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  “I don’t know,” I continued rather lamely. I’d run out of story now. “Into the darkness somewhere. I couldn’t follow him.”

  Nick was looking at me. “You’ve had even more adventures than me,” he said, and sniffed deeply again. He looked at me. “Your hair’s all wet,” he said, “and your clothes … what on earth happened to you?”

  “I told you,” I said, “I had to hide under that old horse in the stable over the way.”

  “I still don’t —“ he began, and then stopped. A look of horror crossed his face as he realized what had happened, and then he began to laugh.

  I couldn’t help laughing too; but then I remembered Mrs. Muggerage upstairs. “Ssssssshhh!” I hissed.

  Nick reached over and threw me a ragged old towel, with which I thankfully dried myself as best I could. “Here, stick these on,” he whispered, rooting out a pair of pants and an old brown shirt.

  Making a face, I pulled my stinking wet shirt over my head. But as I was doing so there was a sudden clatter from above and Mrs. Muggerage’s face appeared at the trapdoor. I rolled off the bed onto the floor and Nick stood up.

  “What is it, Ma?” he called, just a little too quickly.

  “Who’s down there with you? I can ‘ear whisperin’, and … and laughin’,” she added bitterly, as though the latter were the worst crime she could imagine.

  “No, Ma. Honest.”

  A foot appeared on the top step. I held my breath. “I been listenin’, Nick boy, and you been talkin’ to someone. It’s that nasty little boy Jake again, innit? ‘Ow did ‘e get in?” She came stamping down the stairs.

  “There’s no one here, Ma,” Nick protested, his voice quavering with fear. I hadn’t had time to scramble completely under the bed, and I was desperately hoping I couldn’t be seen.

  “Don’t you lie to me,” the huge woman snapped.

  “I ain’t lyin’, Ma, honest. You don’t have to come down. Honest.”

  “You’ve ‘ad enough warnin’, Master Nicholas,” she growled. Her voice was deep with menace, in a way I’d never heard a woman’s voice sound before. “You’ve told enough lies lately, yer little rat. One more lie, Nick boy.” She advanced into the room. “Come on. One more lie!”

  Something very peculiar happened to Mrs. Muggerage when she got really irate. She seemed to grow, for one thing, until she completely blocked out every other object in sight, as though someone were inflating her from behind. And her muscles seemed to tense, and her neck grew stiff, and her head shook slightly, and her eyes went glassy. It was as if, at some sudden prompting, every last trace of humanity drained out of her and she became an animal, or even a machine, perfectly adapted for violence.

  “Don’t!” moaned Nick. He sounded utterly terrified. All at once I understood what he’d been suffering all his life. In his voice I could hear the pure sick fear his guardians’ violence could reduce him to. Groping on the floor around me, the first thing I found was my sopping old shirt. Silently, I pulled it towards me.

  “You lie to me, Nick,” the woman cajoled, “come on. You open your mouth.” As the giant shadow fell over me, I saw my chance. I launched myself up onto the bed and, before she could really react, I flung the vile-smelling shirt over her head and pulled the corners sharply.

  She struggled, her face buried in the wet cotton, her neck pulled back unexpectedly.

  “Gragh!” she coughed as the revolting stuff filled her eyes and mouth.

  “Run, Nick!” I screamed; giving the shirt a final twist and ducking a huge swipe from her trunklike arms, I followed Nick up the stairs.

  We virtually fell out of the trapdoor into the scullery; and I slammed the door down, fumbling in panic to pull the heavy keg across the top.

  “It might not hold her for long,” I said as there came a huge thump from beneath. “But it might be long enough.” I was gasping for breath. “Come on,” I urged, and reached out to grab Nick’s arm. He met me in a bear hug, sudden and tight. In two seconds in the dark scullery his fear and his relief shuddered through me, like a trapped fish escaping into open water. Two seconds: then he let go.

  And we ran.

  We broke our run only to untie Lash from his post; and we finally stopped at a street corner nearly a mile away, where we clung to a cornerstone and gasped for breath like hounds.

  “She … hasn’t followed us,” Nick said, holding his sides. “I thought she … was going to kill us … both.”

  We stood panting for a while in the dark.

