Spectre of War by Kin S. Law

Author:Kin S. Law [Law, Kin S.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781944728540
Publisher: City Owl Press
Published: 2017-10-23T22:00:00+00:00

London was her usual steamy self. A mile from the city center, an abundance of greenery lessened the signs of Victoria III’s steam-driven revolution. In times long ago, this part of London had been used for cemeteries. Later it housed the myriad workforce needed to maintain and drive Britain’s budding industry: the Arabs, the blackamoor Africans, and the Indians.

Arturo left the pub with a warm agitation in his chest. He had gambled on much: New York, as the likely place Hargreaves would begin her investigation, that M.A.D. would play into his hands like they did, and that Hargreaves would even continue investigating. But he knew her that much, as well as this neighborhood, in fact.

For whatever reason, a great swath of the place had been saved from the ravages of building to become lush, beautiful parkland. Not even leisure dirigibles chose to land on the green, favoring the flatland of Hyde Park to the bridged hills of Mile End. One wing of a decrepit department store stood like a row of gapped teeth, with one portion missing, bombed out in the last war. The park had been allowed to claim the building, filling the vacant space with grass and benches.

Arturo felt as at home walking these streets as he did in his rooms in fashionable North London. He passed a knot of cockney boys smoking cigarettes outside a pub. The closest, a large bearded fellow, took a long glare at Arturo’s shock of bright, spiky hair, until another of them nudged the fellow with an informative jab. Their leader nodded, knowingly. Last year Arturo had posted the leader’s bail on a trumped-up charge. Half of these men had been in his pay, at one time or another. Now they were better than hounds when he needed to find someone underground.

By the chip shop on his left, Arturo had found Withers the cat half a dozen times for elderly Mrs. Howell there in the grove of spiny sloe. In the housing complex to his right, he had once saved a young couple’s marriage by proving beyond a doubt the tart carrying the husband’s child was nothing more than a pretender with a stolen handkerchief. He had people to protect him here, like an armor of whispered tales and rumored deeds. This was his side of the city.

Which made the tail so inexplicable in this part of town. He knew it like the back of his hand. The tail might be hiding his face behind a scarf, but the sharply polished shoes, the immaculate coat, and the way he stepped round the puddles as if they were plague-ridden, all spoke of someone not native to gritty Mile End. Further, as Arturo rounded the corner, the man suddenly picked up his pace.

Arturo gave it some thought. He was surprised it had taken so long for someone to find him. The usual suspects came to mind, of course: British Intelligence? Not Scotland Yard; they were not the cloak and dagger sort. He considered the American thieves, but it was unlikely.

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