By the time he arrived at Rogues’ Walk, the corner was already six deep in night owls, with a glut of brawn outside the Hidey-Hole’s double doors as patrons lined up for a ringside view of the Battering Rams’ infamous fighting ring, which on any given night could feature exotic warriors, dogs, roosters, and even, on one notorious occasion, a dwarf and an Australian miniature bear.
This is not the time to speak with Otto Malarkey, Garrick realized. Even a man of my talents could not hope to penetrate such an army. But my moment will come.
Garrick was distracted from his task by the sight of a sometime stooge of his sauntering toward the bonfires, then begging nips of gin from the lowlifes warming their hands.
Lacey Boggs. My West End songbird.
Lacey Boggs’s con was to sing for tipsy gents after the theater while her accomplice dipped into their pockets. The dodge had not been pulling in the revenue it once did after Lacey passed a summer at Her Majesty’s pleasure and came out of the clink minus her teeth and plus a set of wooden dentures.
Garrick took Lacey by the elbow and propelled her beneath a gas streetlight, so that her head bonged against the pole.
“Here, what’s all this rough stuff?” she objected. “I’ll ’ave your hand for a spittoon, mate.”
The bluster was replaced by terror when Lacey realized exactly whose hand she had just threatened.
“Oh, not you, Mr. Garrick. I never meant you. Be rough all you like, I know there’s no harm in you.”
Garrick tightened his grip on Lacey’s elbow. “There’s harm in me, Lacey Boggs. Gallons of harm and hurt, a-waiting to be spilled onto some poor unfortunate.”
Lacey smiled, and Garrick saw that she had taken to dying her wooden choppers with lime. “Not me, Mr. Garrick. Ain’t I always done as asked to the letter? Who was it that located that French count for you? The one what was brutally murdered . . .” Lacey’s eyes went wide and she covered her mouth with her hand. “I never meant that you had nothing to do with that. A fine gent like yourself . . . Coincidence, surely.”
Garrick had no patience for this bleating woman. “Calm yourself, Lacey. The harm in me is not for you. I have a job, that’s all. Do you remember my boy, Riley?”
Lacey’s face muscles relaxed. “Aww. I remembers him. Cute little beggar with the wonky eyeballs. Suffers with the nervosity a bit, I’d say.”
“That’s him. I need you to find him. Employ whomever you need. Have old Ernest send a pigeon to the theater if I cannot be found.”
Lacey sniffed, as though she could smell a sovereign. “London is a big place, Mr. Garrick. Three million souls big. Could you give a girl a clue?”
“I shall be generous. Two clues I have for you. Firstly, Riley may fly to the Old Nichol, for he is well aware of the abhorrence I hold in my heart for that disease pit.”
“And the second?”
“It is possible that he travels with an Injun maiden. A pretty lass, but dangerous.”
Lacey Boggs clacked her wooden teeth in rumination. “An Injun in Old Nichol. That fox will hunt herself, so she will.”
Garrick took a sovereign from his supply. “There is another sov to go with this if you are successful. If not, I will be reclaiming this one from your dead hand. Do you understand me, wench?”
Lacey Boggs shivered as though suddenly cold, but one hand flicked from below her shawl to claim the coin. “I understands. Find the boy and send word.”
Garrick took her chin in his bony fingers. “And no gin until the job is done.”
“No gin. Not even a tot.”
“Very well, Lacey,” said Garrick, releasing his grip on the woman. “Off to Old Nichol with you. I have business here.”
Lacey rubbed the fingermarks on her chin. “Is you placing a wager, Mr. Garrick? If so, think twice, sir. Otto Malarkey always fixes the odds so he can’t lose.”
Garrick patted his coat and trouser legs, checking the blades concealed in secret pockets all about his person.
“Even the great King Otto can’t fix these odds. He has started a fight that he cannot win. So if I was you, I would quit this place in case the blood flows onto the street.”
Lacey Boggs hitched up her petticoats as though the blood already pooled about her feet. “I am making myself scarce, sir. I am an employed woman with a job to do.”