Timecurse

by Tom Becker

  “Me neither,” Carnegie agreed. “Let’s go see what some old friends can make of it.”

  The offices of the Darkside Informer were located in the tanning district on the east side of the borough. Pedestrians hastened through the shadows of giant factories. Industrial chimneys weaved a blanket of poisonous smoke over the rooftops, the smell of leather so thick it left an aftertaste in the mouth. Even by the low standards of Darkside, this was a grimy, insalubrious area.

  Which made it the perfect hideout for the journalists of the Informer. They were marked men in the borough: Darksiders liked their secrets to stay secret. On his previous visits to the newspaper, Jonathan had found the office to be a gloomy, furtive place, where every stranger was greeted with suspicious glances and watchful eyes. This time, however, as the three of them entered the building, he heard an unfamiliar sound above the rumbling of the printing presses: laughter.

  Jonathan came into the main office, and blinked with surprise. The dismal atmosphere had vanished. The boarded windows had been freed up, allowing the room’s occupants to see the Darkside skyline as it retreated into early-evening darkness. The coal stoves had been lit, and were pumping waves of warmth out into the office. Gas lamps burned fiercely on every desk, chasing away the shadows and casting a rosy glow on to the faces of a group of journalists as they sat around swapping stories. Engrossed in a particularly long tale, not one of them acknowledged the new visitors.

  The storyteller was a man Jonathan knew well: Arthur Blake, editor of the Informer. Always comfortable recounting his great deductions and daring deeds, the rotund man had his audience in the palm of his hand. Despite the fact that Jonathan was never entirely sure that Blake’s stories were true, he couldn’t help himself: he laid the bag containing the ledger down on the nearest desk and crept closer to listen in.

  “. . . So no one knew what had gone on, but when I looked over the photographs of the wedding I noticed that one of the footmen in the background had a rather familiar mole on his left cheek. It was none other than Owen Galbraith, the celebrated thief!” Arthur paused, allowing his audience to digest this fact. Then he sighed, and continued hurriedly: “Sadly, by that time Galbraith was long gone, and so was the bride’s necklace, but it made for a first-rate exclusive. . .”

  At the back of the room, Carnegie snorted loudly with amusement. “You’re quite the detective, Blake. Ever thought of taking it up full-time?”

  Arthur looked up, his chubby face breaking into a smile. “Carnegie!” He hopped out of his chair and waddled over to shake hands.

  “Everyone seems remarkably cheery in here,” the wereman muttered, as Arthur enthusiastically pumped Jonathan and Raquella’s hands. “Is it payday?”

  “Better than that,” Arthur laughed. “It’s the Succession. With the Bow Street Runners out, a journalist’s life becomes altogether easier. We can even walk the streets unharmed. Though we still have to get the edition out tonight.” He turned and clapped his hands. “Back to work, everybody!”

  The reporters drifted slowly back to their desks. When Arthur spoke again, it was in a conspiratorial whisper. “Now, what can I do for you?”

  “What do you know about moonstones?”

  The portly editor raised an eyebrow. “As much as any man on my salary can be expected to. They’re expensive minerals that have to be specially imported – they don’t tend to turn up in the Lower Fleet, if you catch my meaning.”

  “What are they used for?” asked Jonathan.

  “Mainly ornamental purposes: decorating mirrors, lamps, watches. . .”

  “Doesn’t sound like a typical Vendetta purchase,” Carnegie rumbled.

  “The vampire’s involved?” asked Arthur.

  “According to Dexter Scabble, and there’s a payment in Vendetta’s ledger to prove it,” Carnegie replied. He turned to Jonathan. “Where is it, boy?”

  “I left it over – hey!”

  From nowhere, a boy had soundlessly crept up to the desk behind Jonathan and now sat idly flicking through the ledger, his feet propped up on another chair. The boy looked up and winked at Jonathan, who grinned with recognition. Harry Pierce was the son of James Ripper, who had died at his brother Lucien’s hands. With James dead, Harry no longer had any claim to the Ripper’s throne, and had instead settled down as a journalist at the Informer. Although at first Jonathan had despised Harry’s airy, arrogant demeanour, he had come to respect the boy’s bravery, and knew better than most that beneath his frivolity lay a serious soul who had never really recovered from the death of his father.

