Black Iron

by Franklin Veaux

  Thaddeus waited for him to speak. Let them get in the first word. That was key. If you started talking first, you were apt to start babbling, and that would do you no good at all.

  The moment stretched until it threatened to snap. Thaddeus fought off the urge to run. Donnie leaned against a pile of pig iron ingots, smiling placidly. Claire, hammer still in her hand, watched the three officers with bright, alert eyes.

  Finally, the commander cleared his throat. “State your name,” he said. He sounded bored.

  “Thaddeus Mudstone Ahmed Alexander Pinkerton,” Thaddeus found himself saying. He had intended to stop after the first word, but the rest just tumbled out as if afraid to let the first bit go out alone.

  “Thaddeus Mudstone Ahmed Alexander Pinkerton,” the commander repeated. He shook his head slightly. “Whitechapel or Highpole?”

  “Whitechapel born and bred,” Thaddeus said.

  “Hm.” The commander nodded. “Tell me, Thaddeus Mudstone Ahmed Alexander Pinkerton, where were you last night before sundown?”

  “Oh, you know,” Thaddeus said, “here and there. Out and about. No place in particular. I had a social engagement.”

  “What was the nature of this social engagement?”

  Thaddeus ratcheted his smile wider. “Drinking. At the pub. With some mates.”

  “Does this pub have a name?”

  “I’m sure it does,” Thaddeus said. “I was too drunk to notice. What I can do for you?”

  “We have received a complaint,” the policeman said. “Care to comment on that?”

  Thaddeus forced the smile wider still, until his face threatened to split. “A complaint?” he said. “I can’t imagine why. I’m certain I paid my tab, Officer…?”

  “Skarbunket,” he said. “Commander Skarbunket, London Metropolitan Police. These are my associates, Officer Bristol,” gesturing to the man who had confronted Thaddeus in the loft, “and Officer Mayferry. May I examine your hat, please?”

  “My…hat?” The question threw Thaddeus off balance.

  “Yes. The complainant gave a detailed description of the hat. And your shoes.” The police commander looked down. “Those are very…distinctive shoes.”

  Thaddeus took off the top-hat and handed it over to the commander, who turned it over and looked inside.

  “May I inquire as to what—” Thaddeus began.

  “Is this your hat?” Commander Skarbunket said.

  “I can’t imagine who else it would belong to,” Thaddeus said.

  “Hmm, I imagine not. And those are your shoes, are they?”

  “Yes.”

  “Brundel and Sons, Pemmerton Street?”

  “Beg pardon?”

  “Your shoes,” Commander Skarbunket said. “You can tell a lot about a man by the clothes he wears. You can tell even more about a man by how he wears them. Those shoes, they are very fine shoes. Very expensive. Way beyond a working stiff like me. Made by Brundel and Sons over on Pemmerton Street, as anyone who cared enough about shoes to wear such a pair would know. Me, I don’t care about shoes. But those are the shoes of someone who cares very much about shoes. Which is why I find it odd, and I mean no disrespect by saying this, sir, but I find it odd they’re on the feet of someone like you. Odd and perhaps a little suspicious. Can you tell me where you were yesterday?”

  “I told you already. Out and about.”

  “Ah, yes, you did say that.” He nodded again. “Though now that I think about it, that doesn’t really tell me very much at all.”

  “Is there a point to all this?” Thaddeus snapped through his bolted-on smile.

  “We have received a report,” the commander said. “A peculiar report. One of the most peculiar I have heard in quite some time, and I have to tell you, sir, just so you really appreciate the full impact of what that means, I have to tell you I have heard some very peculiar reports in my time. Like a report that a flying creature as big as a horse dropped an egg on old Mrs. Havelhutt’s roof in the middle of the night. That report described a creature covered with scales and, if I recall correctly, with eyes that glowed like red fire. Excuse me, I ramble sometimes. Anyway, last night I received a report so peculiar that I almost paid it no mind. But the report was very specific on some of the details, you see. And the chief inspector has been encouraging us to be more proactive in our duties. And I happened to be in the area…”

  “Of course you did,” Thaddeus said bitterly. “With two other officers.”

