The Providence Rider (30 page)

He opened the door to the ruddy light of the triple wicks atop the dresser.

From the white high-backed chair with the black abstract design, Professor Fell said, “Close the door and lock it, Matthew.”

Matthew stood still for a few seconds too long.

“Go ahead,” the professor urged. “It’s the sensible thing.”

Matthew had to agree with that. He closed the door and locked it. Then he stood with his back pressed rigidly against it, and the figure with the flesh-colored mask and flesh-colored gloves sat comfortably with legs outstretched and crossed at the ankles. The professor tonight wore a conservative dark blue suit, a white shirt with a cascade of ruffles down the front, and a dark blue tricorn with a black band.

There was a silence. Professor Fell seemed to be studying the ceiling. Regarding the small cracks there, Matthew thought. Then Professor Fell’s featureless face angled toward the New York problem-solver.

“You had some trouble today.” It was a statement of fact, as dry as the fish bones in the skeleton collection.

“A mite,” Matthew allowed.

“Hm. One of my stone seahorses is missing from the library balcony. Also the curtain cords are gone. There is—
was
—a wine bottle on the ledge. What can you tell me about that?”

“Nothing.” Matthew shrugged. His heart was a furious drummer. “Much.”

“You shield your enemies. Why?”

“I take care of my own business.”

“That’s admirable. Stupid, possibly…but admirable. Please sit down, you’re putting a crick in my neck.”

Matthew seated himself in the chair at the writing-desk, the same as the evening before. He turned himself so as to have full view of the emperor of crime. A question came to him that had to be thrust into the air, like a fiery sword. “May I ask…why you never reveal your face?”

Did the mouth laugh, just a shade, behind the cowl? “I am so beautiful,” said the professor, “that I might stop time itself, so the angels could adore me longer. Or I am so ugly I might stop the hearts of any beasts that lay their jaundiced eyes upon me. Or…most likely…I am simply a man who enjoys being faceless.”

“Oh,” said Matthew.

“Anything else you’d care to know?”

“Many things. But I don’t think you’d tell me.”

“You speak with certainty, though it’s doubtful you understand.”

“I’m ready,” said Matthew, as the candles cast equal amounts of illumination and shadows, “to be enlightened.”

The head nodded, ever so slightly. The gloved fingers steepled. “First, what have you learned?”

“Not much.” But it occurred to him that Professor Fell valued his opinion, so he reversed himself. “A little. Concerning Adam Wilson and Edgar Smythe.”

“Go on,” the professor urged.

“My opinion only, of course.”

“Yes. Your opinion has been paid for. Go on.”

“That the former has a streak of cruelty and the latter does not wash enough.” Matthew paused, his own fingers steepled, to consider his next offering. He decided to give the professor the benefit of his suspicion, and a taste of what Fell was looking to find. “I believe they have had some…association outside the realm of business. I believe they’ve discovered they are kindred spirits in some activity in London.”

“And you say this based on
what
?”

“Based on my instincts. On my feeling that they are familiar in a way that has formed a bond between them. What that bond might be, I don’t know, but it’s in the way Wilson speaks of Smythe using his Christian name. And, also, the fact that they seem to be looking out for each other. Guarding their interests, possibly. Or sharing a secret.” His horses were galloping now, and Matthew decided to give them free rein. “I think they have violated your decree of no association between members of your…” What was the proper word? Oh yes. “Parliament,” he concluded.

Professor Fell was silent, and did not move. For a time he appeared to be what he pretended to be, an automaton dependent upon a key. Then he sat up straighter in his chair, with a motion that made Matthew think of the smooth gliding of a snake.

“I enforce that decree,” said the professor, “for reasons of security. If one member of my ‘Parliament,’ as you so colorfully phrase it, is…shall we say…put out of business by an overzealous puppet of the law, then I do not wish that consequence to spread through my other affairs. My associates know their positions, and what is required of them. That is all they need to know.
I
take care of the…” He hesitated, seeking the word.

Matthew supplied it. “Octopus?”

“As you please.” The tricorned head bowed, with the eerie flesh-colored cowl beneath it.

