by George Mann
Most interestingly, Renwick’s left eye had been damaged beyond the bounds of normal medical repair at some point, and had been replaced by a primitive viewing device reminiscent of a jeweller’s eyepiece. This small machine had been wholly embedded into Renwick’s skull, wired directly into the visual centre of his brain.
Renwick had claimed on more than one occasion that the unseemly device had actually improved the quality of his vision, and that he felt no regret at the loss of its biological predecessor-other than, perhaps, the effect it had on customers, who would at times enter his emporium bursting with enthusiasm, but leave again hastily when they caught sight of the owner.
Newbury had grown used to it by now, of course, but still found it mildly disconcerting when the eye appeared to move of its own accord, shifting the lenses around with tiny gears to refocus Renwick’s vision and compensate for any changes in the quality of the light.
It wasn’t, perhaps, the most aesthetically pleasing of mechanical enhancements, but it clearly worked, and Renwick himself seemed more than satisfied with its performance.
Newbury wove a path through the heaped stacks of books towards the counter, narrowly avoiding sending some of them toppling over in his wake. He peered over at what Renwick was doing. He appeared to be engaged in repairing the binding of a rather tatty old book, carefully stitching the printed sections into a new leather spine.
“I’ll be with you in a minute, Newbury,” he mumbled, his head down. “Tricky operation, this.”
“What is it?” asked Newbury, showing no surprise that Renwick had already established the identity of his visitor.
“A first edition of A Key to Physic and the Occult Sciences,” said Renwick, slowly, as he threaded through the final stitch and tied off the thread with a flourish. “Very rare.” He placed the needle on the counter beside the book and stepped back, admiring his handiwork. “There. A bit of tidying up to do, but much more satisfactory.”
He glanced up. “You look terrible, Newbury,” said Renwick.
“Oh, so we’re skipping the pleasantries?” said Newbury, jovially.
Renwick leaned closer, bringing his face disconcertingly close to Newbury’s own. His warm breath smelled of alcohol. His mechanical eye turned in its socket with a metallic grating as it refocused. “It’s not the opiates, is it?” he said, his voice level. It was a rhetorical question.
Newbury shook his head. There was no point in lying to this man, or attempting to make light of his words. Renwick could see through Newbury’s bluster like a hawk spying a scurrying rodent amongst the mulch and twigs of a forest floor.
“You’d better come through,” said Renwick, pushing open the dividing door to his back room. A waft of something foul smelling gusted out of the door, but Renwick did not seem to notice. Smiling, Newbury stepped inside.
There was a warm familiarity to the room, and Newbury felt himself relax. It was like stepping into a vault of ancient treasures, and he hardly knew where to look first. Row upon row of mahogany bookcases lined the deceptively small space, each of them crammed full with some of the most valuable books outside the Vatican library. At the back, a pan sat steaming on a small stove. Closer, on his right, was a large still, set up with numerous rods and bottles. Strange coloured fluids bubbled and fizzed, some of them being slowly siphoned off into small jars, others emptying into a large plastic bucket on the floor. Most surprisingly, the brass skeleton of a large bird was laid out on the floor, components spilled haphazardly around it; cogs of all sizes, levers and keys, trailing wires.
“You’re building something, then?” asked Newbury, indicating the slurry of parts.
Renwick nodded. “I was. I’ve been rather busy with something else for the last few days.” He patted a small stack of books on a stool by the door.
Newbury looked a little sheepish. “Yes. I apologise for calling on you, once again, out of the blue.”
Renwick shrugged. “So, tell me what’s going on. First I hear nothing from you for months, and then I receive a note asking some very interesting questions. Then you happen to turn up here at the shop, looking like that,” he motioned up and down with his hands, as if appraising Newbury’s appearance.
Newbury sighed. He could see he wasn’t going to get away without explaining himself. He dropped into a fusty-looking armchair, sending a huge plume of dust into the air. He waved his hand before his face, coughing. “Well, first of all, the two things are not related,” he said, once the choking had abated. “The contents of the note and my … appearance, I mean.”
Renwick reached for one of the flasks on the still and raised it to his lips, taking a swig of the bubbling liquid. He grimaced, glanced at the contents of the flask, and put it back on the still with a shrug. He eyed Newbury, but didn’t say anything in response.
Newbury grinned. “I managed to obtain a copy of the book,” he said, knowing this would provoke a reaction.
Renwick frowned, his mechanical eye whirring-always a giveaway that Newbury had captured his attention. “The book?”
“Yes, the book,” replied Newbury.
“Have you got it with you?” said Renwick, with an urgency that surprised Newbury.
He shook his head. “No. It’s back at Cleveland Avenue.”
Renwick shook his head in mock offense. “So you’ve managed to obtain a copy of one of the rarest, most sought after books of ritualistic magick in the world, and you haven’t brought it to show me. Now I’m really hurt.”
Newbury laughed, but there was truth in what Renwick said. “Give me a week, Aldous, and you can come to Chelsea to visit. There are things I have to do first.”
Renwick nodded. “You’ve been using it, haven’t you? That’s why you look like such a damn mess. I’ve told you, Newbury, that’s a dangerous book. The things you’re dabbling with … you’ll end up getting yourself killed.”
