Sweet Revenge Read online

  “Does Torbel believe?”

  “He says no, but I think he knows what’s what.” The old man’s eyes sparkled. “Maybe he’s afraid, eh, lass?”

  “Of what? His mother?”

  “Nah. She’s dead more than twenty years now. Afraid of himself, of what his own mind could do, put to the test.”

  “But that’s…” She started to say “silly,” caught herself and changed it to “nothing to worry about, surely. If he had any clairvoyant ability, it would have manifested itself before now.”

  The sparkle deepened. “How do you know it ain’t?”

  How indeed? Instinct perhaps. Or maybe because, of the psychics she’d met through Prudie and mother, not one of them had possessed a scrap of ESP. They couldn’t even read tea leaves or tarot cards with any degree of success. Still, she wanted to hear anything about Torbel that Boots was willing to share.

  “Why did he leave Scotland Yard, Boots?”

  “Therein lies one of the great mysteries of our age,” a new but familiar voice put in. Sergeant Peacock touched his cap. “Good morning, Ms. Summers, Boots.” Victoria saw the old man slip the money she’d given him into his shirt. “So, you’re curious about Torbel, eh?” The sergeant smiled, a cordial, albeit less than open smile. “I’m afraid the only person who can answer questions of that sort is Torbel himself. And speaking of questions, I’m told he’s been asking several of his own this morning.”

  “About Lenny Street?” Victoria inquired from her knees. Boots, she noticed, had clammed right up. He was currently tucking his stash of smaller treasures into his shirt, away from Peacock’s keen eyes.

  “That and any strangers who might have been seen lurking about lately. Inspector Fox is, shall we say, less than impressed.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it isn’t Torbel’s province to interfere.”

  “You’re contradicting yourself, Sergeant. You sent me to Torbel—now you don’t want him to help me?”

  The sergeant clasped his hands behind his back, his military stance halfway between attention and at ease. “Lenny Street’s death falls under our jurisdiction,” he stated. “It has nothing to do with your problem.”

  “No? Then how do you explain his note?”

  “I don’t. First of all, it was written in his own handwriting.”

  “The original wasn’t.”

  “As far as we are aware, the note in Street’s possession at the time of death was the original.”

  “Then you’re unaware. Tell him, Boots.” Victoria turned to the old man.

  Boots shook his head. “Already told Inspector Fox. He said I was top and sent me on me way. Just like old Goggy, that one. But I’ll go with the sergeant to the station if he wants.”

  Sergeant Peacock nodded. “If we need you, we’ll send Clover to fetch you, Boots. Can I walk you to the Rag Man’s storehouse, Ms. Summers?”

  “No, thanks, I’m going to talk to Boots for a while longer.”

  “As you wish.” He dipped his head. “Watch out for pickpockets. This neighborhood remains infamous despite the best efforts of our department.”

  “Pompous prig,” Boots declared when he was gone. “Still, he’s better than Fox and all. Now, there’s a fitting name if ever I heard one. Cunning as any fox you’ll meet is our inspector. Not like how he looks, all polished and primped like a toff. Can’t trust the toffs, miss. They’re the trickiest of all.” His old eyes clouded. “Robbie knew that. Figured it out on his own, he did. Can’t trust a toff as far as you can throw them.” His gaze sharpened on hers. “Can’t trust a fox what owes his soul to a toff even more.”

  Chapter Nine

  “Inspector Fox is a crook!” Victoria declared. She looked around the storehouse. “Where’s Torbel?”

  Keiran pushed off from the desk where he’d been going through a pile of notes and grinned at her. “Out, and I know.”

  Victoria paused in the midst of extracting a file from her briefcase. It was 8:00 a.m. Wednesday morning, muggy, overcast and threatening rain. She’d been up half the night with a borrowed laptop computer, and for Keiran to tell her that he already knew what had taken her a great deal of time and even more luck to unearth was not what she wanted to hear. “How did you find out?”

  “We like to keep track of who’s pulling the strings at the local station. What did you dig up?”

  Was there any point to this? Victoria sighed. “Large gambling debts, mysteriously paid in the eleventh hour, then neatly glossed over as being part of an undercover investigation. Several assaults, buried in red tape and also glossed over. Several more alcohol-related charges, too cloudy to interpret properly.”

