Freaks (11 page)

“How?” Monkeyboy wailed.

Sheba held her breath as he clambered up the puppet's leg and squeezed inside. A moment later, there came a series of grinding crunches, and the huge model stopped. Monkeyboy's head popped out of the puppet's bottom.

“Oi, Lumpy!” he called to Gigantus. “You can turn it off inside!”

Gigantus gave a nod, and then drove his fist through the cracked chestpiece of Gog and grabbed a handful of metal parts, ripping them free with a crunch. The puppet juddered and froze, a statue once more.

Sister Moon descended from a double backflip to land squarely on the last spider's back. It flew into pieces with a crunch.

“Nice move, Moonie,” Monkeyboy said.

“Rolling porcupine flip. I invent myself.”

Breathing a sigh of relief, Sheba turned back to the lock. She could feel the tumbler beginning to spring. She levered it up, then stuck a second pin into the keyhole to shoot the bolt back. She was rewarded with a loud
clunk
, and the heavy door swung open a couple of inches.

“Oh no you-a don't,” said a voice from inside.

Farfellini's hand shot out, grabbed Sheba's shoulder, and pushed hard, flipping her head over heels.

“Sheba!” cried Mama Rat.

Landing on all fours, Sheba turned on the puppet maker, as full of fierce anger as she had ever been. She saw the little man had pulled a strange-looking pistol from his jacket, and was raising it to point at her, but she was too furious to be frightened. This horrid puppeteer had just tried to hurt her friends, and could even have Till hidden away in his room. More than anything, she wanted to teach him a lesson. Her sharp teeth were bared in a snarl, her fingernails had squeezed themselves into sharp little claws, and she knew her eyes were flashing bright orange.
I've never changed this much before
, she thought.
What happens if I can't change back?

Behind her she heard a roar. It was Gigantus, stampeding toward the door. Farfellini switched aim to the lumbering giant and fired.

There was a
twang
, and Gigantus halted, slapping a hand to his neck as if he'd been stung. A tiny dart with bright red fletchings jutted between his fingers.

Farfellini frantically wound the mechanism on the side of the pistol, getting ready for another shot, just as Mama Rat was pouring powder into the muzzle of her pistol across the room. But Sister Moon was quicker than both. She pulled her sword scabbard from her back and flung it at the man, knocking the gun from his grip and sending it spinning across the floor toward Sheba.

Even as Farfellini made a grab for it, Sheba snatched it up and pointed it straight at his head.

“Don't move or I'll shoot,” she said. She was still in the grip of her wolfish anger, so the words came out as a kind of snarl.

“Don't-a shoot! Don't-a shoot! Is poison, you silly girl. It kill me!” Farfellini put both hands in the air as the Peculiars surrounded him.

“What kind of poison?” Sheba asked. “What have you done to our friend?”

Farfellini looked over to where Gigantus was still clasping his neck, swaying to and fro and looking very pale. “Nothing bad,” he said, unconvincingly. “He be fine.”

“No, he pigging won't,” said Monkeyboy.

And they all watched as the big man let out a groan and collapsed to the floor like a felled redwood tree.

While Mama Rat saw to Gigantus, and Sister Moon tied up Farfellini, Sheba went to investigate the room where Farfellini had been hiding. Behind her, she could hear Gigantus groaning and the puppeteer cursing in Italian as Monkeyboy interrogated him by using a pair of his pliers to pluck out his nose hairs one by one.

Farfellini's quarters were quite different from the workshop outside. There was carpet on the floor, pictures on the walls (mostly badly painted views of foreign cities that Sheba assumed were in Italy), a small cot, and a stove. There was also a drawing board by the window, and another workbench. Sheba saw several half-built clockwork spiders, just like the ones that had attacked them. By the door was a board covered with levers and wires. Something inside it made it spark and crackle.
Electricity
, she realized.
The new miracle energy. It must be how he activated his trap.
It was incredible, really. Like magic.

There was no sign of anything crablike, though. No claws or pincers, no rubber piping or steam engines. Had they jumped to a false conclusion? But he had run away when they'd mentioned a crab — and he had tried to kill them with pistols and poisonous spiders.
There
must
be something
, Sheba thought. She went to the drawing board. Stacked upon it were sheet upon sheet of detailed drawings. It seemed that Farfellini meticulously planned his every creation.

Sheba saw blueprints for everything in the main room, including Gog and Magog and the spiders, and for others that either weren't here or had yet to be built. There was a tiger, a dragon, an elephant, tiny fairies, and a monstrous snake. She was nearing the end of the pile and about to give up when she saw it: the unmistakable shape of a serrated claw.

