“Where indeed?”
“Star and Ferret, sir.”
“I beg your pardon.”
“It’s a pub, sir. Down Cheapside way. There you can find all manner of neerdowells, sir. The bleedin’ dregs of humanity. There you can find anybody to do anything you can think of, sir.”
“Oh, really? And how do you know this, Sergeant?”
Adams bristled with pride as well as follicles. “Place is also riddled with our informants, sir. I take it you’ll be going there, sir. Arsk for a glass collector by the name of Sprite, sir.”
Inspector Kipper gaped.
“Little tyke, about yea high,” Adams held out his hand.
“I know him!”
“Him, sir? I could have sworn he was a she.”
“Really?”
“Well, if you knows him and you says he’s a he, then who am I to argue with an inspector?”
“Cheapside, you said?”
“That’s right, sir. Star and Ferret. The kind of place where you wipes your feet on the way out. I could come with you, sir.”
“I don’t want to be conspicuous.”
“Out of me uniform, of course, sir.”
“No, no; I’ll be all right on me Molly Malone.”
“If you’re sure, sir. I’ll get you a cab.”
Adams left Kipper alone. The inspector fastened his coat and wrapped his muffler around his throat. He felt in his pockets. He had some loose change but not much. He would just have to hope that Sprite would price his information on the cheap side.
Thirteen
My head was still drowsy from Hoo’s drugs but I staggered across the lab and tried the door, knowing full well it would still be locked. I was losing track of how long I’d been there. And I still couldn’t fathom why Hoo was keeping me incarcerated like a common criminal. Why did he save me from the noose and rescue me from the grave if he’s only going to keep me under lock and key?
Oh, yeah: on account of me trying to diddle him out of the toff’s money.
But why give me new arms and not the liberty to enjoy them?
I was going to have it out with good old Doctor Hoo as soon as I set eyes on him. I just hoped he’d hurry up because I was getting rather hungry by this point. I paced around the lab like a caged animal in a forgotten zoo.
I tried to run my hand across my brow and almost broke me own nose. I wasn’t used to my new hands; they was bigger and heavier than my old ones and the arms was a bit longer so I was having trouble judging distance with them. And talk about clumsy! I was flailing about like a broken windmill until I learned how to control them. Well, it looked like I had plenty of time to practise, didn’t it? So I sat down and began with simple stuff, like counting on my fingers, one, two, three - well, you know how it goes. When I got to four, I had trouble with me ring finger; I couldn’t shift it at all at first. I didn’t half sweat and when I tried to wipe the sweat away I clobbered myself in the hooter again, because I done it without thinking.
After that, I tried to button my shirt. It was like trying to knit with sausages instead of needles. Hours I must have spent but I was determined to master it. After all, a man must be able to dress himself. Even if he has a butler, like that toff.
Speaking of that toff, I wondered how he was getting on. Edward, Lord Beighton. How was he getting on with one leg? At least my arms was a matching pair. My guess was he was limping around, dragging his new foot behind him. Probably claiming it as a war wound or hunting injury or something. The posh git.
But who cares about him? I had problems of my own. I got me arms behaving themselves but it was my belly’s turn for rebellion. My Auntie Nelly was gurgling and rumbling, trying to get my attention. Feed me, it was saying, as if I didn’t know I was hungry.
I went to the door again and, slowly, closed my hand around the door knob. I turned it, pleased with the way my fingers was almost behaving normally. But the door was still locked. I was stuck like a cocked hat in a trap. Even the thought of a cocked hat - or ‘rat’ if you ain’t a Cockney - was beginning to have its appeal. Why, if one crept across the laboratory floor that minute, I wouldn’t have fancied its chances of reaching the other side.
