Automatic Woman (15 page)

“This way.” No-neck grinned. He was missing a good eight or nine teeth, which I imagine still put him ahead of the norm for this neighborhood. The building we stopped at was slanted at a sixty degree angle.

“Remember what I said about your shooter.”

“I’m not looking for trouble, mate. I just need to verify the letter for my employers.”

No-neck knocked on a door. It was promptly answered by what appeared to be a large bundle of rags.

“Woo, Jeffery!” The rags cooed. I could see no part of the woman, just brown bits of cloth puffed out like a dirty cloud.

“This man needs to see Willie’s letter.”

The rag pile turned to me. Near the top center of the pile a face revealed itself. The woman was a hundred if a day. Dust darkened the lines of her eyes, her mouth, her forehead. Her toothless smile was radiant, free of all malice and cynicism. It was like looking into the face of an angel. A muddy, filthy angel.

“Are you from the government?” Willie’s mum asked.

“Yes, ma’am. I just need to verify his communications.”

“He’s not in trouble is he?” Her smile told me that this was not a possibility, that all was right in the world. She made my heart ache for my own mother.

“No, ma’am. Quite the contrary. Your Willie is doing special work for us and receiving top accommodations for it. In fact, I’ve been authorized by the Queen herself to give you a portion of his bonus.”

I pulled a ten pound note from my pocket and handed it to the old mum. She gave a little animal hoot and the currency vanished into some part of her rag outfit.

“The letter please.” I smiled and held out my hand.

Mum ran back into her room and shuffled through bits of garbage and debris. She returned with a poshy cream-colored envelope.

“May I keep this, mum?”

“Sure, mister. Can I invite you in for tea?”

I looked inside her single room home. It didn’t look like there would be enough room for me to sit, stand, or turn around. I politely declined and was on my way.

I couldn’t get out of the neighborhood fast enough. Even armed as I was, this felt like a place where I’d likely get a knife in the back as I would a “good day.” No-neck followed.

“That was a good bit,” No neck said.

“What was?”

“Giving my aunty that money.”

We turned one corner, then another. The surroundings started to freshen a bit, and desperation lifted from the air.

“Got any more?” he asked.

Fucking hell! I reached into my dwindling supply and produced a pound note for No-neck. More than he deserved but I had no smaller currency to give.

No-neck pocketed his tip and was on his way. The sun had gone past the horizon and I found myself in yet another public house for yet another meal and pint. One of these days, you mark my words, I will settle down and find the family life promised to me by my father and school and all the authorities who explain life to children. I’ll find the regular existence that has eluded me these past thirty years.

After a meal of spiced potatoes and roast beef, I laid out my paper work before me. The first item was the note Stoker gave me. It was a map of a circus camp outside of Stoke Poges. The notations were in what appeared to be my handwriting. How the bloody hell did Darwin copy my script?

I unfolded Willie the Porter’s letter. His hand was blocky and childish. Given his home, I’m lucky the man knew any script at all. It read as follows:

Dear Mom,

I will not be home for several days.

Men from the government have asked me

to help them with a special job. I am an acting

messenger for a science research camp. Do not

worry.

They say I will be home in a week or two.

Your boy,

Willie

Not much in the script. The use of the word camp hinted that the whole event was a tent and out-doors affair. If anything, this helped the theory from the first note that Nouveau and company were cloistered in the woods somewhere, working from tents and enjoying the rustic life. This made sense, or at least it would to a lesser man, a man not used to the intricacies of investigative work.

I emptied my pint glass and wiped away the froth with my dinner napkin. The thick bottom was my magnifying glass and with it I gave the porter’s letter a good once over. The paper itself was rich with clues. First, there were no misspellings, which told me that Willie wrote under the guidance of someone. Second, the paper was a thick high quality stock, not the type to be found in country stores. Also, the paper was beige instead of white which was more expensive. Impressive card stock, the kind used by people and institutions who were well funded, who could push the extravagance of expensive paper, even for the trivial letters of hangers-on. And finally, in the reflected view of my pint glass, there was a thin watermark down the center. The water mark was more revealing than anything else. It was a mark given to paper to prove authenticity, to show that this paper had come from a single, specific location. Without any other clue I could tell you that this piece of paper came from the inner catacombs of Central Bureaucracy. Central B did not sell its paper stock, nor give it away. It was a trade mark, a thing exclusive to the organization. Willie the porter could not purchase nor receive it except by someone connected with the organization.

Was this another false lead? It seemed like a misstep on Darwin’s part. Would he allow something like this to escape his far reaching clutches, and for what reason? If he was selling the idea of a research camp, why use this nonconforming paper stock?

A new idea formed in my mind. This was a mistake. Darwin’s people delegated the task of sending a letter to the family of the poor missing porter, so as to not rouse authorities and investigating Metros; a necessary job, but not important enough to assign to someone of strong abilities. The figuring out of universal secrets, the dissecting and recreating of living automatons had to be a big job with all the smartest and quickest of men snapping to. What if minding the porter was given to a fool, a lesser? What if this lesser screwed up? Mistakes are built for exploitation and in my mind, this was it. This was a piece of the puzzle given to my hands though not by anyone’s intent.

The porter was housed in Central Bureaucracy, which meant Nouveau’s family was housed in Central Bureaucracy, which meant Nouveau and the Swan Princess were housed in Central Bureaucracy.

Darwin could not have picked a better location. London Central Bureaucracy was a monstrous building, a concrete pyramid erected to house the information agents and filings of the entire British Empire. Corporate contracts, trade agreements, personnel files on government employees, foreign intelligence reports, and the largest, greatest, most powerful Difference Engine known to man. The building occupied two city blocks and was twelve stories high with a rumored twelve stories below. In short, it was an impenetrable fortress set to repel foreign invasion, let alone simple burglary. 

