by Glenn Cooper
Rising over the village was a mound of earthenworks, some twenty yards high, with a flattened top. Perched on the mound was a fortress of sorts, a squat stone building which would have resembled a Norman tower had it been taller. It was almost as if the builders had run out of stone. The truncated tower had a few slotted windows overlooking the river and a large wooden door.
“Don’t gaze on it,” Dirk warned. “We don’t want to be meeting the underlord.”
“Hard-ass, is he?”
“What’s an ass?”
“You know, bum, buttocks.”
“Well, I’ve never had occasion to touch his blind cheeks, so I couldn’t say if it were ’ard or soft, but I don’t believe you’d wish to share a bubber of belch with the likes of ’im.”
“Dirk, you and I are going to need a translator.” After a while John asked, “Is Solomon Wisdom some kind of a lord?”
“’Ardly. Wisdom’s a merchant.”
“Oh yeah? What’s his merchandise?”
Dirk cackled. “Poor bastards what winds up ’ere, of course.”
As they made their way through the village that repellent aroma John had smelled in Dartford overcame him once again.
“What is that? Sewers?”
Dirk sniffed at the air as if he hadn’t noticed. “Partly open ditches, I s’pose, but we’re near to their rotting rooms, I expect.”
“What are they?”
“Nasty places I don’t care to speak of. You ask our Master Wisdom if it pleases you.”
Suddenly a group of filthy men poured from another open-fronted structure, a market stall of sorts with a barrel of beer on a table, and hastened to block their way. A few of them circled behind the horses to prevent an escape.
Dirk pulled his reins and said, “We’re buggered. Cheese it, John Camp. Let me do the tittle-tattle.”
John controlled his jittery horse and focused on the alpha male, a young, shirtless fellow at the front of the pack wielding a large club. Judging by the patches of dried blood on his scalp he had recently shaved his head. His pasty-white chest was full of decidedly modern tattoos. Gang ink, by the looks of it.
The young man pointed his club at the riders and said truculently, “Who the fuck are yous two?”
“’Ere, kindly let us pass, friend,” Dirk said. “We’ve got urgent crown business.”
“You’re no friend a mine, mate. Off your fucking horses.”
A panicky Dirk began to comply but John told him to keep to his saddle.
The young man frowned at John and said, “What’s your problem, sunshine? Hard a hearing?”
An older fellow in the group thrust his finger at John and said, “Can’t you smell ’im, Reggie, he ain’t one of us?”
Reggie answered the man, “You’ll have to excuse me, you dozy bastard. I haven’t been in this fucking place long enough to tell the difference between the various aromas of shite. But I’ll tell you what I see. I see two cunts on soldier’s horses they likely pinched, coming down my fucking street in my fucking town.” He waved his club at Dirk and John and said, “Now get the fuck down before I club you down.”
John shocked them all by smiling and saying evenly, “How’re you doing today, Reggie? Enjoying your pint?”
Reggie looked confused. “What’s a bloody Yank doing in my town?”
“That’s funny, I thought the town belonged to the guy in that castle up there.”
“Fuck him,” Reggie said. “On this street, I’m the boss man.”
A few men murmured their support.
“How long’ve you been here, Reggie?” John asked, “Recent arrival?”
Reggie began moving his club in a tight little circle as he crept closer to John’s horse. “1997, mate.”
“Real badass, I’m guessing. That tat on your chest, The Firm—that your gang?”
He kept coming. “You know it, Yankee-doodle cunt. Thamesmead’s finest.”
“This Thamesmead’s a bit different from yours. Liking it so far?”
“It was a concrete shithole before, it’s a wooden shithole now. Consider this the end of our chinwag, arse-wipe. I’m taking your horses, I’m taking your sword, I’m taking what’s in your bloody bag.”
“This bag?” John said, unwrapping it from the pommel and reaching his hand inside.
Reggie charged, his club raised above his head, and when John pulled the trigger inside, for a second, everyone, man and beast, seemed to freeze.
