The Midnight Palace Page 13

‘Exactly,’ de Rozio confirmed. ‘Have you ever tried moving an adult who weighs a hundred and twenty kilos?’

  Seth thought about it.

  ‘I have no recollection of such a thing, but—’

  ‘Just a minute!’ cried Michael from some invisible point behind the ring binders, boxes and piles of yellowing paper that filled the room. ‘I’ve found something.’

  ‘I hope it’s a pillow,’ protested de Rozio, raising his bulk.

  Michael appeared from behind a column of dusty shelves carrying a box full of papers and stamped documents that had been discoloured by time. Seth raised his eyebrows, praying that the discovery would be worthwhile.

  ‘I think these are the court records for a murder trial,’ said Michael. ‘They were underneath a summons addressed to Chandra Chatterghee, the engineer.’

  ‘Jawahal’s trial?’ cried Seth excitedly.

  ‘Let me have a look,’ said de Rozio.

  Michael deposited the box on the librarian’s desk, raising a cloud of dust that choked the cone of golden light projected by the electric lamp. The librarian’s plump fingers carefully flicked through the documents, his tiny eyes examining their contents. Seth watched de Rozio’s face, his heart in his mouth, waiting for some word or sign. De Rozio paused at a page that seemed to have a number of stamps on it and brought it closer to the light.

  ‘Well, well,’ he mumbled to himself.

  ‘What is it?’ begged Seth.

  De Rozio looked up and gave a broad feline smile.

  ‘I have in my hands a document signed by Colonel Sir Arthur Llewelyn. In it, citing reasons of state security and military secrecy, he is ordering the discontinuance of trial number 089861/A in court number four of the Calcutta High Court, in which a citizen named Lahawaj Chandra Chatterghee, an engineer by profession, is charged with alleged involvement and withholding and/or concealment of evidence in a murder investigation, and he instructs the transfer of the case to the Supreme Military Court of His Majesty’s Armed Forces. All previous rulings are therefore overturned and all evidence provided by the defence and the prosecution during the hearing is declared null and void. It’s dated 14 September 1911.’

  Michael and Seth stared at Mr de Rozio in amazement, unable to utter a single word.

  ‘So, you two,’ the librarian concluded, ‘which of you knows how to make coffee? This could be a very long night …’

  THE FOUR-WHEELED LOCK gave an almost inaudible click, and a few seconds later the two sides of the heavy iron door swung open, letting out a breath of air that had been trapped inside the house for years. Standing in the dark, Ian’s face went pale.

  ‘It opened,’ he said in a whisper.

  ‘How observant of you,’ Ben remarked.

  ‘This is no time for jokes,’ Ian replied. ‘We don’t know what’s in there yet.’

  Ben pulled out his matchbox and rattled it in the air.

  ‘That’s only a matter of time. Would you like to go first?’

  ‘I’ll leave that honour to you,’ Ian said, smiling.

  ‘I’ll go,’ said Sheere, entering the house without waiting for a reply.

  Ben quickly struck another match and followed her. Ian took one last look at the night sky, as if he feared this might be his last chance to see it, and after taking a deep breath plunged into the engineer’s house. A moment later the large door closed behind them, as gently as it had opened to let them in.

  The three friends huddled together as Ben held the match up high. The spectacle that unfolded before their eyes far exceeded any of their expectations.

  They were standing in a hall supported by thick Byzantine columns and crowned with a concave dome covered with a huge fresco. This depicted hundreds of figures from Hindu mythology, forming an endless illustrated chronicle set in concentric rings around a central figure sculpted in relief on top of the painting: the goddess Kali.

  The walls of the hall were lined with bookshelves forming two semicircles over three metres high. The floor was covered by a mosaic of brilliant black tiles and pieces of rock crystal, creating the illusion of a night sky studded with stars and constellations. Ian looked carefully at the design and recognised various celestial figures Bankim had told them about at St Patrick’s.

  ‘Seth should see this,’ whispered Ben.

  At the far end of the room, beyond the carpet of stars, was a spiral staircase leading up to the first floor.

  Before Ben had time to react, the match had burnt down to his fingers and gone out, leaving the three in total darkness. The constellations at their feet, however, continued to shine.

  ‘This is incredible,’ Ian murmured to himself.

