Bad to Worse

by Edeson, Robert;

  The office door was open, with Paulo sitting at his desk. Worse followed Paulo in, and glanced at an image on Paulo’s screen as he crossed to Edvard’s desk.

  ‘Who’s that?’ he asked.

  Paulo turned around, wondering whom Worse could be addressing. He found Worse looking at him and pointing to the image. He looked back at the screen himself.

  ‘Do you see a face?’ he asked.

  Worse came closer to study it.

  ‘I did fleetingly. Now I’m not certain. What is it?’

  ‘It’s a blotching from the wall in the first cavern. There are thousands of them. Hieroglyphs of some kind, we assume. We are hoping to get better pictures with the lighting you brought in.’

  Worse nodded and sat at his desk to work on aspects of the Mortiss connection to the Ferendes gleaned from the documents in La Ferste. He found himself not concentrating, and after a few minutes interrupted the silence.

  ‘Paulo, sorry. What program did you have that blotching open in?’

  Paulo turned around.

  ‘Pel-Lucida.’

  ‘Would you mind bringing the same one up again and showing me its negative?’

  Paulo looked puzzled before turning back to the screen and reloading the image. Nicholas leaned over from his desk to see. It was a simple matter for Paulo to digitally reverse the contrast, but the effect was dramatic.

  ‘My God,’ said Nicholas. ‘It is a face. Isn’t it?’

  ‘Possibly,’ said Worse, more reserved.

  Paulo was looking at the screen, smiling broadly. He loaded multiple others, doing the same transform. None was unequivocally a human face, but all looked vaguely as if they might be. This potentially changed the significance of the cave discovery completely.

  ‘What colour is the cave rock?’ asked Worse. ‘Pale, I take it?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Nicholas. ‘The blotchings are generally dark markings on an almost white surface. A marble, we think.’

  ‘And the large silhouette figure? Pale with dark edges?’

  ‘As far as I could see, yes,’ said Nicholas.

  Paulo turned toward Worse and Nicholas.

  ‘What are you suggesting, Worse?’

  Worse sat back, staring at a reversed blotching on Paulo’s screen, trying to recapture that instant of complete confidence when he first looked as he entered the room.

  You say the art is lost.

  He was struggling to assimilate ideas, and only managed to form an argument as he spoke, beginning tentatively, then with increasing cogency.

  ‘We have a coincidence of findings here that we can form into a ridiculous hypothesis.’

  Nicholas and Paulo leaned forward expectantly.

  ‘These people, these Neolithic people, had a giant darkroom in the form of the cave. They had a source of silver halides within their josephites. We know that they valued that mineral because they troubled to mine it, and were sufficiently observant of its properties to use it for scintillation lighting, so you believe. That strongly suggests they would also have noted that josephites darken in sunlight. In fact, they must have known that, in order to prevent it happening during transport to the cave, where according to Nicholas the specimens are pristinely transparent. They potentially had flash illumination as you saw with that almost explosive terebinth flare. And we can suppose they probably had primitive natural lenses in the form of fortuitously biconvex josephites.’

  ‘You’re saying they had photography? Flash photography? You’re saying these blotchings are photographs?’ said Nicholas.

  ‘That’s the ridiculous hypothesis,’ said Worse. ‘They would be negatives, of course. The remaining question is the chemistry: what did they use to develop and fix the images? You said that you thought seki juice was used to stain the rock, that blotchings were painted in some way. Maybe the seki wasn’t a stain but part of the photographic process. The other thing we don’t know much about is terencium. As the rarest of rare earths and the most recently discovered, it’s the least understood. Maybe terencium halides are also photo-reactive and behave differently from silver salts on that particular rock surface. And, for all we know they might be sensitive to wavelengths more exactly suited to terebinth light.’

  Worse stopped to let the others speak.

  ‘That is fantastic,’ said Nicholas. He was already thinking of the next step. ‘We need to lift one off en bloc and get the whole surface analysed.’

  ‘I think you’re on to something, Worse,’ said Paulo.

  ‘Actually, that might be too destructive. But we should try to reproduce their methods, to establish feasibility,’ continued Nicholas.

