Resurrection Row - Anne Perry [86]
“Do you think they’ll hold?” he asked, knocking his hat askew on the beam above.
“God knows,” Dominic replied, stepping past him and going up. A good deal of his mind sympathized with Fleetwood, recalling his own feelings in Seven Dials, which had been less fearful than this. But there was also a strong tide in him that enjoyed it, tasting what Carlisle knew, the passion to alter this world, to force the innocent, the unknowing to look at it, to see and taste all of it, and to care. The emotion inside him was fierce, almost volcanic. He went up the stairs two by two and dived after Carlisle into a fetid mass of rooms where families of tens and dozens sat in the sickly light, carving, polishing, sewing, weaving, or gluing together to make all manner of articles to be sold for a few pence. Children as small as three or four years old sat tied to their mothers by string so they did not wander from work. Every time one of them stopped his labor or fell asleep, the mother would clout him over the head to wake him up and remind him that idle hands made for empty stomachs.
The smell was fearful, a mixture of wet mold, smoke and coal fumes, sewage, and unwashed bodies.
At the far end of the particular tenement they emerged into a dank courtyard that must once have been a mews, and Carlisle stopped and knocked on a cutaway door.
Dominic looked at Fleetwood. His face was pale, and his eyes looked deep and frightened. Dominic guessed he would long ago have run away had he had even the faintest idea which way to go or how to get back to the world he knew. He must have seen things even his nightmares had not conjured up.
The door opened, and a lean, bent little man peered out. He seemed to be lop-shouldered, as if one side of him were longer than the other. It was a moment before he recognized Carlisle.
“Oh, it’s you, is it? What do you want this time?”
“A little of your skill, Timothy,” Carlisle said with a smile. “For a consideration, naturally.”
“What kind of skill?” Timothy demanded, looking suspiciously over Carlisle’s shoulder at Dominic and Fleetwood. “Not rozzers, are they?”
“Shame on you, Timothy!” Carlisle said with heavy disgust. “When did you ever know me to keep company with the police?”
“What skill?” Timothy repeated.
“Why, the balancing of fine carriages, of course,” Carlisle said with a twist to his face. “His lordship here,” he indicated Fleetwood, “has an excellent pair, and a fine chance of winning a few gentlemen’s races, private wagers and the like, if he can get his carriage balanced to do justice to them.”
Timothy’s face lit up. “Ah! Course I can do suffink about that! Balancin’ makes all the difference. Where’s this ’ere carriage, then? You tell me, and I’ll fix it for yer to run smooth as a weasel, I will. For a consideration, like?”
“Of course,” Fleetwood agreed quickly. “Holcombe Park House. I’ll write the address for you—”
“No good, guv—I don’t read. Tell me—I remember anything. Reckon it dulls the memory, readin’? Don’t do you no good, in the long run. Reckon them as writes down everythin’ don’t remember their own name, if they keeps it up long enough.”
Carlisle never missed a chance. He took this one as a swift bird takes an insect on the wing, with barely a flicker.
“But there’s work for men who can read and write, Timothy,” he said, leaning on the door. “Regular work, in offices that close in the evening and send you home. Jobs that pay enough money to live on.”
Timothy spat. “I’d die of hunger and old age afore I learn to read and write now!” he said in disgust. “Don’t know what you want to say a thing like that for!”
Carlisle patted the man’s shoulder. “For the future, Timothy,” he said quietly. “And for those who don’t know how to balance a racing gig.”
“There’s ’undreds o’ thousands what can’t read nor write!” Timothy looked at him sourly.
“I know that,” Carlisle conceded.