Automatic Woman Part 9

"Go on."

"Step three, you can come back to work for me. Like I mentioned earlier, I've clearly underestimated your skills as an investigator and enforcer. There are members of this firm who are entrusted with certain, let's call them tasks."

"Like wearing silly masks and shooting at blokes in a penny theater."

"Sure."

"Can we subst.i.tute that provision for cash. I'd prefer not to come back to work here."

"No deal. You know things about this operation that can't be talked about. You're either with us or you're dead."

"You drive a hard bargain."

"You have my terms."

"And for this I have to kill Charles Darwin?"

Lord Barnes' face took on a look of genuine irritation.

"Are you mad? Kill Charles Darwin? The man is a national treasure! While I live, nothing is to happen to the Great Naturalist!"

"But he's..."

"I'm honored to have a combatant on the level of Darwin. Once he's gone I may as well off myself from boredom."

"If I'm not set against Darwin, then what do you want with me?"

"Your quarry is Jacques Nouveau. Locate him, observe him; if he figures out Saxon's secret and records it, shoot him and bring me the records. If he doesn't, subdue and bring him to me anyway. Nouveau is the price of your freedom."

"And Mary?"

"Mary, Orel, Emily. Nouveau brings this whole thing to an end for you and yours."

I pressed my luck.

"What about expenses? Cash on hand. I could use the help."

Lord Barnes stood up and poured himself a drink, half vodka, half purple stuff. He did not offer any to me.

"You have between sixty and eighty pounds in your pocket as we speak. You'll manage."

It did not surprise me that he knew this. Lord Barnes, the master of information.

"Do I get my guns back?"

"Sure."

"Any leads?"

"I would say Darwin knows where he is, but you already know that. Be on your way, don't disappoint me. I get emotional far too easily."

Lord Barnes finished his drink and poured another. Still no offer to me.

"Another thing," he said. "I have other searchers out there. Some you know, some you don't. If anyone brings me Nouveau before you, our deal is forfeit."

"And my friends."

"They'll be forfeit too." He held up his gla.s.s. "Cheers."

Eight.

Jolly receives a lesson on the spiritual nature of man My former colleagues escorted me to the front entrance. Silver put his good hand on my shoulder.

"Know this, Jolly. No matter what Barnes says, I will be the end of you. Your death will come by hand, tomorrow, the day after, a week from now. I will take you unawares, from behind."

"If you come at my behind, at least have the decency to buy me a proper meal."

I retrieved my guns from Bells. He handed me the rounds separately. Silver stared daggers at me. I continued my little speech.

"Front, back, side, whatever. The next time you come for me bring more of your friends. I'll be sure to find something larger than a hotplate to bring down on your thick skull. Off you go then."

I waved them off. Silver looked like he had more to say but his friends pulled him back. The thief catchers returned to their beautiful building. I took a leisurely walk, formed my thoughts, had a brisket plate and a pint of dark ale at the St. George and Dragon.

Mary was safe, or at least relatively safe. Lord Barnes was a monster, but he'd at least abide by the rules of civilized warfare regarding prisoners. She'd be fed and unharmed. Same with Orel and Emily. I found myself back at my apartment. If Barnes was off my back, if I was back to playing his lackey, I supposed my flat would be safe. Relatively safe as there was always the Silver issue, but hey, life's a gamble. My place was still a broken mess. I made a cup of tea and watched the gaslights of late evening London. Had myself a quiet moment. Went back to sleep on my terrible pile of feathers.

I woke up late the next morning. Feathers stuck to my hair and burn wounds. I carefully removed each one so as to not cause the embarra.s.sment I endured the last time I'd slept in feathers.

Outside, the day seemed quiet, still. It took a moment for me to realize that today was Sunday, the Sabbath. No good Anglicans working on this day. This was a day for baths and nice clothing and seeing how comforting the Lord can be on a sunny morning. My skin was tight and irritable. My new advice to friends, if I had friends, would be to avoid immolating yourself. It's a right pain in the a.r.s.e.

