Twilight Robbery (18 page)

‘Now hush up, and keep pace with me.’

With some trepidation, Mosca and Clent crept down the street after Mistress Leap, keeping close to the walls as she did, stopping to hearken when she did. They passed one alley in which a dozen or so shambling figures dragged their manacled feet across the cobbles, brooms and buckets in their hands, but did not pause.

‘Toil-gangs,’ Mistress Leap breathed. ‘Fell into debt, poor fellows. Don’t stop to look at them.’

After five minutes or so the midwife stooped and slipped into a lightless covered walkway. Mosca saw her own apprehension in Clent’s face, but each ducked and followed her. The tunnel-like walkway proved to be part of a veritable warren, and Mosca stumbled on through darkness, one hand clutching the belt of Clent, who walked a pace ahead of her, the other trailing against the wall.

When they emerged, the moonlight was so shockingly bright that Mosca felt torchlit and exposed. The midwife led them swiftly across the street and softly knocked at a low door. A long rap, three short raps.

Somewhere locks rearranged themselves, and the door opened to show a lantern-jawed, middle-aged man with tobacco-yellow eyebrows.

Ah, Welter.’ Mistress Leap patted his cheek. ‘Pop on some

nettle tea for our guests, there’s a dear.’

Passing through the door, Mosca found herself in what appeared to be a cluttered hallway. A few paces in, however, she realized that the hallway did not open up into larger rooms, but continued corridor-like all the way. All the business of a house, including hearth, furniture, shelves and beds, were crammed into this windowless passage four feet in width. The furthest reaches of it even seemed to have been transformed into some kind of workshop, strewn with boxes, clock parts and tools.

Welter’s face contorted with what Mosca hoped was shortsightedness as he examined his ‘guests’. Then his watery eyes fixed on Clent’s badge. He leaned forward to peer, and went pale.

‘Leveretia—’

‘I know. Tea, Welter.’

Welter turned about abruptly and hobbled away towards the meagre hearth to manhandle the kettle. Mosca could only suppose that he was the midwife’s husband.

‘Sir – you’ll sit on that stool. Miss – you’ll sit on the rug.’ The midwife still appeared to be in bustle mode, and Mosca wondered if delivering a baby filled you with energy that took a while to wear off. It seemed impossible for her to be idle, and she negotiated her way to and fro across the cluttered, halflit room with the ease of long practice, despite the fact that often this involved mountaineering over furniture or boxes.

Welter’s throat was emitting a series of rasping creaks, apparently with the aim of attracting his wife’s attention. Eventually the midwife took pity on him and joined him in the corner for an earnest whisper-match, with many glances towards the guests. Mosca’s sharp ears caught only a few words – ‘spot of luck’ and something sounding a lot like ‘with the morning delivery’. At last the midwife returned with a tray of chipped cups, a steaming teapot and a bowl of what looked like dessicated droppings but which turned out to be the driest of dried figs.

‘Now, sir – you will grant that you’re in a bit of a spot,’ the midwife continued without preamble. Mosca watched her pour the dishwater-coloured tea, her fingers strong but thin and worn. ‘You and your young friend are wandering around where you don’t exist, and people take unkindly to that sort of thing round here. You need us to get back where you belong . . . and as it happens we need you too.’ The midwife’s brow creased a little, as if her words were costing her some effort. ‘It . . . rubs my fur contrary to say this, sir, but . . . we are in the most desperate and urgent need of coin.’

‘Ah . . .’ Clent’s fingers fluttered over his waistcoat. ‘We . . . ah . . . we are not exactly well gilded at present . . .’

‘I am sorry, sir.’ The midwife’s gaze and tone was dogged. ‘But you are a daylight man, and will have means to come by money, means that we lack. The night of Saint Yacobray is nearly upon us, and then we will need it more than you do.’

The mention of Yacobray struck a chord in Mosca’s mind. When had she heard that Goodman mentioned recently? Yes, it had been Skellow earlier that evening. He had said that the kidnapping of Beamabeth Marlebourne needed to happen before the night of Yacobray.

