The agents demon, p.21
The Agent's Demon, page 21
“Where are we going?” Steel asks.
“The British Museum.”
“Is this really the best time to visit a museum?”
“I’ll explain in a moment,” I say as we approach the assistant’s desk. “I’d like to see Monaghan, please,” I tell Miller. “As soon as possible.”
He shakes his head. “I’m sorry, but the professor left early this morning. He’ll be gone until the end of the week.”
I stand there for a moment, Miller gazing at me and waiting for a reply. “Thank you,” I manage. The image of the latest victim flashes through my mind. I can’t wait that long. “I left something in his study. Would you mind if I go in to get it?” I ask, my heart picking up at the lie.
“Yes, of course. It’s unlocked, go right in.” Miller gestures to the door and goes back to his work, ignoring me.
Taking a deep breath, I enter the study, tilting my head for Steel to follow. He slips in and I shut the door.
He looks over his glasses at me. “I don’t remember you leaving anything in here.”
“We need a letter of authority for the museum, and I can’t wait for the professor.” My stomach contorts. Even if I justify this by saying it’s for the case, for the women lying cold in the ground, it’s still an abuse of my role. Monaghan could have me disciplined. Or worse.
“What kind of museum is this?” Steel mutters.
I open the first desk drawer: letters from the Home Office and copies of Monaghan’s replies. The next holds a stack of the same letter he gave me for the Wellington Barracks, already written and awaiting a signature. I dip Monaghan’s sleek black pen into the ink pot on his desk and copy his signature onto the letter, holding my breath as I do.
Steel picks up the portrait on the man’s desk. “Who’s this?”
I glance at it. The big frame makes the picture look tiny. “That’s the daughter of the man Monaghan worked for, before he joined the agency. She was murdered by a demon, years ago.” In the portrait, she has long blonde hair and a straight, freckled nose. It’s easy to see why I’d stood out to the professor, over a hundred other girls.
It doesn’t matter why Monaghan chose me. Only that I prove worthy of his choice.
I wince at the thought. Doing this is hardly going to prove that I’m worthy. The opposite, in fact. I sand the signature to dry the ink. “There. Done.”
I put the pen and ink back where they were, lining up the pen with the grain of the wood, everything perfectly straight. Then I fold the letter and tap it against my other hand.
“Let’s go.”
Chapter thirty-six
Walking into the British Museum is like crawling into the veins of a titan. Huge walkways lead to a myriad of exhibits, with towering marble statues and elegant glass cases displaying artifacts plundered from countries all over the world.
The Museum’s library is a haven of knowledge, brimming with toppling book stacks and a dry, dusty scent. The Reading Room is a circular walled structure at its centre, closed off from the bigger library.
Steel gazes around with raised eyebrows. “I’m starting to understand why you need a letter just to get in.”
“Turner could have hidden a book among one of the stacks out here,” I say, gesturing to the bookcases, the haphazard piles. “Why hide it in the Reading Room? Why go to so much trouble?” The letter is another barrier, like the code. Had she intended for someone in particular to break it? Me?
Or perhaps that’s wishful thinking. I clutch the letter in one hand and lengthen my stride to reach the Reading Room. Inside is a far cry from the chaotic book stacks. Neat shelves line the circular wall, enveloping desks lit with stylish green lamps. A few people sit scattered through the room, bent over their books. It is absolutely silent. I approach the desk at the centre.
The clerk is a man in his late fifties with coiffed hair and a magnificent white moustache. He examines me and sniffs. “Yes?”
I slide the letter over the desk. “I have special dispensation to review one of your texts.”
He takes longer than necessary to open the letter. As he reads it, his brows draw together and his mouth droops. No doubt he was looking forward to showing me the door. “Write the reference here.” He gives me a card marked with columns for the reference number. I write it in.
The clerk whisks it from me almost before I finish writing and sniffs again. “Take a seat. I’ll bring it to you.”
