Gideon Smith and the Mask of the Ripper (2 page)

“We’re here,” he said to Devonshire. “I’ll take the wheel; go tell the Corkman to kill the engines and inform the navy boys that they can start getting their little toy ready.”

“Better them than me,” sniffed Devonshire.

Palmer gazed out at the storm-lashed sea again. “And me, Mr. Devonshire. And me.”

*   *   *

The three Royal Navy officers were dressed in regulation yellow oilskins, two of them hanging on to the tarpaulin that covered the bulky cargo dangling on chains from the gantry that had been bolted to the
Lady Jane
’s deck while the third, Commodore Peter Leadbeater, stood with his fists on his hips, riding the bucking and rolling of the deck with the consummate ease of the seasoned seaman. The fourth man was gray haired and steely eyed, but wiry and fit, and the tossing of the deck didn’t seem to bother him overmuch. Dr. John Reed he was called, and despite his lack of military title the navy men—including Leadbeater—seemed to defer to his quiet authority. Devonshire emerged from belowdecks as the steady thrum of the engines ceased and the ship danced freely on the storm-tossed waves, the Corkman behind him.

“Captain Palmer,” acknowledged Leadbeater, his waxed mustache standing proud despite the weather. The sky above the ship boiled blackly, the last trails of smoke drifting from the
Lady Jane
’s chimneys to add to the gloom, and the deck was slick with rain and the seawater that crashed against the hull.

“We have reached our coordinates,” shouted Palmer above the storm. “Are you sure you want to do this? It seems folly to me.”

Leadbeater smiled crookedly. “Once we’re down there, the weather won’t trouble us, Captain.” He nodded to the two lieutenants, who began to untie the tarpaulin from the object slung beneath the gantry.

What emerged was a sleek, cigar-shaped object, twenty feet in length and the height of a man, with a hatch fitted into the side and a glass dome at what Palmer assumed was the fore of the vessel. At the aft was a propeller, and flexible cables as thick as a man’s arm were attached to the top. The whole thing was plated in steel, riveted tightly together. The hull bore the legend
HMS Proteus
.

“Tell me you’re not getting into the water in
that
thing,” said Devonshire, agog.

“That we are, Mr. Devonshire,” said Leadbeater proudly. “This is a submersible, an underwater ship. The first of the Royal Navy’s new fleet. Experimental, admittedly, and highly secret, naturally.”

Palmer raised an eyebrow; Leadbeater was being remarkably loose-lipped with a crew of casual sailors culled from the Gibraltar dives. Palmer said, “Steam?”

One of the lieutenants had opened the hatch and unfurled a rope ladder. He began to clamber inside the cramped space and Leadbeater said, “Yes, with a gear-driven backup. We take in water as ballast in a chamber beneath the submersible and expel it when we want to rise. The cables you see attached to the top will connect us to an air pump up here on the deck of the
Lady Jane
.”

Palmer pursed his lips. “And what are you looking for down there, Commodore? I presume you
are
looking for something? We haven’t come all this way to carry out mere testing of your experimental underwater ship?”

Finally Reed spoke up, fixing Palmer with his stare. “I’m afraid that is
above
top secret, Captain Palmer.”

Palmer returned his gaze. “What exactly is your role in all this, Doctor? You have been awfully quiet the whole journey.”

Reed smiled. “You don’t need to know, Captain. You don’t
want
to know.” He turned to Leadbeater. “I think you boys should get ready.”

The commodore saluted and followed his lieutenants into the cramped submersible, clanging the hatch closed behind them. Palmer nodded to Devonshire, who rallied the hodgepodge of a crew to begin hauling on the ropes that swung the gantry’s twin arms, the
Proteus
suspended between them, over the rising gray waves.

“Better them than me,” said Devonshire again.

“Unlikely to be you, Mr. Devonshire,” said Palmer as the sailors lowered the submersible into the sea, where it immediately began to sink. He glanced at Reed, who leaned on the railings, watching the operation. “Above top secret, and all that. Not for the likes of you and me.”

The coils of thick rope fixed to the deck began to unspool as the
Proteus
dropped out of sight beneath the cold Atlantic, and Devonshire nodded for the Irishman to begin working the bellows that pumped fresh air through the pipe that was similarly coiled on a giant bobbin.

