Bribing someone was something of an art, Sebastian Gloom had always thought. If you were lucky enough to find a genuine crook, he could usually be persuaded to do anything for you in return for a suitable financial reward. Contrary to popular opinion, though, most people were honest and would react with hostility to any implication that they could be bought. Even they could be dealt with, though, if you approached them in the right way. Don’t call it a bribe. Pretend that you're in desperate straits and that only they can help you, while offering the money as a show of your appreciation. This was a method that Gloom had used successfully many times in the past, and it paid off again during his visit to the central postal office.

     Twenty minutes after arriving, therefore, Gloom was leaving again with the address of one Bartholomew Gideon esquire who was probably the most upright pillar of the community that Manchester had to offer and had had nothing whatsoever to do with the invasion of the Cranston house. Nevertheless he was a gentleman who had to be checked out and eliminated from their enquiries before they could pursue other leads.

     Gloom had promised Benson that he would not go anywhere near Cheetham Hill without him, but he couldn’t resist just going past Gideon’s house, just to get a look at it. He wouldn't be stopping there, or even slowing down. He would just be passing down the street on his way somewhere else and he would be looking at all the houses as he passed them by, not just Gideon’s. If he happened to take a longer, more careful look at that house than any of the others, nobody who saw him would be able to tell.

     Cheetham Hill had once been a town in its own right, Gloom knew, before having been swallowed by the spreading Borough of Manchester some years earlier. Even now there was a sparsely built strip of land between it and Central Manchester in which fields of crops and acacia trees could still be seen, although this was the place where new housing estates were always built when new homes were needed. The central part of Cheetham was slowly turning into an industrial district now, providing work for the Irishmen came fleeing the Great Famine and jews fleeing persecution in central europe.

     Gloom saw evidence of its multi-ethnic nature as he drove along the pavement of Cheetham Hill Road and saw both catholic and protestant churches, synagogues, mosques and even a Hindu temple. People of all skin colours watched with interest as the steam wheelchair chuffed its way past them and he heard many different languages being spoken, some of which even he didn't recognise. He kept his eyes open for a Cheetham Hill home for Waifs and Strays, just in case there really was such a place. The discovery of such an institution would throw his whole investigation off track and reveal Father Anthony to be an honest man whom Gloom had unjustly maligned in his mind. He failed to spot any such place, but just to be sure he stopped someone. An elderly Irish woman whom he hoped had been living in the area long enough to be thoroughly familiar with it. He asked her for directions to the place, and to his relief, she could only shake her head and say that she'd never heard of it.

     He turned a corner into Progress Road, Jake walking beside him, and entered Manchester’s largest industrial district. To his left was a huge charcoal factory to which endless cartloads of acacia wood were being taken to be converted into fuel for steam engines, and next to it were other factories. Steel mills. Cotton mills. Refineries. Chemical and munitions plants, all churning out the raw materials upon which the Empire depended and all dependent in turn on the charcoal factory that produced fuel for them. A little to one side, like a nervous child who wasn’t sure if the big children would let him play with them, was an electricity generator in front of which was a small group of protesters carrying signs that said “Electricity is the work of the Devil” and “God hates sparks.” Gloom mused that he’d never heard a priest of any denomination denouncing electricity, and supposed that it was just the usual human habit of opposing change of any kind.

     He heard the sound of engines and looked up to see an airship passing overhead, travelling west. Either to Ireland or all the way to the American provinces. It was one of the smaller ones, he noted.  No more than fifty or so passengers and crew in the ornate, stately gondola rich with gold painted gothic detail. It had a balcony at the rear end on which he could see expensively dressed passengers relaxing on chairs, and railed walkways ran along both sides as far as the bridge from which the crew controlled the craft. Its underside, he noted, was fashioned into a ship's keel, complete with rudder, so that it could survive an emergency landing on water. He supposed that somewhere were masts and sails that could be raised to allow it to make headway to a friendly port. It was supposed to reassure passengers, he mused, but only the direst need would have induced him to board a vessel slung below such a huge balloon of flammable hydrogen.

     The turning into Stephenson Road was just past the cloth mills and Gloom found himself passing through the residential district that housed the workers for all the factories. It also contained a school whose yard was filled with grubby children screaming and running around, and beside it were rows of small shops with stalls of small, misshapen fruit and tables covered with poor quality merchandise. The wives of the factory workers drifted in and out of the shops and thronged about the covered market that filled a large open area between a pub and a dog racing track. The women were dressed in threadbare shawls and were bent over, aged before their years. Gloom knew that they worked almost as hard as the men, some in their own homes getting calluses on their fingers sewing rugs and carpets to sell in the markets. Others worked in factories of their own where they were deafened by the sound of the machinery. Two incomes were essential in most homes, though, in order to make up for the low wages paid by the factory bosses.

