The Hunchback Assignments (7 page)

By the third day he was confident enough to return to the street, shifting his face into that of a young, handsome man. He helped lift a carriage stuck in deep septic mud and received a penny for his trouble. Soon he found other jobs that required his unusual strength. He slept in Hyde Park
at night, until the police shooed him off, then he moved to a manure-rich stable. He squirreled his money away until he could afford a lice-infested room and a hot meal.

At night he would take to the rooftops and watch the Londoners: the furtive movements of young ruffians who pickpocketed gentlemen on their way to the opera; women with impossible hats and beautiful faces out for tea; bobbies on their patrols, clutching their truncheons; the brawlers shouting near the pubs. On the roofs he was safe and could observe much more than most anyone else in the city.

Once he watched a lower-class family walk to church. Their shabby clothes and shoes and tired eyes made him wonder if he was lucky to have been raised in Ravenscroft.
Did Mr. Socrates save me from this sort of pauper life?
But when the father put a hand on the son’s shoulder, a lump had risen in Modo’s throat.

It was a dog that had led him down the path to his current work as a detective. From a rooftop, he’d spotted a trim white hound with an ornate collar. It had leapt a low wall and was trapped in a blind alley. Modo heard the dog’s owner call for it. Modo dropped down to the alley and, thankfully, found the dog to be friendly. He still smiled when he recalled how it had licked his hand. He led it to its master and was paid threepence.

He was inspired to place small notices in the
Times
, advertising “Lost Things Found” under the name Wellington. He thought people would trust the name. The Duke of Wellington had been a war hero, after all. Soon there were many requests for his services, people needing
help to find everything from the mundane (wallets and walking canes) to the curious (a highly praised violin and a wooden leg). In a matter of weeks Modo was able to move into the Red Boar, taking a room on the top floor with a coal stove and easy access to the roof.

He’d spent nearly every night of the past six months on these rooftops. They belonged to him now, the only place he felt free. He had each dormer and slanting surface memorized. He could get from his room to Trafalgar Square faster than any cab. And what made it all so easy was that Londoners never looked up; they were always watching the cobblestones or hunching under umbrellas.

But tonight, as he trailed Oscar Featherstone across Baker Street, Modo sensed he had moved up in the world. In this assignment he felt a certain prestige. No more searching for lost wallets. Now he was on a
case;
he was a real detective. This is what he’d been trained for.

It had been relatively simple to follow Oscar from his manor. The real test would be whether or not Modo could uncover what had been keeping the man up so late at night and frightening his sister so.

His sister.

Audrette.

The thought of her name made Modo feel warm on a cold night, and yes, even giddy She was so lovely, and spoke with angelic eloquence. He pictured the way she’d dabbed at her eyes with the handkerchief. He had memorized the moment, so tragic, sad, and at the same time so beautiful. His heart was racing uncomfortably and he nearly lost his grip on the shingles.

“Don’t get addled, Modo,” he whispered angrily, adjusting his haversack so that it sat squarely on his humped back.

He crept along the rooftop until Oscar turned off the street and passed through an iron gate. At a two-story brick house, Oscar knocked on the door. The silhouette of the person who answered filled the doorframe, so Modo deduced it was a man. The hulking figure stepped aside so that Oscar could enter the house. The door closed.

Modo surveyed the area. The roof of the house was too high and too far away for him to swing onto it. The stone wall surrounding the yard wasn’t in good shape, sections crumbling here and there. But between him and the house, in the middle of the yard, sat an old gazebo that would likely support his weight.

Modo ran quietly to the edge of the rooftop and launched himself toward the gazebo, taking a few branches off the oak tree as he flew through the air. He landed on the structure’s rounded roof with a thud and immediately bounced from there to a large balcony directly above the front door of the house.

He’d tried to land lightly, but he’d made far too much noise, so he hid in a corner next to the drainpipe and waited until he was sure no one would come out looking. Tharpa would have been proud to see how he was putting his teachings into practice. Except, perhaps, for that jump.

