Ah, yes. She was telling me it would all turn out. And though I didn't believe it, I didn't protest, either. Not even when Artemus' lancet found the thin blue streak in Poe's forearm. Not even when the blood began to dribble through the tube into the waiting cruet.
It was done in five seconds--Artemus had learned well--but the lancet's prick had stirred something in Poe's body. A buzzing in his legs and shoulders. He murmured, "Lea." The hazel eyes startled open and beheld the spectacle of himself, disappearing into a bowl.
"Strange," he muttered. He made as if to rise but whatever strength he had was already ebbing away. It seemed to me I could even hear it ebbing, like rain leaking through a joist: drip... drip... drip... And whenever the blood flagged, Artemus gave the tourniquet a squeeze.
He'll die, I thought.
Poe raised himself on his elbow. He said:
"Lea."
And said it again. Said it with more purpose, for somehow he had found her. Through the blaze of torches and candles, through the screen of her own vestments.
And she--she was ready for him. Knelt by his side, hair spilling over her shoulders, wearing a smile like a dream. A smile that should have been a blessing but which affected him like the most terrible of afflictions. He tried to drag himself away and, failing that, tried once more to raise himself, but his strength again failed him. And the blood... for Artemus had indeed cut true... kept up its steady trickle: drip... drip...
Lea ran her hand through his matted hair--a gesture of wifely affection--caressed his jaw with long gentle strokes.
"It won't be much longer."
"What?" he stammered. "I don't--what?"
"Ssshhhhhh." She put a finger to his lips. "Just a few minutes more, and it will all be done, and I'll be free, Edgar."
"Free?" he echoed, faintly.
" To be your wife, what else? What better?" Laughing, then, she gave her robes a tug. "I suppose I shall have to give up the priesthood first!"
He stared at her as if she were changing shapes with each word. Then he held up his arm and pointed to the glass tubing and, in a child's voice, said:
"But this, Lea. What's this?"
I was so very close to answering him myself. Oh, yes, I wanted my voice to blaze through that ice-cold cloister. I wanted to shout it to the very bats...
Haven't you figured it out yet, Poe? They need a virgin.
Narrative of Gus Landor
38
Truth be told, it had only just hit me. I'd been recalling those odd remarks of Artemus' in the darkened stairwell: "It's my suspicion that you've not yet, oh, given yourself, shall we say? To a woman." I'd been going over those words for days, waiting for the glimmer--and the glimmer came--and I knew then that Artemus had put the question not out of vulgar curiosity but in behalf of another party: Henri le Clerc. Who, like any good sorcerer, would demand, for the grander kind of ceremony, only the best kind of blood.
"Listen to me," Lea was saying, tucking her fingers under Poe's chin and tilting his face toward hers. "This must happen, do you understand that?"
He nodded. Whether it was his own doing or the action of her fingers, I don't know, but he nodded. And then watched as she cupped her hands round the cruet of his blood.
It was nearly full by now, and she held it like a bowl of hot soup, watchfully, as she carried it to the rock altar. Then, turning, she gazed round the chamber, meeting each pair of eyes in turn. She raised the cruet over her head... and calmly overturned it.
The blood fell in a plunging drift. Pooled on the top of her head and charged over the side, sliding down her face in shining bands. It gave her an almost comical look, Reader, as if she had draped a fringed lampshade over her head, and yet the fringe clung to her like sin, and as she gazed through her veil of blood, the words that came out of her were, shockingly, English. And perfectly distinct.
"Great Father. Release me from thy gift. Release me, O Most Merciful Father."
She reached behind the rock altar... fumbled in a small niche in the stone wall, and removed a small wooden box. A cigar box, I think it was, probably one of her father's. She opened it and stared at the contents with a pure fixity, and then, good teacher that she was, held it out for her comrades to see.
How slight it seemed, after all, in its little container! Not much larger than a fist, as Dr. Marquis had said. Scarcely worth all the trouble.
But it had been the start of everything, that heart. And it would be the end, too.
From Lea's mouth now came pouring a bright stream of... of oaths, I'd call them. She was speaking again in her alien tongue, but the smack of consonants against her lips, the cruel savor of each sound, she gave her utterances the feeling of deepest obscenity. Then her voice died away, and the cloister fell silent as she raised the heart toward the ceiling.
