The Illusionists. Rosie Thomas
but she had come along just the same.
This threesome lingered for a few moments in the Palmyra’s foyer as a mob of overheated young men surged in the entrance, shouting to each other about where and how to continue their evening’s pleasures. Two of them took sudden offence and they squared up, swaying and jabbing until the theatre’s doorman bundled them out into the street. He was seeking to secure the premises, so along with the rougher elements of the audience Jasper’s party found themselves outside in the noise and glare of the Strand.
‘I think we shall make our way to the stage door and wait there for my friends,’ Jasper said quickly. He shepherded the two women a few steps to the alleyway that ran down the side of the theatre.
Eliza was not afraid of a pair of brawling inebriates, but she allowed Jasper to guide her. As soon as they turned the corner they were buffeted by a sharp wind that funnelled up from the river, carrying with it the stink of mud and horse manure and wet straw. The cobbles were greasy with the damp of a November evening, and they reflected the glimmer of a single torch burning in a holder next to the unmarked stage entrance. Jasper was about to knock when the door was suddenly flung open. A line of people emerged, but before she could distinguish them she became aware of more footsteps skidding down the slippery cobbles. Someone fell and loudly cursed, and another voice jeered, ‘Get up, Makins. See here, it’s the philosopher. Looking to cut off another couple of heads, are you?’
‘Whoa, and the dancer with the pretty doll. Where is she? In the box? Care to loan her, would you? I’ll teach her a different dance.’
‘Ha ha.’
Eliza saw a man in a threadbare coat throw himself across a trunk on a porter’s wooden cart. Two toughs wrenched his arms behind his back and tried to haul the trunk from underneath him.
More figures scuffled down the alley to reinforce the assailants and seconds later a proper fight erupted.
‘Get inside the door,’ Jasper called hoarsely to the two women. Faith did as she was told but Eliza stood her ground. She saw how Jasper pitched straight in alongside the man she recognised as the evil philosopher, as if they had both done this sort of work before. They made a useful pair of combatants. The ringleader staggered backwards from a punch delivered by the philosopher, and Jasper followed up with a series of jabs which obliged two others to abandon their attempt to wrestle open the trunk. Seemingly oblivious to the fighting, the man in the overcoat knelt to secure the catches, his pale hands shaking.
Eliza became aware that a considerable force was operating at a secondary level. She looked down and saw a miniature man, hardly more than three feet tall. He launched himself between the legs of the attackers, pummelling and kicking until one of them stopped short. This man swiped his coat-sleeve across his moustache, gasping in derision.
‘Hulloa, who is this? Is the midget your familiar, Mr Conjuror?’
Carlo’s reply was a savage punch at the tender spot behind the man’s knee. He yelled with pain, at which his nearest accomplice responded with a kick that connected with Carlo’s jaw. The little man collapsed like a punctured bladder. Eliza cried out in dismay and ran the few steps to his side. She sank to the cobbles and held his head in her lap as bright blood ran from his mouth.
A whistle sounded at the top of the alley. Instantly the fight broke up and the assailants ran off in the direction of the river. The man in the overcoat took up a protective position in front of his trunk. Jasper and the philosopher dusted themselves down and tried to look inconspicuous as the bobby marched towards them. None of them had the slightest wish to attract the attention of the Metropolitan Police. Carlo opened his eyes and saw Eliza.
He sighed and thickly muttered, ‘Don’th revive me. I am quithe comfothable.’
The police officer loomed over them.
‘Is this person badly hurt?’
‘I don’t believe so,’ Eliza said. ‘There were some drunken creatures who ran that way …’
Jasper came to her aid. He explained that they had been to the theatre and had been set upon as they made their way to meet friends at the stage door. He didn’t think the attackers were thieves, but they had been threatening enough. ‘There are ladies here,’ he added.
‘What is this?’ the bobby demanded, pointing his stick at the pale man’s locked trunk.
‘Theatrical properties,’ he answered in a Swiss-German accent. The policeman frowned.
‘Open up.’
Eliza gave her handkerchief to the dwarf. Sitting up he spat some blood and reached a clean-enough finger into his mouth to explore the damage. The flesh over his jaw was darkly swelling.
‘Rest for a moment, then we’ll take you to find water and a dressing. You will be quite all right,’ she reassured him.
The bobby was staring at the trunk’s contents. A woman’s body, folded in half, was nested into a cocoon of padded velvet. Disbelieving, he ran his hands over the rubber limbs and shone his lamp into the cold glass eyes.
‘I am an engineer of automata,’ Heinrich Bayer said.
The policeman straightened up.
‘Are you, indeed? It takes all sorts. Go home now, the lot of you. I’ll see if I can catch up with your friends.’
Carlo muttered a thick phrase and Eliza patted his arm in gentle restraint.
As soon as the bobby had moved off a small knot of performers emerged from the stage door with Faith in their midst. Jasper groaned.
‘Faith, are you all right? And you, Eliza? How in the world am I going to explain to Matty that I brought you to an innocuous evening at the variety and we ended up in a pretty bout of fisticuffs?’
‘You could avoid any mention of it. That would be the easiest course,’ Eliza advised.
In the presence of the policeman the evil philosopher had made himself next to invisible. Now he seemed to regain his full stature, even to be somehow bigger and made of more solid matter than the rest of them. He became the inevitable pivot of their strange group.
‘Jasper, you have lost none of your abilities. Won’t you introduce me to your friends?’
Jasper muttered, ‘Mr Hector, ah, Mr Devil Wix. Mrs Shaw, Miss Eliza Dunlop.’
Devil bowed to Faith, but Eliza was still crouching on the cobbles with one arm supporting Carlo. The dwarf was sitting up, dabbing at his smashed mouth with her handkerchief. Devil folded himself to their level just as Jacko Grady’s barrel body and surprisingly diminutive shoes emerged from the stage door.
‘What’s this?’ the manager demanded.
‘Mr Boldoni was attacked by some pleasant individuals from your choice audience.’
‘Don’t let him lie here in front of my theatre. Is he hurt? Wix, you’d better make sure he’s fit to perform tomorrow.’
Grady secured the big padlock with much jangling of a large bunch of keys. The performance was calculated to display ownership and Devil hated him for it. Grady picked his way past them and headed towards the Strand. Turning his head, Devil saw Eliza Dunlop stick out her tongue at the man’s receding back.
‘Of course he’s hurt,’ she retorted. To Devil she said, ‘We need warm salt water to rinse out his mouth. And some light to inspect the damage.’
Carlo moaned as the pain in his jaw intensified.
‘Shhh,’ she told him, and stroked his hair.
Devil noticed that her gloves were blotched with blood and Carlo’s spittle. This detail touched him more directly than the prettiest smile or the most fashionable dress ever could have done.
Who is this? he asked himself and his eyes slid at once to Jasper’s neat boots, standing only a yard away beside Mrs Shaw.
Ah,