‘My name is Brendan Mulryne. I wanted a word with you, darling.’
‘You’ve come to the wrong place,’ she said, curtly. ‘I don’t entertain guests any more.’
‘It’s not entertainment I want, Polly — it’s information.’ He looked past her into the room. ‘Do you have company, by any chance?’
‘No, Mr Mulryne.’
‘Would you mind if I came in to look?’
‘Yes,’ she cautioned, lifting her skirt to remove the knife from the sheath strapped to her thigh. ‘I mind very much.’
Mulryne grinned benignly. ‘In that case, we’ll talk here.’
‘Who sent you?’
‘Isadore Vout.’
‘That mangy cur! If you’re a friend of his, away with you!’
‘Oh, I’m no friend of Isadore’s,’ promised Mulryne, ‘especially since I lifted him up by the feet and made him dance a jig on his head. He’d probably describe me as his worst enemy.’
‘So why have you come to me?’
‘I’m looking for someone called William Ings — Billy Ings to you.’
‘He’s not here,’ she snapped.
‘So you do know him?’
‘I did. I thought I knew him well.’
‘So where is he now?’
Polly was bitter. ‘You tell me, Mr Mulryne.’
‘Is he not coming to see you?’
‘Not any more.’
There was enough light from the oil lamp just inside the door for him to see her face clearly. Polly Roach looked hurt and jaded. The thick powder failed to conceal the dark bruise on her chin. Mulryne sensed that she had been crying.
‘Did you and Mr Ings fall out, by any chance?’ he asked.
‘That’s my business.’
‘It happens to be mine as well.’
‘Why — what’s Bill to you?’
‘A week’s wages. That’s what I get when I find him.’
‘His wife!’ she cried, brandishing the knife. ‘That bitch sent you after him, didn’t she?’
‘No, Polly,’ replied Mulryne, holding up both hands in a gesture of surrender. ‘I swear it. Sure, I’ve never met the lady and that’s the honest truth. Now, why don’t you put that knife away before someone gets hurt?’ She lowered the weapon to her side. ‘That’s better. If you were hospitable, you’d invite me in.’
She held her ground. ‘Say what you have to say here.’
‘A friend of mine is anxious to meet this Billy Ings,’ he explained, ‘and he’s paying me to find him. I’m not a man who turns away the chance of an honest penny and, in any case, I owe this man a favour.’
‘What’s his name?’
‘There’s no need for you to know that, darling.’
‘Then why is he after Billy?’
‘There was a train robbery yesterday and it looks as if Mr Ings may have been involved. His job at the Post Office meant that he had valuable information to sell.’
‘So that’s where he got the money from,’ she said. ‘He told me that he won it at the card table.’
‘Isadore Vout heard the same tale from him.’
‘He lied to me!’
‘Then you have no reason to protect him.’
Polly Roach became suspicious. She eyed him with disgust.
‘Are you a policeman?’ she said.
Mulryne laughed. ‘Do I look like a policeman, my sweetheart?’
‘No, you don’t.’
‘I work at The Black Dog, making sure that our customers don’t get out of hand. Policeman, eh? What policeman would dare to live in the Devil’s Acre?’ He summoned up his most endearing smile. ‘Come on now, Polly. Why not lend me a little assistance here?’
‘How can I?’ she said with a shrug. ‘I’ve no idea where he is.’
‘But you could guess where he’s likely to be.’
‘Sitting at a card table, throwing his money away.’
‘And where did he usually go to find a game?’
‘Two or three different places.’
‘I’ll need their names,’ he said. ‘There’s no chance that he’ll have sneaked back to his wife then?’