  “I think,” I said, “we’d better go and check on Mr. Spintwice.”

  As we moved through the streets, keeping Lash on a tight lead, I told Nick more about my expedition the previous night. We were careful to keep our voices down in case unwanted ears were close at hand. At one point we felt stones raining down on us, and when we turned we saw a couple of ragged boys haring off into a dim passageway. Even the most harmless of kids, we knew, could for a couple of pennies give up information to someone with really malicious intent. These apparently innocent children were the eyes and ears of the underworld.

  Nick, of course, could tell at a glance who was who. “Swell,” he’d murmur, and pull us back into the shadows as a well-dressed young man with a face scarred by smallpox sauntered by, casting a shrewd eye about him as he went. Dodging thieves such as this, we eventually reached the little silversmith’s shop.

  Lash was straining at the lead.

  “What is it?” I asked him. He’d picked up a scent, and was pulling us not towards the front door but to a high gate at the side of the house, stained green with mold.

  “Is that a way through to the back?” I asked. “Only, Lash seems to want us to go that way.”

  We felt our way down the lane, so narrow we could touch both sides without even stretching our arms. The ground was covered in mounds of smelly garbage left outside the backs of the houses; stumbling over these, we found Spintwice’s tiny back door. Lash stood there expectantly, looking up at us.

  Nick knocked, and we waited. He knocked again.

  “He sleeps in this back room,” he whispered, “he ought to hear us.” He knocked harder.

  There was no reply. The more we knocked, the more undeniable the responding silence. Lash started scrabbling at the door with his front paws. We tried knocking on the grimy little window.

  “Mr. Spintwice!” Nick called softly.

  Lash was whimpering now and I was getting worried. “You don’t think something’s happened to him, do you?” I asked anxiously. Nick said nothing. He was feeling around the window sash, and in a couple of seconds he’d slid it open.

  “Mr. Spintwice!” he called in.

  Putting our heads inside, we could hear a muffled banging sound as though someone was trying to attract our attention.

  “Come on,” said Nick, “he’s in trouble.” I helped push him up through the little window. Lash bounded up after him; and I followed, Nick pulling me through into the little back room where the banging sounded quite distinctly now.

  “Mr. Spintwice!” Nick called.

  We tried to avoid the tiny furniture as we dashed through the house. The noise turned out to be coming from a tea chest on the floor of the shop. Its lid was firmly nailed down. “Mr. Spintwice!” Nick called through the side of the chest, “is that you?”

  “Mmmmmmppphhhggg!” came a strangled voice from inside, followed by a long and furious storm of kicks. Nick found a claw hammer, and soon the long brown nails were pried out of the chest lid and Mr. Spintwice was revealed, trussed up like a turkey, with a silk handkerchief around his mouth.

  “Thank heavens you’ve come,” he said as soon as we pulled the gag off his face. “I thought I was going to suffocate.”

  “Who did this to you?” asked Nick.

  For the first time since I’d met him, Spintwice wasn’t grinning. There was a dark crease of fear across his face. If we hadn’t come to check up on him, it might have been days before anyone came by, I realized. He really had beli
eved he was going to die; and again I felt ashamed at having involved him in all this in the first place.

  “A man with a pointy mustache,” piped up Spintwice when he’d got his breath, “your snake-man from Calcutta, I suppose. No sign of his snake tonight, at least.” He was very shaken, and we helped him into a chair. “I came in here to check the locks before going to bed,” he explained, “and what did I find but this fellow standing here in a cloak and looking at me with his big eyes. Didn’t expect to find anyone here, I suppose. Thought he could sneak about to his heart’s content! Well I soon saw to that.”

  “But how did you end up in the chest?” asked Nick.

  “Well, he was bigger than me,” said the dwarf grudgingly. “I threatened him, and told him to get out, and — well, he laughed. As if I was some sort of … of circus act,” he spluttered. “Next thing I know I’m being bundled in there and he’s banging nails in!”

  I’m afraid neither Nick nor I could suppress a smile at the thought of Spintwice trying to put up a fight. We were relieved we’d arrived in time to rescue him. But there was a lump of dread in the pit of my stomach as we tried to establish what the man from Calcutta had gotten away with. A few seconds’ feeling inside a nearby cupboard was enough to make it clear he’d taken the camel; but what about the jar with the powdery contents in?

