Gussie, picturing what that might consist of, shuddered and let the subject drop.
‘And have you got it, Theo?’ said Lady Werth.
‘The ritual? Yes. I rather think you will not want to use it, though.’
‘Whyever not?’
‘It calls for the sacrifice of a maiden Werth.’ Theo looked significantly at Gussie.
Who stepped prudently backwards. ‘I had no notion our ancestors were so barbaric!’ she said. ‘Really, I am impressed.’
‘Then you will not mind offering your neck, for the purposes of our reunion with Lady Margery.’
‘I hope you will not think less of me if I do mind, just a little,’ said Gussie. ‘I am not blessed with an overabundance of necks. In point of fact, I only have the one.’
‘Theo,’ said Lady Werth. ‘It says nothing of the kind, does it?’
‘Of course not,’ said Theo irritably. ‘No one but Gussie could imagine it possible. Here.’ He thrust his pocket-book into his mother’s hands. ‘It is all in there.’
‘But why did the Book conceal it from us?’ she said, opening up the little book, and turning through the pages.
‘Was the Book concealing it?’ said Theo. ‘Or did you simply have no notion to ask?’
Gussie, thinking that through, blinked. ‘Why, but that suggests there might be a great deal more written there, that we have never seen either.’
‘I should imagine it likely,’ said Theo. ‘Next time Father is struck with a desire to go grave-digging, Mother, you might encourage him to enquire.’
‘Your father will not be going grave-digging again for some time,’ said Lady Werth firmly. ‘It is injurious to his health.’
Chapter Sixteen
‘It must be performed by the head of the family,’ said Gussie, pointing at a nigh-upon illegible section of scrawl in Theo’s pocket-book.
‘Cannot Theo do it?’ said Lady Werth plaintively. ‘You would not think it to look at your uncle, but such feats take a terrible toll upon him. He is no longer a young man, after all.’
Privately, Gussie thought her aunt over scrupulous of Lord Werth’s health. He was not unlike his son in certain respects, and Lord Bedgberry was the nearest thing to indestructible mankind had to offer.
‘He has recovered admirably from his meeting with Lord Felix,’ Gussie said, and with justice, for a day had passed since his erstwhile lordship had returned into his grave, and Lord Werth had already fully regained his natural colour. ‘And he ate a hearty breakfast. I am persuaded he is equal to it, Aunt.’
‘I suppose it does not appear so very taxing,’ said Lady Werth dubiously, surveying Gussie’s neatened rendition of her cousin’s notes once again.
They had adjourned to the shrubbery to discuss the matter, the morning proving fine. Gussie had gone out with only a parasol, eschewing her shawl. She would have dispensed with the parasol, too, had her aunt been willing to countenance the idea.
‘For my part, I am relieved to discover that there is no singing,’ Gussie said. ‘Of all things my uncle would dislike, it’s that. Really, there would be no taking oneself seriously, standing in state at the heart of the Towers and warbling away like a lark. One could hardly blame him for objecting.’
Lady Werth smiled at the idea, as Gussie had hoped. The events of the past fortnight had upset her aunt’s usual composure; twice she had only narrowly avoided another icing, and this fretfulness over her husband’s health was of a piece with the rest. Gussie could not blame her for that, either, not with the spectre of Lady Maundevyle and her deplorable descendants hanging over them all. And Gussie’s own plight was not to be dismissed. If Lady Werth had quietly hoped to be proven wrong about her niece, she was suffering all the disappointment of it now — and all the anxiety for Gussie’s future that came with it.
In moments of greater self-knowledge, Gussie wondered if she and her aunt had not both seized upon Lord Maundevyle’s problems as an appealing distraction from their own. Until they had determined what was to be done with the dragon, neither of them need devote too much attention to the insoluble problem of what was to be done with Gussie.
‘It is only a little reading,’ said Lady Werth. ‘Perhaps he could manage that very well.’
‘He has always possessed a splendid reading voice,’ Gussie agreed. ‘Very sonorous.’
Lady Werth pointed. ‘But this part about the letting of blood, Gussie. That concerns me. In your uncle’s present state of health—’
‘Perhaps Theo could do that part,’ Gussie suggested hopefully. ‘His is good, Werth blood, and he will bleed creditably.’
