Douglas Preston - The Obsidian Chamber

“What do you think of my composition?” Diogenes asked. “You played it beautifully, by the way. I hope I managed to catch some of the contrapuntal fire of Alkan, in one of his more conservative moods.”

“It is unwise of you to bring up Alkan,” Constance replied. “It will only make your end more painful.”

There was a pause. And then: “You are right. That remark must have seemed — no, it was —insensitive. That was not my intention. That was my old self speaking. You have my apology.”

On one level, Constance could not believe — simply could not comprehend — that she was speaking, conversing , with the man who had lied to her, seduced her for his own perverse ends, and then discarded her with such triumphant scorn and contempt. What was he doing here — and why? No doubt to humiliate her further.

Diogenes said nothing. The silence lengthened. Still she bided her time. “So Aloysius was right,” she said. “He warned me to expect a confrontation: and now it has come. Assume nothing —those were his words. So that was you, in the tunnels beneath Oldham? That was you he saw, standing on the Exmouth dunes, watching us?”

Silence.

“And now your revenge upon your family is complete. Congratulations. Aloysius is dead — thanks to that thing you released. You think you are here to toy with me again. You think you can seduce me a second time, with your poetry and effete aesthetics and all the rest of your intellectual ordure . And then, when the moment is ripe, you’ll slip the knife in— again .”

“No, Constance.”

She went on, “Except, connard , it is I who will slip in the knife: an emasculating slash. I cannot wait to see the look on your face when I do. I saw it once before, you know: on that day when I pushed you over the lip of the volcano. It was the surprised look of a man losing his manhood.”

As she spoke, she felt the fury begin to rise again. She willed herself to stop talking, to let the cold composure return so that, when the chance arose, she wouldn’t miss.

At last, Diogenes spoke again.

“I’m sorry, Constance, but you’re wrong. Wrong about my actions — and utterly wrong about my motivations.”

Constance did not reply. She was calm once again. And the hand that grasped the stiletto was ready to dart forward and thrust home at the slightest indication of sound or movement. The years spent in the dark spaces of this sub-basement had sharpened her senses like a cat’s — odd it was taking so long for her eyes to accustom themselves to the blackness. She had been too long in the light.

“Let me assure you of one thing. I do not seek revenge on my brother or anyone else. No longer. Now my aim is different. Your hatred changed me. Your singular pursuit changed me. The volcano changed me. I’m a different man, transformed— reformed . The reason I am here, Constance, is because you are here.”

Constance said nothing. His voice seemed to be getting stronger, as if he were edging closer. Just a few steps more… a few steps more…

“I will be honest with you. You deserve nothing less — and besides, your high intelligence would see through any deception. By the time I’m done, you will know I am telling the truth: I promise you that.”

A brief pause.

“True: there was a time when I desperately wanted to see my brother suffer, as I had suffered as a child. Back then, I regarded you — forgive my bluntness — as merely a path to help destroy Aloysius. You see, Constance, I didn’t know you then .”

In her stockinged feet, she took a slow step toward his voice. And another.

“I was horribly injured by the fall into La Sciara. During the months of recovery, I had a lot of time to think. I did harbor notions of revenge toward you. But then — and, Constance, it happened so suddenly it was like a veil being torn from a window — all of that changed. I recognized my anger for what it truly was: another emotion altogether. My true feelings. ”

She maintained silence. Diogenes had used such words on her before. At the time, they’d had the effect he had desired. She had drunk them in like water thrown on a parched garden.

“Let me explain why I feel — for want of a better term — a reverence for you. First, you’re the only person I’ve met who is my intellectual equal. And, perhaps, my emotional equal. Second: you bested me. I had to respect that. I made the mistake of toying with you, and you responded with the most astonishing vigor and singularity of purpose that I have ever seen in a human being. It awed me.”

Another step forward.

“Reverence. And respect. There are few people on this earth that I respect, living or dead. You are one. And thanks to my ancestor Dr. Enoch Leng, you have led a long and rich life. His elixir kept you young for over a century. It was only with his death that you, like the rest of us, began to age normally. The upshot of this is that you sport more than six times my scholarship.”

Diogenes laughed at this observation. But there was nothing snide or sarcastic in it: it was a light, self-effacing laugh.

“There is something else that I find most attractive about your long life span. You’ve lived . You are the one person whose thirst for knowledge, for revenge — and, if I may allude to something else as well, passion —has astonished me with its ferocity. Constance, I not only admire you, but I’m afraid of you. I realized this as I lay, recovering, in a small hut outside Ginostra, under the volcano, listening to the booming of Stromboli. It was humbling, because prior to that I feared nobody, man or woman. Now I do fear one woman .”

She slid another step forward in utter silence. She sensed he was there, mere feet from her. One more step and she could lunge…

“Which brings me to the other thing vital to understanding our connection: you are the mother of my son. ”

In utter silence, she leapt forward and thrust the stiletto — into thin air.

“Ah, Constance. That saddens me. But I don’t blame you.”

Constance listened, motionless, in the dark. The voice had moved. Somehow he anticipated it. Or was he that close, after all? The echoes in the stone room, with its myriad doors and air shafts — combined with his low, soft voice — made it impossible to be sure.

“You see, Constance, I am convinced you are the one human being who, deep down, is capable of sharing my own peculiar view of life. Let’s face it — we’re misfits. We’re misanthropes, cut from the same cloth.”

It took Constance a moment to parse the meaning of what Diogenes had said. When she did, her grasp tightened on the stiletto.

“That is the crux of it,” Diogenes went on. “I was blind; I didn’t see. Now I do. We’re alike in so very many ways. In others you are my superior. Is it any wonder, then, that my reverence for you has only grown?”

For a moment Constance thought that Diogenes would say more. But now the blackness around her became filled with silence — a silence that stretched on, and still on. Finally, she broke it herself.

“What have you done with Mrs. Trask?”

“Nothing. She remains in Albany, at the side of her sister — who is taking a little longer to recuperate than initially expected. Have no fear: it is not serious. And Mrs. Trask is easy in her mind, having received assurances that you are being well cared for here.”

“Cared for? By Proctor, I suppose. I imagine you’ve murdered him.”

“Proctor? He’s not dead. He’s rather preoccupied at the moment, though, on an unexpected trek across the Kalahari Desert.”

The desert? Could he be telling the truth? Proctor would never leave the house defenseless while she was in residence. So much of what he was saying was shocking… and unbelievable.