‘In case, Celeste,’ replied the Contessa. ‘And because you might have made something of the knowledge. Did you? No – only a sweet knot of regret in your stomach. But that is enough for me.’
‘How can such an insignificant person as myself command such malice?’
‘You have earned it ten times over.’
‘Why do you risk everything to restore a man who wished your death? Are you so lonely? Are you so old? Are your lovers sickened by your scars?’
The Contessa called with impatience, ‘Professor Trooste, we are past time. Strap the Bride to her marriage bed.’
Acolytes secured Miss Temple to the second table, next to Chang. She did not fight them.
The Doctor shouted to the Contessa: ‘This serves no purpose, madam – her participation is completely unnecessary!’
‘On the contrary, Doctor, it serves several aims in one thrust. Shall I explain? First, Cardinal Chang dies. Second, so does Celeste Temple. Third, Robert Vandaariff is restored.’
‘You know very well that Vandaariff is long gone.’
‘Robert Vandaariff will be restored.’
‘And you will become the next lady of Harschmort? Is it that simple?’
‘I am Robert Vandaariff’s heir!’ Schoepfil insisted, wiping his face on a sleeve. ‘Not that inert felon –’
Miss Temple did not mark the rest of his complaint, nor anyone’s reply. She turned her gaze to Chang. His face was wedged into a gap in the table, but his naked back offered its own portrait, muscles, nicks and scars. His strong arms were sheathed in black rubber, sprouting wire, like a bird’s wings stripped of feathers. Her heart ached for him, as it had never done for herself. Professor Trooste worked between them, connecting hoses and wires from Chang’s table to Miss Temple’s body at the hands and feet. He brought up the rubber mask, dangling cords.
‘Please,’ she whispered. ‘I want to see him.’
‘You will know him inside yourself, to every detail, before you succumb.’
Trooste smoothed her hair aside and cinched the mask in place, so hard her eyes began to tear. With a lurch the table was tipped to the same angle as Chang’s. She could look only forward through the narrow slits, straight at the equally faceless Contessa in her den. The room fell silent. Trooste came forward, dipped his head to the Contessa and began to speak.
‘The tale of The Chemickal Marriage is ancient, a true account of the defeat of corruption and perfect rebirth. A band of chosen guests make possible through their faith a resurrection. First, the royal party is sacrificed. Then the King and Queen, the Groom and Bride, are reborn. Some of this is metaphor. Much more is fact.’
Trooste bowed again to the Contessa. ‘Lord Vandaariff named you Virgo Lucifera, angel of light, the heaven-sent overseer – the celebrant of this most sacred rite. He knew a certain volume would arrive in your possession, madam. He relied upon it.’ Trooste indicated the glass book he had taken from the hamper. ‘Now death is immaterial and the marriage can begin. The ritual will remove the taint of corruption that consumed his body, and thus enact a new covenant. The flesh of life is remade to the flesh of dreams.’
Trooste’s last words were echoed by acolytes as if it were part of a liturgy.
The Contessa nodded gravely. ‘As he was ever the most mighty, so shall Robert Vandaariff be first redeemed.’
Trooste laid a hand on Chang’s scar. ‘The vessel has been prepared, seasoned through the progress of metals. As his essence is restored from the book, our master’s soul will pass through infusions of six sacred alloys, and so by each be cleansed.’ Trooste knelt at an empty slot beneath the table. ‘The glass volume is placed in a chamber charged with quicksilver, the seventh metal. An eighth metal, tincture of bloodstone, protects the vessel himself, serving as an alchemical sieve. The soul will take root in its new home.’ Trooste indicated the hoses that linked Chang to Miss Temple. ‘While the corruption of death is passed on. Into the Bride.’
Miss Temple’s throat burnt. The more fully Trooste detailed the path of violent energy, the more the Comte’s memories confirmed her doom. Trooste moved to where Miss Temple could see his earnest expression. ‘Thus she becomes the embodiment of pure love.’
‘It will kill her,’ declared Svenson.
‘Not immediately. We should have several hours for study.’
‘Wait.’ Mahmoud stepped forward, eyeing the metal tubs with suspicion. ‘Six metals? You’re not going to kill anyone else.’
