Twisted Tracks (The Clearwater Mysteries Book 2) Read online

  Twisted Tracks

  The Clearwater Mysteries Book two

  by

  Jackson Marsh

  First published in Great Britain in 2019

  Copyright © Jackson Marsh 2019

  The right of Jackson Marsh to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Proofread by Ann Attwood

  Cover Design by Andjela K

  Printed by CreateSpace, an Amazon.com company.

  ISBN- 9781096730446

  Available from Amazon.com, CreateSpace.com, and other retail outlets. Available on Kindle and other devices.

  Also by Jackson Marsh

  Other People’s Dreams

  In School and Out

  The Blake Inheritance

  The Stoker Connection

  Curious Moonlight

  The Mentor of Wildhill Farm

  The Mentor of Barrenmoor Ridge

  The Mentor of Lonemarsh House

  The Mentor of Lostwood Hall

  The Clearwater Mysteries

  Deviant Desire

  Twisted Tracks

  One

  James Joseph Wright was born on January 10th, 1863 at the precise moment the world’s first underground train delivered its passengers to Farringdon station. As the locomotive puffed and fumed from the tunnel, James’s mother, some four miles distant, puffed and fumed through her own first delivery.

  The boy arrived healthy and noisy, pink and robust, and survived childhood thanks to the care of a mother who doted, and a father who worked hard and provided well. James was planned and wanted, unlike too many other children in the city, and benefited from a poverty-free upbringing.

  Where the underground was the first such railway in the world, so James Wright, inaugurated on the same day, was the first and only of his kind, or so he thought.

  Although he didn’t lack affection at home, he craved it from his school companions, but only from the other boys. When he reached double figures, and his friends talked about marriage and the playground-taboo subject of sex, they spoke about girls. James was uninterested and thought only about men until he realised he was the only lad who did so. He kept the secret to himself and lived a confused and quiet life in the semi-respectable neighbourhood of South Riverside imagining that one day he would wake up to an interest in the opposite sex. It wasn’t until he became a telegraph boy at fourteen that he realised he didn’t have to. There were others of his kind in the world; men who were solely attracted to men.

  Work as a messenger brought with it all manner of opportunities, both for income and for companionship. The young men were drilled each morning by a senior hired for his military bearing. They were crammed into tight uniforms which soon loosened as they spent hours cycling and walking the streets. There were the social times when the lads would joke and mess together, telling stories of their conquests and their day’s earnings, who they saw inside the hall at Lord X’s house, and who had been seen at the upstairs window in Lady Y’s when her husband was away. Life was a mixture of routine, running and raunchy behaviour towards girls, something his mates saw as a game of conquests, and something that bored James to tears of frustration.

  Until he met Thomas. Since then he hadn’t been able to get the man out of his mind.

  He had been on his feet all day, running messages and waiting to take replies. It had been as mundane as usual until he was sent on an urgent errand to Clearwater House. There was nothing uncommon in the delivery except that he had never delivered to Lord Clearwater. It was usually someone else’s patch, but that man was ill, and James was chosen because he was presentable and polite. It wasn’t the address that brightened his day, nor the neighbourhood half a mile from his home but a whole world away. It was the man who answered the door that sent him reeling from the steps, trembling.

  The chance meeting began with a standard, brief announcement, ‘Telegram for Lord Clearwater,’ but after that, nothing about the exchange was ordinary. Not the way the footman looked at him, nor the way James was suddenly lighter than air, and not the way the two swapped names as if they knew they would meet again. James had been met at front doors by many handsome servants, but the Clearwater footman was the first to stir more than just a casual interest. He caused James’s blood to race, and as he left, he glanced back. Thomas was doing the same, and James sensed he had found a kindred spirit.

  Admittedly, it was only a few hours ago, but all the same, he was determined to speak to his employer and see what he had to do to change his patch and deliver to Bucks Avenue and Clearwater House.

  The Crown and Anchor was fogged with pipe smoke, clammy and noisy, but the seats were padded, and James’s legs ached. He sat with a newspaper on the table reading the latest horrors committed in the East End. The Ripper had killed twice in one night, and there was no foreseeable end to his reign of terror. The police were useless, locals were rioting, and the city was gripped by panic.

  ‘Huh,’ he mumbled. ‘Not in South Riverside.’

  Luckily, the murders were taking place far from his home borough in the west where James sat sipping a pint of cloudy ale. He often needed a drink after the day’s work, but today, he needed one more than ever. He was on his second pint and still his heart was racing, his mind tumbling over itself and his blood coursing with anxiety. Not even the grisly reports from Greychurch could distract him. Every sentence contained a reminder of his encounter with Thomas.

