“Can I use me bludgeon? I never fights without it for reasons of balance.”
Malarkey was shocked. “Use yer bludgeon? Of course you can use yer bludgeon, Mr. Skelp. I would never deprive a brother of his beloved weapon of choice.”
Skelp drew from behind his back a blackthorn club the size of Chevie’s leg. As if its dimensions were not formidable enough, Skelp had hammered on armored plates that had doubtless once been shining steel but were now dull with congealed liquid and matter.
“Charming,” said Chevie. “You guys are a classy bunch.” Malarkey laughed. “Skelp is one of our more sophisticated brothers. Betimes he reads stories to the illiterates.
“The odds are ten to one on Skelpy. Cash only, no markers. Give yer coin to my accountant.”
A small man in a waistcoat was suddenly besieged by aggressive men with money and dealt with them all efficiently, using a complicated system of facial tics and swearing. Once the betting was done, a space was cleared in front of the dais. Riley guessed that this was the traditional bareknuckle arena, and he hoped that the dark splashes on the floorboards were simply wine or beer.
Chevie did not seem anxious, though there could be nothing familiar to her about the proceedings.
Riley realized that the attention of every man in the room was on Chevie, and that this was a perfect time to look for a way out for them both. He couldn’t abandon her now. We are partners, till the end of this affair.
The Battering Rams jostled for a ringside view as the opponents readied themselves for the competition. Chevie carefully stretched her muscles and tendons, while Skelp stripped to his waist and spoke soft words to his darling bludgeon. “I will call the match,” said Malarkey through his speaking trumpet. “Last man . . . or woman . . . standing shall be proclaimed victor. Both parties prepared for the bout?” Skelp spat a gob of chewed tobacco, mostly on his own boot. Chevie simply nodded and balled her fists.
“Then begin!” called Malarkey.
The Rams were expecting the little lass to be brim-full of vinegar and take a run at Skelp, possibly causing him to fall down laughing. They were prepared to berate their comrade good-naturedly as he was eventually forced to tap the girlie on her noggin in order to claim his winnings.
They were utterly unprepared for what actually happened, and several burst out laughing, presuming that it was some manner of jape orchestrated by King Otto for a bit of a giggle. Before the echo of Malarkey’s words faded, Chevie rushed in low, used a basic judo disarming maneuver to twist the club out of Skelp’s grasp, then unleashed an out-of-the-ballpark uppercut with the man’s own beloved bludgeon that knocked out three of his teeth and sent him flying into a gaggle of his comrades. The whole lot went down like ninepins.
“Next,” said Chevie, which was a bit melodramatic, but no more so than the entire situation.
A silence followed Chevie’s victory, the like of which hadn’t been heard in this arcade in twenty years, not since Gunther No Nose Kelly earned his nickname during a rat-eating contest. “Wait for it,” said Malarkey out of the side of his mouth. When the assembled Rams realized that their invested chink was in serious danger of disappearing beyond their grubby grasp forever, the short-lived silence was shattered by a collective moan that rose like an ululating wave and crashed in a sea of objections.
“Hold on there!”
“Unfair! Unfair!”
“Will you beat a man with his own club?”
“She ain’t no female. She’s a witch.”
Malarkey silenced the clamor with a bellow through his trumpet, then addressed the stunned congregation.
“You fellers seem a mite surprised by my little whirling dervish here. I warned you, but no—you fine gentlemen knows better than yer beloved regent.”
Malarkey rubbed Chevie’s head as though she were a favored puppy and even instructed Riley to relax in his throne. “Here,” he said, tossing a purse of gold to Riley. “A share for the Injun princess, even though that were not part of the deal; but I am a fair and benevolent monarch.”
Malarkey faced his subjects.
“Listen, my gallows-bound busters, there is another twist to this tale. You have witnessed what my champion can do, so maybe yer regretting monies wagered. So I offer you one chance to retract yer wager without penalty. But if you leave yer ill-gotten gains in the kitty, then among the benefits that will accrue to you are shorter odds, a free toddy, and the admiration of your peers. And who steps up to spill the blood is your affair. You coves have leave to select the burliest muck-snipe from among your ranks to set against my little girlie. Choose whomsoever you fancy, so long as he bears the mark.” Riley found his discomfort swelling with every passing second. This was a fine penny-show for the Rams, but Chevie and himself were sitting ducks. If Garrick had managed to dump his carcass into the tunnel-of-time, it wouldn’t be long before some tidbits concerning a battling squaw dropped into his ear hole. And then the Thames water rats will be raking two extra floaters out of the dawn currents.
Riley perched on the throne’s cushion.
