The Kings of Eternity (21 page)

I whirled around.

The jump gate hung in the air of the alien world, and the image within the oval frame of the portal shimmered as I stared. I could make out a familiar scene: the cosy environs of Jasper Carnegie’s library, the ranked books and the glowing fire, and in the foreground, peering through the portal, the terrified faces of Vaughan and Charles, eddying like reflections upon a disturbed mill pond.

Then the image disappeared, to be replaced by the inhuman blue of the generation field. I cried out, and fear gripped my entrails.

I counted out the seconds. Each one seemed like an eternity. I turned again to Jasper. “Can nothing I say persuade you!” I said. “Think of your brother, your friends on Earth.”

“I cannot forego this opportunity,” Jasper replied. “And anyway, there is always the chance that I might return, one day.”

I turned again to the portal. The blue field shimmered, and then the solid image of the earthly library established itself - but for only two or three seconds at the most, before the image shivered again.

I heard Vaughan’s despairing cry, as if from a million miles away, “The image is breaking up! Its period of stability becoming ever shorter! You must both jump next time or forever be-”

And his words were snatched away as the blue field replaced the scene of the library.

I stepped up to the jump gate, positioning myself upon its very threshold, the increased gravity of this world making my every step a labour. The blue field seemed to last forever. I counted ten seconds, and a further ten, and I began to despair that I would ever return home.

Then, just as I had begun to give up all hope, the image of the library established itself, briefly, and I wasted not one second in diving through and into the arms of Vaughan and Charles Carnegie.

I whirled around in time to see the image ripple - it had lasted barely three seconds! - and then turn blue.

I was sweating, and my heart was racing fit to burst as I held Vaughan to me and looked around at the wonderful sanctuary of the library.

I turned and faced the portal. The blue field seemed to last for ever. At last it flickered, and briefly I made out the panorama of the alien world, and the incongruous figure of Jasper Carnegie staring through at us. As we watched, he raised his arm in valediction before the image wavered once again.

For the next five minutes we watched as the periods of equilibrium became less and less; soon, the alien world appeared for a second only - brief blips between long stretches where the field showed only blue. Then the image vanished altogether, and the connection between the worlds was no more.

Charles cried out loud and slumped into an armchair.

“Don’t despair!” I said, and looked frantically around the room.

“What?” Vaughan asked.

“The paper on which Jasper noted down the hieroglyphic sequence,” I said. “If we can find it-”

I stopped and stared at Vaughan, for he was shaking his head.

“I saw Jasper stuff the paper into his pocket,” he said.

I approached the shanath, knelt and regarded the symbols upon its base. I looked up. “It cannot do any harm to try a random sequence,” I said.

“You could try,” Vaughan said, “but I doubt it would do much good, either. The chances of happening upon the right sequence must be astronomical.” He stopped and grimaced as he realised his awful pun.

I knew that he was right, but nevertheless stabbed at twenty symbols in quick succession and stood back. Nothing happened, not even so much as a flicker in the blue field.

I tried again, to no avail, and yet a third time. As I stood back after this attempt, the blue field extinguished itself suddenly, and the room was once again illuminated by just the firelight and a reading lamp in the corner. I touched the green light upon the surface of the shanath, which had earlier activated the blue field, but this time nothing happened.

I stared at my friends, bereft.

Vaughan poured three stiff measures of brandy, and we drank in silence and gazed into the flames of the fire.

At last I roused myself to say, “When I spoke to Jasper, he said that more than anything he wanted to remain.” I paused, then continued. “Also, Charles, he said that one day he might return.”

He stared at me. He appeared to have aged ten years; his thin face was even leaner, his eyes sunken. “Did it really happen?” he said, more to himself. “Is my brother really out there?” He gestured in the vague direction of the heavens.

Vaughan shook his head in silent wonder. “He got his wish. He is among the stars. Who knows what great adventure he has embarked upon?”

We fell silent, each occupied with his own tumultuous thoughts.