“How deep do you think they’ll go in that thing?” asked Devonshire.

Palmer shrugged, tightening his oilskin around him as the freezing wind tore across the deck with seemingly renewed vigor. “Until they find what they are looking for, whatever that might be. Perhaps Dr. Reed can enlighten us.”

Instead, a crack of thunder clapped overhead, and Reed said, “They used to say not far from here that storms were called up by the thunder god, Thor, when he was angry.”

Palmer raised an eyebrow. “Perhaps your mission does not have the blessing of the gods, Doctor.”

They waited an hour on the storm-battered deck, until the wind and rain seemed to drop slightly, though there was no respite from the oppressive gray clouds overhead. One of the Spaniards shouted in alarm as the thick rope still connected to the aft of the
Proteus
went suddenly slack. Palmer raised an eyebrow; were the navy boys in trouble? He joined Devonshire at the starboard side and peered into the brine.

“Wind those ropes,” he ordered the sailors, nudging Devonshire in the ribs. “Look.”

Beneath them a dark shape that could have been a small whale or even a shark shimmered in the deep, rising until half a dozen yards off the starboard bow the
Proteus
surfaced with a splash, seawater coursing off its brass panels, the ropes slack on the sea’s surface. The hatch sprang open and Leadbeater, grinning broadly, waved.

“Captain Palmer! Dr. Reed! Would you be so good as to wind us in?”

The mission had been a success then, given the smile on the commodore’s face. Reed nodded, evidently satisfied. Devonshire put a man on each winding coil and they began to haul the ropes taut, dragging the
Proteus
back toward the
Lady Jane.
Palmer turned to go to his cabin to get a bottle of rum; it was customary to toast a successful expedition, and he trusted the navy chaps wouldn’t spurn his hospitality.

“Captain!” Palmer was only halfway to the bridge when Devonshire’s cry rang out, followed by a volley of shouts and screams. He turned to see the ropes tighten, just as the deck bucked beneath him, almost throwing him off his feet. The
Proteus
seemed to be making steam, trying to dive again. What on earth was that fool Leadbeater—?

Then, as he reached to steady himself on the rail, he saw a brown mass seeping over the submersible—it appeared to be brown fronds of seaweed, but massive, creeping over the brass hull.

No, not seaweed. Tentacles. One yellow eye opened and seemed to regard Palmer directly, balefully, as the slick, bulbous shape fully twenty feet across wrapped itself around the
Proteus
and emerged from the iron-gray waves.

Palmer swore. Suddenly he remembered where he’d heard that word before,
hafgufa.
Sea mist his foot. An old Danish sailor, always the worse for ale, used to burble the word all the time in one of the pubs in Portsmouth. He was an old drunk, not to be trusted with even the most menial jobs on board any ship. He was white haired, which he said had happened through sheer terror, after coming face-to-face with the most terrible of creatures that roamed the oceans.

Hafgufa
.

“The kraken,” said Reed at his side, drawing a revolver from his belt.

Leadbeater poked his head out of the hatch, looking around at the source of the commotion, and his eyes widened as one of the kraken’s tentacles swung by his head. Palmer stood transfixed; he had never thought to see such a beast, never really believed they existed. Then the deck lurched again; the kraken was determined to take the
Proteus
down—and it threatened to take the
Lady Jane
with it.

“I’m going to have to cut you free!” roared Palmer at Leadbeater. “The thing’s going to pull us over!”

The commodore disappeared beneath the hull for a moment then returned, hauling an oilskin bag with him. “Dr. Reed, take this!”

He tossed the bag over the three yards between the
Proteus
and the
Lady Jane,
and it skidded to a halt at Reed’s feet. Devonshire had at least had the foresight to take out his gun, and he was emptying the chamber into the thick hide of the beast that tugged and tugged at the submersible. Reed was firing, too, and Leadbeater took out his own pistol and began to fire at close quarters, gore and slime spraying up from the kraken’s eye as the commodore’s bullets found their mark.

On the deck, the bag had spilled out something remarkable. Almost like a glass bowl. Palmer stooped to pick it up. It seemed to be made of something much harder than glass, opaque with a yellowish tinge. He hefted it; it was perhaps three pounds in weight, the curved side bisected by a slight indentation, the underside peppered with symmetrically spaced holes and one large aperture, an inch in diameter. It seemed both incredibly old and fantastically
other
at the same time. A shout brought Palmer back to his senses.

