Red Dog Conspiracy: A Noir Future Steampunk Crime Family Saga

Tony left after breakfast to attend to the Business. When Pearson was out of sight, I went into Tony’s library, closing the door behind me. While larger and finer than Mr. Kerr’s library, it continued the gray, pastel blue, and white theme which covered most of our home. So I preferred the library at the Kerr’s.

But I didn’t come here to admire the decor.

“Holy Writ,” I murmured, “Casino Management … Fall of the Western Empire … Business Communication … ah! Here it is!”

A street atlas of the city of Bridges, a slim volume, but important in my case. I opened the book onto Tony’s desk, being careful not to disturb anything. After studying several maps of the Diamond quadrant, I decided to visit Mrs. Bryce.

Mrs. Bryce appeared in better spirits, and although thinner and paler than I remembered, glad to see me. She invited me in her back room and offered me luncheon, but her plate seemed so bare I told her I had already supped. She didn’t argue, eating my tiny portion as well as hers.

She peered at me. “Do you have any news?”

I nodded. “I have evidence that David may be alive.”

Mrs. Bryce sobbed while I sat silently, recalling how unhelpful Amelia’s words were earlier. At last she said, “I’m sorry,” and wiped her eyes.

I said, “A group of men was recently kidnapped. They described a young boy held alongside them. The description of the boy matches David’s.”

Mrs. Bryce stared at me in shock. “This is horrendous!”

“The men couldn’t tell us where they were being held. I have reason to believe your son is in the Diamond quadrant.”

Mrs. Bryce nodded, tears filling her eyes. “Yes, where my poor Herbert was found.”

“I must ask — do you have any contacts, or friends, or associates in Diamond? A person I might make a delivery to, or you might visit?”

“There’s a fabric shop, much like mine; the owner imports his material from Europe. I've been there once before, but the prices were too high for me to order anything. I have his card here somewhere.” She began to search the room.

Several people came in, milled about, and left without purchasing anything. I attended the counter, dressed in Tenni’s shop maid uniform, yet no one paid me any mind.

Finally, she said, “I have it!”

“Very good. When can we visit? I can return on —”

“I will wait no longer.” She got her keys and hung the “closed“ sign on the door. I followed her outside; she locked the door and went down the street.

Her decisiveness seemed such a departure from her usual manner that I felt completely surprised. After a moment’s hesitation, I followed. Perhaps I would have the same reaction if my child were missing. I couldn’t imagine bearing a child in the first place, so the point seemed moot.

I found a public taxi-carriage that would take us to the Diamond quadrant, and soon we were off to the address on her card, the taxi-carriage’s wheels rattling over the cobblestones. “How did you come to be in Bridges?”

What I wanted to ask was “How did you come to leave Bridges?“ But I couldn’t ask, not yet, or she would realize who I really was.

Mrs. Bryce sighed. “My husband was an importer, but not a competent one. He died suddenly, leaving a large amount of debt which I was unable to pay. First, the better part of my inventory was seized, then my customer lists were taken, then I was threatened with eviction.

“I saw a notice in the paper advertising shops for rent in Bridges, so when the creditors informed me they were taking our home, I gathered what inventory was left and brought my sons here.” She stared out of the window. “At times I feel it might have been better to stay and face the debtor’s prison.”

Debtor’s prison? Her city sounded harsher than Bridges, if such a thing were possible.

The carriage came to a halt, and we alighted to the silver-gray cobbles. The temperature had dropped, and I wished I brought Tenni’s overcoat.

The shop was in the better part of the Diamond quadrant, and I could see why the prices might be too high for Mrs. Bryce.

I felt eyes on me, and a light-skinned man in brown turned away before I could see his face. A shiver of fear went down my back. “Let’s get out of here.”

A few streets over, we found a taxi-carriage which would take us to the slums “to see our aunt.” For an extra penny, he brought us to a rundown street a few blocks outside the Pot, just west of the main roadway. “It might be hard to find a taxi-carriage here,” he said.

Clever man. “Would you wait for us?”

He thought for a moment. “I suppose I can …. If you have another penny…?”

I glanced at Mrs. Bryce, who nodded.

“When we return, I promise.”

He nodded, then pulled his goggles down around his neck, tipping his hat over his eyes and leaning back.

We cut between two buildings and down an alley.

From the description the men gave Tony, it seemed they were held in a larger building, such as a warehouse. Few such buildings lay in Diamond, which wasn’t known for its manufacturing. Most of the warehouses were in the western part of the Diamond section of the Pot. For this reason, I planned to limit the search to the west Diamond Pot, which was all we had time for.

The only good thing about each section of the Pot is that it is narrower than the rest of the quadrant it belongs to, being at the “point,” if you will, closest to Market Center. I decided to begin at the south end and work my way north.

