The Mermaid in the Basement (39 page)

“Clive’s not a member of the peerage.”

“I know that, but the prosecutor will make it seem as though he is.

He’s the brother of a viscountess. That’s all people will need to know.”

“You’ll have to overcome that some way,” Serafina said.

Sir Leo looked at the copy of the journal, put his hand on it, and shook his head. “We need more than this. Find the man with the steel hook, get the name of the woman, and get her to testify. That’s the only sure hope that we have. And remember, we don’t have to prove who the murderer is—all we have to prove is that Clive is innocent.” He stared at the two and saw that they were filled with doubt. “I wish I could give you better tidings, but that’s the way it is.”

“I know you’ll be able to help Clive,” Serafina said, her face intent.

“You have the testimony of that man Simmons. That will count for a lot, won’t it, Leo?”

Sir Leo’s lips tightened, and he could not look Serafina in the eye. “I know this will come as a shock, Lady Trent, but we can’t use Simmons as a witness.”

Dylan and Serafina stared at Sir Leo.“But—why not?” Serafina whispered. The expression on Leo’s face alarmed her, and she felt fear rising in her breast.

Sir Leo lifted his eyes and said in a voice touched with compassion, “We can’t use him because he’s dead.”

TWENTY-ONE

S
erafina felt that she had been struck a hard blow in the pit of her stomach. She stared at Sir Leo, and her voice was thin and strained as she whispered, “Simmons is dead? That—that
can’t
be!”

“I’m afraid it is, Lady Trent,” Sir Leo said quietly. “You know that I’d been to see him twice to go over his testimony. He was living in a boardinghouse on Oak Street, across from a pub called The White Owl. I must confess that I got to like the fellow. He came from a good home, but he’d made some bad choices and become a criminal. I think he might have been redeemed, really I do! I had him persuaded to go back and make things right with his parents, and I really believe he would have done it.”

“But how did he die?” Dylan demanded. He saw that Serafina’s face had paled, and he was conscious of a sinking sensation. “What happened to him, Sir Leo?”

“A heart attack,” Sir Leo said, sadness in his tone. “I saw him three days ago, and he seemed fine. But when I went back to see him this morning, he was gone.”

“Did he have a history of heart trouble?” Serafina asked abruptly.

“No, but the doctor told me that a bad heart can go undetected for some time.” Leo leaned forward and said gently, “I’m sorry, Lady Trent.

It’s a blow for our case—and a tragedy for a young man who might have had a better life.”

For a time Leo and Dylan spoke of the death of Simmons and what it might mean to the case, but Serafina seemed totally overcome by the development. Finally she asked, “Will there be a funeral?”

“Why—yes, there will. I contacted the young man’s parents, and they were quite stricken. The Simmonses will pick up the body tomorrow. The funeral will be on Thursday at St.Andrew’s Church.”He looked at Serafina and said, “There’s no need for you to attend, Lady Trent. After all, you never met the man.”

Serafina rose and said hurriedly, “We must go, Sir Leo.” She moved toward the door, and Dylan hurried after her. Sir Leo watched them go, then shook his head sadly. “Too bad! Oh, too bad!”

Outside, Dylan said nothing but caught a glimpse of Serafina’s profile. Her mouth was drawn tightly into a line, and colour was beginning to come back to her cheeks. She stopped abruptly and said,“He was murdered, Dylan.”

“What? Simmons, you mean?”

“Yes. It’s all too convenient. The one witness who might identify the murderer and he dies five days before the trial.”

“You can’t know that!”

Serafina stared up at Dylan. “I will know it—if you will help me.”

Dylan was baffled but said, “Of course I will. You know that.”

“It might land you in jail.”

In her voice and in her expression was a determination that Dylan had never seen in her. “I’ve been there before, me.What about you?”

“I’ve never been in jail, but what I want to do could get us both there.”

“Tell me, then.What’s this plan that’s going to get us in jail?”

Serafina began to speak rapidly, her eyes locked with Dylan’s. Her breast swiftly rose and fell, and when she finished, she gasped and shook her head. “Well, will you do it, Dylan Tremayne?”

“Will I do it?” Dylan smiled. “Well, if the day ever comes when I won’t help a beautiful viscountess in a crazy scheme, you can look for me on the floor!”

Dylan drew the team to a halt and looked up at the sign over the pub. “The White Owl,” he murmured. He turned his head and studied Serafina, half expecting to see some hesitation in her eyes. But she was looking at the house across from the pub.

“That must be where he lived,” she said. She was calm, and Dylan thought about how she had directed their actions. She had insisted that they disguise themselves so that they would not be recognised. Dylan had decided to make them look like elderly people, and on the whole, he felt that he had done a good job. He wore a plain and worn snuff-brown shirt, with old shoes and a broad-brimmed hat to match. Serafina was dressed like a middle-class matron. Her dress was cotton, and its fullness diguised her youthful figure. Dylan had added some lines to her face and hidden her hair under a scarf. The shadows of the evening would also help conceal their true appearance.

“All right, Dylan, let’s do it.” Serafina started to leap down, but Dylan caught her arm. “Wait a minute, Mother,” he grinned. “Remember your age and your rheumatism.”He got down in a slow, lumbering movement as if he were in pain and then came to help her down. “Slow and easy, and let me do the talking.”

