Ptolemy's Gate (60 page)

“So…possibly not part of our case, then, if it was a mouse?”

“Probably not.”

Beyond the frosted panes, in the interior of the house, I spied a movement: something shifting in the hall's black depths. “Here we go,” I said. “She's coming. Remember what I said.”

Lockwood bent his knees and picked up the duffel bag beside his feet. We both moved back a little, preparing pleasant, respectful smiles.

We waited. Nothing happened. The door stayed shut.

There was no one there.

As Lockwood opened his mouth to speak, we heard footsteps behind us on the path.

“I'm so sorry!” The woman emerging from the mists had been walking slowly, but as we turned, she accelerated into a token little trot. “So sorry!” she repeated. “I was delayed. I didn't think you'd be so prompt.”

She climbed the steps, a short, well-padded individual with a round face expanding into middle age. Her straight, ash-blond hair was pulled back in a no-nonsense manner by clips above her ears. She wore a long black skirt, a crisp white shirt, and an enormous wool cardigan with sagging pockets at the sides. She carried a thin folder in one hand.

“Mrs. Hope?” I said. “Good evening, madam. My name is Lucy Carlyle, and this is Anthony Lockwood, of Lockwood and Company. We've come about your call.”

The woman halted on the topmost step but one, and regarded us with wide, gray eyes in which all the usual emotions figured. Distrust, resentment, uncertainty, and dread: they were all there. They come standard in our profession, so we didn't take it personally.

Her gaze darted back and forth between us, taking in our neat clothes and carefully brushed hair, the polished rapiers glittering at our belts, the heavy bags we carried. It lingered long on our faces. She made no move to go past us to the door of the house. Her free hand was thrust deep into the pocket of her cardigan, forcing the fabric down.

“Just the two of you?” she said at last.

“Just us,” I said.

“You're very young.”

Lockwood ignited his smile; its warmth lit up the evening. “That's the idea, Mrs. Hope. That's the way it has to be.”

“Actually, I'm
not
Mrs. Hope.” Her own wan smile, summoned in involuntary response to Lockwood's, flickered across her face and vanished, leaving anxiety behind. “I'm her daughter, Suzie Martin. I'm afraid Mother isn't coming.”

“But we arranged to meet her,” I said. “She was going to show us around the house.”

“I know.” The woman looked down at her smart black shoes. “I'm afraid she's no longer willing to set foot here. The circumstances of Father's death were horrible enough, but recently the nightly…
disturbances
have been getting too persistent. Last night was especially bad, and Mother decided she'd had enough. She's staying with me now. We'll have to sell, but obviously we can't do that until the house is made safe.…” Her eyes narrowed slightly. “Which is why you're here.… Excuse me, but shouldn't you have a supervisor? I thought an adult always had to be present in an investigation. Exactly how old
are
you?”

“Old enough and young enough,” Lockwood said, smiling. “The perfect age.”

“Strictly speaking, madam,” I added, “the law states that an adult is only required if the operatives are undergoing training. It's true that some of the bigger agencies
always
use supervisors, but that's their private policy. We're fully qualified and independent, and
we
don't find it necessary.”

“In our experience,” Lockwood said sweetly, “adults just get in the way. But of course we
do
have our licenses here, if you'd like to see them.”

The woman ran a hand across the smooth surface of her neat blond hair. “No, no…that won't be necessary. Since Mother clearly wanted you, I'm sure it will be fine.…” Her voice was neutral and uncertain. There was a brief silence.

“Thank you, madam.” I glanced back toward the quiet, waiting door. “There's just one other thing. Is there someone else at home? When we rang the bell, I thought—”

Her eyes rose rapidly, met mine. “No. That's quite impossible. I have the only key.”

“I see. I must've been mistaken.”

“Well, I won't delay you,” Mrs. Martin said. “Mother's filled out the form you sent her.” She held out the manila folder. “She hopes it will be useful.”

“I'm sure it will.” Lockwood tucked it somewhere inside his coat. “Thank you very much. Well, we'd better get started. Tell your mother we'll be in touch in the morning.”

