Shadow Conspiracy (29 page)

To: Tristan Dellacourt, Viscount Whitlake

My Dear Viscount Whitlake,

Thank you for the information which you have communicated at such length.

I fear no definite conclusions can be drawn from the evidence of the orangutan. I regret to say, there is little that may be done at this point, unless you are prepared to produce the crocodile.

Yr. Obedient Servant,

Detective Inspector Bucket

Scotland Yard

… by Jennifer Stevenson

“Now, Ileen, the Penderby residence is capacious, so you will sleep in your own room, rather than share with the other maids, as is more common in London. I gather that things were otherwise for you in...Paris?”

“Yes, M’sieur Soames, very different. I am most happy to serve in the house of the great scientist
Docteur
Horace Penderby.”

“Er, yes. Although it is to Mrs. Penderby that you owe your position here.”

“Quoi?”

“Mrs. Penderby is a founder of the Society for a Broader Definition of Humanity.”

“I assure you, M’sieur Soames, I am human.”

“Er, yes. Of course.”

“As are you.”

“I see you are curious. Very well, on this one occasion I will satisfy your natural question.”

“Thank you, M’sieur Soames, I should like to be satisfied.”

“Although in future it would be impertinent to pursue the matter.”

“Yes, M’sieur Soames.”

“If you would accompany me downstairs. As you have guessed, Ileen, I am one of Dr. Penderby’s automata. He endowed me with the equivalent of an Etonian education, with one additional year of Oxford in his own specialties, so that I may assist in the laboratory. I have a chassis which satisfactorily mimics the human frame, such that visitors are not unduly alarmed by my appearance, and a minute understanding of etiquette, household management, London society’s practices and customs, in short, everything necessary to make the ideal butler for such an establishment as this one.”

“M’sieur Soames is indeed marvellous.”

“I am also capable of handling the wild beasts which reside—through this door—in the laboratory, which was once the ballroom. We have an orangutan, a crocodile, rabbits, agoutis, and smaller mammals and lizards. It will be one of your duties to assist me. I trust you are not afraid of God’s creatures?”

“But no. I, too, am one.”

“Er. Of course.”

“And did
Docteur
Penderby provide you also with a soul?”

“Automata do not require them. I have a mandate to which I refer, which aids in my self-direction.”

“But
Docteur
Penderby is the author of
They Are All Alive
—”

“Those pamphlets were penned by Mrs. Penderby. It is a topic on which master and mistress...differ.”

“Oh.”

“Do not look so stricken, girl. Mrs. Penderby will discuss your soul, if you choose, as exhaustively as you could wish. Dr. Penderby is easily satisfied, provided his staff do not faint, scream, or indulge in hysterics above once or twice a week.”

“M’sieur Soames is satirical.”

“I fear not. We suffer rather a high turnover of staff. It is the orangutan, principally. He forgets his trousers.”

“He does not mistake the maids for orangutans, does he, M’sieur?”

“I am gratified to report that he has stopped short of such an outrage. Er, Ileen.”

“Yes. M’sieur Soames?”

“Have you—that is to say, you seem to me—er, where are you from originally?”

“Wittgenstein, M’sieur Soames.”

“Fancy. I see. Hm. Thank you, Ileen, that will be all.”

“And I told him, my dear Gwendolyn, Piffle. An automaton of one hundred percent synthetic parts is no more nor less a creation of science than one that combines organic and mechanical elements.”

“And why is that, Horace?”

“Don’t look so crafty, my dear. It doesn’t suit you. What difference could it possibly make?”

“So the bishop argued that to use cadaver parts would be to risk contaminating your automaton with some remnant of the divine spark that once animated the corpse?”

“Not that word at table, my love. The servants. What must Soames think, or poor Ileen, only here a day?”

“You need not patronize me, Horace. I was your assistant until I lost the baby. I saw many a corpse on the slab.”

“Quite so, quite so.”

“That was, of course, before you
created
your own assistant. A more discreet one than I, I am sure.”

“Gwendolyn, you mistake. I treasure your interest in my work—”

“If it is silent interest.”

