The Obsidian Dagger (Horatio Lyle)

by Webb, Catherine

  ‘How’s it do that?’

  Thomas stared into the round, pink, childish face, probably no more than five or six years old, staring up at him with big, bored, impatient eyes, and felt all the wonderful things slip out of his mind. ‘Well, I . . . it’s all to do with elements, you see. All you need is a little iron and a little lime water to pass the carbon dioxide through and then . . .’

  ‘Why? Why why why?’

  ‘It’s . . . well, you see, if you . . .’ Thomas stared into those uncomprehending eyes, and let out a little sigh. ‘It ’s elemental, really.’

  The child thought about this, long and hard. Then put one finger in its ear and one in its mouth and mumbled, ‘I wanna be detective.’

  Thomas couldn’t help feel that two scientific detectives with a grasp of the useful applications of lime water and carbon dioxide might be one too many, but found himself saying kindly, ‘Maybe if you work hard at it, Arthur . . . ?’

  ‘Doyle. Me mam wanted me to be called Ignatius after the priest what has the thing with the cross and goes to the place where the men who study the things learn about stuff. But me dad calls me Conan.’

  Thomas patted Arthur gently on the head. Arthur mumbled, ‘I can do this thing with my ears . . .’

  However, what Arthur Conan Doyle could do with his ears, Thomas never had a chance to find out, although he was probably not the sadder for the loss, because at the far end of the room, the doors swung open.

  ‘Who the hell did this?’

  The servant marched down the hall and picked up the lantern that had fallen on to the floor, plunging the corridor into darkness. She picked it up and shook it gently. Inside, something rattled in a distinctly broken way. She hissed in irritation and scanned the darkness for something to take out her annoyance on. Then she frowned: for a second she thought she saw a shadow where there wasn’t usually one, a little area of darkness darker than the rest of the corridor; but a blink and it was gone. She advanced a few cautious paces and looked again. There was the tiniest suggestion of a shape, the faintest outline of something alien and odd, something that shouldn’t have been, something like . . .

  ‘Where are the damned sheets?’ The muffled voice drifted up from the stairwell.

  The servant sighed, turned, glancing behind her in case something moved there, then left, clutching the lamp. At the stairwell she quickly looked back, but the darkness had thickened in her wake, and not a flea breathed.

  Sighing, then singing under her breath, ‘“When I grow rich,” say the bells of Shoreditch . . .’ the servant went downstairs to sort out sheets.

  Tess counted to sixty in her head, then pulled herself up from where she’d been lying, pressed into the wall of the corridor. She felt her way past the place where the lantern had stood, the wood under it still warm, ran her fingers down the door until she found the lock, and gave the lock picks wedged in it a damn good thump.

  The lock clicked. The door swung slowly open. Tess peered into the room beyond, lit by a single candle burning on the desk, and started to smile.

  And somewhere, not as far away as the coward in Lyle would have liked it to be, but close enough to alert the copper in him, someone, maybe even something, looked up slowly from its contemplation of black stones in a black darkness behind a black door, and said in the voice the earth would use if it talked, or the deep rumble heard in the mines when you’ve gone too far down, ‘Yes.’

  And it stood up, and looked at the door, and began to smile.

  CHAPTER 13

  Earthquakes

  The whole kitchen staff, half the housemaids and one or two footmen who should have been on duty had congregated in the kitchen. Their combined attention was fixed on Tate.

  Tate ignored them, and focused whole-heartedly on eating his way through a substantial plate of cold meats that had appeared before him as if by magic as he’d scrambled out of Lyle’s bag and on to the table. The dusting of flour on the table showed his paw prints running directly from Lyle’s bag to the plate, and on either side of them ran a long, straight line where the tips of his ears had dragged.

  The more Tate ignored everyone around him, the more they tried to get his attention. Every hand vied for the chance to scratch his chin or stroke his glossy coat.

  Lyle all this time had been edging cautiously away. He reached the door, peered left, peered right, made a break for it, got two paces and . . .

  ‘Are you leaving so soon?’

  Lyle turned. The head cook stood behind him, and still had the damn rolling pin in her hand.

  ‘I was just going to see if everything was all right.’

