The Express Diaries

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The Express Diaries Page 15

by Nick Marsh


  Colonel Neville Goodenough’s Personal Notes, Thursday, November 12th, 1925

  The diary – I knew there must be more to it. I examined it again, last night. It was damnably hard work. The pages of the diary were yellowed, and the ink had faded, so that it was almost impossible to read in the dim electric light – and those passages that I could translate made little or no sense at all. Some rot about ‘beasts’ in a cave, and an amulet. As I read, hunched over the diary, with that bloody wind rattling the window until it sounded ready to shatter, I thought of the medallion that the angel statue had held. I became convinced that this amulet that Winckelmann discussed was the key to our mystery. If we could find it, all else would follow. Why else would Smith give us this lead?

  I read and re-read the passages about it, whilst the storm howled behind me like an arctic banshee. Not a hint or a clue as to the amulet’s whereabouts - only that Winckelmann had concealed it somewhere to prevent his roommate from discovering it. I idly flipped through the pages – and then stopped. On the inside of the back cover, so faded as to be almost invisible, Winckelmann had sketched a map. A map of Trieste!

  Stunned, I sat bolt upright in my chair, holding the diary up to the flickering bulb on the wall, and examined the faded sketch. How had we missed it before? It only showed a segment of the city, but it was enough. Even though it must have been over a hundred and fifty years old, I could make out the street that our hotel was now on. More importantly, I could see a building just a few streets away, marked with a large asterisk.

  The amulet – there was no question in my mind. As I peered at the scribbled map, I saw in my mind’s eye the street that Winckelmann had indicated all those years before. We must have walked past the place earlier. I was certain I could find it. The amulet – only a few hundred feet away from where I was sitting!

  Any chance of sleep was gone for good now. I was too energised by my discovery. I peered back at the page. For a moment, I saw only blank, yellowed paper, and my heart sank, but after a moment I began to discern the faded brown ink again. Even as I did so, I realised I no longer needed the map. I knew exactly which building the amulet was in. There was no time to waste.

  From the Journal of Violet Davenport, Thursday, 12th November 1925

  Dear Diary,

  Well, that’s it, they’ve finally cracked. I think it’s time to put them out to pasture. I suppose it happens to the best of us, under stress. I know that Uncle has been through much worse in his life, but it seems that the strains of this particular peculiar holiday have finally sent him right round the bend.

  I may have mentioned that he has been in a funny (not to mention foul!) mood ever since we arrived in this freezing city. At first I thought it was simply the weather getting him down – I have felt the same, and I don’t even have a gammy leg! - but I’ve never seen him in such a black mood. He’s been wandering around as if he had found a wasp in his beer for the last couple of days, but last night, dear diary, did not just take the biscuit but also the whole pot of tea, and a cake or too as well for good measure.

  I had just managed to drift off to sleep despite the infernal racket from the windows, when I was awakened by a door slamming across the hallway. Uncle Neville’s room – not to mention the room where we are keeping the trunk with you know what inside. Quick as a flash I was at the door to see a familiar figure stumbling towards the staircase!

  ‘Uncle Neville!’ I cried. Uncle turned, then looked away quickly (honestly, he’s such a prude! I keep telling him that my night attire covers my modesty far better than anything I wear on stage). ‘What are you doing?’

  He looked dreadful, ghastly white in the face apart from deep black circles under his eyes. Also, I don’t think that he had shaved since the day before.

  ‘I’ve found it!’ he said, holding up the battered diary we had wasted a day finding. ‘It was in here all along!’

  ‘Found what?’ I asked. ‘The statue?’

  Uncle looked confused for a moment, then shook his head. ‘No, no, no. The amulet!’

  ‘Amulet?’ I said. ‘What amulet? The one in the diary?’

  He nodded. ‘I know where it is! Go back to bed. I’ll see you in the morning.’ He turned to go, but before I had a chance to argue Auntie Betty emerged from her room, and subjected him to a similar line of questioning - with no more sensible response. As Auntie and I looked at each in other confusion, Grace’s door opened, then Milos’s.

