CHAPTER V Image The Delirious Man

Let us begin with introductions,” said Professor Moriarty.

Listen and learn, Alice reminded herself. She would be just like Mary, who was just like Mr. Holmes himself. She would observe and remember, so that when she got out of here—and she would get out of here, she was determined—she could tell Mary and Mr. Holmes all about it. She leaned forward a little so she could see all the men in the room. Now Professor Moriarty was introducing them. She must remember their names. How would she describe them to Mary?

They reminded her of the characters in one of her penny dreadfuls. There always seemed to be a group of men who fought the monsters and saved the realm. Mentally, she cast them in their proper roles. Lord Godalming was the Peer of the Realm. He was handsome, not young anymore but still boyish, despite the gray in his hair and mustache. He had a pair of very blue eyes. Mr. Quincy Morris was the American, with what she assumed was an American accent. Despite her trepidation and discomfort, Alice could not help being amused by his fringed leather outfit and the large knife at his belt. Was this what Americans wore all the time, or only in the Wild West? As for Jonathan Harker, what was he, exactly? Quiet, deferential, clean-shaven. He looked younger than the others, and had an air of not quite knowing what was going on. She would not assign him a role yet. Seated on the other side of Lord Godalming was a heavyset man whom Moriarty introduced as Colonel Moran. As Moriarty mentioned his name, he rose and joined his leader by the fireplace, leaning on the mantel. He was obviously the Enforcer. His jacket did not hang quite right. When he moved, Alice could see there was something underneath, the approximate shape and size of a revolver. Dr. Seward was of course the Alchemist, a member of the Alchemical Society and the director of the Purfleet Asylum. And Moriarty was the Mastermind. He was so clearly in charge, so clearly the leader of this group. As for Dr. Raymond—well, she was not quite sure how to describe Dr. Raymond. Was he just another Alchemist, like Dr. Seward?

“This is Miss Trelawny, daughter of the late Professor Trelawny, the Egyptologist,” said Moriarty. “No doubt you have heard the name.”

“Indeed,” said Dr. Raymond, bowing in Miss Trelawny’s general direction. “My condolences, Miss Trelawny, on your father’s untimely death. I saw his obituary in The Times and was shocked, quite shocked, at the loss of such a brilliant mind. It will set our efforts in Egypt back significantly. I understand that the artifacts from the tomb of Queen Tera are about to go on display at the British Museum.”

“Thank you,” said Miss Trelawny. “Your words bring me comfort, Dr. Raymond.” Although she made this statement in the same pleasant, genteel tone with which she said everything, Alice glanced at her, puzzled. Somehow, it did not ring true. The energic waves around her head did not look quite right.

“And this,” Miss Trelawny continued, “is your granddaughter, Lydia.”

Granddaughter! Suddenly, all eyes were on Alice. Oh, if only she could sink down into the chair cushions, or hide herself in the folds of Miss Trelawny’s dress! She did not want their attention on her, particularly after such a revelation. Nevertheless, she could not help looking at Dr. Raymond curiously. This was her grandfather? This man whom she knew to be cruel and callous, who had allowed Archibald to remain locked up in the dark? Mrs. Raymond her mother, Dr. Raymond her grandfather…

“Indeed,” said Dr. Raymond, peering at her. He took a pair of spectacles out of his jacket pocket—they had no earpieces and simply sat on his nose—to examine her better, as though she were some sort of interesting insect. “So you found her again, after all these years. And is she—”

“Almost as skilled at manipulating the mesmeric waves as I am, and she will no doubt surpass me someday,” said Mrs. Raymond coldly. If they were father and daughter, there was no love lost between them! She did not seem particularly happy to see him, had not risen or greeted him in any way. So this is my family, thought Alice. She would much rather have been related to Mrs. Poole.

MRS. POOLE: Well, I did raise and train you, my dear, after you came to us from the orphanage. I think you can consider me family.

ALICE: Thank you, Mrs. Poole. You don’t know how much that means to me.

DIANA: We’re family too! Don’t forget about us. I mean, you’re annoying and insipid, but then so is Mary, and she’s my sister.

“If we could have a small demonstration of her powers…,” said Dr. Raymond, looking at Alice in a way she did not like. Gleefully? Avariciously? Catherine would have known the right word.

