Merciless Reason (28 page)

“Trom,” he muttered, just as that rumbling rose to a thunderous bellow.

Snatching up Apple's body, he wound it up and pushed it into his pocket. Then he grabbed the package containing his suit, and darted out the door. The building shook around him as the bull-razer struck. He heard the sound of masonry being demolished beneath him, felt the floor lift under his feet and saw cracks snake up the walls. The room behind the fitting room, at the back of the building, was a small storeroom. He shoved the door open, crossed the length of the room in a split second and hurled himself feet-first through the lower half of the window. The white wooden sash in the middle of the window grazed his head, and then he was falling in a shower of broken glass and wood.

He landed clumsily on the tiled roof of an outhouse, thinking it was going to hold for a moment, but then the tiles gave way under him and he fell through, dropping another seven feet to knock a sink off a wall with his backside and shove one foot down the bowl of a toilet. Still holding onto his suit, he let out a string of curses as he clutched his buttocks, yanked his soaking foot out of the toilet and kicked open the flimsy door. Lunging out, he sprinted across the back yard as the enormous bulk of Trom came piling through the building, its massive plough-shaped jaw bursting up from the basement through the back wall. The bull-razer crashed out into the yard and Nate vaulted over the back wall seconds before the wall was crushed beneath the engimal's rolling feet. Behind it, the remains of Rudolf Bloom's building collapsed in on themselves, all three floors effectively demolished in one unstoppable charge.

In the cloud of dust and debris, the slow-witted engimal did not see Nate racing down the laneway. But it was built for destroying structures—the crushing of people was largely incidental, and it was convinced it had completed the task its master had set for it. As Nate ran further from the noise of the demolition, he heard strains of music. Coming out into the side street, he slowed down, making his way more carefully onto the street where Bloom's shop front had once been.

The dust cloud mingled with the smog to form a shroud of thick fog on the street. Lights were coming on in the houses up and down the road and cries of alarm and anger could be heard. But beyond them, Nate heard the strains of a violin, and recognized Gerald in the strokes of the bow. Keeping in close to the wall of a house, he watched Trom reverse back onto the street and begin making its way home. A bugle was sounding in Portobello Barracks, only a few hundred yards away, and Nate knew the British cavalry would be coming, but it would be too little, too late.

Everyone knew who owned Trom. He wondered if Gerald's control over it was sufficient to see the ponderous beast back to Wildenstern Hall without it being steered directly, but he doubted it. Gerald would take a velocycle back to the estate, and the army would waylay the bull-razer if they could. They had behemoth engimals of their own, if they could be mustered in time—though no one of them was an equal to Trom. The Wildensterns would be blamed for this outrage, and their money and influence would not save them from the disgrace it would bring. Gerald clearly did not care. He was not fool enough to anger the Royal Irish Constabulary or the British authorities … unless he had no choice. Or he was powerful and arrogant enough to brush off any punishment they might try to inflict upon him.

“But you're still using music,” Nate muttered under his breath. “Then maybe there is still hope. You haven't figured it all out yet, old friend. Maybe I can even stop you before you do.”

Tucking the packaged suit under his arm, he started walking quickly away from the scene of the disaster. The army had soon spread out through the streets, forming a cordon around the site of the destruction, stopping people and questioning them. Cavalry gave helpless chase to a bull-razer that paid them little mind. Nate took a wide route through Ranelagh and then back along the canal, where a group of soldiers waved him on past the end of Rathmines Road, allowing him to walk on to the small house where the Fenians awaited him.

“What the blazes happened out there?” Dempsey demanded as he ushered Nate in the door. “It's as if you've started your own little apocalypse!”

“Not yet,” Nate replied. “But give me time. And I'm afraid the family will have to buy Mister Bloom a new building. Where's Duffy?”

“Gone to gather the rest of the men, and pick up the documents your sister-in-law gave him. He means to be ready to walk into Dublin Castle as soon as she sends word that everything is in position.”