  ‘Well, it’s a circumstantial mix for now,’ said Worse, replying to Paulo.

  ‘… using only materials that were available to them,’ said Nicholas to the room generally.

  ‘It is that very circumstantial mix that was, in fact, available to them,’ said Paulo quietly to Worse.

  ‘Then we need to decode the blotchings numerically and establish that they are irregularly focused images,’ said Nicholas.

  Worse and Paulo smiled to each other. Nicholas was way ahead with planning a research programme.

  ‘Photography! I love ridiculous.’ Nicholas was typing rapidly as he spoke. ‘Who remembers anything about Zernike polynomials?’

  ‘Paulo, can I have a copy of the blotchings album?’ said Worse.

  ‘And Edvard,’ said Nicholas. ‘Edvard will have to get some specialist chemists involved in this. Some old-school photography scientists as well. And spectroscopists. And more computing. And more maths.’

  The campus at the Edge had just enlarged by several buildings.

  There had been no further visits to the cave since the police operation to recover Glimpse. Paulo considered it too hazardous for the two of them alone, and suspended the survey until an expert team was organized by Tøssentern, or at least they had devised suitable measures against the Shuffler crab danger. Having Worse with them altered the balance. He was keen to see the cave, and he would assist in the task of transporting and installing the improved lighting brought in from Madregalo.

  There was extra motivation now, too. The photographic theory of the medallions made Paulo and Nicholas anxious to examine them anew, and to seek Worse’s views on their appearance in situ. The expedition was set for the following day, and they spent some of the evening planning, packing kit, and briefing Worse.

  They started out at 6.00 am, heavily laden with generator fuel, batteries, rope, camera gear, and the new lighting system. It was hard trekking, and they needed frequent rests. During one of these, Paulo shared his thoughts.

  ‘You know, Nicholas. This isn’t going to work when the team arrives. Not everyone will be fit enough for what we’re doing. We need to be able to get vehicles in for equipment anyway, or for emergencies. For one thing, we’ll have to replace the generator with something much bigger, and that means transporting diesel in by tanker, not backpacks.’

  ‘You’ll have to ask Edvard for a road survey and a bulldozer crew,’ said Nicholas. ‘At least all that can be sourced from Madregalo.’

  ‘From everything you two have described, you’ve discovered a world heritage site,’ said Worse. ‘I would have thought that means high-level authorization, environmental impact studies, international best practice assets management. Will Edvard fix all that?’

  Paulo exchanged looks with Nicholas.

  ‘If you want to see a typical Ferende environmental impact statement, Nicholas and I will take you to the northern plain. Until last year, the Chinese were destroying hundreds of square kilometres of forest for milling, followed by ripping up the subsoil for rare-earth mining. Luckily the attack on Feng generated enough superstition to close it down.’

  ‘Let’s hope the standards improve,’ said Worse, shouldering his pack. ‘I don’t think I told you that before he hit on josephites, Glimpse was scavenging those abandoned mine stocks for terencium ore and smuggling it to the States.’

&nbs
p; At the entrance to the cave, Nicholas and Paulo repeated their well-practised routine of fuelling the generator, reorganizing loads for the descent, and checking torches. Paulo reiterated for Worse the climb hazards of the first section, and advised how he would call them at each point, and how Worse should acknowledge.

  The hazard not discussed was the Shuffler. Paulo was hopeful that given the creature’s size, the z-bend in the tunnel would present a natural impediment, if not a complete barrier. What wasn’t known was whether there were smaller relatives able to get through, yet still large, upright and agile enough to be a danger. Also, they didn’t know at this stage whether there were other routes into the first chamber. But the key to safety, as Paulo had consistently argued, was good lighting, and the main purpose of today’s expedition was to install more wattage while they had Worse’s assistance.

  Nicholas, while conscious of the risks, was more driven by his excitement in the science and human history. In the chamber, when he threw the switch on a new floodlight, it was pointed toward the tunnel access. There was the great pale shadow picture, ten metres high, legs splayed and arms wide, dominating the entrance like a giant fertility goddess.

