The Revolutions (27 page)

“Only a madman or a fool would confront Podmore without proper preparation.”

“Preparation. You mean delay. By God, Atwood—if you spent every night by her side, listening to her every breath. If you…”

He fell silent. Atwood looked at Arthur for a long time, then steered him into one of the many empty rooms of his house.

“Sit.” Atwood gestured towards the chairs by the unlit fireplace. He fiddled with lamps. “There’s more at stake than Josephine, you know. But I agree.”

“What does that mean?”

“You mustn’t breathe a word of this to the others.”

“Of what? Why not?”

“The others are—traditionalists. They believe in rites and ceremonies. They’ll do this sort of thing for ever. But you’re quite right. We don’t have time to waste, do we? The ordinary rules no longer apply. We must take firmer action.”

Atwood leaned forward as he spoke, and watched Arthur intently. Lamplight made his shadow tremendous, uncanny. Arthur gave it a long look, half-expecting it to move, or speak, or do something dreadful as soon as he took his eyes off it.

“Can I trust you?”

“If it helps Josephine.”

“Are you willing to what must be done?”

“What are you planning, Atwood?”

“My man Lewis is preparing my coach.”

“At this hour?”

“I intend to visit our friend Thorold,” Atwood said, “And to put some questions to him, man to man. Will you join me?”

Arthur was silent for quite some time.

“Thorold murdered our colleague Leggum, don’t forget—and you may be quite, quite sure that he’s done worse than that.”

“Murder, Atwood?”

“Of course. Perhaps not by his hand. But you may be sure that it was no coincidence that Mr Leggum’s horse bolted. If your conscience is troubling you, Shaw—”

“My conscience held its tongue through that diabolical ritual. Who am I to balk at a little burglary?”

“Good. Then I can trust you?”

“What do you intend?”

“It won’t come to violence, if that’s what you mean. I know Thorold by reputation. A mediocre magician. A good doctor. A quiet man. There were rumours concerning the death by poisoning of a business-partner.… Well, men of that sort are not brave when confronted.”

“Men of that sort! I seem to remember a time that I hardly ever associated with murderers of any stripe.”

“I beg your pardon, Shaw? You broke into
my
house boldly enough. Has your courage failed you now that it might be of some use?”

“Now, listen, Atwood—”

Lewis called out from the hall to let them know that the coach and the fourth of their party were both ready.

“Excellent,” Atwood said. “Thank you, Lewis.”

*   *   *

Lewis climbed up into the driver’s perch with his lantern. Atwood climbed into the coach, and Arthur followed. A moment later, the fourth of their party hopped up, forcing Arthur to shift. He was horrified to see that it was Mr Dimmick.

“Dimmick! By God—what—”

Dimmick’s grin was the same as it had been back when he’d worked in Gracewell’s Engine, but the rest of him was greatly changed. He wore shoes and a hat, which made him appear somewhat less simian. His shoulders were still broad and muscular, but his face looked thin, as if he’d spent the last few weeks starving in a gutter, or tossing and turning in a fever. His cheeks were blotched with awful burns—grey in the darkness of the cab—and his left hand was wrapped in a dirty-looking bandage. He rested his long black stick on his knees.

“Ah,” Atwood said, “of course, you’ve met; you were both Gracewell’s employees. I have retained Mr Dimmick’s services for tonight.”

“He tried to kill me!”

Dimmick held up a hand. “No hard feelings, Mr Shaw! I got myself confused, that’s all. All our hard work going up in flames. You just asked too many questions. Just a nosy bugger. That’s all. Innocent man. See that now.”

“Right. Yes. That’s right, Mr Dimmick.”

The coach started moving, and Arthur realised that he was stuck in it with Dimmick whether he liked it or not.

Dimmick nodded. “Thought on it long and hard, bandaged up in that bed. Let ’im go. Let ’im be. That’s what I thought, in the end.”

Dimmick leaned forward, putting his grinning face unpleasantly close to Arthur’s. “Don’t worry, Mr Shaw. No man in London better than me to have on your side in a fight. Ask His Lordship.”

The streets were empty and they were quickly moving at such a gallop over the cobbles that it made Arthur queasy.

Atwood muttered over his hands, uttering the names of the stars and the angels and the Kabbalah.

“Atwood.”

“Hmm?”

“Atwood—why
is
Mr Dimmick here?”

“Dimmick is here to ensure that all goes well.”

“And how will he do that?”