“Cut the ropes!” he ordered, then headed to the bridge, still clutching the glass artifact. He stowed it in his deep desk drawer and broke out his rifle, feeling the
Lady Jane
right herself as the
Proteus
was cut loose. Loading the rifle, he headed back out on deck, to see the submersible and the vast kraken wheeling away in the waves. He raised the weapon and blasted at the beast, ripping a huge wound in its flank. Leadbeater had crawled out onto the hull of the
Proteus,
stabbing at one of the kraken’s leathery tentacles with a knife. The man was not short on bravery, Palmer had to give him that.

Another of the navy crew had appeared at the hatch, firing at the kraken’s other eye. By accident or design, the monster swung a tentacle at him, curling it around the sailor and lifting him, screaming, into the air. Palmer reloaded and fired again, but the kraken plunged the navy man deep into the water with a forceful finality.

It seemed to be loosening its grip, sliding backward off the
Proteus,
whose air-filled cells were proving more than the beast had bargained for. Reed cupped his hand to his mouth and called, “Leadbeater! Swim for it, now the beast is injured!”

The commodore nodded and shouted into the submersible. The surviving lieutenant climbed out and the two men dove into the choppy waters. Palmer ordered the two Spaniards to throw them lines; that water was freezing and they wouldn’t last long. As they were dragged toward the
Lady Jane,
Palmer raised his rifle to his shoulder and took careful aim. The thing was built like an octopus, and he hoped its brain was in the same place. He aimed for the bulge above its stricken eyes and fired. The kraken uttered its first sound, a high-pitched shriek, and slid from the submersible and under the waves. As Leadbeater and his surviving lieutenant were pulled aboard by the mulatto and the Irishman, the
Proteus,
evidently greatly damaged by the encounter, spun once, upended, and sank stern first out of sight.

“I’m sorry we lost your ship,” said Palmer. “But at least we saved the—”

“Captain!” said Devonshire.

“What now, Mr. Devonshire?” asked Palmer, turning to where the first mate was pointing. One of the
Lady Jane
’s lifeboats, only a slender affair, had been put out to sea off the port side. Two figures were in it, and a quick head count identified them as the Frenchman and one of the Spaniards. The oilskin bag that Leadbeater had tossed aboard was gone.

Leadbeater glanced at Reed then closed his eyes. “Curses. We’ve lost the
Proteus
and the—oh, bollocks.”

With a swift coldness that surprised even Palmer, Reed took his pistol and put a bullet each into the remaining Spaniard, the mulatto, and the Irishman before they even had time to realize what was happening.

“That was my crew,” said Palmer, stunned.

“You were told to leave your crew at home,” said Reed wearily. “This is why. Throw them overboard.”

Palmer looked into the distant sea, the lifeboat lost to sight. “What of the other two?”

“Spies,” sighed Reed. There were a couple items scattered on the deck, leftovers from the bag. Reed picked them up and held to the dim light a ruby of fantastic size, suspended on a gold chain. He stared into its depths for a moment then pocketed it.

“A Spaniard and a Frenchman? Working together?” said Palmer incredulously.

“Apparently so.” Reed puffed out his cheeks and exhaled. “Bother. Bloody bollocking bother.” He looked up at Palmer. “Don’t suppose you have any rum, do you?”

Palmer led Reed and Leadbeater to the bridge while Devonshire and the navy lieutenant disposed of the Gibraltar sailors. “You going to be in trouble when we dock?” Palmer asked.

“A world of trouble.” Leadbeater nodded.

“But at least you got something,” said Palmer. “That ruby I saw you pocket, Dr. Reed.”

“A trinket,” said Reed. “Not what we came for.”

Palmer opened his desk drawer and took out a bottle of rum, pouring two generous measures. He sipped his and watched Leadbeater throw his drink back in one swallow, then refilled his glass.

“Good job I saved you this, then,” Palmer said, taking out the strange glass object.

Reed’s eyes widened, then he broke out into a wide grin.

Palmer said, “Don’t suppose there’s much point in me asking what it is.”

“This,” said Reed, taking the artifact from Palmer and holding it reverently, “really
is
above top secret. Well done, Captain Palmer. Now I’d be gratified if you could take us all home.”