Free The Vice Society by James McCreet Page A

– we had a terribly early start this morning. Nelly would go, but she must answer some important questions.’
    ‘You will be paying for them, of course? And for my time in walking there?’
    ‘Naturally, madam. Nelly will be safe with us.’
    And with much huffing, snorting and wrinkling, the malformed harridan banged up the stairs and out of the house. Her servant relaxed visibly, slouching back in her chair and looking with a renewed lascivious air at the younger man.
    ‘Was he a friendly man to you, Nelly?’ asked Mr Jute.
    ‘’Pends what yer mean . . .’
    ‘Did you spend time together talking? Did he help you in your duties, perhaps? Did he tell you anything of his writing?’
    Nelly exhibited a smile that would have had her thrown out of church, had she ever attended one. ‘He were nice enough to me. He told me pretty words from books. I dunno what some of ’em meant, but they was ever so pretty.’
    ‘Do you know if he had friends in the city? People he spoke of who he would visit?’
    ‘Ha! That’s a good one! Friends, yer say? He hated everyone ! Yer should have heard him when he come back from the coffee house: “So-and-So says he is to publish his history of Sussex, the ———.” Or, “That ——— Mr Thingummy is to receive an advance on his volume.” Or, “Mr Wotsitsname, the talentless ——— got three pound for his piece in the Chronicle. ” Friends? He had none.’
    ‘Which coffee houses were these?’ asked Mr Williamson, his pen poised above the notebook for a salient fact.
    ‘Dunno. Just coffee houses.’
    ‘Tell me, Nelly,’ said Mr Jute, ‘if you were to go to him now, where would you go?’
    ‘I never saw him outside the house. Truth be told, sir, I am mostly here in this very room, or in the rooms upstairs cleaning out the grates and suchlike.’
    ‘We have reason to believe that his name was not really “Mr Mann”,’ said Mr Williamson. ‘What did you call him?’
    ‘I called him “Mr Mann”. Missus says I am to call all tenants by their names so.’
    ‘But when you were alone . . . when madam was not listening . . . did you call him something different? You have no need to be ashamed.’
    ‘Well . . . I called him Andrew.’
    ‘Ha! A capital joke,’ expostulated Mr Jute.
    ‘Explain yourself,’ said Mr Williamson somewhat fractiously.
    ‘Well, it might be a coincidence, but “Andrew” comes from the Greek. It means “manly” or “man-like”. That would make him “Manly Mann”.’
    ‘Amusing, I am sure. A joke at everyone’s expense. May I ask you a delicate question, Nelly, now that your mistress is out of the house? Were you and the gentlemen more than conversational acquaintances? More than friends?’
    ‘Oh sir! What do you take me for?’ said Nelly (my Nelly!) with sparkling eyes and a leer that answered the question more honestly. ‘I am a good girl.’ She flashed Mr Jute a look that suggested she was indeed as ‘good’ as he might expect.
    ‘Hmm. I think we have gathered as much information as we can here,’ said Mr Williamson, standing. ‘Short of taking Nelly around every coffee house in the city in search of the man – and it might well come to that – I cannot think of anything else at present that will further our case.’
    ‘I could stay and press Nelly further if you think it might be of benefit,’ said Mr Jute.
    ‘I think not. I dare say the man has already imagined that we might one day question the girl, which is why he has told her nothing of consequence – including his true name. That is the extent of his foresight and duplicity.’
    ‘Do you think we will ever catch the man, sir?’
    ‘Patience, Mr Jute. Patience and reason. He is somewhere close. These gentlemen are parasites upon the body of the city. They need its journals and publishers to survive. Why, he is most certainly sitting in a coffee house somewhere fewer than two miles from this place.’

 
    SIX
     
    In fact, Mr Williamson was quite correct.