  She advanced towards him slowly. ‘All right where?’

  ‘Down there?’ he hazarded, pointing down the corridor.

  She smiled. It took him by surprise - the smile was light, warmer than her stern, determined gaze suggested, and almost made him want to smile back.

  ‘We aren’t allowed down there, Mister . . . ?’

  ‘Lyle,’ he replied quickly. And then, not knowing why he said it, ‘Horatio.’

  She held out a hand. He found himself taking it in a daze.

  ‘Marley,’ she said. ‘I suppose I could tell you that my first name is Margaret, but that’s jumping into intimacies a little fast, isn’t it?’

  ‘Erm, yes . . . Why aren’t you allowed down there?’

  Marley looked past Lyle at the gloomy corridor beyond. ‘It ’s the cellar down there. Mistress said we weren’t ever to go in. And considering how well she pays, I thought maybe it would be better to let curiosity slip on this one. Wouldn’t you, Mister Lyle?’

  Lyle hesitated. ‘Well -’

  ‘It’s a nice dog you have.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘What’s its name?’

  ‘Tate.’

  ‘You clearly spoil it.’

  Lyle bridled. ‘Actually, it’s young Teresa who spoils Tate so shamelessly. I am always the one who has to tidy up afterwards and look after the children with, may I say, heroic temperance and . . .’

  ‘You’re not very good at being a servant, are you?’

  Lyle turned red. ‘I’m new.’

  ‘It shows. In fact, if I didn’t know better, I’d say that you were more of a poli—’

  And the ground shook.

  Earthquakes and London have never coincided, except on a minor scale whose tremors barely have force enough to ripple water.

  What shook the house that had once belonged to Lord Moncorvo, now gifted to his distant relation Lady Diane Lumire, was different. It rose up from the stones of the cellar and ripped through the kitchen, sending pots and pans tumbling, making old nails creak and water splash and pool. It wobbled its way up the stairs, hummed down the brighter corridors of the house, shimmered up the walls, made the windows creak and the glass crack, caused the curtains to flap and each chandelier to jingle like a drunken percussionist; it thrummed its way up higher and higher, making old stones hum and new metal sing a gentle little tune, hark, hark, whispered under the toes and up the legs, and stretched its fingertips luxuriously up to the roof, sending showers of snow tipping down the side with a wet, heavy noise, before fading into silence.

  The vibrations passed under Thomas’s toes, and shook him from his scrutiny of the lady who had just entered the room. As the nervous titters of the guests faded, he looked up again and saw her, Lumire, the lady of the house, the object of their mysterious search, standing serenely in the doorway. She was smiling, unperturbed by the sudden vibration which had shaken the guests and made each wineglass tremble in its holder’s fingers. Her skin was marble white, her hair was volcanic basalt black, her eyes were granite grey, and she wore a sapphire blue dress that seemed to light up the elegant monotone of her appearance to a new radiance. He had never seen anyone quite like her. When she moved, it was like watching the world glide around her. If anything, the tremor which had just shaken the house brightened her face with an almost childish glee. She surveyed the room, and for a second h
er eyes settled on Thomas’s. At that moment he knew they weren’t the eyes of a Tseiqin: not the bright emerald eyes that delved through your helpless mind. These eyes reminded him of the seashore on a cool misty morning; and like her lips they held a smile.

  She raised her hands in greeting to the room, waited for the assembly to fall into stillness, and said in a voice Thomas could-n’t have described, ‘Friends. Welcome.’

  And looked once more around the room, and this time her eyes met Thomas’s, and stayed.

  He felt his heart race, and heat rise to his face, and tried to think of Gravitational Constants and cabbage.

  Tess glanced up, as the vibrations passed through the soles of her feet. She paused, shrugged, and went back to examining the contents of a desk in the corner of the room.

  She had struck gold, she knew it. If the large crucifix hanging on the wall by the bed hadn’t given her a hint, then her opinion was sealed by the giant Bible on the pillow. With scrupulous care she was now rifling the desk by the glow of a single candle.

  The first drawer had been disappointing: pen and paper and a pamphlet entitled Thy Damnation Cometh? St Paul and St Peter compared (revised); Tess resisted the temptation to tear it up for sheer spiritual satisfaction.

