A Study in Silks

inches, and leaned down into his face.

Magnus grinned, and it wasn’t pleasant. “Eventually, it shall be a relief to place the casket in my hands, because that is the price—the only means—of obtaining peace.”

He touched the green gem that pinned his necktie. The sun leached out of the room, leaving it cold and dank and dark. Shadows crept from the corners, leaving all in shades of mildewed gray. Keating felt a chill move up his legs, as if cold hands were reaching up from graves hidden beneath the carpet. Keating felt a sudden, craven urge to beg the doctor to let the light back in. He bit the inside of his cheek, refusing to let his teeth chatter. “This is magic. The use of magic is illegal in the Empire. Punishable by death.”

The doctor waved a finger. “Oh, tut. You are credulous, for a man of business. I am merely a mesmerist.”

“Mesmerist?” Keating’s voice sounded shrill. “This is more than tricks of the mind, sir.”

“Are you so certain of that?” Magnus laughed softly.

Fear lanced through Keating at the sound. He jerked back, as if Magnus were poisonous to the touch. “You will regret this.”

Magnus turned his eyes to the ceiling in a gesture of exaggerated patience. “Please, threatening me is unwise in the extreme. Don’t force me to fall back on the obvious blustering tropes of penny-dreadful adventures.”

Keating was a brave man, but there was something in the darkness that recalled every boyhood terror. “All men bleed. Is that a trope?”

Magnus pulled a face. “But not all men have daughters, Mr. Keating. And yours is so lovely. Think on her while you ponder my request.”

There was a moment of stunned silence while Keating’s breath choked in his throat.

“Good day, Mr. Keating. I shall be seeing you about town. Often.” Magnus gracefully bowed from the room.

Keating fell backward into his chair, glad of the light that came rushing back through the window glass, but not feeling one bit warmer.

Until his rage breached like a furious kraken.

Chapter Twenty-four

The only antidote to Dr. Magnus was action. And the Gold King had resources for this kind of thing. He had Striker.

South of Marlborough and East of Regent Street lay one of the poorest parts of the Gold district. St. James Workhouse formed one corner of a neighborhood made up of people surviving on a few shillings a week. For a few shillings more, Keating had bought himself an army of Yellowbacks.

Striker, as their leader, had been an even greater find. He was strong and hard and ambitious, but he also had a talent for firearms. Not just to use them, but to make them from bits and scraps. Illiterate, barely articulate, Striker was a natural savant, a primitive Mozart of weaponry.

Keating had snatched him up, a rare and useful specimen to keep close by—but not too close. A streetkeeper had privileges—a place of his own and enough money for regular food, liquor, and the occasional whore—but Striker could still see the workhouse from his rooms. A useful reminder.

Striker’s home was not the kind of place Keating preferred to go, but some orders were better delivered in person. Still, he took extra grooms to watch the carriage, and another pair to follow him into to the rooming house where Striker lived, just in case.

It was daytime, so the place felt oddly subdued, as if the very bricks of the ramshackle building were sleeping off last night’s gin. The main floor had a communal parlor to the left of the front door, probably where whores entertained their customers. Above that were three floors of supposedly private quarters. Striker was up a long, steep flight of the narrow, filthy stairs in one of the corner rooms.

Keating followed behind one of his men, another bringing up the rear. The middle of the steps sagged and creaked, so he found himself walking close to the wall for safety, and then leaning away so his sleeve wouldn’t brush against the grimy paint.

The first man, who had moved up the steps more quickly, pounded on Striker’s door.

“Go away,” came the streetkeeper’s growl, muffled by the wood.

The man pounded again.

“What the bleeding hell do you want?”

By that time Keating had caught up, puffing a little from the climb. “It’s Keating.”

“Then do come in, sir.” More polite, but not exactly welcoming.

Keating turned the rattling knob and pushed open the door. The sight reminded him of an illustration to a cautionary tale, something to do with the wages of sin. The stench was worse—cheap gin cycled through the human body and sweated out again.

Striker sat at a wood table littered with odds and ends, his ragged shirt half buttoned and his bandaged leg stretched out in front of him. His dark complexion had a gray cast, his eyes pink with lack of sleep. Perhaps pain was keeping him up nights.

If so, the man had found his solace. An open bottle hung loosely from his hand. Striker shoved the other through his spiky hair, as if dimly aware of his disheveled state.

It was the first time Keating had ever seen him without the metal-encrusted coat. Now he could see the outline of heavily muscled arms beneath his filthy shirt.

Striker began to struggle out of the chair, but Keating waved him back. “Don’t try to stand.” If he didn’t fall from his injury, the drink might do the job.

Striker subsided. “Thank you, sir. Right kind of you.”

Keating looked around, the floor crunching as he shifted his feet. There was almost no furniture. There was an unmade bed in the corner and a fireplace with a cook pot, but little else. Something had crusted inside the pot that added to the malodorous fug hanging in the room.

Keating felt his gorge rise. “How’s the leg?”

Striker’s face darkened, but he shrugged his bulky shoulders. “It’ll heal. The wound’s clean enough.”

“Glad to hear it.” Probably the cleanest thing in the room.

Keating looked down at the table. Among the plates and string and garbage were several of Striker’s weapons, the housing cracked open and the guts spilling out like cornucopias of gears and wires. Fixing, inventing, improving—he was never done with his creations. They were always works in progress. Always better than anything Keating could buy for his street rats, no matter the price. He’s an asset, if an ill-mannered, grubby piece of work.

He flicked through the mess with one gloved finger, until he uncovered the handle of a silver paper knife. Not something a streetkeeper would own. “Is this the weapon that hurt you?”

Striker grunted and took a pull at the bottle, wiping his mouth on his sleeve.

Keating saw the crest on the handle of the knife and frowned, first shock, and then a worm of anger, sliding through his guts. He picked it up, making a fist around the elegant coat of arms. Bancroft. What was his knife doing in Striker’s leg? The Roth family kept turning up these days like an invasive weed.

“May I keep this?” he said, already sliding the knife into his pocket.

Striker’s lip curled. “Why not? I’ve got others. A knife’s a knife, and that’s not the sharpest. Did for me well enough, though. Gypsy bastard who had it was a professional.”

Interesting. What was Bancroft doing with a professional knife man? Or was this the work of bizarre coincidence? It was one more thing to follow up on. He watched Striker take another swig and decided to get down to business. “I have a job for you. There’s a man who needs killing.”

The streetkeeper glanced at his bandaged thigh. “How soon?”

“Now. The man’s name is Dr. Magnus. I expect he’ll be staying somewhere close at hand. He means to annoy me, and I won’t have it.”