The Martian Ambassador (14 page)

‘Venus?’ Blackwood said incredulously. ‘Are you sure?’

‘I’m quite sure, Thomas,’ replied Sophia.

They were sitting in Blackwood’s office at the Bureau of Clandestine Affairs, having taken the late omnibus from Taunton to London the previous evening. The strange metal fragment left behind by Spring-Heeled Jack at the Alsop residence lay on the desk between them, its iridescent surface contrasting strangely with the green Moroccan leather of the desktop.

Sophia had just come from the Society for Psychical Research in Kensington and had brought the report on the fragment’s analysis, which she handed to Blackwood. He leafed through the pages, raising his eyebrows in gradual increments until his expression was one of unalloyed astonishment.

‘The chemical analysis correlates quite strikingly with the impressions experienced by our psychometrists,’ said Sophia. ‘They bear each other out to such an extent that I don’t think there’s any room for doubt: this piece of metal came from the planet Venus.’

‘Quite so, my dear,’ Blackwood murmured as he continued to scan the pages. ‘Carbon dioxide… sulphur dioxide… inert nitrogen, silicates, carbonates, quartz. What a strange brew!’

Sophia leaned forward in her chair. ‘The really striking parallels are between the psychometrists. We asked our three most talented ones to hold the fragment and describe the psychic sensations it evoked. Of course, we kept them isolated from each other and did not offer them any information whatsoever on how we came by the artefact.’

Blackwood nodded. ‘A wise precaution.’

‘As you will see if you read from page four onwards, their psychic impressions were virtually identical.’

He did as Sophia suggested, and read aloud, ‘The air in the place from which this object came is hot and heavy… suffocating… unbearably oppressive. There is a livid yellow sky above me; I can see neither sun nor stars, for the firmament is obscured by thick, churning clouds. The ground below is hard and brittle… desiccated, with broken rocks strewn everywhere. It’s a horrible place – a dying place! No trace of green paints the distant mountains, whose jagged peaks reach up to the yellow sky as if begging for escape. This is not Earth… although it might be what Earth will become in future aeons, when the ancient Sun reaches out angrily to smite its children. No, it is not Earth: I feel that I am closer to the Sun here… a little closer… oh, the heat! It beats upon me, stifling, relentless!’

Blackwood turned the page to the account given by the second psychometrist. ‘I see vast ranges of orange dust and chaotically-strewn boulders… great valleys sweeping into indigo depths of hot shadow. Nothing moves on the plains: all is silence; all is death. But below… in the depths of the valleys, at the bottoms of deep gorges and chasms, and at the poles of this world… there are lights in the dark. There is life. Furtive, frightened, cloaking itself in eternal dusk, amidst the last of the boreal ice and in the darkness of vast caverns underground… there is life!’

Again, Blackwood turned the page and read the words of the third of the psychometrists who had held the metal fragment and opened their minds to the psychic impressions it generated. ‘A mighty civilisation once dwelled upon this world. Rich in ability but poor in wisdom, it ate and drank of its resources, stripping the world bare with its ceaseless activity. Its industry was an insatiable maw into which all was hurled, until all was machine, and the machine breathed in the air of life and exhaled the miasma of death, and the world was covered with it … and all the while the nearby Sun continued to pour its light and warmth upon the surface of the world, until the world became overheated with the ceaselessness of the machine and the brightness of the Sun… and began to suffocate. And the people looked with hatred upon their ruined world, for they did not regret their excesses and believed the world to have betrayed them, and they retreated to the poles and into caverns they made with their great machines, which had become no more than shovels to dig their ultimate graves. And there they wait, wondering what will become of them…’

Blackwood laid the pages aside and gave a deep sigh. ‘Good grief, Sophia, what a strange and terrible picture your psychics have painted!’

‘Monstrous, isn’t it? I could barely bring myself to read those descriptions. What a horrible, tragic place it must be!’ Sophia suppressed a shudder and sipped at the tea which Blackwood’s secretary had prepared for her.

‘I see that there’s no actual description of the Venusians themselves,’ said Blackwood. ‘Why is that? Were the psychic impressions not powerful enough to provide even a glimpse?’

‘Yes, they were,’ Sophia replied. ‘But not one of the psychometrists could bring himself to write down a description of them.’

‘Why not?’

Sophia hesitated, and Blackwood now saw genuine fear in her eyes. ‘Because of what they looked like. They were horrible beyond words – indescribably awful. I spoke with the psychometrists myself, and asked them to give me just a vague description… but they wouldn’t, and they became visibly distressed even at the question.’

Blackwood raised his eyebrows. ‘I see.’

