The Harlequin Tartan: Quest of the Five Clans

by Raymond St. Elmo

  She put fists to head, beat upon the thoughts within.

  “Ach. You are mad, truly. In your house I will soon be the same.”

  For a moment I considered traveling towards the madhouse with another. Such journeys are easier for the company.

  “Well, if you go mad, then we shall burn the house down again, build it up again,” I decided. “Soon or late it must stand sound and sane.”

  Sionnach stared at me, then crossed arms.

  “I will not stay without sane company,” she declared. “And if you are not my husband, then ‘twere best I have a chaperone. I ask that the Father stay the night as well.”

  I considered refusing the priest. But arguing against his presence would cast shadows on my motives. The woman was comely and I had a reputation to keep for another week. It would not do to have clerics denouncing the New Charter’s champion as a lecherous womanizer. Granted, I would happily be a lecherous womanizer if politics allowed. The week after next, I would pursue lechery.

  “Be welcome to my house,” I nodded to her if not to him. “I will fetch servants, have them prepare you suitable rooms, all you need.”

  I turned to find most of the servants already in attendance. They stood in the open door, else out in the hall peering in, audience for the play. The cook. Edward the groom, a few random carpenters. Mrs. Grumble the housekeeper, and the maid still holding my cloak. Eyes round as owls’, mouths a circle of delight. My valet Phineas standing to the back. Eyes hid behind lenses; mouth shut tight.

  Chapter 14

  The Unity of Blood

  Midnight in a haunted house. Haunted by the ghost of the previous house. For a proper home is a living thing. Warm hearth for a heart. Walls for bones, windows for eyes, door for mouth. Basement for bowels, attic for memory. All the rooms and halls and stairs making paths of thought for the domestic mind. A mind that dreams by night, heart-fire sunk to embers. Clock ticking, mice scurrying, floors creaking with no foot upon it. A living house sleeps and rises, laughs and cries, sings and sighs with those within. And grows old as they so grow, worn by wind and repetition of the days. Till at last it dies; in gentle collapse or sudden consuming fire. And when the house has passed, what dreams will come?

  Bah! Poetic nonsense. A house is mere practical box of wood and brick, a shell to huddle within from wind, wolf and world. I sat in the library of my new home, counting dismal clock chimes. Listening to new walls creaking, new foundations settling, pretending to hear the ghostly whispers of my previous house. If a spirit of the dead building remained, it did so within my mind.

  Clearly a mistake to rebuild a memory. I glared at the floor where I’d found Elspeth. Fresh new planks now. No blood stain upon the bright rug. Yet turned away, ever from the corner of my eye I spied her shadowed corpse.

  I set teeth, focused on the papers before me. Preparations for the Chartist gathering at Echoing Common. Lists of wonders promised by Zeit-Teufel to cast magic glamour upon the dull drone of political speech. I puzzled over the items of wonder. I did not question his Clockwork Giant. The name encompassed the thing itself. If a man should say ‘a clockwork giant is at the door’, his fellows will comprehend.

  But what the devil did Teufel mean by ‘Planetary Cannon’? Weaponry to bombard Mars? What of his ‘Flame Calliope’? Would it provide beautiful music, or decimate armies? What horror awaited the revealing of his ‘Lightning Spiders’?

  I envisioned releasing glowing insects upon the gathered guilds and speakers, the protesters and the preachers… It had appeal. Simple. Modern. Mechanical and pointless, probably murderous. Perhaps therein lay the future.

  “And Balloon Dancers?” I asked. “Has he taught Montgolfiers to waltz with his dragon? We risk associating the Charter with lunacy, not progress.” I needed Elspeth’s opinion. She had a sharp kitchen wisdom that butcher-knifed nonsense. I weighed asking her. If I turned I’d see El lying with head upon outstretched arm, staring thoughtful at the curtains…

  Enough. I put down pen, took up lantern. Pushed back chair and strode to the spot. Fresh smooth boards, polished till I could near see my face. No shadow of murder, no stain of blood. No ghost, no girl.

  Another bah. Here was no haunting. Behold my own mind mocking me. I sighed, strode to the fireplace. Above the mantel hung the carved tabletop from Dealer’s shop. Here at least was something new. The face flickered in lantern shadow, smiling down. A kindly look. No amusement at another’s confusion. No air of wise mystery. Behold a smile declaring ‘I am no wiser than you. We share this weather together’.

