“We need to find Jonathan Small.”
“He has not returned to my shop,” she said.
“We didn’t imagine he would,” I said. “But you might have information that could help us.”
Crow was watching her intently. “The treasure that Major Sholto stole from him, Small stole from another man, whom he murdered. He is not an honorable man. He betrayed you as surely as he did Anuvadaka when he went to the police.”
“Worse than that,” said Madame Silvanova, “he must have used one of my charms on them.”
“How so?” Crow asked.
“All those police officers, and they didn’t ask his name? Or how he came by his knowledge?” She shook her head. “I make a charm I was taught by a hedge witch in Danzig—not of invisibility, but a sort of … inconspicuousness. People forget you’re in the room. They don’t ask you questions when they should. I give them freely to the unregistered, but I didn’t give one to Jonathan Small. He must have stolen it. If the policemen realize what happened, I will be fined for practicing unlicensed witchcraft, and that is attention I do not need. But I do not know that having Jonathan Small caught will help me. Or Grigori. There will be nothing to prevent him telling the police all he knows about the unregistered in London. And they will be very interested.”
That was unanswerable, because she was entirely correct. And we could hardly make the argument from morality or ethics when we were currently harboring Bartholomew Sholto’s murderer in our attic.
“He is a murderer and a hemophage,” Crow said. “He was prevented from going on a rampage two nights ago. But you know that means he’s more likely to go on a rampage now.”
She did know; her frown deepened and she bit her lip.
“Do you want those deaths on your conscience?” Crow continued, playing the morality card regardless. “We can’t stop him if we can’t find him. And right now we can’t find him. Not without your help.”
“But I know nothing useful,” Madame Silvanova protested.
“Then you harm no one by telling us,” Crow said. “I promise we will not share any information you give us about the unregistered with the police.”
She looked at me, immediately spotting the loophole. “I promise,” I said and felt the spark of the oath binding.
“I am a fool,” said Madame Silvanova, “but very well. I will tell you what I know and you may make of it what you will.”
Her story matched Anuvadaka’s, with the addition of a considerable exchange of gossip. She said, perhaps a shade defensively, “I don’t know why women have the reputation for gossip when in my experience men are just as bad. Small certainly was. He was particularly interested in other unregistered hemophages.”
“Did he say why?” I said uneasily.
“I did not ask him,” she said. “I tried to engage him in conversation as little as possible. He was…” Her shoulders lifted, past a shrug, not quite into a hunch. “… encroaching.”
“Did he proposition you?”
“Not in so many words,” she said. “But he made it very clear what he wanted, and he seemed completely unable to grasp the idea that I was not interested. He was vulgar.” It was clearly the worst insult she could think of, for she said it with utmost loathing.
Crow said slowly, carefully, “Is there a nest of hemophages in Southwark?”
He was right to be careful; it might not be illegal to be a hemophage, but it was definitely illegal to be a member of a nest. Hemophages in groups were far more likely to rampage.… And Small was already primed. Combining him and a nest was going to result in something very ugly.
She knew it, too. She said, “They would not,” but then stopped. She knew—as I knew—that they would. She made a gesture expressive of defeat and said, “There is a nest near Waterloo Station. They call it a social club—I believe they even collect dues—but it is a nest. I know he knows of it, for he asked me about it: what was the address, how many members were there, and so on. He asked me just as many questions about the rumors of a hell-hound pack in Shoreditch—which are not true—so that I thought nothing of it.”
“At the time it may only have been idle curiosity,” Crow said. “I doubt he intended to go anywhere near them before he hit on his new plan. But if I were a hemophage in need of a bolt-hole, a nest is where I’d go.”
“More than that,” I said. “Hemophages are drawn to each other’s company just as … as hell-hounds are.” I almost managed the word without stumbling and could only pray Madame Silvanova did not notice. “Especially once he’d been triggered without being able to feed, he would be desperate to find others of his kind.”
“I will take you,” said Madame Silvanova. “And may God forgive us all if it is the wrong decision.”
* * *
The social club of the hemophages was in a run-down warehouse, apparently derelict except for their comings and goings. “They are mostly here at night,” said Madame Silvanova. “Few of the unregistered are as lucky as Grigori, to have a job that suits their needs and their hours so well.”
“And their hungers,” I said dryly.
She shot me a knowing look. “No unregistered has a job that suits their hungers, Doctor, a fact you know as well as I do.”
She had noticed something. I could only hope that she assumed I was like her, the sibling—or parent or spouse—of an unregistered, not that I was unregistered myself. I said, “True enough, madame.”
Crow had stayed at Baker Street; people as habitually, necessarily suspicious as unregistered hemophages would not wait for explanations about his not being Fallen—they would flee as soon as they saw him. I went with Madame Silvanova to the warehouse door, where she knocked briskly and called, “Ludwig, I know you are here!”
There was a long silence. She knocked again, harder, and finally the door opened a crack. “Who is your companion, Miss Silvanova?”
It was an obvious watchman, an elderly man who peered around the door at me like a suspicious rabbit.
“This is Dr. Doyle,” said Madame Silvanova. “He is a friend.”
