Phoebe cocked her head like a squirrel. “Wha—that’s mighty strange.”
“It’s not marble,” I said with a laugh. “It’s wood.”
She looked the column up and down and delivered a knock of her own, laughing at the sound. “I don’t understand...he’s rich as Croesus. Why paint wooden columns to look like stone?”
“Because it’s a façade,” I told her. “No one’s meant to come here.”
“It’s all for show?”
“Clever bit of prestidigitation, isn’t it? Let’s see what else he’s hiding.” I didn’t have any of my burglar’s equipment, so the front door was out. It wasn’t very tough, but without a crowbar, I’d be reduced to kicking it in, which I wanted to avoid. Instead we continued around the front of the massive house until we got to the conservatory.
The glass dome rose on the southern corner of the mansion. I’m not the botanical type, but I knew it was there to catch the southern sun. When a southern sun was around to catch, anyway.
We could see the shapes of trees crouching inside. For a moment, I took them for fakes. I had seen—on a previous case—how one could fabricate trees if necessary. It occurred to me, however, that if my theories about Liutt were correct, he wouldn’t fake his trees. He might even have some expensive specimens.
I wasn’t disappointed. We found a door and, with the butt of the revolver, cracked the glass and unlocked it. Inside, we found quite the herbarium.
It was warm so I loosened my coat front.
“Why’s it so hot? The sun hasn’t shown for days.” Phoebe looked around with interest. “Is he heating the place?”
“Probably.”
If he was willing to install gaslights in the doctor’s laboratory, it was a fair bet he’d pay to keep his trees alive in winter. A pattern was emerging, a pattern I had anticipated.
Phoebe paused in front of a weird tree. Even in the diffuse light of the solarium, we could see a heavy contrast between a branch with lightly-colored bark and the rest of the tree, which was dark gray.
“What kind of tree is that?”
“Johnny Appleseed’s worse nightmare.”
She shot me an irritated look. “Can’t you just answer the question?”
“You get low marks, girl—both in horticulture and history.” I glanced around at the other plants and was not surprised to see that all the trees were similarly mismatched. Some appeared to be thriving, but others were not doing so well—more than a few had brittle green leaves giving way to brown.
“What do you mean?”
“Johnny Appleseed planted trees because he hated grafting. He thought it was unnatural. Our robber baron, however, appears to have a different opinion of the practice.”
“Looks like he’s a damn enthusiast.”
“Your ma is gonna kill me.” I shook my head. “Breaking and entering is one thing—but swearing?”
She smiled.
We continued through the weird garden and saw that his interest went beyond trees. He had tried, with varying degrees of success, to graft tomato vines with some Eastern fruit I didn’t recognize. Wheat, corn and sunflowers all made an appearance, cobbled onto foreign plants. None of the plants in the conservatory were natural—it was a gallery of freaks and experiments.
Past the twisted tomato vines, we found the doors to the mansion. They weren’t locked.
It was devoid of furniture. There wasn’t even a stool. We moved slowly through the mansion and saw that every wall had been gutted, if gutted is the right word. More likely, the builders had never even bothered with niceties like interior plaster or insulation. The entire front of the house was a bare brick wall.
The only signs of human habitation were gaslight fixtures installed near the front and back windows, but these were merely part of the illusion.
“The secretary we saw,” I said, pausing at one of the lights. “His job is to come up here and light these every night, wait until it gets late, and then turn them off.”
“But that doesn’t make sense. It’s wasteful. I thought you said he was cheap.”
“He is—but he’s got to keep up the illusion.”
“Illusion?”
“This.” I waved my hands at the empty house. “He wants people to think that he lives up here, like a king on high.”
“But why? Why would he do that?”
I gave her a significant look and continued down the corridor. The windows on my left painted the floor with squares of red. It was light enough to maneuver without a lamp.
Not surprisingly, there were no stairs and no second floor. It made our search all the easier.
We found the secretary’s office at the back of the house, where a kitchen might have been in a normal mansion. The door wasn’t locked but it was dark inside. I moved in, briskly closed the drapes, and lit the lamp at the desk.
Considering how empty the rest of the mansion was, this office was shockingly tight.
Phoebe was thinking the same thing. “This is tiny. Seems cruel, given the space around it.”
I nodded. “Maybe that bean-counter doesn’t spend enough time here to warrant a bigger office.”
“It sure looks like he spends time here.”
She was right. The desk was blanketed in stationary and the filing cabinets were full to bursting. A cheap cryptographic Babbage sat beside the telegraph receiver. Reams of telegram hung out stamped with weird letters.
“At least he heats the place for his man,” Phoebe observed. “Though truth be told, it’s a little too hot.”
The man had just left, but I wouldn’t expect it to be this warm unless he’d left the heat running. There wasn’t a radiator to be seen or even a cheap Franklin. There was, however, a hallway to the side with two doors in it.
