K Jeter - Infernal Devices

Before I could fetch it out, the parson's voice sounded in a deep rumble. "Saint Monkfish, is it? A moment… now I think I remember you-"

I looked up and saw the penetrating stare from under his lowered brows. In the same moment, we recognised each other.

"Insolent whelp!" His cane landed across his desk with a mighty crack, scattering the papers like frightened birds. "Blaspheming wretch!"

I pushed myself backwards in the chair, away from the trembling point of the cane. The clergyman's sudden wrath made the identification complete in my mind. He had been one of the dignitaries invited to the inaugural service of my father's Clerical Automata at the church of Saint Mary Alderhythe. Indeed, my panic-unleashed memory informed me that his incapacity was a direct result of injuries suffered on that lamentable occasion.

"And now-" His eyes darted fire, his jaws working convulsively, "And now – not content with your unholy machinery's defilement – you come round here with crude japeries at the Church! Apostate!" The cane slashed through the air, whistling past my face. "Mocking – mocking, I say – the sacred traditions of all held holy by right-thinking men. Saint Monkfish, indeed. Very clever, that! You… you Manichean!"

The cane swung again towards me. Rising up to full height, the old clergyman seemed on the verge of lunging across the desk and driving the point through my chest, skewering me to the worn leather at my back. I scrambled to my feet, edging away with the velvet bag clutched to my chest.

"I – I meant no offence," I stammered. "Truly-"

He hobbled around the desk, waving the cane. "Monkfish!" he shouted, his lips flecked with spittle. "I'll give you monkfish, wretch!"

A stinging blow landed across my shoulders as I tugged at the latch of the door. It came open, spilling me out into the church aisle. A few rheumy-eyed faces looked up from their prayers or slumber as the sound of blackthorn against woollen serge echoed from the stone walls. The old parson was still shouting anathemas after me as I fled between the pews.

In the street, some distance from the church, I slowed my paces. The intervening throng screened me from any further pursuit by the gimp-legged clergyman. Safe once more, I assessed my injuries, working my smarting shoulder blades inside my coat as I walked. Perhaps a few bruises, and I was fortunate at that: if the old man's strength had been equal to his anger, I would fair have been beaten into the flagstones. A foul stroke of luck, to wander all innocent into the den of one bearing such a grievance – both personal and theological – against me. I had, at least, achieved some small addition to my knowledge. If ever a Saint Monkfish had lived, his canonization had been achieved outside any Church I might know.

I briefly contemplated abandoning any further inquiries. What I had learned so far had been sorely bought. The clockwork device that the Brown Leather Man had left me still awaited my attentions; was I not shirking those duties I owed the gentleman by this chasing after small mysteries? An ugly doll and an odd coin – what were these but mere coincidences, of no import to any except one looking for diversion? Better to tend my shop; Brown Leather had stated his intent to return in a week's time; perhaps all questions could be answered then.

Wise counsel, even if I gave it only to myself. Yet I put it out of mind, and went on with my Londonbounded voyage of discovery. The sense of dream-like connections persisted, of sea water and clockwork somehow coexistent; as a dreamer dances rashly along cliff edges that would paralyse him with fright when awake, so I proceeded.

The coin with Saint Monkfish's portrait on it had caused me enough grief for the time being. I turned my steps towards the Tottenham Court Road, that costermongers' thoroughfare, where all things were bought and sold.

I soon spied such a person as I wanted. In the midst of the noise and bustle, the jostling pedestrians and carriages, the walking merchants who peddle their wares from pushcarts and neck-slung trays shouted their inducements to potential customers. I pushed my way past the common lot of patterers, gallows litterateurs, cheap johns, and the like; near the turn on to the Hampstead Road, a hawker with a basket of dolls on his crooked arm was holding aloft a pair of the mannikins for the passing crowd's inspection.

"Yes, sir: finest wares," said the man, spotting my interest as I approached. "Make a child happy for fourpence – there's not many things in this world as can do that. Have you a small one to home?"

"Actually, no," I said. "I really only require information from you."

"Mayhap you do." He poked about in his basket, arranging the dolls to better effect. "But I doubts as you could tell me how much trade I'd lose thereby, there being many fine folk who'd swallow their disappointment over not obtaining one of these rare toys, rather than interrupt such a discussion."

I fetched out a shilling and handed it to him.

The coin disappeared into his pocket. "Very fine, sir; very fine. For that you'll know all that Dick the Dollman knows, though it take hours in telling. Man and boy. I've peddled the London streets, though I was raised to a better class of trade and am only reduced to this through harsh circumstance. My father was a pensioner in Greenwich College-"

I interrupted a monologue that seemed, through frequent repetition, to have taken on the mechanical aspects of one of my father's clockwork figures. "Pardon; I only need to know the origin of the dolls you sell. Who makes them, and from where they come."

"Why, I makes them myself, sir. Very clever I am at it, too. I've made wax heads – large size, that is, big as yours or mine; I don't make these little ones – of murderers who were hung, for exhibit by a company of showmen; I did the infamous Rush, and Mr and Mrs Manning, and very convincing they were. In all aspects of dolls and wax figures and the like, I'm your man."

"You don't make the heads for these dolls?" I seized upon this one helpful fact.

"Oh, no, sir. It's cheaper to buy them, and assemble them on to the wax bodies as I make. There's no profit in fiddling with these tiny heads, as I can buy 'em seven-and-a-half-pence for a dozen, easy enough."

"Where do you buy them? Who makes them?" persisted.

"Why, they're near all made in Hamburg, but we buy them here in London. Alfred Davis', in Houndsditch – they're of a very nice quality, very fine; I prefers them to those of White's, though they be right close by. Or Joseph's – they're in Leadenhall Street; not nearly so fine, they are."

I leaned closer to the doll seller, to better separate his words from the surrounding street noise. "I take it, then, that if shown a particular doll's head, you could identify the premises of its origin?"

He preened himself a bit, smoothing his shirt-front with one hand. "As I said, in all things pertaining to dolls, Dick's your man."

From the velvet bag I drew forth the ugly doll given me by my last night's host. "If you'd be so kind, then," I said, holding it forth. "Which of the shops you mentioned sold this?"

I saw his eyes widen, startled, as he gazed at the thing; an ashen pallor drained into his face. Then he recovered a measure of his composure, and looked up at me.

"Never seen the like," said the doll-seller, shaking his head. His voice held only a fraction of its former bravado. "Never in my days. Right 'bominable-looking, it is." He tucked his own wares back into his basket, and moved away from me.

I clutched his coat sleeve to restrain him, "You say you have never seen one like this before?" An evident falsehood; the look in his eyes had been one of fearful recognition.

He jerked his arm out of my grasp. "No, never," he said grimly. "It's not a fit plaything for a child – best throw it away, sir, or on the fire." He began a quick walk, pushing into the shifting wall of the massed crowd.