air had somehow turned too stifling to breathe, like being in an overheated steam bath.
I turned and saw the thread of some strange, purplish smoke drifting towards us. Feeling suddenly sick, tears sprang to my eyes and I too began to cough uncontrollably.
I tried to reach out to Charlie but suddenly found my limbs weighed down as though they were statuary. Scarcely able to move, I half-stumbled, half-fell to the floor. Through a mist of stinging tears, I could just make out Charlie’s broad back. He tumbled to the floor, scrabbling at the air as though it were attacking him. With a titanic effort I hauled myself on to one knee and peered blearily about the room. What devilry was this? A Venus fly trap — and us the flies! Clutching at the oriental cushions, I staggered to my feet and tried to head towards the door.
Every step seemed to take an eternity. It was as though I had a diver’s lead shoes upon my feet. Coughing constantly I put my hands to my face and slapped myself in an attempt to clear my befuddled brain. My mind seemed to be swirling and tumbling and swimming madly, as though I’d drunk a quart of absinthe.
Reeling around, I found I had lost the door. It was as though I’d been transported to some other room, so strange and alien did Venus’s boudoir appear. The dressing table stretched crazily before me on stilt-like legs. Great heaven! The furniture appeared to be moving! The drawers of the dresser gaped open like hungry maws, snapping at my legs as I lurched and stumbled across the floor.
The oil-lamp loomed largest of all. It was then, with my eyes almost popping from my bursting head that I saw that the lamp was the source of my terror. For, gushing from the shade like a spectre or genie was a billowing quantity of some noxious gas, mauve in colour, settling heavily on the floorboards and sending me into near- convulsions.
I reached for the lamp but the closer I got the more dreadful were its effects. My fingers seemed to bend and stretch like the talons of a terrible bird as I groped at empty air, the image of the lamp blurring and multiplying before my exhausted eyes. I looked wildly about for Charlie but could make out nothing in the greasy smoke.
With one last attempt at clear thought I grabbed hold of the lamp’s iron base and picked it up. Perhaps I intended to smother the damned thing or hurl it into a dark corner but, in truth, I do not know. My senses whirled, a great blanket of mauve darkness enveloped me and I was falling, falling, falling into an abyss…
14. The Pale Man
IN the distance, a clock struck four. I stirred and found myself lying prone on cold stone. Shifting a little, I cracked open stinging eyes, peered blearily about, coughed and opened my mothball-stale mouth. I tried to sit up but sank back at once on to the chilly floor, skull throbbing as though it were fixed about with a tight iron band.
Where the hell was I?
I raised my head again, widening my eyes in a last-ditch attempt at wakefulness. I was in some kind of cell, windowless and cramped. Slimy straw lay all about me and there was a pervasive odour of ammonia.
Head splitting, I somehow managed to stumble to my feet and then sank back against the wet bricks. Looking down at myself, I saw that I was in full evening dress, my shirt-front torn and the lapels of my coat plastered with mud.
I could recall nothing at all. Never mind where was I!
I hammered my fist against my forehead and screwed up my eyes. Something about a box. A box with a centipede in it. No. That wasn’t right. Perhaps it was a book. A book in a box. Daniel Liquorice! Was that my name? No. A Jack in a box? Jack Box? Jackpot? That was someone else entirely, I felt sure.
Bending down, I peered through the rusted keyhole. I could just make out a suggestion of a gloomy corridor beyond.
I sank down against the wall then leant forward as I became aware of something poking into my back. I had a dim remembrance of a similar feeling, connected to a yellow villa in Islington but this was not quite the same. Exploring under the tail of my ruined shirt my fingers closed upon the warm, reassuring presence of my revolver, still strapped in the hollow above my buttocks that nature almost seemed to have provided for the express purpose.
I took it out, opened the chamber and span it.
«That won’t help you,» came a whispered voice from the darkness.
I started and whirled round, brandishing the pistol.
Nothing.
«Who’s there?» I demanded.
A hissing chuckle sounded close by. I crept towards the far wall. Just about visible was a tiny, barred window, evidently connecting to the cell next door. I pressed my face to it, making out a crouched figure in the gloom beyond. He turned his face towards me but little detail was visible in the filthy mass of hair and beard.
«Oh…» I cried. «Hullo.»
«Good evening. Or is it morning? I no longer know.»
«My name is Box.»
«And mine’s the Count of Monte Cristo! Hee-hee!»
I pulled back from the window slightly, alarmed at the fellow’s crazed laughter. He fixed me with a wild eye and shuffled across the floor of his cell. «As I say, that weapon of yours won’t do you any good. They don’t feel pain. They don’t feel anything!»
«Who don’t?»
«They came for me, you see. I was getting too close. Too close to the truth. Mr Poop — he was on to them.»
My ears pricked up. «Poop! What do you know of Poop?»
The strange old man coughed noisily. «Looting they was! Stripping the excavations bare and flogging the stuff to keep this wretched place going!»
«Excavations?»
«They’ve forgotten me now. Hee-hee! Thrown away the key. Maybe you’ll rot here too!»
As if in response, a key rattled in the lock and my door was thrown open. A strange figure was framed there; very tall, clad in black and wearing what appeared to be some kind of brass helmet. I rubbed at my eyes. Was this still part of my strange purple dream? Had the notion of a lead-shoed diver sprung to life before me?
My neighbour in the next cell jumped to his feet and pressed his grimy face to the bars.
«Look out! They’ve come for you! Don’t resist! They don’t feel anything! Hee-hee!»
The extraordinary helmeted figure stumped across the cell towards me and opened his great arms as though offering an embrace.
I thrust the revolver into my pocket and backed away. Pale as death, the man’s jaw hung slackly open, a strand of drool dangling from his lips. His eyes, staring blankly ahead, were a horrible yellowy grey like the yolks of over-boiled eggs.
My gaze was drawn, however, to the strange brass thing that covered the top part of his face. On the closer inspection I was now afforded, I could see it was like a Norman helmet, though the upper part was made of glass and glowing a weird, sickly purple. Great brass screws were inset at the temples, effectively clamping the helmet to his head.
Stepping quickly to one side, I raced towards the door, bargaining that the brute’s sluggish gait would count against him.
«No good!» croaked my neighbour through the barred window. «He’ll get you!»
At once the creature changed direction and cut me off, his eyes rolling in his head, arms outstretched in deadly intent.
I resorted to my pistol but he swung at me, knocking the weapon flying. As I moved to retrieve it, his sweaty