At that moment, there was a high-pitched whistle, and a small cylinder of paper dropped from the vacuum tube beside Blackwood’s desk into a tray at his elbow. He took the cylinder, unrolled it and read the brief message it contained. ‘Grandfather would like to see us,’ he said.

*

‘Have you seen the papers?’ Grandfather growled. He was leaning over his desk as Blackwood and Sophia entered his office. Several newspapers were spread out before him, including
The Times
,
The Telegraph
,
The Daily News
and
The Morning Post
. He took up
The Times
and thrust it at Blackwood, who accepted it and scanned the front page. The report’s heading brought a frown of consternation to his brow:

SPRING-HEELED JACK STRIKES AGAIN

_____

‘MARS WILL TRIUMPH!’ HE SHOUTS AS HE ATTACKS PASSERSBY ACROSS LONDON AND THE HOME COUNTIES

WHAT CAN IT MEAN?

_____

NOW, HE ADDS MURDER TO HIS LIST OF CRIMES

_____

A SENTRY AT THE ALDERSHOT BARRACKS SET UPON BY THE MANIAC

‘Murder?’ said Blackwood. ‘He killed a soldier?’

Grandfather shook his head. ‘Some poor girl in Bermondsey: threw her into a sewer and watched her drown, he did!’

‘Oh!’ Sophia put a hand to her mouth in horror.

Grandfather glanced at her. ‘Do forgive me, your Ladyship. I did not mean to shock you so. Please, take a seat, both of you.’

‘Did he really say that?’ asked Blackwood. ‘Did he really say that Mars will triumph?’

‘New Scotland Temple are investigating,’ Grandfather replied. ‘So far, they have testimony from at least a dozen witnesses that that is
exactly
what he said. But what the deuce it means, I have no idea, for the brute is clearly no Martian.’

‘Indeed not,’ Blackwood replied in a measured tone. ‘In fact, we have evidence to suggest that he hails from Venus.’

‘
What?
’ Grandfather spluttered. ‘What the dickens are you talking about, man?’

‘It’s quite true, I assure you sir,’ said Sophia, as she handed the SPR report and the waxed envelope containing the metal fragment across the desk to him.

Grandfather took them both and glanced at the envelope. ‘This is the thing you showed me yesterday.’

Sophia nodded. ‘And you also have there the metallurgical and psychometrical analyses. Our chemists and psychometrists concur that the fragment originated on Venus.’

Grandfather read the report, periodically muttering to himself in amazement as he did so.

Blackwood waited for him to finish and then said, ‘It looks like you were right, sir: there
does
seem to be a connection between the activities of Spring-Heeled Jack and the death of Ambassador R’ondd – a connection which is strengthened by what we were told by Andrew Crosse.’

‘Explain,’ said Grandfather.

Blackwood described their questioning of the amateur scientist the previous day, along with his description of his singular visitor, who had called himself ‘Indrid Cold’.

‘If this Johnnie
is
from Venus,’ said Grandfather when his Special Investigator had finished, ‘then why in God’s name is he babbling about a Martian victory?’ He picked up
The Times
again and waved it at Blackwood. ‘Lord knows, I’ve no particular liking for journalists, but they ask a fair question: what
can
it mean?’

‘I’m afraid that has yet to be ascertained, sir,’ replied Blackwood with a sigh. ‘As far as we were aware, there
was
no life on Venus – at least, no
intelligent
life. And yet, apparently there is…’

Grandfather grunted. ‘Well, how could we have known for sure? Our new Æther zeppelins have yet to be tested in the depths of space, although of course there are now designs afoot to build craft capable of reaching Mars.’ He slapped the paper down on his desk. ‘One thing’s for sure: this “Mars will triumph” business puts us in the wrong ditch, and we’d better climb out of it before people start thinking that the Martians are behind all this.’

‘Can we be absolutely sure that they’re not?’ asked Blackwood.

Grandfather sat back in his chair and gave his Investigator an appraising look. ‘What, you mean employ some ruffian from another planet to attack the centre of the British Empire, and then assassinate their own Ambassador? What could they possibly gain from such a plan?’

‘Perhaps they need an excuse to attack Earth,’ Blackwood replied.

Sophia glanced at him in shock. ‘Thomas! I mean… Mr Blackwood! Do you really think so?’

‘I really don’t know. But we’ll do well to examine all possibilities.’

‘Hmm,’ said Grandfather. ‘Well, examine as much as you want, but do it quickly. Time is rapidly becoming our enemy.’ He picked up a piece of paper from his desk and handed it to Blackwood, who read it.

