Infernal Devices - KW Jeter [28]
"Very kind of you, sir," said the cabby, dangling a raw strip down to the dog's mouth. "I do appreciate it." The chop had been carried off to a farther room; a sizzling noise of fire and grease wafted out. "This here gentleman," he said, pointing to me, "wants to be taken to Wetwick. Fancy that, eh?"
The hawking butcher, his basket up on his shoulder again, lowered the jar he had taken from its place in front of me. His wide grin was damp from the stale beer. "Does he, then? Wouldn't have thought him the type, just from looking at him. No wonder he's not hungry for this sort of meat." One blood-mottled finger tapped the side of the basket. "It's some other bit of mutton he's after." His lewd smile twisted even further as he winked at me, then turned and laboured his burden towards the door.
The cabby signalled for his jar to be refilled. "Yes, indeed," he said, leaning across the table. His creased face exuded the conspiratorial bonhomie of one who delightedly assumes that all the world is as foul-minded as he is. He fell into smirking reminiscence: "Many's the time, all these years I've worked as a long-night man – that's what we call it, mind, six of the evenings to ten the following mornings – many's the time I've had fine gentlemen such as yourself asking to be taken to the borough of Wetwick. Fine gentlemen, indeed… and roaring boys." The phrase generated some excitement in him; his eyes widened in his flushed face. "Eh? Eh? The roaring boys – out for a lark, they were, yes." He gazed at his reflection in the renewed ale, smiling as if satisfied at what he saw. "The green girls – that's what you lordly rakes want, isn't it now? Eh?"
I made no reply, stupefied into muteness by the closeness of the den and the alcoholic fumes it contained. The cabby's pallid face danced in front of me, a child's grinning puppet given over to wickedness and the relish it found therein.
"Mind you, now," he went on, unstoppable, "though it be to your heart's desire–" The last word sent him into a salivating ekstasis. "Your heart's desire, says I, a greater bargain is impossible to find. And why is that? Eh?"
I perceived that he was asking me a riddle. "I have no idea." My head had started to throb.
"Because – ho-ho! – because all it takes to get there is a single coin. Ha!" He choked and beat his fist on the table in his mirth. "A single coin! Very clever, that! Eh?"
"Yes…" I agreed feebly, attempting to mask my incomprehension. "Yes, quite amusing."
He eyed me more closely. "Of course," he said slowly, "it has to be the right coin. Don't it, sir? There's only one will do for it." He drew back, waiting for my reply.
I saw that under his smile there was an element other than jest. At the same moment, in a flash of understanding, I realised the point of his words. Keeping his gaze locked with mine, I drew the velvet bag out of my pocket, extracted the Saint Monkfish sovereign, and laid it on the table in front of him.
The cabby picked up the coin and held it glittering in the candlelight. For a moment he studied the remarkable profile on its surface; then he handed it back to me. With an exaggeratedly servile nod, he said, "Right you are, sir. Most pleased to be of service to the cognoscenti. To Wetwick, then." He looked up when a cracked plate, shiny with grease, was laid in front of him with the blackened chop upon it.
I watched as he sawed the redolent meat apart with his pocket knife, spearing the pieces with its point and conveying them to his mouth. "Shall we be off, then?" I said.
He jabbed another morsel and held it down to the dog, who adroitly licked it off the blade. "There's no call for haste, sir." He took another bite. "Plenty of time, as you well know." He signalled for another round.
Time within the dingy confines