Blaze of Glory (21 page)

She rose from the chaise longue. 'Aubrey, I may rest a
little before supper. Will you be happy here on your own?'

'George will be back soon. I'll be fine.'

Aubrey was dozing lightly when George came back. 'I
say, old man,' his friend said as he burst into the room,
'I think you're right about this code business. Look at
this corker!'

George spread the newspaper on one of the side tables,
then dragged it to where Aubrey was sitting. Aubrey
blinked away sleep and found George was pointing at
some lines in his beloved agony columns. 'Well, ' he said,
'it definitely looks like a cipher to me.'

In the bottom corner of the page, surrounded by curt
and plaintive messages, were four solid lines of garbled
letters.

George beamed. 'Yes. I've been trying to solve the
dashed thing. Devilishly tricky.'

Aubrey ran his fingers through his hair and yawned.
'That? Oh, I solved that last week.'

George stared at him. 'You solved it?'

'If it's the same cipher as you showed me on the way
home from Penhurst, I'm sure I have.'

'Aubrey,' George said, exasperated, 'when do you find
the
time
to do all these things?'

He looked up. 'Hmm? Time?' He looked back to the
newspaper. 'I invented the seventy-minute hour, George.
I get more done that way.'

'I see.'

'This cipher took me a while, though,' he said, tapping
the newspaper. 'It was devilishly tricky, as you say.'

'I tried everything I could think of.'

'Well, yes. It wouldn't yield to straightforward frequency
analysis, I found that out quite smartly.'

'Frequency analysis,' George repeated. 'I see.'

Aubrey snorted. 'I can always tell when you don't know
what you're talking about. "I see" is a giveaway.'

George was not a good actor. He tried to look wideeyed
and innocent, but instead looked as if he had
heartburn. 'Tell me about frequency analysis.'

'The most commonly used letter in the language is?'

'
E
.'

'Correct. So we look for the most commonly used
letter in the coded message and assume that's
e
. The same
works at the other end of the scale.'

'So uncommonly used letters like
q
,
x
and
z
would
appear least frequently?'

'Indeed.' Aubrey rubbed his chin. 'But this method
didn't work. The gibberish remained gibberish. I had to
think of something else.'

'Some other pattern?'

'Almost. I put it aside for some time and then, while
I was rehearsing for the school play, it struck me. If the
frequency of single letters wasn't revealing anything,
perhaps I should be looking at the digraphs.'

'Digraphs? Pairs of letters?'

'Exactly. In order of frequency, the way we use the
language, the most common digraph is
th
, then
he
,
an
,
in
and so on. The message you showed me last time was a
long one, with plenty to work with. By concentrating
on the digraphs I was able to uncover enough to read
the message.'

'Astounding, Aubrey, simply astounding. What did the
message say?'

'Nothing of any real account. Something like
"Tomorrow night no good. Wait until Friday. Give the
present to my friend at the station. He will have news for
you." And so on. Quite banal.'

'Oh,' George said, crestfallen. 'I'd been hoping for
something more dramatic. Well, what about this one?'

Aubrey studied it for a moment, then pulled up a chair.
'Pencil, please?'

It took fifteen minutes of effort, with much scribbling
and crossing out, but finally Aubrey sat back with a look
of satisfaction on his face. 'There.'

'You're done?'

'Now, you can never be totally sure, but I think it reads
like this: "Meet at fitness society this Friday. Plans are on
course. We are not suspected. The way forward clear.
Proceed." Of course, I inserted the punctuation.'

'Hmm. Rather prosaic. It could be a young couple,
planning elopement. See where it says "our plans are on
course".'

'That could mean anything. And why would a couple
who are running away to get married meet at a fitness
society?'

'No idea. Another mystery, it looks like.'

At that moment, Lady Fitzwilliam appeared at the
door to her bedroom. 'What will remain a mystery,
gentlemen?'

Aubrey gestured at the newspaper. 'The agony
columns, Mother.'

'Ah, spying on others' lives, are we?' She laughed. 'Your
father hasn't returned, Aubrey?'

'No.'

