Kirov Saga: Devil's Garden (Kirov Series) (33 page)

The sun set very late that day, at well near eight ‘o clock, and
the new moon was not yet up, so the night was thick after darkness came. The
Duke walked alone on the quiet shore thinking of all he had done in the years
past, the slow but steady rise to wealth and fame, his acceptance as a Peer of
the Realm, which was most unusual for anyone outside the Royal Family in modern
times. Yes, he thought, I will be hard pressed to do any better in the years
left to me, but at least I shall have the thrill of the hunt back again. I was
getting a bit jaded at the top of the tree. Time to live again.

He breathed in the cool sea air and quietly said goodbye to the
life he had brought to this place, and to the whole of the world beyond the
shores of that isolated, holy isle. Then it was up the long wide stairs to the
castle again, the approach leading to the pantry on the lower battery and
through the kitchen to find the stairway up to the second level. The castle as
it stood that day had been lovingly restored by the noted architect Sir Edwin
Lutyens in 1902, who fashioned an Edwardian home on the upper floors They would
catch a few hours rest in the bed chambers there and then rise in the dark well
before dawn, with the crescent moon low over the submerged tidal zone on the
muddy shores leading up to Fulwark Burn and Buckton. It was the last moon, he
thought, the moon of the Ninth Day.

Mister Thomas had placed their luggage in the small bedroom as
directed. They warmed themselves with a cup of hot tea in the kitchen before
they left. Then the Duke led the way to the back of the narrow room by the
gallery where there was a small closet.

“I’ll just be a moment,” he said quietly, stooping to enter alone,
his hand tucked into the pocket of his outer coat. He soon emerged, a wry smile
on his face and a gleam in his eye.

“Well, Mister Thomas, are you ready?”

“Certainly, sir. I’ll take the bags downstairs right away. Will
there be a car coming for us this morning?”

“No, my good man. You may bring the luggage this way.”

To Ian’s surprise the Duke was gesturing to the open doorway of
the closet. His first thought was that his lordship intended to leave the bags
there for safekeeping, and that they might then pass the day here sightseeing
on the island. Yet as he entered the narrow door he felt a sudden chill, a
distinct draft of cold air rising. The Duke was right behind him.

“I’ll take that bag,” he said, holding up a small flashlight that
now illuminated a dark portal at the very back of the closet. “Two is a bit
much to manage on this stairway. There’s a small landing just inside the
entrance. Pause there, please, while I secure this door. And do mind your step,
Mister Thomas. The stairway is somewhat treacherous, and it’s a long way down.”

Thomas had heard of secret passages in old castles—every boy had
dreamed of them at one time or another. Well, here was a fairly good one right
at his feet! He assumed it was a hidden back stairway that would take them to
the north end of the castle. Why the Duke wanted to take this dark, narrow
stairway he did not know. As they stepped through the entrance to the landing
the jittery light revealed the topmost flight of stone cut steps, very steep
and narrow. Cobwebs draped across the narrow way, and the place could have done
justice to any haunted house. The Duke handed him a folded umbrella.

“There you are, my man. Swipe aside those cobwebs with this. If
you would be so kind as to lead, I’ll light the way as best I can.”

“Very good, sir.” Ian lifted the bag he was to carry, still thinking
this was an odd way to make their exit, with the Duke carrying the last of
their luggage. The sound of the upper closet door closing behind them had a
certain finality about it, though he didn’t know why he felt that way.

Down they went, thirty steps to another stone landing and a second
door. The Duke set down his bag and stepped up, quickly inserting a small metal
skeleton key into the lock there with a strange click and what sounded like a
quiet electronic tone. “And yet another flight,” he said as the doorway creaked
open on dry metal hinges.

The sound echoed up the dark stone stairway behind them, and Ian
could now see that this second flight angled off to the left in a new
direction. Well that will at least point us towards the cobblestone road when
we get down, he thought. The door closed behind them again with a metallic
click this time, and it was thirty more steps down, and very steep, growing
colder as they went.

“Ground level,” said the Duke with a smile where there was yet
another door, opening on yet another flight of stairs, darker and more
foreboding than any they had traversed. How very odd, he thought.

“Now we get to the heart of the matter,” said the Duke, setting
down his bag. “Mister Thomas…Are you certain you wish to accompany me on the
journey that now lies before you? It begins here, and may not end for a very
long time.”

“Sir, you have my full commitment.”

“The circumstances may be hard on us both at times.”

“I understand, sir. You may rely on me entirely.”

The Duke took a long breath, then spoke a quiet verse of poetry,
as if to christen their adventure: “If there be spirits in the air that hold
their sway between the earth and sky, descend out of the golden vapors there and
sweep me into iridescent life. Oh, came a magic cloak into my hands to carry me
to distant lands, I should not trade it for the choicest gown, nor for the
cloak and garments of the crown…”

Thomas gave him a bemused look.

“Johan Wolfgang von Goethe, Mister Thomas. From
Faust
.
We’re about to sell our souls to the devil, my good man. Good then. Let’s get
on with it.” He gestured to the stairs, lighting the way again with his small
LED flashlight.

Down they went, into dense, musty cold that seemed to find a way
quickly through their coats and vests and chilled them to the bone. Ian felt a
brief sensation of dizziness as they reached the bottom, feeling just a bit
claustrophobic in the constricted space.

What’s wrong with me, he thought? I spent days and days digging
out that narrow tunnel to fetch Churchill’s ashes for this man, and never felt
a twinge of anything like this. Yet something about the space was deeply
unnerving, the quiet, the dark, the cold of decades lying here in this narrow
way. They were in a long stone hall now, and this time the Duke edged past him
to lead the way. It curved round to the left again, and then began to slowly
angle up in a gradual climb. Ian had lost his sense of direction by now in the
dark, but he reasoned they must still be beneath the castle. Another door
barred the way ahead, which the Duke quickly opened with his strange key.

