Tenfold More Wicked

by Viola Carr

  On the wooden tray, a scalpel winked, tempting. She still had a few minutes. Perhaps she could get stomach contents. Eagerly, she turned for her instruments.

  The grinning clerk grabbed her.

  She backed into the cadaver’s table. “Unhand me, buffoon!”

  “Hands off! Hands off!” squeaked Hipp.

  The clerk advanced. “You’ve had long enough. Shall we get to it?”

  Enraged, Eliza shoved him backwards, hard. At his stupid, shocked expression—what absurdity, a woman fighting back—her blood boiled over. Not Lizzie’s fury this time, but her own. At this stupid, inequitable world and the fools like this who ran it.

  Wildly, she slapped him, kicked his shins, clawed for his eyes. “You arrogant fool. Did you imagine I’d trade favors? You think far too much of yourself!”

  Lizzie cheered. Huzzah! About time. Now let me strangle the limpdick rat. Eliza’s hands flexed hungrily. Her flesh tingled, heating. How she burned to end him . . .

  “You lying hussy,” he snarled. Already his face blossomed red where she’d hit him. “I’ll make you sorry.”

  “Don’t take that tone with me, you witless runt.” With a supreme effort, she controlled her breath. She swept her optical into its case, ripped off her gloves, and made for the door. “I have all I require. Keep the money. Call it a consolation prize. Zap him, Hipp, there’s a good boy.”

  Hipp popped out his crackling copper coil and jabbed the clerk’s thigh. Zzzap!

  The fellow cursed, hopping, and slapped ineffectually at Hipp. “Stop it, you brassy fiend.” Zzzap! “Don’t think I won’t report this to your inspector, you evil tart!” Zzzap!

  She halted, one hand on the swinging door. “By all means, sir. Don’t think I won’t report you to Lady Fleet. Defying her instructions, just to get your sticky hands on a bit of skirt? Your Mr. Hare will surely hear of it, and you’ll be dismissed on the spot. Think on that, before you open your vulgar mouth.” She smiled sweetly. “Now go home and beg your wife’s forgiveness, you despicable man. You don’t deserve her. Good day.”

  Satisfied, she strutted out into the street, and collided with a stocky body.

  She stared, heart pounding. “Hello, Mr. Brigham. Didn’t expect to see you here.”

  It was Brigham, for sure, lush black curls and youthful face. No more bruises, naturally. Captain Lafayette’s genial threats had done their work. Out of butler’s costume—instead, a rough brown coat and trousers. He clutched a bulging canvas bag by wicker handles.

  “Ma’am.” He touched his cap, trying to sidle by.

  She blocked his path, a casual swish of skirts. “Not at work this afternoon?”

  “Come to pay respects.” His East End tones were stronger, as if reinforced by his clothing.

  “To a master who beat you? Isn’t that odd?”

  “Got nuffing to say to you . . . Oi!”

  Hippocrates barreled from Hare’s and launched at Brigham. Doinng! The boy stumbled, dropping his bag, and its contents tumbled into the dirt.

  A clockwork servant’s head, knobbly neck bolts unscrewed. A disassembled logical processor, sprouting dusty wires. Spanners, probes, a rusted electrical meter with a cracked casing.

  Hipp scrabbled at the brass head. “Clockwork overstressed! Logic unit failure! Maintenance imperative!”

  “You’ll bust it, you rotter. Get off.” Hastily, Brigham stuffed the head back into his bag. Papers spilled, circuit diagrams and notes in Brigham’s painstaking hand.

  Starlit memory sparkled. That same writing, listing the guests at Sir Dalziel’s dinner. Lady Fleet’s obsequious entourage. Dr. Silberman, Lord and Lady Havisham, Lord Montrose, Sir Wm Thorne . . . She frowned. “Wait. Why did you write Dr. Silberman’s name first?”

  “Beg pardon?”

  “On that guest list. In order of precedence, wasn’t it? Except you put Dr. Silberman first. Why does a lowly physician take precedence over a viscount? Unless he or she is somehow the most important.”

  Brigham’s dark eyes shifted. “Thought of him first, is all.” Again, he tried to push by.

  “Are you taking that clockwork for maintenance?” She grabbed his elbow. “Don’t you do that yourself? Keep the monsters in good repair, you said. So why was it malfunctioning?”

  Brigham shrugged her off. “Daft things break down all the time.”

  “No, they don’t,” she retorted, inspired by splintered memories of a broken cuckoo clock. “Where did you learn to repair clockworks? Not from Mr. Lightwood, by chance?”

