by Ed Zenith
“It’ll be good to get out and about.”
Meysey stood on the footplate of the Black Viper, KRUM’s steam engine. It was state of the art: 70 foot long and weighing 165 tons, she was capable of unheard of speeds, although they were not after speed today of course. The Bishop had no idea they were coming for him and so had no reason to run. It pulled behind it a functional-looking black steel carriage, which housed a few bunks and a galley for cooking. It also stored the weaponry and explosives needed for the mission.
Behind the carriages was a flatbed trailer, on which stood a huge piece of apparatus, covered and hidden by a large black tarpaulin. Fitz was a little unsure about taking this mysterious load with them, but Meysey had convinced him, figuring they had nothing to lose.
“Are the children ready?” said Fitz, his deep voice booming echoes in the cavernous train shed that housed the Black Viper. He referred to the Wicks and Thrubwell, who he often joked were like the tearaway toddlers in their little dysfunctional family. He needn’t have asked, as he could hear the two brothers bickering just around the corner.
“S’no skin off my nose if you want to get killed.”
“Shut up, scragface.”
Fitz sighed.
“What is it now?”
“Please Sir,” piped up Badbury. “Private Wick here wishes to die a horrible death on this mission. He’s only taking two short swords and a rapier, when the situation clearly calls for a weightier weapon.”
“Who’s the swordsman here? Anyway, you’ve only got a semi-automatic steam rifle. What it he gets up close? You need a handgun, that’s what you need.”
“Gentlemen!” interrupted Fitz. “You are both experts in your chosen field of combat. Trust in each other that you’ve made the correct choices.”
“Where’s Nempnett?” said Meysey. “Thrubwell!”
There was no answer. The soldiers looked to each other and they all cried in unison at the tops of their voices.
“THRUBWELL!”
The round shape of Nempnett Thrubwell trotted into view from around a corner, holding a stick of dynamite.
“Somebody call?”
Thrubwell was in charge of packing any devices and explosives they might need for the mission. He took a mixed case of dynamite, nitro-glycerine and fuses. Badbury also saw him tuck two corked test tubes into his shirt pocket – his ‘Kiss from an Angel’.
“I thought that weren’t ready?” said Badbury.
“Only one way to find out!” smiled Thrubwell. “Anyway, I’m not leaving it here. Thought I’d take it with me for safe keeping.”
“Are you sure that it’s safe?” said Meysey.
Thrubwell shrugged. Meysey threw a worried glance to Fitz, who reassured him with a look and a nod. The soldiers all readied themselves, packing their chosen weapons into the carriage. They each had a case except for Fitz, who himself was considered a lethal weapon. He didn’t need fancy steamguns and suchlike, although he did carry one of those new revolver things, just in from America. His job was to direct his deadly regiment and get the job done.
“Right gentlemen. We have one mission, two objectives. Find and recover the crimson blade and neutralise the man known as Bishop Cannings,” said Fitz.
“I thought we was supposed to kill ‘im?” said a confused Thrubwell. Fitz ignored him.
“Both targets are believed to be in the Great Western Home for the Unruly and Damned, which recently housed an explosion, for reasons unknown. Cannings is known to have stayed in the Home while an investigation continues under the eye of the Ministry of Engineering. We get in and out quickly and leave at first light. Clear?”
The regiment nodded.
“Good. A nice, simple mission. Let’s not mess this up.”
5.
Acton jumped down from the desk and with a quick glance at Cannings to check he was unconscious, moved over to Ash.
“If I want something doing properly, I have to do it myself, don’t I?” he said, mock-angry.
“Acton, I’m sorry, I was careless.”
“Never mind that now boy. Let’s just get out of here, eh? This the one we want?” he said, unclasping the knife from Cannings’s grip. Ash nodded and Acton used the knife to cut his ties, immediately heading for the door. They swung the door open and came face to face with five green-suited guards, their pneumatic truncheons at full length. Before Acton could react, the guards were on top of him, battering him black and blue. It only took one guard to grab Ash and they soon found themselves in a cell on their own, their ties now replaced with iron shackles. Acton had yelled during the scuffle, but was now silent. Ash thought he was angry with him, until he raised his head from the floor and spoke.
