The Golden Specific (27 page)

Broadgirdle raised his heavy eyebrows and gave a slight smile. He sat without speaking. “Well said,” he finally replied. Theo felt gratification at the compliment and then a flood of nausea for being gratified. He sensed Peel relax slightly. “Working in the State House raises all manner of ethical dilemmas. It is important to know where one's loyalties lie and to not be overly nice with one's virtues.”

“I understand, sir,” Theo said. “Thank you for the explanation.”

Broadgirdle gave him one last, appraising look and then turned to Peel. He nodded slightly.

“We'll return to the front office now, Mr. Slade,” Peel said.

“Thank you for the interview, sir.”

Broadgirdle acknowledged him and turned to the window once again.

“Mr. Slade, I will contact you soon about the position,” Peel said when they reached his desk. He glanced at the sheet of paper on his writing desk. “Care of the South End Post office?”

“Correct.”

“Thank you for coming in.”

“Thank you.” Theo felt too shaky to say anything else. His legs carried him along his escape route: down the corridor, down the steps, and out through the colonnade to the main entrance. When he reached the common he tried to remove his gloves, but he found that the sweat had glued them to his palms. He shook his hands furiously, suddenly desperate to take them off. Finally, pulling them inside out, he was able to yank them from his fingers. He walked unsteadily across the common, feeling great relief and some surprise that he had survived.

—June 12: 13-Hour 45—

T
HE
LETTER
FROM
Broadgirdle's office arrived on the eleventh, announcing that he had been offered the position and asking him to present himself for work on the twelfth. Theo tried to visit Nettie's house to tell her, but the inspector was home. He left her a note addressed
To Nettie from your friend Charles
in the mailbox. He spent the rest of the day preparing himself, and on the next he did what he once would have considered impossible: he worked his first day in the offices of MP Gordon Broadgirdle.

He realized, as morning gave way to afternoon, that his contact with Broadgirdle would be limited. For one thing, Peel
was fiercely jealous of his time with Broadgirdle, and he tried to be the sole point of contact with the powerful MP. Theo did not protest. Moreover, Broadgirdle spent very little time in his office; he spent most of it moving stealthily through the halls of the State House, meeting with various members of parliament and no doubt applying his leverage in as many places as he could.

Theo tensed every time someone turned the doorknob, but by the end of the day his tension had begun to lessen. The avalanche of busywork deposited on his desk by Peel helped, too. When a young woman in a pinstripe shirt and sharply creased trousers came in, Theo welcomed the interruption with relief. “Can I help you?” he asked, getting to his feet. Peel had scrambled out of the office with his writing desk some time earlier in response to a summons from Broadgirdle.

“I just wanted to introduce myself,” the young woman said, putting out her hand. “Cassandra Pierce. I work down the hall in MP Gamaliel Shore's office.”

“Archibald Slade. Very nice to meet you.”

She gave a firm handshake. “How are you settling in?”

“Fine, thank you.” Theo gestured at the pile of paperwork on his desk. “I have plenty to do already.”

Cassandra smiled, tilting her head slightly. “It seems I was spared.”

“How do you mean?”

“I applied for your position, but was not chosen.”

“Ah. Very sorry.”

“Not at all.” She tucked her short black hair behind her ears.
“It can be overwhelming here. All the little snubs and things that go unspoken. Let me know if I can help.”

“Thank you. That's very kind.”

Cassandra paused and looked around the office. “Well, it's nice to meet you. The assistants all have lunch together on Fridays, if you'd like to join us.”

“Maybe I will—I appreciate it.”

She gave him a brief wave as she left. Theo looked down at his desk and realized it was almost fourteen-hour. He tidied the papers on his desk, took his jacket from the coat stand, and left the State House.

He felt exhausted, but the day had been a tremendous accomplishment. Though he had learned nothing new, he had successfully implanted himself in Broadgirdle's office. He felt suddenly, exultantly certain that this would work. Broadgirdle had no idea who he was. In a day or two, he would start searching in earnest, and he would find something that explained the presence of the Sandmen, or pointed to the location of the Weatherers, or proved Broadgirdle's involvement in Bligh's murder. It had to be there. With luck, he would have what he needed by the end of the week.