He padded to the edge of the balcony and removed his bendable spyglass from his haversack. It had taken great patience and many hours to create the instrument, reshaping and joining two spyglasses with his large-knuckled,
fumbling fingers. He extended his invention and put the eyepiece up to his right eye. He lowered the other end over the side of the balcony until he was looking into a dirty windowpane. The angle wasn’t perfect and the fish-eye lens distorted the view even more. Nonetheless, soon Modo got his bearings and slowly scanned the room. He could make out Oscar talking to a man who had his back to the window. The man was tall, his immense shoulders stuffed into a suit coat, his hair black as coal. Modo watched them until the man walked away from the window, opened a door, and ushered Oscar into another room, out of Modo’s sight.

Now the best way to find out what Oscar was up to would be to get inside the house. He could easily break in through the balcony door, but he had no idea what, or who, was on the other side. It would be much more logical to walk in through the front door. That would require a transformation. He backed up into the corner of the balcony again.

“You will always be ugly,” Mr. Socrates had regularly reminded him over the years. “Always. But you are better able to adapt than any chameleon. Be thankful for it.”

At the moment Modo was feeling anything but thankful as he checked his pocket watch, then turned his will to altering his body. Fire burned in his veins as his bones shifted in their sockets. He’d performed this “adaptive transformation,” as Mr. Socrates called it, thousands of times. He had worked to perfect each change.

He closed his eyes, grimacing, picturing the man he wanted to look like. He chose an appearance inspired by a
sketch of Peterkin, a favorite character from the novel
The Coral Island.
Mrs. Finchley had allowed him to read it, but he had to promise to hide the book whenever Mr. Socrates visited. Modo’s facial plates shifted and became angular, his skin stretching smoothly across his new skull and straightened nose.

His arms became thinner and longer, his chest smaller. And finally he turned his will to the hump, the dreadful hump. He forced it to sink into his flesh.

He picked up his pocket watch. Three minutes. Mr. Socrates would have been pleased.

Sweating and tired, Modo patted his face to be sure he hadn’t missed any unsightly lumps. He could only hold this shape for five hours, at the most. Then his muscles would grow weak and he’d slip back into his natural, repulsive self.

His clothing looked ridiculous on his new, thin frame, so he took another cautious look around and stripped to his underclothes. Out of his haversack he pulled a set of fine breeches and yanked them on, followed by a shirt and a shawl-collared vest. He tied a brown cravat around his neck, slipped on good shoes and a frock coat. He stuffed his mask under his old clothes in the haversack and left the bag in the shadows.

Using bricks and the drain spout for support, Modo climbed down the wall. After ensuring his clothes were on straight, he stepped nonchalantly to the front door, took a good, deep breath, and knocked.

M
odo smoothed a few more creases from the front of his coat and wondered if the men he was about to meet would notice that it wasn’t as finely stitched as theirs. He hoped the lights would be dim. He would have worn a top hat, but he had yet to find an affordable one. A collapsible, spring-loaded hat, like the ones gentlemen wore to the opera, would be perfect. He could slip it into his haversack and pop it open whenever he needed it. He knocked again.

The door opened an inch to reveal a single red-veined eye. “What do you want?” a gruff voice said.

“I’m here to attend the meeting. I do apologize for being tardy, sir. My driver had great difficulty finding the address. In fact, I was in such a hurry I left my hat in my carriage.”

The eye didn’t blink. “And your name is?”

“Robert Peterkin,” Modo said without hesitation. “I’m an associate of Mr. Oscar Featherstone. I’m sorry, am I at
the correct address? This is Twenty-two Balcombe Street, is it not?”

“That is the address.” The eye still hadn’t blinked.

“I apologize if I’m not following the usual protocol. Yesterday I met Mr. Featherstone at the Crystal Palace. I’m an acquaintance of his sister.” At the mention of Audrette, the man raised his eyebrow. “We attend the same painting courses. She’s a very fine painter. In any case, I had a most pleasant discussion with Mr. Featherstone and I expressed my interest in scientific discovery and the exploration of”—Modo wished he’d asked Audrette what exactly the society explored—“the sciences. Mr. Featherstone mentioned your society and invited me to attend a meeting. Have I come at a bad time?”

