The Map of Chaos (47 page)

W
HILE
J
ANE AND
W
ELLS CARRIED
the old man out of the house, Murray and Doyle headed toward the staircase. Wells feared for their lives, though less for that of Doyle, whom he had always considered quite indestructible—immune to the everyday events that killed off ordinary folk. He was more concerned about Gilliam, whom Death had begun stalking lately, disgruntled perhaps by the irreverent disappearing act he had performed in the fourth dimension.

“Wait, Arthur!” Murray exclaimed at that very instant. “Why limit ourselves to a pair of swords?” He approached one of the walls in the hallway, took down the enormous iron mace, and handed it ceremoniously to Doyle. “This admirable weapon was apparently made for you. Besides, I hear you're a talented batsman, isn't that right?”

Doyle hung his sword from his belt, gripped the mace in both hands, and felt the weight of it with satisfaction.

“What a splendid weapon!” he declared, striking the air with a couple of almighty blows. “What about you, Gilliam? Which weapon will you choose?”

Murray wheeled round. He was holding the big crossbow, which he had loaded with an arrow; Doyle had explained its complicated mechanism to them on the day of the excursion.

“The truth is, I've never considered myself a very honorable man,” he apologized with a half grin.

Despite the gloom, the trail of blood was quite visible against the marble steps. Doyle started the ascent, with Murray close behind, trying to fasten a second arrow to his belt. After hesitating a moment, he had finally taken it down off the wall. Two were better than one, he had thought, though he dearly hoped he wouldn't have to reload the crossbow. Doyle located Jane's hairpin on one of the stairs and stooped to pick it up carefully by one end. Noticing that it felt heavier than it should, he ran his finger slowly along it until he encountered an obstruction, something soft and viscous. He pulled a face.

“Good God, I think that's his eye . . . I'll be hanged if I understand what is going on here.”

With a look of disgust, he replaced the pin on the stair and continued his ascent. Murray followed, making sure he didn't step on the invisible eyeball.

“Well, if you don't understand, and you're the expert . . . Oh, why don't we ask that
genuine
medium you brought over from Africa?” he suggested, feigning a burst of enthusiasm. “What did you call him just now? Oh, yes . . . Woodie. It doesn't sound quite as impressive as Amonka, does it?”

Doyle walked on, focusing on the trail of glittering rubies that seemed to sprout from the ground like evil flowers. He studied each stair closely, afraid the Invisible Man might have veered off suddenly, or even silently retraced his steps.

“I don't think now is the right time to bring that up, Gilliam,” he muttered.

“Really? But there might not be another time, my dear Arthur,” said Murray, almost glued to Doyle's back, pointing his crossbow at any shadow that seemed to move. “And I don't want to die without knowing where you got hold of the poor wretch and, more important, how the devil he knew Emma's nickname.”

“He's my secretary.”

“What!”

“Don't raise your voice!” Doyle commanded in a whisper. “Woodie is my secretary. There's no such person as the Great Ankoma. George and I invented him.” Doyle continued climbing the stairs without turning round to contemplate Murray's astonished face. “As for Emma's nickname, the day I first mentioned the medium to you at your house, George slipped out of the room for a few moments. I imagine that, due to the state you were in, you don't remember, but the truth is he took the opportunity to search your study for anything we might be able to use. He came across your and Emma's correspondence in a drawer of your desk. That's where he discovered your nicknames . . .
Mr. Impossible
.”

Murray tried to choose one of the many questions buzzing round in his head while they climbed a few more steps in silence.

“But what the devil made you want to hold a phony séance in the first place?” he finally asked.