There were few Beloved more ominous in reputation than Yacobray. He was addressed as ‘He Who Softens the Step and Protects Those Shy of Notice’, but this was mostly out of politeness. Most people associated him with death by treachery, the smiler with the knife, the hidden blade. He was the patron saint of all assassins but also their fate, patiently stalking them and waiting to claim them as they claimed others.

‘What happens on the night of Yacobray, Mistress Leap?’ asked Mosca.

‘The Clatterhorse comes,’ Mistress Leap answered simply. Her tone was almost offhand, and yet in those words Mosca sensed a wealth of menace.

Like many old traditions, the Clatterhorse was half jocular, half sinister. There were no paintings or carvings of Yacobray himself, for he was believed to be invisible. Instead it was said that all one ever saw of him was the horse he rode, which was completely skeletal. In most villages the young people celebrated the night of Yacobray by creating a ‘Clatterhorse’, a hobby horse with a skull for a head, and galloping astride it from house to house, rattling its loose, bony jaw and begging gifts and sweetmeats.

‘What . . . ?’

‘
They
send it.’ The midwife fixed her guests with a meaningful look, then grasped the chatelaine at her own belt and gave it a swift shake. Her keys chimed against each other, and Mosca understood. The Jinglers. The Locksmiths. ‘
They
send the Clatterhorse on the night of Yacobray. Not just a skull on a stick, a thing the size of a real horse, with great metal shoes that ring out like mining picks. On that night, we all hang offerings for the Clatterhorse before our door – cabbages, potatoes, marrows – and then we go back indoors and we stay there. And when the darkest part of the night is past we go out and find the offerings gone and the string bitten through.’

‘I beg pardon, madam, but are you saying that the Lock – forgive me, that
they
terrify the town with a giant cabbage-eating pantomime horse?’ Clent looked bewildered.

‘The vegetables are full of money.’ The midwife’s hand was not quite steady as she refilled the cups. ‘We all pay weekly taxes to
them
, but the biggest tithe is paid on the night of Yacobray. And if we do not pay it, or do not pay enough . . . then when the horse has passed by, cabbages are not the only thing missing. This is Toll-by-Night, sir. And people disappear in these shadows very easily and very often.’

‘What about the Night Steward?’ Mosca asked. ‘Isn’t he in charge?’

‘Oh dear, no.’ Mistress Leap shook her head with a sad little smile.

‘Wait a moment.’ Mosca narrowed her eyes, remembering Night Steward Foely’s claim that Skellow had not left Toll in two years. ‘Do you think maybe some folks come in and out of Toll sometimes without it showing on the Night Steward’s records?’

‘Oh yes.’ Mistress Leap nodded. ‘I would certainly think so. After all, when somebody comes in or out there is a toll paid. Every toll the Jinglers report is money that must go to the Treasury . . . and every toll they do not is money they may keep themselves. Now, I do not say a word against them, for they keep order in Toll-by-Night better than anyone else could, but they always have a price. Always. And sometimes a bitter one.’

‘So . . . why does anyone stay here?’ Mosca erupted. ‘Why don’t they all get out?’

‘Many would if they could,’ answered Mistress Leap, her tone brisk but her eyes still lowered. ‘But it is no easy matter getting out of one of
their
towns.’ Mosca understood. Once a town or city fell to the Locksmiths, there was precious little chance of seeing the inhabitants again, or guessing what was happening within its walls. ‘Paying your way out of this town at night costs twice what it does by day, and with our taxes there’s no way to save the money. The walls are guarded, and even if you escape the town, they have ways of chasing you down on the moors. Some hang all their hopes on getting the Committee of Hours to reclassify them as dayfolk, so they can escape the night city that way, but I have never known that to happen.

‘A few scratch together enough to pay the toll and leave,’ continued the midwife, ‘but for most of us there are only three ways out of Toll-by-Night: a baby can be born to a daylight Beloved and go to live in Toll-by-Day, a person can die and have their coffin dropped into the Langfeather . . . or you can join
them. Their
agents come and go as they please.’

But Skellow got out of Toll-by-Night
, reflected Mosca.
How did he get out and back in again? And . . . why did he get back in at all once he was out? Toll-by-Night does not seem like somewhere you would be if you had a choice.