‘They’ve brought forward the departure of the interplanetary cylinder from the twenty-ninth!’

‘Quite so,’ said Grandfather. ‘It lifts off from Biggin Hill Cosmodrome at ten forty-five tomorrow morning. Personnel from the Martian Embassy have already retrieved the Ambassador’s body from us and are preparing it for its journey as we speak.’

‘But why?’ wondered Sophia. ‘Why bring the departure forward?’

‘Her Majesty wanted to prove to the Martian Government that we have made some significant progress with our investigation,’ Blackwood replied. ‘She wanted to include that information in her letter of condolence. Perhaps someone on Mars doesn’t want that to happen: perhaps someone wants Lunan R’ondd’s body to be sent home
without
an explanation.’

‘That would certainly cause a great deal of upset,’ conceded Grandfather.

‘Even anger,’ Sophia added.

‘There is a great deal we don’t know about the political situation on Mars,’ Blackwood continued. ‘There may well be factions there who don’t want anything to do with Earth, or with Humanity. It’s possible that there are influences at work of which we know nothing, but which are working against the continued forging of peaceful relations between the two planets.’

‘But where does Venus fit into all this?’ demanded Grandfather.

Blackwood fell silent, suddenly lost in thought.

Grandfather sighed. ‘Well, whatever the answer, it’s quite clear we’re operating on two fronts. Blackwood, I’d like you to go to the Martian Embassy and have a chat with the Ambassador’s Assistant… what’s the fellow’s name?’

‘Petrox Voronezh.’

‘That’s the chap. Find out what, if anything, the Martians know of Venus. They’re streets ahead of us when it comes to interplanetary travel, after all, and they may have some information that we could use to our advantage.’

Blackwood nodded.

‘Shall I go too?’ asked Sophia.

‘No, my dear,’ replied Grandfather. ‘I would like you to liaise with New Scotland Temple. I believe they’ve put one of their best men on the Spring-Heeled Jack case – Detective Gerhard de Chardin…’

‘I know Detective de Chardin,’ Sophia said. ‘We have collaborated once or twice in the past on cases of a supernatural nature.’

‘Excellent. Then join forces with him once again and interview as many witnesses to last night’s attacks as you can. I’m willing to wager that the oaf didn’t just vanish into thin air once he’d had his fun! He must have gone somewhere. See if you can’t gather any clues as to where that might be. We have about twenty-four hours until that cylinder departs. Let’s see if we can put a little more information onboard!’

Blackwood took a hansom to Chesham Place and got out in front of a large, elegant building overlooking Belgrave Square. The building was of five storeys, its walls whitewashed to pristine brightness, the columns about its portico tall and slender; in fact, there was nothing in its external appearance to suggest that it contained the diplomatic mission of a distant world.

This impression of normality was quickly dispelled, however, when Blackwood rang the bell beside the heavy oak door, which was firmly locked. A thin, high-pitched voice issued from the ornately-fashioned brass loudspeaker grille beside the bell-pull.

‘Yes?’

‘My name is Thomas Blackwood. I am here on Crown business.’

A moment later, there was a faint buzz and the sharp
clack
of a withdrawing bolt, and the door unlocked – apparently, Blackwood guessed, by means of some remotely-operated electrical mechanism.

The door swung open on soundless hinges, and he stepped into an expansive foyer, at the far end of which a Martian, formally dressed in a shimmering blue suit and wearing full breathing apparatus, sat behind a desk that appeared to be fashioned from a large slab of highly-polished mottled stone akin to onyx.

Blackwood walked across the marble floor and came to a halt before the desk. Even though the Martian was sitting down, his large head, which presented aspects of the avian and reptilian in equal measure, was on a level with Blackwood’s.

‘Good morning, sir,’ said the Martian.

‘Good morning.’ Blackwood withdrew his calling card and placed it on the strangely-patterned surface of the desk. ‘I am investigating the death of Ambassador R’ondd on behalf of Her Majesty’s Government, and I wonder if it would be possible to speak with Mr Petrox Voronezh.’

The Martian lowered his huge, dark eyes to the card and regarded it in silence for several moments, as if trying to decipher the characters printed upon it. Then, suddenly, a piercing twitter escaped from the speaker grille set into the burnished neck ring of his breathing apparatus. Blackwood winced as the Martian language stabbed at his eardrums.

Almost immediately, another Martian appeared in a nearby doorway and ambled across the floor towards them. A brief exchange ensued in their bizarre, chirruping language, after which the new arrival took the calling card and vanished once again through the door.

‘If you would care to take a seat, Mr Blackwood,’ said the Martian behind the reception desk, ‘my colleague will inform Petrox Voronezh of your desire to speak with him.’

