The Death Collector (4 page)

George had no time to react. Already both the intruders were striding across the room towards him. He backed away, knocking over a stack of papers. He was not afraid to put up a fight, but he doubted he could take on both the men. And he was worried about Percy – now lying still amongst the manuscripts and books at the other end of the room.

‘Where is it?' the big man hissed. His face was glowing in the lamplight as he leaned across the desk. A pale white scar cut like a shadow down the whole of one side of his face, pausing only to let his bloodshot eye stare out at George.

‘What?' George replied, his voice hesitant and taut with nerves. ‘I don't know what you mean.'

‘Could be anywhere,' the other man answered. He kicked at a pile of books, sending them sliding across
the floor. One volume flapped open, its pages bent and torn. ‘Look at all this stuff.'

‘We don't have time to go through this lot,' the big man decided. Unlike his comrade he sounded educated and refined, almost deferential. But then he lunged suddenly across the desk, arms out, reaching for George.

George stepped back again, feeling his feet tangle with books and papers. The man's stubby fingers closed just in front of this throat.

‘Where is it?' the man demanded again. His face was twisted into a snarl of rage, and with a single savage movement, he swept the desk clear. The various piles of books toppled, papers sliced through the air. The oil lamp crashed to the floor, spilling a pool of fire across the bare wooden boards. ‘Where is Glick's diary?'

George swallowed, staring into the flames as they raced through the pool of liquid and attacked the nearest papers. In seconds, books were burning too – the volumes from the desk curling and blackening as the flames set to work.

‘Right now,' George said slowly, his throat dry and scratchy as the smoke clawed at it, ‘Glick's diary is on fire.'

For a single second the two intruders stood absolutely still, staring into the gathering flames. Then they both hurled themselves at the fire, reaching in for the burning books, cursing as the fire bit and spat at them. George left them to it, watching them reach in and
pull out the volumes one by one as he himself edged quickly round the other side of the desk and ran to where Percy was lying.

‘It's the last volume we want,' the larger man was saying. He tossed several of the notebooks aside. ‘The one that he never finished.' He kicked papers and books out of the way of the flames in an effort to stop it spreading.

The other man was riffling through another volume. He dropped it when he saw there were no blank pages at the end.

George spared them little more than a glance. He knelt down beside Percy, shuddering at the sight of the gash across his head. He almost cried with relief as Percy moved, and a groan of pain emerged feebly from his lips.

‘They want Glick's diary,' George said quietly. ‘Are you all right?'

Percy's eyelids flickered in response. His whole body seemed to be shivering in the firelight. From somewhere in the distance came the sound of a whistle.

‘Peelers!' One of the men shouted urgently. They both dropped the books they were holding, and ran for the door.

‘Hold on,' George said. ‘Help's coming.' He cradled Percy's head in his lap, not knowing what else to do. Percy was staring up at him, his eyes wide but unfocused. George felt he should try to keep him talking
until someone came to help. Keep him conscious. ‘Why do they want the diary?' he said. ‘Why the last volume? Do you know?'

Percy swallowed, his whole body shifting slightly with the effort. His lips quivered. ‘Lori …' he gasped.

‘What?'

‘Lorimore,' Percy managed to say. ‘They – help … Or …'

‘Or? Or what?'

But that was not what Percy was trying to say. He shook his head slightly as he forced out the words: ‘Augustus Lorimore.'

His whole body arched in a sudden spasm. Then he slumped down heavily, and was still. George slowly took his hands from under Percy's head. To his surprise he saw that they were dark and wet.

Someone else was crouched down beside George and Percy. ‘I'm afraid he's gone.' George wondered how long Sir William Protheroe had been there with him, holding Percy's hand – or rather, George now saw, his wrist.

‘There's no pulse,' Sir William said. ‘I am so sorry.' He straightened up. ‘I found the guard at the entrance unconscious, so I blew his whistle. The policemen from D Division who are supposed to patrol the Museum have now given chase, but I rather doubt they will catch the miscreants.' He looked down at Percy's staring, sightless eyes, as if realising how inadequate
the word was. ‘The murderers,' he corrected himself.

Gently, George lay his friend's head on the floor and stood up. Even in the glow of the dying fire, he could see that he was himself coated with blood. He felt empty and numb and cold. ‘We should put the fire out,' he said, and his voice was calm, emotionless, dead.

The flames had died down to a flicker now the oil had burned away. The fire struggled to reach more paper or books, but was unable to jump that far. George stared down at the embers – at the charred, curling remains of the books. One of them was almost intact, he saw. So before he stamped out the remaining flames, he picked it gingerly out of the ashes. The leather cover was hot, but not too hot to hold. The book was one of the volumes of the diary, and without thinking, George opened it. The pages were dry and brittle and yellowed with the heat. The surviving cover was the back of the book, and he saw that the pages were blank. The final volume. The book the men had been searching for.

Not that it would have done them any good, he realised. All the remaining pages were blank. The front of the book had burned completely away. A single charred fragment of paper detached itself from the spine and fluttered down towards the flames. As it fell, George could see that there was writing on it. He dropped the book, and grabbed at the piece of brittle
paper, catching it just before it fell back into the dying fire.

It was barely a quarter of a page from the notebook. Neatly written across the remains, a fragment of handwriting. A line and a half of words that emerged from the torn edge and disappeared into a charred blackness:

‘… now know which came first, and I can prove it. The answer lies in the Crystal …'

‘Sir Henry Glick's diary.' The words cut through George's reverie, and he saw that Sir William was carefully picking up the surviving notebooks.