The woman handed him a ring of keys. Somewhere on the road a car horn blared, to be answered by another. There was plenty of time until curfew, but night was falling and people were growing antsy. They wanted to get home. Soon there'd be nothing moving in the London streets but trails of mist and twisting moonbeams. Or nothing, at least, that any adult could clearly
see
.

Suzie Martin was conscious of this too. She raised her shoulders, pulled her cardigan tight. “Well, I'd better be going. I suppose I should wish you luck.…” She looked away. “So
very
young! How terrible that the world has come to this.”

“Good night, Mrs. Martin,” Lockwood said.

Without reply, she pattered down the steps. In a few seconds she had vanished among the mists and laurels in the direction of the road.

“She's not happy,” I said. “I think we'll be off the case tomorrow morning.”

“Better get it solved tonight, then,” Lockwood said. “Ready?”

I patted the hilt of my rapier. “Ready.”

He grinned at me, stepped up to the door and, with a magician's flourish, turned the key in the lock.

When entering a house occupied by a Visitor, it's always best to get in quick. That's one of the first rules you learn. Never hesitate, never linger on the threshold. Why? Because, for those few seconds, it's not too late. You stand there in the doorway with the fresh air on your back and the darkness up ahead, and you'd be an idiot if you didn't want to turn and run. And as soon as you acknowledge
that
, your willpower starts draining away through your boots, and the terror starts building in your chest, and bang, that's it—you're compromised before you begin. Lockwood and I both knew this, so we didn't hang around. We slipped straight through, put down our bags, and shut the door softly behind us. Then we stood quite still with our backs against it, watching and listening, side
by side.

The hall of the house lately occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Hope was long and relatively narrow, though the high ceiling made it seem quite large. The floor was tiled in black and white marble squares, set diagonally, and the walls were palely papered. Halfway along, a steep staircase rose into shadows. The hall kinked around this to the left and continued into a void of black. Doorways opened on either side: gaping and choked in darkness.

All of which could have been nicely illuminated if we'd turned on the lights, of course. And there was a switch on the wall, right there. But we didn't attempt to use it. You see, a second rule you learn is this: electricity interferes. It dulls the senses and makes you weak and stupid. It's much better to watch and listen in the dark. It's good to have that fear.

We stood in silence, doing what we do. I listened; Lockwood watched. It was cold in the house. The air had that musty, slightly sour smell you get in every unloved place.

I leaned in close to Lockwood. “No heating,” I whispered.

“Mm-hm.”

“Something else too, you think?”

“Mm-hm.”

As my eyes grew used to the dark, I saw more details. Beneath the curl of the banister was a little polished table, on which sat a china bowl of potpourri. There were pictures on the wall, mostly faded posters of old-time musicals, and photographs of rolling hills and gentle seas. All pretty innocuous. In fact, it wasn't at all an ugly hallway; in bright sunlight it might have looked quite pleasant. But not so much now, with the last light from the door panes stretching out like skewed coffins on the floor in front of us; and with our shadows neatly framed inside them; and with the manner of old Mr. Hope's death in this very place hanging heavy on our minds.

I breathed hard to calm myself and shut out morbid thoughts. Then I closed my eyes against the taunting darkness and
listened
.

Listened…

Halls, landings, and staircases are the arteries and airways of any building. It's here that everything is channeled. You get echoes of things currently going on in all the connecting rooms. Sometimes you also get
other
noises that, strictly speaking, ought not to be there at all. Echoes of the past, echoes of hidden things…

This was one such time.

I opened my eyes, picked up my bag, and walked slowly down the hall toward the stairs. Lockwood was already standing by the little polished table beneath the banister. His face shone dimly in the light from the door. “Heard something?” he said.

“Yep.”

“What?”

“A little knocking sound. Comes and goes. It's very faint, and I can't tell where it's coming from. But it'll get stronger—it's scarcely dark yet. What about you?”

He pointed at the bottom of the steps. “You remember what happened to Mr. Hope, of course?”

“Fell down the stairs and broke his neck.”

“Exactly. Well, there's a tremendous residual death-glow right here, still lingering three months after he died. I should've brought my sunglasses, it's so bright. So what Mrs. Hope told George on the phone stacks up. Her husband tripped and tumbled down and hit the ground hard.” He glanced up the shadowy stairwell. “Long, steep flight… Nasty way to go.”