Only then did it come to me that, however briefly, I too had stepped upon an alien world. Somewhere out there, beneath the light of another sun, light years away from Earth, I had breathed the atmosphere of another planet. I would never again be able to look up at the stars in the night sky without experiencing a sense of wonder and disbelief.

We remained in the library until the early hours and only then, with a sense of giving up, did we retire to our respective rooms. The following day we spent in silent vigil; again I attempted to activate the shanath, and prodded the hieroglyphs for hours without result. It seemed that whatever damage it had suffered in the crashlanding had finally rendered it inoperable. We also inspected the blue egg and the bread-box device, but could make no sense of either.

On the Monday morning Vaughan and I took our leave, promising Charles that we would be back the following weekend, and drove to London for the most part in silence and with heavy hearts.

In the event, I had to postpone my trip to the Grange that weekend. My father took a turn for the worse and was admitted to hospital on the Thursday, and I remained at his bedside over the course of the next few days. He rallied, but remained bedridden. I spoke to a doctor who said that my father’s demise was only a matter of days away, now.

I rang Charles on the phone and explained the situation; he told me that he had found a post as GP in Aylesbury, so as to be at the Grange in the event of his brother’s return. He had told the woman who cooked and cleaned for Jasper that his brother had had to leave the country on urgent business, and might be away for a year. He invited Vaughan and myself down to the Grange the following weekend, or whenever we could make it. We speculated then as to whether the Vark would attempt to trace Kathan, and it struck me as bizarre that we were discussing such galactic matters over the mundane implement of the telephone.

I spent most of the next few days at my father’s bedside; we played chess, though his concentration wavered. He liked me to read aloud to him, especially from my own short stories, and this gave us both pleasure in his final days.

On one occasion, after a long day at the hospital, I met Carla for dinner in an expensive restaurant in Mayfair. I cannot recall what we ate, but I do recall that at one point Carla reached across the table and took my hand. “I’m sorry, Jonathon. I shouldn’t have made you come out tonight.”

She was, of course, referring to my father, which provoked a pang of guilt in me, for I had been lost in contemplation of Jasper Carnegie and his sojourn among the stars.

As we left the restaurant, I looked up to see that the sky, for once in London, was clear. I made out the massed array of stars, and stopped to stare up at them in wonder.

Carla held on to my arm. “What, Jonathon?” she said.

“Aren’t they beautiful?” I said. And, “Just think, Carla, of all the life out there, all the inhabited planets, the amazing civilisations!”

“Sometimes, Jonathon,” she said, tugging at my arm, “I wonder which planet you’re on!”

I walked home that evening with Carla on my arm, my thoughts far away, considering the incredible events of the previous week and wondering what new marvels the future might hold in store for me.

Chapter Nine

Kallithéa, July, 1999

Langham finished writing at twelve, carried his manuscript book into the villa and locked it in the desk in his study.

He took his sun hat from its hook and set off for Sarakina. It had been three days since he had said goodbye to Caroline with a kiss that she had cut short; he had thought that two or three days would be a decent interval before he called again, though every day he’d hoped she might visit him. Now he would suggest lunch at Georgiou’s, apologise for his forwardness the other evening, and fervently hope that he could see more of her. Hell, he was like a teenager suffering his first crush.

The villa was shuttered. He approached the front door and saw, blue-tacked to the stained wood, an envelope bearing his name.

He tore it open and quickly read the enclosed note.

Daniel, had to rush off to London at short notice. Business. Will be back in a week. See you then - Caroline.

The tone of the note seemed friendly enough, but even so he found himself wishing that she had found time to call on him personally and tell him of her trip. He continued along the track towards the village, contemplating an entire week without talking to Caroline Platt.

He ordered moussaka and salad and a glass of retsina, and sat in the shade and quietly ate. He considered Forbes, the English journalist, and looked across the waterfront to the post office, and above it the open window of the room where Forbes was staying. The window reflected an incendiary burst of sunlight, and it was impossible to see within the room. The thought that Forbes might be watching him at this very minute made him uneasy.

