"Not exactly, my misery. She merely said something about granting Mrs. Underwood her heart's desire."
"And what is that? What can it be but a life with me?"
"She did not explain." The Iron Orchid dabbed at her eyes. "She feared, not doubt, that I would betray her plan to you. After all, we are of the same fickle flesh, my egg."
Jherek said grimly: "I see there is nothing for me to do but confront My Lady Charlotina herself."
"Is this not what you wanted?" said Werther, sitting on a ledge above their heads, leaning his black back against his statue's marble knee and moodily swinging his legs. "Did you not court disaster when you courted Mrs. Underwood? I seem to recall some plan…"
"Be silent! I love Mrs. Underwood more than I love myself!"
"Jherek," said his mother reasonably, "you can take these things too far, you know."
"There it is! I am thoroughly in love. I am totally in love. My passion rules me. It is no longer a game!"
"No longer a game!" Even Werther de Goethe sounded shocked.
"Farewell, black, black betrayers. Traitors in jet — farewell!"
And Jherek swept back to his locomotive, pulled the whistle and hurled his aircar high into the dark and cheerless sky.
"Do not struggle against your destiny, Jherek!" he heard Werther cry. "Shake not your fist against uncompromising Fate! Plead not for mercy from the Norns, for they are deaf and blind!"
Jherek did not reply. Instead he let a great sob escape his lips and he murmured her name and the sound of her name brought all the aching anguish back to his soul so that at last he was silent.
And he came to Lake Billy the Kid, all serene and dancing in the sunlight, and he had a mind to destroy the Lake and Under-the-Lake and My Lady Charlotina and her menagerie and her caverns — to destroy the whole globe if need be. But he contained his rage, for Mrs. Amelia Underwood might even now be a prisoner in one of those caverns.
He left his locomotive drifting a few inches above the surface of the lake and he went through the Gateway in the Water and came to the cave with the walls of gold and the roof and floor of mirrored silver and My Lady Charlotina was waiting for him, knowing that he would come.
"I knew that you would come, my victim," she purred.
She was dressed in a gown of lily-coloured stuff through which her soft, pink body might be observed. And her pale hair was piled upon her head and secured by a coronet of platinum and pearls.
And her face was serene and stern and proud and her eyes were narrowed and pleased and she smiled at him. She smiled at him. And she lay upon a couch covered in white samite over which white roses had been strewn. All the roses were white save one and that one she fingered. It was a rose of a peculiar bluish-green colour. Even as he approached her she opened her mouth and, with sharp ivory teeth, plucked a petal from the rose and tore that petal into tiny pieces which flecked her red lips and her chin and fell upon her bodice.
"I knew you would come."
He stretched out his arms and his hands became claws and he walked on stiff legs with his eyes on her long throat and would have seized her had not a force barrier stopped him, a force barrier of her own recipe which he could not neutralise.
He paused then.
"You are without wit, or charm, or beauty, or grace," he said sharply.
She was taken aback. "Jherek! Isn't that a little strong?"
"I mean it!"
"Jherek! Your humour! Where is it? Where? I thought you'd be amused at this turn of events. I planned it so carefully." She had the air of disappointed hostess, of someone who had given a party like that of the Duke of Queens (which nobody, of course, had forgotten or would forget until the Duke of Queens, who was still upset by it, managed to conceive some really out of the ordinary entertainment).
"Yes! And all knew of the plan, save myself and Mrs. Amelia Underwood."
"But that, naturally, was an important part of the jest!"
"My Lady Charlotina, you have gone too far! Where is Mrs. Amelia Underwood? Return her to me at once!"
"I shall not!"
"And, for that matter, what have you done with Lord Jagged of Canaria? He is not in his castle."
"I know nothing of Lord Jagged. I haven't seen him for months. Jherek! What is the matter with you? I was expecting some counter-jest. Is this it? If so, it is a poor return for mine…"
"The Iron Orchid said that you granted Mrs. Underwood her heart's desire. What did you mean by that?"
