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Authors: Paul Stewart
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the carts and carriages, their whip-wielding drivers hammering along the narrow thoroughfares oblivious to those on foot. Then there were the jostling crowds thronging the narrow pavements; all elbows, shoulder barges and shoves in the back. With my arm in a sling and my head yet to fully clear, I found my walk back to my rooms in Caged Lark Lane every bit as exhausting as a cross-town highstack.
Surfaced with a mix of sea-coal cinders and crushed oyster shells, and lit by a single oil lamppost, Caged Lark Lane was a small alley, just up from the crossroads where Laystall Street crosses Hog Hill – although the casual passer-by could be forgiven for missing it. But then, that’s what I liked about Caged Lark Lane. It was a forgotten, overlooked corner of the great teeming city and, apartfrom J. Bradley-Arnold’s paper merchants on the corner and Fettle’s Yard, where Hackney carriages were repaired, my apartment house was the only other building in the lane.
Number 3, Caged Lark Lane was old, rundown and in need of repair. Not that I’m complaining. For what they were, my rooms were very reasonable. More importantly, the high roof atop the five-storey building offered both excellent views and easy access to the surrounding rooftops to any highstacker worth his salt.
Today, though, I wouldn’t be shinning down the drainpipe and entering through my attic window. Instead, like more conventional occupants, I climbed the stairs to the front door.
As I did so, I heard the words of the neighbourhood newspaper-seller floating through the air. With his wooden leg and eye-patch, Blindside Bailey was an old war veteran supplementing his meagre pension as best hecould. By day, he would sell the editions of the newspapers; by night he would entertain the locals in the Goose and Gullet by recounting his past campaigns to any who would stand him a drink. Many’s the time I had whiled away an evening, listening to Blindside’s tales of a soldier’s life in the far-off lands of the East.
Blindside Bailey was an old war veteran
.
‘Read all about it!’ Blindside Bailey’s gruff voice rang out. ‘Body of gangland boss taken! Read all about it! Graverobbers ransack gangland leader’s grave! Read all about it!’
Turning on my heels, I hurried back to the corner. I exchanged a copper penny for the latest edition of the
Daily Chronicle
, and a cold chill spread down my spine as I started to read.
‘Yesterday evening, as the good folk of the city slept in their beds, the body of infamous gang leader, Edwin “Firejaw” O’Rourke, was stolen from his final resting placein Adelaide Graveyard in the Gatling Quays district. Harbourside police suspect grave-robbers, or “resurrection men” as they are known locally, of perpetrating this outrage …’
B ack in my attic rooms, I collapsed into my old armchair and studied the
Daily Chronicle
. I must admit, my hands were shaking as I scanned the column of small print. It seemed that Firejaw O’Rourke was merely the latest victim of a spate of outrages in cemeteries and graveyards all over town. Ada Gussage had said as much when I ran into her in Adelaide Graveyard, though I had been too spooked and full of lamprey venom to take it in. Now, here it was in front of me in black and white.
The
Chronicle
was of the firm belief that this was the work of graverobbers, or resurrectionmen – a bunch of individuals so reviled and disreputable that not even the denizens of Gatling Quays would admit to having anything to do with them. Apparently, the corpses they stole ended up on marble slabs in underground dissecting theatres, where students of anatomy would pay handsomely to study them.
You could make a pretty penny from a recently buried corpse. The fresher the body, the higher the price the unscrupulous surgeon would be prepared to pay, no questions asked – and all in the interests of scientific enquiry, of course.
The account in the
Daily Chronicle
, so measured and plausible,
Surfaced with a mix of sea-coal cinders and crushed oyster shells, and lit by a single oil lamppost, Caged Lark Lane was a small alley, just up from the crossroads where Laystall Street crosses Hog Hill – although the casual passer-by could be forgiven for missing it. But then, that’s what I liked about Caged Lark Lane. It was a forgotten, overlooked corner of the great teeming city and, apartfrom J. Bradley-Arnold’s paper merchants on the corner and Fettle’s Yard, where Hackney carriages were repaired, my apartment house was the only other building in the lane.
Number 3, Caged Lark Lane was old, rundown and in need of repair. Not that I’m complaining. For what they were, my rooms were very reasonable. More importantly, the high roof atop the five-storey building offered both excellent views and easy access to the surrounding rooftops to any highstacker worth his salt.
Today, though, I wouldn’t be shinning down the drainpipe and entering through my attic window. Instead, like more conventional occupants, I climbed the stairs to the front door.
As I did so, I heard the words of the neighbourhood newspaper-seller floating through the air. With his wooden leg and eye-patch, Blindside Bailey was an old war veteran supplementing his meagre pension as best hecould. By day, he would sell the editions of the newspapers; by night he would entertain the locals in the Goose and Gullet by recounting his past campaigns to any who would stand him a drink. Many’s the time I had whiled away an evening, listening to Blindside’s tales of a soldier’s life in the far-off lands of the East.
Blindside Bailey was an old war veteran
.
‘Read all about it!’ Blindside Bailey’s gruff voice rang out. ‘Body of gangland boss taken! Read all about it! Graverobbers ransack gangland leader’s grave! Read all about it!’
Turning on my heels, I hurried back to the corner. I exchanged a copper penny for the latest edition of the
Daily Chronicle
, and a cold chill spread down my spine as I started to read.
‘Yesterday evening, as the good folk of the city slept in their beds, the body of infamous gang leader, Edwin “Firejaw” O’Rourke, was stolen from his final resting placein Adelaide Graveyard in the Gatling Quays district. Harbourside police suspect grave-robbers, or “resurrection men” as they are known locally, of perpetrating this outrage …’
B ack in my attic rooms, I collapsed into my old armchair and studied the
Daily Chronicle
. I must admit, my hands were shaking as I scanned the column of small print. It seemed that Firejaw O’Rourke was merely the latest victim of a spate of outrages in cemeteries and graveyards all over town. Ada Gussage had said as much when I ran into her in Adelaide Graveyard, though I had been too spooked and full of lamprey venom to take it in. Now, here it was in front of me in black and white.
The
Chronicle
was of the firm belief that this was the work of graverobbers, or resurrectionmen – a bunch of individuals so reviled and disreputable that not even the denizens of Gatling Quays would admit to having anything to do with them. Apparently, the corpses they stole ended up on marble slabs in underground dissecting theatres, where students of anatomy would pay handsomely to study them.
You could make a pretty penny from a recently buried corpse. The fresher the body, the higher the price the unscrupulous surgeon would be prepared to pay, no questions asked – and all in the interests of scientific enquiry, of course.
The account in the
Daily Chronicle
, so measured and plausible,
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