  Not that this was easy to tell right now. Harry was beaming from ear to ear, completely unaffected by Carnegie looming over him.

  “That’s not yours to read, Pierce. I don’t recall giving you permission.”

  “It’s not yours to read, either,” Harry retorted. “Did Vendetta give you permission?”

  “We didn’t have the opportunity to ask him,” Raquella answered sharply. “My master is hunting Jonathan, and we have to find out why. All we know is that it is tied in with Thomas Ripper’s death, and the moonstone Vendetta bought from Scabble.”

  “Hmm. . .” Harry mused as he pored over the ledger. “Interesting. You said something about moonstones being used in watches, right? Well, you might want to investigate this payment here.”

  Jonathan followed Harry’s finger along the final page of the ledger to a small, innocuous payment above the Scabble entry:

  “Bartlemas is a watchmaker on the other side of town,” Harry explained. “And Thomas Horne, well, I hardly need to tell you who he is.”

  At the mention of the second name, Arthur Blake looked up sharply, brow creased in thought. “Incredible. I wonder that this means?”

  “I thought it was interesting too,” Harry said happily, blowing the fringe out of his eyes. Looking up at Jonathan and Carnegie’s blank faces, he chuckled. “You don’t know who he is, do you?”

  “Not yet,” Carnegie growled, “but if you don’t tell us sharpish, there’s going to be some unpleasantness.”

  “Really, Elias,” Arthur tutted reproachfully, “I’d have thought that you would have recognized the name. Especially given the current circumstances. . .”

  Carnegie groaned loudly and put his head in his hands.

  “Who is it?” asked Jonathan. “What’s going on?”

  “Whatever it is,” the wereman replied grimly, “it’s bigger than I could have imagined.”

  “Oh,” Raquella said suddenly. “I see.”

  “I don’t!” Jonathan cried out. “Who’s Thomas Horne?”

  “Most Darksiders knew by him by his real surname,” Harry added. “The one he took up after the Blood Succession. I called him Grandfather.”

  Jonathan started. Harry’s grandfather was Thomas Ripper. Then it came to him – all the Rippers lived under assumed surnames until the Succession. Thomas Ripper must have grown up as Thomas Horne. And was still using that name to pay Bartlemas thirty years later. Carnegie was right – something very big was taking place in Darkside, and Jonathan was being inexorably dragged into it.

  Harry closed the ledger with a merry thump. “Aren’t you glad you stopped by?”

  10

  The carriage clattered through the streets, its frantic progress a legacy of the mishaps and miseries that had befallen countless previous journeys through the Darkside night. On the Grand, it had swerved violently to avoid the urchins scrabbling in the gutters for dropped pennies, and in the twisted arteries of the Lower Fleet, the coachman had to keep his nerve to speed past a gang of desperate robbers lying in ambush. The horses whinnied and bucked their heads in protest, the lash of the whip on their flanks driving them onward.

  Sandwiched between Carnegie and Raquella in the back seat of the carriage, Jonathan felt every bump and jolt.

  “Are we nearly there yet?”

  “Not
far now,” Harry answered, hidden from view by Carnegie’s sizeable frame. “Bartlemas’s shop is just a couple of streets away.”

  Harry had insisted on coming with them, mischievously mentioning something about an exclusive. Now he was squashed up by the window, trying to read through the ledger, waving the corner of the book dangerously close to the scowling wereman.

  “You might want to put that away, Pierce,” warned Carnegie. “If I lose an eye, you can bet that you will too.”

  “It’d almost be worth it,” Harry replied excitedly. “This ledger is incredible. Anybody who’s anybody is in here. For example, did you know that Eli Kinski was paying the actress Gracie Harcourt ten pounds a week? No wonder she can afford to live on Savage Row!”

  “I’m sure Kinski’s wife would be delighted to hear that,” Raquella replied darkly.

