Edith Clayton and the Wisdom of Athena

by A. D. Phillips

  We drive past a spiked iron fence. The electric lamps are switched off, but I recognise the shape of the building: sloped, temple-like roof, columned facade. Amazingly the British Museum hasn’t been hit.

  “There it is!” I shout.

  Ernst drives past the front gates, where he recovered the vessel after my scuffle with Lydia. The museum hasn’t changed much in the intervening years. Two padlocked chains secure the bars. There’s no policeman on duty though, only an embossed sign. Closed until Further Notice.

  “The artefacts were relocated,” Ernst says without stopping, “to protect them from damage. They will likely be nearby, but I do not know where.”

  “Wouldn’t they be stored underground?”

  A logical assumption, since they won’t be safe anywhere on the surface. We pass a red bricked station, and I have a Eureka moment.

  “Underground!” I shout.

  Ernst stamps the brake pedal. The Austin screeches to a stop thirty yards up the road. Luckily this old heap of junk doesn’t go very fast, otherwise I’d be catapulted through the window glass.

  Ernst shifts the gear stick into reverse, and pulls back to the London Underground station we passed. Aldwych, according to the blue and white overhang. The latticed steel gate has been left wide open.

  “I thought this line was out of service,” says Ernst.

  A constant low-pitched drone comes from above. I trace the noise to a loudspeaker fixed to a lamppost. The evacuee I live with told me about the almost nightly air raid sirens, and how she and other children hid in shelters whenever they sounded. Electric lights switch off as the blackout begins. I shut off the car engine and headlamps.

  “So your friends don’t bomb us,” I tell Ernst.

  People exit houses, still dressed in their nightclothes. Nobody cares about appearances when the German bombers could be mere minutes away. The civilians head for the station entrance in groups, carrying lit candles and gas masks. A white-helmeted, black-cloaked man leading the congregation shines his electric torch on us.

  “Are you two daft!?” he barks over the siren. “Move!”

  I get out first, then Ernst after he pockets the vessel. The helmeted man has the vocal projection of a drill sergeant mustering his troops, so it’s a surprise to see straggly white hair under the tin hat. A stencilled W on the front identifies him as an air raid warden.

  “Why are you driving about at this hour?” he asks.

  An awkward silence follows. Ernst couldn’t talk without a German accent if his life depended on it, and it might well do under these circumstances.

  “My uncle’s sick!” Yelling so loud leaves my throat dry, but the air raid siren makes it necessary. “Tonsillitis! He can’t speak right now.”

  “That doesn’t explain what you’re doing outside.”

  The droning ceases, replaced by the faint hum of aircraft propellers. Three planes fly overhead in formation, just about visible against the night sky. British fighters.

  “Hurricanes.” The warden shouts, even though there’s no longer any need to. “Go get ‘em, boys!”

  I glance at Ernst. He doesn’t seem too bothered by the old man’s overt warmongering. The patriotic warden leads us into Aldwych tube station and down a flight of concrete steps. Maybe he’s suffered a memory lapse, or is simply in a cheery mood, but thankfully he doesn’t ask any more questions.

  The disused train platform is crowded, with hardly any room to walk between resting refugees. There’s a wide range of people down here: older men, women, and children that haven’t been evacuated to the countryside. They must be expecting the bombing to go on all night, since they’ve brought along sleeping blankets and pillows. Some lack even those basic comforts, and make do with rolled-up jackets and sheets of newspaper.

  Ernst taps me on the shoulder and points to a metal door. It’s padlocked, and the riveted Keep Out sign has a British Government seal. Promising, but we’ll need to watch out for the warden. He’s at the other end of the platform checking on two sleeping girls, but he could turn round at any moment.

  I inspect the lock. It’s secure, and so is the steel bolt. The door barely budges when I push it.

  “Perhaps we could force the lock,” Ernst says.

  “And wake everyone up?” I object. “We need to be more discreet.”

  Kostis tutored me in lockpicking, but I left my tools in Athens. All I brought with me to England was my black cloth outfit, but maybe I can find a suitable replacement. I’m looking for metal wire, thin yet strong. There… the clip in that lady’s hair. Polished silver, inlaid with milky white pearls, and inscribed My Beloved Florence. Taking a family heirloom feels wrong, even if I do intend to return it. But I need that pin.

