The List Of Seven (52 page)

Alexander Sparks was no longer beside her; Doyle had lost sight of him.

Eileen ran toward the stairs. Chandros's screams stopped, his hands fell from his ravaged eye, and gore slipped out of the cavity in thick red clots; the pin had penetrated into his brain. Although the message had not yet reached his extremities, Sir John Chandros was already dead. Pillphrock sat stock upright, hands at his throat, face turning black, mouth open in a silent, protesting bellow. Death was near at hand.

A moan from Vamberg—in shock, clutching his wounded arm—brought Doyle back to his left. He bent to retrieve the razor; Eileen's skirts moved by him at floor level as she rushed from the table.

As his hand touched the steel, Doyle felt hot liquid pour onto his cheek—blood, not his—then a pincer grip descended onto his neck. With a hoarse screech, Vamberg clawed at him with his wounded arm; nails raked Doyle's skin, drawing blood. Unable to raise his head against the pressure of Vamberg's surprisingly harsh grasp, Doyle fumbled the second syringe into position, jammed it hard into Vamberg's upper left thigh, and hit the plunger; half the hypodermic's contents emptied into the femoral artery before the man jerked violently away, and the needle broke off in his leg. Now the needle's function reversed; voluminous arcs of blood pumped out in the opposite direction.

Doyle pushed off for the stairs. A servant mshed at him; Doyle slashed with the razor, cutting the man and knocking him back.

"Eileen!"

A pack of servants turned a corner in the upstairs hallway and swarmed down the stairs toward her.

"There!" he shouted, pointing to a door off the landing.

Dust pocketed from a point of impact on the marble steps near her feet as a shot rang out; turning, Doyle saw Drum-mond advance toward the stairs, leading a charge of servants, revolver in hand. Doyle hurled the razor at him; Drummond deflected it with an arm.

"Consign you to hell!" shouted Drummond, raising the pistol again.

Falling from high above, a suit of armor crashed down onto the servants nearing Doyle. Drummond's second shot missed wide.

"Arthur!" shouted Eileen.

He turned; a servant stood over him, club, raised to batter. Doyle heard a sharp whistle, and a silver star embedded itself in the man's forehead. The man fell away. Doyle looked up; a dark shape flew over the balustrade and sailed onto the servants advancing down the stairs. Driven into the steps by the impact, the attackers tumbled around Eileen as Doyle reached her on the landing. Dressed in servant garb, the figure who'd ridden them down jumped to his feet and began hurling assailants who hadn't been knocked senseless off the staircase.

"Go on," said Jack Sparks, gesturing to the door on the landing.

Sparks picked up a broadsword from the jumble of armor, and he used it to finish one of the men, swinging it wildly to prevent the others from advancing.

"Now, Doyle!"

Another bullet whistled past their ears. Drummond took aim again, struggling to line a clear shot through the knot of men working their way around the armor.

Eileen tried the door. "Locked!"

Doyle and Jack threw shoulders against the wood; the lock splintered on the second try. Doyle grabbed a torch from a sconce on the inside wall, took Eileen by the hand, and they rushed down a bare, narrow servants' passage. Sparks threw a vial onto the landing that produced a thick, noxious plume of smoke.

"Go, go, as fast as you can."

They ran. Sparks followed. They rounded a turn, hearing shouting and footsteps in the passage behind them as servants braved the smoke, driven on by Drummond's bellicose orders.

"Are you all right?" Doyle asked Eileen.

"I wish we'd killed them all," she said angrily.

"I saw you come off the wagon—" said Doyle back to Sparks.

"It took an hour to get this far into the house; they must have a hundred men inside."

"Did you see—"

"Yes: I reached the stairs before you attacked. I needed a distraction—"

"We understand, Jack—where are we?" said Eileen.

Good Christ, she's calmer than I am, thought an astonished Doyle.

They paused at an intersection. One fork of the passage led deeper into the house, the other sloped down and to the left.

"This way," said Sparks, leading them to the left.

"How do we get out?" asked Doyle.

"We'll find a way."

The passage walls grew rougher as they moved down, woodwork giving way to masonry and masonry to raw rock. Sounds of pursuit behind them grew encouragingly remote.

