“—Until the twenty-ninth of September 1829, to be precise,” Wendy interrupted.
Doc continued, oblivious: “So the rookeries were lawless and dangerous. By 1888 Whitechapel had survived mid-Victorian attempts to clean up and redevelop the other rookeries, and it was notorious for prostitution and drink. Also illegal gambling clubs and opium dens, but the prostitution was out in the open. About six percent of the women of late Victorian London worked as prostitutes—80,000 of them at any time—many of them in brothels, but a lot of streetwalkers, too, some as young as thirteen, the age of consent in those days. Which means—”
Rebecca cleared her throat. “Anyone tries to lay a hand on me, he’s going to suffer,” she announced.
“You’ll get us all in trouble if you start a fight,” Doc blundered on. “Just keep close and most of the low life will avoid us, is what I’m saying—if we look like a mixed group who know where we’re going—”
“Crapsack London is crap, sucks to be female.” Wendy put a warning edge in her voice. Game Boy’s shoulders were as tense as clocksprings. “We got the message, wise guy.”
“—But really, you don’t want to wander off. Because it’s 1888, and Jack’s on the prowl—”
That was as far as he got when Game Boy spun round and punched him.
Game Boy wasn’t aiming to hurt, but a fist in Doc’s stomach when he wasn’t expecting it shoved all the air out of his lungs and left him doubled over. “Stop it!” Game Boy shouted. He stopped dead, looking at Doc and Imp with wide eyes. “I can’t stand this shit. I just want it to be over.”
“What did I say?” Doc whimpered.
Imp took him by the shoulders and led him gently aside. “I think you just triggered the person who was forced to spend his first fourteen years as a girl.” Imp glanced at the others, taking in Rebecca’s furious scowl and Wendy’s impassive face, which might as well have had keep digging, son tattooed on it. “Count yourself lucky Boy snapped first: Del and her friend aren’t far behind.”
“But what did I—”
“Listen.” Imp leaned his forehead against Doc’s and stared into his eyes. “Everybody knows, Doc. Everybody knows as much as they can stomach about Jack the Ripper, and they won’t thank you for telling them anything they don’t already know, because they don’t want to know the stomach-churning details. They especially don’t want to know the unvarnished truth. They know where we’re going, son, and they’re scared and angry and handling it really well. Now take a deep breath and apologize. And you stick close to them. Got it?”
Wendy and Del and Game Boy were pretending not to listen. Now Game Boy nodded at Imp, a silent thank you.
“Um. I’m sorry, people? I really didn’t mean to—”
“It’s all right.” Wendy smiled at him too brightly, spun round raising her hands, and unleashed half a dozen arrows in as many heartbeats. Her bow howled, a gut-throbbing brown note that cried death: the arrows flickered and faded as they pierced the mist behind them.
Doc paled. “I’m really sorry,” he wrung his hands.
“I doubt it, but that’s okay,” said Wendy. “Just don’t do it again, or you really will be sorry.” The bow vanished back to wherever it had come from.
The silence gathered thickly around them for a few seconds, broken only by a faint giggle like glass windchimes tinkling in the breeze.
“Did anybody else hear that?” asked Game Boy.
“Guys.” Imp side-eyed the sunken road in either direction. “We shouldn’t hang around here, it’s not safe.” He cleared his throat and gave Wendy a significant look. “Also, don’t shoot unless you mean to kill? It pisses them off.”
And all at once they were marching again, hurrying, almost running, really, desperate to get out from between the clutching embankments to either side; desperate to reach the end of the ghost road leading into a dream of London in the darkness.
The Bond made reasonable time.
The idea of being eaten by magical horrors with too many teeth for the crime of stepping on a ley line did not appeal to him, nor did the risk of running into Eve’s minions. So he decided to make his own way, and outpace them in the bargain. He had certain advantages. For one thing he’d grown up in the rural Midwest before he enlisted, with horses and traps as well as tractors and crop sprayers. For another thing he knew London, and the layout of the main streets hadn’t changed so very much between the nineteenth century and his own era. And finally, he was a solidly built gentleman wearing a small arsenal. Nobody rational would want to mess with him.
It was late evening when the Bond stepped out into the mist, and there weren’t many people about. It took him almost half an hour to flag down a hansom cab. He had no coin, but he paid for the loan of the cab with the most valuable currency of all: he spared its owner’s life. (A syringeful of flunitrazepam ensured the cabbie would spend the night comatose in the park.)
The cab-horse was in poor shape, but the Bond wasn’t overly concerned so long as it didn’t go lame before he reached his destination. Wearing the cabbie’s cape and hat he blended in with the London traffic, and he drew the curtains closed around the passenger seat to obscure its lack of an occupant. He made good time until he reached White Church Lane where he abandoned the cab, hitching the horse to a railing
