Phil Anbury wasn’t easy to follow. It was something about the way he walked – a kind of Phil Ambury wasn’t easy to follow. It was something about the way he walked kind of slouching, meandering, lugubrious band knowledge of London, which often traveled for the best slouching, meandering, lugubrious sarabande. His knowledge of London’s byways was cyclopedic, which meant he often travelled in circles, a match for the best (worst) hackney carriage drivers.

But he was being followed all the same.

Anbury was curious despite himself. These weren’t yer likely local footpads. The smell of death clung to Anbury like quicklime – the London underground tended to avoid him like... well, like a disease. Not that Anbury didn’t have enemies, of course. It was just that he’d already buried most of them. Personally.

He ducked into a winding alley further along Eastcheape and peered back round the wall, trying to get a glimpse of his pursuers. For a moment, there was only shadow – and then he saw them! There were two of them, and they didn’t move right neither – a little too fast, a little too start’n’stop, stealthy in a skitterish way. And there was something about their curious hats that kept the guttering torchlight out of their faces.

Blanks.

Anbury didn’t exactly fear death. For one of his profession, it was a known quantity, measurable in feet and inches, garnished with a pat of dirt. Life was a hard pack of stacked cards and the house always won – he had no problem with that. But, as he machinated upon his third masterful metaphor in as many heartbeats, he tilted at a distant and vaguely windmilling memory – of being gotten the better of – and of how much he despised the feeling. Particularly when the bettering was by street slops.

No, that would not do at all.

He slid his implement of choice out of his coat sleeve. It was only a trowel – its larger brother being too big for easy concealment. But, as Jerry would say, it wasn’t the size that counted – it was where you put it that mattered! He steadied his breathing, digging one boot into a mulched pudding in the gutter for added ballast, and raised the trowel high–

–and brought it down hard to connect with whoever – or whatever – or thatever – was coming round the corner...

The trowel connected, lodged and stuck... held within one hirsute claw. Finely manicured nails, filed to a point, were caught by a stab of moonlight.

“Not so fast, grampz!” Deep, accented: foreign, yet familiar. “We just wanna talk!”

A second shadowy visage, smaller in stature, appeared around the wall’s edge. “Easy now, Undertaker!” A pinched voice, high, all nose and teeth. “Too much excitement ain’t good for a fella of your years! Why, you could hurtz yuzself real bad! Ain’t that right, Scratchfella?”

“Real bad, Pinky!”

What was that accent? It was like nothing Phil had ever heard before. It was definitely in the direction of the King’s, but it had taken several awfully dark back alley shortcuts, and at least one oceanic detour, to get there.

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Phil had done nothing to arrest the downward pressure of trowel towards hat brim, but the damn tool wasn’t moving. His assailant was strong.

When violence failed, only base speech remained: “What d’ye want then? Out with it! I don’t have all night to bandy breath with guttersnipe!”

The smaller of the two shadows bristled visibly, “Hey, Scatchfella, I think he’s talking about yuz!”

The larger shadow seemed to grow, though it was probably merely straightening. “Hey Pinky, maybe we aughta show him the t’ird bank of the Thames!”

The one called Pinky put his (or possibly her) hand on Scratchfella’s free arm. “Yeah, well, maybe we will, maybe we won’t, uh? Look, Anbury, I t’ink we got off on the wrong paw...”

The trowel was suddenly released, the brute Scratchfella stepping back all too deftly, avoiding the final leg of the trowel’s long delayed descent.

Phil grunted. “Hmmh! How do you know my name?”

Pinky leaned close, which did nothing to resolve his/her/its features, but did give the Undertaker a whiff of something obscenely foetid. “We knows lots about you, Anbury... More than you might t’ink!”

“We?”

“We represent the recently royalled ‘King Under the River.’”

“The Merry Monarch has a lot of names. I don’t really follow the–”

“Not that King! We’za talking about the real muscle in these parts–”

“The gluteus maximus.”

“Dunno no Maximus. I’m talking about the main marsupial, the Big Cheese himself!”

“Cheddar or Stilton?”

“Funny!”

“–is my middle name!”

“Look, our benefactor–”

“Never heard of him!”

“But he’s heard of you! In fact, he knows all about you – your assistant – and your little... problem with the rent.”

“There’s no problem with the rent! I just can’t afford to pay it!”

“Exactly! And that’s why we’za here’z – to help!”

“I doubt that.”

“Look, Phil – may I call you ‘Phil’?”

“No.”

“Phil, what if we could make all your problems go away, huh? Rent paid, new trowel – you could fire your assistant at long last – hire some real help – yu’d be minted for life! And all we ask in return is a little... information.”

“Fire my assistant! My my! You do know how to toll a man’s bell! What kind of information?”

“We’re looking for some body. A dead body. You tell us where he’s buried – we do’s the rest. Whatd’ya say?”

“Ah! Grave robbers. I thought as much! I’ve dealt with scum like you before... Trinkets and trophies is all your kind is about!”

“Hey, we don’t wants no tin cats, Phil! This is more, how y’say... porshonal?”

“Really? Exactly how... porcelain?”

“Let’s just say we’z got a bone to pick and leave it at that?”

Anbury chuckled dryly, a death rattle served over chilled venom: seasoned veterans had been known to go into sympathetic labour at the sound. “You have a vendetta against a dead man? This I have to see! What are you going to do – kill him again? Play fetch with his earthly remains? Urinograph his headstone? Go on then – give me the poor sod’s name!”

And so it was given.

There was a long silence, broken only by a small fart of escaping air from the pudding underfoot.

And then the Undertaker was walking quickly, his breathing heavy, the final words of the two nerry-dos ringing in his ears. “Don’t worry Grampz! If you won’t help us, we’ll just find someone else who will!”