Page 33 of A Case of Possession
“Yes, very virtuous, but you’re not in China.”
“Morality is different there?”
“You bloody know it is.” Crane saw Stephen blink. “And life is cheaper. Especially in the disreputable quarters of Shanghai. But if that spiteful little worm led you to believe that Tom Hart was some kind of criminal mastermind, or that he and I went around murdering willy-nilly, he’s a damned liar.”
“There I’ll agree with you,” Stephen said. “He reeked of malice. Dr. Almont was lethally dull, that man Shaycott managed to make a story about giant rats boring even under current circumstances, and on the whole, I cannot believe you made me put on a fancy suit for that experience.”
“It would have been more interesting if you were badly dressed?” Crane asked, striving for his usual tone.
“I’d have felt less like a silk purse in a pig’s ear,” Stephen retorted.
They bickered amicably back to Ratcliffe Highway, both forcing a lightness neither felt, and if that meant skating over blood and fear and the prospect of parting, Crane was happy with that, but the nauseated feeling in the pit of his stomach was still there when they parted in Oxford Street and he headed westwards to call on Leonora Hart.
Chapter Eleven
“I’m glad you came.” Leonora spoke in Shanghainese, locking the parlour door and putting the key on a side table. She looked drawn, older, obviously lacking sleep. “That bloody worm Rackham was supposed to call and collect five hundred from me today. He hasn’t turned up. I keep thinking he’s gone to Eadweard. You don’t think—”
“I’m sure he hasn’t,” Crane said. “Leo, what do you want me to do about him?”
“I don’t know. Could you not—well, couldn’t Merrick do something? What did he do to that horrible tax collector?”
“Broke both his arms and threw him into a high-sided hog pen.” Crane had no trouble remembering that incident. “And then stood there watching. I had to help him out in the end, I swear Merrick would have let the pigs eat him. It made the point, though, and we had no more trouble.”
“Are there any hog farms in London?” asked Leonora wistfully.
“There are doubtless alternatives. Is that what you want?”
“I don’t want to pay blood money for the rest of my life.” Leonora’s jaw firmed. “I will not let him keep me in fear, either. I don’t deserve that.” She paused, then added self-mockingly, “I just don’t know how to prevent it.”
“I wouldn’t worry,” said Crane. “The little shit’s dead.”
“He’swhat?” The shock on her face looked as genuine as any Crane had seen. She leapt out of her chair and took a few paces. “Oh God. Lucien, this isn’t Shanghai. You have to be careful. What happened? Why?”
“I have no idea. I went round to his rooms and found him dead.”
“Oh!” Leo put a hand to her mouth and let out a relieved sigh. “Oh, thank God. I thought you’d killed him.”
“I realise that. Thank you for your good opinion.”
“Well, really—” Leonora looked round sharply at a rustle from the walls. “My damned cousins. They do eavesdrop, the nosy bitches. Avoid names. So what happened to him? Did he overdo the opium?”
“No, he was murdered.” Crane saw Leo’s eyes widen. “Just not by me.”
“By whom, then?”
“Presumably someone else he was blackmailing.” Crane looked round in his turn at a rattling, scratching sound. “I don’t know about eavesdroppers but you definitely have mice.”
“How horrid,” said Leonora, who had once killed a cobra with her bare hands. “Are you serious, though? He’s dead? Oh God, that’s…wonderful. That’s marvellous! Thank heavens.”
“Thank a killer. It wasn’t terribly pretty, Leo.”
“Oh. No, I suppose not. Well, I’m sorry— No, I’m not. I can’t pretend to be. I think really we have to consider it something of a stroke of luck, don’t you? Eurgh.” Her noise of disgust was directed, not at Rackham’s demise, but at the wall. “Listen. The damned things are scuttling up and down all along the other side of the skirting board. How filthy. And I don’t even think it’s mice,” she added, with distaste. “It sounds more like rats.”
“Rats,” Crane repeated, and the hairs all over his neck and arms rose up in response to the wave of fear. He rubbed his thumb and finger together gently, as Stephen did, and felt—imagined? Felt?—a strange greasiness in the air.
“—because it really isn’t. Lucien, are you listening to me?”
“We have to go.” Crane turned his head, watching the walls. “Now. Out.”
