Whatever, the result’s the same. And turns out it’s a good thing I’m wearing red today.
It’s a clear case – self-inflicted gunshot wound, no question. No one saw me come up, no one saw me go in. If anyone had wanted to investigate the shot, well, they’d have been here already.
I check the room quickly, make sure I’ve left no trace. Then I take the ruby and skedaddle.
Back in the safety of my office, I examine the rock. I stare right into the blood-red heart of the ruby, and something shifts inside me. Curses don’t seem so far-fetched any more.
Suddenly I do believe this ruby can kill.
CHAPTER EIGHT
STORMCAGE, AD 5147
Ventrian and I soon got into a daily routine. First thing each morning I’d read him the developing adventures of Melody Malone, facing murder and intrigue in Old New York, and then we’d discuss what my fictional detective should do next. I’m solitary by nature, but I rather liked the intimacy of the discussions. Having that one person to whom you could open up – not exactly a sounding board, more a passive collaborator – I found strangely helpful.
‘Life’s better with an accomplice,’ I said to him once after I’d solved a particularly perplexing plot problem by utilising his listening skills.
After our fictional diversion we’d do a bit of history – I explained everything I could remember about Cleopatra, which entailed explaining everything I could remember about Mark Antony, which entailed explaining everything I could remember about Julius Caesar, which entailed explaining everything I could remember about the Roman Republic – back and back we went, turning down any interesting alleyway that presented itself. And if I occasionally implied in the language I used that I’d been an eyewitness to some events, he naturally assumed it was just the writer in me.
We did touch upon time travel, though, after a while. Just in general. Ventrian had heard of some of the people who’d worked in the field – Kartz and Reimer, Magnus Greel, Megelen of Karfel and so on – but he spoke of time travel as a kind of strange theoretical notion rather than something that had any impact on our existence. So I too talked of it as an intellectual curiosity, instead of telling him about, for example, the double date the other half and I went on with Napoleon and Josephine, where the emperor insisted on keeping his hat on throughout the whole meal because I was taller than him, even without heels.
A time-travelling archaeologist. It’s a very strange thing to be. You might think it pointless – couldn’t one always cheat? Take Cleopatra’s tomb. It’s true that, currently, no one knows where it is. Oh, there have been theories over the years, there have been almost-discoveries, but it has simply evaded detection right up to the present day. And there lie the issues. Currently. Present day. Meaningless phrases to a time traveller. I could go back to 30 BCE and watch what happens after Cleopatra’s death. I could scoot forward to AD 20,000 and pick up the latest issue of ‘What Sarcophagus?’ magazine and see if later, more advanced technology has enabled someone to solve the riddle. But … where’s the fun in that?
Spoilers! – as I often have to say to a certain Special Someone.
The discovery is wonderful, but only as the climax of the journey. Yes, it can be tempting to ‘check your answers’, and I confess to having done that once or twice – just a tiny peek, mainly so I can say ‘I was right!’ to said certain Special Someones who may have alternative theories. But looking up whodunnit before you’ve read the book – no, that’s not for me. We study the past to learn about ourselves. And I happen to think I’m worth the effort.
Ventrian and I managed a few interesting arguments – after all, life without argument would be dreadfully boring – but it was pleasing to find out that essentially, he was figuratively and literally very much on the same page as me. After a while he relaxed enough to tell me something about his own work, although every now and then he would abruptly clam up. Those sudden silences tended to last a while; whatever it was he wasn’t telling me was upsetting to him. Was his crime connected to his archaeological work? Had he stabbed someone with a trowel, or hit them over the head with an especially heavy soil sifter?
The first time I got close to the truth was after I’d read him the latest chapter of Melody Malone’s adventures. He’d been impressed by Melody’s detective abilities in identifying George Badger Junior, which had made me smile – it’s easy to solve a mystery when the clues are presented to you by your creator; in real life, nine times out of ten leaps like that would smack straight into dead ends.
But it was after I’d read the last couple of lines that he put a tentative toe in the water.
‘Do you believe there are really such things as cursed objects?’ he said.
