The Secret of Abdu El Yezdi

by Mark Hodder

  “Dirty politics, Lord Elgin.”

  “All politics is dirty. It has to be. Trade is warfare and warfare is trade. That’s the way of the world.”

  “You still haven’t told me how Oliphant fits into this distasteful picture.”

  Elgin pushed his hookah aside and reached for his coffee. As he sipped it, his eyes met Burton’s above the brim of the cup and the explorer saw amusement in them. He realised that Elgin was purposely provoking and prevaricating—that it was the man’s technique in negotiations and he’d employed it so frequently, it was now habitual.

  Elgin leaned forward, placed his emptied cup onto its saucer, and jabbed a finger at Burton.

  “The opium trade is but one factor among a great many in our dispute with China, but it’s the one Oliphant was responsible for. I relied on him to assess the situation as it developed, to communicate British demands to the emperor, and to summarise and bring to me the Chinese counter-demands—all of which would have been well and good were it not for one thing.”

  “It being?”

  “That the bloody fool himself became an addict.”

  “Ah.”

  “It came to my attention at the start of April this year. We had briefly returned to London during the latter half of March, and while there, Oliphant joined some sort of gentlemen’s club. He was rather secretive about it—never told me its name—but I gather its members share his fascination with that damned book. A mere week after we returned to China, I went to his rooms to collect some papers and found him in an opium-induced stupor.”

  Burton pursed his lips and thought for a moment. “You associate his taking of the drug with the club?”

  “I do. A week or so later, I demanded an explanation for his behaviour. He babbled a great deal of nonsense, but from what of it I understood, I gather The Wisdom of Angels hypothesises multiple levels of existence—beyond even the Afterlife—and the club encourages the exploration of these through the use of mind-altering drugs. Oliphant told me, in all seriousness, that he’d established communication with a being from one of these other worlds. Absolute rot, of course.”

  “I take it your confronting him had little effect?”

  Elgin leaned back and grunted an agreement. “None. He became thoroughly unreliable. In the end, I took over the duties I’d assigned to him, and I’ll confess, it’s been more than I can comfortably cope with. Thus my determination to replace the fellow.”

  A few minutes of silence fell between them. Burton finished his coffee. He looked out of the porthole and saw the rooftops of Vienna.

  “Would you object to me searching his quarters?”

  “Not at all.”

  “Thank you, Lord Elgin. You’ve given me much to think about.”

  Elgin flapped his hand dismissively.

  Twenty minutes later, Burton had retrieved the key to Oliphant’s cabin from the steward and was letting himself in.

  The Wisdom of Angels, its leather spine cracked, its pages worn and creased at the corners, was on the bedside table.

  “Thomas Lake Harris,” Burton said aloud, reading the author’s name. He flicked through the pages, looking at the chapter titles, digesting random paragraphs, gaining an overall impression of the subject matter. It was just as Elgin had summarised, with the addition that Harris reckoned his non-corporeal beings were influencing human history. Bizarrely, he also claimed to be married to one of them—an angel known as the Lily Queen.

  Burton muttered, “Utter claptrap!”

  He pushed the book into his jacket pocket and started to search through Oliphant’s belongings. He found a daguerreotype showing the man posing with a white panther—the animal had moved during the exposure and its face was blurred. He opened a chest to reveal a large collection of daggers and flintlock pistols. He lifted three books down from a shelf. Two were travel journals written by Oliphant: A Journey to Katmandu, published in 1852, and The Russian Shores of the Black Sea, from 1853. The third was a thick sketchbook. Three-quarters of its pages were filled with pencilled illustrations of landscapes, buildings, and people—obviously a record of Oliphant’s various travels—but they petered out, leaving a thick section of blank paper before the sketching resumed toward the back of the volume. These pictures, which Burton guessed were more recent, were far less accomplished and appeared to be the unconscious scribblings of a meandering mind. Mostly they took the form of diagrams and sigils, many of which the explorer recognised as occult in nature. There were also rapidly made drawings of a panther and, on the last page, a bizarre self-portrait in which Oliphant had combined his own face with his pet’s, giving himself feline eyes, a projecting muzzle, and a mouth filled with canines. Above the portrait, he’d written the word Predator, and beneath it, the sentence: What better way to transcend human limitations than by quite literally becoming something a little more than human?