“This is neither the time nor the place,” said Mrs. Raymond with a frown. Her voice was contemptuous. “You will have plenty of opportunity to observe the results of your experiment. This is a business meeting.”

“But what sort of business?” asked Jonathan Harker. “I’m grateful, of course, that Lord Godalming has included me in this enterprise, but thus far I have only the vaguest notion of what we are aiming for, or how we are to achieve it. If you would enlighten me—”

“Of course, Mr. Harker,” said Moriarty. “That is precisely why we are holding this meeting today. Lord Godalming and I want to make certain you gentlemen understand and are in agreement with our goals. We have given you an inkling of them—now we shall explain ourselves fully. Allow me to—ah, here is Mandelbaum.”

Alice had not noticed the butler standing just outside the circle of armchairs with a tea tray in his hand, but of course that was the defining characteristic of good butlers—one did not notice them. Ah yes, Margaret Trelawny had said there would be food. In her fear and consternation, Alice had almost forgotten.

“If someone would move the tables—” said Moriarty.

“Here, if you please,” said Miss Trelawny. “I shall do the pouring out.”

Mr. Harker placed one of the small tables beside Miss Trelawny’s chair, where she could reach it easily. The butler proceeded to put the tea tray on it, then went to the place in the wall that opened onto a dumbwaiter and took out what had been raised from the kitchen below—teacups and saucers, and two trays: one with pastries, the other with a selection of small sandwiches. Alice looked at them hungrily. How long had it been since she’d had a proper meal?

The others did not seem particularly interested in the pastries or sandwiches. Once the butler had left and most of the men, as well as Mrs. Raymond, had teacups in their hands—Mr. Morris declined and was drinking something out of a flask he had produced out of an inside pocket—Miss Trelawny loaded a plate for her. Alice tried not to eat too quickly, worried about making herself sick after the meager diet of the last few days, but it was difficult not to gulp down the sandwiches, which were very good. Shrimp paste! She had always liked shrimp paste. And some sort of cream cheese with cucumber. She did not recognize the pastries, which were quite different from the kinds made by Mrs. Poole. Some of them were filled with chocolate, some with apricot jam.

“Now,” said Moriarty. “Where were we? Ah yes, why I have brought us here together. The nine of us come from different worlds. Mrs. Raymond and Colonel Moran have been in my organization for many years. It is, shall we say, a commercial enterprise of sorts. We import and export various goods that fetch a high price on private markets. We provide services of the kind more, shall we say, conservative businesses are unable to provide. The good doctors”—here he nodded at Raymond and Seward, who were seated next to each other—“are members of the Alchemical Society, who have very kindly rented us their former London headquarters. Lord Godalming was at one time a member, until the English branch was disbanded and he resigned in protest. Mr. Harker is his solicitor and trusted representative. Mr. Morris is the famous explorer—we have all heard of his travels up the Amazon, his hunting expeditions in Africa. And Miss Trelawny represents her late father, whose discovery of the tomb of Queen Tera at Philae has brought us what we need to effect our central purpose.”

“Which is?” asked Harker. He looked as though he still did not understand what was going on. Well, Alice didn’t either.

Moriarty smiled. She did not like his smile—it reminded her too much of how Mrs. Raymond smiled. Whatever jollity their mouths expressed did not reach their eyes. “Mr. Harker, I invite you, Dr. Raymond, and Mr. Morris to join the Order of the Golden Dawn. The rest of us here are already members. The German branch of the order has repudiated us—indeed, I received a letter just this morning asking us not to use that name for our organization. But no matter. Golden Dawn we are and shall remain, because that is what we propose to bring to England. A glorious new dawn for this country, and the true English men and women in it.”

He put his teacup on the mantel, clasped his hands behind him, and leaned forward a little—it was the stance of a man in front of a lecture hall.