I felt glad the warehouses were concentrated in the western Diamond Pot. I didn’t want to have to travel the tunnels under the roadway, dressed as I was. All sorts of scoundrels and ruffians loitered in such places.

Even though the Diamond Pot was fenced with wrought iron, as was the Spadros Pot, this fence also had openings, either melted away by ray blasts or by the many bombings. It didn’t take long to find one and slip through.

Someone whistled from high up and to our right, and it reminded me of my days in the High-Low Split. Our watchers whistled if they saw someone: one for quadrant-folk, to beg or steal from; two for another gang attacking; three for the cops.

We dodged packs of dogs and men, wove around sleeping forms, piles of trash, and the occasional curious onlooker. An old woman with dark brown skin leaned on a battered broom at her door. Dirty, ragged children just out of infancy spun a broken bottle. A man with pale skin roused from sleep peered at us then covered his head with a piece of cardboard.

Strangely enough, we were never challenged. Also, the streets were too clean. The piles of trash were well-stacked, no smell of filth or urine permeated the air, and no corpses covered with carrion lay about. It seemed strange.

Perhaps they conducted their affairs differently here.

This area must have survived the wars better than Spadros quadrant; more of the buildings stood undamaged. Several of the buildings were locked (and more to the point, bolted) on all sides. As we could hear nothing and had no way to force entry, we left those. Others were unsafe to enter, and after hearing no reply to our shouts, we left those as well.

“This is so frustrating!” Mrs. Bryce said. “My poor child could be in any of these and we wouldn’t know it.”

No bolts secured the next building, a one-story brick warehouse. So I retrieved my picks (which I had secreted in my bodice) and began to work on the lock.

Steps came from behind. “Ah, now look here,” a man’s voice came, also from behind, along with a pair of hands traveling around my midsection.

At his touch, I slumped down, backwards, and to the side. Moving forward and likely taken off guard, he fell to the other side, being thrown over my shoulder and against the door by his own actions.

I’m not sure how to explain it better: I never learned the technique’s proper name. I'd practiced the maneuver many times, but never used it in reality before. It was one of the first lessons Roy taught me, and he claimed knowing the name would interfere. “You brood too much as it is.”

I pulled my dagger from my left boot-sheath and put it to the man’s neck.

Pale skin, a crooked nose, and light brown hair. A dirty laborer’s shirt with orange-brown pants and a coat twenty years or more out of fashion. The clothes looked as if they came from the items the poorhouse threw out, too threadbare and torn to sell. His face was smeared with dirt, and he smelled as if he hadn’t bathed in a week.

“Hey, now.” He glanced down with surprise and fear in his eyes. “I was just having a bit a fun with you. No need for knifing.” His speech was slurred, as if he had an impediment.

I stepped back. “Fun’s over, move on.”

He picked up his cap and put it back on, but not soon enough to hide a look of deep chagrin. “You smell too good for any maid a hers,” the man gestured at Mrs. Bryce. “And not many maids know they way round a knife, either.”

And I did; I learned knife-fighting as a child, from Josephine Kerr herself.

“Tis none your concern.” I fell back to Pot-speak, I suppose, without meaning to.

“No dummy, me. Pot rag dressed a slum maid, smelling like a lady. And armed.” He took off his cap and bowed. “Please to meet you, Mum Spadros.”

No dummy indeed. “Hush, you fool. Black Jack would see me dead.”

“He would. And you too pretty for that rascal, so I keep my trap shut.” He smiled, and his swollen gums lacked several teeth.

“You gotta name to give?”

“Eh,” he said, disappointed, “knew you would get round to asking. You can call me Morton.”

“Morton!”

“So twas you napped Clover!” He laughed and shook his head. “You think my treys don’t talk? When Clover told me a men blaming us for napping lads, I had to set things right.”

I thought this was fairly admirable for a man who taught boys to vandalize. “You hear a lad taken?”

The man scrutinized us. “Aye, just ta other side ta fence, or so they say. Jack’s old barn, not used much now. One a ta whores sneaking out heard ta boy a-crying.”

I nodded, and fished out a penny, but the man waved me off. “You forget so soon. Help you own, aye?”

“Aye,” I said, abashed. “Thank ye.”

“Stay warm,” he said.

“Stay warm,” I turned to leave, but then thought of Stephen. He didn’t sound like an outsider, but who else would talk to the police? “Wait.” Morton turned back. “Red Dogs take outsiders?”

He spat. “Never.” Then he went round the corner.

Mrs. Bryce frowned, as if puzzling out something. “So do we go there?”