"Jherek! You're becoming dull. This is extraordinary. Come and make love to me, Jherek, if nothing else!"
"I loathe you."
"Loathe? How interesting! Come and make —"
"What did you mean?"
"What I said. I gave her the thing she desired most."
"How could you know what she desired most?"
"Well, I took the liberty of sending a little eavesdropper, a mechanical flea, to listen to some of your conversations. It soon became evident what she wanted most. And so I waited for the right moment, today — and then I did it!"
"Did what? Did what?"
"Jherek you have lost all your wit. Can't you guess?"
He frowned. "Death? She did at one point say that she would prefer death to…"
"No, no!"
"Then what?"
"Oh, what a bore you have become! Let me make love to you and then…"
"Jealousy! Now I understand. You love me yourself. You have destroyed Mrs. Underwood because you think that then I will love you. Well, madam, let me tell you —"
"Jealousy? Destroyed? Love? Jherek you have thrown yourself thoroughly into your part, I can see.
You are most convincing. But I fear, something is missing — some hint of irony which would give the role a little more substance."
"You must tell me, My Lady Charlotina, what you have done with Mrs. Amelia Underwood."
She yawned.
"Tell me!"
"Mad, darling Jherek, I granted her…"
"What did you do?"
"Oh, very well! Brannart!"
"Brannart?"
The hunchbacked scientist limped from one of the tunnel mouths and began to cross the mirrored floor, looking down appreciatively at his appearance.
"What has Brannart Morphail to do with this?" Jherek demanded.
"I had to employ his help. And he was eager to experiment."
"Experiment?" said Jherek in a horrible whisper.
"Hello, Jherek. Well, she'll be there now. I only hope it's successful. If so, then it will open up new roads of inquiry for me. I am still interested in the fact that she did not come here in a time-machine…"
"What have you done, Brannart?"
"What? Well, I sent her back to her own time, of course. In one of the machines in my collection. If all went well she should be there by now. April 4, 1896, 3 a.m. Bromley, Kent, England. Temporal co-ordinates should offer no real trouble, but there might be a slight variance on the spatial. So unless something happened on the way back — you know, a chronostorm or something — she will…"
"You mean — you sent her back to … Oh!" Jherek sank to his knees in despair.
"Her heart's desire," said My Lady Charlotina. "Now do you appreciate the succulent irony of it, my tragic Jherek? See how I have produced your reversal? Isn't it a charming revenge? Surely you are amused?"
Jherek did his best to rally himself. Shaking, he raised himself to his feet and he looked past the smiling Lady Charlotina at Brannart Morphail, who, as usual, had missed all the nuances.
"Brannart. You must send me there, too. I must follow her. She loves me. She was on the point of declaring that love…"
"I know! I know!" My Lady Charlotina clapped her hands.
"Of declaring that love, when she was snatched from me. I must pursue her — across a million years if need be — and bring her back. You must help me, Brannart."
"Ah!" My Lady Charlotina giggled with delight. "Now I understand you, Jherek. How daring! How clever! Of c
ourse — it has to be! Brannart, you must help him."
"But the Morphail Effect…" Brannart Morphail stretched his hands imploringly out to her. "It is highly unlikely that the past will accept Mrs. Underwood back. It might propel her into her own near future — in fact that's the most likely thing — but it will send Jherek anywhere, back here, further forward, to oblivion possibly. Visitors from the future cannot exist in the past. The traffic, is, effectively, one-way. That is the Morphail Effect."
"You will do as I ask, Brannart," said Jherek. "You will send me back to 1896."
"You may have only a few seconds in that time — I cannot guarantee how long — before it — it spits you out." Brannart Morphail spoke slowly, as if to an idiot. "To make the attempt is dangerous enough. You could be destroyed in any one of a dozen different ways, Jherek. Take my advice…"
"You will do as he asks, Brannart," said My Lady Charlotina, tossing aside the rose of a peculiar bluish-green. "Can you not appreciate a properly realised drama when it is presented to you? What else can Jherek do? It is inevitable."
