by Alex Grecian
“I see,” Griffin said. “And we could simply fetch ourselves down to the market on the corner for a loaf of bread and a fish pie, could we?”
“Well . . .” The bald man shook his head. “I didn’t say it would be easy, did I?” He pouted. “We’d have to go above sometimes. Of course we would. Only once in a while, and only to get food and other necessities.” He sniffed and looked around at the abandoned façades. “I’ll bet if we were to clean one of those storefronts out, we’d find it a perfectly suitable place to live. After a time, we could even bring others. Have a little community of our own. Even a child or two running about in this courtyard. There’s all the room in the world down here. And wouldn’t a child just brighten the place right up?”
7
Detective Inspector Adrian March, late of Scotland Yard, stopped Day at the edge of the murder room, where the railing gave way to the entrance hall.
“Walter, my boy,” he said, “so good to see you again. How is my favorite pupil?”
“I wish the circumstances were better,” Day said. “Were you introduced to Sergeant Hammersmith?”
“I only just met him in Sir Edward’s office.”
Hammersmith smiled at March, but the retired inspector didn’t smile back at him. His eyes traveled up and down Hammersmith’s misbuttoned jacket and settled on a bloodstain halfway down his left sleeve.
“I’m frankly surprised the commissioner had nothing to say about your attire, Sergeant,” March said.
As if on cue, Sir Edward’s office door opened and he called out, “Hammersmith? Is Hammersmith gone yet?”
“I’m here.”
“I’d like to see you.”
“Yes, sir.”
The sergeant turned to Day and grimaced. “Well, I suppose I know what that’s about.”
“Did you have no clean shirts today, Nevil?” Day said.
“I had one. I really did. Hanging up neat as you please in the closet, ready to put on in the morning.”
“What happened to it?”
“It’s still there, I imagine. It was hanging next to this one, and in the dark . . .”
“Nevil, you ought to have all your shirts washed at once. Then you won’t have this sort of problem.”
“But I can’t wash the shirt I’m wearing on wash day.”
“Don’t hang that shirt back up,” Day said.
“I might need it again.”
“Then don’t eat soup on wash day.”
“Never again.”
Hammersmith trudged back across the room and the office door closed behind him.
“Is he any good as a policeman?” March said.
“Nevil?” Day said. “He’s better than I am, I fear. Absolutely relentless once he’s on the scent.”
“You’re describing a dog,” March said. “And I’ve seen many dogs that were better groomed.”
“He’s a good man.”
“If you say he is, then he must be.”
“He is.”
“I see you’re wearing the cufflinks I gave you. Tell me, have you kept up with your lock skills?”
“I’ve still got your old set of keys,” Day said. He reached for the breast pocket of his jacket and came away empty-handed, a puzzled look on his face.
“Were you looking for this?” March held out a well-worn leather case.
“How did you . . . ?”
“You must be more aware of the people around you. I was easily able to lift this from your pocket.”
“That’s very good.”
“I’ll teach you how to do it.”
“Did you look inside the case? I’ve added to it a bit. Two new picks and a handful of keys to fit some more recent locks.”
“Really? You know there are ways to reduce the number of tools you’ve got to carry around. You could get by with just three keys and a pick or two,” March said.
“You haven’t lost your interest, then? Since leaving the Yard?”
“On the contrary, I’ve become even more keen. Do you know there’s a gun I’ve found that looks exactly like a key?”
“Like a key? But it holds bullets? How big is it?”
“Oh, very small. It only fires one bullet, and the aim is dreadful, but it’s quite cunning, really.”
“I’d like to see it,” Day said.
“I’m glad to hear you say so, because I’ve sent you one.”
“You haven’t.”
“I found two of them and I thought to myself, ‘Who would appreciate a thing like this more than my dear friend Walter Day?’”
“You shouldn’t have. When did you send it? I haven’t seen it arrive.”
“I should think it would have got there yesterday. But really, watch for it any old day now.”
“I shall. Thank you so much.”
“When this is over, you must stop by the house. You’d be astonished by some of my recent finds. In fact, I have something I very much want to talk to you about. A proposition, you might say.”
“I’m intrigued.”
“By God, how I’ve missed your company. You have a knack for making a person feel like he’s the most interesting fellow you’ve met. Do come for dinner. I’ll have Jane make something special. And bring your lovely wife. How is Claire?”
“Oh, she’s huge. The baby can’t come fast enough for her at this point.”
March laughed. “Don’t worry. It’ll come all too fast, and it will grow even faster. You’ll wonder where the time went.”
“I already do.” Day glanced at the clock and grimaced. “Mr Hammersmith isn’t coming back out of the office, is he?”
“You’re anxious to get to the prison?”
“Of course. It’ll be daylight soon, and we’ve got to get on the trail of those men before they hurt anyone.”
“I’m not sure about all this. What will we possibly be able to accomplish at the prison itself? The escapees are long gone already, and I don’t think it matters all that much how many men we’re after, just so long as we catch them all.”
“You may be right,” Day said. “Ours is but to do and die, as the poet says.”