  Burton shuddered. He closed the book but kept hold of it as he continued his search of the room.

  He found a bag of opium and a number of pipes.

  There was little else of interest.

  He was turning to leave when something glittered and caught his eye. He crossed to an occasional table and looked down at a pair of white gloves folded upon it. A tiepin had been placed on them. He picked it up and examined it. At its top, a small disk of gold bore two symbols, one looking like the letter C but with two small lines extending outward from the left edge of its curve, the other like a mirror-image number seven. Letters, Burton was sure, but—again!—from a language he was unfamiliar with.

  He pocketed the pin and sketchbook, left the cabin, and found Sister Raghavendra standing in the corridor.

  “Hello, Sadhvi. Have you been waiting for me? Why didn’t you knock?”

  “I didn’t want to interrupt. But what are you doing running around? You should be in bed. You’re not well.”

  “I’m shaky, I’ll admit. Gad, that potion you gave me certainly brought the fever to crisis! Really, though, I’m thoroughly fed up with my bed. Don’t worry—I won’t overdo it. I want to visit Oliphant, then I’ll settle in the library and I shan’t move until we’re home.”

  “You’ve already overdone it, Richard, and there’s no point in seeing Oliphant. The captain called me to attend him an hour ago. The man is a raving lunatic. Apparently he screamed and babbled his way through the early hours then lapsed into a catatonic trance. He’s neither moved nor said a word in the past three hours. Poor William! He was such a good soul. Why in heaven’s name was he killed?”

  “That’s exactly what I’m trying to find out.”

  Burton looked the Sister up and down and gave a broad smile—not something he did very often, for he knew it looked as if it hurt him, and fully exposed his overly long eye teeth. Indeed, Raghavendra blanched slightly at the sight of it.

  “Bound and smothered, I see,” he said.

  She glanced down at her voluminous bell-shaped skirts, tightly laced bodice, and frilly fringes, then reached up and patted her pinned hair.

  “Woe is me,” she said, “a genteel woman of the British Empire, which spreads its civilised mores across the globe and slaps its shackles on every female it encounters. Are we really so dangerous?”

  “None more so than you, Sadhvi,” Burton replied. “Such beauty has, in the past, caused empires to fall.”

  “No, no, I’ll not have that. It is men who create and destroy empires. Women are just the explanation they employ to excuse their ill-disciplined passions and subsequent misjudgments. History is proof enough that your so-called superior sex is utterly inferior and wholly lacking in common sense.”

  “Thank you kindly, ma’am,” Burton said, with a slight bow, and it struck him that—though it was Isabel Arundell he loved and would marry—he possessed few friends as loyal, true, and forthright as Sadhvi Raghavendra.

  “And the reason for this bondage,” the Sister said, gesturing down at her clothes, “is that our passengers are about to board, so I thought it prudent to sacrifice
my comfort and liberty, especially after having so shocked Lord Elgin with my thoroughly practical Indian garb. That’s why I’m here, Richard: to fetch you. We’re to greet the newcomers in the ballroom. After that, you can—and you will—take to the library.”

  Burton grunted his acquiescence and followed her along the corridor.

  “Have they told you who our passengers are?” he asked.

  “Lord Stanley,” she replied. “And who? His secretary?”

  “Prince Albert.”

  “Prince Albert? The Prince Albert? The HRH Prince Albert?”

  “That one, yes.”

  “Bless me!”

  “Indeed. I feel our homecoming has been somewhat overshadowed. We are eclipsed.”

  Sister Raghavendra put her hands to her face and exclaimed, “Imagine! I might have met him in my smock! Thank goodness I changed!”

  “And there you have it,” Burton said. “The fair sex identifies the crux of the matter.”

  They reached the staircase and started up it. Impatiently, and somewhat ungraciously, Burton was forced to accept Raghavendra’s supporting hand on his elbow.

  “A bloody invalid!” he grumbled. “Excuse my language.”

  She giggled. “I’ve been bloody well excusing it every bloody hour of every bloody day for well over a bloody year. Why must you insist on a display of strength when you know full well you have none?”

  “Climbing stairs is hardly a display of strength. And you should wash your mouth out with soap, young lady.”

