The Bone House be-2

by Stephen Lawhead

  “Would you mind terribly?” asked Dr. Young, still gripping Kit’s hand. “A small assist would be most useful.”

  “Not at all,” replied Kit, who gave a solid tug.

  The fellow scrambled out of the pit and patted the dust from his beige linen suit. “That is better.”

  He straightened and, hands on hips, stood regarding Kit, his grey eyes keen behind small round steel-rimmed glasses. A compact, tightly knit man, he gave the impression of barely contained energy, like a coiled spring. Beneath his tropical linen he wore a white shirt and a waistcoat of yellow silk. The boots on his feet were of the heavy, serviceable type a military man might favour. “So!” he cried at last. “Here you are!”

  “Here I am indeed,” confirmed Kit. The physician stood gazing at him as at a prize exhibit in a zoo until Kit, growing uncomfortable under the man’s scrutiny, blurted, “I believe we have a mutual friend.”

  “Yes,” agreed Thomas Young amiably, “I rather believe we do.”

  “Wilhelmina-”

  “Striking girl,” said Thomas, stirring himself. “Most remarkable young woman. Possessed of a strength of will one encounters only rarely. A genuinely unique individual.”

  “She’s all that,” conceded Kit.

  “Come, sir, it is the heat of the day. We must not stand out here jawing like a pair of yahoos. I have a jug of lemon water standing by. Splendidly refreshing. Will you share a drink with me in my tent?”

  “I would be delighted,” replied Kit, falling into the more formal rhythms of nineteenth-century speech. “I am positively parched.”

  “Khalid!” shouted Thomas. “We are retiring to my tent. Rest the workers now and give them something to eat and drink. Tell them we will resume at the usual time. When you have done that, join us, please.”

  The servant made a slight bow and then, turning, clapped his hands for attention. As the workers moved off, Kit observed, “You sent him to look for me.”

  “I did,” replied the doctor, leading the way to a large tent that had been erected in the scant shade of twin palm trees. “Every day at this time he went to look for you. I thought if you came at all, it would be in the morning. It is just too hot later. It is still early in the season,” he said, “and already it is beastly-much too warm for this time of year.” He stepped to the entrance of the tent and held aside the opening flap. “I fear I shall soon be forced to suspend excavations. Pity.”

  Kit ducked under the flap and into a commodious, well-ventilated space that was less tent than open-sided marquee. Two sides were hung with gauzy material; periodically, a servant would come by to sprinkle it with water using an olive branch and a wooden pail-a primitive but surprisingly effective form of air-conditioning. The reprieve from the heat and hammering sun was instant and welcome, and Kit could not help offering up a sigh of relief.

  The interior was divided into two distinct areas: a working place with a desk and lamp, three folding chairs, and a wicker settee, and a sleeping place with a cot shrouded by insect netting; the two were divided by a standing screen of woven palm fronds. The slightly uneven floor was covered by heavy Egyptian carpets laid one atop another. It was, Kit decided, the temporary abode of a well-seasoned traveller, one who knew and understood his surroundings. This was further demonstrated when the doctor removed the lid of a covered bowl and drew out a roll of wet cloth. “Put this around your neck,” he said, passing the roll to Kit. He took one for himself and draped it around the nape of his neck. Kit did likewise and instantly felt the better for it.

  Beside the desk stood a small tripod bearing a large oval tray of brass; on the tray were a painted pottery jug and several upside-down glasses. A shallow bowl of almonds sat beside the jug, and it was to this that Thomas Young was first drawn. “Here, my good fellow, get some of these into you,” he said, offering the bowl.

  Kit took a few of the heavily salted almonds and popped them into his mouth; his host did the same.

  “You need the salt in this heat. It’s good for you. Prevents heat prostration.” Returning the bowl to the tray, he waved Kit to a chair. “Please, sit down, Mr. Livingstone. We will rest awhile and chat.”

