by Jack
‘Well done, sir,’ the gentleman in blue said, his expression tight, even grief-stricken, and he stepped now to Bunting. The fellow was truly short, the top of his three-cornered thrice-high barely coming to the corser’s chin. ‘Atticus Wells, sleuth and theoretician,’ he added, presenting first a courtly bow that provoked a sour reaction in the corser’s proudly simpler manners, then a manly hand. ‘How come you to this fine neck of the world?’
It was then that Bunting realised this one called Atticus Wells was actually moving by aide of a sturdy walking cane. What by the precious here and vere ...? he cursed inwardly, but said, ‘Fetching stooks,’ tossing his hand evasively to the broken kindling still masking his true load, his eyes glassy with a what-do-you-reckon stare. ‘How is it you are here, my chum?’
Wells peered at Bunting a moment. ‘We are here, sir,’ he declared with a flourish of his hand towards the girl as the big fellow in black weskit put her into the cart, ‘to rescue her ...’
* * * *
On the low streets and rear lanes of any city in the Soutlands — or the Half-Continent or even the entire Harthe Alle, for that matter — the disappearance of some reduced or destitute girl is regrettably common and goes largely ignored. A hazard of moll potnies, goodday gala-girls, posy vendors, snugman snitches and songbird beggars are routinely snatched from benighted streets by sinister souls; the disappeared typically unmissed but perhaps for a meagre and equally powerless collection of needy relations and impoverished acquaintances. Such folk as these can do little to prevent their rough darlings from being carried off on secretly-fitted vessels to distant lands and there to be auctioned into marriage or servitude; or set to hard labour in some impossibly remote mill or mine; or worst yet, delivered up to an ashmonger and on-sold to anthropists, massacars, parts-grinders or the transmogrifying surgeons of Sinster and other notorious butchering cities.
Yet though they keep their operation to the fouler districts of the city, occasionally these malevolent abductors unwittingly misstep and pinch some lass who is actually in possession of superior connexions; and these superior connexions almost always send shrewd and doughty fellows to restore their missing damsels to them.
It was for this grievous and dismal reason that Monsiere Valentin Pardolot of the Pardolots of the suburb of Steepling Oak, Brandenbrass — receiver of the Garland of Courtesy and chief senior indexer at the Grand Plus Banking & Mercantile — had shifted himself to seek the apartments of one Atticus Wells, the city’s most illustrious, indeed celebrated, sleuth. If asked, Valentin would readily confess he was not the kind of gentleman to run with such sneaking and clandestine fellows, however fine their reputation. Yet the complete and suspect vanishment of the wayward eldest daughter of Grey, his dear wife’s much admired and hardworking housekeeper, pressed him to such extremes. Need, as he had put it to himself on the quarter-hour journey by day carriage from his townhouse in Steepling Oak to Bankers Lane in Risen Mole, makes beggars of us all.
And so it was that this vaunted mercantile clerk ventured up the narrow flight between a fine-cut poulterer and a violin maker to the upper-storey rooms of the vaunted sleuth. Shown by a blank-faced servant from the small pristine vestibule to a sparse but tastefully furnished upstairs drawing room, he was greeted by a tall, profoundly capable-looking man in a silken bagwig. Introducing himself as the great Atticus Wells, the fellow offered Valentin to join him and sit on gilt and velvet armchairs before an alabaster hearth. Here, comforted by a tott of malmsey thinned with a little water, Monsiere Pardolot poured out the whole sorry story.
Viola Grey, a defiant child barely in her majority and — as with many city girls thinking in their misjudged adventures to follow the steps of the such fighting women as the Branden Rose or Epitome Bile — determined to make herself a spectacle. Breaking free all too frequently from lock and window, she sought to live it high in the make-merry districts of Pantomime Lane and the Fairerside. Always, she would return the next day, either of her own accord or fetched back from her favourite haunts by one of Pardolot’s stablery men. But on Midwich last, she had absconded one final night, never to return, and the house staff unable to find any tell of her for the past three days.