“As we meet here in the magnificent city of London, the greatest city in the world, a modern rival to the glory of ancient Rome, we might assume that we stand at the heart of a powerful empire. But you know, gentlemen—each of you knows—that we have been invaded. Look at our docks! They team with the outcasts of Europe and beyond. Why, there are places in this city where no English is spoken! Our markets are a cacophony of languages, of nationalities. Where, anymore, but in the highest halls of polite society can we find the pure, the Anglo-Saxon, strain that made this country great? At the same time, we send our young men off to India and Africa, to water foreign lands with their blood. And what does this get us? An empire, to be sure, but at the cost of the purity of our race, the stability of our nation. At the cost of our traditions—the cost, I tell you, of our very souls! What we propose—the purpose of our Order—is no less than the restoration of England, for Englishmen—and women, of course.” He bowed to Mrs. Raymond. “You all know of Galton’s Hereditary Genius and his later writings on what he has called ‘eugenics’—the good, pure, noble birth. English society is headed in the opposite direction, that of ‘dysgenics.’ ” The poor give birth like rats, immigrants fill our cities with the refuse of a hundred shores, and the flowers of English manhood and maidenhood are swamped in the tide. We must regulate our borders so that we no longer accept immigrants and refugees, regulate births so that only the best, the highest intellects, are allowed to perpetuate the race—although we must of course allow a certain number of the lower classes to continue breeding, or we shall have a servant problem indeed!” Here he smiled as though he had said something amusing. “What we need is a group of men, true Englishmen, who are not afraid to fight for their vision of what this country could be. A small group of dedicated men, with the proper resources at their disposal, can do what mobs cannot. As the Spartans held off the Persians at Thermopylae, so too must we stop the tide that is threatening to overwhelm us. And we have resources—Godalming brings to us his position in the House of Lords and considerable fortune. Raymond and Seward bring scientific knowledge. Moran has connections in what is sometimes called the underworld of London that have already served us well. Together with Morris, he also brings us, shall we say, a certain amount of firepower. And you, Mr. Harker—your knowledge of the law will add to our arsenal. We shall form the central core of the Order. As for the ladies, they too have much to contribute. Helen, my dear, perhaps this is the time for a demonstration?”

Everyone looked at Mrs. Raymond. There she sat, a beautiful woman of middle age, her black hair not yet touched by gray, the white lace falling from her snowy shoulders over the gray silk bodice of her gown. She gave a small, grim smile—and suddenly, she was not there anymore. Instead, sitting in her chair—

“What the devil!” said Morris.

Harker sprang up and almost tripped over his chair. “Your Majesty…”

Alice would have cried out in astonishment, but Miss Trelawny had gripped her arm, as though in warning.

The woman who rose from the chair in which Mrs. Raymond had been sitting was as familiar to her as her own face in the mirror. She had seen that countenance all her life, on coins and stamps, in photographs in the newspapers. It was the Queen herself, a compact figure in black crepe, with a lace cap on her head and an expression on her face of determination and resolve. This was the woman who ruled the greatest empire the world had ever known.

And yet—the mesmeric waves swirling around her were recognizably those of Helen Raymond. The illusion would have been perfect, except to a mesmerist.

“Rest easy, we have not whisked Her Majesty from Buckingham Palace to this room,” said Moriarty with a dry chuckle. “Helen, if you would reveal the illusion?”

Before their eyes, Queen Victoria seemed to swirl like smoke—a column of black, gray, and white that reformed into the semblance of Mrs. Raymond.

“That, gentlemen, is the power of mesmerism,” she said. “I was able, for a time, to convince you that you were seeing the Queen herself. It was, of course, merely a kind of trick. If you would like me to demonstrate again—”

“Not for the world!” said Harker. “Can such a power truly exist? I thought mesmerists were merely charlatans.”

“Most of them are,” said Mrs. Raymond. “But some of them can truly manipulate the mesmeric waves that surround us like an invisible ocean. By manipulating those waves, I can determine what you see—for a time.”

“Then you did not truly become Her Majesty?” He still sounded disbelieving.

Mrs. Raymond sighed, as though wearied by his questions. “Mesmerism does not change the physical world—it merely alters our perception of it. Actually changing material reality is theoretically possible, but would take more power than I currently have. And there is a limit even to the visions I can create. I could not sustain this illusion if there were hundreds of spectators present, rather than the nine of you in this room.”

