Unobtainium 1: Kate on a Hot Tin Roof (15 page)

The problem here was that seeing men carrying a woman through the streets, generally one the worse for drink, was not that uncommon. Determining whether any of them might be kidnapping their burden was not at all easy, and as the clock ticked towards midnight, Antonia decided upon an alternate plan. They would check the warehouses, for she suspected that that was where they would find the captive girls. Once again, Kate was doing so from above while Antonia surveyed the ground below.

There was certainly no shortage of illegal activity going on. The brothels which had regained some purchase in the city after the crackdowns of the last century were further north, but there were other vices for people to indulge. Antonia uncovered an opium den which surprised her because she thought they had all been wiped out. Kate discovered what appeared to be a fencing operation from the random assortment of goods being stored and the rather shady man she saw doing business in the place. Both of them found several houses which rented their rooms out to sailors and their ‘doxies.’ Or that was what Antonia called them, and Kate found the word somehow amusing and began using it herself.

‘You know,’ Kate said as they paused their search for a few seconds to coordinate, ‘Mrs Morton never taught me rude words. I know very few and those by accident. Someone could call me all manner of unseemly things and I’d be oblivious.’

‘And you consider this a
bad
thing?’

‘Well… I suppose not, but somehow I feel that my vocabulary is incomplete without a way to swear at people. Or at least utter a suitable exclamation should I hit my thumb.’

‘I am not about to start teaching you swear words, Katherine Felix. Charles would likely be cross with me for at least ten minutes. Now, you take the south side towards Wapping Lane and I’ll angle north. We’ll meet up around Chandler Street in an hour and then go home.’

‘I am not feeling lucky tonight, Antonia.’

‘Nor am I, but I believe that luck favours those who put in the work. Onward.’

Wapping.

‘Do you see them?’ Antonia’s voice sounded urgent over the portio. ‘I’ve lost sight.’ They had put in the work and Lady Luck had apparently been watching, for Antonia had spotted two men carrying a limp, humanoid bundle wrapped in a blanket coming down from The Highway and heading towards Wapping Wall.

‘I see them,’ Kate replied. ‘You’re a hundred yards behind them. They just turned left. Hold on…’ She darted across the rooftop, a flat one, she was using as a vantage point, and looked down upon the alley the two men had taken. ‘Got them. They’re going in. The building on the north side of the alley.’

‘A tobacco warehouse.’ There was a noise a little like a grunt, distorted by the portio. ‘Now they’ve made me want a fag.’

‘I didn’t know you smoked.’

‘I don’t. Except for those times when I do. An occasional cigar at the club is my usual vice. I get worse in Kenya for some reason. David accused me of smelling like I’d rolled in an ashtray one day in Nairobi and I cut back to almost nothing.’ There was a pause. ‘Besides, it’s bad for the breathing.’

Kate jumped across the alley and began walking to the rear of the building. This roof was sloped and she had to balance on a few inches of brick at the edge. It had occurred to her that most women, Antonia included, would find it hard to perform such a feat, and harder still in heeled boots, but it seemed quite natural to her. Another of those ‘features’ her father had gifted her with somehow. Master Sun had suggested performing his forms in such an outfit was unconventional, but if she could do it then it indicated even greater inner balance.

‘I see no easy way in. There is a loading port in the eaves here which I could get to. I do not recommend you use the same door.’

‘Perhaps not. And not tonight. We retreat and return soon after dark tomorrow. I feel the need for a change of clothes before entering this jungle.’

‘Should we not inform Inspector Franklin of the location and have him send constables?’

‘I think that by the time they have gained entry, even assuming the slavers do not have a snitch in the Yard, half the girls would be dead and the men ready to fight. If they do obtain prior warning,
all
the girls would be dead and the men long gone. Besides which, we do not
know
that this is the location we seek. No,
we
will enter, and if this
is
the lair of such foul men as we believe, we will seek to rescue those captured and detain the criminals.’

Richmond, 8
^th
August.

