by Jan Siegel
On the one hand, there was the possibility Mrs Harkness wouldn’t believe the true story. On the other, since Pen was not the type to invent fantastic lies, she might insist on going to see Mr Pyewackett for herself, and learning the real facts – and in that event, Pen was convinced, she would never be allowed to stay in Temporal Crescent and do her job. And she wanted to. She wanted it more than anything in her life. It was maturity, responsibility, freedom. She had decided she wasn’t worried about the danger element – a house surely couldn’t be dangerous, with or without a front door. Whatever might happen there, she would handle it.
If she got the chance.
‘I think I should go and see this Mr Pyewackett,’ her grandmother said, as predicted.
But Pen had already worked out her response.
‘He’s awfully ill,’ she said. ‘He’s going to... to be gone within a month. He doesn’t see people at all. Only he’s got this thing about my family, because the Tudors always took care of his affairs – and his ancestors’ – like, from way back. He doesn’t have any relatives of his own. He just wants me to stay there till the proper legatee can take over. It won’t be for very long.’
‘It seems a very odd request to me,’ Eve Harkness said. ‘Very odd. What do we know about this butler of his?’
‘You’re acting as if I was a kid,’ Pen said. ‘I know I’m still a minor, but... oh Gran, don’t you see?’ Now, the spirit of truth was in her voice. ‘It’s my chance to... to do something legal. It’ll be an experience I can’t get any other way...’
‘It’s just a house-sit. That won’t teach you anything about the law.’
‘I’d be acting as an executor. That’s not just house-sitting. Honestly, Gran, I’m a teenager. If I’d lived in mediaeval times I’d probably have been married by now.’
‘Yes, but you aren’t. This is the twenty-first century, you’re technically still a child, and you can’t argue your way out of that one. I don’t want to spoil what you see as a great opportunity, but...’
Pen opened her mouth, and shut it again. She knew when it was best to stay silent.
‘What if I came with you? Is there anything that says you can’t do your executing with an adult around?’
‘I... I don’t know if the house is big enough,’ Pen said. She had never really expected her grandmother would permit her to go alone, much as she had wished for it. This at least was half an adventure, and half an adventure was better than none.
Besides, she wasn’t – really – the adventurous type.
‘I’ll ask Quorum,’ she said.
‘HOW ABOUT IT?’ said Mr Pyewackett, the following Saturday. ‘Got it all worked out yet? Ready to move in, are we?’
‘My grandmother wants to come with me,’ Pen said. ‘She insists.’
‘S’pose that’s all right,’ said Mr Pyewackett, rather grudgingly. ‘Just don’t let it stop you doing your job. She mustn’t go nosing about next door, either. Can’t have anyone nosing about... No more nonsense about miners and stuff, hey? You’re a lawyer, aren’t you? A lawyer and a Tudor. Knew my affairs would be safe in your hands. Quorum! Let’s have some sherry. Can’t drink to your success in tea, can we?’
When the sherry came, Pen sipped it distastefully. She wasn’t keen on alcohol.
‘You were going to tell me about the house,’ she said. ‘Number 7. Why did you say it was dangerous?’
‘Said that, did I? Slip of the tongue. No one goes in, no one comes out. That’s all that matters. See to that, and everything’ll be fine.’
‘If no one goes in, no one can possibly come out,’ Pen said. ‘That’s logic.’
‘Using logic on me, hey? Clever girl. You’ll be one who can spot a loophole in an argument a mile off.’
‘You’re dodging the question,’ Pen pointed out. She had honed her examination skills on invisible witnesses in the bath.
‘What question?’ Mr Pyewackett demanded, swivelling his unnerving glare in her direction.
But Pen had no intention of being unnerved. ‘Why is the house dangerous?’ she repeated obligingly.
‘Ah. That question. Long story. Too long for now. Drink up, girl. That’s my best Amontillado.’
‘You’re dodging again.’
