"Lad...Toby...Lad..."

Lestrade was bending over him with a face as white as chalk where it wasn't plum-black with bruising. "Are you all right?"

Toby nodded that he was all right...and he hoped he wasn't lying. Mr. Lestrade had freed his hands somehow—oh. He had Short Man's pocket-knife. He held still as the Inspector used it to cut the knot at his wrists.

"Hold on... Try not to look, lad."

Toby didn't want to look. He pressed his cheek against the cold frame of the manger and squeezed his eyes shut. He could hear the sound of the rope sawing apart, twine after twine. Outside the horse was making happy noises. Daft animal, Toby thought.

"There." The last snick of his knife was welcome in the boy's ears. "Sorry that took so long," he apologised. Toby understood. He took his freed hands to his face and rubbed his jaw with a wince.

"Are you hurt?" The man gripped his shoulder.

Toby lifted his eyebrows and took in the bloody mess that was his rescuer.

"Most of it isn't mine." Mr. Lestrade read his expression correctly. "Well. I think so." But he sounded skeptical to his own ears and sighed. "Let's get you up." He ran the edge of the blade through the heavy rope at his ankles and it was Toby's turn to sigh. Together they got him up, but Mr. Lestrade stumbled and clenched his teeth together with a hiss of pain.

"I'll be fine." He vowed to an increasingly doubtful Toby Irish. "At least, as soon as we get out of here."

Toby pointed outside where the nag was eating.

"She won't get anywhere near me." He was told. "I'm covered in blood."

And a few things that weren't blood. Toby really didn't want to think of that or look at it, but he could only imagine how awful it must feel to be Mr. Lestrade right now.

"Here..." Mr. Lestrade found horse blankets, and threw one over the boy. "See if you can put one over the girl, would you?"

Toby did as he was told, relishing the feel of movement again. He was sore from tip to toe, but he was glad to be free.

Mr. Lestrade had found a hoe-handle against the wall and used it as a walking stick. He managed to get to the heavy gripsack the gang had tossed in the corner and knelt very slowly. Toby shivered and stamped his feet free of snow as quietly as possible. When Mr. Lestrade pulled out a wicked-looking gun, the boy shouted in mute surprise.

"Good thing they didn't find it, eh?" Mr. Lestrade's voice was grim beneath his blood-clad face.

Toby gulped and nodded. If he wasn't already dumb, he would be from the shock. Policemen didn't carry weapons.

"I may yet need it." Mr Lestrade's eyes were black with anger as he took in the sleeping tavern. "Good thing they like their drink in there." He said softly. "We're going to cut over the field, and keep the barn between us and the tavern. It means going through snow, and I'm still blind in the light, but you can help guide me. The road's on the other side of the slope, and we're going to hit it as soon as we can." He took a deep breath. "This is a rotten plan, Master Irish. But I can hardly storm the tavern with my eyes being the way they are right now and I'm not having you be my eyes for me! Just signal me if you see anyone coming our way."

Toby had to agree. At least the tavernkeeper was one of the dead men. Any guests under that miserable roof were probably other killers like himself.

He took a deep breath, and slowly smiled. They could do this.

"Bloody hell, what the devil is the matter with you?"

"I..."

Toby opened his eyes. He was warm and cozy inside a large woollen blanket and moving felt like a bad idea. Mr. Lestrade had his left arm in a sling and his eye was still black with blood but he was somewhat cleaner and standing (thanks to a borrowed walking-stick) up to the much-taller Mr. Gregson.

Mr. Gregson did not look well. His pale face was pink as a rose and that made his yellow hair stand out as more yellow.

"You're telling me that walking glue-pot killed six killers—an entire gang?"

"I doubt that's the entire gang, Gregson. They had to have so-"

"I'm not finished!" Gregson continued to shout. "That glue-pot, that...that Rockerfeller biltong...you took a war nag with you, and she cut her lucky, and you and the urk managed to survive?"

"Toby wasn't in danger from that horse." Lestrade said firmly. "He was safe in the hay-cratch. And I ducked down as soon as she started kicking."

Gregson was fighting for breath. His face was darkening to a cherry-red. Toby had never seen this look on the big copper before, and stared in fascination. "You," he said at last, "are just lucky that she remembered her master's old password."

