cloudy sky to meet the two men, leaving the door open as he had found it.
SIX
BEAUMONT’S REWARD
T he several houses that lined Lazarus Walk were large, many-roomed structures from the last age, with multiple chimneys and lamp-lit geminate windows glowing through the fog. Beaumont looked into the courtyard of number 12, through a broad, scrolled-iron gate between the high walls of granite stones that separated the immense house from the rest of London. It was a half-timbered mansion with colored glass in the downstairs windows. Many years ago someone had bled money to build it.
There was no gatekeeper to be seen. A gold-painted Berlin carriage, very old and very elegant, stood on the cobbles near the arched front door, its two patient horses waiting in front of a large carriage house, lanterns lit within. A man – the driver, perhaps – came out of the carriage house now and stood smoking a pipe, the reek of burning tobacco mingling with the fog. He was a narrow man, his legs needlessly long –
The Duke of Limbs
, Beaumont thought. He wore a red bowler hat with a low dome. Beaumont waved the handbill at the man, who stared at him with a look of disapproval on his face. A crowd of laughing people jostled Beaumont, shoving him against the iron bars of the gate, one of them knocking his hat askew and laughing as he did it. The chin ribbon saved it before it fell.
“Be off with you, dwarf!” the gangly driver shouted at him, but Beaumont held up the handbill again and pointed at the picture drawn on it. The man considered him for another moment before stepping across to the gate and said, “State your business, then.”
“I’m here to lay claim to my reward, your honor: twenty pounds, it says here on this bill, as you can see right enough.”
“Tell me what you know, then, and I’ll fetch your money. If it’s worthless to Mr. Klingheimer I’ll fetch you a kick in the arse.”
“I’ll fetch my own reward from Mr. Klingheimer, if you please, sire,” Beaumont said. “It’ll spend better in my hands than it will in yours. The man you see here, I was his coachman, the same situation as you, I don’t doubt. A black Landau coach, which I cleaned and polished and cared for the horses. I was ostler and driver both for near on a year.”
“And where is he now, this master of yours?”
“Under my hat, which is where he’ll stay.”
“Tell me what the man did, then. What line of work?”
“All manner of evil more than aught else. Viversuction, poisons, resurrection. I had nought to do with any of that. It weren’t in my line. I mostly minded his horses’ business, not his.”
“Go around back, then,” the man said, “down the lane there. If it’s twaddle you’re peddling, you’ll regret it.” He nodded up the road, where there was no doubt a cut-through. “The red door, first you come to. Don’t bang the knocker. Mrs. Skink will open it in due time.” He turned away and walked back into the coaching house, disappearing within.
Beaumont considered what he would reveal as he walked along the narrow bit of pavement toward the red door, which he could see now through the wisps of fog blowing past, hiding and then disclosing things. He realized that he had little to say to anyone that he had not already said, except that the man they sought had gone to damnation, a prisoner of the toads. They would pay little for news about someone who was as good as dead. Beaumont would brass it out, though, to see what came of it – a farthing for his trouble, perhaps, which was twice better than half a farthing.
He waited as he had been told, standing several paces back from the stoop, removing his hat and holding it in the crook of his arm. The door was standing open at present, a greengrocer handing crates of vegetables through it to someone unseen in the shadows. The grocer went away in the direction of the river pushing his now-empty cart, and the door swung shut. Beaumont looked up at a bank of long
SIX
BEAUMONT’S REWARD
T he several houses that lined Lazarus Walk were large, many-roomed structures from the last age, with multiple chimneys and lamp-lit geminate windows glowing through the fog. Beaumont looked into the courtyard of number 12, through a broad, scrolled-iron gate between the high walls of granite stones that separated the immense house from the rest of London. It was a half-timbered mansion with colored glass in the downstairs windows. Many years ago someone had bled money to build it.
There was no gatekeeper to be seen. A gold-painted Berlin carriage, very old and very elegant, stood on the cobbles near the arched front door, its two patient horses waiting in front of a large carriage house, lanterns lit within. A man – the driver, perhaps – came out of the carriage house now and stood smoking a pipe, the reek of burning tobacco mingling with the fog. He was a narrow man, his legs needlessly long –
The Duke of Limbs
, Beaumont thought. He wore a red bowler hat with a low dome. Beaumont waved the handbill at the man, who stared at him with a look of disapproval on his face. A crowd of laughing people jostled Beaumont, shoving him against the iron bars of the gate, one of them knocking his hat askew and laughing as he did it. The chin ribbon saved it before it fell.
“Be off with you, dwarf!” the gangly driver shouted at him, but Beaumont held up the handbill again and pointed at the picture drawn on it. The man considered him for another moment before stepping across to the gate and said, “State your business, then.”
“I’m here to lay claim to my reward, your honor: twenty pounds, it says here on this bill, as you can see right enough.”
“Tell me what you know, then, and I’ll fetch your money. If it’s worthless to Mr. Klingheimer I’ll fetch you a kick in the arse.”
“I’ll fetch my own reward from Mr. Klingheimer, if you please, sire,” Beaumont said. “It’ll spend better in my hands than it will in yours. The man you see here, I was his coachman, the same situation as you, I don’t doubt. A black Landau coach, which I cleaned and polished and cared for the horses. I was ostler and driver both for near on a year.”
“And where is he now, this master of yours?”
“Under my hat, which is where he’ll stay.”
“Tell me what the man did, then. What line of work?”
“All manner of evil more than aught else. Viversuction, poisons, resurrection. I had nought to do with any of that. It weren’t in my line. I mostly minded his horses’ business, not his.”
“Go around back, then,” the man said, “down the lane there. If it’s twaddle you’re peddling, you’ll regret it.” He nodded up the road, where there was no doubt a cut-through. “The red door, first you come to. Don’t bang the knocker. Mrs. Skink will open it in due time.” He turned away and walked back into the coaching house, disappearing within.
Beaumont considered what he would reveal as he walked along the narrow bit of pavement toward the red door, which he could see now through the wisps of fog blowing past, hiding and then disclosing things. He realized that he had little to say to anyone that he had not already said, except that the man they sought had gone to damnation, a prisoner of the toads. They would pay little for news about someone who was as good as dead. Beaumont would brass it out, though, to see what came of it – a farthing for his trouble, perhaps, which was twice better than half a farthing.
He waited as he had been told, standing several paces back from the stoop, removing his hat and holding it in the crook of his arm. The door was standing open at present, a greengrocer handing crates of vegetables through it to someone unseen in the shadows. The grocer went away in the direction of the river pushing his now-empty cart, and the door swung shut. Beaumont looked up at a bank of long
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