by SA Sidor
At the mention of walking, my eyes were involuntarily drawn to the gold leg braces she wore from ankle to mid-thigh. Underneath the gold, I saw dark wine-colored leather sleeves strapped around her muscles. Her dress parted enough for me to mark that the sleeves laced tightly up the front, along the shinbone, with cut-out circles for her knees. In the light from the gas lamps I noticed filigree decorations on the gold. The metalwork depicted astronomical symbols: the sun and moon, major and minor planets. Asteroids, comets, stars. Zodiac pictograms were there as well, and other markings unfamiliar to me, but the light was poor, and I could not study them too closely for obvious reasons.
Vivienne shifted her legs. I quickly gazed up. She smiled at me privately, as her husband continued to catalogue the expenses of shipping an entire French road overseas.
The coach slowed.
“We have arrived,” Vivienne said.
“Where is the house?” I asked, as I stood waiting outside the coach. The gas lamps cast an orange glow over the snow-covered rocky terrain. Away from the mountain a string of lights lay like distant campfires: this was Raton. One campfire surged and flickered more brightly than the others; that was the Starry Eyes, still blazing. But on the mountain darkness ruled. The moon was a bone shard embedded in the clouds, mists haloing her silver aura. Starlight twinkled icily, but so far away. The coach driver was a small man, a dwarf, in fact, with a grim face and a long drooping black moustache. He carried both a whip and a Bowie knife on his belt.
“Step aside,” he said to me.
“Which side?” I asked.
“Pick one.”
I picked left. He walked past me and turned a large iron key set into the rocks. Then he removed the half-smoked cheroot from his mouth and touched it near the same rock. A tongue of flame filled a previously hidden gas globe set at my waist. The driver walked ahead, occasionally drawing on his cheroot as he lit a series of identical globes along a path. I could see now that what at first appeared to be the stony face of the mountain was, in actuality, the entrance to a mansion hewn into the mountain.
Nightfall Lodge.
“Remarkable,” I said. A horizontal sheet of ice hanging off the craggy shelf became a row of large glass windows heavily draped against the cold but with an incredible view to the south.
“One of a kind,” Oscar said. “I have a passion for rarities. Much like your Institute for Singular Antiquities. We have that in common.”
“You’ve heard of us?” I said, sounding more surprised than I meant to.
“Miss Waterston has filled us in on her plans for the future. A most ambitious project. I am captivated by Evangeline’s concept.”
Was it the concept or the woman that captivated you? I wondered. Her plans, did he say? What of our plans? It seemed I was fated to struggle forever with one or another Waterston over the control of our mutual endeavors. Worthwhile? Yes, but nonetheless frustrating.
Oscar called his coach-driver back from Nightfall’s doors.
“Hodgson, escort Mrs Adderly into the house.”
The driver nodded to his boss. He climbed up the rear ladder of the coach and came down with Vivienne’s wheelchair balanced on his shoulder. It was clear he had performed this task many times before for the chair did not bounce against the coach and he set it lightly on the ground beside the coach’s step. McTroy moved to help get Vivienne down, but Hodgson halted him with a hand gesture and, gathering Mrs Adderly in one stout arm, pivoted, descending the step, and depositing her gently in her seat. Vivienne unclasped her arms from his corded neck. She nodded at the driver warmly, giving a quick squeeze to his thick forearm, and then looked away at the mountain.
“Thank you,” she said. Hodgson tucked a fox-fur blanket across her lap.
He pushed her chair along the walkway to the lodge doors.
I felt someone standing to the side of me and turned, hoping to find Evangeline.
“Wu? You scared me back there in town. I thought we’d left you behind.”
“You scared me as well. I could not get you to move or talk. You were like…” Wu pulled an unflatteringly stricken face, halfway between a politician and a mule-kicked drunkard.
“Stop that.” I swatted him with my glove. He did not stop. “Wu, please, enough!”
“See? It was making me feel strange too,” he responded.
“I understand. But I was in a trance of some kind.”
