“Wot we got here, me lovelies?” The dog thrust his massive muzzle into Renzo’s face, his jowls visibly shaking with outrage.
“We are exceedingly sorry, we didn’t intend … please forgive the intrusion,” gabbled Renzo.
“Speak plain, boy, do. I hates an oily tongue. Shows me a slimy heart.”
Despite the fury of the dog’s growl, Teo was reassured by the open, generous style of the writing visible only to her above Turtledove’s head.
She spoke rapidly. “We’re Venetians. We’ve come on the floating orphanage, the Scilla, to escape the ice in Venice, and to look for my parents, who’ve been kidnapped. They may be in London. And we believe that Venice’s deadly enemy—he’s a ghost called Bajamonte Tiepolo—is here or on his way here too. He killed your Melusine and Sea-Bishops—those poor creatures that were found floating dead in the Thames a few weeks ago.”
“A dirty shame!” exclaimed Turtledove, removing his paw from Renzo’s throat. “ ’Twere all over the papers, an’ none of it were kind, wot they sayed about the poor beasties. Old Queen Victoria dint approve of ’em one bit. But wot’s this Venetian Bajaminty thingy got to do wiv us in London, then?”
Renzo, still flat on his back, answered, “He’s in league with the Pretender to the British throne, Lord Harold Hoskins. They’re planning something terrible.…”
“You doan mean that jumped-up nob wot were sent to Orstralia?” asked Turtledove disbelievingly.
“How come you never menshoned any of this ’mazing stuff before?” Pylorus Salt interrupted. “Sounds ’ighly unloikly to me! London’s the greatest city in the world. How can some old Venetian ghosty hurt us?”
Teo explained, “Baddened magic. That’s what brought the ice storm to Venice. And our boat was taken over by a terrible woman who whipped and starved us. And now she’s with some awful Ghost-Convicts on the Bad Ship Bombazine, which will doubtless shortly arrive in London and start the attack … just when London is at her most vulnerable, with Queen Victoria dead.”
Renzo rose to his feet. “Bajamonte Tiepolo is a coward who preys only on the weakened. His friend Miss Uish is just the same. That’s why we urgently need to find Venetian Incogniti—who are disguised as pumpkin-sellers. They’ll take us to the mermaids who’ve swum here from Venice.”
The boys and girls of the Mansion Dolorous stood openmouthed.
“A female child-hurter?” A deep, dreadful growl vibrated in Turtledove’s throat. The glimmer of a tear appeared in the corner of one fierce eye. “Yew two mites is been through all that? Yew is all on yer alonesome in London Town? In them thin clothes? And the snow’s a-lyin’ thick as Irish linen over the whole city? Look at the ribs stickin’ out of yew! Feelin’ numblish, is yew? When did yew last git somethin’ good to eat?”
The kindness of his tone undid Teo. “Ages ago,” she sobbed.
“And it wasn’t very good either,” moaned Renzo. A bit of sympathy had unbuttoned all his bravery too.
Turtledove winked. “I thought as much. Yew have that air about yew. Of childer wot needs takin’ in kindness an’ lovin’ up a bit.”
That dog had the most expressive wink Teo had ever seen. Perhaps it was because his large eyes were so wide apart above his huge snout. And now she was made to realize why the Mansion Dolorous boys and girls all had such clean faces: Turtledove proceeded to lick her face industriously, removing every trace of tears.
“Childer,” he barked at the Londoners, “bring food for these little ones, do. I has been to Butcher Brown’s an’ me satchel’s full o’ goodness.”
A platter of broken pie was placed in front of Teo and Renzo.
“Gie it a chew!” urged Ann Picklefinch.
“Steak an’ kidney!” shouted Tobias Putrid. “Superb!”
“I’m sorry,” snuffled Teo, feeling very small indeed, “I’m a vegetarian.”
“A wot?” boomed Turtledove.
“I don’t eat meat. I don’t like animals being killed.”
Given that Turtledove was, while a figure of authority, clearly an animal, Teo hoped her opinion might be received with approval.
But the dog growled angrily again, jutting out his fearsome jaw. “For why’ve yew got the teef, then? I doan hold wiv that kind of unnatural doings, girlie. Look at poor Fossy here. She’d love to chew a cutlet, but she hain’t got the ’quipment ’cos o’ that cursed match factory where she worked. Marg’rit’s gotta soupify everythin’ for her. Turnin’ down good food ’cos yew’s too squeamish! I doan hold wiv it.”