“You alright?”
“Yeah. Think so.”
More silence followed.
“Well, this is a bloody mess, isn’t it?” said Acton. They both laughed. Ash realised it was the first time they had shared a joke. The laughter receded into silence.
“Thanks for coming back for me,” said Ash quietly.
“Came for the knife didn’t I? Take more than the life of a scrawny runt like you to get me back inside this place.”
Ash shrugged this comment off as bravado, but part of what Acton had just said struck him. Back inside.
“Of course. You used to live here, didn’t you?”
“Live is a kind word for how a man suffers in this place.”
“But you escaped? Like me?” said Ash warily. He was aware that Acton could burst with anger at any moment. Instead, Acton started to laugh.
“Yeah, that’s right. The only two people to escape from the Great Western Home for the Unruly and Damned and look at us now!” He shook his shackles like they were sleigh bells and laughed. Ash soon got caught up in this infectious giggling and they found themselves laughing again.
“What are we laughing at?” asked Ash finally.
“I dunno. Seems ridiculous. I left here years ago, yet here I am, back at the mercy of that fat pile of scrag.”
“Cannings?”
Acton nodded.
“Did he used to beat you?”
Another nod.
“Me too.”
Acton looked up at Ash. They seemed to both realise that they shared something; an awful upbringing and mutual hatred of Bishop Cannings that bound them together. They talked while they waited for their captors, recounting stories of their escapades and escapes. Acton laughed at Ash’s story of the exploding Providence Engine and Ash marvelled at Acton’s daring escape; he had fashioned a tightrope out of the laundry’s washing line and scaled it to jump out of one of the high windows.
It transpired that they had been very similar as lads, always getting into scrapes and testing the Bishop’s patience. Their good natured banter turned sour however, when Ash dared to ask the forbidden question.
“Why don’t you like being called Iron Acton?”
Acton looked across to see if Ash was mocking him, but when he saw just plain open curiosity, he pulled up his sleeves with his teeth and revealed the scars on his forearms.
“’Cos of these.”
The scars were deep, Ash saw now. He had assumed that they were from a rail accident, or cuts from a daring knife fight, but these were much too careful, too precise and deliberate to have been caused by accident.
“Cannings caught me one time,” Acton started, “trying to escape. I was only young, an amateur really and I had no chance of getting very far. He got hold of me and gave me a thrashing. It wasn’t my first beating, but this time he was possessed, getting more and more enjoyment with each punch. The guards didn’t dare stop him of course, but the ones who looked on, they could see I couldn’t take much more. He stopped finally and the guards took me off to see the doctor. He patched me up and I had to spend the night in the infirmary. You’d think that’d be enough, sending a boy to hospital? Not Cannings. He was planning something. That night he came down to the infirmary and took me from my bed. He brought me to solitary confinem
ent, his huge hands over my mouth so I couldn’t shout. It might even have been this cell. He had stuff prepared there. A small bin of hot coals and a branding iron.
“He said he didn’t like folk trying to escape from his home. He said he owned me. He said if I was so intent on leaving, he would have to make sure that I’d be handed back to him once the police found me. I cried, I pleaded, I begged, but he just smiled and held my arms down. I had no strength after the beating, I couldn’t have fought back, but God did I scream. Folks say they heard me that night and the screams stayed in their nightmares for months.
“I don’t really remember what the pain was like, but the smell? Burning, melting skin. That says with you.
“Once he was done with the branding iron, he threw a bucket of water over me and walked out, whistling. After that night, he started calling me Iron Acton and the guards followed suit. That was my name in this place and I swore I’d leave it behind me once I escaped.