Nate had been informed of Daisy's plan, which would apparently be triggered by his arrival at Wildenstern Hall. He had agreed to play his part, not because he was convinced it would work, but because it was better than anything he had come up with. He smiled as he considered how prepared these veteran fighters were to follow a plan laid down by a woman—one who had no experience of military strategy except that which she had learned from her malignant relatives. At that moment, he felt immensely proud of Daisy. In rare instances of hope for his future, he had wondered if they might both survive this, and whether they could salvage some kind of life together if they did. Whether she would have any feelings for him, after all she had endured.

But he never let those embers grow into anything brighter. He could not allow himself the luxury of dreams for the future. Ever since Clancy had found him, Nate had resolved to confine all plans of his future to the death of Gerald Gordon. For the sake of his son, and all those he loved, that was the only future he dared hope for.

“Time to get scrubbed up, I think,” he said, looking into a mirror on the wall and brushing his hand through his beard. “I'll need to look my best when I show up at the old manor.”

“I don't hold with the idea that a good suit makes a man any less of a vagabond,” Dempsey remarked with a sniff. “I doubt your family will be fooled. Still, I'm sure they'll welcome you no matter what. There's no place like home, as they say.”

Nate stared at his reflection in the looking glass, blinking older, tired eyes.

“Well, there's certainly no place like mine.”

XXIX

HOME SWEET HOME

THE GOTHIC, TOWERING, MENACING SHAPE
of Wildenstern Hall had changed little in the time he had been away. As he rode through the tall wrought-iron gates hung from marble pillars, Nate looked up the gravel driveway to the towering building that loomed above the rest of the manor house and the sight caused him to take a deep, shaky breath. Established in Norman times, Wildenstern Hall had been partly ruined, rebuilt, enlarged and refurbished many times. The tower that now formed the main part of the house was thirty stories high. Steel girders, anchored deep in the stone core of the mountain, formed the bones which supported the flesh of brick, wood and stone. There was no other building like it in the country—and very few like it in the world. Steam turbines powered its mechanical lifts and it was plumbed up to the very top floor and lit by gas-lamps.

Gothic turrets jutted from its roof into the sky and gutters emptied the rainwater they caught out of the mouths of gargoyles. Any eye looking over the structure would find itself caught by the high arches, flying buttresses and the sculpted terracotta paneling that formed a skin around it.

But these were merely the features that were visible to the casual observer—someone not familiar with the building and its inhabitants. Nate viewed the place from a very different perspective. In his mind's eye, he pictured the layout of the complex structure, mapping out its more idiosyncratic features from memory, such as the armories, the small weapons caches, the alarmed doorways, the secret passages and the dozens of lethal booby-traps. He had grown up here, playing in the maze of passageways, learning to survive this place in much the same way that other children learned to play schoolyard games.

Gerald would have made changes over the last few years too, as would some of the other family members. Nate tried to imagine the most likely places where new traps might have been set. When it came to creating a killing ground, Gerald could boast a particularly deadly combination of qualities: his profound knowledge of the human body and how to damage it; and a vivid imagination. From the moment Nate entered that building, he could face mortal danger from any direction.

And that was before he even counted possible attacks by enterprising family members.

Flash's engine had a brooding quality as the engimal rolled up the driveway. Word had already spread and people were emerging from the front door of the house to greet the long-lost Duke of Leinster. A small crowd had gathered as Nate drew up near the steps. The expressions on his relative's faces ranged from joy, through suspicion, to unbridled hostility or fear. Elvira had barged her wheelchair through to the front of the gathering, and was clearly examining him for any sign of neglect in his deportment. The wide smile on Gideon's heavily bearded face could not hide his uneasiness. His wife, Eunice, narrowed her beady eyes in dull-minded calculation as she tried to ascertain how this would affect the ranking of her husband and sons. There was no sign of Oliver, but his remaining brothers, the Gideonettes, were there, scowling through, their own various arrangements of facial hair. Nate took note of some of the other cousins, trying to judge which of them could be counted as allies, and which should be labeled as enemies. There were precious few allies.

There was also no sign of Elizabeth or his son. Perhaps it was best not to think about Leopold altogether for now.

