The Dickens Mirror (29 page)

“Yes?” The word was as void of expression as her face.

“Doyle. Kramer did something to him.”

“An injection. Yes.” After a pause: “He’s an addict. Kramer provided.”

Ah, well, that did explain Doyle’s raucous guts. A few times there, he’d have liked to die from the stink. For Kramer to go behind Battle’s back, circumvent the police, he must want something very badly. “Why? Kramer’s not exactly the charitable type.”

“No. But Doyle can lay hands on something Doctor cannot.”

“And what’s that?”

Her eyes were steady. “Bodies.”

Madding Crowd

“MOVE ASIDE
 … police … make room.” Working his stout billy club in a steady tick-tock, Doyle forged a trail through the general crush of foot traffic and handcarts. The air was a stew of curdled smoke, thick snow, and the unintelligible burr of voices. Slicked by icy patches and fresh snow, the cobblestone road was treacherous. With the quake, whole portions had buckled and caved whilst others had been thrust up a good six, seven inches. The way was a positive horror. “Move along … police. Make way.”
Tick-tock, tick-tock, right-left, right-left
. “Have a care … police …” The crowd, only so many anonymous blobs, jostled and shouldered past. Why, you could run this same madding crowd past him night after night and he’d never know the difference.

Yes, but if not for Battle, would I know the way? What street is this anyway? Are we still on Lambeth?
He didn’t think so. They’d taken turns, rounded corners, passed doorways and snickets and ginnels. Somewhere past the crowd, he’d the impression of hulking tenements, narrow alleys, crumbling fronts curtained behind snow and a thick gray veil through which no light of any sort
oozed. These warrens, these passageways and secret back courtyards, were their own worlds. Who knew what creatures lived there? There was talk around the station: certain constables gone missing, never to be seen again. Anything could live in that soup,
anything
, and here he was, breathing it in. They all were. The Peculiar hadn’t smothered them, yet he felt its tendrils kneading his brain, poking and prodding the way you stuck your finger in a Christmas pudding to search for a silver coin.

Or perhaps it’s Kramer and his injection
. Black Dog gave his arm a tiny nip.
Think about it, how quickly your mood’s soured, how irritable you are. Touch a match, you’ll explode. Don’t you feel it? Kramer’s out to poison you
.

He couldn’t deny how he felt: nerves jangled, entire body on alert. His skin fairly fizzed, like vinegar and bicarbonate. All of a sudden, he wanted to tear his clothes from his hot, flushed skin and race bare-arsed into the night. Let the fog and whatever waited inside take him and be done with it.

Stop, Doyle, stop
. He ground his teeth until his jaw complained.
What you thinking, you lunatic?
He had to remain steady. Kramer wanted something only Doyle could procure. Cove wouldn’t cross him, not yet.

I didn’t say the drug doesn’t work. I’m suggesting that you’ve fallen for the oldest con in the books, poppet
. Black Dog actually seemed sympathetic.
Shoot you up enough to take the edge off but leave you chasing your tail until you make good
.

No, that was ridiculous. All he had to do was tell Battle. But wait … no, he couldn’t do that either, could he? Then what was he going to—

“… mind, Doyle?” Battle, alongside, tap-tapping his shoulder.
“Are you there? Is something the matter, Constable?”

“What?” He looked over, then realized that he’d gone on several paces. Turning, he found Battle, with his bull’s-eye lantern held aloft, giving him a curious stare. “Uh, no, sir.”
Stop it. Focus. Do your job
. He darted anxious glances right and left, his neck swiveling,
tick-tock-tick-tock
, trying to look at everything at once. “No. Just … thinking,” he said, finally. It seemed as good an answer as any. It was also true.

“Yes.” Battle managed to make it sound as if Doyle had decided to drop his drawers and relieve himself on the bare cobbles. “You’ve been preoccupied since we left the asylum. What’s on your mind, Constable?”

Too many people; hard to breathe
. His face dewed with fresh sweat. The snow stinging his face actually felt good.
Getting sick
. He was distracted, feeling the pressure, this whisk of people brushing close, and the
noise
, this incessant burr of many voices and, beyond, the squall and creak of pushcarts. Another shiver grabbed his neck.
Get back, wrap myself in a blanket, sweat this out
. Suck his humbugs for the sugar; that would make him better, too. Then he remembered: he’d only the few left that he’d dropped in his coat pocket.
Idiot, giving them away to that girl; you’re a fool!
Well, he’d make do. Then what? Back to Kramer, beg for another shot? Then he thought,
Kramer. Right. Come on, Doyle. Keep your eye on the prize
.