  “And all charges ultimately dismissed,” Keiran concluded. “Anything else?”

  “Three thefts.”

  “Really? We only know about two in Durham.”

  “There was a third in Manchester twenty-five years ago. He robbed a pub at closing time.” She flicked through the file. “The official report is sketchy, but in the end it was put down to an undercover preventive-measures investigation.”

  “Same as the first two.” Keiran shrugged a broad shoulder. “The powers that be said he was conducting an investigation into safety and awareness in the community. I say that’s a load of old cobblers. I’d also say that Fox has an angel on his shoulder.”

  “More like friends in high places,” Ron grumbled, passing through with a large box. “Torbel’s back if you want him,” he told Victoria. He didn’t look at her, though. And he wasn’t about to let her see what he was carrying in the box.

  “Whatever.” Keiran addressed Ron’s first remark. “Fox isn’t the only person with connections. Police, politicians, just plain rich people—you get off and get ahead a lot easier if you’ve got someone above you with the clout keeping you squeaky-clean while they’re pulling you up your chosen ladder.”

  Sliding the file back in her case, Victoria asked, “So who’s Fox’s ‘someone with clout’?”

  Keiran grinned. He really was a very handsome man, not classically so, but good-looking just the same. And not a fraction of the shadowy mystery that Torbel was, either, she’d bet.

  “Some say it’s the chief inspector himself. Others think there’s a royal connection.”

  “Sounds like Jack the Ripper.”

  “Not quite that bad, but he’s no paragon of virtue.”

  “Is he bad enough to have killed a man?”

  “If you mean Robbie, I wouldn’t have said so. Street, either, for that matter. Fox has never been overly bloodthirsty.”

  “Neither has Peacock,” Ron put in gruffly on his way back through the central area. “But he can kill. Spent a fair bit of time in the navy. Word is he could pick off the enemy at two hundreds yards in heavy fog.”

  “Stories like that tend to be exaggerated over time,” Keiran countered easily. “Morning, Torbel. Any luck?”

  “Not much.” Victoria caught the mocking edge in his voice when he added, “No forays to Bouverie Street today?”

  Of course, her cutoffs and oversize white T-shirt would give that away. “I thought it might be more productive to do some investigating on my own,” she retorted sweetly. God, he looked good today, freshly showered and in clean jeans, an off-white jersey and boots. His brown hair was all unruly curls; his eyes gleamed wickedly in the sullen morning light.

  The air felt sticky and close. Victoria sensed a thunderstorm approaching, but so far there’d been nothing. Hardly a puff of wind stirred the air. She smelled bread baking, oranges and soap—the latter no doubt from Torbel’s skin. She needed to get out of here quickly, she thought in mild desperation.

  “Victoria did a recce through Fox’s confidential files,” Keiran was saying. “It seems we missed a few details.”

  “We know how he cartwheeled over Peacock and others like him to get to the top spot,” Ron noted sourly.

  Victoria was uncomfortably aware of Torbel’s eyes on her as he returned, “Top spot down here is no coup.”<
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  She found her tongue. “That would depend on your background, Torbel. For someone like Fox, this might be considered quite a coup.”

  “Or a stepping stone to bigger and better things,” Keiran added.

  “Yes, and to hell with how many toes he has to step on to get there.” Victoria frowned. “I wonder if Sergeant Peacock resents being passed over for promotion in favor of Inspector Fox.”

  Torbel poured himself a cup of coffee from an urn on one of the cluttered tables and brought it steaming to his mouth. “I doubt if he’d be too happy about it, but he isn’t likely to drop Fox at two hundred yards in the fog out of spite, either.”

  Keiran chuckled. “You heard that, did you? You’re the one who wants suspects, Torbel. We’re just trying to provide a few viable ones.”

  Victoria’s mouth watered for the coffee she’d missed that morning. “Suspects for what?” she asked. “Robbie Hollyburn’s death, the poisoning of Lenny Street or the attack on Torbel and me?”

  “Take your pick,” Torbel said dryly. “Information’s hard to come by on any of them right now. No one’s seen or heard a thing as far as I can tell. Except Boots, and I haven’t bumped into him yet this morning.”