‘Calling me a dodger, are you? I won’t have it. Speaking like that to your elders and betters – and I’m as elder and better as they get, believe me. All the same, young people – you and that boy Petal – disrespectful, insolent–’
‘Why is the house dangerous?’
‘Too young,’ declared Mr Pyewackett. ‘You’re too young to understand. It’s a matter of science. Even I don’t really–’
‘If I’m not too young to take care of the place,’ Pen said in her best legal manner, ‘then I’m not too young to know why it has to be taken care of.’
‘That’s the Tudors,’ said Mr Pyewackett with evident appreciation. ‘Sharp as a thorn, dry as a–’
‘Answer the question!’
‘Do I have to?’ the dead man asked of no one in particular.
‘I fear so, sir,’ said Quorum from his stance by the sherry decanter. ‘The young lady is, after all, your legal adviser.’
‘Don’t need any advice.’
‘Nonetheless...’
‘All right, all right.’ Mr Pyewackett paused to take what, in a more animate figure, would have been a deep breath, but in his case he merely rattled his teeth. ‘Difficult to know where to start. The house is old, you see – very old. Been a house here since heaven-knows-when. Didn’t always look the same, of course: must have been Jacobean once, all limed oak and plaster, mediaeval, Roman... Go back as far as you like. There had to be a house, see. Hides the doors.’
‘I couldn’t see a door at all,’ Pen said.
‘Ah well, that’s the trick. Think it doesn’t have one, do you?’
‘Every house must have a door,’ Pen insisted.
‘So where is it, hey? Any ideas?’
This is a test, she thought. If I’m clever, I can work it out. But I need to think... laterally.
‘It’s in here,’ she said at last. ‘It’s in 7A. This is, like, the gatehouse. So the door must be here. Otherwise how could I watch over it?’
Mr Pyewackett grunted and Quorum, she noticed, looked at her with approval. She was careful not to appear pleased with herself, whatever she felt.
‘Right,’ said the corpse edgily, sending another gulp of sherry through the empty corridors of his digestive system. ‘Door’s in here. Quorum’ll show it to you when the time comes. There’s a word for people like you, girl. Can’t remember it right now, but it’ll come back to me. Something to do with smart... fart... tart...’
‘Intelligent,’ Pen supplied.
Mr Pyewackett made the noise which is always written: Harrumph!, though it doesn’t actually sound much like that. His teeth closed with a snap, refused to reopen, and had to be delicately prised apart with a knife by Quorum.
‘Where were we?’ the dead man resumed. ‘Doors. Yes. They say there was only one to begin with, but it grew. They built the walls to keep it in.’
‘To keep what in? The doors?’ Pen was getting confused.
‘That’s it. Doors to... elsewhere. Trouble is, elsewhere can be anywhere, or so they say. They’ve got one of those scientific names for it – a space-time prison, something like that.’
‘Prism, sir,’ Quorum intervened tactfully.
‘Prison – prism – what’s the difference? Go inside and you’re lost. You could wind up anywhere, anywhen. They say the rooms shift about, so the sitting room doesn’t stay the sitting room – it may turn into the bathroom overnight. And once you’re in, you think you’ve always been in the sitting room, see? You think that’s where you belong.’
‘The theory of historical absorption,’ Quorum elaborated, with unexpected erudition. ‘If you travel into the past, history will absorb you. It is believed to be a form of defence mechanism.’
‘But,’ said Pen, ‘but...
how can history defend itself? It’s not a person.’
‘It has to, Miss,’ Quorum said. ‘Otherwise it would be changing whenever someone slipped back a century or three. History wants to stay the same. If it doesn’t you get split universes and divergent realities and a lot of other complications.’
‘Physics,’ said Pen with relief. ‘I see.’ It had all begun to sound a bit like fantasy, but if it was physics, she could deal with it.
And then: ‘Do people often... slip back?’