“To stop you from killing yourself,” Doyle replied. “George was desperate . . . He felt he was to blame for the accident and for Emma's death. It was he who advised you to come clean with her, remember? And he considered it his duty to help you finish what you had started. He thought it was the only way you would find any peace. When George came to my house and told me that the only way to save you was to let you communicate with Emma during a séance, I assumed he meant a real one, but he soon disabused me. George wanted you to talk to her, but he didn't want to take any risks. He wanted to be in control of all the variables: the medium, Emma's responses, her forgiveness of you . . . everything. He wanted her to command you to go on living, even to force you to be happy, insofar as you could be . . .” Doyle shook his head and gave a wry grin. “I don't know how he managed to convince me to take part in one of those phony séances I have spoken out against so strongly . . . But damn it all, you know, I almost ended up enjoying it! You must admit we managed to build up a fairly compelling tale: the mysterious medium, the hand of fate . . .”

“But I saw Emma in the garden!” Murray interrupted.

“Oh, yes, that . . . ,” said Doyle, pausing to examine the trail of blood with a frown, like a housekeeper finding fault with the housemaid's work. “The Emma in the garden was also our doing,” he confessed, resuming his ascent. “That was Miss Leckie, who kindly offered to help us out. With the aid of some of your servants, we got hold of one of Emma's dresses and a parasol. It was all we could think of. We were desperate! Time was passing, and we had failed to persuade you to attend the séance with the Great Ankoma . . .”

“So, when you challenged me to jump out of the window . . .” Murray reflected. “What you really wanted was for me to see Miss Leckie!”

“Elementary, my dear Gilliam.” Doyle grinned at him.

“Good heavens! . . . But what if I hadn't seen her? What if I'd jumped?”

“She was clearly visible,” Doyle said with a shrug. “Besides, I knew you wouldn't do it.”

“Good heavens . . . ,” Murray repeated, incapable of saying anything more.

When they reached the top of the stairs, Doyle carefully examined the floor once more.

“The trail heads toward the right wing,” he announced, signaling with his chin the long corridor receding into the darkness.

“That corridor is a dead end . . . ,” Murray murmured with a distracted air. “All the rooms on that side are locked, apart from the one the builders use to store their plaster and tools.”

“Then it won't be so difficult to hunt him down,” said Doyle. “Though we could do with a bit more . . . energy.”

From his pocket he plucked a small box of cocaine tablets with an image on the lid of two children playing innocently, and he offered one to Murray.

“No, thanks, Arthur,” Murray said. “I think the rage I feel will suffice.”

“As you wish.” Doyle shrugged. He took a tablet, put the box away, and with a show of bravado lifted his mace. “Let's find that son of a bitch!”

But before he could step forward Murray restrained him, clasping his arm.

“Wait a moment, Arthur . . . I realize that this invisible monster isn't another of your little hoaxes.” He reflected for a moment about what he was going to say. “No, of course it isn't. Running poor Baskerville through with a sword would have been going too far, even for you. But”—he looked straight at Doyle—“what about what happened with the mirror?”

“That wasn't our doing either,” said Doyle. “We insisted on holding the séance at Brook Manor in order to practice the slate trick without anyone seeing; that would have been impossible at your house, and you spent much of your time at the Wellses', and as for my place . . . well, I could never have forgiven myself if my wife or children had found out that I was helping to organize a fraudulent séance. But what happened with the mirror . . . how could we have managed a stunt like that?” he gasped, betraying his own unease at the memory of it. “What we saw in the mirror was truly incredible, a mystery we need to look into dispassionately. But first we must get out of here alive, don't you agree?”

Murray nodded but made no attempt to move.

“And what exactly did we see, Arthur? Where was Emma?”

“I can't tell you that, my friend,” Doyle confessed, shaking his head in perplexity.

“Was that the Hereafter you so often talk about?”

Doyle lowered the mace to the floor and sighed wearily.

“I don't believe it was, Gilliam. I think what we saw in the mirror was . . . another world.”

“Another world?”

“Yes, another world. And the mirror must be an entry point, a sort of portal . . .” Doyle paused to reflect. “I was reminded of the hole the Reed People made in the air, weren't you?”

“Why, yes, of course.” Murray nodded with a knowing air.

“If I'm not mistaken, that magic hole was also a portal, only it led to the fourth dimension, a vast pink plain filled with other portals to other moments in our past and future. But what if it wasn't true? What if that plain wasn't the fourth dimension but rather a sort of antechamber to other worlds? And what if mirrors are shortcuts, portals that lead directly into other realities, without passing through the great antechamber?”