  Kit lowered himself into the canvas chair and accepted a glass of the pale yellow liquid. It was tepid, but the sharp tang of the lemon made it palatable. Thomas settled into his chair behind the desk and sat gazing at his guest from behind an untidy mass of papers and various drawing utensils. Kit sipped his water and waited for his host to begin.

  “Do I dare ask if you have brought something for me?” wondered Thomas at last.

  “As it happens,” replied Kit. He placed his half-empty glass on the tray and, fumbling at the buttons on the front of his shirt, produced the brown paper package he had retrieved from the hotel. “I was instructed to deliver this to you unopened. As you can see, I have obeyed these instructions.” He rose and, holding it in both hands, ceremoniously placed the paper-wrapped bundle on the desk before his host. “I am happy to pass this to your care.”

  Thomas made no move to pick it up, but sat with his hands folded before him, regarding it quizzically. “Do you know what is inside the wrapping?”

  “No, sir, I do not,” replied Kit. “I was not told. Do you?”

  “In part.” Thomas raised his eyes to Kit and then returned to his survey of the parcel. “If it is what I think it is…”

  Kit waited. The archaeologist neither altered his gaze nor made any move to pick up the packet. He simply sat staring at the string-bound square.

  “Dr. Young?” said Kit after a moment. “Is anything the matter?”

  “If this is what has been promised, history will change.” He raised his eyes once more, his round glasses glinting in the soft light of the tent. “You know that, do you not? The world will change.”

  “Right.” Kit nodded. He could wait a little longer for that.

  Outside, the braying of a donkey echoed across the ruins. As if in response to the sound, the doctor drew a sharp intake of breath and pulled the package closer. He lifted it, diffidently balanced between his hands-the very picture of a man trying to delay an action he might well regret. Kit could sympathise. Who could guess what Wilhelmina had put in that parcel?

  “The thing must be done, I suppose,” Thomas said and, with trembling fingers, untied the string and peeled open the paper wrapping to reveal a curious assortment of objects: an old shilling coin, a letter, a newspaper clipping, and several printed pages that appeared to have been torn from a book-more or less what might be found in the average scrapbook-nothing that appeared likely to be of much importance, let alone world-shattering consequence.

  Kit watched as his host examined the coin, then put it aside and lifted the letter, scrutinising it front and back. The letter was in Mina’s hand and addressed to Christopher “Kit” Livingstone in the care of Dr. Thomas Young. The white envelope was sealed and stamped, but the stamp had not been cancelled. Thomas placed the letter before him on the desk. “This alone would have been enough,” he murmured.

  “Sir?” wondered Kit.

  “See here,” Thomas said, pointing to the stamp-a simple black postage stamp with an engraved silhouette of a young Queen Victoria with the words one penny beneath-a fairly unremarkable example, to Kit’s eye.

  “The stamp, yes?”

  “This stamp as you call it”-Thomas touched it lightly with a fingertip-“has never been seen before-at least not by me.”

  “May I?” said Kit, picking up the letter. “I see the letter is addressed to me.”

  “By all means,” said the doctor. “You must open it at once.”

  Kit slid his finger under the flap and drew out a single piece of plain white paper that read: Kit-If you are reading this, you have met Dr. Thomas Young-the last man in the world who knows everything. Trust him with your life. Ever yours, Mina. And that was all.

  Thomas, in the meantime, had picked up the coin and now held it between his thumb and forefinger, turning it over and over with a look of bewi
lderment on his face-an expression Kit guessed was highly unusual for the man. He passed the shilling piece to Kit for examination. The silver coin bore the profile of Victoria on one side and, on the other, a crown with the simple words one shilling beneath. Below Victoria’s disembodied head was the date: 1835.

  “Have you ever seen the like?” asked Thomas.

  “Yes, I have,” replied Kit, handing back the shilling. “Many times.”

  The English gentleman simply nodded and laid the coin beside the letter. He picked up the newspaper clipping, glanced at it, and then looked at Kit. “Have you ever been to Kew Gardens?” he asked.

  “Once or twice,” replied Kit. “It is a well-known attraction. People go there for picnics and a pleasant day out.”