Luckily he wasn’t able to see just how high I raised my eyebrows. I almost laughed out loud – but stopped myself just in time. I’m a good judge of character and I just couldn’t believe that Ventrian was superstitious or that he believed in black magic or anything of that kind. We’ve both held enough mortal remains in our hands to know that if we were going to be struck down by divine forces, it would have happened by now. So for him to ask a question like that, ridiculous on the surface – well, there had to be something behind it. Something big.
I thought for a moment, then decided to treat it as a genuine question that deserved a genuine answer. ‘I don’t believe Ancient Egyptians could put a curse on a gemstone; superstition, coincidence, fatalism – they’re the factors involved in those circumstances. But outside of that … it’s not so straightforward as belief or disbelief. There’s still so much in the universe that’s beyond my understanding. The idea of a curse is to scare people away. Some unknown technology might be roped in to fulfil the same function, and “curse” might be the only way someone has to describe the consequences.’
‘Yes,’ he said, his voice sounding far away, dreamlike. ‘I found something, and death has followed me ever since. If I call that a curse – it doesn’t seem so bad, somehow. Like it’s the fault of whoever cursed it. It wasn’t on me – I was just the unlucky one who dug up my own Eye of Horus.’
How do you stop the thoughts?
That’s what Ventrian had said. Was I going to learn at last what had brought him to Stormcage? I’d mentioned the rules enough times. If he’d decided to tell me anyway, I was going to listen.
But the silence continued. So I did something that went very much against the grain. I told him some of my own history. I told him why I’d ended up in Stormcage. How I’d been brought up by Madame Kovarian and the Silence to be the perfect assassin. ‘So you see, death has followed me too,’ I ended. ‘Perhaps I carry my own curse. A living Eye of Horus.’
Finally he spoke. ‘A … Device,’ he said at last. ‘I was leading an expedition on – no, I mustn’t say.’
‘I’m hardly going to tell anyone,’ I said (not necessarily true. But I was slightly affronted, considering how much I’d just shared with him).
He wasn’t moved, though. ‘It’s too dangerous,’ he said. ‘No one must ever know.’
Oh well, be like that, then.
‘I shouldn’t have gone there. There was a plague beacon warning everyone to stay away from – the planet. But I wanted to make my name.’
That was a theme running through my book. Everyone wanted their name in the history books.
‘I wanted to find out what had happened down there,’ he continued. ‘I sent down a probe and it said the surface was habitable, that there was no plague. And I started to have dreams …
‘My wife was worried, but I pooh-poohed her concerns. I was determined. Stubborn, she called it. Stupid, is what it really was. But I waved her goodbye as I had done a thousand times before and set off.’
He’d never mentioned a wife before. A tiny smile sounded in his voice as he spoke of her – trailing off into despair.
‘You know sometimes on a dig, when you look at a completely featureless plain, but something inside you goes: dig there. Instinct. Although that’s just an
other way of describing how you’re really deciphering a million tiny clues that your experience shows you. I looked in front of me, and I said, “Dig there.” And I thought it was my experience talking, my instinct. I didn’t realise something else was drowning them out.’ An intake of breath, an audible shudder. ‘It was calling to me, and I never realised how I was being manipulated. I just congratulated myself on my genius, how great an archaeologist I must be to make such a discovery.’
Now Ventrian was talking, the words tumbled out of him. How his dreams had led him to a site. How his dreams had told him where to dig, and he had done so, and he had found … it. And how his dreams continued, wanting him to do … things. He would wake up with ideas, and somehow the ideas would become reality. He stopped knowing if he was awake or asleep, all he knew was that the Device was part of him.
‘It doesn’t just get into your head,’ he told me. ‘It gets inside you, all of you. But for all that, I don’t know what it wanted. What did it get from me using it? Or from it using me, more like.’
I looked around me at my small cell. ‘Solitary confinement can cause irreparable damage to a person’s psyche in just a couple of weeks. The longer it goes on, the greater the danger of breakdown, psychosis, self-harm … Who’s to say it’s only people who feel that way? Maybe machines can get like that too. Perhaps your Device just wanted some company. Someone to talk to.’
