The Honours (27 page)

The rope sliced Delphine's palms. She groaned with effort. If she lost her grip, Propp's sister would drop like a body on the gallows. She paid out the line inch by inch, breathing through gritted teeth.

She felt the rope slacken; the old lady had touched ground. Delphine tried to untie the rope from the trunk but the knot had pulled too tight. She sawed through it with her pocket knife.

Before she climbed onto the ladder herself, she felt her way back to the tea chest and pulled the sack from on top. She draped the sack over the raised trapdoor. If vesperi came down here, it might disguise her means of escape. Or draw their attention.

Deafened, palms stinging, her head pounding, her legs weak and numb, Delphine climbed down the ladder. The darkness pulsed with stars.

*
Anwen Stokeham (nee Prothero-Lloyd) 1833–1854. The one mention of her Delphine had found simply stated: ‘quiet, Welsh; died in house fire'.

CHAPTER 22

THE OLD LIE

T
he story came out of her in a gabbling rush. She told Mr Garforth about the black cloud that had smutted the horizon, the coarse ungainly monsters smashing their way into the house and swamping Mrs Hagstrom and the Professor, the beast with breeches and duelling pistol, the death of Dr Lansley, the masked stranger, Mr Propp alone in the master bedroom, the pistol shot, and her slow escape through the tunnel, dragging the drooling old woman on her blanket. Mr Garforth sat, not saying anything. He did not laugh, or get angry, or call Delphine a liar. Her throat felt sore from where the dagger had nicked it, and when she was done it felt sorer still.

‘There are my parents, Professor Carmichael, Miss DeGroot, the servants, maybe others. They were all in the Hall.'

Mr Garforth nodded. With Delphine's help, he had put Propp's sister to bed in the adjacent room, where she had immediately fallen asleep. The kettle began to whistle. He filled the teapot.

‘You knew this would happen, didn't you?' she said.

He exhaled.

‘You think I'd have sat here while they came for you? If I'd known?'

‘But you believe me. About the monsters.'

He glared into the dying fire. ‘I told you. I know everything that goes on in these woods.'

‘Why didn't you tell me?'

‘Because it's none of your business! You're a child. It was for your own good.' He glanced at her grazed and bloodied body. She saw him grimace at the welts on her palms. ‘I never thought they'd make it through.'

‘Who? Through what?'

‘The vesperi, the harka – any of the beasts throwing their lot in with Stokeham. Someone must have let them in.'

‘No one let them in,' she said. ‘I told you, they broke through the windows.'

‘Not into the Hall, you ninny. Into the
world
. Someone must have opened the channel on our side.'

Delphine threaded her fingers then used them as a cradle for her forehead. ‘What.'

‘Just leave it. This is estate business.'

She stared at a knot in the table, lines banding round it like ripples spreading from a black island.

‘What matters now is you're safe,' he said. ‘Once you've rested I'll get you as far as the village, then you can ca – '

‘Hush. I'm thinking.'

She concentrated on the gentle weight of her brow against her fingers, the throb of her rope-burned palms. The table had nicks in it where Mr Garforth had slipped with his tools. She listened to his breathing, the purr at the end of each out breath, and began to copy its rhythm. At the edges of her attention, she swore she heard ticking.

She looked up.

‘There's another world?'

‘This won't solve anything.'

‘I nearly died.'

Mr Garforth poured the tea. ‘You wouldn't understand.'

‘Then it won't matter if you tell me.'

He banged the pot down, slopping hot water. ‘Where d'you learn to be so damn stubborn?'

‘My Mother, who may be dead.' She let the riposte hang. ‘Now – what did you mean, someone “let them in”?'

Mr Garforth set a mug down in front of her. He turned his chair round and straddled it with his arms folded over the back. He gazed out the window.

‘They're from Avalonia. It's got older, truer names, but they don't care to learn those.' He unfolded his arms and rested his grubby fingers on the lip of the table, like a pianist. ‘It's not part of this world. It's somewhere else entirely. There are pathways – channels – that connect there and here. One is on this estate.'

‘And that's how these . . . vesperi got here?'

‘To the best of my knowledge. Never been there myself.'

‘But Mr Propp and Lord Alderberen and Dr Lansley – they have.'

Mr Garforth chewed his dentures. ‘Not Lansley – too young. Mr Propp and his Lordship say they have, and I've no reason to doubt them.'

‘Why did they . . . I mean, how did you, uh . . . '

‘Why would they tell someone like
me
, you mean? A lowly gamekeeper.'

‘Head gamekeeper.'

‘I'll let you in on a secret.' He lifted his mug to his lips with both hands, sipped. ‘You can learn a lot if you're still and quiet and act harmless. They spoke as freely in front of me as you would a dog.'

Delphine frowned. She slid her fingers apart.

‘No,' she said. ‘You're lying.'

‘Excuse me?'

‘I don't believe you. Mr Propp isn't so foolish and you're not so good an actor.' She slapped her brow, trying to shake off the fog around her thoughts. ‘That first day I reset the rat traps – you knew I'd spared one.'

‘I could see it in your eyes.'