‘But it does say the head of the family?’
‘Lord Bedgberry must be considered the next best thing. He will be the head of the family in due time, God help us all, and he will make an excellent proxy for my uncle.’
‘I am not sure Theo would thank you for volunteering him for bleeding duty. Especially not quite so enthusiastically.’
Gussie waved this away. ‘There is plenty of blood in him. He can spare a little.’
Both women fell silent as a shadow passed over the sun: the expansive form of Lord Maundevyle on the wing, darkened to black against the glare of the light, and doubtless in pursuit of some hapless prey for his breakfast.
‘It does seem barbaric that there should be any blood-letting at all,’ Lady Werth resumed.
‘The ritual dates from barbaric days,’ Gussie agreed. ‘One need only listen to one or two of my uncle’s tales to realise that. Lord Felix is positively civilised compared to some of his predecessors.’
This reflection did not please Lady Werth. She said nothing for some moments, and then offered: ‘Perhaps you are right. Perhaps it is unwise to perform so ancient a ritual. Can we be certain that any Werths presently unknown to us will not hearken back to these uncivilised times?’
‘No,’ said Gussie. ‘We cannot.’
‘And there may be another way to reach Lady Margery.’
‘Indeed,’ said Gussie. ‘Or another way to help Lord Maundevyle, come to that. Dragonlore cannot be wholly forgotten across England, can it? There must be books, somewhere — scholars devoted to the subject — experts in Wyrded form-shifting — any number of alternatives. May I propose a trip to town as a preferable scheme?’
‘London!’ said Lady Werth. ‘My goodness, it is a positive age since I was last there.’
‘And I,’ Gussie thought it worthwhile to point out, ‘have never been at all.’
Aunt Werth looked her over. ‘No, and I ought not to take you now.’
‘For inevitably I shall run amok in the streets, Wyrding every unsuspecting passerby.’
Lady Werth hesitated. ‘It is not that I suspect you of any such propensity, only…’
Gussie waited.
‘You can have no notion of the extent of the scandal we would cause,’ she said, ‘were your experiences with Lord Maundevyle to be repeated in the heart of the capital.’
‘I shall wear gloves, everywhere.’
‘In summer? It is not at all the fashion.’
‘Then I shall be set down as an eccentric, which can hardly be avoided anyway, considering that my name is Werth.’
Lady Werth sighed. ‘That is a just reflection.’
‘I did not mean for you to be cast down by it, Aunt.’
‘We will take Theo with us,’ continued Lady Werth.
‘Then it is settled. We shall be set down as the most complete eccentrics London has ever seen.’
‘And Miss Frostell.’
‘Her very ordinariness will lend us respectability, and disarm criticism. She will be delighted.’
‘And Great-Aunt Honoria.’
Gussie hesitated. ‘You did express a wish to avoid scandal, Aunt?’
‘Lady Honoria presents a ghastly appearance, but she is not in herself dangerous. Not in the way that you are.’
‘Oh,’ said Gussie, disconcerted.
‘And there will be other Wyrded families in town, of course. The Gouldi
ngs, I should think will be in residence; and perhaps the Whytes.’
Gussie spared no efforts to encourage this happier flow of reflections, content to see her carefully written page of notes disregarded. If a hint of an unpleasant aroma chanced to assault her nostrils in the midst of her aunt’s conversation — something redolent of grave-earth and decayed flesh — Gussie set it down as some leavings of Theo’s, or possibly of Lord Maundevyle’s, left too long undevoured in the heat of the summer, and rotting slowly away.
***
Came the midnight hour, and Lord Bedgberry, as was his custom, was still awake.
Convention required that a gentleman’s waking hours should, in general, coincide with the daylight hours; and while many a gentleman might lie abed until noon, and carouse until the early hours of the morning, to sleep all the day through and prowl the world at night could not be considered behaviour befitting a gentleman of rank. Even at Werth Towers.
Theo resented this. He belonged to the night. The hours from midnight until dawn offered all the peace and silence he could require, not to mention a surplus of unwary prey, and he had for some years made a habit of setting out into the park just as the church clock struck twelve, and taking his solitary perambulations until at least two.
