Wyntertide

by Caldecott, Andrew

  Salt had made no such sartorial effort. Mud scarfed his boots and lower trouser legs, and he now shared with Ferensen an otherworldly presence.

  ‘A bird – or birds – may have escaped from Lost Acre,’ Orelia said, adding the context.

  Salt’s face darkened. He now found the very name ‘Lost Acre’ unwelcome. ‘In the turmoil of Midsummer Day, I saw flocks of them,’ he replied quietly, ‘desperate for calmer air. They rapped the bubble’s windows – the stuff of dreams or nightmares, depending on your point of view. Many had oversize eyes, suggesting they’re nocturnal.’

  ‘Nothing half-human?’

  ‘None of them wished me a good evening, if that’s what you mean.’ Salt gave Orelia a grin, which she gladly returned. Her favourite curmudgeon had not lost his humour. ‘You did say this year’s Winter Solstice Crossword?’ When Orelia nodded, he said, ‘He’s still among us then, this Calx Bole.’

  The group divided and Salt joined Jones to discuss the replanting of Grove Gardens. In recent weeks, he had felt a kinship with the athlete, although for no apparent reason.

  Gorhambury arrived late, as ever in suit and tie, wearing his chain of temporary office. His contribution to the rebirth of their democratic rights had, like his other contributions to Rotherweird, passed largely unnoticed. ‘Glass of water, please.’

  ‘Even bishops, what we don’t have, drink on Fridays,’ replied Aggs, thrusting the largest available cocktail into Gorhambury’s hand.

  ‘Oh, go on then.’ He skimmed off a bubble with a delicate sip.

  Madge Brown followed with a healthy swig. She too had dressed up.

  *

  Oblong sensed a winding-down – the odd glance at a watch, refills refused, the departure of fringe guests, only for Boris Polk to make a dramatic entrance.

  Anxiety rarely featured in his repertoire of facial expressions. Even when the fire in Deirdre Banter’s tower had threatened destruction, he had maintained a studied optimism – but not tonight. The jaw sagged; fingers raked his flame-coloured hair. Oblong recalled the anonymous finger at Belshazzar’s Feast, dispelling cheer with a doom-laden message. The analogy proved apt.

  ‘I’ve had a visit from Mors Valett,’ announced Boris.

  Orelia recalled Valett’s visit to Baubles & Relics on the morning of her aunt’s death. Undertakers do not deal in good news.

  Boris sounded reluctant to spoil the party, so Valourhand reverted to type, slapping her thighs with impatience. ‘And – and?’

  ‘Finch is missing – incomprehensibly missing.’

  Unease rippled through the party. More guests left, some in shock, so central was Finch’s office to Rotherweird’s constitution, others eager to pass on such dramatic news. With them went Mrs Fanguin, Bert Polk and his wife, the Smiths, Madge Brown and, to Orelia’s disappointment, Hayman Salt. He had lost his appetite for adventure; the Green Man had stolen a chip of his soul.

  Members of the company felt guilty, having barely thought of Finch, despite his position as mainstay of the stand against Sir Veronal Slickstone. His formal office and commanding intellect, his age and eccentric manner of speech all combined to give him a daunting quality; he was more admired than missed.

  Put out by Finch’s tart response to his request to review the documents in Escutcheon Place, Oblong had not even asked him to the party.

  Orelia stood down the musicians and was about to close Oblong’s front door when the stranger appeared, looking up from a lower step: dark hair, strong in face and build, with blue-grey eyes, vivacious but wary. Details of the moment lodged deep, as images can in childhood – the landing’s contours, the pitch of the roof, the empty wine glass perched on the banister, all props in a portrait of him. Colours registered more than materials – dark grey jacket, faded green trousers, heavy brown shoes and a frayed checked shirt. Who on earth was he? And was that look quizzical or mocking?

  ‘Yes?’ she stammered.

  ‘I’m sorry – moth to a flame.’

  He had a mellow voice, and Orelia understood the simile: the loner drawn to the party, the passer-by caught by the music.

  Before she could reply, Oblong intervened. ‘Everthorne,’ he said, ‘how rude of me – do come in.’

