Lord John and the Hand of Devils (12 page)

“Creature. You mean the—”

“Der Nachtmahr,”
she said, lowering her voice and looking involuntarily over one shoulder, as though fearing that some vile thing hovered in the air nearby.

Nachtmahr.
“Nightmare,” it meant. Despite himself, a brief shiver tightened Grey’s shoulders. The halls were better lighted, but still harbored drafts that made the candles flicker and shadows flow like moving water down the walls.

He glanced down at the box. There were letters etched into the lid, in Latin, but of so ancient a sort that it would take close examination to work out what they said.

“It is a reliquary,” she said, moving closer, as though to point out the inscription. “Of St. Orgevald.”

“Ah? Er…yes. Most interesting.” He thought this mildly gruesome. Of all the objectionable popish practices, this habit of chopping up saints and scattering their remnants to the far ends of the earth was possibly the most reprehensible.

She was very close, her perfume cloying in his nostrils. How was he to get rid of the woman? The door to his room was only a foot or two away; he had a strong urge to open it, leap in, and slam it shut, but that wouldn’t do.

“You will protect me, protect my son,” she murmured, looking trustfully up at him from beneath golden lashes. “So I will protect you, dear John.”

She flung her arms about his neck, and glued her lips to his in a passionate kiss. Sheer courtesy required him to return the embrace, though his mind was racing, looking feverishly for some escape. Where the devil were the servants? Why did no one interrupt them?

Then someone did interrupt them. There was a gruff cough near at hand, and Grey broke the embrace with relief—a short-lived emotion, as he looked up to discover the Landgrave von Erdberg standing a few feet away, glowering under heavy brows.

“Your pardon, Your Highness,” Stephan said, in tones of ice. “I wished to speak to Major Grey; I did not know anyone was here.”

The princess was flushed, but quite collected. She smoothed her gown down across her body, drawing herself up in such a way that her fine bust was strongly emphasized.

“Oh,” she said, very cool. “It’s you, Erdberg. Do not worry, I was just taking my leave of the major. You may have him now.” A small, smug smile twitched at the corner of her mouth. Quite deliberately, she laid a hand along Grey’s heated cheek, and let her fingers trail along his skin as she turned away. Then she strolled—curse the woman, she
strolled
!—away, switching the tail of her robe.

There was a profound silence in the hallway.

Grey broke it, finally.

“You wished to speak with me, Captain?”

Von Namtzen looked him over coldly, as though deciding whether to step on him.

“No,” he said at last. “It will wait.” He turned on his heel and strode away, making a good deal more noise in his departure than had the princess.

Grey pressed a hand to his forehead, until he could trust his head not to explode, then shook it, and lunged for the door to his room before anything else should happen.

T
om was sitting on a stool by the fire, mending a pair of breeches that had suffered injury to the seams while Grey was demonstrating saber lunges to one of the German officers. He looked up at once when Grey came in, but if he had heard any of the conversation in the hall, he made no reference to it.

“What’s that, me lord?” he asked instead, seeing the box in Grey’s hand.

“What? Oh, that.” Grey put it down, with a faint feeling of distaste. “A relic. Of St. Orgevald, whoever he might be.”

“Oh, I know him!”

“You do?” Grey raised one brow.

“Yes, me lord. There’s a little chapel to him, down the garden. Ilse—she’s one of the kitchen maids—was showing me. He’s right famous hereabouts.”

“Indeed.” Grey began to undress, tossing his coat across the chair and starting on his waistcoat buttons. His fingers were impatient, slipping on the small buttons. “Famous for what?”

“Stopping them killing the children. Will I help you, me lord?”

“What?” Grey stopped, staring at the young valet, then shook his head and resumed twitching buttons. “No, continue. Killing what children?”

Tom’s hair was standing up on end, as it tended to do whenever he was interested in a subject, owing to his habit of running one hand through it.

“Well, d’ye see, me lord, it used to be the custom, when they’d build something important, they’d buy a child from the gypsies—or just take one, I s’pose—and wall it up in the foundation. Specially for a bridge. It keeps anybody wicked from crossing over, see?”

Grey resumed his unbuttoning, more slowly. The hair prickled uneasily on his nape.

“The child—the murdered child—would cry out, I suppose?”

Tom looked surprised at his acumen.

“Yes, me lord. However did you know that?”

“Never mind. So St. Orgevald put a stop to this practice, did he? Good for him.” He glanced, more kindly, at the small gold box. “There’s a chapel, you say—is it in use?”

“No, me lord. It’s full of bits of stored rubbish. Or, rather—’tisn’t in use for what you might call devotions. Folk do go there.” The boy flushed a bit, and frowned intently at his work. Grey deduced that Ilse might have shown him another use for a deserted chapel, but chose not to pursue the matter.

“I see. Was Ilse able to tell you anything else of interest?”

“Depends upon what you call interesting, me lord.” Tom’s eyes were still fixed upon his needle, but Grey could tell from the way in which he caught his upper lip between his teeth that he was in possession of a juicy bit of information.

“At this point, my chief interest is in my bed,” Grey said, finally extricating himself from the waistcoat, “but tell me anyway.”

“Reckon you know the nursemaid’s still gone?”

“I do.”

“Did you know her name was Koenig, and that she was wife to the Hun soldier what the succubus got?”

Grey had just about broken Tom of calling the Germans “Huns,” at least in their hearing, but chose to overlook this lapse.

“I did not.” Grey unfastened his neckcloth, slowly. “Was this known to all the servants?” More importantly, did Stephan know?

