The Clockwork Tartan: Quest of the Five Clans

by Raymond St. Elmo

  I circled about to the stable, walking in near dark. Waited till a guard upon a barrel revealed himself with a snore. Slipped past him, prepared to strike if he awoke. Yes, I had knife ready. To kill a shilling-a-day guard. If needed.

  Needed? This was no mission for the Charter, nor even to earn a spadassin’s bread. I spied upon my dead mistress. With no purpose but stirring ashes of bitter desire. So my conscience chattered. I ignored the blue nosed busybody, climbed a fence, moved to better perch, climbed further, settled upon a window ledge. Empty room. Sidled to a lit window. Within waited candles and carpets, wine and crystal. And Elspeth sitting upon the bed.

  No one else in view. Cloak tossed aside, hair unbound. She sat hands folded in lap. Waiting. For what, for whom? Jealousy set my teeth grinding. If Black stepped into the room in his smirk and periwig I’d break through the window. What a joy to kill the man twice. Then I’d shake Elspeth into sense.

  I studied her. She wore the green dress given by Dealer. I resented it, for all I admired the fit. Almost two years since I’d seen her lying dead. What had I forgot? Not the sharp chin, not the tiny nose. Pretty, not beautiful. What had I felt for her? I recalled… contentment. I’d been at home with her. How little that sounds, yet how much it meant to my homeless soul. I climbed roofs by night, fought pirates in dank taverns and thought of Elspeth washing pans, keeping dinner warm.

  And of a sudden, sheer recollection overcame me. All the smells and tastes and textures of the past. Sensations shaking me so I near fell from the ledge. Elspeth, Stephano and I had made a home. We’d kept daily customs and sacred anniversaries, private jokes and shared moments. My tiny family of lonely souls had meant much to me. I’d near gone mad to lose it.

  ‘Family’ now was a comic nation of in-laws who plotted complex idiot conspiracies to murder me, confuse and confound me. And yet… perhaps ‘family’ was always such madness. Glockens and Harlequins, Mac Tiers and Sanglairs… perhaps they were the sane ones, valuing what we clay-souled folk too seldom realized as treasure.

  A sound in the alley below, as though something fell. I peered down, ready to leap upon enemies. Caught glimpse of a dog rooting in the trash. I returned to the window. Elspeth stirred. Had she seen me? Heard the noise? No, she opened purse, withdrew a tiny leather-bound bible. Ha, I’d given her that for Christmas. Well, no, Stephano had. I gave the hymn book. But I’d suggested the bible. Stephano thought to give French soap. Women do not want a man to choose their soap.

  She leafed through the bible, mouthing words with child-pink lips. Always her habit when faced with dire decision. Seeking inspiration in random lines. Finding it, perhaps. I recalled her in my dream, standing on the road of Pilgrim’s Progress, staff in her hand, wind in hair.

  El had been more than kitchen maid. She’d followed her own path, despite the shouts and seductions of men such as Rayne Gray or Jeremiah Black. I looked within the window, within myself, and admitted I had loved her, and had failed that love. But I did not repent that I loved another now.

  Bah; enough with the past. I readied to drop into the alley again. Still I lingered, greedy for one last final sight. Elspeth put the bible away. Done with prayer, some hard decision reached. She searched the purse, withdrew a pocket pistol. I blinked. Not a Queen Ann, something more modern. Wasn’t any gift from me. She checked the priming, cocked with practiced thumb. Then stood, took two steps towards me and fired.

  Chapter 19

  The Several Vintages of Insanity

  I lay in the muck of the alley. Shot dead, no doubt. Bullet to a weary heart. Staring up at this world’s last light, the glow of the second story window. Till the head of some hell beast appeared, eclipsing all. I held still. It put jaws to my face, panted a warm wind of meat and trash. Gave me a sticky lick. Well, it was a dog.

  I remained quiet, not wanting to jar my death wound. I felt the chill of death. No, I felt the chill of the ground on a spring night. Why not, a clockwork killer wandered eternity with my coat. Meanwhile the dog gave another lick. I pushed it aside. Stared at the window above. It was whole, unbroken. How? I recalled the shot splattering the pane.

