by Martin Booth
Number forty-seven was a bungalow that looked no different from any of the others. It had a dark slate roof, the walls rendered and painted white. The front door and windows were obviously new, made of white PVC and double-glazed.
Checking up and down the street that no one was observing them, they slipped one by one through the garden gate, pushed their school bags under a holly bush and set off to walk around the bungalow on a small gravel path which encircled it. Their every step crunched on the stones underfoot.
“Nifty early-warning system,” Tim remarked.
The rear garden was lined with a tall privet hedge that prevented any neighbors from seeing what they were doing.
The curtains on all the windows but one were open. Through them, they could see the lounge contained a settee, a low table with a glass top, an armchair and a television. Against one wall stood a bookshelf lined with chemistry textbooks. In the dining room was a modern dining table and four chairs while in the bedroom there was a double bed and a chest of drawers, a wardrobe and two chairs. The kitchen was basic — a gas range, a fridge and a washing machine installed under the work surface. Against one wall stood a kitchen table and two chairs.
“You know,” Pip remarked, “it doesn’t look — I don’t know — lived in. There’s no pictures or ornaments.”
“He is a fastidious man,” Sebastian said as if in explanation.
“Never mind Yoland’s neatness,” Tim said. “How do we get in?” He pointed to the window latches. “Even they’ve got key-operated locks.” He glanced at Sebastian. “How about you do your padlock trick?”
“I fear I cannot,” Sebastian answered. “To do so, I must hold the lock in my hand.”
“So that’s it,” Pip decided. “We can’t get in without smashing a window or something.”
As she was speaking, Tim set off to walk around the bungalow a second time. Where an old garage abutted the house, there grew a tall, dense buddleia bush, the conical flower heads gone to seed. Parting the tangle of branches and peering through them, he could make out a small wood-framed window, the sill rotted through, the paint peeling and the glass hazy with dirt. Pressing his face to the pane, he surveyed the interior of the garage and returned to the others.
“We’re in!” he announced, grinning broadly. “There’s a window in the garage and a door from the garage into the house.”
“It’s going to be a tight fit,” Pip remarked when she saw the window. “You shouldn’t’ve pigged out on that Mars bar.”
Tim tested the window. The latch was shut.
“Return to square one,” Pip said.
“Watch and wait, listen and learn,” said Tim pontifically.
The edge of the pane of glass by the latch was cracked, the putty holding it in place dried and breaking away in chunks.
“One more crack won’t be noticed,” Tim declared and, picking up a pointed stone from beneath the buddleia, screwed his eyes tight and gently tapped at the point where the crack met the frame. In less than a minute, there was a hole in the glass big enough for him to get his index finger through. Taking care not to cut himself, he pushed his finger through and flicked the latch handle over on itself.
“Bingo!” he murmured. “Give me a leg up. I’ll go inside and open the back door for you.”
Pip bit her lip as he eased himself in and disappeared from sight.
The garage was empty except for a large cardboard box containing a replacement for the rotted window through which Tim had just slipped, some gardening tools and a very ancient workbench on to which he lowered himself. Closing the window to cover his tracks, Tim then jumped to the floor, making sure not to step in a covering of white chalk-like dust on the floor: the last thing he wanted to do was to leave footprints. The door into the house was locked, but the mechanism was faulty and a quick jerk opened it.
His heart pounding, Tim stepped into Yoland’s house, shutting the door behind him.
He rapidly went down a short passageway to the kitchen and, opening the security lock on the back door, let Pip and Sebastian in.
“Over to you, Sebastian,” Tim said. “It’s your show from here on. Where do we start?”
“It is my considered opinion,” Sebastian replied, “we might be well advised to commence in the room in which the closed curtains preclude the entry of day-Hght.”
“And in English we say?” Tim replied sarcastically
Opening the door of what must have been the second bedroom, they stepped in. Weak daylight filtered through the closed curtains. The room was furnished as a study. A low, two-drawer, gray metal filing-cabinet stood against a wall, to one side of which was pinned a cork noticeboard. The papers attached to it concerned school matters and were neatly arranged to overlap each other. Cautiously, Tim tested one of the cabinet drawers. It was unlocked.