"Don't I know it!" Lestrade responded fervently. "Don't I know it, Gregson! I thought he was addled for even telling me that old trick. They lost their heads when she started swinging. Poor beast."

"Poor beast my eye. She's saved the Courts a great deal of money..." Gregson puffed and held up a cup of tea. "Much as I'd like to have the satisfaction of hanging every man-jack. They've found more bodies beneath the floor of that barn, Lestrade. D'you want to hear the story behind that?"

"Dear Lord, no, but you'll tell me anyway, eh?" Lestrade cringed at the warm steam touching his beaten face. He sipped delicately and hoped the pain would die down soon. He needed tea as badly as he needed to breathe...even Gregson's tea.

"Don't get your hopes up. It isn't that grand of a story." Gregson warned him. "The innkeeper's father started the custom—oh, that can wait till later. The fact is they couldn't add the Holly-Men to the collection until the weather warmed up.

"All this for smuggling bits and bobs to a woman in hiding."

"People do more for women who aren't in hiding. And you have to admit, Sir Roland's family makes enemies in permanent ways."

"Did they find out what these thugs were hoping to find?"

"Property they claim was rightfully theirs."

"Rightfully stolen, in other words."

"Hah. I daresay what's left of the gang will disperse once we get the bracelets on Sir Roland's son. He's the source of all their anger."

"And charge him with what?"

"If I have to, I'll charge him with keeping bad company. As far as that crowd goes, it was a criminal offense." Gregson sniped. He was calmer but that wasn't actually good. Gregson was less dangerous to others when he was sputtering angry.

"What then?" Lestrade hesitated to ask. "This case is all over the map. Maps. Who has the bloody jurisdiction?"

"Hanged if I know. We'll leave it to the areas in which we were entrusted. I'll even be so kind as to let the RP know the bits those bastards violated."

"So long as we don't include the horse in this."

"We might be able to get that bag of bones to her master with very little attention on part of the newspapers."

"I hope so." Lestrade leaned forward on his stick. "She doesn't deserve it. They'd demand her death as a dangerous animal."

"You're saying she isn't dangerous?"

"Only when she isn't given the command to fight."

"You were lucky beyond belief." Mr. Gregson sounded as if he were speaking to a well-meaning but dim child. "Of all the horses you could be loaned in London, you were given the one horse that hates Prussians as much as you."

If Gregson had slapped Lestrade, the reaction would have been milder. The two men stared at each other, white-faced with anger and the dawning realisation that too much had been said. Toby vowed not to move, but two heads turned at the same time to skewer him through the heart.

Toby sank deeper into the blanket.

"Toby." Mr. Gregson moved first, and Mr. Lestrade fled.

"Here you are, lad." The gruff voice of the big man tried to gentle as he helped the boy sit up, but Gregson wasn't good at being gentle. He quickly gave it up as useless and just slipped a pillow under his back. A cup of tea was produced and Toby drank it down. "All right now, are we?" He coughed. "Any aches and pains on your person?"

Toby shook his head no, but his eyes were still on the empty doorway.

"He won't be back for a while." Gregson grumbled. "Man's a decent enough policeman, but he doesn't like to hear some things." He sounded as though he wanted to convince himself of something. Toby looked at the big man's face for clues. Mr. Gregson released his breath in a long sigh. "Mr. Lestrade doesn't like to hear any mention of Prussians." He said at last. "He lost kinfolk in the War."

Mr. Lestrade was French? Toby was baffled. He didn't look French. Or sound French.

Gregson suddenly grinned, divining Toby's thoughts. "You'll have fun learning about the different peoples of London, Master Irish." He pulled out a half-smoked fag and Toby took it happily. They shared it together, man and boy—the hard-taught child easily holding the man's vile smoke in his lungs. For a few minutes they smoked in companionable silence. Toby often used smoking to stifle his hunger. Gregson sat on the edge of the cheap drunkard's cot and passed him every other puff of smoke until the tiny room was fogged up.

"If you're going to get ahead in the world, my lad, you'd best find something your friends don't have. You're curious and that's already something most men and women will never own. But you need to know what to do with your curiosity. Names are important anywhere in the world, but never moreso than on this island. Names and appearances judge a man for life.

