“And if you must,” he said, “I shall be with you.”
He might have said more, but the butler interrupted him.
“Yes, Booth?” he murmured as the old man bent down to whisper in his ear. Callender rose, bowed to the ladies, and hurried out into the hall.
And there in the twilight stood the gaunt form of Mr Entwistle. “I know how these things are, sir,” he said, “and I would not wish to keep you waiting.” He handed Callender a few small objects tied in a handkerchief. “His rings, his pins, and his watch,” he said.
Callender cringed, but thanked the undertaker nonetheless.
“I understand entirely,” said Mr Entwistle. “It is not all uncommon for young gentlemen to experience a temporary embarrassment while waiting for the reading of the will. You may be sure that your uncle’s estate will compensate us for our trouble.” He bowed and slithered back into the gathering darkness.
Reginald Callender stood with his uncle’s jewelry in his hand and a wave of disgust pouring over him. While Felicia worried about souls, he was forced to concern himself with the problem of raising enough money to keep the household in order. It was hardly gentlemanly behavior; in fact, it was almost like robbing the dead. Still, his uncle’s adornments had been visible in the open coffin, yet had been rescued from the grave. Supported since childhood by the investments of his mother’s brother, Callender truly had no notion of supporting himself except to sell what came to hand. It was only a temporary aberration, he told himself; soon the estate would make him rich.
Still, he was angry with himself, and more angry with Felicia for concerning herself with spirits when he was so desperate for material comfort. He saw the maid hurrying across the hallway and called out to her.
“Alice,” he said, “come here for a moment.”
The girl came slowly toward him.
“Are you happy with your position here?”
“Oh, yes sir,” said Alice.
“And were you happy with my uncle?”
Alice blushed and nodded.
“Then we shall continue the same arrangement now that I am master?”
“Just as you say, sir,” said Alice.
“Very well. My visitors will be leaving soon. I shall expect you later this evening, Alice. Everything will be as it was before. I will expect you at ten. And bring my uncle’s riding crop.”
II. The Resurrection Men
The boy with the crowbar strapped to his leg ordered another pint of beer. He rarely drank the stuff, because it cost too much and he had no head for it anyway, but tonight he felt as jumpy as a cat, and certain of enough money to buy a whole barrel if he liked. And anyway, he told himself, it would be Syd’s fault if he got drunk. They had agreed to meet an hour ago in this pub, “The World Turned Upside Down,” and since Syd was so late, it became necessary to keep buying beer. Henry could hardly expect to stay inside without spending money, and even at that there had been a few jokes about his age, but Henry Donahue was unconcerned. He was fifteen, after all, and old enough to drink all he could hold, and old enough to rob a grave. Still, he wished Syd would hurry.
Henry had picked the place himself, even though he had never been inside before, partly for its proximity to Kensal Green and partly because he had always liked its sign. Whether the globe on it was really upside down he could not have said, but something in the idea appealed to him. And things were quiet enough inside, which he supposed was good, though he would have preferred enough of a crowd to make him feel a bit less conspicuous. He was looking around the dim room, convinced that all the other patrons were watching him, when he saw the door open and Syd’s sharp, pimply face peer in. Henry gulped down the last of his drink and walked briskly toward the door. Syd was half way inside, but Henry pushed him out again.
“Let me come in for a minute, will you?” protested Syd.
“You’re late enough without dawdling here any longer, don’t you think?”
“I know, I know, but I’m cold enough already, aren’t I? Is it my fault if I couldn’t get away?”
“It’ll be your fault if we’re any later, Syd. I can’t be out all night, you know.”
“You smell like you already have been, mate. A fine thing, drinking on the job. You won’t be much good for picking locks now, will you?”
Henry grabbed Syd’s arm to quiet him. A lamplighter was shuffling down the empty street toward them, the yellow fog of London dimming the light of the small hand-lamp he carried. The two boys leaned against the building with feigned unconcern, Henry gazing at the sign while Syd read the words guaranteeing the availability of Courage and Company’s Entire and wondered how much of it Henry had consumed. The old man climbed up his ladder, turned the gas cock, applied his lamp, and scrambled down again, leaving the entrance to the public house only a little brighter than it had been before. The boys waited until his footsteps had died away.
