Mariah Mundi (4 page)

‘Do you think it was him who came into your room?’ Mariah asked as he gulped the lump from his throat and shivered as if a cold hand touched the back of his neck.

‘Why should he? I have nothing to steal but a few old postcards from Ireland, that and a trinket or two.’

‘Did he leave anything for you, a note, a gift?’

‘Nothing. When Mister Luger searched his room they found nothing, even the mantelpiece had been dusted and the grate cleaned. All that belonged to Felix had gone except this stage suit,’ she said as she brushed the sleeve. ‘That had been put on the hanger and placed behind the closet against the wall.’

‘What about his family?’ Mariah asked nervously as he twizzled a long strand of his curly mop.

‘No one, he spoke of no one. Mister Luger only takes orphans, boys from the Colonial School and the workhouse,’ she said as she saw Mariah look at her with enquiring eyes. ‘Did you know Felix? He must only be a year older than you.’

‘Felix? No, can’t say I did … There were so many of us, one of many really,’ Mariah replied. ‘Worked here long?’ he asked, hoping to change the conversation.

‘My father got me the job here. I’m the eldest of nine children and there’s no room at the inn.’ She laughed at her own joke. ‘My mother keeps the Kent Arms in Paradise, it’s a bar by the harbour – we get Saturday afternoon to ourselves, so I’ll take you. My father’s a coastguard. In the morning you’ll see the castle. Look to the street below and that’s Paradise.’

‘So you lived in Paradise?’ he laughed.

‘But some parts of Paradise are so full, now I have to live here.’ Sacha lost her smile as a distant church clock struck midnight, its shrill chimes carried by the wind. ‘Best be leaving you,’ she said as she opened the door. ‘There’s no lock, but since Felix disappeared, I’ve taken to blocking the handle with a chair. Haven’t slept for so long … I’m glad you’re here, I’ll sleep tonight,’ she said tearfully as she turned to go, shutting the thin wooden door firmly to keep out the night.

Mariah crept to the window and opened the thick curtains. He looked out to sea. The room appeared to be at the very top of the hotel, hidden in the very top of the tower. It was as if it was as high as the clouds that swirled about the round turret and rattled the glass panes. Through the rain-streaked windows he could make out the square shapes of the bathing machines on the narrow strip between the Prince Regent and the sea two hundred feet below. The scene was clearly lit by the gas lamps from three hundred windows and several cones of limelight that illuminated the hotel so it could be seen from far out at sea.

Far below, the lighthouse poked like a thin white finger through the rolling waves breaking over the pier, drenching the fishing boats that clung to the harbour wall. Wave after wave crashed from the darkness, briefly phosphorescent in the glow of the light, then plunged black-dark into the night storm.

Mariah turned the element of the lamp until the mantle glowed with the strength of a firefly, barely lighting the palm of his hand. Then he sat on the bed, wrapping himself in the wool blankets as he listened to the storm beating against the windows and crashing against the beach below.

It was then he heard the sound. It was neither storm, nor sea. The gentle tap, tap, tap of fingernails on the broad water pipe that ran across the wall of the room, and with it the faraway sound of voices in sombre conversation.

M
ORNING came quickly. The storm had ebbed into a gentle, December breeze that chased mountainous white clouds across the sky. Mariah had been woken by the scream of the seagulls that lodged on the roof and squawked and prattled well before the rising of the sun. He had dressed quickly in the black shirt and suit left for him by Sacha. They fitted well, as if tailored just for him. In the dirty brown wardrobe he had found a dainty pair of black pointed boots with neat ankle straps and a silver buckle – they too had fit perfectly, and as he paced the room he was entertained by a gentle leather squeak from his right foot. In the minutes he waited for Sacha he stared from the window of his room, captivated by all that was before him.

To the north he could see the castle with its bombarded keep, high walls and a garrison house that proudly flew a Jack from a stubby flagpole on its grey slate roof. Mariah had looked for Paradise and traced the street with his eye, following his finger across the windowpane as he drew its length from the castle to the sea. Far below, in the calm that followed the storm, was the harbour. Every inch of water was crammed with small
boats that even in the first light of dawn jostled to flee out to sea. On the slipway a large brig stood half built, its ribs and keel open to the elements like the carcass of a dead whale being stripped of its meat. It crawled with men, who in the distance looked like small black lice.

Mariah had never expected it to be such a beautiful sight. The crisp blue morning sky was edged in gold thread from the rising of a southern sun that skipped across the horizon, shedding its light below the high clouds. It was the first time he had seen a dawn such as this. Even from his tiny room in the Colonial School he had only ever witnessed the drab rising of a foggy orb that would, with its feeble arm, scatter the smog by late afternoon and allow its return as it quickly set to the west. For him, the sky and the sun had been a mere backdrop to his life, of no importance but to provide him with light for his steps. Now they commanded time and attention as they stretched out before him to the distant horizon of the German Ocean.