Summer nights being especially agreeable, clear-skied and mild, Theo set out in good spirits, anticipating a pleasant stroll. But he had not got much beyond the shrubbery before his sensitive hearing registered a most unusual sound: a muffled curse.
Theo stopped.
The sound came again, and more followed; a veritable stream of vituperation, in short, directed at who-knew-whom in a voice Theo recognised.
Since a longing look directed at the darkened fields Theo would not, now, be exploring did not obligingly whisk away the disturbance, Theo adjusted his ideas, and directed his steps towards the sounds of the scuffle rapidly becoming an all-out fight.
Before Theo came upon the combatants, however, there came the noises of a deciding blow delivered; the thud of a body striking the ground; and the satisfied murmurings of the victor.
Theo’s nose had, by this time, given him some inkling as to the victor’s identity.
‘Lord Felix?’ he said, wrinkling said nose in distaste, for the aroma of advanced decay souring the fresh night air threatened to turn his stomach. ‘What have you done to my father?’
For it was the unfortunate Lord Werth lying prone among his wife’s shrubbery, dressed in his nightgown and cap, and obviously hauled from his bed.
Lord Felix, bending over his victim with some unknowable purpose in mind, straightened. He regarded Theo in silent thought for some moments, and then said: ‘In point of fact, that is an excellent idea.’
Theo had no time to enquire as to the direction of his ancestor’s thoughts. Lord Felix favoured him with an urbane smile, shot back the sleeves of his disreputable coat, and leapt at Theo.
The unfortunate Lord Bedgberry, unsuspecting of such an attack, took a sharp blow to the temple, and collapsed like a felled tree.
He woke soon afterwards, and lay for a short time, staring up at the distant moon. Trees ringed some sort of a clearing in which he lay, and the said moon, almost full and blazing with silver light, did a creditable job of illuminating the otherwise pitch-dark grove. Theo rather thought he had fetched up in that odd little nook in the park, the bit no one could imagine a purpose for. The grove, well-kept despite its lack of appointed use, was empty save for two articles: a statue of some former scion of Werth, a sorrowing lady with head bowed — and a slab of white stone, plain and unadorned.
His head ached abominably.
More unaccountably, so did his wrists. They stung, and he felt a warm dampness seeping through the sleeves of his shirt.
‘Someone,’ he mumbled thickly, ‘has caused me to bleed.’
This idea ought to have troubled him more; but Theo was not unused to blood, and some little time passed before he hauled himself into a sitting position, and then to his feet.
A succession of unusual and shocking sights met his eyes. His father lay supine upon the slab of stone, while Lord Felix, more composed than a man so covered in blood had any right to be, held a small book in his bony hands, and was engaged in reading from it. Stumbling nearer, Theo was intrigued to recognise his own pocket-book.
But he did not recognise any of the words Lord Felix was in the process of uttering. If it were English at all, it came from so distant a past as to be unintelligible.
Understanding dawned. Had he not copied these unfamiliar phrases into his pocket-book himself, and recently at that? Hearing them uttered aloud in no way enhanced his understanding.
‘I say,’ said Theo, marching up to Lord Felix. ‘Have you any idea what it is you’re doing?’
Felix broke off, and cast at his great-great-grandson a look of intense annoyance. ‘Is this not your foolish little book? You must be perfectly aware of what I am doing.’
‘Yes,’ said Theo. ‘But that is not what I asked.’
Lord Felix gave a shrug, expelling a cloud of foul-smelling dust. ‘I am doing what your father ought to have done years ago.’
‘Called a gathering? Why?’
‘I remember my day,’ said Lord Felix dreamily. ‘The family was strong, Theodore! The mightiest of all the Wyrded families in England! No one trifled with us.’
‘How gratifying,’ said Theo.
Lord Felix brushed a quantity of dust and earth from his shoulder. ‘And look what has now become of you,’ said he, as though Theo had not spoken. ‘Spread to the four corners of England; all the power and might of the Werths forgotten, abandoned and useless! Why, a Werth was snatched from this very doorstep, and in broad daylight! And it would be of no use to tell me that ruin has been wreaked upon the perpetrators, for I know it to be the most scandalous falsehood!’ Lord Felix paused, and glared at Theo.
