The Map of Chaos (Trilogía Victoriana #3)(45)

While he had been working on the Madame Amber case, for example, he had all but forgotten about the countess. A routine case of suspected fraud had all of a sudden turned into an extraordinary mystery, a true puzzle for a mind hungry for challenges. Not only had a murderous spirit materialized during a fraudulent séance, but that same spirit had pursued one of the participants home a few hours later, apparently with the aim of stealing a mysterious book that, according to the old lady, contained nothing less than the means of saving the world.

And now Clayton knew the reason why Mrs. Lansbury’s servant had never returned: poor Doris’s body had been discovered by Scotland Yard detectives the following day in a nearby street, so horribly mutilated that even the hardened officers had been appalled. No message was found on her. Clearly the murderer had intercepted the maid before she had been able to deliver it, and so the intended recipient never knew how anxiously the old lady had awaited him and Clayton had no way of finding out who the devil he was. Subsequent inquiries revealed that Mrs. Lansbury enjoyed no social life beyond her interest in spiritualism. The detectives had to limit themselves to interviewing the people who had bumped into her most frequently at séances, but none of them had any relationship with the eccentric old lady beyond the obligatory courtesies and were therefore unlikely to be the intended recipient of the message. Apart from that, she did not seem to have any family or friends. Catherine Lansbury had appeared out of nowhere in London society a few years before. She possessed a small fortune thanks to owning the patent for the Mechanical Servant, but no one had been able to discover anything more about her, except that she was a widow and came from a distant land, which seemed surprising given her impeccable English accent. Recent rumor had it that she had squandered her fortune on her obsession with the Hereafter and it was only a matter of time before her creditors caught up with her. Even so, the old lady did not seem to have relinquished her costly pastime, although, according to some of the statements, she never sought to make contact with anyone in particular during the séances, as was habitually the case. At no time had she asked to speak to her deceased husband, for example, and if some crafty medium declared joyously that he was in the room and wished to speak to her, Mrs. Lansbury would consistently refuse, waving her small, wrinkled hand in the air as though someone had paid her an inappropriate compliment before replying, “I don’t think so: my husband knows perfectly well I have no wish to speak to him. Besides, he isn’t the one I’m looking for. It is others I seek. I shall wait.”

After that she would remain silent, in expectation of those who it would seem never turned up. Could they be the same ones she herself had referred to as “those from the Other Side,” for whom the book was apparently intended? And who was the strange creature who had tried to steal it? How had he managed to appear during the séance, and how had he suddenly vanished in the middle of the street, leaving a trail of blood that had become visible only moments later? More important still, how had the old lady disappeared from a room that was locked on the inside? Too many questions without any answers.

Although they were frustrating questions, they distracted him, saving him from himself. He needed those questions because they were the barrier that kept at bay that other ferocious hoard of thoughts, which if they invaded his mind would end up destroying it. And so he had no other choice but to keep his fainting fits secret. None of his superiors must ever find out, not even Captain Sinclair. And if that also meant no more dreaming about Valerie, he would have to accept that, he told himself, as he fingered the gold-edged card that had been languishing in his coat pocket for the last six months like a treasure at the bottom of the ocean, until he had rescued it a week earlier.

The sound of a door clicking open and the gentle murmur of female voices announced that the session of the patient before him had ended. Clayton fixed his eyes apprehensively on the door of the waiting room. When he had arrived at Doctor Higgins’s consulting rooms an hour earlier, a plump nurse had guided him there along a corridor lined with doors, inviting him to leave his hat on the stand and to take a seat in one of the small armchairs. Noticing his ashen face, she had assured him that no one would disturb him while he was waiting, as no two patients were ever asked to wait in the same room, thus guaranteeing absolute discretion. Afflictions of the soul were apparently very delicate matters, Clayton reflected when she had gone. After standing rigidly for a few moments in the center of the room, he finally took off his hat and ventured to sit down, wondering about his fellow patients in the adjoining cells, which seemed to stretch out forever, like a hall of mirrors: neurasthenic gentlemen overwhelmed by the intolerable pressures of business; ladies suffering from chlorosis, their skins a delicate greenish hue, like forest fairies in which some child had stopped believing; hysterical young girls in desperate need of a husband, or possibly a lover? What the devil was he doing among this display of deviant behavior? But now it seemed it was too late. The murmur of voices had taken on the habitual inflection of departures, and the sound of a door gently clicking shut told Clayton that Doctor Higgins was done healing that particular patient’s soul. The tap of approaching footsteps followed, and the waiting room door opened, framing the nurse.

“You may go in now, Mr. Sinclair!” Clayton silently cursed himself for his complete lack of imagination when it came to giving a false name. “Doctor Higgins is waiting for you.”

? ? ?

WHILE HE SPOKE, DOCTOR Higgins was in the habit of tugging his goatee between his thumb and forefinger, a gesture that possibly betrayed an incurable affliction of the soul, and which didn’t exactly help Clayton to feel at ease. Indeed, it had the opposite effect on him, and so he had to take his eyes off the doctor and cast them around his spacious office. He studied the volumes lining the bookshelves, so thick they seemed to hold all the wisdom in the world between their pages; the engravings of body parts covering the walls; the uncomfortable couch; and the display cabinet in a corner, containing a few human skulls with deranged smiles lying on a bed of scalpels, syringes, and other sinister-looking instruments.