Trooste blinked and said nothing.
‘You are not,’ repeated Mahmoud, ‘going to kill anyone else!’
‘Of course she is!’ bleated Schoepfil. ‘Don’t be a damned fool!’
‘I’ll do it this instant if you don’t be quiet,’ said the Contessa. She called to Trooste: ‘And his mind will be whole again? The corruption, the madness –’
‘All cleansed, madam. Purity. Rapture. Eden.’
Mahmoud began to protest but Svenson touched his shoulder and addressed Trooste: ‘How do you know this? Today, healing Mrs Kraft, you had no more idea than I.’
‘Lord Vandaariff instructed me, this very night.’ Trooste was a priest describing a revelation. ‘Just as his incarnation informed the child. And all has come to pass as he foretold. The Vessel returned for consumption, the Bride to accept the sin, the Virgo Lucifera to enforce heaven’s will. He knew. And he will know again.’
Trooste raised his hands like the conductor of an orchestra. A snapping sound came from Doctor Svenson’s hands. In a stride he reached Trooste and plunged the broken tip of a blue glass key into his neck. The blood around the wound stiffened to glass, cracking as Trooste’s throat filled. The wound bulged and his face darkened to purple. Trooste’s gasp of shock was swallowed in a gutteral crackling and he fell. Svenson stepped away and lifted his empty hands, three carbines and a revolver aimed at his chest.
‘You bloody imbecile!’ shouted the Contessa. ‘You – you –’
Svenson’s voice cut through her anger like a sword. ‘If I am killed, this ends. None of you know enough about the Comte’s science. Without me nothing can continue.’
The Contessa snarled with frustration. She nodded the helmet, ruefully it seemed and, despite her fury, with a certain appreciation. ‘And, let me guess, you refuse to do so?’
The Doctor reached into his tunic for a cigarette. ‘Not at all. But there will be conditions.’
At once the weapons shifted to Mahmoud and Schoepfil, each of whom had moved towards Svenson. Svenson blew smoke from the corner of his mouth, eyeing them coolly.
‘I’m sorry, gentlemen. At some point a man’s just had enough.’
With a feeling of dread Miss Temple watched Svenson approach the rack of books. His eyes were as absent of feeling as they’d been in the Thermæ. She had passed him Francesca’s key, as they discussed the star map, in the hope that he could somehow open the book and save Chang’s memory, but he had thrown away the tool to secure his own freedom. She had told him to save himself …
Svenson took a handkerchief from his pocket to protect his hand. He pointed to one of the volumes in the padded book rack and looked at the acolytes.
‘This volume has been lately brought by the Contessa – I’m sorry, the Virgo Lucifera?’
The acolytes nodded. Svenson pointed to another book, near it. Despite their disapproval, the acolytes did not prevent his reach. He carefully slid the second book from its slot, keeping a layer of cloth between his skin and the glass.
‘I will want this.’
‘And what is that?’ the Contessa sneered. ‘Lost love?’
‘It is my business, madam.’
‘Is that all?’
‘No. Safe passage – let us say a ship sailing east – and a supply of funds. As Lady Vandaariff in all but name, I doubt this is beyond your power.’ He broke off to address the acolytes sharply. ‘Is the quicksilver alloy prepared?’
When they did not immediately reply, he called to those attending Chang. ‘The quicksilve
r for the book! Has it been compounded?’ He turned back to the acolyte slipping the Contessa’s book from the rack, his hands insulated by the thin silk robe. ‘By God – not with your robe! Get away!’ He tucked his own book under one arm and used the handkerchief to lift the book containing the Comte. A properly gloved acolyte came forward to assist, but Svenson simply strode to Chang’s table. ‘Where is the mercury?’
‘Be careful!’ shouted the Contessa.
‘The interior of the chamber is already bathed,’ explained an acolyte, indicating the book-sized slot beneath Chang’s table. ‘A sheath of compounded glass plating –’
‘I must examine it …’
‘We have obeyed every instruction –’
‘And I do not care! You – every one of you – before this day wore other clothes! What were you – a banker? A shiftless second son? Parrot all you want – but I must know what has been done! I believe trust has been proven quite bankrupt in this enterprise!’
