I was prepared for a number of things, but an afternoon off was not one of them. Barker’s hansom let me off in New Kent Road near our home, and I watched him rattle away to his appointment. My employer had kept me occupied all morning, but now I was alone with thoughts of Maire and what had happened on the bridge. I began to feel low again.
I went upstairs to read, but it was too hot in the house on a June afternoon, and so I took a turn in the garden. Harm came over to sniff my trousers, took a few laps from the miniature pond under my window, and went back to lie in the bed of thyme. I bent down and scratched him between his ears. He seemed to like that.
I stood for a moment with my hands in my pockets, listening to the gurgle of the stream and the swishing of the windmill that pumped it from underground, if a bit sluggishly. Then the strangest thing happened, or perhaps it was the most natural. One of my hands rose to form a beak and the other went out in the opposite direction as if to ward off a blow. What was the next move Barker had taught me? Ah, yes, hands together, one atop the other, with the right foot forward, toe pointed up. I was doing Barker’s internal exercises. I started at the beginning and went through the entire form twice. It calmed my wounded spirit.
“Very impressive,” a familiar voice said.
I looked over my shoulder. Israel Zangwill leaned against the frame of the back door. He had never come to the house before, but I remembered he and Jacob Maccabee were acquainted.
“Israel! Good to see you!” I said, pumping his hand.
“I heard you were back in town. That’s quite a pair of black eyes you’re sporting.”
“Yes, well, it’s better than the spectacles I was wearing,” I said. “I think Barker’s trying to turn me into a lesser version of himself. Come into the kitchen. I will make some coffee.”
“Thank you. This garden is amazing. I’d hardly imagine such a place existed in London.”
His voice suddenly awakened the diminutive dragon that stood guard over our secret garden. I had just enough time to scoop him up before he sank his teeth into Zangwill’s trouser leg.
“My word, that’s the ugliest dog I’ve ever seen,” my friend said over the animal’s frantic barks and howls.
“He’s a Chinese imperial dog, and his name is Harm. He belongs to my employer,” I explained as the dog screeched in his face.
“Yes, well, your employer is welcome to him. I shall wait in the kitchen, if you don’t mind.” He backed away slowly and went into the house.
After I brewed coffee on the stove, we sat at the deal table overlooking the garden, while outside Harm attempted to launch an assault upon the window, making quite impressive aerial leaps to see if we were still there.
I wanted to tell Israel everything that had happened, but I knew Barker would have counseled me not to. The most I could reveal was that in the course of our last case, I had managed to fall off Charing Cross Railway Bridge and successfully get my heart broken.
“Your employer certainly doesn’t do things by halves, does he?” my friend pronounced. “You may be the only man to have fallen off a London bridge and survived.”
“It is not a distinction I covet, thank you. What am I going to do, Israel? I feel as if I may never get over this.”
“I am no rabbi, of course, but if I could offer some advice, it would be that time heals all wounds.”
“I didn’t know that was a Jewish proverb.”
Zangwill threw his shaggy head back and laughed. “Yes, it was Rabbi Geoffrey Chaucer, if you must know. Some scholar you are. Oh, and if you’re still looking for a reason to live, I can give you hundreds. A fellow doesn’t have to travel far to find pretty girls. And allow me to point out that they generally prefer rakish detectives with their exciting tales to humble scholars and teachers, such as me.”
“I thank you for the encouragement, but if you must know the truth, I believe I shall avoid women for a while. I’m not very good for them, nor they for me.”
Zangwill watched as Harm sailed past the window again. “He really is the maddest creature I’ve ever seen.”
He rose and tossed a coin on the table.
“You needn’t pay for your coffee, Israel,” I joked.
“That’s not my shilling. It is the one you lent Ira before you left. I’ve been keeping it for him, since money rather melts through his fingers. He told me to tell you he was never so glad to pay a shilling in his life, and that he hopes you realize it was the prayers in the synagogue that allowed you to survive, if just barely.”
“Thank him for me the next time you see him,” I said.
“Thank him yourself at the Barbados this Sunday, if you can get away. Say, two o’clock?”
“Done,” I told him.
Barker came home at dinnertime with a look that said, “Don’t ask me where I was or what I’ve been doing.” The Widow was never to be discussed. I suppose we all have our tender spots.
“How was your afternoon?” he rumbled.
“Fine, sir. I got back to the internal exercises.”
“Good, good.”
“Israel Zangwill came to see me.”
“Zangwill,” he said. “What did he want?”
“He heard I was feeling low.”
“I’ve always found that work is the best antidote for a sad heart,” Barker stated. “What would you say to a new case?”
“Already?” I asked. “We’ve only just finished one.”
“Lad, they can’t wait patiently in a queue. We must take them as they come. It’s nothing as dangerous as the last one, however. Some securities have gone missing. We should start on Monday.”
I thought for a moment. “I’m your man.”
Barker nodded. “Very good.”
That evening, I finally got around to reading
“It is the very thing to fix the broken heart,” the prickly Frenchman stated. As far as he was concerned, all ills were to be remedied with food.
So far, Barker had prescribed work, Dummolard good food, and Zangwill said that time would heal my malady. I believed them all wrong, like Job’s trio of advisors, but certainly a slice of pie would do no harm. I slid off the side of my bed, where I had been lounging, and went downstairs, registering the sound of Barker’s footsteps climbing up to what I call his Red Room.
Down in the hall, I couldn’t help but notice Mac sitting on a bench by the door, with his head down and his hand clutching the top of his yarmulke. Mac seated is not a sight one saw every day. In fact, he is normally so industrious I couldn’t recall seeing him seated at all. The fellow was not thirty, and despite a studied manner and a habit of posing as if for a painting of Byron, he is a bundle of energy. So, one can see why I found the sight novel. I thought perhaps he was praying. Just to test the waters, so to speak, I cleared my throat. I thought he would jump up, but he did not.
“Whatever is the matter?” I asked.
Maccabee looked up, as if in a reverie. “What? Oh, the Guv just had a telephone call from Mr. Anderson.”
“Anderson? Really? What did he have to say?”
“Quite a lot, actually. Mr. Barker listened for a good five minutes. From what I gather, the Guv was recommended to receive some sort of honor.”
I was astounded, but after a moment, I thought that Barker did deserve some sort of recognition. He had saved the life of the Prince of Wales and foiled an attempt to blow up London. Certainly he should have received more than the pittance Her Majesty’s government paid him as a spy.
“That’s marvelous! Is there any chance of a knighthood?”
