Dreamlands (3 page)

A
bellow from the next room forestalled yet another silence.  Dinner was served.

“Will
there be wine, Mrs. Caddock?” was, naturally, my first question.

There
would be no wine.  The housekeeper despised any drink stronger than black tea,
and in all things adhered strictly to her own opinion, the one idol she held
above Christ.  The food proved as flavourless and grim as the company was
delightful, though the housekeeper did put her personal stamp on the event, periodically
finding a reason to stomp through the room, to slam down a tray or throw open,
then later drag closed, the windows.

As
I struggled with the meal, I let Georgine have the run of the conversation,
which centered around her affection for my uncle and Arkham.  When the
housekeeper had tired of pestering us, the girl began to quiz me on the mundane
household duties which kept Mrs. Caddock so harried.  In her poor and troubled
childhood Georgine had not been afforded any education in sewing, cooking, and the
like, but her appeals in these areas to Mrs. Caddock had been rebuffed.

“Of
course the poor dear is so busy,” she whispered.  “I would like to help her,
but she hasn’t the time to teach me.  It’s just her and the groundskeeper now. 
Did you know your uncle used to have a staff of six here, full time?”

“Yes,
I believe I heard that mentioned at some point.  Can you tell me, how long has
it been since Eamon sat at table?”

“I
can’t remember exactly.  It’s been more than a month, two months perhaps?”  We
sat for a minute in the lee of this unhappy fact.  “Your uncle treats me very
kindly.  Did he tell you he was friends with my mother before the War?”

“No,
we’ve hardly had a chance to catch up.  How did they meet?”

“She
never mentioned it to me when she was alive, but Mr. Sloan knew mother from her
singing days.  He had seen her in a cabaret in Port–  Now, what was it?  I’ve a
terrible memory for names.  It was a port in Spain.  And by a lovely coincidence,
the two of them met in the meat market in Arkham.”

This
revelation set rusty wheels grinding to life in my head, and I studied her
sharp nose, flat cheeks, and narrow chin.  The high forehead could be that of a
Sloan, but nothing else.  Oblivious to my speculation, she continued chattering
happily.  Georgine inspired in me a euphoric calm, a sensation, I apprehended, not
unlike that of laudanum.  I felt my right eyebrow twitch, and as swiftly as that
serenity had filled me, it drained away.

“You’ve
gone pale,” she said.  “Did I say something wrong?”

“No,
it’s not you, Georgine,” I said, reaching to pat her hand but stroking the
tablecloth instead.  “It’s nothing at all.”  Excusing myself with what grace I
could muster, I headed for the thankfully empty kitchen, where I acquired a
glass and pitcher of water.  I had been about to congratulate myself on my steady
hands when, with the stealth of a seasoned assassin, Caddock ambushed me in the
hall.  Seeing no quick route around this obstacle, I pressed my lips together
and nodded, beads of sweat pricking up on my scalp in perfect serried ranks.

“I
know any man with the name Sloan isn’t going to be fooled by her easy charms,” she
said, tossing her head in the direction of the dining room.

“My
uncle’s quite taken with her, obviously,” I replied.  “The old man’s not quite as
conservative as he puts on, eh?”

“What
are you implying?” she asked, and to my smirk said, “Don’t play the fool. 
Georgine isn't his daughter.  She’s no New England girl, more like a gypsy I’d
say.”

“Maybe
she is,” I said, striding past.  “What of it?”

I
returned to my chamber and, turning the lamp’s wick up for more light, changed
into the dressing gown in which I had woken the day before.  All was well, or
so I told myself.  My anxiety flared again however, when I saw that my valise had
shifted its position slightly.  Also, all of its buttons had been fussily
fastened.  The snaps resisted my clumsy fingers, maliciously I was sure, as I
opened the case to confirm a terrible fear.  My little brown bottle was gone.

“Mrs.
Caddock,” I called from the top of the stair.  Worry was creeping into my voice
as I called a second time, and rolled the drinking glass in my hands.  She
appeared from an unused guest room on the first floor, her expression one of high
spirits.

