Ten Second Staircase (35 page)

'I'm sorry, Frank; you seem to be speaking some alien language designed for people who care about your problems. Back to me. Where is Dorothy?'

Frank glumly pointed a long forefinger to the floor. 'She's dead.'

'Dead? I was picking her brains on Etruscan pottery a fortnight ago; how can she be dead?'

'Stroke. We buried her on Tuesday. I tried calling your mobile, but there was no answer.'

'There wouldn't have been. I traded one, and dropped the other in a hole I was digging. This is awful news. Poor old Dorothy, what a terrible shame. I suppose she had a good run, though. Give me the name of her nearest relative and I'll send some pears.'

'She had no relatives left alive, Mr Bryant. I was the closest to her. Er, pears?'

'Golden Delicious. She loved them, and they can plant the pips.' A horrible thought struck the detective. 'What's going to happen to the Huxley collection now?'

'It's in safe hands,' Frank assured him. 'She passed the building over to me on the condition that its purpose as a library remained unaltered.'

'Could she do that? I mean, you're not her next of kin.'

'Actually, I am.' Frank stroked the side of his long nose thoughtfully. 'She legally adopted me four years ago.'

'Dorothy never told me that.'

'That's because you only ever came to see her when you wanted information.'

Bryant wasn't used to someone answering back, and was momentarily stumped for a reply.

'She did it so that Greenwich Council wouldn't be able to touch the building. They've been sniffing around, sensing a real estate killing to be made, but we've foiled them.'

'Good for her. She was always a crafty old bird.'

'I always wanted to ask you—did you go out with her once?' asked Frank. 'I heard she was a bit of a goer in her time.'

'That's none of your business, even if you are her son.' Bryant bridled. 'Really, this prurience is most distasteful. I'm sure she would have wanted us to continue as normal, so I'm here to avail myself of your utilities.'

'You mean you're looking for a book.'

'Precisely so.' He looked around, smacking his lips, uncertain. 'Dorothy always knew where everything was . . . '

'And so do I, Mr Bryant. It's hard to share a room with someone for twenty years without learning everything they know. What are you after?'

'A canting dictionary. You know, an English code of thieves and cutthroats. I understand that highwaymen and outlaws used their own language to leave messages for each other, in much the same way that burglars still mark houses today. I wondered if they had ever committed their code to print.'

'Such a book would, by its very nature, have been illegally published, but I'll see what I can find in our Private Reference section.'

Thunder rolled lazily across the roof of the library, rustling the

damp pages of forgotten periodicals and sharpening the air with static. 'I'll need to get a light,' Frank explained. 'The electrics don't work back here.'

Bryant extracted a long metal usherette's torch from the voluminous folds of his overcoat. 'Don't worry, I have my partner's Valiant.'

They made their way between stacks of books, like divers negotiating coral reefs, until they reached a row of rusting cabinets. True to his word, Frank knew exactly where to look. He lifted down a heavy leather volume with mouse-chewed corners and laid it on the table. After consulting the index beneath Bryant's beam, he tapped the page meaningfully. 'Do you know about the Thieves' Key?'

'Yes, done that; what else is there?' asked Bryant with characteristic rudeness.

'Well, there's the Thieves' Exercise. It goes hand in hand with the key.'

'What is it?'

'Hm.' Frank read in silence for a few minutes. 'Appears to be a series of lessons passed on from lawbreakers to their pupils, full of slang. Listen to this:
Dinging the Cull upon the Poll
—that is, bashing someone over the head if he offers resistance.
Mill the Gig with a Betty
—to open a door with a crowbar;
Fagger and Storm
—to break into a house and tie up its residents.
Gamon, Bowman, Angling Stick, Squeezing Chates, Pike on the Bene, Main Buntings, Nubbing Chit
—there are hundreds of phrases here.'

'Can I take this away with me?'

'No, but I can make you some photocopies.'

'That will have to do.' Bryant flipped the pages. 'It says that attackers chewed licorice to make them more long-winded during foot escapes. Sensible advice. There are cases here that go back to Charles the Second.'

'This might be of use,' said Frank, wiping a thin green layer of mildew from the cover of a small tome.
'The Grammatical Dictionary of Thieves and Murderers.'

'Show me.' Bryant flicked his fingers at the librarian. On the front of the book was an embossed drawing of a highwayman. In his right hand he held playing cards: a four of clubs, known as 'the devil's bedposts,' and two pair, aces and eights, the so-called dead man's hand.

He read the frontispiece.
'"Being a Collection of Words, Terms, Proverbs, and Phrases Used in the Modern Language of the Thieves, Cutthroats, etc., Useful for All Sorts of People (Especially Travellers) to Secure Their Money and Preserve Their Lives."
Oh, this is interesting.
Backt,
meaning "dead," deriving from the backing up of a coffin onto six men's shoulders.
Cloud,
"tobacco," as in "to raise a Cloud."
Sneaking Budge,
one that robs alone. Jolly good stuff; not much use to me though.' He slammed the book shut.

'Why did they need their own language?' asked Frank.

'Because the criminals of London were transported for petty larceny and buying stolen goods, and hanged for everything from shoplifting to murder. They needed to be able to function below the eye level of the law.'

'Well, you can take your pick here. It's a complete linguistic guide. Substantives but not many nouns, plenty of adverbs, and something referred to as the Copulative. Do you honestly think all this stuff is going to help you with the case?'

'He's leaving me clues,' said Bryant. 'I need to be able to understand them. There's not a society of highwaymen, is there?'

'How do you mean?' asked Frank.

'Oh, you know the sort of thing, people who dress up and research their favourite characters. I presume the library is listed as a resource for all sorts of clubs and associations.'

'Yes, it is,' Frank agreed. 'I can probably get you a few addresses, but it'll mean making some phone calls.'