  Now a man perched on the same ledge from which I’d fallen. He peered in, near pressing face to glass. Idiot. Even thick glass at night will show a spy so close. Large fellow, but limber. Perched easy as cat on narrow stone. Rapier on right side. Left handed, most like. Hair bound in tail to back. No coat, for all the chill. Chain mail vest…

  Well, it was me. I lay on the ground shot, and stared up at myself about to be shot. More time door madness. Must have fallen through a hole to the minute before. I considered this me of the previous minute. From the dirty alley floor he didn’t portray ‘tragic hero beholding lost love’. He looked a boy spying on his aunt’s bath. Pretending he felt revelations of love and final reconciliation, not the twitches of his cock.

  Dying is a moment of insight. It was revealed unto my eyes that the Rayne Gray of the previous minute was a shallow fool. Swigging a mug of recollection, pretending it a chalice of sorrow. It was only his heart’s loss he took seriously, not the girl lost. Else he might have expected the damned gun. Elspeth O’Claire was proven a woman used to dangerous dealings. And now she beheld a spy upon her window ledge. After brief prayer, she’d shoot him dead. Serving Gray right. He’d rushed from the side of his wife to chase the memory of another skirt.

  Still, I didn’t want the idiot tumbling atop me. I got up, humiliated for lack of death wound. Brushing broken glass from the chain mail vest. The bullet had not pierced. Too light a caliber. But I could have broken my neck, I point out. Someone appeared in the entrance to the alley. The guard awoken by my fall. I backed deeper into the dark, feeling for the alley’s end. The dog followed, happy to share adventure.

  The shot came, the glass shattered. I watched myself fall backwards, only to disappear before hitting the ground. The guard shouted. Now I’d plummet to the alley of two minutes ago, lie staring up, insulting my previous self. Thinking I saw the truth of my soul from the dirt. To hell with both the fools. I hurried farther, unable to see anything except the faint-lit window, the silhouette of Elspeth peering through the shattered glass.

  “Madness,” I growled to the dog. If it replied I’d go mad. No, I’d be revealed mad. Where was the back fence? I staggered blind down an infinite city alleyway.

  “We’d call a man mad to think himself a teapot,” observed someone. “Yet we would not call a teapot mad for thinking itself a man.”

  I jumped, reached for knife, then sighed, let it be. I knew the voice. No mistaking it for the dog’s. Not that I knew the dog’s voice. I suspected the dog’s name. But the speaker had a distinct crow-call touch. Raspy, quavering with years. Lalena’s uncle. I thought of him as the Birdman, or Uncle Raven. Following the oldest traditions of her family, he avoided exact naming. As he cherished abstract declaiming.

  “In fact, we’d admire the teapot that thought itself a man,” he continued. “How brave it would be, how grandiose for a little glazed pot to declare itself worthy to sit among kings and potters. Ah, but you will bark that a teapot has no mind to weigh such fancies?”

  Bark? “Is he talking to you or to me?” I asked the dog. Felt its warm breath on my hand, the kiss of a lick. Sensible answer. Lucy had more sense than twenty in-laws. I’d nominate her as Mistress of the Clans, were she fool enough to want the title.

  “Now suppose a man were to believe his teapot thought itself a man? Is the madness in the man, or the teapot? Else in the tea itself?” mused Uncle Raven. No doubt hands clasped behind as he considered. “A man who admires his teapot’s delusions cannot be mad for recognizing the value of its porcelain presumption. No, our own sanity demands we approve his conclusion, for all the error of flawed proposition.”

  The air wafted a cold stone chill spiced with dust of infinite years. Welcome back to the Hall of Time. I strode through darkness, lecturing in-law to the left. The ‘click, click’ of nails declaring the dog upon my right.

  �
��Now you will say the man who admires his teapot for thinking itself a man, is mad. And he will reply that it is the teapot who is mad, best take matters up with it. Meanwhile the teapot shall sit proud. And when asked its opinion, we must translate its silence to say that it alone is sane, for it alone is free from the tyranny of definition. And what is madness but a mind bound by another’s words?”

  I searched pockets for a candle. None. I vowed to start carrying a lamp henceforth. Hollow wick and bull’s eye lens, with oil to burn till Christmas. Enough of dark passages.

  “Now in my day,” drawled Uncle Raven, surely putting thumbs behind lapel, “We bottled our madness as a vintner does his finest wines. Your true connoisseur would store bottles of insanity in his mind’s cellar. Uncorking the best only for grand occasion. Births, christenings, weddings, funerals. You will understand, each feast of life requires a special vintage of madness. For insanity’s wines are of many natures. Why, love’s madness alone varies from sweet to bloody, from heady fumes to liquid desire scintillating in the glass. A proper wedding banquet kept a rack for each.”