“You were really scared of him, weren’t you?” sneered Syd. “Maybe you should run home now and forget all this, Henry.”
“I’m not scared of anything. But there’s no point in letting anyone know what we’re up to, is there? Burke and Hare were hanged, weren’t they?”
“They were murderers, you dunce, and we’re not even stealing bodies. There’s no market for ’em anymore, is there? All we’re doing is relieving the old gent of some jewelry that he’ll never miss. It would be a crime to let it rot with him, wouldn’t it?”
“Not a crime you can be charged with,” Henry said.
“Well, if you don’t want the money, mate, you run along.”
But Henry was already walking toward the cemetery, pulling his cap down over his shaggy red hair and turning his collar up against the cold and the eyes of passersby.
“You’re sure he’s got all this stuff on him, are you, Syd?”
“I saw it, didn’t I? There’s not much else to do when you work for an undertaker but look at the bodies. Just like there’s not much for an apprentice locksmith to do but learn how to open things. I’ve just been waiting to meet a partner like you, Henry. We’re in business now, you know, and we have splendid prospects.”
The closer they got to Kensal Green the more unhappy Henry was. The houses were thinning out here, the lights were farther apart, and the fog filled the empty spaces. Henry began to feel as if he were lost somewhere out in the countryside, and would have happily turned back at once except for a certain reluctance to disgrace himself in front of Syd: it was easier to face corpses than to admit to a boy a year older than himself that he wanted nothing more out of life than to be back in his bed in a garret.
Henry watched his feet slip over the damp cobblestones; they were almost all he could see. The dark was bad enough, but the fog was worse. “We’ll never find it,” Henry said.
“What do you mean, we’ll never find it? We’re here!”
Henry looked up and saw something like a temple looming through the mist. There were columns and walls and fences, and it looked to him less like a churchyard than the Bank of England. The gigantic gates were clearly locked, and he could perceive nothing behind them but another wall of impenetrable fog.
“I don’t want to open those gates,” he said. “Someone might come along.”
“Don’t worry,” Syd insisted. “We’ll just climb the wall.”
“What’s the use?” said Henry. “We can’t find anything in there. The fog.”
“I know where it is, don’t I? How many times have I been here, eh? It’s my job. Just give me a leg up. Come on, over here.”
Henry almost ran away, but he didn’t. Instead he hurried toward the sound of Syd’s voice, and was almost relieved to be touching someone else, even if it was his partner in a crime that he would have willingly abandoned. At least he was not alone. He squatted, close to the ground where the air was a little clearer, and made his hands into a cradle for Syd’s foot.
Syd scrambled up, and Henry thought for an instant that he had broken a wrist. He grunted, and then lost Syd in
the fog. “Where are you? Are you up?” A hand dropped down to him.
“Here. Grab it. Come on. Get off the street!”
Henry grabbed onto Syd’s wrist and felt himself hauled up against the wall, scraping and squirming until he reached the top. “You’re up?” said Syd. “Then drop down,” and suddenly Henry was alone again.
He looked into the opaque night, shivered at the thought of an observer, and dropped into the darkness. He landed on Syd, and both of them tumbled on the wet grass of All Soul’s Cemetery.
“That’s fine. You’ll kill us both.”
“Are we in? Where are we, Syd?”
“Kensal Green, my boy. We’re in. Follow me.”
“Wait a minute, Syd! Where are you? You can’t know where we’re going.”
“I tell you I know this place like I know my mother, even if I haven’t seen her for years.”
“Give us your hand then, will you? I’m lost.”
“Take hold then. You’ll hold a prettier hand than this one, once we’re done.”
Henry hung onto Syd, wandering through a sea of fog that might have been Heaven or Hell. From time to time a monument loomed up, a spire or an angel or a slab. Some of them were huge. He let Syd drag him through the clouds. It was so cold that his nose began to run, and all at once he was hungry. “We’ll never find it, Syd. Let’s go home.”
