“This is the kind of place the Company puts you up in nowadays?” Joseph set down his bag, looking worried.
“I’ve lived in worse,” Lewis said, wrestling a bulky object out of a cupboard. He set it on the floor, yanked a lever, and staggered back as an air mattress self-inflated with a roar. “There, you see? I can even accommodate a guest. And we’ve plenty of gin. Let the good times roll.”
No security techs snooping around? No fallout from that trip to Yorkshire?
Joseph asked, poking doubtfully at the air mattress with his foot. It gulped in air in a last hissing spasm, like a dragon with gas, and lay quiet.
Techs? No, nothing like that. A few bad dreams now and then
. Lewis reached deeper into the cupboard and pulled out a sleeping bag, which he unrolled on the mattress with a flourish. It lay there sullenly exuding a smell of British army surplus shop.
This was how it began sometimes, Joseph thought uneasily, postings that got worse and worse, jobs that got more and more pointless. Never any official acknowledgment of Dr. Zeus’s displeasure, but over the great span of years the Company had to play with you, an ever-increasing number of opportunities to hang yourself, and lots of rope.
“The worst time was during the Blitz,” Lewis mused. He folded back the slatted screen that closed off his bathroom, displaying the dingy porcelain delights beyond. “Those poor mortals. At least the bombs don’t generally fall from the sky anymore. And look, all the hot water your heart desires, and no shillings needed. It’s a vast improvement on the old days, let me tell you.”
“Gin, huh?” Joseph rubbed his hands together. “Are the bootleggers any good?”
“Oh, the best,” Lewis assured him. “It’s all brought across the border from Scotland. Though if you’d like a cider or beer, they’re
still legal. There’s a sandwich shop on the corner with a nice selection. I can’t afford to eat there myself, but—”
“My treat,” said Joseph, suppressing an urge to wring his hands. “Come on, let’s go down there.”
The place was small, dark, and overheated, but Lewis seemed to revel in the atmosphere.
“Gosh, this is like the old days,” he said happily. In the dim light his face looked gaunt. Joseph staved off feelings of guilt by remembering that Lewis looked like a tragic poet at the best of times. He ordered most of the menu.
“You gentlemen aren’t driving or operating machinery after this, I hope,” said the barmaid sternly, bringing their beers.
“No fear!” Lewis toasted her, grinning. She seemed about to respond with a reluctant pleasantry when she gasped and dived for the floor, just as the sound of some heavy vehicle roaring by outside filled the room.
“Down!” Lewis yelled, and Joseph needed no urging. He found himself crouching in the darkness under the table as shots chattered in the street. There were a few screams and a lot of curses. He heard the distinctive ping and rattle of a bullet coming through a windowpane.
“Don’t worry,” Lewis said, sipping his beer, which he had brought under the table with him. “It’s all safety glass in these places.”
“Great,” Joseph muttered. Three more shots followed in quick succession and broke another window, the lamp over the bar, and the holo-pinball machine in the corner. The machine didn’t die quietly; it began to short out in great gouts of sparks and flame, to say nothing of low-level microwaves. The barmaid shrieked and scrambled on her hands and knees for a fire extinguisher. Joseph, who knew an opportunity when he saw one, reached into his coat pocket and switched on a tidy little device Suleyman had given him. He felt a click and a slight chill. So did Lewis, who lowered his beer and looked questioningly at Joseph.
The vehicle roared on, and now one could hear sirens screaming
in pursuit. The barmaid got up and doused the fire. Grumbling, she went behind the bar for a potholder, with which she unplugged the defunct machine.
“I
knew
this bloody thing wasn’t safe,” she said. “Edwin! Get the tape, please.”
A slender youth emerged from the kitchen and proceeded to tape brown paper over the broken windows. This seemed to be the signal for the other diners to emerge from under their tables. Within five minutes the glass had been swept up, candles had been lit at the bar, and conversation resumed as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened. Actually, nothing out of the ordinary
had
happened, except to the two immortals at the table near the door.
“I gather you’ve finally perfected that little device you were working on?” Lewis said, taking another sip of beer.
“Sort of,” Joseph replied. “We can talk for about six hours.”
“Good,” Lewis said. He set down his beer. “Any new clues in our mystery?”