‘Thank you.’ Blackwood glanced around at the Chesterfield standing against the wall to his left and sat himself down. While he waited, he allowed his mind to turn over the various aspects of the case which he and Sophia had so far uncovered. As was his habit, he thought in brief phrases, examining each in turn, much in the manner of an antiquary browsing amongst curious artefacts:

Ambassador murdered by means of artificial life forms… Andrew Crosse, their creator, visited by a strange man calling himself Indrid Cold… who may be Spring-Heeled Jack… apparently from Venus… takes a sample of the creatures… somehow introduces them into R’ondd’s breathing apparatus… how does he do that? Past Martian security? Unlikely.

A Venusian attacking people in London… the heart of the Empire… shouting ‘Mars will triumph!’… to what purpose? Is he in the employ of the Martians? Again… why? If they wanted to attack us, why not simply do so? Unless such an attack would be considered an outrage by the majority of the Martian people. An excuse, then: an
agent provocateur
to sow seeds of mistrust and hatred between the two species.

They know we’re building new Æther zeppelins with a range sufficient to reach Mars. Do they want that? At the moment, we have to request passage on their cylinders if we want to go to Mars… that will soon change. Is that enough to make them want to destroy us? Is the forging of economic and cultural relations between our two worlds nothing more than a ruse, a means by which they can learn of our strengths and weaknesses? Perhaps… but what the deuce is the Venus connection?

Blackwood’s thoughts were interrupted by the return of the Martian who had taken his card and who now stood towering above him. ‘Petrox Voronezh will see you now, Mr Blackwood,’ he said.

Blackwood got to his feet. ‘Thank you.’

As they crossed the foyer, the Martian said, ‘Have you ever been in our environment?’

Somewhat taken aback by the question, Blackwood shook his head. ‘No… no, I have not.’ He had expected Voronezh to don breathing apparatus and meet him in the atmosphere of Earth, as a courtesy. He was slightly irritated that the opposite was apparently the case. And yet, he supposed, this
was
Martian territory…
When in Rome
, he thought, philosophically.

It was only when he followed his guide through the door from which he had originally appeared that Blackwood realised the reason for this apparent incivility. The room in which he found himself was unremarkable save for the rows of breathing apparatuses hanging upon one wall, like the disembodied heads of weird automata, and the large, circular metal door which dominated the far wall.

An airlock
, Blackwood thought.
Of course! The entire building must be given over to the Martian atmosphere. The rooms must be hermetically sealed to preserve the correct proportion of gases. Voronezh isn’t being discourteous in bidding me enter the Embassy-proper – quite the opposite, in fact! It would have been impolite – not to mention indiscreet – to hold a conversation in the foyer.

Blackwood’s guide selected one of the smaller items of headgear and turned to him. ‘If you will allow me, sir…’

‘Of course.’

The Martian placed the bulbous helmet of the breathing apparatus over Blackwood’s head and helped him into the harness supporting the air tanks. ‘We keep several of these smaller types,’ he explained as he began to manipulate knobs and switches beyond Blackwood’s field of view, ‘for humans visiting the Embassy. The tanks contain gases in the correct Earthly proportions, for a maximum duration of four hours.’

‘I see,’ said Blackwood. He was about to say more but was surprised into silence by the curious – and rather unpleasant – sensation of something pliable and slightly damp closing around his neck. ‘Ugh!’ he said.

‘Please do not be alarmed,’ said the Martian. ‘That is merely the neck ring self-sealing.’

Damned thing feels alive!
Blackwood thought, and then he added to himself,
Lunan R’ondd died in one of these...

Suppressing a shudder, he followed his guide to the circular metal door, which reminded him somewhat of the entrance to a bank vault. The Martian began to turn the large, five-spoked wheel at the centre of the door, and as he did so, Blackwood heard the faint hiss of well-oiled precision machinery.

The door swung slowly open – Blackwood noted that it was more than a foot thick – and they passed through into a rather smaller chamber whose walls were covered with what looked like air vents. The Martian closed the outer door and went to a wall panel covered with complex-looking levers and dials, from which numerous metal pipes sprouted before disappearing into the floor and ceiling.

There was a loud hiss as the Martian completed his operation, and Blackwood felt goose pimples rise all over his body at the sudden touch of cold, unfamiliar air.

Presently, when the atmosphere of Earth had been replaced with that of Mars, Blackwood’s guide opened the inner airlock door and beckoned him through to another dressing room, where the Martian divested himself of his own breathing apparatus.