"They've killed Barry," said Doyle.

"Worse than that," said Eileen.

"I know."

"They must have Larry as well," said Doyle.

"No. He's alive."

"Where?"

"Safe."

They traveled nearly half a mile down. The temperature rose. Walls sweated moisture. Around another corner a heavy oaken door blocked the passageway. Sparks listened carefully, then reached down and lifted the latch. Open.

Carved out of the earth, the cave they entered stretched ahead indefinitely, as broad as it was long. The ceiling barely cleared their heads. Deep straw covered the floor. A wind draughted in from somewhere, guttering the flame, the torch blackening the rocks above with streaks of carbon. The air felt unusually warm, permeated with an unpleasant pungency, like a field of overripe fruit. Doyle knew he had encountered that smell before, but he couldn't place it.

Stepping forward they discovered shallow water underlying the straw, up to a foot of it in spots. As they sloshed cautiously ahead, the door behind them caught in the breeze and slammed shut, giving them a start.

"Did Larry come in with you?" asked Doyle.

"No. I found him at the train. Barry was taken at the abbey."

So those had been Barry's cries they'd heard raining down from the heights. Doyle hoped he hadn't suffered long. Who knew if he was suffering still.

They had passed halfway across the long chamber, their progress impeded by the curious combination of straw and water.

"Where did you go last night, Jack?" asked Doyle.

"A company of Royal Marines and two squadron of cavalry are on their way from the Middlesbrough. They'll arrive here before dawn."

Never had Doyle been more willing to take him at his word. "Why didn't you wait for them?"

"Eileen was with you," he said, without looking at them.

Doyle stepped on something soft and yielding; his foot slipped off before he could replant it, but he regained his balance before falling. He was left with a vague, unpleasant impression that whatever he'd stepped on had moved when he touched it.

"Jack, they've got Prince Eddy—"

"I understand—"

Something cracked sharply under Eileen's foot.

"What was that?" asked Doyle.

She shook her head; Doyle held the torch as Sparks cleared the straw under her feet.

"Oh God," she said.

Her foot had snapped the rib cage of a human skeleton lying half beneath the surface of the water, the bones bleached white, picked clean. A gruelly substance gleamed on the straw, trails of silver excretion circling around and away from the remains.

"We've seen this before—the stable at Topping," said Doyle.

"Don't move," said Sparks. He was looking over Doyle's shoulder.

An undulating shape humped toward them beneath the straw, a slow, rippling, ophidian movement. The distinctive smell suddenly grew more potent, stinging their eyes.

"Ammonia," said Doyle.

Doyle looked to his left; another shape slithered toward them from that direction.

"There," said Eileen, pointing straight ahead to more movement in the straw.

"What are they?" asked Sparks.

"If they can grow cabbages as big as globes and trout the size of dolphin ..." said Doyle.

"I'm not sure we want to know the answer to that," said Eileen.

The straw on every side of them seemed alive, as active as sea foam. The shapes closed in from every direction, but a gap opened in front of them.

"Go. Straight ahead," said Sparks, readying the sword.

Doyle moved ahead, brandishing the torch. He felt something brush against his boot and stepped quickly to avoid it.

A black shape slithered out of the straw to their right to a height of five feet. Its limbless, cylindrical shape ended in a fluttering orifice rimmed with palpitating suckers that surrounded a set of three gnashing jaws, each equipped with symmetrical rows of sharp white teeth.

An identical shape lifted to their left, drawn by a rudimentary sense of smell. Another rose behind them. What they smelled was blood.

They were leeches.

Jack darted underneath the swaying head of the one to their right and ripped the sword down the length of its body. A sac punctured, spilling a fetid black fluid, and the creature tumbled back into the swampy water.

Doyle waved the torch, keeping the creatures to the front at bay. Their black wrinkled bodies recoiled instinctively from the fire, moisture sizzling on their glistening skin.

"Light the straw!" said Sparks.

Another monster reared up behind Sparks and struck; teeth ripped into his shoulder before Jack wheeled with the sword and severed the thing in two. The surviving halves scurried frantically away.

Doyle set the torch to the straw around them; the drier stuff on top ignited rapidly and spread across the room in a solid sheet of flame. The leeches nearest to them fell in its advance, combusting, bursting apart.

