Engines of Empathy (Drakeforth Series Book 1)

by Paul Mannering

  ‘How do you know my name? Leave me alone,’ I said and gathered up the scattered paper.

  ‘You know what I’m talking about?’ He leaned forward in the recycling bin, risking a nasty fall to the pavement.

  ‘I think you are quite mad,’ I ventured, pages of awful poetry and fanciful algorithms clutched to my chest.

  ‘Mad? Yes. Insane? Possibly. But not together. The legacy of Huddy Godden is enough to drive any right-thinking person into a cul-de-sac of despair.’

  ‘Huddy Godden? The discoverer of empathic energy?’ This was junior school stuff.

  ‘No!’ my verbal assailant shrieked and the recycling bins shuffled, their lids clicking nervously.

  ‘No,’ Drakeforth repeated at a more conversational level. ‘Huddy Godden the thief, the swindler and the perverse purveyor of poppycock!’

  ‘We are talking about the Huddy Godden who discovered empathic energy and is credited with being the architect of the modern age?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes, but he is noted by some biographers as having been a ruthless and eccentric businessman,’ Drakeforth replied.

  I gave a snort, ‘We’ve all heard the stories claiming that he spent his last years married to a Malatian fruit bat and insisting that anyone in his presence pay the creature the due courtesies. Yet he did leave his entire fortune to science and industry for the development of empathic technology.’

  ‘Huddy Godden was an evil mastermind,’ Drakeforth said.

  ‘You seriously believe that someone who married a fruit bat could have been the architect of a global conspiracy that has stood unchallenged for over one hundred years?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ Drakeforth nodded.

  I opened my mouth and then closed it again. ‘I don’t have time for this.’ I turned and made my way back to the narrow strip of neglected dirt that was my backyard. A clattering and cursing behind warned me that our conversation was not over yet.

  I slammed and locked the kitchen door while Drakeforth ran up and down the alley. I could hear him hooting like a deranged owl and occasionally accosting the recycling bins, accusing them of being accomplices in this foul conspiracy.

  I pushed the crumple of my gathered papers into a kitchen cupboard and forced it shut before retreating to the office under the stairs.

  I rested my face on the smooth timber of the desk’s flat writing surface. The curved top arched over me like a protective hand. The cool touch of the wood, the spice odours of patchouli and tobacco, caressed my nostrils. When I was very young, I would crawl inside the cavity of the desk and roll the cover down, carefully wedging a thick book under it to allow light and air in. In this womb of polished wood and strange scents, I dreamed a child’s dream. On mornings like this I wished I could still fit inside.

  A crashing sound from the kitchen snapped me out of my reverie. I heard the ripping clatter of the senetian blinds collapsing, followed by the thud of something landing on the tiled floor and moaning.

  I hurried out and found Drakeforth tangled in my cutlery drawer and collapsed blinds, which he had become caught up in after climbing through the window.

  ‘What the ballcock are you doing?’ I demanded.

  ‘Bleeding,’ was his terse reply. I sighed and gave him a cursory examination. His wounds were minor; he complained of a possible bruise on one ankle where it had caught in the blinds and a scratched hand from an unsheathed margarine knife.

  I helped him up, untangled the senetians and restored the cutlery drawer.

  ‘This is a home invasion!’ I said.

  ‘A mission of mercy, more like!’ He stood up and winced as he put weight on his foot.

  ‘Get out!’ I spluttered.

  ‘So this is how the other half live, eh?’ Drakeforth looked around and limped into the hallway. ‘Where do you keep the family secrets? Got a vault around here some—? A-ha!’

  Drakeforth threw himself at my office door, which was still open. I followed and stood behind him as he surveyed the room with gleeful suspicion.

  ‘I can smell it,’ he inhaled deeply.

  ‘Patchouli?’ I ventured.

  ‘Yes … a sure sign,’ he limped forward and sniffed again.

  ‘Of what exactly?’

  ‘Treachery.’ He hunched over and glared from side to side around the room.

  I glanced towards the burglar alarm control panel inside the front door. They said it could detect burglars, fires and unsolicited door-to-door salesmen. If necessary it would raise the alarm. The lights on the panel blinked with the calm blue that said all was well.

