The Aylesford Skull (12 page)

“I’m unaware of the particulars, sir, for the discussions in my late husband’s notebook, when it referred to the opening of the gate, were mere sketches and implications, although there was some discussion of his affairs with John Mason, touching on Mason’s inept work contriving the lamps, as he referred to them. My husband carried his own knowledge in his mind, for the most part, and his mind is closed to us now.

“It was open for a number of years to the youthful Narbondo, however. John Mason blew himself to pieces when he detonated the dust in a grain silo, attempting to project an earthbound spirit onto the suspended cloud before it exploded. Whether he was successful in opening a gate to the netherworld, if you will, God alone knows. I’m certain, however, that my husband was far more adept at necromancy than John Mason had been. My husband was a man of vast knowledge, Professor, arcane, evil knowledge, if you’ll permit me to use the word, and he was very much feared in certain circles. Narbondo, however, had no fear of him, even as a boy, but used my husband to his own ends, just as my husband used others. Narbondo, we’re certain, is in possession of what my husband referred to as the Aylesford Skull, simply to keep it distinct from others of its kind. He never for a moment thought of it as the skull of his only son, objects and people being merely more or less useful to him.”

“You’re worried that Narbondo will make use of the skull, as John Mason attempted to do?” St. Ives asked. “He means to open one of these fabled gates?”

“Exactly, sir, except that his goal, I fear, is to open the gate fully, and to leave it open.”

“I don’t quite follow you,” St. Ives said.

Kraken tugged on his chin, widened his eyes, and said, “She means there’ll be a-coming and going when he’s finished, sir. That a man might walk across Piccadilly and into Hell as easy as kiss-my-hand and back out again with a bucket of brimstone and his hair afire, and so with them that dwells there, the dead and the living in a sort of hotchpotch, as the Scotsman said.”

“Why would a man
desire
to bring about that end?” St. Ives asked.

“Bill’s account is perhaps a bit fanciful,” Mother Laswell said, “but your question is well taken. Morbid curiosity, might answer, or an opportunity to travel where no man has traveled previously. It is quite possible that a man possessed by evil would be drawn to such an atrocity for reasons of his own, or perhaps in his narcissism he fancies himself a modern Virgil, who would lead people through the realms of the dead. We know nothing of the nature of the gate, Professor, or what lies beyond. We cannot say whether it leads to an actual, earthly place, or to the spirit world, or to both in some manner. But such questions are of secondary importance. It’s the very
attempt
that we fear – the detonation, the spilling of human blood, perhaps on a massive scale.”

St. Ives nodded. “I would
very
much like to see that notebook,” he said. “No fragment of it remains?”

She shook her head decisively.

“And the laboratory? Perhaps the foundation still stands?”

“An oast house was built on the site.”

“There’s nothing then?”

“Nothing, Professor. What I know you now know. The only thing separating our mutual understanding has to do with belief.”

St. Ives sat for a time in silence, and then said, “At the moment, Mother Laswell, I’m at a loss for a suitable response. You pay me a great compliment simply by taking me into your confidence, but I’m not certain that I can repay you in kind. Your story has a good deal to do with the ways in which a man’s endeavors might betray the very things that he most loves, or should love – his wife and his children. Since you’ve been candid with me, I’ll pay you in kind. At the moment my life is full of the duties I’ve mistakenly ignored to my own peril – my home and my wife and children. I’ll consider what you’ve told me, and in fact won’t be able to do otherwise, since the tale is compelling, but I tell you truthfully that I see no clear course of action, and, if I did, I’d be disinclined to pursue it. There’s little profit in my speaking falsely here.”

He stood up from the table as the clock was striking ten o’clock, and it came to him that Cleo and Eddie would be in bed by now, quite likely asleep, perhaps Alice also. He had meant to speak of air vessels and elephants to them tonight, simply to inform their dreams, but it would be too late for that. “Good evening, ma’am,” he said, but Mother Laswell’s eyes seemed to be focused on something that was a very great distance away, and his words apparently went unheard.

“I’ll show you out, Professor,” Kraken said in a low voice, leading the way toward the door. They passed through the entry hall and into the starlit night. Ned Ludd the mule was still abroad, as if standing sentinel until St. Ives had gone away and the imaginary drawbridge could be hoisted and secured. The sliver of moon shone in the sky in the direction of the river.

“I can find my way home, Bill. You remain with Mother Laswell. She needs some comfort.”

“Aye, she’s in a state, sir, and has been since the news of Mary Eastman’s death this morning. As soon as she heard of the grave being dug up and the skull gone, she vowed to hunt Narbondo down. She brought him into the world, she said, and it was her bounden duty to take him out of it again and to put poor Edward to rest. She means to kill her own son, sir. I talked sense to her six to the dozen, but I don’t have the words to make her see, and I was hoping that with your help she would...” He fell silent now, as if he had overreached himself.

“I honor you for it, Bill. And I envy your faith in both of us. I’m convinced that she will abandon any idea of killing Narbondo. She’ll see things more clearly when the sun rises. Come round to meet Eddie and Cleo tomorrow. You’ll understand me better, perhaps. A man changes over the years. We’ve had some adventures, you and I, but for me that season has passed away, or nearly so.”

“Perhaps for the best, sir, if only you’re in the right of it. Here now, Ned!” He stepped down off the porch and put his hand on the mule’s neck. “Time for bed, old son.” He nodded to St. Ives, deep worry visible in his face, then turned Ned Ludd around and headed in the direction of the barn, the shadowy outline of which St. Ives could see beyond the now-dark palm house.

