by Mark Morris
Psychological it may have been, but being dressed in my own clothes had an energising effect on me. It was as if I’d put on my battle armour; all at once I felt not only physically stronger, but more determined and confident than I’d been since arriving here. Skirting the stained table in the middle of the room, I crossed to Tallarian’s workbench and rooted among the paraphernalia. I came across a half-metre length of copper pipe, which I hefted in my hand, swishing it through the air. It wasn’t the greatest weapon in the world, but it was better than nothing. With the pipe in one hand and the lamp in the other I crossed to the door.
Tucking the pipe into my belt, I glanced back once more at the stack of cages on the opposite wall. The glow of lamplight reflected eerily from dozens of pairs of eyes, all of which seemed fixed on me. There was still some caterwauling from the occupants of the cages, but most had quietened down again now. Logic dictated that those watching eyes contained nothing but a primitive wariness of the intruder in their midst, but I liked to think there was expectation, even hope, in some of them too.
‘I’ll fetch help,’ I whispered, and then, bracing myself, I opened the door. As it swung inwards, my hand moved quickly from the brass knob to the copper pipe, ready to pluck it from my belt and bring it down on the head of whoever might be lurking on the other side.
But there was no one. The door opened on to a flight of uneven stone steps leading upwards. Stepping forward, I noticed there was a key dangling from the keyhole on the outside of the door and guessed that this room was probably kept locked when Ruby and the other nurses were about. I assumed that Tallarian was more lax with his security when he was here alone, but as I began to ascend the steps another possibility struck me. Maybe Tallarian wasn’t lax at all; maybe whoever had unbuckled the strap around my wrist had also unlocked the door for me. But who might that be? Huckerby? Could Tallarian’s right-hand man be less tolerant of his employer’s activities than the doctor realised?
No, that didn’t ring true. If Huckerby was concerned about Tallarian’s experiments, why had he left it until now before doing anything? Why, for that matter, was he relying on me to escape and alert the authorities instead of telling them himself? Wouldn’t it be a long shot on his part to assume that a) I would wake up in time, b) that I would manage to get away once I had woken up, and c) that even if I did get away I would have enough of a conscience to go to the police?
I pushed my thoughts aside, deciding that the only important thing right now was not to look this gift horse in the mouth. The steps I was ascending were steep, and so narrow that I could have touched the walls on either side if I had wanted to. I was about halfway up them when I heard a noise – or thought I heard a noise. There was still enough of a racket coming from the cages below that I couldn’t be entirely sure. I hovered in an agony of indecision, wondering whether I should carry on or wait until I was sure the coast was clear. Then my decision was made for me. The door at the top of the stairs started to open.
For an instant I was a rabbit in the headlights. Then I moved. Adrenaline flooding my system, I turned and raced back down the stairs. I didn’t look over my shoulder, so had no way of knowing whether I, or the light from the lamp, had been spotted. Slipping through the door back into the laboratory, I hesitated for barely a second, knowing I had only moments to decide what to do. I realised that whoever walked in here would know immediately that I had escaped. Not only were my clothes no longer on the wooden chair beside the door, but my hospital gown was crumpled on the floor and the oil lamp which had been sitting on the workbench across the room was now dangling from my left hand. There was no way I’d be able to sort out all of these things and find somewhere to hide before whoever was descending the stairs entered the room. Which left me with only one option.
I scooted across and put the lamp on the operating table, then ran back and pressed myself against the wall beside the hinge side of the door. I was only just in time. Even as I was sliding the copper pipe from my belt the door began to open. I was half-tempted to throw myself against it, to slam it into whoever was entering the room, but I forced myself to wait. The best-case scenario would be to avoid violence altogether. If the newcomer didn’t twig I was hiding behind the door, they might move far enough inside for me to slip out behind them and lock them in.
Nothing in life is ever that simple, though. What happened was that the door came three-quarters of the way open and then stopped. There was a pause, during which I pictured Tallarian standing with his hand gripping the door knob, his gaze sweeping across the room and taking in the discarded gown, the misplaced lantern.
Sure enough, it was Tallarian’s voice which snapped, ‘He’s escaped.’
My heart sank as I heard another growling voice beyond Tallarian’s. ‘’Ow’s ’e done that then?’
Tallarian’s response was cutting. ‘Well, I don’t know, do I? But the main door is locked, so he must still be in the hospital. Quickly, we must search the premises!’
The door began to close. For a second I considered allowing Tallarian and his companion to precede me up the stairs, and then it occurred to me that the doctor might lock the door and pocket the key, trapping me here. Acting on impulse, I leaped forward, grabbed the edge of the door and wrenched it open. Caught by surprise, Tallarian, who was still holding on to the handle, stumbled forward. As I stepped in front of him, his eyes widened in shock and rage.
Raising the copper pipe I whacked him as hard as I could on the side of the head. There was a sickening crack and he staggered sideways, blood instantly gouting from a wound above his left eye. As his legs crumpled, I thought about hitting him a few more times – but then with a roar the other man came at me.