‘Oh, balderdash. I'm an expert liar. You
knew
.' She took a slurp of tea, watched him over the rim of her mug. ‘You knew about the tunnels too.'

Mr Garforth sniffed and turned away.

‘I followed you,' he said. ‘Watched you go in.'

‘That's funny.'

‘What's funny?'

‘Just how I purposely only ever went in them on a Sunday, yet somehow you managed to watch me from a church
four miles away
.'

Mr Garforth sipped his tea and watched the fire.

‘All right,' he said. ‘All right.' He put down his mug. ‘The truth.' He stood, took his cap from a hook by the door. He picked up his shotgun. ‘The bloody truth.'

In the middle of the silver birch spinney behind the cottage was a thicket of brambles. Mr Garforth parted them with his stick and hooked a rusty iron ring lying flat in the grass. Delphine watched the sky for vesperi.

Mr Garforth grunted. His knees cracked. A circle of sod lifted from the surrounding earth. His palms slipped on the shaft of the stick. He swore out the corner of his mouth. Taking a breath through his nostrils, he lifted and pushed. The lid, hinged on one side, jawed open. He stepped forward. The lid reached its apex, then toppled wide.

‘You first,' he said.

Delphine climbed into the hole. The ladder was cold. Mr Garforth climbed in behind her. He pulled a piece of twine and the hatch closed above him.

At the bottom of the ladder he switched on his electric torch. They were in a tunnel with a low ceiling. Mr Garforth started walking.

‘This isn't on the maps,' said Delphine.

‘There's a lot not on maps,' said Mr Garforth. The torchbeam flashed over brown, clayey puddles. Their footsteps sloshed.

The tunnel was cool and quiet. Soon, it split in two. The left fork led away to the west. Mr Garforth took the right.

The ground began sloping upwards. They came to a set of iron rungs hammered into the rock. Mr Garforth switched the torch off.

‘Up,' he said to the blackness. She listened to the
clang, clang, clang
as he began to climb.

Delphine clambered out the trapdoor into a building large and dark as a barn. Canvas had been tacked across the high windows.

‘Where are we?' she said.

‘Old hunting lodge,' said Mr Garforth. He clapped his hands three times. ‘Gentlemen.'

A swarm of shining eyes slammed open.

CHAPTER 23

THE LITTLE GENTLEMEN

‘
T
hey're refugees,' said Mr Garforth, spooning sugar into warm water. ‘They don't want a war.'

Delphine sat in the cottage, surrounded by foot-tall red beetles – fourteen of them.

The scarabs stood erect, hunched beneath segmented carapaces, watching her with bright, swirling eyes. Their pupils were smoked blue marbles floating in milk. Beneath the eyes was a tangle of complicated mouth parts: wet hooks around a moist proboscis.

Mr Garforth did not have enough cups so he poured the sugar water into bowls. The beetle-things sat three or four to a bowl, dipped their crimson proboscises into the water, and fed.

Delphine wrinkled her nose and did her best to hide her revulsion.

‘Can they . . . understand us?'

‘Of course. They're not animals.'

‘What are they?'

‘Not what. Who,' said Mr Garforth. ‘And there's not the word in English for their kind. Out of respect, I call them the Little Gentlemen.'

At this, the creatures ticked and popped in a similar manner to the vesperi, but higher-pitched, like cards riffling. The noise made her scalp crawl.

‘They help me on the estate,' said Mr Garforth, ‘and I keep them safe.'

‘They've been watching me, haven't they? I felt them – in the tunnels.'

‘I knew you wouldn't listen. I asked them to keep an eye on you.'

Delphine thought of climbing the chimney – the cold grip round her wrist that had saved her from falling. Had that been them, too? She was shocked that a little thing could be so strong.

‘I saw one,' said Delphine.

‘Your father.'

‘He found something by the lake.'

‘Wasn't one of ours,' he said. The Little Gentlemen tick-chittered restlessly.

‘There are more?'

‘Of course there are more. You can't control a threshold without one.'

‘Threshold?'

‘One end of a channel. That's how the Gentlemen came here. It's
why
they came here. They don't want to pick sides. They don't want to work as slaves. They want to live out their days in peace.'

‘God.' Delphine squeezed her head between her palms. ‘So, what are we going to do now? Shall we call for the police?'

‘And say what?'

‘That monsters are . . . ' She caught his expression. ‘All right, Bolsheviks. We'll say the Hall has been overrun by Bolsheviks.'

‘This is exactly why I shouldn't have told you.'

Delphine ruffled her hair. ‘Fine. Burglars. Fifty burglars with rifles.'

‘Fifty?'

‘Ten, then.'

‘And they'll send what,' said Mr Garforth, ‘twenty men? How long d'you think they'll take to get there – two hours, three? What chance have twenty coppers got against an army?'