I bent low, squinting at the floor in the half-dark. “Yeah, look how the tiles have cracked. He must've fallen with tremendous f—”

Two sharp crashes sounded on the stairs. Air moved violently against my face. Before I could react, something large, soft, and horribly heavy landed precisely where I stood. The impact of it jarred my teeth.

I jumped back, ripping my rapier from my belt. I stood against the wall, weapon raised and shaking, heart clawing at my chest, eyes staring wildly side to side.

Nothing. The stairs were empty. No broken body sprawled lifeless on the floor.

Lockwood leaned casually against the banister. It was too dark to be certain, but I swear he'd raised an eyebrow. He hadn't heard a thing.

“You all right, Lucy?”

I breathed hard. “No. I just got the echo of Mr. Hope's last fall. It was very loud and very real. It was like he'd landed right on top of me. Don't laugh. It's not funny.”

“Sorry. Well,
something's
stirring early tonight. It's going to get interesting later. What time is it?”

Having a watch with a luminous dial is my third recommended rule. It's best if it can also withstand sudden drops in temperature and strong ectoplasmic shock. “Not yet five,” I said.

“Fine.” Lockwood's teeth aren't quite as luminous as my watch, but when he grins, it's close. “Plenty of time for a cup of tea. Then we find ourselves a ghost.”

Acknowledgments

My thanks to Laura Cecil, Delia Huddy, Alessandra Balzer, and Jonathan Burnham; to the late Rod Hall; and to everyone at Random House, Hyperion, and Miramax. And to Gina, most of all.

Endnotes

Alexandria: 125 B.C.

¹
This was one of the peculiarities of their sect: they acted only when the moon was full. It made their tasks more difficult, their challenge greater. And they had never failed. Aside from this, they wore only black, avoided meat, wine, women, and the playing of wind instruments, and curiously ate no cheese save that made from the milk of goats bred on their distant desert mountain. Before each job they fasted for a day, meditated by staring unblinking at the ground, then ate small cakes of hashish and cumin seed, without water, until their throats glowed yellow. It's a wonder they ever killed anyone.

²
All horrid and curved they were, filed sharp like eagles' talons. The assassins took good care of their feet, because of their importance in their work. They were washed frequendy, rubbed with pumice, and marinated in sesame oil until the skin was soft as eiderdown.

³
The sect avoided perfumes for practical reasons, preferring to coat themselves with scents appropriate to the conditions of each job: pollen in the gardens, incense in the temples, sand-dust in the deserts, dung and offal in the towns. They were dedicated fellows.

⁴
I won't say
where
he pulled it from. Let's just say that the knife had hygiene issues as well as being quite sharp.

⁵
The Hermit of the Mountain trained his followers in numerous methods of foolproof murder. They could use garrotes, swords, knives, batons, ropes, poisons, discs, bolas, pellets, and arrows inimitably, as well as being pretty handy with the evil eye. Death by fingertip and toe-flex was also taught, and the furtive nip was a specialty. Stomach-threads and tapeworms were available for advanced students. And the best of it was that it was all guilt-free: each assassination was justified and condoned by a powerful religious disregard for the sanctity of other people's lives.

⁶
And they didn't intend to start now. The Hermit was known to be pretty sniffy about disciples who returned in failure. There was a wall of the institute layered with their skins—an ingenious display that encouraged vigor in his students, as well as nicely keeping out the drafts.

1

¹
There was the time when a small section of Khufu's Great Pyramid collapsed upon me one moonless night during the fifteenth year of its construction. I was guarding the zone that my group was working on, when several limestone blocks tumbled down from the top, transfixing me painfully by one of my extremities. Exactly how it happened was never resolved, though my suspicions were directed at myoId chum Faquarl, who was working with a rival group on the opposite side. I made no outward complaint, but bided my time while my essence healed. Later, when Faquarl was returning across the Western Desert with some Nubian gold, I invoked a mild sandstorm, causing him to lose the treasure and incur the pharaoh's wrath. It took him a couple of years to sift all the pieces from the dunes.