It was a bad start to the day for Philip Fields; he had solved the Winder Case. Sure, this had resulted in a hefty wad of notes in his wallet, and had prevented a man from escaping the hangman of justice, but now it meant his mind had no trick to work at.
In other words, he was bored.
He gave his mind a chance to wander as he absorbed the sounds of the busy street. The constant clatter of wheels on the paving served as a backdrop to the chattering pedestrians, and the occasional whinny of a cabby’s horse. The air was heavy with smog, but Philip inhaled deeply as he stepped out onto the pavement.
He nearly bumped into a woman hurrying along.
“Oh sorry-“
She smiled at him before turning away, a dark ringlet that had escaped her ribboned hat bobbing with her footsteps. He admired her retreating figure before she was lost in a crowd of long skirts, hats and shawls.
He sighed. He saw her nearly every day, at least once a week, and that was the longest conversation they’d had yet. He was hopeless.
Putting her from his thoughts, he crossed the road and began heading to the bookshop. However he was soon intercepted by a boy who was covered in the grime the working class seemed unable to be rid of.
“Let me guess,” Philip said. “An update on the Kensington robbery?”
“That’s old news,” said the boy, “whoever’s done that is long gone.” He smiled, which showed one his missing front teeth. “There’s a murder at Hollylake Lane, stabbed right through the eye. Oh, and one of Sir Lannard’s piglets has been killed.”
“His piglet?”
“Yes sir, the cook told me. He wanted to keep it secret – it’s a prize-winner.”
“Did they not take it with them?”
“No, that’s the horrid thing. They left all that food to waste in the dirt, just cut its throat and left it.”
“That makes an awful lot of sense.”
“It does?”
“Potentially.”
Philip tossed the boy a shilling and hailed the nearest cab. As he sat in the rattling cabin, he reminded himself of the case.
*
Martha Gridley, a servant at Kensington, was found surrounded by blood in her mistress’s bedroom on Tuesday morning. The jewellery from the room had been taken and the girl herself had been badly beaten. The police deduced it was with a blunt weapon, such as a rock or plank of wood – because burglars often have those to hand.
She had a letter-opener from the desk and a poker from the fireplace in her hands, which she had used to fight the burglar - hence the blood - before he overpowered her.
“Before it overpowered her,” Philip corrected himself. “I can’t assign it a gender.”
The doctor whose name, Philip chewed his pipe as he thought, is Jenkins was immediately summoned. Her sister, Sally, who worked at that house on Tuesdays and Thursday, very admirably refused to neglect her work in the situation, after an initial check on her sister of course. The doctor proclaimed Martha beaten, but not in need of any treatment other than bed-rest, and that was that.
Unfortunately the burglar was long gone, without leaving a single clue. Not even a footprint or some cigarette ash to work with. The police were hoping would turn up in hospital or a ditch, given its injuries, but they weren’t lucky as that.
And the valuables, mostly jewellery, hadn’t turned up either. The house had been searched, Martha too, and nothing.
It was all a bit hopeless. Until this dead piglet turned up.
The cab stopped behind a fine blue carriage that looked freshly painted. It was waiting outside a large red house that was decorated with white balconies and green shutters. The flowerbeds were bursting with tulips.
Philip raised his fist to knock on the polished door when it was opened for him.
*
A woman was about to step out. She had sunny yellow hair, was dressed in pale creams and blues and greeted Philip as if she was happy to see him, though they had never met before.
“Why hello,” Lady Boucher said. “How lovely to meet you. I’m just out really, could you come by tomorrow?”
“It’s only quick,” said Philip. “Jenkins sent me to check up on Miss Gridley.”
“But she’s at home. I do hope nothing’s wrong?” She seemed genuinely concerned.
“Oh nothing to worry yourself over. It’s just the business was so ghastly, we want to check her over. It could have been much worse, why to think you could have been hurt too!”
“Yes, I suppose the danger was right on my doorstep.”
“You suppose?”
“Well, and I know it sounds ridiculous, but it just doesn’t seem very important. Martha is going to be fine and the things that were stolen can easily be replaced. The one thing I cared about, my mother’s locket, was left - thank goodness! It’s silver but I guess they didn’t want it because it is a little battered.”
“I’m glad to hear it and, though I’m aware you’re probably running late due to my intrusion-“
“Oh of course, I was leaving!”
“-I really do need Martha’s home address.”
“I’m sure Wilson can help you, I’m sorry but I really must go.”
“Of course.”
Philip watched the lady of the house dash into her carriage. He knew Wilson had heard her last sentence, he was the one holding open the door, and so was willing to wait until the man had fished out the information he needed. For some reason, butlers did not have a great like for him.
*
The next home Philip visited was decidedly different from the last. Crammed into a row of identical houses at the end of a dirty alleyway, it was grey and chipped, with some panes missing from the lone small window. It smelt horrid but, if he was honest, it was the smell of sickness and death that overpowered the decay of excrement.
It was a girl that greeted him, probably about nine. He couldn’t help but notice the large boots stood on the hearth.
“I’m looking for Martha Gridley,” he said. “I was sent by Mister Jenkins.”
“The doctor?”
“Out the way Sally, who is it?”
“He says he’s sent by Mister Jenkins.”
“And my orders were to ensure you got enough bed-rest,” said Philip, guessing the new girl’s identity from the bruises patterning her face.
Martha smiled bitterly. “There’s no time for bed-rest, far too much to do. Thank you.”
She made to shut him out so Philip quickly muttered.
“Like faking a robbery?”
“What did you say?”
Martha checked behind her and stepped outside, closing the door behind her.
“You know what I said. It was clever, the way you organised for your sister to be present to pass her the stolen goods before you could be examined too closely. And it must have taken some solid nerves to hit yourself against the fireplace like that, to make it look like you’d been beaten.”
“The burglar hit me.”
“The burglar that happened to leave a locket very sentimentally valuable to a lovely woman, and employer. I don’t believe that for a moment.”
Martha didn’t look like she believed it either.
“Why rob her in the first place though, if you’re not going to go all the way? I didn’t understand that before I came here, but now I do.” He thought about the boots, and the smell of the house. “Is it your father?”
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“Not long.”
“Then I won’t keep you.”
Philip touched his hat and left.
He walked through a pretty park in the area and sat heavily on the nearest bench.
The piglet had given it away; Martha needed its blood. The piglet was probably killed by her sister, who had Monday, Wednesday or Friday to carry out such a plan, maybe she even worked at the Lannard’s Household. The blood was an essential part of the plan, without it no number of bruises would make anyone believe her story. But it had made him wonder at the blood again, and how there were no footprints despite it being all around her. That could never happen in a genuine scuffle.
Philip leaned heavily on his cane. Another case solved. But now he was back to his original problems: boredom and women.
He looked up at the sky. He did have that murder to research, but it wasn’t late; in fact it was the perfect time for calling on a certain dark-haired lady with red lips. And he had just solved a case, a chance to look intelligent but not too intelligent.
“Cab!” he called. “To Hollylake Lane.”
He didn’t want the corpse to get cold.