by Evelyn James
Jasmine had gone straight over to an old Chinese woman and was saying something in her sharp native tongue. Clara had no hope of following the conversation, not with the clipped syllables and strange elongations the two women were making of their words. Jasmine finally returned.
“Not here, he owes them too much money,” she said, a grin lighting up her eyes. “They won’t let him in through the door.”
Jasmine escorted them from the first den to another, and then another after that. At each she asked her question and was greeted by a shake of the head, or sometimes by an irate rant from the owner of the den. Simon Clark appeared to accrue a lot of debts, certainly he was rather unpopular among the opium dealers.
“I have an idea,” Jasmine said as they departed from the fourth such den and Clara uneasily looked at the time on her watch. “There is a den recently opened. Let’s try there, maybe they haven’t worked out Clark is a bad payer yet.”
Jasmine took them on another circuitous route through the back streets. Clara was beginning to wonder how the girl knew so much about the opium dens, but was not in the mood to ask. It wouldn’t be much longer before they would need to catch the last train back to Brighton. Time was running out and Clara did not want to leave London without something to show for her day’s excursion.
They came to a building much like all the rest and once again Jasmine marched in without a hint of trepidation. Clara briskly followed. By now she was growing used to the opium smoke and, while she did feel a little light-headed, she could not say that it was effecting her dangerously. Clara waited impatiently while Jasmine went to talk to the owner of the place.
“Wild goose chase, springs to mind,” Tommy puttered. He had done a lot of walking that day and his legs, still suffering from his war wounds, were complaining.
Clara wished she could counter his statement, but she was feeling the same way. Maybe Simon Clark was in his lodgings or, worse, stuck in a prison cell. This might, after all, be another red herring.
Clara was about to suggest they give up when Jasmine ran up to them looking excited.
“He’s here,” she said. “In a side room. I told you they don’t know he is a bad payer yet.”
Clara breathed out a sigh of relief. Now all they had to do was drag the man out of here and ask him some questions.
“Show us, Jasmine.”
Jasmine showed Clara to the side room, which was really just a partitioned section of the main room with curtains draped over the front to afford privacy. The owner of the opium den followed them, complaining about something. Jasmine shot a few words at her, but the woman lingered nearby, watching their every move.
Pulling back the heavy curtain, Jasmine revealed a man lying on a pile of cushions. He looked like someone had just dropped him there. His arms sprawled out either side of him, one still clutching the mouthpiece of the opium pipe, which was a largish device somewhat like an Arab hookah. The man’s head was thrown back, falling off the cushions. His mouth gagged open and his eyes were rolled up in his skull.
“Is he dead?” Clara asked in astonishment.
“Probably not,” Jasmine clambered over the cushions and slapped the back of her hand on the man’s cheeks.
The opium den’s owner began to putter again. Clara shut her up by handing her some money.
“We’ll have to sober him up before he can talk,” O’Harris observed grimly.
“First things first, we get him out of here,” Clara strode into the room and bent down by Simon Clark. She felt his cheek first and was reassured by its warmth. “He’s breathing. Though if he stays like this for long he might not be. He could easily choke to death in that position.”
O’Harris joined Clara and Jasmine as they heaved Simon Clark upwards. He was a dead weight and Bob wandered in to help. Eventually the unconscious man was slung between the shoulders of O’Harris and Bob. They dragged him from the room and negotiated around recumbent figures until they found the door and made their way outside. The den owner, Clara’s money safely in her hand, did nothing to try and stop them.
“What now?” O’Harris asked, readjusting the weight of Clark on his shoulder. “We’ll need to take him somewhere.”
Clara found herself hesitating; where could they take him? Perhaps there was a hotel or lodging house where they might rent a room for a short time, but she didn’t like the idea of too many people seeing her consorting with Clark and reporting her ‘interview’ to those who had commissioned the robbery. She knew she was dealing with powerful people, the sort of people who had money and no qualms about hiring a thief to steal someone else’s property. Clara didn’t want her name getting back to them too soon. Not until she was ready to confront them, at least. Dragging the unconscious Clark into a hotel would make her activities all too obvious.
Jasmine was looking at them curiously, assessing them and their dilemma. She was also eyeing up Simon Clark, who was standing before her (if you could call it standing) completely helpless. She had not forgotten how he had threatened her father, nor how frightened her father had been. Jasmine, on the contrary, did not frighten easily and had been looking for a way to revenge the wrong Clark had done her family for some time.
“Bring him to my rooms,” she said. “Father works in the shop until late. No one will be there apart from us.”
Clara hesitated. It was a way out for her, but she was concerned about putting the girl into danger. Simon Clark, from what she had gathered, was not a nice piece of work.
“I don’t know…” she started, but Jasmine interrupted her.
“Where else will you take him?” she asked. “He’ll need tea and probably something to eat to rouse him enough to talk to you. I don’t see you have a choice but to accept my help.”
Clara suspected she was right.
“Could we make a decision?” O’Harris moaned. “This man is surprisingly heavy and he smells like a wet dog.”
Bob turned his head and sniffed Clark to confirm what O’Harris had said.
“He’s right,” he agreed.