Turtledove cocked his leg. Teo stared up at him in horror.
Pylorus Salt whispered, “He do that on things he doan approve of.”
The leg inched higher as Turtledove knitted his fantastically heavy brows. But the Mansion Dolorous gang seemed to know just what to do. They clustered around the dog, speaking very fast, changing the subject, even daring to thump his broad back affectionately. Turtledove’s ferocity was soon tamed to gruffness. His leg returned by quarter-inches to the floor.
“I likes yew a heap, girlie, but I still doan hold wiv that vegetatin’ lark,” he muttered, staring hard at Teo. “Childer need victuallin’.” Now put the kettle on, Tig. We’ll bile up some o’ that Benger’s food wot Her Late Majesty favored, for the little Eyetalian girlie.”
The Londoners screwed up their faces with distaste.
“Unpalatable, ain’t it? Well, skilly, then.”
Skilly proved to be a kind of porridge made from Indian corn and hot water. It wasn’t tasty, yet it was filling. Teo scooped up two bowlfuls, only stopping when she felt as if a warm feather quilt had taken up residence inside her. Meanwhile, Renzo helped himself to a substantial portion of pie.
“Dint touch the sides, that,” noted the dog approvingly.
Now that he had fed Teo and Renzo, Turtledove seemed to feel that the Venetian orphans were his own. “Look at them roses bloomin’ in yer cheeks!” he exulted. “Who loves yew?” he asked, cuffing them lightly with his paw. “So yew’ll be joinin’ us then, little ’uns? In the meantimes, I mean, while we finds yer Incogneekies and yer mermaids for yew? Magical creaturs doan get thesselves easily found. They will take some lookin’ for.”
“Join him?” thought Teo, Miss Uish’s cruelty still fresh in her feelings. “I’d like to hug him!”
“And the Bombazine?” asked Renzo.
“We’ll keep on eye on the Lloyd’s Register.”
“She’s a ghost ship. Adult Londoners will not be able to see her. Nor the Ghost-Convicts.”
Teo ventured, “And we need to tell our friends on the Scilla what is going on. They’ll be worried about us. But we can’t go ourselves because the ship is in quar …”
Renzo broke in, “Sealed up by the customs officers.”
“Of course, yew wants to tell yer friends yew’s safe,” said Turtledove reassuringly. “Nothing simpler. I’ll have a word wiv Pattercake.”
Pattercake, it emerged, was a barge dog on the Thames.
“He knows a bit of Eyetalian. He works nights in an Eyetalian restaurant. He’ll run a message to yer friends on the Scilla. Customs officers won’t bovver ’im.”
“How does a dog work in a restaurant?”
“He’s a washer-up. Dogs is very handy that way. Can lick a plate clean quicker ’n an ’ooman can wash it. Yew two good for readin’ an’ writin’? Good. Write a letter. Pattercake will deliver it.”
Greasy offered some sheets of black-edged notepaper and a slim black pencil.
“Mourning pencils?” asked Teo. She began to write rapidly. Eventually, she handed Renzo the paper and he added a page of his own.
… And so we’ll be safe here at the Mansion Dolorous, and have found a way to keep ourselves until we can find Lussa and the Incogniti. We hope that the quarantine ropes will serve to keep our enemies off the Scilla, as well as keeping you in.
Renzo smiled at Teo, and then folded the sheets, and tucked them into a black-edged envelope, which he handed to Turtledove. “But we also n
eed to get food to our friends. There’s nothing much aboard.”
“Not to worry,” said Turtledove. “Pattercake’ll take care o’ that. They’re right generous wiv the leftovers at his restaurant. Bits, take this letter down to Pattercake at Old Compton Street, do.”
As Bits departed via the secret entrance, there came the jingle of a key in the lock of the Mansion Dolorous’s front door.
“Messrs. Tristesse and Ganorus!” Turtledove growled. “Are the coffins shipshape? Good. Get that grin orf yer face, Greasy. Woan suit, woan suit at all. Stand in line an’ look proper miserable,” he ordered, pushing his head into a masterpiece of black straw. Jauntily set on top was a heart-shaped pincushion of jet beads from which sprouted curled black ostrich feathers.
He nudged Teo and Renzo in front of him.