Distracted by these thoughts, Theo did not notice that he was being followed.

The boy was easy to overlook. He was barefoot, because the soles of his boots had given out that winter and the way they slapped the pavement made it difficult to walk around unnoticed.
Untidy
did not begin to describe his hair, which looked more like a pile of crushed straw than a covering for his scalp;
dirty
did not begin to describe his skin, which was so covered with dust it was impossible to determine its color; and
torn
did not begin to describe his clothes, which seemed in danger of disintegrating entirely. His pants were held up with twine. His shirt had only one sleeve. At the very top of this bedraggled arrangement perched a very fine and well-made cap, which he had acquired the day before and was sure to keep for only a day or two longer. The best pieces were always bound to be stolen.

The boy padded silently on his bare feet, receiving only the occasional look of pity or disgust from passing pedestrians, and he followed Theo all the way through the Little Nickel to the South End and onto East Wrinkle Street. The boy observed how Theo tousled his hair with a rather desperate movement and accelerated his pace. Running up behind Theo, he scurried around so that he was standing in front of him and stood in his way, arms crossed.

“Uh . . . hello,” Theo said, eyeing the diminutive figure in his path. The boy had large ears and freckles, which made it difficult for him to appear menacing, however piercing his glare.

“Hello, Archibald. Or should I say Charles. Or should I say Theodore.”

Theo squinted and eyed the boy thoughtfully. He looked familiar—not familiar in the sense that Theo knew this particular boy, but familiar in the sense that Theo himself had once been very like this boy. It was like seeing a younger version of himself. “Scram,” he said, not unkindly. He moved to walk past him.

“You don't want to do that.”

“What? Go home?”

The boy scowled. “Ignore me. It's a bad idea.”

Theo smiled. It was true, he reflected. Ignoring himself when he was this age would have been a bad idea. “Okay. I'm not ignoring you. You figured out that I have three names.”

The boy seemed momentarily disconcerted. “I did,” he asserted, attempting to keep his tone confrontational.

Theo shrugged and looked away. “Probably someone told you. And now you want to pretend you figured it out all by yourself.”

“No one told me! I did figure it out all by myself.”

Theo gave him a skeptical look. “Prove it. How did you know?”

“Easy. Saw you leaving the State House. Followed you here. Saw you sneak in. Saw you sneak out again the next day. Saw you leaving love letters over in the Little Nickel. I've got eyes and ears, and I'm just about invisible. It's a good way to figure things out.”

“All right,” Theo conceded. “But you don't know what I'm actually doing or why I'm doing it.”

“No, I don't,” the boy replied stoutly, “but it seems to me that whatever you're doing, you ought to calculate me into your expenses if you plan on staying undercover.”

Theo laughed. “Not likely. Nice try, though.” He tried to walk away, but the boy stuck out a dirty hand to stop him.

“I know what he has on Shadrack.” He looked up at Theo, his eyes sharp.

“What?”

“Broadsy made an agreement with Shadrack. I know what it is.”

Theo made an effort to appear mildly impressed rather than desperately curious. “What is it, then?”

“Ha,” he replied dryly. “No chance. You and I agree to terms. Then I'll tell you what I've got. If you don't like it, the terms are only good for one week. If you do, the terms are good indefinitely.”

Theo tapped his chin, speculating. “All right. Let's talk. What's your name?”

The boy looked suddenly greatly relieved. The tough talk had proved something of a strain for him. “Winston. Winston Pendle. Go by Winnie.”

“And you're one of the boys who work near the State House, right?”

“Right.”

“How many people know about this?”

“No one, just me,” Winnie said with a touch of pride.

“All right. First part of the terms. That's how it has to stay.”

“Obviously. Second part. I want a nickel a day.”

Theo's eyes narrowed. “Are you blackmailing me like ‘Broadsy' does?”