“Not silent!”

“Uncritical, then.”

“You wrong me, Gwendolyn.”

“That will never do.”

“Your womanly scruples are a very necessary counter-balance to the cold, inquiring mind of a scientist.”

“I don’t object to you inquiring, Horace. But you were not used to be cold. I fear that exposure to certain scientific minds—”

“My fellows in the Royal Society are of the highest character—”

“Do not freeze me, Horace, I beg you. But if it is not their influence that has chilled you, then whose?”

“No one’s!”

“Then why do you avoid me? If I could have another child, would you—”

“You are imagining things, Gwendolyn.”

“That also will never do. More hot water, please, Ileen?”

“No more for me, thank you. I have—I have a meeting this evening, and must be from home at the supper hour.”

“I see.”

“No, you
don’t
see—oh, what’s the use!”

“Soames, I shall receive Viscount Whitlake and Mr Danton this evening in the library. And, er, as Mrs. Penderby is attending her own meeting from home, it will not be necessary to, er, trouble her with my guest list. You understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Not that the gentlemen are unwelcome here.”

“Far from it, sir.”

“No. Precisely. Well, I’m off. Have brandy and cigars in the library by nine, and see that the fire is well along. Nine o’clock, mind. No earlier. Mustn’t ruffle Mrs. P.”

“No, sir. Thank you, sir.”

“Er, Ileen, have you finished with your duties abovestairs?”

“Yes, M’sieur Soames. You see I am bringing the shoes down to the mud room. That is the last?”

“It is. Ileen, I do not like to ask this in front of Cook or the boy, but there are certain matters of routine maintenance which, er, I feel sure that your Continental mind will be resilient enough to—that is, which you may approach in a purely impersonal manner—“

“Of course, M’sieur Soames. Where I come from, the upstairs maid is often required to service the major domo.”

“Oh, please! You mistake, I assure you. One would shrink from—I am not sure an automaton
can
—er—in short, here is this oil can. Do you suppose you can reach the back of my neck? It will, I fear, be necessary to remove my collar, for which breach of decorum I deeply apologize.”

“It makes nothing. M’sieur Soames.”

“Thank you, Ileen.

“This is the hole for me to put the oil?”

“It must be added slowly, one drop at a time, twenty drops. The oil is very fine, and the mechanism absorbs it slowly.”

“M’sieur Soames is a work of art. I had not noticed the hole. M’sieur Soames is synthetic?”

“Nearly. Certain organs function better than man’s makings.”

“But the limbs? The—the arms?”

“One hundred percent artificial. Ileen, your arm—”

“It was lost when I died, M’sieur Soames. This one is a substitute. So the skin tone differs.”

“It was not you who died, Ileen. Mrs. Penderby likes us to be correct in our speech. The previous occupant of your body died.”

“No doubt, but I have no memory of another body.”

“Were you not then translated into this one?”

“I do not know, M’sieur. I think not.”

“Do not blush, Ileen. Under Mrs. Penderby’s roof you must receive due respect as a full member of the human race. Everyone is a person here. Do you—are you soulless, then?”

“I—don’t know. I overheard them talking while I lay on the stone, so I ran away. You are shocked. Will you expose me, M’sieur Soames?”

“Of course not. Merely, I am surprised you were able to motivate the, er, body before a soul could be installed in it.”

“M’sieur Soames is well informed about a process that is illegal in England.”

“The master and his associates are very interested in the process. Do you not know whose your body was?”

“I remember nothing. And yet I feel...everything.”

“That must be distressing for you.”

“I contrive.”

“The thought of waking prematurely on the slab in a body so recently mutilated—I can only imagine—”

“There. Twenty drops, and no spills. Does M’sieur Soames bathe? Must the hole be covered?
Merveilleuse!
And the meat organs, have I said that right? They accommodate satisfactorily in every respect?”

“I apologize if I overstepped, Ileen.”

“M’sieur Soames disarms me. In a manner of speaking. You have said nothing about my color, M’sieur Soames.”