Gordon Dahlquist - The Dark Volume

Miss Temple did not answer him, glaring again at Tackham. Rawsbarthe leaned forward with difficulty. His chin quivered and suddenly Miss Temple wondered where he had been in the house all this intervening time. Even from the upstairs room, his condition had precipitously declined.

“Will you tell us?” he croaked.

“Why should I, given these peremptory gentlemen?”

“It would be indelicate to say,” drawled Tackham, “but I should be more than happy to show you.”

“Captain Tackham!” cried Rawsbarthe. “I believe you have tasks other than drunken insolence! You will inquire as to the readiness of your charges, at once!”

“I was told to wait—”

“And I am telling you to go!”

The officer met Rawsbarthe's gaze—and his trembling jaw—and then mockingly clicked his heels. He cast a last glance at Miss Temple. Then he was gone.

“Mr. Harcourt, as soon as Miss Stearne reveals Lord Vandaariff's location, you will take the news to Mr. Phelps alone.”

“Yes, sir.”

“If I tell you,” Miss Temple asked, “will you let me see the children?”

“It is not your place to bargain,” wheezed Rawsbarthe.

Miss Temple was certain that as they stood talking, no matter what Rawsbarthe intended to do, Captain Tackham would carry the children farther and farther from her grasp.

“ Well then.” She tugged on a dangling chestnut curl, and then exhaled with a tinge of boredom. “It is the simplest thing to learn where a person is—one merely has to know where he isn't . Lord Vandaariff is not at any dwelling or place of business, or you would have found him long ago. He is not anywhere related to his business, or his family. His daughter is gone. His recent companions of close council are gone as well, all off to Macklenburg. Of course, such a man has secrets —yet with the destruction of his home, he must suppose those secrets compromised . He must turn to others, and so one returns to these absent companions. Which of them possesses resources he might rely upon… or take outright.”

“If he were in the shelter of Crabbé,” whispered Rawsbarthe, “the Ministry would know it.”

“So he is not,” said Miss Temple. “And neither the Contessa nor the Comte have an organization of people . It leaves only Francis Xonck, and the power of Xonck Armaments.”

“But… but Francis Xonck…” Harcourt looked nervously to Rawsbarthe.

“Was here this very day,” said Miss Temple. “I know it.”

“Yet if Francis Xonck could not find him…” began Rawsbarthe.

“Then it is not Francis Xonck Lord Vandaariff is with.”

Neither man spoke. Rawsbarthe stared at Miss Temple, his fingers gripping the divan at some internal pang.

“Go to Phelps,” he hissed. “It is the sister after all.”

HARCOURT RUSHED from the room. Miss Temple followed him to the door and locked it. From the corridor she heard Colonel Aspiche roaring to his men. She turned to the wheezing man on the divan.

“You are not well, Andrew. And now you have quite compromised yourself. When it is known who I am, she will be angry.”

“Then she must not know.”

“She knows already. Have you not sent Tackham to her? She will snatch my image from his mind.”

“I resent this very much indeed,” Rawsbarthe muttered. He coughed weakly. Tears glazed his eyes.

“Come, come,” she said, with a brightness that would not convince a trusting dog. “You forget that I am well acquainted with the woman. Indeed, I am acquainted with her as a woman. Up you go!”

She took his arm carefully with her case-hand, guiding him from the sofa and toward the inner door.

“We cannot—”

“If I leave you here, you will simply die, like Mr. Soames.”

“And the Duke,” he sighed, as if this were a terrible admission.

“And the horrid Duke,” she agreed. “But the truth is, Andrew, the Duke of Stäelmaere was killed some days ago. He was shot through the heart in the quarry at Tarr Manor, and by the lover of a Macklenburg spy at that.”

Rawsbarthe wobbled as Miss Temple reached for the doorknob.

“I had no idea.”

“It is a world of secrets.”

THEY PASSED through another shuttered parlor and another after that, Miss Temple closing each door behind with a flick of her boot.

“I have always found you beautiful,” wheezed Rawsbarthe.

“Well, that is most kind of you, I'm sure.”

“What you said to me earlier—about my being ushered into a room, and not remembering…”

“The truth is better for us all, Mr. Rawsbarthe.”

“That is a terrible lie! The truth is a plague!”

“Mr. Rawsbarthe—”

“Andrew!”

She felt the clawlike grip of his fingers on her arm as she opened the next door. Beyond lay a table spread with white cloth, dotted with small reddish stains.

“Can you smell her?” she asked.

“I cannot smell myself,” he whimpered. “Though any mirror says I ought to.”

“She has left with Captain Tackham and the children.”

“What does she look like exactly?”

“You have seen her yourself, Mr. Rawsbarthe.”

“Andrew,” he whined.

“Andrew —you have seen her. She has seen you. Have you no memory of it at all?”

He shook his head dumbly. “I saw your man,” he said.

“What man?” Miss Temple had grown impatient and pulled him round the table to the door. “Roger?”

“Roger is dead. And I have been thinking, since we spoke—you will wonder that I have come back to find you—but all of what you said has been gnawing at my mind, and—I will say it—at my body. I can imagine where you have been, what you have done, what experiences you have cast yourself open to, what wanton impulses—”

“Mr. Rawsbarthe—”

“Do not deny it! I am speaking of your criminal!”

Miss Temple's hand was on the knob, but stopped mid-turn.

“You saw Cardinal Chang? At the station?”

“Of course not. At the Trappings'.”

“When was that? What were you doing? What was Chang doing?”

“Looking for her.”

“Mrs. Trapping?”

“Why should you care for him?” Rawsbarthe whined. “He is a brute! Your curls are so beautiful—”

Rawsbarthe erupted in a coughing fit. His face was bright with fever. Clumps of hair fringed his lapels. His eyes had acquired a slick cerulean oil, and she doubted he could see a thing. Miss Temple pulled free. He sank against the table. She retreated to the far door.

“Where are you going?” he rasped, his voice shrill with concern.

“I must find Captain Tackham. I will return, I promise!”

“You will not!” Rawsbarthe moaned, then toppled. He scrabbled to steady himself but found only the tablecloth, balling it up in his hands. He collapsed to the floor with a shriek, pulling the white sheet on top of him. Miss Temple plunged into the darkness of another room.

RAWSBARTHE'S PLAINTIVE cries ( “Celeste! Celeste!”) penetrated the door to Miss Temple's back, but she did not pause. She followed Mrs. Marchmoor's path, the smell growing more bitter and the stains more bright until she finally emerged in a far part of the garden, lined with hedges. Crushed on the threshold was a broken chocolate biscuit.

The glass woman's journey to Harschmort had yielded nothing. In the absence of the book, and the Comte's machines, and Vandaariff, was Mrs. Marchmoor in flight? Or did she follow some desperate strategy? One thing was sure: since the children had been taken out this way, not back through the house, Mrs. Marchmoor did not intend a return via carriage or train…