Is that how it normally works? Asking would reveal my ignorance, so I thank him and find a desk as far from the other visitors as possible.
Steel flicks out the tail of his coat and sits beside me. “So, this is where the Empire keeps its knowledge,” he muses.
One of the men on the other side of the room looks up. “Quiet,” I whisper. “This is a library.”
Steel shrugs, unconcerned, and stares at the ceiling.
I put my hands on the desk and try not to tap my impatience into the wood. I watch the clerk, my eyes narrowing as he makes no move towards the shelves. Eventually he looks up and catches me watching. With apparent effort, he levers himself from his chair and lumbers over to the bookcases. Glancing at my code, he climbs up one of the wall ladders and pulls a large book from the shelf.
Not a book; it looks more like a folder. He brings it to our table. “We close at six,” he says, dropping it in front of us. “You have two hours.”
“Thank you.” I pull the folder towards me and wait for him to leave before I open it.
The binder is made of leather and a date is inscribed on the inside cover: April 1861. Inside the binding are sheafs of paper, all different sizes, sewn or stamped into the leather to keep them together. Some pages are written in English, some in French or German, and others in Arabic and Mandarin. More are in languages I don’t recognise. The pages I can read speak of demons: each one is a tale of a different breed.
I flip to the back. Tucked into the binder is a thick wad of paper. I unfold it and inhale. A map of London.
Not just any map, though; this one is marked with symbols. There are three that occur over and over again, dotted all around the map. One or two in west and south London, handfuls in the north and large clusters over the East End.
Steel leans over my shoulder, examining the map. “Those are alchemical symbols,” he whispers. He looks at my expression and shrugs again. “What? I may not be able to crack a secret code, but I’m familiar with basic alchemy.” He points to one, a circle standing on top of a small cross. “That means copper. This one that looks like a crescent moon, that’s silver.”
Copper and silver. “Demon classes?”
“I would guess so.”
Those two symbols are everywhere on the map. “What about this one?” I point to one, a series of crossed horizontal and diagonal lines.
“That’s an older form of the copper symbol. Maybe it refers to different types of demons within the copper class.”
I flick back through the pages. They all have symbols on the pages, silver or one of the two copper icons. “This is a list of every demon in London.” I peer at the map more closely. A fourth symbol lies tucked in among a group of copper and silver class, smack in the middle of the East End. Where the other symbols are repeated and scattered all over the map, this is the only one of its kind: a circle, with curved lines radiating from the sphere like tiny rays. “What’s this?”
“That’s gold,” he replies, frowning. “But the gold class Houses are destroyed. They were all killed or cannibalised by—” He stops, his expression going remote.
“By what?”
He pauses and then says, “By what is now known as the diamond class.” Another pause. “There is no symbol in alchemy for diamond,” he adds.
I stare at the map, at the small sun. My heart has grown as cold and as heavy as a stone. “You’re saying there’s a diamond-class demon in London. In the East End.” Spitting distance from Whitechapel.
“According to this, there was. This is thirty years old, isn’t it? It might not be there anymore.”
“Or maybe it’s still there. Putting together components for its spells.”
Steel sits back, crossing his arms. “If it’s been there for thirty years, why is it now that these murders are taking place? I don’t think much of your police force, but I find it hard to believe they wouldn’t have noticed women being murdered in their own neighbourhood.”
“We have to find it. That’s the only way to know for certain.”
He exhales. “The diamond class has magic. They can disguise themselves better than any other kind of demon. They’ll be impossible to find.”
I peel the map from the binder and fold it into a small square. “Not with this.”
Chapter thirty-seven
The map fits snugly in my pocket. It seems to make my skirt heavier, though I know that’s a result of my stinging awareness of it rather than its actual weight. As we hurry back, a chill autumn breeze chases my thoughts. This map could make the agency’s duties so much easier—finding and interrogating demons would be simple—yet it was locked away in a museum instead of in our own library.