“We all been there, Doc. You were black-haired lady-tranced. Witchified.” McTroy smirked and wiggled his fingers at me as if throwing an evil spell.
“I was no such thing. I saw bizarre shadows. I heard Vivienne’s voice in my head.”
“Not only your head,” McTroy said.
I was about to protest further when Evangeline finally joined us.
“My heroes have gathered together again,” she said, curling her lip amusedly.
“It is good to see you, Miss Waterston,” I said.
“I am Miss Waterston to you, am I?” she teased.
“You are whoever you choose to be,” I said, inclining my head.
“Oh, Hardy, I have missed you so much.” She leaned in and kissed my flushed cheek.
“We have been apart too long,” I said.
McTroy and Wu started along the path following Hodgson and Mrs Adderly.
“Yes, we have, but now we are all here. I cannot wait to see what happens. These Adderlys are still waters, Hardy. They run deep. Strange giants swim in the depths,” Evangeline whispered. She made a swimming motion with her hand, poking me in the ribs.
“Is it just Oscar and Vivienne living inside the mountain?”
She shook her head. “No, no. They have two grown children. Twins. Claude and Cassiopeia. And the household servants live here, of course, although I haven’t been able to account for them all as they tend to come and go.”
“Do the twins favor their mother or their father?”
Evangeline thought about this.
“Hmmm… neither, I’d say. But they are remarkable. What a spooky pair! When one is looking at you, it as if they both are. That’s not exactly right. Suffice it to say, you’ll see what I mean when you meet them. Let’s catch up with the group now before they extinguish the globes and we are stranded in this dark wilderness alone.”
I would have smothered the lamps myself if I thought that were true.
Instead, I offered my arm, and Evangeline seized it snugly.
7
The Dead Zoo
Nightfall Lodge
Sangre de Cristo Mountains, New Mexico Territory
Nightfall Lodge smelled of freshly sawed lumber. What had been made of mountain rock on the outside was made of mountain trees on the inside. Here is a very rich man’s cave, I thought. It was not unpleasant. A painted buffalo hide hung on the wall. It depicted an Apache hunting party on horseback using bows and arrows to strike down a herd of bison. Zigzag-patterned baskets and black-and-white geometrically painted clay pots decorated the elegantly sparse room. The ceiling arched over us, supported with rough beams any bat would die to hang from. Granite fireplaces warmed the entrance hall. Despite its great size, the vestibule felt cozy. My face must have appeared quizzical, because Oscar answered the question I’d been asking in my head.
“I had them drill chimneys through the mountain,” he said. “So we don’t smoke ourselves out.” He laughed, slapping me on the back. “You’ll find one in every room. Viv hates the cold.”
Two old but sturdy-looking servants appeared from the shadows of a hallway. The man took my bowler and coat. The woman attended to Evangeline. In a minute, each person in our group had a crystal balloon of warmed Armagnac in their hands. Quite smooth, and quite expensive I’m sure, certainly the best brandy I have ever drunk.
I sensed that Nightfall Lodge was shaped like half of a wagon wheel. The entrance was the hub, and various dark corridors led off like spokes of the wheel, or the hours on half a clock. Currently, a single sp
oke (twelve o’clock) was lit for our purposes.
“I’ll spare you the grand tour. But I want you to see one thing before you go to bed,” Oscar said. “Follow me.” His boot heels echoed off the polished floor.
We followed him.
On either side of the hallway were alcoves, shadowy niches only partially illuminated by the corridor’s lamps. Each alcove had a waist-high barrier with a small latched swinging gate. I could not help glancing back and forth into the gloomy nooks as we proceeded to our destination. Glassy eyes stared out from the dimness, unblinking. I counted more than a dozen watchers. Were these the other servants Evangeline mentioned? No. I tried to consider them more intently without breaking my prior pace or appearing to stare too obviously. But what were they, these contorted figures standing motionless among arrangements of plaster of Paris boulders, woven leaves, and paper mâché tree trunks?
