Steampunk!: An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories by Kelly Link Page B
Authors: Kelly Link
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present himself posthaste in order to sign the several official documents that necessarily accompany an event of such gravity."
We'd known as soon as the inspector turned up on Saint Aggie's door that it meant that William was dead. If he was merely in trouble, it would have been a constable, dragging him by the ear. We half-children of Saint Aggie's only rated a full inspector when we were topped by some evil bastard in this evil town. But hearing the inspector say the words, puffing them through his drooping mustache, that made it real. None of us had ever cried when Saint Aggie's children were taken by the streets — at least not where the others could see it. But this time around, without Grinder to shoot us filthy daggers if we made a peep while the law was about, it opened the floodgates. Boys and girls, young and old, we cried for poor little William. He'd come to the best of all possible Saint Aggie's, but it hadn't been good enough for him. He'd wanted to go back to the parents who'd sold him into service, wanted a return to his mam's lap and bosom. Who among us didn't want that, in his secret heart?
Monty's tears were silent, and they rolled down his cheeks as he shrugged into his coat and hat and let the inspector—who was clearly embarrassed by the display — lead him out the door.
When Monty came home, he arrived at a house full of children who were ready to go mad. We'd cried ourselves hoarse, then sat about the parlor, not knowing what to do. If there had been any of old Grinder's booze still in the house, we'd have drunk it.
"What's the plan, then?" he said, coming through the door. "We've got one night until that bastard comes back. If he doesn't find Grinder, he'll go to the sisters, and it'll come down around our ears. What's more, he knows Grinder, personal, from other dead ones in years gone by, and I don't think he'll be fooled by our machine, no matter how good it goes."
"What's the plan?" I said, mouth hanging open. "Monty, the plan is that we're all going to jail, and you and I and everyone else who helped cover up the killing of Grinder will dance at rope's end!"
He gave me a considering look. "Sian, that is absolutely the worst plan I have ever heard." And then he grinned at us the way he did, and we all knew that, somehow, it would all be all right.
"Constable, come quick! He's going to kill himself!"
I practiced the line for the fiftieth time, willing my eyes to go wider, my voice to carry more alarm. Behind me, Monty scowled at my reflection in the mirror in Grinder's personal toilet, where I'd been holed up for hours.
"Verily, the stage lost a great player when that machine mangled you, Sian. You are perfect. Now, get moving before I tear your remaining arm off and beat you with it. Go!"
Phase one of the plan was easy enough: we'd smuggle our Grinder up onto the latticework of steel and scaffold where they were building the mighty Prince Edward Viaduct, at the end of Bloor Street.
Monty had punched his program already: he'd pace back and forth, tugging his hair, shaking his head like a maddened man, and then, abruptly, he'd turn and fling himself bodily off the platform, plunging 130 feet into the Don River, where he would simply disintegrate into a million cogs, gears, springs, and struts, which would sink to the riverbed and begin to rust away. The coppers would recover his clothes, and those, combined with the eyewitness testimony of the constable I was responsible for bringing to the bridge, would establish in everyone's mind exactly what had happened and how: Grinders was so distraught at one more death from among his charges that he had popped his own clogs in grief. We were all of us standing ready to testify as to how poor William was Grinder's little favorite, a boy he loved like a son, and so forth. Who would suspect a bunch of helpless cripples, anyway?
That was the theory, at least. But now I was actually standing by the bridge, watching six half-children
We'd known as soon as the inspector turned up on Saint Aggie's door that it meant that William was dead. If he was merely in trouble, it would have been a constable, dragging him by the ear. We half-children of Saint Aggie's only rated a full inspector when we were topped by some evil bastard in this evil town. But hearing the inspector say the words, puffing them through his drooping mustache, that made it real. None of us had ever cried when Saint Aggie's children were taken by the streets — at least not where the others could see it. But this time around, without Grinder to shoot us filthy daggers if we made a peep while the law was about, it opened the floodgates. Boys and girls, young and old, we cried for poor little William. He'd come to the best of all possible Saint Aggie's, but it hadn't been good enough for him. He'd wanted to go back to the parents who'd sold him into service, wanted a return to his mam's lap and bosom. Who among us didn't want that, in his secret heart?
Monty's tears were silent, and they rolled down his cheeks as he shrugged into his coat and hat and let the inspector—who was clearly embarrassed by the display — lead him out the door.
When Monty came home, he arrived at a house full of children who were ready to go mad. We'd cried ourselves hoarse, then sat about the parlor, not knowing what to do. If there had been any of old Grinder's booze still in the house, we'd have drunk it.
"What's the plan, then?" he said, coming through the door. "We've got one night until that bastard comes back. If he doesn't find Grinder, he'll go to the sisters, and it'll come down around our ears. What's more, he knows Grinder, personal, from other dead ones in years gone by, and I don't think he'll be fooled by our machine, no matter how good it goes."
"What's the plan?" I said, mouth hanging open. "Monty, the plan is that we're all going to jail, and you and I and everyone else who helped cover up the killing of Grinder will dance at rope's end!"
He gave me a considering look. "Sian, that is absolutely the worst plan I have ever heard." And then he grinned at us the way he did, and we all knew that, somehow, it would all be all right.
"Constable, come quick! He's going to kill himself!"
I practiced the line for the fiftieth time, willing my eyes to go wider, my voice to carry more alarm. Behind me, Monty scowled at my reflection in the mirror in Grinder's personal toilet, where I'd been holed up for hours.
"Verily, the stage lost a great player when that machine mangled you, Sian. You are perfect. Now, get moving before I tear your remaining arm off and beat you with it. Go!"
Phase one of the plan was easy enough: we'd smuggle our Grinder up onto the latticework of steel and scaffold where they were building the mighty Prince Edward Viaduct, at the end of Bloor Street.
Monty had punched his program already: he'd pace back and forth, tugging his hair, shaking his head like a maddened man, and then, abruptly, he'd turn and fling himself bodily off the platform, plunging 130 feet into the Don River, where he would simply disintegrate into a million cogs, gears, springs, and struts, which would sink to the riverbed and begin to rust away. The coppers would recover his clothes, and those, combined with the eyewitness testimony of the constable I was responsible for bringing to the bridge, would establish in everyone's mind exactly what had happened and how: Grinders was so distraught at one more death from among his charges that he had popped his own clogs in grief. We were all of us standing ready to testify as to how poor William was Grinder's little favorite, a boy he loved like a son, and so forth. Who would suspect a bunch of helpless cripples, anyway?
That was the theory, at least. But now I was actually standing by the bridge, watching six half-children
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