I knew then we were on the brink of something. I knew there was no longer anything to gain by waiting. If I was going to save Poe, I'd have to act, and act now.
Oddly, it wasn't the danger that made me pause, it was a queer feeling of pride. I didn't want to be just another player in the Marquis theatricals. A player who didn't even know his lines, and had only the vaguest idea of the plot...
This much I had come to see, though: there was a weak link in this family chain. And if I exploited it quickly enough and kept my head about me, then maybe I could brazen this thing out, and get Poe to safety... and live another day.
Oh, but I never felt so old as in that moment, lingering in the corridor. If I could have found someone else to do it for me, I'd have pushed him through that doorway without a thought or care. But there was no one else, and Lea Marquis was angling her face upward as if she were stacking linen on a high shelf, and that single motion--and all it portended--was enough finally to drive me on.
I took three long strides into the chamber. Stood there with the heat from the torches raking my face. Waited for them to see me.
Not a long wait, as it turned out. Within five seconds, Mrs. Marquis' cowled head had swung round. Her two children followed her lead in short order. Even Poe--drugged as he was, the life force draining from him in a slow red stream--even he managed to fasten his eyes to mine.
"Landor," he whispered.
The heat of those torches was nothing compared to the heat of those eyes, all boring in on me, and behind the eyes, a single shared demand. I would have to account for myself. Nothing could continue until I did.
"Good evening," I said.
And then, after consulting my pocket watch:
"I'm sorry, good morning."
I kept my voice as light as I humanly could. But it was still an outsider's voice--the voice of someone who hadn't been invited--and Lea Marquis flinched before it. She set her cigar box on the floor and took a step toward me and extended her arms in a gesture that hinted of welcome before it resolved into defiance.
"You don't belong here," she said.
But I was already ignoring her, turning instead to the woman who stood close by--the woman whose mouth I could see trembling inside her monk's cowl.
"Mrs. Marquis," I said in a balmy voice.
The sound of her name seemed to cause a change of sorts in her. She threw off the cowl, the better to show off her curls. She even--ah, she couldn't help herself, Reader!--she even smiled at me! Looked for all the world as if she were back home on Professors' Row, coaxing us to the whist table.
"Mrs. Marquis," I said. "I was wondering if you could tell me. Which of your children would you care to save from the noose?"
Her eyes darkened; her smile swirled with confusion. No, she seemed to be thinking. I must have misheard.
"Don't, Mother!" called Artemus.
"He's bluffing," said Lea.
And still I ignored them. Bent all my attention, all my force, on their mother. "I'm afraid you have no choice, Mrs. Marquis. The plain truth is somebody has to swing for all this. You do see that, don't you?"
Her eyes began to flick back and forth. Her mouth folded down.
"Cadets can't be killed and carved open with impunity, can they, Mrs. Marquis? If nothing else, it would set a bad precedent."
And now the smile was utterly gone, wiped clean, and without it, how bare her face was! Not a trace of joy or hope in any corner.
"You have no business here!" shouted Lea. "This is our sanctuary."
"Well," I said, folding my hands out, "I hate to contradict your daughter, Mrs. Marquis, but I believe that little heart of hers--the one she was just holding, yes--I believe that makes it my business." I tapped my finger against my lips. "Academy business, too."
I began to walk now. Slow easy steps--no clear pattern--no sign of fear. But that sound still followed me: the drip drip of Poe's blood on the stone floor.
"It's a sad business," I said. "A very sad business, Mrs. Marquis. Especially for your son, who has such a--such a brilliant career ahead of him. But you see, we have here a human heart, which in all likelihood came from a cadet. We have a young man who's been drugged and kidnapped and--and I think it's fair to say, assaulted. Isn't that right, Mr. Poe?"
He met me with a blank face, as if I were talking about somebody else entirely. His breathing--I could hear it--fretful and short...
"Why, what with one thing and another," I said, "I'm left with very little alternative, Mrs. Marquis. I do hope you see that."
"You've forgotten one thing," said Artemus, the muscles flaring along his jaw. "We have you outnumbered."
