Part 2 The Faceless Man Chapter 69 This is the East End
Inside the nearly abandoned medical school building, Audrey, who had finished her party and was circling around to leave, suddenly drifted off and saw the familiar thick gray fog and the blurry figure towering in the center of it.
”That’s the clue.”
Accompanying Mr. Fool’s low voice was a photo scene, and a photo with color!
A man close to two meters, not too burly, wearing black clerical clothes stood in the shadows, his yellowish hair was soft and slightly curly, his dark brown eyes were cold and fierce, the corners of his mouth slightly drooped, and he was as withdrawn as a vicious wolf.
Clues? Clues to the Dalloway Street bombing and Gavin’s slip and drowning in the East End? This was the killer? Audrey was stunned, then realized.
Mr. “Fool” has a clue …… He is really powerful, no, omnipotent …… After secretly sighing, she turned her head to look at Forsyth beside her.
Foerth just removed the mask, removed the surgical cap, and sat in the carriage, he noticed Miss Audrey slightly strange gaze, and immediately asked suspiciously:
”Is there anything on my face?”
”No.” Audrey withdrew her gaze and followed, sitting down and removing her disguise.
Forsyth thought back to the previous party and asked with some curiosity:
”Ms. Audrey, why didn’t you beg for the recipe for ‘audience’? That way you might be able to establish a connection with the Psycho-Alchemy Society.”
She remembers that the generous Miss Audrey remained silent for almost the entire session, listening for the vast majority of the time, merely selling some of the materials containing psychic properties and purchasing another variety accordingly.
Audrey smiled lightly:
”This is my first gathering in this circle, and I think it’s more important to watch and wait.”
”I’m looking forward to the recipes for magic potions and even more so to the magical items, but I told myself that there’s no need to be in such a hurry, and that familiarizing myself with them before acting is a better strategy.”
This was also the “professional habit” of the “audience” pathway, and there was no appearance of the Evil Striped Panther Spinal Fluid, Elven Spring Medulla Crystals, and other extraordinary materials that Mr. “World” desired …… Audrey silently added.
Forsyth looked at the young girl who was not yet eighteen years old, and suddenly felt that the other party was more mature than ever.
She suddenly smiled to herself and said:
”If I could have been like you in the beginning, I wouldn’t have wasted a precious opportunity.”
Audrey smiled haughtily and gave a response, turning to say:
”I’ll go and question certain special friends in the morning to see if they have any leads on the Dalloway Street bombing, and you and Hugh will wait in the usual place for news.”
”All right.” Forsyth nodded without question.
……
Instead of returning to Minsk Street in the night, Klein slept directly in a one-bedroom apartment on Black Palm Street on the East Side.
He was afraid that the suspected murderer’s man in the black clergyman’s uniform still had accomplices and was searching for himself all over the street at this time.
Although the probability of encountering him was not high, and he had made a disguise before, so the other party would most likely not be able to recognize him, but since the results of divination indicated that there was a certain possibility, then Klein was cautious and made do with sleeping in the East End for the night.
At dawn, he changed into another dark blue worker’s uniform, put on his light brown ducktail hat, left his room, walked down the stairs, and entered the street.
By now, a pale white and yellowish mist filled the area, the figures of people coming and going were blurred, and the chill of the early morning soaked into his clothing.
Klein buried his head low and hurried along, exactly like the pedestrians around him who had risen early to work.
As he walked, he saw ahead of him a middle-aged man in his forties or fifties, gray at the temples and wearing a thick jacket, who was constantly shivering in place and trembling as he fumbled for a rolled cigarette and a very empty box of matches from the inside pocket of his clothing.
He had just opened the matchbox when his right hand suddenly shook and the crumpled rolled cigarette fell to the floor and rolled in front of Klein.
Crane stopped himself, picked it up with his hand, and handed it to the other.
”Thanks! This is my old one, there aren’t many left.” The middle-aged man thanked him sincerely and took the rolled cigarette.
His face was green and white, his beard looked as if he hadn’t shaved for a long time, and his exhaustion showed unreservedly from the corners of his eyebrows as he lamented and added:
”Another night without sleep, and I don’t know how many days I can last; I hope the Lord will bless me and enable me to enter the Poorhouse to-day.”
It was the driven vagabond …… Crane asked casually:
”Why don’t the king and ministers allow you to sleep in the park?”
”Who knows? But sleeping outside in this weather, you’ll probably never wake up again, it’s better to be in the daytime, where you can find a warmer place, hey, that way you don’t have the time or energy to look for a job.” That middle-aged and old man lit a rolled cigarette and took a beautiful drag on it.
His energy seemed to have returned a bit as a result, and he walked alongside Klein, taking steps towards the unknown end of the fog or the depths of it.
Klein had no thoughts of pleasantries and intended to speed up to get rid of him, but just then he suddenly saw the well-spoken middle-aged or older man bend down and pick up something dark from the ground.
It appeared to be the core of an apple that had been chewed cleanly.
That middle-aged and elderly man swallowed, stuffed the dirty dirt-covered core in his hand into his mouth, snapped and bit it to pieces, and then skillfully ate it all without the slightest residue.
Looking at Klein’s surprised gaze, he wiped his mouth and shrugged, smiling bitterly:
”I haven’t eaten for almost three days.”
These words struck Klein’s heart in a bold way, giving him an unspeakable touch.
He sighed silently and smiled:
”Sorry, I didn’t introduce myself just now, I’m a reporter doing a story on the homeless, can I interview you? Let’s go to that cafe in front.”
The middle-aged man froze for a moment, then smiled:
”No problem, it’s a lot warmer inside than on the street.”
