CHAPTER 5

THE BLOODSTONE BADGE

Ketch felt woozily happy, despite the chilling fog blanketing the gas-lit streets.

The companionable arm over his shoulder steered him past the King’s Arms at the edge of the square, and he looked sideways at the fugged windows and the inviting glow of firelight and candles within. It was a large building, and an observant passer-by might have noticed the horseshoes nailed up above all of the windows as well as the more customary main doorway. Ketch was not of a mood or disposition to observe small details: he was glowing and sentimental and he felt the tavern exerting a magnetic tug on the heavy jingle of coins in his pocket, and then he had a marvellous idea.

“Tell you what,” he said, looking up into the face of his wonderful new friend, “tell you what! I should like to stand you a drink to round off a mutually profitable night’s work. We could slide in here and have the landlord make us a nice hot ale, or maybe a steaming jug of bishop, yes, bishop’s the thing for a chilly night like this, wouldn’t you say?”

He was so taken with the idea of sharing a warm glass or two of spiced port with his companion that he could already hear the sizzle of the red-hot poker the landlord was going to plunge into the jug to heat it. In fact he was imagining the lovely smell of orange and cloves and strong wine so intently that he didn’t notice Mr Sharp had walked them into a dark side alley until it was too late.

“No,” he said. “No, the door’s over there—”

His voice was strangled by a fleeting moment of worry, triggered both by the knowledge that this particular alley was a dead end and the sudden memory of the alarming knife this man carried somewhere beneath his coat. But the moment dissolved and he instantly relaxed as the eyes turned on him again: even in the stygian black of the blind alley he could see their tawny glow and felt flushed and content, as if bathed in the warmth of a thousand summers.

“Nah, but this is fine too,” he smiled, with a look on his face that was quite as blurred with happiness as if he had already drunk that imaginary jug of fortified wine.

Mr Sharp gently slid his hand off Ketch’s shoulder to grip his chin in such a way that the man could not look away.

“Indeed it is. But it is also goodbye. And it is also this…”

He raised his other fist to show him the gold ring he wore. The ring was set with a bloodstone like the one Sara Falk wore, into which was carved a rampant lion facing an equally wild-looking unicorn. He held it out, and when he spoke again there was a distinctly official tone to his voice.

“By the Powers, Mr William Ketch, and as a Free Companion of the London Oversight, I charge you that you will go now, and you will forget what you did with the girl Lucy Harker, and you will forget us, and you will forget the house we have just left: if asked, you will remember she ran off while you were drunk. And because of that,” he continued, with a sparkle of cheery malice in his face. “Because of that you will never touch liquor again, and you will be kind to the needy—”

Mr Sharp’s nostrils flared slightly and his head came up as he scanned the darkness around them for whatever smell had interrupted his thought. Ketch just nodded, his mouth smiling so sloppily that a thin line of drool dribbled out of the side and spattered on the ground by his boots.

Mr Sharp shook his head and his eyes returned to Ketch. Ketch opened his mouth to say something, but Mr Sharp gently pushed the chin up and closed it again.

“—and because of what you did to the girl’s mouth, you shall be unable to speak from now until the first day the dog roses bloom next spring, and when they do you will go and offer your services at the very Bedlam Hospital you spoke of, and help with the washing and cleaning of the poor turned minds who are locked within. That shall be your own punishment and means of rectification.”

He reached forward and pressed the ring to Ketch’s head. When he took it away, the image of the lion and unicorn was indented on the skin, and for a moment it seemed to glow a mottled red and green like the bloodstone itself, and then it was just a temporary dimple, and then it was gone.

Ketch opened his mouth to speak, and then found he couldn’t. He sneezed three times, looked a little confused, then shrugged and scratched his forehead as he turned and stumbled off down the alley, back into the street.

As he walked he rubbed at the itch above his eyes, and then forgot it as he felt the jingle of coins in his pocket and pulled a handful out, pausing to examine them beneath the first gas lamp he came to. He saw a scrabble of tarnished copper ha’pennies and farthings and felt an unaccountable pang of surprise: surely these coins were meant to be something else? But then he couldn’t quite remember what or why he might think they would be anything other than they were.

He pocketed the change and was swallowed up by the fog.