The Versatiles

by Alex Duncan

As soon as the man had touched him Zanga saw the strong images of an empty bottle and a narrow stream and a floating body flashing through his mind, but he said nothing, only shook his head.

  Ezekiel let him go and turned back to Henry.

  ‘You’re a foolish old man, you’ll get yourself killed if you go in there, or worse…’

  ‘That’s as may be,’ Henry shrugged. ‘It shouldn’t concern you, all I want to know is if you can help us or no?’

  The vile, discordant sounds of the harpsichord chimed through the clearing, filling the air with lethargic sounds, as Ezekiel looked from one man to the other, struggling with his conscience. The music seemed to affect him much like a poison would, swilling through him and leaving him little else but a slave.

  ‘I’ll have nothing more to do with this business,’ he finally said, lying back down on the ground, resigning himself to his fate. ‘Leave me to my thoughts.’

  Henry huffed in frustration, too tired to try and convince the soporific fellow, as he pushed himself up and left him lying there, consumed in despair.

  ‘I can help you.’

  Henry turned again and hobbling towards them was another familiar face, dressed in a tatty but fine gown with a ruined, feathered bonnet clutched between her fingers.

  ‘Mrs Bellville is it?’

  The young lady curtsied to them both, a strange vision of etiquette in her rags.

  ‘I couldn’t sleep and I heard you from over there. You said you wish to get inside,’ she gestured to the fallen down mills and out houses in the distance. ‘If you are willing to trust me, I can help you.’

  ‘You’d be a fool to trust any of us,’ groaned Ezekiel from the floor, but they moved away from him and Mrs Bellville clutched Henry tightly by the arm. Her imploring eyes stared desperately into Henry’s as she clawed at his sleeve.

  ‘If you say you’re here to help us, I can show you the way.’

  Henry took her hand and gently squeezed it.

  ‘I am here to help you, both of us are.’

  ‘Then please, follow me.’

  CHAPTER TEN

  Time ticked on with all the assurance of Harrison’s famous clock. The edges of the hills glowed, seemingly with expectation, as the sun struggled to rise over the horizon in the east and lighten up the valley. The fields high up began to sparkle with the jewels of a thousand dew drops and the sky soon filled with the sounds of the morning chorus singing out as loud and defiant and timeless as ever. It was going to be a hot spring day.

  The town’s folk of Hope were still tucked up in their beds, their minds fretful and their dreams restless.

  Not one of them knew that they all now waited on the brink of fate.

  Mr Hugh Monk looked down on the town from the roof of the theatre and felt fine waves of pleasure wash over him. He ignored the coming dawn. For him the night was not yet over and there was still plenty to do. He pulled out his silver tinderbox from a pocket and turned it over and over in his muddy hands, feeling its sharp edges and smooth faces against his rough fingertips as he pondered on the hours ahead. His finger passed over a particularly keen edge on the box and cut sharply down into his thumb. He lifted the cut up to his eyes to inspect it, but there was no blood, only a white flap of skin. As he put the fingertip in his mouth and sucked on it a voice, a high, throaty and altogether unpleasant voice, spoke to him.

  ‘And will it work? Will they come back to us, hmm?’

  Monk smiled.

  ‘They’ll come back,’ he murmured under his breath. ‘They’ll come back, don’t you worry. And when they do…’

  ◆◆◆

  ‘I’m going to have a bath as hot as the sun,’ Sam said to himself as he walked down the tunnels. ‘And…and…a shank of lamb…ooo yes, that’s it…a shank of lamb so tender it’ll fall of the bone, drowning in mint sauce, and I’ll eat it in the bath…with a maid scrubbing my back. That’s exactly what I’ll do when I get out of this mess.’

  He walked on, mumbling away, turning this way and that through the underground alleyways and hardly believed that he was down there again at all. He no longer felt tired instead it was as if the world had slowed down around him.

  Turning once more, the burning torches on the walls came to an abrupt end and he reached into his jacket and pulled out the strange, metallic instrument that Henry had given him.

