Chapter Fourteen

“The Aether Confession”

1.

Nathanial was almost delirious with exhaustion. He had not slept in nearly two days. Jasperse disappeared for a bit and returned from the galley bearing two earthenware cups of steaming hot tea, brewed so strong Nathanial winced with each sip. Still, with no sugar to cut the bitterness, it did its job of keeping him alert.

The workers finished cleaning the blood an hour later. They trundled away with their buckets and brushes, grumbling to themselves and stained to the elbows with soapy gore. Jasperse took up his carbine and followed Nathanial into the hall.

“Clean as a baby’s bottom,” Jasperse remarked as they passed through. “Mind your step, sir. The floor is still wet.”

Jasperse stood watch while Nathanial searched for the mechanism that would open the door. This would all be in vain if he found the door still locked. Part of Nathanial hoped it would be. Then, he could drift back to his quarters and sleep. It would be so nice, so easy, to give up, to fall asleep, and wake with the hope that all had magically righted itself while he slumbered.

The walls here were fixed with a granite façade. Carved into it was a scene Nathanial did not recognise. It was a gathering of men, well-dressed, arranged in a circle with a man in their centre, on his knees, his shirt open, revealing a naked chest. He was blindfolded. Before him stood another well-dressed figure, pressing the tip of a sword against the kneeling man’s breast. A number of symbols adorned the carving, none of which Nathanial knew, either. He felt each part, but found nothing resembling the mechanism. The façade ended a few inches from the floor, protruding slightly. He ran his fingers along the bottom here, and there he felt the catch.

“Ha!” he cried a bit too loudly. The mechanism clacked, and the panel slid open, revealing a dark room.

Inside Jasperse found a palm plate which, when pressed, flooded the room with a normal amount of lighting. Both men took a few moments to let their eyes adjust, and then they began an examination of the room’s contents.

“Place seems smaller than I expected,” Jasperse said immediately.

One look around the room, and they knew Loaves’ killer was no longer here.

“How?” Nathanial asked.

“Maybe he did slip past after he gave Loaves the slice.”

“It just doesn’t seem possible.”

“Possible or not, it is what it is, sir. He’s not here, or he’s doing a magnificent job of hiding.” Jasperse picked through a pile of rubble. “Seems a waste to leave here without something to commemorate the occasion, though, eh?”

Nathanial sighed, disappointed. “I need something to use as leverage against Doctor van den Bosch when I next meet with him,” he said. “To convince him to let me fire the stabilisers, I need to suggest something else that so goes against the grain that he’s forced to choose the lesser of two evils.”

“And if he chooses to deny both of your evils? He’s prone to such things, you know.”

The remains of the lab were burned black along the floor and the walls. Broken rubble, some of it furniture, most of it scientific implements, lay strewn everywhere. Here was a room that had survived a terrible battle. There was no mistaking it.

“Jasperse, the story you told me the other day, about Dolan saving van den Bosch from the lab accident that killed Wren. Did he ever say what caused the accident?”

The older man stopped and scratched a muttonchop. “Not that I recall.”

“Could they have had an argument that escalated into violence?”

Jasperse nodded. “It’s possible, it is. Every worker on this station has a tale of seeing the two of them having a row.” He looked about with a sour cast to his face. “Certainly looks like the case here.”

“Indeed.”

“Will you use that as your leverage, then?”

“No. No, whatever the case may be, Doctor van den Bosch is still an eminent scientist and a well-respected member of the scientific community. I won’t stoop to blackmail, especially when I have no proof of wrongdoing.”

“You could question Dolan. He might tell you what you need to know.”

“I’d rather not. I don’t believe Dolan cares much for me, at any rate. I’d likely waste what precious time I have.”

“I can question him for you.”

Nathanial chuckled. “I don’t want him tortured, Jasperse, but thank you.”

“Torture him with a bloody whiskey bottle, I would. You’d have your answers right quick, and painless for all involved.”

Along the wall were the remains of some machine. This must be what Jasperse had described, Nathanial thought, the experiment Wren was performing concerning the luminiferous aether. It was a wreck, but Nathanial could imagine from its remains what a working model might look like.

“My God, Jasperse, Professor Wren was trying to harness the power of an aether vortex!”