Mariah tidied the room. He felt as if it were not yet his, that the presence of Felix was still close. Trying to imagine what his predecessor had looked like, he set about searching the room for a slight trace, a mere thread or particle of dust that would give some clue as to the disappearance of the boy and why others had vanished before him. He had looked everywhere for something to tell him that the boy had been there. But it was as if every memory, trace and thought of Felix had been totally eradicated by a meticulous hand that desired not to leave anything behind. He felt as if whoever had done this had been purposeful in their plan and, in his confusion could not decide if Felix had been the perpetrator or victim of some elaborate plot.

In the minutes that followed, Mariah allowed himself to think that which until then he had kept from his mind. He remembered the penny dreadful that had been smeared over Captain Charity as he slept. The black ink cartoon of Fiery
Jack, snatching children from their beds and dragging them across the rooftops of London to be devoured in his lair, filled his head. He again checked the window, feeling the securing bolt to see if it had been tampered with. He looked outside to the small balcony that encircled the tower and wondered if Felix had escaped that way, on to the roof and down to the street. Or had he been carried sleeping by Fiery Jack, the demon creature that plagued the city with his sulphurous breath and spring heels, across the rooftops to another world?

Mariah folded his first-class suit with great care and placed it in the wardrobe. It was then that he remembered the playing cards wedged deeply in his pocket, kept away from prying eyes. Slowly and carefully he dipped his hand into the pocket and, before bringing the cards and the jewelled skull to the light, looked over his shoulder to see whether he was being watched. Mariah stared at the Fool, dressed in his clown’s guise with chequered shirt, ruff collar and painted face. He studiously examined the stiff wax seal that held tight to the flap, squeezing the box lid securely shut. With another glance he looked behind him, sure that he was being watched. Then he quickly took the cards and the skull and hid them under the bed, wedging them between the mattress and the oak boards, hoping they would never be discovered.

As he got from his knees there was a knock at the door. From the rattling of the handle and the stamping of feet outside, he knew it was Sacha. ‘Mariah,’ she whispered as she pulled on the handle. ‘If we go now I can show you something before you see Mister Luger. You have to see it …’

Mariah opened the door and stood back to allow her in. Sacha didn’t move, but looked him up and down, not speaking.

‘Cat got your tongue?’ he said as he tired of her staring.

‘You look just like him,’ she said, surprised at his appearance. ‘Same hair, same eyes. You could be brothers.’

He ignored what she said, uncomfortable in his new clothes and feeling as if Felix was closer than before, that he had never left the room but just changed into dust and now stared down from the thick cobwebs that hung in the corners of the room. ‘What do we have to see?’ he asked, reminding Sacha of her excitement.

‘Something special. Mister Luger said he’ll see you in an hour. Monica’s been causing trouble and Bizmillah wants her cast out of the Music Hall. They’re all in his office. You can hear the shouting, she’s screaming and …’ she said quickly, her voice excited as her hands danced her words. ‘That’s it!’ she shouted as she remembered what she wanted to say. ‘I found a galvanised bathing machine, it’s incredible. Arrived last night from Luger’s workshop, the only one in Europe and destined to cure all of life’s ills –’

‘Mister Luger says,’ Mariah echoed.

‘Precisely. And it’s in the hotel, I found it this morning. Quickly, we’ll have to go by the stairs.’

Sacha took him by the hand and dragged him through the narrow door and into a thin spiral staircase that twisted down and down, lit only by narrow slit windows that looked out across the sea. Mariah could hear the steam elevator pounding away as the expanding piston thrust the carriage up the shaft, pulled at the same time by the whirring winch that coiled the thick steel cable around and around.

Mariah followed as Sacha ran faster, skipping the steps as she ran. Every now and then she would whirl herself around the blind corners, grabbing the brass rail and throwing out her feet, vanishing from sight then reappearing as Mariah chased after her. The sound of their chasing rumbled on ahead, drowned only by the vibration of the steam elevator as it went up and down, shivering the shaft and gargling steam from the many vents that criss-crossed the wall.

Every so often Mariah passed a small landing, each with a narrow wooden door marked with the number of the floor. He counted the landings as they spiralled down, his feet tripping in his pointy boots and his curls blowing in the strong draught that blew from the depths of the shaft.

‘Much further?’ he shouted as Sacha ran even faster, vanishing in the patchwork of light and dark.

‘Another five floors and then we’ll find it,’ she gasped as she ran, stumbling over her frock-tails.

Mariah counted the landings again as they ran by, each door neatly labelled, showing that they now dashed below the level of the ground. He become aware that the lower they descended, the hotter the shaft became. The handrail was warm to his touch and the sound of hissing steam filled the staircase.

‘Don’t worry,’ Sacha cried out above the noise of the steam engine. ‘Two more landings and then we’ll take the next door and all will be well.’

Mariah had lost all track of time. In his heart he felt a growing ache that he would be too late to see Mister Luger, and that this unseen master of everything would pack him on the first train to London without him even sampling the blessing of being cut in half by the Great Bizmillah at the Sunday matinee.