"Do you now?" I took a step toward him and cocked my head like a sparrow... but my eyes never left his mother. "Do you think your son really means to kill me, Mrs. Marquis? On top of all the others he's killed? Would you stand for such a thing?"
She'd been reduced now to pushing her curls into place, a faint echo of the coquette she must once have been. And when at last she spoke, it was in a mild, propitiating tone, as if she'd forgotten to put someone's name on her dance card.
"Come, now," she said, "nobody's killed anybody. They told me, they assured me there was no--"
"Hush," hissed Artemus.
"No, please," I said. "Please, Mrs. Marquis, I insist you speak. Because I still need to know which of your children I'm to save."
And this was her first reflex: to look first at one, then the other--to weigh them, as it were, in the balance--before the horror of weighing them at all grew too strong for her. Her hand went to her collarbone, her voice tumbled out in fragments:
"I don't--I don't see why..."
"Oh, yes, it's a very difficult business, isn't it? Now if you're worried about Artemus' cadet standing, then maybe you're hoping his sister was the mastermind of all this, and he was just a dupe, as it were. Much like you, Mrs. Marquis. Why, if we could make a strong enough case against Lea, then Artemus might get by with, oh, a few days in the brig, and still be around to collect his brevet commission next spring. All right, then!" I clapped my hands together. "The Case Against Lea Marquis. We begin with the missing hearts. We ask ourselves, who would have need of human hearts? Why, your daughter, of course! To please her beloved ancestor-- and cure her tragic condition."
"No," said Mrs. Marquis. "Lea wouldn't--"
"She needs hearts, yes, and she knows her brother doesn't have the... should I say the stomach for it? So she recruits his nearest and dearest friend, Mr. Ballinger. And on the night of October twenty-fifth, she sends Mr. Fry a note to lure him out of barracks. How thrilled he must be! A covert tryst with a handsome belle. Why, he must think his wildest dreams have come true! How disappointing, then, to find Ballinger there instead. With a noose. Oh, yes," I said, glancing over at Poe, "I've seen how easily Mr. Ballinger can disable an opponent."
"Lea," said Mrs. Marquis, gouging her fingers into her palm. "Lea, tell him--"
"Ballinger being such a good friend of the family," I went on, "he'll gladly do anything for your daughter. He'll even hang a man... and, under Lea's guidance, carve the heart out of his chest. The one thing he won't do, I guess, is stay quiet. And so he has to be taken care of."
Keep moving, Landor. That was the command I kept foremost in mind as I wove a path round those torches, as I listened to the dripping of Poe's blood... as I smiled on Mrs. Marquis' crumbling white face. Move, Landor!
"I suppose that's where Mr. Stoddard comes in," I said. "Being, I suppose, another admirer of your daughter's--so many to choose from, eh?--he takes care of Ballinger. The only difference is, he doesn't wait around for someone to take care of him."
For the first time, even Poe found the strength to protest. "No," he murmured. "No, Landor."
But he was already being overridden by Artemus' voice, whistling with cold: "You are vile, sir."
"Well, there you are," I said, smiling like an aged uncle upon Mrs. Marquis. "The Case Against Lea Marquis. It's not a bad one, I think you'll have to admit. And until Mr. Stoddard can be found, I'm afraid it will have to stand as the likeliest explanation. Of course"--and here I lifted my voice to a still lighter register--"I stand ready to be corrected. So if I'm wrong..."
And now, for the first time, I met Artemus' eyes. Met them straight on. "If I'm wrong," I said, "somebody really should tell me. Because, you see, I need just one person to hand to the authorities. The rest of you may do as you like. Why, as far as I'm concerned..." My eyes took a quick sketch of the torches and the burning tree and the charcoal brazier, with its ceiling-high flames. "... as far as I'm concerned, you may all go to Hell."
We had come now to the part of the play that was out of my hands. Enter Time.
It was Time, yes, that would have to pile atop young Artemus Marquis, bow him down until all he could see was the choice that fronted him. And as though to dramatize the transaction, his shoulders did indeed begin to bow, and the skin started to sag from those proud cheeks... and when he again spoke, even his voice had dipped below its usual frequency.
"It wasn't Lea's idea," he said, faltering. "It was mine."
"No!"
Her eyes steaming, her finger pointed like a rapier, Lea Marquis came charging on us.