Beneath London (29 page)

TWENTY-ONE

W
hen Alice descended the stairs next morning, Tubby and Hasbro were sitting at a table drinking coffee out of a porcelain pot. Miss Bracken was nowhere to be seen, likely still in bed. Neither Mr. Hillman nor Mr. Smythe was about, either. There was a man near the fire stowing away a plate of food as quickly as possible while looking into the morning paper.

“I’ll beg a cup of that coffee from you gentlemen if you can spare it,” Alice said, sitting down with her two friends.

“Billson purchased the beans from a man just in from Sumatra,” Tubby told her, pouring her a cup. “He parched the beans this morning and brewed this pot when he saw us on the stairs. You’ve never had better, I’ll warrant, although it’s growing cool. I must say that you seem in a jolly mood this morning. What’s afoot?”

“I’ll tell you what’s afoot in a moment,” Alice said, seeing now that Tubby’s eyebrow had been split open and that there was a bit of plaster on it. Protruding from his shirt cuff was a quarter inch of bloody bandage, apparently wrapped around his wrist. “Any news, Hasbro?”

“I’m sorry to say there is not. The Board of Works is already far along with the work of filling the sink-hole. The fact that two men are still lost below makes no matter to them, nor did my protests. I sought out Mr. Bayhew as you requested, and he filed papers asking that they desist until rescue efforts had been carried out, but the Board refused. In Bayhew’s opinion it’s useless. The Board has an immediate responsibility to the public, we’re told, and not to individuals foolhardy enough to descend into the abyss.”

“Mr. Bayhew is a fine solicitor, and he performed prodigious legal wonders when we were charged with the collapse of the Cathedral,” Alice said, “but if determined work on the sink-hole is already underway it would be a miracle if he prevailed over the Board of Works. It was worth an attempt, but I didn’t hold out much hope.”

A plate of bacon and a dozen fried eggs appeared now along with a fresh pot of coffee and slices of toast. Alice discovered that she was nearly starved. Yesterday she had had no appetite. Today it had returned in force. The man sitting near the fire put down his newspaper, paid Billson, and went out into the blustery morning, the door shutting behind him.

“Shall I tell you what it is now?” Alice asked.

“This instant. We insist,” Tubby said, slathering jam on a slice of toast and engulfing half of it in his mouth.

“Langdon is alive,” Alice said in a low voice. “He surfaced on Hampstead Heath last night, and wandered into the midst of a gipsy encampment where he was recognized by friends of ours – the Loftus family, who helped us with the hop harvest just a short while ago. You remember them, Hasbro. They put Langdon back together and ensconced him at the Spaniards.”

Tubby gazed at her with a look of surprise on his face. “He
surfaced
, do you say? That’s brilliant news. What of Uncle?”

“Langdon had no knowledge of Gilbert. They were separated in the blast, which was behind them, and the force of it pitched Langdon forward into the darkness. The same was likely true for Gilbert, or so I very much hope. Langdon was injured somewhat in the fall, but he was not buried by the cave-in. He told Mr. Loftus that the world below is quite vast, especially the deep reaches. Langdon failed to find Gilbert, but he
did
find his way out, and so it stands to reason that there’s hope for Gilbert as well.”

“By God it
does
stand to reason,” Tubby said. “I’d stake a good sum on the old man’s being alive. There’s no one half so game as Gilbert Frobisher. We’d best shift our gaze from the Embankment and fix it on Hampstead Heath, Hasbro. But how do you know all of this?” he asked Alice.

“Theodosia Loftus, the oldest of the Loftus children, came to my room last night.”

“It was
she
who knocked upon your door!” Tubby said. “That bilge rat Hillman – not his name, by the way – was lurking in the hallway listening at the keyhole.”

“I heard you accost him, Tubby,” Alice said. “You went out together directly, I believe.”

“Yes indeed. It dawned on me that Uncle’s jewelry case had not fallen out of his bag at all, but had been removed and ineptly hidden by those two frauds when they’d gone up to the room earlier. I had a word with the alleged Mr. Hillman in the alley and discovered that the two men are mere spies, intent upon looking into our business. He admitted to the attempted theft of the jewels, by the way, and more, before I was done with him. I’m waiting for Mr. Smythe to come down to breakfast. I believe that the two of you will find our conversation amusing, although not half so wonderful as what you’ve been telling us.”

“We’re to keep it a secret,” Alice said, “even from Miss Bracken, although it would give her a bit of hope, perhaps. Our enemies currently believe Langdon to be dead, and for the moment it must stay that way.”

“They’ll have their eye on us in any event,” Hasbro said. “We haven’t gone away, after all, which we would soon do if we in fact believed him dead and buried.”

“Who
is
Mr. Hillman?” Alice asked Tubby. “Or rather
what
is he? I’ve been told his name is Penny. He’s not from Manchester. I know that. The Billsons recognized him as a local man.”

But before Tubby could answer, Mr. Smythe appeared on the stairs, looking out of sorts, it seemed to Alice.

“My dear Mr. Smythe!” Tubby said cheerfully, and then sopped up egg yolk with his toast and bit off a great piece, chewing like a satisfied badger.

“What is it?” Mr. Smythe asked. “I’m in something of a hurry.”

Tubby swallowed the mouthful and said, “I daresay you are. The delightful Mr. Klingheimer awaits you, I don’t doubt. Will you give him my
very
best wishes? Tell him that Tubby Frobisher will pay him a small visit on a particularly dark night in the near future.”

Smythe stared at him, apparently struck dumb. He made an effort to compose himself, and said, “I do not take your meaning, sir.”