"We are a great empire, I believe, but no matter how great the giant, his heart's still only a small portion of his body. England is the heart of the empire, and London is the heart of England. We are surrounded by a world's worth of friends and foes and both keep changing sides with each other.

"You've met people from all over the earth just by living in London, Mr. Toby. Maybe all you've done is see them with your eyes but they're there. You're a man now and it's time you learned more about the people with which you share our city.

"I'm a Gregson and my people have been here a long, long time. We cut metal and wooden sculpture for the wealthiest families in our heydays...I've got distant cousins who are still in the Guilds, men and a few women. I've never seen them. Me, I was lucky enough that I could choose what I wanted to do with my life. Didn't quite have the right patrons to go into law, so I went to law enforcement. It was the right fit for me. I'm a bit of the black sheep, but as my old granny would say, 'a black sheep is still in the flock.'" He chuckled, pleased with the old lady's advice, and Toby smiled.

"Did you know," Mr. Gregson said almost too casually, "I'm part Greek?"

Toby's eyes went wide. He stared at the big, tow-headed man who looked as unlike one of the fishermen off the Estuary as anyone he could imagine. He could believe Mr. Lestrade was French against the effort of putting Gregson in with short, bronzed and curly-headed seamen.

"It's true." Mr. Gregson smirked at his disbelief. "The Gregsons have been here since before the Norman Invasion...legend has it we helped carve up the Durham cathedrals and chapels. Wouldn't be surprised. Some of those carved up saints look an awful lot like some of my family...would've been just like them to pull a trick like that..." he paused for another smirk. "But my great-grandmother was Greek and it's from her I got my view of the world. For better of for worse, I see London as how she really is: A gem that needs protecting and polishing in equal measure." He handed the dwindling fag back to Toby. The boy took a glad puff.

"It was from her that I have my fair hair. She liked to say Theseus had yellow hair like me. The point I'm making is this. Never assume or judge people completely on how they look and act. Mr. Lestrade's a runty little Gaul and it's true, and the fact that he looks full Black Country Welsh is the same point I'm making about myself. You wouldn't think he had a drop of Frog in him any more than you'd think I have Greek, would you?"

Toby shook his head no, with such violence that he hurt his head. Gregson laughed out loud at his expression.

"He and I are both judged by our appearances. For better or for worse that's how the world runs. Mr. Lestrade is tapped to be the CID's street rough because the public wants to believe a small, dark and frankly quite ugly little man is just as disreputable on the inside as he is on the outside."

"And as for Mr. Gregson," Mr. Lestrade's scathing voice sliced in, "Is judged by his appearance to have more meat than muscle between his ears, because they think someone as big and fat as himself never had to use his brains for anything but to hold his skull together."

Toby blinked. Mr. Lestrade had returned as if by magic, and was standing on one foot, the other drawn up against the wall with his arms awkwardly folded over his chest. He still looked a fright.

"It helps if you can bend iron nails with your fingers. Want one?" Gregson primly extended the remnants of his cigarette.

"No, thank you. I'd like to live to see the next Coronation." He delicately manoeuvred a finely-made cigarillo between his fingers and pridefully struck his own light from a little box in his pocket. Gregson grinned at him, amused that he would waste the price of a Vesta on vanity.

"We take how people see us and use it to our own advantage. It's a fine line we walk, but if you're under-estimated you have a better chance of winning. What do people see when they see you, Toby Irish?" Mr. Gregson had grown serious. "They see you as the guttersnipe son of a man who helped his fellow man whenever he could, and poor though he might be, he wasn't poorly. He had his pride and he looked any man straight in the eye as he talked. He did what he could to feed his family, even though he was only good at the only thing he knew how to do."

And that was poaching. Toby looked down, his cheeks burning with an old shame. His father poached; his uncle made loaded dice and rigged games. The Irish family meant little in their own eyes and even less in the eyes of the neighbors.

"He was a fine poacher because he had eyes and ears." Mr. Lestrade said in a more gentle voice. "He helped us out, and his help was finest kind. What he did for a living, lad, had nothing to do with his personal honour."

"You're confusing the boy, Lestrade."