"This way!" yelled Doyle.

They chased the burning straw. Water sloshed as creatures fled from the heat, explosive plops filling the air as the fire consumed more of the loathsome worms. Sparks finished off the few survivors they encountered. The fire at this end of the room fizzled as it burned down to the soggy straw below. Holding the torch high, Doyle found a door in the wall ahead. Sparks lifted the heavy latch, and they were through the door.

They found themselves outside, near a cooperage, barrels stacked around them, limiting their vision. Horses' hooves, carriages, and angry voices could be heard nearby. A full moon burned high in the night sky above. Doyle extinguished the torch.

"I'm going to be sick," said Eileen quietly. She moved off. Doyle went with her and held her gently as she voided the corrupt meal they'd been served. Sparks waited a discreet distance away. When the spasms had ended, she clung to Doyle and closed her eyes, shuddering against the cold air, nodding that she was all right in response to his entreaties. Refusing to speak about the nightmare they'd encountered was a way to deny its reality, Doyle supposed. He wondered how many other skeletons lay buried in that hellish breeding ground. Convenient way to dispense with disciplinary problems. Or drive one's enemies mad with fear—he

thought of the lines of salt across the halls of Topping; they had indisputably done the job on Lord Nicholson.

Did these monsters give credit to Vamberg's ravings about dark spirits and relationships with elementals? Had some fundamental secrets of spirit and matter been revealed to them?

The thought broke off with the approach of Sparks.

"How many did you kill?" he asked quietly.

"Chandros. The Bishop. Probably Vamberg."

"Alexander?"

Doyle shook his head.

"Wait here," he said, patted Doyle on the shoulder, and crept out of sight.

"I killed him. That horrible man," said Eileen, her eyes still closed.

"Yes, you did."

"Good."

She lay quietly in his arms. Sparks returned minutes later with two servant's outfits and, even more welcome, warm woolen coats. They changed behind the barrels as Sparks kept vigil. Eileen stuffed her hair under a mobcap.

Through a gap in the barrels, they looked out at a grounds-eye view of the courtyard where Doyle had earlier seen Jack slip from under the wagon. Servants and convicts ran in every direction. Panicked horses reared as they were held at rein before wagons and carriages. Platoons of guards gathered and dispatched under the direction of officers.

"Evacuation," said Sparks quietly. "The soldiers will arrive in time to mop most of this lot up."

"They won't fight?" asked Doyle.

"Not without orders. And we've ruptured their chain of command."

"What about Drummond?"

"He won't make a stand unless Alexander is with him."

"Maybe he is."

"There's no cause on earth for which he'd sacrifice himself. He's miles from here by now."

"Where will he go?" asked Eileen.

Sparks shook his head.

"What about Prince Eddy?" asked Doyle.

"I would imagine Gull's already gotten him well away."

'To where?"

"Back to his train. Back to Balmoral. He's not much good to them now."

"He'll probably sleep through it," said Eileen.

"They wouldn't keep him a hostage?" asked Doyle.

"To what purpose? They'd be hunted down like dogs. He can't harm them as a witness. Why would they risk confiding in him? He was the guest of some distinguished citizens for a country weekend."

"If that's the case, we've beaten them, Jack. They've given up."

"Perhaps."

A more troubling question occurred to Doyle. "Why haven't they come after us?"

"They've got a few other wickets to mind, don't they?" said Eileen.

"They will," said Sparks quietly. "Not tonight, or the night after. But they will."

A long silence followed.

"How do we get out of here?" asked Doyle.

"Through that gate," said Sparks, pointing at an exit leading toward the factory.

"How do we manage it?"

"Simple, my dear Doyle. We'll walk."

Sparks stood and headed out from behind the barrels. Doyle and Eileen followed, heads down, blending into the milling mix of the courtyard. No one stopped or questioned them. It wasn't long before they cleared the open gates and left the walls of Ravenscar behind.

The path led directly to the biscuit factory. Jaundiced electric lights lit up entrances as figures scurried in and out its open doors. To the west behind the hulking structure lay the moors, what remained of the snowfall glowing faintly in the moonlight. Sparks stopped where the railroad tracks branched toward the factory loading dock.