He glanced to either side quickly, wondering which way would get him around faster than her shortcut if he hastened and chose the path that wound around near the signage hub. He'd have to cross into its torchlight and swing under the big wooden arm that pointed to the right and announced St. Bartholomew's lay in that direction, but it seemed a safer bet than trying to weave through a bunch of half-shuttered market stalls and tenement buildings.
He was moving before he'd even finished making the choice, nearly colliding with a quartet of young men carrying a heavyburlap sack between them and giggling amongst themselves as though they'd already broken into their libations for the night.
"Christ, don't get it on me!" one of them yelped. "It's leaking!"
"Of course it's leaking, it's been dissected!" another returned with a chortle. "We'll dump it on the doorstep and then you can go have a nice bath, hm?"
"What if that little witch doctor woman uses it to curse us?" a third moaned. "They use animal parts in West Indies cunning magic, don't they?"
"She's not Caribbean," the first one snapped. "She's a Londoner."
Roland froze.
"Well, that doesn't mean her people aren't doing witchery," the moaner responded. "Who knows what they got up to before they sailed here. People who look like that came from somewhere, didn't they?"
"As long as she isn't there when we arrive, I don't care where she came from or where she went after," another snapped, voice polished and posh. "Walk faster. This is bloody heavy."
“Bloodyandheavy,” his compatriot muttered in return.
Roland pressed the tip of his tongue into the sharp points of his teeth, contemplating which way he was supposed to go now.
This coterie of idiots wasn't out to do any real violence, but they were clearly a source to the vandalism problem, and if he lost them now, he might never find them again.
At the same time, if this quartet was out and on this mission, they might have compatriots on others. And one of those others might be aimed at Mae herself.
That is who they were talking about, after all.
He swallowed the urge to turn on his heel and beat these four within an inch of their pampered lives.
Let them dump whatever disgusting, dissected viscera they had in that sack and run. It was harmless. He could see to that as soon as he knew she was safe.
He needed to know she was safe. And he had already wasted precious moments now eavesdropping on their plot.
He darted across the cobbles and into the cross street, scanning the road for a flash of yellow fabric emerging from the alley. He walked directly toward it, his pace brisk and determined.
He was no longer concerned with the prospect of her catching sight of him. He needed to ensure he was the only one in pursuit of her tonight.
His heart clenched, his eyes finding little to nothing on the empty street, passing back and forth and back again along the dents and dips of London's barrows, until in a brief and blessed flicker of movement, he spotted a flash of yellow, just a little slip, against a brick wall in the distance.
He wasted no time moving toward it, breaking into a run as the shadows of other night dwellers began to trickle into walkways while the final glimmers of light faded away, their shadows growing longer and more ominous by the second.
When he reached those bricks, that wall where he'd last seen her, and took the corner so fast he nearly left the ground entirely, hefound himself only a breath away from collision not with Mae, but with her grandfather, who was blinking at him in shock, holding up a brown-paper-wrapped parcel of very fragrant fish as though he was going to beat him with it if he tried anything untoward.
"Dr. Casper," Roland breathed, collapsing forward with his hands on his knees and dragging in a breath.
"Mr. Reed?!" the doctor returned, clearly baffled as he swung his maritime bludgeon back down to his side. "What in the heavens?"
Absurdly, Roland felt himself begin to laugh, his fingers digging into the recesses around his kneecaps as the buzzing panic in his skin began to fade and the little townhouse behind the doctor came into hazy relief, glowing from within as Mae herself and a woman who must be her grandmother moved about inside.
"Well, I hope you haven't come for dinner," Dr. Casper said, watching this unfold with bemusement. "I only bought three fish."
CHAPTER 7
In the week since the night of the dissected pig, the menagerie of deceased animal parts that had found its way onto the doorstep of the Clerkenwell Clinic had varied not only in genus, but in creative presentation.
Mae was grateful that by the time she had arrived most mornings, the actual gore had been mostly cleaned away. That had been true since the very first incident, which apparently had been spotted by Mr. Reed's gang of young watchmen as it happened and immediately dispatched to the Tod & Vixen for response by Mr. Beck and Mr. Reed.
By the time she'd arrived the next morning, it had only been to answer some questions to a very bored-looking Bow Street Runner who was almost certainly not going to keep the notes he took or ever look at them again, and a few stubborn bloodstains on the threshold.
