The Aylesford Skull (31 page)

Mother Laswell was confounded to see Bill Kraken six paces away running and not slowing down. Lord Moorgate set his feet to meet the onrush, but was simply mowed down, his hat flying away, Kraken banking off the nearby wall, catching himself, and leaping forward to kick Moorgate on the knee. Helen, knitting needle in her hand, lunged at Kraken as Moorgate fell, but Mother Laswell threw herself forward and grabbed a handful of Helen’s dress and the woman tripped and went down, grunting audibly when her knee and hands struck the stones of the pavement, her knitting needle snapping in half. Mother Laswell leaned heavily against her as she got to her feet, stepping into the road to fetch her parasol, meaning to teach Helen a lesson in manners.

Moorgate leapt up and assumed a boxer’s stance, he and Kraken circling Helen, who rolled up onto the footpath, shielding herself with her hands and arms. Moorgate feinted at Kraken, who ducked backward as his opponent took a wild swing at his jaw, Kraken knocking his fist away, Moorgate bobbing toward him again, lashing out and catching Kraken on the chin this time, knocking him backward.

With room to move now, Helen scrambled to her feet and turned toward Mother Laswell, who rushed in at her, pummeling her with the umbrella, thrusting it into her face, Helen windmilling her arms to fend it off and fleeing into the street. Mother Laswell followed, her blood up now, and took a wild swing with the umbrella at the back of Helen’s head. The umbrella flew open, two of the ribs entangling themselves in Helen’s hair and bringing her up short.

“Murder!” Helen began screaming. “Murder! Murder!”

Mother Laswell snatched the umbrella away with both hands, shouting, “We’ll see who murders whom!” and starting forward again, but abruptly finding herself pulled backward. Behind them, Lord Moorgate lay face down on the pavement.

“We’d best take our leave,” Kraken said, hurrying her along.

Suddenly energized, Mother Laswell found herself running, her corns be damned – something she hadn’t done in years, the two of them rounding the corner and hastening south along Bishopsgate. When it was certain they weren’t being followed, they slowed their pace and limped along, Kraken looking back every few yards, both of them laboring simply to breathe. No one followed. Lord Moorgate had given it up, apparently. Mother Laswell wondered if he were dead. More likely he would simply have gone on his way. He wouldn’t want the police involved, not if he thought she knew something about his dealings, which he evidently
did
think, although he was dead wrong in that regard.

“We’d best keep on,” Kraken said, gasping. “They’d jail me for certain, Mother, for laying into that gent.”

“He’s no gent,” Mother Laswell said. “
You’re
a gent, Bill, and I owe you an apology for running out on you this morning. Indeed, I owe you considerably more than that.”

“Nobody owes me nothing, Mother, including you,” Kraken said. “I don’t hold with being owed. Who was he, then – him and the strumpet?”

“That was Lord Moorgate. You’ve savaged a Peer of the Realm, Bill. The woman was a vicious little adder. It’s my great hope that we never meet them again. I’ve gone my entire life without brawling, and now twice in one night I’ve found myself in a rout. If you hadn’t come along when you did, they’d have had their way with me.” She took stock of her umbrella, which was flayed to pieces. A considerable hank of black hair was entangled in the bent ribs, and she saw with satisfaction that there was a bit of bloody skin attached.

The tooth!
she thought, thrusting her hand into her pocket. With it, Mabel might once again locate Edward, even if Narbondo had moved him out of London. The tooth was still there, safe enough.

“Mabel Morningstar showed me the map,” Kraken said, “and I been searching these last hours. It was dumb luck that I fell in with you when you were a-standing outside there on the street. When the two of them joined you, I held back till I seen what they were about. You didn’t kill the Doctor, did you? I’m hopeful that you didn’t. You couldn’t of stood it, a woman with your heart.”

“No, Bill. I didn’t kill him, although I admit that I tried, or I think I did. I didn’t have the spirit to do it for its own sake, but there was a boy there, and I plucked up the courage to use the pistol when it came into my mind to take the boy away.”

“Eddie, his name is – the boy,” Kraken said.

“Yes. How did you know?”

“The missus told me. Alice St. Ives – the Professor’s missus, before I come into London.”

“I’m bound to find that boy, Bill. I nearly brought him away with me, but I couldn’t manage it. Narbondo will kill another child, do you see, and I can’t have that. I couldn’t stand having two on my conscience.”

“No more can I, Mother. We’re in it together, up to our necks. We’ve got a mort of seams to caulk, and no pitch hot, but we’ll see it done, by God. Damn me if we won’t.”

“Nobody will damn you, Bill, ever. I don’t deserve a friend such as you. I tell you that plainly.”

“More than a friend, ma’am,” Kraken mumbled. And then he nodded his head resolutely. “
More
than a friend.” He said it clearly this time, his face looking both pleased and determined in the moonlight.

She gazed at him quizzically, a smile on her own face, but he kept his eyes forward. She took his arm, happy enough not to press him, and he reached over and patted her hand.

TWENTY-SIX

SHADE HOUSE

I
t was very nearly dawn now, and Finn Conrad, still lying in his depression behind the coach, considered what he would do, because he would have to do it soon. His shoulder ached, his knee was bent at an unnatural angle, and the iron edge of the platform on which he lay dug into his elbow. He had no idea how long he had been rattling along, but it was too long, to his mind. Some time back, in St. Mary Hoo, where they had stopped for a time at an inn before leaving the pavement and driving into the wilds of the Cliffe Marshes, Finn had slipped off the back of the coach and hidden behind a hedgerow in order to keep from being discovered. Then he had leapt back on again when the coach got underway in the darkness, but not as nimbly as he had in London. In his diminished, cramped state he had nearly fallen. He should invent a tale right now, he told himself, and think it through in the time he had left. If they twigged to the lie, he would simply run away, if he weren’t half crippled.