“Why, Turtledove, have you found us two new children?” asked one of the two tidy old gentlemen who now walked into the main hall of the mourning emporium.
The writing above his head was neat and pleasant. Teo decided to like him. “Which is Tristesse and which Ganorus?” she asked.
Turtledove did not answer, but sat demurely on his brindled haunches, his head on one side. Teo realized, “With adults, Turtledove doesn’t even try to talk. London must be like Venice—the adults have lost the ability to hear animals speak.”
“Not that we’re not grateful for the children, dear Dog,” added the second gentleman, a small dapper person seemingly stitched into a tight buttonless black waistcoat. Teo saw a more imaginative and looser script above his head. He patted Turtledove’s broad back.
“These two orphans is from Venice, Italy, sirs,” volunteered Tig, “so they’s bound to be uncommon good at sad, hain’t they? Given the ice flood an’ everybody drownin’ an’ all on Christmas Eve loik. And they speaks the Queen’s Hinglish.”
Their faces bright with curiosity, the two men approached. The dapper man smoothed the hair from Renzo’s forehead with a manicured hand. “Look at this, Mr. Ganorus,” he twittered, “hair, mouth and eyes of an angel. You cannot by any chance sing, boy? Jay’s have just got themselves a singing mourning boy, and we’ve heard he’s surpassingly popular. Do you read notes, boy?”
He handed Renzo some sheet music entitled “Little Sister’s Gone to Sleep.”
In answer, Renzo raised his eyes and let loose a few soulful notes that had the District Disgrace positively shivering with delight and Pylorus Salt rolling his eyes.
Mr. Tristesse clasped his hands to his breast, bleating with pleasure. “That’ll give Jay’s something to think about!” he crowed. Then he cast a shrewd eye on Teo. “This one’s terribly thin. Good eyes, though. Can you weep a few drops, child?” he asked Teo kindly.
Teo had only to think of Professor Marìn’s death and her missing parents, and the tears spurted from her eyes in clear streams that sparkled in the lamplight.
“Highly pathetical,” said Mr. Ganorus approvingly. “That girl can mourn as well as any orphan in London.”
Mr. Tristesse leaned down to pat Teo and Renzo affectionately on their heads. “Greasy, find these dear children some warm mourning clothes. And I think that Numbers Two and Thirteen coffins will do nicely for them.”
Sleeping in a coffin, however softly padded, held few charms. As soon as he laid himself down, Renzo missed the roll of the sea and the rough enfolding comfort of his hammock, not to mention the sleepy late-night chatter of the crew of the Scilla.
Renzo was also distinctly dubious about his six-foot elm coffin, ebonized and gilded, lined inside with ruffled satin over a wool mattress.
Teo’s small mahogany coffin was quite humble in contrast. Its mattress was of cotton, the shroud of linen. There was only the merest graze of fretwork on the lid and handles. Teo’s most urgent concern was to make certain that the lid was firmly bolted open. Once sure of that, she enjoyed stretching out inside her voluminous black flannel nightdress. Her eyes drooped. The District Disgrace sobbed inconsolably in her sleep. Greasy snored to an ecstatic rhythm. The mourning clocks—carriage, grandfather and wristwatch—ticked soothingly.
“Teo!” Renzo whispered. “Are you awake?”
“Slightly,” she yawned. “What is it, Renzo? Don’t you think we’ve been amazingly lucky?”
“But this isn’t finding the mermaids. What if they’ve been attacked by whatever killed the Melusine and the Sea-Bishops? What if the Bombazine …?”
“They were prepared. And Turtledove said he’d help us find them and the pumpkin-sellers. Isn’t he adorable? Much better than trying on our own. We don’t know the first thing about how to get around London.”
“You’ve got maps in your head, memorized, haven’t you?”
“True, but that’s just paper. And we need friends.…”
Before she finished speaking, sleep had overtaken both Teo and Renzo.
Suddenly, Tig was opening the black curtains on a gray London morning, and it was time for Teo and Renzo’s first funeral. Dressed to the neck in crepe, and smothered in mourning hats, the two of them walked in time to Thrasher’s drumbeats beside an open hearse, on which lay a white-draped coffin with a spray of white ostrich plumes nodding on top. Renzo’s tender singing, accompanied by Fossy’s heartbreaking violin, rose above the sound of the city traffic, causing passersby to stop and stare at the coffin with tears in their eyes.