TEN

WHAT DUTY REQUIRES

A
lice sat in front of the mirror pinning up her hair, capturing and imprisoning wayward locks that would apparently much rather remain at liberty. St. Ives watched her happily. It was a Saturday morning, and they meant to breakfast on the veranda and then do very little. Alice would no doubt spend some time with her begonias, the new rhizomes already putting out leaves. As for him, he meant to set his mind to the problem of the barn, perhaps sketch his plans out again now that the elephant had complicated things.

“But what do
you
believe you should do?” Alice asked, turning to St. Ives. “In your heart of hearts? What does Duty require?”

“What do I
believe
? I believe that the entire business is nonsense. There’s nothing nonsensical about the tragedy, of course. I don’t mean that. Mother Laswell suffers a great deal of pain. But I don’t for a moment believe that I can effect a cure for human misery. Perhaps time will answer in that regard, or perhaps Bill Kraken will answer. He seems wholly dedicated to her. As for Narbondo’s anticipated depredations, you’ve said yourself that there’s such a thing as the police. I have no regard for the lunatic idea that a man might open a lane to the land of the dead in this fabulous manner, although I have a high regard, if ‘regard’ is quite the right word, for Narbondo’s capacity for evil. If I found him lurking hereabouts I’d be inclined to shoot him like a mad dog. But will I go out searching for him because I’m motivated by this wild notion of a gate to the afterlife? I will not.”

“You sound quite certain.”

“Never more so. I’m certain that Mother Laswell dearly wants her son’s skull returned to her. She tells the truth. But I’m not persuaded that it’s my business.”

“I’m happy to hear it. It puts my mind at ease, and it cheers me that I don’t have to beat you with a coal shovel. Poor Mother Laswell, though. I’ll pay a visit to the farm and introduce myself.”

St. Ives looked out the bedroom window, taking in the view. He could feel warmth through the glass. There was a tonic quality to the heat, a salutary tonic, and he found once again that he was quite happy. The children had indeed been asleep when he had returned last night, and the house quiet. Alice, however, had not been asleep, nor did either of them have any particular desire to sleep until quite late, or early, he reflected happily. They had got out of bed some time after midnight and gone downstairs together to tuck up the children. It being a warm night, Eddie and Cleo slept in what Aunt Agatha Walton had referred to as “the sleeping gallery,” the windows covered with fine wire mesh against insects. As ever, when they tiptoed in they found Cleo’s blankets on the floor and Eddie’s virtually unmoved despite his being comfortably asleep beneath them. Mrs. Langley slept nearby in the adjacent scullery, which long years past had doubled as a maid’s quarters. They had watched the sleeping children for the space of several minutes, listening to Mrs. Langley’s soft snoring from beyond the door, and then had gone back up to bed, St. Ives falling instantly into a deep and grateful sleep.

It occurred to him now that Alice looked particularly radiant this morning, although she had only been a few minutes out of bed, and after a fairly short night. Her eyes very nearly sparkled. He thought again of Mother Laswell and her tribulations, and wondered if his own happiness was unnatural under the circumstances. It was not, he quickly decided.

“I’m thinking of running into the village today,” he said.

“Consider having Logarithm pull you in the wagon,” she told him, “unless you particularly want exercise.”

“You’re positively giddy,” he said to her. “Perhaps you’d like to come along. I’m going to talk to Mr. Milford and his son about tripling the size of the barn door.”

“On behalf of the airship?”

“Yes, indeed. It’ll need a commodious great door. Simple to build, I believe, and Aunt Agatha’s lumber room will answer for the materials.”

“I’d be happy to go along. We’ll take Eddie and Cleo, if that would suit you, and perhaps a picnic basket. I promised to show them where my nemesis the pike lives in the weir. The weir is a famous spot for newts and toads, you know, if you keep an eye out.”

“Excellent. Cleo loves a newt.” St. Ives nodded happily, his mind shifting effortlessly from airships to toads and newts and then quite naturally on to the notion of elephants. Certainly there was no better moment to broach the subject with Alice, given her high spirits. “An idea came into my mind yesterday, my love.”

“An
idea
,” she said. “Treat it kindly, then; it finds itself in a tolerably strange place.”

He laughed at the witticism. “You’re right about that,” he said, “more than you know, perhaps. I’ve come to the conclusion that we’re in particular need of an elephant.”

“What a perfectly wonderful idea, Langdon. One of your best, without a doubt. Perhaps we should have two of them?”

“I’m quite serious.”

“As am I. They pine away without the company of fellow pachyderms, I understand.”

Did he hear irony in her tone? There was nothing in her face to suggest it. “Finn Conrad has a sizeable knowledge of the creatures,” he said, shouldering on. “I intend to put Finn in charge of it. We’ve got plenty of room in the barn, and...”

“You’re
serious
?” she said.

“Quite. It will provide the motive power needed to shift the barn roof, do you see?”

“Don’t elephants go on rampages? Tread people flat?”

“Only when provoked. None of us are in the business of provoking animals. This place breeds serenity, Alice. You can feel it in the air this morning. The lion lies down with the lamb even as we speak.”

“An army of newts wouldn’t serve to open the roof?”

He smiled at her and was relieved when she smiled back. “Think on it,” he said. “We’ll speak to Finn together in order to get an educated opinion. Certainly there’s no tearing hurry.”