  I looked back at Drakeforth, ‘Mister Drakeforth, I have no idea what this is about, but if you do not leave immediately I shall call the police!’

  He turned and grinned at me. I realised that I preferred it when he was not smiling. His ranting anger was less disconcerting than that mocking smirk.

  ‘Bergenstein’s techniques for vocal command work better if you are calm when you try to employ them.’ He went back to staring at the various shelves, cabinets and desk in the space before us. ‘Give me a hand.’ He went to one end of the roll-top desk and waited while I stood staring at him. ‘Well, come on, grab the other end.’

  The annoying thing about Bergenstein’s command techniques is that when used correctly you act before you realise.

  ‘On three. Three,’ he said, and we heaved the desk away from the wall.

  Drakeforth squeezed into the gap and began tapping along the back panel of the desk. It sounded as hollow, as I expected.

  ‘What are you looking for?’ I asked.

  ‘Patchouli, can’t you smell it?’

  ‘Well, yes. But where’s it coming from?’

  Drakeforth stopped and stared at me. ‘From the patchouli oil that treachery is steeped in.’

  He pulled himself out from behind the desk and rolled up the lid, setting the desk rumbling in alarm. Drakeforth wiped his fingers under the lid and sniffed them. ‘Bah,’ he said, and began investigating drawers. With some wiggling, he slipped each one out and examined it carefully. The contents (pens, pencils, knucklebones, an Origami walrus, paperclips, and a set of keys that opened no lock that I could find) he dumped on the floor. With an enthusiastic noise he began to stack the empty drawers up on the open desk top.

  ‘Don’t hurt it,’ I said.

  ‘Hurt it? It’s barely aware.’ The small drawers, thirty-four in all, were piling up in a pyramid on the desk. The desk was silent.

  There are many schools of thought on where the empathic resonance of an imbued item is located. Science tells us that every sub-atomic event wave of an item infused with empathic energy generates an empathic field. So you couldn’t destroy an empathic machine by removing bits, but you would reduce its functioning capacity.

  ‘The desk is very old,’ I said.

  ‘Yes, I can see that.’ Drakeforth was turning the drawers over and stacking them again, this time in five separate piles.

  ‘It’s living oak.’ I stood there, poised to call the police, but at the same time deathly afraid to leave this strange man alone with my desk.

  ‘The only known natural source of empathic energy,’ he replied, focused on the drawers.

  ‘Illegal to harvest living oak now of course, but this is an antique,’ I said, wanting him to be careful with the desk.

  ‘Should be in a museum I expect,’ he said and I frowned at the clear sarcasm in his tone.

  ‘No, it should be left alone and unmolested in the home of the one who owns it and cares for it.’

  ‘It should be tried for crimes against humanity and then burned,’ Drakeforth snapped.

  ‘How dare you!?’ My shock sounded shrill. ‘I am calling the police, Mister Drakeforth!’

  ‘Watch this …’ Drakeforth began to re-insert the drawers, each one sliding home in a different slot from its original until all thirty-four drawers were in place. The desk shuddered and a fine dust jetted from its seams.

  ‘That’s got it.’

  ‘What hav
e you done?’ I took a single step closer.

  ‘Got the desk running, that’s what.’ Drakeforth slid the top down and began to press his fingers lightly along the strips as if seeking a pulse.

  I watched, confused, as his fingers probed and slipped along the slats. He played the desk’s roll top like a musical instrument and a resonant tone began to rise from within the heart of the wood.

  ‘How did you—?’

  ‘Shh …’

  The smell of patchouli and tobacco became stronger with each caress. The tone began to pulse and morph into a rhythmic melody. The cadence took on a distinct tonality and the ancient wood began to utter recognisable sounds. After a few moments it started to speak in three distinct voices.

  ‘Who else knows about this …?’

  ‘… discovery …’

  ‘But dare we …?’

  I recoiled, pressing myself against the doorframe, mouth gaping at the wooden voices.

  Drakeforth glared at the desk as he continued to stroke and press, working some obscure acupressure technique on the timber. No more words came out; the empathic oak faded into silence.

