Horatio Lyle (21 page)

Through his chattering teeth, which he tried to silence but couldn’t, he heard himself croak, ‘Was
. . .
who
. . .
was
. . .
’

‘Feng Darin,’ said Lyle in a low comforting voice. ‘Are you all right?’

‘I
. . .
I
. . .
’

‘Mister Lyle?’

It was Tess’s voice, and there was something in it, a new and frightened edge, that immediately commanded attention. Lyle turned to look at Tess, then followed her gaze down to the body. Then he reached slowly into his pocket and pulled out a fat match, striking it off his shoe again.

By the dull flame’s light, he saw that the blood seeping slowly from the back of the dead man was thick and white.

Lyle looked at this, at Tess, and said nothing until suddenly the match was burning his fingers, when he jerked back to reality and threw it aside. In the silence, the only sound was of Tate barking frantically from inside the house.

‘Bray,’ he muttered, once, quickly, darting to his feet and running into the house.

It was dark, rubble was strewn across the floor and Tate was barking furiously somewhere in the shadows. Tess followed numbly and lit the lantern that he gave her. The light fell on Bray, sprawled across the floor, expression vacant. Lyle immediately knelt down by him and grabbed him under the shoulders, dragging his head up and into his lap. His hand, where it fell briefly on the back of Bray’s neck, came away bloody. ‘Jesus,’ whispered Tess, her hand shaking. ‘Oh God, oh Jesus
. . .
’

‘Tess!’ Lyle looked up at her, and there was pleading in his eyes. ‘Please, it’ll be over soon,
please
.’

She nodded once, sharply, biting her lip.

Lyle looked into Bray’s face, heard his strained, choking breath, felt the weakness of his pulse. ‘Bray,’ he whispered softly. ‘Bray, they’ve gone, you’re going to be fine now.’

Bray’s eyes flickered and focused vaguely on Lyle. ‘Jack?’ he whispered. ‘You there?’

Lyle swallowed and, his voice only slightly shaking, whispered, ‘I’m here, Bray. It’s all right.’

‘I’m dying, Jack. I’m dying, ain’t I?’

‘You
. . .
’ Lyle swallowed again. ‘Bray, where’s the Fuyun Plate? Where did you hide it?’

‘Jack? I
. . .
I didn’t have time, you see? I
. . .
oh God
. . .
Mary Mother of Jesus, I was going to go to the priest, I was going to, just like you wanted, I swear I
. . .
’

‘Bray? Did you tell them where the Plate was?’

His eyes fixed vaguely on Lyle, but his jaw tightened. ‘No. I wouldn’t tell them bastards, not for their
. . .
their tricks and their magics
. . .
I wouldn’t tell them
. . .
’

‘Bray, where is the Plate?’

His eyes started to close.

‘Bray! Where
is
it? Where’s the Fuyun Plate?’

His eyes flickered on the edge of shut. His voice was barely above a whisper, his skin sodden with sweat, white. The blood seeped on to Lyle’s hands, his clothes, but he clung on still, desperately, knuckles as white as Bray’s face. ‘Bray, where is it?’ he whispered. ‘Jack’s here now, it’s all right, where’s the Plate?’

‘It’s
. . .
’

‘Jack’s here, just tell Jack.’

Bray’s eyes seemed to focus on Lyle for just one, brief second. He almost smiled. ‘It’s
. . .
in the hands of justice
. . .
Jack
. . .
’ He let out a long breath that seemed to deflate every muscle made bigger by the holding of it. He didn’t take another breath in again.

Tate stopped barking. Out in the street, windows were opening, doors were slamming, lights were starting to burn at the sound of the gunshots. Thomas leant against the door, grey, clinging to it as if for support. The metal of the lantern rattled as it jangled against itself in Tess’s shaking hand. Lyle carefully laid Bray’s head down and slumped back against the cold, ruined floor.

In the distance, a church struck the hour. In Covent Garden, the watercress man began to open up his stall by candlelight. On the highway through Archway, a tired messenger paused to water his horse at the trough. In the docks, a sailor called down from the rigging to his neighbour, who snored under a bottle of whisky. In the seas around Dover, the cabin boy snored, in the Channel south of Hastings the captain looked to the south and saw a storm rising off warmer waters. At the Lizard, where the sea lapped sleepily against grey rocks that had seen harder times, a traveller woke to look to the east.

The first light of dawn flecked the horizon, and slowly spread across the land, towards London.

CHAPTER 13

As dawn spread across London, someone was angry.

‘He died before he could speak?’

‘It wasn’t meant, my lord, there was smoke and sparks and
. . .
’

‘Bray is dead and we do not know where the Plate is?’

‘No, my lord. But I am sure that Lyle cannot know either
. . .
’

‘That is irrelevant! If he has it we can take it; if no one has it we cannot use it!’

‘My lord, I am sorry, I—’

‘Get out!
Get out!
’

And in a room too large for its occupants, someone else said, ‘My lord? Lord Lincoln?’

‘What is it?’

‘I have been speaking to the Commissioner, sir. There was an incident last night in the King’s Cross area.’

‘Well?’

‘Horatio Lyle was involved.’

‘Has he found the Plate?’

‘I do not know, sir. Sir, one of the bodies was Tseiqin. Lyle saw it. He examined it before he left. The other belonged to Bray.’

‘Bray? The thief?’

‘Yes, my lord.’

‘Did Lyle say anything?’

‘No, my lord.’

‘Well. Well, perhaps it is for the best.’

‘My lord?’