“Which is of course the problem,” said Moriarty. “Over the past decade, my organization has infiltrated government at the highest levels. Colonel Moran and I have assembled a dossier that could bring down half the cabinet. Once we tell certain powerful figures what we know about them, they will beg us to command them, and willingly do our bidding. But the Queen herself, sitting above the daily fray of politics, is nevertheless sharp-eyed. She keeps a watch over matters of state and has her own shadow cabinet, as it were, whose members are loyal only to Her Majesty. While her role appears ceremonial, in reality she is far more than a figurehead. If we are to effect true change in this country, we must replace her with another, more amenable, version of herself—whom you have seen! That version will reign long enough for us to put our members into the government. Lord Godalming will be our new Prime Minister. And then she will abdicate in favor of Prince Edward. From what I have been told by reliable informants, he will be much more sympathetic to our cause. All of us here are loyal to the Crown—that goes without saying. But the Crown is not necessarily the Queen. She shall not be harmed, I assure you. However, she is old, and it is long past time the throne passed to her son. He will understand the problems of the new century, which is almost upon us. What say you, gentlemen? Are you ready to join the Order of the Golden Dawn?”

“Is this not treason?” asked Harker. “What will happen to Her Majesty during this—this interregnum you are describing?

“She will be kept in the Purfleet Asylum,” said Dr. Seward. “I assure you that she will be both safe and comfortable. If she claims to be the Queen of England, she will be seen as yet another madwoman. And when we return her after her abdication, any mention of having been abducted or confined will be treated as evidence of incipient dementia. Either way, she will not be believed.”

“Jonathan, consider,” said Godalming, turning to the solicitor. “You and I have talked about how someone needs to take things in hand. This country is going to the dogs—with this depression, and beggars even in Pall Mall, and Fenians bombing whenever they please. India in rebellion, war coming in Africa… Someone needs to do something. Why should that someone not be us? If we abduct the Queen—for yes, that is what Moriarty is suggesting, let us have no illusions about that. She will be well taken care of, with the comforts that her age and station require, but this is nevertheless an abduction. If we do so, we will be doing it for a higher purpose, a greater good. Is that not true patriotism, to serve one’s country and one’s race, even if no one will ever know what we have done? Even if we earn no praise, receive no accolades, for our actions? Once we are in power, we will close our borders to the unwashed masses that pollute our cities. England for Englishmen! We will administer our empire with a firmer hand—no more rebellions, or at least not ones that go unpunished. No more concessions to native populations who have no idea what is good for them. I assure you that in public policy, mercy is an overrated virtue. Come, man, do you not want to save your country?”

Alice, who still had an uneaten sandwich on her plate, put it aside. She was shocked by what these men were planning to do. Kidnap the Queen? And then hold her prisoner in a mental institution where she would not be listened to or believed while they rearranged the government to suit their purposes? Impose this system of “eugenics,” whatever that meant, on the English people? She did not understand all the details of their plan, but what she did understand horrified her.

Harker still looked undecided, but Morris said, “I’m in, gentlemen. This is about as dangerous as hunting lions in Rhodesia, I reckon. Tell me what we do next.”

“As you can see,” said Moriarty, “Helen has considerable power—but not enough, not yet, to effect our purpose. Initially, we thought that if we found the most powerful mesmerists in England, they could, as it were, augment her power—but they turned out to be poor specimens, after all. One of them led us to Helen’s daughter, whose power I have seen with my own eyes. Helen, show us what Lydia can do.”

What had he just said? Was he expecting Alice to do something, in front of all these people? She shrank back even farther into the cushions of the armchair.

“Here? Now?” said Mrs. Raymond. She sounded surprised and angry. “I thought perhaps later, when Lydia has recovered a little—”

“Yes, here and now,” said Moriarty. “We need to see what abilities she can add to our cause. Or are you not as committed to that cause as you have told me?”

Mrs. Raymond glared at him. He merely looked back at her, imperturbable. “All right,” she said after a moment. “Lydia, come here.”

What in the world was Alice supposed to do? She felt like Galatea before Aphrodite brought her to life—as though she were a statue incapable of motion.

“Go on,” whispered Margaret Trelawny, pushing her just a bit, so that she slid to the edge of the armchair. “Go to your mother.”

Feeling numb, Alice stood up and walked over to Mrs. Raymond. She had no idea what to do. Mrs. Raymond grabbed her wrist and pulled her over, more roughly than necessary. “Just open your mind,” she hissed under her breath. “I can’t do this unless you open your mind to me. Do you understand?”