'Well, I shall have two handsome young gentlemen
take me to dinner. Aubrey, would you ring the hotel
dining room and reserve a table for three?'

W
HEN THE LIFT OPENED ON THE GROUND FLOOR,
A
UBREY
was surprised to see Sir Darius waiting to enter. His face
was distracted and serious, but it lightened when he saw
his wife. 'Rose! I was coming to fetch you to dinner.'

'I couldn't wait,' she said. 'Luckily these two were able
to escort me. But we've only reserved a table for three.'

'I'm sure they'll be able to accommodate us.'

As Sir Darius shepherded them towards the dining
room, Aubrey's eye was caught by a tall, angular figure
leaving the hotel through the revolving door. Once
outside, he turned back briefly, much as one would when
trying to fix a location in one's mind. In the instant he
turned around, Aubrey recognised him.

It was Craddock, the head of the Magisterium.

T
HE NEXT MORNING,
A
UBREY SAT IN THE HOTEL DINING
room watching George work his way through a
breakfast the size of a small country. Poached eggs,
sausages, bacon, fried bread and tomatoes, mushrooms,
toast and orange marmalade disappeared as George ate
with gusto.

Aubrey picked at his food. A sausage sat on his plate
next to an untouched fried egg. He'd taken a single bite
from a piece of buttered toast.

It had been an awkward night. He'd lain awake,
convinced that his soul was about to be pulled from his
body, but nothing happened. Then, in the small hours of
the night, he'd lain awake simply worrying about the state
he'd put himself in. It was pointless, worrying like that,
but it overwhelmed him as he dwelt on what could have
been and what he should do next. Sleep took him, eventually,
but it was fitful, with troubled dreams.

George finished. 'Excellent! Sets one up for the day, a
breakfast like that.'

'I'm glad you enjoyed it.'

George studied him. 'You're having trouble.'

'Not a good night. A few aches and pains.'

'Perhaps you should stay here. I'll go and see Caroline.'

'I can manage,' Aubrey said sharply, then he held up a
hand. 'Sorry, George.'

George grinned. 'You're interested in her, aren't you?'

'She is interesting. Intriguing. Fascinating.'

'Attractive?'

'That's another way of putting it, I suppose.' He
frowned. 'Is there a motive behind this inquisition?'

'No, nothing really. I'm just pleased to see the effect
she's having on you. Makes you seem human, old man.'

'Effect?' Aubrey considered the best way to deny this
for a moment, before the second part of what George
had said caught up with him. 'What do you mean, "makes
me seem human"?'

George nodded. 'That took you longer than usual. She
is
having an effect on you.'

Aubrey stood. 'Are you coming or staying here?'

C
AROLINE'S MODERN, TWO-STOREY HOME WAS IN A ROW OF
houses in a quiet part of town opposite a small, well-kept
cemetery which looked to be a favourite place for dogwalkers.
Aubrey was disappointed when Mrs Hepworth
opened the door. She was pale and drawn. Her hair was
unbound, hanging well below her shoulders, and she
wore a mauve robe that left her arms bare.

'Good morning, Mrs Hepworth. Miss Hepworth asked
us to visit her this morning.'

'Yes,' Mrs Hepworth said. She studied Aubrey for a
moment. 'You're Fitzwilliam, aren't you? Darius Fitzwilliam's
boy?'

This was a question Aubrey had faced all his life. 'Yes,
ma'am.'

'You have his eyes.' She stood back and waved them
into the house, oblivious of Aubrey's curiosity.

I have his eyes?
he thought.
How do you know his eyes
so well?

Caroline was waiting for them in the hall and Aubrey's
train of thought veered in a completely new direction.
She looked pale, but determined. 'Do you still want
to see my father's workshop?' she said, without any
preliminaries.

'Of course,' Aubrey said. George nodded.

'Very well. We'll go now.'

'Caroline?' Mrs Hepworth said. She put a hand to her
throat. 'What is this about?'

'I want to show Father's workshop to these two. They
may be able to help.'