‘It’s here,’ she shouted, out of breath and relieved to have found the door. ‘This way for the experience of a lifetime …’

Mariah followed her through the door and into a long corridor. He suddenly realised that they were not below ground: the hotel was built on the side of a high cliff and one part of the Prince Regent was built against the rock face. The corridor was lined with large windows that ran its length, and was carpeted in fine green wool inlaid with golden crowns. Mariah saw the narrow beach that was covered by the full tide and the peculiar bathing huts that looked like miniature houses strapped to the
back of old horse carts and wheeled out into the sea. A hoard of shabbily dressed urchins, barefoot and ragged, searched the strand for the washing of jetsam brought in by the storm.

Sacha beckoned him to follow as she led on, confident that he would now know the way back to see Mister Luger. ‘Not far,’ she said as the sound of the steam engine died away in the distance. ‘Just at the end is the spa – drink the water and you’ll turn green and die … But people pay good money to swallow the stuff, though it smells of Mahoney’s and devils belching. You should see the look on their faces after they’ve been made to drink a gallon.’ Sacha grimaced, opening her mouth and sticking out her tongue.

She stopped at a double door crafted from the finest dark wood and etched with carvings of holly leaves. ‘This is it,’ she said. She looked both ways along the passage, then stepped quickly inside as if she didn’t want to be seen.

Once inside, Mariah stood in an incredible water garden. A large swimming pool stretched out before him lit with blue gas lamps that shimmered a rainbow upon the purple water. It looked like a huge cavern made of blue tile; white mosaics covered the walls and large parlour palms shot forth their long green branches. Around the pool were several wicker sofas with curiously shaped backs, humped at one end like a camel. Immediately the heat sweated his face, and his heavy black suit felt out of place.

‘Not far,’ Sacha said as she went on her way through the spa, looking for a gathering of tall tropical plants that protected a small doorway in the tiled wall. ‘In here,’ she whispered, and she slipped under the branches of a minute tree laden with yellow fruit, with a large oriental bat dangling by its thin claws from one of the branches. It slept in the morning sunlight that streamed through the high windows that formed the glass floor of the terrace above.

‘What is this place?’ Mariah asked, wide-eyed in amazement.

‘People come here to swim, take the waters and sit under Mister Luger’s health lamp. It’s powered by electricity – after a week they turn brown. Some of them look as if they are boiled lobsters,
and
they pay,’ she said incredulously. ‘But if you want to be amazed, wait until you see this.’ Sacha’s eyes lit up with excitement as she pushed open the door and dragged him into a large room clad in fresh pine planks and smelling of a freshly cut forest. ‘Look!’

Mariah stared at a large brass dome fitted to what looked like an enamel bath. Over the bath was a wooden hood like an upturned boat, with a tidy circular hole padded with red leather. From the dome, three large pipes came out; one went into the roof and the others bit into the bath like a giant spider’s fangs. On the side of the bath was a brass indicator with a large green lever which at that moment pointed to the word
Resting.

‘Steam-powered,’ Sacha said proudly as she stroked the soft wood. ‘This really does become a wonder – one flick of the handle and it’s filled with steam, two flicks and gallons of freezing salt waves are pumped from the sea and sprayed inside. Three flicks and hot water bubbles all around. Mister Luger says it invigorates the soul and cleanses the mind, the only one in Europe.’ Sacha looked at the handle and smiled. ‘It’s a Galvanised Bathing Machine … I overheard Mister Luger saying that the water was mixed with a secret ingredient that gave it curative properties. He said he would pump it from under the streets and mix it with the seawater, called it
Kuck
… I wasn’t sure what he meant, but it sounded as if it would be good,’ she said, her eyebrows raised as if she too desired to try the wonder tub. ‘Every bath costs an extra pound on the bill so people wouldn’t pay if it weren’t worth it. Shall we see it work?’ she asked audaciously’

‘I wouldn’t do it, Sacha. What if we are found here? I have to go, got to see Mister Luger – he’ll want to see me, it’s my first morning.’

‘So, Mariah
is
a coward. I knew it when I saw you last night. Just like Felix, I thought to myself, all talk and nothing in his britches. No one will know, Mariah. We are the only ones here.’ Sacha fumbled with the starting handle. ‘Get in – there’s a swimming robe in the back room, get changed and get in. It’ll be the best thing you’ve ever done.’

Mariah was torn between pleasing her and running away. He looked at the Galvanised Bathing Machine where it sat on the tiled floor, dead … ‘You can do what you like, Sacha, but I’m not getting into that thing – I want to see it working first.’

‘If
that’s
what you want then
that’s
what you’ll get,’ she said quickly as she slipped the handle from
Resting
to
Active
.

The large brass bubble made a sudden gulp, then began to gurgle and simmer, quietly shaking the floor and trembling the bath as it sucked in
Kuck
from a huge vat far below. Through the leather-clad hole it belched a breath of salty steam that rose into the air like a circular cloud. Mariah looked on, glancing to the door, knowing it was the only means of escape.

‘What if somebody comes?’ Mariah asked anxiously as the Bathing Machine gurgled and even more salty, sulphurous breaths rose, one after the other, faster and faster. The room began to stink like a sewer as thick brown steam gurgled and gurgled.

There was a sudden loud shudder that shook the whole room as the brass bubble belched violently and rumbled several times. More and more steam began to billow from the top of the bath.

‘Ready?’ Sacha shouted as she flicked the switch once and stood back from the machine.