As he adjusted his collar in front of the cheval mirror and considered this sensitive subject, he came over all strange. His heart bumbled around inside him like a moth inside a lantern. His knees were weak and he was sure he’d forgotten how to breathe.
Evadne and Kingsley. I suppose that would make us a couple.
He had to sit on his bed, lest he find himself on the floor.
This hadn’t been a sudden plunge into romance. Nor was it a considered thing where he’d tallied up advantages and disadvantages. He was tempted to say that it crept up on him and took him unawares, but that would be an untruth. Ever since the first time he’d seen Evadne Stephens, he had dreamed about her. These dreams were pleasing but her capriciousness had kept him at a distance. She was kind, she was fun, she was stunningly good-looking, but she was also challenging, impulsive and decidedly prickly at times. When she had declared that a professional partnership needed a degree of distance he’d agreed with some relief, but it was a relief tinged with regret. Ever after, circumstances had been conspiring to breach this wall of professionalism, assaulting his battlements of detachment, besieging his fortress of friendliness. The events of the last few months had been trying enough without his also laying his feelings bare. In extremis, they had both found what was important and had declared it through their actions.
‘Kingsley.’
Evadne stood in his doorway, a picture that took away what little breath he’d managed to regain. She was wearing some sort of pale blue Oriental coat over a black dress. The coat looked heavy, with elaborate embroidery and gold braiding. She wore a hat, too, smaller than most hats Kingsley had seen women wearing lately, almost a miniature fez. ‘It’s a Mandarin coat, Kingsley. A perfectly delightful old woman sold it to me a few years ago. I wear it too seldom, so I thought this the perfect time. Come here, your tie is crooked.’
‘That’s because it’s ashamed at not being able to meet the standard you set, which is exceedingly high.’
‘Fumbly and awkward, but still a compliment. Good.’
‘What I meant to say is that you look overwhelmingly lovely. It’s not just your clothes, although the fact you chose them shows your exceptional good taste. It’s your bearing and your manner, which are striking in their own right.
She finished adjusting his tie and stood back, smiling broadly. ‘That’s better.’
‘The tie?’
‘And the compliment. Detailed, thoughtful and eloquent. I could live with that.’
He took her hand and kissed it. ‘And I couldn’t live without that.’
The Palm Court at the Ritz had so much style that Kingsley thought it could give its excess to less well-appointed hotels and London would be the better for it. It sparkled, a song of pale walls, many mirrors and gilt.
Kingsley’s foster father was resplendent in his morning dress, with a soft grey waistcoat for a touch of individuality. He rose, smiling, when Kipling, Evadne and Kingsley entered. ‘We’ve ordered tea. Hope you don’t mind.’
Kingsley seated Evadne, and when he sat he was next to Mrs Winter. Mrs Ward. The woman who married his foster father.
This is foolish, he thought and he decided a direct approach was best. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said to her. ‘I still don’t know how to address you.’
She rested her chin on her hand for a moment, amused. She had a white silk wrap over a dress of palest yellow satin. Her hat was a tight black turban. ‘How would you like to address me, Kingsley?’
‘That’s only half of it. How would you like to be addressed?’
‘Oh my. We’re in danger of foundering on our own over-solicitousness. The name I have that is least under dispute is “Selene”.’
Kingsley felt a little awkward, calling an adult by her first name. Yet the alternatives were even less comfortable. ‘Selene is a charming name. I’d be honoured to use it.’
Evadne, on his left, leaned across. ‘Since we’re talking about names, Selene, have you thought about my offer?’
Kingsley noted that Evadne had none of his hesitation in using an adult’s first name. He added an abundance of self-possession to the list of things he admired in her. ‘What offer?’
Selene touched his wrist. ‘Evadne has an intriguing opportunity, but I’m afraid I must decline.’
Kingsley looked across the table. Mr Kipling and his foster father were discussing something that entailed their heads being close together with quite a few furtive looks being cast at the other patrons of the Palm Court.
