Steampunk Omnibus: A Galvanic Century Collection (53 page)

Bartleby, of course, maintained a wilful ignorance of our mutual distaste.

"Yes, well." Undersecretary Johnson seemed to have caught some of the subtext, but had the grace to ignore it. "The situation we are in remains nevertheless dire. The inmates – forgive me, patients – remain in control of the facilities, and retain quite a few staff-members hostage."

"What demands have they made?" Bartleby removed his gloves, folding them carefully as he looked over the schematics lain out across the pavilion tent's table.

"Just one," the undersecretary said. "Just for you. Their leader has agreed to release their female hostage on condition of your arrival."

"They asked for us?" I asked.

"Mr. Bartleby in particular."

"My husband?" Aldora looked up sharply. "Whatever for?"

"I'm afraid I haven't the foggiest," Undersecretary Johnson said. "You are under no such obligation to participate in whatever is going on here, and normally we'd be loathe to drag uninvolved citizens of the empire into such a matter, but before he left for South Africa Brigadier Wilson spoke highly of you at various government functions."

The Brigadier, I recalled, had been one of the guests at Bartleby and Aldora's wedding party. It had been, in the words of the broadsheets, "spectacularly eventful" in a terrible and tragic way. I had to admit that my partner had rallied quite well to organise his guests into a force to fight off the half-man half-corpse automatons of flesh and brass that had been trying to murder him and his wife.

"Very well. I shall meet with the blaggards and hear their demands."

"Are you quite sure about this?" I asked.

Bartleby flashed a smile. "Nothing to fear, James. With you at my side and my beloved Aldora watching my back, I couldn't possibly be safer."

Johnson paled. "Mr. Bartleby, are you actually suggesting that your wife expose herself to--"

"Oh, of course not," Aldora said with a laugh as genuine as the felt holly pinned to her hat. "I will of course stay here. Where it's safe. To assist in logistical matters however I may."

Johnson accepted the obvious but comfortable facade, colour returning to his face. "Excellent. I'm sure we can find something for you to do."

I clenched my fists in my pockets. There were too many unknowns involved for my liking, particularly with Aldora involving herself. The woman was frightfully confident, but Bartleby and I were a team, and I was accustomed to working with only one partner. I didn't want to have to distract myself, watching out for two.

"Will you require an escort?" the undersecretary asked, glancing towards Abel, who stood stone-faced behind us.

"No. No, it's vital that our hosts remain at ease. We don't want to set them off further with a police presence. Besides, I've got James."

Johnson sized me up, eyes taking in the breadth of my shoulders, the size of my arms, the power in my frame. "Do you require a pistol, Mr. Wainwright?"

I shook my head. I'd have felt more secure with a spanner or a stout length of pipe in my hands, but I didn't want to bring anything along that might put the madmen on edge.

"Very well. Mrs. Fiske, I'll have one of the men bring you some tea. If you two gentlemen would accompany Inspector Abel?"

I could feel Aldora bristle at her exclusion, and allowed myself a small smile as Bartleby and I followed the inspector back into the rain.

***

Abel led Bartleby and myself out of the pavilion tent towards the Metropolitan Police line. The inspector was a large man, almost as broad as I am, and he walked tall and proud through the rain as if to prove to the very elements what a hard man he was. Abel had always resented our involvement in Scotland Yard's business, hated the way the press seemed to favour us, and had a particular dislike for us on a personal level. He didn't glance at either of us as we approached, but kept to his stoic march.

When we arrived he cupped his hands and shouted towards the asylum. "MR. BARTLEBY HAS ARRIVED! HE AND A COMPANION WILL BE COMING TO THE GATE!"

My eyes flickered to the rifles at the policemen's sides, barrels under their coats to protect them from the rain. "Are the patients armed?"

Inspector Abel didn't turn his head. "They've got one rifle that we know of. The orderlies may have had saps that have been appropriated."

"Has anyone been harmed?" Bartleby asked.

"Not so far as we are aware," the inspector said. "They have not seen fit to communicate beyond confirmation that they are holding the staff. And, of course, the request for Mr. Bartleby."

Bartleby wiped the rainwater from his face.

Inspector Abel smirked. "Feel proud, boys. Your exploits are popular among the mad."

Bartleby started moving. It only took us a few steps to advance beyond Scotland Yard's cordon of sandbags and police wagons, but the walk up to the gates felt like an eternity of cobblestones. I felt bare, exposed, watched not only by resentful police inspectors but by the unseen unbalanced eyes of the patients within, one of whom no doubt had a rifle trained on us every step of the way.

Trained on myself, most likely. I wasn't the one they wanted, the one they'd asked for. I was the more imposing figure, broad and stocky where Bartleby was slender and unassuming, and to them, a disposable and unwelcome surprise.

I carry violence in every step, menace in my swagger. It isn't something I can help even when I'm aware of it. Growing up in the East End neighbourhoods of my childhood has left me with an ever-challenging posture, even in a state of relaxation. I could not let my guard down, even now, even after my years at the Academy, even after years of prosperity far from the East-end poorhouses and factories I'd left behind.

I pushed the wrought-iron gate out of our way and we continued up the long sand walkway towards the asylum's heavy brass-panelled doors. I couldn't help but think of the facility as some sort of ancient Egyptian tomb, but up close it was clear that there had been recent renovations. Narrow slit windows had been augmented by wider unbarred panes. Topiary hedge-work, bare mud exposed at its base, had been planted to break up the immaculate but featureless lawn. The wrought iron sign over the gate had been overlain with a painted wooden sign, cheerfully proclaiming the asylum's new life as the "Bedford Mental Hospital."

