The Isle of Blood (Monstrumologist)

My master waved the questions away impatiently. Von Helrung pressed on. “And how many more come bac in humiliation and defeat, reputations ruined, their careers in ashes?”

“I hardly see what that matters,” answered the doctor angrily. “But yes, I do happen to know. Six, counting Lebroque.”

“Ah, Lebroque. I forgot about him, armes Schwein. And who was that talkative little Scotsman, the one with the lisp?”

“Bisset.”

“Ja, Bithet.” Von Helrung chuckled. “All arms and chest and the bluster to match!”

“A dilettante,” said Warthrop dismissively. “The rest quixotic adventurers.”

“But not Lebroque.”

“Especially Lebroque. He allowed his ambition to blind him—”

“Ambition will do that,” allowed von Helrung. “And worse.” He rose and went to my master’s side, placing a pudgy hand on his forearm and gently braking his restless pacing.

“But you are exhausting your old master. Please, Pellinore, sit so we might reason together and decide upon our course.”

The doctor pulled free from the old man’s grasp and said, “I already know the course. I will leave for England tomorrow.”

“England?” Von Helrung was taken aback. “Why do you go to England?”

“To find Jack Kearns, of course.”

“Who has vanished like the mist, leaving no trace of himself behind. How will you find him?”

“I will begin by looking under the largest rock on the continent,” answered the doctor grimly.

Von Helrung chuckled. “And if he isn’t there?”

“Then I shall move on to the smaller rocks.”

“And once you find him—if you find him—what if he refuses to tell you what you want to know? Or worse, doesn’t know what you want to know?”

“Know, know, know,” Warthrop savagely mimicked. “You wish to know what I know, Meister Abram? I know Jack Kearns wanted me to have the nidus. He took great pains to make sure I received it quickly. He also wanted me to know he was leaving England—quickly. There can be only one explanation: He knows where the nidus came from. And that is why he let it go. There is only one thing on earth more valuable than an authentic nidus ex magnificum, and that is the magnificum itself. The nidus is a great prize, but the Unseen One is the prize, the prize of all> prizes.” Warthrop was nodding vehemently. “It is the only explanation.”

“But why send anything to you at all? What was the reason for it? Surely he would want no one to know that the prize of prizes was within his grasp, least of all Pellinore Warthrop.”

The doctor nodded. “It has been troubling me a bit. Why did he do it? The only thing that makes sense only makes sense if you know John Kearns.”

Von Helrung thought for a moment. “He is taunting you?”

“I think so. In the cruelest manner possible. You know Kearns, Meister Abram. You know as well as I the depravities to which he will stoop.”

My master then waved the thought away. He did not wish to dwell on Jack Kearns or what drove him. He was too much in the grip of his own demons.

“He is a cruel man,” he said. “Some might say a monster of a man. But that is no concern of mine.”

“Listen to you; listen! My former pupil! Father in heaven, forgive me for my transgressions, for I have failed you—and my dear student! Pellinore, we are men before scientists; it is the human monster we should most concern ourselves with!”

“Why?” the doctor said sharply. “What of monstrous men? I can’t think of anything more banal. I have no doubt—no doubt whatsoever—that once it has obtained the means to do so, the species will wipe itself off the face of the earth. There is no mystery to it. It is in our nature. Oh, one might delve into the particulars, but really, what might we say about the species that invented murder? What can we say?”

Forgetting myself for a moment, I said, “You sound like him.”

Warthrop whirled on me. “What did you say?”

“What you were saying… It sounded like something Dr. Kearns would say.”

“Just because a man is a homicidal maniac doesn’t make him wrong,” the monstrumologist snarled.

“No,” said von Helrung softly, his bright eyes flashing dangerously. “It merely makes him evil.”

“We are scientists, von Helrung; such concepts are alien in our vocabulary. In India it is a sin to kill a cow. Are we Westerners evil for slaughtering them?”

“Human beings, mein Freund,” replied von Helrung, “are not cows.”

Warthrop did not have a ready retort for that, and he listened silently as his old friend begged him to reconsider. Rushing off to England would be premature. Kearns was gone, and, after all, the quest was not for