To Blackwood, the sight was surprising – shocking, even – for although he knew perfectly well what Martians looked like and had viewed Lunan R’ondd’s body in its dead nakedness, he had never seen a living Martian without his breathing apparatus. Although he hadn’t realised it, the helmets they wore, while affording an unobstructed view of their features, nevertheless acted as a kind of screen or barrier separating them from their environment on a subtle emotional level as well as a crudely physical one. The fact that Blackwood himself was now ensconced within his own apparatus did nothing to lessen the intense impression of
alienness
which the bare-headed Martian now evoked in him.

The Martian gave him a look which he perceived as strange even for that singular race. What was behind that look? he wondered. Was it due to a sudden sense of vulnerability… or perhaps the opposite?

I am at you mercy…

The thought sprang unbidden into Blackwood’s mind, and he could not banish it, for it struck him as profoundly true: just as the Martians in London were at the heart of the British Empire, so had he entered the heart of their presence on Earth. It was not a comfortable feeling, and it was only exacerbated by the self-sealing neck ring of the breathing apparatus which had closed so powerfully and cloyingly about his neck.

He followed his guide out of the dressing room and into a long corridor containing several doors. Blackwood noted the complete lack of Martian decoration; it might have been a corridor in any large and well-appointed house.

He mentioned this to his guide, who replied, ‘We do not consider corridors to be living spaces; even in our cities, they are rare and are unfurnished and undecorated. However, we are also well aware of our status as guests on your world, and as such we consider it discourteous to alter the appointment of any rooms, in any houses, which we may use. You will see what I mean when you are in the Assistant’s office.’

Blackwood tried to shrug, but it was no easy feat in the contraption he was wearing, and so he simply nodded and followed his guide to the end of the corridor, where the Martian chirruped loudly at a wide double door. An answering chirrup came immediately, and the Martian opened the door. ‘Please go in,’ he said and then, turning on his heels, started off down the corridor.

As soon as he stepped into Petrox Voronezh’s office, Blackwood understood what his guide had meant with his brief explanation of Martian decorative practices while on Earth. The room was tastefully furnished with a number of very fine pieces, and the intricately-patterned rug covering the parquet floor was evidently of Turkish provenance. Such was the elegance and harmony of the furnishings that Blackwood assumed that the choices must have been made by humans, perhaps at the behest of the building’s interplanetary residents.

And yet, the room also contained a number of exceedingly tall screens, some of which reached right up to the ceiling fifteen feet above Blackwood’s head. These screens, which were arranged about the room in a haphazard fashion (haphazard, at least, to human eyes), were painted with a variety of Martian scenes, which struck Blackwood as beautiful and
outré
in equal measure. There were desert scenes rendered in exquisite shades of red and ochre, sunsets of cloud-strewn pink and lilac, canals of glittering azure beneath million-starred night skies, and distant cities filled with pinpoints of light which seemed to flicker as Blackwood looked at them, their light catching and playing upon the strange geometries of the alien buildings.

‘Beautiful, aren’t they?’ said Petrox Voronezh, who had risen from his desk and was now approaching Blackwood.

‘Very.’

‘I confess I spend a few minutes every morning simply standing here amid the scenes of my home world. It – what is the English expression? – it sets me up for the day.’

‘You must miss it very much.’

‘I do.’ Voronezh offered Blackwood his hand and then indicated the single chair facing the desk. Blackwood noted that the desk was made of the same curious stone as the one in the foyer. He also noted that the cogitator which sat upon it was of a Martian design which appeared to operate on completely different principles to Earthly machines. In fact, there was only a complex keyboard and a scrying glass; of the cogitator itself, there was no sign.

‘May I ask what type of stone this is?’ asked Blackwood as he took the proffered chair.

‘Its name translates to English as World Mind Stone,’ replied Voronezh. ‘A rather clumsy phrase, I admit, but then, if you will forgive me for saying so, English is a rather clumsy language.’

‘World Mind Stone,’ Blackwood echoed, ignoring the slight.

‘We believe that our world is a conscious being and that its awareness is concentrated in certain minerals, including this.’ Voronezh gently laid a long-fingered hand upon the polished surface of the desk. ‘It gives us comfort to bring it with us when we visit other worlds.’

Other worlds
, thought Blackwood.
Plural. Interesting.
‘Certain humans have similar beliefs,’ he replied. ‘The shamanic cultures of the Americas and the Far East believe that everything has a soul, including animals, trees, rocks…’

‘I did not say “soul”, Mr Blackwood: I said “awareness”.’

‘Is there a difference?’

The Martian responded with a curious expression, which Blackwood took to be a smile. ‘Why do you wish to see me? Have you made any further progress in your investigation?’