Despite the overcast sky, the afternoon light had a slightly dazzling quality that he found hard on his eyes. He dismounted and pulled off his leather helmet, goggles and riding coat, which he handed to a waiting servant. He was clean-shaven, having bathed and had his hair cut before donning his new suit. Even so, the changes in him were obvious. Tatty was first to greet him, rushing forward and throwing her arms around him and burying her face in his new suit. Daisy came forward then. Looking over Tatty's shoulder, she waited her turn, and when it appeared as if Tatty meant to hold on for the rest of the day, looked over her friend's shoulder at Nate. She opened her mouth, closed it, opened it again, and closed it again, completely at a loss as to what to say. Nate could understand, feeling a warm rush of emotion welling up inside him, threatening to choke him and blind him with tears. They stared at each other for a long time as Tatty cried and the rest of the relatives, in a show of good social grace, began to applaud his return.

“You're late,” Daisy managed at last, barely heard over the noise.

“I took the scenic route,” he replied, finding it difficult to get the words out.

“You are absolutely
never
going away again,” Tatty mumbled from his chest.

Nate did not reply. His eyes were on the thin figure that appeared at the top of the steps. Gerald had a cigarette in his left hand and his right tucked into the pocket of his jacket. Struggling to maintain his composure, Nate suppressed a shudder, though whether it arose out of hate or fear he didn't know. It would take every ounce of self-control he had to keep his hands from Gerald's throat. This was not the time or the place for their confrontation. Gerald, in turn, regarded Nate with the kind of contemplative air he might have adopted while looking at one of his test tubes, and drew a long drag of smoke.

“Hello, Nate,” he said. “Still struggling with your daddy issues?”

“Always,” Nate answered. “You still pulling the legs off engimals?”

“Only for the good of humanity,” came the reply.

Taking Tatty's right arm in his left, Nate offered her his handkerchief to wipe her face and then began greeting the other relatives as if they were a real family, shaking Gideon's hand and giving Elvira the obligatory kiss on the cheek. Nodding to a few of the servants he would have known well, he walked to the marble steps with the rest of them following behind, and started climbing. Daisy took his right hand and gave it a tight squeeze as she walked alongside him too. He noticed that two of her fingers on that hand were bandaged. As they came to the top of the steps, they found themselves face to face with Gerald. There they all waited, with Gerald standing in their way. Nate looked past him and saw a giant in a tailored suit standing in the hallway. Brutus, Elizabeth's brother.

Nate brought his gaze back to Gerald's face.

“It's over,” he said to his cousin.

“On the contrary, old chum. Things are just kicking off.”

With a chilly smile, Gerald stood aside and ushered Nate into the house. A house he'd had years to prepare in anticipation of Nate's return. In that moment, even without Brutus standing in the middle of the hallway, Nate would happily have traded this place for the storm-struck, heaving deck of a sinking ship. As his fear threatened to smother him, he leaned closer to his cousin, his voice low so that only those closest could hear.

“I know where the intelligent particles came from,” he said. “But I'm never going to tell you.”

Gerald's face went a shade paler, but there was no other reaction. Nate stepped past him and went on into the house, a lady on each arm.

“Brutus!” he exclaimed, standing before the huge man. Brutus gazed down at him without expression. “I believe you're running things at the moment. When's dinner? I'm famished!”

The next hour was spent in the living room, with celebratory drinks all round and a long line of strained chitchat, which threatened to sap Nate of the will to live before Gerald could even get started on him. Gerald kept his distance, watching the proceedings but hardly taking part. Brutus stood back too, though his expression was harder to fathom—a wariness perhaps, the look of a man who was careful to do nothing in case he might do the wrong thing. Or perhaps it was something more to do with the fact that he would occasionally glance across at Gerald, as if the latter was holding him in check.

Nate told interesting and amusing stories of his travels, as if he had merely been away on some whimsical adventure. The others listened and related their own tales of their doings while he had been away. It was all very courteous and civilized, and when Nate felt that he could not bear any more he excused himself and made his way out to the mechanical lifts.