I looked up Dr. Doyle in a Central Bureau Directory and hired a hansom to his office. Thankfully, he was not a Sabbath observer.

"Good morning, Doctor."

"Mr. Fellows, good to see you walking about." His face told me this was a lie. In fact, he looked quite put off by my presence.

"How's Mary?" he asked.

"She's fine."

"Is she?" The anger crept into his voice. His right hand was in his doctor's bag clutching G.o.d knows what. "I stopped by her place this morning. Didn't look all right," he said.

Of course. "Look, Doctor. She's in light danger. No more than I can handle. In fact, my capacity to handle matters is the reason for my visit. Got any of that salve for my skin?" Doyle took his hand out of his goody bag and opened a wall-sized blackwood medicine cabinet. He produced three jars and stacked them on a table.

"Any more of that seven percent solution, Doc?"

"You took both doses at once, didn't you?"

"Guilty."

"You're lucky you didn't die of a heart attack."

"I'm lucky I didn't die of a lot of things. What does ten quid get me?"

"That salve and five shots."

"That's not a bargain."

"Find another physician, then."

I paid the man. As I was leafing through my diminishing bank roll, I noticed the cog etchings folded into the bills. I held one of the etchings up.

"This look like anything to you, Doc?"

"Looks like foreign script. What is it?"

"I don't know. You know anyone who can read it?"

"Nope, try Oxford, there's bound to be someone."

"I might not be welcome at Oxford."

"That's not surprising."

Dr. Doyle pocketed my money and put my items in a paper bag.

"You take care to find Mary. She's... special to me."

"I get that, Doc. Don't you worry."

I left Doyle's office and went back into the quiet sunny Sunday. The question of what to do and where to go overwhelmed me. I reflected back on another of my father's sayings.

"When the big picture gets too big, boy, when you feel like you have too many tasks at hand, focus on the minutiae of the moment. The one little task that needs to get done right now. Finish, go to the next, then the next, then the next. The big picture is an illusion, like the ocean. You don't ever have to consider the ocean, just the s.h.i.te you're swimming in right now."

My whole ocean was Darwin and Barnes and their quest for Saxon's truth. Living in that ocean were the seas of Mary, Nouveau, the Swan Princess, Orel, Emily, Silver, Oxford, Bow Street, on and on. The minutiae was in my pocket. Etchings of cogs, an unknown factor, but one made by Saxon's own hand. The variable of the moment was the s.h.i.te I was swimming in.

Oxford was out. If Darwin pulled the kind of influence to contend with Barnes, then he would have agents on the grounds, maybe even in Whitechapel. Without the aid of Oxford intellectuals, I would need to turn to local resources, specialists in the strange and macabre. The h.e.l.lfax Club came to mind.

The h.e.l.lfax was a secret organization that was really not a secret to anyone. They were self-proclaimed mystic researchers and pract.i.tioners financed by bored and naive society women. There is some unwritten code or law that all women of means must be into Hinduism or Mysticism or psychics by the time they reach fifty years of age. The male equivalent to this is ornate guns. All aging women find psychics, all aging men find gun cabinets and expensive brandy. There's your truth.

So back to the h.e.l.lfax, social club of the strange, safe haven of tea readers and phrenologists, and astrologers and all the pursuers of said arts who didn't care to subject themselves to the slick and nimble hands of gypsies. Respectable mumbo-jumbo. Also, the h.e.l.lfax was open on Sundays, of course.

I walked to the club. The London air was a little less p.i.s.sy, a little less sulphuric, on this fine Sunday. Yesterday's train ride to Oxford had stoked my whimsy for country strolls and fresh air. If I survived this, I promised myself, a holiday would definitely be in order.

The h.e.l.lfax Club occupied a two-story Tudor townhouse. The front double doors were affixed chaotically with stars, moons, and pyramids. The moons were crescent, the stars were five -pointed, and each pyramid was centered with a single eye. Very controversial.