Mrs Hepworth looked pained for a moment. She took
a deep breath and nodded. 'I see.' She turned to Aubrey
and George. 'Caroline was always like this. She knows
what she wants and I'm afraid that I've encouraged that
independence. It's something I must live with, I suppose.'
She looked at her daughter with such tenderness that
Aubrey thought she was going to cry. Instead, she added
in a very soft voice, 'Be careful.' She held her daughter at
arm's length. 'You're wearing the diamond brooch he
gave you.'

'Yes,' Caroline took her mother's hands. 'I shan't be long.'

Aubrey felt awkward. He looked at George, but he was
studying an umbrella stand as if he'd always been fascinated
by them.

Caroline tapped her foot as she put on a small hat.
'Come now. We may as well be off.'

They followed her as she strode down the footpath.
Aubrey looked up and saw Mrs Hepworth watching
from an upstairs window. With her pale face, her unbound
hair and her robe, she looked like a figure from
an ancient tragedy, a despairing mother watching her offspring
leaving for war.

'Shouldn't we catch a cab?' George said.

'I need the walk,' Caroline said, without looking at
him. 'It may help clear my head.'

'Ah, indeed,' Aubrey said. 'We're heading to the
university?'

'No.'

That was all they had from her for the next hour.

She marched relentlessly through the streets. When
they had to stop to cross roads, her face was set and
resentful. If pedestrians were slow, blocking the way, she
went to the other side of the street. Aubrey decided
she was trying to vent her grief, anger and frustration
through physical effort. She was making a good job of it.

After the poor sleep of the night before, Aubrey began
to feel the strain of keeping up. He swung along easily
enough, but since he didn't know how long they were
going to be walking, he couldn't pace himself. His knees
and the soles of his feet ached.

He really needed to spend a few days recuperating,
restoring his strength, doing some more research into his
condition, but events were conspiring against him.

Eventually, they found themselves walking through
streets of small factories – metalworkers, cabinetmakers,
glassworks. A world away from the cosy, domestic neighbourhood
of the Hepworth residence, they were mostly
squat, inelegant buildings, many with grubby windows
and fenced-off yards. Aubrey saw a famished-looking
watchdog studying him intently as they passed and he
was confident that Geo. Walsh and Sons, Wheelwrights,
was likely to be undisturbed by intruders.

At the end of one such street, beyond a maker of industrial
knives, Caroline stopped and they faced a singlestorey
brick building, perhaps forty years old.

'You have the key?' Aubrey asked. His throat was dry
and painful when he swallowed.

'What do you mean?' Caroline asked.

Aubrey pointed upwards. 'This is the only building in
the street with an electrical supply. The doors are large
enough for a lorry to drive through. No windows in the
building, only skylights. It's at the end of a cul de sac with
an abandoned building either side. Perfectly private.' He
grinned. 'So I'm assuming it's your father's workshop.'

Caroline didn't answer. She simply opened her bag and
took out a key.

The doors were stubborn. 'Let me,' George said. He
put his shoulder to one and it screeched open. Caroline
insisted that he shut it behind them.

'Disappointing, really,' George said after their eyes had
grown accustomed to the dim light. 'I'd expect a master
magician's workshop to be a bit more dramatic. Where
are the stuffed crocodiles hanging from the rafters? The
strange mirrors on the walls?'

The workshop looked like a chemistry laboratory.
Aubrey supposed at one time the building might have
housed a small engineering works or machine shop.
Dusty lathes and turning equipment were clustered at the
far end of the room in the shadows, blocking a rear door.
Coils of rope hung from hooks on the walls.

The rest of the workshop was filled with three rows
of benches. The benches themselves supported forests of
elaborate glassware, interspersed with machinery that
looked like half-gutted radio receivers and transmitters.
Large carboys of reagents caught the light and glowed
like a stained-glass window in a cathedral. Pairs of discarded
leather gloves, pieces of chalk, crayons and scraps
of paper showed that it was a working space. From the
disorder it looked as if the owner had simply stepped out
for a moment.

Aubrey cleared his throat. 'We should be careful. I'm sure
the professor would have some security spells in place.'

Caroline walked to the nearest bench. She reached for
a dangling chain and electric light flooded the space. 'I've
been here a hundred times. It's perfectly safe.'

