Part 36 (1/2)
”How's that goin' to happen?”
”I need to be a.s.sured that you are familiar with laudanum's potency. I want you to be warm in the cold and able to sleep without not waking up.”
”You're talkin' about dyin' from it?”
”That has been known to happen to inexperienced partakers.”
”I've been swallowin' laudanum since I was first on the streets. So have they.” The man indicated the group farther along the tunnel.
”Perhaps you'd like to share with them. That way, no one consumes too much.”
”Share? How's this supposed to happen?”
”Do we have an agreement?”
”Yes, yes, yes. Now where's the laudanum?”
De Quincey led the limping man back to the broken crate. He reached under it and produced the flask.
”What's that?” one of the beggars yelled.
”Another payment for your favors.” As much as De Quincey craved a swallow, he handed the flask to the man with the limp. It was one of the most difficult things he had ever been forced to do: giving away laudanum. ”When the flask is empty, you can sell it.”
The man with the limp took the first sip. Each of them shared.
”I wonder if it would be too bold to request yet one more favor,” De Quincey ventured.
”For a little bloke, you sure have nerve.”
”Fifty years ago, during my time on these streets, it was the custom that our group had territory within which we worked. I could beg from the Hyde Park end of Oxford Street to the corner of Bond Street. South to Grosvenor and north to Wigmore. But if I crossed from that area, I transgressed on another group's territory, and the consequences could be severe.”
”It's the same now,” a beggar agreed. ”We have our spots. We don't compete. Live and let live.”
”You would do me an important service. In fact, you would do London and England itself a service if you communicated with the neighboring groups and requested that they in turn communicate with their neighboring groups.”
”What for?”
”I'm looking for a man. He's a retired military officer. He served twenty years in India and was celebrated for his combat achievements. He is in his early forties, unusually tall, with attractive features that are nonetheless unsettling because they do not reveal his thoughts or emotions. He is clean-shaven. He has light brown, curly hair. He walks with an extreme military bearing. He dresses with the elegance suitable to the man who controls security for the home secretary.”
”Lord Palmerston? You do know Lord Cupid?”
”I met Lord Palmerston only once. That was last night, and the experience was disagreeable. The man I wish to know about is named Colonel Brookline.”
”What do you want to know?”
”The location of Brookline's lodging, his whereabouts, his habits, anything that anyone can learn.”
”To help England, you said? England ain't helped us much lately. What do we get for doing this?”
”The relief of knowing that he won't murder you in your sleep.”
”Well and good, but I'm just as afraid of dyin' from starvation.”
”I guarantee that everyone who helps me find Colonel Brookline will receive a plentiful supply of food.”
”Without a pence in your pocket, I don't see how you can guarantee a blasted thing,” a man complained.
”Lord Palmerston will arrange for the food.”
”The man who wants you in jail? You expect us to believe that?”
”I promise that Lord Palmerston will overflow with generosity when shown the evil that hides next to him. Joey, since you now wear presentable clothes, you're the best person to sit on a bench in Green Park and watch Lord Palmerston's mansion on Piccadilly. Colonel Brookline will arrive there today. Probably several times. The description I gave you and the stern look in Brookline's eyes are unmistakable. Remember he is tall, with an extreme military bearing. He does not have facial hair, unlike the mutton-chopped politicians and bureaucrats who visit Lord Palmerston. His hair is curly.”
”And what am I supposed to do if I see him?”
”Follow him. Then instruct a fellow knight of the street to come here and report to this gentleman who offered me the use of his platform.”
”My word, you're makin' us into detectives,” a beggar said with a toothless grin.
”Heroes,” De Quincey corrected him.
ON A USUAL TUESDAY MORNING, Oxford Street would have been crammed with vehicles and pedestrians as well as various mongers with their coffee, pastry, and oyster carts. But on this particular Tuesday, traffic was half of what it normally would have been as the terror of years earlier was repeated.
The city's five dozen newspapers had printed extra copies of special editions but couldn't keep up with the demand. Rumors spread rapidly that more murders had been committed than were reported in the newspapers, some of them in neighborhoods of distinction. It was widely a.s.sumed that, after the governor of Coldbath Fields Prison had been killed, all the criminals had escaped with the purpose of violating London. The roads from the city were packed with coaches as the wealthy departed to their country estates. The railroad stations were crammed with anyone who could afford a ticket.
Thus any observers studying Oxford Street in the hope of seeing a short, thin man of sixty-nine years had reason to believe that the absence of the street's normal chaos would make him more noticeable.
That there would be observers, De Quincey had no doubt. The previous night, he had told Emily, in Brookline's presence, that she would find him where he listened to the music. Brookline couldn't know what that meant. But perhaps Emily wouldn't know, either. De Quincey could only pray that she would remember when he had taken her to Oxford Street on Sunday and shown her the corner where he and Ann had listened to the barrel organ. But meanwhile Colonel Brookline would send men to every place in London where he and Emily were likely to reunite. Oxford Street-so important in De Quincey's past-would be at the top of the list.
What Brookline couldn't be aware of-what no one who hadn't nearly starved to death there could be aware of-was its underside, the secret world that only beggars inhabited.
Anyone watching now saw those beggars emerge from their crannies. They looked at the day's dismal prospects and proceeded with more than usual discouragement toward their corners. One of them was legless. The poor ragged devil transported himself on a small platform that had rollers under it. His head bowed, he used sticks to push at the paving stones of the sidewalk and move the platform along rather than abrade his hands on the stones.
EACH SEAM IN THE STONES sent a jolt through De Quincey's knees. The pressure of his legs pinned under him made him wish that he had sipped from the laudanum flask before giving it to his new companions in the tunnel. Soon his craving for opium would intensify his pain. Already his head throbbed while sweat slicked his forehead, sweat caused by withdrawal, not by the exertion of moving the platform.
Logic suggested that anyone watching the street would need to remain stationary, pretending to wait for someone or read a newspaper or look in a shopwindow. De Quincey noticed several possibilities, but as he wheeled past one of them, he attracted only the slightest, dismissive attention. The lowest members of society were beneath anyone's interest.
At another alley, De Quincey rolled the platform into shadows. Only when he was confident of not being observed did he dismount and carry the platform down steps. Making his way through deeper shadows, he reached another sequence of tunnels. Past a gap in a rusted barrier, he navigated what became a maze until he climbed steps and faced a cl.u.s.ter of shacks in a dismal courtyard.
A haggard woman peered out. ”A customer this early, and he don't look like he has two pence to rub together.”