  The doctor set aside the clipping and, placing his hands flat on the printed pages torn from the book, he said, “This, I believe, will be the ultimate test.”

  Kit could not think how to respond to this, so remained silent.

  “Unless I am very much mistaken, our mutual friend will have provided me with undeniable proof that what she has claimed, outrageous though it seems, is in fact the naked truth.”

  He then lifted the pages and, with a slightly trembling hand, offered them to Kit. “Would you read it to me, please?”

  Taking the loose sheets, Kit scanned the top one quickly on both sides. It was merely the title page-torn hastily from the spine, it would seem, judging from the ragged edge; the reverse contained part of an acknowledgement by the author. “You want me to read this?”

  “Please,” replied Thomas Young, removing his glasses and closing his eyes.

  Kit cleared his throat and began: “A Course of Lectures on Natural Philosophy and the Mechanical Arts, by Thomas Young, MD. A new edition with references and notes by the Rev. P. Kelland, MA, FRS. London and Edinburgh. Printed for Taylor and Walton, Upper Gower Street. 1845.”

  Kit glanced up at his audience. Young was sitting very still, his eyes closed. Kit turned the page over and continued reading: “Having undertaken to prepare a course of lectures on natural philosophy to be delivered in the theatre of the Royal Institution, I thought that the plan of the institution required something more than a mere compilation from the elementary works at present existing, and that it was my duty to digest into one system everything relating to the principles of the mechanical sciences that could tend to the improvement of the arts subservient to the conveniences of life.”

  He paused for breath and waited. In a moment Thomas nodded, and Kit resumed: “I found also, in delivering the lectures, that it was most eligible to commit to writing, as nearly as possible, the whole that was required to be said on each subject, and that even when an experiment was to be performed it was best to describe that experiment uninterruptedly and to repeat the explanation during its exhibition. Hence it became necessary that the written lectures should be as clearly and copiously expressed and in a language as much adapted to the comprehension of a mixed audience as the nature of the investigations would allow…”

  The doctor gave out a groan, and Kit broke off. Thomas Young sat still as a sphinx, eyes closed, outwardly composed. The only sign of an internal struggle was to be seen in his hands, which were clasped so tightly together the knuckles were white.

  “Would you like me to continue?” asked Kit, his voice breaking into the intense reverie of the man behind the desk. “Is everything all right?”

  “No,” breathed the physician. “Nothing is right.” He opened his eyes and looked at Kit with an expression of wonder and despair. “It is from a book- my book. That is what your Wilhelmina has brought me as proof of her assertions.”

  “Yes, so I gather, but-”

  “That is the trouble.” Thomas stretched a finger towards the page in Kit’s hand and gestured mutely at it as if at the certificate of his own death. “This book is not yet published. In fact, it is not even finished.”

  Kit could imagine how that might be a problem. “Oh,” he said, trying to sound sympathetic. “I see.”

  Thomas’ glance became sharp. “Do you?” he demanded. “I submit that you do not see the half, sir! This-” He snatched the page from Kit’s grasp. “This scrap of paper comes to me from another world and a future not my own, a world where all I have thought and done is already past-where I am dead and buried and the things I see before me, now worn with age, are yet to be.” The doctor shook his head again. “Do you see it yet? Time is out of joint, and reality merely a delusion. All I have believed about the world is a mirage, a chimera, a fantasy. My work, my science… worthless. How,” he asked, his voice falling to a lament, “how am I to live in light of that?”

  PART THREE

  Coming Forth by Day

  CHAPTER 15

  In Which an Apprenticeship Is Begun

  Xian-Li thrust her hand into the bowl cradled on her hip. She smelled the dry, sweet, floury scent of the cracked corn as she filled her palm, then flung the handful in a wide, generous arc around her. The chickens, already flocking to her, squawked and fluttered as they scurried to snatch up the kernels she had scattered. She watched their sleek heads bobbing as they pecked at the corn. A simple chore, feeding chickens, yet she took great pleasure in it-knowing that it was something her mother and grandmother had done all their lives. The uncomplicated act linked her to generations past and present and yet to come, and that gave her a comfortable feeling.

