Devil Take Me

by Jordan L. Hawk

  “That’s Umberry’s story, but I’m not certain it explains why he kept all those passages intact.”

  Nimble nodded. Absently he picked up one of the golden fried chips from his plate, but he didn’t eat. Archie, on the other hand, polished off his six-penny serving of beef and peas, as well as his chips and lump of cheese. He’d hardly eaten the three days before and felt relieved to regain his appetite. He sipped his beer and considered what, if anything, he’d learned from his encounter with Nancy Beelze’s dissolute husband.

  “He said that she took everything,” Archie said.

  Nimble looked up, his eyes flashing bright yellow as they rose over the blue lenses of his spectacles. “There weren’t any women’s clothes or toiletries in the bedroom or bath.” Nimble remembered the chip and ate it quickly before turning his attention to his peas and beef.

  “You were expecting as much,” Archie guessed.

  Nimble nodded. “Like I said, I’ve been asking around about the twelve others who went missing from the club. They share a number of commonalities.”

  “All Prodigals.” Archie knew that already. “All took part in the Sunday fights at the Dee Club.” Normally he would have lowered his voice, but in the cacophony of the Fatted Cat chophouse, his words hardly carried. Besides, so many of the surrounding discussions revolved around the murders, affairs, and treasons of stage plays that their conversation could hardly compete with the surrounding drama and scandal.

  “Right. Also all but one of the twelve are women. And every single one of them was living with a man, whom my dear departed mum would have referred to as a shit-with-fists.”

  “Violent?”

  “Oh, definitely. But most deep in debt too,” Nimble said.

  “So these missing people would all have had good reason to run away.” Archie considered that. “And if they disappeared, that would be the first thing anyone would think, right?”

  “Righto. One girl’s mum told me that she didn’t search for her daughter at first because she was scared that she would lead her daughter’s husband to her.” Nimble leaned forward a little. “I don’t think it would have taken much talking to convince Nancy or any one of the others to pack their belongings and come away. Show a little kindness, lure them in with the offer of shelter. Then when he’s got them alone, do them in.”

  The thought struck Archie as horrible, cunning, and manipulative in all the worst ways. What kind of person chose a victim like Nancy—a person in desperate straits—and exploited her anguish to make her take part in her own murder?

  That was like something his uncle Silas would dream up, Archie thought in disgust. Then he considered the idea more seriously. Could Silas be involved? He certainly wasn’t above anything so repulsive, not so long as it served him. But the question was, how would the deaths of thirteen Prodigals benefit his uncle? Could his presence in the Dee Club merely be a coincidence, unrelated to Nancy’s disappearance?

  “On top of that,” Nimble went on, “say one of their bodies does eventually wash up on the river bank one day. There’d be no question of who the Inquisition would arrest. Neighbors, friends, and parents have already seen plenty of bruises, heard fights and the nastiest sorts of threats.”

  Archie nodded, recalling Doug Beelze’s hateful words. He hadn’t spent even an hour in the man’s company, but he felt certain Doug had abused his wife and was fully capable of killing her.

  From the point of view of someone plotting to murder Nancy, Doug would make a perfect scapegoat. Perhaps even a deserving one.

  “And here’s the other thing they have in common, and this one is rather strange.” Nimble’s words interrupted Archie’s thoughts. “Every single one of them was introduced to the club through a pretty fellow who goes by the name of Pugg—”

  “Mr. Pugg the dog trainer?” That, Archie had not anticipated at all.

  “The very one.” Nimble ate another of his chips.

  “Mr. Pugg….” Archie struggled to imagine Mr. Pugg in any capacity other than a handsome man holding out hoops for his hounds to leap through. There had been a guileless—even stupid—quality about his beaming stage presence that Archie found difficult to get past.

  “It’s curious, ain’t it?” Nimble commented.

  Archie nodded. Both of them lapsed into thoughtful quiet.

  Then, without preamble, the young man in the scarlet dress turned in his seat and leaned in to their table. He offered Archie a brief sweet smile and then placed his gloved hand next to Nimble’s. “I’m sorry for intruding, but we just have to know.” He indicated his two companions. The girls smiled with a warmth imparted by one too many pints of beer. “Are you two staging a murder mystery play?”