  ‘Right, let’s see if you work shall we.’ And he pulled the small brass lever that the old man had shown him. No light came out so he shook it but that did no good. This was surprising. Everyone knew that if something didn’t work a hearty shake would put it right.

  There must have been a small chamber within the contraption, somewhere where a wick or fleck of tinder burned on without being upset but he couldn’t see it. He lifted the instrument up to his eyes and peered down through the cylinder. It wasn’t doing anything, but he did spot another small lever on the opposite side of the chamber and so moved it. The lever lifted up a covering and for an instant he was blinded. Pulling his eyes away he could see only white dots floating around his vision.

  He rubbed his eyes and shone the torch out in front of him and instantly a defined and sharp sword of light cut through the darkness, illuminating the depths and revealing the place to be even more miserable than under the dull, moving light of the burning torches. The mirrors and glass inside the small contraption seemed to magnify the tiny light inside it ten fold and now firmly banished his blindness in the tunnels.

  Newly confident, he ran on remembering turns and twists in the path he had taken earlier that night. It occurred to him that he’d yet to come across any of the guards from the town or any other of the mob that he’d met and thanked his luck. He didn’t feel in any mood for a fight and his legs were so heavy he doubted he’d be able to outrun a child. He was hungry, his feet hurt, his mouth was as dry as a bone and he was having interminable trouble keeping his mind off Rosie.

  Every time he blinked she was there behind his eyes gazing back at him with that shrewd and serious expression of hers, her dark curls falling down past her white neck. What a rare girl, he thought, hoping beyond hope that she’d quickly see that he didn’t know what that drawing was all about and that he was on her side. They were getting on so well before she had found that drawing. He even deluded himself into believing that she had moved into him, that she might favour him. But what would a young lady like that, of such talents and beauty, be doing favouring an errand boy such as him. No, life wasn’t that fair.

  Passing through the tunnels he came out into a chamber that was beyond the reach of even his powerful torch. The beam of light faded away into nothing wherever he shone it. Whatever the room was, it was huge, but moving on he felt an uncommon sense of recognition. A familiar feeling in his stomach that spread threw his body until it was consuming him. Again he was sure he could be lost down there in the darkness. That he would be lost and die alone. Like the last time, he tried to shake off the feeling, rid himself of the madness, but it was clogging up inside him. He was sure that this was the end of his adventure and fell down onto his hands and knees ready to welcome it.

  He gagged for air and coughed and in the blackness of his mind he realized that he could taste something in the air, a soft, sweet taste of smoke perhaps, that stung the back of his throat. In his desperation he ripped off a measure of his shirt and tied it round his mouth and nose as his head swam and he was sure he would sink into unconsciousness.

  As quickly as it had begun, his head cleared and he was able to stand. Why he had felt like that, both times he had been down there, he had no idea, but as he shone the torch to the side of him the light finally reached out and hit the shiny rock face of the chamber and a door leading from it. It wasn’t the door that led to the underneath of the theatre, this one was splintered and old and warped, but as far as he could see, it was his only way onwards.

  He rushed over and kicked out at the door, knocking it open and not ten paces ahead, illuminated by the torch light, was what he could on
ly describe as a large metal pyre, a dish held up by a tripod, and within the dish a mound of smoking coals and an acrid smoke pouring off them. Coughing again now he was closer to the dangerous smoke, he tore off his frock coat and threw it over the large dish, covering it and holding off the fumes for a short time at least.

  The sounds of coughing continued and it only took Sam a moment to realize that it was coming from behind him. He span around and shone the torch out.

  The blade of light lit up an endless number of faces all staring down at their single wooden desks. Sam nearly dropped the torch and yelled out in fright, backing up against the far wall of the room. It suddenly dawned on him that he didn’t know what he had been expecting, but this hadn’t been it. Shining the torch about the room he took in the vile scene.