Svenson went to his knees, squinting at the brass undercarriage. He shifted the books from arm to arm as he changed position and probed gingerly with his fingers into the slot where the book would go. Finally he stood and thrust a book into the hands of the gloved acolyte. ‘It will need cleaning. There cannot be the slightest blemish or smear.’
‘Doctor Svenson,’ called the Contessa. ‘I admire this zeal for survival, but your demands? Is that all?’
He glanced at Miss Temple. The Contessa clucked her tongue.
‘You cannot save them. Chang is gone already. Celeste will die at your own hand.’
‘Better mine than someone who does not care.’
‘I’m sure she values the distinction. Can you hear us, Celeste? Have you gone to sleep?’
‘Robert Vandaariff was your enemy.’ Miss Temple was ashamed at the quaver in her voice. ‘His restoration will mean your ruin.’
‘Celeste, while you persist in refusing to see yourself, I do not. I am very good at some things, and not at others.’ She laughed. ‘Spelling, for example. Robert Vandaariff will be wise enough to see the many advantages I can offer. It is a circle returning to its start, for he and I began this whole affair. Doctor, what are you doing?’
‘I am protecting my charge.’ Doctor Svenson crouched near the rack of books, and for the first time Miss Temple saw the leather case, the same she had lost to Foison. The Doctor swivelled it to the Contessa. ‘I do not want my book broken in any disturbance.’
But before Svenson could place his book in the leather case, he had to remove the one that lay inside. He slipped it out and then juggled the two books arm to arm, for he’d only the one handkerchief with which to shield his skin, even as he also awkwardly moved the cigarette from his fingers to his mouth.
‘Doctor, please, what is that other book?’ called the Contessa impatiently.
Svenson raised it to the light, squinted, shrugged. ‘Mr Foison could tell us for sure, but I believe this book holds Cardinal Chang.’
‘Is Foison alive?’ asked the Contessa. ‘I thought not – rouse him! Rouse him! And rouse that idiot as well.’
This last was to the green-coat at her window, who gave a stiff kick to Jack Pfaff’s inert form. Acolytes hurried to Foison, turning his body and tapping his face, and the man rose stiffly to a sitting position.
‘The book in the leather case,’ Svenson explained. ‘Cardinal Chang?’
Foison nodded. ‘What has happened?’
‘Your master is dead,’ Svenson replied. ‘And about to be reborn.’ He knelt and set the other book into the case, standing again with the one Foison had agreed held Chang.
Svenson weighed it in his hands. ‘Perhaps I will take this too, as a condition.’
‘No,’ said the Contessa.
‘Why not?’
‘I do not trust you, Doctor.’
‘Then we are matched.’ He turned to Miss Temple. ‘Forgive me, Celeste. I did try.’
Without another word Doctor Svenson heaved the glass book into the air, straight past the green-coated guard and through the open trapdoor, where – to everyone’s ear – it burst to pieces on the iron steps.
The Contessa exploded with anger – the book was hers, the waste, it could have been reused – but Miss Temple only closed her eyes. When Pfaff had told her Chang’s mind was gone, she had been stricken, but at the book’s destruction he was finally, truly lost. With a dreadful relief Miss Temple exhaled, expelling with her breath all hope and all despair. For the first time in what felt like years, her mind was clear.
And the men before her were fools.
‘Would Colonel Bronque stand so idly by? Would your mother?’ The words were thick in her mouth, but she did not care. ‘She’s going to kill them all. She’s going to kill you.’
Mahmoud looked at Schoepfil. The Contessa’s cold voice cut in: ‘I can kill them now. But I will not, if I do not have to. Do I have to, Doctor Svenson, for the procedure to work?’
Svenson had returned to Chang’s table, bending low to peer beneath. ‘I am examining the Professor’s work – obviously he intended that they should be consumed –’
‘All must be consumed!’ warned an acolyte. They stood in a menacing ring around the machines.