  The woman is asleep and all by herself, but I’ll have to be careful not to disturb her. While the warden’s occupied with the two children, I undo the clasp. The woman’s slate-grey hair loses its shape as I slide out the clip. With my substitute lockpick in hand, I get to work.

  Lydia opened the Alexandrian catacomb gate in seconds. I’m much less experienced – by about two thousand years – and it takes me well over a minute. We survive a couple of scares. A loud bang that’s surely an exploding bomb, and a tense moment where the hairpin jams. But I get the padlock open eventually.

  There isn’t time to reshape the woman’s hair, so I place the hairclip into her bony hand and cover it with her knitted, lambswool blanket. Ernst slides back the bolt and pushes open the door. He ‘borrows’ a candle – a relatively fresh, wax stick in a simple handled, tin holder – and proceeds into the restricted area.

  I follow, closing the door behind us. There’s nothing I can do about the lock from this side. Hopefully the warden won’t notice his air raid shelter is two refugees shorter.

  More concrete stairs ahead, and nothing to light our way except the candle. If Ernst doesn’t slow down, the flame could blow out, and with the electric cabling stripped for scrap metal we’ll be left to flounder in the dark.

  There’s a muffled explosion above and dislodged mortar trickles onto my head. I brush it off while I walk. The stairwell opens onto a long, tubular tunnel. It’s part of a London Underground line, but no longer in use. Not by trains, at least.

  Wooden storage crates are stacked along the platforms and tracks. They vary in size considerably: small, large, flat, bulky. But the nailed lids all carry the same prominent black stamp: Property of HM Government – British Museum.

  “Edith! Over here!” Ernst shouts from the opposite platform, putting the candlestick on a high crate.

  I head over to him, nearly tripping over a steel track. A yellow-toothed rat gives me a fright, screeching wildly before it scurries down the tunnel. My little adventure over, I join Ernst by a stack of long, thin crates.

  “These boxes are the correct shape,” he says. “We will try these.”

  Ernst takes a pair of Vernier callipers from his inside pocket. They’re a scientific tool for measuring distances of objects, but he uses the metal jaws to crudely jemmy up the lid. Wood creaks and splits as the nails loosen.

  I insert my fingers in the gap and pull. Working together we get the crate open. The artefact – assuming there is one - is buried under a heap of straw. Ernst bails out the insulation, exposing a cloth wrapped bundle that he hurriedly unwraps.

  “That’s one of the Parthenon marbles.” My confirmation is redundant. Where else would a carving of Theseus battling Amazons have come from?

  Ernst reaches into his suit’s outer pocket, and removes the black metal ball. “You will need to…”

  He stops to stare at the marble. Straight lines glow bright blue within the stone. More appear as Ernst brings the vessel closer.

  “They don’t require power,” I say.

  “All light sources require power,” Ernst contradicts me. “But these do not draw the electrical charge from your body. Perhaps whatever was placed in the marble has its own power supply, and reacts to the presence of black metal. Black metal lik
e the armour worn by the traveller.”

  Ernst moves the ball, adjusting its position until a full set of three framed symbols is revealed - a sequence I haven’t seen before.

  “This message was probably intended for her own people,” Ernst speculates. “We can assume they would have vessels already, so these symbols must lead to… Cargo, perhaps. That the traveller had with her when she crashed. Or something powerful that she wished to hide.”

  “More powerful than a vessel?” I feel myself tremble, and it’s not aftershock from a bomb blast.

  “I can translate the symbols,” Ernst says, “but since there is a faster method available to us…” He looks at me expectantly.

  I freeze time, wondering what picture will form when I focus on the patterns. Straight, blue lines join the dots, and… It’s the most terrifying image I’ve ever seen. I wish I could stop looking, but the vision remains fixed in my mind until the picture is complete.

  “What did you see?”

  I hadn’t even begun to open my eyes when Ernst asked that inevitable question, but at least the picture is gone from my head. Do I tell him? Why not? There were no directions to the ‘treasure’, and I doubt even the genius could decipher this.