The old man looked dubious, but did not demand that I present my bona fides on the spot. He said, “What brings you here, then?”
“We are looking for someone,” Madame Silvanova said. “A man named Jonathan Small. Has he been here?”
The old man was no poker player. We both knew the answer before he opened his mouth to lie. “I do not know the name.”
“You’d know him by sight,” I said. “A man with a wooden leg.”
“No, sir,” said the old man, who might as well have been wearing a sign: LIAR. “I do not remember anyone of that sort.”
“He is a bad man, Ludwig,” said Madame Silvanova. “He will bring the police down on you.”
The old man spat at the mention of the police, a petty warding that didn’t do a damned thing, and said, “But I told you, Miss Silvanova. I do not know this man.”
“Ludwig,” Madame Silvanova said. “I know that is a lie, just as you do.”
The old man hesitated a moment, then said, “I suppose you must come in.” He swung the door wide; I gestured for Madame Silvanova to precede me.
As I was following her inside, I realized first how very dark it was, and then that I had no idea where the old man was, and then, like the solution to a theorem, what was about to happen.
I turned just in time to catch my stick in the closing door. The impact jarred up into my hand; I heard Ludwig hiss, and, grabbing the door to swing it open again, I said to Madame Silvanova, “Run.”
She had fast reflexes, eluding the hands of two hemophages who emerged suddenly from the darkness, and she hauled up her fashionable skirts and ran like a deer, graceful and fast. They weren’t fools enough to pursue her.
“You may regret that, Dr. Doyle,” said the old man, and a third hemophage, all staring white face and gruesome teeth, caught me across the side of the head with something that felt like the Tower of London but was probably only a length of board.
I was not knocked fully unconscious, although I fell hard to the floor and lost my grip on my cane. I heard them arguing in half-grumbling whispers about what to do next, and then two of them picked me up—carrying me between them like a drunk—and followed the old man down what seemed interminable flights of stairs, into basements and subbasements, and finally through an awkward iron hatch, where the brutes dropped me, which made them laugh, and into a long, brick-lined tunnel.
“We’ll take him to the hole,” the old man said. “He’ll keep there until we decide what to do with him.”
That sounded bad, but I did not have enough control of my limbs to struggle effectively, and even if I had somehow succeeded in getting free from them, I did not have my cane and would be as easy to recapture as a newborn kitten. They hauled me briskly along, not caring when my bad leg hit something and I yelped, until they came to a sort of side tunnel, where the old man unlocked an iron grille and they half threw, half shoved me in. The grille clanged shut behind me.
There was a trickle of light coming from somewhere, and for a long time that was all I was aware of, as my head swam and pounded and I struggled neither to lose consciousness entirely nor to vomit. But gradually, as things inside my head began to calm, I saw that across from me, that strange trickle of light was picking out the line of a nose, a cheekbone … a man with a long nose and a sharp widow’s peak, watching me intently with eyes that proved he was no hemophage, for they were the lambent, narrow-pupiled gold that the addict-poets have been singing about for centuries.
I had been imprisoned with a vampire.
17
The Vampire
The realization acted as a face-full of cold water. I was abruptly alert and if not terrified, definitely alarmed. I sat up much too quickly and had to shut my eyes against the consequent surge of nausea.
The vampire said, in a rich Irish voice, “You need not be frightened. I have neither the intention nor the ability to harm you.”
The nausea abated somewhat, and I was able to open my eyes again. The vampire had moved farther into the light and extended his hands so that I could see the silver manacles on his wrists.
“They’re keeping you captive?” I croaked.
The vampire said, both embarrassed and annoyed, “They caught me with my guard down.”
“But why would anyone do such a suicidal thing?” I said.
It made the vampire smile, a careful, Mona Lisa–esque smile that did not show the teeth. “They wish to negotiate with my hunt.”
“They’ve picked a phenomenally stupid way to go about it.”
“They seem to feel the risk is worth it in order to get our attention.” He paused a moment and added, “They have not harmed me, other than the insult of silver. And those cold iron bars.”
“Well, I suppose that’s something,” I said.
“They assure me they will release me unharmed when they have completed their negotiations.” This smile had an ironic curl.
“But what are they negotiating for?”
“That part seemed a bit confused, but in essence they want their nest to be recognized as a vampiric hunt.”
“It’s no such thing.”
“No, it isn’t. But they seem to think we can make them that which they are not, and then they will be protected from your laws.”
And the peace the government had with the vampiric hunts was delicate enough that that part would probably work. But the premise was hopelessly flawed. The vampires could no more make a nest of hemophages into a vampiric hunt than a flock of peacocks could make a mouse into a bird. And they were unlikely to endorse the legal fiction, for they needed the delicate peace as much as did the government.
“How long have they had you here?”
“A couple of days. Nothing to signify, really.”
Vampires can go for weeks without feeding, but they do not like to. Hence their red lamps and courteous ways. A true, deeply enthralled addict will let his or her vampiric Master feed daily if asked to—although vampires, wise and old and cold-blooded, and with a large population of addicts to choose from, generally do not do so.
