The Memory of Blood(6)
May took the huge brown coin from him and inserted it in the slot at the front of the machine.
‘You don’t honestly think that ridiculous contraption is still going to work after all these years, do you?’ Land stood back and folded his arms, refusing to be drawn in.
‘Now give me your hand,’ said Bryant, grabbing Land’s wrist, ‘and place it palm down on the brass panel.’ The automaton was humming with errant electricity.
The rectangular plate beneath the wax figure was dotted with a hundred tiny holes. Unwilling to appear a spoilsport, Land placed his hand over it. Pins shot out of the holes in a ripple, stinging his fingers. ‘Bloody hell!’ Land shouted, trying to pull his hand free, but Bryant held it in place. He had a surprisingly strong grip.
The medium’s eyes flickered more brightly and she jerked forward, as if trying to examine Land’s palm. Inside the case, gears groaned and unoiled pistons squealed in discomfort. ‘I’ll get some WD-40 on that later,’ said Bryant.
Land’s hand was tingling—the metal pins had delivered a mild shock. ‘I’ve just been electrocuted,’ he complained dramatically.
‘Yes, some automata do that,’ said Bryant with interest. ‘The Victorians thought it was very health-giving. Wait a minute.’
Madame Blavatsky’s eyes dimmed, then flared. Her right arm swivelled forward and her fist partially opened to drop a white oblong card, which rattled into the slot at the front of the machine. Rubbing his fried hand, Land retrieved the card and examined the stamped-out lettering.
DEATH WILL REPAY ALL DEBTS
‘What kind of fortune is this?’ he exclaimed.
‘It’s a paraphrased quote from The Tempest,’ said John May. ‘Even I know that.’
‘Well, it’s a bloody depressing thought for a Monday,’ Land said, tossing the card onto his desk. ‘Get this thing out of here.’
‘Fine,’ said Bryant. ‘I’ll have it in my office.’
‘Must you? It’s already starting to look like your old office in Mornington Crescent.’
‘But of course. It’s the contents of my head.’
‘Well, it certainly contains the contents of a head, unless you’ve had the brainpan of that stinking Tibetan skull cleaned out.’
‘No, I mean it acts as my excess memory. It contains all the things that there’s not enough room in my head to hold. Clutter, either mental or physical, is the sign of a healthy curiosity.’
As Bimsley began rolling the automaton toward the door under Bryant’s guidance, Raymond Land looked back at his own bare office space and tried to figure out whether he had just been insulted again.
‘Madame Blavatsky?’ said May as they headed downstairs to the new tea shop that had just opened beneath the Unit. ‘You’re the last of your species, you know that, don’t you? One day you’ll be in your own glass case in a museum. Label: the London Eccentric, Londinium Insolitum, shy, hardy, solitary worker, difficult to breed, uncomfortable out of its native habitat—an area extending no more than five miles either side of the Thames—liable to bite when provoked.’
‘You missed out my key attribute,’ said Bryant. ‘My eidetic memory. It’s unconventionally arranged, but more useful than any of your fancy computers. The world seems so intent on erasing its past that someone has to keep notes. That’s why I’m good at my job. I make connections with my surroundings. It’s like throwing jumper cables into a junkyard and sparking off the things you find there. No-one else can do that. It’s why we’re still in business.’
Bryant was being a little disingenuous, and knew it. In truth, his mental connections were extremely haphazard and just as likely to short out. Moreover, he was unable to function without his partner. John May was indeed the acceptable face of the PCU, friendly with officials, kind to staff, linked to the zeitgeist. May had never allowed himself to become an institutional officer, the kind who blankly processed criminals through the system. He believed in the innate decency of humankind, and Bryant’s innocence kept his belief alive. Such an old-fashioned approach to teamwork was not encouraged in the league-table mentality of the new century.
‘I want you to meet someone,’ said Bryant, pushing open the door of The Ladykillers Café. The new tea shop had been named after the famous 1955 Ealing film that had been shot in the neighbourhood. It had begun life a few weeks earlier as a pop-up store, but the owners, two sisters who dressed in identical postwar fashions, had taken up the lease and now served teas in a setting that perfectly replicated a period neither of them was old enough to remember. The girls were in their early twenties, and had adopted the café’s styling as an ironic pose. Instead, they had attracted the wrong clientele: older locals who took the environment entirely at face value.