  There were hundreds of people, sat in row after row of neatly lined tables stretching the distance of the room. Every nationality was there. He could see Africans and Indians, Spaniards and Chinese, Russian and Middle Eastern and many more he wouldn’t be able to identify if he were given the chance, all sitting hunched over their work, bent over papers, scratching away with simple quills. Every expression in every face was distant and lifeless and each person, be they grown woman or young boy, was clutching some small object. One man held a small wooden doll to his chest as he wrote, one lady clutched a delicate pearl box, another held a pair of spectacles and another a scarf, and so on and so on. Sam saw it now for the first time, the horrible truth of it. They were a hive of workers, each one with the same gift as Zanga for seeing the future and the past. Whatever they held, be it a necklace or a toy, they could see the owners whole life before their eyes.

  This was Apollo’s Oracle.

  Sam dashed down the first line of desks, pulling his special key from his pocket and undid the first heavy padlock, yanking the chain free from around the prisoner’s bloodied ankles. The free man didn’t move. He sat where he was, continuing to write in a spidery hand on his parchment as though Sam wasn’t there at all.

  He continued down the line, pulling the chains free as he did so and unlocking every padlock he came to.

  ‘Go!’ he shouted to each one. ‘You can leave. You’re free! Go back to where you came from!’

  But none of them moved. They all just sat and went on with their work, as studious and industrious and lifeless as before.

  ‘What’s wrong with you?’ Sam yelled, his frustration building with each lock he picked and each chain he loosed. ‘Why don’t you go? You’re free!’

  Still none moved.

  Sam screamed out, but could do nothing other than finish the job that he had been sent to do. He continued down every row of workers, freeing each one in turn, until he came to a young man of nearly his own age, and as he stooped down to pick the lock, stopped short.

  The young man was clutching a small white handkerchief, delicately embroidered with a bunch of purple tulips in one corner. Sam would have recognized it anywhere.

  ‘Hey, that’s mine!’ He went to grab it, but the young man held it firmly in his grip. ‘My mother gave me that before she died, I thought I’d lost it…’

  His eyes flicked downwards and he saw the parchment on the desk. It was another drawing, in every flick of the pen the same as the last. There he was again, etched on the paper, standing in front of Rosie and pushing a dagger hard into her gut.

  He snatched the paper from off the desk and pulled the frail young man up out of his chair and onto his feet.

  ‘How can you see this?!’ he raged, slapping the man across the face. ‘I’d never do that to Rosie. I’d never hurt her.’

  The man eyes met his with a cold and piercing stare.

  ‘You will. You can’t run from it.’

  Sam threw him back into his chair and rushed on.

  ‘I won’t do it,’ he called back, unlocking one more chain. ‘I’d never hurt Rosie.’

  Another line of chains finished and another and soon enough he was doing the last line, and still not one of them got up out of their chairs.

  If they won’t move, he told himself, then I can’t help them. Mr Versatile asked me to unlock them, but that was all. I’m no hero. They’ll have to save themselves.

  He unlocked the final shackle and yelled out.

  ‘There, you’re free, all of you. Go!’

  And he left the room, recounting his steps the last time he had been there, eventually finding the far door leading under the theatre, down one more corridor, past the rooms of high shelves stacked with papers and out the door marked DELPHI into the golden, circular room beyond, which would lead to his exit.

  It was only his bad luck that sat on the chair at the table in the middle of the light room, quite awake and smiling a crooked smile, staring straight at him with his one good eye, was a man as broad as a boat with a head as thick as oak and a scalp of finely cropped hair, cracking his knuckles. The man looked very pleased with himself.

  Sam’s heart sank.

  It was Thump.

  ‘Well, well, well, I’ve been waitin’ for you.’

  ◆◆◆

  Zanga stayed behind the tough old man as the two of them followed the ragged form of Mrs Belleville, making her way hastily away from the courtyard and towards the ruined outbuildings at the far end of the clearing.

  The young lady seemed very eager to help them and show the way. Her spirit was no doubt stronger than the others and yet to be dampened by the mournful music around them and Zanga, for one, was very glad to be following her away from that place.