He took the elevator right to the top floor. Even as he stepped out into the corridor that led to what had once been his father's study, he felt a nervous tremor run through him. His experiences in this part of the house had never been pleasant. Following the corridor until he came to a flight of stairs, he climbed them to the door that let out onto the roof. The wind tried to pull the door out of his hand as he opened it, and he had to close it firmly behind him.

The area of flat roof was overlooked on all sides by tiled gothic turrets, plated in terracotta. In one of these turrets, a round window looked in on a room that connected to the attic. The room where his mother had been imprisoned for years had long been bricked up—it had been one of the last commands Berto had given as Patriarch before he died—but it was still possible to see into it through the round steel-framed window up here. Nate peered into the shadowy place, a heavy weight in the pit of his stomach. Rain was falling in widely spaced drops, lazily, like the light opening notes of a tune that would soon build up to a great crescendo. Walking across to the parapet, he leaned on the wings of a gargoyle and looked over in time to see Gerald on the back of a velocycle, riding away from the rear of the building on the road that led to the church. At the same time, he heard someone come through the door behind him, and knew it was Daisy.

“At a guess, I'd say he's building some kind of complex musical instrument,” he said to her, without turning round.

Daisy came up beside him, standing close enough to put her hand on his where it lay on the stone parapet.

“It's the organ in the new church,” she told him. “He built it using the bodies of engimals.”

Nate nodded to himself. Gerald was taking what he knew and meant to apply it on a much, much larger scale.

“Then there's still time to stop him.” Nate turned and sat on the low parapet, watching the wind blow strands of Daisy's dark hair across her face. He wanted to take that face in his hands and press his lips against hers. He wanted time with her, and a life with her, one where they were not perpetually at risk and where they could talk about normal, everyday things. But he was not to have it. Looking Daisy in the eyes, he said, “There are two things you need to achieve to gain control over intelligent particles. You need a clear understanding of what they are, and the acceptance that it is possible to communicate with them on an instinctive, subconscious level.

“Imagine if you had never seen anyone swim, but you were faced with learning it yourself, on your own. You have to consciously work out the strokes that will move you through the water, but you must also accept, deep down, that the human body can float.

“Gerald has achieved the first of these, and he could be on the verge of the second. If he masters this control, he will have the power of a god. Believe me when I say that I am not exaggerating.”

Daisy looked down at her bandaged fingers. She untied the bandage and unwound it, exposing the once-injured fingers. The tips had almost completely grown back, leaving only a slightly flattened shape on the side of each that was still tender to the touch.

“I believe you,” she said, standing against him to seek warmth from the wind.

He put his arm around her, pressing his cheek to the side of her head. For the first time in years, Daisy felt some of the weight lift from her. Finally, there was someone to help carry it.

“I have to tell you a story,” Nate said softly. “You're going to find it hard to believe. I wouldn't have believed it myself, except that I was made to
experience
it. In a way, I still
am
experiencing it.

“When the serpentine entered my body and saved my life after the last fight with Gerald, she started showing me visions of the people who created the particles. It took me a long time to understand what I was seeing, and … well, let me start where this all started. And bear with me, it is a … a perfectly bizarre tale.”

He stopped and took a breath, staring out across the mountainous landscape, watching the heavy, saturated clouds scud overhead. Even among the mountains, there were the hedges and fences that marked out farmland. The gleaming twin lines of railway tracks coursed through the trees at the bottom of the hill. Smoke rose from the chimneys of cabins in the distance. In any direction he looked, the mark of mankind could be seen on the land.

“Centuries from now, the human race has reached a point in its science where they are capable of things we could only dream of. But something happens: a cataclysm that wipes out most of humankind. The ones who are left begin rebuilding. Their world is little more than a barren rock, and despite their great advances these people still need to grow food to eat. In its weakened state, their civilization is vulnerable, and when a terrible blight begins destroying their crops they realize that they are going to starve. This fungus is resistant to everything they try, and whenever they attempt to eliminate it, they destroy their food too. Because of a simple fungus, the last members of the human race are going to starve to death.