  Another shrug.

  “You sabotaged that machine, didn’t you? So it would lie to us about that night. What really happened at that dinner? Was this Silberman in charge?”

  “Don’t know what you’re gobbing about.”

  “Come, Mr. Brigham, you’re a better liar than even Captain Lafayette gave you credit for.” She watched his expression, triumphant. “Aha! That still gets a blush. We imagined you’d no reason to protect Sir Dalziel, but we were wrong. Tell me the truth and there’ll be no more unpleasantness.” And we can all go home for tea, she almost added.

  Brigham scowled. “Vicious old codger gave me a job, didn’t he? Could’ve replaced me wiv a clockwork, but he never. I can take a slap or two if it keeps me in a situation.”

  Clearly he accepted such abuse as a way of life. “I’m sorry he mistreated you. Couldn’t you protest?”

  Brigham laughed. “Right. Keep your sorry, lady. Never swallowed your pride to get your way? Hell, I done whatever he asked. His students took it harder than I ever did. And now he’s croaked, and at last that screeching crow’s got her way and put me out on the street. Crueled me right and proper. Think I’ll find a new place as high?” His chin trembled. “To think I lied for her all this time. Mary Mother of God, if I told half of what goes on in that filthy house . . .”

  “Take care, sir, lest your curses betray your sympathies. Do you mean black magic? Is this Silberman the ringleader?”

  His face drained. “Never said that.”

  She dragged him into the bay window’s niche, out of the noisy crowd. Time for a dose of Lafayette’s methods. “Don’t waste my time with more lies. Sir Dalziel was murdered for plotting to expose this Silberman. Now Carmine Zanotti’s dead, and he might not be the last.”

  A shrug. “Ain’t my problem.”

  Incensed, she slapped his cheek. “Shame on your chilly heart,” she hissed. “It’ll be your problem, when I tell the police you tampered with those clockworks to falsify evidence. Fancy a stretch in Coldbath Fields? I hear the convicts reserve special treatment for pretty papist lads such as yourself.”

  “Piss on you,” muttered Brigham, but his sullen gaze shifted.

  “Whatever floats your boat, sir. Who else knew about this?”

  He fidgeted. “Lady Fleet’ll know I told.”

  “We’ll keep you safe,” she promised, far from sure it was true. “Captain Lafayette has powerful friends. Who can just as easily implicate you as protect you, if you don’t prove your worth. Does Lady Fleet deserve your silence so well?”

  Defeated, Brigham yanked his cap off to rake his black hair. “All of ’em stayed until three,” he admitted. “Lady Fleet never went down to the country. She wouldn’t miss their naff-arse rituals. Blood sacrifices, demon summoning, the usual bollocks. There’s a secret basement where they all go at it. Old Dalziel were nutty as a fruitcake. Thought he’d live forever.” He flushed. “I’ve already crowed too much. I ’ave to go.”

  Briskly, she grabbed his coat and shoved him against the window. “Don’t imagine I’m too ladylike to thrash sense into you,” she lied. “Where can I find this Silberman?”

  Brigham’s eyes lit. “Joking, ain’t you? That’s just what he calls himself. No fixed abode. A bad egg, no mistake.”

  She relinquished her grip, only half satisfied. “Do you mean a murderer?”

  “Lady, there’s worse things than dying.” Casually, he yanked his coat straight, but his brow gleamed
with sweat. “Look, I don’t know who done it. I lied about the dinner ’cause I wanted to keep my job, that’s all. I never talked to you, all right? Swear to Christ, if you come looking, I’ll make you sorry.” He stuffed his bag under his arm, the electric head poking out. “Get your pet looked to, madam,” he added politely, as Hipp capered at his ankles, yelling nonsense. “Leave him much longer, he’ll pop.”

  “Please—”

  But Brigham was already swallowed by the teeming rush-hour crowd.

  A DYING SCREAM

  HIPP,” ANNOUNCED ELIZA, HER MOOD ONCE AGAIN buoyant, “we have a suspect.”

  Hipp bounced in agreement. “Investigate,” he yammered. “Information please. Information-mation-mation . . .”

  “Do try to calm down,” she added, exasperated. She’d more important things to do than tinker with Hipp. Witnesses to re-examine, a case to build. Who was this elusive Dr. Silberman? Everyone at that Exhibition had lied, and she intended to extract the truth.

  Beside her, Lizzie laughed, a bright phantom in red skirts. “Oh, aye. You and whose army?”

  Eliza rolled her eyes. “For heaven’s sake, don’t you start.”