  ‘Wait till you see upstairs,’ said Sheere a few metres beyond him.

  Ben lit another match. Sheere was already waiting for them by the spiral staircase, and without a word Ben and Ian followed her.

  The spiral staircase rose in the middle of a lantern-shaped shaft, similar to structures they had studied in drawings of castles built on the banks of the Loire River. Looking up, the friends felt as if they were inside a huge kaleidoscope crowned with a cathedral-like rose window that fractured the moonlight into dozens of beams – blue, scarlet, yellow, green and amber.

  When they reached the first floor, they realised that the needles of light issuing from the lantern’s crown projected moving drawings and shapes against the walls of a large hall.

  ‘Look at this,’ said Ben, pointing at a rectangular surface about forty metres square that stood one metre above the ground.

  All three walked over to it and discovered what appeared to be an immense model of Calcutta, reproduced with such precision and detail that when you looked at it closely you felt as if you were flying over the real city. They recognised the course of the Hooghly, the Maidan, Fort William, the White Town, the temple of Kali to the south, the Black Town, and even the bazaars. For a long time Sheere, Ian and Ben stood spellbound by the extraordinary miniature, captivated by its beauty.

  ‘There’s the house,’ said Ben, pointing.

  The other two drew closer and saw, right in the heart of the Black Town, a faithful reproduction of the house they were standing in. The multicoloured beams from the ceiling swept across the miniature streets, revealing the hidden secrets of Calcutta as they passed.

  ‘What is that behind the house?’ asked Sheere.

  ‘It looks like a railway track,’ said Ian.

  ‘It is.’ Ben followed the outline of the track until it came to the sharp, majestic silhouette of Jheeter’s Gate, on the other side of a metal bridge spanning the Hooghly.

  ‘This track leads to the station where the fire happened,’ said Ben. ‘It’s a siding.’

  ‘There’s a train on the bridge,’ Sheere observed.

  Ben walked round the model to get closer to the reproduction of the train. As he examined it, an uncomfortable tingling ran down his spine. He recognised the train. He’d seen it the previous night, although he’d thought it was only the product of a nightmare. Sheere walked over to him and Ben saw there were tears in her eyes.

  ‘This is our father’s house, Ben,’ she murmured. ‘He built it for us.’

  Ben put his arms round Sheere and hugged her. At the other end of the room Ian looked away. Ben stroked Sheere’s face and kissed her on the forehead.

  ‘From now on,’ he said, ‘it will always be our home.’

  At that moment the lights on the little train standing on the bridge lit up and, slowly, its wheels began to roll along the rails.

  SILENT AS THE GRAVE, Mr de Rozio was devoting all his archivist’s cunning to the reports on the trial which Colonel Llewelyn had been so determined to bury. Seth and Michael were doing the same with a folder full of plans and notes in Chandra’s handwriting. Seth had found it at the bottom of one of the boxes containing the engineer’s personal effects. After his death, because no relative or institution had claimed them and he had been an important public figure, they had ended up lost in the museum’s archives
. The library was shared by various scientific and academic institutions, among them the Higher Institute of Engineering, of which Chandra Chatterghee had been one of the most illustrious and controversial members. The folder was plainly bound and its cover bore a single inscription, handwritten in blue ink: The Firebird.

  Seth and Michael had hidden their discovery so as not to distract the plump librarian from his task and had moved over to the other end of the room.

  ‘These drawings are fantastic,’ whispered Michael, admiring various illustrations of mechanical objects whose specific function he couldn’t quite fathom.

  ‘Let’s concentrate,’ Seth reminded him. ‘What does it say about the Firebird?’

  ‘Science isn’t my forte,’ Michael began, ‘but if I’m right, this is a plan for an enormous flame-thrower.’

  Seth examined the plans without understanding them in the slightest. Michael anticipated his queries.

  ‘This is a tank for oil or some sort of fuel,’ Michael said, pointing to the document. ‘This suction mechanism is joined to it. It’s a feeding pump, like the pump in a well, and it provides the fuel to keep this circle of flames alight. A sort of pilot light.’

  ‘But the flames can’t be more than a few centimetres high,’ Seth objected. ‘I don’t see how there can be any real power there.’

  ‘Look at this pipe.’