  “I’m fond of French claret,” I offered. Sounded plebian.

  “A satisfactory choice with cheese,” admitted the voice. “But consider the crushed grapes of Despair’s Madness. Fermented to a red so dark one might seek within one’s cup the tiniest sparkle of hope, finding only starless night. Proper for a funeral, and excellent with a salad.”

  The dog gave dismissive sigh at mention of salad. Far ahead, a faint light shone. Enemies? If so, did this mad old man and grinning dog count as allies?

  “Then the various vintages of Fear have their advocates,” continued Uncle Raven. “The sweeter anxieties, in particular. I find the reds too thick for my palate. But great grandfather kept a cellar of Timor Mortis Rosé, 1335. Passed sips about at my aunt’s birth.”

  “Strange drink to serve for life’s beginning.”

  “Ah, you are young, sir. Yet old enough to know how very fearful a thing is existence. The Madness of Fear is a background wine served upon all the greater feasts of life. To sip it decorously upon a day of birth, strengthens the spirit as cordial does the winter traveler.”

  “Lalena is wandering about this accursed hall of the Glocken,” I said. “Have you seen her?”

  “Then there are the many vintages of Regret’s madness,” observed Uncle Raven. “A white bitter fermentation. Distillations of the heart’s realization of what is lost, what is left behind by foolish choice. Good for a quiet moment alone, staring into the fire.”

  Enough. I stopped, weary of mad theatre.

  “I asked of my wife,” I growled. “Is there accusation in your babble?”

  His return came sharp. “Is there something you regret, Rayne Gray?”

  “I’m a spadassin,” I snarled. “A killer. I have much to regret, and –“

  That was as far as self-flattering confession reached. I then found throat grasped, my heavy person lifted from the floor.

  “By ‘regret’, sir, I do not mean errors in your daily labor. I refer to your treatment of my niece, of whom I am rather fond.”

  Before the word ‘fond’ I’d drawn knife, readied strike. I did not, for all I choked and dangled. For of a sudden I did regret. Why did I keep leaving my wife behind, running off on fool missions I set myself, whether casual challenge, political battle or mysterious obituary? One would think I preferred facing my death, to facing my life.

  Of a sudden I wished I were mad. Let madness be wine. Hellfire, I’d sit to table and down a dozen glasses, toasting old life and new, friends and enemies both; and every last love passed. But which vintage of madness to pour? I’d had a surfeit of despair, fear and regret.

  “And joy?” I gasped.

  I caught surprise in his voice. “What? What about it?”

  I coughed, unable to answer. Curiosity led him to return me to the ground. I caught breath, considered the knife strike again. Decided not.

  “What wine of madness do you make from joy?”

  For a long moment the Birdman was silent. Not like him at all. At length I heard his steps continue. The dog’s click, click. I put away knife, followed after, feeling at my insulted throat. We approached the distant light. A lamp hung upon a hook next a door.

  “I know a thousand distillations of Delight,” considered the Birdman, “and all the milder cordials of Contentment. Not to forget the elixirs of Elation, seven tinctures of mad Exultation. I have sipped liquors of fevered Anticipation, quaffed brews of giddy Laughter.” He reached, opened the door. He stared into it, then waved me to pass into its dark interior. I hesitated.

  “But there is no true Madness of Joy,” he decided. “Joy is the wine of sanity.”

  Chapter 20

  Two Dogs and a Dead End

  I stood alone in an alley. At first I supposed it the same where I’d lain in trash, thinking myself shot dead, pitied by a stray dog. My eye searched for a shattered window, El looking down while Rayne looked up, despising the man he’d been a minute past. But no, behold a different alley and daytime sky. By smell somewhere close to the river. High buildings upon all sides, lacking windows or doors.

  No, one door remained. I turned about, expecting the magical portal gone, vanished in the usual dramatic mystery. But there it waited, a shadow-filled frame. Then out trotted Lucy, Dog of Wonder. Wagging tail to greet me and the sudden day. She sat and scratched, waited for what adventure would come.