  “Just so. As I said, this report was specific on some details. Such as your shoes. And this hat.” He looked down at it as though he’d forgotten it was in his hands. “Black top-hat, purple sash, exactly as the report said. Are you quite sure you don’t want to tell me where you were yesterday? Besides ‘here and there,’ I mean.”

  Thaddeus weighed his options. He could bolt out the back and be on the other side of the forge before they had time to react. From there, he could veer left, around the long, low building where the apprentices slept, then past the shed where the Bodgers kept the coal, and then down the street toward the bridge. But there were three of them, and besides, those shoes, those absolutely ridiculous shoes, would slow him down.

  He could jump the man, Thaddeus thought. Maybe take his sword. And then the other two would run him through.

  He could try to push past them, make a break for it out the front, try to lose himself in the alleys—

  “I wouldn’t recommend it, sir,” said Commander Skarbunket.

  Thaddeus carefully rearranged his face. He made a mental note to start breathing again. Damn and blast. The man could see right through him.

  Thaddeus felt giddy. He knew that somewhere, an officer of the law was asking him questions he had no good answers for. He knew that this officer had come with backup, which suggested he’d known all along that Thaddeus would not have good answers, because he already knew the answers, or else why ask the questions? He knew his connection to this earth was now very tenuous, and likely to end with a short, sharp jerk. The knowledge made him free.

  “Now see here,” Thaddeus heard himself say. “I have no idea what you think you’re getting on about, but I had an invitation, see, and…”

  “Invitation, sir?” The watch commander’s face was unreadable.

  Thaddeus’s train of thought ran into a wall. The cars jumped the tracks and collided with one another, tumbling over each other in a slow-motion catastrophe that strewed wreckage across his mental landscape. He carefully scrubbed all trace of expression off his face. “Is this about the party?”

  “I’m sure I don’t know anything about that, sir.”

  “Then what—”

  “We have received a report that as of sundown last night, sir, a gentleman matching your description, sir, did in or about the intersection of Harrington Way and an alley often referred to by the locals as Ambush Alley, sir, steal a top-hat of the following description: black, felt, with red silk lining and a purple sash, in good repair but with some damage, sir, from a young lady by the name of…of…”

  “Missy Ellington,” Officer Mayferry supplied.

  “Missy Ellington,” the commander continued. “This gentleman appeared well-to-do, and was reportedly wearing very expensive shoes of a particular style made, as your shoes were, sir, by Brundel and Sons of Pemmerton Street. Said hat, sir, was gifted to Missy Ellington by her late departed father, may he rest in peace, upon the occasion of his death some years ago, and owned by her, sir, as her sole possession in all this earth. And I had to wonder, sir, what kind of monster steals a hat from a young orphan girl who has nothing? Ordinarily, we do not involve ourselves with certain types of petty crime. But as I said, sir,” and he coughed, “this was a most peculiar report. One does not normally see the nobility stealing from the poor by such…” he coughed again “…direct means. The removal of what little property might be in the possess
ion of the poor is ordinarily done at a greater…remove. Sir.”

  The last syllable, for such a simple sound, packed an entire lifetime of experience: a hard climb up from a humble beginning, an unending drive for self-improvement, disillusionment and bitterness at the unjust scales of life, and, most of all, a driving contempt for the rapaciousness of the wealthy in their eternal scorched-earth crusade to accumulate more.

  Thaddeus had not even known it was possible to squeeze so much into one word.

  “You have me all wrong,” Thaddeus said.

  “I’m sure I do.” There was a strained silence. Then Skarbunket said, “You mentioned a party, sir?”

