Neverwhere(36)

“Actually,” said Richard, “I’m looking for the marquis. And for a young lady named Door. I think they’re probably together.”

The old man did a little jig, causing several feathers to detach themselves from his coat; this provoked a chorus of raucous disapproval from the various birds around them. “Information! Information!” he announced to the crowded room. “See? I told ‘em. Diversify, I said. Diversify! You can’t sell rooks for the stewpot forever—anyway, they taste like boiled slipper. And they’re so stupid. Thick as custard. You ever eaten rook?” Richard shook his head. That was something he could be certain of, at any rate. “What’ll you give me?” asked Old Bailey.

“Sorry?” said Richard, awkwardly leaping from ice floe to ice floe in the stream of the old man’s consciousness.

“If’n I give ye your information. What’ll I get?”

“I don’t have any money,” said Richard. “And I just gave my pen away.”

He began to pull out the contents of Richard’s pockets. “There,” said Old Bailey. “That!”

“My hankie?” asked Richard. It was not a particularly clean handkerchief; it had been a present from his Aunt Maude, on his last birthday. Old Bailey seized it and waved it above his head, happily.

“Never you fear, laddie,” he sang, triumphantly. “Your quest is at an end. Go down there, through that door. You can’t miss them. They’re auditioning.” He was pointing towards Harrods’ extensive network of Food Halls. A rook cawed maliciously. “None of your beak,” said Old Bailey, to the rook. And, to Richard, he said, “Thank’ee for the little flag.” He jigged around his stall, delighted, waving Richard’s handkerchief to and fro.

Auditioning? thought Richard. And then he smiled. It didn’t matter. His quest, as the mad old roof-man had put it, was at an end. He walked toward the Food Halls.



Fashion, in bodyguards, seemed to be everything. They all had a Knack of one kind or another, and each of them was desperate to demonstrate it to the world. At the moment, Ruislip was facing off against the Fop With No Name.

The Fop With No Name looked somewhat like an early eighteenth-century rake, one who hadn’t been able to find real rake clothes and had had to make do with what he could find at the Salvation Army store. His face was powdered to white, his lips painted red. Ruislip, the Fop’s opponent, resembled a bad dream one might have if one fell asleep watching sumo wrestling on the television with a Bob Marley record playing in the background. He was a huge Rastafarian who looked like nothing so much as an obese and enormous baby.

They were standing face to face, in the middle of a cleared circle of spectators and other bodyguards and sightseers. Neither man moved a muscle. The Fop was a good head taller than Ruislip. On the other hand, Ruislip looked as if he weighed as much as four fops, each of them carrying a large leather suitcase entirely filled with lard. They stared at each other, without breaking eye contact.

The marquis de Carabas tapped Door on the shoulder and pointed. Something was about to happen.

One moment there were two men standing impassively, just looking at each other, then the Fop’s head rocked back, as if he’d just been hit in the face. A small, reddish purple bruise appeared on his cheek. He pursed his lips and fluttered his eyelashes. “La,” he said, then stretched his rouged lips wide, in a ghastly parody of a smile.

The Fop gestured. Ruislip staggered, and clutched his stomach.

The Fop With No Name smirked outrageously, waggled his fingers, and blew kisses to several spectators. Ruislip stared angrily at the Fop, redoubling his mental assault. Blood began to drip from the Fop’s lips. His left eye started to swell. He staggered. The audience muttered appreciatively.

“It’s not as impressive as it looks,” whispered the marquis to Door.

The Fop With No Name stumbled, suddenly, going onto his knees, as if someone were forcing him down, and fell, awkwardly, to the floor. Then he jerked, as if someone had just kicked him, hard, in the stomach. Ruislip looked triumphant. The spectators clapped, politely. The Fop writhed and spat blood onto the sawdust on the floor of Harrods’ Fish and Meat Hall. He was dragged off into the corner by some friends, and was violently sick.

“Next,” said the marquis.

The next would-be bodyguard was again thinner than Ruislip (being about the size of two and a half fops, carrying but a single suitcase filled with lard between them). He was covered in tattoos and dressed in clothes that looked like they had been stitched together from old car seats and rubber mats. He was shaven-headed, and he sneered at the world through rotten teeth. “I’m Varney,” he said, and he hawked, and spat green on the sawdust. He walked into the ring.