Throwing the other sketches to the floor, she stretched out the broad sheet of paper and held it up to the light. The design showed a huge contraption with two colossal claws, a series of spindly legs, and some kind of screw propeller to drive it through mud. There was also a porthole at the front, surrounded by tiny gaslights. It had a steam engine slotted into the rear, with pipes and vents jutting from under the carapace. And where its stomach should be was a chamber. “Big enough for two” was scrawled upon it.

“Found anything?” Mama Rat had poked her head around the door into the workshop, and was looking at Sheba expectantly.

Sheba held up the plan and grinned. “Jackpot,” she said.

Back in the workshop, Gigantus was still sitting with his head in his hands. Mama Rat had managed to remove the dart, and now the big man was quietly groaning while Monkeyboy tenderly patted him on the back. Sister Moon had the point of her sword at Farfellini's throat.

“What you do to my work?” Farfellini managed to croak, raising himself on one elbow. “You ruin my machines, you steal from my workshop! I call the police, you all go to jail.”

“Call the police, by all means,” said Mama Rat. “And then maybe you could explain this to them.” She waved the crab blueprint in his face, and Sheba noticed that he instantly began to tremble.

“That is nothing,” he said. “Just a design. An idea, only.”

“That's funny,” said Sheba. “Because a machine
exactly like that one there
has been stealing children from the river.”

“It not prove anything . . .” Farfellini began.

“Well, shall we turn it over to Scotland Yard and see what they make of it, then?” Mama Rat said. “Or would you like to tell us exactly who you made it for?”

“I can't tell!” Farfellini cried. He was beginning to panic. “A man come. He pay me. He not say his name.”

“Not good enough,” said Sister Moon. She pushed the sword a little harder into the soft skin of the little man's throat.

“He was a skinny man,
calvo
. . . bald, with spectacles. He give me orders, but that is all, I swear to Santa Maria!”

Sheba and Sister Moon looked at each other. Mama Rat nodded at them, and Sister Moon put her sword away.

“What will you do with me now?” Farfellini asked. His face was white as a sheet.

“I have an idea,” said Gigantus. The big man had managed to get to his feet, but he looked almost as shaky as Farfellini. He wobbled across the workshop, reached down, and hoisted up the puppeteer by his throat, until the two were face-to-face.

“You and I are going for a little walk together,” Gigantus said, growling, and hauled him off the ship.

“I think we should be off, too,” said Mama Rat. “The peelers could well be on their way here after all the racket we just made.”

Sheba nodded, and they began to make their way out onto the street when she felt something heavy in the pocket of her cloak. She reached a furry little hand inside and pulled out Farfellini's clockwork pistol. She must have tucked it in there and then forgotten about it. She thought about dropping it on the floor. After all, it wasn't really hers. But then again, it might prove useful in a tight spot.

Finders, keepers
, she thought, and slipped it back into her pocket before following the others back to Brick Lane.

A few hours later Sheba was busy showing everyone the clockwork pistol she had “found.” Sister Moon popped open the breech, showing her where the darts were loaded. There was a circular spool of little rings that held six shots. One chamber was empty, but the others still held small poisoned thorns with red fletchings, just like the one that had ended up in Gigantus's neck.

“I can make more for you, very easy,” she said. “I even do range of poisons if you like. Some for sleeping, some for paralyzing, some for making blood come out of eyeballs.”

“Um . . . thank you,” said Sheba.

It was just then that the door opened, and a queasy-looking Gigantus staggered in. Sheba quickly hid the pistol away, guessing he probably wouldn't want to be reminded of it. “My head . . .” he groaned, slumping into a chair. His scarred face had a definite greenish tinge, and beads of sweat covered his brow.

“You poor thing,” said Mama Rat, fetching him a cloth. “That nasty little puppet man poisoned you good and proper.”

“That poison kill normal-sized man,” said Sister Moon.

“Thank goodness you're such a great lump,” said Mama Rat, mopping his forehead.

Gigantus moaned in agreement.

“What exactly did you do with him, by the way?” Sheba asked. She hoped it wasn't anything too horrid.

“Mr. Farmy-flanelly is now on a one-way trip to Australia,” muttered Gigantus, holding his head in his hands.

“Transported to the prison colonies?” Mama Rat said in surprise. “How did you manage to get him into court so quickly?”

“I didn't,” Gigantus said. “I just nailed him into a packing crate and paid someone to stick him on the next ship out there. Serves him right for shooting me with that stupid gun.”