  ‘Best wine at the end,’ chirruped Aggs, not immune to good looks despite her age. She pressed a glass into his hand as Boris joined the welcoming committee, recalling Everthorne’s unprompted help in loading his fellow travellers’ luggage onto the charabanc. Boris judged people by their small kindnesses, or the lack of them.

  ‘I like a man who doesn’t mind rain – good to see you again.’

  Boris completed the introductions. The distinctive name and the flecks of oil paint spattering his shirt cuffs confirmed his ancestry.

  After shaking various hands, Everthorne walked straight to the large oak beam above Oblong’s fireplace. ‘Art beetles,’ he said with a smile, tracing the furrows in the wood with his fingers. ‘See? Crocodile, camel, a dog’s head turning back.’ He added a skilful flourish with the tip of a pen-knife and they saw what they would otherwise never have noticed. The likenesses were uncanny.

  Boris, feeling a need for urgent action, intervened. ‘Forgive us, Everthorne, but we have a minor crisis. Our Herald has disappeared.’

  The remark conjured a portrait in Everthorne’s head – The Vanished Herald – full-length, swathes of black and burned umber framing an abstract explosion of creams and greys with, at the centre, a knot of armorial fragments and brilliant colours. The gypsy girl – Everthorne’s instant impression of Orelia – flicked a lock of hair over her right shoulder. Everthorne had known beautiful women – the painter’s privilege – but here he perceived another quality: spirit.

  Orelia felt obliged by her new candidate status to show initiative. ‘Why “incomprehensibly” missing?’

  ‘According to Mrs Finch he worked late in the archivoire with the doors locked. This morning there’s no sign of him and the doors are still locked.’

  ‘Who investigates?’ Orelia asked.

  ‘I do,’ replied Gorhambury, nervously fingering his temporary chain of office. Why on my watch? he thought. Why on mine?

  ‘I have Mrs Finch’s spare keys as a start,’ added Boris.

  ‘Should we be discussing this in front of him?’ muttered Valourhand, nodding towards Everthorne. She was distrustful of handsome men – indeed, anyone other than scientists – and dismissed the artist as no more than a salesman of South Tower fripperies in the wider world.

  His riposte surprised even her. ‘Your Herald might be in the tunnels. He’d have locked up before leaving and may have got lost.’

  ‘How do you know about the tunnels?’ asked Valourhand fiercely.

  ‘My grandfather walked them – he drew them, and mapped them for his own amusement. I was planning a visit.’

  Orelia recalled a painting in Rotherweird’s Art Gallery, in the room devoted to Everthorne Senior’s studies of arches, set in pools of shadow, exquisite in an understated way. ‘It’s true,’ she said.

  ‘Out there’ – Boris waved gently in the direction of wider England – ‘police use artists. Why shouldn’t we?’

  Valourhand withdrew her objection on no more than a hunch that Everthorne might contribute despite the unpromising exterior.

  ‘We take the tunnels, then,’ declared Gorhambury.

  Finch’s disappearance had unsettled everyone. Little was said in Everthorne’s presence, but in their minds theories abounded – abduction, murder, a retreat into hiding or even a visit to Lost Acre – each raising its own subset of questions: why, how and where.

  At least Gorhambury had sounded decisive.

  ‘Mercifully,’ Boris added, ‘Mrs Finch and that dire son of hers have moved out.’ Orelia remembered Mrs Finch from Sir Veronal’s party, a snobbish member of the Snorkel set and visibly disapproving of her husban
d’s unconventional ways.

  Aggs added impetus. After a burst of water from Oblong’s kitchen she announced, ‘The general person clears for greater brains to do the needful.’

  5

  Escutcheon Place Revisited

  Outside, Gorhambury reminded everyone of the location of The Journeyman’s Gist Underground, Ferdy’s replacement tavern during Slickstone’s brief tenure as landlord; it had been their departure point for Escutcheon Place on the night of the fire. As Orelia waited for Everthorne, a threatening sky fleetingly broke to reveal a half-moon riding high. The artist emerged from his lodgings with two faded sketchbooks bound together with string.

  Rotherweird’s circulatory system allowed many routes to the same destination. ‘Highways or byways?’ she asked.

  ‘Veins or arteries? You choose.’

  She decided on the more picturesque side streets. Everthorne lolloped along beside her, peering at the pavement. ‘Moon shadows,’ he said, ‘less sharp than their daylight cousins, and the devil to paint. I’m for the dark cobbles!’

