Death in the Devil's Acre - Anne Perry [79]
“What about Bertie Astley?” she demanded.
“What about him? He owned a block of buildings in the Acre, a whole street. That’s where the Astley money comes from, their own private slum.”
“Oh, no!”
“Oh, yes! Perhaps he had a brothel as well, and he was removed by a rival.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Go back and look again, of course! What else?”
“Thomas, please be careful!” She stopped, unsure what more to say.
He knew the dangers, but the alternatives were worse: another murder; public outrage reaching hysteria; Athelstan, afraid for his position, putting more and more pressure on Pitt to arrest someone, anyone, to satisfy Parliament, the church, the patrons of the Acre and other whorehouses all over London. And then terror, fury, and guilt when there was yet another atrocity.
But, perhaps foremost in his own mind, he felt the need to solve this case himself, to solve it before Charlotte, unwinding some thread from Emily’s society connections, started to follow it from the other end and ran into something she could not handle. He had forbidden her to meddle not only because her life could be in great danger, but also because he must demonstrate that he did not need her help.
“Of course I shall be careful,” he said stiffly. “I’m not a fool!”
She gave him a sidelong look and held her tongue.
“And you stay at home and keep out of it!” he added. “You’ve plenty to attend to here without interfering where you can only get into trouble.”
Nevertheless, when he went into the Acre the next day, he took even more care than usual to dress inconspicuously, and to walk with that mixture of sureness of where he was going and the furtive, beaten air of someone whose journey is futile and who knows it.
The day was cold, with gloomy skies and a hard wind blowing up from the river. There was every excuse to pull his hat down and wind his muffler over the bare skin of his face. The sparse gaslights of the Acre glimmered in the murky morning air like lost moons in a sunken, crooked world.
Pitt had a good likeness of Pomeroy, and he intended to find out everything he could about the brothels that catered to customers who liked children. Somewhere in this cesspit he expected to find Pomeroy’s reason for being here, and he believed it had to do with a need the man could not or dared not satisfy in Seabrook Walk. Nothing else would have brought such a prim, almost obsessively meticulous creature into this world.
He had begun the day in Parkins’ office, gathering all the information the local police could give him about brothels that were known to employ children. He was even offered the names of snouts, and small personal secrets that might allow him to exert a little pressure to assure the truth.
But no one was prepared to say that he knew Pomeroy, or had ever catered to him.
By ten that night Pitt was cold, bone-aching tired; he intended to try one more house before going home. There was no point in lying about who he was this time; Ambrose Mercutt’s doorman knew him. It was his job to remember faces.
“Wotcher want?” he demanded angrily. “Yer can’t come ’ere nah, it’s business hours!”
“I’m on business!” Pitt snapped. “And I’m perfectly happy to come and go quietly, and not disturb your customers, if you’ll treat me civilly and answer a few questions.”
The man considered for a moment. He was long and lean and he had half an ear missing. He was dressed in a modishly cut jacket, with a silk kerchief tied around his throat. “Wot’s it worth to yer?” he asked.
“Nothing,” Pitt said immediately. “But I’ll tell you what it’s worth to you: continued employment and a nice pretty neck—no ugly rope burns! Can ruin a man’s future, a hemp collar.”
The man snorted. “I ain’t murdered no one. Duffed up a few wot didn’t know w’en they’d ’ad their money’s worth.” He tittered, showing his long teeth. “But they ain’t makin’ no complaints. Gentlemen as comes to these parts never do! And there ain’t nothin’ you can do, rozzer, as’ll make ’em. Rather the than lay a complaint