Page 3 of Death of a Courtesan
‘Thank you, sir.’ Peterson opened the doors and stood back to allow Riley and Salter to precede him through them. ‘There have been a fair few gawpers, even in this weather. Lord knows how word got out.’
‘Protesters?’ Riley asked, thinking it too good an opportunity for the Temperance Society to ignore.
‘Not that I noticed. The weather must have kept even that lot indoors.’
‘The grapevine seems to be in excellent working order,’ Salter said. ‘The ghouls are here and we haven’t even looked at the body yet.’ He nodded to a cluster of people standing across the street, huddled beneath umbrellas.
‘News like this won’t ever stay quiet,’ Riley said. ‘No newspaper men sniffing around, I trust?’ he added, turning to Peterson for clarification.
‘Not so far as I am aware, sir.’
‘Long may it last,’ Riley muttered, more in hope than expectation.
They stepped into a small ante-room with a desk on one side and what appeared to be a cloakroom the other. The desk, Riley knew, would be manned by a porter-cum-bodyguard, to whom customers would be required to give their names, always supposing the porter didn’t recognise them.
Peterson opened the door onto a long and narrow reception room which had probably originally been the entrance vestibule. Their footsteps echoed on the marble floor as Riley took in his surroundings. A galleried landing accessed by a wide, sweeping staircase spanned three sides of the hall—a voyeur’s paradise. There were ornate chandeliers at either end of the room and more discreet lamps lining the walls at regular intervals. The space was lavishly and expensively furnished with chaise-lounges dotted about. Extravagant floral arrangements gave off an intoxicating aroma. A credenza bearing crystal glasses and a variety of decanters sat against one wall. A small doorway led from the far end of the room to the back of the house probably giving access to the kitchens, enabling servants to preserve the clientele’s stamina by keeping them fed and watered.
The space could be mistaken for a drawing room in a superior household, Riley thought, but for the fact that the walls were adorned with thick red embossed paper and a series of salacious yet oddly tasteful sketches of females in various states of undress. Upon closer inspection, some of the smaller paintings proved to depict couples in positions that would be physically impossible to replicate. The crimson paper ended at ceiling level with a cornice of erotic engravings. There were several alcoves partially hidden from view with full length mirrors on three sides of the chaises that occupied them. Marble statues of artistically posed couples featured, as did pillars that probably served as more than decorative supports. Privacy, Riley suspected, was not a necessary requisite for the denizens of this particular establishment. They were exhibitionists, and the girls employed to entertain them were not too particular about where those entertainments took place, or who watched them.
‘Blimey,’ Salter said, scratching his head.
‘Where is everyone?’ Riley asked, turning towards Peterson for clarification.
‘All the occupants of the house are together in the salon,’ Peterson replied, pointing towards a closed door. ‘I told Harper to stay in there with ’em and make a note of anything they say, like.’
‘Good thinking, Peterson. I will talk to them in a moment. But first, I’d best see the body.’
‘This way, sir. We checked to make sure she’s dead.’ Peterson shuddered ‘Not much doubt about that, but I thought it best to follow procedures. Then we locked the door, made everyone else go downstairs and waited for you to get here.’
‘You did well,’ Riley replied, nodding his approval. ‘I take it there were no gentlemen on the premises, given that the body was found this morning.’
‘No, sir. Only the man what lives here. He seems to perform the duties of butler and guard combined.’ Riley nodded. ‘This is it, sir.’
Peterson stopped in front of the door in the centre of the first floor, clearly one of the principal rooms. Riley took a quick stock of his surroundings. They were now standing on the galleried landing, looking down on the salon below. There were five similar doors leading off from the landing, implying that up to six ladies worked from individual rooms at any one time. Whether they were the same ladies who took care of the communal entertainments below Riley had yet to establish. A further, far less pretentious staircase led to the third floor. That presumably was where the ladies lived and slept, and where Mrs Sinclair had her private quarters.
Peterson removed the key from his pocket, opened the door to the room containing the murdered girl and stood back.
‘Thank you, Peterson. Have photographs been taken?’
‘Yes, sir. The police photographer had to go on elsewhere but he was finished here so I said it would be all right.’
‘It was. Go back to your post downstairs and show the doctor up as soon as he arrives.’
‘Yes, sir.’
The metallic smell of blood assailed Riley’s nostrils even before he took in the tragic figure, semi-clad, lying in the centre of the bed, her throat slit neatly from ear to ear. Drying blood was everywhere. Pooled on the bed, running down the sheets to the rugs on the floor, splashed up the walls. A vicious crime committed in anger or for revenge, were Riley’s initial thoughts. He held a handkerchief to his nose, regretting that the pouring rain excluded the possibility of opening a window. He pulled aside the partially closed curtains, revealing a long garden, neatly maintained and dominated by a statue appropriately depicting Aphrodite. He pulled the top sash window down an inch and felt immediate relief.
He then forced himself to examine the body with a clinical eye, lamenting the waste of such a young life. The girl couldn’t have been more than twenty, and was breathtakingly beautiful even in death. A glorious cascade of golden hair was spread beneath her, some of it stained with her own blood. Her complexion was flawless and her eyes stared lifelessly upwards—cerulean blue clouded by the mask of death.
‘Such a waste,’ Riley said, articulating his thoughts with a sad little shake of his head. ‘What are your initial observations, Salter?’
‘Rigor mortis has set in, sir,’ he said, pointing to the girl’s fingers, clenched into rigid claws. ‘So she must have died late last night or early this morning.’
Riley nodded. ‘Anything else?’
Salter prowled around the bed, avoiding the blood that had spilled onto the rug. ‘A couple of her fingernails are broken, but all the others are well manicured.’ He gazed thoughtfully at Riley. ‘She tried to fight off her attacker. There are defensive scratches on her forearms.’
‘Very good.’ Riley glanced at the neatly lined floggers, canes and whips situated in a cupboard in one corner of the room, the door to which was flung wide, and let out a soft whistle. ‘Of course, she could have acquired those wounds during the course of her professional activities.’
