The Curious Steambox Affair

by Melissa Macgregor

  We found his cane at the foot of one of the closes. Our investigation focused there, and we immediately went into action. We are an investigative group, with our own specializations. Simon Trantham galvanized the police into conducting a proper search. Gordon MacBean alerted the Chevalier Cabinet, who arranged for airships to scour the city. Hamish MacBean and August Smithson began questioning everyone in the area, learning quickly that Purefoy had been seen, being shoved into a carriage. Hamish and Smithson got involved with following those leads.

  A few days ago, I went on a long walk with Purefoy, in what should have been a bit of scenic exercise. It was, and yet I found myself constantly on alert. I was aware that recently, some mysterious stranger had made inquiries about Purefoy’s whereabouts, which was cause for alarm. I am not a believer in coincidences, and the fact that he was present at several of the recent murder scenes gave us the idea that he was possibly being hunted.

  And so I scanned the crowd of hikers as we climbed the mountain. I watched carefully at the tea shop. And when I saw a man behaving oddly at the summit, I thought it could not be coincidence.

  I did not wish to alarm Purefoy, and so I disappeared briefly, moving through the fog unnoticed. I wished for a chance to observe the stranger, who was so concentrated on glaring at Purefoy that he was unaware of me. His hands were clenched at his sides, fury evident in his expression. He had eyes for no one save Purefoy, and I knew, without a doubt, that if there had not been a crowd of hikers present, then he would not have hesitated to harm him. I saw the man stare repeatedly at the edge of the cliff side. I saw him stare intently at Purefoy. When he finally focused on me, I was very nearly upon him, but he scampered away with a sharp cry of alarm.

  I let him go, although I had committed his facial features to my mind. He was obviously someone familiar with Purefoy, and I had long ago memorized all the faces of those who shared either boarding house. This man was not from there. He was not from the restaurant we frequent. He was not from the tavern or bookshop. He was not police. So that left only the Doctoral Council.

  My mind was preoccupied as we returned to Hyde’s town house. I immediately excused myself and returned to my own home, lost in thought.

  It was not until the next morning, Monday, that I decided to go to the Doctoral offices. I was refused entrance, but I contacted Gordon MacBean, who, as usual, was able to open all closed doors that were presented to us. The two of us demanded an accounting of all physicians and all assistants. We asked to see them all, and their protests were met by stoic disdain and disinterest from MacBean.

  We paraded them through the Operating Theatre. MacBean and I sat in the lower observing gallery, while I looked at each of them. We were joined by Patrick O’Sullivan, and our friend, Anthony Martino, who had recently arrived from Venice. We filled them in quickly on my suspicions, and they agreed that this was a good place to start.

  At this point, we had decided that the man on the mountainside was probably our culprit. If not, he certainly hated Purefoy with abandon, and none of us was willing to allow someone like that, murderer or no, access to our friend.

  We are very fond of your Purefoy, Miss Campbell. We are his friends, and none of us will tolerate anyone bringing him harm. And we have already proven this, but I am getting ahead of my dismal story.

  We ignored the irate complaints of the physicians and their assistants. The lower floor of the Theatre was full of them, loudly shouting that this sort of inspection was an outrage. MacBean calmly insisted that it was necessary and that if they did not watch themselves, he would have them all arrested for the obstruction of justice. His threat worked, as usual, and I was granted silence in which to continue my perusal.

  I looked at them all but saw no evidence of the man I had seen. I asked if this was everyone, and to my surprise, Patrick O’Sullivan answered me.

  “There is no Mr. Rose. He is not here.”

  Surprised, I turned to my friend. I described the remembered features of the man at the mountainous summit. Sully nodded his head and said that it was, undoubtedly, Mr. Rose.

  The euphoria we felt at finally making discovery was dampened by our learning that neither he nor his physician, Dr. MacDougal, were present in the Operating Theatre. No one was aware of their locations, and not even the threat of impending arrest made it otherwise. They truly did not know, and had not seen any sign of them in days.

  Immediately, we changed tactics. The search for these two men began in earnest, and we were heavily involved in it, late into the evening, when we received word that Purefoy had gone missing.

  You can imagine our alarm to learn this, and I wish to offer you my most heartfelt apology that it even happened. There was a gross misunderstanding among us. Everyone believed that someone else had seen to the security of Purefoy, but in the heat of the hunt, we had all thought that someone else was protecting him. The last we had seen of him, he was with Hyde, and it sickens me that I was so busy finding his threat that I allowed it to reach him.

  Please forgive me, Miss Campbell. Forgive me for not protecting my brother Purefoy better. I take the responsibility upon my own shoulders, as do the rest of the Gentlemen. We believed he was to stay at the town house. We should have told Hyde to keep him close.

  Instead, he was gone. MacBean contacted the Crown, who started the airship search. The others started questioning those who were close to the discarded cane. They searched Rose’s quarters, as well as MacDougal’s town house, but there was no sign of either.