“I would not say that Dimmick is a learned man. He has not developed his mind to any great extent—even Dimmick would admit that. But he is well-travelled, and he has developed his body. Boxing, and weightlifting, and the deeper arcana:
savate
, and
jujutsu
, and what-have-you.”

Dimmick sat back smugly. “You and me, Mr Shaw, working for His Lordship again.”

Arthur didn’t think of himself as Atwood’s employee, but he didn’t want to argue the point.

“Mr Dimmick—what happened to Vaz?”

“Who? Oh yeah, him. Could be he got out.” Dimmick shrugged, as if it was of no particular concern to him whether a man was alive or dead, whether he had or had not murdered him.

They rode for a while in silence and darkness, except for the hooves of the horses and the crack of Lewis’s whip, and Atwood’s mutterings, which Arthur took to be a form of ritual preparation. Dimmick absent-mindedly tapped his stick on his knee.

“This is awful, Atwood.”

“He must needs go that the devil drives, Shaw.”

“Devils. Quite right. Devils indeed. Now we’re consorting with—listen, Atwood, why can’t your Hidden bloody Masters help us?”

“Be quiet, Shaw. I have to prepare myself. You should be ready, too. No help will be coming from that quarter.”

“No—I dare say not. There’s no such bloody thing, is there? There’s just you and Jupiter and Mr Sun; madmen the lot of you, and I’m the maddest of all for listening to you. I should take Josephine to a doctor.”

“I’ll have Lewis stop for you if you want to walk home. Otherwise, be silent.”

Arthur stewed for a while in silence.

Lewis called muffled commands. The coach came to a stop.

*   *   *

Harley Street was silent. A weak moon, thick clouds. A light here and there in an upper window suggested doctors working late into the night over studies or experiments. The heat of the day was long gone. Something in the air threatened rain. Lewis stayed with the coach on the corner. He shuttered his lantern, rolled a cigarette, and hunched against the cold.

No lights in Thorold’s windows. It was a dark and nondescript edifice of brick, indistinguishable at night from any of its neighbours, except that a plaque by the door identified Thorold by name and as a consulting physician at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital.

Atwood gestured at the door, and Dimmick stepped forward, hunching over the lock, seeming to use his stick as a sort of crowbar. The door opened with a sickening crunch and Dimmick led the way inside.

To their right was a waiting room. Shelves of heavy tomes, presumably medical, and paintings of the sea.

A sound of footsteps, then a cough, somewhere in the darkness ahead. The glow of a light coming from under a door. Arthur froze, turned to bolt back out into the street. Atwood put a hand on his shoulder and pointed to the waiting-room. Dimmick took off his hat.

Light filled the hall. Thorold emerged from his pantry, nudging the door closed with one slippered foot. He cut an unimpressive figure, and at first Arthur took him for a servant. He was barefoot, in a nightshirt and cap, with a pair of large horn-rimmed spectacles. He carried a candle in one hand and a plate of biscuits in the other. He turned, dropped the plate, and stared in wide-eyed shock at the invaders, lifting up the candle as if he thought they must surely be a trick of the light, and a better angle might dispel them.

In the light of the candle Dr Thorold looked pale and clammy, as if he’d been awoken by a nightmare.

“You!” Thorold stared at Atwood. “You bloody lunatic, what are you doing here?”

“Thorold!” Atwood made a gesture with his left hand, holding up fingers like crooked horns. “Stop, Thorold. You’re—”

Thorold blew out his candle, dropped it, turned, and ran. Atwood ran after him, but in the dark he stepped on the candle as it rolled underfoot, and he fell. Arthur stooped to help him up.

“Stop him! Stop him—Dimmick, where’s Dimmick?”

Dimmick charged, jumping over Atwood, holding his hat to his head and brandishing his stick. Atwood and Arthur ran along behind him, through Thorold’s parlour, where Arthur banged into a looming black grand piano, and Atwood was startled by his own suddenly moonlit white-faced reflection in a mirror. When they entered Thorold’s study—a dusty, dark dead-end cluttered with books and papers, stuffed owls and weasels, jars and skulls and flasks of God-knows-what—Dimmick already had Thorold cornered, his stick under the old man’s jaw. Thorold’s spectacles had come loose from one ear and dangled precariously on the end of his nose.

“You
will
answer my questions,” Atwood said.

Thorold glared. “This is common burglary, Atwood.”

“Hah! Then you admit you know who I am.”

“Of course I know who you are, Your Lordship. And is this creature Dimmick? I know him by reputation—but Good Lord, look at him. What a specimen. Leave my house, Atwood.”