“I have my reasons, Aldous. I’m trying to help someone,” said Newbury, softly, seriously.
“And I’m trying to help you!” said Renwick, evidently trying to contain his outrage. “Where did you get it from, anyway?” he asked. “There are only two known copies in existence.”
Newbury remained silent.
“Oh, no. You didn’t. You stole it from the Cabal, didn’t you?” said Renwick, with a heartfelt sigh.
“The only other copy is in Constantinople, under guard by a hundred clockwork warriors. This one was a mile across town, in the vaults of a band of devil-worshipping imbeciles. Of course I took their copy,” said Newbury, exasperated. “They didn’t even understand the significance of what they had.”
“It hardly matters,” said Renwick, “whether they understand or not. You might think them imbeciles, Newbury, but that makes them all the more dangerous. They won’t rest until they get it back. Their entire belief system is centred around the ritualistic practises in that book.” His good eye twitched erratically. “Have they sent you any threatening parcels yet? That’s their usual method.”
Newbury nodded. “Yes. A most unpleasant assortment of oddities it contained, too.”
“Newbury…” said Renwick, his voice strained. “You need to take this very seriously indeed. Get away for a while. They’re a dangerous enemy. You mustn’t underestimate them. Throw them off the trail. Head to the Continent for a few weeks.”
“What, and leave the book with you in the meanwhile?” said Newbury, laughing.
“I don’t want it!” said Renwick. “I want to see it … but I don’t want it here. I don’t want them sending one of their ghastly creations after me. I don’t have your nerve, Newbury, or your resources. I don’t want the Cabal as an enemy.”
Newbury shrugged. “They’ve already tried to get it back once, but even in that they failed miserably. They couldn’t even hold me prisoner for more than a day or two. They’re nothing but credible fools, Aldous.”
“Newbury…” stressed Renwick.
Newbury nodded. “Very well. I’ll heed your advice. Once I’ve dealt with
this miserable affair of the missing hearts, I’ll give the Cabal my full and proper attention.”
“Make sure that you do,” said Renwick. “And I suppose if that’s what’s holding you up, I’d better get on and tell you what I’ve found out about your missing organs.” He reached for the stack of books on the stool and withdrew a volume bound in black leather from approximately halfway down the pile. “Although, I warn you, you’re not going to like it.”
“I didn’t imagine for a second I would,” said Newbury, sitting forward in the armchair and disturbing further clouds of billowing dust. He glanced down at the light layer of dust that covered his black jacket and trousers, and decided it wasn’t worth worrying about until he was home.
“In your note you described three corpses. Each of the victims were stabbed, their chests cracked open, and their hearts removed,” said Renwick. “The missing organs were not found at the scene, and have not been recovered as yet?”
“Yes,” said Newbury. “That’s correct. Except that there are now five victims.”
Renwick nodded. “You asked if there was any occult or ritual significance to the removal of the hearts. I presume this was because you’re hoping any such significance will help you to divine a motive.”
“Precisely,” said Newbury, beginning to wonder where this was leading. “I could think of no significance other than the sacrificial practises found in the Aztec civilisations, but the murders did not bear any other hallmarks that suggested this might be the case. We’re at a loss. I need ideas that might lead us to the killer. Anything at all is useful.”
Renwick shook his head. “There’s no need for ideas. I’ve already identified your killer.”
“You’ve what?” said Newbury, taken aback.
Renwick grinned, evidently pleased with himself. His left eye let out a grating whirr. Newbury could see the winking red light at the heart of the mechanism, deep inside Renwick’s skull.
“Allow me to tell you a story,” said Renwick, dragging out another stool and lowering himself onto it, “about ‘the Scourge of Paris.’”
Newbury sat back, making a steeple with his hands. “The Scourge of Paris?”
Renwick nodded. “In the early 1820s there was a spate of vicious murders in the streets of Montmartre. The victims came from all walks of life: nobles, peasants, soldiers, maids. Their bodies were found in a variety of despicable conditions, some of them with their throats cut, others disembowelled, others still with their limbs lopped off or garrotted. The locations varied, too. Some were killed in their homes; others down darkened alleyways, left amongst the detritus of the slums. Only one thing connected them: the fact that they’d all been brutally killed within the space of a couple of weeks. The authorities claimed it was the work of a single, insane killer, although no witnesses came forward. At least, not officially.”
“Like the Ripper,” said Newbury.
Renwick nodded. “Similar,” he said. “The newspapers of the time called this killer ‘the Executioner.’”
“The Executioner?” said Newbury, his voice cracking. He felt a sudden palpitation in his chest. The Executioner. The resonance of the word was like a physical blow.
Renwick frowned. “Does that mean something to you?” he asked.
“Possibly,” said Newbury, waving his hand and urging Renwick to continue. His mind continued to race, but he tried to focus on the rest of Renwick’s tale.
“Soon after, the final victim was discovered. He was an inventor named Monsieur Gilles Dubois. He had been dead for nearly two weeks, found stabbed to death in his drawing room. His adoptive daughter-an orphan he had taken in when his wife had died of a wasting disease ten years earlier-was missing. The girl had recently been diagnosed with a weak heart. They eventually gathered that Dubois had been carrying out unusual experiments on her, and she was now missing.”