Probably something to do with the safety of the realm and my father’s new job.
Despite blustering and refusing and arguing, Dr Ward had ended up as the new head of the Agency for Demimonde Affairs, mostly because his wife had declared that she was happier in a country with good protection from Demimonde devilry, and no-one could do a better job than her husband.
‘But you’d be splendid,’ Evadne was saying to the new Mrs Ward. ‘Someone with your calm, your aplomb.’
‘Not to mention my easy way with any gods who might be in the area? No, sorry, Evadne, your terms are too onerous.’
Kingsley tapped his teacup with a spoon. ‘And here’s where I’ll interrupt and ask “what’s all this about?” instead of listening hard and trying to make sense of what you’re both talking about.’
‘I’ve asked Selene to be the new Mrs Oldham,’ Evadne said simply. ‘She has been a school teacher and I’m sure she could manage the girls.’
‘Oh, I’m sure I could,’ Selene said. ‘In fact, I’d love to. It’s just that having only recently taken on a new name, I couldn’t possibly throw it aside and take another.’
Kingsley dabbed at his lips with a napkin. ‘Everyone in charge of Mrs Oldham’s School for Girls must take on the name of “Mrs Oldham”.’ He frowned at Evadne. ‘I think “Mrs Ward’s School for Girls” has a fine ring to it.’
Evadne threw her hands up in the air. ‘Oh, very well then. It’ll mean having to get a new brass plaque, though.’
Kingsley pointed at her with the teaspoon he still had in hand. ‘I’m sure you have a Demimonde friend who can do such work.’
‘Of course.’ She leaned across Kingsley again. ‘Mrs Ward’s School for Girls it is.’
Evadne and Selene shook hands, elegantly.
‘I say, Kingsley, Evadne, have you heard the news?’ Mr Kipling was gesturing across the table. ‘Dr Ward has just told me that Buchanan wants to stay on in the Agency.’
‘What?’ Kingsley said. ‘I thought he’d want to go when Congreve-Knollys left.’
‘He says the filing system needs a complete overhaul,’ Dr Ward said. ‘And procurement is in a shambles.’
‘You could do worse, I suppose,’ Kingsley said. ‘But whatever you do, spend some time with Christabel Hughes, Father. She’ll tell you what’s really going on in that place.’
‘Hughes? The youngster who was at the farm?’
‘That’s the one.’ Kingsley thought about having another salmon sandwich. ‘And the Immortals. Any thoughts about what you’ll do with them?’
‘The same as Gompers. Keep them locked up. Oh, someone will probably want to study them, try to work out where their power comes from, but I think that might be a very dangerous road to go down. I’d be happy if everyone simply forgot about them.’
And that’s enough shop talk. Kingsley signalled to the waiter who had been alert for the cue. An instant later, half a dozen of his white coated colleagues were serving champagne to the table. ‘This was meant to acknowledge your wedding,’ Kingsley said, his glass raised in a toast, ‘but to that I’ll add congratulations to Selene on achieving the distinction of superseding Mrs Oldham, and to my father on his new position as head of the Agency for Demimonde Affairs.’
‘I probably won’t last a month,’ Dr Ward said. His attempt at gruffness was short-lived, however, when he spied the waiter approaching. ‘Ah, cucumber sandwiches, my favourite! It’s the mint, you know, that makes them so appetising.’
A few
delightful hours later, Kingsley and Evadne left, making their apologies. Outside, the weather was caught between drizzle and not. ‘Shall we walk?’ Evadne said.
‘What about your Mandarin coat?’
She pointed at the man on the corner. ‘Such times were made for umbrella sellers.’
Arm in arm, they walked down St James’s Street towards Pall Mall.
‘Dr Ward asked me if you’d finished reading the journals,’ Evadne said. ‘The two journals.’
‘I haven’t found the proper time.’ It was odd, but after seeking his past so avidly, now that he had the journals, Kingsley had been reluctant to read either of them.