  ‘Patchouli oil,’ Drakeforth said finally, ‘is used to preserve the empathic vibrations absorbed by the grain of living oak.’

  I nodded, stunned by the voices speaking from so long ago.

  ‘Using the right application of pressure, emotional content can be forced out of the wood. Emotive pulses such as distressed or excited speech are more readily retained by the wood. This suggests that the discussion was heated and someone wanted it recorded.’

  Drakeforth turned on his heel and walked out of the room. I followed him to the kitchen where he put the kettle on to make a pot of tea.

  ‘Got any milk?’ he asked while plucking cups from their hooks.

  ‘No, I’m afraid not.’ The fridge gave an indignant snort. Drakeforth glanced at it.

  I looked to the telephone. The police should be called, but my indignation was being eroded by my curiosity about the secrets of my desk.

  ‘Your desk gets me thinking,’ Drakeforth said, opening packets of tea and wafting their scent into his face. ‘What alternatives do we have to empathic energy? Just how sentient is your average fridge? This powifery about degrees of life. Seriously, can you kill an empathic engine?’ he asked.

  I folded my arms, his presence still unsettling me. ‘Electricity is one option,’ I said, ‘But empathic energy is still the cleanest energy we have. So why bother going to the cost and hassle of generating electricity from other sources when double-e flux gets the job done so much more efficiently? And no, you can’t kill something that is technically not alive.’

  I watched as Drakeforth poured boiling water into the pot and sprinkled a selection of my teas on top.

  ‘Where did you study tea-making?’ I asked, my curiosity piqued. If nothing else, finding out more about this man could aid the police in gaining a conviction for whatever shopping list of crimes he had no doubt committed.

  ‘Beaufort College. I was studying alternative history. Specifically, economic modelling forecasts based on consideration of factors culminating in alternative outcomes to historically valid events.’

  ‘Gosh, that sounds interesting.’

  ‘Dullest three years of my life. As a result I spent a lot of my time avoiding the lectures and hanging out in tea houses.’

  He handed me a steaming cup and the aroma alone was enough to take my tension down a few degrees.

  ‘Would you like a chocolate biscuit?’ I could hear myself being hospitable. I sounded like a polite stranger.

  ‘Tea and chocolate should be taken seriously. Each consumed in its own instance, without outside influence.’

  We sat there together, drinking our tea in my kitchen, the appliances around us as quiet as sleeping cats. I felt a sense of betrayal at their nonchalance. Even if my home security system thought everything was fine, the phone should be picking up on my distress and offering to call the authorities.

  ‘Patchouli oil!’ Drakeforth declared, setting his cup down with a clatter.

  ‘Yes,’ I said, refusing to be surprised by him again.

  ‘We will need a quantity of it.’

  ‘Whatever for?’ I asked.

  ‘Patchouli oil is distilled from the dried and fermented leaves of the plant Pogostemon cablin.’ Drakeforth’s eyes gleamed as he ignored my question.

  ‘It’s a volatile oil,’ I replied, our eyes locked together.

  ‘Some say it is a treatment for venomous snakebites.’ His irises were the green of the sea under a storm.

  ‘Are we at risk of venomous snakebite?’ I asked with a completely straight face.

  ‘Not usually, but who knows where this investigation will lead us?’

  ‘Investigation? What investigation?’

  ‘Our investigation into the truth behind Godden’s treachery.’ Drakeforth spoke as if addressing a dullard child.

  I sighed, and set my own cup down. ‘From the beginning. Please.’ I hoped the police would understand if I didn’t take notes. It seemed clear to me that Drakeforth was indeed quite insane.

  ‘Huddy Godden, first of that name and so-called discoverer of Empathic Energy one hundred and fifteen years ago—’

  ‘One hundred and twel—’ I started to correct. Drakeforth raised a finger.

  ‘In case you weren’t aware, this dialogue is intended as a monologue.’

  I nodded sheepishly and wondered if there might be another cup of tea in the pot.