The shapes became anatomies. I recognized a few but could not imagine them living here. Evangeline caught my hand as I reached for the next gate out of curiosity, though what I might have done after I opened the gate was a mystery to me. I gasped at my impulsivity. But I simply wanted to know more.
“It is so silent,” I said. “Are they not chained? I mean, is it safe?”
Evangeline nodded.
I hitched my step when I spotted the tiger. I dodged away. Then a grizzly bear on the opposite side of the corridor reared up on two legs out of the darkness, his snarling pendulous lips and gaping jaws froze my feet in place. Had he lost his roar? Was he mute? His claws could decapitate Evangeline and me together with one swat. I lunged in front of Evangeline, blocking the ursine menace with my body and my stick.
But the death blow never came.
Oscar gazed over his shoulder at us when our steps ceased.
He turned and said, “Ah, Dr Hardy, I should have told you. I apologize. We are passing through my zoo on the way to the trophy room.”
“But these creatures? How did you acquire…?”
“I shot them all. It is my artistry as a taxidermist that captures their fierceness so precisely that it stops you aghast in your tracks tonight. Do you feel awe? You should. Their innate power extends beyond their lives.” He walked to where I had inserted myself between Evangeline and the bear, our backs exposed to the tiger stalking in the reeds behind us. “This bear I killed up in Alberta. That tiger who is about to break your neck came from a forest near Bandhavgarh Fort on the maharaja’s game preserve, though she would much rather dine on a chital, or spotted deer, than you. There is one down the corridor, by the way. Just follow her eyes.”
Oscar drew a line in the air from the tiger’s alcove to the deer.
“Do you see?” he asked, playfully.
“Yes, I do.”
“But what you do not see is that you have already passed a snow leopard, a black rhino, and a cape buffalo. Not to mention a Nile crocodile, a whole family of silverback gorillas, a jaguar and not one but two lions. You have already died a dozen times in this hall, Doctor.”
He grinned and wagged his finger at me. “But you are no hunter. McTroy told me so. I asked you here for other reasons. You seek not the bloody-minded predator but the ancient wonders of the world believed lost to time. Discovering treasure is your desire. Is this true?”
I nodded cautiously, adding, “Historical treasures. I pursue knowledge.”
“But of course. If not for wonders what would the world be?” Oscar paused, but when no one answered he said, “Quite boring. That is the answer, I’m afraid.”
And he made a sad face.
He clapped his hands together, making a sound like a firecracker.
Everyone startled at the sudden noise except McTroy.
“Luckily, we have wonders aplenty. Now, come, come. You will have time to absorb the beauty of my dioramas tomorrow before breakfast, if you choose. The others will be here first thing in the morning. We will meet in the trophy room and talk about our great adventure!”
“Others?” McTroy asked.
“Did you really think you were the only ones to receive a private invitation?”
“I reckoned we were,” McTroy said.
“Well, you reckoned wrongly. After breakfast you will meet the teams.”
“I don’t operate with others.”
McTroy was prepared to leave then and there. I could see it.
“Ha! McTroy, you misunderstand me. Your team is you and the friends you brought. I have my team. And there will be one more team. This is a healthy competition. We will all go out separately and do what we choose. The winner will take the prize. That is America, friend.”
“You said we would be paid for coming here.”
“And you will, you will. How successful you are determines your pay.”
There was one thing that provoked anger in McTroy above all else, and Oscar Adderly had just found it: you did not mess with McTroy’s money. But given that we were stranded, at least for the remainder of this night, at Nightfall Lodge, McTroy saved the battle for the morning.
“You don’t trust your own skills?” Oscar asked.
“You’re the man who should be worried about my skills.”
“I fight the beasts when they come and not a moment sooner. Worrying serves nothing.”
“One man’s worrying is another man’s examination of probabilities,” I said.
“Spoken like a true worrier, Dr Hardy,” Oscar said.
“Oscar, are you insulting our guests?”