  The second drawer, however, was full of papers. She pulled one out. It read, in huge letters, I am the vessel of change, the Lord maketh and . . . WOE to her that is filthy and polluted, to the OPPRESSING CITY!

  She turned it over. On the back, someone had doodled a couple of crosses, and a smaller note read, in the same hand, Her ladyship has been most generous. BEAUTY. Weakness in men, thy damnation . . .

  She put it to one side and opened up a huge sheet of paper. It was a map. At the top, in a curly script, was written ‘London’. But it was no London she recognized. The streets were neatly laid out, and seemed to lead in together, with a series of circular roads spreading out from the core of the city. Here and there public buildings had been marked, like ‘hospital’ and ‘church’; she noticed many churches, some of them in a stranger hand than the one which had originally marked them.

  She opened the third drawer, and with some trepidation, as well as a sudden horrified fascination, pulled out the object inside. She didn’t know much about such things, but she was sure no one should have a gun quite that big in their bedroom. She peered at the chamber, and saw six bullets already loaded. She put the gun down quickly, turning it to point away from herself, feeling suddenly afraid of it, and tried not to look too much at it, on the off-chance it took offence.

  There were footsteps in the corridor outside.

  Tess slammed the Bible shut, stuck the paper in her pocket, bounded over to the desk, grabbed everything she could carry, blew the candle out and was halfway to the window as the handle turned in the door.

  The tremors had caused chaos in the kitchen. Boiling pots had spilt, pans had fallen, plates had shattered, and the younger and less practical of the staff were still buzzing. Marley strode back and forth, restoring order with a look and a command that couldn’t be disobeyed, glancing around and surveying the damage in an instant, taking everything in her stride. She knew where everything was in the kitchen, could look at a bulging drawer of cutlery and tell how many teaspoons were missing, and who was most likely to have them. She could bake a pie with one hand and boil jam with the other, and stoke a fire to get an oven to exactly the right temperature; she knew how many coals it took to increase the heat given off by how many degrees and how many minutes more or less to cook the pastry. It took her less than five minutes to get the staff back to their rightful places, after which she paused in the doorway, looked round and saw everything as it should be.

  Although Lyle and his dog were now nowhere to be seen.

  CHAPTER 14

  Marquis

  ‘Master Elwick?’ Lady Diane Lumire simpered, one hand going to her mouth, and her shoulders shook as her eyes crinkled up. ‘Master Elwick, I think - I hope - I’m right. But you are Master Elwick, aren’t you?’

  ‘Erm . . . yes, m’lady, you are correct.’

  ‘I’m so glad you could call - I hadn’t hoped for such an honour as an Elwick visit.’ She simpered again, and, for just a second, there was something unsettling about it. Then one of her arms was linked through his - Thomas could feel how cold she was even through his jacket - and she was leading him to one side, talking all the way. ‘Please, you must tell me everything about yourself. I’ve heard so much.’

  ‘What do you want to know, my lady? What have you heard?’

  Before Thomas knew it he was sitting on a padded chair against one of the walls of the room, and she was next to him, gesturing with excitement at each new question. ‘Do tell me about this medal. What was it for?’

  Thomas almost choked. ‘Ah . . . well, it was . . . there was . . .’ Memories flooded back. It felt wrong to talk about it in this house, at this time, to a lady who he knew Lyle regarded as a suspect, to someone with such eyes and such a voice.

  ‘It was . . . nothing.’ The words killed him to say it. ‘An accident at St Paul’s Cathedral. It was my privilege to be able to assist in some small measure.’

  ‘Oh, it can hardly have been small, surely!’

  ‘Well . . . I say small, but . . . naturally . . . I mean . . . well . . .’ Thomas took a deep breath. ‘So tell me about yourself, my lady.’

  ‘Me?’ She laid her fingertips over her heart, as if astonished that anyone could want to know. ‘Oh, I’m hardly interesting at all. Not like you. I travel a lot, I love to explore and meet new people. I think it’s what I live for, you know.’

  An idea struck him. ‘Have you ever been to America, my lady?’

  ‘Why, yes, I have. Are you interested in America? Terrible state at the moment, of course, such problems. Oh, it hardly bears speaking of . . .’