And Turner knew about the existence of a diamond-class demon and hid that knowledge. Why? Why hand it to me after her death?
If only she was still here. If only I could meet her for tea and cake with Mrs. Stewart and unpick the details of this case together. But I’m alone.
Steel’s footsteps click on the pavement beside me. Not quite alone.
The demon remains silent as we return to the agency. Eve’s voice comes from the kitchen and I halt at the door. Khurana’s there, too. This might be the first time I’ve seen her since the second test. She speaks to Maia in what sounds like Hindi.
I join Eve, who’s perched against the wall nibbling a biscuit. “Working on the case?” I ask her.
“Taking a break. Monaghan wants to host a dinner when he returns, and he thought Khurana might help him organise it.” She throws me a speaking glance and I grimace.
“I can imagine her reaction.”
“We’re going to make ourselves scarce. I suggest you do, too.”
I nod. Monaghan won’t return until the end of the week. Steel and I can patrol Whitechapel and escape the dinner at the same time.
“Where have you been all day, anyway?” Eve asks.
“We met Mrs. Stewart.” The words to explain the map sit in my throat. I hold them back. Turner had a reason to keep all of this from the agency. Until I know why, I should respect that. Still, guilt curls through me. It’s not just my case this might affect. “Do you still think there’s a connection,” I ask, “between your case and mine?”
Eve puts her biscuit down with a sigh and dusts crumbs from her hands. “Yes, we do. It would be better, in a grim kind of way, if it is the same person. At least then Khurana and I will catch him and know that all of it will stop. I dread to think of there being two of these murderers loose in London.”
Steel has been sitting on a bench, watching Khurana, but at this he turns to Eve, smirking. “You’re making the assumption that you’ll catch him before we will.”
Her mouth twists into a mirroring smirk, although hers has a hard, challenging edge. “What do you say to a wager?” she suggests. “First to catch him wins?”
Steel rests his chin in his hand. “What are the stakes?”
I sigh. “You’re as bad as each other.”
“I know,” Steel continues, ignoring me, “the loser treats us to dinner.”
“You mean us. And you’re not going to win.”
“This is not a game.” Khurana’s cold voice interrupts us, and Eve and I bow our heads, chastised. “It matters not who catches the man, as long as the killing stops. Our first duty is to the people of this city.” Her expression matches the granite in her voice. Even if it’s not a competition, I can’t help but think that I’m going to lose.
The agent looks at me, her gaze piercing, as though she can see the secret I’m keeping. Dropping my eyes will project my guilt as loudly as speaking it, so I hold her gaze. With difficulty.
“It’s getting late. We’ll meet tomorrow morning,” she tells Eve, who nods. “For now, you should all rest.” She doesn’t glance at Steel as she leaves, but her demon acknowledges him with a curt nod.
Eve jumps down from the windowsill, all long slender limbs and smooth dark skin. “I had best go, too,” she says. “Our case isn’t as widely published as yours, so Monaghan has persuaded the police to send over a copy of their reports. They saw me and decided to send everything they ever wrote, just to make my life difficult.” She grimaces.
“If you’d like help—”
She cuts me off with a wave. “And rob me of the opportunity to make them look bad in front of the Inspector, when I dump it all back on their desks? I don’t think so. Good hunting.” She flashes me a grin and heads after Khurana.
“You didn’t tell her,” Steel murmurs.
Doubt gnaws at me under the guilt. “Do you think I should have?”
“It was hidden for a reason. No one else should know until we understand what that reason is,” he replies, echoing my thoughts almost too closely for comfort. But his words ease a bit of the guilt. Eve will understand, when I explain it to her. When we find out what Turner was hiding.
Chapter thirty-eight
The tiny sun hovers over a house on Flower and Dean Street. The building huddles in the middle of a dozen identical small brick cottages, and the hustle of people coming and going tells me each one will be overflowing with people. I wonder if Turner made a mistake.
