Lockwood & Co: The Screaming Staircase (23 page)

Someone
was
studying them now.

A shape stood beside the shelves, a hulking figure dressed
in black. It was a man, broad in the shoulder and half a head taller than Lockwood; he wore a long coat, with the hood drawn up to hide the face. A bright rapier hung at his belt. He was turned away from us, examining one of the smaller cases in a black-gloved hand. He had his torch trained on it closely; spears of light reflected off its facets and extended over the ceiling.

Whatever he sought he didn’t find. He tossed the case contemptuously on the floor.

‘Can I offer you some tea while you ransack our place?’ Lockwood said politely.

The figure wheeled round. Lockwood shone his torch full into the intruder’s face.

Despite myself, I let out a gasp. The hood hung forward, curving like a raptor’s beak. Beneath this cowl, the face was covered by a white cloth mask. The eye-sockets were black slashed holes. Another slash, jagged and off-centre, formed the mouth. Nothing of the man beneath it could be seen.

The intruder was clearly blinded by the torch. He raised an arm against the light.

‘That’s right. Put up your hands,’ Lockwood said.

The arm shot down. It reached for the rapier hanging at the belt.

‘It’s three against one,’ Lockwood pointed out.

A swish of metal: the sword was drawn.

‘Be like that, then.’ Lockwood raised his blade, stepped slowly forward.

Plan C seemed the obvious manoeuvre in the circumstances. We normally use it on powerful Type Twos, of course, but it works for mortal enemies as well. I went to the left, George to the right. Lockwood held the centre. Our blades were up and ready. We moved steadily inwards, hemming the intruder in.

Or so we thought. The white-masked figure seemed unconcerned. He raised his left hand to the shelves and grasped a case that glowed with a dim blue light. Turning, he threw it with appalling force, so that it struck the floor at George’s feet. Hinges cracked, the case broke open; a fragment of finger-bone fell out. At once the light escaped, bled outwards like a little cloud. A faint blue apparition rose from the floorboards. It took the shape of a hopping, deformed creature dressed in rags. It rolled its head, threw back its arms and, with a sinuous sidelong plunge, sprang straight at George.

I saw no more, for the intruder had seized two other cases and thrown them at Lockwood and at me. Lockwood’s bounced, but didn’t open. Mine shattered completely, emitting a woman’s hairgrip, six streams of yellow plasm and a violent psychic wail. The streams rolled and tumbled on the floor, then rose like striking cobras and swung in my direction. With frantic hacks and swipes I sliced them to
ribbons. Some instantly dissipated and were gone; others fused and returned to the attack.

A clash of blades. Lockwood had leaped past and closed in on the enemy. Their rapiers met and met again. Beyond, George parried the Spectre’s flailing blows. He drove it back, wove iron patterns in the air.

The Visitor I faced was weak and tentative. It was time to snuff it out. I scrabbled in my belt, located a bag of filings. Ripping it clear, I tossed it down. A burst of sparkling light. The thrashing plasm shrank and dwindled, became a smoking puddle on the floor.

Beside me, iron smote iron; Lockwood and the intruder moved back and forth in the centre of the room, exchanging rapid strikes. The man in the mask was fast, his attacks accurate and heavy, but Lockwood remained at ease. He moved in a swaying dance-step, a sashaying, drifty sort of motion. His boots hardly touched the ground. His rapier-arm gave delicate twitches, the blade-tip changing position like some nimble dragonfly.

George grew impatient with his contest; dropping back a little, he took a salt bomb from his belt and blew his shambling Spectre into twinkling motes of sapphire light. The noise distracted Lockwood, who glanced aside. At once the masked enemy swung his rapier at Lockwood’s face. It would have been an awful injury – if it had struck. Lockwood leaned away; the edge swished past his cheek. With his
enemy unbalanced, Lockwood stepped to the side, jabbed his sword forward. The figure gave a cry, clutched at his midriff. With desperate strikes he drove Lockwood back and, plunging past him, ran across the room. George reached out to stop him. A gloved fist swung, caught George across the cheek, sent him crashing with a moan against the wall.

The intruder raced across the room towards the spiral stairs with Lockwood in pursuit. I jumped over the fading ribbons of yellow plasm and closed in, swiping blindly with my rapier. The man fled past the stairs and through the arch into the front office. For a moment his silhouette was illuminated by the faint light seeping through its window, and I understood what he was going to do.

‘Quick!’ I cried. ‘He’ll—’

Lockwood already knew the danger; even as he ran, he reached to his belt, plucked out a canister of Fire.

The intruder put on a spurt, drew near my desk. He leaped upon it and, as he did so, threw his arms across his face. He collided with the window in a crouched position, smashing through the pane in a whirl of spinning shards.

Lockwood cursed; from the far end of the office he hurled the flare. It passed straight through the broken window and out into the yard. We heard the canister crack upon the stones. A silver-white explosion lit up the night, sending the remaining window-glass hurtling back into the room. It spilled across the desk, clattering against the
ghost-jar, so the head inside it winced and goggled. Shards like spilled ice fanned out across the floor.

Lockwood sprang onto the table, sword in hand; I came to a halt behind him. We went no further. We knew we were too late. Out in the basement, little white fires flickered in the broken flowerpots, and danced and dwindled like Christmas lights across the hanging ivy. Smoke rose towards the street; somewhere up above us, a variety of car alarms beeped and yammered. But it had all been for nothing. The intruder was gone. At the top of the steps the front gate swung gently, gently. It came slowly to a halt.

