The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack by Mark Hodder

Author:Mark Hodder [Hodder, Mark]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3, mobi
Tags: Fantasy, SteamPunk
ISBN: 9781616142407
Publisher: Prometheus Books

THE RESURRECTIONISTS

When my mother died I was very young,

And my father sold me while yet my tongue

could scarcely cry "'weep! 'weep! 'weep! 'weep!"

go your chimneys I sweep, and in soot I sleep.

-WILLIAM BLAKE, SONGS OF INNOCENCE

hwack!

"Please-no-yes-aah!"

Thwack!

"Oh my-my-ceh-yow!"

Thwack!

"Oh! Ah!-Oh! Ha! Ha!-It burns!"

Again and again, the leather belt struck Algernon Swinburne's buttocks with terrific force, sending wave after wave of pleasure coursing through his diminutive body. He shrieked and howled and gibbered rapturously until, finally, Master Sweep Vincent Sneed grew tired, threw the belt aside, took his hand from the back of the poet's neck, stepped away from the wooden crate over which Swinburne was bent, and wiped his sweaty brow.

"Let that be a lesson to yer," he snarled. "I'll 'ave none o' yer backchat, yer little toerag. Stand up straight!"

Swinburne stood, rubbing his backside through his trousers. He was wearing a flat cap, a stained white collarless calico shirt, a threadbare waistcoat, fingerless woollen gloves, and trousers that were too short-they stopped some inches above his ankles. On his feet were ill-fitting boots with loose soles. His face, hands, and clothes were smeared with soot and his teeth had been made to look yellow and rotten.

"Sorry, Mr. Sneed," he whined.

"Shut yer cakehole. I don't want another peep outa yer. Pack the tools. We've got a job on an' it's gettin' late."

Swinburne left the crate-which the master sweep used as a table-and limped over to the workbench where the brushes and poles, which he'd been cleaning all morning, were laid out. He started packing them into a long canvas holdall.

Sneed plonked himself onto a stool and sat with legs akimbo, elbows on knees, and a bottle of moonshine in his right hand. He watched Swinburne and sneered. The League had supplied him with this new boy three days ago and the little git was too mouthy by half.

"I'll beat some respeck inter yer, that I will," he mumbled, "yer blinkin' whippersnapper."

In aspect, Sneed resembled a stoat. His thin black hair was long and greasy, combed backward over his narrow skull, his gleaming scalp shining through it. His low forehead slid down into a pockmarked and sly-looking face, the whole of which seemed to have been pulled forward by his gargantuan nose-so much so that his beady black eyes, rather than being to either side of it, seemed to be on the sides of the astonishing protuberance. That nose had earned him his nickname, which he despised with a passion. Woe betide anyone who uttered the words "the Conk" within range of his little cauliflower ears!

His small lipless mouth and receding chin were partially hidden by a ragged, nicotine-stained moustache and beard. Through the tangled hair, two big uneven front teeth could be glimpsed.

Over his short, thin but powerful frame, the Conk was wearing baggy canvas trousers held up by a pair of suspenders, a filthy shirt with a red cravat, and a bizarre blue surtout with epaulettes, which may well have been a relic from Admiral Nelson's day.

"29 Hanbury Street, Spitalfields," he grunted.

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