and naturally he was concerned that something terrible might happen to them in the blighted rookery. It was rather amusing, actually.
“We are quite all right, thank you,” Varanus said.
She counted out some coins and held them up for the cabby to take. Due to Varanus’s short reach, the cabby was obliged to lean down to receive the fare, but when he counted it out, he was quite pleased.
“Miss,” he said, “this ain’t—”
“Keep the extra please,” Varanus said. “I’m feeling rather charitable this evening.”
The cabby touched his cap and said, “Much obliged, miss.” After a little hesitation—no doubt his conscience doing its duty—he set the cab moving again and departed down the squalid street.
“I daresay that kind man is concerned for our safety,” Ekaterine said, smiling brightly. “I find it so heartening to encounter nobility of character in such dark times.”
“Yes,” Varanus agreed, “but he still took the money and drove off, leaving us to our fate.”
Ekaterine held up a hand and said, “Don’t spoil the moment.”
Varanus smiled and took Ekaterine by the arm.
“Come along,” she said. “We must get to the clinic promptly, lest my poor patients be left waiting. And what’s more, I’m feeling rather peckish.”
They began walking down the street, deeper into the slum. All the while, the poor and derelict people who passed them shied away, bobbed their heads, and in several cases cast envious glances toward them. It was not surprising: she and Ekaterine were making a display of affluence in a truly impoverished place. They could have disguised themselves in the manner of locals, but that was contrary to Varanus’s purposes. Far better to be seen and noticed.
“Peckish?” Ekaterine asked, as they walked. “I recall our having eaten only an hour ago.”
Varanus grimaced and said, “If one can call that eating. I fear that the local fare disagrees with me.” She paused. “Well, all but one kind of local fare, and even then it is tainted by the local diet.”
“Don’t you enjoy any part of the English cuisine?” Ekaterine asked, taunting playfully. In truth, she hated it as much as Varanus did.
“As we have both learned these past few months,” Varanus replied, “the English do not have a cuisine. They have food that is heated, and that is the end of it.”
Ekaterine laughed and Varanus joined her. It was good to be in the land of her ancestors, Varanus thought—half of her ancestors at any rate—but she was gravely disappointed by the state of English cooking. Thankfully, English fashion more than compensated.
“I am glad that you wore the blue,” she told Ekaterine. “It suits you.”
Ekaterine glanced toward the stoop of a nearby building where a couple of men were lounging around drinking in the first shadows of dusk. The men were looking in their direction with distinctly lecherous gazes.
“So I’ve noticed,” Ekaterine said. She smiled at the men and fluttered her eyelashes. The men, rewarded by this display, made noises of encouragement to one another. One of them even stepped off the stoop and began to shamble slowly in their direction.
“Ekaterine!” Varanus exclaimed, slapping her friend’s hand firmly. She began walking more quickly to leave the men behind. “Kindly do not make such a display of yourself. I’m surprised at you. Winking at them like a shameless coquette.”
Ekaterine laughed and replied, “You said you were hungry. I had planned to lure one or two of them into a private place for you.”
“I’m doubly surprised,” Varanus said. “Why surely, once they learned what we were about, they would be quite unwilling.”
“In this instance I’d shed few tears,” Ekaterine said. “Unlike you, I trouble myself to learn something of our neighbors. The man following us beats his wife and children. And I suspect he’s a thief. I doubt the world would much mourn his passing.”
“Oh!” Varanus exclaimed. How silly of her not to have trusted Ekaterine, however peculiar her actions. Perhaps there really was something to passing words with the neighbors after all. “I didn’t realize. Shall we go back?”
“Uh…” Ekaterine glanced back and frowned. “No, he’s given up. A shame, but I suppose it was an unlikely thing from the start.”
“A shame indeed,” Varanus agreed, licking her lips. She really was parched. It had been ages since she had properly indulged herself. “I fear that to approach them directly would be most unseemly.”
“Yes,” Ekaterine agreed. “Almost as unseemly as this hat.”
* * * *
They continued on in the growing darkness. Within a few minutes, the sun had dimmed sufficiently for Varanus to remove her veil. It was nice to be able to see clearly, though little of what there was to see proved pleasing to the eyes. As they turned into a side street, Varanus fancied that she heard footsteps behind them, walking along at a slightly quicker pace.
She leaned close to Ekaterine and whispered, “I think we’re being followed.”
“Oh?” Ekaterine asked. She placed her hand over her mouth and giggled, as if being told some wonderful joke, and turned her head toward Varanus. When she turned back, she said, “You’re right. Three men. One has a cudgel. I think they mean to rob us. Or worse.”
“Wonderful!” Varanus said. Suddenly the evening was looking up. And better still, she saw an alley branching off from the street where they would likely be concealed from the prying eyes of the locals.
She led Ekaterine into the alley, looking about like a confused woman lost on her way. To her approval, the alley ended in a tall wooden fence. There was only one way out, so they would be cornered. Varanus led Ekaterine almost to the fence before turning back. The men following them had entered the alley by that point and were approaching. One man held a lantern and another had a short club as Ekaterine had said.
Ekaterine did a good job of shying away nervously, and Varanus did her best to look proud but frightened.
“’Ere then,” the man with the lantern said, leading the way for his fellows. “What’ve we got now?’”
“I do beg your pardon…sir,” Varanus said, dubiously, “but I fear that my sister and I seem to have become lost in your…district. I would be most obliged—” She caught herself as the man with the cudgel approached and leered at her. He smelled horribly of sweat and alcohol. “Oh, my.…” She made a show of drawing away before trying again: “I would be most obliged if you could direct us to the London Hospital.”
Ekaterine clung tightly to her arm and said, “Mildred, I told you we should have remained in the cab.”
“Oh, there’s no need for that, love,” said the man with the lantern, smiling at Ekaterine and showing his yellowed teeth. “We’re all just good Samaritans, ain’t we?”
The other men nodded in agreement.
The