  He read, “The neighbourhood of Greychurch was horrified to a degree of panic…” and remembered how he’d panicked when he first saw Thomas. Reading, “The circumstances of the murder are of such a revolting character…”, his heart jolted in shock because people would think him revolting if they knew he’d instantly been attracted to another man.

  “There are still no clues, and no-one as yet knows who the murderer is…” James had no clue how he could get to know Thomas, he only knew that he wanted to. More than that. He needed to.

  ‘Damnit!’ he growled, and turned the page hoping for more cheerful distractions.

  He studied the House of Lords listing, reasoning that if he learnt more about Lord Clearwater, he might stand a better chance of being given the patch and thus more opportunity to meet the footman.

  He’d begun work for the post office as soon as he was able. Having been taught well, he read fluently, and his handwriting was legible. He was chosen, however, for his stamina. He was not a sporty youth, but he was quick on his feet and was often complimented on his speed despite his stocky build. The hustle and bustle of the dispatch office was enjoyable although, at first, it was all he saw. He was promoted later in his teens and sent onto the streets of the capital with mundane deliveries, later still, he was entrusted with the urgent ones and given his own patch in the west of the borough. In winter, the days were dark and cold, in summer, hot and uncomfortable and he sweated in his uniform. He enjoyed every day of work, apart from those when the
peasouper was so thick he could hardly breathe and had to feel his way to his destinations. Although the air wasn’t always clean, James enjoyed the freedom to run and walk through the streets more than he would have done his father’s irregular glimpses of the outside world and decided his career lay in delivering messages.

  On bad-weather days, he envied his father working aboard ships that sailed to foreign waters. He sat with his younger sister at the parlour table reading her the names of the vessels that used the country’s ports and describing their exotic destinations from books.

  When his father was home, only for a week at a time and not very often, he would tell James of his adventures. First, when James was sitting on his knee asking more questions than his dad could possibly answer, and later, opposite each other at the table discussing the perils of ocean travel as men. Even now in his mid-twenties, James loved to hear his father’s stories, the escapades, the storms, the heat of the sun on the equator and the frozen rigging when he sailed north.

  He had wanted to join him in work and had asked it many times, but it wasn’t until he was older that he realised why his father was reticent. He may have had adventures, seen the midnight sun and flightless birds who lived on icebergs, but only on rare occasions. Most of his time was spent in the steam and heat of an engine room, the pumps deafening him, and the fumes choking him worse than any city fog.

  There was another side to being a messenger, and one which would have neatly rounded the edges of James’s desires, which were to earn money to support his family and to find affection from another man. Another James Wright, but with a different name, someone with whom he could discuss why he wasn’t attracted to the opposite sex. He had never known such a friend. Although he met many young men, none hinted at being open to a conversation should James ever dare to start one.

  That was, until aged seventeen he was approached by an older messenger with the unlikely name of Lovemount.

  James was relieving himself in the depot washroom when the handsome if lanky youth joined him at the trough. He flashed his cock blatantly and asked James if he was interested in making some money. As a way to extend the time he had to gawp at Lovemount’s prick — one of the few he had seen — he asked for more details. The senior messenger explained how his colleagues earnt extra shillings by doing favours for “discreet gentry, at home”, the meaning of which was evident from his state of arousal.

  James had been too shocked to reply. He knew that such things happened, but the knowledge that Lovemount was so open about it gave him hope. Finally, he was not the only James Wright in the world. He told Lovemount that he would think about it, but although the idea aroused him, he never mentioned the subject again.

  If he was to be with another man, it had to be for more than the base acts his colleagues spoke of. Security and love were to come first, of that, James was sure. He reached that conclusion as he left Lovemount semi-erect in the washroom, and vowed that, when his first time came, it would be with a man he loved. The problem, of course, was finding such a man.

  ‘Unlikely to be Thomas,’ he muttered as he turned a page to read the shipping columns, hoping to find news of his father’s current voyage. Even that didn’t distract him from thoughts of the good-looking redhead.

  How was he to know if the look that passed between him and Thomas meant anything? Maybe it was surprise on the footman’s face, the same thrilling rush as James experienced. On the other hand, it might have just been the shock of not seeing their usual delivery boy.

  In fact, it probably meant nothing and, as he finished his drink, he decided it was a pointless fantasy. Even if the footman was like him, there wasn’t much about James to like, not physically. Five-foot-six, ‘big boned’ as his mother said when really she meant bulky, he wasn’t fat, but he was not slender and graceful like Thomas. His hair was military-short and blond which to some represented softness, and he had nowhere near as much in his trousers as Lovemount. Thomas was taller, his hair the colour of a new penny and he looked stunning in his uniform, whereas James looked like any other blue-and-belted courier.