“Well, sir, yes, there is something.” Having rehearsed this as he’d made his way off the ward and then down the long marble stairs to the asylum’s ground floor, he understood that what he said next had to flow naturally. “It’s that Miss Elizabeth. A shock, how she came out of it. And her parents … I didn’t know any of that.”

“Well, you wouldn’t. It’s not your investigation or business to know.” Battle favored him with that copper’s dead-eye. “And? Come now, speak up. It’s cold, and I’ve not had my supper.”

Oh, riiiight
. As if
he
had. But
nooo
, the great inspector had to be properly fed and watered at regular intervals like a damned nag. (
God
, he would gladly murder his own mam for a nice horse’s haunch.) “Right. Sorry.” What was wrong with him? “Ah … it’s nothing, sir. Not for me to say, that is. It just seems to me that—”

From the gloom, something suddenly shot to hook his injured right arm. “Fancy a bit of boiled leather, dearie?”

“What?” Jerking round, he looked down into the snaggle-toothed maw of an old hag, with a left hand made of tin and a huge divot carved from her skull just above the place where she ought to have a right ear. It looked as if a giant had taken a large, sloppy bite of bone and brain. “Christ! Get
off
me!”

“Now, now, no need to get upset.” Showing all three of her teeth to their best advantage, the hag said, “I asked if you wouldn’t fancy a nice mouthful ’a boiled leather.” The fingers of her good right hand tightened to claws on his arm. “Only a farthing.”

“God, no.” This close, he could see the pulse of her brains against a thin tent of grimy scalp. “Move on. Go back to your cart.” And sod Battle; they could talk once they were back at the station. Without waiting for the hag’s reply, he plunged forward, brandishing his billy. “
Police!
Move your bloody arse out of the way!” A startled cry jumped from the murk as his club met something soft. Man, woman; he didn’t care. Butting the person aside, he bawled, “
Get
your—”

“Doyle!” Battle grabbed the hinge of an elbow. “What are you doing, man?”

Touch me again and I’ll cave in your teeth
. Then what Battle had
said caught up with him. Blinking, he looked around and realized with a start of dismay that he hadn’t moved an inch. As far as he could tell, he was in the same spot as five seconds before.

Oh hell
. A fierce trembling swept him.
I wasn’t walking away? I
imagined
it?

“Doyle?” Battle seemed genuinely concerned. “Are you ill? One moment, we’re talking, the next you’re swinging your truncheon about. Nearly knocked my head in.”

“Oh.”
Christ, Doyle
. He armed his forehead with a sleeve. “Sorry. Not quite up to dick. Might be taking a bit of a fever.”

“Then let’s get you to the station.” Battle gave Doyle’s arm a small tug. “Come on. Some hot tea …”

“Dearie.” Something twitched his coat, and then he heard it—her—again, as the hag continued, “Either of you nice coppers in the mood for a good hot piece ’a boiled leather?”

HE MUST HAVE
stood, paralyzed, a good few seconds.
No
. The pressure in his chest was so immense, he should’ve blown apart.
No, I just saw you; you can’t be real
.

“Dearie?” Another twitch, and then he could smell the noxious fumes of her sewer’s breath. Her scalp throbbed. “You all right?”

No
. He was bathed in sweat. He wouldn’t be surprised to find steamy curls wafting up to mingle with the smoke and murk. The cut of snow and wind on his face felt muted, insubstantial.
I’m losing my mind
.

“We’re fine, thank you, mum.” Battle, that stiff, actually touched the brim of his bowler. “I don’t believe either of us
require a morsel of leather, boiled or otherwise.”

Either Battle didn’t remember, or this was happening for the first time.
But it felt so real
. “Right.” Slicking his lips, he extricated his arm from Battle’s grip. To the hag, he said, “Be off with you. Go on.”

“Doyle,” Battle began, as Black Dog whispered,
Poppet, no. Stop
.

“Oh, but wait, wait,” the hag said, “I’ve ever so nice a mess of—”

“Didn’t you just hear? Didn’t I just
say
?” Planting his billy in her chest, he gave her a shove. “Out of my
way
.”