I folded the porter’s letter. Once, twice, three times, four. I made it into a little square and shoved it into my boot, next to Saucy Jack’s knife.

The edges of a plan took hold in my mind. I finished supper and returned to my busted flat.

Jolly executes a plan all his own

The door to my flat stood open. I would have been alarmed had I not remembered that Mr. Safari had kicked the latch off. Everything was still a mess, still a pile of sticks. In my bedroom, some nice gentlemen had carted off my destroyed bed and replaced it with a nicely adorned four-post sleeper. In the frame they’d laid a goose feathered mattress and covered it with silk sheets. It was ill-suited for myself and my flat, with its carved oaken posts and streamers of red velvet. It looked more like a honey trap than a bed, but free is free and who would I complain to anyway?

I sat and removed my boots. Next to the bed, as promised, lay a pair identical to my own. Not just identical in size and make, Darwin had matched the wear and scuffs as well. I took up the right boot and ran my thumb along the sole. Under foot was a small latch. I undid the latch and swung open the heel. Inside a secret compartment lay a dull metal circle. He’d mentioned a coin, but this looked more like a metal slug. There was no print or face or symbol on it, just a disk.

I remembered Stoker’s warning about touching the coin. That seemed strange, but why give the warning if it did not pose some unforeseeable danger, unless there was something about the coin they did not want me to know? I took one of Doyle’s syringes and gave the disc a gentle poke. The surface dimpled under pressure. I prodded the coin again. It seemed insubstantial, near liquid in form. The metal itself was as malleable as mercury, and a layer of gelatin gave it its shape and kept the metal from spilling out.

This went beyond Stoker’s assertion of a loyalty test. There was a specific reason for this coin to be in the third floor fountain of the Bow Street Firm. If I was going to throw a fist full of mercury at Perseus’s feet I needed to know why. Not now, but soon.

I slept better that night than I’d slept in memories past. The silk sheets were soothing on my raw, burnt skin. I woke up without confusion or feathers coating my hair and body.

I ordered a light meal in the pub downstairs. Eggs and toast and black coffee was a working man’s breakfast. The clock struck eight. In eleven hours, rain or shine, I would be in front of Lord Barnes to give one story or another. Time was short and the story had yet to be written. One thing was for certain; playing from Darwin’s script was out of the question. He offered few guarantees for myself.

I left the pub, opted for a cigar from a smoke shop, and leisurely puffed it on my way to the library. I never much gave the impression of a man of books. In fact, I’ve admitted to not being a literate man on several occasions. All pretense drops at this point. I once heard a bloke say the reader is more fortunate then the non-reader, because the non-reader lives but one life while the reader lives the life of every story. I think of that as a half-truth. To me, the reader is blessed because he can peer into the lives of others to see where they went, right or wrong. The reader lives one life, like the non-reader, but a life of better informed decisions.

I needed information and the library was the best source, specifically on chemistry and the purpose of liquid metals encased in gelatin.

I spent the afternoon among the leathery smell of books, getting the sidelong looks from learned spinsters who hadn’t seen a man of my type before, a man of sizable scar tissue. I felt fortunate because the salve Doyle had given me was assisting the healing process nicely, though it did stain my shirt something terrible. The infection in my hand had reduced to a minor inconvenience, a dull throb, easy to ignore. If I ever become a man of wealth, Dr. Doyle will receive the gratitude of my coin for certain.

I borrowed the ink pencil of a library clerk and made adjustments to the porter’s letter. An idea kept running through my mind. Something Stoker had said: “You are to give him no other information other than what is on that paper. If you do, we will find out and your deal with us is no longer valid.” Over and over in my head. “We will find out… we will find out… we will find out.” I started thinking about how they would find out, with a man as secret as Lord Barnes. How could they possibly find out?

I read a treatise on the properties of malleable metals, mercury, lithium, potassium, sodium, rubidium, caesium. Learned books on all the metals that are liquid at room temperature, their properties, their appropriate containment, their dangerous propensities. Fascinating stuff.

I hired a tube locker, this time to store my guns and their beautiful holster belts.

I taped Saucy Jack’s knife behind my right calf, above the boot line. Just in case.

I tore into the lining of my new coat and placed Dr. Doyle’s syringes on the bottom edge. Also, just in case.

In short, I spent the day putting together the pieces of my plan. Right or wrong, I was going to show Barnes and Darwin what I had to offer to their little game.

My preparations ended at five o’clock, leaving me ample time for a plate of lamb chops, mashed peas, and two pints of Irish lager. The nervous energy of the unknown and unknowable coursed through my veins. My skin was electric. I could not wait for the time to pass, for the show to begin. The beers took no edge out of me; rather they made me angrier, more aggressive. I ordered another, and another.

Seven o’clock found me at the Bow Street Firm facing a similar routine with Miss Penny Walker. I strolled in with a cock in my step, like I was the mayor of Bollocksville. My Cherokee name was Four-Pints Brave. Miss Walker got all flustered and called for security escorts in all appropriate haste.

Bell and Silver were giving me the friendly frisk within a minute.

“Where’d you leave your guns, Jolly?” Bell asked.

“Don’t play coy, Bell. You know they’re in Mrs. Silver’s knickers drawer.” I gave Silver a lecherous wink and kissed the air by his cheek. Silver centered himself to me and puffed his bird chest and shoulders. Despite being eight centimeters my junior he made quite a show of it.