“I have no proof Smythe and Wilson are meeting in violation of your decree,” Matthew said. “Only a…”

“Guess?”
Fell asked.

“Only that, yes.”

“But you found nothing of interest in Smythe’s room today?”

“Nothing.” He frowned. “Again, I don’t know what I’m looking for.”

“I think you may have an idea. And…I think you may know it when you find it.”

“
If
I find it,” Matthew corrected. “Which may be impossible, given the situation and lack of time.”

“The situation is what it is. And you may be responsible yourself for the lack of time, as you were too stubborn to attend my command in a prompt fashion.”

Matthew lifted his chin. He stared into the faceless void. He brought up every ounce of courage he possessed, and he said, “I don’t care to be commanded. Not by you or anyone else.”

“Oh! Bravely spoken, sir. Surely then, before Mr. Matthew Corbett I must restrain the very power that has brought me from my humble beginnings to where I sit today.”

“A man in a cowl,” Matthew said. “His face hidden, his steps guarded, his path uncertain.”

“An uncertain path? Why would that be?”

“One traitor or two,” came the reply. “Double flies in the ointment, possibly. And your path so uncertain in picking them out that you have to enlist
me
? The very same man you sent a blood card to back in the summer? What if one of your thugs had killed me? Where might you be sitting today?”

“Downstairs, in my own quarters.”

“And you might be walking in circles on your floor, trying to decide whose head to cut off next. It seems to me that you should be very glad I slipped the blood card. For
with
your providence rider, you have hope. Without me…an uncertain path.”

The professor did not speak for a time. When he did, it was one word spoken with near-admiration for a point sufficiently made:
“Ah.”

“What do you
do
during the day, anyway?” Matthew continued, daring fate. “Do you hide away down in your quarters? Do you work on something? Surely you just don’t live for these little dramas and then sleep all day.”

“I rarely sleep,” was the reply, spoken with no expression.

“All this treasure at your disposal, and you can’t sleep?” Matthew realized he was nearing the dangerous cliff’s edge of his own sharp tongue, yet he felt the need to press forward a little bit more. “You’re a lurker in your own house? You must wear a mask to go out and about? Professor…I fear you’re not as wealthy nor as privileged as you might believe, because even though I live in a dairyhouse half the size of this room I do sleep well—most nights—and I feel no need for a mask.”

Fell grunted quietly. “You do,” he said, “have a set of balls on you.”

“I think they’ve grown since I’ve had this occupation.”

“I could have Sirki saw them off for you, if they’ve grown too large to be comfortable.”

“Do what you please,” said Matthew, and he meant it. His heart was calming and the small beads of sweat that had risen at his temples had begun to dry. “It’s your world, isn’t it?”

With that, the professor leaned slightly forward. “May I tell you a little about my world, young man?”

Matthew didn’t respond. Something in the soft, genteel voice had sent a cold shiver down his spine.

“I shall,” Fell decided. “I told you I had a son, didn’t I? Templeton, as I said. A very fine lad. Very intelligent. Curious about the world. Almost as curious as his father. Well, you do remind me of Temple. As I said…of who he might have been, had he lived. He died when he was twelve years old, you see. Twelve years old.” The words had been repeated with a sad sort of passion that held restrained fury at its center. “Beaten to death by a gang of rowdies on his way to school. He wasn’t a fighter, you see. He was a gentle soul. He was a very fine boy.” Here the professor paused and sat in silence for a time, until Matthew nervously cleared his throat and shifted his position in the chair.

“His image,” said the professor, “is the portrait in stained-glass on the staircase. My Templeton, lost to me. By the bloody fists of a gang of six. They chased him through the streets like a dog and beat him for their amusement, I understand. Oh, he was always dressed very well. Always very clean. No one tried to help him, in that London mob. No one cared. He was another show on the streets, another display of what human beings can do—and will do—for the
pleasure
of it. And the awful thing, Matthew…the awful, terrible thing…is that Temple had a premonition of his death the night before, and he asked me to walk with him to school that morning…but I, being busy in my own affairs…could not be bothered to do so. I had my research before me. My academics. So I said, Temple…you’re a big boy now. You have nothing to fear. Your mother and I trust in God, and so should you. So…go along, Temple, for the school is not very far away. Not very far. Go right along, I said. Because you’re a big boy now.”