I
jogged downstairs, and though I hadn’t yet articulated my complaint she
produced my beloved bottle from her apron pocket and placed it on the bannister
between us, empty.

“I
know what this is,” she said smugly, going so far as to rock slightly on her
heels.  “We don’t have narcotics in this house, Mr. Sloan, lest they are
accompanied by a script.  And we both know you have no script for that.”

I
do not say this proudly, but if that glass tumbler hadn't shattered in my hand
I would have struck her full in the face.

* * *

I
paced the perimeter of my room for an hour, watching it shrink with each turn,
but however much I debated myself I knew my problem would have no remedy before
morning.  When the room had become too small to orbit any longer, I cinched the
sash of my robe and went to look in on my uncle.  He would probably lie awake
nights, I thought, with mortality lurking so near.

“Uncle?” 
A half-dozen candles lit the room, flames dancing in cheerful disregard of the
man’s deathbed. “I’m not disturbing you?”

From
the mound of pillows where he lay like a discarded marionette, he gestured me
in.  I shifted a great wingback chair close to the bed, and to the bottle of
imported whiskey on the bedside table.  Seeing my interest, he waved once more
and I poured myself a generous portion.  I gulped it down, sloshing some of it
in my lap.

“Are
we both invalids now?” he said, gesturing at my nightgown.  “A man your
age should be out tomcatting around on a Friday night, not spending the evening
with an old shut-in.”

“I’m
not likely to find a woman out in Arkham at this hour,” I replied with a laugh.

“No?
 Depends where you look, I warrant.”

He
sipped his whiskey, and I drank mine more carefully.

“How
about a story?” he said.  Eamon had spent much of the 1870’s and 80’s in the
merchant marine, both in war and peacetime, and in better days had never tired
of recounting his adventures before a leaping fire in the parlour.  That fire was
no longer used, in order to save on the cost of fuel.  “Did I ever tell you
about the pirates we encountered off the coast of Spain?  Fearless!”

“No,
I don’t believe you did,” I replied, arranging myself within reach of the whiskey. 
“Let’s have it.”

“In
the days before the Spanish-American War,” he began, growing animated, “the Andalusian
coast was absolutely lawless.  Our captain, Jules Bromm, was widely known and
feared.  Everyone knew him on sight, for a great curving slash from one side of
his mouth gave him a demonic grin.  He was a good friend sober, but a dangerous
man when in his cups.”

Uncle
Eamon launched into a tale of his service under Captain Bromm, of swindlers and
pirates, exotic ports and dangerous horizons.  Both the story and the liquor
relaxed me, yet he clutched my arm as a drowning man clutches a spar.

“Didn’t
you have firearms?” I asked, when he spoke of sailors armed with long knives
and clubs.

“Guns
have their uses, but on a ship’s deck the fight is too close for rifles, and a
good pistol was too pricey for a sailor.  Now hist!  There was a seagoing
Arabic cult which harried us for months.  The madmen got the drop on us outside
of Circo, a pretty little place just north of Cadiz.  I’ve always wanted to go
back there.”

He
fell silent for a minute.

“You
called them a cult?” I prompted him.

“They
were moon worshipers,” he spat, as if this bespoke the foulest sort of
degenerate.  “I don’t take issue with Arabs generally.  They are fierce
traders, but no worse men than some with paler skin.  But this group was by
turn traders and pirates, and rumoured to be slavers besides.  Ruffians thought
they could work magic,” he added with a mutter.

“Anyway,
we had gone off course, alone and far from port, and were stopped on a sandbar. 
The bastards boarded while we waited on the tide, most of us asleep.  They made
too much noise on their approach though, and we beat them back, all except
their devil of a captain.  He was a towering Easterner, with a goat somewhere
in his lineage.  He took a special disliking to me, and would’ve been my end if
Bo’sun Longbottom hadn’t given him a haircut.”

His
words stumbled to a halt then, as they frequently did, and he cocked his head
as though listening.