When I was in prison, I heard stories of men what had supplemented their diet of gruel and stale bread with the occasional rodent what they had caught. I never did. But then, I didn’t have to. I was under sentence of death so I was rather well looked after, all things considered. Odd, ain’t it? You’re the worst of the worst and your days is numbered but the prison does its best to make you comfortable - within reason, of course. I had a cell to myself. My own personal guards to chat to. Regular visits from the chaplain. And the food - well! I’d never eaten so well in all my born days. “Got to keep your strength up,” my mates, the guards, kept joking. They was decent types. And I reckon they was relieved I didn’t try to take them down with me. They told me all sorts of tales about murderers who had tried their luck one last time, railing against the system and doing in a guard or two, for good measure. And there was others, hardened criminals who could make you shit yourself just by looking at you, breaking down into tears and crying for their mothers. Not me. Well, I never had no mother to cry out for, for one thing, but I was calm and collected, like I was waiting for an omnibus, they said. Like I was going on a bleedin’ holiday not to meet my maker or his horned subordinate.
I think it was because I knew Hoo wouldn’t let me down. I knew he’d get me out. And then the night before the rope was due to go around my bushel and peck, he turned up. Said something about examining me to see if I was fit to stand execution. Well, they fell for it, hook, line and bleedin’ sinker - or perhaps they decided it wasn’t worth arguing with him on account of him not speaking English as good as what we does. Hoo slipped me a little packet, a roll of paper with powder in it. He signalled that I was to take it with a drink of water and so I did. Then he goes and before long I’m foaming at the mouth and cramped up in terrible bleedin’ agony and the men calls him back and he says I must go to hospital right away, and they bundles me in the back of a wagon and I’m sinking fast and starting to think getting me neck stretched would be better than being poisoned to death. Everything goes grey and then black and then there’s nothing. I hear Hoo’s voice, all faint like he’s a long way orf, telling them I’m brown bread, only he don’t use them words exactly - he might not say much but he’s well-spoken is Doctor Hoo. Next thing I knows, I’m waking up in that coffin - but you knows about that bit already.
And now he’s got me locked up in here, without so much as a rat to keep me going.
I’d said I was sorry. For switching the money bags. I don’t know what else I could have done.
I lay down and stewed with only the rumblings of my Auntie Nelly for company. I almost wished that toff would come back so I could have run rings around him, intellectually speaking. And I was just dozing off when I heard the warehouse door slide open and shut. Either that or it was a giant yawning. I froze, and held me breath. I couldn’t hear nothing so I knew it was Hoo all right, on account of his ability to shift himself without making a sound - unless he wanted to. I thought about making a racket to remind him of his forgotten prisoner and clatter and bang about the place until I drove him to distraction. But then I stopped myself. I went off that idea sharpish. What if it weren’t Hoo but some other dangerous eccentric? At least I was safely locked in. And if he tried to bash the door in, well, I’d be ready, wouldn’t I, to do the same to his brains because nobody can break through a locked door and be silent about it, can they? I’d be ready as soon as I heard him. Even my clumsy new chalks could do some damage if I swung ’em about hard enough.
“Awake?”
It was Doctor Hoo, standing behind me and I hadn’t heard a peep. I spun around and was about to suggest he take up house-breaking or assassinating or something, when I saw what he
was holding, or rather smelled it. He was holding a tea tray with a bowl of golden noodle soup on it. My stomach pulled me toward it like a puppy on its leash, eager for walkies.
“That for me, is it?” I tried to appear casual and collected.
Hoo shook his head - barely. “Queen Mother,” he said. He put the tray on the bench and backed away with a little bow. I didn’t need telling twice.
I sat on the bench and reached for the bowl. “Hoi! What’s this?” He’d only bleedin’ gone and brought me chopsticks! For soup! Another of his little jokes. He was in a good mood and no mistake.
I cupped my hands around the bowl - slow and careful; I didn’t want to spill any of it. I lifted it to my mouth, aware that the doctor’s minces were on me. Puckering my lips, I tilted the bowl, sending soup splashing down me front.
Hoo nodded. “Practise,” he advised.
“What do you think I’ve been doing in here, while you’ve had me banged up like a common criminal?”
