Amen Court is entered from the junction of Warwick Lane and Paternoster Row ... Of the old houses NOs 1-3, No 1 is interesting as R.H. Barham, then a minor canon, lived here from 1839 - 1845 and wrote The Ingoldsby Legends during his occupation. ... [the pre-Reformation processions allegedly] began with the Lord's Prayer in Paternoster Row and got in their Amen at Amen Corner. They said their Hail Mary in Ava Maria Lane, then their Credo in Creed Lane, and heard their exhortation in Sermon Lane ...
London Cameos by A.H. Blake, 1930
I have a copy of Legends, picked up on a whim in Guernsey. Well worth your time. When I posted about them before I said:
The Ingoldsby Legends. Picked up at Curiosities, an antiquarian shop in Guernsey. It’s often worth your while poking your nose in that sort of place, particularly in somewhere not often frequented like Guernsey. You never know what might be hanging around. This is the 1898 Richard Bentley edition, with illustrations, and is a collection of all three books. The originals would have been published in the 1840s as single volumes. Comic ghost stories and verse. I'm not a huge fan of comic verse - it goes on a little long and I find it wearisome - but the stories are entertaining Gothic and might give you inspiration for your own tales.
One other landmark that would have been close by is Newgate Prison. A portion of the old prison wall still exists at Amen Court. It's slightly surprising Blake didn't mention it; the prison was still there well up until his period, finally being demolished in the early 1900s. In its day it was notorious both as a prison and as a place of execution; the Newgate Hornpipe, ie. hanging, is immortalized in song.
Odd side note. The iron gallows door that led to the place of execution allegedly found its way to Buffalo New York and is now at Canisius University. At least, so says Wikipedia and the internet is never wrong. Not sure how it got across the water, or why; it sounds like the sort of thing that ought to have been put up outside a speakeasy. There was a Newgate Prison in Buffalo, but it was contemporaneous with the existing one in London.
The Legends first appeared in Bentley's Miscalleny, a monthly that boasts Charles Dickens among others as its editor, though Dickens soon fell out with Bentley over editorial control concerns.
With that we get:
Legendary Correspondence
A book scout, Elliott Parker, claims to have discovered some as-yet unknown correspondence written by Dickens to Bentley and approaches the Hounds hoping for a quick sale. The two pages Parker proffers are clearly part of a larger collection, written to Bentley while Dickens was still associated with Bentley's Miscalleny. Parker claims to be acting on behalf of an unnamed seller, and further investigation (eg. tracking Parker's movements) discovers that this seller lives at Amen Court, though it's not clear who the seller is or where, exactly, on Amen Court they live.
The Hounds can determine that the papers are genuine and, if there are more of them, could be sold for a tidy sum.
At one point in the small portion the Hounds have in their possession, Dickens talks about a draft of 'a horrible, gothic little tale' he's working on. It seems to be an early version of his tale, The Haunted House, but if so then it's a version that never saw print. Finding that could be a real boost to the shop.
Spending 1 point of any relevant investigative pool discovers that Parker, when he visits his unnamed seller, always goes to that part of Amen Court closest to the old Newgate Prison.
Option One: Liar. Parker has discovered some Dickens but it's incomplete and has faked up the rest to encourage gullible buyers. He used the good stuff as bait and is relying on the fakes to seal the deal. He's using a false front at Amen Court to sell the story, relying on Rough Magick to get him from his Amen Court false front to his actual hideaway, not far from there, traveling by shadow and subterfuge. However, this repeated use of Magick is making for some very peculiar side effects at Amen Court, and the canons who live there are starting to get worried.
Option Two: The Real Deal. Parker has a genuine seller at Amen Court. The seller discovered these papers during a home refurbishment and thought they would be able to sell these for a small amount. Parker knows their true value and is hoping to fleece the seller. What neither the seller nor Parker appreciate is that the papers are part of a larger stash of lost and found items, hoarded by a supernatural collector. The collector is very unhappy that their stash was found, and is attempting to reclaim the papers.
Option Three: The Newgate Hornpipe. Parker didn't get those papers from Amen Court. He got them from the shadowy remnants of Newgate, gone these many years, which Parker gets to via a magickal door in the wall of Newgate Prison located at Amen Court. Once there he steals the items from the Newgate Hangman, who still exists in that death-touched world beyond. Theoretically the Hounds could copy Parker's technique, get into Newgate and take the papers from their keeper. So long as they're willing to risk a grisly end in the execution cell ...
That's it for this week. Enjoy!
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