‘All the time,’ said Quorum. ‘Think about it, Miss. How many people do you know who are obviously living in the wrong century?’
‘It’s not just a matter of time travel,’ Mr Pyewackett continued. ‘There are magical dimensions as well, or so my father told me. Tartarus, Elysium, Elfland, Avalon. History in the sitting room and myth in the library. A load of codswallop if you ask me, but you can’t take risks. In a house like that, anywhere can happen. That’s why it has to be watched, see? All the time. But I’ve been the caretaker for long enough. Someone else can take over now.’
‘Me,’ said Pen, faintly.
‘Goodman,’ said Mr Pyewackett. ‘Bartlemy Goodman. He’s the man. Used to looking after things, so they say. Goodman – a good man. Don’t believe in the power of names, but you never know. You’re the stopgap; he’s the next custodian. You watch the house till he comes. Find him, too. Probably just as well you’ll have your grandmother. Keep you out of trouble.’
Pen didn’t say anything for a while. She was still trying to take it all in, to decide what she believed. Lawyers were supposed to be naturally sceptical, to question everything, to accept nothing, to respect only the law. But you were supposed to believe your clients, whatever they told you. And her client was dead, had clearly been dead some time, and had appointed her as executor of his Will, responsible for a house which he claimed was some kind of space/time labyrinth, until the long-lost heir arrived to assume his position.
Somehow, Pen had the idea the dead couldn’t lie. There would be very little point. All the things people lied for – keeping up appearances, material or emotional advantage, damaging an enemy or a friend – simply wouldn’t matter any more. I will believe him, she decided, because he’s my client. It’s my job to believe him. But as soon as I can, I’m going to check the facts.
‘If I’m looking after the house,’ she said at last, ‘how do I find this Bartlemy Goodman?’
‘That’s up to you,’ said Mr Pyewackett cheerfully. ‘Use your initiative. If you have any.’
As if it was a school project, thought Pen with secret sarcasm.
Felinacious the cat wandered in, fixed Pen with his standard baleful stare, then jumped onto the bed with much creaking of bed-springs and disarranging of covers.
‘You’d better be off now,’ said Mr Pyewackett. ‘Time for The X Factor.’
Thankfully abandoning the rest of her sherry, Pen left.
Eade, twenty-first century
THE WITCH BENT over the basin, gazing into the liquid mirror. Presently, she nicked her finger with a cheese-knife, letting a single drop of blood fall onto the surface, where it spread slowly outwards in filmy scarlet rings. Fingers being prone to bleed, several more drops followed, until she applied a plaster to the cut. It hurt.
She wasn’t a very good witch. She couldn’t zap her enemies with lightning-flashes from her hand, nor did her eyes ever turn luminous and her hair crackle with hidden power. If witchcraft had been mathematics, she would have been at the stage of simple addition and subtraction, with a little long division thrown in when she really tried. Of course, she could add two and two to make six, a fundamental requirement for magic. Sometimes, in her case, they made eight.
She was a witch mainly because it was in her family. Her ancestors had been witches in the days when it was cool to have a hook nose and warts, and fly around on a broomstick. She couldn’t do anything with a broom except sweep, and she wasn’t too keen on that, her nose wasn’t hooked, merely nondescript, and she didn’t have any warts, only the occasional spot. At sixteen, she felt she was too young for the hook-nose-and-warts look. All she had was the gene, some magical accessories, a lot of body-piercing and an occult tattoo. But she had the instincts. She could smell trouble coming, if trouble had a smell. She didn’t know what to do, but she knew a man who did, or would, if she could find him. Bartlemy Goodman, the wizard who never did magic, who had taught her the little she knew – Uncle Barty, as she called him, because he was everyone’s uncle, no matter how old they were. He was an uncle sort of person. Uncle Barty, who had gone nearly a year ago, no one knew where.
Finding him, that was the hard part.
The mirror wasn’t helping.