  Now Everthorne took the lead in a crazy hopscotch through the winding alleys. He had a casual energy – not, Orelia felt, generated to impress, but rather his way of interacting with the world. He pointed at any architectural features tha caught his fancy, even as cloud occluded the moon and rain and wind swept in.

  Gorhambury was standing guard by the basement door. They entered to find Oblong, Boris, Jones and Valourhand debating who should carry the two available tube-lights and in what position. Of the former tavern, only one empty barrel survived.

  Boris led the way into the tunnels, tube-light in one hand, compass in the other, with Jones bringing up the rear with the second tube-light. The journey lacked the excitement of the expedition on the night of the fire. They felt leaderless without Finch and Ferensen and, as the effects of Oblong’s champagne wore off, the cold began to bite.

  ‘Follow the carved flowers,’ advised Valourhand, but without Finch the tiny little incised markers merely confused. After half an hour they were undeniably lost, and the compass was proving useless in the face of so many loops and switchbacks.

  ‘We’ve been here before,’ suggested Boris.

  Valourhand shook her head. ‘That was last time.’

  ‘This time too,’ corrected Orelia.

  Gregorius Jones, freaked by the constriction and darkness, had a rush of blood. ‘Finch is out there somewhere – starving, abandoned—’

  ‘No!’ cried Orelia, but, waving his coral-coloured tube, Jones had already rushed down the nearest tunnel. Cries of ‘Finch!’ and ‘Marmion!’ grew ever fainter.

  ‘One down,’ said Fanguin unhelpfully. ‘Who’s next?’

  ‘We’re down to one tube-light too, thanks to that moron,’ hissed Valourhand, back to her usual peppery self.

  ‘Where, I wonder,’ said Boris in an attempt at light relief, ‘in the pantheon of splendid failures, do we place the brave but mindless rescuer?’

  ‘This has been the most shambolic expedition ever,’ added Valourhand.

  Everthorne struck a match and moved up from the rear. ‘Left, right, left, if I’m not mistaken,’ he said, holding out one of the sketchbooks. ‘Grandfather’s,’ he added.

  Boris held up the tube-light and everyone craned their necks over the complex map, meticulously drawn, with each arch marked and numbered. It stretched over several pages, the passages interspersed with random sketches of the druid-carved flowers, bird heads and skulls.

  ‘All right,’ said Gorhambury, ‘you lead.’ He walked behind the artist, tube-light raised over Everthorne’s right shoulder. The procession gathered pace as the map, and Everthorne’s decisive interpretation of it, restored morale.

  They reached the chamber below the cellar of Escutcheon Place without further detour. After lifting the stone slab with ease, Everthorne said, ‘I’d best go find Mr Jones.’

  Gorhambury agreed; they could speak more freely without him. Boris exchanged his tube-light for Everthorne’s matches.

  Orelia liked the way Everthorne blended with people he did not know. That Boris liked him was a further endorsement. When the darkness swallowed him up, she felt deprived.

  They made their way up several staircases to the archivoire, lighting candles as they went.

  ‘We assume this is as Finch left it,’ intoned Boris gravely, unlocking the double oak doors. A great candle flickered on the wooden candlestick as tall as a man. Escutcheon Place worked on natural light, despite the wealth of parchment, dry leather and wood; gaslights presented the greater hazard in Finch’s opinion.

  Boris distributed tapers from a tankard on the central table and other candles quickly flared into life. Shadows danced; the spines of gilded books gleamed; carved heads peered down. They were back in Rotherweird’s forbidden garden, surrounded by their own history. Like an adolescent’s second encounter with alcohol, the impact struck deeper. They drifted from bay to bay, half tourists, half aspiring detectives.

  ‘I see no sign of a struggle,’ said Oblong, but Boris shook his head.

  ‘There,’ he said, pointing at the table in the first alcove.

  At first glance, Boris’ comment baffled them. Finch’s work in progress lay undisturbed on the table, two books open with paper markers at the ready.

  Then the devil crept out of the detail.

  The lid of Finch’s inkpot hung open, and a slick of dried ink ran to the table edge, flecking a magnifying glass on the way – but with no sign of a pen. Finch wrote with drawing pens, slim wooden sticks with exposed changeable steel nibs.

