Julius and the Soulcatcher Read Online Free PDF

you think it’s connected with what happened at Mr Darwin’s lodgings?’ said Abberline.
    Mr Flynn shrugged. ‘Perhaps. In any case, friends of mine have been threatened and, well, let’s just say I’d like to know what’s going on.’
    ‘I suppose you’d like a look around Mr Darwin’s lodgings, then?’ said Abberline.
    ‘If it wouldn’t be too much trouble, Constable,’ said Mr Flynn.

    It was a short distance to Walnut Tree Walk.
    ‘Here it is,’ said Abberline. He, Julius and Mr Flynn stood outside a respectable-looking house. A handwritten sign at the window advertised rooms for rent, at reasonable rates to single professional gentlemen.
    ‘Bedlam’s just round the corner, so when he couldn’t be reasoned with I took him there,’ said Abberline. ‘He was still raving when I left him.’
    ‘What was he saying, Constable?’ said Julius.
    ‘All sorts of nonsense. He was clearly mad. About an orchid climbing out of its pot. About his soul being stolen by someone called…what was it? Mr Dock? Or was he saying Tock? That’s it. It must have been Tock.’
    ‘So there is a connection,’ said Julius.
    The front door opened a crack, then more fully, to reveal a woman in a woollen bonnet.
    ‘Constable Abberline, I thought I heard your voice,’ she said. ‘Come about poor Mr Darwin, have you?’
    ‘Yes, indeed, Mrs Clitherow. I have a couple of independent investigators with me. They’re keen to look at Mr Darwin’s rooms.
    The woman looked the large bare-knuckle boxer and the schoolboy up and down. Mr Flynn doffed his top hat, and Julius blew into his mittened hands and stamped his feet.
    ‘Well, if you’re sure, Constable. I…um, I suppose it’d be all right,’ she said.
    Constable Abberline, Julius and Mr Flynn followed the landlady up two flights of stairs.
    ‘How long had Mr Darwin been lodging with you?’ said Mr Flynn.
    ‘Not long, sir. A few months. A very respectable young man, he was. He’d recently returned from a long voyage. He saw some things an Englishman shouldn’t see, if you ask me. That’s what made him like he is. Oh, don’t get me wrong, sir, I never had any nonsense from him. Not like some of my other gentlemen. No, he’s just a bit highly strung that’s all. The nervous type, you might say, on account of being among foreigners for too long.’
    ‘I see. Did he have any visitors?’
    ‘Oh, no. He kept to himself. Always in his room scribbling in his notebooks, mumbling to himself about Heaven knows what. You’ll see when we get there—not natural it’s not.’
    ‘Did he have a profession?’ asked Julius.
    ‘He had private means, which in my book is better than a profession. He didn’t keep regular hours, but he always paid his rent in advance and was never any trouble.’
    They came to a door with a sheet of paper pasted over the lock. It bore Abberline’s signature.
    ‘I thought it best to seal the room so that any clueswouldn’t be disturbed,’ said the constable. He tore the paper off the door and unlocked it with a key provided by Mrs Clitherow.
    ‘Thank you, we’ll manage by ourselves from here,’ he said.
    Julius stopped as soon as he entered the room. Papers, books and clothes were strewn everywhere. ‘It’s like a whirlwind been through here,’ he said.
    ‘It certainly does,’ said Abberline. ‘Mr Darwin turned everything upside down when he was battling the imaginary orchid.’
    Julius looked at the walls. They were covered with page after page of drawings of flowers and strange animals Julius had never seen before. Intricate diagrams of petals and leaves, and eyes, beaks and hooves as well as watercolour paintings of strange landscapes and native people.
    In the far corner was a bed and on the bedside table was a plate, bearing the greasy remains of a half-eaten pie.
    ‘That’s where he was lying when it happened. He said he fell asleep and was woken by the thing creeping towards him,’ said Abberline.
    Julius moved the tangled