The Rich Man’s House

by Andrew McGahan

  Madelaine shook her head. ‘If so, there was no note in his apartment. No. It’s impossible. I knew him. He was not unhappy about anything.’

  It was Rita and Madelaine together who had searched Kushal’s apartment for any clue as to what might have happened. But there was nothing. Kushal had retired at the same time as the rest of them last night, and all indications were that he had gone straight to bed. The clothes he had been wearing during the day were neatly folded over a chair in the bedroom; a book—Rita’s own book, she noted to her discomfort—was resting page down on the side table, next to an empty whisky glass; his toothbrush and some medications sat neatly on the sink in the bathroom; the bedside lamp was switched off, and the bed had clearly been slept in.

  But at some point he had thrown the covers back. And on the floor, as if discarded hastily, were a man’s pyjama pants and shirt. Nearby, slippers lay unused. Suggesting that Kushal had risen, taken off his clothes, and then, naked and barefoot, climbed all the way up to the Conservatory, and finally walked out into the deadly minus-twenty-degree chill of the Terrace.

  Why would he do that? Why would anyone, unless forced, maybe, at gunpoint? And indeed, Kennedy’s first suspicion had been of foul play, theorising that someone—one of the five of them—must have invaded Kushal’s apartment and marched him at gunpoint out onto the Terrace.

  Except that it hadn’t happened. Immediately after raising the possibility, Kennedy had descended to the Control Room and summoned up the security camera footage of the previous night.

  And there, plain to see, appearing in the hallway outside his apartment at 1.55 a.m., was Kushal, quite alone, tall and solid and completely naked, walking with a slow, calm deliberation towards the Helix Staircase. He seemed to be fully awake; his eyes were certainly open—though the resolution of the security camera was not sufficient to read any expression there—but at the same time his gait had the manner of one drugged, or perhaps sleepwalking.

  The cameras next caught on him the Helix Staircase themselves, then in the Atrium, and then in the Conservatory. All the while he moved in the same slow, abstracted manner, never glancing to this side or that, never veering from his course. Which led him at last to the airlock doors. He slid the inner door open calmly, and passed through to the second.

  But here the all-seeing security was foiled. For although there were indeed more cameras out on the Terrace, and although they were still functioning under the emergency power protocols, the Terrace lighting was not, and between the fog and the night, the cameras were all but blind. A little indirect lighting did leach up from the Atrium below, and perhaps a vague shape was caught at one point, moving near the pool’s edge, but otherwise there was nothing but phantoms of mist.

  ‘It cannot have been suicide,’ Madelaine repeated. ‘I don’t care what your cameras saw. He was fine when he went to bed last night.’

  ‘That’s not exactly true,’ said Clara, her expression thoughtful. ‘He was upset about the stairs collapsing, remember. He wasn’t his usual self at all.’

  Richman shook his head. ‘He would hardly kill himself over that. But dammit, even if he did intend suicide, how the hell could he have ended up like that, half in and out of the ice? He would have had to walk out into the middle of the pool and cut holes in the ice to put his arms and legs and head through. But what did he use to cut the holes? He had no axe, and there’s no sign anyway that the holes were hacked out, the ice was snug around his arms and neck and legs. Okay, maybe, if he’d walked out when the ice was still thin, then he could have forced his arms and legs through it, but of course if the ice was that thin it would never have supported him to walk out there in the first place. But if the ice was thick enough to hold him up, he could never have sunk his hands and feet through it without an axe or something. It’s impossible either way. It’s like he was simply hanging there, in midair almost, while the ice formed around him.’

  Clara was gazing at nothing. ‘Maybe he was.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. There’s no way to explain it. But Kushal himself would find this another interesting coincidence, don’t you think?’

  ‘And what does that mean?’

  The major-domo glanced at Rita and then to her employer. ‘He was the one most concerned about what’s happening here, about whether or not there is something deliberate behind it, something that comes from the Wheel. He was the one who thought Rita should perform a lustration. And as I understand it, a lustration would weaken whatever force lies in the Wheel, maybe even kill it entirely. So you don’t find it strange that of the five of us, he’s the one who dies in a way that seems overtly impossible?’