“No. We’ll never find it?”
Something loomed in the fog. Henry blinked twice and then sat down. “It’s big enough,” he said.
“The lock is small.”
A gray box squatted in the yellow fog. A stone box, its roof pointed, with pillars beside the door. Two figures made of marble stood on either side of the door; they looked to Henry like women in night-shirts. He couldn’t see much, but what he saw was enough.
Syd knocked on the door while Henry shuddered. “Mr Callender’s residence?”
“Don’t do that, Syd.”
“No? Think he’ll wake up, do you? Don’t worry, I threw his guts away myself. If he did rise up, he’d fall right over.”
“That’s not funny.”
“Don’t laugh, then. Just open the door.”
“I can’t.”
“You haven’t even tried yet. You’re terrified, that’s what’s wrong with you.”
“I can’t see, can I? How do you expect me to work?”
“I got a bunch of Lucifers, and I told you what the lock is like. Just work. The sooner you start, the sooner we’ll be out of here.”
Syd lit a match, and the way it colored his eyes was enough to send Henry toward the lock. He reached in his pocket and produced several instruments.
“I’d love to know how to work those.”
“I’ll teach you. Then you can do this by yourself.”
“Don’t be like that. Just a few more minutes, and we’ll be rich men, Henry. You take care of the lock, and I’ll take care of the body, all right?”
“Splendid,” muttered Henry, his stiff fingers fumbling. He heard something snap, then wished he hadn’t. Syd pushed him toward the metal door, and it fell away before them into hideous blackness. Henry twitched and looked toward the sky, but all he saw was the name “Callender” carved in the marble over his head. He lost his balance and sprawled against a wet wall as Syd shoved him into the house of the dead. The stink of dying flowers turned his stomach. He sat down in a corner and watched Syd strike another match and light a candle with it. The light flickered around stone walls like slabs. Henry looked outside and glimpsed a shadow. “There’s something out there, Syd.”
“Ghosts.”
“Don’t be smart, I saw a dog.”
“Then shut the door and he won’t see us.”
“Too late for that,” he said, but he pushed the iron door back.
Immediately he felt trapped. He hurriedly caught the edge of the door before it could swing shut, pulled the crowbar out from under the leg of his jagged trousers, and braced it against the jamb. The opening allayed his fear slightly, even when he saw wisps of fog drift through it, but Syd was not pleased with his handiwork.
“What do you think you’re doing with that, then? Have you been walking stiff-legged all night so we could have a doorstop? Give it here.”
Henry handed it over reluctantly, unhappy to be farther from the exit and closer to the sinister oblong of stone that brooded in the center of the small, dark room. Syd stuck the candle to the floor with its drippings, then turned to the sarcophagus and began to pry off its lid. Henry backed away at the hideous sound of scraping, grating stone and put one foot outside the tomb, relieved to find that they were not already imprisoned by some uncanny force. Syd pushed and grunted against the ponderous weight while Henry prayed that he would fail to move it.
“You could help,” gasped Syd.
“A bargain’s a bargain. The lock was my job, and the body’s yours.”
“It’s only another box in there. It won’t hurt you.”
“I know it won’t, since I’m not going near it.”
“All right, then!” Syd threw himself furiously on the bar and the stone slab tilted ominously. For an instant he hung counterbalanced in the air; then the lid screeched and fell to the floor with a crash that sounded to Henry like the end of the world. And at the same instant Syd dropped on the other side and snuffed out the candle. The echoing tomb was black.
“Oh my God,” whispered Henry.
“He’s not likely to be much help to you when you’re on a job like this one, is he, mate?”
Something shuffled in the dark, and another of Syd’s matches burst into flame, making his face as red as a painted devil’s, but no less reassuring to Henry for that. He was amazed to discover that he had not run away, then realized that he had been too startled to move. Syd lit the broken candle and handed it to him. “Hold this,” he said.
“I don’t want to look.”
“Of course you do. I’ll bet that’s half of why you came.”