Open her mind how? Alice did not even know that it was closed. But then she felt it—another presence in her head, tugging at her consciousness, pulling her spiritually rather than physically. She looked down at her arms in wonder. The mesmerical waves—she could see them flowing from her to Mrs. Raymond. Their waves were merging. Suddenly they were no longer seated in the common room of the Alchemical Society. Columns were rising around them, coming together into pointed arches between walls of white stone with statues of saints in carved niches, and then windows of stained glass, letting in multicolored light, and then up until the illusion knit itself together into a high domed ceiling, gilded and painted. Alice had never seen anything so magnificent in her life.

“The dome of St. Paul’s!” said Harker in wonder, like a visitor from the country seeing it for the first time. “How is this possible?”

“Well, damn,” said Mr. Morris. “Now that’s impressive.”

And then, like the illusion of Queen Victoria, it dissipated, the cathedrals and statues and stained glass swirling away like smoke. Once again they were standing in the common room. Alice’s arm hurt where Mrs. Raymond had gripped it.

Dr. Raymond rubbed his hands together gleefully. “Wonderful, wonderful,” he said. “You see, Helen, this is what I always wanted. This is what I suffered and sacrificed for. Look what you and little Lydia can do together. Surely this will allow us to implement Professor Moriarty’s plan.”

“No,” she said coldly. “It will not. Even drawing upon Lydia’s powers, I can only maintain such an illusion for a limited period of time. We need to fool hundreds of people over a period of weeks.”

“And for that, we need something more,” said Moriarty. “What we need, gentlemen, is to summon the Great God Pan!” He said it dramatically, as though it might mean something important. However, the only response was Dr. Raymond’s sharp intake of breath and Mr. Harker’s “I’m afraid I don’t understand. What does classical mythology have to do with all this?”

“Dr. Raymond, if you will explain?” said Moriarty, looking irritated.

Raymond took a deep breath and said, “I’m not quite certain what you mean by it, Moriarty—whether you mean what I think you mean. But it’s an alchemical procedure that I myself… well. It’s a metaphor, of course. The alchemical sciences have long used metaphors to express the inexpressible, or what, for practical purposes, must be kept hidden from the ignorant public. As you know, the god Pan was the Greek deity of the natural world. To summon Pan means to summon the energic powers of the Earth and contain them within a host. That is what I tried to do, long ago, to a girl—a beautiful young girl, my wife, Helen’s mother. Unfortunately, her mind could not support such an influx of power, and she went mad. At the time, unbeknownst to me, she was with child. You see the result.” He nodded toward Mrs. Raymond. “My wife died in a mental hospital, so I sent Helen to be raised in the country, which I thought would be healthier for her. Besides which, I did not want to be reminded of my dear departed. Since my experiments were not yielding the results I wanted, I gave them up and pursued other studies. And then, after many years, for we had become estranged, I heard from Helen again. I’m sorry that we did not speak for so long,” he said to Mrs. Raymond. “And I’m glad to see that you have grown into such a fine woman. You have your mother’s eyes, my dear.”

Mrs. Raymond did not respond.

“Well,” he said after a moment. “When Helen contacted me, she told me something I could scarcely believe. I am still not certain whether to credit her account.…”

“And yet it is entirely accurate, Dr. Raymond,” said Miss Trelawny. “As I’m sure you all know, for it was featured prominently in The Times, six months ago my father discovered the burial chamber of Queen Tera. That was not surprising—such discoveries seem to be made every year, now that we have men such as Flinders Petrie in Egypt and the support of the Egypt Exploration Fund. What did surprise us was the intact state of the chamber, which had never been looted, and the paintings we found on its walls. Queen Tera was the High Priestess of the Temple of Isis at Philae. On the walls of her burial chamber, in faded hieroglyphs, was described a ritual for raising the energic powers of the Earth and imbuing the High Priestess with such powers. For those of you not familiar with Egyptian history, Tera was the second wife of Ptolemy Auletes and mother of Cleopatra, whom you know from Shakespeare. After Ptolemy’s death, she was sent as far away from Alexandria as possible—to Philae, near the first cataract of the Nile, on the border between Egypt and Nubia. There, she became High Priestess of the Temple of Isis. She died in 30 B.C., when Augustus invaded Egypt. After he had secured Alexandria, he sent his soldiers south, to attack Philae—most likely because Tera was there. Cleopatra was already his captive—he was planning to parade her through the streets of Rome. It would have been imprudent to leave her mother, the former queen, behind in Egypt, where she might try to ascend the throne and challenge the Roman forces.”