‘Perhaps … ’ It was clearly a new idea to Ventrian – which is unsurprising as I’d just pulled it out of thin air. Although it’s not an entirely novel concept; I’ve had plenty of encounters with robots who were quite clearly desperate for my company. ‘And it had been buried on that moon for centuries,’ he continued, going further along the train of thought. ‘It must have gone completely mad.’
‘What did it do, Ventrian?’ I asked softly, kindly, supportively, waiting for the big reveal.
‘It wasn’t my fault,’ he said. ‘Not if it was cursed. It wasn’t my fault that I killed them all.’
CHAPTER NINE
NEW YORK, AD 1939
The main door of the Pink Tiger club is shut but not locked, and I let myself in.
‘Hey,’ I call across to the barman, who says, ‘Hey,’ unenthusiastically in return.
It’s always odd to see things carrying on as normal when you’ve just seen someone painting a room in delicate shades of red and brain. But for everyone else, life goes on. This guy, polishing glasses behind the bar. The canary, all teeth and curls, who seems not to have realised you’re supposed to put something on over your underwear when you’re out in public. Looks like she’s auditioning for a spot here and thinks flashing her gams will swing it for her. Mind you, she’s probably right.
The barman waves me through and I head to the back. Ain’t no one standing guard outside Wallace’s door so I give a quick knock and head straight on in.
Wallace is poring over some paper, and thrusts it in a drawer when the door opens. Hey, I’m a big girl, I don’t care what you’re looking at in the privacy of your own nightclub office. Ain’t nothing gonna shock me – I’ve seen just about everything in my time.
I note his safe is sitting open – ready for the ruby, I’m guessing. I march up to his desk, and I toss the stone onto it. I like making an entrance.
Wallace is pretty darn happy too. His eyes seem almost to glow red as he snatches it up, gloating and grinning away. I feel almost uncomfortable, like I’ve walked in on him doing something best done in private.
I need my fee, then I just wanna get out of there. So I break into Wallace’s rubescent reverie, give him a quick overview of how I got it (to say he couldn’t care less about the sad demise of George Junior is an understatement; I guess you don’t get to be a millionaire by splashing out on too many wreaths) and remind him of his obligation to my bank account.
He counts out a wad of notes and hands them over, and I bid him a farewell that’s as fond as I can manage. Don’t like the guy, but I won’t say no to him throwing a few more jobs my way. If I only worked for people I liked, I’d have a helluva lot of free time on my hands.
The barman’s talking to some joe at the bar. I call out ‘Ciao’ and head towards the door. Then the joe shoots a glance my way, meaning I can take him in properly. Or maybe improperly. And would you look at that? Seems I’m not heading to the door after all – it turns out I really need to talk to the barman about something. Hopefully I’ll work out what that something is by the time I reach him.
But the joe makes any ruse unnecessary. He sticks out a hand soon as I get within range. ‘Harry Durkin,’ he says.
‘Malone,’ I say. ‘Melody Malone.’
‘I like it,’ he says. And heck, I can see something l like too. Harry is what you’d get if Cary Grant and Gary Cooper had a baby together – and the baby grew up to do a hell of a lot of weight-training.
‘Hey, Durkin, you son of a gun! When you get back?’ That’s Wallace, shouting all the way from the door of his little office.
‘Gotta go see the boss,’ Harry says to me. ‘You sticking around?’
‘Oh, places to go, things to see,’ I say casually. But we’re having a conversation that’s got nothing to do with the words coming out of our mouths. I’m guessing I’m going to see Harry again, but in the meantime just remembering this meeting’s gonna keep me warm at night.
Harry goes on back to Wallace’s office, and I resume my original course out of the club. The pile of cabbage is burning a hole in my purse and it’s lunchtime. I head into the first place I find that’s offering free coffee refills. But I’m only on my second cup when Harry Durkin slides into the seat opposite me.
‘Good job I spotted you. Saves me a trip to your office.’ My eyebrows scoot up high. The enthusiasm is flattering, but a little excessive at our level of acquaintance. But turns out it ain’t just my charms that’ve brought him hurrying after me. ‘I’ve persuaded the boss to bring you in,’ he says.
