Steven Harper - The Doomsday Vault

“It’s so much to take in.” Alice squeezed his hand. “But I’m thrilled, Norbert. Absolutely thrilled.”

“Congratulations,” Mrs. Leeds said. Alice started. It was the first word the woman had spoken, and Alice had quite forgotten she was there.

“We must celebrate!” Norbert said. “It’s a bit early in the day for a mixed drink, but it’s never too early for champagne, eh?” He pressed another button, and the footman arrived with a dark bottle in a silver ice bucket. Behind trotted a familiar figure.

“Click?” Alice said. “What on earth are you doing here?”

Click jumped up to the tabletop, nearly upsetting Alice’s salmon plate. He opened his mouth, and a man’s voice said, “ ‘Dear Miss Michaels: I hope this letter finds you and your father in good health and good spirits. I am solicitor to your esteemed aunt Edwina, and I must request your presence at a most urgent meeting. It is with great hope I request that you come to my office with all haste at your earliest possible convenience. Your dutiful servant, Harold Stoneworthy.’ ” An address followed, and Click closed his mouth. Alice stared in mute astonishment.

“Extraordinary,” Norbert murmured.

“I didn’t know he could do that,” Alice said, curiosity and surprise both warring for supremacy in her breast. “Norbert, I’m sorry, but this appears to be an emergency and I must leave. Can your footman call me a cab, or-”

“Nonsense! I’ll accompany you in my carriage.”

“Thank you,” Alice said, “but I think this is a private matter, and although you’re my fiance, we aren’t yet married, and I suspect Mr. Stoneworthy won’t speak with you. It would be silly for you to ride all the way down there and then sit in his waiting room, darling.”

“Hm. I suppose you’re right,” Norbert said, apparently mollified by Alice’s use of the word darling. “But I shall send you in my carriage, nonetheless. And now that I think of it, I should have one built for you, as a wedding present, perhaps.”

“Oh! I’m overwhelmed.” Alice got to her feet, and Norbert leapt to his. Mrs. Leeds finished a row and unwound more yarn. “And I really must go.”

“Do I get a good-bye kiss?” he asked, moving around the table.

“My goodness, I suppose you do. Darling.”

Her first kiss. Norbert cupped her face gently in both hands and leaned in. Alice waited, not knowing what to expect. She had read a number of romantic novels, of course, and she had long come to suspect that, lurid descriptions to the contrary, real kissing couldn’t possibly transport either party to the gates of ecstasy and back. Still, she found herself hoping, even through the soft click of Mrs. Leeds’s knitting needles. Norbert’s lips softly brushed hers

— and then he pulled away. “Thank you, darling. Let me know what the solicitor says, would you?”

The horse and carriage delivered Alice and Click to the offices of Stoneworthy, Marvins, and Lott, a tastefully small brownstone with an equally small sign hanging near the door. As Alice alighted, a flicker of motion caught the tail of her eye, and she glanced upward. On the roof one building over from the law office was a familiar figure. It wore a long brown coat, and a white skull mask covered the upper half of its face. The figure grinned its wide, dreadful grin and waved at Alice. A cold finger slid down Alice’s spine. She cast about, but no one else on the street seemed to notice the figure, and no policemen were in sight. Before Alice could react further, the figure threw a small package into the air over the street. Alice shouted a warning, but it was lost in a loud boom as the package exploded. Horses reared in harnesses. People screamed and covered their ears or ran for cover. Alice ducked into the doorway of the law office with Click hiding beneath her skirts as a shower of little papers fell like snowflakes. She caught one.

Written on one side was a musical staff with a single interval: a C and an F-sharp. On the back were the words I REMEMBER.

Alice gasped and looked up at the rooftop, but the figure was gone. Heart pounding, Alice hurried into the law office, where a clerk who seemed oblivious to the goings-on outside immediately showed her and Click into Mr. Stoneworthy’s private sanctuary, an office laid with carpet and lined with books. The desk was piled so high with papers that Alice could barely see the round figure of Mr. Stoneworthy on the other side.

“So good of you to come so quickly, Miss Michaels,” he said in a surprisingly flutelike voice. Someone so rotund and white-haired should have a deep voice. “Are you quite all right? I heard some sort of commotion outdoors.”

“I’ll be fine,” she said. “It was nothing.” But she couldn’t help wondering what the figure-the clockworker who had controlled the zombies-meant by I remember . A warning? A simple greeting? If he had wanted to harm her, he had every opportunity while she was walking obliviously past. And how had he known where she would be? Perhaps he had been following her or spying on her in some other way. The thought turned her stomach.

“You’re looking positively peaked, Miss Michaels,” said Mr. Stoneworthy. “Would you like some refreshment?”

“I’ve just come off lunch, but thank you,” Alice said, pushing thoughts of the clockworker away, which only allowed the reason for her visit to catch up with her. A call for an emergency visit to Aunt Edwina’s solicitor could only mean dreadful news, and although Alice hadn’t seen Aunt Edwina in more than a dozen years, she still felt a certain fondness for the woman, strange and estranged though she was. Nausea gave way to dread. Click sat next to her chair, his tail curled nonchalantly about his legs.

“Then I won’t keep you in suspense,” Mr. Stoneworthy said. He coughed into a handkerchief, belying the promise he had just made. “Pardon. I’m afraid it is my duty to inform you that you are the sole heir to the estate of your aunt Edwina.”

The chair rocked beneath Alice’s body, and she gripped the arms tightly. Tears welled in her eyes, and her throat thickened. Surprised at the strength of her reaction, she could only murmur, “Good heavens.”

Mr. Stoneworthy looked supremely uncomfortable. “Yes. Perhaps you would like some brandy?” Without waiting for an answer, he raised his voice. “Dickerson! Some brandy for Miss Michaels!”

A glass was pushed into her hand, and Alice drank without thinking. The brandy, her first, burned all the way down and pushed away the tears. She felt more able to speak. “How did she… pass away? And when? And why wasn’t my father notified?”

“She hasn’t died, exactly,” Mr. Stoneworthy said. “She’s missing.”

“Missing? I don’t understand.”

Mr. Stoneworthy coughed into his handkerchief again, and this time Alice caught him peeking at the contents. She hoped he didn’t have consumption, or worse, the clockwork plague. “You’re probably aware that your aunt was a bit… eccentric, yes?”

“She has her ways,” Alice said, feeling suddenly defensive.

“One of those ways was to send a letter to this office every month. I was instructed that if the letter should fail to arrive for twelve consecutive months, I was to execute her will. It names you as the sole heir to her estate.”

“So she’s definitely not dead?” Alice demanded. Click made a mechanical mew at her feet.

“I frankly don’t know,” Mr. Stoneworthy replied blandly. “I’m merely following her instructions.”

“But I’m… I can’t inherit her estate!”

He put on a pair of reading glasses that made him look like Father Christmas and examined a long piece of paper. “You are Miss Alice Michaels, daughter of Arthur, Baron Michaels, of London?”