“Other realities?”

“Yes, things that might have happened but for some reason didn't, or vice versa.” Doyle was speaking hesitantly, as though thinking aloud. “I don't know whether you noticed that in the reflection I was wearing a different suit.” Murray shook his head slowly. “Well, I was. The one I put on this morning, and that I changed for this one after spilling coffee on it. Do you realize what that means? It is as if we had seen a parallel world where things happened differently. I didn't spill coffee down my front, and Emma . . .”

“And Emma didn't die!” Murray finished Doyle's sentence, more perplexed than elated.

“No, in that parallel world
she
wasn't the one who died in the accident,” Doyle corrected Murray, staring hard at him. He watched Murray's bewilderment give way to alarm as he gradually understood what that implied. But Doyle didn't give him a chance to carry on thinking, for he needed Murray to be as alert as possible. He lifted the mace and peered into the shifting darkness at the end of the corridor. “But let's put that to one side now, Gilliam. We have to catch an accursed ghost.”

“And what does the invisible creature have to do with all this?” murmured Murray, not moving a muscle.

“I don't know.”

“Does it come from one of those other realities?”

Doyle exploded. “I don't know that either, damn it!” For a few seconds, he peered anxiously into the corridor they were about to venture down, where an unimaginable horror was lurking, and then he turned to Murray. “But I can promise you one thing, Gilliam . . .” He took a deep breath, suddenly aware that this was the moment he had so longed for in his childhood dreams, the moment when he would behave like an authentic medieval knight. His hair was disheveled, he was wielding a ridiculous, rusty mace, and he wore a pitted sword hanging from his belt that could mutilate him permanently at the slightest wrong move; but despite all this, he was smiling the way only the heroes of old could. “I, Arthur Conan Doyle, father of Sherlock Holmes, swear to you, Gilliam Murray, Master of Time, that if we come out of this alive, I will spend the rest of my days trying to unravel that mystery, and if there is a portal somewhere that leads to your damsel, I assure you I will find it.”

Murray nodded, touched and at the same time daunted by Doyle's heroic attitude.

“Then what are we waiting for, Arthur?” he exclaimed, filled with an almost childlike excitement. “Let's go after the Invisible Man!”

But before they could make a move, they were startled by a rumbling noise from below. They both stared at the floor, which had begun to shake with growing intensity, and before the two men knew it, the floorboards had split asunder and everything collapsed with a deafening roar. Groping in the dark, Murray managed miraculously to grab hold of the banister on the balcony with one hand while with the other he hung on to the crossbow. He felt a terrible cramp in his left arm, and a wave of blistering heat scorched his face. He cried out as he felt the pain wrap round his body like barbed wire. When it abated slightly, he realized that he had torn away part of the banister as he fell and was dangling in midair, his body pressed against the jagged edge of an enormous hole, like the mouth of a volcano, spewing plumes of thick black smoke and searing heat. He was relieved to discover that between the crater and the banister a flimsy, narrow strip of floor had survived. He set down the crossbow as far from the edge as possible and made a supreme effort to haul himself up, scaling the piece of banister that had come away under his own weight. Each time he leaned his elbows or knees on the strip of floor, bits of it broke away, plunging into the flames below like a dreadful omen. Murray was terrified of falling, but with one last almighty heave he managed to reach the ledge, where he lay sprawled on his back, gasping for breath, his arms and legs covered in gashes. He discovered that the sword was gone, but he still had the second arrow. He would have preferred it to be the other way round, but clearly his opinion didn't count for much in this situation. At least for the moment he was out of danger, though he could not afford to rest. He retrieved the crossbow, and, standing up as straight as he could on that ledge, which was little more than a foot and a half wide, he tried to glimpse something through the smoke. The gallery floor was now a gaping hole, although, fortunately, the strip of floor under him stretched as far as the stairs, assuming it would hold up under his weight so that he could reach them.