Again Brannart objected, growling to himself. But My Lady Charlotina drifted over to him and whispered something in his ear and the growling ceased and he nodded. "I will do what you want, Jherek, though it is, in all senses, a waste of time."
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The Quest for Bromley
The time machine was a sphere full of milky fluid in which the traveller floated enclosed in a rubber suit, breathing through a mask attacked to a hose leading into the wall of the machine.
Jherek Carnelian looked at it in some distaste. It was rather small, rather battered. There were what looked like scorch marks on its metallic sides.
"Where did it come from, Brannart?" He stretched his rubber-swathed limbs.
"Oh, it could be from almost anywhere. In deciphering the internal dating system I came to the conclusion that it's from a period about two thousand years before the period you want to visit. That's why I chose it for you. It seemed that it might slightly improve your chances." Brannart Morphail pottered about his laboratory, which was crammed with instruments and machinery, most of them in various stages of disrepair, from many different ages. Most of the least sophisticated looking instruments were the inventions of Brannart Morphail himself.
"Is it safe?" Gingerly Jherek touched the pitted metal of the sphere. Some cracks appeared to have been welded over. It had done a lot of service, that time machine.
"Safe? What time machine is safe? It's as safe as any other." Brannart waved a dismissive hand. "It is you, Jherek, who want to travel in it. I have tried to dissuade you from pursuing this folly further."
"Brannart, you have no imagination. No sense of drama, Brannart," chided My Lady Charlotina, her eyes twinkling as she lounged on her couch in a corner of the laboratory.
Taking a deep breath, Jherek clambered into the machine and adjusted his breathing apparatus before lowering himself into the fluid.
"You are a martyr, Jherek Carnelian!" sighed My Lady Charlotina. "You may perish in the service of temporal exploration. You will be remembered as a Hero, should you die — crucified, tempestuous time-traveller, Casanova of Chrononauts, upon the Cross of Time!" Her couch sped forward and she reached out to press in his right hand a translation pill and, into his left, a crushed rose of a peculiar bluish-green.
"I intend to save her, My Lady Charlotina, to bring her back." His voice came out as a somewhat muffled squeak.
"Of course you do! And you are a splendid saviour Jherek!"
"Thank you." He still maintained a cool attitude towards her. She seemed to have forgotten that it was because of her that he was forced into this dangerous action.
Her couch fell back. She waved a green handkerchief. "Speed through the hours, my Horos!
Through the days and the months! The centuries and the millennia, most dedicated of lovers — as Hitler sped to Eva. As Oscar sped to Bosie! On! On! Oh, I am moved. I am entranced. I am faint with rapture!"
Jherek scowled at her, but he took her gifts with him as he slipped deeper into the sphere and felt the airlock close over his head. He floated, uncomfortably weightless, and readied himself for his plunge into the timestream.
Through the fluid he could see the instruments, cryptographic, unconventional, seeming to swim, as he swam, in the fluid. They made no sound, there was no movement on their faces.
Then one of the dials flickered. A series of green and red figures came and went. Jherek's stomach grew tight.
He felt his body shift. Then it was all still again. It seemed that the machine had rolled over.
He could hear his breath hissing in the tube. The machine was so uncomfortable, the rubber suit so restricting, that he was almost on the point of suggesting they try a different machine.
Then the same dial flickered again. Green and red. Then two more dials came to life. Blue and yellow. A white light flashed rapidly. The speed of the flashing grew faster and faster.
He heard a gurgling noise. A thump. The liquid in which he floated became darker and darker.
He felt pain (he had never really felt physical pain before).
He screamed, but his voice was muffled.
He was on his way.
He fainted.
He woke up. He was being jolted horribly. The sphere seemed to have cracked. The fluid was rushing out of the crack and as a result his body was being bumped from side to side as the sphere rolled along. He opened his eyes. He closed them. He wailed.
Air hissed as the tube was wrenched from his face. The plastic lining of the machine began to sink until Jherek lay with his back against the metal of the wall, realising that the sphere had stopped rolling.