Then he groaned again, and made a sound as though he was going to be sick. Sister Moon ran to get a bowl from the kitchen.

“Why don't you lot go out somewhere?” said Mama Rat, looking concerned. “I think things here are about to turn a spot unpleasant. I'll send my ratties along with you to keep you safe.”

“Right you are,” said Monkeyboy, not needing to be told twice. He was out of the front door in a few seconds, and Sheba and Sister Moon followed close behind.

“We're best off out of there,” said Monkeyboy when they were safely on the street. “Can you imagine that huge gorilla throwing up? It'd be like a tidal wave of spew. We'd probably have drowned in half-chewed mutton.”

“Enough, Monkey,” said Sister Moon. “At least we have afternoon for ourself. Where shall we go?”

“We could go to the Great Exhibition,” suggested Sheba. “You did say we would, and I'd love to see the Crystal Palace and the big diamond.”

“Too expensive,” said Sister Moon, looking at the few coins in the pouch on her belt. “We not have three shillings.”

“What about the penny gaff down the road? They're a steaming great heap of bum-juice but they do an afternoon show most days,” Monkeyboy said. “We've got plenty enough for that, and some cakes and lemonade besides.”

Sheba and Sister Moon agreed, and the three of them set off.

Sheba pulled her hood down over her eyes, and kept her hands tucked beneath her cloak. Monkeyboy had hidden his tail down a trouser leg and jammed his battered bowler hat over his huge ears. Oddly enough, Sister Moon was the one getting all the stares. Probably because she was a girl wearing trousers.

Through the door behind them, a nasty retching sound could be heard. Sheba trotted a little faster, just in case Monkeyboy was right, and a giant wave of vomit was about to chase them down the street.

Back in Little Pilchton, Sheba had read about penny gaffs in scraps of newspaper, which described them as dens of vice and criminal behavior. Officially they were cheap versions of the theater, with a range of badly performed acts that kept their rowdy audiences entertained for an hour or so. Of all the sights she had wanted to see in London, it wasn't very high on her list.

“I'm sure going to a penny gaff will be interesting,” she said politely as they walked along Cable Street.

“You clearly haven't been to one before,” Monkeyboy cackled.

“Where are rats?” Sister Moon asked. “I not see them.”

Sheba sniffed the air. There were scents of rodent everywhere, but then there were probably more rats in London than people.

“I think we've lost them,” she said.

“Good,” said Monkeyboy. “Them things give me the creeps.”

They turned onto the Ratcliff Highway. It was a seedy, dirty place, with people lying in the gutter and hordes of ragged children leaping around piles of rotting litter. The smell of disease and decay made Sheba feel sick, and she took her handkerchief out and held it to her nose.

“Lovely here, innit?” said Monkeyboy, grimacing. “Just the place for an afternoon out. Makes Brick Lane look like bleeding Mayfair.”

“This the place,” said Sister Moon. She had stopped by an ancient, timber-fronted building that looked as though it might have once been an inn. The outside was covered with pasted playbills, all too weather-stained to read.

“I'll say it again,” said Monkeyboy. “I hope you're not expecting anything spectacular. I don't want the blame if it's rubbish.”

“It be good, Monkey. You see.” Sister Moon ducked through the low door, not waiting for the others to follow. Suddenly, without a
ninja
to protect them, the highway didn't seem a very safe place for two young children to be standing. Monkeyboy and Sheba quickly followed.

They came out into a small, crowded tavern. Sheba could smell lots of unwashed bodies, pipe smoke, and gin, and also something sweet. Over in the corner she saw a makeshift bar, where a woman was selling apples and slices of unhealthy-looking cake.

Sister Moon was standing at the far doorway, beckoning. It looked as though the show was about to start. Sheba and Monkeyboy pushed through the unwashed bodies toward her. As they arrived she dropped three pennies into the hand of the doorman and they went through into the theater.

It was dark inside, and even smellier than the tavern. People were squashed into the small pit area next to the stage, and it was with difficulty that the three of them managed to push their way through to the rows of wooden benches at the back, which stretched up to the ceiling like a Roman amphitheater (if amphitheaters had been knocked together by a few drunken carpenters out of worm-eaten timber). Sister Moon grabbed hold of a wonky ladder and scampered right to the top, where she found an empty bench. Monkeyboy followed, just as agile, but Sheba found the climb difficult and not a little frightening.

After minutes of clutching the splintered rungs and praying she wouldn't fall onto the heads of the crowd beneath, she felt Sister Moon's hands around her wrists, lifting her up. Stress had made her claws come out, and she left little gouge marks on the top rung. They had a bird's-eye view of the whole theater. The stage below seemed small, but at least the air was clearer up here, away from all the dirty clothes and festering armpits.