  The lady was twitchy and excitable as she rushed on with her dainty small steps in her torn and muddy gown and would spin around and check that the two men were still there every two or three paces.

  The grey outbuildings ahead were a desolate and soulless scene. Each building was the bare frame of what it had once been, now twisted and broken with a carpet of shattered glass covering the ground and splintered wooden beams precariously balancing one on top of the other. It was as dismal and run down as Henry may have expected from far off, but behind the ramshackle façade, once they had entered through a smashed door, there was an unusual air of life to the rooms they passed through. Perhaps it was the faint beat of hammers in the distance or the far off echoes of machinery, the old man was undecided, but there was something barely tangible that made the small hairs on the back of his neck stand firmly on end.

  The two of them kept up with Mrs Belleville, weaving in and out of empty, dirty rooms, and went further in, descending a wide set of dusty steps that led down to several large, but deserted workshops.

  After the distant murmurs of life, it was disconcerting that every room they entered was suddenly empty and silent.

  ‘I do not mean to be a fear monger Henry Versatile,’ said Zanga, leaning over and whispering to the old man, ‘but don’t you think it is a little too quiet?’

  Henry grunted his agreement as they walked on.

  Stacks of old lathes, chisels, workman’s knives and saws and all the paraphernalia of carpenters and builders lay about their feet, hurriedly left by the looks of it, and Zanga felt himself becoming increasingly anxious.

  ‘I do not like this Henry Versatile,’ he hissed as they passed through another empty room. ‘How do we know that we can trust this girl?’

  Henry dropped back from Mrs Belleville, a few paces out of earshot.

  ‘What other choice do we have my friend?’ he asked. ‘This is the only other way in that we know of and, as far as I could gather, this girl…’ he gestured towards the young lady, skipping ahead of them, ‘…was the only guide up there who could string a sentence together without sounding a few shillings short of a guinea.’

  ‘Be that as it may,’ sighed Zanga, ‘I still don’t like it.’

  Henry patted him on the shoulder and forced a small smile.

  ‘That makes two of us.’

  Mrs Belleville pushed open another door and led them through. High windows in the ceiling let in streaks of dull blue light, cast
ing long shadows across the floor.

  ‘Mrs Belleville, what is this place?’ asked Henry. ‘And why are you being kept down here?’

  Her voice was high and excitable as she gazed over her shoulder back at them.

  ‘This is where we build,’ she said. ‘I didn’t see it to begin with. Like the drunken man in the clearing I too have only been here a day or so, but I’ve learned so much. I can see that this will be the centre of things to come, right here where we’re walking. This will be the new Jerusalem, the new Egypt and the new Rome. Isn’t it exciting!’

  Henry and Zanga exchanged a look.

  ‘What exactly is it that you build here?’

  The young lady gave a wicked smile and stopped in front of a set of doors that stretched up to twice her height and winking at them both, turned the brass handles and pushed open the doors to the room beyond.

  Henry looked ahead of him and felt his jaw drop.

  ‘Oh,’ he said, quietly.

  Before them was a room as large as the courtyard outside and as high as the walls surrounding it. Spread across the floor, from one end to the other, were at least a hundred, possibly two or even three hundred, man-sized Oracle machines, all in various stages of completion. Some were no more than the brittle inner shell of the machine and some were the twin of the ghastly contraption the old man and Rosie had seen presented before an audience in the theatre that very night.

  ‘You’re…you’re building Oracles?’ Henry stuttered, looking in horror over the mass of twisted machinery stretching out across the whole length of the room.

  ‘That’s right,’ squeaked Mrs Belleville, clapping her hands together. ‘We’re building one for every major city and town across the whole country, soon enough all of England will be just as safe and free of crime and hurt as…’ her voice faltered, but only for a moment as she caught her breath, ‘…as here in Hope.’

  Henry shook his head in disbelief.

  ‘Don’t worry old man,’ she went on. ‘I didn’t believe it at first, but they made me see that this is for the best, this will lead us all to a brighter future!’