The interior was purposefully gloomy. Velvet drapes hung in every archway, over every window, over every raw brick wall; the interior of the house was reminiscent of a soft furry cave. Two sorts of people wandered the h.e.l.lfax. Middle-aged women in bright coats and feathered hats, marred by the plumage of society, enjoyed tea and gossip and the prospect of communing with the dead. The other sort were actual members. In contrast to the guests, they wore black silk to match the walls and drapes. What jewelry they wore was predominately silver or ruby. A butler approached me.

"Can I be of service?" His words were drawn-in like all high society help. His tuxedo matched the decor.

"Got anyone versed in runes or script?"

"Why yes, sir. Please, come with me."

I followed Jeeves down one of the halls, past the scornful look of society ladies and their ridiculous feathered hats. Past the curtains and veils and kilometers of velvet, Jeeves and I entered a stately room, something a bit more normal to social clubs. Men sat in circles around wood tables with cards laid out. Some drank brandy, some smoked cigars, some did both. Jeeves directed me to a ma.s.sive greasy foreigner. He was a younger man whose face was absolutely dominated by a black beard, the kind that could house birds, ferrets, maybe a revolver. The foreigner did not get up.

"Mr. Grigori Rasputin of the Russian Empire. Visiting scholar of Cyrillic mysticism," Jeeves announced. I presented my hand; the Russian looked at it like spoiled pork. He said something to a nearby a.s.sociate in his b.a.s.t.a.r.d dog language.

"Mr. Rasputin would like to know what you want," The man said in a thick Russian accent.

I unfurled the cog papers. "I need to know what these mean. Can he translate?"

The man spoke to Rasputin in their mother tongue. Rasputin answered again through his translator.

"He says he can tell you the meaning of these symbols if you have enough money for a fresh bottle of Hine Cognac."

The men at Rasputin's table all got a chuckle out of this. I slapped down five pounds of hard currency, the kind that shuts mouths and ends questions.

"Alright, Mr. British. Have a seat." The translator said something and one of the seated men rose and left the circle. I took his place. Rasputin slurred something which got his compatriots laughing again.

"Before he begins he wants to know how it is you are so fat. He says men in his home country are not as fat as any of the English he's encountered. Why is that?"

"Regular meals. Also, we don't s.h.a.g our sisters, so our breeding stock is better."

The translator put this in their language and the table roared with laughter, including his beardship. He barked more words.

"Well, you don't know what you're missing," the translator said with tears running down his eyes. I smiled at the Russian; at least he was clever.

"Time is money, Ivan. What do I have?"

Rasputin took a hold of my etchings and gave them a good stare. He yipped an order and one of his contemporaries produced a monocle. Rasputin fixed the lens to his eye and gave the papers another look. He laid into a monologue that sounded like a bulldog's love song. I waited for the translation.

"He says that these symbols are Mongol. That they tell the story of a horseman who loved a girl. The girl was high born and the horseman was a bandit. He asked her father for her hand, but he, a wealthy merchant, refused unless the horseman could double the merchant's wealth."

Rasputin went on. So did his translator.

"The merchant's offer stood as a challenge. The horseman accepted. He went into the desert and prayed to the G.o.ds for an answer. In response, the G.o.ds caused a ma.s.sive tree to sprout from the desert, a lone tree in a place of sand and snakes. The horseman dug the tree out of the sand with his hands and carved from its trunk a bow and a club. He used the blessed weapons to rob the first merchant caravan to cross his path.

The lead guard attacked the horseman, but was felled by his mighty club. The second guard approached. Then the third. All were defeated by the horseman's magic wood. Finally, the owner of the caravan exited his coach to beg the horseman for his life. By the G.o.ds, by the stars, by coincidence, the merchant of the caravan was the same man who had refused the horseman his daughter.

The merchant was amazed, relieved even. 'Take my daughter.' the merchant said. 'A man with your fighting prowess is welcome in my family.' The horseman laughed at this. 'I don't need your daughter, I have your money and your caravan and all your horses!'"

The Russians roared in laughter. I expected more to the story, but Rasputin kept laughing, his entourage kept laughing, everyone was laughing but me. I turned to the translator.