  Victoria’s spirits sank. If Torbel couldn’t eke out information down here, she doubted anyone could. Hopefully Boots wouldn’t turn out to be their only source. He might be a lovable old codger, but he was also caught up in Welsh-Irish magic and premonitory dreams.

  He’d told her things about the Rag Man, though, fascinating tidbits, which she’d promised to keep secret and would never have been able to worm out of Torbel. Not yet anyway. He was too private a man for that.

  He had a university education, but no major in criminology. What he knew of criminals and crime fighting, he’d picked up on the streets—mostly in London, but also apparently in Ireland and Wales as a child.

  Also his grandfather on his mother’s side was still alive. He lived in County Clare. His grandmother was dead, but she’d been Welsh-American, born and raised in New York City. It was, Victoria decided, a very small world.

  However, his reasons for leaving Scotland Yard were, as Sergeant Peacock suggested, one of life’s great mysteries. Boots had no idea. Neither did Tito, whom she’d quite literally bumped into later that afternoon.

  She hadn’t bumped into Zoe until this morning. Unfortunately, with all the information about Inspector Fox running through her head, she’d forgotten to ask about Torbel.

  “What about it, Victoria?” Torbel’s question broke into her thoughts.

  “I—” She searched for the thread of their conversation but found nothing. “I’m sorry,” she said truthfully. “I didn’t hear you.”

  Was it amusement that danced through Torbel’s eyes? He handed her a cup of coffee. “Here, this’ll wake you up. Do you know where Boots might be today?”

  “I’m not sure.” She sipped the coffee and shuddered. It tasted like hot turpentine. “He mentioned trying his luck at the pub. I think he meant Gooseberries.”

  Torbel gave Keiran a meaningful look.

  “Gooseberries it is,” Keiran agreed, heading for the door.

  The phone jangled and Ron answered it. “Yeah, he’s here,” he said at length. The distasteful expression on his face reminded Victoria of the look Prudie got when she ate turnip greens. “It’s Peacock.”

  Not especially interested, Victoria explored the storehouse work area while Torbel talked. Zoe’s poster of Sherlock Holmes in The Scarlet Claw brought a delicious chill to her skin. The ghostly apparition wandering the moor, like the hellhound of the Baskervilles, had turned out to be a fake—the local postman playing a role within a role and covered with phosphorous paint to make him glow.

  She didn’t believe in spooks or spirits or telepathy. Actually she wasn’t sure what she believed in these days. Even her career had lost its luster.

  From behind a painted screen, she slid Torbel a considering look. Was it possible…? No, she didn’t dare think that.

  Three people entered the storehouse but appeared not to notice her. They congregated in the corner farthest from Torbel. Ron joined them, let his eyes dart about, then, satisfied, began to draw something on a scrap of paper.

  “Here’s how we’ll get the necessaries in,” he said in a low voice. “Ivy, you handle the masks. Oswyn, you stand watch in the lane. The stuff we need is starting to arrive, so keep your eyes open. Lucky for us, Torbel’s wrapped up in this vendetta thing.”

  Ivy shook her head. “If he finds out about this, he’ll kill us.”

  Ron made a Scottish sound of dismissal. “Never. Torbel’s sharp but he’s preoccupied right now. Still, we have to keep our eyes and ears open. He spots one thing out of place, and we can kiss this whole caper goodbye…What was that?”

  It wasn’t Victoria; she hadn’t moved a muscle. But the sound had come from some place close by. Swinging her head around, she spied the source—Torbel’s little black cat, Smudge. She was walking across a stack of files like feline royalty.

  “Victoria!”

  Her heart stopped for a full three seconds. She spun as Torbel’s fingers gripped her arm. Just as forcefully, four pairs of eyes bored into her through the silk screen. The agents dispersed instantly, all but Ron, who came to glare at her, his fists clenching and unclenching.

  “Come on,” Torbel said, then he frowned. “What’s the matter, have you gone deaf? I said Peacock wants to meet us.”

  “What? Good—I mean, why?” She forced herself to turn her back on Ron. Surely he wouldn’t stab her in front of Torbel. “Does he know something?”

  “He says he does.”

  “About Street?”

  “Robbie Hollyburn.”

  “But what…? Never mind. Go on.”

  “That’s it. He wants us to meet him at the Totter’s Lane junkyard in half an hour.”