Before the deafening report of the pistol had fully dissipated, Reggie’s tattooed chest turned red. He clutched at it and crumpled to his knees, as surprised as he’d probably looked the moment he landed in Hell.
The horses rose on their hind legs. John struggled to control the reins with one hand while drawing his sword with the other, but the townsmen chose not to pursue Reggie’s unfinished business.
One of them pointed toward the squat castle. Its main gate had opened and soldiers were streaming out.
“The lord comes!” a man cried, and the lot of them scattered and disappeared toward the river.
“Come on, John Camp,” Dirk yelled. “Ride like the wind!”
John slapped the flanks of his horse with his heels and the animal responded. In seconds the town was behind them and they kept riding hard for at least ten minutes before allowing themselves a look back to see if they’d been followed. It looked like they were in the clear but they kept up the gallop for a while longer to make sure of it.
“You don’t mess about,” Dirk panted when they finally slowed.
“In a war, you try to kill the other side’s general early on. In a street fight, you take out the meanest son-of-a-bitch first.”
Dirk looked impressed. “You sure you ’aven’t been to Down before?”
They were in the countryside again, carving their way through high grasses, veering away from the river when the ground became too boggy. After an hour or more of hard riding the river made a hairpin turn and a hill came into view.
John had been to the Royal Observatory at Greenwich many times; it was one of his favorite spots in London. He recognized the position of the hill relative to the river but there the comparison ended. The manicured parkland, the grand, red-bricked, domed and spired buildings were not there. Instead, a Tudor-styled timbered house stood at the highest point of the hill.
Dirk pulled up.
“That’s where we’re going. That’s Master Wisdom’s ’ouse.”
They rode upwards on a steep, well-trodden path, the small of John’s back pressing hard against the cantle. At the top of the hill they dismounted and tied the sweating horses to a post. The house was the most elaborate John had seen thus far, three stories of heavy timbering with white plaster infill.
As he was admiring it, men burst through the front door drawing swords, but they stood down at the sight of Dirk.
“Oy, what are you doin’ here?” one of them, a stout redhead, asked.
“I brung a special gentleman to see Master Wisdom. Is ’e about?”
The redhead approached gingerly, sniffing away, and once he had a nostril-full of John, he rushed back into the house, calling his master’s name.
Solomon Wisdom emerged into the fading light. He was thin and tall with stringy, graying hair to his shoulders, muttonchops and a long, sallow face. He wore a black mid-thigh frock coat, black trousers, a coarse white shirt and a black cravat, an outfit, to John’s eye, very much befitting a Victorian undertaker.
Wisdom studied his guest for a long while, sniffing discreetly while inching closer. Then his dour face transformed itself with a crooked smile and he extended a bony hand.
His elocution was refined, even elegant. “My goodness, me! Welcome, welcome, welcome. How very exciting. My name, good sir, is Solomon Wisdom. What shall I call you?”
“John Camp.”
“Is that an American accent I hear?”
“It is.”
“Well, even more exotic. Please come in. You’ve come from Dartford, I presume?�
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Dirk answered in a deferential tone. “That’s right Master Wisdom, sir. We ’ad a bit o’ trouble and then we ’eaded ’ere and then we ’ad a bit more trouble and now ‘ere we are.”
“Well, then, come along. I’ll have food and drink brought in and we shall have an epic discussion. I can scarcely contain myself.”
Wisdom led them inside to a large room off the entrance hall. The furnishings were basic. A plaited, reed rug, a trestled table and dining chairs, and by the dormant hearth, a pair of cushioned armchairs with padded ottomans. The walls were bare. The only items of apparent value were a pair of substantial silver candlesticks on the table, dripping with yellow, solidified tallow, a stack of tarnished silver plates and a number of silver cups.
“Please, sit,” Wisdom said, gesturing at the table. “I can offer you drink. I have beer, of course, a cask of imported wine, and I have a few very special jars of rum. There’s a story to how I obtained them but that’s not for now.”
“I’ll have all of them,” John said.
Wisdom squinted. “Really? How marvelous.”
