“He’s not dead. He’s lost.”
“Then find him. You’re the explorer. You can’t just—”
“Jake.” It was the first time Venn had used his name. It stopped him. He saw that the tall man had turned at the bottom of the stairs, one hand on the banister, at bay like a trapped animal. “Jake, listen to me. Your father is lost. He’s not here. He’s not anywhere I can find him. He’s lost in time.”
Jake shook his head. “What sort of rubbish is that?”
“I wish it was. I wish to God I had never meddled with it. But I did and now I have to go on. Whatever it costs.” He looked weary and haggard, Wharton thought. No, haunted. He looked like a man who sees a ghost in every mirror. Except that there were no mirrors in this house.
Venn turned away. “I’ll talk to you about this later.”
“You’ll talk to me now!” Jake leaped up the stairs, right up to the man, so close that Wharton hurried forward. He had seen too many schoolboy brawls not to recognize the sudden urge for violence.
Venn didn’t move. His eyes were as cold as winter. “I should get rid of you,” he breathed.
There was a terrible moment of silence.
Until the phone rang. It erupted like a small explosion in the charged air.
They all looked at the old black telephone on its shelf in the hall, as if they barely remembered what it was.
Then Piers had slid out of the kitchen and was answering, the abruptly cut-off ringing still echoing in the high vaulted ceiling.
“Wintercombe Abbey,” he said, his voice prim and high. “Yes. Yes…Certainly. One moment please.” He turned to Jake and held out the receiver. “It’s for you.”
Jake stared. Then he came and took it. At once Venn stalked up the stairs and slammed a distant door. Piers glanced at Wharton and went back to the kitchen. After a moment, awkward, Wharton took himself off up the stairs too. At the landing he paused and looked down. Jake was talking quietly, into the receiver.
Thank God for whoever that was.
Because, for a moment there, it had all looked very nasty.
“Sorry? Who is this?” Jake snapped.
“You don’t know me, Mr. Wilde, so my name would mean nothing to you. But I have some information for you. Something you might dearly want to know.”
The voice was a man’s, quiet, faintly husky.
Jake leaned with his back against the paneled wall. “Like what?”
There was a small breathy silence at the other end. A scratchy sound. Then the voice said, “I know where your father is.”
Jake kept very still. His hand shook a little, as if he was holding the receiver too tight. He said, “Where?”
“I can’t tell you that over the phone. The line might not be secure. You understand?”
Another scratchy sound. Was someone listening in? Piers? Jake said, “Yes. Okay. But how do you know?”
“I’m calling from the village. From the parking lot of the pub. Can you get here?”
“Yes, but…”
“Come at once, Mr. Wilde. Come alone. Then I assure you, I will explain everything.”
A click.
Silence.
He replaced the receiver slowly and looked around. Should he find Wharton? No time. And he didn’t want the hassle. He grabbed a coat that hung on a peg and went to the front door. It was warped with damp, and stiff; he pulled at it, but Piers said softly, “Going out again, Jake?”
He swung around, fast. “Maybe.”
The tiny, smiling man gave him the creeps. Always that mocking grin. As if he knew so much.
“It’s just that Mr. Venn would rather you didn’t leave the estate at the moment. In your state of mind.”
“Venn, or you?” Jake stepped forward. “Who’s really running this place, Piers? Because you seem to be the one in control around here.”
“I assure you, I’m just the slave of the lamp. The controller of the cameras.”
Jake was simmering, but he had to keep calm. He managed a bitter shrug. “I get it. So that’s how it is.”
“That, I’m afraid, is how it is. I’m sure by tomorrow you’ll be feeling a little better about things.”
“You can’t keep me a prisoner here.”
Piers shrugged. “It was you who wanted to come, Jake.”
Jake snorted. He walked past him, down a corridor lined with vases, not knowing or caring where he was going, striding around a corner and past a door that opened. A hand came out and grabbed him. “Jake. In here.”
Sarah looked worried. She stood in the dim scullery and whispered, “What’s going on? You and Venn?”
“Forget him. Sarah, listen, I need your help. Someone in the village has information about Dad. How do I get out of here without Piers knowing?”
“You have to be invisible,” she said softly.
“What?”
“Nothing. Sorry. Well, there’s a side door that leads out by the Wintercombe. But the gates at the end of the drive will be locked, and Piers…”
“I’ll climb them. I don’t care if he sees me. Show me.”
She led him through a tiny stillroom to a black studded door. It took both of them to grind back the rusty bolts; when it creaked open, they found they were looking into shrubbery that had grown thickly over the door. Jake suddenly remembered what Gideon had said, and stared at her curiously. “I know you only came here yesterday. How did you know about this?”
She shrugged, irritated. The movement slid a small medal on a chain around her neck. It was one-half of what seemed to be a broken coin. “Maybe I know this place better than you think. Jake, listen! Try and get back before eight. I need to talk to you, because…”
He slipped out, impatient. “Because you lied about not seeing my father in that mirror? Get out of my way, Sarah. Tell me later.”
He had to hurry. Whoever made that call might not wait.
He was gone before she could explain, rustling into the dimness. Annoyed, she spared one glance around for traces of the wolf and then slid back in and closed the door, making sure the bolts were rammed tight. He was breathtakingly selfish. She needed an ally here. Someone to talk to.
She made herself stay calm. It was his loss. Because she would have shown him the journal. She kept it stuffed in her pocket now, afraid to leave it in her room, since Wharton had seen it.
And because she was afraid Janus would come looking for it.
She crept down past the kitchen and into the room called the Blue Closet. There she perched in a faded chair and looked at the gilt French clock as it pinged out three high notes. She had five hours, before…what?
The Chronoptika?
Suddenly cold, she pulled out the book and hastily found her place.
I said, “As you see, I’ve come.”
The scarred man nodded. “I was quite sure you would, Mr. Symmes. And I have the device, which, I assure you, is quite unique in this world.”
He indicated a veiled object on a table in the darkness, and moved an oil lamp, so that the slot of light fell across it. My eyes fixed on it, and I dare say my greed was perfectly visible to him. I whispered, “What is it?”
He did not answer. Instead he drew away the velvet cloth.
I saw a black slab. At first I thought it stone, but then as I moved, a thousand reflections of myself slid across it and vanished, and I realized it was glass, black glass, high as a man, smooth as a mirror. As I stepped closer I saw my features strangely slanted and shadowed. It was held upright in a narrow frame of silver, an angular design incised with letters of some alphabet unknown to me.
The man said, “It is pure obsidian. Volcanic glass forged in the deepest furnaces of the earth.”
I was fascinated.
I went to touch the mirror, but he forestalled me, quickly putting out his hand. “Not yet.”