Miss Trelawny leaned forward and looked at each one of them, as though addressing them directly.

“We know what happened at Philae because those who survived recorded it on the walls of Tera’s tomb. The priestesses defended the temple, and many of them were killed. Tera herself died leading the defense. The survivors ordered a tomb to be built for Queen Tera. Its walls were covered with friezes carved into the stone. Among them, my father found rituals and recipes—medicines long lost to civilization, ways of performing surgical procedures—as well as an account of that final battle with the soldiers of Augustus. They showed lightning coming out of Tera’s left hand. They also depicted a ritual for raising the energic powers of the Earth and containing them within a living host, who was intended to be the High Priestess herself. Once these powers were contained, they could be redirected and used—for whatever purpose the host desired. This ritual, my father attempted to perform, with himself as host. Also present were Eugene Corbeck, my father’s assistant, and my fiancé, Malcolm Ross—a solicitor like yourself, Mr. Harker. You will no doubt have heard of the terrible accident that took my father’s life, as well as those of Ross and Corbeck. But it was no accident. There was, indeed, an explosion in the room where he housed his collection, but it was not set off by bitumen, as reported in the papers. Rather, it was the ritual itself that killed them. You see, the ritual demands a sacrifice—as it fills a host with power, it must drain power from another. Someone must die. My father did not realize that—he had not read the original Egyptian hieroglyphs as carefully as he should have. Alas, I realized it only after his death, when it was too late. This ritual can indeed give you gentlemen power—but do you truly want to attempt it? The two men I loved most in the world perished in the quest for knowledge. Do you, too, wish to risk your lives for the power and wisdom of ancient Egypt?”

She looked around at the men in the room. Alice, cradling her arm where Mrs. Raymond had gripped it, looked around at them as well. Mr. Harker seemed apprehensive, but the rest of the men appeared to be eager, even cupidous. Dr. Raymond was rubbing his thin, dry hands together. If Miss Trelawny’s words had been meant to deter them, she had not succeeded.

“And who is to be our host?” asked Seward. “Who is to wield these powers? You, Moriarty?”

“I am,” said Mrs. Raymond. “I already know how to wield energic power, and I am willing to risk my life in this endeavor.”

“The danger of this ritual will be primarily to her,” said Moriarty, putting a hand on her shoulder. “However, she is willing to undertake that danger to further our cause.” What was the relationship between him and Mrs. Raymond? Clearly she was his subordinate—he told her what to do and she obeyed. And yet his attitude toward her was more intimate than such a relationship implied. Whatever it was, it made Alice feel a little sick. She did not particularly care about Mrs. Raymond—why should she? What sort of mother had she been? But Moriarty, despite his high, white forehead, which should have signified intellect, reminded her of a devil in human form. As imperceptibly as she could, she returned to her seat beside Margaret Trelawny. She wanted to get as far away from Moriarty as possible. Fortunately, no one seemed to be paying attention to her.

“Well, gentlemen?” said Moriarty, looking around at all of them. “Are you with us?”

“Of course we are,” said Godalming. “What man would draw back from such a challenge?” He smiled his charming, sincere smile, which Alice was beginning to distrust. Better a cold smile like Mrs. Raymond’s than Lord Godalming’s deceptive warmth! Harker continued to look dubious, but Alice could see the other men nodding.

“Excellent,” said Moriarty. “Now that Dr. Raymond and Mr. Harker have agreed to join us, we have everything we need for the ritual.”

“Well, I don’t know…,” said Harker, but Lord Godalming glanced at him in a meaningful way, and he did not finish his sentence.

“Which are what?” asked Seward. “What do we need exactly? And how do we know that what happened to Trelawny and his assistants won’t happen again?”