Engraved in the lower corner of the sign was the blue and white clockwork sigil of the Royal Guild of Artificers and Engineers – an unexpected element indicating that someone on the premises was a licensed and certified inventor from my own alma mater. This immediately piqued my interest, though what use technology might be of in a soft field like psychiatry I hadn't the foggiest.

The doors parted as we drew near, opened by an impossibly tall and broad man dressed in a torn and ill-fitting white uniform. I am no small man, but this person was truly massive, almost filling the doorway, sullenly gazing from the interior gloom of the foyer towards where we stood in the rain. In his large hands the door's handle seemed small and fragile.

My eyes were drawn to them, my imagination filling with images of the violence they could wreak on soft flesh and brittle bones should their possessor have a mind towards mayhem.

The giant stared at us staring back at him momentarily before stepping aside, clearing the way for us to enter. I passed into the gloom first, keeping an eye on the large patient, ready to react should he decide that it was time to start mangling. Bartleby followed, seemingly unconcerned.

I noticed, as we entered, that there appeared to be some sort of mechanical locking mechanism, currently disengaged. A quick glance told me only that it was some sort of complicated clockwork within the walls themselves.

It was gloomy within, the electric light fixtures on the walls inert. I assumed that the Metropolitan Police had disconnected the property from London's grid – instead, the reception hall was dimly lit by a number of candles placed haphazardly on counters and the backs of a few benches. A large skylight above revealed nothing but the grey of the morning's storms, absent even of lightning to provide the occasional illumination.

Dim or lit, the room was stark and institutional. The few attempts made by the current administration to make the place cheerier – a few vivid paintings, velvet cushions on the chairs, painted signs above the doorways – served only to make the place garish, highlighting its overall unfriendliness.

The giant stepped from the door to point mutely down the hall leading through the hospital's west wing. The way he indicated was darker than the reception room, lit not by candles, but by scant light coming from the door at its end. A red line had been painted across the hall's entrance, and I noted that other such lines had been painted on the floor as well, guides for the patients and perhaps visitors. A red line barred the entrance from the foyer as well, and blue and yellow lines led down the east wing hall into the gloom beyond.

Bartleby set off at once in the direction the giant had indicated, and I hastened to follow after, not keen of letting my partner wander off into danger. Our footsteps echoed on the bare concrete tiles.

I glanced back to see that the mute giant had vanished, perhaps back to his post at the door. If I strained my ears I could hear footfalls slapping against concrete elsewhere in the hospital, and beyond that the sounds of conversation, laughter, and even a howl somewhere in the distance.

God alone knew what the patients were up to without supervision, without their medications, freed from whatever restraints the hospital placed upon them.

"Ready to meet the King Lunatic?" I asked with a smirk.

Bartleby didn't laugh, and for the first time I noticed the grim set of his shoulders, the pursed expression on his face replacing his usual devil-may-care half-smile.

Worry crept into that space between my shoulder-blades. I'd never seen Bartleby so ruffled that he couldn't at least pretend at disaffection.

He faltered at the lit door at the end of the hall, steeling himself with a hand on the frame before pushing his way in.

The office we entered was lit by a gas lantern sitting on a broad hardwood desk. Behind it sat an older man, thin with watery eyes, face raw from a recent shave. His eyes slid past me, alighting instead on my partner.

"Alton."

Bartleby's voice was flat. "Hello, father."

In Which Alton Bartleby Has a Reunion

"I'm honoured that you saw fit to accept my invitation." Sarcasm dripped from the words Dennis Bartleby spoke to his son.

"It would be most ungracious to refuse." The banter came back to Alton easily, as if the gulf of time between the men was fifteen days rather than fifteen years. "After you'd gone to such lengths to extend your hospitality."

"Oh now, you really haven't changed." A hard note crept into Dennis's voice, that familiar disapproval. "Bandying about the certainty that all things are somehow for your singular benefit."

Alton felt his lip twitch, as much a sign of fluster as he ever allowed. He could stare down dukes and generals, debate with assassins and statesmen, but that certain tone from his father threatened to turn his carefully crafted disaffection into so much gossamer and smoke.

Dennis gestured towards a pair of chairs facing the desk. "Please. Sit."

The older man sat back as Alton took his seat, and the younger noted that the years had not been kind to the elder. It was almost, in a sense, like looking into one of the distorted mirrors at the King's Cross carnival and seeing an older, decrepit version of yourself. His father's skin didn't seem to fit well, sagging slightly off of its frame, and his blue eyes were watery where his son's were clear. His full head of hair was good news for Alton's own pate, even wild and unkempt as it was. Dennis still wore the simple white cotton garment that the hospital had dressed its patients in.

"How are the girls?" Dennis asked. "I hear that you had them shipped off to the Americas."

Alton's words were terse. "I arranged Audrey marriage with a wealthy industrialist. She was grateful. Mother and Elmira elected to emigrate along with her."

"With a strong encouragement, no doubt."

"What is this all about, father? You take over your asylum and take hostages... what, to get my attention? To have a familial chat?"

"That's what it would take to get an audience, is it not? But no, Alton. this isn't about you, you self-centred little cur."

"Then why send for me?"

Dennis settled back into his seat, hands clenching and relaxing. "Word spreads, Alton, even in this forgotten corner you've stashed me away in. I found it a farce, at first, when I heard that my boy was running around London playing detective. Some new fad or hobby you'd found to distract yourself with, or a play to bring what you think of as honour to the family name."

"Someone has to repair the damage you and grandfather have done to it. We were laughingstocks before I set about my social repairs!"

Dennis dismissed his son's words with a wave of his hand. "We don't have time for your blame."

"Then get to the point," Bartleby sat back in his own chair. "Why am I here? Why have you and your fellow lunatics taken over the asylum?"

"And has anyone been hurt?" James spoke up softly.