It could be a trap. Pot rags don’t steal from each other, cheat each other, or betray each other — usually — but they will anyone else. Since I wasn’t a Pot rag anymore, I wasn’t sure how I qualified in his eyes.

He didn’t look like a Diamond, which made me suspicious. I had no proof he was even from the Pot, other than an accent.

But we might not get a better chance. “We go.”

Someone whistled, close by. We hurried through the maze of alleys, around broken fences, and down streets piled with the rubble of war after war. It began to snow as we went.

For once, Mrs. Bryce said nothing. I heard her panting as we went round corner after corner, across streets, through alleys, then through another melted hole in the wrought iron, until we got a couple of blocks from the building Morton mentioned.

Two gentlemen carried a struggling package, boy-sized, which they placed into a carriage. One had light brown skin and wore brown, the other had dark skin and wore white.

“David!” Mrs. Bryce said.

The men climbed in and the carriage moved away.

I ran after them, Mrs. Bryce behind. Then I slid to a stop. “Follow me!” I ran for our carriage. A dozen blocks away, the carriage still stood there. “Go to the end of the street,” I told the driver, “then follow the tracks.” After I helped Mrs. Bryce in and shut the door, the driver did so.

“That was him.”

“Who?”

“That man in white … it was him. He came to the shop … a few weeks … before David went missing.” She paused, panting. “He was the only one … who came by … the week we moved here. All three of us came out to the store front to meet him.”

I leaned back, horrified.

“I thought he was a neighbor.” Mrs. Bryce stared at her hands. “Why would he take David?”

We sped down the lane, following the tracks, as the snow fell with more intensity.

I jerked away from a motion out of the corner of my eye, so Mrs. Bryce’s slap barely grazed me. “What the hell are you doing?”

“You got my Nicholas killed!” She unleashed a flurry of slaps and punches, which I deflected as the carriage barreled along. I knew this was coming, but the timing of it surprised me.

Finally she stopped, weeping. “You got him killed! He would have done anything for you, and you got him killed. He was just a little boy.”

We were born the same day.

After Peedro finished his negotiations with Roy that terrible cold night, he let me go. The crowd began muttering about him killing a child, picking up bricks and iron rods as they moved towards him.

Jack Diamond glared up from where he knelt by his friend, shaking with rage, dark eyes full of tears. Even Roy Spadros didn’t frighten me as much as the look in this man’s face, which promised terrible vengeance.

The memory frightened me still.

I ran to Air, sobbing, but he lay dead. My vision blurred as I half dragged, half carried Air through the foul-smelling streets all that long walk home.

I didn’t want the rats to get him.

My mother woke when, exhausted, I dropped Air’s body with a thud on the wooden floor of our quarters. Once she deciphered what had happened, she sent her girls with messages and put me to bed.

The minute she left the room, I crouched next to the door until Air’s mother came for his body. I listened to her screams, her sobs, her curses.

Eleanora said the same thing that night ten years ago: I got him killed.

I did get him killed. I thought about it every day; his death filled my dreams every night. There was nothing I could say.

* * *

After about a half hour, the driver pulled over and came round to our window. “Begging your pardon, miss, but I lost them for the snow,” he said. “Can you tell me who you’re following?”

I leaned out of the window. “It was a carriage like yours, almost exactly.”

The driver shook his head. “The way that left back wheel was wobbling, he won’t be driving it long. And the other had a divot outta the right back; when he made the turn back there you saw snow clear as day. That’s got to be stole from the carriage-house on Market Center. It’s on the repair list or I’m an old maid.”

“Can you take us back to Spadros? I’ll pay extra.”

“Gladly.” The man smiled. “Most fun I’ve had all day.”

Mrs. Bryce didn’t like abandoning our pursuit.

“What would you have me do? It’s snowing. There are no tracks to follow.” I paused for a moment, thinking. “Let me look into this further.”

She wept. “My little boy … why are they holding him? He’s done nothing wrong!”

We didn’t know that, but it wouldn’t help to say it. “I think I know where to look from here.”

“So you’ll find David?”

“Now you want me to help you. After all that?”

She glanced away. “Yes.”

The whole world became silent.

Toss the deck — Jack Diamond thought I took the case already. “Yes, I’ll find him.”

“Thank you,” she sobbed. “Thank you.”

“But I must tell you true. I’m not the police. I’m just a woman. All I can do is find David, not catch the ones who have him, not bring them to justice. We might not even learn why they did it. If I get him home, you both may be in danger. These scoundrels may try to take him again. But I will find him. Will that be enough?”

“Yes.” She wiped her tears with her handkerchief. “All I want is my boy back, even if for just one day.”

I patted her hand. “I always find who I look for.”

I neglected — for her sake — to mention that sometimes I found them dead.