  “That should be on the mantelpiece in there,” Spintwice said, indicating the little sitting room across the corridor. And, indeed, that’s where it still was. I gave a guffaw of joy.

  “But won’t he realize the camel’s empty?” Nick asked, looking worried. “He might come back for the rest.”

  “Shouldn’t do,” Spintwice said. “After you’d gone I had a thought, and I filled the camel up with flour. It’ll keep him happy till he gets back to Calcutta, I should think. And then his wife can use it to make bread with, and stop his mouth from complaining.”

  “Mr. Spintwice,” said Nick, “you’re worth your weight in gold.”

  “As little as that?” said Spintwice, pretending to be offended. “That doesn’t amount to much.” He was getting his sense of humor back.

  “So … what’s he going to do with it now?” wondered Nick.

  “That’s his business,” Spintwice butted in. “Sit down and let me make you cocoa. I think we’re all better off without having camels in the house, if the consequences involve being hammered into tea chests by strange men.”

  I looked at Nick. He had a resigned expression on his face. He knew I wouldn’t be content to sit here having cocoa with a dwarf while the villains were still running around all over London.

  “I don’t think we should waste much time,” I said. “How long had you been in there, Mr. Spintwice?” I asked him.

  “Quite long enough, thank you,” he snapped. Then he realized I really wanted him to tell me, and he thought for a moment. “It was a minute or two after nine when I came in here and found him,” he recalled. He had every reason to be precise: there were enough clocks in here, after all.

  “It’s nearly half past ten now,” I said. “You were in there more than an hour.” I chewed my lip. “He’s had ages. He could be anywhere by now.”

  “Well, precisely,” said Nick. “The important thing is, he’s gone, and Mr. Spintwice is safe. That’s all that matters. Why don’t you sit down?”

  I was agitated. There was something that didn’t make sense.

  “Something’s wrong, Nick. He wouldn’t have had time to get here by nine o’clock, after I saw him at Lion’s Mane Court. It must already have been very nearly nine by then.”

  “Well, obviously he just moves fast,” said Nick.

  “It must have taken us nearly half an hour to get here, Nick,” I persisted. “He’d have had to do more than move fast. He’d have had to have a —” I looked at Mr. Spintwice, and remembered the book Nick had shown me the first time we’d come “— a magic carpet,” I said.

  Mr. Spintwice laughed shortly. “Well, if I ever see him again I’ll make sure I’ve a carpet beater handy so I can take a swipe as he comes past.”

  It was plain that Spintwice needed something hot to drink to revive him, and Nick and I offered to go and make cocoa while he sat and recovered his composure.

  “Why don’t you calm down?” Nick asked quietly, once we were out of earshot in the little scullery. The hiss from the water heating up in the kettle was quite loud enough to make our conversation inaudible in the next room.

  “There’s definitely something not quite right,” I said. “The more we see of that man, the more magic he seems.”

  “Well we can’t do anything about him just now.”

  “I’d just love to know where he goes with the camel now he’s got it back,” I said.

  “Mog,” Nick said, “you said yourself, he’ll be miles away by now. We couldn’t begin to find out where he’s gone.”

  “We’ve got a pretty good idea, Nick. He’s probably gone back to that house next door to Cramplock’s.”

  “And what are you going to do? Go in and fight him?” He suddenly looked dreadfully tired.

  I stirred, uselessly. “I just think we ought to be doing something,” I said. “He’s got the camel, and he’s got a snake which bites people, and he’s got —” My bangle, I thought; but I stopped myself from saying it. “I’m afraid more people are going to get killed,” I said instead. “Where’s your Pa?”

  “How should I know?” snapped Nick, irritable now. “I’m not going anywhere where I stand a chance of meeting my Pa. Or anybody else,” he added, “murderers or snake charmers or anyone. We can’t stop them. We’d just be taking a stupid risk.”

  He poured the boiling water into three little mugs, and stirred cocoa into them. I carried the tray back through the little door into the parlor, steam pouring off the mugs like factory chimneys. Mr. Spintwice was looking much happier, and had produced a big glistening ginger cake from somewhere. He’d placed it on a low table in front of him, and was making a fuss of Lash, who was sitting between his feet, licking the little man’s fingers affectionately. No wonder Nick liked coming here so much. My resistance was being broken down, and I was both exasperated and delighted.