  “There’s a shady deal on every single page,” Harry said, shaking his head in wonder. “Vendetta could have blackmailed half the borough if he wanted to. But that’s not all – look at this.”

  He awkwardly passed the ledger around Carnegie to Jonathan. “The name Josiah Bartlemas turns up on the third of every month. Same amount, always from Grandfather. Like clockwork.”

  “But what was he paying him for?”

  “That’s what we’re going to find out, boy,” Carnegie rumbled.

  As the carriage sharply turned a corner, Jonathan’s brow creased with consternation. There was something about the name Bartlemas that was bothering him – for some reason, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he had heard it before.

  “We’re here,” said Carnegie, and banged on the roof of the carriage. The coachman hauled on the reins, bringing the vehicle to a halt at the crossroads of two deserted streets of terraced housing. Bartlemas Timepieces had set up an unassuming residence on the corner, its run-down wooden façade and dusty latticed windowpanes shying away from the street lamps. The shop floor was dark, a “Closed” sign hanging in the front door. On the first floor, a large clock face had been set into the wall, the second hand conducting a silent circuit around the dial. It was approaching half past eleven at night.

  Carnegie approached the building and peered in through one of the windowpanes.

  “It’s shut,” he said.

  “You noticed?” Jonathan shot back.

  The wereman pulled away from the window and glared at him. “Bartlemas’s shop is always open. The clock never stops, the door never closes. He’s famous for it. No – this isn’t right. Maybe Vendetta isn’t the only Darksider who’s left town.” Carnegie stopped, noticing Jonathan’s frown. “What is it, boy?”

  “I dunno . . . it’s weird. . . I’ve just got this feeling that I’ve seen this place before.”

  “Unlikely. We’ve never been to this part of town. You must be confusing it with somewhere else.”

  “Yeah . . . perhaps,” Jonathan said slowly, though he knew that wasn’t it. He glanced up and down the street. “Shall we have a look inside, then?”

  Carnegie swung a boot back to kick down the front door, but Harry stopped him. Pulling out a set of slender picks from his pocket, the boy kneeled down and began jiggling them in the lock.

  “No need to destroy the poor guy’s shop,” he murmured.

  “I see Arthur’s been teaching you more than editing.”

  “Tools of the trade,” Harry replied. “I am a journalist, after all.”

  There was a click, and the door swung open. Harry bowed to Raquella, and gestured for her to enter.

  “Ladies first.”

  “You’re too kind,” the maid replied acidly, moving through into the shop. Harry winked at Jonathan behind her back.

  “I think she likes me,” he whispered out of the corner of his mouth.

  “I’m not sure she does,” Jonathan whispered back.

  Harry frowned. “No. Maybe not.”

  The first thing that struck Jonathan upon entering Bartlemas Timepieces was the noise: the shop echoed with the insistent chirrup of ticking clocks, as though they were standing in a field of metal crickets. Every inch of space in the glass display cases and on the front counter was taken up with watches, hundreds of tiny mechanisms furiously working to keep pace with time. By the wall, a platoon of grandfather clocks stood stiffly to attention.

  Unsure what he was looking for, Jonathan closed the front door behind him and begin to inspect the display cabinets. Suddenly there was an explosion of chimes and cymbals: Jonathan spun round, expecting to see some monstrous creature, while beside him Harry instantly adopted a fighting stance. Then, from the other side of the room, came the sound of Carnegie chuckling.

  “Easy there, boys. Just the clocks. It’s half past eleven.”

  Jonathan relaxed, feeling a little foolish.

  Harry looked rueful. “It’s been a while since I’ve done something like this – I think I’m out of practice.”

  “I’m not sure I’ve ever been in practice,” Jonathan said. “I’m going to look upstairs.”

  He slipped behind the counter and headed up the stairs, pleased to leave the cacophonous ticking behind. He found himself in a high-ceilinged workshop, where rows of wounded watches spilled tiny cogs and coils out on to the workbenches. The centre of the room was dominated by a large upright piece of iron shaped like a fin. As the moonlight stole in through the windows, a shaft of white light bounced off the fin and arced out across the floor. Looking down at his feet, Jonathan saw that a clock face had been painted on to the floorboards.

