Burning Lamp (15 page)

“I said no.”

“Griffin, you are being ridiculously hardheaded about this and you know it.”

“You think that my refusal to let you put me under again is the result of sheer stubbornness, but that’s not the case,” he said wearily. “I swear it.”

“Then why won’t you let me help you?”

“Because when I sleep that deeply, all of my senses sleep as well.”

“I understand.” Her voice softened. “You feel that you are not in control. You’re afraid that if something happens you will not awaken in time to deal with it.”

“I am not accustomed to sleeping so soundly, Adelaide. It is as if I am unconscious.”

“Well, you are in a sense,” she admitted. “But I have a solution to your concerns.”

He eyed her warily. “What is that?”

“You only require a couple of hours of the deep, healing sleep each night to promote your recovery. If you allow me to put you under I promise that I will come back in precisely two hours to awaken you. Will that satisfy you?”

He thought about it. “This deep sleep, it really does promote healing?”

“Yes.”

“I need my strength,” he said.

“You’ll recover it in half the time if you let me put you into the healing state for a couple of hours a day.” She paused. “But I do understand that allowing such a therapy requires trust.”

He made his decision. He lay back down on the pillows.

“Put me under,” he said.

She touched her fingertips to his forehead. He felt her energy whisper across his senses.

He slept.

 

 

 

THE DOOR OF THE LABORATORY OPENED JUST AS BASIL HULSEY clipped a small frond off the
Ameliopteris amazonensis
. Luttrell and one of his enforcers, a heavily muscled man who moved like a beast of prey, walked into the room.

“Good morning, Dr. Hulsey,” Luttrell said. “How goes the dream research?”

Hulsey gathered his shaken composure. The enforcer made him nervous but it was Luttrell who truly frightened him.

From a distance, one would never guess that the man was a powerful crime lord who, if the rumors were anywhere near accurate, controlled a string of brothels, opium dens and other disreputable enterprises. He certainly did not look like anyone’s mental image of a master criminal.

Luttrell was in his late thirties, a handsome, well-built figure of a man who was always elegantly dressed. It was not until he opened his mouth that one caught the faint traces of the streets in his voice.

There was a chilling aura of power in the atmosphere around him. It was there in his ice-cold gaze, as well, Hulsey thought. Luttrell’s eyes would have looked entirely appropriate in a viper, assuming snakes had blue eyes.

“The work is going very well, sir,” Hulsey said. “Thanks to your great generosity and your keen appreciation for the complex nature of scientific investigation. I believe that we will be ready to run the first experiment on a human subject within a few days.”

He put the frond down very carefully on the laboratory table. Thus far the experiments on the lacy fern that he had stolen had proved frustratingly inconclusive. He had developed one or two intriguing chemical concoctions from it, but his intuition told him that there was something vastly more important to be learned from the plant.

“I’m pleased to hear that,” Luttrell said, clearly bored by the subject. “Meanwhile, I have come to see if the new devices are ready. You did say that they would be finished soon.”

“Yes, of course, sir,” Hulsey murmured.

He suppressed a sigh. A new month, a new employer. Lately he and Bertram seemed to be changing financial patrons more often than they changed their socks. It was becoming quite tiresome but there was little alternative. When one dedicated oneself to science one required money, a great deal of it. Money came from men such as Luttrell.

All in all, Hulsey thought, a crime lord was an improvement over his last patrons. At least Luttrell was honest about his profession and social status. The men of the Seventh Circle, on the other hand, had considered themselves gentlemen but had proved to be no better than the lowest sort of street criminals.

He looked toward the open doorway at the far end of the laboratory.

“Bertram,” he called, “bring out the machines, if you would. Mr. Luttrell has come to collect them.”

Bertram appeared. He gripped a large canvas bag in each hand. “I was able to prepare a half-dozen. I hope that will be sufficient.”

