He nodded. “I’ve spent some time here. I saw the woman wot got herself murdered as well. She lived here.” He hooked a thumb over his shoulder at the tenement.
It could well be a lie.
“Do you know the tavern where she worked from time to time?”
A nod. “It’s not far, but there’s a handful between here and there.”
Clever young imp. And for a coin, he’d take me to the one where he knew she worked, rather than spend a good amount of time making inquiries at each one as the hour grew later.
“How much?” I inquired.
“A half-crown to tell ye which one.”
I had to admire the little thief’s initiative.
“I can well make the inquiries myself, and find the tavern myself,” I replied. “Sixpence and no more.”
He nodded. “Payment up front.”
I gave him two pence. “The rest after I speak with the tavernkeeper.”
There was a slow nod.
“It’s the Halfway House, half the way along the Close.”
He gave me a toothsome grin, and we set off up that steep cobbled pathway of the Close.
“Do ye talk to crows?” he asked as we climbed the pathway.
“Wot are ye nattering about, ye lout?” I asked as we passed a print shop and two abandoned and darkened entrances.
“There’s a saying about those who talk to crows, that they have a special power. They know things people dinna know. Sometimes, they know when someone is gonna die. Two crows means somethin’ else. I forget.”
I frowned. I had heard that as well. Old wives’ tales, I thought.
“Wait here if ye want to be paid the other four shillings,” I told him and entered the tavern.
6
Iwas not so foolish as to think that entering a tavern might not be a dangerous situation. I pulled the folded knife from my pocket as I entered the Halfway House—halfwayup the Close.
It was not my first time in such a place. When I lived and worked atThe Churchyears before, I was often sent out to purchase ale that I carried back in a pail. I was given a coin by Madame if I returned without spilling any of the ale intended for ‘customers.’
The smell of the tavern might have been the one that I had frequented nightly—ale and other spirits, perhaps whisky, smoke from cigarettes or a pipe, and the smell of bodies pressed together under a cloud of smoke. Requests for more ale shouted to the man who filled mugs and efficiently swept up payment with a large paw of a hand.
I was aware of the curious glances from more than one bleary-eyed customer as I made my way to the tavern bar. The tavernkeeper among them, who stared at me with open curiosity.
“Lost are ye, missy? A bit far from the New Town?”
He was a burly fellow with a dark beard on thick jowls and twin hams for forearms that suggested little tolerance for skirmishes in his tavern.
“I would like information.”
He grunted. “I don’t hand out information, missy. It would make my customers uneasy.”
“I will pay for information,” I replied. “Regarding a woman who worked here. Her name was Dory Brown.”
He continued his routine of filling mugs and wiping the bar as he moved behind it, exchanged a crude comment with a customer, then returned. He watched me with narrow-eyed speculation.
