A four-wheel cab appeared through the crowd, pulled by some uncomfortable shaggy biped from the northern tundra that paced its way through the rubbish on back-bent legs like a bird’s. Vermishank raised his arm. The cabdriver attempted to manoeuvre his vehicle towards him. Vermishank’s pursuers sped up.

“Monty,” boomed the larger man and slapped his shoulder. Vermishank turned in alarm.

“Isaac,” he faltered. His eyes darted around him, sought the cab, which was still approaching.

“How are you, old son?” yelled Isaac in his left ear, and underneath it, Vermishank heard another voice hissing in his right.

“The thing poking your stomach is a knife and I will gut you like a fucking fish if you even breathe in a way I don’t like.”

“So glad to bump into you,” howled Isaac jocularly, waving the cab over. The driver muttered and approached.

“Try to run and I will cut you and if you get out of my hands I will shoot a bullet into your brain,” the voice crooned with loathing.

“Come and have a drink at mine,” said Isaac. “Brock Marsh, please driver. Paddler Way, you know it? Handsome beast, by the way.” Isaac kept up a stream of loud nonsense as he swung into the closed carriage. Vermishank followed, shaking and stuttering, goaded by the sting of the blade. Lemuel Pigeon followed him in and slammed the door shut, then sat looking straight forward holding the knife at Vermishank’s side.

The driver pulled away from the kerb. The creaking and rattling and complaining bleats of the animal cocooned the three men in the cab.

Isaac turned to Vermishank with the exaggerated delight gone from his face.

“You have a lot of talking to do, you evil cunt,” he hissed menacingly.

His prisoner was visibly regaining his poise second by second.

“Isaac,” he murmured. “Hah. How can I help you?”

He started as Lemuel jabbed him.

“Shut your fucking mouth.”

“Shut my mouth and do a lot of talking, Isaac?” mused Vermishank smoothly, then yelped incredulously as Isaac struck him, hard and suddenly. He gazed at him astonished, gingerly stroking his stinging face.

“I tell you when to talk,” said Isaac.

They were silent the rest of the journey, swaying south past Lud Fallow Station and over the sluggish Canker at Danechi’s Bridge. Isaac paid the driver as Lemuel hustled Vermishank into the warehouse.

Inside, David glowered from his desk, half turning to watch the proceedings. His russet waistcoat was incongruously cheerful. Yagharek skulked in a corner, half visible. His feet were wrapped in rags and his head was hidden in a hood. He had discarded the wooden wings. He was not disguised as whole, but as a human.