“I’m still following up leads.” Joseph lifted his beer and drank, after scanning it cautiously for broken glass.
“I’ve continued sleuthing too,” said Lewis. “You remember our friend Edward Alton Bell-Fairfax?”
Joseph grimaced and set down his beer. “That guy. Lewis, he’s even deader now than he was when you found his picture. What’s the point of investigating
him?”
“I’ve learned several positively fascinating things,” said Lewis. At this point the barmaid brought their orders: chips and beans, vegemite sandwiches, and spaghetti carbonara made with SoyHam bits.
“I’m not really interested in him, Lewis,” Joseph said, looking around vainly for salt for his chips. He settled for vinegar.
“He’s part of a bigger picture. Tell me, wouldn’t you be interested in finding out how Edward—after being as good as court-martialed—gained entrance to one of the more exclusive clubs in London? And to an even more exclusive secret society whose origins are lost in the mists of time?”
“You’re going to tell me he was a Freemason, right?” Joseph said, splashing vinegar all over his plate.
“Ever hear of the Gentlemen’s Speculative Society?”
Joseph shoveled in a mouthful of chips. “Sounds like something that meets at a grange hall.”
Lewis pointed with his fork. “Nowadays they call themselves the Kronos Diversified Stock Company.”
Joseph choked slightly. “That’s a Company DBA,” he said when he had his breath back.
“Precisely,” Lewis said. “And it means that the Company doesn’t begin in 2318, as we’ve always been told, but much earlier. When that bunch of twenty-fourth-century technocrats get together and incorporate under the Dr. Zeus logo, they’ll just be taking a new name. I’m beginning to suspect they’re not even responsible for the technology that created us.”
“They will invent pineal tribrantine three, though,” Joseph said. “I’ve talked to the guy who came up with that. An idiot savant mortal by the name of Bugleg.”
“Really? Well, I’m positive they didn’t invent the time transcendence field on their own. Almost the first thing the Company did was guarantee its own existence by setting up a temporal paradox and stationing operatives throughout time in this one secret society. It’s been based in Britain, almost from the beginning; though there’s some indication that it was relocated before recorded history began from what is now Egypt. Tell me, did you ever go by the name Imhotep?”
Joseph jumped as though he’d been shot.
“Ha! Well, somebody using that name passed a few Company secrets to a progressive-minded group of priests, and carefully guided what use they made of the material. You might have been part of it without even being aware. And Edward Alton Bell-Fairfax was closely connected with the Victorian group, the Gentlemen’s Speculative Society.” Lewis pushed aside the empty plate that had contained the spaghetti and started on the beans and chips.
Joseph gulped down half his beer. “I guess you have proof.”
“This time a month ago I had nothing more than inferences and conjectures—a few suspicious coincidences, one or two blatant clues. Evidence that the Company had closely monitored the progress through life of our friend the young naval officer, but no reason why.” Lewis speared three chips on his fork and nibbled them delicately. “Ah, but then!”
“What?”
“I was able to break into the files of a long-defunct department of the British Foreign Office.” Lewis grinned at him. “Doing semipublic business as the Imperial Export Company of London.”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake. Like in the James Bond books? Lewis—”
“No, no, that was Universal Export. You really ought to read something besides Raymond Chandler, you know. Anyway, need I tell you that the gentlemen involved in Imperial Export were all members of the same London club
and
the same secret fraternity? And that one of them was a retired naval officer by the name of Edward Alton Bell-Fairfax?” Lewis leaned across the table and spoke in a lower voice. “I found his dossier, Joseph. You wouldn’t believe the things he did for Queen and country.”
“I’ll bet I would.”
“A lot of them weren’t very nice,” Lewis admitted. “But he was awfully good at his job. Something of a problem solver, you see? Until he disappeared on his last job, in California, in 1863.”
Joseph put down his sandwich. “Does this place sell hot chocolate?”
“Yes, but you’re going to want to hear this first.”
“I don’t want to hear what he did to Mendoza.”
“Listen, Joseph. There was a full-scale expedition to California, supposedly under the auspices of the Foreign Office but spearheaded by the Gentlemen’s Speculative Society. The object was to secure Santa Catalina Island for Great Britain.”