  It soon became clear that Uncle Neville was not to be dissuaded from his course to heaven-knows-where, and that we were not about to let him go wandering about the darkened streets of Trieste in the middle of the night. I couldn’t understand it – he’d never seemed that interested in finding the statue, and now here he was, practically jumping with excitement about some amulet that we hadn’t even heard of until today. And that is how, dear diary, I found myself out of my warm bed and braving the freezing bora at two o’clock in the morning, following an elderly and very possibly senile retired colonel to some unknown destination.

  It turned out that said destination was a ramshackle, boarded-up villa on a curving street some distance from our hotel (how far I could not say exactly because the going was very slow, but it felt like a hundred miles). The door was stuck fast, but to everyone’s relief Milos barged it open on the first attempt, and we hurried in, glad to be out of the wind.

  Having had no idea where we were going, none of us had thought to bring one of the professor’s electric torches, and so we were only dimly aware of our surroundings, but we could make out a reception desk or counter rotting amidst the cobwebs. It might once have been a hotel of some kind.

  Uncle Neville seemed to know exactly where he was going. Holding one hand to his head, with such a grimace etched on his face that I was worried he might be about to have a seizure, he walked through an empty doorway and started down some stairs into the cellar.

  The rest of us were more cautious, but thankfully the stairs were stone and not wood, and so they held our weight. I heard rats scurrying about as we entered the pitch-black cellar. Milos took some rags and a long piece of wood, and eventually got them lit with his lighter. His improvised torch illuminated Uncle Neville in the far corner of the deserted cellar, digging in the ground with his bare hands like a dog that had lost its favourite bone.

  We all looked at each other, sure that Uncle had lost his mind. Auntie Betty took a step forwards and said ‘Neville...’ but at that moment he pried up a loose stone that had been buried under the earth, reached into the small niche, and pulled out a mass of rotten leather. Something gold within it glittered in the torchlight, and as Uncle lifted the bundle to his face the rags around it fell apart to reveal a golden amulet.

  Uncle Neville jumped as if he had been bitten, and he sat down against the wall, staring at the thing. We hurried forwards but he was on his feet before we could get to him.

  ‘I’m fine, I’m fine,’ he was saying, and he was right. The colour had returned to his face, and he looked invigorated.

  ‘How did you know...’ Auntie Betty said, falteringly. ‘How did you know this was in here?’

  Uncle Neville didn’t look up from his prize. ‘Hmm?’ he said. ‘Oh, how did I know? There’s a map, in the diary.’

  He handed the scruffy journal to Auntie, who flicked through it.

  ‘On the back page,’ Uncle said absently.

  Auntie peered at the page whilst Milos held the torch as close as he dared to the yellowed paper.

  ‘A map?’ Betty asked. ‘Where?’

  Uncle finally tore his gaze from the amulet, and frowned. ‘What? On the back page!’ He stood up, and grabbed the diary from Betty.

  ‘Here,’ he muttered, holding the book closer to the torch. We all crowded round.

  ‘It’s very... very faded,’ Uncle Neville muttered. ‘Hard to see.’ He sounded as if he was trying to convince himself.

  ‘Neville,’ Auntie Betty said, after a polite silence. ‘There’s nothing there.’
>
  Colonel Neville Goodenough’s Personal Notes, Thursday, November 12th, 1925 (Ctd.)

  I had a most peculiar dream last night.

  I was sitting in the long-backed armchair in my hotel room in Trieste. Upon the table in front of me I had laid out the amulet we had retrieved that same night, but in the dream it was different. It shimmered and warped as I gazed upon it, and the human-shaped figure carved on one side seemed to dance. Something about the figure was familiar, as familiar as my own shadow, and with a start I realised what it was.

  Lilly. The relief carved into the amulet was my beloved, lost Lilly.

  As I stared, I heard the wind whistle in my ears, but this time the wind had a voice to it. Her voice. I couldn’t make out the words, but I knew it was her. My eyes stung as I reached forward to pick up the amulet, and as I did so I heard my late wife whisper, very clearly into my right ear, the word ‘Postumia’.

  And it was then that I realised I was not asleep, and that this was not a dream at all.