"He's too smart to be confused for long. Look at him. You can see the clock-spring winding up behind his eyes."

"Huh." Gregson fumbled in his pocket and pulled out a tiny pipe. "The point Lestrade's trying so badly to make-" (Mr. Lestrade snorted as loudly as the old nag) "-is that your father did good work for us, and we were wondering if you'd like to work with us too."

After what had happened?

Toby looked from man to man, but they were serious.

Lestrade finally smiled, which was a ghastly sight against his bruised and cut-up face. "You aren't the reason why the case went badly, Toby. Mr. Gregson found us because the Bobbies found your tracks in the snow first. It was a simple matter to trail us to the barn and from there to the orchards."

"The snow is the only reason why the case went bad at all." Gregson said firmly. "It would have been a neat 'un were it not for the Stormy Hand of God."

"You're perfect for the kind of work we need." Lestrade smoked easily through one side of his face. "You're dumb so people will think you're daft too. And don't pretend that you don't act stupid to get what you want when you're begging on the street!" He chuckled as Toby ducked his head down, bashfully hiding a grin.

"What worries me is that people who pretend to be stupid long enough can turn stupid for real." Gregson wagged a finger in Toby's face. "If that happens to you I'll be most upset."

"And you don't want Gregson upset." Lestrade told him. "He gets fussy."

Gregson blew through his nose at Lestrade.

Toby let his feet touch the floor. He had made up his mind quickly, but that was his nature. In a neat return of their earlier pact, the boy offered his hand to shake with the two men.

Toby Irish went home with the following:

a wreath of berried holly

a garland of ivy

a sprig for the Christmas pudding

a handful of money, and

balances paid for the family's goose club, plum pudding club, and coal purchase.

Going by the tiny shrieks and hurrahs when he unlocked the front door, his little sisters were happy to see him.

The Inspectors waited until the door was safely shut before they began the long, slow walk to their respective homes. It would be especially long and slow for Lestrade, who needed his walking-stick. Gregson was not relishing the walk either; the cold had settled in his bones and every step ached all the way up his back.

Around them, London swarmed in a living tapestry of sight, sound and colour. This time of evening the children were the majority of the population. The men didn't let on that they were cheered at the sight of the small ones gadding about in a desperate attempt to wring an extra hour of play out of the clock.

"That went well, considering."

"Huh." Lestrade grunted. He was exhausted. His arm hurt like the devil so he kept the sling cradled close to his chest. "I feel sullied."

"How do you think I feel? His father died on my case!" Gregson snarled.

"I'm not talking about that." Lestrade lifted his good arm. "I'm talking about why we have to recruit him." The small man turned on his heel and shakily looked up into the pale blue eyes of the big man. "You know how many people watched him while we were hollying-up the streets of London?" He didn't wait for an answer. "Plenty. And they were all faces you'd recognise from his uncle's crowd."

"Winnie should be the one dead, not Partridge." Gregson said the truth unnecessarily. "But here we are."

Lestrade was uncharacteristically silent.

"Well, Lestrade? Nothing cute to say about my creating a child-informer?"

"If there's another choice, I don't see it." Lestrade stopped to rub at his aching eyes; Gregson tensed and breathed relief when a passing cab just missed his arm.

"Lestrade...Try walking closer to the walls until that brew wears off."

"Amusing you are." Lestrade said without heat. "Look, what do you want me to say? The whole family dances a high-wire between the law and lawless. As long as his Tad lived, Toby chanced turning out like him if not better. But with Winnie being the man of the house now? God help us! Toby'll turn out better in crime or worse as a man because of his example!If Toby doesn't find his own way of making money for his family, his uncle will recruit him, and the lad'll feel honour-bound to do as his uncle says. But even Winnie won't interfere if he's bringing in decent wages on his deliveries—not to mention it will remind everyone why he needs to keep up his letters! He has to use reading and writing for communicating with the outside world!"

The two men fell silent as they walked. A freakish wind was trying to melt the snow and every foot-step was a trial to the balance as much as the warming air was a trial to the nose. They made it to the edge of a little park with no little gratitude.

"Happy Christmas." Lestrade said at last.

"Same to you." Gregson answered grudgingly.