“No!” Winnie said heatedly. “I want a nickel a day for my work. I can take messages, I can hear things no one else does, and I can follow people. Like I said. I'm invisible.”

“Okay. But we keep it at a nickel, even if things get a bit rough—which they might. No haggling.”

Winnie looked down at the cobblestones in an attempt to conceal his glee. A nickel a day would mean three meals and maybe a pair of shoes, if he saved up. “I can handle rough work. But it can be expensive.”

“I said no haggling.”

“Fine.”

“It's a great deal and you know it,” Theo said.

“Yeah. Yeah, I guess it is,” Winnie agreed.

“All right. Let's hear what you've got. I'll go in this way, and you go around and knock on the side door of 34 East Ending Street in five minutes. I'm going to introduce you to Mrs. Clay. First test for you. Mrs. Clay has no idea what I'm doing at the State House, see?”

Winnie nodded.

“It's for her own good. She's a worrier. She thinks I've been spending all my time hanging out like you do on the common. We're going to keep it that way, all right?”

—15-Hour 34—

M
RS
.
C
LAY
WAS
more than a little shocked by the state of Winnie's attire, and for several minutes, while Theo explained who he was and how they had met lingering near the State House, she could do little more than stare at him. She had seen such children on the street before, of course, but she had the vague sense that their state was always temporary, and she had never had the chance to speak to one of them to ascertain whether this was true. Nodding absently as Theo finished his
introductions, Mrs. Clay frowned. “And where do you sleep at night, Winnie?” she asked.

“You know, here and there.”

Her frown deepened. “Where are your parents?”

Theo rolled his eyes; this line of questioning was all too familiar, and he knew it would lead nowhere. Winnie squirmed. “No idea about my father. My mother's upstate.”

“What do you mean, ‘upstate'?”

“At the 'stitution.”

“The what?”

“The 'stitution.” Winnie looked decidedly uncomfortable. He examined his bare feet.

Theo pushed him into one of the kitchen chairs and sat down next to him. “I have always thought, when they put you in an institution,” he said, enunciating clearly for Mrs. Clay's benefit, “it usually means that you are too talkative in the wrong company or quiet in the wrong company or smart in the wrong company or persistent in the wrong company. Basically, it means you have been yourself but in the wrong company. Isn't that the way of it?”

“That's right,” Winnie said, crossing his arms with an expression of indignant disdain that did not entirely conceal the gratitude shining in his eyes like tiny flames.

Mrs. Clay sat down slowly, her face pale. “I see. Well, Winnie. You are always welcome to a meal here.” She had the sense that this was woefully inadequate, but the complications of doing more struck her forcibly, and she realized that she would
have to think long and hard about this problem. Opening the breadbox that sat on the counter, she removed a loaf of currant bread, cut a few slices, and placed the butter beside it while the conversation continued.

“Winnie wants to help us,” Theo went on, “and he's going to start by telling us what he found out about the agreement between Shadrack and Broadgirdle.”

Drawn away from thoughts of the institution by the currant bread and Theo's prompt, Winnie straightened up in his chair. “Broadgirdle has a book. He was going to give it to Shadrack.”

“Yes, he gave it to him. But we don't know what it is.”

“It's a book written by another Shadrack.”

Theo squinted. “What do you mean?”

“A book written by another Shadrack Elli. Published in 1899. It's about maps for places that don't exist, and a war.”

Theo's face eased with understanding. “Ah—it's dreck.”

“What's dreck?” Winnie asked. He took the opportunity to seize a piece of currant bread.

“A word from another Age. It means trash. But really it means things from another Age that don't belong in ours. Like that book.”

“Well, Broadsy used the book to explain to Shadrack what he wanted. He calls it ‘westwood spansion.'”

Theo and Mrs. Clay exchanged a glance. “He wants to take the Indian Territories and the Baldlands,” Theo said slowly, thinking aloud. “Westward expansion.”

“And,” Winnie added with his mouth full, “he wants
Shadrack to help him. He's even agreed to get Shadrack out of jail so he can do it.”