came with it and spilled onto the floor. The sound of it hitting made me dizzy. I wasted no time in fishing in the pocket and bringing out the canister. Once I had it in my hand, I backed away from the desk and shouted to the others in a voice cracking with fear. 'Now, let's go!'
I went around the room and, using my foot, nudged everyone sharply and ordered them to move. Anotine was the first to come around, and she helped me rouse Brisden and Nunnly. Before we could leave, Brisden insisted that he take the glass jar of ocean as something to stand in as a symbolic presence we would now find difficult continuing without. Once he had it in his hands, we dashed down the hallway and out into the village. Anotine led us through the passage ways, and I was last, using my spear to prod Brisden in the rear end when he tried to slow down. Our flight was a nightmare, and at every turn I expected to see the gaping maw of the Delicate. Though I had only been told about it, it was now more real to me than anything I could remember.
20
Brisden kept to his own plan and was well into a pint of Tears In The River. He sat at the small table in the back of the room, the signal gun resting in his lap, staring into the glowing ocean sample he had retrieved from the Doctor's. Nunnly was in the chair opposite, following the trail of smoke that rose from his cigarette. I stood by the entrance, looking down the steps and across the moonlit terrace below for any signs of movement while Anotine sat cross-legged on the brown rug, her spear lying next to her and the black box in her hand. No one had bothered to light the spire lamps when twilight gave itself up to darkness. No one had spoken since our return. The loss of the Doctor had left us weak, our mourning compounded with the other impossible elements of our predicament.
As I stood guard, I thought about Hellman and how incredibly I missed him. He had been more vibrant than many of the people I had known on a daily basis back in Wenau. It came to me in the midst of my vigil that he had to be, no more, no less, than some manifestation of Below's personality. I had a hard time reconciling this. In fact, all of my companions on the island were first-rate human beings. Was there an aspect of the Master I had missed? I supposed that everyone, even the most heinous of criminals, could think himself, in some way, righteous and good. This type of delusion could have been the impetus for the creation of the four moral souls I had met, or perhaps Below did harbor a positive side.
It was all too confusing to consider, especially in light of the fact that our time was quickly running out. The sound of the island disappearing had grown stronger since our foray to the Doctor's. What was quickly becoming evident through our siege was that the Delicate was too smart to enter a room full of armed enemies. His plan became clear to me—draw us out into the night, separate us, and devour us one at a time. I had a sense from the little I knew that he was patient and methodical, perfect attributes for a beast of prey.
I hated to have to implicate the others in my decision, but without taking action at this point we had absolutely no chance of survival. It was obvious that we would have to do exactly what the Delicate wanted. As I turned back into the room, I found Nunnly standing behind me, spear in hand.
'Let's go,' he said, and one look into his eyes told me we had reached the same conclusion in our thinking.
Anotine got up and came over to join us.
'Stay here with Brisden. Nunnly and I are going to try to lead the Delicate back to the room. As the Doctor said, we don't know what he is capable of. I think we have a better chance of taking him here with all of us working together,' I told her.
'I want to go,' she said.
'I want you to, but someone has to be ready to charge the trap when we lead him through the door. You're the only one who knows how to work the box.'
She reluctantly nodded.
Nunnly leaned over to her and whispered. 'Get the signal gun away from Bris. He's more of a danger with that thing to himself and us than to the Delicate.'
'Forget about what we discussed earlier,' I said. 'If the creature comes through the entrance and the trap doesn't work, shoot it. We'll have to risk damaging its face.'
'I know what to do,' she said. She kissed me, then went back to sit on the rug.
'Someday you will have to explain that lip maneuver to me,' said Nunnly as we stepped out into the night.
In addition to the spears we carried, I also had the Lady Claw secreted away in my boot with a piece of sponge protecting the blade. I almost relished the idea of getting in close to our nemesis and practicing some of my old technique. Even considering the dexterity I had lost since my renouncing the mantle of Physiognomist, I was confident I could surgically fillet the bastard with a few passes.
A strong breeze now blew in toward the center of the island, a phenomenon caused, no doubt, by the disintegration at the edges. The noise from out there where the wood was rapidly falling into nothing was a constant distraction. We moved along cautiously, keeping close to the walls of the rooms where the shadows were thickest, communicating only with hand signals and the merest whispers. At one point Nunnly proposed that we not move too far away from Ano-tine's room, but that we should think of it as the center of a circle, and our wandering should not exceed a modest circumference. With this tactic, we would always be the same distance from it. I agreed, seeing that we were only trying to attract the Delicate. Neither of us thought it feasible that we could actually hunt him down.
