“An idea,” said I, gazing with impetuous hope at the vehicle resting on the cobbles. “Come along, we’re filling you with a hot meal.”
As Vesalius Munt was only my second murder, in the immediate aftermath I imagined that a black reaction would set upon me with razor teeth; such was not the case, however. My mind was piercingly clear, and I recognised the shabby manure-spattered coach which had carried me to purgatory at age nine as soon as I glimpsed it, thinking, Here—if we are very lucky—perhaps is an ally.
The instant we entered the tavern, Clarke leaning weakly against my arm, I spied him: Nick, the driver who had conveyed me here so long ago. Swiftly, I ushered us to a table. A cheerful wench wearing an apron which perhaps had been used to muck out the stables previous to dinner service grunted at my order and, upon her departure, I leant across the table to grasp Clarke’s frail hands.
“Eat your curry when it arrives, slowly. I need to speak with someone.”
“Who could you possibly know here?” Clarke asked, but I was already striding towards the coachman.
Nick sat, nursing a pint, staring at grooves carved in the bar by time and dissolution. The same forces had done a workmanlike job with his face, for his mouth was bordered by stark crevasses, and his oncered nose had abandoned its unheeded alarums and subsided to a sulky yellow.
“Nick, I think.” I nearly coughed at the ripe cloud surrounding him. His boots were worn, which gave me hope, and his fingernails were cracked. “It’s a long time ago we met, but I hope you—”
“I dun’t know ye,” he slurred, slurping at the beer. “I live on the highway, Lunnon to Manchester, Manchester to Lunnon, picking up fares. Never a respit’, never two nights i’ the same bloody place. Unless yer a sprite after hauntin’ my carriage, and ye look a sprite right enough, by Jesus, I dun’t—”
“You brought me here when I was a girl. I gave you a potted rabbit luncheon I couldn’t eat for nerves.”
“Chestnut—he’s a horse, mind—knows me better than me own pillow, us having spent considerable more time together, and I’ve never clapped eye on ye before. I tell ye, I never stop moving—”
“‘The world is a hard place, and I live in it alone,’” I whispered.
Flinching, Nick narrowed red-rimmed eyes at me. “By George,” he husked at length. “Is that ye in the flesh, then? The wee miss wi’ the tragic eyes I dun brought here from Highgate House? Yer alive?”
“And in need of your help.”
Nick spat, recalling to my mind his alacrity at this skill. “Help, ye say? What daft breed o’ thickheaded are—”
“I gave you a basket full of food once. Now I’ll pay you six shillings to carry my friend and me to London.”
“Stomached enough o’ Lowan Bridge, then?” he puzzled, wiping his brow with his wrist.
“You couldn’t have chosen a more appropriate phrase.”
“And now I’m meant to risk my hide when Vesalius Munt hasn’t let a charge disappear in nigh—”
“He’s dead.” My eyes brimmed—for myself and Clarke, for dread of shackles and scaffolds. “There will be no consequences to you, Nick, upon my honour.”
Were I to picture my honour, I imagine it might resemble a less attractive than usual tadpole; Nick owned no inkling of this, however, and his bleary eyes boggled.
“Mr. Munt dead? The shite-arsed bastard what bilks the factory lads from here to three counties hence?”
“Bilks them?”
“Bilks them!” Nick cried, livening at last. “Aye, he never delivers a meal at discount save he’s less ten portions promised. Says as benefactors can’t give beyond their means or they’d turn paupers themselves! I’d love to see that feller stuck through the—”
“Someone beat you to it. Oh, please, Nick! We can’t go back, and you know how hard the world is.”
Nick considered, thoughtfully gathering spittle. I thought then that kindness had not deserted him, and I think now that he needed my money, for he did not look well. We are all of us daily decaying, after all; the speed is our only variant.
Nick spat; Nick finished his beer.
“I’ll oblige ye, after I’ve rounded up the other fares what have already paid.” He took my coins and dropped them straightaway upon the bar as he nodded to the serving lass. “But if ye thought the world was hard before . . . cor, will Lunnon ever throw ye to the wolves. She were suckled by a wolf mother, they say,” he added with a faint flash of his old dire humour.
“At least she was fed,” I muttered as Nick called for the bill to be settled.
When he departed, I returned to our table and passed a gentle hand over Clarke’s pallid brow, promising to return upon the instant after using the privy and imploring her to be patient as she finished her modest meal. The pressure within my cranium had grown nearly unbearable by then; half-frantic with fear, sidling behind her so that my semi-conscious friend might not see, I bore my trunk to the outhouse, barred the door, and deposited my bloodied uniform therein. It was not a perfect solution—but it was foul enough to serve, and anyhow, I reminded myself grimly, it seemed that most of my solutions to conundrums fell considerably shy of the mark.