“Introductions!” the vampire said briskly. “My name is Moriarty.”
“Doyle,” I said and, having observed the vampire’s long, curved nails, did not offer to shake hands.
The nausea was almost gone; I asked, “Who has the keys to the grille?”
“There are two keys,” Moriarty said, “and I think not more. Meier—the old man—has one, and the other is held by the hemophages’ leader, a man named Overton.”
“Bother.” I touched the side of my head gingerly, finding the mess of bruising and sticky blood I had expected.
“And how did you come here, Dr. Doyle?” said Moriarty, adding, “I heard them call you ‘Doctor’ as they brought you down the stairs. But you are no hemophage. You have not their smell.”
“I must smell like a hell-hound, then,” I said sourly.
“Yes,” said Moriarty. “But not, as I would have expected, in league with my—our—captors.”
“I came here looking for a hemophage named Jonathan Small—a man with a wooden leg. Have you seen him?”
“Oh, yes,” said Moriarty. “He and Overton came and threatened me last night.”
“Threatened you?”
“Apparently, Mr. Small has fed on vampires before and has a taste for us. They want me to write a letter to my hunt telling them to negotiate. I told them that even if I did, it would not help them in the slightest, but they did not believe me. They promised me they would return; therefore, you will get to see Mr. Small yourself. Why are you hunting him?”
It could do no harm that I could see to tell him, and I rather badly needed his goodwill, since even chained with silver he was probably strong enough to overpower me. I told him the story, starting with Miss Morstan and ending with Ludwig Meier. Moriarty listened intently, golden eyes—the eyes of a beast in a man’s ascetic face—fixed on me. He said when I had finished, “Mr. Small is a man of many surprises. I don’t believe he has told his new friends about his treasure. I do not know that that can be used to our advantage, but it might.”
“If Overton is greedy enough,” I said.
“Greed seems to follow this treasure,” said Moriarty. “And Overton is a venal man. I cannot believe that he would not want his share.”
“It seems to be the only weapon we have,” I agreed. “How do those manacles fasten?”
“They’re rather ingenious,” said Moriarty, as one reluctantly giving credit where credit was due. “They screw together, you see, but without a screwdriver with the correctly shaped head, they cannot be unfastened.”
“They must have been very expensive to make,” I said, examining the bulky lock that held the manacles stacked together like a hinge. The screw had an odd, irregular star-shaped head—not the sort of thing one could improvise.
“I would imagine so,” said Moriarty, “although you will understand that I did not inquire. They held me down with an iron bar across my throat to fasten them, and I was not in the mood for conversation.”
“I wouldn’t have been, either. But it’s all the more reason Overton might be interested in the Agra treasure.”
“True,” said Moriarty. He sighed as he tried to ease his arms into a new position. “Monstrously expensive they may be, but I must admit I find them tedious.”
“Do they hurt?” I said.
“Not exactly. Not like iron, which burns. But silver makes my bones ache and it drains my strength. Like the influenza, if my friends have described it to me accurately.”
“It does sound similar,” I said.
It is not really possible to make small talk with a vampire, but we discussed the Whitechapel murders, about which he was nearly as well informed as I was, for he had been following the case avidly in the newspapers. He denied vehemently that it could be the work of a vampire. “The waste of all that blood? Even a starving vampire would never cut someone’s throat ba
ck to the bone and sever all the major vessels in one go. And even if you imagine a vampire that insane, it would end up covered in blood—mouth, face, hands, everything—because it would never be able to resist feeding, and I think someone drenched literally head to foot in blood would have been memorable even to the people of Whitechapel.”
“What about a hemophage?”
“Well, it’s more like something a hemophage would do—all that needless carnage—but they don’t usually leave their prey where they kill them. Some hemophages have traveled considerable distances to hide their kills. This doesn’t really fit a hemophage’s pattern, either. I think it’s an ordinary human being.” And he smiled, this time showing his teeth.
I did not shrink back, but it was a near thing. Vampires’ teeth are not as horrible as hemophages’—few things are as horrible as a hemophage’s teeth—but they are no pretty sight.
“It’s only the Star that’s really pushing the ‘insane vampire’ idea,” I said, “and they only like it because of the headlines.”
At this point in our conversation, which had taken place intermittently over several hours and had meandered a good deal as the throbbing in my head waxed and waned, Moriarty said, “Someone’s coming,” and we both fell silent.
After a few minutes, I could hear them, too, thanks to the acoustical properties of the staircases. Among the dull thumping, the sharp tock of a wooden leg end was plainly audible.
I glanced at Moriarty, who nodded, a quick jerk of the head. “Small,” said he.
Listening to Small’s slow approach was far worse than if he had simply appeared in front of the grille like the Devil in a pantomime. Moriarty and I did not attempt to resume our conversation; we were both listening too intently to the irregular tock of Jonathan Small’s wooden leg.
Voices became audible, too, although I could not distinguish words until they started down the tunnel toward us.
“… be trouble, no doubt, but she’ll have no luck getting the police to believe her. Not in this district.” A round of laughter which meant either that the police in Lambeth were very stupid or that they’d been bought.
The Angel of the Crows Page 18