After following this strategy for over an hour, having made at least ten orbits around our point of departure, we had ceased whispering and now spoke in normal tones. The anxiety that had accompanied us at the start had all but diffused, and Nunnly made the suggestion that we might have been too stealthy.
'I think we need to be more obvious, Cley,' he said.
'Should we split up?' I asked.
'Not completely, but we should make it appear as if we have,' he said. 'You know the course we've been following. Stay on it, but I will follow twenty yards behind you. This way if he shows up, well still be close enough to come to each other's rescue.'
'If that should happen, try not to engage him, but instead lead him back to the room,' I said.
'I understand,' he said, and brought his hand to his mouth with a lit cigarette now in it.
As I started off, he said, 'You know, Cley, while we were walking just now, I had a memory of my other life. Perhaps it is the fact that everything is falling apart that allows me to see into my past'
I stopped to listen.
'It wasn't much,' he said. 'I definitely recall having had a black dog, though. A rambunctious animal, courageous and trustworthy, but verging on the insane. I can just about see him, running in circles. That's all.'
'Interesting,' I said, knowing full well that what he told me was impossible. 'No doubt you'll remember more and more as we proceed.'
He took a drag of his cigarette and smiled, smoke leaking from the corners of his lips.
I moved on ahead, happy for Nunnly, even if he had somehow absorbed my memory and taken it for his own. It was just this kind of absurdity that made everything seem so dangerous.
We circled and circled. I passed forty times the mousehole opening to Anotine's secret place, and thought about my dream of the monkey dancing. It was the first time since I had arrived that I began to get a sense of how the village was laid out. I finally knew that if you were to take the alley to the right of the pelican fountain and go up a flight of stairs, you would pass the corridor that led to Nunnly's. Other landmarks became familiar and I began to plot, from certain points, the best course to get back to Anotine's should I hear a scream or the firing of the gun. At the end of every circle, I would wait up for Nunnly by the fountain, and we would have a word in order to make sure each of us was still safe.
It must have been only two hours or so till morning, and I was treading wearily along the path we had defined, having nearly forgotten what I was doing, when I heard a distinct sound rise above the background din of the disintegration. Like a single note struck on an out-of-tune piano, it brought me up short, and my fatigued mind worked to place it. I saw a picture in my mind before I realized what it was—the sound of Nunnly's steel spear, hitting the stone floor of the corridor I had just turned out of.
I began to run, backtracking down the alley and turning the corner onto the corridor beside the pool that was lined with columns. At the opposite end, by the steps leading down from a terrace, I could see two figures that appeared joined in a dance. They moved in and out of the shadows, and my approach made it clear that a large-headed man in a dark suit had his arms wrapped tightly around Nunnly, his lips covering the engineer's.
The Delicate didn't notice me, so engaged was he in his business. I gave no shout of warning, but used the momentum I had built up with my charge to drive the steel spear into the middle of his back. The brown suit jacket split, and the creature arched his spine, releasing a high, throaty whistle. Nunnly dropped to the ground, still writhing, his body only partially deflated.
'My, that smarts,' said the Delicate in a voice both masculine and feminine.
I stepped back, waiting for him to fall to the ground. Instead, he whipped around to face me, and the steel shaft was flung out of his back with the violence of the motion. It hit the stone and rang out. He winced with the sound of it, and, for the first time, I got a look at him. The bald head was enormous, suggesting either brilliance or idiocy, I wasn't sure which, but in the face's long descent toward the chin it grew exceedingly thin, coming almost to a point. The twin braids, which Anotine had spoken of, were draped forward over the shoulders and tied together in front. His body seemed too thin to support the weight of that head, which appeared to ride atop it like a pumpkin on a flexible broom handle.
'Good evening,' he said to me, adjusting his shirt cuffs inside the sleeve ends of his jacket.
I stepped back even farther and reached down into my boot for the Lady Claw. As I straightened and pulled the protective sponge off the end of the instrument, Nunnly caught his breath and let out a most pitiful scream that scrambled my senses. Weak with fear, I held the scalpel up in front of me and made ready to defend myself.
'What have you there?' asked the Delicate as he took a step closer to me.
I sliced at the air to let him know I
'This is all a misunderstanding,' he said in a placid voice.
He reached out toward me with those long rubbery fingers, and I sliced the Claw down across them.
He flinched and drew his hand back. 'Excuse me for hitting your weapon with my hand' he said, giving me a sincere smile. 'Perhaps we should get to know each other.'
I lunged again with the scalpel, this time for his throat, but he was deceptively fast. His neck seemed to move separately from the rest of his body, pulling itself in, as his hand came up and caught me. Those fingers grew and circled my wrist, applying a pressure so intense I had to drop the Claw. In reaction to this, I threw a