  “You’re exhausted, Mog,” said Nick, coming in to join us. “You spent most of last night running around after criminals, and so did I. We all need a rest. Just forget about the man from Calcutta for a bit.”

  I eyed the cake, my heart torn. “You’re right,” I sighed.

  Mr. Spintwice beamed even more broadly than usual. “I think I would really be happier,” he said quietly, “if you two stayed here. Just tonight.”

  11

  THE PAPERMAKER

  When I woke up the sun was in my eyes, and at first I wasn’t sure where I was; but after a few seconds it dawned on me. I also realized that it was Sunday, and I didn’t have to work; which was rather lucky, since the first sound I heard was the jangling of the parish bells calling people to church, and if it had been a working day I’d have overslept by three hours. We’d both slept at Spintwice’s; and as I lifted my head I saw that I was alone in the big spare bed, with nothing more than a crumpling of the sheet beside me to indicate where Nick had slept. I remembered a few tired murmurs we’d exchanged before we went to sleep, but you couldn’t call it a conversation. I had dropped off in no time at all, the troubled whirling in my head of the recent events and mysteries pacified, at least for a while, by the dwarf’s good nature. For the first time in about a week, I’d had no dreams — or, if I had, I couldn’t remember them when I woke up. Now the sun pasted bright cutouts on the plaster wall, and I sat propped up on one elbow watching Lash, curled at the foot of my bed with his tail under his chin a bit like the dog on the watermark. He twitched, whimpered a brief “Good morning,” and yawned hugely.

  I could hear faint voices from another room. I stretched luxuriously under the sheet, staring up at the ceiling where a large fly was revolving in agitation, caught in a spider’s web, buzzing like clockwork. Details and questio
ns began to return, lazily, to my mind.

  “Nick,” I said later, as Spintwice served up bacon and bread for breakfast, “I’m going to explore today. Will you come?”

  “Explore where?”

  I chewed contemplatively. “Not sure,” I said. “Back to the Three Friends, maybe.”

  “You’ll have to be careful, in broad daylight,” said Nick.

  “I shan’t do anything silly,” I said, a bit impatiently. “Are you going to come?

  Spintwice looked from one to the other of us. “I’d rather hoped,” he said, “that Nick might help me with something this morning. I got a box of books the other day and I haven’t had time to look at them or sort them out. I thought you might enjoy giving me a hand.”

  This was too much for Nick to resist, of course, and I realized it would be. I promised to come back in the afternoon and tell them what I’d found out; but Lash and I were alone, and swift, as we left the shop and joined the life of the streets. Darting through the narrow lanes of Clerkenwell, we headed towards the City.

  After a short time we passed a row of tall, well-kept brick mansion houses with railings outside, the servants’ quarters in the basement, and a short flight of steps up to a grand front door with a hanging basket of flowers above. They were the kind of houses where fashionable doctors and merchants lived. A couple of hopeless beggars, old men in broken hats which opened up at the top like round boxes, were wandering along pestering the servants at the doors. Waiting outside one of the houses was a black carriage drawn by a patient, aristocratic-looking horse.

  I stopped and grasped one of the spiked railings. I’d seen this horse and carriage before.

  Just to make sure, I crossed the street to take a look at the horse from the other side: and sure enough, along its right flank, there was an unmistakable smooth, long scar.

  At that very moment a gentleman in black and grey, with shiny shoes, stepped briskly out of the nearest house and down the steps to the carriage. I didn’t have time to hide, but just had to try and look as inconspicuous as possible on the other side of the road, picking at the leaves on an overhanging tree and hoping he wouldn’t notice me. I watched him carefully. He had a haughty face, his nose held high and his cheeks sucked in, as though there were an off-putting smell beneath his nostrils. There was a low murmur of conversation as he greeted someone who was already in the carriage: the man known as his Lordship, presumably. Someone called an instruction to the driver and, as he lifted the reins, the driver turned his head back towards the carriage window and repeated the address with perfect clarity.