“All right, we’ll take him to Jasmine’s rooms,” Clara conceded reluctantly.
Jasmine seemed delighted by this pronouncement, but Clara shared an anxious look with Tommy. He shrugged his shoulders, they were running out of options.
It seemed a long walk back to where they had first been introduced to Jasmine. O’Harris grumbled every time Clark’s dragging feet hooked on a loose stone or scrap of rubbish. Bob didn’t seem to notice the burden. Clara suspected he could carry the recumbent man all by himself if he wished, but did not want to offend O’Harris’ pride by doing so. Everyone was filmed in a layer of sweat by the time they reached the side road where the old Chinese lady was quietly peeling her potatoes.
“I think he is waking up!” O’Harris announced sharply.
Jasmine hurried to open the door to her lodgings and directed the party up the stairs with eager flicks of her hand. They clunked Clark up the steps, his feet catching on every single one. Jasmine slipped past them and hurried forward to open a door. By now O’Harris was weary and even Bob looked tired. As they negotiated their load through the doorway, they clipped Clark’s head on the doorpost. He opened his eyes, gave a delayed cry of pain and started to take in his surroundings.
“Quick, tie him to this chair!” Jasmine pulled a wooden chair into the middle of the room and Clark was dropped onto it.
He was beginning to take an interest in what was going on as they hurried to use some washing line to fasten his hands to the back of the chair, and then his ankles to the chair legs. Simon Clark was coming alert fast. He pulled at his tied wrists and scowled around at them.
“Hey! What’s going on?” he demanded.
Clara placed herself before him.
“Mr Clark. Nice to meet you. I have a few questions I would like you to answer for me.”
Chapter Seventeen
Simon Clark was everything you might expect from a professional criminal and opium addict. He was sc
rawny, the sort of scrawny that looks close to being considered emaciated. The opium no doubt kept hunger at bay, with the result that he was skin and bones. But Simon did not mind that because he had made a career for himself specialising in getting into places that other people could not. Eating was a professional hazard, so he didn’t touch food unless absolutely necessary. There was not an ounce of fat on the man and that was just the way Simon liked it.
He was not overly tall, which was another benefit for his thievery. His face mimicked his body, being merely a layer of skin over the bone of his skull. He had unpleasantly defined cheekbones and a slight overbite which, with his taut skin, meant his front teeth were prone to protruding from his mouth even when it was closed. He had cut his hair close to the scalp and could have passed easily for a victim of starvation, had he wished.
Simon’s outer appearance did not inspire friendliness and his personality didn’t help. Mean, selfish and bitter towards the world, Simon saw everything in terms of how it benefited him. He cared little for people, they were just a means to earning money. He ran up debt because often he was skint and his opium addiction cost the earth. But he hardly cared. When he had used up all the credit he was allowed at one place, he simply moved on to the next. There was always someone gullible enough to accept his promises to pay later. And when he did do a job and had some ready money, he would pay off some of his debts and restore himself in the eyes of those he had previously bled dry. Simon was good at persuading people that this time he would pay them promptly.
He took a good look at Clara as he sat in the chair, hands tied behind his back. He was angry already and the woman before him was only making things worse by the way she glared at him. He was not impressed and not inclined to talk.
“Let me go!” he demanded.
“I have it on good authority that you burgled a house in Brighton the other week,” Clara ignored his demand.
Simon Clark wriggled in his chair.
“What is this? You want money?” Simon glowered at the men around him, then his eyes settled on Jasmine. “Is this your father’s doing? Where is the squinty-eyed runt!”
“This has everything to do with me,” Clara stepped right in front of him and spoke. “Look at me when I am speaking to you.”
Simon Clark looked squarely into Clara’s face, then he spat at her. In truth, she had been half expecting such a response and did not satisfy him by flinching in surprise. However, he did earn the indignation of Bob, who rested one large meat-slab of a hand on his shoulder. Bob rather looked like he could eat Simon Clark and still have room for pudding. Just the weight of his hand on Simon’s shoulder made the thief reconsider his antagonism.
Clara wiped her face with a handkerchief.
“And all I wanted was a nice little chat,” she grumbled in mock disappointment. “Bob was hoping you could give me all the answers I wanted.”
Bob squeezed Simon’s shoulder a little too hard, making the bony man wince. That was the problem with a lack of fat, each touch went straight to the bone. Tommy and O’Harris moved to stand behind Clara and they too had a mean look in their eyes. They had both been on the verge of reacting to Simon’s disrespect of Clara, but Bob had beaten them to it, and Bob was an expert at silent intimidation.
“He’s like a puppet,” Bob remarked, his large fingers further squeezing into Simon’s shoulder. “Like a wooden puppet. No flesh on him at all. How does he not break anything when he moves about?”
Clara could see Bob’s face, and knew the question had been purely innocent, a casual remark that didn’t imply anything. But Simon took it as a threat, a hint that if he didn’t behave bones might get broken. In the world Simon lived in, that was a very real possible ending to a conversation. Some of his defiance evaporated.
“Shall we try again?” Clara asked him sweetly. “The other week you committed a burglary in Brighton, yes?”