‘But . . . ah . . . surely there must be other ways?’ Clent sipped his tea. ‘If this child and myself can fall into Toll-by-Night by the mere misadventure of staying out too late, why do not bright sparks do the same in reverse? Surely they may hide their badges, or steal some, or make new ones?’

‘These things have been tried – of
course
they have. Sir, I do not think you realize how lucky you have already been in dodging the Jinglers this night. And you would need twice the luck to slip from night to day, for the Jinglers are twice as watchful at dawn as they are at dusk.

‘Many have tried to sneak into Toll-by-Day and failed. And even those that have succeeded have all been caught sooner or later. Everybody in Toll-by-Day watches out for folks without badges, and nightlings tend to stand out in the day crowds, what with their sickly look and worn-out clothes. And of course it falls apart the moment somebody asks their name. Then when they are caught the dayfolk hand them back to the Jinglers with the dusk, and after that we never see a hair of them again.’

Clent’s fingers began their dance over his waistcoat. Evidently it was dawning upon him that, however terrible all this might be for the citizens of Toll-by-Night, it might also currently be fairly terrible for Eponymous Clent. As a matter of fact, she was starting to have similar uneasy suspicions about the prospects of Mosca Mye.

‘What about us?’ Mosca asked curtly. ‘We got the right badges for daylight. What happens if we go out on the streets before dawn and just wait?’

‘If the Jinglers catch you out on the street between bugles, your badges won’t help you,’ came the answer. ‘Nobody is allowed out then except the Jinglers themselves.’

‘Mistress Leap, a child has just been born under Goodlady Twittet, yes?’ Clent’s eyes were sharply speculative. ‘And a babe so born is a passport, as it were, to the world of day. Could you perhaps . . .
adjust
the paperwork so that myself and my young charge were listed as close relations, so that when the family passed into Toll-by-Day—’

‘You do not understand, sir,’ the midwife interrupted firmly. ‘Only the babe goes to live in the daylight town. The family stay behind.’

‘Then that mother back in the other house . . .’ For the first time Mosca understood Blethemy’s tears.

‘. . . wanted a “scaring” so that her son would receive all the blessings she can never have, and live under a sun that she can never see, instead of growing up wan and thin and bow-legged with rickets.’ The midwife drew her knuckles hard across her own cheeks, as if angry that there were no tears to wipe. ‘Very soon that boy will be adopted by some daylight family . . . and no doubt Blethemy will find herself nursing and bringing up some night-named child born in Toll-by-Day. That sort of exchange happens a good deal.’

Mosca thought of the tremulous, furious, purple-faced baby that was so soon to be motherless, just as she had once been.

‘Poor little gobbet,’ she muttered to herself.

Clent also looked crestfallen, but Mosca guessed that his mind was still busier with the dilemma of Eponymous Clent than the plight of the Gobbet. ‘Mistress Leap, I can see you have an escape for us in mind, and mean to charge us toll in the place of the Lock – ah, in the place of
them
. But truly, madam, you find us without funds. Plucked. Fleeced. Bare as midwinter trees.’

‘So how
were
you planning to pay your way out of Toll?’ The midwife folded her arms, her bird-like face a picture of scepticism.

‘Ah . . .’ Clent made tiny adjustments to his cravat. ‘We . . . ah . . . anticipate being of great service to a family of consequence, and receiving our just reward. The . . . the mayor’s family, in fact . . .’

‘Oh!’ The midwife’s face thawed instantly. ‘So you’ll have seen young Beamabeth! How is that little peach?’

Mosca heard her cup crack as her grip became vice-like.

‘Hale and well, fair and blithe,’ Clent answered quickly, ‘and courted by a little lord from another town, as I hear it. But she and her family face some . . . difficulties which they have called upon us to remedy . . .’

‘Courted by a fellow from another town, you say?’ Mistress Leap’s face had fallen, and suddenly she looked quite distraught. ‘You mean . . . she would be leaving us? Young Beamabeth Marlebourne would be leaving Toll?’