  Be assured, the seven of us tore the city asunder. We spent hours learning the usual haunts of these men. We then searched there. We left no stone unturned. August Smithson even went up the cliff-side pathway, determined to learn if Purefoy had been taken there. We scoured the docks at Leith. We used every resource available to us, determined to find Purefoy and find him swiftly.

  The night passed and turned into a dismal morning.

  And then Sully had the idea that eventually proved our salvation. He insisted upon the Old Physicians’ Hall, which we had already explored. He said that we had to go back. Simon Trantham argued that we had already searched through the cavernous hall, but Sully said that he had a feeling, an intense feeling, that there was something there.

  I am a Cherokee Indian. I was taught to never ignore a feeling, and so I agreed to go.

  And so, I set out with Sully. Tony Martino came as well. The three of us left the cerebral search to the other Gentlemen, who are always better at making things happen within the proper channels. As I have said before, we each have our specializations. For me, for Patrick O’Sullivan, and for Tony Martino, it is better if we take a more active role.

  We approached the quiet Physicians’ Hall, and I will admit I felt a disappointment to discover that the floor and antechambers were still as empty as when we had first searched them. I was very aware that each passing moment, each hour, could be the last for my friend. I knew we were running out of options, out of places to look, and hoped that one of the other Gentlemen was having better luck in finding out news of where they could have possibly taken Purefoy.

  Tony Martino has always been a master tracker. He is a Venetian count but possesses such similar tracking skills to mine own that we have often laughed about him carrying a hint of Indian heritage. It was he who noticed a slight discoloration in the wooden floor, close to the main fireplace. It was a small spot, easily overlooked by even the most expert of hunters, but we were unwilling to ignore it.

  We took out our knives, and I managed to find the hidden trigger. The floorboard depressed slightly, and then caused the entire front of the fireplace to swing open, revealing a dark hallway beyond.

  We took a torch, and shining it against the hallway floor we could see the marks of recent footprints. We could tell by the movement of the dust that something had been dragged. Something, or someone.

  And so, without h
esitation, the three of us walked into battle. We were armed. We held the torch above us, and we did not linger. We hurried through the impossibly tight passageway, feeling it descend into the netherworld. The air was damp with mold and disuse, but the footprints were still visible.

  The hallway was soon bathed in torchlight. We could hear voices. Laughter. Pausing only to rid ourselves of our own torch and pull out our weapons of choice, we stepped through an open stone archway.

  The room must have been an ancient cellar, buried deeply beneath the Old Physicians’ Hall. The ceiling was high and curved, and the walls were composed completely of a very slick, very old brick. A second entrance to the room was revealed across the wide floor from where we stood. The sudden and intense light was nearly blinding, and we paused, just within the threshold, and took quick stock of what lay before us.

  We saw MacDougal. We saw Rose. There were seven other men there as well, rough and sturdy and obviously hired as working muscle, probably from the docks. They milled about a medical examining table, upon which was laid a truly shocking sight.

  I hesitate to tell you about it at all, Miss Campbell, but I have my orders to speak the truth. And I know it is what Alistair would want, should he know that I was writing you. I do, however, ask for your forgiveness in relaying such horror.

  Upon the table was a gross collection of human body parts. They were sewn together in a terrible method, in a sick pretense of a normal human body. I know now that they were the bits taken from the different murder scenes, kept in cold storage, and attached together. Beside the table, there was a second table, its surface filled by a small wooden box, covered with brass handles and dials. Brass tubes were connected to the medical bed, and this contraption so captured the attention of the physician and his assistant that they were unaware that they had visitors.

  The seven men were occupied elsewhere. They crowded around a man, around Alistair, who was hung suspended by ropes at his wrists. He was pulled upward, his bindings connected to a metal hook descended from the ceiling. The balls of his feet touched the ground, keeping him steady. He was without his shirt, and as we watched, one of the men slapped a wooden cane across his back.

  Everything at this point becomes difficult to tell, Miss Campbell. Rage overwhelmed me, as it did my two friends. All I could focus on was the sight of my friend, of my brother, who was covered in welts and cuts. I could see what appeared to be a recently dug grave, just beyond where he hung suspended. I saw all of these things in the blink of an eye. I saw the marks upon his back. The bruises on his face. The soil that still discolored his skin, and I realized that he had recently been put within that grave.

  In the next second, Alistair lifted his head. He looked at me, and my only thought was that he was still alive.

  I threw back my head and let out my warrior’s howl, and then the mayhem began.

  I pause now. I take a drink of coffee. How can I possibly tell you what happened next? Hyde tells me that I must, and is threatening to do so himself if I do not continue. He says that you are a Warrior’s lady, and that it is your right to know how we avenged the ills inflicted upon your man.

  We massacred them. They are all dead. The room became red with the shedding of their blood. We were brutal.

  I fought my way to Alistair. I fight differently than most, as do my two friends. I was ruthless with the dockworkers, showing no mercy. Sully fought at my side, his pistols firing.

  We reached Alistair and cut him down. His shoulders and arms were damaged from being hung suspended, but he was breathing. He was covered in cuts, with marks across his wrists. He had been buried alive, pulled out just before he died. He had been beaten with a cane and with a whip. He was barely conscious as I cut away the ties that bound him, but he was alive. And to us, that was all that mattered.