Mrs. Raymond rose and walked over to Miss Trelawny’s armchair. The men who were seated rose when she did, and did not sit again until she had seated herself on the arm of the chair, next to Alice, who looked up at her uncomfortably. She hoped she would not be called upon to demonstrate her mesmerical powers once more. Her mother and Miss Trelawny looked like sisters, with Mrs. Raymond as the elder. Alice felt very small between them.

“The ritual was meant to be enacted by the priestesses of Isis,” said Mrs. Raymond. “They were accustomed to manipulating the energic powers of the Earth. That is why the ritual will be conducted by myself, with the assistance of my daughter.” She put one hand on Alice’s shoulder. Suddenly, all eyes were on Alice again. She wished that she could sink down into the cushions—down, down, through the stuffing and then the common room floor, back down to the cellar where she had been held captive. “Of course, we will be acting under the direction of Miss Trelawny.”

“And we will have the seven of you to light the lamps,” said Miss Trelawny. “Seven lamps, carved to resemble the seven incarnations of Hathor, were found in the tomb. My father lit them one by one—I believe they need to be lit simultaneously, and at the correct moment, for the ritual to take effect. Furthermore, when my father conducted the ritual, he did not realize it required a source of energy before it could draw upon the energic powers of the Earth—as one needs to prime a pump. It drew power out of him rather than imbuing him with it. We will have a source of power to draw on—a battery, you could call him. Or, if you prefer, a sacrifice, as Professor Moriarty said. You see, we have planned very carefully. We do not intend to repeat my father’s mistakes. The exhibition opens on Monday—we are planning on conducting our ritual on Sunday, while the British Museum is closed and we have Queen Tera’s artifacts all to ourselves.”

“This sacrifice…,” said Harker. “Are you speaking of a human being?”

“An old enemy of mine,” said Moriarty with satisfaction. “A man I have been trying to get rid of for years, and who almost managed to get rid of me at Reichenbach Falls! I do not know how he survived in the turbulent waters—if Moran had not dragged me out of the pool below the falls, I would have drowned myself. He is a man the world would be better off without. It will, indeed, be a mercy to rid the world of such a meddling, sanctimonious—well. Are you satisfied, gentlemen? If so, I suggest Lord Godalming and Dr. Raymond continue this conversation in my office. We have some logistics to discuss. The rest of you may smoke—Helen and Margaret won’t mind, I’m certain. And the child can go back to—wherever you’ve put her.”

“Come on,” Margaret Trelawny said to Alice, taking her hand. “I’ll bring you back to your room. And put some of those little rolls in your pocket—you need something nourishing, after that diet of dry crusts!”

Alice took three of the pastries, put them in her apron pocket, and followed Miss Trelawny, dodging the gentlemen who were milling about now, talking among themselves and paying no attention to her. Once they were in the hall, Miss Trelawny said, “Gitla, just a moment! Einen Moment!” The maid was halfway up the stairs, carrying a water jug. “Can you take Lydia back to her room?” She pointed to Alice, then up, toward the second floor.

“Jawohl, Madame,” said Gitla, nodding. She gestured for Alice to follow—with her head, because she had no hands free.

“I’ll make sure Mrs. Mandelbaum sends up some supper,” said Miss Trelawny. “You’ll be all right, won’t you, my dear? No one will mistreat you, now that I’m here. And you must not think too hard of Helen—of your mother. Her life has been difficult in ways you cannot imagine. Now, go on. I won’t see you again tonight, but tomorrow we shall have a great deal to do.”

Miss Trelawny leaned down and kissed her on one cheek. Alice was so startled that she could only nod. Then, she ran to catch up with Gitla on the stairs.

As they walked along the second-floor corridor, Gitla said something incomprehensible, then stopped in front of a door that was not Alice’s. She placed the water jug on the floor, unlocked the door, turned to Alice, and held up her hand—clearly, Alice was supposed to wait outside—then opened the door and carried the jug in.

Through the open door, Alice saw a room that resembled hers, with afternoon light streaming through the window. Someone was lying on the bed, under a blanket. As Gitla entered, the form on the bed turned toward her, murmuring weakly, “Watson, is that you? Watson…”

There, on the pillow, was the pale, damp, feverish face of Sherlock Holmes.