‘Well, what should we do, then?' She slammed her palms into the side of the table, shoving her chair back. One of the legs caught a loose tile and the whole chair tipped; she dismounted and it clattered to the floor. ‘What should we bloody do?' She kicked the chair and it skidded a couple of feet. She kicked it again. Several of the Little
Gentlemen curled into spheres. ‘While we're just sitting here, they're killing everyone and my parents are
dying
, they're dying and you won't even ring for a policeman!' She brought both fists down on the table. ‘Damn you!' She kicked the chair again and this time it bounced, a leg snapping off, rolling to the foot of the fire. ‘Damn you, you stupid old man!' She looked down at her hands. They were filthy, covered in tiny cuts. She was breathing fast. Her fingers felt numb.

‘That's it,' she said. Florescent streaks ebbed in her peripheral vision. ‘I'm getting my gun and I'm going back.'

‘No you're bloody not.'

‘Watch me.'

‘Don't be selfish. You'll get killed.'

‘If Daddy's dead I don't want to live any more. I just want revenge.'

‘You're a child.'

‘I'm thirteen.'

‘Exactly.'

She took a couple of quick, shuddery breaths.

‘Mr Garforth. I am going to fetch my gun and my hook and my good boots, then I'm going to walk back to the Hall and start killing.'

Mr Garforth slipped his rough hands together, rested his chin on his knuckles. ‘How quick can you reload a shotgun?'

Delphine shrugged. ‘About five seconds.'

‘I reckon that's about how long you'll live.'

‘Then . . . well, fine.' She folded her arms, glared into the fire.

‘So you're happy to die, just like that? For nothing.'

The dying embers looked like a distant shining city on a hill, covered with snow.

‘Yes.'

‘I don't believe you.'

‘Well.' She inhaled, tried to get the tremor out of her voice. ‘I'm going anyway. So if you don't want me to die, you'd better come up with a better plan.'

The cottage was silent, save for the plop and trickle of proboscises.

‘I have a better plan,' he said.

She looked at him over her shoulder. ‘I'm listening.'

* * *

When Mr Garforth was finished, Delphine squatted on her hams amongst the Little Gentlemen. She dunked a finger in the sugar water and sucked it.

‘All right,' she said.

‘Not now.'

‘What do you mean? I thought you said – '

‘The deal is . . . ' He lowered his voice. ‘
The deal is:
you rest and you eat and then you decide.'

‘I've decided. I want to go now.'

‘You don't
get
to go now. For starters,' he jabbed a thumb at the window, ‘there's a big ball of fire in the sky that makes little girls very easy to see.'

‘But – '

‘I'll tell you what I think: doing anything but running away from here as fast as you can is madness, and it'd be a terrible sin, bad as murder, if I let a child give her life so cheaply, without at least trying to make her see sense.'

Her chest clenched. ‘I've made up my mind.'

‘Then you've nothing to fear from a little more considering.' He gripped the back of his chair and began to get up. ‘Best-rested is best army – you know that, don't you? Can't fight tired, can't fight hungry. Besides, if you want to do it proper, our friends here need time to do some spying.' He gestured at the lumps of living crimson armour.

‘If it's too dangerous for me to go in daylight, why is it okay for them?'

Mr Garforth folded his arms. ‘Gentlemen.'

The scarab-creature by Delphine's foot stood. Its dark red proboscis extended and started to vibrate, sending up a high, oscillating drone until it began to blur. The other scarabs rose and joined in. Delphine felt the buzz in her nostril hair, down the nape of her neck. She stepped back. The pale fluid in the creatures' eyes grew agitated; it began fluxing green, turquoise, magenta.

‘What's happening?' said Delphine but Mr Garforth shook his head.

Flamelike, the blurring spread from each creature's proboscis, over
its hinged mandibles, across its glowing eyes, its banded thorax, its spindly arms, the glossed maroon plates of its carapace. With each creature, the last things to be consumed were the bristled hooves of its feet, hooked foretalons smearing, fading.

The Little Gentlemen had not disappeared. They were enveloped in a kind of heat haze. Trying to focus on them made her eyes go funny. They were burgundy smudges, fragments of boulder glimpsed through steam.

‘You see now why everyone and his horse wants them as spies,' said Mr Garforth. ‘They know the tunnels, the secret passageways, the nooks, the dark spots – places I doubt even a busybody like you's managed to unearth. They'll tell us how the land lies.' He ambled to an old pine cupboard. ‘If you're still certain when the time comes, I'll do everything I can to help you. I'll lay down my life beside yours. That's my word.'

‘Thank you.'

‘Don't thank me.'

‘I'm going to fetch my gun,' she said.

‘Can't do that. They might have left lookouts.'

‘They don't know these woods. I do.'

‘Still.' The cupboard squealed as he opened the doors. ‘If you get spotted, that's it, we're jiggered.' When he turned round he was holding a double-barrelled shotgun. ‘Here.'

She accepted it. The muzzle was extended and slightly tapered.

‘Nice.'

‘Good goose gun, that,' he said. ‘Full choke in the right barrel, half in the left. Throws a tight pattern at range. If you must go out and clear your head, head down towards the beach. I 'spect they won't have come that far, not out in the open.'

She broke the barrel and two cartridges popped from the breech, clattering across the tiles.

‘Jesus. It's loaded.' She pushed them back into the breech and shut the gun:
chuk
.

Mr Garforth looked at her.

‘May God forgive me.'