  Richman laughed sourly. ‘So what are you saying—the Wheel did this? The Wheel made him walk up to the Terrace, naked, and then held him there over the water while it froze solid?’

  Clara was unperturbed. ‘Did he look like he knew what he was doing, in those videos? He’s walking like a zombie. I think something had a grip on his mind, something forced him out there.’

  ‘Oh for fuck’s sake …’

  ‘Rita?’ asked the major-domo. ‘In the old days, did you ever experience anything like this? Did your presences ever … hypnotise people?’

  Rita was already shaking her head. No, god no, there had never been anything like this. She had known presences to give people nightmares, and there had been the young boy, at the site of her very first lustration, who had been sleepwalking. But to make a grown man walk heedless to his death, to hold him above the water as it froze? ‘No,’ she said. ‘Even back then, I never saw anything like this.’

  Clara said, ‘And yet you claimed in your book that these presences of yours are capable of killing people. Your mother, for one.’

  Rita swallowed. ‘Yes, but that was the only death I witnessed firsthand. The presences I dealt with were usually not as strong as that.’

  The major-domo was implacable. ‘But you say also that there are bigger and stronger presences in storms and in giant waves and the like, and those things can certainly kill people.’

  To that Rita had no answer. It was true, she had written exactly that, believed it; she had experienced for herself the ferocity of the monstrous presence within the jet stream during the LA flight, had been in terror for her life because of it.

  Yes, presences could kill. But when they did, it was a swift, unthinking action. The sudden fall of cave roof, a tornado’s whirl, a rogue wave rearing and crashing in a few terrible moments. The idea that a presence could coldly reach out across the sea and take hold of a human’s mind and body, one human among six, marking him out for reasons of its own, and then guide him to a point of execution …

  No, at that even her old self would have rebelled. It could not be. And yet, how else to explain what had happened? What else could have made Kushal do what he had done?

  Richman was staring at his major-domo. ‘Are you really buying into all this, Clara? You think a ghost did this to Kushal?’

  Clara shook her head. ‘No. I don’t think so. I just wanted to reason out how Rita—or how her book—might have explained it.’

  ‘Trust me, natural causes are more than explanation enough,’ said Richman. ‘Whatever the reason—suicide or sleepwalking—Kushal went up to the Terrace and ended up in the pool and drowned. Then, by some fluke, he froze in that weird way. I don’t know what the fluke was, but I’ve seen enough bizarre shit on mountains in my day to know that ice can do freakish things at times. Right?’

  Clara, his fellow mountain climber, gave a reluctant nod of agreement.

  ‘Then let’s leave it that,’ the billionaire concluded, ‘and forget all the other bullshit. We’ve got enough problems as it is.’

  ‘Like no rescue coming,’ said Madelaine. ‘Even though you promised it would.’

  Richman gave a puff of frustration. ‘If only this damn fog would lift!’

  Kennedy, who had been hulking silently in a chair all the while, looked up. ‘Fog or not, we should h
ave heard a plane or helicopter at least circling about by now. And we haven’t.’

  ‘I know, and I can’t think why that is. Someone has screwed up massively somewhere.’ Richman straightened, gathered himself. ‘But fine. If rescue isn’t coming, then we have to rescue ourselves. The first thing is to get down to Base. Agreed?’

  His gaze swept the group, and then settled significantly on Clara. Rita stared at the major-domo in sudden alarm, understanding. But Clara herself was gazing at the fire and gave no answer.

  Kennedy nodded slowly. ‘If it can be done, then yes, getting down to Base seems a good start. But,’ and he too now looked at Clara, ‘can it be done? Can someone really get down those stairs?’

  ‘Like I said,’ said Richman, with a certain impatience, ‘I’d be happy to try. But in these situations it’s not about who wants to go, it’s about who should go, who has the best chance of getting safely down. And ego aside, I know that’s not me.’