Of course
, Aubrey thought.
No doubt he would have made
sure you were safe if you came without him.

He stood still, barely a yard from the doorway, right
next to an empty hatstand. He felt the prickling on the
back of his neck that signalled the presence of magic, but
decided that it would be strange if he
didn't
have that
sensation in such a place. Still, he felt uneasy, and he
scanned the workshop, looking for danger.

George stood next to him. 'I'd usually offer to scout
around, old man, but I thought I'd wait until you'd given
the all clear.'

'Even though Caroline is moving around?'

'Father's notebook will be here somewhere,' she said,
standing with her hands on her hips. 'He never took it
out of here.'

George took a few steps towards the benches. At that
moment, Aubrey happened to look up.

His eyes narrowed. There, in the shadows, near one of
the rafters . . .

'Don't move!' he hissed.

George stopped as if rooted to the spot. He knew that
tone of voice. 'What is it?'

Aubrey ignored him. 'Caroline,' he called softly, 'would
you please stand still?'

'I beg your pardon?' She gave Aubrey a look of
exasperation.

'Something deadly is watching us very closely.'

She froze. Only her eyes moved, her gaze darting
around the shelves and cabinets.

'Where is it?' George muttered to Aubrey.

'Look up. Carefully. It's in the corner, on one of the
rafters, where it can see the whole room.'

'I can't spot anything up there. It's too gloomy.'

'Wait until it moves.'

'What is it?' Caroline said in a low, calm voice.

'A shade,' Aubrey said. 'I've read about them, but never
seen one before. A magician detaches a shadow from
something and binds it using the Law of Sympathy,
so it retains some of the qualities of whatever it once
belonged to. They're not very intelligent, but they can be
quite lethal. Thin as shadows, they're like flying razors.'
He paused. 'Of course, the original owner of the
shadow dies.'

'Why isn't it attacking us?' George asked.

'Good question. Caroline, did your father ever make
anything like this?'

'He'd never do something that involved cruelty like
that.'

'Then it's been put here by someone else.' Aubrey
frowned. 'It's probably been ordered to wait until someone
finds the professor's notebook, then kill them and
report the location of the prize.'

George glanced upwards. 'Oh.'

'If it's not harming us, we should leave,' Caroline said.
'We can come back with help.'

'That's probably best,' Aubrey said.
But it's the last thing
I'd do
, he thought. 'George,' he said, 'what do you have in
your pockets?'

George rolled his eyes. Slowly, he felt in his pockets.
'Some coins, a wallet with very little in it, my notebook,
a pencil, a pocket handkerchief.'

'Well, that makes two pocket handkerchiefs,' Aubrey
said. He'd left all his magical paraphernalia behind.
Improvise, improvise
, he told himself. He began humming
as he looked around the room.

His eyes widened as he saw a shallow rectangular
container, about two feet long and a foot wide, on one of
the benches. It was filled nearly to the brim with a silver
liquid. 'Caroline,' he called softly. 'Can you please look at
the bench to your right. Is that a quicksilver bath?'

She glanced at the bench. 'Yes. Father used a lot of
mercury in his work.'

'Good, good.' Aubrey glanced up. 'Now, George, I
think you should take out any important pages from your
notebook. Anything you want to keep, that is.'

'Why?' George removed a few pages and stuffed them
in his pocket. 'What are you doing?'

'Plotting, George. Notebook, please.' Caroline stared
and Aubrey realised he was grinning. He clamped down
on his smile. Everything was clear and sharp-edged as his
senses grew almost overwhelmingly alert. He could smell
the nitre and the hensbane somewhere towards the back
of the room. He could hear crystals forming in one of the
beakers to his right. His blood was singing as he thought
ahead to what needed to be done.

George shuffled close and handed over the notebook.

'Now, you're not overly fond of that hat, are you?'
Aubrey asked.

George took it off mournfully. 'Here.'

'Jacket.'

George slipped out of it, knowing better than to
complain.

Aubrey arranged the hat and jacket on the hatstand.
'We must move swiftly,' he said, 'once it attacks this
decoy.' He stuffed the notebook into one of the jacket
pockets, but made sure it protruded.