  A bend in the alleyway prevented sight of the street. But footsteps and voices echoed warning that others approached. Back end of a long alley by the docks? It’d be cutthroats come to share a bottle and a stolen purse. I drew sword, readied footing. Mad violence was my life of late. Once it was of a normal violence. This facing of dockside ruffians made pleasant nostalgia. Better than confronting hell-beast automatons. Or newlyweds with knives. God forbid a dead housemaid with a pistol.

  “Elspeth shot me,” I told the dog. It looked up, chocolate eyes concerned. Did it understand? I didn’t understand. Elspeth had shot me. And Lalena had run off. Her kindly uncle near throttled me. Anger for these injustices had me near slashing at the walls like the automaton with my coat. Which reminded me, an automaton had my coat. How nice it’d be to actually fight, instead of stumbling through a play writ to mock.

  Around the alley bend came a motley band. A woman in black dress and veil, an ancient sailor. Between them, walking by their aid, an old fellow with front shirt turned bloody rag. A black dog trotted behind. Then a rag-clad boy with dandelion hair, a tatter-dressed girl, hair tangled as ivy vines. Dragging a broom that muttered soft swish, swish to the dirty bricks.

  I knew the broom. That broom was old acquaintance. So also the girl and the boy and the dog. And of a sudden I knew where I stood and when I stood. And who’d come next down the alley. And so I smiled, for I welcomed this part of the play.

  The strange group halted, considering me. I bowed, moved aside, waved them towards the impossible door. Ha! Wonderful to play the mysterious stranger, conductor of the magic. For a moment they hesitated, then the veiled woman nodded, urging the wounded man on. The boy stared, eyes round shillings to pay for the wonder of me. While the tangle-haired girl frowned, grim as general considering the placement of troops. She jerked an elfin chin back down the alley.

  I nodded to say, understood. Tapped blade to say, orders received.

  Orders given, she darted on through the dark passage. The strange group disappeared. Excepting the dog, who stopped to sniff and greet the dog beside me. They might have been mirror images, ragged-furred twins with chocolate eyes, wet black noses twitching happy to meet a friend. Of a sudden, quick as blink, the dark door disappeared. Blank wall behind me now, no exit.

  More steps, in no hurry. Laughter as well. Men with swords ready for easy murder. Coming into view they stopped, surprised to find one spadassin and two dogs, and no huddle of innocents.

  “Where’d they go?” asked the first.

  “Who’s this fell
ow?” asked the second.

  “You,” demanded the third. “Where’d them kinder get to?”

  I felt no interest in answering. Not just because they wouldn’t comprehend the answer. Nor because they were dock ruffians unworthy of the dogs’ respect, much less a spadassin’s. But they were dead. Years passed, I’d seen these three lying still-warm corpses. One with throat neat cut, one with throat ripped away. Third with head bashed to bloody mud. The sight had frightened me then. Not for the blood, but because it had no explanation. And now I knew: I was the explanation.

  “Elspeth shot me,” I informed the three. That was a mystery I needed to declare. It felt good to share with someone, even the doomed. Sounded mad, no? I knew it so. Yet could one take the time to explain, it stood as sane a declaration as praise for a teapot‘s ambition to be a man. The three exchanged glances.

  “Who’s Elspeth?” asked one, looking for a girl with pistol. He considered the dogs.

  “You aren’t seeming shot,” weighed the other, suspicious.

  The third shrugged away mystery, gave me brotherly wink. “The girls aren’t no good in bed ‘less they want to kill you, friend.”

  I considered that answer. It seemed tavern wisdom. Half wise. No, it seemed wrong.

  “No,” I told him. I waved blade about, sketching my thoughts. “For sure El didn’t know it was me. She was on a mission. She saw a shadow at the window. But God in Heaven and Devil in New Jersey, Elspeth O’Claire shot me. And she’s been dead nigh two years.”

  Again the three exchanged glances. They could make no sense of it. No more than could I.

  “Drop the sword, squire,” commanded the middle fellow. “We’ve no quarrel.” Of course he followed talk of peace with sudden lunge. I’d have been more surprised by a war cry. I parried, corkscrewed. He was not taken so easily. He jumped aside. Alas, same time the fellow to his right leaped forwards. The two tangled, one tripping the other. I laughed. The two dogs leaped upon the fallen. The fellow to the right made a hesitant lung. I parried, reached, drew him a neat red line across the throat.