“Yes, of course. Orders are orders. I tell you what, though: If I see one of those prisoners outside the walls, I’ll shoot first and worry about capturing him later.”
“You’ve got your weapon?”
“I’m always armed, my dear boy. And not only with single-shot jailer’s guns. Made an enemy or two in my day, and it never hurts to be cautious. But I tell you what: You go ahead to the prison and I’ll wait for your sergeant here.”
“You’re sure?”
“Absolutely. It’ll give me a chance to get to know the lad. And you can get started unknotting Sir Edward’s little mystery.”
“Right, then. Good of you. I’m off. See you in a bit.”
Day closed the railing behind him and hurried away down the hall. Adrian March paused to glance at the closed door of Sir Edward’s office and clucked his tongue. “Bloody disgrace,” he said.
8
Cinderhouse was delighted to have a friend.
But there was a small voice nagging at him from the back of his mind. He’s a stranger, the voice said. He’s an escaped prisoner. Who knows what terrible things he’s done? Not the sort of friend we want, is he?
But I am also an escaped prisoner, Cinderhouse thought back at the voice. I have done terrible things. I needed to do terrible things, was forced to do them, but even so, who am I to judge anyone else?
The voice did not stop nagging, but it moved further back where he could ignore it amidst the other chatter in his head.
He and Griffin followed the underground stream deep into the tunnels beneath the city. Griffin was quiet and seemed tense, but Cinderhouse found himself occasionally humming a merry tune.
They passed through a long narrow channel that seemed to grow closer and closer as they went, the walls pushing in on them. Moist red clay oozed in the light of Cinderhouse’s lantern all around them, and their feet gr
ew heavier as they walked, packing clay around the soles of their shoes. And then they passed out of that tunnel and there were steps cut into the clay ahead of them. Cinderhouse stopped and peered down into the darkness, and Griffin bumped into him as he emerged from the tunnel. Cinderhouse almost lost his balance and fell, and barely stopped himself from striking Griffin.
Remember, he’s your friend, the nagging voice mocked him.
“Where do we go from here?” Cinderhouse said out loud.
“Down, I suppose,” Griffin said. “There’s nowhere else to go.”
It was true. There was no way forward. The only choices they had were the staircase and the tunnel behind them, and Cinderhouse didn’t want to have to turn back. But he couldn’t bear the thought of descending into the blackness below, with no idea what might wait for them down there. He was about to suggest that they try the tunnel again and keep a sharper eye for branches that might be dug into the walls, but Griffin spoke first.
“Here,” Griffin said, “let me see the lantern for a moment, will you?”
“Why?”
“I think I see something up above. Maybe some other way we might go.”
Cinderhouse handed the lantern over. Griffin took it by its wire handle and turned around. He set it on the floor of the tunnel behind them and turned back to the bald man.
“Why did you—” Cinderhouse began.
Griffin swung a blow at him that the bald man did not see because the lantern was behind Griffin, making him nothing but a vague silhouette in the darkness, a yellow rim around a hole in the black mouth of the tunnel.
Cinderhouse yelled, but he was already turning away, covering his head. He ducked down, a thing he had seen many children do when he had punished them, crouching and covering their heads and necks. He felt the breeze from a second blow pass over him and heard a yelp as Griffin overcompensated. The other man had expected to meet resistance at the end of his fist and had not braced himself properly. The force of his swing pulled his shoulder around and he went forward across the top of Cinderhouse’s cowering body. His left knee hit the bald man’s back and he bent forward, his own weight carrying him over Cinderhouse and down the clay steps in front of them.
There was a great deal of thudding and thumping and yelling, moving away from Cinderhouse and down, and then there was silence again. Cinderhouse opened his eyes and stood. He picked up the lantern and held it out over the top of the steps.
“Griffin?”
There was no answer.
He tried again. “Griffin? Are you all right? Were you hurt just now?”
Again, no answer.
Well, this is a fine thing, the voice in Cinderhouse’s head said. Now you’re alone again.
Will you make up your mind? Cinderhouse thought back at it. First you don’t want him around, now you do.
The voice went quiet and Cinderhouse thought about his choices. They were the same as before, only now Griffin might be waiting to ambush him at the bottom of the steps. Cinderhouse took a step back into the red clay tunnel and stopped. The prospect of traveling back down the entire length of it, completely alone, did not appeal to him one bit. He turned back and looked into the tunnel ahead that led down and down, past the edge of the lantern’s light. He put a foot on the top step and then he put his other foot on the next step and he moved down like that, never resolving to actually go all the way down the entire staircase. But then he was far down it already and there seemed to be no point in turning back, and he had the lantern, which was more than Griffin had. If Griffin was even awake down there. Or alive. And then there were no more steps ahead of him, just hard-packed mud with traces of the red clay from above.
Griffin lay on the floor of this much larger passage, five feet from the bottom of the steps. Cinderhouse could see from his perch on the bottommost step that Griffin was still breathing, but his leg looked strange. When Cinderhouse drew cautiously near the other man, he could see a bit of pink-smeared bone sticking out through the trouser leg of Griffin’s prison uniform. Cinderhouse’s stomach turned over and he almost vomited, but he had eaten nothing since the evening meal at Bridewell and was able to swallow his rising gorge.
