Lawless and The Devil of Euston Square Read Online Free PDF Page A

man, Mr Coxhill?”
    “Repair man? Our machines don’t need repairs. No, no.” He tugged at his beard. “Not one of ours, is he, Hunt? Hunt! I say, do buck up.”
    The terrier looked away from the body, subservient again. “Never saw him before in my life, sir.”
    All of a sudden, the night porter piped up. He gaped at the corpse, then he stood up, clapping his hands in surprise.
    “Hulloah!” he said. “That ain’t him! When me and your inspector was dragging him in, I didn’t see it, I was that upset.” Drunk, you mean, I thought to myself. “No, sirs, I didn’t see it in the dark and the wet and all, but that ain’t the same fellow. My man had these intensitive eyes. Trust those eyes with your life, so you would. I’d know him anywhere. This! This is a different codger entirely.”
     
    EUSTON EVENING BUGLE
    9th November, 1859

    LAST TRUMP SOUNDS FOR LONDON
    The metropolis is doomed. Veteran reformer, Mr Edwin Chadwick, prophesies the imminent demise of the capital in his pamphlet published today, “Smell is Disease.”
    How wonderfully smell concentrates the mind. For years Londoners have been dying in their cohorts of cholera, typhus and worse. Yet it took the “Great Stink” of last summer to convince panicked parliamentarians to stomach the cost of the Sewers Bill. Poor Mr Disraeli, clutching a handkerchief to his sensitive nose as he ran from the chamber!
    Still, our reliance on Progress and Capital to cure our maladies seems increasingly vain. Thus far, the Metropolitan Board of Works’ monumental expenditure has effected only an embarrassment of traffic jams and a shortage of bricks. The stink lingers on.
    DEVILS AT EUSTON SQUARE
    Last night, a water-powered crane—called an “hydraulic devil”—burst outside Euston Station, killing a vagrant. A sizeable crowd applauded, as passengers from the late train were greeted with an impromptu fountain. Inspector Wardle of Scotland Yard insists that readers of the Bugle may go safely about their business. Nonetheless, the use of hazardous machinery in defiance of the builders’ strike must be cause for alarm.
    Another alarming local development sees the Metropolitan Railway sink a preliminary shaft at Euston Square next month. In approving the short-sighted plans of the Hon Mr Charles Pearson, championed by that misguided publication, the Clerkenwell Horn, the Traffic Select Committee has ignored the Bugle ’s manifestly superior proposal. Our “Crystal Way” would have spanned the city with road, rail and pedestrian tiers, triumphantly solving congestion in a feat of engineering to make the world gasp.
    “Shameless profiteering will lead London to the same dismal end as Rome and Babylon,” predicts Mr Chadwick, in his Sanitary Committee pamphlet. “We stand in need of drains, not trains.”
    The Bugle awaits with curiosity the collapse of tunnels, annihilation of property, and subterranean fumigations that must inevitably result from Pearson’s infernal undertakings.
    ROYAL CELEBRATIONS
    None of which can dampen the frolics of the younger royals. Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, returned to Windsor Castle this morning.
    Following a spirited start to his university career, rumour has it that he is to be created a duke. Tonight Prince “Bertie” sets aside a raucous social schedule to celebrate his eighteenth birthday with the Queen and the Prince Consort.
    Amongst such banquets and honours, may the ills of the capital remain to him but a distant murmur.
    ***

    Anonymous Telegram, 8th November, “To Roxton Coxhill & His Rotund Friend’: guy fawkes was a genius
    ***
     
    THE CADAVER
    It was perhaps unwise to take a cab, especially as my wage was only nineteen shillings a week, lodgings not included, and Wardle had made no mention of reimbursement, but I had no idea what an interest London cabmen take in matters that don’t concern them. I didn’t feel I could ask the man to help me shift the corpse; at least, not without a substantial tip.