'I haven't got much of a budget,' Bryant warned. 'Do it for Dorothy.'

Back outside the library, though, Bryant began to wonder. He was cold and tired, he'd forgotten to take his tablets, and his legs were playing up. He was also halfway across the city poking about in arcane library books when he should have been getting his report ready for Faraday's inspection.

If the time he'd invested in this esoteric trawl through the forgotten world of London's thieves failed to pay off, there would be no way out. How did knowing that the Leicester Square Vampire had modelled himself on Robin Hood help to close the case?

May had insisted on reattaching himself to the Vampire investigation. Bryant knew that his own erratic methods could drag them both down, as well as stranding some of the country's best minds without hope of employment.

You have to give up this behaviour once and for all, Arthur,
he thought as he walked to the corner in the rain and tried to remember where he parked the car.

As he passed the murky trash-filled alleyway behind the library, the Highwayman was close enough to reach out and touch his scarfwrapped neck. Instead, the leather-clad wraith shifted back into the darkness until only the dull gleam of his eyes remained.

34

ELABORATE ACTS

'Let's go, Peculiar!'

Dan Banbury raised a hand on either side of him. The rest of the group stood in a ragged circle, joined at their fists. Only Meera Mangeshkar looked sceptical, mainly because she was having to hold Colin Bimsley's hand.

'Come on, you lot, put your backs into it this time,' said Banbury, attempting to sound hearty.

'Let's go, let's go, let's go, Peculiar!' echoed the group, lifting their arms high. They stopped in mid-chant and turned towards the door.

Arthur Bryant was watching them with his mouth open. 'What on earth is going on here?' he asked finally. 'What are you all doing in my office?'

'Team-building, sir.' Banbury began confidently, but his voice broke. 'Stimulates the brain and releases stress-inhibiting hormones. Only way to keep our spirits up.'

'Well, could you kindly not,' snapped Bryant. 'I don't want this place infected with happiness. Nothing will be achieved unless you're all dead miserable.'

'I thought in the light of Mr Kasavian's announcement this morning, it might prove beneficial.'

'Well, you thought—What announcement?'

'About closing down the unit on Monday, sir.'

Thunderheads rolled into Bryant's eyes. 'Whatever you've heard is wrong, and whoever told you is a lying hound. Besides, if that had been the case, Raymond Land would have been creeping around here by now, visiting his particular form of spiritual ebola on us.'

'Come on, there's no need to cushion us; we all received the memo, old bean,' said Kershaw nonchalantly.

'I'm not cushioning you, you upper-class nincompoop. I have no idea what you're talking about.'

'There's to be an internal investigation of the whole Leicester Square Vampire business. Your comment about him possessing eternal life made the papers this morning.'

'Eternal life?' repeated John May, stepping in from the corridor. 'Tell me you didn't say that, Arthur.'

'I've been misquoted. I said he was an example of an eternal myth,' Bryant barked. 'I was just answering a question posted on the unit Web site.'

'And you didn't realise it was from a journalist?'

'I stand by my remark. The Leicester Square Vampire's physical appearance is a universal archetype, a perverse spirit of old England, if you will. Take a look at the evidence in engravings and photographs; every few years the same kind of creature appears. Ultimately he eludes capture, because question marks hang over the guilt of the condemned culprit. Look at the mythology surrounding the Vampire—he ran through alleys, launching himself at strangers, drawing symbolic blood before soaring aloft, untouchable and unstoppable, before vanishing through brick walls. He didn't, of course; they were merely illusions caused by our unwillingness to accept more mundane truths. We want to believe in divine retribution, even when it appears to be directed at innocents. We never checked back far enough. All the evidence was there. When the first crime occurred, we studied only the recent files. Nobody thought of going back through the centuries.'

'I wonder why,' said May bitterly. 'Arthur, I gave you licence to be unorthodox, but this mental meandering has to stop.'

'Even you noticed the similarities between the Highwayman and the Vampire,' Bryant reminded him. 'The same ideals connect them spiritually and ideologically, if not physically. They share a common root, and it goes right back to Robin Hood. The idea that a murderer can somehow be rehabilitated in the public mind as a hero, a people's champion, has enduring appeal and goes back hundreds of years. The Vampire knew it, and so does the Highwayman. And the reason why I'm performing this "meandering," as you put it, is to get the Vampire's case closed before Faraday uses it against us.'

'Then you're too late. You should have concentrated on the factual evidence, because that's all the Home Office is prepared to recognise.'

'We still have time to give them the kind of report they're expecting.' Bryant slapped the engravings he had pinned behind his desk. 'There's a split between appearance and meaning. If we only read the surface signs, we'll always get it wrong. Has it ever occurred to you that the time period between fear and acceptance has become radically truncated in the modern age? The Vampire attempted to strike fear into people's hearts, but compared to most modern criminals, he seems quaint and rather absurd. Two weeks ago a man was kicked to death by fourteen-year-olds and thrown off Hungerford Bridge "for a laugh." How would the Vampire's antics have struck them? Would they have shown the respect he craved? The Highwayman is merely the externalisation of a centuries-old inadequacy, except that now his actions are accelerated to suit faster, darker times. We have found our motive.'

'What we need is the identity, Arthur. This is about capture and punishment, not apportioning blame to society. Right from the start, this unit should have been dealing in tangibles. You've had your chance and wasted another day. No more poking about in archives or consulting with psychics. Oskar Kasavian is not a man to be trifled with. He's taking us down because we've failed to make connections.'

'The victims have no links, John! Don't you think I've looked? They never appeared on the same TV show or were interviewed in the same article; they never met one another; they shared no mutual mourners, no common age, race, or class. The only common factor between any of them is this man Leo Carey, the publicist who was married to White and worked for Danny Martell.'