  Diary of Mrs Betty Sunderland, Thursday, 12th November, 1925

  Some very strange discussions were had at the breakfast table this morning. I do not know what has got into Neville, for I’ve never seen him like this, not even after dear Lilly passed away.

  The rest of the party and I were huddled bleary-eyed in the restaurant this morning, trying to make sense of the peculiar disturbances of last night, when Neville arrived. His face was grim, but he looked refreshed. That dreadful pallor was gone from his face, and he appeared to be something more like his old self.

  ‘You’re looking chipper this morning,’ I remarked as he sat down and the waiter poured him a cup of that Italian muck.

  ‘Yes,’ said Neville, although he looked somewhat in doubt about the statement himself.

  He took some toast, buttered it and began to eat, whilst we sat and watched.

  ‘Well?’ I asked, eventually, unable to wait any longer.

  ‘Well what?’

  ‘Well,’ Violet interrupted, ‘Would you like to tell us what all that business was about last night? The old hotel? The amulet?’

  Neville shrugged as if it was a trifling matter.

  ‘Well, at least show us the thing, we’ve lost half a night’s sleep for it,’ I said.

  Neville glanced at me sharply, but I held my gaze. Eventually he relented. ‘Very well,’ he muttered, reluctantly, and fished the golden amulet out of his breast pocket. He held it before him for a while, staring at it, until I reached over the jam and whisked it from his hand, ignoring his protests. Such behaviour! What example does he think he is setting to the youngsters?

  It was a flattened gold disc, about two inches across, with a hole punched through it at the top for string or a chain. A relief of a man standing with his arms outstretched and his mouth open was carved upon one side of it. On the other, several concentric rings were inscribed with hieroglyphs that made no sense to me. It was a pretty thing, to be sure, but largely unremarkable. I couldn’t place it to any particular culture. It certainly seemed to have something of the ancient Greek style to it, but had clearly been made much more recently than that, no more than two hundred years ago.

  I passed it around Grace, Violet and Milos, who inspected at it as I had, whilst Neville fidgeted and watched until it was returned to him. In a flash it was back in his breast pocket, and within a few seconds he had patted it to make sure it was still there.

  ‘Well,’ I said. ‘It’s very interesting, but it’s not a leg, an arm, or a head, so where does that leave us?’

  Violet made a comment that had no place at the breakfast table.

  ‘What about these caves that the chap mentioned in his diary?’ Neville suggested.

  ‘Postumia,’ Milos said. ‘A large network of underground caverns. Something of a tourist attraction. I think they are about fifty kilometres from here.

  ‘Caves?’ Violet exclaimed. ‘What have they got to do with anything?’ She looked at Grace.

  ‘Could you go and ask the waiter for some more coffee for us, dear?’ I asked Grace. Best to diffuse these rebellions before they get out of hand.

  ‘Yes, Mrs Sunderland,’ Grace said, and stood up.

  ‘Well, this Winckelmann chap mentions them,’ Neville said.

  ‘But,’ I protested, ‘he doesn’t mention a statue, or anything like it! We have found this amulet, somehow...’ I looked pointedly at Neville here but he refused to take the bait, ‘but how does that help us?’

  ‘Look,’ said Neville. ‘Professor Smith told us to find Winckelmann, didn’t he? He must have known he was connected somehow. And in the diary, he mentions that the... what was it, the things? Beasts?... tried to get hold of any occult items. Maybe the pieces of the statue were some of them?’

  ‘So,’ said Violet, ‘you want us to grub about in some caves looking for goblins so we can ask them if they’ve got any bits of a broken up statue?’

  ‘Violet!’ I said, sharply. That was no way to talk to one’s elders.

  ‘I think the colonel has a point,’ Milos said. ‘Professor Smith has been right so far. Perhaps he is right this time also.’

  There was a certain logic to it, I had to admit - and we didn’t have any other leads to try. It seemed to be the caves or nothing.

  Milos is making the arrangements now. There is a guided tour every day at noon, so if we catch the next train we should make it with a few minutes to spare.

  I wish that Alphonse was here. I’m sure he would understand this amulet business better than I can. He might even be able to talk some sense into Neville (though I fear that task might have been even beyond the skills of Cicero!).