“Sounds very dangerous.”

“Yes, I believe it was. The mishap must have occurred with this machine, though, for it looks like most of the destruction in this room emanated from it. I daresay you were right. The destruction wrought by even a small vortex could likely have caused Doctor van den Bosch’s injuries, no matter how unlikely that seems.”

“But why experiment with such a thing at all? I refer to my original concern on this matter, sir. Why develop such a lab at all when there’s so much to do, and lose, here?”

“I can’t tell you that, but I can say the applications of such a thing are limitless. Power. Lightning in a bottle. With a single vortex of decent size, you could give electricity to all of England. Steam power would cease to exist except in the most extreme cases.”

“Hard to imagine a world without it, sir, if you ask me.”

Nathanial examined the machine one last time. It was damaged beyond repair, and at any rate, it was no longer coupled to any power source. This was not the device that was drawing so much of the station’s power. A brilliant discovery, but this was hardly what was going to sway van den Bosch. He needed something else.

Jasperse found an open safe containing Wren’s papers. They went through them, yet found nothing of any real use. Most of it was just theories, things scribbled in haste. One curiosity existed, though. The notes were written by two different people. The handwriting, often changing abruptly in mid-sentence, occurred on nearly every page.

Strange, Nathanial thought. Someone else must have been working with Wren on this, but who? Was it van den Bosch himself? He peered at the handwriting. No, he had seen the man’s handwriting often enough, his lettering large, flowing, and elegant. Wren’s handwriting was blocked and precise, much as it had been on the station blueprints. These words here, these break-ins, were wild, scrawled, as if by some madman. Strange.

“What’s this?” Jasperse asked. From beneath a stack of the papers he removed a small book, exquisitely made, with a fine, soft leather binding, its pages a heavy cream-coloured vellum.

“It’s a journal of some sort,” Nathanial replied. “Wren’s journal, unless I miss my guess.”

Jasperse gave it over and went to look elsewhere. Nathanial sat on the floor and flipped through. He turned to the middle, chose an entry at random, and began reading. Again, here was Wren’s precise script, though with a touch of strong emotion not present in his notes.

Tuesday, September 6th, 1887:

H has been at me again. He wishes–no, demands–my involvement in this project of his. Again, I have attempted to deny him, but he knows too much. He spoke only a single name today, Le Boeuf, and I knew then that I had no more choice in the matter. He knows too much and will not hesitate to use even the dustiest ancient history to make me a target for scorn and ridicule by our peers. So I will do this thing for him. I’ll give him his Taj Mahal, and I hope that God sees fit to choke him with it.

Le Boeuf. Nathanial did not recognise the name, but van den Bosch’s use of it was clear. He had blackmailed Professor Wren into designing Peregrine Station. That was how he had coaxed the recluse out of his nice, country laboratory in Shropshire. Just as he was blackmailing Nathanial. He wondered if the others, the department heads like Fullbright, who Nathanial knew had a comfortable post with the Navy before arriving here, were in similar straits. Any of them might have sabotaged the stabilisers. He wondered; was he starting in the wrong place? Should he seek out wrongdoing first and find the culprit instead?

“Jasperse, was there ever an inquiry made concerning the stabilisers?”

The soldier was examining the remains of a bookshelf whose books were mostly burnt black. He looked up. “What sort of inquiries, sir?”

“Did Doctor van den Bosch ever rule out sabotage?”

“No. Never.”

“Then why were Dolan and the rest of you made security?”

“To protect the station against, uh…” Jasperse looked upward in thought, took two long, even breaths, and then said, “I’m not really sure.”

Exactly. What was it they were supposed to be protecting? Prior to Wren’s death, there had been no security force. What had happened in the intervening time that had precipitated the need for armed men protecting the station? Had van den Bosch learned of a threat, one he was not sharing with the others?

Nathanial looked down at the journal. He flipped to the final entry, went back a few pages, and began again.

Wednesday, April 3rd, 1889,

The last of the crates arrived by supply ship this morning. Le Boeuf was smuggled in with the shipment, along with his assistant, a rough fellow named Brennan. They are well-hidden now, and work on Torquilstone can begin now that we’re aboard Peregrine. I walk a razor blade now. H, believing the aether machine is mine, has readily agreed to allow its construction. Really, it is wholly of Le Boeuf’s design. Everything is.