  “Should I come with you for protection?” Ron continued to glower at Victoria. The unreadable sideways look Torbel cast him had the Scotsman shrugging. “I guess not. You need me for anything, then?”

  “I want you and Oswyn to watch Judge Hollyburn’s place. Let me know who comes and goes.”

  “But I’ve got—”

  “Things to do?” Torbel countered levelly.

  Again Ron shrugged. “They can wait. Why doesn’t Peacock come here if he’s got news? Safer at the storehouse than at the Totter’s Lane Junkyard.”

  “Not so many ears to hear.” Torbel’s grim tone made Victoria’s blood run cold. Because it implied that the Rag Man’s agency was no more a haven than her Tower Bridge flat. And that being the case, where, in all of London’s notorious nooks and crannies, would she and Torbel be safe?

  Her answer took the form of a rhyme, the last two rhyming lines of the note that had crashed through the kitchen window Sunday night.

  To those who long have lived the lie,

  Time now for justice…Time to die!

  “GRANDFATHER?”

  Her subdued voice sounded like a bomb blast. Augustus fumbled with the files and papers he’d almost dropped on the floor. “What is it, girl?” he snapped, thrusting them quickly into his magazine rack.

  Clover entered the parlor on cat feet. She crossed to the fireplace and gave the coals a poke. “Nothing important. I saw Chivers climbing the stairs at six o’clock this morning carrying a letter. You didn’t come in for breakfast. I thought it might have been bad news.”

  “No.” He fought to control his voice. “Not bad news. Just a letter Chivers overlooked yesterday. He found it on the carpet inside the front door. I—” His shaggy brows came together in sudden suspicion. “What’s that you’re wearing, girl? Black? Why black?”

  She calmly fanned the embers of the fire, necessary for his old bones even in this heat. “I’m undercover today.”

  “As what?” he demanded, shuffling over to study her. He’d know for sure if he could see her face. Zoe’s eyes were different, not in color or size, but in something he couldn’t def
ine. He wouldn’t put it past her to sneak in here, bold as brass.

  Clover looked at him without hesitation, and he breathed a sigh of relief. Only for a moment, though, then the tension returned. Words bobbed and danced in his head like firecrackers. He didn’t want to analyze their meaning, didn’t want to know anything before the fact. How could he make that clear without seeming to disapprove or discourage?

  “I heard Inspector Fox is coming to dinner,” Clover said quietly.

  His head jerked back. “What of it?”

  “You needn’t bite my head off, Grandfather. I wondered if you needed me to be here.”

  “No.” He regarded her warily. “Why do you ask?”

  “I have…something to do.”

  Did he want to know what? A sharp twinge in his chest made the decision for him. “Whatever you wish.” He waved a dismissing hand. It amazed him that, after so many years of sharp pains and pills, he managed to go on living. Maybe it was his consuming hatred of the Rag Man. “Oli—The inspector wants to see me, not I him.” He seated himself carefully. “Dinner was simply the most expedient means to that end.”

  Clover rose, shifting her weight from foot to foot and fidgeting with her hands. He despised fidgeters. “You, uh, won’t talk about me at all, will you?” she asked haltingly.

  “Of course not. Why should we?” His eyes flashed in a spurt of anger. “If we discuss anyone, it’ll be that bastard Rag Man.”

  She finally stopped wringing her hands. “He’ll get his, Grandfather. We both know that.”

  “No, we don’t!” He stomped a slippered foot. “We don’t know anything, either of us. Do you hear me? We don’t know a thing. Say it. We don’t…”

  “We don’t know anything,” she said, obliging him in a perfectly reasonable tone. “But we hope.”

  Augustus opened his mouth to protest, then slowly closed it Hoping was acceptable. Yes, they could hope—no law broken by that. Hope, wish and even pray for the Rag Man to pay…

  Bloody hell! He turned away. Now he was doing it, making up ridiculous rhymes.

  He glanced at the magazine rack and the piece of white paper sticking out of it. His skin prickled. These particular rhymes weren’t ridiculous, and he knew it, whether he cared to acknowledge that unpleasant truth or not. Lenny Street was dead; that was a fact. But now there was this new threat that spoke of bangs and poison and other things he preferred not to recall.