A little man came out onto the stage. There was an immediate roar from the audience, and it was very hard to hear what he was saying. It sounded as if he was boasting of the marvels of his show — a bit like Plumpscuttle did every night before their own performances.

The more the man went on, the more the crowd jeered. At one point, he compared his theater to the Great Exhibition, and the whole audience fell about laughing. He seemed to take that as the final straw, and disappeared through a trapdoor in the stage floor.

There was a brief moment of silence from the crowd, then a lady in an extraordinary amount of petticoats came on. There were wolf whistles and cheers, some rather pleasant music started — played by three men at the corner of the stage — and she began to dance.

She wasn't the most agile or slender of dancers, unfortunately, and soon the audience in the pit were throwing things at her. Eventually, she was booed off, and the director edged on stage again to announce his next act.

“Ladies and gentlefolk, may I now present to you the scientific genius Mr. Faraday!”

The audience shrieked and booed as a man in a black suit and enormous wig of wild gray hair came on. He carried a badly painted box, covered with coiling copper wires, strange dials, and a crank handle on the side, which he placed on a small table and pretended to tinker with.

“What's a scientific genius doing in a place like this?” Sheba shouted into Sister Moon's ear, trying to make herself heard over the noise.

“It not really him,” Sister Moon yelled back. “Is actor. Is famous because of new invention.”

Sheba was about to ask what he had invented, but the performance onstage soon made it clear. As he turned the handle, his box exploded with a
bang
and the actor jittered about the stage as if being shocked, before collapsing in a smoking heap. The crowd threw empty bottles and apple cores at the stage, forcing the man to scramble away on all fours.

“He made something electric, did he?” Sheba thought of the board of levers and wires on Farfellini's ship.

“He very clever scientist,” said Sister Moon. “You not heard of him?”

Sheba shrugged, not knowing how to explain the patchy nature of her general knowledge.
As soon as I get a chance, I'm going to buy myself an encyclopedia
, she thought.

When the interval came, Sheba was rather relieved. Monkeyboy went off to get some cake for them all, leaving her to enjoy the relative peace and quiet.

“Is something the matter, Sheba?” asked Sister Moon. “You not like the show?”

“It's all right, I suppose,” said Sheba. “Not my sort of thing, really.”

“Yes. In Japan we have theater called
kabuki
. It more civilized than this.”

“Do you miss your home?” she asked. What had driven the young girl so far from her native country?

“A lot, yes.” Sister Moon looked suddenly very sad.

“I'm sorry,” she said. “I didn't mean to remind you.”

“Don't worry,” Sister Moon forced herself to smile. “I cannot go back there, so I must get used to the sadness.”

“Why not?” asked Sheba. “Why can't you return?”

Sister Moon paused for a moment, thinking. Obviously this was something serious, and she was wondering whether to trust Sheba or not. When she spoke again, Sheba felt a rush of affection — that she had been deemed worthy to share Sister Moon's secret.

“In Japan I do bad things, Sheba. Things I not proud of.” She halted, looking around to see if anyone was listening. When she next spoke, it was almost in a whisper.

“I work for a group called Shadow Fist. We belong to powerful
shogun
as
ninja
. . . assassin. My master, he train me for many years, make me the best of all his
ninja
. But then one day he give me new task. He ask me to kill daughter of rival
shogun
. A girl not much younger than me.”

Sister Moon stopped, pressed her hands to her eyes for a moment. Sheba put an arm around her and squeezed gently.

“I refuse,” said Sister Moon. “I refuse mission. Bring disgrace to Shadow Fist. In my country, if you do such a thing, is terrible crime. My master would have had to kill me. So I leave. Get on first boat and come here. Monkeyboy and Gigantus find me in Whitechapel, save me from attack by gang. Mama Rat persuade Plumpscuttle to take me.”

For a moment, Sheba didn't know what to say. Finally, she took one of Sister Moon's hands in hers.

“You poor thing,” she said. Then, because that sounded so hopelessly inadequate: “Your master, he sounds like a horrid man. It's good that you got away from him.”

“He horrid man . . . but . . . he my father.”

There was an awkward silence, broken by Monkeyboy returning with the cake.

“What's going on here?” he said. “Heart-to-heart, is it? Has Moonie told you her sad story?”

“Shut up, Monkeyboy,” said Sheba. She didn't mean to be so harsh, but she was feeling responsible for opening Sister Moon's old wound, and also dredging up thoughts of her own lost family.