Joseph calmly surveyed the leering faces whose eyes warned of violence. “Now that I’ve taken a good look at you all, I see what you mean. I don’t see Mickey. I don’t see Cotton. And you, young man, by the bin, I’m not sure who you are, either.”
“Joby.” the grubby faced watcher said.
The mop headed watcher turned and glared at Joby, who cringed beneath his gaze.
“You don’t need to know our names. Morton.” the mop headed watcher said. “You’d probably tell your failed wizard to put a spell on our names.”
“See, lads, the problem we got here is that neither of us know much about the other.” Joseph locked eyes with the mop headed watcher. “I don’t know your name, and you don’t know much about Dr. Martin Glass. He can’t put a spell on peoples’ names. That’s not how thaumaturgy works. And he is not a failure by any means.”
The mop headed watcher grinned. “He seems that way to us. After all, he’s down here in Blackwall, with you, and not up in the wizard’s heaven.”
That got Joseph’s blood to boil, but he remembered Matthew and decided to try and change the course of his conversation, though he knew it would be like righting a boat in a hurricane.
“So your bosses have been kicking you around? ” Joseph asked. “We’ve got some common ground there, mates. You don't’ like your bosses, I don’t like your bosses.”
“Our bosses are good.” the mop headed watcher said. “It’s our work that’s the problem. Specifically, you’e the problem, Morton.”
There was a great rumbling of affirmed discontent among the watchers.
One of the watchers stood up, spoke up, and shook his fist at Joseph. “One day, Morton, we’re going to find out how you keep getting in and out without anyone seeing you. And when we do, you and your spooky friends are going to jail, because you are using an underground passage, everyone knows it! And one day, it’s going to be proven. Yeah…it’s going to be proven, in a court of law!”
The man turned to other watchers. “Isn’t that right, boys!”
The watchers gave a roar of approval.
The mop headed watcher smirked at Joseph.
“Everyone knows it, Morton!” he said. “People have seen you, the doc, and the failed wizard, climbing out of the ground like rats from the sewer!”
It was exactly what the watchers suspected. There were, in fact, a series of tunnels dug under Blackwall by their old friend the Knocker which converged beneath the offices of Ernest, Morton, and Glass. The tunnel system was in violation of several municipal zoning laws which forbid “manes-associated businesses,” like Ernst, Morton, and Glass, from building any sort of structure near other businesses, even if those structures were deep underground. The tunnels also violated ordinances which guaranteed that the right to upturn earth in Blackwall belonged only to National Reclamation.
Stolen story; please report.
The tunnel system was an open secret among the members of the city council, and they kept it under their hats either because Ernst, Morton, and Glass showed them the tunnels personally when they helped them with their own ghost problems, because they feared getting on the bad side of a group of men who had magic and ghosts on their side, or because they believed that the tunnels might one day be used to create a copy of the London Underground transport system without the city having to spend a single penny.
But though the city council was secretly on the side of Ernst, Morton, and Glass, as were most of the clients they showed the tunnels to, a few were willing to sell them out to the watchers. But the watchers had a problem when it came to producing evidence of the tunnels outside witness testimony. They would be told that an opening was at such-and-such a place, go to investigate, and find nothing but solid ground filled by the Knocker’s power. And so, the watchers were stuck trying to prove a fact with only hearsay and rumor to substantiate it--and the insurance companies were growing tired of hearing about secret tunnels underneath Blackwall that the private detectives on their payroll couldn’t show.
“Hmm…” Joseph tapped his cane against the ground. “You lot have been frustrated in your quest to find our supposed ghost tunnels for a long time, yet you’ve never been this outraged before”
“Seeing your friends lose their jobs and go to the workhouse because they say we “don’t produce results” will do that.” the mop headed watcher said.
Joseph understood. The replacement hires were acting up to win over the established watchers. They wanted to prove that they were part of the group, lest they be attacked for taking a job that used to be held by three.
“But you take your frustrations out on us, not the big wigs that terminated the employment of your friends.”
“Of course we take it out on the outlaw.” the mop headed watcher said. “We don’t break the law, Morton. But you people do. There’s nothing that gives you the right to dig holes underneath Blackwall. We looked into it. You’re going to jail as soon as we prove it.”
“Do you boys realize that without us protecting the privacy of our clients, none of you would have a job? Absolutely none of you?” Joseph asked. “Say I wrote a list tonight of everyone that’s ever visited our offices, where they lived, and how they were haunted, and then I announced to your masters that it was for sell. Before sunset the next day, I’d be richer than John Ellerman and you would back to doing whatever it was you were doing before you decided to bother people for living. And yet, not once have you thanked us for your jobs!”
“Don’t try and take a moral stance, Morton” the mop headed watcher said. “No one’s got a right to hide who and what is haunted. Every man should know if they’re living next to a ghost or not. In fact, France and Germany already have manes registries. England won’t be far behind!”
Joseph sighed. “See, boy, I’m afraid that’s always going to be the chief sticking point between you lot and us. We value the privacy of others, even at our own expense. You sell the privacy of others, to the betterment of yourselves. I’m afraid we aren’t ever going to see eye-to-eye, boys.”
“And then you take that tone, like some sort of school master! Did you come out of your haunted house just to mock us, is that it, Morton?” the man asked.
“Well, no. I’m not out here only to mock you.”
“Cruel old man! Honest men are going hungry because you’re too good at hiding your crimes!”
“Don’t expect me to feel bad for men that profit off human suffering.” Joseph said. “Tell your friends to go find themselves decent jobs.”
The mop headed watcher’s face grew scarlet beneath his greasy locks. “Oh. Ohhhhh!” he fumed “You can say that Morton, you can say that, but it’s not because you’re a strong man, Morton. Big as you are, you are as old as the hills, you withered bastard, and if you didn’t have your failed wizard watching your back with his magic dogs, I bet you wouldn’t talk to us like you are!”
Three times the dirty haired man had called Martin a failed wizard.
The first time, Joseph let it pass for his own sense of personal honor, because he was aware of his temper, and the problems it caused. The second time, Joseph let it pass for Matthew, for he had warned him not to cause trouble. But the third time was for Martin, and for Martin alone.
Joseph brought his cane up to his shoulder and tightened his grip on the handle. ““There’s no magic out here, boys. Only me.”
The watchers mumbled nervously amongst themselves. Then, as one, they fell silent as their red-faced, black haired leader approached Joseph.
“You think you’re a real big man, don’t you, Morton?” the mop headed watcher asked. “You think you’re such a really big man?”
“My tailor thinks so, otherwise I’ve been paying him extra for nothing.”
Suddenly, an eerie sound exploded above their heads. It was so loud and so piercing that even Joseph was startled, and he knew insantly what the sound was from.
Martin’s dogs were howling like Cerberus unbound.
The thought-form beasts exhaled, and a great wind blew through the street. The watchers bolted, some screaming, some cursing, some vowing retaliation.
The dogs then fell completely silent as their master stomped up down the street towards Joseph.