Joseph stared. “The place the chewing-gum guy owned? With the Avalon Ballroom? And the hotel where—”
“Where you thought you saw Mendoza, yes.” Lewis leaned back and steepled his fingers like Sherlock Holmes. “And oh, Joseph, the things I’ve found out about Santa Catalina Island! Were you aware the Company maintains a steady presence there, in fact has quite a few research facilities and other involvements? And do you know why the Company remains interested in the place?”
“Because it’s a safe zone, like Switzerland and Canada, where nothing ever happens,” Joseph said.
Lewis shook his head. “It’s a safe zone because the Company has made it so, Joseph. The Gentlemen desperately wanted something that was thought to be located on that island!”
“What?”
“I haven’t found that out yet,” said Lewis. “The records keep referring to something called Document D. It was discovered in the Royal Archives by a highly placed member of the Gentlemen’s Speculative Society who had security clearance—and who was nudged in the direction of his ‘discovery’ by one of our operatives. And promptly thereafter they sent their covert invasion force.”
“But the Brits never invaded Catalina,” Joseph objected. “Hell, they never even tried.”
“As a matter of fact, they did try.” Lewis took up his fork again and began to finish off his chips and beans. “It’s quite a story, once you track down all the details. They set up a base camp on the island in 1862. Though the expedition found what they’d been searching for, apparently the Yanks twigged to something and prevented them from taking it away.
“But the Gentlemen persisted. After the war they came back, they bought mining rights, and they kept trying to purchase the island itself. They were never able to buy it; but they do seem to have finally made off with the mysterious object.”
“This is Indiana Jones stuff, Lewis,” said Joseph wearily.
“And just how much do you know about the Ark of the Covenant, may I ask?” Lewis retorted.
“I forget. Barmaid?” Joseph waved. “Could we get a couple of hot chocolates over here, please? Thanks, sweetheart.”
“What got the Yanks suspicious by 1863 was a breach of security, some inexperienced political who was caught, and talked. He’d left a valise containing incriminating evidence in a stagecoach inn in Los Angeles,” Lewis continued.
Joseph groaned. “The one where Mendoza was stuck between postings.”
“And Edward was sent to retrieve the valise, and this is where he disappears from history,” Lewis said. “I could probably find out more if I were able to get into the Yanks’ classified archives, and perhaps after the war I shall. The British Foreign Office never knew what happened to Edward, although the Yanks evidently never got hold of the valise. There’s a confused report of a mystery ship that moored off the island near the British base there, where some sort of massacre evidently took place. Then the ship disappeared before they could investigate further.
“They kept Edward’s file open for years before they declared him missing, presumed deceased. He had a reputation for surviving sticky situations. Of course, they didn’t know what we know.”
“That he dragged Mendoza into whatever trouble he was in,” said Joseph hoarsely. “That the Pinkerton agents blew him away right in front of her eyes, and she went nuts and killed them. And the Company stepped in and mopped up so the mortals would never find out about her.”
“Or about
him
!” Lewis said. “Hasn’t the import of all this sunk in on you? The Company wanted Edward mopped up after too. He was on Company business when he died. Mendoza was helping him. In fact—” He halted before he could blurt out what had just occurred to him.
The barmaid, coming to their table, looked in concern at the American gentleman who’d ordered the hot chocolate. “Here, is he all right? Shall I call a medic?” she asked his friend.
The American lifted his head and gave his friend a look that quite unnerved the barmaid, who (as should be evident by now) did not unnerve easily. Without waiting for a reply, she set down the chocolate, murmured something polite, and scuttled away to the safety of the kitchen.
“They set her up,” said Joseph through his teeth.
“I—I suppose.”
“They left her there deliberately so she’d meet him. They knew it would happen! She helped him get rid of the evidence. If she hadn’t, the Yanks would have found out about what the British were looking for and grabbed it for themselves, and maybe then there would never have been any Dr. Zeus Incorporated.”
“And then the Company arrested her and put her away,” said Lewis in a ghost of a voice, “but not because she’d gone AWOL. Not even because she killed those mortals. A Crome generator who has the ability to go forward through time could find out what happens when the Silence falls in 2355 and—”