“Chevie,” he whispered, “do the business quick as you like, then we can make ourselves scarce. My skin is crawling with the feeling that Garrick is coming.”
“Roger that. We need to be on our way,” said Chevie.
Every one of Riley’s Garrick is coming hunches had been bang on the money so far.
Malarkey overheard the exchange. He plucked Riley from the throne, depositing him at his feet like a royal puppy, or jester. “Don’t worry about Albert Garrick. My best team of murdering scum have been lying in wait for him at his digs, their time bought by the very same fancy gent who ordered your deaths. As to you two foundlings being on your way, I think you have misremembered our arrangement.”
Chevie punched her fist into her palm and several large men jumped backward. “What arrangement?” she asked. Riley’s chin dropped to his breastbone, and he answered the question for Malarkey. “We are fighting our way into the Rams, the alternative being a sudden case of violent death—yours and mine. Once we are in, then we are Malarkey’s for life.” Malarkey pointed at Riley. “A shilling to the boy for keenness. You fight for the very breath in your lungs, little lady.
And if you wrestle your death from my grasp, then I still hold your life. Remember that well.”
He swiveled on the balls of his feet like a trained swordsman until his riding crop pointed at Riley. “Take this one and mark him. He is ours now.”
Hands descended on Riley from the crowd, so many that it seemed as though he were being swallowed by a sea anemone.
Riley fought, dropping several of his captors with well-placed blows, but whenever one fell another sprang to take his place.
The Rams lifted him high and carried him through the throng to a far corner of the room, where a decrepit old man sat surrounded by books, boxes of needles, and little ink bottles of dense, jeweled colors. The man’s fingers were small like a child’s but gnarled and inked in the wrinkles, each knuckle a rainbow. Riley found himself plonked in a wooden chair and held in place by viselike fingers on each shoulder.
“A young recruit, is it?” said the man.
“That is the case, Farley,” said Riley’s restrainer. Farley set his store of needles tinkling as he poked through them. “Not really a Ram,” he muttered. “More a lamb than a Ram. Still, mine is not to wonder why . . .” He selected a thin needle to make the mark.
“Mister, ain’t you going to a-sketch it on first?” Riley asked nervously.
Farley’s cough rolled in his throat. “Sketch, is it? Boy, I been doing the ram for years, could do it in me sleep, I could. Now, quit yer vibrations, or it’s a goat adornment you’ll be sporting in place of a ram.”
“That needle is clean, ain’t it? I don’t want to lose an arm.” “Worry not, the tool is sterilized better than any steel in St. Bart’s. No one ever saw a bubble of pus from Anton Farley’s needles. I will do her small and quick, and the time will pass.
And
presently I will select a second, alcohol-swabbed needle to pick out the ram on your friend.”
At the mention of his friend, Riley craned his neck, trying to look back toward the boxing circle without moving his shoulder. From his seat he couldn’t see so much as the top of Chevie’s head, just a throng of Rams who had set up a chant.
“Golgoth, Golgoth,” intoned the criminal coterie, and again, “Golgoth, Golgoth.”
“Ah, me,” said Farley sadly. “Just the one needle, then.”
Chevie was not yet accustomed to the sheer pungency of Victorian London. Even the air seemed to have a sepia tinge to it, and mystery flakes landed on her head and shoulders, mottling her skin.
That can’t be good, she thought. I don’t even want to think about where those flakes come from.
The Rams had formed a loose human cordon around her and seemed to have developed a certain prudence in approaching the Injun maid, probably due to the large club dangling from her dainty fist and the blood dripping from its howjadoo end.
And now the men were chanting the word Golgoth, which Chevie suspected would turn out to be some particularly vicious incarnation of Battering Ram.
Battering Rams. If these guys got any more macho, they could have their own show on cable TV fixing motorcycles and pumping iron.
The ocean of men parted and a malevolent hulk strutted into the circle like he was the world’s best at something violent.
So this is Golgoth, thought Chevie. It’s probably going to take two wallops to knock out this guy.
Golgoth reached up a delicate forefinger and thumb, pinching his crown and removing his hair, which apparently was some kind of hairpiece.
“Hold Marvin for me, would you, Gilhooley?” said Golgoth, dropping the hairpiece into the hand of his much smaller friend, who did what his far larger friend requested of him, which was probably the basis upon which their relationship was built.
Two things about Golgoth surprised Chevie.
One: his creepy hairpiece had a name.
And two: no one besides her seemed to find the word Gilhooley hilarious. It sounded a little bit rude, but she wasn’t sure why.
“Okay, Golgoth,” she said, cracking her knuckles. “I will try to hurt you humanely.”
“I ain’t no Golgoth,” said the giant. “I is his little bruvver.”