The Unseeing Read online

  Edmund wondered whether Sarah could really have lived here in this house and not known. To him, the air seemed filled with death, but how much of that was from what he knew, from what he had heard and read?

  Mrs. Andrews left Edmund standing in the front garden staring back at the house, thinking. It was a fairly long strip of garden overlooked by several other houses. If Greenacre had, as he claimed, left the house and returned to it by the front door late in the evening, surely someone would have seen him.

  As Edmund left, he had the distinct feeling of being watched. Looking across the street, he saw the flash of a face in the shadow, a dark blank oval, and then heard feet running.

  “Who’s there?” he shouted, briefly afraid.

  But it was, he realized, only a child’s footsteps.

  • • •

  Mr. Price was a tall, murderous-looking individual, dressed entirely in black, which accentuated the pallor of his long face. Occasionally, his tongue would flick out and run along his upper lip as though he were tasting the air.

  “I did what I could, but the jury were swayed by Adolphus’ rhetoric. Now, there is an advocate.” He took a bite out of a mutton chop.

  They were dining in the Angel on Coldharbour Lane, the public house where Hannah Brown had planned to have her wedding breakfast. Price himself had chosen the location, apparently finding the notion amusing. The taproom in which they sat was crowded with Windsor chairs and decorated with a curious assortment of brass trinkets and ugly Toby jugs. Tobacco smoke hung thick in the beery air.

  “And of course juries aren’t keen on men cutting women up. In fact, they disapprove of it strongly. So I knew the odds were stacked against them from the beginning.”

  “Then why did you take the case on?” Edmund asked, looking unenthusiastically at his own meal: rump steak with oyster sauce.

  “Because James asked me to. I’d acted for him before, you know, on business matters.”

  “You’re not a criminal lawyer?”

  “Oh, I dabble, I dabble.”

  Edmund clenched his jaw. This was hardly the sort of case in which a lawyer should “dabble.” Two people’s lives were at stake.

  “And he was having some difficulty finding anyone else who would act for him,” Price continued. “It wasn’t exactly an attractive brief. After all, how does one defend a man who has admitted to cutting up a woman and dumping her body parts all over London?” He smacked his lips, which were covered in meat fat.

  Edmund pushed his food around his plate. “You claimed at the trial that Greenacre had returned to the house to find Hannah Brown dead and decided for some reason to dispose of the body.”

  “Yes. James’s evidence was that he was gone from the house for an hour or two and returned to find her sprawled across the floor.”

  “Who, then, do you say killed her?”

  “If you recall, I said that she’d probably fallen from a chair and hit her head.”

  “Oh, come now. You know that’s not what happened. How do you explain the specific injury to the eye?”

  “I’m not a detective, Mr. Fleetwood, I merely put forward an argument.”

  “Because that’s what your client told you to say.”

  “Of course.”

  “But you didn’t believe it yourself.”

  Price said nothing.

  “How,” Edmund asked, “could you have put forward a defense you knew to be false?”

  “Mr. Fleetwood, you’re a lawyer. Do you always believe the views you advance on behalf of others?”

  “I would never put forward an argument I believed to be a lie.”

  “Ah, well, maybe that is why your name is not better known, Mr. Fleetwood!” Price laughed. “But in fact, I have no idea what happened. Even if James did kill the woman, it may well have been an accident.”

  “The neighbors heard them fighting, didn’t they?”

  “The neighbors thought they had heard someone fighting. They couldn’t say for sure that it was James and Hannah.”

  “But they’d heard them fighting before.”

  “So they said. Hannah Brown was a rash and headstrong one, apparently. Flew into a furious temper at the slightest thing.”

  “Yes, so you claimed at trial. As I recall, you made various attempts to undermine the victim.”

  “I did, yes, but it didn’t work. All of our efforts to discredit Hannah Brown failed. Contrary to James’s claim that she was drunk, no alcohol was found in her stomach contents.”

  Edmund put down his cutlery. “He claimed she’d deceived him as to her property, didn’t he? What exactly did he say she’d done?”

  “She told him she had considerable portable property. I forget how much. It was on that basis that James made the offer of marriage. However, he then found out that she’d been trying to buy certain items in his name at a shop in Long Acre. He was, let us say, displeased.”

  “Evidently. And how did Greenacre find out about her deceit?”

  Price shrugged. “I’m not sure I ever discussed that with him. There were more pressing matters.”

  “Yes.” Edmund looked at Price’s bony face, his pale slender fingers. “You made a long speech about Greenacre but said very little on Miss Gale’s behalf. Why was that?”

  “To be honest, I wasn’t particularly worried about her. She has a young child, it was her first offense, and there was no hard evidence that she knew of the crime. It never occurred to me that they might hang her for it. Women are never hanged these days.” He took a gulp of wine.

  “Well, evidently you should have been more concerned.” Edmund spoke levelly but he was furious. “She has now been condemned to death.”

  Price sighed. “Yes, well, it’s always easier to see things after they’ve occurred.”