  Strange to think upon. Once was a woman who smiled just so. No doubt for the nameless guard, mind and heart troubled as my own. And so he carved this memory. Then I fought him, keeping my life, losing my home, gaining this echo of a girl. Absurd and wonderful as, as storing up the sun’s light for a dark night.

  Perhaps no real woman originated the smile. So he created what his soul desired, from out heart’s longing. Or saw this face one day in a twist of cloud? Perhaps the artist borrowed from an earlier image, some graveyard statue or dusty painting. And Dealer flipping pages of old books found the smile within. And so the title ‘Kariel’... Likely enough. I almost recalled the name. Familiar as all the late madness.

  “What do you suppose is a ‘Flame Calliope’?” I asked her. “I called for wonders of Progress. Teufel assembles horrors that closer recall the wonders of Hell. Shall blow us all to some circle therein.”

  The carving said naught. One would expect this silence. Images do not speak, except to the mad. But the hour was midnight and I was mad. Were Dealer’s head present he’d agree. But he’d kept hid since dragon-kicked. Pity. I wished to ask why he’d written as friend, yet acted as foe.

  Back to the desk, to pen and paper and honest work. No more yielding to distraction. I tapped in thought, weighing words to begin a speech. Words not to anger or frighten, but to enlighten. Clink, tink. I found I tapped upon the bronze puzzle box unearthed in my garden. Etched with dark lines, depicting suns and moons. I picked it up. Something shifted within. I considered taking the fire poker, hammering it till it burst. Best not. All the house would awaken, think me mad. I pushed it to the far side of the desk. Away with you, distraction.

  I needed a speech to deliver upon Echoing Common. Something simple but profound. Appealing to the throne of God, yet shaking Heaven’s pillars. A call to revolution that would not alarm a banker. A shouted affirmation of the rights of the poor, in terms so calm that every fat prince of the Earth would nod agreeable assent.

  A good quote for the start. Something from “The Wealth of Nations”. Where the blast had I put Adam Smith? He should be lying on my desk, dagger for bookmark at Chapter VIII: Of the Wages of Labour.

  Gone. The book must sit beside my bed. I sighed, took up lamp, headed to the door, disliking the journey through dark halls I scarce knew. A motion flicker by the window. I did not turn, but I smiled. No ghost, that. A man’s face peering in. I continued to the door, snuffing the lamp wick. Then drew knife. Turned, waited. The window abutted a side garden, close to fence and street. Moonlit at the moment. A poor choice for burgled entry. Better to work about to the darker side. Amateur. And now, entry chosen, he’d freeze for a rabbit, gathering courage to enter the bear’s den. Bother the wait. I leaned against the wall, began to whisper my speech to a hypothetical crowd.

  “Rousseau speaks of a contract that unites. He says a man walks the street in obligation to those who placed each cobble. Passing strangers in agreement they shall not leap upon him as wild animals; nor he upon them. Wise and true. Yet contracts are cold things of paper and self-interest. I remind you today of a higher, deeper connection.”

  Hmm. Could something ‘higher’ also be ‘deeper’? The moon-shadow of a hand appeared at the window, testing whether latch held fast. Burglar, or vampire? Lèse-majesté for supernatural creature to poke at window latches. They should enter through key holes, else down the chimney. Or call siren sweetly for one to leave the shelter of ho
use, join them in the pleasant night.

  I needed words to siren-call a crowd to new thoughts, while seeming to state old truths. Words to make each hearer see themselves and the man beside them as parts of a special… what? Army? Cause? No. Family? That would do. Words describing a proud tribal lineage, each listener a partaker thereof.

  The window casing began to rise. Not locked? I would complain to housekeeper Grumble. If I lived. If not, my corpse must rebuke her. I pictured my murder discovered by screaming servants. Drained of blood, sprawled next the ghost of Elspeth. Would my martyrdom be a boost to the charter, or hindrance? No telling. Best decline the honor.

  “We here today are shopkeepers and clerks, farmers and miners, servants and masters. Laborers united in grand contract of hire and salary, wage and law. But deeper than paper agreements, older than the cobblestones, is a quality that unites all here. Our common humanity.