     The residential buildings were huge and blocky, each containing forty soulless apartments, and Gloom had trouble picking out the one in which Bartholomew Gideon lived. Number 836, the helpful man in the postal office had told him. Presumably each apartment had its number beside its front door, but Gloom couldn’t see them from the street. Then he saw a sign in front of the nearest housing block that was labelled “561-600”, and he saw that every block had a similar sign. He drove along the street until he found the one that read “801- 840” and looked up at the block to which it belonged.

     If the apartments were labelled in a logical manner, then Gideon’s would be on the topmost of the four floors, in the middle. Furthest from the stairs that switchbacked their way up the building on either side. Gloom frowned. It would be impossible to get up there in any wheelchair, steam powered or not. He would either have to get Benson to carry him, or trust the manservant to search the place himself and hope that his less perceptive eyes didn't miss some detail that he would have seen. Once again he cursed his useless legs, but then he checked himself and instead gave thanks for his brain, far sharper than that which had been gifted to most of God's children. He wondered whether he would swap his brain for that of a normal man if that were the price for getting a working pair of legs, but that was a question he couldn't answer.

     He realised that he was receiving a great deal of attention from the street's grimy workmen. Some of them were no doubt taking note of his expensive clothes and wondering how much cash he was carrying on his person. Gloom pushed the lever that made the chair pick up speed and reflected that there was a very good reason why Benson had warned him against coming here without him. He was armed, it was true, and the chair had defenses built into it, but he nevertheless breathed a sigh of relief when he saw a policeman standing by the street corner, his stern gaze making the workmen turn and go about their business. The policeman nodded at Gloom, who nodded back, and then Gloom turned into another street that he knew would take him back to Progress Road and then back to the more respectful parts of the city. He'd had his look at Gideon's home. Now it was time to return to his own.

   ☆☆☆

     Gideon was nursing a glass of beer in the pub when his two henchmen edged their way nervously towards him. “So there you are,” he said, gesturing for them to take two empty seats beside him. “Where have you been?”

     The two men glanced nervously at each other. “Now, look Bart. There's nothing to get upset about...”

     Gideon looked up sharply. “Who said there should be?”

     The first henchman fidgeted uncomfortably. “There was an inspector. He came to our lodgings...”

     Gideon leapt to his feet and grabbed him by the collar. “What did you tell him?” All around, the pub’s other occupants carefully averted their eyes and minded their own businesses. Gideon grabbed the two men and dragged them out into the street, then around to the back of the building. “What did you tell him?” he repeated.

     “Nothing, Bart! I swear it! We didn't tell him a thing! He already knew that it was us who stole the bottle. He wanted to know about you but we didn't tell him a thing.”

     “Tell me what happened. Everything!”

     “This inspector came, with a copper. They tied us up and asked questions but we didn't tell ‘em anything! Doris led ‘em to us. They tricked her into leading them to us.”

     “How did you get away?”

     “After they left we managed to get free. We got out of there before they could get back with more men.”

     “You idiot! That wasn't an inspector. An inspector would have had more men and would have taken you in straight away. That was an investigator, working for the Cranstons. Now what did you tell him about me?”

     “Nothing! I swear it!”

     “So they don't know about me?”

     “They know your name, the name Gideon, but that’s all. Relax, Bart, they don't know your first name or anything else about you. There must be loads of guys called Gideon in the country.”

     “How did they learn my name? You told them, didn't you?” He grabbed the man and shook him. “You told him!” He threw the man away from him, making him stumble and fall. The other man backed away in terror. “You stupid fools! An inspector turns up, he knows nothing, nothing at all, but you sing like birds and you give me up.” The first henchman picked himself up and the two men stood trembling, but Gideon could see that they were preparing for violence. Their safest course of action might be to kill him before he could kill them...

     He made himself relax, therefore. “Oh well, what's done is done. Maybe we can turn this to our advantage. If this investigator does somehow track me down, we can lay a trap. Catch him when he comes snooping around. From now on, you live in my place, with me. One of us stays awake and on guard at all times. When he comes, we catch him and find out what he knows. Then make him wish he’d never been born.”

      The two men relaxed, greatly relieved, and then followed him down the street towards his apartment.