Theo glanced at his father, who had not stirred. ‘He is alive, I suppose?’
Lord Felix sighed and shook his head, causing Theo a moment’s alarm, until he perceived that the former Lord Werth continued to pursue his own reflections, and had paid not the least heed to Theo’s remark. ‘He is a good man, in his way,’ he said, apparently referring to Lord Werth. ‘But as head of the family — insufficient.’
Somewhat reassured by Felix’s use of the present tense, Theo remained where he was. ‘What do you mean to achieve by conducting the ritual?’ he said. ‘Put every living Werth in the same room together, and I am afraid we would only squabble with one another. There is never any shortage of that.’
Lord Felix looked appalled. ‘Squabble?’
‘Like little children,’ Theo assured him.
Lord Felix hesitated, and glanced down at the book in his hand as though he might prefer to destroy it than to continue reading from it. His hand spasmed, and he gave a convulsive swallow.
‘But the dragon!’ said he, after a moment. ‘Lady Margery still lives. Is that not the truth? I have heard it said!’
‘She may be still living. What can that possibly matter?’
‘Oh!’ said Lord Felix. ‘Why, no one will trifle with Werth if there is a dragon on the premises. The mere chance of it is enough.’
‘We have a dragon on the—’
‘Borrowed,’ said Lord Felix, dismissing Lord Maundevyle’s existence with a wave of his emaciated fingers. ‘And a sorry, lugubrious excuse for a creature at that. Whoever heard of a melancholy dragon? No, no, Margery it must be. A worthy Werth! Nothing ever withstood her for very long! And there is no saying who else may appear, you know.’
With which words, Felix appeared to dismiss the subject altogether, and went on with his reading. He had proceeded some way into the ritual already, Theo perceived, for in addition to the quantities of blood smeared upon the stone slab — Theo’s as well as his father’s — he had uttered enough of the ritualistic words to create no inconsiderable effect. Theo felt some current flowing through the grove, a sense of pressure and potential which c
aused his skin, faintly, to itch.
He had only a moment to consider. What ought he to do? Had Lord Felix already gone too far to be prevented now? What would Theo achieve by trying?
‘Oh, well!’ he said, and mentally washed his hands of the subject. ‘After all, it is what m’mother wanted. And there is something in what you say, after all.’
Lord Felix cast him a swift look of approval, to which Theo felt perfectly indifferent. He sat himself down by his father’s side, having satisfied himself that Lord Werth still breathed, and awaited the results of Lord Felix’s endeavours.
These came swiftly. Only some eight or ten more words rolled from Felix’s mouth, gaining in volume with every syllable, until the final phrases crackled like lightning. Having finished, Felix shut the book, tossed it to Theo, and said: ‘I have high hopes for your time as head of the family, Theodore. There is a ruthlessness in you, and an indifference to public opinion, entirely absent in your father.’ With which encouraging words, he rolled his shoulders, producing an appalling crunching and popping sound, and took a deep, and probably futile, breath. ‘Now, if you will excuse me, I shall return immediately to bed. Rituals are so very fatiguing.’
Theo watched in silence as the dead man’s withered figure disappeared into the night. His wrists had ceased bleeding; thankfully, Lord Felix had not been so carried away by enthusiasm as to make too mangled a mess of his great-grandson’s flesh. Lord Werth’s wounds were more minor still, suggesting that, for all Felix’s judging words and ringing pronouncements, he did not wish his descendants ill. Or not so very much.
Lord Werth woke some little time later, and groggily sat up. ‘Theo?’ he said. ‘Where is Lord Felix?’
‘Gone back to bed,’ said Theo, rising to his feet. ‘I would recommend you to follow suit, father.’
Lord Werth sat upon the pale stone slab, his knees drawn up and his clothes bloodied, and looked silently around the grove. ‘I perceive we are to be descended upon by relatives,’ he said.
Theo gave a gusty sigh. ‘Again?’ he answered. ‘Why, yes. I believe we are.’
Lord Werth rose to his feet, swaying a little, but contrived not to collapse. ‘In that case,’ he said, ‘I had better speak to the cook.’
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