  Bastard, thought Rita in increasing foreboding. Tell him to fuck off, she willed at Clara. He can’t make you go down those damn stairs.

  ‘It’s a matter of what’s best for the group,’ Richman went on. ‘That’s how it works in business, that’s how it works on a mountain, too.’

  Clara looked up at last, directly at Richman, her eyes dark with an emotion too private to be understood by the others. (Was it, Rita wondered, disgust?) ‘But you want me to go?’

  The billionaire faltered for just an instant, then was all easy assurance. ‘No one is insisting. It’s your call entirely. If you think you can do it.’

  ‘Jesus,’ Kennedy swore, but only looked away without any explanation.

  Rita too felt herself on the brink of protest … but to say what? After all, what right was it of hers to tell Clara what to do, or even to judge the sanity or otherwise of an attempt to descend the stairs? Richman and Clara were the experts here, mountain climbers both—surely they knew better than Rita did what was possible and what wasn’t.

  But even so, this was all wrong.

  ‘Well?’ Richman asked.

  Clara nodded. ‘Okay, Walter,’ she said, and something final and weary about her tone made Rita guess that the major-domo had said exactly that to Richman too many times, and that Clara was sick of it, and that was why she was leaving him.

  Richman was oblivious. ‘Excellent. What we need to do now then is get you fitted out with some climbing gear. With any luck you won’t need it. Still, I know there’s some stuff in the Museum that isn’t too old: ropes, harnesses, carabiners …’

  Clara nodded, then, strangely serene, glanced to the others. ‘Don’t worry. I know none of you like the look of those stairs, but it shouldn’t be that hard, even if a few of the flights have fallen. There’s still the main scaffold. I’ve climbed far worse.’

  Yes, thought Rita, her glance going to the major-domo’s booted feet, but that was when you had all your toes. But again, the calm competence in Clara’s gaze defied her, prevented her from protesting aloud. If Clara thought she could handle the stairway, then she would know, wouldn’t she?

  And anyway, what else was there, truly, to be done? Should they just sit here, trying not to think about dead Kushal, crouched obscenely in the freezer, and waiting vainly for the fog to blow away, for a rescue helicopter to come? What if another day went by with no change? Wouldn’t they then be back in this exact position tomorrow, only a day more impatient and anxious? And what if, meanwhile, someone else went sleepwalking?

  No, something had to be tried.

  Poor Kushal, of course, had wanted a lustration performed. But even now, indeed especially now, Rita knew that she would not, could not, do that.

  Which left only Clara. And two and half thousand metres of ladders.

  2

  THE STAIRS

  It was three p.m., and Clara stood at the top of the emergency stairs, ready to begin.

  Richman, Kennedy and Rita were with her, gathered on the concrete lip at the head of the great shaft—Rita battling every second against her vertigo. Madelaine had remained up above, standing watch in the Conservatory. Her job was to listen for a rescue helicopter or plane in the fog, then sound an alert if she heard anything. The other three would see Clara off, and then move to the Control Room to best monitor her long climb to the bottom.

  Clara herself was going through her equipment for the last time. From the Museum she and Richman had scrounged a collection of ropes, slung now in neat loops over her shoulders, and a harness, off which dangled a multitude of clips and loops and other tools, the names and purposes of which Rita—although she had listened to Clara and Richman discussing them all expertly—had already forgotten.

  In addition to the climbing gear, Clara also carried, in a backpack or clipped to her harness, two torches, a knife, two rolls of industrial tape, two bottles of water, some energy bars for food—for even at best she expected to be several hours in the descent and would need her strength—and finally, hanging from a belt, one of the walkie-talkies.

  There were intercom panels all the way down the shaft, one every twenty-five flights, that would enable her to report directly to the Control Room. But of course there was no guarantee that the intercoms would be working all the way down, or at the bottom, if she reached it.

  Patting all this down and mouthing a checklist to herself, Clara finally gave a nod, straightened, and looked at the others. ‘Okay then.’

  It was time.

  Richman said, ‘Don’t forget, give us an update at least every half hour, by intercom or by radio, whichever works the best.’

