Potter, almost dozing off at the drone of Gaston’s monologue on the causes of madness, suddenly realised the doctor was making a suggestion about his search for Le Prince.
‘You know, it is no surprise to me that this man you are seeking…’
‘Le Prince.’
‘…Le Prince, disappeared. Little is known about the effects of cyanide on those who indulge in the science of photography.’
Potter frowned.
‘What has cyanide to do with this case, doctor? Are you suggesting that Le Prince had been poisoned?’
Doctor Gaston smiled. ‘Let me explain. About forty years ago, a man called Archer discovered that a substance called collodion made an excellent surface for photographic images. In order to fix this image, a solution was required, and most photographers used a weak solution of cyanide of potassium, silver nitrate, and water. Unfortunately, this solution is highly poisonous, and should not be allowed to touch broken skin, nor should the fumes be inhaled. Many people have died as a result of their interest in taking photographs.’
Potter remembered Albert Le Prince’s comment about his brother’s use of collodion, and being immersed in chemicals.
‘What are the symptoms of cyanide poisoning?’
‘Initially, headaches, faintness, anxiety. Often the sufferer has a burning sensation in his mouth. Later, he will suffer attacks of excitement, anxiety, and increased heart rate.’
‘And finally?’
‘Coma, convulsions, paralysis…and death. Inevitably – death.’
‘You seem to know a lot about the subject.’
‘Oh yes. I have been making a study of the progression of the symptoms, and have observed several research subjects in this very house.’
Potter shuddered at the apparent callousness of the doctor, and his reference to the demented, poisoned souls as simply subjects for his research.
‘Then, if he did jump from the train that day, what were his chances?’
The doctor sighed.
‘If he tried to hide somewhere, and the later stages of cyanide poisoning took effect – heart arrhythmia, respiratory depression – then he undoubtedly would have died a lonely and painful death.’
‘And I am wasting my time. Fancy imagining him pursued and murdered by rivals, when in fact he was simply being persecuted by his own deranged imagination.’
‘Not in the least. Our chance meeting has provided you with the most likely fate for the unfortunate Monsieur Le Prince. Break it to his wife gently.’ He leaned back in his chair. ‘Please, there is a village a kilometre down the road, Monsieur Potter – Pont-sur-Vanne – I will arrange for my assistant to take you there in the carriage.’
When Potter made a token protest at the inconvenience, Dr Gaston brushed it aside.
‘It is better you do not stay here tonight. My patients can be…unsettled by strangers.’
So it was that Potter readily agreed to the doctor’s offer of transport as he now felt his search was over. He thought it likely that Le Prince, doped with accidental cyanide poisoning, had fallen from the train and been killed. At the very least, he would have been seriously injured, and perhaps had crawled away into the woods only to succumb to cyanide and the elements soon afterwards. He shivered at the thought that Le Prince’s fate could easily have been his own.
It was thus with some relief that he took his leave of the doctor and his forbidding residence, looking back only briefly to see the man standing in front of the portico, lit by the flickering lantern he held above his head. Then Potter sighed and settled back in his seat, looking forward to finding a warm dry hotel in the nearby village.
Dr Gaston, lantern in hand, waved goodbye to the Englishman, then mounted the steps back into his domain. He closed the creaky front door of the asylum against the elements. Taking a bunch of keys from his pocket, he carefully locked the door, turned, and crossed the vast, echoing hallway. The darkness hung heavy, like the cobwebs that adorned the upper of the high ceiling, but the lantern cast enough light for the doctor to see his way. Besides, he knew the house like the back of his hand now. To one side of the still imposing staircase that curved up into the darkness of the upper floors there was a secret door made to resemble the wall in which it was cut. He fumbled another key on the ring into the lock and stepped through the door, closing it behind him.
He heard a very familiar shriek. Descending the stairs that took him down to part of the warren of cellars under the chateau, he stopped at another locked door. The moaning came from behind this door. There was a shutter in the upper part of the door, and he slid it gently back. He looked at his latest research subject, and felt firm in his resolution to harbour the secret of his existence. The worth to science, and to Gaston’s reputation, would be inestimable. He watched as the lunatic repeated his strange compulsion over and over again.
The man with the bushy Dundreary whiskers, now somewhat obscured by the full growth of beard on his chin, stared wide-eyed in terror at the illuminated square cast on the wall of his cell. He appeared transfixed by what he saw. In the corner of the room lay an oak box, bound with brass. Unfortunately, the brass had not saved the contents of the box from destruction in some sort of accident. One that Gaston now knew as the man’s leap from the Paris train. The box rattled when shaken, but the man refused to relinquish it.
The occupant of the room screamed, and the doctor slid the shutter closed. He knew the cycle was now going to be repeated over again. And he longed to know what the man saw on the wall, where there was only a feeble square of light cast by the lamp he insisted on keeping burning all hours of the day and night. A blank patch of yellow light that terrified him. The doctor shook his head in bewilderment.
Louis sat mesmerised by the projected image of his persecutor on the wall. It was as real as reality itself. Like so many times before, the tall, thin man in the Inverness cape was sitting opposite him on the train, fixing him with his steely eyes. They were alone in the carriage. Slowly, that eternal, predatory leer formed on his face, and his silent lips formed the words, ‘Give me the camera, Monsieur Le Prince.’ Louis’s heart sank. He could not take his eyes off the man, trying as he had done so many times to fix the man’s features with his gaze. But the image was blurred, and lost in shadow, like a poorly developed photograph, sitting hopelessly in a tray of fixative. The only hope was to add more cyanide of potassium to it. He stared, knowing what was coming next, anticipating the inevitable.
The image shook, just as the camera had when the train had braked sharply, and the tall, thin man threw himself at Louis. The man’s face filled the screen as Louis swung the camera at his head, a sickening crunch jarring him to the elbow. Then the image shifted jerkily to a shot of the carriage door, swinging open, and he was enveloped in the flapping wings of the man’s cape. Under the dead weight of the body, Le Prince plunged into the darkness. He screamed.
Cigarettes by Michael Z. Lewin
I should stop smoking. I’m sure I should. I know I should. Smoking is bad. And it can lead to bad things.
On the other hand, there is a good side to smoking, especially these days. It’s a social thing. And that’s it. Smoking is social, and I don’t just mean lighting up and sharing a cig after you-know-what.
Smoking has always been social, associated with parties, drinking, fun. But these days there’s a new dimension. I’m talking about the way all us smokers gather in doorways outside office buildings and factories, the places where we’re sent now we’re banned from the insides. So those of us who persist, who resist, who continue, we’re all bound to bond. When you’re huddling together from the cold, you make friends.