‘Mother Grey is the finest keeper-of-house I have ever employed,’ Pardolot concluded soberly, almost to himself. ‘My wife — and I too, of course — would hate to see her permanently distempered by her daughter’s non-return.’
‘As would any employer worth the service, sir!’ Wells returned with frank concern.
The chief senior indexer passed over a large pane of paper. It was figured with a rather skilfully executed spedigraph of poor Viola Grey, drawn by one of the many nameless struggling fabulists; creative folk of irregular trade who, along with many other night-merchants, do hover about revelling high-society crowds like gulls for an opportunity to make a little money. ‘This is a most excellent likeness,’ he said, ‘done only a day before her last outing ...’
The sleuth regarded the image with pursed lips, glanced for a moment to the far end of the room but said nothing.
‘I can pay very handsomely, Mister Wells,’ Pardolot offered at last, sitting straighter as he reached into his waistcoat pocket, giving a hearty clearing of his throat. ‘Whatever is required to secure Viola’s restoration to the embrace of her good mother’s bosom.’ Money, he was sure, was the most compelling incentive for such fellows as sat before him — however smart their clothes or sturdy their frame — and he was prepared to part with a considerable sum ... though decency proscribed excess.
‘My fee, most generous monsiere, is the same come peer, peltryman or pauper,’ the sleuth replied smoothly, lifting his well-defined chin gallantly. ‘The best recompense is the job done well.’ For but an instant he seemed to glance quite pointedly to a great storied weave hanging at the far end of the room.
Pardolot went to look too, but before he could get a good view, Wells returned his keen attention to the chief senior indexer and declared, ‘We accept your mission, sir.’
Nobility, manifest with such fine address and fine bearing, were always fit to impress Pardolot most, and he could see plainly the why of this man’s high reputation. Smiling gratefully, he returned his wallet to its usual deep pocket. An interview followed — as extensive as the little he knew could provide — during which his attention was continually drawn to the huge tapestry. He could not say why, but he held the distinct impression that the near wall-high figures playing out a moment of history upon it were in truth watching him. Clearing the notion with a shake of his head, the chief senior indexer answered every inquiry as best he could, which after many, many questions did not amount to much more than her last known position: Ratio’s Swing, a rowdy drinking house of low reputation found on the barely accessible fringe of the slums named by its mucky denizens as the Alcoves.
‘I shall need some manner of weargild from the young lady’s person, something truly her own and bearing her true scent ...’ It will help us to locate her.’
Pardolot frowned but with only the slightest arching of his brow, agreed.
It all seemed such paltry evidence, but this Wells fellow exhibited such verve and confidence that — after paying the retaining fee to an impressively efficient clerk in the small file attached to the drawing room — Pardolot left the unremarkable narrow-fronted apartment on Banker’s Lane with a bill of receipt most properly filled and spirits greatly improved. He had expected to return to his wife with little more than a lighter purse and shuffling excuses but here he could bring the happy report to Lady Pardolot that housekeeper Grey would see her daughter again, he was certain of it.
For the real Atticus Wells the prospect was in truth not nearly so clear, though such doubts would never do to be made plain to clientele. Indeed, Wells did not make himself plain to anyone at first interview and often not beyond. ‘A sad and vexing yet all too common set of circumstances, ‘tis sure,’ he proclaimed as he shuffled out from behind the very tapestry that had aroused Pardolot’s
sensitive curiosity. While it was a very striking hanging, its main function was to screen a recess in the wall from where the real sleuth could sit and watch unseen while others would play his public role. For short and stocky strong, with an oddly long face and a large nose like a smashed fruit, Atticus was a most unimpressive fellow at first glimpse. Yet under his thick, melancholy brow peered glitteringly intelligent eyes, quick to see for a mind yet quicker to perceive, their irises stark cerulean blue in orbs a complete and bloody red. These were the eyes of a falseman, washed in painful potent chemistry so that Wells might see speciousness in people’s words and treachery in their deeds. These eyes gained him a respect his own filial connexions had never done, causing some to reconsider his stunted frame and ugly dial. Yet the curse of all such power was a strange disconnected loneliness, surrounded by people but never properly engaged with them. Mentored by that eminent falseman, Nestor, telltale to the illustrious Duchess Pymn, Wells himself well knew that when pressed or in genuine dread every person might dissemble or lapse in truth. He himself relied on trickeries and sleight of language daily -— by the hour even. Yet only those in possession of a mostly clear conscience or the constant self-ease borne of a forthright and uncomplicated soul were able to remain in his company for long.