Henry didn’t answer, but neither did he turn away when Syd approached the oaken coffin in its bed of stone. The candle flame shimmered in his shaking hand, and he knew without a doubt that when the coffin opened a hideously mouldering corpse would rise from its depths and drag him straight to Hell. He thought he heard a dog howl somewhere outside. He closed his eyes. Wood croaked, and then he heard Syd groan. The groan rose into a wail.
“We’ve been robbed!”
“What?” Henry opened his eyes, and for an instant saw nothing but Syd’s red, furious face.
“Look for yourself! It must have been old Entwistle, the grasping, bloody bastard. He’s taken it all. The rings, the watch, the stickpin, too. There’s nothing left but the damn body!”
Unwilling to believe his ears, Henry moved with the light until he could see into the coffin. He quickly checked the pale fingers and the black cravat. Nothing gleamed on them. He began to curse, then realized that he was staring into the face of a dead man.
It was not as bad as he had imagined. Just a plump old boy with rosy cheeks, really nothing to be afraid of; he looked as if he were taking a nap. It was only when Henry’s nostrils caught the mingled odors of flowers, chemicals, and death that his stomach began to heave.
And then the iron door behind him crashed open.
Henry screamed, dropped the candle, and spun toward the sound. Silhouetted against the foggy night stood the gigantic figure of a man, his outstretched arms barring the way out of the tomb. Henry’s mind went blank, his fanciful fear of the corpse forgotten in the sudden and very real conviction that he was doomed. The blood drained out of his face as he saw himself on the gallows, and he could hold on to only one idea: I’m caught, I’m caught, I’m caught. He hardly heard the low, calm voice of the figure at the door.
“Have you found what you seek?”
Henry was amazed to hear Syd’s brassy answer.
“Nah, there’s nothing here. Somebody’s stripped him bare.”
Another match flared. Syd’s hand was steady, h
is expression insolent. “Bring that candle over here, will you, Henry?”
Henry was startled into action, almost believing that Syd’s boldness might somehow set them free. Not even a second flame showed much of the dark intruder’s face as he spoke again.
“These dead are mine.”
“And welcome to ’em,” answered Syd, moving back toward the doorway with the crowbar held behind his back. Henry followed him like a sonambulist, but stopped dead when he saw the tall man’s face. The skin was pale under long, stringy black hair; the lips were hidden by a drooping black mustache; the eyes seemed no more than dark hollows, the left bisected by a scar that ran from brow to chin. The countenance was so expressionless that it might have been a mask.
“It’s not the caretaker,” Henry heard himself saying, “it’s that spirit reader from across the way.”
“That’s torn it,” said Syd, and he swung for the man’s head with the crowbar. The blow never landed. Henry stood frozen and watched a long white hand shoot out to grasp Syd’s wrist while another attached itself to its face, the fingers scrabbling like a pale spider. The man opened his arms in a gesture that seemed almost hospitable, and Syd’s hand came off at the wrist in a shower of blood while the flesh of his face was ripped from the bones.
Henry dropped the candle again and dove for the darkness where the door had been.
He tumbled to the ground in a blind panic and crawled through the yellow fog. He thought about God. He ran.
A tree stopped him. It bloodied his nose and broke two fingers, but he got up and ran again.
A low tombstone caught him just below the kneecap. He rolled in the wet grass and whimpered. Then he arose and limped away.
He couldn’t see where he was going, but he didn’t stop until the agony of his broken leg compelled him to. He rested under a marble angel and waited for death to come.
It came on black wings.
III. The Spiritualist
The house near the cemetery where he had buried his Uncle William was so nondescript that Reginald Callender scarcely remembered having passed it twice before. He was almost disappointed. He had expected something either gaudy or else picturesquely dilapidated and sinister, but Mr Sebastian Newcastle’s dwelling was an unpretentious house of good English brick, perhaps fifty years old. The tall cypresses surrounding it had a slightly funereal air, but that was all. Every window was dark but one, which glowed faintly through the fog-
The Mammoth Book of Vampires: New edition (Mammoth Books) Page 66