Then Griffin opened his eyes. They locked on Cinderhouse’s eyes, and Griffin screamed.
Cinderhouse swung the lantern in a wide arc, saw the mouth of a tunnel beyond Griffin, and ran. He felt Griffin’s fingers grasp for him as he passed, felt them snag the hem of his trousers and then fall away, and Cinderhouse was free. He ran and he ran, and it took some time before he finally heard that voice in the back of his mind giggling.
It sounded like the voice of a small child.
9
Inspector Walter Day scanned the crowd outside the prison entrance, looking for other policemen, and specifically for other members of the Murder Squad. His wagon had broken a wheel and he had run the final half mile to Bridewell, cursing his luck all the way. He spotted Inspectors Tiffany and Blacker near the edge of the gathering and made his way over to them.
“I didn’t expect to see you here,” he said.
Tiffany scowled at him. Jimmy Tiffany wasn’t the most sociable of animals in the best of times, and this clearly didn’t qualify as the best of times. “We’re to start out there”—he pointed to some distant point—“and make our way back to here.” He pointed at his own feet.
“We thought it might be useful to take a look at here before we went to there,” Blacker said. “Are you doing the same?”
“Sort of,” Day said. He didn’t know whether the others were supposed to know about his assignment.
“How’s the wife, old beast?” Blacker said. Tiffany scowled even more.
“The baby’s coming any day now,” Day said. “Or, well, in two weeks, but these things aren’t precisely timed.”
“I’m meant to be on my honeymoon at this very moment,” Blacker said. “Inconvenient timing all round, if you ask me. Bad people ought to stay in prison where they belong and leave the rest of us to get on with our lives.”
Day nodded. He felt selfish. And foolish. Babies were born every minute of every day. Why was he having so much trouble reconciling himself to the fact that one of those babies would be his own? Everyone else had worries of some sort. Such was life. He closed his eyes and opened them again, resolved to put his problems aside. Cinderhouse must be caught before he could threaten what little peace of mind Day had left.
“Where are the others?” Day said. “Has anyone seen Sergeant Hammersmith? Is he here yet?”
“They’re all about somewhere,” Blacker said. “Them what’s not at the mile mark. Oh, speak of the devil.”
Day turned and saw Constable John Jones pushing through the crowd toward them. Hammersmith was following close behind him. The sergeant had taken the time to rebutton his jacket and had done something with his hair so that he looked moderately presentable. Day let Jones pass and grabbed Hammersmith’s elbow, stopping him.
“Is Inspector March with you?”
“Haven’t seen him,” Hammersmith said. “I thought he was with you.”
“Well, I suppose he’ll catch up to us,” Day said. “You’re all right?”
“I think I need to pay closer attention to my appearance,” Hammersmith said. “It’s the impression Sir Edward has left me with.”
Day grinned and clapped his sergeant on the shoulder. Hammersmith nodded, resigned. Changing the subject, he indicated the milling crowd.
“It seems Jones has left us behind. He’s got a key to the place,” Hammersmith said. “It’s locked up tighter than a drum.”
“How does Jones have a key? How many keys are there to this gate?”
“He just grabbed me and said to follow,” Hammersmith said. “I don’t really know what he’s got and what he doesn’t have.”
Day felt a hand on his elbow and turned. Jones was standing directly behind him, hemmed in by the onlookers milling about. “I was looking for you,” he said. “You two are to come with me.” Without waiting
for any acknowledgment, he trotted away.
Day tipped his hat to Blacker and Tiffany and followed after Jones, with Hammersmith at his heels. They reached the high gates at the front of the stone fence that ringed the prison. Jones saluted the warders there and they nodded, slipped the bolt on the other side, and drew the gates open. They creaked on their hinges and moved reluctantly. Jones didn’t wait for them to open wide, but slipped through as soon as there was a crack wide enough for his body. Day hesitated, but Jones beckoned him through with Hammersmith. They wound their way up the gravel path to the prison’s main entrance and Jones produced his key, inserted it into the lock, and opened the door.
Inside was chaos. Warders of every size and shape, all dressed in dark blue uniforms that made them look like policemen, hurried to and fro, their sidearms out, busy on their various missions. Nobody gave them a second glance, dressed as they were in their police uniforms and Day in his suit. Jones led the way through a succession of doors, using his key at each of them. Day marveled at the fact that a single key granted them access to so many areas. He wondered how secure the prison was and whether he might be able to get through those doors with his lock picks.
At last they reached Bridewell’s south wing. A man stationed at the door gave them a nod and unlocked the door behind him.
“This is the head warder,” Jones said.
The warder held out his hand, and Day shook it. “Warden Munt,” the man said.
“Inspector Day. Rough night you’ve had.”
“The roughest. The boys are pulling it all together, though. Good crew we’ve got here.”
“Glad to hear it. There are some discrepancies in the information I’ve got. I’m hoping you and your men can clear up a thing or two for me.”
The warden motioned for the policemen to follow him. He turned and walked through the door, talking over his shoulder as he walked. “Discrepancies?”