“Just joking. A beer would be great.”
“Humor! Marvelous indeed. Something in short enough supply.”
“I’ll have beer as well, Master Wisdom,” Dirk said.
Wisdom ignored Dirk and scurried out of the room. When he returned the red-bearded guard was trailing behind, awkwardly balancing a tray with three large mugs of beer. When he put the tray down he sidled over to Wisdom and whispered in his ear about finding John’s pistol.
Wisdom nodded, shooed the man away and passed the drinks to his guests before raising his own in a toast.
“To what will undoubtedly be a most remarkable and stimulating evening.”
John was thirsty and very much in need of a drink. He finished the beer off in a string of gulps.
“Well, don’t just stand there like an idiot,” Wisdom shouted to his man. “Bring more beer. My, my, Camp, I applaud your appetites.”
John wiped his mouth with his hand. “It’s okay to call me John.”
“Then you must call me Solomon.”
“Can I call you Solomon too?” Dirk asked.
“Of course not!” Wisdom scolded, immediately turning his attention back to John. “Well, John, I scarcely know where to start. My queries are multitudinous, poised to cascade forth as if from a burst dam.”
John rocked back in his chair, hoping it would hold his weight. “I’ve got my share of questions too, Solomon. But you first. Fire away.”
Wisdom put his mug down, his face suddenly returning to its funereal gravity. “So. You’re not dead, are you, John?”
“I certainly hope not.”
“And yet, here you are.”
“I am.”
“How is this possible?”
“It’s a long story.”
“I have plenty of beer and even more time. I shall hang on each and every word.”
More beer appeared and John had a few more gulps.
“I’m not a scientist, Solomon, but this involves a fair bit of science. To get myself oriented to what you might and might not know, can I ask you what year you—well, left the Earth?”
“You mean the year I died. No need to pussyfoot around the subject. It’s a natural thing to ask one another here. It was 1874.”
John shook his head. “It’s hard for me to wrap my head around that, but my guess is, it’s going to be hard for you to believe what I’m going to tell you. Scientific knowledge has progressed quite a bit from what you’ll recall.”
John launched into a highly simplified rendition of the structure of the atom and the way particle colliders work, watching Wisdom closely for signs of comprehension, but the man was impassive. At the same time, Dirk’s mind had clearly wandered off somewhere far away, for when the young man finished his drink he let his eyes close and his chin fall to his chest. John carried on, explaining the Hercules program and the experiment that had gone bad. He talked about Emily, about Woodbourne.
At the mention of Brandon Woodbourne, Dirk’s eyes opened wide. It seemed he’d been listening after all.
“That sod’s gone off to Earth, then? Bloody ’ell! Well you can ’ave ’im. Nasty piece of business, that one.”
“He lives in your village?” John asked.
“Well, I’d say ’e roams about the shire, only a short ways better than a rover, thieving, doing ’is worst to fowks. ’E takes a considerable pleasure in choking and stabbing. I’ve asked me soldier acquaintances to deal with ’im but ’e’s a slippery one.”
John kept going but he’d need to ask about these rovers at some point. He talked about the theory of how a bridge between the two worlds had formed and about the experiment that had brought him to the place that Dirk called Down.
At that, Wisdom finally nodded and smiled.
“Quaint name, Down. I know the simple folk like to call it that. The name Hell does tend to make one shudder. So fraught with connotation, so biblical.”
John hardly noticed another presence in the room until he heard her clearing her throat. A fat, elderly woman, her face awash in moles, a scarf tied around her white hair, stood by the door, waiting to be acknowledged.
Wisdom looked up.
“Would you be wanting me to bring in some supper?” she asked.
“Yes, yes,” Wisdom replied, impatiently. “Just get on with it.” He turned back to John. “I’m quite lucky to have a female, even though she’s quite repugnant. But at least she can cook which makes one’s existence the more tolerable.”
“I’m awful hungry,” Dirk said, childlike. “Do I get to eat as well?”
