Ancient Appetites

'Aaargh! Enough, for God's sake!' the man shouted.

Nate's grip loosened as he recognized the voice.

'Berto?'

'Nate?' came the incredulous reply. 'What did you go attacking me for? That head-butt bloody hurt. I'm going to have a bruised chin from that… And what are you doing here?'

'I could ask you the same thing,' Nate responded, letting go of his brother. 'Why were you creeping around in the dark?'

'I heard you coming, thought it might be someone… you know, up to some mischief.'

'But why are you here?' Nate pressed him.

'I… I was going to have a look at Marcus's body' Berto said.

Nate knew he was lying as soon as he'd opened his mouth. Berto never could lie worth a damn. He wondered what his older brother was hiding.

'Why?' he asked. He lit his candle again, holding it up to see Roberto's face. 'And why go in secret? You could just walk in and take a look.'

'I wanted to do it in private,' Berto said, sounding sheepish. He brushed his clothes down and took out his own candle. 'Just so I wouldn't have the family telling me what was what. So I could see him for myself He paused. 'That's why you're here, isn't it? To find out if his fall really was an accident?'

Nate avoided his eyes, but nodded tersely.

'Can I pinch a light?' Berto held up his candle. Lighting it off Nathaniel's, he eyed the sputtering flame. 'There was nothing to see. Warburton's already done a good job of fixing him up.'

'I'm still going to take a look,' Nate insisted.

'Suit yourself,' Berto said, shrugging. 'The undertaker's in there, but the old Cavalier painting with the eyeholes still overlooks the examining table. You can see the body through that – they won't even know you're there. God, these tunnels are dusty. Look at the state of my clothes! We'll have to get someone in here to clean up. Anyway, I'll leave you to your. detective work; hope it gives you some peace of mind. Ta-ra!'

He seemed in a hurry to be off, so Nate let him go. Watching the glow of his brother's candle disappear off down the passage, he stood there, lost in thought.

'Pssst!' a voice hissed behind him.

Nate swung round, wax spraying from his candle.

'Who's there?' he demanded, dropping into a defensive stance.

A pale-faced figure in a coppery orange dress stepped into view from round a corner. It was Daisy.

'I'm sorry if I frightened you-' she began.

'As if you could!' he retorted, straightening up and trying to hide his frayed nerves. 'What are you doing sneaking around in here?'

At first she hesitated, but she was in an impossible position and she knew it.

'I was following Berto,' she confessed. 'He's been acting strangely lately and I wanted to find out why'

'So you followed him?' Nate exclaimed, amazed at her nerve. Then he saw a way to take advantage of her indiscretion. 'And what did you find out, exactly?'

'That's none of your business!' Daisy snapped.

'I'm making it my business,' he barked back. 'Unless you'd like me to tell my brother that his wife has been tracking him like a prize beagle!'

Her stare could have cut glass, but he returned it steadily.

'Nothing,' she admitted at last. 'I haven't discovered a thing. He entered this passage through a grandfather clock. Wherever he was going, he bumped into you before he got there. And now I'll never catch up with him… What was all that about anyway, that fighting? You were rolling around like a pair of piglets in the mud.'

'It's how we show our brotherly love,' Nate told her.

'There's such a thing as loving one's brother too much,' she said with a disdainful expression. 'But perhaps that's the Wildernstern way. For Tatty's sake, I hope the same can't be said of your sisters.'

Nate ground his teeth. The woman walked a thin line sometimes.

'So Berto didn't stop at Warburton's?' he asked her.

'I have no idea where one would find Doctor Warburton's surgery. But Roberto didn't stop anywhere until you assaulted him.'

Nate sighed, gazing back up the passageway that Berto had taken.

'There's one other thing,' Daisy added hesitantly. 'He said he came in here to take a look at Marcus's body? But Gerald and Doctor Warburton worked through the night on Marcus; Berto knew that. He was down there this morning after they'd finished the reconstruction process – to discuss the funeral arrangements.

'Whatever Berto came in here to do, it had nothing to do with Marcus's corpse.'

Nate nodded.

'I knew he was lying. All right then, it's one more thing to think about. If you find out anything else, I want to hear about it. I'll see you at dinner. You'd best go back the way you came.'

Daisy didn't move. Glancing behind her, she gave him a reluctant smile.

'What?' he asked impatiently.

'I followed Berto in here,' she explained. 'I don't know the way out. I'm completely lost.'

For just the briefest moment Nate considered running off and leaving her there, but his conscience got the better of him.

'Follow me,' he said in a resigned tone.

It took more than ten minutes to find their way back through the twisting passageways to the wall of animal trophies where Nathaniel had come in. He checked through a spyhole to see that the way was clear and then opened the door. Stepping out, he brushed the dust from his clothes as Daisy negotiated her wide dress through the narrow doorway.

It wasn't until Nate had closed the door that he looked up to see Daisy put a hand to her mouth, and turned to find Gerald standing, his hands in his pockets, staring at them with his head tilted to one side.

'I know, I know,' he said, giving them a lecherous smile as he took out his cigarette case. 'There's a perfectly good explanation for this. But you'll excuse me if I prefer to let my imagination run riot.'

IX

SCREAMS IN THE NIGHT

Wildenstern Hall dominated the horizon south of Dublin. For centuries it had remained one of the largest buildings in the country by expanding with each generation. The thirty-storey tower that now formed the main body of the building had been completed some fifteen years before. From the steel frame that formed its skeleton, rooted deep in the bedrock, to the steam turbines that powered its mechanical lifts, the building was decades ahead of its time.

Its walls were lined with sculptured terracotta panels and at the top of the tower, arches and flying buttresses supported gothic turrets that jutted into the sky. Gargoyles gazed open-mouthed on the land beneath them, and as the sun set, the bats that nested in the eaves dropped from where they hung to take to the night sky and hunt.

Wildenstern Hall was a looming, menacing sight for those who lived around it. It had been designed that way. Its rooms and corridors had seen countless dramas and this night they were to witness another. It was not the first time that screams had echoed through the hallways of this house – but it hadn't happened for a while.

Daisy was sitting up late in her rooms, praying for patience as she waited for Roberto to come in and say goodnight, as he did without fail every evening before they both retired – like all good Christian gentry, she and her husband slept in separate rooms. He had disappeared again and she would not be able to sleep until she knew where he had gone – or at least, until he came back and gave her a half-convincing excuse. It wasn't jealousy so much as fear for his safety – that, and the unbearable thought that he was keeping some terrible secret from her.