  “‘Common’! What a mud splattered peasant of a word. Yet consider sirs, how the common man struggles to live. To house his children, bring bread to their table, guarding them from wolves on two legs and four. If he fails, they perish, the line is ended. Life has always been so. For you, your fathers and their fathers. For common life is battle, and no contract will spare those who fall. Yet consider: we here today are descended in unbroken lineage from all who triumphed, if only long enough to pass the field to the next generation.” In other words, we held the honor of being born and not yet dead. A simple concept that any crowd could appreciate.

  I observed the shadow go through the usual struggle of holding the window casing high with one hand, while clambering through without clatter. A heavy wood frame, thick glazed. He’d best be careful or he’d guillotine himself.

  “We are the common heirs of humanity. The brick layer to your left is a prince of ancient lineage. The shop girl to your right, a queen of holy blood. You must address these as ‘majesty’, were you of lesser clay. But no, you yourself share the blood fire of victorious mankind. The fire of survival, the nobility of struggle. To you is granted the right to address these laurel crowned princes as brother, as sister.” Fine words, but some in the crowd would think I’d turned monarchist.

  Now I stepped to the intruder, who worked to lower the window in silence. Smaller than I. No weapon in either hand. I wrapped an arm about the throat, squeezed tight.

  “Adam Smith,” I declared.

  He gasped, struggled. I put knife to throat.

  “I’m not,” he gurgled.

  “Not Adam Smith?” I asked. “Are you sure?”

  “Not a thief, master. It’s me sir, Edward. Oh lor’ don’t kill me.”

  Well, he sounded like an Edward. My groom, serving as butler till I found better. What was he doing breaking in when he could walk through the front? I could ask. Or, I could torment him a bit.

  “If not Adam Smith then you must be that rascal Rousseau,” I accused.

  He refused to confess. “No sir I am not. I am your groom Edward.”

  “Ha,” I snorted. “Why would my groom break through a window? He can enter by the front.”

  At this, courage came to light.

  “Well why the blast would your Adam Smith or Rousseau do so?”

  I considered. Why indeed? Smith might break the window in search of economic stimulus. Had he done so this morning? While Rousseau would sneak out in search of… ah. Of course. Cherchez la femme.

  I released Edward, shoved him away. Maneuvered through the dark, found candles upon the mantle. Lit a taper from the embers. Considered the intruder in this weak light. A young man in decent clothes. No livery or uniform. By God I will not have the nonsense of livery in my house. I knew little of Edward. Hired by Mrs. Grumble. By my measure he was a boy who’d heard recent gossip of manhood.

  “A girl lurks within this crime, I assume.”

  He looked shamefaced, then defiant. Took a breath.

  “Mrs. Grumble locks us in by night.”

  “Ah,” I said. The servants roomed in the third floor of the west wing, the better to box them in. “You crept out, went courting, could not re-enter?”

  He debated a lie, saw that truth served better. “I counted on a workman’s ladder, sir. But they’d finished up.”

  The guild workers actually finished something? Astonishing. I shook my head. “Idiot. Ringing at the door risks a scolding. Climbing through windows risks your life.”

  The defiant look did not fade. If I’d showed such a face to Keeper, he’d have bounced my head upon the tavern floor. Bad enough to suffer my valet’s irony, the maids gossiping. Why did I not inspire fear among my servants? I was master of the house, a damned spadassin besides.

  I could dismiss this over-proud youth. Hell, I could beat him dead. No law would pursue my bloody fist. He was servant, I master. He possessed the Rights of Man. I held wealth. On the balance scale of justice, that weighed his bag of fog against my bar of gold.

  Of course I would do him no harm. I did not wish to be feared. I saw overmuch of that in the war as a striker. But how easy I walked with this right over the lives of others in my pocket. How kindly I seemed to my mirror, that I forbore to be a beast lording over lesser creatures.

  “Right,” I sighed. “I won’t mention naught to Grumbler. Can you find your way back to your room?” Sensible question. I kept turning wrong. A house three times expanded will confuse the mind by night. But Edward made face to label the question insult. Losing one’s way was an act of age-withered minds. Again I considered violence, repented.