“It seems the name lived on in this place though. When you said it for the first time in the carriage, I felt like I had been brought back to the Home, back to that night Cannings tortured me and scarred me for life. I know I shouldn’t be too hard on you boy, but you remind me so much of my past, where I came from and the boy I wanted to leave behind. I was ashamed of my youth, scared that I’ll end up back here, begging Cannings for mercy again.”
A long period of silence followed.
“You know, your name did live on in here,” said Ash finally, “but not how you think. To us in here, you were – are – a hero. The only man ever to escape from the Home! The stories about you got changed and embellished a little and you got a band of followers. Iron Acton - the only kid to get one over on Bishop Cannings! To us, Iron Acton wasn’t a boy, or a victim, he was a God: strong, fearsome and wise!”
“And look at the real thing!” laughed Acton.
“Don’t you see though? You could still do it! We could still get one over on old Cannings!”
The prospect obviously appealed to Acton and he went into a state of deep concentration. Ash let him think and waited for their captors.
*****
Cannings flung open the cell door and marched in to see his prisoners sat up, alert and, to his confusion, smiling.
“Well, aren’t you a picture,” he said, observing them suspiciously out of the corner of his eye.
“Good morning my Lord,” said Acton, in an almost sing-song voice. “How are you keeping? We didn’t really get a chance to catch up last night did we?”
Ash and Acton kept smiling. The Bishop hadn’t been prepared for this. Hostility, yes. An attack? Almost certainly. But pleasantries? He didn’t encounter these in his everyday life, let alone a situation like this. He found his only options were to return the niceties, or treat them like the guttersnipes that they were. He chose the latter.
“Shut your filthy hole Turville. You’re a dead man now for sure and your little beggar boy here. I’ll see you swinging from the gallows before the day is out, I promise you.”
“That’s a promise that I’ll let go unfulfilled, if that’s alright with you.”
“And how exactly are you planning on doing that?” asked Cannings, almost enjoying the conversation now. The jovial chat before torturing them both to death made a pleasant change for him.
Ash watched the exchange with glee. It was good to see Acton talking back to the old Bishop. It was like seeing a new side to him. Gone was the surly, boisterous Acton and here was his salesman side, selling Cannings a dream.
“We’re going to make you an offer you can’t resist.”
Cannings laughed and turned to leave. Acton delivered Ash a discreet kick, indicating it was his turn to talk in their semi-rehearsed dialogue.
“Told you he wouldn’t want the belt,” he said, hoping Cannings would bite.
Cannings stopped in the doorway. He had taken the bait and Acton started to reel him in.
“Shame. We’ll never get it now and it was so pretty too. All those jewels. Probably worth a bit n’all.”
Cannings turned back to them.
“Belt?” he said.
“Belt,” the two confirmed, grinning.
*****
Ash was amazed. If this was how Acton conducted business, it was a wonder that he ever had trouble finding freight to transport. He managed to convince and charm Cannings first to loosen their shackles and then to sit down and negotiate terms. Acton described the belt down to the last detail, including every jewel and rivet (he had obviously paid close attention in the Heath’s office, or before, when it had hung loosely at Sandy’s hips). Remarkably, Acton wasn’t feeding Cannings a pack of lies. He told him their story up to the very minute that he had burst through the window and every part of it was the truth. For all the hate and bile that Acton had for the Bishop, he knew that Cannings could spot a lie a mile off and respected that. He ran through the plan once more.
“So here’s the deal. We all go up to York; I give the Heath brothers the knife. They hand over Sandy and then you come out of the carriage and persuade them to hand over the belt and knife.”
Cannings gave a low chuckle.
“Persuade…yes, I like that; persuade,” he said, his eyes misting over, an ugly smile appearing on his hideous face. “And the boy?”
“What do you want the boy for? He was acting on my orders. He’ll be out of your way, gone, forgotten.”
The Bishop walked around the cell, his finger pressed to his lips in concentration.
“Turville, you are a liar, a cheat, a thief and a blaggard. How can I trust you?”
