For a few delirious seconds Lawton thought his brain was playing tricks on him again, but the man standing in front of him in the blood-speckled coat looked exactly like the man in all the photographs he had seen. He had the same white Victorian sideburns, the same bushy eyebrows, and domelike forehead, the same remote expression in his eyes, as if he was gazing at some point beyond the present. But the Foulkes in the photographs exuded wiry strength and ageless resilience. The man in front of him looked gaunt and slightly ill, and as frail as he would expect any man in his late sixties to be.
“Mr. Lawton,” he said. “So we meet at last.”
Foulkes’s voice was soft and almost sorrowful, and there was a gentleness in his smile that Lawton found disconcerting, as he tried to reconcile the face that he remembered from so many photographs with the burned and almost faceless body that he had identified in Quintana’s autopsy room less than a fortnight ago.
“You seem surprised,” Foulkes said. “Can’t say I blame you. It’s not every day you find yourself speaking to a dead man.”
“But everything matched!” Lawton exclaimed. “The prints. The missing toes. Even the measurements.”
“I’m sure you were very thorough. More than anyone here would have been. But we were very thorough, too. The prints weren’t mine. And the toes were removed—under anaesthetic. And the measurements, well we were very careful in our choice.”
“Your choice?”
“The corpse you examined was a tramp by the name of Biggins. I knew him from my work. He looked a lot like me. Close enough not to be able to tell the difference after a bomb explosion at any rate. Dr. Weygrand brought him here under hypnosis. Poor chap never knew what was happening, not even when he died. We expected a coroner’s report and perhaps a visit from London, so we substituted his prints before I left London.”
“So there was no Marie Babineaux?”
Foulkes shook his head. “Afraid not. The money was mine and it went to me—to the work to be precise. There had to be some explanation for my presence in Barcelona. We knew the French secret service had taken an interest in the Explorers Club. It was only a matter of time before my government did the same. So Klarsfeld arranged the little incident at the Bar la Luna to ensure that I disappeared. So completely that no one would ever find me. Ah, I see the sleeping beauty awakes.”
Lawton looked over at Esperanza, who stared back at him like a frightened rabbit. “Harry?” she said. “What’s happening?”
“I don’t speak much Spanish, Mr. Lawton,” Foulkes said. “But tell this creature that she will have to be quiet or I shall have to give her another sedative. I have no patience for bleating women.”
“Her name’s Esperanza,” Lawton said.
“I know who she is. And I know what she is. One of Ferrer’s disciples. Polluting the children of the slums with nihilist ideas. Well not anymore. Her career is over—and so is yours.”
“What’s he saying?” Esperanza asked weakly.
“He says you have to be quiet,” Lawton replied, as Foulkes walked over to the counter and began to take out various objects from the cupboard.
“But what’s he going to do with us?” she insisted.
“I told her not to speak,” Foulkes said. “I won’t ask again.”
Lawton repeated the warning. Foulkes inspected a large cone-shaped bottle, with a glass tube that reached nearly to the bottom, and two more tubes fixed into the cork top, one of which had a little bellows attached to it.
“So you’re not dead, but you are a madman and a traitor,” Lawton said.
“I can assure you I’m not mad. And just because I have a loyalty to something greater than my own country does not make me a traitor.”
“The Kaiser, you mean?”
Foulkes shook his head. “Germany is merely a means to an end.”
“And what end would that be?”
“The race, Mr. Lawton! The race!”
“What race?” said Lawton scornfully.
“The Aryan race.” Foulkes turned around now, and Lawton saw that he was smiling faintly and holding a pair of scissors. “The children of the sun. The race that makes civilization possible. The race that has created everything good and beautiful in the world. That is responsible for every great step that humanity has ever made. Of course I would hardly expect someone with your lineage to understand that.”
“My lineage?”
“You are half-Irish and half-savage, Mr. Lawton. An unhealthy admixture. No doubt it accounts for your… condition.”
“I wonder what accounts for yours,” Lawton retorted.
Foulkes showed no sign of emotion. “I’ve spent much of my life studying people like you. Black men. Yellow men. Half-castes and weaklings. And I can tell you we are not prepared to lose the flower of our race in a fratricidal war, and see our people overrun by niggers and Chinamen so that the sons of Judah can profit. Of course they never fight—they merely make it possible for others to kill themselves so that they can feast on the ruins. And this coming war will kill more people than any in the whole of history. This is why our work is so important.”
“Harry?” Esperanza said.
“I told you to shut up!” Foulkes looked suddenly furious. “There are no equal rights in here.”
“Is that what you were doing when you were murdering mad people at Everdale?” Lawton asked. “Defending civilization?”
