Except the Dying

“Arthur,” she protested, “use your handkerchief. Where were you brought up?”

Murdoch grinned. “I’m tempted to make up a few of those myself.”

“You should. Good for you. I tell you I can feel the difference. In two days.”

The cheery tone sounded false, not quite masking the underlying desperation. Arthur Kitchen had lived for a long time now with ever increasing debility and the certainty of a painful death. Murdoch fervently hoped this new treatment would work.

As usual they were sitting underneath their quilts and he was relating the events of the day. Beatrice had lit the fire for his benefit but he’d insisted on leaving the window open as Arthur’s fever was high tonight.

Beatrice sat down again. She had begun to decorate another box and the smell of glue and lacquer was thick and sweet in the air.

“What’s that you’re doing, Mrs. K.?”

She daubed some black lacquer onto one of her shells and surveyed it critically. “Mrs. Lewis said there was a call for mourning boxes, so I’m doing a black one for her. I’ll see if this works. The lacquer doesn’t stick too well … Go on, Mr. Murdoch.”

“Not much more to say, really. Nobody seems to have known the man Alice left the hotel with.” He pulled up the sleeve of his cardigan to demonstrate. “He has a tattoo around his wrist and forearm. A snake. Not hard to recognize, but every last man of them says they never saw him before.”

“They that put their hands in evil will perish by evil.” Beatrice’s metaphor was a little confused, but her expression wasn’t. Murdoch drank some more tea. He knew how kindhearted a woman Mrs. K. actually was, but when it came to certain kinds of immorality she knew no compromise. She hadn’t evinced any pity for Alice Black.

“We also questioned everybody within a mile radius of the beach, but same story. Nobody saw anything.”

“Are they to be believed?” asked Arthur.

Murdoch nodded. “I’d say yes. Her friend, Ettie, swears Alice didn’t know anybody in that neighbourhood and had never been there. It’s more likely she was taken to the beach in a carriage. Her jacket was partially unbuttoned and Ettie says she was wearing a shawl, but that’s nowhere to be found and neither are her boots.”

Murdoch stared into the fire. The dancing flames were making no headway against the cold coming in from the window, but they were soothing to watch. Tomorrow he was going to go to the Rhodeses’ house and show them the rosary. There’d been too much to do today.

“How was himself?” asked Arthur.

“A real Cossack. He kept going on about shirking. I wanted to tell him to feel my frozen feet.”