Lockwood jumped back to the floor. Behind us, a shape emerged: George, shuffling painfully, clutching the side of his jaw. He was bleeding from a cut to his lower lip. I gave him a wan smile of sympathy; Lockwood patted his arm.

‘That was exciting,’ George said thickly. ‘We should have guests over more often.’

All at once I felt light-headed. My legs gave way; I supported myself upon the desk. For the first time since the fight began, I remembered the aches and strains left over from the Sheen Road fall. Lockwood must have experienced a similar come-down. It took him two or three goes to fix his rapier back into his belt.

‘George,’ he said. ‘The Annabel Ward necklace. You said you put it with the trophies. Mind going to see if it’s still there?’

George dabbed at his lip with his shirt-sleeve. ‘Don’t need to. I already thought of that. Just had a look. It’s gone.’

‘You’re sure you put it on the shelves?’

‘This very morning. It’s definitely not there.’

There was a silence. ‘You think that’s what he came for?’ I asked.

Lockwood sighed. ‘It’s possible. Anyway, he’s clearly got it now.’

‘No,’ I said. ‘He hasn’t.’ At which I pulled my collar aside, to reveal the silver-glass case with the pendant in it, hanging safely on its cord around my neck.

I should point out, I guess, that I’m not in the habit of secreting haunted objects on my person. I certainly don’t have any other sinister artefacts stuffed down my socks, as George suggested. The necklace was a weird one-off for me.

I’d seen it the previous afternoon, as we got ready for the assignment by the willow tree. George had put it on the trophy shelf along with all the other curios. It just lay there, in its little protective case, sparkling dully behind the glass. And instead of leaving it, as any ordinary person would have done, I’d picked up the case, hung it round my neck, and simply walked away.

Explaining
why
I’d done this wasn’t exactly easy, especially considering the state we were all in after the fight. So it
wasn’t until after a very late breakfast the following day that I tried to give my reasons.

‘I just wanted to keep the necklace close at hand,’ I said. ‘Not shoved in with all the other trophies. I think it’s because of what happened when I touched it, when I got that psychic connection with Annie Ward. The sensations I experienced then were
her
sensations. I felt what
she
felt; I got a glimpse of
being
her. So—’

‘That’s the danger of your Talent,’ Lockwood said abruptly. He was pale and serious that morning; he regarded me with narrowed eyes. ‘You’re almost too sensitive. You get too close to them.’

‘No, don’t get me wrong,’ I said. ‘I’m not close to Annie Ward at all. I don’t think she was a particularly nice person when alive, and she’s certainly a cruel and dangerous ghost. But because of my Touch, I
do
understand something of what she went through. I understand her pain. And that means I want justice for her now. I don’t want her forgotten. You saw her lying in that chimney, Lockwood! You know what Blake did. So when I saw the necklace dumped there with all the other trophies, it just . . . it just seemed wrong to me. Until that man’s been punished, and justice is properly done, I don’t think we should . . . discard her.’ I gave them a rueful smile. ‘Don’t tell me . . . that’s basically a bit mad, isn’t it?’

‘Yep,’ George said.

‘You need to be careful, Lucy,’ Lockwood said, and his
voice was flat and cold. ‘Wicked ghosts aren’t things to trifle with. You’re keeping secrets again, and any agent who does that is endangering the rest of us. I’m not having anyone on my team who can’t be trusted. You understand what I’m saying?’

I did understand. I looked away.

‘However . . .’ he went on, in a slightly lighter tone, ‘by chance it’s all worked out quite well. This necklace would probably have been stolen, if it weren’t for you.’

He had it in his hand as he spoke, the gold surface of the pendant glinting in the sun. We stood in the basement, beside the open garden door. Cool air drifted in, diluting the taint of decay left by the freed Visitors in the night. The floor was littered with broken glass and plasm stains.

George had been working on the trophy shelves, sorting through the cases. He wore an apron with slightly lacy edges, and had his sleeves rolled up. ‘Nothing else has been nicked,’ he said, ‘which, if that guy was a normal thief working for the black market,
is
a little strange. There are some cracking pieces here. The pirate hand, for instance, or this lovely fibula . . .’

Lockwood shook his head. ‘No. It’s the necklace he wanted. It’s too much of a coincidence otherwise.
Someone
needs it badly.’

‘Well, we know who that someone is,’ I said. ‘Hugo Blake.’

George paused. ‘Only one problem. He’s currently locked up.’

‘He’s in custody,’ Lockwood agreed, ‘but that doesn’t mean much. He’s a wealthy man. He might easily have arranged the raid. But I must admit, I don’t quite understand why the necklace is so important to him. That Latin inscription doesn’t prove him guilty, does it?’ He hesitated. ‘Unless . . .’

‘Unless,’ I said, ‘the necklace contains
another
clue or secret that Blake doesn’t want found out.’

‘Exactly. Let’s look at it in daylight.’

We stepped outside into the little garden. Lockwood held the necklace up for us to inspect. It seemed exactly as before: an oval pendant, gold with pearly flakes, rather squashed and split along one side.

I gazed at it. Split along the side . . .

‘We’re idiots,’ I gasped. ‘It’s staring us in the face.’

Lockwood glanced at me. ‘Meaning . . .’

‘Meaning it’s
supposed
to have a split! It’s a
locket
. It opens! We can open it.’

I took the pendant from him, and pressed the corners of my thumbnails into the narrow crack. I prised gently. Despite its distorted shape, there was an immediate satisfying click; the pendant split in two, neatly swivelling on its hinge. I pulled the halves apart, held it open on my palm.

I don’t quite know what I expected, but I expected
something
. A twist of hair, maybe? A photograph? People keep things in lockets. That’s what they’re for.