  ‘He was studying The Dark Devices,’ announced Boris, turning the spine for all to see.

  Gorhambury saw the significance instantly. ‘Finch would never leave that lying around.’

  Orelia read aloud from the frontispiece to underline Gorhambury’s point, “This book contains the dark devices, coats of arms designed by Geryon Wynter and his disciples. It was fashioned at Rotherweird and found at the Manor there. Its use or distribution is prohibited by law, and preserved only to ensure that this law is observed and its justification understood.” Sir Robert Oxenbridge.’

  She moved to the first page of shields. The images were insidious, now they knew that every face or monstrous detail was potentially real. The names had been erased, save for those below the three blank shields: Hieronymus Seer, Morval Seer and Fortemain, all refused arms for opposing Wynter. The largest shield at the top, surtitled Magister, had to be Wynter’s. One quarter held a tiny floating head of a fine-looking man with hair curled like a Greek hero. Orelia, peering over Gorhambury’s shoulder, recognised Tyke’s face, immaculately rendered, no bigger than a fingernail. What was he doing there?

  Fanguin, who had not seen the book before, brought his biologist’s eye to bear. Heraldic creatures flourished all over town, on beams, panels, mantelpieces, doorways and balustrades, but the creatures in The Dark Devices were true amalgams: patches of animal hair on human skin, fish-eyes with brows above. The artwork was truly exquisite.

  ‘Painted by Morval Seer,’ whispered Orelia to Fanguin, ‘under duress, before Wynter and Slickstone wrecked her in the mixing-point.’

  From the opposite alcove, Boris waved a thin wooden stick.

  The nib had been bent back, its tip stained a rusty red. ‘This is no way to treat a pen,’ he said. ‘Finch must have fought with the only weapon to hand.’

  Gorhambury spotted the Herald’s keys, still hanging from their hook. ‘But where did the attacker go? Where did Finch go?’ He took out a notebook and jotted down: Table: Dark Devices, ink trail. Floor: damaged pen. Room: locked from the inside.

  ‘I did say “incomprehensibly missing”,’ added Boris, prompting Valourhand to lose her temper.

  ‘There’s no such thing as “incomprehensibly missing”! A man does not vanish into thin air. We look for the data, we ana
lyse, we deduce. What’s the point of twelve eyes if we don’t look?’

  Oblong picked up the second book on the table; the distinctive black binding marked it as another from Wynter’s collection. ‘Dante’s Divina Commedia,’ he read.

  Gorhambury made another note.

  ‘And what does that tell us?’ asked Valourhand curtly.

  ‘Something in The Dark Devices took Finch to this Dante fellow,’ suggested Boris, before hastily adding, ‘or vice versa.’

  ‘Who’s Dante?’ asked Gorhambury.

  Before Oblong could answer, Gregorius Jones jogged in, breaking the spirit of enquiry. ‘No sign of him,’ he announced breezily.

  ‘You got bloody lost – idiot!’ hissed Valourhand, flexing her fingers in irritation.

  ‘The best way to find someone who’s lost is to get lost yourself.’

  Jones’ riposte did not improve her mood.

  ‘Can I be of service?’ added Jones.

  ‘Disappear,’ she replied, snapping The Dark Devices shut as she spoke. ‘It’s the best way of finding others who have.’

  ‘Thank you, Everthorne,’ said Gorhambury wearily as the artist walked in. ‘We’re looking for clues.’

  Boris summarised, avoiding mention of Wynter in front of Everthorne. ‘The doors were locked from the inside and the keys are still here. Finch was working at this table. We found his pen, which he used to defend himself.’

  ‘Or the intruder used it to attack him,’ interrupted Valourhand.

  Boris continued, ‘The candle was left alight, which is not Finch’s practice.’

  Everyone followed Everthorne’s gaze to the skylights above every alcove. The library steps would not reach them.

  ‘There must be a hidden way out,’ he said. They tramped the room, tapping the floor, but found no hint of a cavity.

  For Oblong, his party seemed months away. Nobody had spoken of it – nobody, he felt sure, had even thought of it and certainly nobody had thanked him, such had been the dampening effect of Finch’s disappearance.

  Orelia opened Divina Commedia, dislodging a small strip of paper. ‘Finch marked this page,’ she announced.