“You have been thorough.” Foulkes stepped away from the counter, holding a pair of scissors. “My wife chose surprisingly well. I didn’t murder them. I was experimenting with transfusions—injecting patients with my own blood or the blood of other patients to see what effect it had on them. I’d already carried out some transfusions with rabbits at my home, and it was a logical development to continue these experiments on humans. Some of them died in the process—it was experimental after all. It wasn’t until I met Dr. Weygrand that I heard of Landsteiner’s categorizations and began to understand the negative consequences of mixing inappropriate blood types.”
“And now you’ve turned Barcelona into your personal slaughterhouse.”
“A laboratory, Mr. Lawton. Do be civil. For some of the most important scientific work of the century. We are doing what any sane country should be doing. I would have preferred to carry out this work in my own country, had we not allowed ourselves to be held back by sentimental humanism. What else was Everdale but a pointless sop to the conscience? You know one of my subjects used to smear his cell with his own feces?” Lawton tried to pull away as Foulkes began to cut the sleeve of his shirt and jacket, but the straps held him fast. “There was also a woman who murdered her own baby because she thought Satan had impregnated her. Why should such people be kept alive? What purpose do they serve?”
Lawton thought of his mother and remembered how often he had asked the same questions. “You might like to think of yourself as a scientist,” he said. “But to me you’re just one more murdering bastard.”
“Of course you would think that,” Foulkes replied. “Because you’re a policeman. And the Irish are a sentimental race. Always fond of a drink and a song. But sooner or later governments will come to their senses.” Foulkes pulled back the cut material to expose Lawton’s bicep. “Nature always eliminates or dispenses with the weak and the superfluous. This is how some species survive and others decline. Nations and races are exactly the same. Even the Committee on Physical Deterioration recognized this, but they weren’t prepared to take the necessary preventive measures. In the future other governments will be less delicate. There will be laboratories just like this, eugenics laboratories sanctioned by the state, entrusted with the defense and preservation of the race. And they will look on us as pioneers—people who were prepared to act when no one else would.”
“You mean the Explorers Club?”
“Indeed. Though most of us had met before that—through the Institute for Racial Hygiene. That’s how I met Dr. Weygrand—a true visionary. It’s been a privilege to work with him.”
“So the Explorers Club wasn’t trying to reach the North Pole.”
“We were looking for the ruins of Thule, Mr. Lawton. The capital of Hyperborea. Where our race was born.”
“That explains the black sun and monk’s robes.”
“Correct.”
“Have you ever thought that you might be the ones who belong in an asylum—or a freakshow?”
Foulkes stiffened. “There are 30,000 blind people in Spain, Mr. Lawton, and 37,000 deaf mutes, 67,000 insane, and 45,000 morally deformed. The police are useless. The officials are corrupt. In England or even in Germany our work might have come to the attention of the authorities. Here we are able to work unmolested, and I can assure you that one day these rooms will be a place of pilgrimage.”
“And one day you will hang.”
“I doubt it.” Foulkes pressed on the vein just above Lawton’s elbow with his thumb. “You have good veins. Dr. Weygrand will be pleased. I have to admit I wasn’t enamored with the monster idea. My concern is science not politics. But Arenales believes his army friends will be sympathetic to our cause. And if his theater achieves its purpose and helps to bring about a more conducive and supportive environment for our work, then so be it. In any case we intend to be more discreet from now on. There will be no more bodies in the streets. And no more monsters.”
Lawton heard voices in the corridor now, and a moment later the door opened once again and Weygrand appeared, accompanied by Klarsfeld and his driver. Weygrand was wearing a white coat and a bandage over his nose, and he stared coldly at Lawton’s arm.
“We’re ready to begin,” said Foulkes. “Let’s take a sample, shall we?”
Lawton tried to look around as Weygrand and Foulkes walked out of his line of vision, but it was impossible to move his head. He heard the sound of running water and drawers being opened and closed, before Weygrand returned holding a needle. Weygrand expertly slid the syringe into his vein and filled it with blood while Foulkes, Klarsfeld, and his driver stood watching. When the syringe was full Weygrand withdrew the needle and walked away. He returned a few minutes later, holding a rectangular glass plate like the one that Lawton had seen in the mortuary.
“Blood type A, Mr. Lawton. As I expected.”
“I don’t give a damn.”
“Most degenerates have the same blood type. As do Jews and Asiatics. Dr. Foulkes believes your skull shape and facial features show Indian heritage, is that correct?”
“Go to hell.”
“The Indians of South America originally came from Siberia you know, so there is a direct connection to the Lemurian Root Race there. Fortunately Miss Claramunt also has the same blood type, which makes the two of you an ideal combination for our next experiment. Would you like me to tell you what it is, Mr. Lawton?”
“I don’t give a damn.”
“You will look at me, Mr. Lawton!” Weygrand was standing directly in front of the chair now, so that it was impossible for Lawton not to see him. He stared down at the Austrian’s feet as Weygrand explained what happened to blood that was extracted and left standing in the open air. After several hours, Weygrand said, blood began to change its consistency and formed three distinct layers. The bottom layer consisted of the red blood cells that distributed oxygen through the body. The second was formed by a combination of white blood cells and platelets, which helped fight infection and also contributed to coagulation. The top layer consisted of a mixture of water, salts, and proteins called plasma, whose function was not yet clear.