“What does it contain?” Sebastian inquired.
Tim quickly thumbed through the folders. They contained past examination papers, teaching notes for chemical experiments, staff-meeting agendas, teaching-union information, past pupil records, government education directives and local-education-authority circulars.
“Nothing,” Tim replied at length. “Just school junk.”
Opposite the filing cabinet was an old-fashioned wooden office desk on top of which stood a brand-new computer, a fourteen-inch TFT screen, a compact laser printer and a scanner. Before the desk was a new typist’s chair.
“Ay caramba!” Tim exclaimed admiringly. “Now that’s a piece of gear! You two do the rest of the joint while I boot this baby up!”
It took Sebastian and Pip very little time to cover the rest of the bungalow.The bedroom was plain, no suitcases under the bed that needed investigation, only a few clothes in the wardrobe. All the drawers were half empty. In the kitchen, there was very little food, the fridge-door shelves holding only a liter of milk, five eggs and a half-used pack of butter. The only loaf in the bread bin had a fine coating of mold upon it.
“He must eat out most of the time,” Pip said.
“He has no urgent need to eat,” Sebastian rejoined. “As do not I.”
“You mean you don’t eat!”
“I eat the food your mother kindly offers me, but nothing else. It is more than sufficient.”
“Hibernating animals build up fat supplies in their bodies,” Pip said. “I suppose you do the same.”
“No,” Sebastian answered. “If you recall, my father’s potion, aqua soporiferum, not only induces sleep but slows the functions of the body. This, in turn, reduces the need for nourishment.”
“So, whatever Yoland uses, does the same?”
“To some extent. His elixir is not as efficient as my father’s potion, hence the presence in the kitchen of some comestibles — I mean —” Sebastian interrupted himself “— foodstuffs.”
Pip smiled and said, “Better. But just say food.”
They moved on. The lounge was as sparse as the kitchen, the dining room likewise. Even in the bathroom were only the basics for bodily hygiene — a sponge, a bar of coal-tar soap, a bottle of two-in-one shampoo and conditioner, a toothbrush, a tube of toothpaste, a razor and a bottle of shaving foam.
When they returned to the study, it was to find Tim leaning back in the typist’s chair.
“It’s password protected,” he said gloomily. “I’ve tried to break it, but…” He held up his hands in surrender.
Sebastian looked over Tim’s shoulder. The cursor was blinking and an on-screen message requested the administrator’s password.
“Try astromel” Sebastian suggested.
“What does it mean?” Pip asked as Tim entered it and pressed return.
“It is an ancient French word, frequently used in spells by Gerbert d’Aurillac,” Sebastian explained. “It may be that Yoland, feeling himself secure in the twenty-first century, might use such words unknown today.”
The words Incorrect log-on. Please check user name and password came up on the screen.
“No go!” Ti
m said.
“In that case,” Sebastian said, “try ablanathanalba.”
“Abla-what?” Tim retorted. “Bit of a mouthful, isn’t it?”
“I shall spell it for you,” Sebastian said. “It is an ancient word dating to the time of Our Lord and most commonly used in my father’s day.”
“What does it mean?” Pip wanted to know.
“Of that it is best you remain ignorant,” Sebastian said and he spelled it out.
Tim keyed it in. When he pressed return, the screen went directly to the Microsoft Windows desktop.
“Open sesame!” he muttered gleefully. “How much time have we got, sis?”
“Twenty minutes,” Pip answered.
Tim concentrated on Yoland’s directories, going through them as fast as he could. There were over a hundred of them, each with up to twenty sub-directories. Some dealt with school matters but most concerned abstruse scientific data, predominantly nuclear physics and chemistry. They were not only written in English, but in other European languages, Chinese and Japanese.
“There’s no way I can ever download all this in twenty minutes,” he commented. “And if I did, I wouldn’t understand a word of it.”
