K Jeter - Infernal Devices

The cabby signalled for his jar to be refilled. "Yes, indeed," he said, leaning across the table. His creased face exuded the conspiratorial bonhomie of one who delightedly assumes that all the world is as foul-minded as he is. He fell into smirking reminiscence: "Many's the time, all these years I've worked as a long-night man – that's what we call it, mind, six of the evenings to ten the following mornings – many's the time I've had fine gentlemen such as yourself asking to be taken to the borough of Wetwick. Fine gentlemen, indeed… and roaring boys." The phrase generated some excitement in him; his eyes widened in his flushed face. "Eh? Eh? The roaring boys – out for a lark, they were, yes." He gazed at his reflection in the renewed ale, smiling as if satisfied at what he saw. "The green girls – that's what you lordly rakes want, isn't it now? Eh?"

I made no reply, stupefied into muteness by the closeness of the den and the alcoholic fumes it contained. The cabby's pallid face danced in front of me, a child's grinning puppet given over to wickedness and the relish it found therein.

"Mind you, now," he went on, unstoppable, "though it be to your heart's desire-" The last word sent him into a salivating ekstasis. "Your heart's desire, says I, a greater bargain is impossible to find. And why is that? Eh?"

I perceived that he was asking me a riddle. "I have no idea." My head had started to throb.

"Because – ho-ho! – because all it takes to get there is a single coin. Ha!" He choked and beat his fist on the table in his mirth. "A single coin! Very clever, that! Eh?"

"Yes…" I agreed feebly, attempting to mask my incomprehension. "Yes, quite amusing."

He eyed me more closely. "Of course," he said slowly, "it has to be the right coin. Don't it, sir? There's only one will do for it." He drew back, waiting for my reply.

I saw that under his smile there was an element other than jest. At the same moment, in a flash of understanding, I realised the point of his words. Keeping his gaze locked with mine, I drew the velvet bag out of my pocket, extracted the Saint Monkfish sovereign, and laid it on the table in front of him.

The cabby picked up the coin and held it glittering in the candlelight. For a moment he studied the remarkable profile on its surface; then he handed it back to me. With an exaggeratedly servile nod, he said, "Right you are, sir. Most pleased to be of service to the cognoscenti. To Wetwick, then." He looked up when a cracked plate, shiny with grease, was laid in front of him with the blackened chop upon it.

I watched as he sawed the redolent meat apart with his pocket knife, spearing the pieces with its point and conveying them to his mouth. "Shall we be off, then?" I said.

He jabbed another morsel and held it down to the dog, who adroitly licked it off the blade. "There's no call for haste, sir." He took another bite. "Plenty of time, as you well know." He signalled for another round.

Time within the dingy confines of the stale beer shop seemed to congeal into an opaque substance, similar to the speckled drops of fat on the dirty plate. The jars in front of the cabby seemed to multiply, until there were half-a-dozen empty vessels strewn about the table. I had even drained one, in a vain attempt to slake the thirst imparted by the smoky air. This further impaired the normal progress of the hours; I felt as if I had been trapped in the cellar with my leering companion since the beginning of Creation.

I made an attempt to rouse myself, as though fighting to the top of a weed-filled pond. "When," I said thickly, "do we leave? For Wetwick." Across the room I could barely make out the form of the slatternly woman, holding the baby to her flaccid breast; its small head lolled back, the eyes two sightless grey pockets.

The cabby looked up from his own contemplations. His grin was even looser now, slack enough to reveal the gums at the bottom of his stained teeth. "Why, when it's time, sir. You know that."

"Yes… of course. But-" My fuddled brain struggled to express what seemed a momentous concept. "But how will we know when it's time?"

He shook his head, goggling at my self-evident stupidity. "He'll tell us, then, won't he? How else?"

"He'll tell us?"

"The dog." He jerked his horn-ridged thumb at the small creature at his feet.

I leaned over the table, knocking aside the empty jars, and looked down at the small animal. It returned my stare with what seemed to be no more than average canine intelligence. I sat back heavily in my chair, perplexed as to how the indicated communication was to be made.

No sooner had I done so than an excited yapping came from the beast. The edge of its terrier yelp was sharp enough to rouse a few of the cellar's denizens from their stupor, as the dog barked at the empty doorway and back at its master in turn.

"Up you come," announced the cabby. He shoved his chair back and pulled himself on to his feet, seeming little the worse for the drinking bout as he adjusted his cloak and hat. For my part, I had need to accomplish the same in stages, balancing myself against the table to overcome the leaden deadweight that had been instilled in my legs.

The dog grew more excited, skittering around the cabby's boots on its three good legs, and still yapping at the dark open air at the head of the stone steps blundered heavily into one of the other tables as the cabby led me out; the blow destroyed the precarious equilibrium of the young gentleman who had rested his elbows there, face cupped in his palms; I heard behind me his slow pitch forward and sprawling collapse on to the damp floor.

Once outside, the night air on my sweating face revived me somewhat. I soon found myself deposited inside the dilapidated hansom cab, its seat of ancient cracked leather sagging beneath me, as I listened to the driver mounting on to his perch with the barking dog in the crook of his arm. Its claws pattered across the roof of the cab even as the horse was whipped into life. We had soon careered on wobbling axles out of the alley and into the larger street beyond.

The racketing motions of the ill-sprung vehicle sent me sprawling across the seat. My brain, still labouring under the weight of whatever decoction the stale beer had been doctored with in order to increase its potency, struggled to make sense of the vista of lamps and mistshrouded streets reeling by outside. The horse, perhaps through fear of further abuse, was capable of greater speed than I would have imagined possible; the rush of wind tore through my hair as I gripped the window sill and craned my neck to shout at the cabby: "Is this the way to Wetwick, then?"

My words seemed to fuel his high humour as much as the alcohol had. His grin grew even more maniacal as he snapped the whip over the head of the dog. The small creature, too, had worked itself into a frenzy, dashing back and forth on the cab's roof, barking louder as if to urge the horse on its exertions. "To Wetwick!" cried the cabby. "For one of your faith – 'tis the new Rome! All roads lead to Wetwick!"

I fell back inside, jostled by a sudden turning that tilted the cab on to one wheel for a moment. A few white faces shot past, pedestrians startled by the vehicle's clattering haste. Above my head, the barking and scrabbling of the small dog seemed to take on a perceptible pattern: when its claws pattered to one side of the roof, the yapping sounding in that direction, the cabby swung the vehicle around correspondingly at the first opportunity. Gaining the window once more, I looked out and recognised the district through which we were passing: the smell of the river was strong, wafting through a region of ramshackle docks and warehouses. We were not far from my own home in Clerkenwell, having apparently travelled about in a circle.

The dog ceased its noise simultaneously – with the hansom pulling to a halt. The cabby pulled open the small hatch in the centre of the roof and leered down at me through the opening. "Your destination, sir," he said with sly insinuation.