  “Still working out the plot, actually,” Nimble replied.

  The taller of the two girls leaned forward as well. Archie had to admire her shoulders and the muscular quality of her tanned hands. “I like the design for your set, but it’s far too complex and fussy.” She indicated Archie’s sketchy map of the Dee Club. “I build trap doors and false floors at the Moonlight Playhouse. All three of us work there.”

  Archie recognized the name of the theater; it possessed quite the reputation for staging outrageous productions filled with illusions and transformations.

  “This back half here is really all you need or want.” The girl traced her finger over the circular arena on the map. “You’ve got the audience situated perfectly to direct their attention away from the wings, and below you have more than enough space for trapdoors and any machinery you might need to have ghosts or whatnot pop out.”

  “I’m playing a ghost,” the young man commented. “A murdered first wife returned to torment my evil husband.”

  “Seems to be a lot of that going around—evil husbands, I mean,” Nimble replied. “We have a few in our tale as well.”

  “Yes, but we can’t decide if ours are actually to blame or not,” Archie put in.

  “They’re always to blame one way or another,” the second girl stated, then downed the remainder of her beer and flopped back in her seat. “Marriage should be banned until women are given the same rights as men. Like the Nornians have.”

  Her companions exchanged a look of amusement, and Archie guessed the complaint was one they’d heard on many occasions before.

  The five of them exchanged a few more civilities, but the interest of the other three waned notably when Nimble let it slip that he and Archie hadn’t yet secured funding for their production.

  “We’re hoping that interested parties might volunteer their time and skills,” Nimble stated.

  The young man laughed, and two girls wished them the best of luck with pitying smiles. All three departed very soon after that.

  “What would you have done if one of them volunteered to assist us with the production?” Archie asked.

  “I suppose I’d have thrown together a play and hoped that a certain handsome viscount decided to fund it.”

  “You know he would.” Archie laughed. “He could never say no to you.”

  Nimble’s pleased smile was charming and dauntingly affectionate. Archie felt as if his heart was fluttering with a strange delight. How odd it was to feel drawn to Nimble even when he looked well past his prime, gray-haired, age-speckled, stooped, and soft around the middle. Still, Archie couldn’t imagine another man he would rather have been with.

  Nimble sipped his beer and frowned at the taste.

  As long as Archie had known him, Nimble’s preferred drink had always been black tea. He was a bit of a granny that way, though he could put away pine whiskey when he wanted to. Archie wondered if there wasn’t somewhere the two of them could go for a few drinks and then perhaps….

  But no, that was done between them. Nimble had put an end to it, and Archie simply had to accept it and stop wishing matters could be otherwise.

  He snatched up the map he’d drawn of the Dee Club.

  Why had that girl mistaken it for a stage design, he wondered? Then he considered.
The arena was a stage of a kind, wasn’t it? The fights were presented almost like theater for a roaring audience. There had to be a backstage area, as well as wings where the fighters waited to be announced. And the lower levels where the infirmary was housed did have the appearance of a vast trap room hidden beneath a stage floor.

  So why not use the arena for the recitals and musicals performed the rest of the week? It wasn’t as if performers from the club’s theater troupe didn’t take part in the fights. At least a few of them had been present. Archie wished he’d managed to remain sober so he could better recall who exactly he’d seen there and in what capacity.

  “I don’t like you being there on your own,” Nimble said.

  “What?”

  “At that club.” Nimble nodded to the map. “I don’t think it’s wise for you to be there without anyone to watch your back. Not with your uncle skulking around and people disappearing from the place with suspicious regularity.”

  Archie could hardly argue. Silas had nearly shoved him into the river three days ago. Even so, he hesitated to agree, in part because he didn’t want Nimble coming afoul of his uncle, but also, he realized, because he didn’t want Nimble to have to endure the snide comments and snobbery of the club members.

  Which was foolish, and likely Nimble would laugh at him if he ever said as much.

