The Darkest Walk of Crime Read Free Page B

the
wall. The detective swore softly.
    “Are you Peeler bastards still
there?” Tom fired on the last word. As soon as the pistol sounded, Mendick
threw himself into the hole, kicking madly in an attempt to gain momentum. The
wall was thicker than he had expected, and rough brick scraped the flesh from
his outstretched hands as he frantically hauled himself through. He had forty
seconds to reach the screever before Flash Tom finished reloading. Forty
seconds between life and possible death: how long had he already been?
    Did it really matter? He
hesitated, embracing death for a fraction of a second, but duty forced him
onwards. Peering into the darkness, he glimpsed a bearded white face and the
blurred hands of somebody urgently working the ramrod of a pistol. The man
looked up, his eyes vicious above a rainbow waistcoat. Mendick scrabbled with
his feet, seeking purchase, as Flash Tom withdrew the ramrod and stepped
backward into the dark. There was a solid click as he cocked the hammer.
    “Peeler bastard!” The words were
followed by a torrent of foul vituperation that echoed repulsively around the
dark chamber.
    Mendick flinched; with his head
and upper body protruding from the hole, he was hideously vulnerable. “It won’t
do, Tom. If you shoot me, it will be the gallows. Think, man.”
    “Gallows or not, bluebottle,
you’re a dead man.” Extending his arm to aim, Tom pressed the trigger just as
Restiaux gave Mendick a final push that propelled him through the hole.  He
gasped as burning powder from the muzzle of the pistol filled the air, but the
ball screamed wide and smashed into crumbling brick. Coughing with the reek of
shrouding smoke, he instinctively rolled away, but Flash Tom did not attack.
    Jerking upright, he glanced
around, grateful for the beam of light that Restiaux directed through the hole.
    He was in a small chamber with
an arched brick roof and walls smeared with flaking white plaster. A small stove
emitted residual warmth, while the pot on top still contained the congealed
metal that was the raw material of the coining trade. Half a dozen spoons lay
scattered on the ground, together with a number of tools, a pile of documents
and a variety of pens and bottles of ink. It was obvious that a master forger
worked here. There was no sign of Blake, but there was a small opening in the
far corner.
    “Sergeant,” Mendick called
through, “the bird’s flown. I’m going to follow.”
    “Don’t be a fool, man,” Restiaux
ordered, but there was no strength in his voice. “You can’t wander around the Holy
Land on your own.”
    “There’s no choice, Sergeant. We
can’t let him escape now.”
    Before Restiaux adjusted his
advice into an order , Mendick crouched at the opening through which
Flash Tom had escaped. Taking a deep breath, he plunged in, to find himself at
the top of half-rotted wooden steps descending to a square courtyard piled high
with human filth. There was a single exit between two buildings, so narrow he
had to squeeze through sideways, emerging into a crooked street of misshapen
houses. The dirty light of dawn did nothing to alleviate the dismal appearance
of soot-smeared walls, stagnant filth-spilling gutters and shuffling, dull-eyed
people. Mendick did not hesitate.
    “Police!” he roared. “Stand
aside!”
    One or two edged aside as he
splashed through the street, but others made to block his path. He barged them
aside, their underfed bodies fragile before his weight. There was movement
ahead, a glimpse of a rainbow waistcoat as Flash Tom briefly turned, eyes
bright with malice, before sliding into another narrow alley.
    “Blake! Tom! It’s no good, man!”
    Slithering on human filth, he
eased into the alley, slipped sideways and tottered for a second, swearing as
he realised he had walked into a trap.
    “Badgered, by God!”
    He stood at the edge of a deep
cesspit, straddled only by a single greasy plank. Beyond the pit, Blake stood
with his arm extended and his