“One of our areas of inquiry is blood loss,” Weygrand went on. “We’ve found that even when our subjects receive traumatic injuries it isn’t the loss of blood that kills them. They die for some other reason. The anarchist Tosets, for example, had actually lost far less blood than some of our other subjects when he died. We believe the subject died of shock, due to circulatory collapse resulting from a lack of oxygen in the blood.”
“A fascinating theory,” said Lawton.
“It is,” Weygrand said. “And now you are going to help us prove it. You see, we are investigating the possibility that plasma carries oxygen into the blood and that it may help treat hemorrhagic shock—precisely the kind of shock that our soldiers are likely to experience on the battlefield. This has been the main purpose of our experiments so far. Before the Russian, we used dogs to inflict injuries on our subjects. Now we shoot them—and then we give them plasma.”
“What genius,” Lawton said.
“More than you can imagine, my friend. So let me explain what we intend to do now. First we shall extract Miss Claramunt’s blood. We will then leave it standing. When the plasma is fully formed we will separate it through a pipette and give you a direct plasma transfusion, using Acacia B gum as the anticoagulant. This is the first time we’ve ever done this.”
“I’m honored.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” Weygrand’s bulbous eyes gleamed. “Because in order to test our theory, we need a battlefield simulation.”
“He means we have to shoot you.” Klarsfeld said. “In the left shoulder.”
“We will of course bandage you up,” Weygrand explained. “As we did with the Russian. But as you can imagine it will be painful. And your chances of survival are not good. Even if you do, well…” He nodded at Klarsfeld’s driver, who began to undo his straps while Klarsfeld pointed the parabellum at Lawton’s head.
“Get up,” Weygrand said.
Lawton did as he was told. He looked down at Esperanza, who was trying to turn her head in the wooden box.
“Take your clothes off,” Weygrand said.
“The hell I will.”
Klarsfeld sauntered over toward Esperanza. “You know what I did in the Congo when the natives didn’t bring back enough rubber?” he said. “I shot their wives and children. The same with the Herero when they refused to give us information. It worked every time.”
Esperanza let out a whimper as he pressed the Parabellum against her right thigh. “Take your clothes off or we’ll do it the other way around. And you can watch your lady friend bleed. First the leg and then the arm. Let’s see how she reacts to shock.”
Lawton stared back at the cold blue eyes and began to undress, until he stood naked in front of the chair. He was pleased that Esperanza could not see him, as Foulkes and Weygrand weighed him on a scale, and proceeded to measure his skull with a tape and the same kind of caliper that he had seen in Foulkes’s study. Lawton had not undergone a physical inspection since his army medical, and he had been able to keep his underwear on. He had even felt some pride as the doctors examined his muscles and congratulated him on his physical condition. Now he felt like a trapped beast as Foulkes wrote down his details on a clipboard and commented on his brachycephalic skull, his apelike jaw, and degenerate ears. Klarsfeld and his driver watched with amusement as Foulkes photographed him from the front and side. Finally the humiliation was over and Klarsfeld’s driver escorted him back to the chair and strapped him down once again.
Esperanza was sobbing now, as Weygrand and Foulkes returned to the counter. A moment later Foulkes crossed Lawton’s line of vision, wheeling a small table carrying a bottle and tube. Foulkes ordered Klarsfeld’s driver to gag Esperanza, and even after she fell silent, Lawton could hear her sounds of protest through the gag, and he knew the catheter was being attached to her arm.
“Time is eleven o’clock,” Weygrand said. “Extraction of subject A has begun.”
Foulkes was standing in front of Lawton now, looking down at Esperanza with the same detached fascination that he had seen in so many photographs. Klarsfeld and his driver also watched her in silence. At 11:20 Weygrand announced that the first bottle was full and Lawton heard him moving around beside her once again. “Subject has fainted. Pulse rate 40.”
“Jesus Christ,” said Lawton. “What kind of creatures are you?”
Foulkes glanced down at him with the same lofty indifference and then continued to regard Weygrand with a faintly reverential expression.
“We have enough for now,” Weygrand said. “I suggest we return at three to perform the centrifuge on subject B, depending on the condition of our sample.”
Foulkes waited till Weygrand and the others had left the room, and then walked in front of Lawton once again. “You know I’ve often thought it would have been better if the Irish had disappeared during the famine,” he said. “And epilepsy is such an awful illness. All that dread and heartache—it’s no kind of life, is it Mr. Lawton?”
Foulkes looked genuinely concerned now, and then he walked out of Lawton’s sight. A moment later the light went out and Lawton found himself in darkness that was darker than anything he had ever seen, as the footsteps echoed down the corridor.