‘Mind you,’ Evadne said, ‘he didn’t actually ask to read either of them, even though his interest was palpable. I think he’s wondering how you’d react to a request.’
‘Favourably. I owe him so much.’ We share a past already. Now it’s a larger one. He hesitated, then he decided he had to share. ‘I nearly ran away, you know, several times over the last year.’
‘Ah. I wondered. You had that look about you.’
Kingsley really wasn’t surprised she’d noticed. ‘What sort of look?’
‘I’d come across you gazing into the distance, but it was a distance that looked infinitely preferable to the place you found yourself at that moment.’
‘That describes the feeling perfectly.’
‘And now?’
‘Nowhere is preferable to where I find myself right now.’
‘I’m glad.’
He squeezed her arm. ‘Have you packed the dodecahedron off to the Agency yet?’
‘Not yet. I have a few experiments of my own to do first. Then I’ll decide. Even with your father in charge, the Agency is still the Agency.’
They reached the Embankment. The day was beginning to draw in. ‘We have so much packing to do, Kingsley. Are you sure we’ll be able to catch the Edinburgh train in the morning?’
‘The only trouble catching a train is getting someone to throw it to you,’ Kingsley said.
Evadne tapped his arm with a gloved finger. ‘If you were any more arch we could build a bridge out of you.’
Kingsley shook his head. ‘I am now truly put in my place by the supremo of witticisms. I accept that my role is to be the strong and silent partner.’
‘Oh, no, not silent. That’s far too dreary. Just do your best to keep up.’
Kingsley could think of nothing more agreeable. He took her hand in his. ‘I shall.’
FORTY-TWO
Later that day, replete after the sumptuous tea, Kingsley settled in their now secure workshop and started reading his father’s journal. The experience was a strange one.
Before he began, he propped the battered photograph, the one Evadne had found for him, on the table in front of him.
He couldn’t remember his true father at all, so he was looking for the man with every word. He wanted to touch the flesh and blood that were his, but the more he read the more the man eluded him. Kingsley tried to reconstitute the man from such entries as ‘Water courses in NE unaccountably dry’ and ‘Chota Lal – disappeared’. Lists of dates and distances travelled were there aplenty, but the only picture that came was of a man of duty – an observant man, sharp, curious and organised.
Gradually, he learned that his father had been reporting to the Indian branch of the Agency, as well as to the normal military intelligence authorities. It shouldn’t have surprised him, but it did. His father was not only involved with politics, but he was involved with monitoring events in the shifting world of the Demimonde.
The journal was a field diary, a compendium of notes taken while on mission, and by rights should have been handed in with a full report of findings. The fact that it hadn’t made Kingsley sure that his father – Greville Sanderson, British spy – had come to an awful end.
Kingsley paused for some time before reading the final entries.
His father had become aware of rumours concerning vile practices in Kerala, near Ramakkalmedu. In the methodical, organised manner Kingsley was becoming accustomed to, his father had travelled south and set about collecting information, assuming the guise of an official from the Forestry Service. This allowed him access to all sectors of society, from the lowest timber workers to the merchants and to the British officials. His pretence was aided by the presence of his heavily pregnant wife, Alice, who was loved by all around her.
It was in mentions of his wife that Greville Sanderson’s military bearing slipped. His adoration for the woman who was Kingsley’s mother seeped through his stiff prose. He respected her fortitude, admired her intelligence, and loved her kindness. Kingsley wept when he read the hesitating description of how his mother carefully selected servants with families, and insisted that the families came to live with them to share in their comfort.
Sanderson had assumed, at first, that the rumours of evil practices could be hinting at the reawakening of the dreaded Thuggee cult, the mad murderers dedicated to the goddess Kali, but soon it became apparent that this wasn’t the case. Unspeakable rites were taking place, but they had nothing to do with the Thuggees. This was something new.
In a land as ancient as India, with its multitude of people and its panoplies of histories, novelty was rare. Almost everything that was done had been done before, in one way or another. Yet Greville Sanderson was sure he had uncovered something new, in the most hideous way.