The carriage was drawn by four splendid Flemish geldings, black as jet, rippling their magnificent manes in tidy formation. The horses wore feathers on their heads, also in the deepest black. Satin rosettes decorated their velvety ears.
Turtledove waddled in front, his muzzle held at a noble angle.
The dead man was a minor member of an aristocratic Irish family. So the hearse was followed by a dozen carriages decorated with noble crests and driven by liveried coachmen. Yet all the carriages were empty. As they passed through the salubrious suburbs of Mayfair and Belgravia, Tig explained, “Friends of the great famblies doan attend. It hain’t done. They jist send the carriages as a sign of respeck. Doan look shocked. If the famblies came thesselves, we’d be out of a job today.”
“What about ordinary people? Surely they come to their loved ones’ funerals?”
“They do, bless ’em, but they still hire mourning children when they can afford themselves a bit of a show. They loik us to do the picturesque weepin’.”
“Hoi, there’s Tobias and Bits! They’re mountin’ the mournin’ outside the corpse’s own house, to show ’tis a place of sorrow today. Doan fret, Tobias’s been scrubbed with carbolic.”
Both boys wore long gowns of alpaca trimmed with velvet. From the tops of their hats flowed two thick ribbons of white Irish linen, tied in a bow. They stood solemnly to attention outside the stylish house, each holding an upside-down broom wrapped in black fabric and tied with enormous black bows on the stave. As the Mansion Dolorous mourners passed, Bits and Tobias remained aloof and poker-faced, neither greeting nor smiling at their friends.
“Have we done something to offend them?” asked Teo.
“Oh no, they hain’t allowed to talk or smile when they is mournin’.”
At that moment, Bits dared a subtle wink.
Tig instructed, “Now work them tear-pumps, Teo! We need to show the corpse’s neighbors that the fambly has paid over for the very ’ighest quality o’ grief. When they pays but two pounds and tenpence we can walk quite ordinary, but for twenty pounds we has got to go all out—at least a pint of tears between us. Tristesse and Ganorus pride thesselves on a spiffin’ first-class funeral.”
“You mean there are second-class funerals?”
“And third-class. And paupers’ funerals at unmarked pits. We doan attend those, nat’rally. An’ the street children wot die—we doan do it for the likes of them. No one pays for them to be buried. Their parents leaves their bodies in the streets, for to avoid the shame of a pauper’s funeral.”
“But that must be most rare …,” pressed Teo anxiously.
“I should just ’b
out think it isn’t,” said Pylorus Salt, from behind her shoulder. “It said on the Times billboard last week that one child dies of hunger in London every hour.”
After the funeral, Turtledove wriggled out of his finery and disappeared, saying, “Going to find yew some o’ them Eyetalian zookymen, or a taily lady or two, childer! Dint I promise I would?”
As Turtledove departed, Pattercake, a genial collie, arrived with a letter from the Scilla. All was well. The guards posted at St. Mary Overie Dock were not the most vigilant specimens of the force. The night watchman slept peacefully through his shift. (Perhaps Cookie’s offer of a large cup of warm rum—gladly accepted in the cold—gave him sweet dreams.) Giovanni and Emilio had slipped off the Scilla in the early hours and had already found day-work with the bargemen. Their Venetian marine skills were much appreciated. Meanwhile, repairs were already underway on the Scilla, battered from her long journey and the encounter with the colossal squid.
As soon as we can afford a plank, we’ll buy it and sneak it aboard, wrote Emilio. We’re already fixing the masts. Piece by piece we’ll bring the old girl back to glory.
He added, I never thought I’d say this, but we’re actually grateful to Miss Uish for the English lessons. Without them, I’m thinking we would have starved.
Cookie had been taken to a blacksmith who gently removed the torturing wooden casings welded to his jaws.
Sibella, Emilio reported, was desperate to get ashore to the fashionable haunts of Belgravia and Pall Mall, where she apparently knew all the best people. She will keep on about it. Emilio quoted: “This low end of London is quite unknown to me, yet it is plainly detestable. I shall die of disgust.”
Teo muttered, “It’s actually quite surprising that she’s survived this long without a new dress.”
But we’re keeping her aboard, continued Emilio. We’ve decided that there’s something about Sibella we can’t quite trust. We’ve been thinking about what Teo said about her and the leeches and speaking spells to them. What’s more, she doesn’t like cats. Sofonisba doesn’t like her either.