  I suppose, though, in a funny sort of way, the professor is here. He came to me again, last night, and we spoke for a long time about things that I may have been mistaken about. I talked to him about the thing on the clock tower.

  The taxi is here. Next stop, Postumia![43]

  Milos Valinchek’s Personal Journal (translated from Czech) Thursday, 12th November

  Europe is a scarred country, bitter and scarred. Englishmen like the colonel think that their war healed the wounds, and bound them back together. All they did was deepen them, and now they fester, and rot. At what point will the scars be so deep that the body of Europe will die?

  Take Postumia – a small town near Trieste, within the borders of (or, as Il Duce likes to say, ‘under the protection of’) Italy. Yet, you try to speak Italian there and you will instantly be cast as an outsider, and likely a hated one. They all consider themselves part of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (or Yugoslavia, as they all call it).

  Rifts like this criss-cross Europe like the railways on which we travel. If the English, French and Americans think they can erase hundreds of years of resentment by drawing lines on a map they are much mistaken, as I fear they will soon discover. I tried suggesting to the colonel on the train on the way to the caves that perhaps things would be better now if his country had allied with mine and the Germans instead of the French; the Russians would not have dared turn against us then. Predictably, this did not sit well with him, though he is an intelligent enough man to see that there is at least some truth in what I say. Anyone who still believes that nonsense about a war to end wars needs only to look at any corner of Europe to see through the lie.

  Nevertheless, as my father says (when he can lift his head from a bottle enough to speak) – it is a good time to be an arms dealer!

  My thoughts are very dark today – though who could blame me, after the events in the caverns? Or, perhaps, it is the bullet wound. I had not given the pain much thought until I sat down to write. I do hope Mrs Davenport is not feeling quite so sore.

  All of this, of course, requires some explanation.

  The train to Postumia (or Postojna, as they call it in the town) was almost empty – few tourists wish to enter the caverns in the winter – but I noticed several gentleman boarding one of the other carriages. Kemal may have banned the fez, but I do not need
a hat to know a Turk when I see one.

  Conversation aboard the train was strained. The colonel was distracted, and the rest were tired and apprehensive. For myself, I did not expect much – the caves are a tourist attraction, and have been for over a hundred years. Anything strange in the dark would have been discovered long before now.

  When we arrived in Postumia, a few hours later, I watched the carriage carefully for the Turks, but they did not alight, and presently the train set off for Trieste once more. Within another hour we stood in front of the entrance to the caves – an old Austrian building, built when they still owned this part of the world. Who will rule over it in fifty years, I wonder?

  It was just before noon as we arrived, in time to take the only guided tour of the day. No other visitors had braved the foul weather, so the tour was for us alone. Our guide was a tall young man with a broad smile and dark hair. He told us that his name was Tommaso Mascari, but he grinned and asked us to call him Tom.

  Inside the cave, the River Pivka flowed on into the darkness, whilst we followed a walkway up to a set of rails upon which was a small gas locomotive. Behind this were several open trolleys, like mine carts (albeit with doors, and better upholstered than your average miner would expect). Tom frowned at Violet’s flimsy footwear and offered her some stout boots, but she refused to wear such ‘ugly shoes’, so Tom shrugged, grinning, and told us to take a seat.

  The caverns are astonishing, and so large it is hard to comprehend. The rail track continues for a mile or so, but this only covers a small portion of the tour – and even this is only a fraction of the explored parts of the caves. After a long ride, Tom made us disembark and we travelled on foot for at least as far again through the deeper caverns.

  The electric lighting, fitted over forty years ago now, is imperfect, but shows enough of the bizarre stalagmite and stalactite formations to make one’s breath catch in one’s throat. Very quickly, I think, we had forgotten why we had come to this place, as each of us gazed upon nature’s wondrous work. In the flooded caverns, the dark water reflected the shapes in strange and sometimes disturbing ways – which Tom exploited to full effect, cheerfully pointing out such accumulations as the Beheaded Dwarf, the Brain, and the Dead Man’s Bones. Typical tourist fare, of course, but the sights were marvellous.

 

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