Serafina nodded, and the two made their way up the steps of the brownstone.He knocked on the door, and within three minutes, it opened, and a large woman in a blue dress studied them. “Yes, you want rooms?”

Dylan cupped his hand over his ear and said in a voice cracked and thin, “What’s that? Didn’t hear you.”

“Do you want a room?” the woman said, adding, “I’m Mrs.Williams.”

“No, we come about our kin, Mr. Simmons.”

The expression on the woman’s face changed. “Oh, right. Sorry. Did you want to see him?”

Dylan hunched his back and said loudly, “Oh no, we’ve come fer ’im.”

“Come for him?” Mrs.Williams was surprised. “Why, they’re coming for him in the morning.”

“We said we’d see to him, ma’am. Me and Mother want to do what we can fer him.”

Mrs.Williams was confused, but somehow Dylan persuaded her that they had to remove the body at once. “Why, you can’t move him. The two of you can’t carry him to that wagon.”

“Ain’t you mebby got some menfolks who could help? I’d be glad to pay, ma’am.”

“Oh, I don’t want money.”Mrs.Williams hesitated, then nodded.“I’ll get my husband and my two boys—and my son-in-law is stout.”

“We’d ’preciate it much,ma’am,”Dylan said. “Jist have ’em bring the poor feller to the wagon.”

No more than twenty minutes later, as the wagon turned down a side street, Serafina leaned back and gave a short laugh. “You are a convincing man, Dylan! They did just as you told them.”

Dylan slapped the lines on the team, and as they leapt into a gallop, he said, “Well, being a disreputable actor has some benefits, ay?” He turned to face Serafina and saw that she was alive and excited. “Where now, Lady Trent?”

“Take us home, Dylan.” She looked at the form of the dead man under the blanket and then looked forward, her mind working as she planned the rest of their plot.

Night had closed in, and a sliver of a moon threw pale light on Dylan and Serafina as the team pulled to an abrupt halt beside an outbuilding some distance from the darkened main house. It was after midnight, and all were asleep. “Is this it?” Dylan whispered.

“Yes, wait here.” Serafina stepped out of the wagon and moved toward the large door that broke the side of the brick structure. Fishing a key from her pocket, she inserted it and pushed the door open. Groping in the darkness, she found the gaslight, and light filled the room. Turning, she went to Dylan, who had gotten out of the wagon. “We’ll move him inside.”

Dylan rubbed his chin and gave a rather subdued glance at the dark form in the wagon bed. “I’ll do it,” he said. “Easier for one to handle a deadweight.”

“All right.”

Dylan moved to the rear of the wagon, grasped the feet of the corpse, and with one heave, lifted the body. Simmons had been a small man, and the weight was no trouble for Dylan. But the odor of the dead man caught in his throat. He moved quickly to the door and, stepping inside, gave a quick look around. It was not a large room, and was dominated by a metal table about three feet high in the centre of the room.

“Put him on the table.”

Dylan quickly moved to the metal table and carefully laid the body on it. He gave a convulsive shudder as Serafina removed the blanket. He had seen enough men maimed in battle to endure the sight of torn flesh, and certainly Jack Simmons was not damaged. Indeed, he had been dressed in a rather formal suit. He wore a pair of new patent leather shoes, and his shirt was glistening white.His hair was neatly combed, and his expression was peaceful.

“We need to take his clothes off,” Serafina said, her tone businesslike. She moved forward and began to undress the corpse, removing his tie first. “Dylan, sit him up while I take off his coat and shirt.” When Dylan was slow to follow her instructions, she gave him a surprised look.

“Well, come on—help me,” she said shortly.

Dylan obeyed, but as they stripped the clothing from the corpse, he felt repulsed. To him it seemed like some sort of violation of the dead man’s privacy, though he knew the notion was ridiculous.

After the coat and shirt were off, Serafina said, “Lay him down.”

Then she pulled Simmons’s trousers off, and as she began removing his underclothing, Dylan protested, “You’re not going to leave those on?”

“Certainly not!” Serafina stripped the clothing off expertly, and when the corpse lay without a stitch, she moved to get some instruments from a table. She pulled a white, full-length apron from a hanger, slipped into it, then came back and placed several instruments on a small table.Without a glance at Dylan, she picked up a scalpel and made a Y-shaped cut in the chest and stomach of the dead man. A muffled thud suddenly caught her attention, and she whirled and found Dylan on the floor. He lay on his back, his mouth open, and his skin a faint greenish colour. She checked to see if his head had been hurt, and when she discovered it had not, she turned back to the table. “Well, Mr. Dylan Tremayne, it seems you have a weakness after all.” Serafina smiled at the thought, then she began to work swiftly on Mr. Simmons.

“You’ll have to tie his cravat, Dylan. I don’t know how.”

Moving forward, Dylan did as he was told. His colour was still bad, but he finished the task and then stood back, refusing to look at Serafina. Minutes earlier, he had recovered consciousness, and after taking one look at what was happening to the body on the table, he had fled the room and vomited. Serafina came for him, and he had been forced to look at the neatly stitched Y-shaped pattern on Simmons but had said not a word as he helped Serafina dress him.