“What about the Internet?” Pip suggested. “Have a look at his Favorites folder.”
“Good one, sis!” Tim replied. “Girl meets Techno Age.”
“You really can be full of yourself sometimes, Tim,” she came back, peeved.
Tim clicked on Yoland’s Web browser. There were more than two hundred sites listed.
“Sorry, sis,” he apologized. “Switch the printer on.”
“Sure you think I know how?” Pip said as she depressed the power button.
Nothing happened. Pip knelt down. The printer was disconnected from the wall socket. She crawled under the desk, pushing the plug into the socket. The printer whirred. Tim clicked the mouse and the printer sucked in the first sheet of paper.
“Look at this!” Pip called up, her head still under the desk. “There’s more down here than an electricity socket.”
Sebastian and Tim peered beneath the desk. Next to the socket was an old, much-battered and scratched, brown leather attaché case with tarnished brass buckles. Beside that, set into the wall, was a small safe with a combination lock.
“We’re going to need more than some magic word to pry that open,” Pip declared.
“Stick of gelignite, more like,” Tim replied.
“Gelignite?” Sebastian asked.
“Explosive, gunpowder.”
“Ah!” Sebastian exclaimed. “Of this I have heard. Roger Bacon, a monk and alchemist before my father’s time learned of it from the Orient. In the reign of the Virgin Queen, there were factories creating it, the science taught by a German monk called Berthold Schwarz.”
“Never mind the history lecture,” Pip said tartly. “What are we going to do about it?”
Squirming under the desk, Tim despondently spun the combination lock’s dial. It ticked like a frenetic clock as the tumblers inside rose and fell — then he had an idea.
“When you knew Yoland,” Tim said, “like when you were a boy, he was about thirty years old. Right? And let’s say you were about ten. Right?”
“That would be approximately correct.”
“And you were born in 1430. So, in 1440, Yoland was about thirty. Therefore he was born around 1410.”
“Yes.“
“What has this to do with the price of eggs?” Pip asked.
Tim did not reply but started to revolve the combination lock this way and that.
“1410… 1409… 1408… 1407…” he began to recite aloud. At 1406, he stopped and, looking up at Sebastian, said, “Yoland was thirty-four when you knew him.”
The other two bent down. The safe was open.
“How did you…?” Pip began.
“Easy. Like all scientists, Yoland’s a man of method. We have to lock our school lockers with a number that is an important year. As he said, like our year of birth. What could be more important than that? So…”
“Quod erat demonstrandum,” said Sebastian. “In English,” he added, looking Tim straight in the eye, “you say ‘That which was to be demonstrated,’ which implies it has now been achieved with ease.”
Tim winked and started to remove a number of small boxes the size of paperback books from the safe, passing them to Pip, who placed them on the desk. Sebastian opened them.
The first contained gold jewelry and five modern gold sovereigns. Yet none was complete. The jewelry had been cut up with pliers, and several slices had been clipped out of the gold coins. The second box was filled with silver jewelry, similarly defaced, while in the third was a large platinum and diamond brooch, with most of the stones removed and the precious metal cut into roughly equal pieces.
“Look at those,” Pip remarked, pushing the diamonds around the box with her finger. “Aren’t they gorgeous?”
“Girl’s best friend,” Tim replied and he ducked down for the remaining box in the safe.
Although it was the same size as the others, the fourth box was heavier. Tim had to reverse out from under the desk to hand it to Sebastian. He put it next to the others and opened it. Within were at least a dozen spell keys, each wrapped in tissue paper.
“He’s made these from the jewelry and coins,” Tim said.
“Indeed he has,” Sebastian agreed as he counted the spell keys, “and he is yet to fashion more. There are but thirteen here. As each spell requires four, he has to make them in multiples of four.”
“So he has to make sixteen in all,” Pip said.
“Or twenty…” Sebastian added.
“… or twenty-four, or twenty-eight,” Tim went on.