Sadly, the disappearance of children was not an unknown thing. Illness and accident took many young lives, while poverty and hardship forced appalling decisions on some families. Yet the wave of child disappearances in the area centring on Ramakkalmedu was enough to cause disquiet, especially when considered alongside other events in the area.
Greville Sanderson discovered evidence of large groups of people gathering in the forest at night. They went to witness abominable acts designed to give expression to the basest aspects of humanity. Acts of blood and death brought crowds together to wail at the sky, and when morning came, those who perpetrated the acts disappeared, leaving those who’d come to watch sickened, dismayed and ashamed – but hungering for the next time.
While this was happening, elsewhere in the region strange excavations were being undertaken. Rumours abounded of mysterious objects being dug up from deep in the forest, objects that sent many diggers mad simply to look upon.
Greville Sanderson had no choice. He donned a disguise and joined a midnight meeting.
Later, writing in the safety of their house in Ramakkalmedu – the house overlooking the forest – he detailed in careful prose the outrages committed upon animals and people, documenting them for his superiors. His horror became a cold fury as he promised to bring the perpetrators to justice.
Kingsley almost cried out when his father described these perpetrators: three youths who commanded a legion of unliving minions.
At this point, Kingsley stopped reading to order his thoughts, and to cope with the press of emotion. He needed several deep breaths and the application of a handkerchief to his eyes, but his thoughts were more difficult to deal with. His father had encountered the Immortals. When Evadne and he had run up against the sorcerers and their Spawn, there were hints that the unspeakable creatures had spent time in India, and that they had only come back to London recently. Soames, their human go-between, had been arranging shipments containing substantial magical worth. Had this anything to do with the objects being dug from the Indian forest?
Kingsley turned the page to find the next entry was the last. It was brief and shocking in its informality. For the only time, Greville Sanderson wrote in the first person. Kingsley, reading the fateful, final words, was hearing the voice of his father.
‘They have found us. I have barred the door and will hold them off. Alice has the baby. A trusted servant is taking them into the forest. God have mercy on their souls. I love them both.’
Kingsley closed the journal. He sat there in the basement, alone with his thoughts, for a long time.
Then he opened his mother’s journal.
FORTY-THREE
Leetha did not like being on the deck of the ship. So much world on either side and none of it to stand on. Despite having Lavinia and Troilus beside her, she was deeply uneasy at the expanse of water; never solid, never still. The weather, though, had steadily grown warmer and warmer as they had travelled, and more like that of their home. This was cheering.
They had been journeying for many days, and yet she was still not happy with the motion of the vessel. The way it moved, side to side, end to end, was too unsteady for her. Even though the ship was taking them home, she knew that her gratitude to it would be only mild.
She had been glad of the skill of the shipmasters. They had prepared comfortable quarters for her people and her. The captain had also discussed their special requirements with her. Large rooms, bedding on floors, no locks, as many of the round windows as they could have.
Home.
‘What will you do when you get home?’ Lavinia asked Leetha. The wind ruffled the hair of the Trojan woman. She swept it away with an easy hand.
Leetha knew. She and her people would withdraw. They would lose themselves and retire from the world. They did not want to be part of it, not if it was as they had seen. They would remain hidden, overlooked. ‘We shall be together,’ she said. ‘We shall live our lives.’
‘Like us,’ Troilus said. He nudged his sister. He swept an arm over the ocean. ‘While we’re roaming, at least we have each other.’
‘And all your people, are they happy?’ Lavinia asked.
‘All those who came with us,’ Leetha said. ‘They are impatient, now.’
Then she remembered Mannor. He and a few of his friends had decided to stay behind. It was a shock to many, but Leetha was not surprised. Mannor had been fascinated by the workings of the big people. Leetha would never stop anyone who wanted to learn, and the ghost girl – Evadne – promised that she would find Mannor and his friends a place where they could be safe and be taught the ways of working with metal and electricity.
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