“No.” The eye finally blinked and the door opened into a gloomy foyer. Modo hoped he was properly put together. His hair! He’d completely forgotten his hair! Had he grown it to an appropriate length? He put his hand to his head and was relieved to find a thick mop. He patted it into place as he stepped into the house and watched the man lock the door behind him. The man had dark hair and muttonchops and intense, steady eyes.

“Please forgive me, Mr. Peterkin; I haven’t introduced myself. I’m Edwin Fuhr, head of the Young Londoners Exploratory Society; we are an official branch of the Society of Science. As it turns out, you aren’t late for the meeting. We have been delayed. Please follow me.”

Modo fell in behind Fuhr. Even in his transformed state he was dwarfed by the man, who led Modo down a hallway.
His gait was jerky, as though transporting his bulk was difficult. Modo heard an odd hissing sound, but couldn’t identify its source.

They passed three pairs of India rubber boots. One pair was gray with mud and the smell of sewage emanated from it. Modo breathed through his mouth. He noticed that Fuhr’s pants were splashed with brown matter around the knees. It hadn’t rained in a few days. Perhaps he had been mucking about in the garden, though Modo couldn’t picture this particular man clipping vines and pulling weeds.

“We are gathering in here,” Fuhr said, opening a door and directing Modo inside a small library where three young gentlemen sat on a bench, talking animatedly. At the sight of Modo they paused, looked him over with some curiosity, then resumed their conversation. Behind them, standing motionless was a man almost as large as Fuhr. In the shadows at his feet sat a big, keen-eyed foxhound with an unnaturally bulky head. Its eyes followed Modo.

None of these people was Oscar Featherstone. Had he made a mistake?

“Mr. Featherstone is in the atrium,” Fuhr said, as though reading Modo’s mind. “We shall join him shortly. He is setting up a telescope.” He raised his hand to signal the other hulking man to open the door into the atrium. Once again Modo noted the jerky motion of Fuhr’s arm, followed by a slight hiss. The noise was coming from Fuhr himself!

Everyone filed into the atrium, blocking Modo’s view of the room. Her began to follow them, but Fuhr put a
hand on his shoulder. It tightened like a vise. “Not yet, Mr. Peterkrone.”

“It’s Peter
kin
,” Modo replied, trying unsuccessfully to extricate himself from Fuhr’s grip.

“My apologies, young sir. Peter
kin.
Yes. I need you to fill out some declaration forms, please. The discoveries of the society are not for public consumption. At least, not yet.” He released Modo and patted his back with a hand solid as iron.

“Forms? Yes, of course. I’ll gladly fill them out.”

“They’re in here.” Fuhr guided him to a candlelit table in the corner of a small, windowless room. “Read them very carefully, then sign.”

“Yes, sir.”

The table was littered with papers and various maps. One map was of London and it had several circled areas. Modo heard a click on the other side of the room, but at that moment a paper stamped with a symbol of a clock face in a triangle caught his eye. On the same page was a schematic that looked like a drawing of a machine with legs, of all things. With the expertise of a magician, he rolled up the paper with one hand and tucked it into his sleeve. Under the drawing was a set of papers labeled
MINUTES OF THE YOUNG LONDONERS EXPLORATORY SOCIETY
. He skimmed it:

Saxe-Coburg
, that name he’d read in the paper. It had something to do with the Royals, but he couldn’t remember what.

Modo was about to roll up the minutes when he recalled a lesson Tharpa had drilled into him. Never turn your back to your enemy. Such a simple rule and he had already forgotten it. “I’m sorry, sir, but there don’t seem to be any forms,” Modo said, turning to catch Fuhr locking the door to the library. Modo guessed the click he’d heard had been the other door being locked too, and he cursed himself for being so stupid.

“You won’t need to sign any forms, Peterkin,” Fuhr said. “This is not an organization you can be invited to join. Every member is chosen by me.”

“Chosen,” Modo repeated. “Oh, I see. I have unwittingly overstepped the boundaries of propriety. I deeply regret my error.” Though he kept his voice calm, his eyes darted left and right, looking for a way out.

Fuhr glared at him openly. “Who sent you?” There was another hiss and his shoulders shifted and enlarged slightly. Modo couldn’t make sense of what he was seeing.