This place. I walk its halls, imagining where every statue, every mural, even the fountain outside my laboratory, will someday sit. Peregrine is supposed to be the sum total of my genius, yet it is the product of another’s imagination. It strangles me to think of it, but I cannot allow H to ever believe otherwise. If he knew the truth, he would destroy me, just as I also know that when Torquilstone is complete, he’ll seek to steal it. Let him. I shall remove myself from the conflict and let him have his final confrontation with Le Boeuf, a cataclysm twenty years in the making.

Nathanial read through a few more, but they were mostly amorphous thoughts and of little interest. In frustration he turned to the final entry.

April 15, 1889,

H knows. When he questioned me today about the function of the aether machine, I could not adequately tell him. He has demanded I discontinue my experiments. His suspicions are high. He will dig further, and I cannot stop him. He will learn the whole truth, that Peregrine is not mine, that Torquilstone is a lie, that nothing has ever truly belonged to me. I will be discovered.

That is fine. Time to end this charade. He likes to meet with me every evening, berating me, asking penetrating questions for which there are no answers, and then berate me anew when I cannot answer them, as if he knows the truth and is merely toying with me. I shall tell him, then, before he learns it on his own. He’ll get no satisfaction from me. There will be no victory.

I would ride this station into the depths of Hell if I could.

Nathanial closed the book and pursed his lips.

Curious. What was Professor Wren admitting to? Was he really a charlatan, then, who had taken credit for another’s work? The name Le Boeuf continued to come up, again and again. Was he the secret genius behind Wren’s reputation? Such a thought was too fantastic to even consider, yet here was this stark admission, so powerfully delivered, that it left little room for scepticism. Here was Professor Wren, so tired of living a lie, that he had literally written the confession of his guilt.

Nathanial closed the book and stared at its cover. Professor Wren’s journal. The man had attended university with van den Bosch. Great friends, or so the stories always went. Professor Wren knew van den Bosch as well as any man in the world. He had to know, then, how the man conducted his business. Nathanial’s own journal came to mind. They had read his readily enough and been unapologetic about it. It was reasonable to assume, then, that if van den Bosch had grown suspicious of Professor Wren, he would have stolen the journal and read it to confirm or deny his theory. Such an admission as this was certainly worthy of causing the violence that had obviously occurred here.

Professor Wren had meant van den Bosch to find this, then. He must have known, to some degree, what such an admission would do.

Furthermore, the journal admitted Le Boeuf’s presence on Peregrine Station, something which would apparently cause a “cataclysm” that had been long in coming. So van den Bosch and Le Boeuf knew one another. The journal suggested some animosity between the two men. Their relationship must at least preclude civility, otherwise there would be no clear reason for Le Boeuf to conceal his arrival on Peregrine. Yet, if so, why was Le Boeuf here, building a device on this station, one that van den Bosch was both aware of and of which he might―no, would―take credit?

Nathanial could not answer that part, not yet, but what he could reason was that Doctor van den Bosch was now aware of Le Boeuf’s presence, and if he hated him enough, or wanted to steal his work, he might want to eliminate him, as well. At the least, he might want to find and imprison him, hence the newly-christened security force.

The wreckage here proved something, something that a part of Nathanial already knew, for it had been proven in other ways in the past.

Doctor van den Bosch was capable of atrocity.

Yet, the journal also mentioned that Le Boeuf was in hiding on the station. This meant if van den Bosch wished to destroy Le Boeuf, he had to find him first.

Yes. What better way to find him?

“I think I have our answer,” Nathanial said. He tucked the journal into the pocket of his coverall.

Jasperse, who was perusing a shelf blackened books, looked up, curious. “Well, don’t just stand there, sir. Please indulge me.”

“It’s the Juggernaut himself,” Nathanial said. “I do believe Doctor van den Bosch is responsible for sabotaging the stabilisers.”

Nathanial returned to the broken machine. He knelt before it and ran his hands over its battered surface. The aether machine. Was this Torquilstone? It must be, but why would Professor Wren call it a lie?