“Would a diamond-class demon live here?” I ask Steel.
He watches the trickling stream of people. “It’s a good place to hide.”
I glance at the map once more, then tuck it away and knock on the door that I think is closest to the symbol on the map. No one answers for a long moment, then the door cracks open. An older woman, with two small children in the room behind her.
“Can I help you?”
“We’re working with the Vigilance Committee,” I reply. “We wanted to check on everyone in the neighbourhood. Have you noticed anything odd, recently? Strange behaviour from anyone you know?”
“Oh, you’re talking about those murders.” She leans against the door jamb. “You should go look at the Jones’, at forty-eight. They’re right peculiar people. And the Harper family, over at fifty-two. They didn’t go to church last Sunday. That’s number fifty-two, yeah?”
“I see.” I glance at Steel and he gives a minute shake of his head. “Thank you, we’ll be sure to do that.”
“You let us know when you catch him. It ain’t right, being shut away in our ’omes like this.” She closes the door and I look at Steel.
“Nothing that I could sense. Just human.”
I continue to the next cottage. Steel draws a blank there, and at the next three. It’s at the fifth, when a very old woman opens the door, that he stiffens. I keep my muscles as still as I can, watching the stranger. Her hair is sparse and white, and her eyes are rheumy. There’s a raw scab on her jaw, red and weeping fluid.
“Good morning,” I say. I lean subtly to the side to see behind her. The room’s empty. “We work with the Vigilance Committee. May we come in?”
The woman’s gaze darts between us and settles on Steel. “I don’t know, luv,” she replies, in a frail voice. “I’m a bit busy at the moment.”
“Please, ma’am. It’s important.”
“It would be better,” Steel adds, “to have this conversation inside.”
The woman’s mouth firms and she steps back from the door. “Well. You’d best come in, ’adn’t you?” Her voice comes out hard and suspicious, nothing of the frailty she portrayed a moment ago. She holds the door ajar, and I have to breathe in deeply to slip inside.
The room is small, with a door on one side leading to another. It contains an old wooden rocking chair, an untidy bed and a lit hearth. A pot hangs in the fire, covered but emitting a putrid smell.
She closes the door behind us. “You’re not part of the Committee. They don’t ’ave your kind.” She’s looking at Steel.
“No, they do not,” he replies. “But this woman’s agency does.”
“We’re looking for a demon,” I start. “They would have lived here thirty years ago.”
She drops into the rocking chair, her knees cracking. “And you think I’m this demon?”
“She’s silver class,” Steel says to me, not taking his eyes from her. “She’s not who we’re looking for. And by that smell—what is that? Marrow?” He sniffs and grimaces. “She’s a Blood Drinker,” he adds, and I shiver.
“Bone and liver,” she replies, lifting her lips in a gummy smile. “Oh, don’t you fret none, luv. It ain’t from those women. I’m too old to go jaunting about taking live ones. I get my dinner from the ’orse factories, before they turn ’em into glue. Much easier than cutting ’em up myself.”
“Then you would hunt them,” I say, barely restraining my disgust, “if you were younger?”
“Them?” she mimics. “Are you sure you don’t mean ‘us’? Unless you’re so deep into whatever your business is,” she says, jabbing a finger in my direction, “that you’ve forgotten ’ow to be ’uman.” She continues before I can do more than gape at her. “But no, I ain’t one for the dirty business, myself. That’s the way to get caught.”
“How do we know you’re telling the truth?” I counter and she laughs, a sound that makes me think of a crow’s caw.
“Bless you, luv. I mean, look at me. You think I could force some poor woman to the ground and cut up her insides? Go on.”
Steel wanders over to the pot and lifts the lid. “It’s horse, not human,” he says. “She’s telling the truth.”
“You do ’ave a good nose, don’t’cha?” the Drinker murmurs, watching him through lidded eyes. “I didn’t think your lot had that kind of skill.” My gaze shoots to Steel. He ignores the jibe.