‘I do believe you may be enjoying this a little too much,’ Kate opined.

Antonia was sitting on the floor of the drawing room with shotgun parts arrayed before her as she carefully cleaned them. ‘I am finding the excitement more than a little to my taste,’ she replied without rancour. ‘David and I were active people. We explored, we hunted. When we were back in England we would frequently simply go walking to be outside in the fresh air.’

‘I would not describe the air around Whitechapel as “fresh.” I would, in fact, find it inaccurate to describe it as air.’

‘That as may be, I have missed activity. I crave the thrill of the chase and this escapade has given me that thrill. And, should we succeed, we will have done some good in the world. Now, you have your sword and your Webley?’

‘I do. My revolver lies in its case. I’m not as familiar with its use as I might be…’

‘You will find that a Webley is a reliable weapon and you may find that it comes in useful. Your natural abilities and training with the rifle should suffice to make you an excellent shot. Should this kind of action become a habit, I shall undertake to instruct you in some techniques which may be useful in close confines. I shall have this brute and my Mauser. The Germans may be disagreeable at times, but they do make a quite excellent automatic pistol. And Mister Browning’s Auto-5 is a most suitable close-quarters weapon. Belgian, but we shall not hold that against it.’

Kate giggled. ‘I know little of either country, or the people who live there. Mrs Morton was always somewhat disparaging of foreigners. You say the same things, but I do not think you are as serious.’

‘I have my doubts on the Germans, some of them anyway, but generally people are people. Nationality and colour of skin have no bearing on temperament, you’ll find. I’ve known white men who were absolute scoundrels and black men who held honour above all else. No, I do not take seriously my disparagement of other nations and I do not believe that any woman could.’

‘Why women in particular?’

‘Kate, most women cannot vote. We can own property in our own names, but we are treated much as we have been for centuries, as chattels. Women are considered fine operators of the latest technical marvels of the world, but we remain, in the eyes of men and society, as weak, and silly, and unsuitable for management and politics. I have love for neither but I should like the choice of refusing them. No, how can we, we women, consider others our inferiors when we are treated as such ourselves? And how can men who consider half their own nation’s populace inferior consider
themselves
superior to anyone?’

Kate pondered for a second. ‘But Charles isn’t like that.’

Antonia smiled. ‘Charles is prone to it by education, but is, I believe, too much of a scientist to allow it to affect his judgement. He is
so
scientific that he will not postulate a theory without adequate evidence to work with. We return to Conan Doyle for he wrote that when one creates theories without facts, one tends to twist the facts to fit the theory, or more correctly, one ignores the facts which do not
fit
the theory. Charles makes up his mind about people once he knows them, and when one knows someone it is not prejudice to call them bad or evil, for you know them to be.’

‘Then I’m lucky to have met you and Charles. My own nature surely calls for prejudice beyond that earned by any normal man one might meet, and you have both treated me as a civilised human being.’

‘My dear Kate, you
are
a civilised human being. None may say otherwise in my presence without receiving the utmost censure.’

‘As I stated, I am clearly a most lucky woman for having the company I keep.’

Wapping.

Kate dropped from the apex of the roof, landing easily on the beam which stood out above the loading door. It was meant for a block and tackle such that heavy objects could be lifted up easily, but it served as a passable perch for a girl with preternatural balance. She employed that and her unnatural strength as she dropped again, hanging from the post by an arm and a leg so that she could lean forward and press her ear to the wood.

There was nothing to hear beyond the split wooden door and she managed to prise it open without too much difficulty. Apparently no one had considered this point of entry to be a viable one since they had not locked it. Dropping to the boards inside the building, Kate removed her portio from its pouch and thumbed the button.

‘I am in. I shall attempt to locate some evidence of the ring and then make further contact.’

‘Be careful,’ Antonia said from the street below. ‘If this building does house our missing girls, the other occupants are not likely to take kindly to your presence.’

‘The feeling will be mutual.’

