Page 58 of Of Fate and Phantoms
Erskine nodded. "It was the only thing I could do to get him to open up."
"And did he talk to you?"
"Once I returned to my human form, he became quite excited. He was eager to ask me about my changing, and we compared notes, as it were. I learned that he could also change into a wolf-like animal at will, but he was learning to change into other types of creatures."
"How could he learn to change into other things?" I asked, repeating his words for Harriet and Lincoln.
"From his friends. Some could change into other animals. There was a pack of them, you see. A pack of shape-changers, all learning off each other. According to this fellow, however, none succeeded in changing into anything other than their main form. He'd had the only success."
My voice, as I repeated this for Lincoln, sounded stunned.
"The group," Lincoln said, "where do they live?"
"Whitechapel."
The palace footmen saw the impersonator disappear into Whitechapel. The impersonator must be one of the men Erskine stumbled upon, if not the leader himself. "His name?" I asked.
"King," Erskine said, "but I'm unsure if that's his real name. He didn't strike me as the sort of fellow to give it out to a stranger, even one like him. If I had to guess, I'd say he and his friends weren't always law-abiding, like most folk from Whitechapel." His nose wrinkled, as if he could still smell the unwashed slum dwellers. "Although I sensed my every move was being watched from the moment I entered that Godforsaken rookery, I came to no harm, and I suspect I had him to thank for it. He didn't strike me as an uncivil man, either. Indeed, he spoke quite eloquently, and I didn't feel threatened in his presence."
"Where did you speak to him and where can we find him?"
"At the Cat and Fiddle. Whether he still drinks there, I wouldn't know, but someone ought to know him. He was a popular figure."
"How long ago was this?"
He glanced at Harriet. "She was still quite young, not yet a woman. About eleven or twelve years ago."
"Can you describe this Mr. King?"
"Receding brown hair, mid-twenties at the time, moustache and side whiskers. He was quite tall and powerfully built, very broad in the shoulders. Large hands and feet, too, which in hindsight, I think might be a trait of our kind."
"What do you mean?"
He glanced at his hand, still covering his daughter's. His was extraordinarily broad, the fingers thick and the knuckles bulging. Hers too, for a woman's hands. There was nothing delicate about them, although she wasn't a big woman on the whole.
"The first fellow I spoke with had big hands too, as do Harriet and I." He thrust out one bare foot. "And big feet too. Poor Harriet. She always had gloves and shoes made to fit. She couldn't find any readymade feminine ones in shops."
I repeated what I'd learned about Mr. King for Lincoln and Harriet. It gave me time to digest it all, and consider any further questions to ask Erskine. But I could think of none.
Lincoln, however, wanted to know more about Erskine's own family. "What of your relatives?" he asked.
"I have none. I knew nothing of my parents, and was brought up by a governess then tutors who oversaw my day-to-day welfare. The family lawyer who managed my affairs until I was of age. If they knew anything about my form changing, they never said and I never asked."
I repeated this for Lincoln.
"Daddy was very much alone," Harriet said. "That's what he always told me. It was just him and me. That's why he wanted to make sure I married a man older than myself, to care for me properly after Daddy was gone. Someone of solid stock and good family."
Erskine's form shimmered. "Just in the nick of time as it turned out," he said. "Not that I expected Gillingham to lock her away like this. Tell me, Miss Holloway, what's the story there? Ought I be worried?"
Harriet blinked her innocent eyes at me, waiting for me to repeat her father's words back to her. She was so naive and seemed to actually care for her husband. Or, at least, care enough to want his child. I decided to keep quiet about the particulars and my opinion of Gillingham. Lord Erskine could do nothing in his present form to make his son-in-law pay for his treatment of Harriet. It would only frustrate him.
"No," I said. "Mr. Fitzroy and I are seeing that her husband treats her well."
"Good. Good. Is there anything else?"
"Do we have any more questions for his lordship?" I asked Lincoln.
"Have you seen King since that day?" he asked.
