The Final Descent (The Monstrumologist #4)(30)

“Expressions are not random,” Acosta-Rojas said. “Otherwise they would not be expressions.”

Even Warthrop had had his fill. He realized, I think, the fruitlessness of pointing fingers at this crucial hour. “Von Helrung, I suppose there’s no avoiding it,” he said briskly, turning to his old master. “A few discreet inquiries in the appropriate quarters of New York officialdom are in order.”

Meister Abram nodded gravely as he rolled the gnawed end of his expired stogie across his lower lip. “I know just the man—discreet, though not overly inquisitive. He recently was promoted to detective.”

Warthrop barked a laugh. “Of course he was!”

“A moment.” Acosta-Rojas seemed aghast. “You intend to bring the matter to the police?”

The monstrumologist ignored him. He said to von Helrung, “A murder investigation would be . . . awkward.”

“It would, mein Freund, if I were idiotic enough to report one!”

TWO

The monstrumologist and I returned to the Plaza to change out of our evening wear while von Helrung left for police headquarters, Lilly in tow; he was seeing her off to her house on Riverside before heading downtown. Though she hadn’t slept in nearly twenty-four hours, Lilly was brimming with energy—her endurance rivaled Warthrop’s when the hunt was on.

“And now let’s send the little female off to bed with a warm pat and a gentle kiss!” she grumbled to me at the door. Her dress was stained with the grime of the Monstrumarium, her coiffure wilted, the ringlets exhausted loops of raven-black. But her eyes burned with an eerily familiar backlit glow. I tapped her gently on the shoulder and kissed her cheek. She failed to see the humor of my response, and answered it with a sharp jab of her heel upon my foot.

“You had much more charm when you completely lacked any,” she observed.

“Get some rest, Lilly,” I said. “I’ll try to come by later if I can.”

She looked up into my face and said, “Why?”

If I’d had an answer ready—which I did not—I wasn’t able to give it: Samuel appeared at that moment, still dapper in his coat and tails, despite his horribly swollen jaw.

“You still owe me a dance, Miss Bates. I have not forgotten,” he said, slightly slurring the words. He lifted her hand to his lips, and then turned to me. His damaged mouth twisted in an obscene parody of a smile.

“Don’t believe we’ve been properly introduced, old man.” He seemed incapable of opening his mouth more than half an inch. “The name is Isaacson.”

I did not see the blow coming. He drove with his hips, pivoting neatly into the punch; perhaps he had studied some boxing. The von Helrung vestibule spun round; I collapsed onto the Persian rug, clutching my stomach. The world had been emptied of all oxygen. He loomed over me, white and black and pumpkin-headed.

“Warthrop’s attack dog.” He sneered down at me. “His personal assassin. I’ve heard about you and Aden—the Russians at the Tour du Silence—and the Englishman in the mountains of Socotra. How many others have you murdered at his behest?”

“About one short,” I gasped. “But it wouldn’t be at his behest.”

It is exceedingly difficult to laugh heartily without opening your mouth, but somehow Isaacson managed it.

“I hope you like the Beastie Bin, Henry. You’ll be an exhibit there one day.”

He stepped lightly over me and swept out the front door to hail a cab. Lilly helped me to my feet; I couldn’t tell if she was about to laugh or cry. Clearly she was fighting back something.

“Do you still think he’s a mediocrity?” she asked.

“It is not how he sucker punched me,” I informed her. “But how I fell.”

“Oh, you fell splendidly”—and now she did laugh. “It was the most impressive collapse I think I’ve ever seen.”

I don’t know why, perhaps it was her laughter, the pleasing jingle of coins tossed upon a silver tray, but I kissed her, still heaving for air, a pleasant suffocation.

“I’m a bit troubled, Mr. Henry,” she breathed in my ear, “by this curious association you have of violence with affection.”

I was grateful, in a way, that I had no breath with which to answer.

THREE

“It’s Walker,” I told Warthrop on the way to the Plaza.

“The obvious choice,” he acknowledged. “The man’s taste for the finer things exceeds his ability to obtain them—one of the reasons why I’ve always wondered at his choice of profession. Monstrumology is not the shortest route to riches.”

“Unless one stumbles across a species whose venom is more valuable than diamonds.”

He nodded and grunted noncommittally. “We cannot count out Acosta-Rojas. No one has hunted more diligently for a living T. cerrejonensis.”

“Precisely the reason we should count him out. He’d have no reason or need to send one to you.”

“Well, it may be one of them or none at all,” he said, growing testy. “Von Helrung is notorious for running his mouth. And I’m afraid he might not remember to whom he let it slip or even that he let it slip.” He sighed. “Irish gangs! But equally foolish to assume that Maeterlinck or his client—if one exists at all—is responsible.”