Pentecost Alley - Anne Perry [98]
“Gives me a bad name,” George wheezed sententiously. “Bit o’ discipline is all very well. Necessary, or you’d be walked all over. Can’t ’ave that. Girls’d be cheatin’ you left and right. But stranglin’ is overdoin’ it. Brings people like you around, an’ that’s all very nasty.” He coughed and his vast chest rumbled with congestion. The room was hot, the high windows all closed, giving it a musty air in spite of its cool colors, gracious lines and at least half a dozen potted palms placed here and there.
“So why didn’t Costigan discipline her?” Pitt asked, eyebrows raised. “Killing her would seem to defeat his own purpose. Only a fool destroys his own livestock.”
George made a gesture of distaste. “Oh, very crudely put, Mr. Pitt, very crude indeed.”
“It’s a crude trade, George. What makes you think this Costigan even knew Ada was sneaking up west occasionally and then keeping her earnings?”
Fat George shrugged, and his ripples of fat shook all down his body. “Maybe he followed her? Natural thing to do.”
“If he was following her,” Pitt reasoned, “he’d have known the first time she left Whitechapel, which was several weeks ago.”
Fat George rolled his eyes. “How do I know?”
“Maybe someone told him?” Pitt suggested, watching George’s face.
There was a very slight flicker, a tightening of the sallow skin, enough for Pitt.
“You told him, didn’t you, George.” It was not a question but a statement. “She was on your patch, but refusing to pay you either, so rather than let Wee Georgie at her, and risk unpleasantness for yourself, you told her own pimp and let him deal with it. Only he went too far. Not your fault, of course,” he finished scathingly. “When did you tell him?”
The room was becoming suffocating, like a jungle.
George raised colorless eyebrows. “The day she were killed, but I’m hardly to blame, Mr. Pitt. Your tone in’t polite. In fact, most unjust. You’re an unjust man, Mr. Pitt, and that isn’t right. Expect the police to be just. If justice itself don’t …”
Pitt stood up and shot him a look of such contempt Fat George left the rest of his complaint unfinished.
“Costigan a trouble to you, was he?” Pitt said bitterly. “A threat?”
“Hardly!” Fat George tried to laugh, broke into a wheeze, and ended coughing again, his massive chest heaving as he fought for breath.
Pitt had no sympathy for him at all. He turned on his heel and walked out, leaving George purple in the face, gasping for air, and furious.
Pitt took Constable Binns with him when he went to see Albert Costigan later that afternoon. He knew the area and found him without difficulty in the rooms he rented in Plumbers Row, just the other side of the Whitechapel Road from Pentecost Alley. It was narrow and gray on the outside, like all the other tenements, but inside was well furnished, even comfortable. Costigan liked to do nicely for himself, and his expensive tastes showed in the small extras: engraved glass gas mantels, a new carpet, a very nice oak gate-legged table.
Costigan himself was of average height, with large, pale blue eyes, good nose and white teeth. His brown hair was brushed back in waves from his brow. At a glance, before one noticed the defensive, aggrieved expression in his face, the aggressive angle of his body, he was not unlike Finlay FitzJames. Had chance given him the same wealth and self-confidence, the education of manner, they could have passed for cousins.
Pitt had no evidence against Costigan, except Fat George’s words, which were worth nothing as testimony. What was the oath of one pimp against the oath of another? And even a search of Costigan’s rooms would be unlikely to reveal anything of use. It would be natural enough for him to have Ada’s possessions, and very easily explained.
“Yer still lookin’ fer ’oo killed poor Ada?” Costigan said accusingly. “Yer got nothing, ’ave yer?” His contempt was quite open.
“Well, I’ve got some ideas,” Pitt answered, sitting down on the largest and most comfortable armchair and leaving Binns standing by the