He groaned. He was bruised everywhere. Still, he consoled himself, he was suffering now. No one could doubt that.
He looked at the jagged crack in the sphere. He would have to find another time machine, wherever he was, for this one had failed to take the strain of the trip. If he was in 1896 and could find Mrs. Amelia Underwood (assuming that she, herself, had arrived back safely) he would have to approach an inventor and borrow a machine. Still, that was the slightest difficulty he would encounter, he was sure.
He tried to move his body and yelped as what had been a relatively dull pain turned, for a moment, into throbbing agony. The pain slowly died. He shivered as he felt the cold air blowing through the time machine's ruptured wall. It seemed to be dark beyond the crack.
He got up, wincing, and stripped off the suit. Underneath was his crumpled Victorian coat and trousers, in a delicate scarlet and purple. He checked that his power rings were still on his fingers and was satisfied. There was the ruby, there the emerald and there the diamond. The air, while cold, also smelled very strange, very thick. He coughed.
He edged his way to the crack and stepped through into the darkness. It was extremely misty. The machine seemed to have landed on some hard, man-made surface, on the edge of a stretch of water. A flight of stone steps led up through the mist and it was probable that the machine had bumped down these before it shattered. High above he could see a dim light, a yellow light, flickering.
He shivered.
This was not what he had expected. If he were in Dawn Age London, then the whole city was deserted! He had imagined it to be packed with people — with millions of people, for this was also the age of the Multitude Cultures.
He decided to make for the light. He stumbled towards the steps. He touched his face and felt the dampness clinging to it. Then he realised what it was he was experiencing and he gave an involuntary sigh of delight.
"Fog…"
It was fog.
Rather more cheerfully he felt his way up the steps and eventually struck his shoulder against a metal column. On the top of the column glowed a gas-lamp very similar to those Mrs. Amelia Underwood had asked him to make for her. He patted the lamp. He was in the right period at least. Brannart Morphail had been unduly pessimistic.
But was it the right place. Was t
his Bromley? He looked back through the fog at the wide stretch of murky water. Mrs. Underwood had spoken much of Bromley, but she had never mentioned a large river.
Still, it could be London, which was near Bromley, and, if so, that river was the Thames. Something hooted from the depths of the fog. He heard a thin, distant shout. Then there was silence again.
He found himself in a narrow alley-way with an uneven, cobbled surface. There were sheets of paper pasted on the dark, brick walls on both sides of the alley. Jherek saw that the paper was covered in graphics and writing but, of course, he could not read anything. Even the translation pills, which worked their subtle engineering upon the brain cells, could not teach him to decipher a written language.
He realised that he was still holding the pill My Lady Charlotina had given him. He would wait until he met someone before swallowing it. In his other hand was the crushed rose; all, for the present, that he had left of Mrs. Amelia Underwood.
The alley opened onto a street and here the fog was a little lighter. He could see a few yards in both directions and there were several more lamps whose yellow light tried to penetrate the fog.
But still the place seemed deserted as he followed the street, looking with fascination at house after crumbling house as he passed. A few of the houses did have lights shining from behind the blinds at their windows. Once or twice he heard a muffled voice. For some reason, then, the population was staying inside. Doubtless he would find an answer to this mystery in time.
The next street he reached was wider still and here were taller houses (though in the same decrepit state) with their lower windows displaying a variety of objets d'art — here sewing machines, mangles, frying pans — there beds and chairs, tools and clothing. He paused every minute to glance in at these windows. The owners were right to display their treasures so proudly. And what a profusion! Admittedly some of the objects were a little smaller, a little darker, than he had imagined and many, of course, he could not recognise at all. However, when he and Mrs. Underwood returned, he would be able to make her considerably more artefacts to please her and remind her of home.
Now he could see a more intense light ahead. And he saw human figures there, heard voices. He struck off across the street and at that moment his ears were filled by a peculiar clacking noise, a rattling noise. He heard a shout. He looked to his left and saw a black beast emerging from the fog. Its eyes rolled, its nostrils flared.
Dancers at the End of Time Page 12