“My Lord, you have my life in your hands. As one blaggard to another, you have my word.”
“I’m not convinced.”
“Think of the belt my Lord!” said Ash, jumping in. “The glory, the riches, the knighthood, the palace! One leap of faith and it could all be yours.”
Cannings stopped pacing and stared off into the air. He was imagining the life laid before him, the greed and excess he could enjoy if he had that belt and presented it to his Queen. He grinned, drooling as he did.
“You have a deal,” he said, offering his hand. “On the understanding that if you cross me, I will break your spine in two as if I were preparing kindling for a fire.”
His eyes locked on to Acton’s, deadly serious. Acton felt that old sensation spread through him; the same fear he had felt all those years ago in that very cell. It was bolstered by the fact that Cannings was a man that knew no limits. The terrible acts that he threatened were not idle; he was capable of them and much more. Acton tried to shake off the fear and regain his arrogance and swagger. He forced a smile to his lips and shook Cannings’s hand.
“From you my Lord, I’d expect nothing less.”
6.
Sandy had spent an uncomfortable and cold night on the floor of the Heath’s office, almost exactly where Acton had left her. Milbury had given her the choice of staying where she was, or coming back to his town house where he’d make her more comfortable and she had replied by spitting on his shoe. Berkley had stayed to watch over her, quite literally. Before he left, Milbury had ordered Berkley not to take his eyes off her and the large imbecile had followed the instruction to the letter, by sitting down in a plush leather office chair and staring intently at Sandy all night. She tried to burrow herself in a corner, but every time she looked up, he was there, staring impassively. She turned away and shut her eyes, afraid to look at him, paralysed with fear.
Sandy did not sleep well. Quite apart from the hard floor and the cold Yorkshire air, her mind would not let her rest, turning thoughts over in her mind like a baker kneading dough.
She blamed herself for this awful situation. Who else was to blame? She had tried to implicate Ash or Acton, but it just didn’t stick. Who had trusted a complete stranger and come running when one of them offered a sob story about orphans? Who had worn a priceless belt around town, showing off and attracting attention? Who had seen the best in everyone, inc
luding thieves and scoundrels? She found herself doing it now, empathising with her captors. Milbury was just doing a job after all and Berkley was little more than a shaved ape, executing commands to order.
After a night of turning these self-destructive thoughts over and over in her mind, Sandy realised that it wasn’t helping. She started to compile a catalogue of hatred against the brothers. They had lured her to York, playing on her natural charitableness in order to steal her belt. They had attacked her, kidnapped her and left her cold and hungry in the corner of their office. She went over these facts in her mind, forcing her natural empathy not to make her soft, not to feel any compassion for the scoundrels. Her hatred made her strong and she found she was able to move. She turned to look at Berkley.
Amazing, she thought. He’s still staring!
Berkley sat in the office chair, looking directly at her, not blinking. He can’t have slept at all, she thought. Suddenly, something made her stop her train of thought. She sat still and silenced her breathing. She concentrated on Berkley and saw his chest rise and fall slowly with his breathing. She could hear him too and something about the speed of the breaths made her think.
He’s asleep, she thought. He sleeps with his eyes open.
She shuddered briefly at the creepiness of it, then raised a hand slowly in the air. She waved it playfully.
No response.
She saw her chance and rose slowly and silently to her feet. Berkley sat in between her and the glass door, the only way out. She estimated ten strides to the exit, then plenty more down the spiral staircase. She’d then be in the warehouse and assuming she got out of there, she’d be on the outskirts of York, with no one and nowhere to run to.
Sandy chided herself for thinking so negatively; she should make a run for it and do it now; what did she have to lose?
She took a step, her legs shaking. She planted her foot down carefully and congratulated herself silently. Just nine more steps. She stepped again, gaining confidence as she came another yard closer to the exit and just three or so yards from Berkley himself. Sandy let her concentration slip on the next step and found the heel of her boot tapping carelessly on the ground as she placed her foot on the floor.