He was huge! Grey-haired and grey-bearded, he was well over six feet tall. His shoulders were so wide you could easily have stood a couple of pint glasses on them. As he rushed at me, raising hairy, shovel-like hands, I backpedalled frantically. After three or four stumbling steps the base of my spine connected with something hard – the edge of Tallarian’s operating table. I barely had chance to register the pain before the man-mountain was upon me. As he lunged for my throat I swung the copper pipe towards his head. He threw up his left arm, swatting the weapon aside as if it was a troublesome fly. Wrenched from my hand, the pipe spun through the air and hit the wall beside the arch with a metallic clatter. Desperately, fending my attacker off as best I could, I groped to my left, grabbed the oil lamp off the table and swung it with all my strength.
Glass smashed against the man’s shoulder, dousing his hair, face and clothes in hot, burning oil. As he screamed, I jumped back to avoid getting splashed myself. Exposed to the air, the fire took hold instantly and within seconds the giant’s hair and clothes were ablaze. His screams rose in pitch until they sounded barely human as he careened about, slapping desperately at his head and body, trying to douse the flames which even now were roaring and spreading, transforming him into a human fireball.
The heat coming off him was tremendous; I felt sweat rolling greasily down my face and chest. I jumped aside as he staggered towards me, and he crashed into the operating table and fell across it, still beating weakly at his clothes with hands that were already blackened and charred. As the fire continued to devour him the room started to fill with thick black smoke that stung my eyes and made me cough. The occupants of the cages were going frantic, screeching and flinging themselves against their bars in an effort to escape. I knew it was madness to try to save them, knew that most fire victims died of smoke inhalation and that I ought to get out of the room as fast as I could, but I couldn’t just leave them to burn – I had made a promise. Bending double and pulling the collar of my sweater up over my face, I stumbled towards the cages.
Through the haze I saw that although they were made mostly of wood, they were secured by iron padlocks. Spotting the copper pipe lying on the floor, I snatched it up and used it as a jemmy, applying it to the hasp of the lock on the cage containing the boy with the metal jaw and trying t
o prise it free. It took several straining seconds before the padlock tore away from the wood, by which time my head was spinning and I was coughing so hard I could taste blood at the back of my throat. As the door swung open, the boy scrambled out, took one look at me as if weighing up whether I was his enemy, and then scuttled like a hunch-backed monkey across to the open door and up the stone steps. As I watched him go, I was aware of the blackened shape of the man lying across the operating table, still burning (as was the table itself), while, beyond him, Tallarian, blood pouring down his face, was floundering about on the floor in a semi-daze as if he couldn’t work out what was happening.
I turned back to the cages, knowing that I could afford to have a go at releasing only one more captive before getting out of there. With no time to decide I simply moved to the next cage in line, that containing the girl with the metal arm, and rammed the ragged end of the copper pipe into the gap between the hasp and the wood.
Sweat poured into my eyes and my lungs laboured for oxygen. The airlessness caused my head to pound with the threat of unconsciousness, reducing the roar of the fire to a muffled throb. With my strength ebbing, I wrenched frantically on the end of the copper pipe, and after a moment of resistance felt rather than heard the gristly tearing of wood. The door to the cage swung open, but through the smoke-shrouded air I saw that the girl was unconscious, her tiny body heaving as it fought for breath. With what felt like the last of my strength I reached in, dragged her out and heaved her on to my shoulder.
Despite her grotesque metal appendage she seemed to weigh almost nothing. I turned, my chest convulsing with pain as coughs like barbed wire tore out of me, my lungs feeling as though they were on the verge of exploding. Through black smoke and raging heat I staggered towards the door. Just as I reached it a white hand lunged from the greyness and grabbed my foot.
It was Tallarian. I looked down to see him gaping up at me, his mouth wide in what appeared to be a silent scream of rage, but was probably nothing more than a desperate need for oxygen. The left side of his face was a mask of blood and his jacket was red with it. I snatched my foot back and his hand flopped to the floor like a dead fish. Leaving him to his own devices, I staggered out of the room.
Ascending the stone steps was like climbing a mountain. With the girl still unconscious over my shoulder, I literally crawled up them inch by inch, my fingers clutching for each jutting ridge, my body a dead weight that felt constantly on the verge of being torn apart by coughing. The heat and smoke felt heavy inside me, like wet sand which clogged my lungs and brain and weighed down my limbs.
At some point I passed out. I wasn’t even aware it had happened until I felt strong hands beneath my armpits, attempting to haul me to my feet. I tried to protest, but all that emerged was a fit of coughing so violent I thought I was being turned inside out. I heard a voice, soothing and cultured. ‘Try to relax, sir. We’ll have you out of this dreadful place and back home before you know it.’
Home? I thought. What do you mean, ‘home’?
But the airless, choking blackness swamped my thoughts once again and I knew no more.
THIRTY
HOME
My ribs and lungs felt as though they had been kicked and stamped on until they were pulped flesh and bruised bone. I woke up coughing, the ratcheting pain that ripped through me causing me to press a hand to my chest, for fear I might shake apart. Eyes watering, I struggled into a sitting position, trying to stifle the desire to keep coughing until all the smoke was out of me. I could still taste it at the back of my throat with each rasping breath; it was as if I’d been barbecued from the inside.
