Kim Newman - Professor Moriarty The Hound of the D'Urbervilles

Stoke snorted. He didn’t know what it means when small game flees. A bigger predator is about.

I was in tiger country.

VIII

Seen through a veil of drizzle, Trantridge Hall was what you’d expect — big front to impress the peasants, but boarded upper windows and fallen tiles suggested lack of care with the upkeep.

The drill for greeting the Master in the lesser great houses of the shire counties is standard. Even if the landowner has only popped into town to have a tooth pulled or purchase the latest number of La Vie Parisienne, he expects to come home and find the servants have left off whatever they were doing — or pretending to do — and lined up smartly on the front lawn, showing teeth in beaming smiles.

If it’s wet, that’s just hard cheese. Valets, maids and the like are too afraid of dismissal without references to come down with sniffles like high-born folk.

The showing outside the Hall was like inspection the morning after a skirmish. Gaps in the ranks betokened casualties or — most likely — desertions. Such smiles as were on display didn’t pass muster. Here, dismissal in disgrace was early parole.

The carriage halted. An undersized menial advanced to open the door and lower the step, then offer Stoke the temporary shelter of an umbrella. Thring had a red splotch birthmark as if a ball of mud flung at his eye had spattered half his face. He was a jumped-up footman, filling the too-big tail-coat of the butler who’d taken flight.

‘Welcome home, sir,’ Thring said — as if he hated his Master enough to think he deserved a place like this.

Stoke grunted and stepped down, boots sinking into the miry, rutted drive. He paid no heed to the line of soggy servants, as if about to make an undignified dash for the front door. In the lea of the gothic door arch was a woman wrapped in oilskins. She took the prize for most convincing sham smile in the vicinity, and even fluttered flirty fingers.

From Dan’l’s sigh, I gathered this was his favourite — Braham and Saul’s sister Mod. I’d marked her down as ‘of interest’ because she was reputedly the finest piece on the estate. One would be hard-put to determine the yay or nay of that from her weatherproof bonnet and fishing gear, though she showed a pleasant, pink face.

Thring made no move for the house and Stoke deigned to look at the line. Some maids curtseyed, but most made no effort to pretend they weren’t cold and miserable. A snap produced more snarling smiles.

Leaning against a wall was a pink-eyed, skull-faced apparition wrapped in a Yankee cowman’s duster coat. He had cracked a whip to signal the respect due the Master. Dead-white hair straggled from under his broad-brimmed hat. Even a rank amateur deducer would peg him as Nakszynski the Albino, Stoke’s surviving gunhand.

‘Back to work, the lot of you,’ shouted Stoke — in the circumstances, almost a kindly gesture. He didn’t have to say it twice; the servants hurried out of the rain.

Under Thring’s umbrella, Stoke trudged towards the door and the charms of Miss Derby.

I unbent myself out of the trap and looked about.

‘Best get inside, Colonel,’ Braham said. ‘Get a hot toddy in you.’

Mod Derby opened her arms and spread oilskin bat wings as if to envelop Jasper Stoke.

Then another woman appeared, from behind a bush, and levelled a rifle at Stoke. He threw himself into the mud, squealing. The grim-faced harpy, dress front torn open and hair caked with dirt and twigs, stood over the Master of Trantridge and took surprisingly steady aim.

The Firm was on the point of losing a client before the job was half started.

The woman’s weapon was a Brown Bess. The musket might have been a relic of Waterloo, kept for seventy years in a corner with the brooms. I doubted the would-be assassin had kept her powder dry.

Stoke fairly blubbed for his life. He crab-walked backwards three or four yards, making a muddy arse-and-boot-heel trail in the grass. No wonder he’d quit Tombstone. If an apparition with an antediluvian firearm reduced him to wailing terror, I could imagine the effect of a sharp-eyed Earp with a working Winchester.

‘Mattie Ball, come away,’ said Braham. ‘Kill him and you’ll swing for sure.’

The woman didn’t take heed. With her thumb, she pulled back the cock.

I strode into the scene and interposed my chest, shoving up against the musket’s cold barrelmouth.

‘If you want to shoot someone,’ I said. ‘How about me? Got the sand for that, eh? I’m Colonel Sebastian Moran, of the First Bangalore Pioneers. I’ve cheated death in all corners of the world and don’t fancy a Wessex grave. Not at all, my good woman. If you were in shooting mood, you’d already have discharged this antique.’

I recollected Stoke had turned a family named Ball off the estate. Mattie must be a survivor of the clan, demented by sufferings too sordid to dwell on.

She could fire her musket but once — if, indeed, it would fire. She’d not get a chance to reload, pack and take aim again. The avenging farmgirl wouldn’t want to waste her shot on anyone but the author of her misfortunes.

Mattie Ball was demented, but I faced her down. I’ve done as much to men and beasts — and similarly bloodthirsty females — before. A moment of clarity, of understanding, decides the way the cards will fall. Such encounters are over with between the ticks of a clock… but the seconds stretch to hours while you’re in it.

Thus far, the turn has always been in my favour.

Hesitation sparked in the woman. I made a grab for her gun, got a grip and forced the barrel upright. I slipped my gloved thumb into the lock, which bit as Mattie Ball jerked the trigger. The lock scarcely penetrated leather.

I wrenched the musket from her hands. The Albino, who should have kept better lookout, was suddenly there, holding Mattie from behind, spade-bladed Bowie to her neck. Not the proper tool for opening a throat, but it’d do.

Braham wanted to protest, but Nakszynski showed yellow teeth in pink gums which matched his eyes. He began a shallow, preliminary cut.

‘Enough of that, Chalky,’ I said. ‘Miss Ball is just leaving.’

I wasn’t having some bunny-eyed Johnny-come-lately Yankee Polack mule-skinner spoiling the moment. I’d shared something with Mattie Ball, more intimate than the usual mess between man and woman. I wasn’t minded to let it go yet. The knife-touch pricked the woman’s soul. Her eyes and teeth were set in defiance.

Nakszynski gave me a ‘Who are you?’ look, but didn’t press on with his murdering.

Stoke, muddied all over, was helped up by Thring and Dan’l. Mod indicated she’d like to fuss over him, but held back because of the dirt.

‘Hello Mattie,’ Saul said. ‘I was sorry to hear about your poor mama… and your brothers… and Granver Ball… and…’

I assumed Stoke would have need of Nakszynski’s whip. Instead, he broke free of his aides and sloshed at Mattie. Squirting angry tears, he stuck a craven fist into her belly. She doubled, twisting out of the Albino’s grip, and fell, retching. Stoke kicked her in the side, and rolled her over. He spat on her and kept kicking. Animal whining and growling came out of him. His kicks echoed inside her chest as if it were a tight drum.

I started to feel the pinch of the gun-cock.

I gently eased it back and removed my throbbing thumb. I was right about the musket’s age, but it had either been cared for well over the years or recently restored.

Mattie curled, hugging her face, knees over her stomach. Stoke kept booting her spine. Thring stood by, umbrella raised over his Master’s head. A little more rain could hardly put the self-declared tyrant and villain in a sorrier state.