  Tony Martino saw to MacDougal and Rose, deciding to inflict a hint of the torture that they had bestowed upon our friend. He tied them up and began to extract their fingernails as they shrieked. It was he who learned of their diabolical plan to create their own human, using a Steambox as the catalyst for life. They had orchestrated all the recent deaths, wanting body parts for their creation.

  Evil cowards are all the same. When faced with their own impending death, they find it impossible to not confess their every sin. I promised them mercy if they told it all, and they believed me. Both MacDougal and the sniveling Rose admitted that the murders had been failed attempts to get Purefoy. They wanted his butcher hands for their monster. They wanted to hurt him, to hurt Hyde.

  I scalped them, then. Sully shot them. Tony cut their throats. Again, forgive me for the grossness. For the horror. Ian Hyde is reading over my shoulder, and he tells me that you are a remarkable woman, and that I am to tell the rest of it as well.

  Another drink of coffee.

  We heard footsteps then, so many of them. To our dismay, it seems that there were more dockside workers hired. More ruffians, with intent to kill. They approached us from the back entrance, some sick army that could not be appeased.

  I could hear Alistair talking, his voice low and hoarse and barely audible. I bent down, trying to tell him that this would be all right, that we would survive, but he was adamant and determined that I listen.

  “The Steambox,” he rasped. “All the levers. Push them all up. Activate every dial. Unplug the tubes from the bed, and then run! Run out of here!”

  Admittedly, it made no sense to me. But there were thirty or forty of them, against the three of us. I knew that we could do a tremendous amount of damage, and we were well covered in weaponry. Sully’s face was alive with the thrill of violence. Tony was brandishing two long swords and bellowing loud Italian curses. My friends were prepared for battle, prepared to die, and I was as well, but your Alistair, obviously, had other plans for us.

  “Now!” he shouted, the effort of doing so causing him to slip into unconsciousness.

  I ran forward without hesitation. I reached the Steambox, and shouting out for Tony and Sully to get Alistair, I motioned them toward our entryway. They were gracious enough to not question me, although I could see their obvious confusion.

  “Now!” I said. “Get him and go now!”

  They put up their weapons, and carefully steadied Alistair between them. He was still unconscious, but my friends are strong, and they managed to carry him to the hallway threshold.

  I concentrated my attention on the Steambox. The attackers were making a steady approach but were obviously made nervous by the violence that was evident. There were scalped men and blood splattered everywhere. I think they were debating the necessity of continuing on, and I used their hesitation to my benefit.

  I turned all the dials to the highest point, noticing an alarming hum beginning to circulate within the interiors of the wooden box. I pushed the levers up, and when I did so, a piercing scream was emitted from its depths.

  Instantly, the attackers stilled. They ceased their forward motion, mumbling among themselves.

  I worked frantically, following Purefoy’s terse instructions as best I could. I pulled the strange tubes from their attachment to the table. I separated one from the creature’s cold mouth, horrified to touch the thing but unwilling to not do as Purefoy directed.

  The noise of the Steambox was louder now, and the violence of its shaking caused it to tumble off its table. It crashed to the floor with a terrific cacophony, wood splintering in every direction. The noise was horrendous, and it took me a moment to remember Alistair’s other demand.

  He had told us to run.

  “Run!” I shouted, racing to my friends. Sully and Tony appeared mesmerized by the intense sound, frozen with shock.

  I reached them just as the Steambox exploded.

  The noise was deafening, and the light that erupted was like a very large fireball had been released. It flashed as brightly as daylight, brighter even,
and then, suddenly, I could feel a sharply cool breeze drift over us.

  This was unlike any breeze or wind I have ever experienced. It touched my skin lightly, almost like a whisper. There was smoke, but not the kind of smoke that one would expect from such an explosion. This was light and gentle, and as I watched, I could see the shimmering images of what appeared to be ghosts forming out of its mists.

  I have always been a spiritual man, Miss Campbell. Both of my friends are also spiritual, and Sully and Tony have informed me that they had never before witnessed the sight that we experienced. They saw it as well. They felt the breeze. They saw the figures, who formed around us, around Purefoy mostly, reaching to touch us with their delicate, ghostly fingers.

  One of them appeared to press his face against Purefoy’s and then disappeared entirely. Instantly, his eyes flew open, and he said only, “My soul has returned,” before once more succumbing to oblivion.

  We ran then, hauling Purefoy between us. Behind us, we could hear another explosion, this one less mystical. Fire erupted, and we could hear the shouts of the men as they perished in the blaze.

  We hailed a carriage and hurried to Hyde’s house, sending at once for the rest of the Gentlemen. Do not be concerned with the fire at the Physicians’ Hall or the discovery of our revenge. We have sent Hamish MacBean to the site. He returned an hour ago and assured me that all has been handled perfectly, and that there is to be no continued trouble for us.

  As I have said, we each have our specialty.

  Our only concern is for Alistair, and we immediately surrendered him into Hyde’s very capable physician’s hands.