Beside the spell keys in the box were several dozen ancient gold coins, each in a plastic money envelope.
“What are these?” Tim exclaimed, slipping one out of its envelope and onto the palm of his hand.
It did not shine like modern gold, with a garish brightness, but with a rich luster. On one side was depicted a kingly figure standing in a ship holding a sword and shield: the reverse bore a cross, four crowns and four crowned lions.
“They are gold nobles,” Sebastian said. “I have made mention of them to you. They were currency in my father’s time. These are from the reign of King Henry the Sixth.”
“How much is it worth?” Tim asked as he went to replace the coin in the plastic envelope and return it to the box. Yet he could not. It seemed stuck to his skin.
“I can’t let go of it,” he said with alarm.
“It is attracted to you,” Sebastian stated, “and you to it. This is Yoland’s intention, that whosoever handles the coins shall be entranced by them. Being pure gold, it has captivated you, it has stolen your heart as a lover might. I shall remove it.”
With that, Sebastian muttered a few words, pried the coin away from Tim’s hand and, slipping it into the plastic envelope, put it back in the box.
“How did you do that,” Pip inquired, “when Tim couldn’t?”
“I have no interest in gold,” Sebastian replied, “and informed the coin of this fact. The spell, as it were, was momentarily cast asunder.”
“Neither have I an interest…” Tim said.
“You think you have not,” Sebastian cut in, “but did you not ask me its value?”
“It’s a fair question,” Tim admitted, smiling guiltily. “I was wondering what I could buy with it.”
He bent down to return the box to the safe with the others, making sure he put them back in the same order as he had found them. As his face passed the level of the desk top, his eye caught the lower right-hand corner of the computer monitor.
“Criperooney!” he almost yelled. “It’s six minutes past five!”
Closing the safe, Tim spun the combination wheel. At that moment, the printer stopped. He switched off the socket, yanking the plug out. Sitting in the typist’s chair, he shut down the computer, the hard disk droning to a standstill. Removin
g the printouts from the output tray, he folded them over and put them in his shirt.
“Are we ready?” he asked.
“Chair wheels,” Pip said.
Tim looked down. The rollers on the chair legs had, under Yoland’s weight, made dents in the carpet. Tim moved the chair so they fitted into them.
“Right!” he said, making certain the keyboard was in the exact position in which he had found it. “Let’s beat it!”
They turned for the door. Pip gasped. The floor was heaving with massive cockroaches over five centimeters in length, their sinuous feelers stretching out and quivering, testing the air for vibrations. Their backs shone as if they were made of polished mahogany. Despite their numbers, they made no sound whatsoever.
Pip squeaked involuntarily. At the sound, the antennae stopped wavering, swung in her direction and began to tremble.
Even as they watched, the cockroach cohorts swelled. In seconds, they stood four or five deep, balanced on each other’s carapaces. They were like the phalanx of a grotesque miniature army. Now they began making a soft scrambling noise as they fought to keep a foothold on the one below.
“What are we going to do?” whispered Pip, her voice unsteady, her hands shaking and her face white.
“Move slowly to the window,” said Tim.
“No!” Sebastian ordered. “If we go out by the window, we will not be able to close it behind us and Yoland will know someone has been here. We must leave through a door.”
The cockroach army began to advance, those on top falling forward to be engulfed by those below. It was as if a vile, brown, living wave was rolling over the floor engulfing everything in its path.
Tim shrugged.
The cockroaches tipped their grotesque heads to one side in unison at his movement.
“Nothing we can do,” Tim said resignedly and, taking two steps back, ran full tilt at the insects.
As one, the insects took to the wing, a solid cloud flying at him, thudding into him, striking him in the face. The smallest tried to infiltrate his ears and nostrils. The air filled with the insane hiss and rustle of their wings. Tim swatted them against his shirt and blazer, slapping at his cheeks to dislodge them. He grabbed at them with his hands, squeezing fistfuls of them, feeling the creamy, viscous pulp of their intestines slick against his skin.