  “Did you not see it as a conflict, acting for both Greenacre and Gale?”

  “No, not really. Their versions of events were very similar.”

  “Almost identical, in fact,” said Edmund. “Didn’t that make you suspicious? Arguably it was a sign that Greenacre was telling Miss Gale what to say.”

  Price picked up another chop. “It’s not for me to second-guess what my clients tell me.”

  “It is if you think they’re being coerced.”

  Price bit into his chop. “That is not what I thought.”

  “Why did you not press Miss Gale to make a full statement? Her statement for the trial was extremely short.”

  After a pause, Price said, “In the circumstances, I considered it best that she said as little as possible.”

  “What circumstances were those?”

  Price inspected his knife. “There’s only so much we can do for certain clients.”

  “Clients who won’t give you instructions?”

  Price curved his mouth into a smile. “Clients whom we believe to be guilty.”

  For a while, Edmund did not speak. A gale of drunken laughter came from a group of men and women who sat at a large table in the center of the room swigging beer from pewter pots.

  Eventually, he said, “Why did you think that, Mr. Price?”

  “Oh, just an instinctive feeling.”

  “So she never actually said or did anything to indicate she had helped to conceal the murder?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Did you press her?”

  “Mr. Fleetwood, if she’d confessed I wouldn’t have been able to act for her any longer.”

  No, thought Edmund. And then you would not have been paid.

  “This ‘feeling’ of yours, then,” he said coldly. “On what exactly was it based?”

  Price put up his hand to call over the waiting boy. “All that discussion about blood-drenched floors and dismembered limbs and she never once raised an eyebrow. She was a cold one. Unfeminine. If I ever met a woman capable
of covering up such a horrible business, it was her.”

  11

  “The noble science, as fox-hunting is called by its votaries, is, by common consent, allowed to be the perfection of hunting. The animal hunted is just fast enough for the purpose, and is also full of all kinds of devices for misleading his pursuers.”

  —Manual of British Rural Sports, John Henry Walsh, 1856

  “No touching, Gale!”

  Sarah had instinctively stretched one of her hands through the iron bars toward George. After so many weeks of longing to see him, to feel him, she could not quite believe that her son was standing before her, fidgeting. She had forgotten how small and vulnerable he was—his little sparrow neck, his narrow shoulders. They were in the family visitors’ room, one side of which was railed off into a large roofed cage, fenced with wirework, through which the prisoner could talk to her visitors for a short time. Having grown used to the muted colors and sounds of Newgate, Sarah was startled by the sight of so many ordinary people: men, women, children; the reds and pinks and greens of their clothing; the smells of smoke and horses and the outdoors that they brought with them; shouts, laughter, a baby’s cry. Amid all of this walked Miss Sowerton, surveying each person in turn to ensure that nothing was passed between convict and visitor save for words.

  “Look at you,” Sarah said to George. “As smart as sixpence.”

  He was dressed in his best clothes and, as she watched, he pulled at his collar and scratched at his stockings. It was the first time Sarah had seen him since she was arrested and it was a terrible effort to appear composed.

  “Are you being a good boy for Rosina?”

  He looked for affirmation to his aunt, who stood beside him. She smiled. “Always.”

  Rosina wore a straw bonnet and a blue print dress with a woolen shawl. Her face, Sarah noticed, was thinner and more drawn than before: a mirror of her own.

  “You’re learning your letters?” Sarah asked George.

  “And his numbers, aren’t you, poppet? He’s clever—like his ma.”

  George refused to look at his mother. Could he be turning against her? Maybe he had heard the stories and believed them. Or maybe he was simply punishing her for her absence. He had done the same after those nights she stayed out walking the streets looking for custom, leaving him locked in their room with a rushlight and a cup of milk. Then, as now, she had been unable to fully explain—that she did what she did for him. His behavior was probably a normal reaction in a young child, but it stung like vinegar on a cut. She wanted so much to hug her son—to wrap her own body around his like a protective cage—but she could not even touch him.

  “I came to the prison the day after your arrest,” Rosina said, “but they wouldn’t let me through the lodge. They wouldn’t so much as pass a message to you. That cat…” She glanced toward Miss Sowerton. “She refused even to tell you that I’d tried to see you.”

  “It’s part of my punishment,” Sarah said. “To be cut off not only from the other convicts but from my own family. I wasn’t sure I’d get to see you at all.”

  “You know it was the lawyer who arranged this? Mr. Fleetwood.” She raised her eyebrows. “Is he…?”

  They looked at one another in silence for a few seconds.

  “Well. Do you think he believes you?”

  Sarah chewed her lip. “I don’t know. I really don’t know.”

  “He arranged for us to meet. He must be on your side.”

  Sarah pursed her lips. “Oh, I’m not sure about that. I wouldn’t assume anything.”

  Her sister’s shoulders sagged. “Then you must tell him,” she said.

  Sarah shook her head. Not here. Not now.