Still slouched in the highback, the noble — nay, leonine — man who had played him in the interview, was one such soul. Petulcus Sprawle was his name — tall, lithe, dangerous-looking; a man of action and the precise opposite of his chief. This surrogate ‘Atticus Wells’ cocked a handsome brow and promptly removed the powdered and beribboned bagwig from his crown. Glad to free his natural flaxen thatching, he let out a long puff of breath. ‘I do wish you’d have Mister Door do this more often,’ he carped. ‘He does not mind the itch of this scratchbob,’ he added, tossing the wig around and around upon his finger.
‘Indeed, Mister Sprawle,’ Atticus returned, ‘as you say every time; and as I ever reply, security and fine impression are most necessary; my notoriety is problematic enough without every man-jack knowing my face, and my ... awkward condition,’ he flourished his sturdy cane, tapping his legs, slightly bowed and somewhat stunted, ‘is unhelpful for introducing properly placed confidence in prospective custom.’
‘Fie and dash to prospective custom and their misjudgements,’ Sprawle swore faithfully.
Wells smiled vaguely and took up the thin sheaf of papers that constituted his aide’s notations of the interview to peer at them closely. ‘Beside this, Mister Door does not possess your eloquence, and is — as you well know, my man — better for ... humbler clients.’ Staring long at the cheap spedigraph of poor Viola Grey, he sought to fix the visage of the girl in his thoughts.
The faint scrape of fiddle being tortured into tune yowled from the shop below.
‘Did you mark my line about “peers, peltrymen or paupers”?’ Sprawle grinned, stretching complacently to stare at the high pale ceiling divided into ovals and oblongs of convoluted moulding. His face abruptly contorted in a lion-like yawn that distorted his voice as he continued, ‘Heard you pronounce that one last week to a patron — I thought it very convincing. Seemed to please our present chap some too.’
Nodding absently, the senior sleuth stepped to the rightmost of three long windows that stared east over the great stretch of suburbs hiding the city’s teaming civil mass, his regard shifting out to the pallid grey sliver of Brandenbrass’ harbour and the high dome of wan sky. The sun was barely at the 10 o’clock. ‘Call Mister Thickney’ — by whom he meant that impressively efficient clerk in the adjoining file —’for the coach, the day is yet young and time is scarce for the truly disappeared. We have a darling young daftling to find.’
* * * *
Busy with people of every station moving in this margin of decent society and desperate poverty, the outer districts of the Alcoves were safe enough — during the day at least. In this city where money moved more quickly than conscience, the anonymous affluent governors of all the illicit trades came down from their fine suburbs in undisguisedly fancy lentums, arrogantly riding the squalid streets in flashing carriages as they rushed to sponsor the next venture of profitable darkness. Thus Wells’ own glossy lentum was perfectly commonplace as it drew over the Falindermeer trickling its malodorous way thickly to the harbour, and eased before the Ratio’s Swing. Built mostly of grey brick and murky white stone, the drinking-house was a remarkably well-kept establishment, surrounded as it was by mouldering houses built as quick as could be — and often without permit —upon the ruin of any previous structure. Under the see-all stare of Atticus Wells and the striking glower of Petulcus Sprawle, the Ratio’s portly sour-eyed boniface did not recognise the likeness of Viola, no matter how much he wanted. He did, though, make out the style of the spedigraph.
