Steps to the Gallows by Edward Marston

wasin a state of depression that bordered on despair. He had never met anyone like Diane Mandrake. Her effect on him had been extraordinary. Feelings that had lain dormant for many years had suddenly been rekindled. He had long since looked for any happiness in his marriage. The endless hours he spent on duty meant that he saw little of his wife and children. They were very much in the hinterland of his life. Out of the blue, he’d now met a woman who reminded him of long-forgotten pleasures and aroused a desire that caused a nagging unease. Since she sold satirical prints, Mrs Mandrake was, by definition, a person he should detest and harass. Yet he was moved to protect her. Even though she’d stuck a knife in his heart when she told him that the print he sought would go to Peter Skillen, he couldn’t condemn her. When he’d stepped into her shop, he’d been a conscientious Runner about to demand answers to important enquiries. At a stroke, she’d robbed him of his bristling self-confidence and made him unnervingly vulnerable. The irony of it all was that, in her brusque treatment of him, she’d made herself even more irresistible.
    Confused, dispirited and tormented by a vision of Diane Mandrake, he could do nothing but sit there and suffer in silence. When he was joined by Hale and Ruddock, he was so locked into his reverie that he had to be forcibly shaken out of it.
    ‘What are you doing?’ he shouted, brushing Hale’s hand off his shoulder. ‘Don’t you dare to touch me like that again, Alfred.’
    ‘You were miles away,’ said Hale.
    ‘Then you should have waited patiently.’
    ‘Did you learn anything at the print shop, sir?’ asked Ruddock, recoiling slightly when Yeomans turned a murderous glare upon him. ‘You thought that it would provide you with some important evidence.’
    ‘Shut your gob, Ruddock!’
    ‘Well … if you say so, sir.’
    ‘Speak only when you’re spoken to.’
    ‘Yes, Mr Yeomans.’
    ‘Chevy asked a reasonable question,’ said Hale, coming to the younger man’s rescue. ‘You told us you expected to get crucial intelligence from Mrs Mandrake.’
    Mention of her name made Yeomans leap a few inches out of his chair as if he’d suddenly realised that it was covered in sprigs of holly. When he sat down again, he made an effort to master his emotions.
    ‘I gathered some useful information,’ he explained, ‘but I may have to return to the shop again at some point.’
    ‘It’s a pity we can’t close the place down altogether. Mrs Mandrake and her kind are nothing but excrescences.’
    Yeomans bunched a fist. ‘Don’t you dare call her that, Alfred!’
    ‘I’ve heard you use the same word of dealers such as her.’
    ‘Mrs Mandrake is a lady. Treat her with respect.’
    ‘Only yesterday, you called her a whoremonger.’ Seeing the look in Yeomans’s eye, Hale held up apologetic palms. ‘I’ll never describe her as such again, I promise. You have met the woman – the lady, I should say – whereas we have not.’
    ‘If you have changed your mind about Mrs Mandrake,’ said Ruddock, ‘does that mean you think more kindly of the murder victim? Must we treat Mr Paige with respect as well?’
    ‘No,’ barked Yeomans, ‘we must not. I don’t give a trooper’s turd for Paige. I’m very glad that he was killed and I wish the same fate on those like him. But the murder must be solved and it falls to us to solve it.’
    ‘We’ve not been idle this morning,’ said Hale.
    ‘How many heads have you knocked together?’
    ‘More than I can remember, Micah. The first person we tackledagain was Mokey Venables. I was much harsher on him than Chevy.’
    ‘You boxed his ears,’ said Ruddock.
    ‘It helps to clear the brain. Mokey gave us names of people we’d never heard of before, obnoxious maggots who infest Bloomsbury and know its darkest corners. We paid several of them a visit. One of them was very helpful.’
    ‘His name is Dirk Poyesdon,’ said