“I believe you do,” Tubby told him. “I sent a note by messenger to your Mr. Klingheimer just this morning, telling him that he had been betrayed by a Mr. Smythe and a man calling himself Hillman, although actually named Penny. Mr. Penny had no great desire to open his mind quite so completely to me about the good Mr. Klingheimer’s whereabouts, but he was persuaded to do so when his ears began to fall roundabout him like autumn leaves – two of his ears, that is to say. He hadn’t any others. Human beings make tolerably bare trees in that regard. He made the mistake of waving a dirk in my face after I gave him a taste of a heavy cudgel. He oughtn’t to have done that, do you see? I relieved him of his weapon, ascertained that it was very sharp indeed by trying the edge on his ear joints, and admonished him to comport himself like a gentleman from this point hence.”

“You’re
dead
,” Mr. Smythe said flatly. Then he turned around and went out through the door without another word, the wind blowing a flurry of leaves through it before it banged shut.

“You’ve disturbed the man deeply,” Hasbro said.

“I intended to. I had an interesting conversation with Hillman-Penny.”

“Please tell me that you did not actually cut his ears off, Tubby,” Alice said.

“Not entirely, no, although it was necessary that I convince him that I would do so with great enthusiasm with very little persuasion. He mumbled through our conversation, unfortunately, due to his teeth being stove in, but in order to save what was left of his ears he confirmed that the Embankment collapse yesterday morning was indeed no accident. The mysterious Mr. Klingheimer ordered it done. It was quite intentional, a successful effort to close the passage to the nether world. I knew that some powerful force was behind all this, do you see? It stood to reason. And so I went to work like a terrier and worried the rat Penny until he gave up the name.”

“But was the thing directed particularly against St. Ives and Mr. Frobisher,” Hasbro asked, “or were they unwitting victims?”

“That I cannot tell you. Unfortunately our man bolted before I was through quizzing him, and I wasn’t up to a chase.”

“Did he reveal anything of substance?” Hasbro asked.

Tubby picked up the coffee pot now and filled their cups. “He revealed the location of Klingheimer’s residence, very near the Temple. A wealthy man, it seems.”

“Well,” Alice said, “I don’t intend to pay this Klingheimer a visit. And I hope that Smythe won’t stir the hornet’s nest up afresh when he reports to him. I would rather Mr. Klingheimer assumed that he was successful in his efforts and moved on to other crimes.”

“Hasbro is quite correct in stating that the man still has his eye upon us,” Tubby said. “If he were moving on to other crimes he would not have sent Smythe and Penny to spy on us. We’ve stepped into a nest of vipers whether we like it or not, and we cannot stand idle. We know the villain’s name now and he knows ours. We can carry the battle into his camp any time we choose.”

The street door opened, and the three of them looked in that direction. It was Henrietta Billson, blowing into the room on a gust of wind and bearing a great basket of eggs and another of greens. She shut the door behind her with her foot, wished everyone a good morning, and went toward the kitchen, promising to have Billson prepare a fresh pot of coffee. Before another word was spoken, the door swung open yet again, and to Alice’s vast surprise, Mother Laswell, bundled in a vast shawl, came in through the doorway with Bill Kraken right behind her, his hair sculpted into a precipice by the wind and his face hard set. Abruptly it came to Alice that Clara wasn’t part of their company, that they had not gone north as planned, and that beneath his cap Kraken had a bandage wrapped around his head, a bloody patch showing through.

“Thank God we’ve found you,” Mother Laswell said to them, breathing hard and hauling off her coat. “We’re here to search out Clara Wright and fetch her home.”

* * *

T
hey shifted to the great table, where there was room for the eggs and toast and rashers and beans and pudding and pots of coffee and tea that appeared from the kitchen. Tubby settled into a second breakfast, and Alice poured herself another cup of coffee, listening to Mother Laswell tell the story of the treachery at Hereafter Farm and the surprising news that Finn Conrad had followed Clara and the man Shadwell into London – that he must have arrived yesterday.

“He knew that we were staying here at the Half Toad,” Alice said. “We’ve brought along his portmanteau, for he meant to arrive this very day. Why hasn’t he come to us?”

Mother Laswell shook her head grimly. She opened a small purse and removed a wrinkled piece of paper, which she lay atop the table for everyone to see. “Finn is looking out for this address,” she said. “He might have found it – discovered something there that kept him.”

Alice stared unhappily at the drawing of Ignacio Narbondo, but it was Tubby who said, “Lazarus Walk, by God!”

“Do you know the street?” Alice asked.

“Yes, although… This is curious, indeed. Mr. Klingheimer resides there, as I was saying just a moment ago. The odious Penny revealed it to me, and I wondered whether he lied. It must certainly be true, however, for here’s the same street, and associated with villainy into the bargain.”

“Shadwell, the false policeman, carried this bit of paper – several copies,” Mother Laswell said to Alice. “Finn took one along with him. What is this house, then?”

Alice related the story of the collapse of the Embankment, possibly engineered by the shadowy Mr. Klingheimer, and of the suspicious death of James Harrow, and of the land beneath London, and of St. Ives’s surfacing from that land on Hampstead Heath. She paused in her tale, thought for a moment, and said to Hasbro and Tubby, “The explosion
must
have been directed against Langdon and Gilbert then. It wasn’t merely to close the passage to the underworld.”

“You’re in the right of it,” Hasbro said. “Otherwise the coincidence beggars belief. It seems to me that Mr. Klingheimer must have engineered a far-reaching conspiracy, with his false policemen and infernal devices. But why this interest in Doctor Narbondo, who is assuredly dead?”