“Your guess is as good as mine,” I said, and peeked inside.
The massive map had been stuffed to one side, and I noticed a few pins had managed to cling to their positions, dangling limply from the ruffled map, while the others must have been scattered across the floor. A book flew from behind the desk to land on the small pile beginning to collect in the leather armchair. Jackaby popped up, hurriedly flipping through the pages of another, and quietly cursing the lack of useful information he seemed to be finding.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Looking,” he managed, without glancing up. He tucked two of the tomes under his arm and leafed through a third as he brushed past me, back into the hall. Jenny scowled as he passed right through her shoulder before she had time to pull away.
“Haven’t you already been through all these?”
“Yes, but now I know what I’m looking for!” He zipped down the crooked corridor.
“And what, precisely, is that?” I was yelling after Jackaby, as he dashed out of sight. He either didn’t hear me or couldn’t be bothered to respond. I gave the still-scowling Jenny a quick apology. As I hurried out, I noticed that the frying pan had been removed from the wall. The rough hole it had carved still remained, and orange light from the sunset was trickling through it into the hallway. I found myself thinking that, all things considered, the poor ghost really was a remarkably patient roommate.
I caught up with Jackaby again halfway down the block. He was so buried in one of his books, I was surprised he was able to notice my arrival, let alone navigate the walk, but as I drew near, he pitched the other two books into my hands. His lips moved silently and rapidly as his eyes zipped over the pages.
“Jackaby—what are we looking for?” I demanded.
He pried his eyes slowly up from the page and caught my gaze. “Lead.”
“Lead? What—as in the metal?”
He dropped the last book into my arms atop the others. “That might help, at least. And some decent kindling.”
He picked up the pace again and hastened toward the center of town. It was all I could do not to drop his books or crack my tailbone on the icy roads as I struggled to keep up.
The sun was melting into a reddish haze behind the buildings and treetops, and I turned my collar to the biting cold. Here and there, stars were beginning to peek through the gaps in the dark sky, but the moon was nothing but a diffused glow behind the shifting curtain of clouds. It did little to illuminate the shadowy streets. Terraced with well-kept brickwork, a broad stretch of sidewalk opened ahead of us, forming a semicircle around a statue of an important-looking soldier on a rampant horse. A few large flower boxes had been erected at some point to lend color to the block, but the frost had long since finished off the blooms. Across the street sat the city hall, regal, white columns dominating its fa?ade and leaving the recessed entrance a sheet of inscrutable black.
Around the rampant statue, a crowd of a dozen or so uniformed officers had begun to collect. They milled about, some attempting to look alert and attentive, others unabashedly sitting on the edges of flower boxes and puffing away on cigarettes.
Curtains in the surrounding buildings darted open here and there, revealing the curious faces of residents taking notice of the gathering. A few passing workmen stopped to lean against the fence, passing a silver flask around while they waited for something interesting to happen. By the evening’s end, they would not be disappointed. I caught sight of a pair of ladies whispering and casting severe and condescending looks in my direction. One wore a bonnet overloaded with flowers, and the other was in a canary yellow dress.
“Yes, exactly,” came flower-bonnet’s nasal drone over the dull murmur of the square, “she’s that sort.”
“Shameful,” intoned yellow-dress.
I had no intention of playing their repentant lost lamb, withering at their glances. Instead, I threw them a cheeky wink as I jogged up the steps into the square. They looked mortified and bustled away, noses raised, in the opposite direction. I drew up to my employer’s side as he halted at last, my heavy breaths puffing out in pillowy, white clouds ahead of me. He was scanning the assembled officers, and those still trickling in from Mason Street, when his eyes narrowed slightly and his posture straightened.
I tried to slow my labored breathing and spot the target of his interest. “What is it?” I whispered.
Jackaby nodded in the direction of a slender alley through which a figure was approaching, wearing a dark cloak and stiff top hat. The drainage grates billowed steam across the alleyway, shrouding the figure in a pale silhouette at first. As he neared, his features grew slowly more distinct, until he reached the street and came out of the fog and shadows, revealing a bushy-bearded face with rosy cheeks. Jackaby relaxed. “No one. Never mind.”
“Wait, I’ve met him,” I realized. “Let me see . . . Mr. Stapleton, I think. He tried to buy a tin of Old Bart’s from me.” He spotted me as we passed, and gave a polite nod of recognition, which I returned before he continued out of sight down the lane.
Jackaby looked at me. “Why were you selling tins of—wait, Stapleton?”
“Yes, I think so.”
“As in Stapleton Foundry? As in Stapleton Metalworks?”
“Maybe? I don’t know. He was nice. He told me to keep my chin up.” Jackaby was already hurrying off after the man.
“Wait here!” he called over his shoulder. “I’m going to see a man about some lead!”
I stood, alone, clutching Jackaby’s old books to my chest and stamping my feet to keep out the cold while I watched the police officers collect.
“Hello again, Abigail Rook,” called a familiar female voice behind me, and I turned to see who had spoken. All around were men in uniform, and none of them appeared remotely interested in me.
“Something different about you,” she continued. She was only a few feet away when I finally spotted her.
“Oh, hello, Hatun! I’m sorry, I didn’t notice you at first.”
The old woman smiled knowingly. “Findin’ a place in the world, I see,” she said, and brushed her shawl casually with one mittened hand. “And how are the new lodgings? Comfortable?”
“What’s that? Oh, yes, I suppose. Jackaby has lent me the use of a room. Speaking of which, did you happen to see where—”
“That isn’t it, though,” she cut me off, subjecting me to the same suspicious, narrow-eyed examination as she had during our first encounter. “Somethin’ else . . .”
“Right, well,” I said. “I would love to talk, but I really must be . . .”