The Sin Eater(68)
Nell enjoyed the evening at Nina’s flat. Nina had made a huge risotto which they ate in the large friendly kitchen, together with the bottle of Chablis which Nell had brought. Nina rattled on in her customary inconsequential way, Benedict putting in the occasional word, and Nell listened with amusement. But several layers down, she was aware of an undercurrent of excitement. Only a few hours left, then I’ll see him again, her mind kept saying. I’ll find out who he is. I’ll find out what he is. But this last thought twisted the excitement into such a wrench of apprehension that she pushed it away and focused on what Nina was saying about how people thought you could successfully transport beef Wellington for thirty people halfway across London without the pastry going soggy, could you believe it?
Benedict seemed entirely normal. He teased Nina about the risotto, and helped cut up ciabatta bread to hand round. Afterwards Nina shooed Nell and Benedict into the sitting room while she made coffee, and Nell asked Benedict about the criminology studies.
‘At the moment I’m researching for an essay on old Victorian cases,’ he said.
‘You mentioned that last time I was here. It sounds interesting.’
‘It is. I’m trying to find some really unusual crimes from the late 1800s – the 1890s particularly. Ones that weren’t publicized – ones we don’t know about today.’ He glanced at her hesitantly, then, as if realizing she was genuinely interested, said, ‘To start with, I thought I’d re-examine them, comparing the police methods with today’s forensic science. But then I thought that if I could unearth some really good ones, I’d try to find oblique references to them in the fiction of that time. I don’t mean obvious things like the Artful Dodger representing all the pickpockets in Alsatia, or Mr Hyde being Jack the Ripper—’
‘Mr Hyde wasn’t Jack the Ripper, was he?’ said Nina, coming in with the coffee pot, and sounding startled.
‘No, that’s just an illustration of what I mean.’
‘Where on earth was Alsatia? Oh bother, I’ve forgotten the milk. And I made some petits fours—’ She vanished to the kitchen again.
‘Where is Alsatia?’ said Nell.
‘It was in Whitefriars,’ said Benedict. ‘Roughly speaking, the Fleet Street area across to the Thames. It was sort of a sanctuary place for thieves and general ruffians and crooks.’
‘And now it’s home to newspapers and journalists,’ said Nell, deadpan, and was pleased when he grinned and instantly said, ‘Yes. So what’s new?’
‘I like your essay idea. And it’s such a colourful era, as well. The minute you mention the 1890s, you see all the images.’
‘The street life,’ said Benedict. ‘The hot food sellers and the beggars and toffs, and the ordinary clerks and workers. Apothecaries’ shops with huge glass flagons in the windows, and little dusty drapers’ shops and barrow boys. It would smell different then, and it would certainly sound different. London’s always noisy, but it’d have been noisy in a different way. Hansom cabs rattling over the cobblestones, and people shouting and quarrelling, and the hoot of barges from the river, and the sound of overstrung, out-of-tune pianos played in smoky pubs—’
He broke off, and Nell said warmly, ‘And one of the fascinations is that it’s still just about touchable, that era. Our grandparents would remember their grandparents or even their parents talking about it. And we’ve got photographs from those years. Voices, as well. Those scratchy old recordings. But go back a bit earlier, and there’s only what was written down. We’ll never know what people really looked like.’
‘Yes,’ said Benedict, with a kind of eager gratitude for her interest. ‘And we’ll never know what they sounded like, either. In ordinary everyday speech, I mean.’
‘Because language changes,’ said Nell, thoughtfully.
‘Yes. Not just because we use different expressions. We don’t pronounce words as people did a hundred – even fifty – years ago.’
‘That’s true. You only have to watch one of those old 1930s or 1940s British films to hear that. Tell me some more about your essay.’
‘Well, the thing is that an author writing today might have a character mentioning a current murder trial that readers would recognize and know about. Even today if you say Ruth Ellis, most people know she was the last woman to be hanged.’
‘Or Fred and Rosemary West and the macabre patio in Gloucester.’
‘Yes. But those references in a book probably wouldn’t mean anything to somebody reading it in a hundred years’ time,’ said Benedict. ‘So it’s the lost cases of the 1890s I’m going for, then I’ll see if they’re mentioned in the fiction of the day.’
‘Weren’t there books that used to be termed the Newgate Novels?’ asked Nell.
‘Yes, there were,’ said Benedict, pleased. ‘They were a kind of fictional counterpart of some true stories of the era. Oliver Twist is regarded as a Newgate Novel.’
‘Yes, of course. Will you use the essay as the base for a PhD, later on?’
‘It’d be nice to think I could,’ said Benedict rather wistfully. ‘Only I’m not sure about even doing a PhD yet.’
‘Wouldn’t it be a good idea? And you’re so knowledgeable about that era.’