All she could see was the house – a rather grand house, with high walls cutting it off from the road, and blank windows showing nothing of what was inside. As far as she could tell, the house didn’t have a door, but that might have been a defect of her spell rather than an architectural oversight. She waited for it to change into something more instructive – a vision of doom or disaster, a sickbed with phantoms gathered round its sleeping occupant, a distant figure vanishing down a winding road into eternity. But there was only the house. Probably in London, she decided, on the basis that there were a lot of houses in London. Gradually, it faded away, leaving nothing in its place.
The witch tipped the contents of the basin down the sink with a murmured outcantation to prevent anything unpleasant materialising in the drains. Then she changed the plaster on her cut – the blood had seeped through – and sat down to lay out the cards. The Tarot, with swords and pentacles, cups and wands, and the twenty-two high cards all the way from Death to the World. She shuffled awkwardly, inhibited by her injury and the fact that she wasn’t naturally nimble-fingered, muttering the most effective spell she knew for such things.
‘Double-deal and deal them double
eggs and bacon, toil and trouble,
fingers fleet as beetles’ wings
fiddlefeet and twiddlestrings...
fimble famble fi-foh-fum
there we go, and here we come...’
When the pattern was complete she turned the topmost card.
It was Death.
Infernale
NO ONE BELIEVES in the Devil any more. He went out of fashion with wimples and witch-trials, made a brief comeback with the powdered wig, the bal masqué and the Marquis de Sade, popped up in the London smog somewhere between the crinoline and the bustle, and vanished for good into a world of kitsch horror films in the mid/late twentieth century. Evil went on, of course, but Evil is made by humans; we need no supernatural help for that. But there is someone who feeds off our evil – who feeds it and feeds off it – the Rider of Nightmares, the Eater of Souls, the God of Small Print, and if he no longer wears horns and a tail that is merely a matter of style. Modern thinking belittles him, superstition touches wood for him, children dance around his maypole – but never widdershins, always with the sun. He hides in folktale and fear, in legends and lies – don’t speak his name, or he may hear you, don’t whistle, or he may come to you. If you believe in fairies, don’t clap, for there are darker things than the sidhe in the World Beyond Midnight. Call him a myth, call him a fantasy, for myth and fantasy do not exist.
He exists.
He exists at the top of the Dark Tower, in the circular office with the soft silent carpet, heart’s-blood red, and the gleaming desktop made from the last tree of some long-lost species that grew in Eden before the Fall, and the windows that look out over all the cities in the world. A single lamp stands on the desk; the lamplight gleams on the gleaming wood, and pools on the blood-red carpet, but illuminates little else. Behind the desk a painting hangs on the wall, a painting no one ever sees; a black veil screens the canvas from view. Once in a hundred years he will make a gesture, and the veil will withdraw, and he will gaze at the picture as if reminding himself of something, though he has forgotten nothing since Time began: he is the One
who never forgets. If anyone valued it, it would be the most expensive picture ever painted. The artist was the greatest of his day, perhaps of any day, but the subject – ah, the subject is him. It is his portrait. There is no visible face and little form, only the moulding of the paint, laid on thick as treacle, swelling into a shadowy density of heavy shoulders and looming presence, and in the faceless dimness the eyes, alight with their own bale. They say the artist could see through the eyes into the soul, but what would he see through the eyes of one who has no soul – the Eater of Souls – the Spirit of Emptiness and Despair? No visitor has ever looked on the painting, not even the Fellangels, his highest servants. Only he sees it, once in a hundred years, and gazes into its eyes, and knows them for his own.
‘He had the Sight,’ says the Devil, in the mood for conversation. ‘He was human, which is to say weak, feckless, careless, and selfish. In all his life he only thought of two things: himself and his art. But his vision never failed. Talent is not given to the deserving. If I had only been able to work out the distribution system then I might have been a true creator, a giver of real gifts, instead of the great Cheat, the supreme Liar. But I never did. Sometimes I suspect there is no system. All is random.’