  6

  A heated argument filled the guardroom just off the main passageway into the Queen’s Palace, sharp words echoing off stone walls. This was the normal way of things. Throughout history, palaces have always had guardrooms, and heated conversations have always taken place in them. Sometimes, these conversations are of the “no, please don’t, I swear I don’t know anything” variety; sometimes they’re of the “where did that ace come from?” variety; but heated conversations are and always have been as much a part of a guardroom as bad lighting and scarred wooden furniture. Monarchs come and monarchs go, but those who guard the monarchs are ever the same.

  Max the Axe was angry. This was also the normal way of things. Men like Max the Axe are always angry. It’s practically a natural law.

  At the moment, Max the Axe’s anger was pointed in two different directions. Some might feel that rage would be reduced by this division, under the reasonable but uninformed hypothesis that anger aimed at two targets would mean each of them received half his wrath. In truth, the anger of men like Max the Axe, following its own mathematical logic, multiplies rather than divides. Being angry at two people made him twice as mad at each.

  Half his anger—or, rather, double his anger—was aimed at Julianus. It wasn’t just that Julianus was there, standing in front of him rather than rotting in a dungeon or swaying gently at the end of a rope. It was that Julianus existed. People are never as unique as they think they are. If Julianus existed, other people like Julianus also existed. In Max’s world, people like Julianus had no business existing. People like Julianus were loyal to an idea instead of being loyal to their betters, as was just and proper. That made them untrustworthy. Ideas changed. A man loyal to an idea might shift his allegiances. How was it possible to rely on such men?

  The other two parts of his multiplicative rage were aimed, somewhat more carefully, in the direction of the Cardinal. It was not usually safe to point one’s anger in the direction of the Cardinal except from a great remove, and preferably while wearing armor. Max was trying very hard not to let his feelings show. The unfamiliar effort was beginning to fray his nerves. The Cardinal watched him calmly from across the table, and as near as Max could tell, the man had utterly taken leave of his senses.

  The Cardinal sighed and spoke again, this time very slowly, as if addressing an especially stubborn and slightly dim child. “It is the position of the Church that any investigations must adhere to a very high standard of accountability. Therefore, I would like to insist that you include the arresting member of the Royal Guard in all your activities from this point forward.”

  “But that means you want me to let Julianus follow my men.”

  “No. Not just follow your men. I want you to take him with your men.”

  Max blinked, not sure if he could believe the reports coming from his own ears. “You want him to go wherever my men go.”

  “That is correct, yes.”

  “That means he will know everything we do.”

  “Yes. That—”

  “And talk to everyone we talk to,” Max continued. The sheer effrontery of this man was…was…what was that word that meant annoying and French? Gauling—that was it.

  “Captain, this is for your own protection. There are those who would say that you have a motive not to uncover anything that might implicate the Queen, or to be less than forthright about it if you do. So your failure to learn anything of use might, ahem, become a cause of suspicion among the more imaginative members of the Court. Those who see conspiracy at every turn regard lack of evidence as evidence of conspiracy. Whereas if your investigations are accompanied by the very individual who made the arrest, well…he does not share your motivations.”

  “But he arrested the Queen.”

  “So he did, yes. Which is why—”

  “He arrested the Queen,” Max said again, this time more slowly, for emphasis. “You can’t trust a man who would do such a thing.”

  “Now that’s not entirely—”

  “He arrested the Queen,” Max said.

  The Cardinal rose and leaned forward. His long, pinched face looked even more sour than normal, which was no small feat. “Yes,” he said, “exactly right. And that is why you will include him in your search for this mysterious man who leaps out of windows. Or doors. Or whatever it is he leaps out of.”