”If you can stay a little longer after the interview, so that I can sleep inside for half an hour, no, a quarter of an hour, that would be even better.”
Klein opened his mouth, but did not know how to answer, and simply led his “interviewee” in silence into the cheap café at the end of the street.
The tables and chairs of the café were quite greasy, and inside, due to the walls and windows, there were quite a few customers, and the average temperature was indeed much higher than that of the street.
The middle-aged man scratched at his throat to hide the knot in his throat that was wriggling from the scent.
Crane gestured for him to sit down and made his own way to the ordering area, asking for two large cups of tea, a plate of lamb stew with tender peas, two loaves of bread, two pieces of toast, one part poor quality butter, and one part artificial cream for a total of 17.5 pence.
”Eat up, you can’t interview until you’re full.” When the food had been given, Crane carried them back to his own table.
”For me?” The middle-aged man asked with anticipation and surprise.
”It’s all yours except for a piece of toast and a cup of tea.” Klein responded with a smile.
That middle-aged and elderly man wiped his eyes and said with a slightly choked voice:
”…… you, you are truly a kind man.”
”Don’t eat too quickly when you’ve been hungry for a long time.” Klein admonished.
”I know, I had an old buddy who died that way.” The middle-aged man tried to eat at a slower pace, occasionally picking up his tea and taking a big gulp.
Klein simply settled for the toast and just watched quietly, waiting for the other man to finish.
”Phew, I haven’t eaten this much in three, no, six months, and there was just enough food in the poorhouse.” After a while, the middle-aged man put down his spoon, the empty plate in front of him.
Klein pretended he was a reporter and asked casually:
”How did you become a bum?”
”It was an unlucky thing, I used to be a pretty good worker, had a wife, and two lovely children, a boy and a girl, but a few years ago, a contagious disease took them away, and I was hospitalized for a long time, lost my job, lost my wealth, lost my family, and since then, I’ve often been unable to find a job, have no money to rent an apartment, no money to eat , only to wander in different streets and certain parks, which made me weak, and made it harder to find a job …… ” the middle aged man said with a little reminiscence and sadness in his numbness.
He took a sip of his tea and sighed as he spoke again:
”I can only wait for a chance to enter the House of the Poor, but you know, each House of the Poor has a limit on the number of people who can enter it, and if I’m lucky and queue up in time, I’ll be able to have a good few days, regain a little bit of my strength, and then find a temporary job, well, temporary, and soon enough, I’ll be unemployed again, and once again, repeat the same process as before, and I don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to hold out like this. ”
”I would have been a good worker.”
Klein thought for a moment, “How many cigarettes do you have left?”
”Not many more.” The middle aged man laughed bitterly, “They were my last possession, the only thing I had left when I was evicted by my landlord, heck, you couldn’t take them with you when you went into the poorhouse, I’d sneak them into the crevices of my clothes. Only in the toughest of times did I take one out and smoke it to give myself something to look forward to, I don’t know how much longer I can hold on to it, I’ll tell you what, I was a good worker back in the day.”
Klein was not a professional journalist, and for a moment he actually didn’t know what to ask.
He craned his head to look out the window and saw faces with the distinct color of hunger.
Some were fairly sober, the residents of the East End, and some were too numb and tired to be human, the homeless.
There was no distinct interval between the two, and the former easily became the latter, as in the case of the gentleman before me …… Klein looked back, only to find the middle aged man asleep, curled up in his chair asleep.
A few minutes of silence passed before Klein went over and patted the other man awake, giving him a handful of copper pennies:
”Here’s the cost of the interview.”
”Yes, yes, thank you, thank you!” The middle-aged man didn’t return to his senses for a moment, and waited for Crane to walk to the door before he drew up his voice and said, “I’ll go to a cheap hotel, take a shower, get a good night’s sleep, and then look for a job.”
……
At noon, Klein was at the Sommer’s for a party with ten guests.
There was apple juice with steak, roast chicken, fried fish, sausage, creamy gumbo, lots of good food and two bottles of champagne and one bottle of red wine.
On his way back from the lavatory he met Mrs. Starling Sommer, and gave a sincere word of thanks:
”A very sumptuous lunch, and I thank you for your hospitality.”
”It cost a total of four pounds eight soules, the most expensive being the three bottles of wine, but it’s all from Luke’s collection, he has a wine cooler.” The still delicate looking Mrs. Starling responded with a smile.
Without waiting for Crane to speak, she turned to her, “That affair of Mary’s alone has earned you ten pounds, and if you can keep up this good fortune you will soon be able to give similar parties, and it is necessary for people of our class to treat their friends, as well as to be treated by them, once a month.”
Crane, long accustomed to the other’s style, paid a polite compliment:
”Well, but it will have to wait until I have a steady income of four hundred pounds a year before I can be like you.”
Starling instantly raised her chin slightly, trying to make her smile seem shallow:
”£430, gotta have £430.”
……
Docklands, East Byron Dockyard, Workers Union Tavern.
Hugh wore much padded boots and plastered on a thick beard to make himself look like a short man.
She recalled the portrait she’d seen from Miss Audrey, trying to burn the likeness of the man suspected of being the murderer firmly into her mind.
If Gavin had killed him, too, it was probable that he frequented the tavern …… Hugh ordered a mug of rye ale and a luncheon, and, cowering in a corner, ate slowly, now and then stealthily surveying the surrounding area for a target.
After a while, the door to the tavern was pushed open again, and Hugh looked over reflexively.
At this look, her pupils contracted like pinpoints, and her entire being nearly turned into a stone statue.
The customer who came in was close to two meters tall!