  “Don’t worry. By the time we land in London I’ll be as timid as a mouse, won’t speak unless spoken to, and will allow nothing but meaningless platitudes to escape my lips. I may even indulge in a dramatic swoon or two, providing there’s a dashingly handsome young man standing close enough to catch me. Let’s stop a moment and rest.”

  “There’s no need. It’s a small staircase between decks, not the confounded Kilima-Njaro Mountain.”

  “Be quiet, fathead! I can see your knees buckling. Good Lord, you’ve had malaria, Richard. My medicine has burned it out of you, but you require time to regain your health. For once in your life, stop trying to be a hero. Rest!”

  They halted. Burton fumed. A minute ticked by.

  “Can we please scale the remaining heights?” the explorer growled. “What is it? Six or seven blessed steps? I give you my solemn word they’ll not have me succumbing to a heart attack.”

  They continued, and at the top of the stairs entered a smartly decorated corridor leading to double doors of frosted glass. Burton pushed them open and ushered Raghavendra through into the airship’s sumptuous though modestly sized ballroom. Most of the crew was gathered inside. Nathaniel Lawless, standing with the tall and bony meteorologist, Christopher Spoolwinder, waved Burton and Raghavendra over. As they drew near, they noticed Spoolwinder’s hands were bandaged.

  “What happened?” Burton asked.

  “The blithering telegraph has gone barmy!” Spoolwinder said in a plaintive tone. “Absolutely gaga! It’s been throwing out sparks, setting fire to paper, then—pow!—it sent such a shock through me I practically somersaulted across the bridge!”

  “We disconnected it from the ship’s batteries,” Lawless added, “but it’s still operating.”

  “Eh? How?” Burton asked.

  “We don’t know!” Spoolwinder exclaimed. His naturally glum face lengthened into an expression of deep misery. “I mean to say—crikey!—it’s just not possible. The machine should be dead as a doornail. Instead, it’s churning out messages like there’s no tomorrow. Messages sent from nobody and nowhere!”

  Sister Raghavendra stifled a giggle. She’d often told Burton that she found Spoolwinder’s exaggerated mournfulness highly comical, especially when he was overwrought. “Nobody and nowhere?” she asked.

  Captain Lawless shrugged. “There’s no point of origin, Sister. No source. We don’t know who—or where—the messages are coming from.”

  Spoolwinder added, “But it’s always exactly the same gobbledegook. Have a gander at this.” He took a sheet of paper from his pocket, unfolded it, and passed it to Burton. The explorer read:

  THE BEAST . . . THE BEAST . . . THE BEAST . . . YOU SHALL BOW DOWN FOR . . . OL SONF VORSG . . . BORN FROM THE WRECK OF SS BRITANNIA AND . . . LONSH CALZ VONPHO SOBRA ZOL ROR I TA NAZPSAD . . . TO REND THE VEIL . . . FROM THE FALLEN EMPIRE . . . NOW . . . FARZM ZVRZA ADNA GONO IADPIL DS HOM TOH . . . FOR THE ROYAL CHARTER . . . WILL DELIVER HE . . . BALTOH IPAM VL IPAMIS . . .

  “English mixed with random letters,” Burton murmured. “SS Britannia? Is there such a ship, Captain?”

  “There was an RMS Britannia. An ocean liner. We sold her to the Prussians some ten years ago. They renamed her SMS Barbarossa. There’s no Steamship Britannia. Never has been.”

  “And you say this message has been repeated over and over?”

  “Countless times and without variation,” Spoolwinder said. “It used up nearly all our paper supply, and the telegraph burned the rest.”

  “May I keep this copy?”

  Lawless said, “By all means,” and straightened as the boatswain’s whistle suddenly sounded. He muttered, “Look out, here we go,” then yelled, “ship’s company, attention!”

  The crew fell silent, stood with stomachs in, shoulders back, and chins up, and all eyes turned to the second set of double doors at the far end of the chamber. They swung open and Doctor Quaint stepped in, moved aside, and bowed two men through. On the left, Lord Stanley, the secretary of state for foreign affairs—short, stocky, and with a permanently aggressive expression—and on the right, His Royal Highness Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, widower of the late Queen Victoria, overweight, his long sideburns ill-concealing his developing jowls and thickening neck, and appearing to bear the weight of the world upon his shoulders.