“What of it?” Simon growled, deciding that she already knew he was responsible and he had nothing to lose by admitting to it. “You aren’t the police, why do you want to know?”
“Correct, I am not the police. The police have lost interest, just another burglary with no clues left behind. They don’t have the time to dabble around in these affairs like I do,” Clara smiled. “I am looking for the green jade dragon. I am going to restore it to its rightful owner. You are going to help me, because it is in your best interest to do so.”
Simon cast a sideways look at Bob. The man seemed built of bricks.
“I might have been in Brighton,” he said, reluctantly.
“Please don’t play games,” Clara gave a bored sigh. “I know you robbed the house, now all I want to know is who employed you to do so?”
“I was working off me own back,” Simon said quickly, too quickly.
Clara narrowed her eyes at him, though Simon was keeping a close watch on Bob and did not notice.
“You travelled all the way to Brighton on the off-chance you would find a house to burgle?” she said, incredulously.
“No, I had heard of the place,” Simon answered. “Heard it had nice stuff in it.”
“And you went to all that effort,” Clara countered, “to steal just one small object? You could have filled a bag with dozens of things from that house, enough to keep you in opium for years. And you just stole one thing?”
Simon Clark realised how ridiculous he sounded, but he insisted on playing along.
“Yeah,” he said.
“Pretty rubbish thief then, aren’t you?” Clara scowled at him. “You had an opportunity to make a small fortune and instead you stole one object. The one object in the house, in fact, that was the rarest and therefore potentially the easiest to trace by someone looking for it, should it happen to come up on the open market.”
Clara paused for a second to let this information sink in.
“Who did you pawn it to?” she asked.
“No one.”
“Then who did you fence it to?” Clara rephrased her question, in case Simon was trying to be clever by being pedantic.
“I didn’t fence it,” Simon barked back.
“So you still have it?” Clara queried. “Where is it? Hidden in your lodgings? You can take us to it.”
“No, look, I don’t have it!” Simon squirmed in his bonds, playing coy was only buying him so much time and he had yet to figure out how to escape. His hands he might be able to work free, his legs were another matter and the second he tried anything the three men in the room would be all over him like dogs on a fox. He could see that all very well. Simon thought it might be time to offer them something, to start to negotiate. “I sold it.”
“Who to?” Clara asked.
“A man,” Simon shrugged as well as his bonds would allow. “I didn’t get his name.”
Bob’s meaty hand clenched on his shoulder.
“I was hoping to be home for my supper,” he said in a sad little voice, loud enough they could all hear. “I don’t like missing my supper. I don’t like it when people make me miss my supper.”
Simon felt his chest tighten in anxiety, he took a breath through clenched teeth.
“You need to start being more specific. You really ought to remember who you sold the dragon to,” Clara said patiently. “Unless you did not sell it. Perhaps you gave it to the person who hired you?”
“I worked alone,” Simon hissed, but he was no longer sounding convincing.
“Can I hit him,” Bob said with a forlorn sigh. “He isn’t going to say anything until I hit him, and I am getting fed up.”
“So am I,” remarked O’Harris. “The fellow is a little weasel and he will lie through his teeth to you unless you start getting mean.”
“I was hoping this would not come down to violence,” Clara told them both. “I thought Mr Clark would have the sense to talk.”
“Clearly not,” O’Harris snorted. “I don’t usually hold with torture, but this little man has rather gotten under my skin.”
“If you won’
t hit him, I will!” Jasmine appeared at the side of the group holding a metal ladle. “I’ve been wanting to hit him since he threatened my father.”
The ladle was of the stout iron kind, it was probably decades old. The sort of household item that is so robust that it is inherited by generation after generation with barely a notch or a scratch on it. Simon’s eyes widened as he looked at the culinary weapon that Jasmine waggled dangerously.
“For the moment, no one is hitting anyone,” Clara put out her hands to calm her friends. “Mr Clark will clearly have enough sense, given time, to realise it is best to speak honestly with us. The sooner he does so, the sooner he can go back to his opium with all his fingers and toes intact.”
Simon turned his full attention on her, a nasty snarl forming on his lips.
“Supposing I did work for someone else?” he said. “What do you think they will do to me if they find out I told you?”
“I don’t know,” Clara shrugged honestly. “But first they have to find out and catch you. In contrast, we already have you. The question you have to ask yourself is whether the danger you imagine happening is more frightening than the very real danger you are currently in.”
Clara allowed this to sink in to her captive, who looked around at all the faces maliciously scowling at him. Except for Bob. Bob seemed bored and gave Simon a smile and a friendly squeeze of the shoulder which threatened to break bones.
“Nothing personal, on my part,” Bob explained. “I’m just helping.”
Simon felt that somehow made things worse.
“I’ve had enough,” Jasmine declared and she swung the ladle and would have very nearly smashed in Simon’s nose had Tommy not guessed what was to occur and grabbed her arm at the last minute. The ladle swung barely an inch from Simon’s face, and he could feel the whistle of air as it went past. The thought of that heavy iron spoon cracking into his face, breaking bone and teeth was enough to make him reconsider his silence.