To the heavy silence that followed, Matthew offered, “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t speak,”
said the professor, with a soft but cutting hiss, and Matthew dared not utter another word.

They sat without speaking for a while, the professor and the problem-solver. Matthew could hear waves breaking against the rocks below, slowly beating Pendulum Island to pieces.

“I…had to do something,” came the terrible and quiet voice. “Something, to ease my pain. I couldn’t live like that, could I? And neither could Teressa. She was such a mild and sensitive woman. Like Temple, really. He took most of his personality from her, and he resembled her too. When I looked at her, I could see him looking back. But she cried all the time, and I couldn’t sleep…and I knew…I must do
something
, to ease this pain.”

One gloved hand came up, almost touched the forehead, and slowly fluttered down again like the death of an arrow-shot bird.

“I had money. My father left me wealthy. He was the governor here. Have I told you that?” He waited for Matthew to nod. “The governor of Pendulum Island and its seaport, Somers Town. Yes, I remember telling you. Well…I had money. And money is a tool, you know? It can do whatever pleases you. What pleased me then…was to find out the names of the six creatures who had beaten my son to death. After that…to go upon the streets after nightfall, out into the dark dens where the animals gather, and pushing any fear I felt down into myself I walked into places a year before would have never seen. I had money enough—and the skills of persuasion enough—to buy a gang of ruffians of my own. And pay them handsomely to kill the six boys on my death list. The youngest creature fourteen, the eldest seventeen. They never lived another month. But you know…still…it didn’t suffice.

“No,” the professor continued, the word like the tolling of a distant funeral bell. “The pain was still there. So…I gave the order to my gang of ruffians to kill the parents of those dead creatures, their brothers and sisters, and anyone who lived in their squalid little rooms. It cost me quite a lot of money, Matthew. But…it was worth it, because I wanted it done and it
was
done. And quite suddenly…I had power and a reputation. Quite suddenly I was known on the streets to be ruthless in my regard to life, and quite suddenly I had an interested following. And me…a lowly, bookish and reclusive academic, suddenly with a gang of…thugs, did you say?…thugs who
wanted
to work for me. And several in particular who stepped forward and gave me education and good advice. That money was to be made enforcing tribute from the carters and higglers who set up their wares on the streets. In other words, to create a territory.
My
territory, Matthew. At first a small area, then larger. And larger still, encompassing businesses that had existed long before Temple’s death.” The cowled head nodded. “It seems I was very good at persuasion. At…creating plans for further expansion. My thirst for knowledge grew. Only now it was beyond books. It was the desire for knowledge of how to control people, and thus control my destiny. And all that you see—and all you do
not
see—was brought about because of the savage murder of my son on a London street, when you would have been but a child.

“And now,” said the professor in his smooth, quiet and terrifying voice, “here you are, before me.”

Matthew feared to speak.

But the silence stretched, and at last Matthew cleared his throat to urge up the words lodged there like thorns.

“Your wife. What became of Teressa?” he dared ask.

“Ah, sweet Teressa. My gentle angel, whom I pledged to for life at the altar of a beautiful church. She could not go where I was going.” Fell was silent for a moment, as if trying to control the one thing he could not: the whirlwinds within his own soul. “After the deaths of the families, I told her we were done. My love for her was gone. I saw too much of Temple in her. When I saw him looking out at me, it speared my heart. I could not abide such disturbance. Thus…I cast her away. And I recall…I recall this very vividly. When I told her we were done, that I wished never to see her face in this life again…that I was a changed man and walked a changed path she could not follow…she did not begin to cry, Matthew, but she began to
bleed
. From that stricken face I used to love…two tendrils of blood began to drip from her nostrils…slowly, very slowly. And I, being a changed man, watched that blood ooze forth, and all I wondered was…which tendril of blood would reach her upper lip first.”