  ‘And don’t push your luck,’ added Kennedy. ‘You find things are really unstable down there, just come back up. Rescuers will get to us eventually either way, whatever happens, so there’s no need for any crazy risks, just for the sake of it.’

  Clara considered him levelly. ‘I don’t think this is just for the sake of it. That’s the problem.’ Her gaze moved briefly to Richman. There was a message bright in her eyes—or so it seemed to Rita—but she said nothing aloud, and he gave no response. And with that, the majordomo turned to the gap in the railing, and the abyss that waited beyond.

  Her first step down was an experimental one, testing the topmost rung of the first flight of stairs. It held without a quiver. She dropped several more steps, clumping with heavy deliberation, and still the ladder appeared firm and fast. (To Rita’s unease, the major-domo was facing outwards as she went, as if she was on a normal stairway, and not, as Rita would have done, face inwards, as on a ladder. But indeed, though steep, the stairs were not quite vertical.) A few more rungs, then Clara was on the first landing.

  She paused there a moment, seeming to test the feel of the little steel-mesh platform under her feet, then nodded. ‘So far, so good,’ she said, with a glance up at the others. ‘I’ll see you all later.’ Then she was moving calmly down the next flight.

  The three at the rail watched in silence, leaning out to see better, even though, for Rita at least, this brought the full horror of the shaft into view. The scaffold tower and the stairway within, now that it had a human on it for scale, only looked all the more flimsy, a construction of straws, while all around the throat of the shaft gaped black and awful.

  Four flights down, Clara paused again and looked back up at them one last time. The major-domo did not speak, but Rita had a sudden flash of what they must look like from below, the three of them watching from the safety of the rail, secure on the platform of concrete. She felt suddenly ashamed.

  Then Clara was moving once more, from landing to landing, back and forth down the opposing angles of the ladders. Soon she was ten flights down, and nearing the place where the first of the disjointed stairway was adrift of its moorings, its lowest step hanging nakedly out over the gulf.

  Rita’s hands tightened on the rail, watching from above. Clara paused at the top of the askew ladder and studied it for a time. The gloom seemed thicker down there from Rita’s viewpoint, and indeed Clara pulled out a torch
and played its beam probingly about. Finally, still with no glance up, she swung herself lightly—and terrifyingly, to Rita—out onto the crossbeams of the scaffold, her back to the open plummet of the shaft, and in a series of quick movements descended hand over hand to the intact landing two flights directly below.

  Jesus, Rita thought, letting out a shaky breath. Holy fucking Mary cunting Christ.

  But Richman sounded only pleased. ‘Good girl,’ he said. ‘Piece of cake.’

  Below, Clara was already moving on. Within a minute she encountered the second unseated ladder, and bypassed it in a similar swift manner, with no need of ropes or other gear. After a few minutes more her small figure was lost between the gloom of the shaft and the criss-cross of the ladders.

  Even so, the watchers watched. After an interminable while, a sudden torch beam stabbed out to the walls of the shaft far below, searching some unseen detail, but then it flicked off again. And after that, though they waited still, nothing.

  She was gone beyond sight.

  ‘If I yelled,’ said Kennedy softly, ‘do you think she’d still be able to hear us?’

  ‘Probably,’ replied Richman. ‘But I wouldn’t do it. You might distract her just as she was about to swing out from a platform again.’

  They all stared down a moment longer, the air of the shaft rising gently and yet with an unpleasant insistence against their faces.

  ‘Then let’s get up the Control Room,’ said Kennedy, voice even lower.

  And off they went.

  ▲

  The facts about the emergency stairs—as laid out by Kennedy from the design schematics available in the Control Room—stood stark in Rita’s mind.

  It was exactly two thousand three hundred and ninety metres from the top of the stairs to the base of the elevator shaft. The rungs on the ladders were each twenty centimetres apart. That meant five steps to a metre, or nearly twelve thousand steps in all, divided into nearly twelve hundred flights. Intercom panels were placed at every twenty-fifth landing, which added up to forty-seven of them in total.