  Seth saw what his friend was referring to: a sort of tube, rather like the barrel of a cannon or rifle.

  ‘The flames emerge round the rim of the cannon.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Look at this other end,’ said Michael. ‘It’s a tank, an oxygen tank.’

  ‘Simple chemistry,’ murmured Seth, putting two and two together.

  ‘Imagine what would happen if this oxygen were ejected under pressure through the pipe and passed through the circle of flames.’

  ‘A flame-thrower,’ Seth agreed.

  Michael closed the folder and looked at his friend.

  ‘What kind of secret could make Chandra design a toy like this for a butcher like Llewelyn? It’s like giving the Emperor Nero a shipment of gunpowder …’

  ‘That’s what we need to find out,’ said Seth, ‘and quickly.’

  SHEERE, BEN AND IAN followed the train’s journey through the model until the tiny locomotive came to a halt just behind the miniature reproduction of the engineer’s house. Slowly the lights went out and the three friends stood there, motionless and expectant.

  ‘How the hell does the train move?’ asked Ben. ‘It must get its power supply from somewhere. Is there an electricity generator in the house, Sheere?’

  ‘Not that I know of.’

  ‘There must be,’ said Ian. ‘Let’s look for it.’

  Ben shook his head.

  ‘That’s not what’s bothering me,’ he said. ‘Even supposing there is one, I’ve never heard of a generator that starts up by itself. Much less after years of not working.’

  ‘Perhaps this model works on some other sort of mechanism,’ Sheere suggested, although she didn’t sound convinced.

  ‘Perhaps there’s someone else in the house,’ replied Ben.

  Ian cursed his luck.

  ‘I knew it,’ he murmured.

  ‘Wait!’ cried Ben.

  Ian looked at his friend: he was pointing at the model. The train was moving again, this time in the opposite direction.

  ‘It’s going back to the station,’ Sheere observed.

  Slowly, Ben drew closer to the model, stopping by the section of railway track along which the train had started to roll.

  ‘What’s the plan?’ asked Ian.

  His friend didn’t reply. Taking great care, Ben stretched out an arm towards the track. The engine was approaching fast, and as it passed in front of him he snatched it, unhooking it from the carriages. Little by little, the rest of the train reduced speed until it came to a halt. Ben held the engine up to the light from the rose window and examined it. Its minute wheels were gradually slowing down.

  ‘Someone has a strange sense of humour,’ he remarked.

  ‘Why?’ asked Sheere.

  ‘There are three lead figures inside the engine, and they look too much like us for it to be a coincidence.’

  Sheere moved over to where Ben was standing and took the little engine in her hands. The dancing lines of light cast a rainbow over her face and she gave a resigned smile.

  ‘He knows we’re here,’ she said. ‘There’s no point in hiding any more.’

  ‘Who knows?’ asked Ian.

  ‘Jawahal,’ answered Ben. ‘He’s waiting. But I don’t know what he’s waiting for.’

  WHEN THEY REACHED THE bridge that seemed to vanish into the haze over the Hooghly, Siraj and Roshan collapsed against a wall, exhausted after combing the city in search of Isobel. Far ahead the tips of Jheeter’s Gate’s towers peeped over the mist like the crest of a sleeping dragon.

  ‘It will soon be dawn,’ said Roshan. ‘We should go back. Maybe Isobel has been waiting for us there.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ replied Siraj.

  Roshan could tell from his friend’s voice that their nocturnal adventure had taken its toll on him, but for the first time in years he hadn’t heard Siraj complain once about his asthma.

  ‘We’ve looked everywhere,’ Roshan replied. ‘We can’t do any more. Let’s at least go and get help.’

  ‘There’s one place we haven’t visited …’

  Roshan gazed through the mist at the sinister structure of Jheeter’s Gate.

  ‘Isobel wouldn’t be crazy enough to go in there.’ He sighed. ‘Nor would I.’

  ‘I’ll go by myself then,’ said Siraj, standing up.

  Roshan heard him wheezing. He closed his eyes despondently.

  ‘Sit down,’ he said, but he could already hear Siraj heading towards the bridge.

  When he opened his eyes, the boy’s skinny silhouette was plunging into the mist.

  ‘Damn it,’ Roshan muttered to himself, but he got up to follow his friend.