  “He looks ill,” Sister Raghavendra whispered.

  Burton gave a quiet grunt of agreement.

  Quaint guided the new arrivals across the ballroom and introduced them to Captain Lawless.

  “An incredible ship, Kapitän!” Prince Albert declared. He spoke with a heavy German accent. “Mein Gott, gigantisch, no? How many crew?”

  “Thirty-five, Your Royal Highness. We were thirty-six but lost a man in Central Africa.”

  “Ach! Unfortunate! I understand you haff quite the adventure. Most successful. You solve the mystery of the Nile.”

  “Not I, sir. May I present the expedition’s leader, Captain Richard Burton, and his medical officer, Sister Sadhvi Raghavendra?”

  The prince smiled at Burton, who noticed lines of pain around the man’s eyes. “Oh dear. Your reputation goes before you, Burton. I am afraid almost to meet you.”

  Burton bowed. “I give you my solemn assurance, Your Royal Highness, that whatever calumnies you have heard about me are probably entirely true.”

  “Ja! I expected no less! You are a warrior! A man who must cut his own path through life. We are similar, you and I.”

  “Similar, sir?”

  “It is so! For just as you haff chopped your way through the jungles of Africa, so I haff chopped through the jungles of German Politik. We are relentless, no?”

  “Then I take it your endeavours have met with success?”

  “It is correct. Just as yours. I tell you this, Burton: the union of Hanover, the Saxon Duchies, unt Bavaria—the new Central German Confederation—through the middle of Prussia it will slice, so we weaken our opponents, you see? Bismarck is now nothing but bluster unt hot air. He haff no power remaining unt can offer no opposition to the forthcoming British–German Alliance. We deny him his Deutsches Reich. It is sehr gut for our countries. Sehr gut! Unt now the question of Italian independence haff been settled with Austria, I am confident there will be no more wars in Europe.”

  The prince turned to Sister Raghavendra. “But forgive me, Fräulein, this is disgraceful! I do not wish to bore you with such matters. Europe is a game of chess. One concentrates unt concentrates o
n the next move until one’s good manners, they are forgotten completely. For far too long I haff been dealing with the devious men.”

  He raised Raghavendra’s hand to his lips and continued, “I am—what is the word, Kapitän Burton: überwältigt?”

  “Overwhelmed, sir.”

  “Ach! Indeed. Overwhelmed. Overwhelmed to meet such a courageous young lady. It is true, ja, that you accompanied the Kapitän around the great lake in the middle of Africa?”

  Raghavendra smiled and curtseyed. “Yes, Your Highness, it’s true, though the lake is not quite in the middle.”

  “Remarkable! Remarkable!” Prince Albert released her hand and stepped a pace backward. He pulled at his cuffs, winced, and flinched, as if pain had lanced through him, then said, “Well, to get home you are both eager, no? As am I. Let us delay no longer. Kapitän Lawless, will you please haff the ship depart? Unt Doctor Quaint, if you would to my chamber now show me? I was up half the night watching the lights in the sky—Ach! Strange, no?—and am in need of sleep. We will meet again at the palace, Burton. I look forward to it.”

  Burton opened his mouth to ask, “The palace?” but before he could utter the question, the prince turned away and said to Sister Raghavendra, “Excuse my rudeness, I beg of you. The life I chose after the death of my dear wife haff of me made a monster where the women are concerned. No manners, Sister Raghavendra! No manners at all!”

  “Not a bit of it, sir,” she responded. “You have thoroughly charmed me.”

  He smiled, flinched again, and followed Doctor Quaint from the room.

  Everyone relaxed.

  Burton turned to Lord Stanley, who regarded him with hooded eyes and a stony expression.

  “Sir—” the explorer began.

  Stanley interrupted, his voice clipped. “Captain. I daresay you are keen to be reunited with your fiancée.”

  “Er—yes. I wasn’t aware that—”

  “That I knew of Miss Isabel Arundell? Oh, I’m aware of her, Captain. It’s very difficult not to be when one’s office is bombarded on a weekly basis by letters from her.”

  Burton was suddenly lost for words.