The Chemickal Marriage (54 page)

The house was silent. Chang crossed to the foyer, smiling grimly at a view-hole behind a screen. Bronque’s words – ‘the woman and the black man were seen’ – were spoken as a threat, but had been a warning from one ally to another, placing the decision of what to do next in Schoepfil’s hands. Svenson must have watched from the window, but Chang discovered no sign of the Doctor’s presence.

Deeper in the house they found a padlocked door. Foison passed his candlestick to Chang and drew a knife for each hand. The first kick rocked the bolts holding the padlock. The second sheared them from the frame.

‘Worse than I’d feared,’ Foison said quietly.

If the rest of the house adopted polite decor without feeling for use – for
life
– this inner room had been dedicated to another more strident imitation. Every inch of the wall was covered with alchemical scrawls, layered to create different shapes – flowers, bodies, planets –
almost
like one of the
Comte’s canvases. But Chang had been to Harschmort, to Parchfeldt, and Schoepfil’s room only made clear the actual
art
of the Comte’s vision. This was the work of a schoolboy set to copy … markings of paint without passion, nothing insidious or disturbing or mad …

As Chang peered at an open mouth, the curving lips formed by an arching line of tiny glyphs, he thought of his conversation with Father Locarno, and
The Chemickal Marriage.
An alchemical narrative was less a story than a recipe: sequence, ingredients, actions. For the Comte, the art, the
grace
was all important – but was that, alchemically speaking,
necessary
? Granting any of this nonsense in the first place, did Schoepfil’s vulgarity of vision make any difference if he had successfully captured the formula? With a growing chill, Chang wondered if Vandaariff’s parasite nephew was unexpectedly dangerous?

‘Schoepfil means to inherit more than his uncle’s wealth,’ he said. ‘Alliances be damned, here is your enemy. You say he is no intimate of his uncle’s. What of his uncle’s associates – Francis Xonck or Harald Crabbé?’

‘I have been gone these months. Not that I am aware.’

The words were an admission of neglect, and Chang sensed Foison’s mind working, the urge to make up lost ground.

‘What of Colonel Arthur Trapping?’

‘A wholly negligible person.’

‘Whose daughter’s death was worth your sending a messenger.’

‘I had standing orders –’

‘And why was that?’

Foison’s eyes loomed even blacker beyond the flickering candle. ‘The approach of death is taken differently by each man. The actions of the powerful are naturally more … grandiose.’

‘People are being sacrificed on its altar. That child. Lydia.’ Chang rapped his stick against a lewdly painted rose. ‘The girl had scarcely seven years.’

‘Seven or seventy.’ Foison walked from the ruined little room. ‘Death is inevitable.’

They retraced their steps past the front parlour. Chang noticed a coat closet left ajar and looked to Foison before opening the door. He pushed the
hanging coats aside with his stick to reveal the curled body of a soldier in green, bloodstained above the heart. The messenger sent to Vandaariff from the stable. Foison said nothing.

At a noise from outside both men blew out their candles. Foison peered through the slats of a wooden shutter. Abruptly Foison stalked to the foyer and wrenched open the door of Schoepfil’s house, leaving it wide. In the shadows across the road loomed a band of tired refugees, who went still at the sound. When no one emerged from the house, a few of the braver souls crept forward. Foison retreated past Chang without a word, towards the rear door. The first of the crowd had reached the steps and begun to climb. Chang hurried after Foison.

‘You’re inviting them to loot the place.’

‘I’m inviting them to do what they will.’

A hundred yards from Schoepfil’s house Chang stopped. ‘Enough of this wandering. Svenson’s note gives us two choices – Schoepfil’s train or the Contessa and Celeste Temple at Bathings.’

Foison glanced about with caution, but their immediate location, a modest, tree-lined lane, was silent. ‘We cannot reach Stropping before Schoepfil leaves. The Contessa is long departed from Bathings. We have a third option –’

‘Axewith?’ Chang pointed with his stick to the west. ‘The cordon has retreated beyond his command post. Given the fire’s speed, we have little hope of finding him on foot before his place is abandoned once again.’

‘We do not need the
man
,’ countered Foison. ‘If we walk north-east we will strike his troops, at which point Lord Vandaariff’s name will get us transport.’

‘It’s no longer that simple.’