One was open. It led to a cramped little water closet.
The other was closed. When I opened it, a wave of heat wafted up and over me. Stairs spiraled into waiting darkness.
Phoebe paused behind me. “What’s in there?”
“Boiler,” I conjectured. “He has to have access in case something goes wrong.”
I paused, the door half open.
“Why would an empty house need a boiler?” Phoebe asked. “It’s gotta be big to produce this much heat.”
“Good observation.” I went back to the office and fetched the lamp from the desk.
At the base of the stairs, we found a typical boiler room—small and cramped and sweltering. The girl fanned herself with a page she’d stolen from the office.
“You shouldn’t take anything,” I said absently as I scanned the bricks around us. “They’ll know we were here.”
“So what...they’ll think a neighborhood kid broke the window playing ball and then borrowed a lamp?”
I chuckled. “Touché.”
“So what are we looking for?”
“MacCallard’s hidden cellar,” I mumbled.
“What?”
The boiler was running, so it couldn’t possibly hide a secret door. I doubt they used the same builders anyway.
Then I saw the coal bin.
I stalked over and checked the floor around it. There were scuff-marks as if it had been moved. After handing Phoebe the lantern, I grabbed one edge and pulled. The bin was apparently on well-oiled gimbals, for it swung open violently. I nearly fell over, but my temporary ward caught me. She was surprisingly strong for such a dainty figure.
She gave a soft whistle.
&nbs
p; Behind the coal bin was a set of steps leading down to a heavy steel door with an impressive lock. I descended while Phoebe stood on the higher steps, lantern held to illuminate the portal.
“Do you need a hairpin?”
“A what?”
“So you can pick the lock.”
I frowned. “You’ve been reading too many dime novels.” I looked around and sighed. “Most people are lazy or forgetful or both. There’s a good chance he’s got a spare key nearby. Check for loose bricks.”
We circled the small perimeter of the boiler room, alternately tapping and groping the bricks.
“No luck,” she announced.
I nodded sourly and looked at the bin bursting with coal.
She saw where I was looking and shook her head. “You’re on your own.”
“I’ll remember that when it’s time to divvy the pay.”
I used the shovel for most of it. The bottom had two or three inches of coal dust. I couldn’t use the shovel anymore. The only sifting-tools I had were my fingers. I took off my greatcoat and rolled up my sleeves.
“They better have fucking greenbacks,” I whispered to myself.
If Phoebe heard me, she pretended not to.
A few minutes later, I was covered in black dust and no closer to opening the door.
“It must be in the office,” Phoebe said.
I didn’t want to say it, but I did. “Unless it’s not here at all.”
I trotted up the stairs and into the crapper. It occurred to me that the secretary might not even know about the secret door. His job might be to keep the boiler up and his head down. Could be his eyes weren’t meant to go any farther than the telegram feed.
Once I’d cleaned myself—and left a gray layer of grime on the sink—I joined Phoebe in the office. She’d already checked all the obvious places—desk drawers, filing cabinets, under piles of paper. She’d even stomped her little heels on all the floorboards, checking for a hollow space.
I scanned the devastation and paused at the Babbage. I found a screwdriver in the desk drawer and set upon it.
“What are you doing?” she asked over my shoulder.
“Most people don’t know, but these things open.” I took off the brass paneling on one side to reveal the intricate mechanical viscera. It was a jumble of tiny hammers and pistons and gears. At the bottom of the apparatus, though, there was an occasional empty space between the gears and the casing.
A large brass key lay there.
I gingerly removed it—cringing when I had to touch the gears. Even though we had wrecked everything else, it seemed like sacrilege to damage the analytical.
Key in hand, we descended once more and approached the secret door. On my way down the stairs, I inspected the key. It had regular teeth at the end but the shaft had perforations in it like a mnemonikey.
I slid it into the lock, twisted, and was rewarded with a litany of clicks, clacks, and shifting gears.
The vault door swung open under its own power and blasted us with a heat so dry that it felt as if Liutt had hidden the Sahara under his house. When our eyes adjusted to the harsh glare of intensified gaslights, we saw that it wasn’t a desert at all, but a massive chamber running the length of the mansion. The source of the bone-cracking heat was obvious: an enormous bronze device with a square opening in its front. It was situated against the same wall as the boiler. I suspected that the device used the same exhaust pipes as the boiler, masking its presence.
“What’s that?” Phoebe asked, fanning herself.
“A crematorium,” I said, eyes narrowing.
Small wonder the office was so warm, with a boiler and a giant gas burner underneath it.
Stepping closer, I threw open the clean brass hatch and looked inside. Pilot flames simmered beneath an interior just large enough for a corpse.
“This is where the toe-tags go,” I said. “After he’s done with ‘em.” I slammed the hatch shut with grim finality.