  ‘To paint their emulsion that far up, they would have needed ladders, or some kind of demountable scaffold,’ said Nicholas.

  ‘It would be the same for these,’ said Paulo, redirecting the flood to the main blotching wall. It was Worse’s first clear sight of them. He walked across to where Nicholas had left a camping stool beside the camera tripod, sat down, and stared at the enormous medallion matrix illuminated before him. It was beautiful art, more visible to human eyes than ever in its history.

  ‘Sunt lacrimae rerum,’ he said softly.

  Paulo and Nicholas came over. Both sensed Worse’s emotion about what he saw, and hesitated to speak. Eventually, Nicholas could no longer restrain himself.

  ‘What do you think?’

  Worse took time to answer.

  ‘I can understand why you thought they were elements of language,’ he said. ‘They do look palaeographic, I imagine. Similar to each other, but sufficiently different. You would need to determine repetition rates, obviously, and identify a classification. I presume you are looking at that. You’re the experts.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ said Nicholas impatiently. ‘But what do you think, Worse? What are you seeing?’

  ‘Well. They don’t strike me as human faces in any obvious way. Otherwise, you would both have had that thought already. All the same, what I see here, and I’m not sure why, are people. I think you have discovered a kind of national portrait gallery.’

  Paulo and Nicholas were looking intently at Worse as he spoke. Both shifted their gaze to the blotching wall when he had finished.

  Worse wanted time to be alone with his thoughts, and with the incredible document of unknowable human experience displayed before him. He stood up and moved away from the other two.

  Fire and shadow and night: certainly. But this was a passing-piece more intimate, perhaps more sacred, than any other. Worse faced the wall, absorbed in its meaning. These people had devised a language of identity, recording who they were, not how they lived. Each medallion was a form of signature, asserting to posterity its owner’s life. And here was left their written being, defiant and intensely personal, kept in darkness for the ages.

  Some good remains in brilliant fragments, awaiting resurrection.

  Worse felt grieved, and honoured to be reading it. This was the trace humaine made visible. For his ability to see, and for his understanding, he was thankful to interpreters, who are the poets of art and loss.

  25 LATENT IMAGE

  Welcome to Dante where the local time

  Is Paradise Now! and the weather Divine.

  Feast on twicing

  Doubled in icing

  Sing Dante ti amiamo in triple the rhyme.

  Worse flew direct La Ferste–Los Angeles, overnighted to make the best Air Asphodel connection, and arrived in Dante early Tuesday afternoon. He was collected at the airport by Thomas in a police vehicle. Their meeting was warm but not effusive. On the ride to the BHEH, Thomas pointed out a few sights of interest, but neither was talkative. In town, he drove Worse along the historic Main Street, which was closed to normal traffic, and pulled over outside a building on the north side, lowering the driver’s window.

  ‘That’s where the session will be on Thursday. It’s walking distance from your hotel.’

  Worse looked across, in front of Thomas, but said nothing. Thomas resumed driving, keeping the car at crawling speed as Main Street functioned as a pedestrian mall.

  ‘You prepared, Richard? For Thursday?’

  ‘I’m prepared. There’s one idea I’d like to follow up. I’ll charter a helicopter tomorrow. I want to take a look with a metal detector at the exact location where the drone was recovered. I know the coordinates from military surveillance.’

  ‘You don’t need a charter, cousin. That comes under official police business. I’ll take you out in Sheriff Bird. Would first thing in the morning suit?’

  At the BHEH, Thomas left the patrol car on the concourse and walked inside with Worse. He sat in the lobby lounge making phone calls while Worse checked in and carried his bags to his room. When Worse rejoined him, Thomas was looking at the bar menu.

  ‘I take it they didn’t serve a meal on your flight, Richard?’

  ‘No, they didn’t.’

  Thomas handed the menu to Worse.

  ‘The steak sandwich is best. Can I get you one?’

  Thomas called a waiter over, and ordered for them both. That done, they chatted for several minutes on matters ranging from Arizona geography to email security. Worse brought the subject back to the safety board meeting.