‘Into what?’
Harry shrugs. ‘Come on back to the club. He’ll explain.’
I guess I ain’t doing anything better right now. I drain my coffee and take the rest of my steak sandwich to go.
Wallace gives me a bit of an eyeballing when I re-enter his sanctum, so I’m thinking that maybe he wasn’t a hundred per cent sold on my participation in whatever this turns out to be. Guess Harry’s desire to get to know me a bit better was the major factor in bringing me back here after all.
‘If you says a word out of turn … ’ is what Wallace tells me the moment I walk in. I indicate my understanding. In my line of work, if you don’t keep your mouth shut you end up either unemployed or at the bottom of the Hudson wearing concrete shoes, and I’m guessing Wallace would be going for the second option.
Wallace gestures for me to take one chair and Harry takes the other. He puts the piece of paper on the desk and smooths it out. Then he holds up the ruby, like he’s about to chink glasses with it. Moves it this way and that way, staring at the paper the whole time, then shakes his head. I am careful not to show on my face what I’m thinking, namely that I’m in the presence of a lunatic. Because I am aware he is a rich and influential lunatic.
Now he looks at me. ‘Harry here, he’s my top agent,’ he says. ‘Got a roaming brief. Few years ago he was out in North Africa. There he is, passing through Egypt, when he hears some rumours. Now, rumours – most of the time they’re not worth a red cent. But Harry, he can sniff out an opportunity like a pig can sniff out truffles. You tell her, Harry.’
I turn my attention to Harry, which is not a problem. ‘Here’s the deal. I’m in Egypt, and I come across this woman, Dalilah. Her husband, Masuda, had got caught up in some native uprising to do with finding a tomb. He made it out alive cos he was out of the way, dealing with a corpse at the time – not the occupant of the tomb; some British guy gave him cash to arrange burial of some other British guy, the one who’d been in charge. This Masuda finds a piece of paper on the body, takes it home to Dalilah, then he gets sic
k too. Real sick. I’ve heard of that sort of deal happening before – it’s maybe old-timey germs and stuff that got let out of the tomb when they opened it. Anyways, this Masuda’s sick and there ain’t no money for doctors. But I get her to show me this paper, and whatdya know?’
‘Tell me,’ I say.
‘It was a map.’
It’s not hard to connect this story to George Badger Senior. ‘To Cleopatra’s tomb?’ I ask.
‘Yes, ma’am.’
I’m not so keen on the ma’am. I casually push back my hair, making sure to angle my hand so as to demonstrate my complete lack of a ring. ‘That newspaper story didn’t say anything about a map?’
‘I like things hush hush,’ puts in Wallace. ‘But there’s more to the story, right. Harry, here, he does his thing. Tells the wife her man could be put in the big house for stealing, but as he’s such a nice guy and he’s sorry for her, he’ll take the paper off her hands for a few piastres. Enough to get a doctor, anyways.’
‘Oh, he sure is a nice guy,’ I say. Damn. I’m not saying double-dealing’s a deal-breaker, but it takes the gilt off the gingerbread, you know?
‘The map don’t make a lot of sense to Harry here,’ Wallace continues. ‘So he comes back to me. “Let’s get in an expert,” he says. “Get an expedition together.” Trouble is, the map don’t make any sense to the expert, either. Says there must be stuff missing. Details, you know. And in the end we figure Harry bought a pig in a poke. Lucky for him, he’s a useful guy.’
Yeah, and lucky for me.
‘Can I see it?’ I say. ‘The map? That’s what you’ve got there, right?’
‘You sure are a sharp cookie,’ he says. Yeah, I sure am. If anyone tries to take a bite, they get scratched.
He hands over the paper and I look at it. Map? I guess so. Lines going here and there, I can see how you’d get ‘map’ from this. I can see how you get ‘Egyptian’ from this too, it’s got all these little symbols, hieroglyphs. They look odd, but a bit familiar – I guess from all the stuff I was reading at the public library. ‘You get this translated?’ I ask, indicating the picture writing as I handed it back.
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