  Then came respect’s nod. “Thank you, sir. You’re a kind master.” He fled into the dark hallway. I smiled to hear him crash into the flower table. His steps diminishing towards the west wing.

  Enough. To bed, myself. I took the candle, stepped around the shadow of Elspeth without glancing down. Now to traverse the maze. My bedroom on the third floor, east wing. I made my way, considering corners where a vampire might leap out, or assassin tiptoe behind.

  I stopped on the second landing. A lamp should have shown here, welcoming night travelers. It sat dark, a guard asleep at post. Another complaint for the housekeeper. The window let in weak light, showing the dance of branch shadows in night wind. I stood listening, shivering within a forest of France again, or some dream of a dark maze. The house creaked, breathed, sighed. How many lives slept tonight within this box?

  Mrs. Grumble the housekeeper, her daughter, another maid. Edward the groom, Phineas the valet. The cook. Mr. Box, the gardener-handyman. And my two house guests Sionnach and Bright. On the opposite wing from where I roomed. No accident, that.

  Too large a house for any need of mine. Except the purpose of impressing bankers and princes, a show to say ‘see, I am no threat to crown and bank’. A lie, that. I intended to shake the banks, and raise beggars to the rank of lord if not king. But how comfortable my revolutionary soul grew to wealth, position, power. Did I truly still believe in a lordship of common humanity?

  I stood in the dark eyeing shadows within and without, and decided: yes. Bloody right I believed. Soul questioned, now on to bed. My room waited with door open, lamp lit within. Excellent. I closed the door, wondering if I’d latched the library window. Perhaps Edward had. Damned if I’d go back to do so now. I glanced about for ‘Wealth of Nations’. There it was. Sionnach held it. She sat in a chair by the lamp, perusing each page, nose wrinkling skeptical of economic proofs.

  “No,” I said. “Madam. Please. Out.”

  She looked up from the book.

  “Here’s a part I like,” she declared. “A man must always live by his work, and his wages must at least be sufficient to maintain him. They must even upon most occasions be somewhat more, otherwise it would be impossible for him to bring up a family, and the race of such workmen could not last beyond the first generation.”

  “A fine quote,” I agreed. Should I shout for servants to drag her forth? Embarrassing. Where was her blasted chaperone-cleric? Let us avoid comic scandal, I prayed. Not that today’s parlor drama
would not be in tomorrow’s journals.

  “Do you really believe in your cause of labor, this sheltering of the poor?” asked Sionnach. She put down the book, replaced the dagger bookmark.

  “Surprised you ask,” I returned. “Did I not before?”

  She shook head to that. “You spoke, you preached, you harangued. You stamped up and down the earth speaking of the rights of man. But you smiled. I thought you up to mischief. A fighter bored with tavern brawls, seeking to slap the faces of greater foes.”

  She stood, put hands to dress, began to unfasten the staying laces. “There is honesty in madness. Perhaps your delusion has led you to believe what you once pretended.”

  “Madam, please.”

  She paused, arched brows. “Rayne, I have undressed before you as virgin bride. Now I stand as your quite legal wife. Are you so weak as to protest the course of life?”

  I hesitated whether to pick her up and push her out the door. Or throw her to the bed. She drew eye and cock and something of my heart. Had since I first saw her. But when was that first sighting? Perhaps I had indeed lain with her, upon her, laughing and panting in nights of desire. In all the joys my recent madness stole from me.

  The dress fell, a soft sigh of satisfied silk. She stood in underskirt and chemise. Swelling of breasts, nipples poking forth. She began to unfix her fox-fur hair. What color fur would wait between legs? Soft as the brush of a fox-vixen… I shook myself as if from dream.

  Strode to her. “No,” I spoke firm, scowling down. “This stops before it happens.”

  She smiled teeth white and sharp as forest creature ready to nip or rip. The chemise fell, revealing smooth curve of belly, child-kindled.

  “It has happened before, my lord. And yet if it be new to you, why then I am new as well. Take me as your bride again, and we will be strangers learning, teaching, sharing.”

  She pressed herself close, small pale breasts into mine, nipples standing. Began to run a hand down my side, along the groin, finding the response she wanted… and suddenly she burst into tears.