“What
is a bo’sun?” I asked.

“Bo’sun
is short for
boatswain
, a petty officer.  What a lubber you are, my boy.” 
He laughed in a forced sort of way.  “That particular bo’sun saved my life more
than once.

“Longbottom
played the game with a cavalry saber, a leftover of his days as a United States
Marine.  With that saber he took the villain’s head clean off, and every pirate
and sailor stopped mid-fight to watch that head, for while it rolled, and for
minutes yet after it stopped, it tracked Longbottom’s every move with undying yellow
eyes!

“They
remember the names Bromm, Longbottom and Sloan,” he said, panting with nearly
every word, “for side by side we sent their kind to the bottom of the sea.”  He
added, when he was able, “Watch out for them.”

“I’m
hardly likely to meet up with any pirates in New England,” I replied, “or even
Arabs for that matter.”

“Their
memories are long and their blades sharp,” he said, with nothing of the
excitement or relish of the past hour.  He slumped down in place, and I helped
make him comfortable for the night ahead.  I had thought his feverish energy
lapsed for the last time when he spoke again, a deathly wheeze all but
swallowing the words.

“Listen,
Isaac, there’s something left undone, something you could take care of for me.”

“Of
course, Uncle.  What is it?”  I was impatient to get to my own bed.  Sleep, for
me a coy mistress, was just then very near and seductive.

“We
may be overheard,” he said in a hoarse whisper, eyes bugging at the door.

His
terror was so convincing I did check the hallway –Caddock after all was exactly
the type I expected to find crouching at the keyhole– but we were alone.  By
the time I returned to the bedside, he was submerged in a fitful sleep.

* * *

I
woke to wan light filtering through an overcast sky.  Unsurprisingly, my next
dose of laudanum was calling from wherever it made its home, but so far plaintively,
not as an implacable command.

I
dressed and went straight to my uncle’s room, eager to take up our conversation. 
The funk of sickness was now overlaid with an unbearable spicy sweet scent, a
cleanser used by Mrs. Caddock I supposed.  I had already said my good morning
and forced aside the smothering window hangings before recognizing in his
repose a stillness more absolute than sleep.

We
would like to believe that in their last moments the dying find peace,
especially those like my uncle, bedridden for so long he had been worn to the
quick.  But his features were locked in a rictus, eyes starting from his
emaciated shell as if witnessing some incomprehensible horror.

This
being the first time since my arrival when I wished to see Mrs. Caddock, it was
also the first time she was not immediately under foot.  Neither was Georgine at
home.  I forced myself to prepare and eat a bowl of oatmeal, thinking on
Uncle’s stories and particularly on Bo’sun Longbottom, who I believed was still
among the living.

When
later in the day the housekeeper did return, she had no interest in my
questions.  The business at hand, she said, was to secure an undertaker in town. 
Since t
he
dread surrounding the estate was anathema to something as useful as a young boy
to run a message, this duty fell to me.

I
came back to a cold dinner and a housekeeper immersed in spurious activity.

“How
clean must the house be for a dead master?” I did not ask.  The long walk had
at least been productive.  It is no great task to secure opiates in a place the
size of Arkham, and after taking precautions regarding their storage, I passed the
day in my chamber in a heavily medicated funk.  Georgine did not reappear.
 

The
following morning I was dressed and sitting comfortably in the parlour when Mrs.
Caddock, bag in hand, passed me on the way to the front door, apparently ready
for another day out.  Her hand stopped on the knob as I cleared my throat, a
look of guilt flashing on her face like the spot of a lighthouse’s lamp.

“A
moment please, Mrs. Caddock,” I said.  “Before he died, Uncle Eamon mentioned a
friend of his, a bo’sun named Longbottom.  I don’t suppose you have an address
for him.”

“No,
I don’t know any Longbottom,” she said.  “What is a bo’sun?”

“A
boatswain is a sailor,” I said with authority, “on a ship.  Uncle Eamon served
with this man Longbottom for several years.  I’d like to get in touch with him.”