  She stared at George, trying to drink him in: his smooth milk-white skin; his dark blond hair, fine like goose feathers. Eventually, he looked up at her. She smiled at him. Her boy.

  But, almost immediately, her burst of joy gave way to anxiety.

  “Have you noticed anyone near the house?” she asked Rosina quietly. “Anything out of the ordinary?”

  Rosina shook her head. “I promise you, I’m being very careful. You must stop worrying.”

  They stood in silence for a while, listening to the people around them chattering, bickering, crying. There was so much they needed to discuss but it was impossible to do so here.

  “I lost my situation,” Rosina said eventually.

  “Oh, Rosina, I’m so sorry.”

  She shrugged. “I didn’t much like it at that house in any event. They treated me little better than a servant.”

  “But what will you do? Did they give you a character?”

  “Of sorts, yes.”

  “They don’t know?”

  “No, they’ve no idea you’re my sister. Only that I needed to take care of my nephew, which is the reason I gave for needing to live out. I told them you were ill.”

  Which in a way I am, Sarah thought.

  “You must be nearly out of money.”

  “I have a little kept by,” Rosina said. “From selling…” She trailed off.

  “Yes, but that won’t last long.” Sarah frowned. “There’s a lady helping me,” she said after a moment. “Miss Pike. She thinks me good, or at least savable. I’ll see if her Society can get you some money for food and clothes.”

  “That reminds me.” From beneath her shawl, Rosina removed a small parcel. “It’s just a few things to eat,” she whispered. “You look half-starved, Sarah.” However, as she made to pass it through the bars, Miss Sowerton—perhaps noticing her movement—began to walk in their direction and Rosina hid the parcel again beneath her shawl.

  Rosina breathed out, frustrated. “What about him?” she said. “Can’t he help us? He owes you well enough.”

  “He has helped, in his own way. That’s why all this has happened.”

  “But does he know—”

  Sarah shook her head again. “Hush! There are eyes and ears everywhere in this place.”

  The bell rang out, marking the end of visiting time, and Miss Sowerton walked toward the exit. All around began the sounds of farewells, tears, and recriminations. Sarah kissed her own hand and transferred the kiss to George, feeling the smooth curve of his cheek.

  Rosina stepped forward so that her face was touching the bars of the cage. “Sarah,” she whispered, “you must act now, before it’s too late. This is madness!”

  Sarah looked about her to check no one was watching them, and then moved closer to her sister: “And then what?” She grabbed Rosina’s hand. “I know what I’m doing. I promise you.”

  Rosina’s eyes shone with tears. She squeezed Sarah’s hand and released it. Then they were gone.

  • • •

  As Sarah walked back along the corridor to her cell she heard footsteps close behind her and felt the shiver of breath on her neck.

  “Just like you, ain’t she, your little sister? Only unspoiled.”

  It was Rook, her speech fast, her breath, as before, tinged with liquor. Where was she getting the drink from, Sarah wondered. Who was helping her?

  “Maybe I’ll pay ’er a visit when I get out,” Rook said, when she did not respond. “Hart Street, ain’t it?”

  Sarah snapped her head round to look at Rook. Who was this woman? What did she want? What did she know? But Rook had pulled back and now gazed at the floor.

  Miss Sowerton caught Sarah’s movement. “Head in front, Gale. Get to your cell.”

  • • •

  That night the chilly hush of the prison was broken by the sobbing of another woman. It penetrated through the wall into Sarah’s cell: a miserable choking interspersed with cries like those of a wounded animal.

  For a long time, Sarah lay awake, her stomach twisting with hunger and anxiety, listening to the sound of the other woman’s anguish. Although she tried to push the thoughts
from her mind, memories came to her of those nights when she had lain in her childhood bed, weeping. Her cries, however, had been silent.

  “This will be our little secret,” her father had told her the first time he visited her room. And it still was.

  Sarah curled herself under her gray blanket, clutching her knees to her chest in the dense darkness of the cell, trying to put the memories from her mind.

  She did not know how long she had lain like this when she sensed a presence. She was not alone. The air had grown even colder. On the stool in the corner she thought she could make out a figure, although she knew it could not be possible. Had she fallen asleep? She could hear breathing, labored and thick.

  “Who’s there?” she whispered into the blackness.

  No answer, but still the heavy breath.

  “Who are you?”

  Sarah sat up in bed, keeping the blanket wrapped around her. She scrabbled for the tinderbox and, despite her shaking hands, managed to light the char cloth, the blaze of fire illuminating the room and throwing shadows bouncing off the walls. She saw a woman on the stool, facing the door. Even before the woman turned, Sarah knew who she was. She willed herself to look away as the face was lit up by the flame’s glow, one eye gone, the other shining bright. Before she could light a candle, the flame was extinguished and the room was swallowed in darkness. Once more, she was alone.

  • • •

  When Hinkley unlocked Sarah’s door the following morning, the vision was still with Sarah as an uneasiness in her stomach; a residue on her skin. She was, she realized, terrified of being left alone in her cell again.