  “I thought I would find you here,” said Arthur, a slight reproof in his tone.

  She turned and smiled as he came to stand beside her.

  “We have servants to do this, you know,” he said. “You are the lady of the house. You don’t have to feed chickens.”

  “I enjoy it.” She flung another handful to her circle of plump brown hens. “And they like it.”

  He caught her wrist as she returned it to the bowl. “Your hands, my love,” he said, lifting her palm. “They are getting rough. You do too much.”

  “I do what pleases me, husband,” she countered. “Would you deny me that?”

  He kissed her palm and released it. “It will be tomorrow,” he said after a moment. He felt her stiffen beside him. “I cannot put it off any longer.”

  “But he is only six years old,” Xian-Li declared. Her face clouded, and her lips pursed in objection.

  “He is old enough.” Arthur waited, watching the chickens scratching for errant kernels they had missed in the first flurry of feeding. “We’ve always known this day was coming. It is time he began his apprenticeship.”

  “But he is only a child,” she complained, resisting what she knew to be true.

  “The boy must learn.” Arthur was adamant. “He must be taught.”

  Xian-Li turned and flung another handful of grain to her flock.

  “He won’t be going alone,” said Arthur, pointing out the obvious. “Do you imagine for a moment I would let any harm to come near him?”

  She frowned, her normally smooth brow furrowed now.

  “Xian-Li,” he said softly. “It is time.”

  She sighed, lowering her head in submission.

  To assuage her anxiety, he added, “Besides, he must have some experience of it if we are to consider taking him to see your father and sister in Macau.”

  “You are right, husband. I worry too much. But if anything happened to-”

  Arthur interrupted before she could finish the thought. “I know.”

  Since coming back to England, Xian-Li had taken charge of the small holding that had been in Arthur’s family for over a hundred years. Tucked away in the Cotswold countryside, she had devoted herself to her family and made a good life for herself and Arthur and little Benedict-away from the judgemental stares of city sophisticates who considered her a member of an inferior race. To the country folk of Oxfordshire, Xian-Li was a curious and somewhat exotic novelty whose presence among them provided interest in what was often a drearily mundane existence. As people in the neighbouring holdings and settlements had grown to know h
er, they accepted her, according the family a higher rank and status in respect of Arthur’s learning and manners. Arthur became known as “the squire” and Benedict, affectionately rechristened Ben by the locals, became “the young squire.” The boy was their sole pride and joy-all the more so because both Xian-Li and Arthur knew there would not be another child.

  Later, Arthur took his turn at tucking little Benedict into bed so he could deliver the good news. “Tomorrow,” he said, “we are going on a journey.”

  Ben looked up, excited. “Are we going to town?”

  “No.” His father shook his head. “We are not going to Banbury, or Whitney, or even Oxford. We’re going somewhere far away from England.”

  “China!” The little black-haired boy rose up in bed.

  “No, not China. Not this time. That is a difficult journey, and you must be older for that.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “We are going to Egypt.”

  “Egypt?”

  “That’s right. Remember I told you about my friend Anen who lives in Egypt?”

  The boy nodded.

  “We are going to pay him a visit.”

  “And I can go too?”

  “Yes,” his father assured him. “You will come with me this time. There is much to learn, and it is time your lessons were begun.”

  The boy sat up in bed again and clapped his hands. His father pressed him back down. “We must leave very early in the morning, and you must get your rest. Now, say your prayers and blow out the candle. Morning will be here soon enough.”

  When Arthur came to wake him the next morning, he found his son already awake and dressed, shirt laced, shoes buckled. “You look a fine traveller,” Arthur told him. “Did you sleep at all last night?”

  Ben nodded. “Are we leaving now?”

  “Right this very minute,” replied his father. “The carriage is ready. We can eat our breakfast while Timothy drives.” He tucked in the boy’s shirttails and tightened his belt. “Now, run and kiss your mother good-bye. Then put on your coat. I will be waiting for you in the yard outside.”