‘Indeed. However,’ Svenson went on blandly, ‘art is not science. As Mr Schoepfil has taught me, what satisfies alchemical symmetry may be superfluous to the desired result.’ He indicated the tubs with distaste. ‘Mr Harcourt gives us iron … Mr Kelling copper … poor Colonel Bronque lead. Now … iron serves the blood, of course … ’
Miss Temple’s head swam. The more Svenson spoke, the more the Comte rose within her. She coughed wetly through the mask. Each insight felt like a knife turning inside Miss Temple’s chest. Was this what had happened to Francesca? She pictured the ravaged corpse, each ruined organ excised –
‘What is going on?’ asked Jack Pfaff. Miss Temple saw him stand through a haze. He was looking at her. ‘Is she being made to talk?’
‘She’s being made to die,’ said the Contessa. ‘Do not intervene.’
Pfaff said nothing, but his face was pale.
‘What report from the gates, from the perimeter outside?’
This was Mr Foison, hobbling to the green-coat with the revolver.
‘The party at the gate was taken in hand, sir.’
‘That was an hour ago. What since?’
‘There is nothing since,’ called the Contessa.
‘Bronque brought but one company. If the remainder of his regiment follows –’
‘The remainder is occupied in town. Besides, do you not have a strategy in place?’
‘Not for that many men.’
‘Mr Schoepfil, where is your late friend’s regiment?’
Schoepfil pulled his brimming eyes from the gruesome tub. ‘What?’
‘Where are the grenadiers?’
‘Aren’t they dead?’
‘What is wrong with him?’ asked Foison.
Schoepfil’s voice was small. ‘She has killed the Colonel.’
‘One is amazed,’ muttered the Contessa. ‘We need not worry, Mr Foison. Lord Axewith has given orders that no one should come near Harschmort. That the Colonel disobeyed with so few only describes the limits of his power.’
‘I would prefer to see for myself –’
‘And I would prefer you to remain.’ Without waiting for Foison’s reply – for he gave none, even when one of the soldiers came up with a three-legged stool for him to sit upon – she called, perturbed, to Doctor Svenson. ‘Are you not finished? Can we not proceed?’
‘We can.’
Miss Temple erupted in a spasm of choking, her mouth filled with the taste of rotten flesh.
‘Good Lord,’ said the Contessa. ‘Even at a distance, it’s disgusting.’
‘It will only worsen.’ Svenson stood before Miss Temple. ‘You know as well as I, Celeste. Like Francesca, you do see what will happen – and, like her, your sickness is a measure of my success with these machines, what
I’m sure you see as my betrayal. The more I correctly arrange the fate of Chang and yourself, the more you plunge into distress.’
He met her eyes, took a puff on the cigarette. Miss Temple let fly a stream of dark phlegm that splattered near his boot.
‘That’s for your damned betrayal,’ she rasped, scarcely able to form the words.
‘Doctor Svenson,’ groaned the Contessa. ‘May we please –’
Svenson raised his hand in acquiescence, but his expression clouded as he saw the hoses and wires connecting the two tables. He called sharply to the acolytes standing at either side. ‘What is this? Who is responsible? These are wrong!’
‘They cannot be wrong,’ protested an acolyte. ‘Professor Trooste –’
‘I don’t give a damn about Professor Trooste.’ Svenson was on his knees, pulling at the undercarriage of each table. ‘Celeste! Look at me! Celeste Temple!’
She looked down, ready to spit again, though her eyes were swimming. He rapped his hand on the brass fittings that connected the black hose. ‘The direction of force is incorrect, Celeste? Is it not? It must pass through the tubs’ – he indicated the line of rubber reservoirs – ‘then through the mineral compounds and into the book. The whole reaches Chang and the bloodstone. The discharge, the corruption, is strained off and sent to you. But if these are misaligned, the bloodstone will come into play too soon – look at me, Celeste!’
He shoved aside the acolytes and with a few rapid tugs flipped a line of brass switches, toggling the flow of the hoses. Then, pivoting on his heels, cigarette pinched in his lips, the Doctor took a glass flask from his tunic and poured the raw bloodstone – with a spasm of pain Miss Temple knew it on sight – into a chamber beneath her own table. But she perceived within her fog of nausea that the Doctor’s actions bore no resemblance whatsoever to his words. There was no call for bloodstone on her table, and the brass switches now sent the purifying energy to her instead of Chang.
The Chemickal Marriage Page 55