The Arcanum by Thomas Wheeler

knew them.
    But none of that mattered. Tonight was different. No one should be out on the streets tonight. Not after what happened to poor Martha. How perverse that a woman so gentle could die so viciously. Dexter tried to shake the memory off, but another just rose up to take its place. Audrey. There would be no more of her silly songs, no more of her mischievous little tricks, her ways of calming colicky babies.
    Dexter couldn’t let himself feel the full impact of their loss; not yet. Instead, he just pressed on. Protecting the others, that’s what mattered.
    Dexter spotted a local thief, Chops Connelly, catching a cig outside a brothel on Mott Street.
    Chops spoke first. “Whaddya say, Dex? Goin’ huntin’?”
    Dexter never smiled. “Seen Abby or Matthew?”
    “Seen ’em? I wish! The little shits owe me fi’ dollars on a dice game. They ran off, o’ course, ’fore payin’ what they lost. I can’t allow that to happen, see?”
    “You’ll get your money.” Dexter always looked men directly in the eyes as he spoke, which won him respect even from thugs like Chops.
    “I don’t know why ya don’t tie a brick round their ankles and drop ’em off a dock.”
    Dexter calmly lifted the shotgun and touched the muzzle to Chops’s chin.
    “Ay, ay, easy, Dex. I ain’t sayin’ I’m doin’ nuthin’; the kids is trouble’s, all. Don’t be like that.”
    “Anything happens to them and I’ll hold you personally responsible. Do you understand?”
    “Whaddya takin’ everythin’ so personal fer?” Chops backed away and flicked his cigarette into the street. He rubbed his throat. “You shouldn’t a done that, Dex. That weren’t smart. Them kids owes me fi’ dollars.” And Chops stalked off into the night.
    Dexter watched him go with steady black eyes. He’d been dealing with men like Chops for so long, and in so many different cities, that their threats meant nothing to him.
    For the next hour he searched all the way to City Hall Park, but in vain. He combed the usual hideouts—the Doctor’s and the Billy Goat and the dance halls—but none of the regulars had seen them. Although by Dexter’s calculation, Abigail and Matthew owed half the city approximately fifty dollars and change.
    By now most of the riffraff had retired for the evening. The streets were canyons, empty save for the stray bottle rolling in the wind.
    Dexter’s anger gave way to worry. Regardless of their age he still thought of Abigail and Matthew as children—and of himself as their guardian. And, silly as it was, he felt like he was letting them down, leaving them open to danger.
    Suddenly, Dexter spun into a low crouch, the rifle locked and loaded. He knelt there in the middle of the street, aiming into the darkness of a tenement alley. He wasn’t sure what he had seen, but his peripheral vision was legendary. And something that had moved caught his eye.
    Steel scraped off steel, and Dexter sprang to his feet, dashing across the street to a small children’s playground.
    A child’s swing squeaked on rusting hinges.
    Dexter pressed his back to one of the trees, then turned and aimed into the darkness again, eyes searching for movement.
    A gurgling squeal echoed through the air. Dexter tried to place the sound. It was like phlegm rolling in a long throat; like a pig’s squeal on the chopping block.
    Dexter heard the steel-scraping sound again, and ducked down. It came from the opposite direction as the squealing, and sounded farther away this time.
    Another round of squealing erupted, closer now. Dexter’s gaze darted up and down the streets. His heart swelled in his throat. He could smell something in the air—something fetid, decaying.
    Then there was a blur of movement behind him. Dexter whirled around. There was nothing there, but this time the squeal he heard was the loudest yet. It rang off the buildings, and goose bumps rose on Dexter’s arms.
    His only thoughts now were of escape. He was outnumbered, and he knew it.