Bertram, Hulsey thought, was a mirror image of himself at twenty-three: a scholarly- looking young man with spectacles and a receding hairline. But it was Bertram’s talent that invoked a flush of paternal pride. His son’s psychical abilities were not precisely the same as his own. No two talents were ever identical. But Bertram was as strong, if not stronger, than himself.

Together they would make vast strides in the field of dream research, assuming they could continue to obtain financing. And after he was gone, Hulsey thought, Bertram would not only carry on the Great Work but produce offspring who would inherit the Hulsey psychical gifts for scientific inquiry. Their bloodline would have an untold influence on future generations. It was an intoxicating notion.

“I’m sure six of the machines will be enough for what I have in mind,” Luttrell said. “If they achieve the desired effects, I shall no doubt be in the market for several more, however.”

“Certainly, sir,” Bertram said politely. He hoisted the canvas bags onto the workbench.

Luttrell’s face lit up with a disturbing air of excitement.

So far as Hulsey and Bertram were concerned, the vapor contained in the small machines was merely an accidental by- product of an experiment on the fern. But when Luttrell had viewed the results on a cage full of rats he had immediately seen the potential for creating weapons.

He watched hungrily as Bertram removed one of the metal canisters from the bag.

“Show me how it works,” he said.

Bertram pointed. “You simply press here. The valve will open and the gas will be released immediately. The vapor is quite potent and spreads rapidly into the atmosphere. Whoever employs these devices should be advised to cover his nose and mouth with a thick cloth and stay well clear of the fumes until they have evaporated.”

“Excellent.” Luttrell picked up the canister and turned it in his hands. “I believe this will be a very handy tool, indeed.”

Luttrell was pleased. Hulsey decided to take advantage of the moment. As he always did when he was feeling anxious, he took off his glasses and started to polish them with his dingy handkerchief.

“About the new microscope, Mr. Luttrell,” he said cautiously.

“Yes, yes, go ahead and purchase it,” Luttrell said. He smiled his reptilian smile. “I wouldn’t want to stand in the way of scientific progress.”

“We also require some new chemicals and herbs,” Hulsey added.

“Make up a list and give it to Thacker, as usual. He is here to run errands for you.”

Luttrell signaled the enforcer to pick up the canvas bags and then led the way out of the laboratory.

Hulsey watched the pair leave. When the door closed behind them Bertram heaved a deep sigh of resignation.

“I cannot believe that we are working for one of the city’s most powerful master criminals,” he said.

“Once again we are obliged to create dangerous toys for a patron who has no true appreciation for the Great Work.” Hulsey positioned his glasses back on his nose. “But that seems to be the price of scientific discovery in the modern age.”

“One can only hope that, in the future, there will be more respect paid to those of us committed to serious paranormal research,” Bertram said.

 

 

 

FIVE DAYS LATER, DELBERT STOOD AT THE KITCHEN WINDOW, drinking the rich hot chocolate that Mrs. Trevelyan had prepared. He contemplated the scene in the garden. The Boss was sitting with Mrs. Pyne on a green wrought-iron garden bench. They were examining the old leather-bound journal that the Boss always kept close. The dogs sprawled at their feet. It was a peaceful scene. But nothing about the Boss was peaceful these days.
Never had been, come to that,
Delbert thought.

“What do you think they are talking about?” he asked.

Mrs. Trevelyan did not look up from the mound of bread dough that she was kneading.

“And just how would I know the answer to that question?” she asked.

Delbert studied the couple in the garden. He had known Griffin Winters for two decades, had watched the younger man grow up hard and fast on the streets. There had always been a woman somewhere in the background. The Boss liked women. But the word
background
was the key. That was where all the females in his life had remained until now.

But Mrs. Pyne was different. The Boss had never been like this with any other female, not even his wife. There was something in the atmosphere around the two people sitting on the bench, some sort of invisible energy. When he was in the same room as the pair, Delbert thought, he swore he could almost see little flashes of lightning.

He turned around to watch Mrs. Trevelyan work the dough. It was a pleasant sight. Her full bosom heaved against the apron as she leaned into her task.