“Eat,” was his next piece of advice. And he was right and all; I didn’t want the soup to get cold. My second attempt was more successful. I drank the clear, golden liquid, feeling the spices warm me insides and I slurped at the noodles like the earliest bird getting all the bleedin’ worms.
When I’d finished I wiped the back of my hand across my north and south, taking care not to give myself a thick lip in the process. I was feeling a lot better and more disposed to having a proper chinwag with the doctor rather than knocking his block off.
“Why did you do this to me, Doctor?” I asked his immovable mask of a face. “Why’d you give me these?” I hunched my shoulders. The brass fittings rose and fell under my shirt.
Hoo lifted a finger to quiet me. He seemed on the verge of saying something when we was both surprised by loud and repeated banging from downstairs. Somebody was hammering on the door like they meant it. A glance passed between me and Hoo.
“I don’t think that’s a giant bleedin’ woodpecker, do you?”
“Unlikely,” he replied. “Stay.”
He glided from the laboratory and closed the door behind him. I tiptoed over to it and listened my hardest.
The banging stopped. I heard the door slide open and voices.
It was the police!
Fourteen
Kipper heard the pub before he saw it; its general din of loud conversation, raucous singing and demonic laughter greeted him as he skirted the corner of Watling Street - and the pub was at the other end! He made his way toward the comparatively inviting glow of its windows, like a moth desperate for hard liquor. The street was dark, devoid of lampposts and Kipper paid heed to what he might be treading in. At least there’s no fog, he reflected.
There was fog though, only it was inside the Star and Ferret. A dense pall of tobacco smoke hung in the air like a cloud that had popped in for a swift half and had ended up making a night of it. Kipper stood on the threshold, spotted the location of the bar and made his way through the melee. The tapster, he hoped, would know the whereabouts of the diminutive glass collector and might even disclose them for only a modest gratuity.
“Here!” a burly bloke in Kipper’s path spun around and glared at him. “You lookin’ at my pint?”
Kipper was flummoxed. “I - I - I,” he stammered, his voice seizing up when he was faced with the bloke’s broad and hairy fist.
“You better buy him another one,” advised a rat-faced ruffian at the burly bloke’s elbow. “And me and all.”
“I don’t want no trouble,” said Kipper. He reached inside his coat. Burly and Ratface sneered - but they were sneers of encouragement. Surely, fresh pints of ale could not be far away. Their faces swiftly changed when they were presented, not with a pound note but a police officer’s warrant card.
They scarpered. In an instant, unspoken word got around the pub and within seconds it was empty. Even the cloud did a runner. As the door clattered shut behind the last to leave, Kipper approached the bar, trying to ignore the squelches of his shoes on the sawdust.
The tapster was glaring at him with eyes like hot coals. He did not even glance at the warrant card. “We don’t serve your kind in here,” he growled.
“Good,” said Kipper. “I’m not here to buy one. I’m after Sprite.”
The barman gave a one-shouldered shrug. Kipper blinked twice.
“Looks like I’ll have to settle in for the evening. I can’t imagine how that’ll affect your takings.”
He cast around as though selecting the best place to sit.
The barman grunted. His fingers itched to fetch his trusty cricket bat from under the counter.
“It’s all right, Bert,” said a voice behind Kipper’s back. “I know him, I do.”
Kipper turned to see the urchin, a little cleaner than the last time - at least, the hands. From washing glasses, he supposed. The face too had recently been in contact with water, however fleetingly. Cheeks, nose and forehead had a pinkish hue but the child’s neck was still as black as soot.
“Hello, Inspector,” Sprite smirked. “’Ow may I be of hassistance?”
Kipper looked over his shoulder at Bert the barman, who threw up his hands in despair.
“Take it outside, if you please,” he groaned. “Perhaps some of me customers’ll come back in.”
“Through here,” said Sprite, leading Kipper to a side door.