“Oh, yes, me lord.” Tom had laid down his needle, and now looked up, eager with his news. “See, the soldier, he used to do work here, at the Schloss.”

“When? Was he a local man, then?” It was quite usual for soldiers to augment their pay by doing work for the local citizenry in their off hours, but Stephan’s men had been
in situ
for less than a month. But if the nurserymaid was the man’s wife—

“Yes, me lord. Born here, the both of them. He joined the local regiment some years a-gone, and came here to work—”

“What work did he do?” Grey asked, unsure whether this had any bearing on Koenig’s demise, but wanting a moment to encompass the information.

“Builder,” Tom replied promptly. “Part of the upper floors got the woodworm, and had to be replaced.”

“Hmm. You seem remarkably well informed. Just how long did you spend in the chapel with young Ilse?”

Tom gave him a look of limpid innocence, much more inculpatory than an open leer.

“Me lord?”

“Never mind. Go on. Was the man working here at the time he was killed?”

“No, me lord. He left with the regiment two years back. He did come round a week or so ago, Ilse said, only to visit his friends among the servants, but he didn’t work here.”

Grey had now got down to his drawers, which he removed with a sigh of relief.

“Christ, what sort of perverse country is it where they put starch in a man’s smallclothes? Can you not deal with the laundresses, Tom?”

“Sorry, me lord.” Tom scrambled to retrieve the discarded drawers. “I didn’t know the word for starch. I thought I did, but whatever I said just made ’em laugh.”

“Well, don’t make Ilse laugh too much. Leaving the maid-servants with child is an abuse of hospitality.”

“Oh, no, me lord,” Tom assured him earnestly. “We was too busy talking to, er…”

“To be sure you were,” Grey said equably. “Did she tell you anything else of interest?”

“Mebbe.” Tom had the nightshirt already aired and hanging by the fire to warm; he held it up for Grey to draw over his head, the wool flannel soft and grateful as it slid over his skin. “Mind, it’s only gossip.”

“Mmm?”

“One of the older footmen, who used to work with Koenig—after Koenig came to visit, he was talkin’ with one of the other servants, and he said in Ilse’s hearing as how little Siegfried was growing up to be the spit of him. Of Koenig, I mean, not the footman. But then he saw her listening and shut up smart.”

Grey stopped in the act of reaching for his banyan, and stared.

“Indeed,” he said. Tom nodded, looking modestly pleased with the effect of his findings.

“That’s the princess’s old husband, isn’t it, over the mantelpiece in the drawing room? Ilse showed me the picture. Looks a proper old bugger, don’t he?”

“Yes,” said Grey, smiling slightly. “And?”

“He ain’t had—hadn’t, I mean—any children more than Siegfried, though he was married twice before. And Master Siegfried was born six months to the day after the old fellow died. That kind of thing always causes talk, don’t it?”

“I should say so, yes.” Grey thrust his feet into the proffered slippers. “Thank you, Tom. You’ve done more than well.”

Tom shrugged modestly, though his round face beamed as if illuminated from within.

“Will I fetch you tea, me lord? Or a nice syllabub?”

“Thank you, no. Find your bed, Tom, you’ve earned your rest.”

“Very good, me lord.” Tom bowed; his manners were improving markedly, under the example of the Schloss’s servants. He picked up the clothes Grey had left on the chair, to take away for brushing, but then stopped to examine the little reliquary, which Grey had left on the table.

“That’s a handsome thing, me lord. A relic, did you say? Isn’t that a bit of somebody?”

“It is.” Grey started to tell Tom to take the thing away with him, but stopped. It was undoubtedly valuable; best to leave it here. “Probably a finger or a toe, judging from the size.”

Tom bent, peering at the faded lettering.

“What does it say, me lord? Can you read it?”

“Probably.” Grey took the box, and brought it close to the candle. Held thus at an angle, the worn lettering sprang into legibility. So did the drawing etched into the top, which Grey had to that point assumed to be merely decorative lines. The words confirmed it.

“Isn’t that a…?” Tom said, goggling at it.

“Yes, it is.” Grey gingerly set the box down.

They regarded it in silence for a moment.

“Ah…where did you get it, me lord?” Tom asked finally.

“The princess gave it me. As protection from the succubus.”

“Oh.” The young valet shifted his weight to one foot, and glanced sidelong at him. “Ah…d’ye think it will work?”

Grey cleared his throat.

“I assure you, Tom, if the phallus of St. Orgevald does not protect me, nothing will.”

L
eft alone, he sank into the chair by the fire, closed his eyes, and tried to compose himself sufficiently to think. The conversation with Tom had at least allowed him a little distance, from which to contemplate matters with the princess and Stephan—save that they didn’t bear contemplation.

He felt mildly nauseated, and sat up to pour a glass of plum brandy from the decanter on the table. That helped, settling both his stomach and his mind.

He sat slowly sipping it, gradually bringing his mental faculties to bear on the less personal aspects of the situation.

Tom’s discoveries cast a new and most interesting light on matters. If Grey had ever believed in the existence of a succubus—and he was sufficiently honest to admit that there had been moments, both in the graveyard and in the dark-flickering halls of the Schloss—he believed no longer.

The attempted kidnapping was plainly the work of some human agency, and the revelation of the relationship between the two Koenigs—the vanished nursemaid and her dead husband—just as plainly indicated that the death of Private Koenig was part of the same affair, no matter what hocus-pocus had been contrived around it.