  ‘When does Walter get in, do you know, Thomas?’

  ‘He’s on a tight schedule. Arrives tomorrow afternoon, evidence Thursday morning, and leaves on adjournment. You’ve never met Walter?’

  ‘No. But he’s close to people I’m close to,’ said Worse.

  ‘You’ll like him. But you do know Anna?’

  ‘We met last year in the Ferendes. Anna and Edvard.’

  ‘She’s a very nice person, Anna. I’m sorry she can’t be here for this second hearing. She had a lot of interest in Walter’s situation.’

  ‘Anna’s been helpful to me,’ said Worse, ‘filling in about the board proceedings last time, and a little about Dante, where to stay and so on. If she hadn’t told me about the limerick custom, I would have been rather mystified at the cabin crew announcement when we landed. I’ve also been reading the book by Monica Moreish, on Anna’s recommendation, for homework.’

  Thomas smiled. ‘People don’t refer to them as limericks here; they just say them. It can be a sensitive issue with some folk. Best advice is take it all seriously and save up any guffaws for the privacy of your hotel room.’

  Their meals were served on a coffee table in front of them. Worse was surprised at the elegance of the presentation. Thomas insisted on signing the tab.

  ‘Speaking of hotel room, what’s your number?’ asked Thomas.

  ‘Five-one-two.’

  ‘I chose that; I hope you don’t mind,’ said Thomas. ‘There’s a lot of interest in the mystery stranger come to give evidence, and not all of it will be welcoming. That room is a little easier to keep secure. If you have no objection, I would like to place a twenty-four-hour guard outside.’

  ‘No objection, Thomas. I’ll keep the guffaw volume low.’

  Worse was looking around as he ate. ‘Who is that party?’ He tilted his head toward the other end of the lobby, and across the lounge space from where they sat. He had an idea already.

  ‘I’ve seen them. That party,’ said Thomas, stressing the words, ‘will be waiting for the presidential suite to clear. That’s Regan Mortiss, brother William on her left, and the man about to stand up is the most errant confessor in Chicago. His name is Sendoff. He and Regan spend time together. Night-time.’


  ‘I’ve followed Sendoff’s curriculum vitae, so to speak, online. He needs to be investigated as an accessory to murder. So does the brother.’

  ‘Jeez, Richard. How do you know?’

  ‘I’ll pass you an evidence file on Friday. The victim was a corrupt accountant named Tweisser. I suspect he’s deep in Lake Michigan. She’s the killer.’

  Worse looked again at the others. Sendoff had walked to the reception desk. ‘How could you tell he was about to stand up?’

  ‘Body language. He’s Regan’s personal bellhop, and I read feminine imperative in the pointed finger.’

  Now Regan also stood, walking slowly toward Sendoff while taking a call. She was tall, slim and beautifully dressed. Despite the subdued interior lighting, she had on sunglasses. Thomas noticed Worse watching her.

  ‘Be careful with her, Richard. She never moves without a shoulder bag and we know what’s in it. She can relieve you of half an earlobe at thirty paces.’

  ‘She’s really that good?’

  ‘She certainly used to be.’

  They had finished eating, and Worse shifted in his chair to put the Mortiss party behind him.

  ‘How often does she get to Dante?’ he asked.

  ‘Infrequently, now. The family owns a lot of property but they don’t like the place. The connection to Area Pi was a complete surprise to us, I regret to say.’

  Worse nodded. He was reprocessing the conversation as he listened.

  ‘What did you mean by “used to be”?’

  Thomas showed no surprise at Worse’s delayed question.

  ‘She was once our junior state pistol champion. By her mid-twenties, her scores were falling off and she gave away competition.’

  ‘Do you have an opinion as to why that might have been?’

  Thomas smiled. ‘You are persistent, cousin. Rumour has it there’s a vision problem in the family. Retinitis maybe. We haven’t had just cause to examine their medical records.’

  Their plates were cleared. Thomas excused himself to make a short call.

  ‘I want to introduce you to someone. He’ll be along in a minute,’ he said when finished. ‘What are your plans? Can I give you a lift anywhere?’