“Where are you, Xander?”
Standing as close under the meager overhang as he could manage, Thomas shivered and watched his breath rise up through the now heavy rain.
“Where are you—and what happens now?”
As much as George, Thomas, and Augustin had discussed Adi’s mad predicament over the years, they’d never had enough information to know what might happen to the twins if the time ran out. When it got to be 6:01 A.M. on November 11th, 1918.
“It’s not as if they’re going to simply—poof!—disappear,” said Augustin. They all agreed with that.
But sometimes, Thomas wasn’t so sure. Though school at the abbey had pretty much beaten it out of him, he was raised a good Catholic boy. Magical thinking was part of the package: walking on water, raising the dead, saints carrying their heads around in their hands. There was always a lot of weird business going on.
“I guess it would be too much to hope,” said Thomas, “that Adi might show up. Wouldn’t that be wonderful.”
He heard a little rattle behind him and turned to see an eye peering through the peephole in the gate.
“Xander?” said Thomas. “Is that you?”
The gate opened with a creak, light shimmering through the rain. There stood a brother, one Thomas didn’t recognize.
The man held the lantern up to get a better look. “I’m Brother Christopher,” he said.
“And I am Thomas Hast. I do apologize for the hour.”
“And I beg your pardon for keeping you standing out in this. Come in. I understand you have a package for Father Abbot?”
Thomas considered handing it over, but then thought better of it.
“Of course,” said Brother Christopher, seeing him hesitate. “If you’ll come with me I’ll take you to his quarters.” He opened the gate wide.
• • •
It had been several years since Thomas had lived in the abbey but it took no time at all for him to see that they weren’t going anywhere near the abbot’s little house.
“Could have moved,” thought Thomas.
But as they passed through the cloisters and the back garden, down the stairs to the old chapel, that possibility became highly unlikely.
“I’m pretty certain he’s not sleeping in here,” thought Thomas, looking up at the crumbling stone façade. Brother Christopher let them in and got the door shut just ahead of a powerful gale. The lantern nearly blew out as he shut the great wooden door behind them. Brother Christopher was going on about the fire that had burned a good deal of the structure back when the place was a nunnery.
The scaffolding on both walls of the long narrow chapel creaked and rattled from the wind flapping through the oilcloths in the unfinished windows above them. As they passed down the center aisle, the circle of light from their lantern lit the remnants of grotesque medieval faces on the frescoed walls.
“Excuse me, Brother,” Thomas said, “These paintings—might I have the lantern for a moment?”
With reluctance Brother Christopher handed it over. Thomas placed the lamp upon a creaking shelf.
And then without warning, he grabbed the front of the brother’s robe and slammed him against one of the scaffold supports. The lantern rocked on the ledge, sending crazy shadows slashing across the walls. From under the brother’s cassock, a tiny derringer clattered to the floor.
Thomas kicked it away and had his own out and pointed before the man could blink twice.
“Sorry, Brother,” said Thomas, as the door blew open at the end of the room. “But there’s a few too many odd things going on here. Start by telling me where you’re taking me and why you thought you needed a gun to do it?”
“You don’t understand,” Brother Christopher said. “I was trying to—”
Footsteps in the shadows, a hammer cocked right behind Thomas’s head. He looked back to see Brother Hilbert holding a pistol.
“Trying to, what, Brother?” said Abbot Berno, stepping into the light.
• • •
Having a reasonably good idea of how to start the engine, Adi had persuaded George and Samuel (and herself) that she knew what the hell she was doing on this machine.
She made it out of the carport—and out of their sight—before she went off the cobblestones into the garden. Barely avoiding a fountain, she kept the bike from stalling and made it back up onto the drive just before the gates. She nearly killed herself a half dozen more times in the first mile. All she could think about was how much of her precious fuel she was burning.
It got better. The brakes on the thing seemed next to useless. And the wind, weaseling its way into any tiny opening in her coat, cut like a knife. But once she figured out how to work the throttle, she realized she was hurtling along like a rocket, sweeping away the miles.
Ahead on the right—There! The sign for Gentiana Abbey. Five kilometers! She could do this!
That’s when the mist turned to rain and Samuel’s beautiful orange motorcycle drank its last drop of petrol.
• • •
The abbot directed Brother Hilbert to take Thomas’s pistol.
“Let’s see who we have here,” said the abbot. Taking Thomas’s pistol from Brother Hilbert, he turned Thomas toward the light.
“I’ll be damned—it’s—what was it? Thomas Hast! I never forget a name. And look at you. All grown up. You’re looking well, Thomas. How’ve you been?”
“A bit confused at the moment, Father Abbot.”
“Yes,” said the abbot, his smile fading. “These are confusing times.” He wiped some of the rain from his head. “I understand you have a package for me?”
Thomas took the package from his pocket. He’d never actually looked at the address. He tilted it toward the lamp.
“It’s for Xander and Xavier?” he said, staring down at it, incredulous.
“Why is this news to you?” said the abbot. He snatched the package from Thomas’s hands and dropped it into the pocket of his robe.
Just then, carried on the wind, there came the sound of people shouting. Abbot Berno cocked his head to listen but it was too faint to make out.
“Doesn’t matter,” he said. “Time for you all to be gone.”
“Father Abbot?” said Brother Hilbert timorously. “Shouldn’t we wake the brethren and tell them—?”
“Tell them what?” said the abbot, turning his gun on the man.
Brother Hilbert emitted a little shriek.
But it wasn’t because of the gun.
The upside-down face of Xavier materialized from the darkness, followed in a flash by the crack of a cricket bat to the side of the abbot’s head.