‘It’s the hand of a certain Mister Peltfelt,’ the fellow offered, staring down Atticus with peculiar, unwilling yet anxious fascination. ‘I — I have several by him of my wife. H-has a room down at Mother Wrist’s common lodging house ... on the Scramble Street.’
In thanks, Wells bought the boniface a jug of his own best stingo, the fellow mumbling something approaching fidgeting gratitude, keen for them leave.
Deeper into the Alcoves, inside the tottering third-hand edifice of Mother Wrist’s, the shrewd-eyed lady herself informed them that the fabulist Peltfelt was not in but had stepped out for some necessary or other. Deciding to shift themselves to a dingy tomaculum conveniently situated directly across the road and down in a half-cellar with slippery steps the sleuth and his agent sat to wait. Wells keeping a weather-eye through the grimy lights of squat arched windows for their mark’s return, Sprawle ordered early lunch: pullet and ramsin broth and vinegar pie for them both, sluiced down — though it was before midday — with pitchers of the best Patter Moil beer. It was an aromatic combination and they spoke little as they ate.
Brow cocked and mouth bent wryly, Sprawle finally uttered, ‘She’s as likely to have eloped with some gambling-debted naval captain.’
‘And if that is so then that is what we shall find and that is what we shall report to Monsiere Pardolot. Ah! Our man cometh!’ Wells, draining the dregs of his beer, stood and hurried up the tomaculum steps with the surprising nimbleness he possessed when fixed entirely on his current prize.
Accosted at the door, Peltfelt blearily confirmed the drawing as of his own execution, but who the girl was, he could not recall.
‘I scrawl so many dials it gets so I cannot tell one person from next.’
There was no lie in him, Atticus could see it easily enough, just hunger and a craving for forgetfulness.
Returning to the vicinity of the Ratio, they attempted some simple canvassing, asking all they passed if they had seen the girl in the sketch. It was remarkable how often such a seemingly haphazard method succeeded in unearthing important traces, but by midafternoon their endeavour was proving to be little more than finding the pin amongst the needles.
‘I guess its down to my box-bound nose, now,’ Sprawle said lightly as they rattled home aboard the lentum.
‘We shall see what inklings Messrs Door and Thickney have mined,’ the sleuth returned, ‘but yes, as I presumed it would always be, your facility with a sthenicon may once again be the only key to our success.’
‘Let us hope then that her trail has not gone too stale,’ his companion countered, serious for the first time that day.
Leaning chin on hand, Atticus covered his smile under a suede-gloved hand. It was always a great satisfaction when Petulcus Sprawle grew serious.
Things happened.
Good things.
* * * *
Back in Banker’s Lane, the two found Door and Thickney also returned, having achieved some better success interviewing two of the four girls who claimed themselves as disappeared Viola’s friends. It turned out that the initial tale told to father Pardolot had been thin in extremis, but between Mister Thickney’s dour gaze and Mister Door’s amiable half-smile a fuller account
emerged.
The five girls had been dancing the vinegar’s jig with a group of lively, heavily-tattooed vinegarroons, ticket-of-leave men from some Gottish main-ram. After some addling drink the girls did not know the name for, they were taken — near dragged — to some night-cellar not far from the Ratio’s Swing, where the vinegars promised the waters were harder and the fun with them. It is here that Viola’s friends finally applied some wisdom and left. Alas, the eldest Grey, thinking she found at last her moment for complete infamy, remained and would not be prevailed upon to do otherwise. That was their last sight of her, so small and careless among all those huge, sweating men.
‘Do you have the name or location of the night-cellar?’ Wells inquired when Mister Thickney’s accounting was done, standing again by the drawing room window to watch the city in the latening light.
‘No,’ Thickney returned, chin thrust into his copious neckerchief as he thumbed rapidly through his several notations. ‘They did not notice. Miss Amfibia Pardolot — our client’s daughter and Viola’s chief inducer and ally — did say that she might find it again by sight.’
‘I suppose it might be too much to hope the sweet lasses cared to mark what vessel those coarse vinegars served aboard.’