  “You’re already a member, so there shouldn’t be any difficulty sponsoring me, should there?” Nimble asked.

  “No. No, none at all….” Archie wondered what supplies Nimble would need to conjure spells that could ensure his safety in the club. “Could you be ready to come with me by tomorrow?”

  “Tonight would be better.” Nimble set his beer aside. “Pugg is one of the Wednesday performers, isn’t he?”

  “He is,” Archie said. “The show starts around seven.”

  “Can you meet me at the club at five?” Nimble asked.

  “Anything for you, old boot.”

  Chapter Five: Shots in the Dark

  ARCHIE ARRIVED a half hour early, only to discover Nimble already waiting in the shadows of the cherry trees. An odd nervousness fluttered through Archie as he stilled to study Nimble’s altered appearance. He’d stripped away his mustache and padding, rinsed the gray from his hair, and washed out the lines and shadows that had previously tempered his striking features. A jewel-blue tailcoat accentuated his glossy black hair and dark complexion, while his indigo pinstriped trousers clung to his legs in a way that Archie found almost mesmerizing.

  Nimble was certainly never going to melt away into the dull anonymity of a crowd, Archie thought ruefully as he glanced down at his own wardrobe—another tediously elegant study in shades of pale gray.

  Nimble lifted a leather journal and jotted down some note with a clerk’s pencil. Then he returned to his thoughtful study of the fishermen on the far banks of the White River.

  “Penning a poem?” Archie called out.

  Nimble glanced up and grinned, then schooled his expression into a study of somber dignity and recited:

  “Oh, River White, your foam yellow as nags’ teeth!

  How many a strange mystery

  Of our city’s culinary history

  Has come bobbing up from sewer pipes beneath?”

  Archie snorted.

  “A better question of our time,” Archie answered, “was ne’er before addressed in rhyme.”

  “Oh, you should hear the verses I’ve composed on the subject of dental hygiene.” Nimble shoved the journal into his pocket and tucked the stubby pencil behind his right ear, just as a practiced clerk would have done. “Adventures in Dentures is what I’m calling the collection.”

  “A biting satire, I suppose?” Archie drew the gilded Dee Club medallion from his coat pocket. He’d chosen a gray silk ribbon but now realized how dowdy it looked compared to everything else Nimble wore. Even the gold of the medallion seemed faded next to the fiery orange quince flowers adorning his waistcoat.

  Archie reached out, meaning to hand the thing over, but Nimble stepped nearer to him and bowed his head. A strange sense of intimacy filled Archie as he carefully lifted the ribbon over Nimble’s head. His hands brushed Nimble’s hair and then rested briefly on his shoulders. It was hardly a moment’s contact, much less a caress, and yet, touching Nimble here in broad day, in public, it felt like a kind of declaration.

  Two bright blue dragonflies darted past them. From a branch overhead, a shrike took flight after them. In an instant the bird handily snapped up one of the pair in its jaws.

  Archie looked back at Nimble. He wished he possessed even a shred of magic to imbue the medallion with any real protection for Nimble.

  Nimble lifted his head, and a flush seemed to color his face. He held Archie’s gaze, then ran his hand over the ribbon and medallion. He looked pleased and about to make a joke. Then his smile folded to a straight line and he narrowed his gaze past Archie’s shoulder. Archie turned to see Silas and his two varlets striding from the stable and through the club’s wide green doors.

  Silas carried a slightly wilted bouquet of scarlet peonies and pink snapdragons under one arm. His expression struck Archie as far too smug for a man who’d just lost his country property. Perhaps the bank hadn’t informed him yet. No, Silas had to have received notice by now. There was some reason the news hadn’t dispirited him. Archie guessed it was the prospect of Agatha Wedmoor’s dowry.

  “And the snake has come a-calling for your girl,” Nimble commented.

  “She’s hardly mine,” Archie replied, but he turned and started after his uncle. He hadn’t grown fond of Agatha, but he did feel a kind of sympathy for her. Her plight so reminded him of his mother’s.

  “Off to the rescue, we go, then,” Nimble commented as he drew alongside Archie.