“Yes, Dirk, I suppose I’ll let you have some of my food. Now, I’m being rude, John. There’s an outhouse. Go down the hall and outside behind the house. You’ll find a trough of water for a wash if you like. We’ll eat, drink some more and talk until we are quite blue in the face.”
“Don’t mind if I do,” John said, rising.
When he’d left, Dirk timidly inquired if he was allowed to ask a question of his own.
“What do you want?”
“Are you going to be telling ‘im that I brung the lady ’ere too?”
Wisdom delivered a withering look.
“You didn’t tell him, did you?”
“’Course not! You told me if I ever opened me mouth ’bout that you’d cut off me tongue.”
“Your tongue, your hands, your cock, and by God, your head! He’s never to know. No one must know, do you understand?”
Dirk nodded vigorously, as if the harder he worked his neck, the more believable he was.
“You was right clever not saying nothing ’bout all the Earth business when the lady sang you much the same song.”
Wisdom sneered, “Yes, I suppose I might aspire to be a player at Drury Lane if there were a Drury Lane in Hell, Dirk, my cretinous fool. Now shut your mouth. He’s returning.”
John settled himself back down and the old woman returned carrying a large platter of food and steel utensils.
“It’s mutton and boiled turnips,” Wisdom said rather proudly. “I shall be switching to wine. How about you, John? It’s quite good, from Francia.”
“France?”
“Yes, of course. The old names tend to stick here.”
“Sure. I’ll have some wine. What’s England called?”
“We are Brittania.”
John hadn’t realized how hungry the horseback ride had left him. He ignored the gaminess of the meat and shoveled down the food. One hard bite did a number on his most vulnerable tooth and he fished a piece of it from his mouth and flicked it onto the floor. The remaining half a tooth began to throb and he dealt with the pain by downing the rest of his red wine. It was drinkable and Wisdom’s man kept pouring. At least he wouldn’t be suffering from alcohol cravings here.
“So, John,” Wisdom said while chewing, “you’ve bravely travelled to terra incognita to find your lady. How chivalrous.”
“It’s my job. I’m in charge of security at the laboratory.”
“I sense there’s more to your actions.”
“I suppose you’re right about that.”
“Then we must assist you. It’s quite the story you’ve told and quite the quest you have embarked upon. There’s heroism, love, the dangers of the unknown, a journey to the underworld where you, Orpheus, do seek your Eurydice.”
“Might as well throw in a helping of Dante while you’re at it.”
Wisdom suddenly looked dreamy. “How I miss those books. How I miss any books. There are some, I’m told, but I possess none. It’s one of our many, many hardships. Are you a man of letters, John? You seem too fit and well-proportioned for the halls of academia.”
“I’m a soldier, a professional soldier. But I read a lot of history. I studied military history at college.”
“Fascinating. In America?”
“West Point. Know it?”
“Yes, I’ve certainly heard of West Point. Your Civil War generals Grant and Lee attended, am I correct?”
“You are.”
“Grant was your President when I died.”
“He was, until 1877.”
“Then you are a scholar and a soldier. Truly marvelous. I presume you were an officer.”
“A major in the US Army.”
Dirk saw an opening into the conversation and took it.
“There’s more to ’im than someone who gives the orders. ’E’s a fighting man. ’E dispatched a right old brute who accosted us in Thamesmead town. And we ’ad a squad of sweepers come through shortly after ’e landed and John put all of ’em down.”
Wisdom looked intrigued. “Is that so? Which squad, Dirk?”
“It was Captain Withers’ and ’e won’t be doing no more sweeping, that’s for damn sure. John ran ’im through with ’is own sword and now ’e’s taken it for ’imself.”
“I thought I recognized the style of weapon on your hip,” Wisdom said. “I am most impressed.”
“I didn’t come out scot-free,” John said.
“I saw you’ve been favoring your shoulder. We shall have fresh bandages and unguent for you anon. Tell me, when you were a soldier, where did you fight?”
“In Iraq and Afghanistan.”
“I don’t know this name, Iraq.”