The Silent Cry - Anne Perry [75]
Shotts bit his lip. “Nobody wants ter ’ave seen ’em,” he said candidly.
“What about women?” Evan went on. “If they were here for women, someone must know them.”
“Not for sure,” Shotts argued. “Quick fumble in an alley or a doorway. ’Oo cares about faces?”
Evan shivered. It was bitterly cold, and he felt the chill eating inside him as well as numbing his face, his hands and his feet. It was beginning to rain again, and the broken eaves were dripping steadily. The gutters overflowed.
“Would have thought women would be careful about familiarity in the street these days. I hear there have been several bad rapes of dolly mops and amateur prostitutes lately,” Evan remarked.
“Yeah,” Shotts said with a frown. “I ’eard that too. But it’s over Seven Dials way, not ’ere.”
“Who did you hear it from?” Evan asked.
There was a moment’s silence.
“What?”
“Who did you hear it from?” Evan repeated.
“Oh … runnin’ patterer,” Shotts said casually. “One of ’is stories. I know some o’ them tales is ’alf nonsense, but I reckoned as there was a grain o’ truth in it.”
“Yes …” Evan agreed. “Unfortunately, there is. Is that all you found?”
“Yeah. Least about the father. Got a few likely visits o’ the son, women ’oo think they ’ad ’im. But none’s fer sure. They don’t take no notice o’ faces, even if they see ’em. ’Ow many young men d’yer suppose there are ’oo are tall, a bit on the thin side, an’ wi’ dark ’air?”
“Not so many who come from Ebury Street to take their pleasures in St. Giles,” Evan answered dryly.
Shotts did not say anything further. Together they trudged from one wretched bawdy house to another with the pictures, asking questions, pressing, wheedling, sometimes threatening. Evan learned a considerable respect for Shotts’s skills. He seemed to know instinctively how to treat each person in order to obtain the most cooperation. And he knew surprisingly many people, some with what looked like a quite genuine camaraderie. A few jokes were exchanged. He asked after children by name and was answered as if his concern were believed.
“I hadn’t realized you knew the area so well,” Evan mentioned as they stopped and bought pies from a peddler on the corner of a main thoroughfare. The pies were hot and pungent with onions. As long as he did not think too hard as to what the other contents might be, they were most enjoyable. They provided a little highly welcome warmth inside as the day became even colder and the fine rain turned to sleet.
“Me job,” Shotts replied, biting into the pasty and not looking at Evan. “Couldn’t do it proper if I din’ know the streets an’ the people.”
He seemed reluctant to talk about it; possibly he was unused to praise and his modesty made him uncomfortable. Evan did not pursue it.
They continued on their fruitless quest. Everything was negative or uncertain. No one recognized Leighton Duff, they were all adamant in that, but half a dozen thought perhaps they had seen Rhys, then again perhaps not. No one mentioned the violence in Seven Dials. It could have been another world.
They also tried the regular street peddlers, beggars—the occasional pawnbroker or innkeeper. Two beggars had seen someone answering Rhys’s description on half a dozen occasions, they thought … possibly.
It was the running patterer, a thin, light-boned man with straggly black hair and wide blue eyes, who gave the answer which most surprised and disturbed Evan. When he had been shown the pictures, he was quite certain he had seen Leighton Duff once before, on the very outskirts of St. Giles, alone and apparently looking for someone, but he had not spoken to him. He had seen him talking to a woman he knew to be a prostitute. He appeared to be asking her something, and when she had denied it, he had walked away and left her. The patterer was certain of it. He answered without a moment’s hesitation and looked for no reward. He was also certain he had seen Rhys on several occasions.
“How do you know it was this man?” Evan said doubtfully,