  Inside, a crowd of club members and their sponsored Prodigals filled the galleries, many excitedly discussing the prospect of the evening’s entertainments. Two new Prodigal actresses from the Queen’s Theater had been sponsored since Archie had last attended the club, and they’d agreed to perform a recital. The warm humidity of too many tightly packed bodies filled the place with the atmosphere of a hothouse.

  “Standing room only, eh?” Nimble commented as they worked their way through the crush of men. Archie noted Neet’s flushed countenance peeping out from a clot of young men all circled around two very tall, radiantly beautiful Prodigal women. Strings of pearls supported the golden medallions that glinted from the silky breasts of the actresses’ green gowns. Archie thought he recognized Lupton’s stocky figure—brandy snifter in hand—farther down the hall. He appeared to have cornered Archie’s uncle in some conversation. Silas looked bored but not yet belligerent, while Lupton appeared indifferent to Silas’s disinterest.

  As Archie neared them, he noticed Agatha Wedmoor and Nurse Fuggas creeping up the stairs with Phebe between them. He gave a nod, and Nimble looked to the stairs with a very thoughtful expression. Archie guessed the women would withdraw to Agatha’s private rooms on the third floor, where Agatha’s maids could repel any male callers.

  “Of course, it’s not my place to say why Archibald might bear you some ill will.”

  Lupton’s voice drew Archie’s attention. The man appeared unaware of the Smith twins’ glares or Silas’s refined pose—which conveyed to all the world that he was a indulging the rambling of a drunk.

  “But if you truly felt that battle would make a man of him, why didn’t you at least send him to serve with peers in the cavalry?” Lupton, for all his flushed face and alcoholic air, sounded sincere. “We would have looked after the boy, kept him safe.”

  Several of the men standing near the two of them looked uneasy, and their expressions only grew more alarmed as Archie stalked closer. Though neither Silas nor Lupton seemed to notice him through the crush of gray-clad men.

  “You’re quite correct, Lupton. It’s not your place to say anything on the subject at all,” Silas replied, and he twitched the bouquet hanging from his left hand like
an angry cat flicking its tail. “But since you’ve deemed yourself qualified to comment upon the private matters of my family, I’ll tell you. I am proud that I had the faith to place my nephew’s edification in God’s hands. I entrusted him to the Children’s Brigade to learn humility and piety. Qualities that I hardly think the horse guard are famous for. If I hadn’t, I have no doubt that he would have grown up a simpering effeminate—” Silas shot a disdainful glance to one of the men looking on, and the young fellow colored. Several of the men standing near him stepped away slightly. Silas turned his sneer back on Lupton. “He’d probably be a lobcock and a drunkard to boot.”

  Lupton stiffened and his face darkened with anger. But before he could respond, Archie sidled up beside his uncle.

  “As is, I’ve blossomed into a feckless wastrel,” Archie announced. “So, praise the Lord.”

  “Deo gratias,” Nimble called out as if he were in a particularly lively church. “Amen and all that!”

  Silas nearly dropped his bouquet as he spun on Archie and caught sight of Nimble. “What is this?” Silas demanded.

  “Nimble Hobbs, sir.” Nimble made a show of tugging his forelock. “Most obliged to make your acquaintance. I’m the fortunate soul whom your most generous nephew has deigned to sponsor into this magnificent establishment.”

  Silas stared at Nimble, then recognition showed in his expression. “You were at the funeral….”

  “Yes, sir! I served with your unfathered nephew, Archimedes. Sadly that brave boy’s edification involved too many cannon balls for us to ever learn how he might have turned out. Still, the righteous will have their reward in the end, eh?” Nimble grinned a wide display of his jagged teeth. “Most gratified that you recall me, sir. I promise I have never forgotten you either.”

  Silas glanced to Archie, then turned on his heel and shouted after one of the Prodigal servants. He strode away, demanding water for his flowers and that Lady Umberry be informed that he had arrived. Mike and Nate paused a moment—sizing up Nimble, Archie thought. Then they lumbered after their master.