The attic space seemed to be stocked with lengths of two-by-four and a lot of rolls of something which looked like fishing net made of galvanised iron twisted together. Kate had never seen the like of it, but thought, perhaps, that the two components might make a sturdy cage for a girl without her strengthened constitution. That she considered a good sign and hurried to locate a means of getting down, which she found in the form of a staircase in one of the corners.

From the arrangement of the outer windows and general knowledge, Antonia had surmised that the building had one, lower, high-ceilinged room which was the main warehouse, perhaps three storeys in height. Above it would be another floor, perhaps open, perhaps divided into rooms. As Kate descended, she discovered that it was a bit of both. Half the building was open, but contained a few crates which gave her some opportunity for cover. The other half appeared to be rooms of some sort and she could hear voices from those. A moment of concentration resolved words, but in no language she knew, or even recalled hearing.

Seeing another staircase across the floor, she moved towards it as quickly and quietly as she was able to, finding that it dropped to the floor below in three stages with a small landing between each flight of stairs. Moving down to the first of these, she looked out on the warehouse floor.

There were cages there, each about six feet by six feet and no taller than she was. Each cage was made of wooden posts bolted together with the metal netting nailed across it. Each had two pallets laid on the floor with a blanket and no pillow. She counted ten cages in two rows of five, and in all fifteen girls occupying them. At a table set between the rows, three men sat playing cards. She could see a shotgun leaning against the table, and one pistol. It was likely all three were armed.

Backing up the stairs, she located a spot behind some crates away from the occupied rooms and took out her portio. ‘I have located the girls. They are on the ground floor with three men doing a poor job of keeping watch over them.’

‘Any others in the building?’ Antonia asked.

‘I believe so, but they are in rooms upstairs, out of sight, and I have no way of determining how many.’

‘That is tactically disadvantageous.’

Kate looked around and then grinned. ‘I may have a way of slowing their progress if I can achieve it without alerting them.’

‘Very well. If you are discovered, fire your pistol. I will hear the shot and attempt to make entry. Be most careful, Kate. Charles would be most upset with me if you came to harm on this enterprise.’

‘I will be
most
careful, Antonia, for we cannot have that.’

She took it slowly, because she wished to be sure of no one hearing her. With her strength she could easily have moved two crates at a time, but she took one, and then another, placing them in front of the three doors which opened out onto the larger space, and then piling additional ones atop them. Within ten minutes she had a wall, two crates deep and two across, in front of each of the doors. It would not be impassable, the doors hinged away from her barricades and they would be able to push through, but it would slow them significantly.

‘They are contained, for a time anyway. Should I attempt to let you in the door?’

‘No, dear, I shall make my own entry. Prepare yourself.’

Kate untied the string which tethered her revolver over her left shoulder and hung it by her right hip. She broke the gun open and checked the load, and then snapped it shut, taking it in her left hand before slipping her sword free from where it was slung on her back. Suitably prepared, she slipped down the stairs in time to see one of the guards arriving at the door.

‘Goodness!’ Antonia’s voice came from the opening doorway. ‘I was
not
expecting to find someone home. Very good. Kirsty Wickhampton-Smythe of the Temperance League. I’m here to ensure that none of your slave girls are drinking!’

The reaction was, probably, to be expected. The man, a tall, thin figure wearing a wide-brimmed hat indoors, pulled a pistol from his belt and waved it at Antonia. ‘Kom in! Nou!’

Kate saw Antonia step inside, her hands raised and no weapon visible. As usual for these occasions, she was dressed in a brown coat and skirt with a white, high-collared blouse beneath it. ‘Oh, Afrikaans. Haven’t heard that in ages. Welkom by London. Ek hoop vir jou olifant is opgehou.’

The man peered at her as though she was insane, pushed the door closed, and then turned his head in the direction of his compatriots, who were now on their feet at the sound of voices. ‘Daar is ’n paar krankzinnige vrou hier.’ As he turned away, Antonia’s arm snapped down, her elbow punching into her hip. Her hand closed around something and there was a sharp crack. The man crumpled in front of her and she moved rapidly to slough her coat.