Foison gently shifted his stance. ‘I thought you had agreed to come.’

Chang could not run. Foison would put a knife in his back – or more likely his leg – and drag him to the nearest horse. But Chang had come to his decision. He slipped into a defensive crouch. Foison drew two knives with an unpleasant ease.

‘I will force you.’

‘You will have to kill me. Perhaps you
can
, but it is against your orders. I, however, may kill
you
most freely.’

‘You need me to reach Harschmort.’

‘I disagree. And once I get there I will kill your master.’

‘You won’t get within ten yards of the door. How many men did Miss Temple send? How many dozens came from other rivals? Harschmort has changed. You
know
how they died.’

Chang extended the walking stick like a blade, the tip floating at the level of Foison’s eyes. Foison sighed with impatience.

‘This is madness.’

Chang feinted at Foison’s abdomen, then swung the stick like a sabre blade, a cross-cut at the man’s head. Foison deflected the blow with one knife, but his counter thrust was slow. They watched each other. Foison could not attack freely and risk the possibility of Chang’s death, while Chang could attack and attack again, and finally – inevitably – strike home.

Foison retreated two steps. ‘Stop this – I am willing to follow, as long as we leave. If you’re not at Harschmort in time, Celeste Temple will be consumed.’

Chang advanced again, a jab to the face and then a swipe at Foison’s knee. Foison parried, dodged, fell back.

‘She’ll be consumed anyway. You know full well.’

‘I have no idea.’

‘You lie.’

With a swift motion Chang cracked the haft of the stick across Foison’s wrist and one knife clattered to the road. Foison brought the wrist to his mouth with a hiss, and fell back. Chang scooped up the knife, a weapon now in each hand. Foison flipped his remaining knife in the air and caught it by the tip, ready to throw.

‘You change nothing. She
will
die.’

‘She
shouldn’t
.’

‘We are all tested.’ Foison’s voice dropped to a whisper. ‘And if I kill you here and now … so be it.’

Foison whipped back his arm and threw. Chang dived, taking the cobbles on his shoulder. He felt a sting at his hip, but Foison – still seeking to wound
instead of kill – had missed. Chang rolled up, slashing the stick across the empty hands that reached to take him. Foison hissed at the pain, yanking both hands back as Chang lunged and stuck the knife into Foison’s thigh. Chang brought the walking stick down hard on Foison’s head. Foison fell and lay still.

The knife had pierced his coat, but the point had gone wide, scarcely a prick. Chang tucked a knife into his belt and glanced at Foison’s wound. He would live. Chang began to run.

It was half a mile before he found the cordon: exhausted militiamen doing their best to tend to those displaced – handing out blankets and serving soup from a makeshift canteen. He presented himself to a weary subaltern as an emissary of the Church and was passed through. Soon Chang was running again, angling away from where he’d been directed – if Foison did attempt to follow, Axewith would appear to have been Chang’s goal – and towards the train.

Not Stropping Station – there Foison had been right. The place would be a madhouse. But he recalled Foison’s suggestion that Bronque post men beyond Stropping on the route to the Orange Canal. Now, because of Foison, Schoepfil would make his transit safely under the protection of the Colonel’s men.

At the next checkpoint, further from the chaos, the troops again fed refugees from steaming pots suspended over open fires. He passed in easily, trading on the Archbishop’s name to request transport. A sergeant directed him to a line of people pressing similar claims of urgency. He stood behind a dishevelled older man and woman, their rich clothing spoilt by soot and water. The woman’s pleasure to see a churchman was visibly curdled by the Monsignor’s scars.

‘A terrible night,’ she managed.

‘We must reach our home,’ explained her husband, shifting to maintain his place in line ahead of Chang. ‘The grandchildren. The horses.’

Chang craned his head to the front. Despite there being any number of apparently free vehicles, no one moved. With a sigh of disgust he strode forward.

‘We have to wait!’ cried the old woman.

‘Take us with you!’ pleaded the husband.

Their calls caught the attention of others as Chang advanced, like a match to a trail of powder, igniting shouts of protest at his refusal to wait and calls of support from those attaching their frustration to his own.