“Doyle!” Battle snapped.

“AAAWWWK!”
Mouth snapping open in a surprised O, the hag wheeled, sticklike arms circling, before falling back. She was lost from sight in a second as the snow and crowd closed over her once more.

There, stay gone!
Turning, he roared,
“POLICE!
Make way, make way! Come on,
move!”
Brandishing his club:
right-left-tick-tock-tick-tock-right-left-right-left-right! “Movemovemove!”
Thinking,
Get back, fast as I can. Wrap myself in blankets
.

Poppet, stop, listen to yourself
.

He paid Black Dog no mind. Plowing forward, he hacked right and left with his club.
Sweat this out, it will pass. Have a few humbugs …
“Oh
shite
,” he said, the whimper worming between his teeth.
I just thought that
.

That’s right, poppet, that’s right. Take a look round. Go on. What you see?

Right
. He felt his mind grasping onto Black Dog’s voice, which reminded him of his mam’s, how she soothed when he took a high fever. Close his eyes, Doyle could almost taste milky,
sweet, weak tea. But now he did what Black Dog said and looked about.

Same spot
. Same cobbles. Same smoke and mist. The incessant snow, and of course, the crowd.
Haven’t budged an inch
.

“Doyle.” Holding his lantern high, Battle was studying Doyle with the avid intensity of a scientist gawking at an eight-headed hydra. “My God, man, you’re positively swimming in sweat. Are you feverish?” Using his teeth to pull off a glove, Battle pressed a hand to Doyle’s forehead. “Burning up, boy.”

“Sorry, sir. Just a little …”
A little what? Oh, it’s nothing, sir; just a touch of the old shakes, the jimjams, that bloody fucking withdrawal. Never you mind that I’m suddenly mad as hops because I’ve no idea where in hell we are, or what’s really going on. Only damme if I don’t keep reliving the same few moments over and over again
. “Might be taking ill,” he said, with remarkable calm. “A touch on edge. That’s all.”

“Yes, so I’ve gathered. You’ve been preoccupied since we left the asylum,” Battle said. “What’s on your mind, Constable?”

OH
.
SAME WORDS
,
same question.
You watch; the hag will appear next
. He
was
like a dog after its own tail, chasing round and round. If he hadn’t already been living the same day over and over again. Maybe this was the only real moment of his entire day.

Kill Battle
. Yeah, that might work. Certainly change things up now, wouldn’t it? He threw a wild eye over the gray steel bowl of Battle’s hat.
Split your face with a single blow, then melt into the night with these others
. That would be a way.
Or …
He looked away from Battle and into the snow. Out there was the Thames, and the patient veil of the Peculiar. Lose himself in that and no one would
ever see him again. Who knew? Once he passed inside, perhaps he’d dissolve completely, like bones in strong lime.

“Doyle?”

“Nothing, sir.” His lips strained with a lunatic’s grin. “Nothing on my mind, not a thing, not
any THING
.”
Shut up shut up shut up!

“Well, you look rather peaky again, Doyle.” Battle frowned. “Are you quite sure?”

Yes. No
. God, he had to stop this. Get off this particular flying horse on this particular carousel.
Round and round I go
. His tongue skimmed wet salt from a bottom lip. Black Dog was right.
It’s whatever’s in that cocktail Kramer’s dreamt up
. Get himself to his rooms—that was the ticket. Swaddle up in blankets, sweat this out a bit, pop a few humbugs, the sugar would help, and …

Some person—male, female, he didn’t know—brushed too close. Startled, he wheeled, arm coming up and a cry leaping from his tongue: “Don’t
touch
me, ya
gob
!” Swinging, he cursed. “Move aside, make way,
police
 …”

A tap on his shoulder made him whirl and draw back, elbow cocked, club half-raised to strike. “Doyle! Easy!” Wreathed in snow and mist, Battle put a palm out. “What are you doing, man? There’s no need for that.”

He was going to kill Battle; he would pulverize that face, split the man’s skull if they didn’t get moving, out of this snow, away from this damned crowd! “Just clearing the way, sir.” He could hear his voice climbing the registers of hysteria. “On our way … yes, on our way, on our way to the station, that’s right!”
If you’d only mind your own sodding business and move your bloody ass afore that hag …