“You murdered a colleague of mine, and you’re in league with my—my enemies.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Your Lordship. Of course I follow your work—we share an interest in the new science, after all. Mine is an amateur interest, but of course medicine occupies so much of my time. I knew your father, once upon a time. A great man—”

“Enough!”

Dimmick jabbed Thorold’s chin and he fell silent.

“Now, answer my questions, doctor, and truthfully. By Mercury I command it, and Ishtar, and the Holy Ghost. Oriston, Soter, Eloy, Tetragrammaton…”

Dimmick relaxed his stick to permit Thorold to remove his dangling spectacles. Thorold ignored Atwood’s chant, glanced at Arthur, and asked who he was. Arthur said nothing.

Thorold polished his spectacles with his sleeve, muttering.

“I’ll ask again. Who are you, young man, and why are you in my house, and why are you in league with Martin Atwood? What has he promised you? You have made a very foolish choice, my friend—Atwood’s path will lead to your ruination as a magician and as a man.”

“… Zeboth, Adon, Elion, Tetragrammaton!” Atwood said. “Name your allies, Doctor Thorold.”

Thorold quite casually tossed his spectacles to Arthur, who blinked in surprise and couldn’t help but catch them. Instantly he found himself dizzy and stumbling—it seemed that the room had spun. He thought for a moment that he’d somehow tripped and fallen—where had that bookshelf come from, and where had the desk gone?

He realised with a sickening sensation that he was now standing where Thorold had been standing a moment before, and Thorold had taken his place on the other side of his study. It had only taken an instant, and now all four men in the room were moving again, but Thorold was too close to his desk to stop. He snatched up a small glass jar, and gulped most of its contents down before Dimmick’s stick knocked it from his hand. His face twisted in pain and he fell to the floor.

Atwood shouted “Name them!”

Thorold sprawled, thrashing his naked hairy legs. He coughed out names:
Backhouse, Carroll, Sandys
. Atwood repeated his command and Thorold coughed out
Podmore
, and then laughed, and then roared senselessly, jerking and twisting as if his neck and his spine were breaking—as if he were being broken in the jaws of a great invisible cat—and his eyes rolled up in agony. His limbs shook and his hair stood up, thick and bristly.

Thorold jumped to his feet. He seemed taller now: long-limbed, wild-eyed, long-toothed. Long hairy fingers grabbed Atwood’s shirt and lifted him, struggling and uttering futile words of power; then Thorold threw Atwood into the door-frame. Atwood cried out and slid onto the floor.

Arthur dropped Thorold’s spectacles and looked about for a weapon. Nothing obvious presented itself.

Dimmick picked up a large glass jar and dashed it on Thorold’s head. Dimmick’s stick appeared to have been snapped in two somehow while Arthur wasn’t looking. Blood and glass everywhere—Thorold staggered but returned to the fray, with vigour that would have been remarkable in a man a third of his age. He seized Dimmick by the throat and the two of them wrestled, reeling from side to side of the room, knocking books off shelves and shattering glass. Occasional moonlight illuminated them. Dimmick butted Thorold’s head, drenching the scene in fresh blood. The doctor howled, lifted Dimmick, and hurled him bodily into a shelf. Dimmick fell to the floor and rolled in broken glass, swearing mightily.

Atwood crawled towards Arthur and crouched in the doorway at his side. He was winded, and bleeding from a cut on his head.

Thorold ran for the door—almost down on all fours now, loping—and Arthur tackled him. They rolled together, sliding on smooth parquet into the wall. Somehow Arthur ended up underneath the old man, whose eyes were yellow, whose breath was foul, whose teeth glittered. Arthur held on to a hank of his hair for dear life, scared to let go.

Dimmick struck Thorold on the back of the head with a candlestick, then hauled him off Arthur, grunting,
hup, hup, hup, you bastard, hup
.

Atwood, on his feet again, chanted some sort of gibberish, one hand commandingly raised. What effect this had, if any, Arthur couldn’t tell. Dimmick and Thorold, bloody and tattered, bashed each other against one wall, then another. Then in the next sliver of moonlight Dimmick had somehow got up on Thorold’s shoulders, the better to bash at his head and gouge at his eyes. Thorold bit Dimmick’s wrist. They stumbled, writhed. Dimmick kicked Thorold’s leg. Thorold howled and fell. Bone glinted. Dimmick kicked again, and again, and again. Then, as Thorold writhed on the floor, Dimmick went for the candlestick again.