Vivienne pushed away from Hodgson at the far end of the corridor and wheeled herself to her husband’s side.
Perhaps it was the exertion that caused a dewy sweat to glisten on her cheeks and an injection of color to invade her otherwise ivory paleness. Like a crimson hand, a mark appeared around her throat, but the look she shared with us crackled with electric excitement.
Oscar smiled down at her.
“A bit of manly gamesmanship never hurt anyone. It spices the meat of the matter. Don’t you agree, gentlemen?” Oscar opened his arms in a grand gesture of conviviality.
“Spoiled meat needs the most spice,” I said. “But I am no chef, myself.”
“Get on with your pomp,” McTroy said to Oscar.
“To the trophy room we go!” Oscar turned and walked away.
“Oscar is an incorrigible jouster when other men are around,” Vivienne said, raising an eyebrow in disapproval. Yet, despite her objection, she seemed most interested in Oscar when he was behaving badly.
“I find that male jousting is an all-too-common occurrence,” Evangeline said.
“Present company excepted?” I asked. “McTroy and I are not constantly sparring.”
“You’re more a swordsman where jousting is concerned,” McTroy said.
“Thank you.”
“Wu is still too young to compete in such games,” Evangeline said.
“But I am learning,” Wu said, sticking out his chest.
“McTroy? Your swordsman comment has turned in my brain. I take back my thanks.”
“No need to apologize, Doc.”
Evangeline said, “Does it ever bother you to live among these stuffed animals?”
“No more than it would any other woman,” Vivienne said. “I think we should join Oscar. He will pout if we keep him waiting.” She wheeled herself over to Hodgson, who asked her a question we could not hear. But she nodded exasperatedly and went on wheeling herself into the trophy room while he exited back the way we had come.
“He is a steely fellow,” I said, as Hodgson passed us without as much as a glance.
“Good-looking though,” Evangeline said.
“Do you think so?” I asked, surprised.
“I do,” she said.
Here I assumed Hodgson had a disadvantage with women, being that he was of smaller than normal stature. Other men most certainly had teased him and acted cruelly toward him in public his whole life. I wondered what attraction Evangeline s
aw in him. But she had moved off to join the Adderlys, pausing only to pet the velvet antlers of the spotted deer as she went by.
“Do you find Hodgson to be handsome?” I asked McTroy and Wu.
They looked away and shrugged.
“His coolness of manner must be the key. The man is confident. He has swagger,” I said, brandishing my ape-headed stick. “No doubt he developed this attitude over time – as a defense.”
“He has that Bowie knife and whip,” McTroy offered.
I nodded slowly, not understanding how that changed anything. “What do you mean, precisely?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” McTroy said, tilting his hat back and scratching his forehead.
“Are you three finished? Or shall we start without you?” Evangeline called to us.
Our analysis ended, we scampered like hungry puppies at the sound of her voice.
Skull room. Antler room. Ossuary. Each of those names would have fitted our surroundings more than trophy room. Stacked buffalo skulls filled the wall behind us. A thicket of elk antlers took over two more walls. And windows looked out over the starlight-bathed icy peaks of the Sangre de Cristos. Vertigo spun in me as my eyes climbed the harsh crags. I felt like a man in a rowboat about to be crushed by a foaming, gray tidal wave. But the most disquieting thing in the trophy room was none of these. It was a cage. A twelve-foot square cube of iron bars.
Oscar unlocked it.
“What do you think of my jail? Be honest. Will it hold the so-called Beast?”
I was impressed with the cage, even if it shouted its high theatricality so that a deaf man might hear. “It appears the model of an oversized prison cell,” I said. I grabbed the thick cold bars and gave them a pull. “I’d dare to call it escape-proof. What do you think, McTroy?”
McTroy set his empty brandy snifter into the notch of an elk antler and left it there. “Ain’t a cell can’t be broken,” he said. “That includes this one.”
Oscar took this comment as a challenge. “Do you doubt the materials, or is it the workmanship you question? Because I assure you both are of the highest calibers available.”