He hadn’t heard from the man for three days, when Forbes had accosted him and detailed his movements in ‘90. More disturbing, though, had been Forbes’ claim that, before ‘90, Langham had been untraceable. Well, there was a good reason for that, and let the fat Englishman try to discover it, if he could.

At two o’clock precisely, Langham paid Georgiou and walked home through the pines. He took his time, inhaling the scent of the trees and contemplating Caroline’s return. He found himself wondering how their friendship might progress, looking into the future and seeing them together, which just a month ago he would have considered as absurd as it was unlikely.

The novel was going well. In a week, slightly less, the first draft would be finished. Its title was
Cairo
, and it would weigh in at around one hundred and fifty thousand words. He would get the manuscript typed up by Maria in Xanthos, and then begin the leisurely process of going through the typescript and cutting.

He was contemplating the scene he would be working on tomorrow when he stepped onto his patio and saw that he had a guest.

Someone was sitting on the sofa, staring out at the view. He could just see the top of the man’s head, his disgusting ginger bristles.

The stuffed hold-all, deposited on the table, gave away the interloper’s identity, and Langham felt a sudden rage at the intrusion.

He stopped directly behind the sofa so that, if the man wished to regard him, he would either have to stand or screw himself around in the seat. “Make yourself at home, why don’t you?” he said. “I’d offer you a beer, but I’m out of them at the moment.”

Forbes made not the slightest movement. He said, “Not to worry, Mr Langham. A glass of water will suffice.”

“I didn’t invite you here, Forbes.”

“I think it’s time we talked properly,” Forbes said. “I arrived before you begin work at three. We have thirty minutes.”

“What do you want?” Involuntarily, Langham reached into his pocket for the mereth.

“As I think I have mentioned,” the man said without turning, “I would like to straighten out a few details here and there, settle a few outstanding matters.”

“In that case, I suggest you get on with it. My time is valuable.”

“If I could have that glass of water, please.”

Langham paused, then went into the kitchen, selected the ugliest, most chipped mug from the draining board, and filled it without allowing the water to run cold.

When he returned to the patio, Langham saw that Forbes had taken the opportunity to move from the sofa. He was sitting at the table, his hold-all at his feet, and was staring out to sea.

Langham moved to the table and banged the mug down next to Forbes. Water sloshed. Forbes ignored him.

Still gazing out at the headland, Forbes said, “You’ve chosen yourself a beautiful little hideaway here, Mr Langham.”

Langham, deciding to play Forbes at his own game, pulled a chair from the table and positioned it across the patio, so that a gap of roughly six feet divided the two men.

Suddenly Forbes turned and stared at him. He leaned forward, placing his hands on his knees, and Langham again saw the man’s repulsive finger-nails, small and convex, like miniature television screens ensconced in dough.

“Why the need to hide yourself away like this? What have you got to keep secret?”

“Nothing,” Langham replied shortly. “Nothing at all. I need privacy in order to write. I’ve never chased after publicity.”

“In a way,” Forbes said, regarding his fingers splayed across his fat knees, “the fact that your latest books have become best-sellers must have caused you no small amount of concern.”

“I don’t quite see what you’re driving at.”

“What are the sales figures of your books in total? Something like two million? That’s quite an achievement. Your books are popular, and attract critical acclaim. But with popularity and acclaim comes scrutiny, does it not?”

“You’re talking in riddles, Forbes. Like I said, my time is precious.”

“I’ll explain myself, in that case. As I mentioned the other day, I’ve noticed that there exist between your books and those of other authors, certain textual similarities.”

His heart thumping, Langham watched as Forbes reached down and pulled his hold-all towards him. It was heavy, and scraped across the tiles. He reached into the bag with both hands and came out with a pile of books.

Langham saw, with a start of disappointment, the familiar covers of novels published in the thirties and forties, with quaint, sketched covers. All the books were by Jonathon Langham: fifteen novels and a collection of short stories.