  “You ain’t the police,” persisted ghost-Lizzie. “If they’s all in on it, like Brigham claims, think they’ll talk to you? Not without a certain scarlet-coated Royal agent to strike fear into ’em.”

  “Indeed. Did it escape your notice that the captain and I disagreed?”

  “Well, you’d best agree again, missy, or for you this case is over.” Jauntily, Lizzie tossed bouncing curls. This time, she wore a crooked top hat and a huge monocle, one eye looming impossibly large. She seemed scarily real. Almost opaque.

  “Nonsense. I don’t need him. I’ll return to the Fleet house, ascertain if this secret basement is real . . .”

  Lizzie just laughed.

  Stubbornly, Eliza pursed her lips. “I don’t need anyone. Especially not you.”

  She hailed an electric omnibus, waving at the driver through the raucous crowd. The thundery aether scent brought to mind that stormy night at Bethlem, when the Chopper tried to bring a stitched-up corpse to life.

  Mr. Todd had offered bizarre insights into the Chopper case. What would Todd say about this pentacle-carving, heart-eating killer? Perhaps she could mail him her case notes. She wouldn’t need Captain Lafayette for that. Dear Mr. Todd, why did the crazy person do this?

  She squeezed onto the crowded omnibus, thanking a gaunt fellow in black with a rolling glass eye who offered her his seat. He clambered up the spiral steps onto the roof, and the omnibus rattled away, leaving Lizzie standing on the sidewalk.

  Eliza grinned, and waved. Ha! See you later.

  Hipp bounded into her lap. “Bus! Bus! Bus-bus-bus . . .”

  Her vision wobbled, lurching vertigo, and the pale-haired governess sitting opposite suddenly seemed to wear Lizzie’s face.

  “Aye,” the apparition taunted, “stand on your stupid pride, until this pentacle-brain loon kills someone else. Face it, missy. You NEED Remy.”

  The cramped omnibus suddenly trapped Eliza, the thick air choking her. Surely everyone was staring. What she needed was a tonic and a good lie-down . . .

  The Lizzie-thing practically purred. “Pox on your precious independence. Would it be so dreadful to spend another day in his company? Or is you scared he don’t want to see you, after you accused him of torturing folks for fun?”

  Bang! The omnibus jerked to a halt at the corner of Southampton Row, and Lizzie smirked and vanished. The governess returned Eliza’s stare with suspicious eyes.

  Heavens, she was losing her mind.

  Hurriedly, Eliza paid her threepence and jumped down with Hipp under one arm. The gaunt glass-eyed man tipped his hat to her, and her spine crackled cold. Hadn’t she seen him before? He put her in mind of Lizzie skipping along a dark street, a weaving drunkard who bellowed a song. While soft the wind blew down the glade . . .

  Good God. Was the whole town spying on her?

  “Fine,” she snapped, to no one in particular. “Hipp, if you please, telegraph Captain Lafayette. Tell him I’ve a development in the Pentacle Killer case, and I’ll come by tomorrow morning, if he doesn’t mind terribly. If he’s not too busy, that is.”

  “Busy,” yelled Hipp happily, galloping away. “Inner Temple, ten o’clock . . .”

  Niggled by dumb animal guilt—what had her harsh words with Lafayette even been about?—Eliza headed reluctantly for home. Birds twittered in the leafy park, irritatingly cheerful. Shoppers strolled and laughed. Smiling couples flirted. Children frolicked on verdant grass. How infuriatingly domestic.

  She stomped onwards, peeved. If Lafayette thought she’d forgiven him—“For what,” yelled Lizzie from a passing carriage window, “making you face the truth?”—he could think again. In the meantime, she must do the Philosopher’s bidding. Unless she fancied a rusty electrified dungeon in the Tower.

  And that meant the elixir. Lizzie would fare better by far in the Rats’ Castle than she . . . and as always, since her guardian’s identity had been revealed, Eliza felt a strange mixture of reluctance and girlish eagerness at the prospect of seeing Mr. Hyde.

  But the Philosopher’s coercion maddened her. Always subject to another’s orders, following another’s plans. Never acting of her own volition.

  “Not so nice, is it?” called Lizzie gaily, swinging lace-gartered legs atop the spiked park fence. “Ha ha! How’d you like them apples?”

  “I like ‘them apples’ perfectly well, thank you.” Eliza crossed the street, dodging a blue-skirted young lady swerving along on an electric velocipede, and stomped up her front steps. “What does that mean, anyway? Where are these ‘apples’ you’re forever on about? Why do you have to be so picturesque?”

