The Devil's Workshop

“Sir Edward was right,” Day said. “At least, I think he was. By the way, where were you?”

“Me? I waited for a bit at Scotland Yard, then followed you out here.”

“Why didn’t you come with the sergeant?”

“I never saw him leave Sir Edward’s office,” March said.

“Well, it’s good to have you here now,” Day said.

“Take a look at this, Inspector,” Hammersmith said. He had knelt on the road and was pointing to the spot where March had been looking.

“It’s nothing, I tell you,” March said.

“I don’t know about that,” Hammersmith said. “I think you might have stumbled across something after all.”

Day squatted next to Hammersmith. He was privately amused that Hammersmith gave no thought to grinding the knees of his trousers into the dirt, even after being reprimanded that very morning for his appearance.

He squinted and brought his lantern in closer to the road and saw a smudge of blue chalk, distorted by uneven cobblestones. The chalk appeared to have been clumsily rubbed out, but there was still a faint impression where it had ground down into the stones.

“It’s an h,” Day said.

“From here, it looks like a four,” Hammersmith said.

“No, you’re right,” Day said. “It’s a four, all right. And an arrow.”

“You think it means something after all?” March said.

“Well,” Day said, “probably not. I don’t mean to contradict you, sir.”

“Not at all,” March said. “Your eyes are no doubt better than mine in the dark. To me it looked like a child’s scribble and nothing more.”

“It may well be,” Day said.

“But it may be something else,” Hammersmith said. “The arrow’s pointing that way, across the field.”

“Shall we follow it?”

“It may be a waste of time.”

“On the other hand…”

Hammersmith stood and held out his hand to Day, pulled him to his feet, and they set off moving slowly away from the prison, their lanterns held high. March hesitated a moment, then drew his revolver and followed them into the high grass.

15

The ground beneath the ground was uneven, and Jack was still unsteady on his feet. Cinderhouse needed to help him occasionally when it came time for them to pick their way over broken stones or across overfull streambeds. They left a trail of Jack’s blood behind them, and he imagined each drop that fell from his wrists blossoming from the dark soil into tall black flowers, screaming and swaying like sirens. Jack was dismayed by how much muscle tone he had lost. He assumed his coordination and strength would return, but it would clearly take some time. Cinderhouse had given him his jacket, with the black darts dotted across the front and down the sleeves, but Jack was still naked from the waist down. His legs were skinny and scratched. Cinderhouse carried both the lantern and the black medical bag from the cell.

They found a shallow place and crossed an underground pond, small darting white creatures swarming around their ankles and between their toes. They walked through dense catacombs, human bones stacked high and deep, skulls piled high over their heads, and into a large open chamber that Jack imagined was the inside of some enormous whale carcass, grey wooden ribs arcing above them.