“What kind of experiments?” asked Newbury.
“They found a workshop full of drawings and mechanical components. It seemed he’d been constructing a primitive clockwork heart to replace her failing organ. What’s more, they found evidence of occult practises, of rituals and spells conducted in the cellars of the house,” continued Renwick. “He’d been desperately trying to keep her alive, and it seems he was prepared to try anything.”
“And she killed him for it,” said Newbury. “She killed all of those people and disappeared.”
“Yes,” said Renwick. “It’s thought that’s where she started.”
“Started?” said Newbury, surprised. “It sounds like quite the career already.”
Renwick smiled knowingly. “She was next seen in Prussia, almost five years later,” said Renwick. “It’s not known what happened to her in the intervening time, but by the time she surfaced in Berlin, she’d adopted the moniker given to her by the French newspapers. She was selling her services as a murderess for hire under the name the Executioner. And she had a trademark now, too. She always stabbed her victims with a curved blade, then opened up their chests and claimed their hearts.”
Newbury sat forward again in his chair. “You can’t seriously be telling me it’s the same woman. Is that what you’re suggesting?”
Renwick laughed, but otherwise ignored the questions. “Throughout the course of the nineteenth century she is seen again and again, popping up all over the Continent. St. Petersburg, Constantinople, Leipzig, Venice, London, Madrid, Bruges. Always she is known as the Executioner, and always, without fail, she removes her victims’ hearts. It’s thought that her death toll is in the thousands.”
“But how can that be?” said Newbury, sceptically. “Surely she’d be dead by now.”
“There are very few descriptions of her, as most who meet her do not live to tell the tale. But those few that I have found,” he indicated the pile of books on the stool, “all describe her in the same way. Slim, around twenty years of age, her pallid flesh completely covered in elaborate tattoos, said to describe ancient rites and pacts with the very devil himself. It’s claimed she has precious metals inlaid into her cheeks, highlighting particular runes or symbols. She wears a metal brace across her left shoulder which contains the clockwork mechanism that long ago replaced her heart. It bears a porthole in its outer casing, through which her own, decaying organ is still visible, now just a blackened, shrivelled lump. She is ruthless and unfeeling, and will stop at nothing to accomplish her goal-to kill the person she has been charged with executing-and claim their heart for her own unspecified purposes.”
Renwick leaned over and passed Newbury the black book he’d been holding throughout his tale. His thumb marked a specific page. Newbury took it and scanned the contents. The text was in Flemish, but the etching that filled the entire right edge of the page was of a woman, just as Renwick had described. She was dressed in a form-fitting black suit, and what flesh was visible-her hands, forearms, and face-was covered in intricate tattoos. She was wearing what looked like a sword guard on her left shoulder, and she carried twin scimitars, one in each fist.
Newbury took a deep breath. “You still haven’t answered my question,” he said. “How can it be the same woman?”
Renwick shrugged. “Whatever Dubois did to her, it worked. Whether it’s the machine he built to replace her heart, or whether he really did make a pact with the devil … I don’t know. Whatever the case, there’s no denying the truth. She exists. Her presence is felt on the sidelines of history throughout all the great nations. Everywhere you look, she’s there in the background, and she’s always the same, always killing to order and stealing people’s hearts.”
“Why has no one stopped her?” asked Newbury. “In all that time?”
“She chooses her clients well. Lords, ladies, governments … the sort of people who know how to suppress information,” replied Renwick.
“But if it is her…” said Newbury, gauging the immensity of what he’d just said.
“Then you have two problems,” finished Renwick. “The Executioner herself, and whoever is pulling
her strings. She doesn’t kill for pleasure, and she is not aligned to any particular regime. She is a mercenary. If she’s here in London, she’s here because someone has contracted her services.”
Newbury glanced again at the image on the page before him. “It sounds like pure fantasy,” he said. “A fable. A myth. It’s utterly preposterous. And yet…” He trailed off again, deep in thought.
“I know,” said Renwick. “I know. It’s hard to stomach. But I’ve spent days looking into this, Newbury, and it’s all here in these books. Once you piece it together, her life story is right there, as old as the last century. If you have any doubt, think of the Queen. Life can be sustained beyond its natural span. Inevitably, however, something is lost in the process.”
Newbury nodded absently. The Executioner. The name he had heard in his dreams. The name he had scrawled upon ream after ream of paper in a clairvoyant frenzy; had screamed in terror and rage as he’d scratched it into the floorboards with his bloodied fingernails, back in his study in Chelsea. The name Amelia had warned him of, once he’d disclosed his secret to her.
The woman who would kill Veronica.
Renwick was right. Despite everything, it made sense. What he’d seen in his hallucinations had been real. The corpses told their own tale.
“It’s remarkable, isn’t it?” said Renwick, flexing his shoulders and reaching for the flask on the still once again. He took another swig, shuddered, and put it back.
Newbury stood, placing the book back on the pile. “I’m sorry, Aldous. I have to go.”