‘If Lyle is to survive, he must know
how
to survive. The Tseiqin will not let him live after this.’

‘Shall I summon him, my lord?’

‘If you believe that he will come.’

‘My lord, I do not know.’

‘Then perhaps you had better find out.’

 

And as the bells tolled, calling the morning masses to prayer, and the factories whistled, to much the same effect, there was a knock on a door in Waterloo. It opened. A round-faced woman, grey hair loose around a pink face, looked down the short flight of steps to a hansom cab with a near-sleeping driver slumped at the front, a boy asleep in the back and Horatio Lyle holding a small sleeping, bedraggled and grimy girl in his arms, her hands wrapped round his neck. Lyle’s face was dirty; blood clung to his clothes and hands.

‘Horatio?’ said the woman in surprise, not moving, not showing any sign of dismay or horror at the sight before her.

He stared up at her wretchedly. ‘I need help.’

 

And as the washed sunlight spread in pale waves across the city, a door opened in a small mews behind Hyde Park, and closed again.

‘Feng Darin, welcome home.’

‘
Xiansheng.
’

‘You were out longer than we expected.’

‘Lyle found Bray. So did the Tseiqin.’

‘Has he found the Plate?’

‘I do not know. Perhaps. One of the Tseiqin is dead.’

‘Then Lyle’s life is not worth living.’

‘I went to his house to warn him. He wasn’t there.’

‘Where is he?’

‘I do not know. He has gone into hiding. Perhaps he is beginning to understand what he is facing.’

‘Feng Darin, how did the Tseiqin die?’

Silence.

‘Feng Darin!’

‘I shot it. Fire and lead. I killed it. I destroyed it.’

‘Do you believe that to have been wise?’

‘He would have killed a child.’

‘Would that child have found us the Plate? Perhaps fatigue is compromising your judgement, Feng Darin. Now we are all in danger.’

‘
Xiansheng
.’

‘Once again, it seems, we are waiting on Lyle for the next move.’

 

And the time passed. Tess woke, in another alien bed. The room was small, but the bed was comfortable and at the end of it she found, to her surprise, a small iron tub full of steaming water that seemed to be heated through some strange, foreign mechanism underneath, and a plate of neatly cooked meat and vegetables, left cold for her. A new, clean dress was lying on a chair in a corner.

Tess thought about it, about it all, sunlight over the scrubby houses of King’s Cross, a hand burnt with iron, fires in the night, and made a decision.

For the first time in living memory, she had a bath. To her surprise, it was wonderful.

 

And the time passed, and Teresa Hatch, newly washed and scrubbed, found herself knocking politely on the door leading to a kitchen hung with herbs. A chubby woman wearing an apron, hands caked in flour, grey hair pinned back from her head, turned, and treated her to a broad grin under her sparkling grey eyes. ‘You’d be Teresa, wouldn’t you?’

‘Yes, m’m.’ Something about this lady instinctively made Tess want to be respectful. It was the same unplaceable something that always made Lyle a
Mister
.

‘Are you still hungry? I have
. . .
oh, let’s think
. . .
almost anything you want, really. Nothing too sweet - I don’t think children should have too much sugar while they’re still growing. Don’t linger in the door, dear. I’m Milly,’ she said, holding out a large hand. Tess shook it nervously, getting a light dusting of flour in the process.

‘Tess. Is Mister Lyle
. . .
’

‘Oh, Horatio dear is in the living room, in Father’s old armchair, brooding. Just like a sulky boy, really. He gets very embarrassed when I ask him about it - says that I’ll think he’s gone potty.’ She laughed, a deafening sound that made Tess both cringe and smile at the same time. In the same jovial tone she chatted on. ‘I assume by the distribution of bloodstains across his jacket he held a man who’d been stabbed no more than an inch from a major blood vessel - probably in the neck, although it could quite easily be the thigh, but not the wrist, and I doubt if it would be the thigh, because then the man probably wouldn’t be dead, which suggests somewhere near the jugular. Tea?’

‘Erm
. . .
no, thank you.’

Milly put the kettle on the stove anyway, and continued. ‘I’m also assuming by the way he was piecing back together that little dynamo of his that he had need of a magnetic field, which might explain the parallel-plate tube in his pocket. The fact that it had been discharged also suggests he was in a fight, and the mud-stains on the back of his coat - which are very difficult to shift, I might tell you, unless you soak it quickly before it dries - possibly mean that he was involved in a very tight hand-to-hand fight somewhere no more than six miles north or south of the river, probably north by the colour and dirt in the soil, but certainly not north of Alexandra Palace or south of the clay belt. The faint smell of ammonia means he’s been blowing things up, and the vial of white gooey liquid scraped up from a dirty street is something I’ve never seen in my entire life ever, and which probably isn’t a natural compound.’ She sighed. ‘He does get so carried away.’

Tess stared up at Milly with her mouth open. ‘Are you
. . .
are
you . . .
’

‘Yes, dear,’ said Milly nicely, patting Tess on the shoulder. ‘I wouldn’t think about it too much. It tends to upset people. Come on, dear. Let’s see if he wants lunch.’

 

Lyle was indeed sitting in a very old padded armchair, feet up on a table, face covered with his travelling hat, a vial of white liquid sitting on the table in front of him, an anatomical dictionary lying discarded at his feet. Milly strode into the room on surprisingly silent feet, put a tray down on the table by his side, pulled the hat off his head and promptly hit him with it. ‘Stop brooding, Horatio! Have you eaten any fish recently?’