“How did you come by your post in Mrs. Pyne’s household?” he queried.

“The agency sent me around,” she said. “I don’t mind telling you, I was a bit desperate by the time she interviewed me. My old employer died a while back without bothering to leave me a reference, let alone a pension. Very hard to get a position in a respectable household without a good character, you know.”

“I wouldn’t know. Never tried to obtain a position in a respectable household.”

She gave him a single head-to-toe glance. “Yes, well, judging by your very fine boots and your gold- framed spectacles and that ring you wear I expect you’ve made a good deal more in your post here than I’ll ever see in a lifetime.”

Susan Trevelyan was a fine, handsome woman, he thought, not for the first time. Her broad, rounded thighs and full breasts put him in mind of a statue of some ancient goddess. She was strong and energetic, too. She hoisted the heavy iron cooking pots as though they were made of paper. It occurred to him that she might be equally vigorous in bed.

“Go on with your tale,” he said.

“The agency hoped that, since Mrs. Pyne was recently arrived from America, the Wild West, no less, she might not be too particular in the matter of a character reference,” Mrs. Trevelyan said.

“I’ve heard they’re a bit odd out there in the West.”

“I believe so. In any event, Mrs. Pyne interviewed me and hired me straight off. She never asked for a character reference, thank goodness.”

“Does she ever talk about her time in America?”

“Sometimes.” Mrs. Trevelyan settled the dough into a pan.

“Always been curious about the place, myself,” Delbert said. “They make excellent guns.”

Mrs. Trevelyan opened the oven door and inserted the pan of bread dough. “I think Mrs. Pyne gets a bit lonesome for the West at times. She had friends there and a great many adventures as well.”

“Did she say why she came back to England?”

“No. I don’t think she knows, herself, why she returned. To tell you the truth, until recently I thought she had made a mistake. I kept expecting her to book passage back to America.”

“Why do you say that?”

“There was a strange restlessness in her spirits. Oh, she was always busy enough, what with her charity work and all, but it was as if some part of her was waiting for something to happen.”

“Such as?”

“I had no notion and I don’t think she did, either. Not until recently, that is.” Mrs. Trevelyan wiped her hands on a towel and angled her head toward the scene in the garden. “A social reformer and a crime lord. Who would have believed it?”

Delbert smiled. “Who would have believed that a respectable woman like yourself would end up cooking for the Director of the Consortium and his lieutenants?”

She gave a gentle snort of laughter.

“Makes for an interesting change,” she allowed.

There was a light sheen of sweat on her noble brow. Somehow it made her even more attractive.

“You’re an unusual woman, Mrs. Trevelyan,” he said.

“You are not quite what I expected in a member of the criminal class, yourself, sir. How long have you been with Mr. Winters?”

“Since the first days he arrived on the streets. He was just a boy. Barely sixteen years old and he’d been raised in a respectable home. He knew nothing about what he was facing but he learned fast. It was like he’d been born to create the Consortium.”

“Consortium.” Mrs. Trevelyan took a stew pot down from the wall. “Sounds more like a respectable investment firm than an underworld gang.”

“That is exactly what the Boss said.”

 

 

 

ADELAIDE MARKED HER PLACE AND CLOSED THE LEATHER-BOUND volume. “No offense, sir, but your ancestor was a peculiar individual.”

“By all accounts, I take after him,” Griffin said. “You’ve seen the portrait in the library. When I look at it, it is as if I am viewing my own reflection.”

It was very pleasant sitting out here in the garden with Adelaide, he thought. A brief, tantalizing glimpse of what his life might have been like if his past had taken a different turn, if he were not who and what he was, if he had been free to marry and start a family.

“You do bear a striking resemblance to Nicholas Winters, but you are not at all the same man,” Adelaide said.

The ringing certainty in her voice made him raise his brows.

“Why do you say that?” he asked. “The resemblance, both physical and psychical, is obvious.”