Chang cared only that no one blocked his way – that they’d remained docile for this long showed how little destruction this crowd had really seen. At the head of the queue stood a major of engineers, looking up from a folding field table of maps at the growing cries. The weary officer raised his hoarse voice for everyone to hear. ‘A system is in place, without favouritism – if you would just go back to your place –’

‘I have urgent word for the Archbishop.’

The Major pointed with his stylus. ‘And
that
man for the Admiralty, and
that
man for the Ministries, and
that
man for Lord Robert Vandaariff himself – unfortunately, everyone must wait.’

‘Those coaches are unused.’

‘They may be required.’ The Major waved unhappily to his soldiers. ‘Kindly escort the Monsignor –’

‘That would be a mistake.’ Chang spoke coldly enough to give the soldiers pause. He turned to a man the Major had indicated, fat-faced and fair-haired, laden with several bulging satchels. ‘Your errand is with Robert Vandaariff?’

‘I beg your pardon?’ stammered the man.

‘His errand is none of your –’

Chang’s walking stick slammed like a shot on the folding table, directly between the engineer’s two hands.

‘What is your
name
?’ Chang demanded, ignoring how his action had stunned everyone within earshot to stillness.

‘Trooste.’ The fair man’s hesitation set a wobble to his chin. ‘Augustus Trooste, Professor of Chemical Science, Royal Institute.’

Chang let his expression curl to a knowing sneer. ‘Is that so?’

‘It is! My research – to Lord Vandaariff, is of the
highest
–’

‘When did you last see Madelaine Kraft?’

Professor Trooste blanched, swallowed, rallied. ‘Why, whoever is that?’

Chang laughed aloud at the lie. The trade between the Institute and the
Old Palace was so thick that no resident scholar, whether he partook of her wares or no, could be ignorant of the woman who was its mistress.

‘You’ll come with me.’

‘To the Archbishop?’ protested Trooste, even as he bent awkwardly for his papers. ‘But I have told you –’

Chang leant over the engineer’s table, speaking low. ‘Robert Vandaariff clings to life. The explosion at the Customs House – the news has been suppressed, but he will die tonight. His bequest of aid to the city has not been signed. He has no heir. Do you understand what that will mean to the city if his offer becomes swallowed in legal wrangling?’

‘But – how does the Archbishop –’

‘Who do you think arranged it to begin with? This man’– Trooste had joined him, breathing hard from the weight of the satchels – ‘may be able to extend Lord Vandaariff’s life. Can’t you, Professor? If the matter is
blue glass
?’

Trooste baulked again, his shock evident, but the engineer, aware that the decision lay beyond his care, only shouted over his shoulder: ‘Two to pass. A damned dog-cart if you’ve got it!’ He glared sourly at Chang. ‘All blessings on your task.’

Not a dog-cart, but small enough, a two-wheeled gig, given over at the soldiers’ insistence by its whey-faced owner, who demanded – and was denied – an official chit to mark his property’s requisition. Trooste drove, satchels crammed under the seat, as Chang, town-born and ever poor, had no skill with horses. He knew the city, however, and directed Trooste down unobtrusive roads where they made good time. The Professor was hardly calm in Chang’s menacing presence, however, and it was minutes before he attempted conversation.

‘Will we really go to Harschmort House? It seems cruel to the horse.’

‘It’s a cruel night,’ Chang replied. ‘Turn left.’

‘But that takes us away from –’

‘
Turn
.’

Trooste guided the trap into an unpaved lane. ‘So, the Archbishop’s own messenger –’

‘The Archbishop can go hang. Do you know how Mrs Kraft was restored to her mind?’

Trooste stammered at the directness of the question, but then accepted he was not up to the task of duplicity. ‘As a matter of fact I do.’

‘Was it you or Svenson?’

‘Well, I do not flatter myself –’

‘Or the child?’

‘What child?’

‘The one who’s
dead
, Professor.’ Chang turned in his seat, making sure they’d not been followed. ‘Left again.’

Trooste did so with some skill, for the road was littered with refuse that might well have broken a wheel. Chang wondered at the man’s origins. Had he grown up with money, a horse-cart of his own, books and telescopes to feed his hungry mind? Judging by his modestly cut coat, that comfort had gone – gambled away? – though an attending air of privilege remained.

‘Lord Vandaariff has not sent for you at all.’

‘But he
will
see me.’ Trooste beamed with confidence. ‘He will want to hear what has been achieved – the actions of his enemies –’