The coach was in among trees, rocking slowly along a rutted track. He could see the remnants of stars through the branches, and the bright moon, and in the eastern sky there was just the hint of dawn, the stars dimmed by it. He raised his head carefully and took a look in the direction of the distant, invisible Thames, where moonlight shone on a broad body of water: Egypt Bay, no doubt – the south shore along the Thames merely a line of shadow in the far distance. He thought of Square Davey, who was almost certainly on the river, possibly nearby. If he failed, he told himself, and something happened to Eddie, he would take Davey up on his offer to take up oystering again. Returning to Aylesford would be unthinkable. Thoughts of old Davey brought the Crumpet into his mind. The man would soon arrive in the Cliffe Marshes, and that would change everything on the instant. Finn must look for his chance to snatch Eddie away as soon as ever he could. If Newman had got his message through to the Professor, so much the better, but Finn couldn’t depend on it and he couldn’t wait for the Professor to play his hand.

The driver reined in the horses, and the coach drew to a stop before a run-down, ancient, three-story wooden structure, tilted where its north-facing wall had apparently sunk into the marshy ground over the years. Several windows looked out onto a weedy yard where there stood an enormous walnut tree, the upper limbs of which arched over the roof of the inn. A sign hanging on a post in the yard read ‘Shade House,’ the lamp above it throwing out enough radiance so that Finn drew his head in just a bit. Another lamp burned behind a downstairs shutter. Now the inn door opened and a man walked out and said something to the coachman, who climbed heavily down to the ground before muttering a reply. Finn recognized the newcomer from Narbondo’s rooms on Angel Alley. He had thrown a cracker at the man just before fleeing through the door across the rope bridge with Eddie. He must have come along to the Bay immediately following the dust-up. His boots and trousers were brown with dirt, and he looked weary, his face bruised and cut. He opened the door of the coach now and helped Narbondo down, then lifted out the sleeping Eddie. He was delicate about it, and held the boy easily. There was something in the action that made Finn wonder whether the man had some variety of kindness in his heart, kindness that might be turned to advantage.

“See to the boy, George,” Narbondo said in a low voice. “Put him in the lace bedroom and hang some bottles of champagne in the brook for Lord Moorgate. I suspect that he’ll be along in a few hours, and we want to put him at his ease and play upon his pride. I mean to confound him come what may and let him rot, but he’s too suspicious by half, and the longer we can keep him dancing the better.”

With that Narbondo turned to the driver of the coach, and said, “Take your ease, Mr. Beaumont. George will see to the coach.” He walked away then – not through the door of the Shade House, but around the side, disappearing into the darkness. Mr. Beaumont climbed stiffly down and went in through the open door of the inn.

George followed him, carrying Eddie, the night falling silent. Finn dragged himself off his perch and crept down to the ground, immediately setting in to shake himself limber and to push himself up on his toes to ease the cramping in his legs. A lamp came on behind one of the windows in the top floor now – Eddie being locked away, perhaps – near enough to the tree, Finn noticed, to climb up to it. He considered the succession of limbs both downward and upward, and whether Eddie might be induced to climb down, which was always more frightening and difficult than climbing up.
Doubtful
, he thought.

He settled his cap on his head and waited, reviewing his tale. Very shortly George came back out through the door, saw Finn standing there, and stopped in his tracks. Finn swept his cap from his head and bowed, thankful that he’d been wearing the balaclava earlier, which he had happily pitched into the street before they were out of London.

“Where in the devil’s name did
you
come from?” George asked.

“St. Mary Hoo, sir, when this coach stopped for a time. I climbed up onto the back and rode along, hid by the baggage.”

“Then you’ll be able to find your way back to St. Mary Hoo afoot. Off with you.” He jerked his head to underscore the command and pointed back down the road. “
Now
, boy. You don’t want to linger – not here.”

“I’m right anxious for a trial sir, if you’ll have me. I was an ostler for two years in Yorkshire for Mr. Carnahan, and I can pick a man’s pocket like it was nothing, if that suits your honor.”

“I daresay you can. No doubt you picked Mr. Carnahan’s pocket, whoever he is, which explains why you’re no longer in his employ. And now you’ve skulked out of St. Mary Hoo in the dark of night. You’ve only just been breeched and already you’re tearing along toward the gibbet like a devil in a red cap.”

“I’m just trying to make my living, sir. If it please your honor to help me, I’d be grateful.”

“It would not please me. I tell you to go home, wherever home is, before they put the rope around your neck. The noose is already tied, depend upon it. Better to look to the kindness of your mother, because there’s little enough of that commodity you’ll find in the world, nor here at Shade House, neither, for that matter.”

“My mother’s dead, sir, and my father’s gone off. He left when I was a lad, and never came back. He was a drunk, sir, so I don’t miss him. I took care of my little brother till he died of the bloody jack when he was only five years – not much older than the boy who come along in this coach just now. After that I left London and went north, where I worked in the cheesing line, Stilton mainly, and was scullery boy at the Bell Inn on the Great North Road, where I learned to butcher some. I can do a day’s work, sir, no matter what. I don’t peach, neither. Never have. I’d sooner stay here and work for my room and board, and no matter any pay. You won’t be sorry for it.”