  There was the sound of footfalls on the stairs, and his companions appeared. Raquella passed her hand through the beam of moonlight.

  “A moondial!” she breathed. “How wonderful.”

  “Not bad,” Carnegie agreed. “But it doesn’t tell us where Bartlemas is. Let’s spread out.”

  Jonathan began a tour of the room, inspecting every broken watch in the hope of stumbling over some kind of clue. Near the window, he passed Harry, who was frowning, holding up a large sheet of paper boasting an immensely complicated diagram.

  “What’s that?” Jonathan asked.

  “I’m not sure. I’m guessing it’s some sort of clock.”

  “Looks more like a circuit board to me.”

  “A what board?”

  “Never mind.” Experience had taught Jonathan that Darksiders were best kept away from modern technology. He hadn’t forgotten the first time Carnegie had encountered a television at Jonathan’s house on Lightside – the wereman had growled suspiciously at the screen until it had been turned off.

  Harry gathered up the plans and folded them into his back pocket.

  “Anyone found anything?” he called out.

  Carnegie shook his head. “There’s nothing here.”

  “Not if you don’t look properly,” Raquella called out from underneath one of the workbenches. She emerged on her hands and knees, her black dress covered in dust. In her hand was a small calling card.

  “One of the few advantages of being a maid,” she said lightly, accepting the wereman’s help up. “You know where things get lost.”

  The card read simply:

  Jonathan had barely finished reading it when there came the sound of a carriage drawing up outside. Harry dashed to the window.

  “We’ve got company,” he reported.

  Jonathan joined him at the window, and peered through the smeared glass to the street below. Although the carriage had stopped by the street lamp outside the front of the shop, steam rising from the flanks of the horses, no one got out.

  “What are they waiting for?” asked Jonathan.

  There came a deep rumbling sound by way of reply, and the pavement outside Bartlemas’s shop began to shake.

  “Uh oh,” breathed Harry.

  In a sudden eruption of stones and pebbles, two figures exploded from out of the pavement. They drew the
mselves up to their full height, necks slowly turning as they inspected their new surroundings.

  Jonathan gasped. “Bow Street Runners!” he hissed.

  “No kidding,” Harry replied. “But what are they doing here?”

  “More importantly,” Carnegie growled softly, “who’s in the carriage?”

  The vehicle had maintained an aloof distance from the Runners, staying back in the shadows. Thick black drapes hung in the windows, and the side door was decorated with an ornate crest.

  Carnegie let out a low whistle. “The plot thickens.”

  Jonathan was about to ask what he meant when the door of the carriage opened and a man stepped out, his resplendent white hair shining in the streetlight.

  “It’s Holborn!” Harry exclaimed. “But why’s the Abettor here?”

  “We can find out later,” Carnegie replied. “I don’t like the look of this. Let’s get out of here.”

  As he spoke, the Bow Street Runners stepped up to the wall of Bartlemas Timepieces and melted into the brickwork. The building trembled slightly, and then a series of heavy footfalls could be heard from downstairs.

  “Come on!” the wereman hissed. He ran over to the side of the room and hauled open a window. Needing no second invitation, Harry swung out of the window and lithely scaled down the drainpipe to the ground below. Jonathan hadn’t forgotten how athletic Harry was – but he was more surprised by Raquella, who quickly tucked up her skirt and clambered neatly after him.

  There was a thud on the staircase. The Runners were coming.

  Jonathan slipped quickly through the window and into the darkness, his breath frosting in the early winter air. Clinging to the pipe with cold fingers, he made his descent hand-over-hand, his feet struggling to get purchase on the brickwork. Near the bottom, the pipe wobbled violently, and Jonathan looked up to see that Carnegie had closed the window and followed after him. Realizing that the drainpipe wasn’t strong enough to hold the both of them, Jonathan let go and dropped to the floor.