Down he went, dropping the pistol. He clutched his head in pain. Brother Christopher snatched the gun from Brother Hilbert, provoking another squawk from him. Xavier flipped over and dropped from the scaffolding to the floor, followed immediately by Xander.
“Good job, boys!” said Brother Christopher, picking up the abbot’s gun.
“Is this the man?” asked Xavier, pointing to Thomas. “You know Adi?”
“We’ll get to that,” said Brother Christopher. “Help Father Abbot to his feet. Though maybe we should start calling him by his real name, Nicolas Paul.”
Xavier leaned over to help the big man up. In that instant it occurred to Thomas that the derringer was unaccounted for.
“Call me whatever you like, Brother,” said the abbot. Derringer in hand, he grabbed Xavier and held the gun to his ear. “Ah, ah!” he said to Thomas and Brother Christopher. “Your guns. Down there.” He pointed his chin to the far end of the hall.
“That derringer’s only got one bullet,” said Brother Christopher, still holding his gun on the abbot.
“It will be a comfort, then, that you have another twin to replace this one,” said the abbot, tapping the barrel on Xavier’s head.
Thomas and Brother Christopher looked to one another and Xavier. No one could argue with the abbot’s logic. They tossed the pistols away.
“Walk me to the door, Xavier,” said the abbot. They moved away up the aisle but then stopped. The abbot looked back at Brother Christopher.
“How did you know?”
“Seven years ago,” said Brother Christopher. “When you were met by the monks at the train station. You didn’t know I was there, looking on. I hadn’t seen my older brother in years. I was going to surprise him. Imagine my . . . bewilderment, at seeing you introduce yourself.”
“I’ll be damned,” said the abbot.
“No doubt,” said Brother Christopher.
Holding tight to Xavier’s collar, Abbot Berno marched the lad along till they reached the door, wide open, rain blowing in with the tempest.
“Listen,” Thomas said.
They could make out the shouting now.
“Fire! Abbot’s house, on fire!”
• • •
The abbot slammed the doors behind them and casting about, pointed at a piece of lumber on a pile of rubble to the right of the entrance. Xavier hesitated.
“Don’t cross me, boy,” he said, his customary avuncular tone gone.
Xavier picked up the board. The abbot grabbed it from him and jammed it into the door handles.
“Now come on,” he barked.
Up the stairs they ran, the abbot pushing Xavier whenever he slowed.
As they came out from the cloisters, brothers were staggering out of the dormitory, rubbing their eyes, pulling on robes.
A brother turned and spotted them. “Father Abbot!” he yelled.
The abbot wrapped his finger around the trigger of the tiny derringer hidden just beneath his sleeve.
“Thank God, Father! You’re all right! We thought—” He ran off shouting, “Abbot’s safe! He’s not inside!”
Coming around the library, they saw bright flames pouring from the back of the abbot’s little two-room house. Several of the brothers were attempting to organize a bucket brigade from the well in the courtyard.
“Perfect,” muttered the abbot. “I’ll get to the car. And away I’ll go.”
Several more brothers came running up to them. Xavier broke away from the abbot and ran, circling back to the chapel. Short of firing at the boy, there was nothing the abbot could do to stop him. “Doesn’t matter,” he said, pocketing the derringer.
Standing with his back to the great yew tree in the center of the courtyard, the abbot took one last look at his home of seven years and heard an unfamiliar voice.
“It’s not in the car.”
He turned to find Halick, broom in hand, shadowed by the branches of the great tree.
“What?” said the abbot.
“Your trunk,” said Halick, quietly. “It’s not in the boot anymore.” He closed his eyes and turned his face to the rain. “I put it back safe. In the closet.”
Nicolas Paul stared at his son, searching for some sign of misunderstanding, some indication that his defective brain was getting the words wrong. The boy lowered his head, tears of rain running down his cheeks. He turned to his father and smiled.
• • •
They came around past the library: Thomas, Brother Christopher, and the boys. Xander spotted the abbot first amidst the chaos. “There!” he shouted.
The abbot had thrown open the door of the little house, and was standing looking in at the smoke and flame. Halick, dancing wildly about, laughed and brandished his broom at any of the brothers who got too close. Finally with a hoot, he threw the broom high into the air. Shoving his father into the house before him, he followed and slammed shut the door.
• • •
Coal listened to the screams. Everyone around him, crying and shouting.
You should be crying. You have no idea what trouble will come from this. There’ll be no Halick with a pistol. No assassinated prime minister. Or was it to have been the queen? The pictures grew fainter in his mind. The war would not happen the way it was supposed to.
How many times he’d tried to explain to Dr. Bleuler: to keep the balloon from bursting, you’ve got to keep letting a little air out.
“And what is this ‘air’ that’s filling the balloon?” asked the doctor.
“Human . . . malevolence, maybe? What do I know?” said Coal. “I’m only the piano player.”
Flames poured from the windows. Years of plans and improvisation up in smoke. All three of them gone. The duchess. And now the abbot and Halick. All done.
Nothing to even put in a jar. Just ashes.
And you’re surprised? Coal said to himself. The way you’ve behaved. The way you’ve always behaved. You and your never ceasing carelessness? He stuck his hands deep in the frayed pockets of his coat, jangling the last of the gold coins.
His last minutes were ticking away. The girl had not, would not, could not, get here in time.
“To hell with it,” he said. “Ashes. Better that way.” He pulled up his collar and turned to leave. Then stopped.
A few feet away, Xander and Xavier, one of them with an arm around the other’s shoulder, were staring at the flames. The courtyard was chaos and confusion, professors and brothers and students were working to form a bucket line from the well.
“Boys?” said Coal. They didn’t hear over the noise. “Xander! Xavier!” he called.
They turned and saw him there. “Yes, Professor Coal?”