“After he’s done with ‘em?” she repeated numbly.
I nodded and pointed deeper into the basement.
The chit didn’t move. She stood frozen like a mourning stone angel, eyes on the clean brass hatch.
“It’s best not to loiter when skulking in a secret laboratory.” I blew out the lantern and left it on a gurney near the door. I had no use for it here, since the laboratory was as well lit as the morgue.
She still hadn’t moved, so I took her by the elbow and led her away from the gruesome stove. We walked between several enormous glass cylinders. The acrid burn of chemicals wafted out of them, bringing tears to my eyes.
“But why burn them?” Her voice quivered a little.
“Bodies take up space,” I said, blinking. “Digging up six feet of dirt ain’t cheap neither.” I chuckled grimly. “Ash on the other hand...well, that’s useful stuff. Probably uses it to fertilize his gardenias.”
Phoebe covered her mouth with a kerchief. She looked as if she might vomit.
“I was kidding about the gardenias.” At least, I thought I was kidding. You can never tell with Magnates.
She turned away from me and waved a hand in the air to look away.
I obliged her. It sounded as if she swallowed back her problems. For now.
“He’s cheating the miners,” she announced slowly. “He’s charging them for burial when he’s just burning their bodies like trash.”
“Ayep.”
She shivered. “What’ll happen, you know, in the end?”
“This is the end, sweetheart.” I didn’t feel like having this discussion.
“No, at the End of Days. What will happen when Gabriel blows his horn? How will they come back? What about the resurrection of the body?”
I sighed impatiently. “So you believe a bugler can make people outta bones...but you draw the line at ashes?”
A tear slipped over her cheek, yellow in the gaslight.
I grunted and rubbed my temples. Coal mines and Gatling guns were murdering people all around us and this girl wanted to talk eschatology.
She kept her head high, straining to keep her voice dignified. “It ain’t fair to be burnt up.”
“Maybe Gabriel’s got a tuba for the crispy ones.” I patted her shoulder awkwardly.
“And what about their kinfolk?” she asked. “They’re praying at vacant graves.”
Not even I had an answer for that. It might’ve been cruel, but then that was normal for the Magnocracy. This was a land where everyone prayed at some empty altar or another.
To my relief, Phoebe’s sadness sharpened into anger. She shook her little head. “He’s a dirty cheat.”
I paused beside one of the glass cylinders. This one was filled with a strange yellow liquid...and something else. “He’s cheating them worse than that.”
At the sight of the tank’s occupant, she gave a little squeak and covered her mouth again.
Thankfully, I think she was too shocked to throw up.
Chapter Fourteen
A cadaver floated in the yellowish suspension liquid. From the ambient reek, I guessed the liquid was formaldehyde. The poor bastard’s skull was caved in, his eyes half-open and his mouth agape in a scream of shock, as if he could still feel the support beam that smashed the life out of him.
Phoebe turned away quickly, covering her eyes. I was uncertain if the sight of death or nakedness bothered her more. I felt pity for the poor bastard—death and the suspension liquid had conspired to shri
nk his manhood to nothing. It didn’t seem right, looking at him like this.
“Don’t it bother you?” she asked, head turned away.
I glanced around curiously. “I see a lot of bodies. For a trumped-up nanny.”
She didn’t laugh. “You’ll never let me forget that, will you?”
I grunted sourly. It sounded like something Moira would say. Having a sharp memory like mine can be as much a flaw as an advantage. Sometimes, insults are best forgotten. Battlefields too.
“You think that’s the man we’re searching for?”
“Dunno. They didn’t give me a photograph.” I glanced over him. His flesh—pale and yellow now—clearly belonged to an Irishman, unless they had other whites working in the mines, that is. I hadn’t really had time to do a survey.
“Why would he keep bodies in his basement? What’s wrong with him?”
“It makes perfect sense,” I told her, resuming our tour. “If he’s conducting research.”
“But why would he conduct research in his basement? Why not the hospital?”
“This is more private. From the machinery we saw before, I’m sure a lot of the work is done at the morgue. But the really extreme stuff—the work he doesn’t want anyone to know about—is done up here. Out of sight.”
The tanks and machinery gave way to an operating theater. A massive steel slab stood in the center like some infernal altar. It had drains and gutters to catch stray fluids. The gaslights and amplifying mirrors cast a baleful yellow light on a tray holding a veritable armory of gleaming implements designed to cut flesh, organ, and bone.
“Better not look,” I warned Phoebe.
I felt one of her small hands grip my elbow as we approached the slab.
A man was laid out—another miner by the looks of him—with his ribs spread open like a blossoming flower. A nearby cart held his guts in clear glass jars. It sounds messy but it wasn’t. The whole place was immaculate. There wasn’t a single drop of blood to be seen.
Phoebe was staring at the dead man’s face.
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