  As for what Thomas might have in his trousers, that wasn’t James’s first thought, not even his first desire. It was something else, something intangible he couldn’t see, a thing he could only imagine; the touch of Thomas’ lips.

  He put his glass on the table, folded the newspaper and, as alone as when he entered it, left the pub.

  The following day fate once again delivered him the man he had spent the night fantasising about. Not, this time on the steps of Clearwater, but at an agent’s business in Riverside High Street. James, again asked to cover the patch for his sick colleague, entered the premises to find Thomas seated by a desk. At first, he was struck dumb at the chance meeting, and then it was panic which robbed him of his words. He stumbled over his delivery. Waiting for the agent to compose a reply gave him time to talk to the Clearwater footman, but not enough time to plan what to say.

  He was relieved when Thomas seemed pleased to see him and engaged him in conversation. Thomas was waiting to buy a railway ticket with the last of his savings, he said. Having lost his job, he was travelling home to his parents’ farm the next day.

  ‘Is that what you want to do?’ James asked, fearful that he wouldn’t see the man again.

  ‘No,’ Thomas admitted. ‘I want to be in service, but I’ve just been fired. No respectable house will employ me now.’

  James was devastated to think he would lose Thomas as soon as he had met him, but kept his wits about him and thought quickly. Always one to find an opportunity in a crisis, he offered Thomas the use of his room should he want to stay in the city a few days while he thought things over.

  Thomas was caught off guard and took a moment to think. He endearingly bit his bottom lip as his emerald eyes flicked from side to side. He raised them to James and smiled.

  ‘Can I?’ he asked, the realisation of the offer dawning on him.

  ‘Why not?’ James shrugged, although he wanted to scream with joy. ‘My sister can go in with my mum, and we’ll have my room.’ The thought thrilled him with possibilities.

  ‘It would be useful,’ Thomas said.

  James hoped it would be more than that. ‘We’d have to share a bed,’ he ventured.

  He expected the man, essentially a stranger, to change his mind, but he didn’t. He was no keener either, but he was still happy to accept the offer.

  ‘I have some things to do first,’ he said. ‘I have to see someone in the hospital, but we could meet later?’

  They did, and Thomas brought his bags to James’s house that afternoon. They parted on the street, Thomas to visit the hospital and James to wander the pavements counting the hours until they met again. He was thanking gods he didn’t believe in when he was suddenly overtaken by nervousness. Thomas was probably not interested in him that way. Even if he was, how was James to find out?

  He didn’t know it at the time, but once again, fate was waiting to dispatch an opportunity.

  Two

  Thomas Payne was deep in conversation with a post office messenger he had met only the day before when a man half a mile away changed the course of his life.

  He wouldn’t know the details of what Viscount Clearwater had in store for him, but even if he had been privy to his Lordship’s plan, he wouldn’t have believed it, particularly as he had been dismissed from his service only forty-eight hours previously. He hadn’t been able to tell the viscount that he no longer worked for him, and Tripp had forbidden him to come to the house. That was painful enough, but he now had nowhere to live. Luckily, he had met by chance the cheerful blond man now sitting with him at the corner table.

  The Crown and Anchor, as usual, was cloudy with smoke infused with the smell of ale and the tang of workman’s sweat. A crackling fire heated the public house which, that night, was busy, and th
e sound of men’s chatter, laughter and falling dominoes provided enough background noise to cover the discussion being had by the new friends.

  ‘Like I said earlier, Tom,’ James rested his elbows on the table, ‘you can stay with us for as long as you need. Don’t worry about it.’

  ‘That’s very good of you,’ Thomas replied. ‘I’m still shocked, I suppose, and haven’t been able to work out yet what I am going to do.’

  It was the content of a telegram James delivered that sparked the events leading to his dismissal. Thomas had read the message and, defying Tripp, the butler, acted on it out of loyalty to his master and with no thought for himself. He was still loyal to him and would always be, because his affection for Lord Clearwater ran deep. Until he met James, and before that his Lordship’s new secretary, Silas, he had very few friends.

  ‘Me mum don’t mind,’ James said and took a sip of his beer. ‘If you don’t mind the bunking up.’

  James’ interest in his plight was heartening. Although they barely knew each other, the man was affable, keen to know more about Thomas, and had offered to help in any way he could. Thomas knew that, in part, this was down to an instant physical attraction that had sparked between them on their first meeting. At least, that was what he hoped at the time. Such a notion, however, was not something he was able to discuss as openly as his current lack of employment, and although part of him hoped James’ interest was more than platonic, Thomas had to tread carefully. So far, they had conversed merely as acquaintances, but James had taken him in. That, surely, suggested he had more than philanthropic motives.