“Quite a maze down here, your grace. I had no idea these passages
were this extensive beneath the castle.”

“You’re in good company, Mister Thomas, because no one else knows
about them either—at least no one that matters. Here now, the final door. Just
let me get this key out of my pocket again and we can begin.”

*
* *

Two
other men were also on a narrow stairway at that very same
moment, though they were thousands of miles and long decades away. Captain
Volkov led the Englishman up the main stairway to his room, searching it
quickly and then hustling the man down the dark back stairway. Where has that
proprietor gotten himself to, thought Volkov as they went? Where are my men?
This whole situation was very odd, and most irregular. Who were those imbeciles
posing as NKVD? They paid a very high price for their little reenactment,
whatever they were doing here. He was intent on locating his men and getting to
the bottom of this mess. There would be a report to file now. The local
authorities would have to be called in, and the coroner. Yet he was certain his
position would absolve him of any wrongdoing here. Those men had interfered
with a naval officer, and threatened him at gunpoint. They got just the same in
return. It was purely self-defense.

The dining room they found themselves in was obviously the same
room Volkov had been in before. He could tell by the window arrangement, but
now it was all strangely different. The windows were shattered, and an amber
glow from outside was illuminating the room. What was going on here? Where were
the bodies of those idiots he had to deal with here a moment ago?

Volkov was tensely alert now, and Byrne could feel his hand
tighten painfully on his shoulder. They moved to the front desk, and Volkov
studied the situation carefully. No one was there, just a register open on the
desk, a pen there as if it had been dropped at a moment’s notice. Where was
that serving girl that had been cowering behind the desk? She probably ran off
when things got violent. Gunshots will have that effect, so he thought nothing
more about the fact that the lobby and foyer were deserted now. He squinted at
the scrawled handwriting in the register, noting the names there: Lt. Hans
Koeppen, Ernst Maas, Hans Knape, and the date was very odd in the registry, 30-6-08.
Sure enough, he saw the name Byrne there as well. The Englishman was telling
the truth.

“Koeppen,” he said aloud. “The thirtieth of June? The year is
obviously wrong. 2008?”

“One of the contestants,” said Byrne, glomming on to the
information as if to buttress his story with this strange and dangerous looking
man with a gun.

“Contestants?”

“In the Great Auto Race, sir. The race I am here to report on.”

“What are you talking about, you fool? There is nothing of the kind
underway here…” He had no knowledge of the famous historical event, a grueling
race from New York to Paris, and not crossing the Atlantic, but heading west
across the United States, the Pacific, Siberian Russia and all the way to Paris
through Asia and Europe. The last three cars had endured the waist deep mud of
Siberia, to get this far, and the German team was now in second place, trying
to catch up with the speedy Thomas Flyer car of the American team.

The more Volkov looked about him, the stranger everything seemed.
There was no computer at the front desk, the furnishings, lamps and chairs,
were all antiques, though wonderfully restored. Everything was different, and
the calendar… another oddity obviously there for decor. They were making this
place out to be an old inn from centuries past.

“Where is everyone?”

“Probably out near the tracks, sir, where I should be. The
Protos
is leaving this morning. That’s the German team’s car. I was just running upstairs
to fetch my notebook when I found the door locked on the upper landing and
began knocking to see if I could gain access. Then you appeared with that other
older man, and…well, I’m very confused, sir. Are you with Mironov?”

“What? Mironov? I am with the Russian Naval Intelligence, and I
have had more than enough of this nonsense. Is this Mironov the associate you
spoke of earlier?”

Byrne followed what Volkov said as best he could, in spite of the fact
that his Russian was limited. Yet he heard enough to realize this man was an
intelligence officer, and Mironov’s warning about the Tsar’s secret police, the
Okhrana
, rose as a warning in his mind now. “He was just another
boarder,” he said, not knowing what else to say. “I had breakfast with him. I
thought perhaps that you were with his party.”

He had seen Mironov go up the stairs after that other strange man
left them, the one who called himself Fedorov. Then Mironov appeared again, a
troubled look of astonishment on his face. He said nothing, striding quickly across
the dining hall and out the main entrance there by the front desk.

Now Volkov seemed to be peering outside. “Through that door,” he
said gruffly, nudging Byrne out. They emerged to find the northeastern sky
still aglow with a strange light, as though there had been some tremendous
explosion there and the whole taiga forest was set aflame. There was still a
distant rumble of thunder in the air, as though from a cannonade, or more
explosions.

“My God,” said Volkov as he stared at the sky. He could only think
that a nuclear detonation could produce such a scene. “They’ve finally done
it,” he breathed. “It’s begun.”

Chapter 29

The
door was above them this time, and it took the strength of both men
to raise the heavy stone lid with considerable effort. It opened on a cold
empty room, its far wall and roof broken and open to the low sky above. A grey
mist hung over the scene, pale and diffused with the light of an early rising
sun. The cold air of the tunnel was unabated in the stark scene they entered, and
Thomas saw here the broken remains of the castle in which they had just passed
a comfortable evening’s rest.

“My lord, where have we come?”

“Step lively, Mister Thomas. Here, can you give me a lift up?”

Thomas helped the Duke gain a firm hold and assisted as he climbed
up through the opening. He reached down to receive the luggage and set it
aside, then extended an arm to Thomas, heaving him up.

“A bit of strength still left in these old arms and shoulders,”
said the Duke, breathing in the cold foggy air.

“My God, that stone lid looks like it hasn’t been moved in ages.”