It was only when the initial bout of coughing subsided that I realised where I was. Through my swimming vision I recognised the room in the Kensington house where I’d recuperated after my encounter with Hulse and his men. To my right was the row of bay windows with its view of parkland and the pagoda-like structure on the hill. But the room had been redecorated since the last time I’d been here – the wallpaper was maroon and richly textured, the curtains and carpet thicker and darker. Plus it was more cluttered, knick-knacks and items of furniture taking up most of the floor space, and framed pictures cramming the walls.
Then I realised. Of course the house hadn’t been redecorated; I was evidently still in the past and this is how it must have been before I had known it.
Although I was grateful to be free of Tallarian’s clutches, my spirits were low, thoughts of Kate filling my head. The two of us were further apart than ever, and without the heart I could see no way of getting back to her. But how could I even begin to search for it here? I was stranded, with no identity, no influence, nothing. I may have been in the middle of a city, but I felt as if I’d been cast adrift on a desert island.
Having said that, I clearly had allies here. The fact that I was recuperating in a familiar bed was evidence of that. Perhaps, then, I wasn’t completely isolated. Perhaps there was some hope to cling to.
Moving slowly, I inched upright in the bed, fighting the urge to cough, and wondered if I could summon enough strength to call out. But then there was a creak on the landing and a tap on the door.
‘Come in,’ I wheezed, the effort bringing on a fresh bout of coughing so violent that it doubled me over.
When it subsided, and I was able to raise my head, I saw a tall, lean, immaculately dressed man standing at the foot of the bed. He was around sixty, the silver hair at his temples matching the silver waistcoat he wore beneath a dark, long-tailed jacket. His swan-like neck, rising from a wing-collared shirt, supported a head that was tilted in a way that, combined with his hooked nose, gave him the air of a Roman emperor. The austerity of his expression, however, was offset by the concern in his sky-blue eyes.
As I opened my mouth he raised a hand.
‘If you’ll pardon me, sir, I would advise you to rest your throat and conserve your breath. I shall endeavour to provide you with sufficient information to answer many of the questions you are doubtless clamouring to ask.’
I recognised his voice immediately. This was the man who had rescued me from the fire in Tallarian’s laboratory. What was it he had said? Something about bringing me home? I watched in bemused silence as he crossed to the bedside table, lifted a beaded lace doily from the top of a jug and poured me a glass of water. As he handed it to me, I noted with relief that the water was clear and seemed free of impurities. I sipped, grateful for the soothing coolness of it against my throat.
‘May I?’ he asked, indicating a wooden chair beside the bed. I nodded and he sat down, though he remained straight-backed, his hands resting on his knees, as if relaxing didn’t suit him. Without preamble he said, ‘My name is Hawkins. I have been butler in this house for a little over two years. That is when I first met you, sir. You employed me shortly after you purchased the property from the estate of its previous owner.’
Reaching into the pocket of his jacket, he withdrew a small, ivory-coloured envelope, which he handed to me.
‘If you’ll permit me, sir, before I resume any further explanations I have been advised to give you this.’
Puzzled, I took the envelope from him. On the front ‘Alex’ had been written in block capitals. Opening the envelope, I took out the folded sheet of notepaper inside. The letter, covering both sides of the paper, was handwritten in black ink. With a jolt I recognised the handwriting as my own. I began to read:
Hi Alex,
First of all, I know how weird this is. But it’s even weirder for me in a way, because I’m trying to remember exactly what this letter said when I read it in my past (your present).
I know exactly how disorientated you’re feeling right now, because I’ve been there, but things are not quite as black as they seem. The house is yours, so you don’t have to worry about finding somewhere to live, which I’m hoping means you’ll be able to work out a few things.
But basically all I wanted to say was just listen to what Hawkins tells you and don’t interrupt – not till the
end, anyway. I know your chest and lungs are hurting and you’re finding it hard to breathe, but you’ll recover, trust me. Just take your time, be patient and think. I can’t tell you too much, I’m afraid, not because I don’t want to, but just because this is what I remember the letter saying when I read it and I don’t want to risk messing things up by telling you more than I knew back then. I don’t know if it will mess things up, but I daren’t risk it. I don’t have anything like all the answers, in case you’re wondering (which I know you are), I don’t even know whether time is set in stone and that by reading this letter it means that you’re guaranteed to get to where I am now. Maybe things change all the time, maybe time is mutable, maybe the past me (i.e. you) will never even write this letter. Frankly, all this time-travel stuff does my head in. It’s best not to think about it too much if you can help it.
In short, I’m winging it just as much as you are. But, as I say, do yourself a favour and listen to Hawkins. I know exactly how you’re feeling just now – scared and confused and stranded – but although he’s a bit uptight (don’t tell him I said that – I know you won’t) he’s a man you can absolutely rely on. You’ll learn a lot from him and he’ll help you get by.
Okay, that’s it. I’m dying to say more, but writing this is like taking dictation from my own memory, so I’d better not.
Good luck and take care, and I hope you get at least to where I am now. If not, God knows what will happen to me. Maybe I’ll just blink out of existence or something.
