Chapter 3
“No, thank you.” I hold up my hand, forestalling any further hospitality at the moment. James would have accepted the drink most likely, and taken the opportunity to chat with our potential client. Ensuring repeat business or at least hoping Hart would recommend us to others of his social circle.
But I’m tired, and sweaty, and the tightness in my cheeks makes me suspect I acquired a sunburn wandering around the countryside with no shade. If there’s any possibility of returning to my own apartment and my own bed, I want to take it.
“Are you certain? I have a lovely brandy—it’s been in my cellar since long before Prohibition.
” Hart’s mouth shapes a smile, but his eyes fix on me with an odd sort of intensity.
Given the state of the track leading here, they likely get few visitors.
Maybe Hart is lonely for any company that isn’t that of his servant.
The grandfather clock ponderously ticks away the seconds behind him, and a glance confirms that I might yet get out of here in time for the train, if I hurry.
“Thank you for the offer, but I’d prefer to get right to work. I’d hate to waste any of your valuable time.” I turn to Myers, who’s standing in the doorway. “If you could just show me the books?”
Myers looks to Hart for permission. “If you insist, Mr. Caine,” Hart says grumpily. I’ve offended the man; James won’t be happy about that.
Well, I simply won’t tell him. He can’t scold me for something he doesn’t know about.
“This way,” Myers says, and damned if he doesn’t look just as annoyed as his employer. As though not having to fetch me a drink is some sort of inconvenience.
Trying to keep my expression blandly pleasant, I follow the butler out of the room and up a sweeping staircase to the second floor.
It’s stifling up here, the windows shut and curtains drawn against any chance of a refreshing breeze.
Myers stomps down a hall lined with paintings, then opens a door. “In there.”
Beyond is a small library, though with the drapes drawn I can’t see much of it. “Is there a particular shelf, or…?”
“Boss says anything is fair game.”
My estimate as to how long this is going to take rises, and I silently curse. It seems I’ll be forced to stay overnight after all. “Thank you.”
Myers grunts and leaves, heavy footsteps fading away into some other part of the house. The moment he’s gone, I cross the room and throw open both drapes and windows. Despite the general disrepair of the house, the windows slide open with only a slight protest, for which I’m grateful.
Sunlight floods the room, along with a breeze laden with salt. I stick my head out for a moment, taking a deep breath. Outside, trees rustle and birds sing, bringing a lightness to my oppressive mood.
In France, all the trees were blown to flinders from years of shelling and mortar fire. All the birds dead or driven away. Every breeze carried years of decay, the stench wafting up out of the very earth, where blood as much as water created the mud under our feet.
I turn my back quickly on the scene outside. This is why I don’t leave the city.
As for the library, the layer of dust on everything else in this house is absent here.
There’s a large desk with only a lamp and a fountain pen on its surface, three wing-backed chairs, worn upholstery testifying to their use, and a fireplace for winter.
Except for around the fireplace, every wall is covered by built-in bookcases, all of them stuffed full with tomes.
Praying that Hart uses some system of organization, I begin to scan the titles in hopes of getting an overview.
Thankfully, the books seem to be grouped according to subject.
The first bookcase I look at is dedicated to gardening, the second to cooking and the domestic arts, and a third to the occult.
This section seems to have the oldest books—which doesn’t necessarily mean the most valuable. Rare book collectors have specific interests, and magic and folklore is a niche one at best. Still, it is one we’ve filled before. I’m always surprised at the nonsense people will pay good money for.
I spot quite an old binding and reach to ease the book from its place on the shelf to examine it more closely. As I do so, the entire bookcase sways slightly.
I jump back—it must not actually be built into the wall, but instead ready to crash down upon me.
But no—the bookcase isn’t falling. Rather, it’s shifted position slightly inward along one edge.
Like a door.
My hand hovers over the shelf, uncertain. From James, I know it isn’t unheard of to discover hidden compartments in houses with built-in libraries. They inevitably contain pornography.
If the client is interested in selling it, he refers them to a neighboring shop on Book Row, whose proprietor can properly value the pieces and discreetly move them along to some of his ‘special’ buyers. We generally receive a small finder’s fee as a thank-you.
But from what James says, the hidden compartments are often small and hidden amidst the decorative woodwork. This is a door.
Either Mr. Hart has so much pornography it needs an entire room to house it, or he has some other interests he doesn’t want anyone to know about, which would logically be concealed adjacent to a library. Stolen first editions, perhaps?
I could retrace my steps and ask Mr. Hart if I’m supposed to check inside the hidden room, and his butler simply forgot to tell me. But that might offend him if I’m not meant to know the room exists at all, and as eager as I am to leave, I can’t afford to get thrown out for prying.
Just a quick look, then. To reassure myself there’s nothing of interest inside. If not, I can get back to work as though I never found it. If so…then it depends on how valuable it is.
Irrationally, I take a quick look around, even though the butler with his heavy footsteps could never come upon me unawares. Of course I’m alone in the library.
I swing the door open.
The room is dark, light penetrating only far enough to show me it’s about the size of a small dining room, which is still larger than I expected. A side table stands just within the door with a box of matches and candelabrum on it, so I light the candles to see better.
I’d expected books, or nude photos, or scandalous art.
Instead, the room is sparely furnished, with two chairs, a table…
and what appears to be some sort of altar, complete with a pair of unlit candles in pewter holders.
Between the candles sits a book—not some hoary old tome with a cracked leather cover and time-stained pages, but instead thoroughly modern in appearance.
A tapestry hangs on the wall behind the altar, solid black with a symbol combining an hourglass and a moth with skull-like markings on its back.
A death’s-head hawkmoth? Something like that.
Disappointment sweeps through me. Hart is clearly some sort of Golden Dawn crackpot—the occult books on the concealing shelves should probably have warned me. With a sigh, I step backward, toward the door.
Something punches me hard in the upper arm, the blow followed by a burning sensation deep in the muscle. Instinct kicks in; I sweep my arm up, knocking aside whatever hit me, while reaching for the firearm I’ll never carry again.
Myers is standing between me and the exit, a syringe in his hand.
I stumble back, confused thoughts tumbling through my head. How did he sneak up on me? I should have heard his distinctive tread…
Unless it was an act from the start.
My arm starts to go numb. “What’s going on?” I demand, or try to. My tongue is too thick, my lips uncooperative. My heart pounds against my ribs, every beat pumping whatever drug he injected me with further into my body.
“What a disaster this has been,” says Hart. He shuffles up behind Myers, watching me with an expression of annoyance.
Myers shrugs. “We gotta make do with the hand we’re dealt, as my old man used to say.”
“I suppose in your line of work, quick thinking is necessary.”
I try to rush Myers, hoping to shove past him, but my legs betray me. Before I’m even certain what’s happening, I’m on the floor, staring up at the two men.
“No,” I mumble. “Don’t.”
I’d cowered in old shell holes while death rained from the sky. Charged the enemy while the men around me fell riddled with machine gun fire, certain I’d be next. Listened for hours as Emerson moaned, while every man who tried to help him got their heads blown apart by a sniper’s bullet.
I’d never felt as helpless as I do now, unable to move my limbs while Hart draws closer to leer down at me.
“Poor Mr. Caine,” he says mockingly. “Are you afraid? You should be.”
He flies up a long, shadowy tunnel—no, I’m falling down it. Farther and farther, faster and faster, something yanking me away from everything I’ve known, until darkness overtakes me.