The Policeman of Secrets

Chapter 4 Part 1

Chapter Four

“Well? Have you found anything? Anything at all?”

Elizabeta strode through the house in a fury, her expression sending a chill through the host of Arcanum agents following her from room to room.

“Nothing of any note, Madam,” said one of them, a wan-looking man named Fleesh, who had been raised to the position of her aide thanks to Crowe’s death at that hateful bookshop. “Our men keep looking, but there is no sign of the book.”

“It must be here, dolt! You’ll find it, tonight, if you know what’s good for you. It reveals too many of our secrets, and I want it. Now.”

They re-entered the parlor, where the roaring fire illuminated the corpse of the former Rose Kilmartin, lover of literature and patron of Mr. Snow. Elizabeta paused her tirade long enough to give the body a ferocious kick, then strode to one of the windows that dominated the room. Another night’s snowfall had begun, she saw. Good. Keeps the slaves off the streets.

The agents dispersed, beginning what she was sure would be another futile search. God, this house is enormous. Her inquiries, some with a blade—or worse—at the old woman’s throat, had confirmed that the accursed volume had not left Kilmartin’s home following its delivery from the bookshop. But the hag had shown indecent temerity by dying before revealing its precise location.

Elizabeta began to pace, her feet sending up flurries of papers torn from Kilmartin’s shelves. No clues as to the whereabouts of a key weapon the Workshop of Light had hunted for the past year or more. Elizabeta and a handful of others in her refined circle knew of the danger posed by scientist-author Richard Lenksham and the discoveries he had so carefully penned. Now, despite several hours of vigorous questioning, Elizabeta had failed to drag sufficient information from Snow’s client. Who was to know her heart was so weak? Must I do everything?

Her agents (each one a fool, she fervently believed) had found little of note. A handful of first editions from before the Arcanum’s rise to power, and a few especially good pieces that she had purloined for her own already extensive library. But not the one key book both sides in this damned war were seeking—one to use it, the other to destroy it before it brought down all they had worked for.

The moonlight sparkled on her carriage, parked outside in the sort of carelessly palatial street that had become so familiar to her since she became the Arcanum’s chief investigator. The driver was tending to the horses, and nearby two more agents meant to be keeping watch were smoking and exchanging a few quiet words. Elizabeta’s eyes narrowed as she made a mental note to give them to the Subjugation Assembly. No room for laziness here. Balthazar and his friends are close to breaking our secrets, and I am given nothing but fools and old women who die at the first kiss of the knife.

“I must away,” she told Fleesh. “Find the book before the Workshop does or your children will become orphans.”

As she passed the fireplace, on a whim she unsheathed her rapier and used it to flick a cloud of embers and ash onto the dead woman’s face. The flesh soon gave off a satisfying burning smell that sent Elizabeta off with a spring in her step.

From the corner of an adjoining street, two figures cloaked in shadow watched the carriage leave.

Solomon, staring at the extravagant house and the figures visible through the windows, said: “Balthazar, you really think we can get into Rose’s secret library and escape with this book? She trusted me enough to show me the entrance, but what’s to say she hasn’t told our enemies?”

As he had done so many times before, the count was formulating a plan, judging distances, his strength, and the hundred other things that could spell the difference between success and death. He slapped Solomon on the back, and said: “If she had, they would be long gone. As they are still here, it will certainly be exciting, eh?”

Quickly checking the various pockets, harnesses, and accoutrements in his voluminous coat, he gestured for Solomon to follow. The approach he favored led them through a large garden beside the Kilmartin mansion and, using its border of trees as cover, they were able to take their first close look at the two guards at the main door. Clad in the now familiar coachmen’s coats and high boots, the men were too engrossed in a conversation to keep watch. Behind them, the door was open.

Passing a pistol to Solomon, Balthazar whispered, “Have that, just in case things must turn... wet. But I do prefer the blade at times like this.”

He pulled his own sword and its blade reflected moonlight into his grim expression. Solomon drew a dagger, concerned at how much his hands were shaking. It had been a day or more since he had been able to settle his nerves in his usual fashion, and now he was suffering. If the count noticed, he said nothing.

Exchanging a nod, they slowly pushed their way through the trees closest to the doorway. With his eye on the sky, Balthazar waited for a cloud to cover the moon. There was the briefest moment of darkness then the two men charged for the door, their boots crunching a tattoo.

The guards were tired and slow to react and turned far too late. Balthazar’s sword took one full in the heart but Solomon’s man was able to draw a pistol as the dagger pierced his chest. He let out a low, final moan and Solomon grabbed him under the arms before he crashed to the ground and dropped or fired the gun.

The count tilted his head towards the deeper shadows beside the porch, and they pulled the two bodies out of sight. Solomon pocketed his victim’s pistol then they stepped into the doorway, listening. From the upper floors came heavy footfalls and crashes as men turned over furniture and hacked away at boards.

Balthazar indicated that they should stay to the edges of the hallway and away from the danger of creaking timbers, and then Solomon pointed him left, towards the kitchen.

They entered the room to discover the body of an elderly cook lying face down, her back torn by a stab wound. All was in disarray with cupboard doors opened and crockery and utensils strewn throughout. Solomon went to the oven, where the cook must have been making a meal when the Arcanum had arrived to torture her mistress. The flame had died but Solomon touched the ironwork gingerly before pulling open the main door.

As Balthazar kept watch, Solomon fumbled in the dark of the stove until his hands alighted on his goal: a sturdy lead box still warm to the touch. Pulling it free, he tugged off the lid to reveal a long iron key wrapped in cloth. Tucking it inside his coat, he whispered, “Follow me.”

Next time (instalments are added every Wednesday and Saturday): can Balthazar and Solomon survive long enough to discover the hidden information that may be so close at hand? To find out, follow me and The Policeman of Secrets.

If you cannot wait, it is available now as an e-book from all major stockists and as a paperback from Amazon in the US, UK, and Europe. For more details of this and the rest of my writing, visit http://www.andrewmelvin.com, and follow me on Twitter at https://twitter.com/AMelvin_Author