“Yes,” I say. “You can take a picture of yourself, from a distance. Which is helpful when it’s a group photograph and you want to be in it.”
“I never seen such a thing,” Mick says. “We don’t have one.”
“Most photographers don’t,” I say. “Self-timers are a new experiment. They’re not on the market. Those I’ve seen were one of a kind, made by inventors.”
“So he were takin’ pictures of himself,” Mick says, eyeing a battered wooden chair positioned opposite the camera with the timer. “But why down here?”
The drab room seems to contain nothing that would merit four cameras. My gaze returns to the man, and I notice details that I previously missed. Rather stout, he wears black trousers and scuffed black boots. His mane of thick, wavy silver hair contrasts with his dark eyebrows, moustache, and beard. His features would be handsome if not for the mouth flaccid with death, the film that overlays the expression of shock in his blue eyes.
“Do you know who he is?” Barrett asks the vicar.
“No. I’ve never seen him before.” The Reverend Thornton’s sonorous voice has a faint hoarseness that I don’t remember. “And I can’t imagine how he got into the church. It’s kept locked at night. We’ve had a problem with thieves. It was locked when I arrived this morning, and I noticed nothing amiss.” He tugs at his white clerical collar as if it’s too tight. He seems deeply shaken by the murder, as if he’s struggling to remain calm.
“Does anyone besides you have the key?” Barrett says.
“Quite a few people. And there’s a spare one hanging on the wall in the vicarage foyer.”
I’m about to ask for names when my gaze snaps back to the body like an iron nail to a magnet and belated recognition jolts me. Memory serves up a man with darker hair, the same moustache and beard, a slimmer figure, and blue eyes that twinkle with his friendly smile.
“Oh God. It’s Charles Firth!”
Everyone stares at me. Sally says, “You know him?”
“Yes.” I’m shaken, and not just because a victim at a murder scene is, once again, someone of my acquaintance. “He owned a photography shop in Whitechapel. He sold me my first camera. I’d already been to a dozen other shops, and the prices were so high I couldn’t afford them. He gave me a discount.” Grief wells up in me because a man so kind and generous to a stranger has met a violent end. “If not for him, I couldn’t have become a photographer.”
“Oh, Sarah.” Sally hugs me. “I’m so sorry.”
“Have you any idea why he was taking photographs in the church?” Barrett says.
“No. I purchased equipment and supplies at his shop until he relocated and we lost touch. I’ve not seen him in perhaps ten years.”
We’re all silent, contemplating the mysteries of fate. Then Sir Gerald says, “This could be a good story for the Daily World. Miss Albert, write it up.”
“Yes, sir.” Sally sounds delighted by the assignment, even as she gives me an apologetic glance because of the circumstances. Here is her big opportunity to break into writing about important news, albeit at the expense of publicizing the misfortune that befell my wedding.
The best man, a constable named John Young, says, “Barrett, the fellows and I will report the murder and fetch the police surgeon. You shouldn’t have to work today.” He and the other policemen depart.
“Sarah, I’ll take photos and develop ’em,” Mick says. “You two can go.”
Barrett and I exchange a glance, reading each other’s thoughts: a murder investigation wasn’t how we expected to begin our marriage, but he doesn’t want to hand off a case that cropped up during his own wedding, and I can’t abandon a victim to whom I owe much more than my career. Life’s big and small events are connected by fragile threads of happenstance. If not for Charles Firth, I wouldn’t be a photographer; I wouldn’t have met Barrett and wouldn’t have married him today. The least I can do for Charles Firth is that which I’ve had the honor of doing for other people who have died by violence—deliver his killer to justice.
“Reverend Thornton, can you tell the guests to go on to the wedding breakfast?” Barrett says. “Sarah and I will be there in a moment.”
Sir Gerald and Sally leave with the vicar. With everyone gone but Barrett, Mick, and me, the crypt is quiet. As Mick takes photographs, the shutter clicks seem unnaturally loud. The blasts of light and falling sparks fill the room, and the acrid smoke from the flash powder joins the sweet, meaty, iron smell of blood. I was too nervous to eat anything today, and nausea turns my empty stomach. To distract myself from it, I survey the floor and see a thin, scuffed-up coat of dusty grime.
“If the killer left any footprints, they’ve been trampled over,” I say.
“No signs of a struggle,” Mick says, inserting a fresh negative plate into my camera.
Barrett crouches by the body, careful not to step in the blood and soil his black patent-leather boots. He gently presses his fingers against Charles Firth’s cheek. “I think he died sometime last night. The surgeon will have a better estimate.”
I think of the first time I saw Charles Firth, when I went into his shop. He bowed, smiled, and said, “What can I do for you, miss?”
His manner was gallant, flirtatious. I was even shier with strangers than I am now, and I closed up like a wounded clam. I was about to run out the door when an expression of sympathetic understanding came into Firth’s eyes. He said, “Look around as much as you like. If you need help, just ask,” and withdrew to the back of the shop.
I studied the cameras, relieved to be left alone. Other customers came, and he flirted with the women, joked with the men, and discussed technical aspects of his merchandise. He had a talent for adapting himself to other people’s needs, and he’d sensed that I wished to avoid attention. That he also noticed my poverty and my pride became obvious when he saw me linger at a particular camera and said, “That one’s damaged. I’ll give you thirty percent off.”
The damage was merely a few nicks on the case. I couldn’t afford to say no, but I was afraid he would demand something from me in exchange. But he didn’t. Whenever I returned to his shop, he greeted me with a smile, let me browse to my heart’s content, and marked down his prices for me. We never talked about anything except photography; on a personal level, we never got past introductions. Some twenty years older than I, he treated me as a teacher would a pupil. The last time I saw him, he said he was moving his shop to a different location and invited me to come by if I needed anything. I never went. For various reasons, I was afraid that it would make us friends. Now I regret not going.
Barrett is searching Charles Firth’s pockets. He removes a leather card case, takes out a card, and reads out two addresses in Islington.
“I recognize the address on Upper Street,” I say. “That’s his shop.”
Mick repositions my camera at a different angle. “At least we know where to start askin’ questions.”
I examine Mr. Firth’s cameras. They’re professional grade, high quality but not new, their mahogany box cases scratched, their leather bellows supple from use. I open the cameras one by one and remove the glass negative plates in their protective cases. “I’ll develop his photographs. Maybe they’ll provide some answers.”