  Julianus stood ramrod-straight, staring at a point on the wall just beyond Max’s head. He didn’t like either man, and he felt that there were better uses for his time than searching for someone who in all probability did not exist, or if he did, was doubtless being cleaned up off the streets by scavengers looking for squidgy bits to sell to the animate-makers. Roderick was a good enough chap: solidly unimaginative, not terribly bright, but competent. He said he’d seen a man fling himself out the loading door of a zeppelin in flight. Then again, he also said he’d seen a cat with six legs in an alley near the pub on Pinebutton Street. And he swore it wasn’t the Longfellow ale he’d put down, because if he were seeing double, it should have been eight legs, right? And the Queen did keep some very good wine in her airship, not that you were supposed to drink it when you were on duty, or even when you weren’t, but still…

  “Are we agreed?”

  “Your Eminence?” Julianus hastily rewound the last few seconds of conversation in his mind. “Yes, Your Eminence,” he said. “I will accompany representatives of the Queen’s personal guard on all enquiries regarding a falling and / or flying man who may or may not have jumped out a door, a window, or other points of egress from the Queen’s airship in or…” he coughed. “…above New Old London.”

  “Good.” The Cardinal had the look of a man who’d just discovered the carcass of a dog in his stewpot. “I will not impede your enquiries, then.”

  Max the Axe, Julianus noted, was absolutely trembling with rage. A vein on his head looked as though it might burst forth of its own accord and start strangling people. So at least there was one small spot of light in this whole ridiculous business.

  “Where do we start?” Julianus asked, smiling pleasantly at a spot somewhere just above Max’s head. Max growled, his entire body quivering. “Partner?” Julianus added.

  It took two junior members of the Queen’s Guard half an hour to clean up all the splinters from the shattered table, on account of some of them being stuck, inexplicably, to the ceiling.

  7

  “Excuse me, sir. I hate to bring this up, but...what exactly are we doing here?”

  Commander Skarbunket looked at Bristol with an expression of surprise. “Surely it is plain what we’re doing, Mister Bristol? We’re upholding law and order by investigating a criminal complaint.”

  “Ah, yes, of course, sir. Upholding the law, righting wrongs, championing the defenseless, all that. It’s just…”

  “Yes, Mister Bristol?”

  “Forgive me if I’m out of line, sir, but I just can’t help feeling that this matter is a bit beneath our pay grade, you know?”

  “Ah. Hmm, yes.” Skarbunket dusted off the hat he held in his hands and squinted at it as if trying to decipher the secrets of the universe from the crisscrossed pattern of creases in the velvety blackness of rich but rumpled felt. They were standing in a crowded
street that wound its circumlocutious way along the docks, following both the river and its own inner logic. “Mister Bristol, how long have you been on the Force?”

  “Five long years, sir, though sometimes it feels more like decades.”

  “I know what you mean. And Mister Mayferry, how long have you been one of us?”

  “Nine years, seeing as how I lacked the advantage of Mister Bristol’s military commission. You know this very well, sir. What’s your point?”

  “Ah, yes, my point. All in good time, Mister Mayferry.” He threaded his way through the streaming traffic, nimbly evading a cart loaded with casks of wine being shoved through the crowd by a burly man dressed in blue and white, who handled it with the careless indifference of a sea captain plowing his icebreaker through a sheet of ice.

  The presence of the three officers was cause for no small amount of open consternation among the press of people surrounding them. The three of them were the targets of suspicious and occasionally openly hostile stares. There was a certain order, a certain informal agreement between those who enforced the law and those who worked the intricate machineries of commerce here in the docks. The very existence of law enforcement was viewed, by those whose jobs revolved around this place, as an unfortunate necessity of life. Sure, they were sometimes good to have around in case someone took it into his head to get too greedy, but most of the time, they were more like sand in the machinery of trade.

  Over time, a complex system of graft, bribery, and tacit understandings had evolved here, a quiet, informal way to make sure that business was not unduly hampered by the intrusions of law and order. The presence of Commander Skarbunket and his men was a violation of that delicate system. There were certain places the arm of the law was not expected to reach, certain times when the good citizens of the docks could safely assume that they could perform their job duties without worrying that representatives of the London Metropolitan Police would be around, and the three men, merely by their presence, were violating that natural order of things. There were many who considered their presence a personal affront.