  “Picture-who?” Now Lizzie lurked beneath the porch, spitting on a dirty handkerchief and polishing Eliza’s shingle.

  “You know that word. You can display perfectly respectable manners when you feel like it, but insist on acting like a circus clown. No one likes following the rules, Lizzie. I can behave myself. Why can’t you?” Eliza slammed the door, her breath short.

  Was she truly going mad at last? Or just that sweet-pink remedy, playing tricks?

  She dropped her bag on the consulting-room desk. Now Lizzie was fighting in her guts again, punching her insides black and blue. “Stop it! You’re not squirming out while I’m sleeping this time. I need to remember, not wake up half drunk in a doorway with mud up my skirts. It’s the elixir, or nothing. And you’ll come straight back when you’re finished, young lady,” she added, half-hidden memory scorching her cheeks. “No messing about with your seedy gentlemen friends. Kindly salvage a whisker of self-respect.”

  “Ha!” Lizzie’s grin poked from between the drapes. “At least I’m honest about it, instead of making out my turds don’t stink. Forever pretending to be sommat you ain’t, just to impress a man. Call that self-respect? Arse-licking, more like.”

  “Call it what you please,” snapped Eliza, flinging herself into her chair. “Just don’t expect sympathy from me when you contract some horrible disease.”

  “Don’t matter if I do, eh? I just change, and everything’s healed! Ha! How’d you like them apples . . . ?”

  Mrs. Poole bustled in, brandishing a vase of fresh freesias. “Everything all right, Doctor? I heard voices.”

  Confused, Eliza glanced left and right. Lizzie had vanished. “Er . . . quite. Thank you. Uh . . . I’ll retire early tonight, if you please. I’m rather tired.”

  Mrs. Poole bossed the flowers into order. “Quite an evening last night, was it?”

  Eliza covered a fake yawn. “Home by eleven, if you must know. I barely stayed awake.”

  “You poor thing. How unbearable, swanning about in a fancy gown with that handsome captain on your arm. Took you long enough to come inside, didn’t it? Anyone would think something salacious was going on.”

  “Is that what happened? I hardly recall. Might you fetch me
milk and a sandwich, please? I’m not very hungry.”

  “Humph. Something amiss with my suppers, is there?”

  “You have me. All these years, I’ve been pampering your feelings. I’m afraid you can’t cook to save yourself.”

  “All that fine food wasted,” grumbled Mrs. Poole. “I suppose I can rustle up something.”

  “A jewel, as always. Whatever should I do without you?” Eliza started upstairs.

  “Starve and work yourself to death, like your father?” called Mrs. Poole after her.

  “In a matter of days. I’ve little doubt.”

  The sunset had faded, staining her bedroom’s white drapes with watery blood. She lit the electric light, pop! Her skin jittered, a poor fit, and her palms itched, begging her to scratch them raw. How she longed for Lizzie’s devil-may-care confidence. Yank that well-oiled sconce, dive into the secret chamber, fill her mouth with that bitter delight . . .

  Mrs. Poole arrived with supper. Eliza ate it, barely tasting. She sat at her writing desk and tried to read—Herr Gross’s text on the identification and preservation of crime scene fluid samples—but her concentration scattered like marbles. She paced up and down. Loosened her clips, pulled hairpins loose in readiness. Fetched her elixir from the cabinet. The glass felt warm and greasy in her hand. Pulsing, like a living creature, eager to be free.

  Grimly, she stared at it. It stared back. Waiting. Yearning.

  The mantel clock struck eight.

  THE ART OF MAKING A POINT

  I SMACK MY LIPS, ELIXIR ROLLING IN MY BELLY LIKE molten gold.

  About time.

  I ditch the empty bottle. Stretch my hungry muscles, pop my neck, crack! I feel . . . odd, as if my skin don’t fit proper. That shiny pink hellbrew is playing merry bugfuck with me, my friends, and I won’t stand for it.

  My dresses beckon from my closet, tempting red devils . . . but I let ’em be. Becky’s killer might still be a-hunting, and if he is, he’s wanting a saucy-eyed dolly in a red dress, not a prim schoolmarmish lady. Out of twig, no less! Ha ha!

  I pop a few corset clips, and my chest swells, grateful. Her shoes are too damn sensible, ugly, too, but they’ll serve. No stiletto—my sweet steel sister’s lost—so I grab Eliza’s stinger and test the button. Bzz-ZAP! Current forks blue between twin metal prongs. Well enough. I tuck him into a pocket.