‘The last volume got burned, I'm afraid,' George said.

The elderly man clicked his tongue. ‘A shame. But his first work, his greatest discoveries will be detailed in the earlier volumes. At least we still have them.' He picked up several surviving volumes and stacked them on the desk before looking round, shaking his head sadly. ‘Such a waste. Even without the loss of life, it would be unforgivable. As it is …' He spread his hands out as if trying to show how great a crime he considered it to be. ‘What could possibly be worth this?'

‘What indeed?' George agreed. As he spoke, he took out his wallet and tucked the fragment of paper inside. That must be what Percy had been trying to tell him
he realised – that if anyone could help George discover the truth and avenge his friend's death, then it was Augustus Lorimore.

George hardly slept at all. After describing his evening's experiences to the police and answering their questions, he did not get home until well after midnight. Lying in bed in the dark, all he could think of was Percy Smythe's face; all he could feel was Percy's sticky, heavy head cradled in his hands. And even when he eventually managed to banish his memories of that, he could see Sir William Protheroe looking intently at him. Sir William had told George that he was Curator of the Department of Unclassified Artefacts.

George had worked at the Museum long enough to know all the Departments. ‘I'm sorry,' he said slowly, ‘I have never heard of it.'

‘Ah,' said Protheroe sympathetically. ‘Well, that would be because it does not officially exist. Also,' Sir William admitted, ‘my Department is unique in that while it is funded and administered by the Museum, I was actually appointed by, and answer to, a small
committee of the Royal Society. A secret committee, just as my Department is secret.'

‘Secret?' George had echoed. He remembered how Sir William had smiled in reply. And what he had said:

‘No one apart from myself knows about my Department, other than the inner committee of the Royal Society, my immediate superiors at the British Museum and the senior trustees, and my assistant Mr Berry. Except for you.

‘Which is rather ironic I always think, given that it is called The Department of Unclassified artefacts. But it is an apt title, despite the fact that the work we do and the items in the collection itself, are kept secret – not only from the public but also from the majority of the scientific world. Put simply, it is to my Department that artefacts are sent which do not fit in other Departments.

‘At first, it was a catch-all – a home for finds that were genuinely unclassified. But over time its function has changed. Now, the Department is home to those relics and finds which not only fail to fit into other Departments at the Museum, but which do not fit into established archaeology or history or science. Some are items which contradict current thinking. But others are artefacts the existence of which would be simply too frightening for public awareness. Things that should not exist, but do.

‘Most of our artefacts seem innocent enough on
first inspection. It is only when scientific and historical examination throws up contradictions and paradoxes that they come to us. A tooth might seem normal enough, unless it is the tooth of a vampire. The pelt of an animal of the canine family is unremarkable, unless it was taken from a werewolf. A stone tablet engraved in the Queen's English is unlikely to cause controversy, unless it was unearthed from a site which is several thousand years old and might be the lost city of Atlantis.

‘Now, I'm not saying that we have any of these items in our collection. They are merely examples of how the apparently commonplace may be remarkable. And of course there are also items which are instantly recognisable as out of the ordinary. Inexplicable. Perhaps impossible, except that they do indeed exist in our vaults.

‘It is the job of the Department, of myself, to acquire and research such artefacts, to discover what they really signify – while knowing that my work may never be made public.

‘So why am I telling you this? For two reasons. First, believe it or not, the work of our small Department is on the increase. Now more than ever science seems to throw up things it cannot – will not – understand. As a result I find myself in need of a second assistant to help Mr Berry. It strikes me from what I know of your work, Mr Archer, and from what I have been told by
others, that you would be ideally suited for the position. If you are interested. If not, then so be it. I have told you of my secret Department and its work, but no matter. Even if you wanted to make my work public, which I doubt, who could you tell who would believe you? But I think you would find the work rewarding – financially and intellectually.

‘The second reason I am telling you this relates to Sir Henry Glick's diary. It seems that tonight someone has gone to great lengths to acquire the final volume of the diary. It may turn out to be nothing to do with my Department at all, but since I have been in some small way involved, I should like to know why.'

Sir William was looking at George carefully, his expression grave. ‘And I think,' he finished, ‘that you would like that same question answered, would you not?'

Again and again George went over the conversation in his head. Again and again he replayed Sir William's words. The notion of the Department of Unclassified Artefacts was at once both intriguing and a little frightening. And to be offered a job there … George eventually dropped into a fitful and restless sleep as the first hint of dawn was washing across the sky outside.

By eight o'clock, George was awake again, and he felt as though he had not slept at all. The events of the previous night and Sir William's words all seemed a blurred dream, and it was only when he opened his
wallet and carefully drew out the ragged slip of paper from inside that he really believed that those things had actually happened.

Lorimore – he knew the name, he was sure. All the way to the British Museum, he tried to recall where he had come across the name. It worried him on the walk to the underground station. It rankled as he stood on the crowded, smoky platform waiting for the train. It was at the forefront of his mind as he sat inside one of the tiny carriages and hurtled through the dark tunnels. But by the time he arrived at the Museum, he had remembered, and he wondered how it had taken him so long. Augustus Lorimore – the industrialist. He owned a string of factories and workshops, financed experimental development work, supplied the latest technology to Her Majesty's government, and was quoted as an expert almost daily in the papers and engineering journals.