Infernal Devices - KW Jeter [89]
I shrugged noncommittally. "They seem pleasant enough sorts. Doing their duty, and all that. And they are letting us live all this time, instead of dispatching us immediately, as they could have done."
That brought a disgusted snort from him. "Get real. They've got their reasons for what they're doing. They want to pop us off, leave the bodies on that stupid island, and make it look like ol' Bendray had a hand in it. Groughay's his island, remember? These people just wanna stir up a ruckus on the old boy's head. So they can't very well kill us now – they want us to be fairly fresh meat when somebody else finds us."
As usual, Scape had a base explanation for anyone else's actions. Unfortunately, I could find no flaw in his reasoning. As the practical results were the same whether he were right or wrong, I let the matter drop as being of no importance. After a moment's reflection, I spoke again: "There are many things that still puzzle me–"
"Yeah, I bet."
"–such as how a person of your character came to be involved in these matters–"
"My character?" He gave me a glare of mock severity: "Hey, watch it!"
I pressed on: "–or the reasons for so many apparently nonsensical actions. Say, for instance, back in London, at the church that night–"
"Oh, that." He shrugged. "I could give you a reasonable explanation for all sorts of things."
"Such as?"
"Yeah, well, sure; why not? Got plenty of time now, I suppose." Scape flexed his spine against the edge of the hatchway, making himself comfortable.
The discourse that followed so impressed itself upon my memory that I may safely warrant the accuracy of its transcription here. A good deal of Scape's speech various words, different cant phrases – had puzzled me since the blackguard's initial appearance in my Clerkenwell shop. The mystery had been continuously reinforced by the certain strangeness (for lack of a more precise word) in his general aspect; alien, yet at the same time familiar, as though I were seeing him in a clouded, distorted glass, one that magnifies certain aspects while diminishing others. We view such a wavering reflection, and say that we recognize the figure contained therein, but cannot say from where. So with the enigmatic Scape his divergence from myself, or any Englishman, was made more unnerving by the similarity that still remained.
As to the veracity of the history he related to me, on board the Virtuous Persistence, I can give no avowal. At the time, tête-à-tête in our mutual captivity, the vision be spun from the empty air, of fabulous machinery and the Future revealed by it, weighted my soul with an oppressive certitude. At this remove, safe by my sanctuary's fire, I entertain neither Belief nor Unbelief; in this one matter, at least, I have fallen into that dismal position, below that of the most wretched atheist, of not knowing what I believe. The reader must determine his own stance with no assistance from me.
"The thing is," said Scape after a moment's thought, "I wasn't always this – what d'ya call it, 'person of your character'. I mean, I didn't talk like this, f'r instance. Maybe you've noticed I sound a little bit different from you?"
"It had struck my attention."
Scape nodded. "You see, I used to talk pretty much like you do; that kind of stodgy way. Maybe a little hipper, because I was – how d'ya say it – in the business. The life. You know what I mean?"
I hazarded a guess: "Criminal activity?"
His brow furrowed from the wince behind the blue lenses. "Christ, Dower; you don't have to make it sound that bad. Let's just say I was out there, doing a little… hustling. Just sorta getting by, no great shakes. Me and Miss McThane, she's still down below, sleeping; she had a late night, trying to put the moves on one of these Godly Army guys, before she gave it up as a lost cause anyway, the two of us had a little travelling-show