  Siraj paused when he reached the end of the bridge and stared at the entrance to Jheeter’s Gate looming ahead. Roshan joined him and they both stood there, examining the building. A gust of cold air issued from the station’s tunnels carrying the stench of burnt wood and filth. The two friends tried to discern what might lie beyond the well of blackness that opened up inside the entrance.

  ‘It looks like the gateway to hell,’ said Roshan. ‘Let’s get out of here while we still can.’

  ‘It’s all in the mind,’ said Siraj. ‘Don’t forget, it’s only an abandoned station. There’s nobody there. Only us.’

  ‘If there isn’t anyone there, why do we have to go in?’

  ‘You don’t have to go in if you don’t want to,’ replied Siraj. There was no reproach in his voice.

  ‘Of course,’ snapped Roshan. ‘And leave you to go in alone? Forget it. Let’s go.’

  The two members of the Chowbar Society entered the station, following the track that led in from the bridge towards the central platform. The darkness inside the building was much denser that it had seemed from the outside and they could only make out a few shapes in the watery grey light. Roshan and Siraj walked slowly, barely a metre apart. Their footsteps seemed to form a repetitive litany against the sighing of the breeze that echoed from somewhere deep inside the tunnels.

  ‘We’d better climb onto the platform,’ said Roshan.

  ‘No train has come through here for years – what does it matter?’

  ‘It matters to me, all right?’ Roshan replied. He couldn’t get out of his mind the image of a train appearing through the mouth of the tunnel and crushing them under its wheels.

  Siraj muttered something unintelligible but placatory, and was about to walk back to the platform end and clamber onto it when something drifted from the tunnels towards the two boys.

  ‘What’s that?’ said Roshan in alarm.

  ‘It looks like a piece of paper,’ Siraj guessed. ‘A
bit of rubbish blown by the wind, that’s all.’

  The white paper twirled along the ground and stopped by Roshan’s feet. The boy knelt down and picked it up. Siraj saw his friend’s face crumble.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ he asked. Roshan’s fear was starting to feel contagious.

  Without replying his friend handed him the sheet of paper. Siraj recognised it instantly. It was the picture Michael had drawn of them by the pond, which Isobel had taken with her. Siraj gave it back, and, for the first time since they’d begun their search, he considered the very real possibility that Isobel might be in danger.

  ‘Isobel …’ Siraj called into the tunnels.

  The echo of his voice faded into the depths of the station. He tried to concentrate on controlling his breathing, which was becoming more difficult by the moment. He waited for the echo to die away and, steadying his nerves, called again: ‘Isobel?’

  A loud metallic crash resounded from some distant corner of the station. Roshan gave a start and looked around him. The wind from the tunnels now whipped at their faces and the two boys took a few steps back.

  ‘There’s something in there,’ whispered Siraj, pointing towards one of the tunnels. He seemed strangely calm.

  Roshan stared at the black mouth of the tunnel and then he too could see it. The faraway lights of a train were approaching. He could feel the rails vibrating beneath his feet and he looked at Siraj in panic. Siraj seemed to be smiling.

  ‘I’m not going to be able to run as fast as you, Roshan,’ he said. ‘We both know that. Don’t wait for me. Go for help.’

  ‘What on earth are you talking about?’ cried Roshan, perfectly aware of what his friend was implying.

  The train’s headlights pierced the station like a burst of lightning in a storm.

  ‘Run,’ Siraj ordered him. ‘Now.’

  Roshan looked frantically into his friend’s eyes as he heard the thunderous roar of the engine. Siraj gave a nod. Then Roshan gathered all his strength and ran desperately towards the platform end, looking for a place where he could jump up, out of the train’s path. He ran as fast as he could, not stopping to look behind him. He was sure that if he dared to look, he would be confronted with the metal front of the engine centimetres from his face. The fifteen metres that separated him from the end of the platform seemed like a hundred and fifty, and in his panic he thought he could see the railway tracks receding before his eyes at a dizzying speed. He threw himself to the ground, rolling over the rubble, and the train sped past him only a hair’s breadth away. He heard the deafening screams of the children and felt the flames tearing at his skin for ten terrible seconds, during which he imagined that the whole structure of the station was going to collapse on top of him.