  Thomas felt as if he had struck gold. ‘My family has an interest in America. Some people we once met were terribly keen on cotton, although,’ he almost bounced up and down with excitement, desperate for Lyle to see how clever he was being, ‘I’m told that in some areas they can be very unsound on religious matters.’

  And then, to his shock, Lady Diane Lumire, the most mysterious lady in London, or at least that part of London which could buy Somerset and have change left over, giggled, ‘Oh, my dearest, you are absolutely right! What terrible dears these Americans are.’

  Darkness. Lyle’s footsteps sounded hollow and lonely on the stones. Tate’s snuffling somewhere in the gloom had grown into monstrous proportions. Every few paces Tate would stop and something warm would brush against Lyle’s feet as though to say, no, this isn’t wise, let’s go back now . . . please . . .

  When the darkness became so thick that it seemed to stop all senses beyond sight, and it was impossible even to guess where the walls were or where to move to carry on in a straight line, Lyle dug into his pockets. His fingers passed through layers of glass tubes and rolled fabrics and tools and bits of stray wire and loose change and the occasional compromising paper wrapper that at one time had hidden a secret, guilty caramel. One day, he promised himself, he’d organize his pockets.

  He found what he was looking for in his inner pocket, the bulb trailing wires and, deeper yet into his voluminous coat, a small magnet, encased in a cylinder of tightly wrapped wire. A handle was attached to one end of the magnet. He twisted the wires leading to the bulb around the small nodes at either end of the coiled wire, and started turning the handle. A glow dawned inside the fat bulb, the thick black filament giving off acrid smoke that clouded the yellow light.

  The light didn’t exactly illuminate the corridor he stood in so much as merely give gloomy definition to where one wall began and another ended. The floor was stained with puddles of dirty water, frozen over, and Lyle’s breath fizzled off the hot bulb where it touched it. Tate began to whine.

  They walked carefully down the corridor. It took an eternity. Tate grew quieter as they neared the blackness towards the end where the fai
ntest of lights seemed to stop, until even the padding of his paws was inaudible. As Tate grew quieter, Lyle walked slower, until they stopped dead at the end of the corridor. The hand that turned the magnet fell to his side. The bulb went out.

  Lyle listened.

  He could hear himself breathing. And if he strained, he could hear Tate taking shallow, scared breaths. Beyond the door that shuttered the end of the corridor, he could hear nothing. Not a breath, not a murmur, not a creak. He reached out in the darkness and felt the rough, thick wood of the door and the pocked iron. His fingers danced across a locked padlock, a closed bar.

  He could smell something old and dry. It reminded him of baked clay, or dry loam, but it was subtle and hard to place.

  A little sound behind the door. The tiniest of chinks. The sound of something pushing against the flagstones. Lyle dug hastily into his pocket, pulling out a little clouded glass sphere and a box of matches. He struck a fat match on the wall and, in the dull yellow light, he held it underneath the sphere. The sphere began to smoke and turn white before, with a sudden hiss, it exploded in burning brightness, almost too hot and too bright to look at. Lyle shook the match out, raised the sphere up to eye height and peered through the keyhole.

  For a second, just a second, two stone-grey eyes stared, unblinking, back at him. Lyle gave a cry and jumped away, dropping the matches, just as the eyes retreated from the sudden and blinding light into the darkness again. Tate started barking furiously, but from behind the door there wasn’t a sound. Lyle, not taking his eyes off the door, bent down to pick up the matches, still holding up the light. As his fingers closed over the matches, the ground shook. It was more powerful this time, a deep, low humming that travelled right up the toes and came out at the ears. It knocked Lyle off his feet, and he landed with an undignified thump. Without glancing back, Tate exploded past him, heading away from the door at speed. Lyle crawled towards the buckling wall and clung to it for support as around the door the stones bent and twisted, grinding in their old mortar, which erupted in a shower of dust, as if squeezed out by unbearable pressure. Lyle heard a low, painful creak, saw a couple of stones splinter, then watched as cracks began at ground height and raced upwards towards the ceiling, crawling into the roof like poison ivy, running over his head and onwards, chasing after Tate’s vanishing tail.