  “A metal… monster,” I describe, making her sound far tamer than she appeared. “A woman with a fish tail. Like a…” What was that mythical creature called? “A mermaid, only with clawed hands. She was on an island, swiping the air. She must have been inside a cave, because there were stalactites on the roof.”

  “It is a warning.” Ernst is calm. He wouldn’t be if he’d seen the actual drawing. “This mermaid you referred to. She must be a guardian. Was there an object close to her?”

  “Two. One… looked like a diamond. The other was circular with fish inside.”

  “Another vessel,” says Irene, stepping from behind a tall crate. “Thank you, little sister. That’s just what I wanted to know.”

  Chapter Sixteen: The Battle of Aldwych

  How long was Irene hiding in the shadows? How did she know where to find us? Was it Ernst? Have they been secretly working together? My sister loves to gloat, so I won’t have to wait long for answers.

  Irene kicks off her high heels, and strolls barefoot into the candlelight. She looks like a tramp. Strands of her messy hair are stuck together with dried mud. Her jacket is torn along the stitches, her skirt ripped to shreds. Both her hands are smeared with shiny black engine oil. So that’s how she followed us.

  “You hid under the car,” Ernst says, arriving at the same conclusion. “For a woman to hold on for so long under such adverse conditions. That is remarkable.”

  Does he realise she’s here to kill us? I never understood his admiration for my sister, and I certainly don’t share it.

  “She’ll do anything to find a vessel. Kill anyone.” I emphasise the last part for Ernst’s benefit. “How do you think she got that uniform?”

  “By killing a little wren.” Irene flexes her blackened fingers. “It wasn’t very difficult. She was a weak girl with a weak neck.”

  My sister’s unrepentant confession doesn’t discourage Ernst. He walks to her, holding forth the vessel as a peace offering. I’m surprised he doesn’t grovel at her feet.

  “Why oppose each other?” he asks. “We could combine our talents. Work together.”

  Irene takes the vessel, spreading her fingers to firm her grip. “We could,” she says playfully. “But I already have your notes on Rosetta. I don’t need anything else from you.”

  My sister clobbers Ernst’s jaw with the metal ball, a blurringly fast strike that knocks him back into a crate. A wooden plank splits and buckles inward. There’s a loud crash, and the contents spill out, burying the unconscious German under straw and shattered china.

  Irene grabs Ernst’s hair, bicep bulging through her torn sleeve. The warrior women carved on the marbles are scrawny by comparison.

  “What do you think, little sister?” she asks. “Should I kill him?”

  If Irene expects me to watch and do nothing – like with Johann in Berlin – she’s mistaken. There are no soldiers to stop me this time.

  I roll up my sleeve and take out the branch. Gripping the sharp stick tight, I sidestep until I have a clear line of attack. My sister opens her hand, letting the vessel roll off her dipped fingers. The metal ball lands on Ernst’s belly with a fleshy squish.

  “I suppose not,” Irene says. “I might need that wonderful brain of his some day. But now I can read the symbols, I won’t be needing yours.”

  Irene drags her foot sideways, sweeping straw into an untidy pile. She ignores the cuts she receives from the broken china vase and walks calmly toward me, leaving a trail of fresh blood. “You know what I want. I won’t let anything get in my way. Not some trifling pain. And not you.”

  My sister’s close enough to smell the engine oil. The stick feels warm in my clammy hand, but I don’t blink. Freezing time would only give me longer to doubt myself. I know what I have to do.

  “Do you really think you can—”

  I lunge before Irene talks me out of it. The wooden stake is on course for her heart. Then she grabs the branch, and I may as well be pushing a mountain. I haven’t outmuscled my sister since she was ten. Irene breaks the stick with a upward flick of her wrist, and hurls the sharp piece across the train tracks. It lands on the other platform, out of sight. And reach.

  “So cold. So ruthless,” says Irene mockingly. “Where did my timid little sister go?”

  “She grew up,” I reply.

  Confronting my sister head on would be madness. I need to handicap her, give myself a fighting chance. I fling the broken stick at Irene’s face, move in swiftly under her raised arms, and stamp her kneecap.

