so far that was unexplained.