Out in an alley, Sprite assured him they would not be disturbed. “The dollymops don’t tend to use this place,” Sprite took on the air of a tour guide, “on account of too many of their punters’ wives drinking in the same boozer.”
The urchin waited with a patient smile. Kipper gave up trying to divine the child’s gender and got down to business.
“That place... In Harley Street...”
“I never took nothing!” Sprite was quick to interrupt.
“I’m not saying you did. Whose place is it?”
“That’s right,” said Sprite.
“What?”
“It’s Hoo’s place, all right. Only he ain’t been there for donkeys’. You saw the state of it, Inspector. Like a desert with windows.”
“And you have no idea where he might be found?”
“Who?”
“That’s right.”
Sprite’s head shook slowly. “You don’t want to be messing with the likes of him, Inspector.”
“I don’t want to mess with him. I only want to arsk him a few questions.”
“Well,” Sprite’s hand rubbed the back of Sprite’s neck and came away filthy.
“If it’s a question of...” Kipper produced a sixpence. Sprite snatched it away, quick as a wink.
“It ain’t that...” the urchin shrugged. “It’s just that I don’t want you getting hurt.”
“I’m touched,” said Kipper, furnishing another coin.
“You’d have to be,” said Sprite, whisking the second tanner away.
“Putting your concern for my welfare aside for a moment, do you or don’t you know the whereabouts of this Doctor Hoo?”
“Oh, I knows all right. There ain’t much goes on in this town that don’t come to my attention sooner or later.”
A third coin exchanged hands.
“Well?”
“Well what?”
“Are you going to tell me?”
“No, mate,” Sprite grinned. “I can do better than that. I’m going to take you there myself.”
***
Kipper allowed himself to be led by the urchin with something approaching utmost trust. There was something about the urchin that inspired his faith: if Sprite said it then it was undoubtedly true. It went against Kipper’s instincts as a copper but he didn’t seem to mind that either - Oh, I ain’t stupid, he reminded himself. I’m well aware this little bastard could
be leading me up the garden path - and by garden path, I mean a dark alley where a bunch of confederates lie in wait to ambush me with the hiding of my life. Kipper thumbed the cosh in his overcoat pocket: If I’m going down, I’m cracking a few loaves open on my way.
Not that he truly believed that for a second that the dirty urchin was leading him to his doom. Head held high, Sprite strode through the streets of London as if he (or she) was the landlord (landlady). They encountered no one on their route to the docks at Limehouse, even though the clangour of activity on the river was growing louder with every step they took. Even at night, the waterside was busy, with cargoes being loaded or unloaded - Kipper was willing to bet most of it was far from legit but that was not the reason he was there. He trailed after Sprite across the waterfront to where hulking shapes loomed ahead, darker shadows against the night sky.
“This is the one,” Sprite came to a stop, punctuating the announcement with a wet sniff. “Hoo’s new gaff.”
Kipper looked the edifice up and down; it seemed exactly like all the others. “What makes you so sure?”
Sprite winked and clicked his teeth. Or her teeth - oh, this is maddening, thought Kipper! I must ask! Are you Abel or Mabel?
“Like I said, there ain’t nothing that don’t come to my attention sooner or later. Ain’t you going to knock?”
“What?”
“Only I find it the most expeditious way of letting ’em know you’re here.”
“I know what knocking is, thank you. Here.” He handed the child a shilling. Sprite pocketed it but did not move.
“Ain’t you got nowhere to go?” Kipper scowled. “Only I’m running out of cash.”
“Oh, no, mate,” Sprite grinned. “I ain’t going nowhere. I’m going to help out, ain’t I?”
“Oh, no, mate,” Kipper bristled. “I can’t allow that. This is police business. You might get hurt.”
“So might you,” the urchin observed.
“That’s what they pays me for.”
“No, it ain’t. They pays you to catch the criminals. Listen to me a minute, Inspector. While you knock on the door and do things up front and proper, like, I’ll have a squint around the back.”
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