  I expect to cripple her leg - or at least upset her balance - but where the vulnerable joint should be, there’s a rigid surface. And instead of a crunch I hear a metallic clink. My sister’s skirt stretches tight around her upper leg, and I make out the impression of something long and curved underneath.

  Irene smashes her elbow in my face, a punishing blow that knocks me back. I lose my footing, rubber soles skidding along the concrete floor. I freeze time before my sister takes advantage. She’s lifting her leg, about to kick high. I resume the fight, twist my waist, and lean back. Irene’s foot whooshes harmlessly past, but now I’m on the defensive.

  I stop time again, looking for a counter move which isn’t there. The best I can do is block Irene’s next attack. The punches keep on coming. A few I avoid without freezing time, but I don’t know how much more my body – or mind – can take.

  I slog Irene in the stomach, then her jaw. She absorbs the damage, grinning as she strikes back. A quick, hard-hitting jab leaves me breathless.

  “Grown up?” my sister jibes. “You’re still the same, puny girl.”

  Irene grabs my top, twists the neckline tight, and shoves me back into the broken crate. A second plank caves in beneath the first. I’m stuck in the hole. My leggings tear on wooden splinters as I attempt to wriggle loose.

  “And the same stupid girl,” Irene says. “Do you think you overheard me in the grocer’s shop by chance? The Germans sent me to England to recover the vessel, not a way to translate the symbols. I only found out about Rosetta after I questioned the little wren. Then I saw you in the village, and I wondered… what if there is another vessel, and she knows about it?”

  “So instead of asking, you came up with a twisted plan.” I shift sideways to get more leverage. “I hope you remembered how to translate the symbols. Don’t expect me to do it.”

  Squealing rodents flee, disturbed by a circle of light that rapidly shifts to us.

  “What the hell’s going on?” the air raid warden demands, pointing his electric torch.

  “I caught these two looting.” Irene fakes disgust to sell her lie. “There’s a war on. Hard to believe there are silly little girls who would steal at a time like this.”

  “Don’t listen—” The broken
plank slices into my leg, cutting short my warning.

  “Silence!” the warden yells. Like a schoolmaster telling off a naughty girl.

  I try pushing the plank off the crate, but the nails hold firm. “She’s a spy!” I cry. “She’ll kill you!”

  Irene laughs it off. “Children and their imaginations.”

  The warden marches past her, looking down with visible anguish at the smashed china pot. “This is from… the British Museum,” he gasps. “Do you have idea what it’s worth?”

  “More than you think,” Irene says, lifting her skirt.

  The warden’s looking at me. He doesn’t see my sister draw a familiar razor-sharp sword from the concealed scabbard strapped to her upper leg. Light bounces off rubies on the cutlass’ golden hilt.

  “Watch out!” I scream, grabbing both sides of the crate.

  Irene locks her arm around the warden’s neck, holding him upright as she plunges her blade into his back. Her cutlass passes all the way through, coming out just inside his left hip. Fresh blood runs down the curved blade, collecting on the man’s cloak.

  The electric torch falls from the man’s shaking hand. Glass smashes, and the light goes out. The dying warden’s a crooked figure in the candle’s glow. Fighting for his life, he reaches into his coat pocket and removes a revolver: an old Webley with a scratched barrel.

  Irene grabs the warden’s wrist, redirecting his aim upward. “The British are such gentlemen,” she taunts him. “They would never look under a woman’s skirt.”

  I give the damaged plank a two handed push, and it snaps off. Splinters tear through my flesh as I fall onto the straw beside Ernst. A bloody geyser erupts from my leg, so powerful it catapults pieces of broken wood over the crate. It’s too painful to stand, and my wound’s taking an awfully long time to heal. Too long to help the warden.

  The old man fires his Webley. A ceiling tile shatters, showering the platform with ceramic chips. Irene bends the man’s fingers back from the trigger guard, breaking them all at once. The gun goes off as it strikes the floor, putting a bullet in the warden’s ankle. His head drops, as do his hands. No cries or groans, which means he’s dead.