  Drakeforth ticked off the salient points on his fingers, ‘Huddy Godden, alleged discoverer, empathic energy … ah yes, one hundred and fifteen years ago he claims to discover empathic energy. However, I believe that he was not the only one to make the breakthrough. I have made it my life’s work to prove that in fact, there were three discoverers of empathic energy. Godden was the only one who lived long enough to profit from it.’

  I gave a slight shrug, ‘There have been all manner of theories and claims over the years. In college I went on a date with a chap who claimed it was our brainwaves being harvested.’

  ‘Brandy-fingers the lot of it,’ Drakeforth said. ‘Where is he now?’

  ‘Who?’ I asked, frowning.

  ‘The string-mop who had said empathic energy was brainwaves being harvested.’

  I set my cup down. ‘How should I know? We only went on one awful date. I don’t even remember his name.’

  ‘Probably not important,’ Drakeforth said in a tone that suggested he was filing it away.

  I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, ‘What evidence do you have of Godden’s conspiracy?’

  ‘Your desk,’ Drakeforth leaned forward and put his elbows on the table. ‘Your desk is the secret. It holds a recording of a conversation between Huddy Godden and two other men. Together they are the three co-discoverers of empathic energy.’

  ‘Who are the other two?’ I sat back in my chair and wrinkled my nose.

  ‘There are several candidates.’ He waved the question away. ‘Is it so hard to believe that everything you have ever been told is a lie?’

  ‘It just seems, well … convenient.’

  ‘Convenient? Convenient that people died and are still dying to protect Godden’s secret? His larceny? His treacherous betrayal of the fortunes of two entire bloodlines?’ Drakeforth rose from his chair.

  ‘Well, no, I didn’t mean it like that. I imagine it must have been very inconvenient. It just seems that it’s perfectly convenient for you that this be true.’

  ‘Convenience is for stores, pre-packaged dinners and parking spaces within easy walking distance of your destination. Lies are only convenient for the liar,’ Drakeforth declared.

  ‘And you’re going to uncover the truth,’ I said, refusing to accept this verbal assault meekly.

  ‘We, Pudding. We are going to uncover the truth and challenge the conspirators … We shall challenge them with patchouli oil.’

  ‘But the other two could be an
yone? Why would their conversation be recorded in my antique desk? You’re not suggesting …?’

  ‘It’s possible. Pudding’s a common enough name.’

  ‘How is it possible? The living oak desk has been in my family for generations. Passed down, from my great-grandmother to my grandmother, to my mother and now to me.’

  Drakeforth sank into a chair, ‘Your mother, her name was Dorothy Pudding?’

  ‘Yes – wait, how do you know that?’

  ‘Pudding is the fourth most popular surname in the Northern world. Dorothy, even more so. Why, about a year ago, early in my investigation, there were some civilian casualties. A tragic case of mistaken identity from what I could gather. Honestly, if you want proof that coincidence is the most powerful force in the universe …’ I felt the hairs on the back of my neck rise in a scalp-tightening chill as Drakeforth continued talking.

  ‘There was this couple, perfectly normal people. Last name Pudding. Her name was Dorothy and his was …’ Drakeforth tapped the side of his skull to dislodge the trivial memory.

  ‘Daedius?’ I suggested.

  Drakeforth stabbed the air between us with a finger. ‘Yes! Daedius and Dorothy Pudding. As I said, a popular name. Quite a bizarre accident, at least that’s how it was reported. They were actually killed by a couple of professional assassins.’

  ‘My parents died in an accident,’ I said, the coldness seeping into my voice.

  ‘Mine too,’ he said. ‘Does no one die of natural causes anymore?’

  ‘Were you close to your parents?’ I asked. I could feel the tea souring in my stomach.

  ‘Not really, my mother was a circus clown. My father worked the talk-show audience member circuit. He wrote poetry in his spare time and was published in torrid little journals that came with a free book of matches.’

  ‘Your mother sounds interesting. Growing up in a circus would have been fun,’ I slipped into a professional customer service mode of speech without making a conscious decision.

  ‘I wouldn’t know. I was raised by a flange of baboons.’

  ‘What happened to your parents?’ I asked, refusing to entertain his absurd claim.