Soul Stealer (16 page)

“Nothing,” Tim replied at length. “Just school junk.”

Opposite the filing cabinet was an old-fashioned wooden office desk on top of which stood a brand-new computer, a fourteen-inch
TFT screen, a compact laser printer and a scanner. Before the desk was a new typist’s chair.

“Ay caramba!”
Tim exclaimed admiringly. “Now that’s a piece of gear! You two do the rest of the joint while I boot this baby up!”

It took Sebastian and Pip very little time to cover the
rest of the bungalow.The bedroom was plain, no suitcases under the bed that needed investigation, only a few clothes in the
wardrobe. All the drawers were half empty. In the kitchen, there was very little food, the fridge-door shelves holding only
a liter of milk, five eggs and a half-used pack of butter. The only loaf in the bread bin had a fine coating of mold upon
it.

“He must eat out most of the time,” Pip said.

“He has no urgent need to eat,” Sebastian rejoined. “As do not I.”

“You mean you don’t eat!”

“I eat the food your mother kindly offers me, but nothing else. It is more than sufficient.”

“Hibernating animals build up fat supplies in their bodies,” Pip said. “I suppose you do the same.”

“No,” Sebastian answered. “If you recall, my father’s potion,
aqua soporiferum,
not only induces sleep but slows the functions of the body. This, in turn, reduces the need for nourishment.”

“So, whatever Yoland uses, does the same?”

“To some extent. His elixir is not as efficient as my father’s potion, hence the presence in the kitchen of some comestibles
— I mean —” Sebastian interrupted himself “— foodstuffs.”

Pip smiled and said, “Better. But just say food.”

They moved on. The lounge was as sparse as the kitchen, the dining room likewise. Even in the bathroom were only the basics
for bodily hygiene — a sponge, a bar of coal-tar soap, a bottle of two-in-one shampoo and conditioner, a toothbrush, a tube
of toothpaste, a razor and a bottle of shaving foam.

When they returned to the study, it was to find Tim leaning back in the typist’s chair.

“It’s password protected,” he said gloomily. “I’ve tried to break it, but…” He held up his hands in surrender.

Sebastian looked over Tim’s shoulder. The cursor was blinking and an on-screen message requested the administrator’s password.

“Try
astromel”
Sebastian suggested.

“What does it mean?” Pip asked as Tim entered it and pressed
return.

“It is an ancient French word, frequently used in spells by Gerbert d’Aurillac,” Sebastian explained. “It may be that Yoland,
feeling himself secure in the twenty-first century, might use such words unknown today.”

The words
Incorrect log-on. Please check user name and password
came up on the screen.

“No go!” Tim said.

“In that case,” Sebastian said, “try
ablanathanalba.”

“
Abla-
what?” Tim retorted. “Bit of a mouthful, isn’t it?”

“I shall spell it for you,” Sebastian said. “It is an ancient word dating to the time of Our Lord and most commonly used in
my father’s day.”

“What does it mean?” Pip wanted to know.

“Of that it is best you remain ignorant,” Sebastian said and he spelled it out.

Tim keyed it in. When he pressed
return,
the screen went directly to the Microsoft Windows desktop.

“Open sesame!” he muttered gleefully. “How much time have we got, sis?”

“Twenty minutes,” Pip answered.

Tim concentrated on Yoland’s directories, going through them as fast as he could. There were over a hundred of them, each
with up to twenty sub-directories. Some dealt with school matters but most concerned abstruse scientific data, predominantly
nuclear physics and chemistry. They were not only written in English, but in other European languages, Chinese and Japanese.

“There’s no way I can ever download all this in twenty minutes,” he commented. “And if I did, I wouldn’t understand a word
of it.”

“What about the Internet?” Pip suggested. “Have a look at his
Favorites
folder.”

“Good one, sis!” Tim replied. “Girl meets Techno Age.”

“You really can be full of yourself sometimes, Tim,” she came back, peeved.

Tim clicked on Yoland’s Web browser. There were more than two hundred sites listed.

“Sorry, sis,” he apologized. “Switch the printer on.”

“Sure you think I know how?” Pip said as she depressed the power button.

Nothing happened. Pip knelt down. The printer was disconnected from the wall socket. She crawled under the desk, pushing the
plug into the socket. The printer whirred. Tim clicked the mouse and the printer sucked in the first sheet of paper.

“Look at this!” Pip called up, her head still under the desk. “There’s more down here than an electricity socket.”

Sebastian and Tim peered beneath the desk. Next to the socket was an old, much-battered and scratched, brown leather attaché
case with tarnished brass buckles.
Beside that, set into the wall, was a small safe with a combination lock.

“We’re going to need more than some magic word to pry that open,” Pip declared.

“Stick of gelignite, more like,” Tim replied.

“Gelignite?” Sebastian asked.

“Explosive, gunpowder.”

“Ah!” Sebastian exclaimed. “Of this I have heard. Roger Bacon, a monk and alchemist before my father’s time learned of it
from the Orient. In the reign of the Virgin Queen, there were factories creating it, the science taught by a German monk called
Berthold Schwarz.”

“Never mind the history lecture,” Pip said tartly. “What are we going to do about it?”

Squirming under the desk, Tim despondently spun the combination lock’s dial. It ticked like a frenetic clock as the tumblers
inside rose and fell — then he had an idea.

“When you knew Yoland,” Tim said, “like when you were a boy, he was about thirty years old. Right? And let’s say you were
about ten. Right?”

“That would be approximately correct.”

“And you were born in 1430. So, in 1440, Yoland was about thirty. Therefore he was born around 1410.”

“Yes.“

“What has this to do with the price of eggs?” Pip asked.

Tim did not reply but started to revolve the combination lock this way and that.

“1410… 1409… 1408… 1407…” he began to recite aloud. At 1406, he stopped and, looking up at
Sebastian, said, “Yoland was thirty-four when you knew him.”

The other two bent down. The safe was open.

“How did you…?” Pip began.

“Easy. Like all scientists, Yoland’s a man of method. We have to lock our school lockers with a number that is an important
year. As he said, like our year of birth. What could be more important than that? So…”

“Quod erat demonstrandum,”
said Sebastian. “In English,” he added, looking Tim straight in the eye, “you say ‘That which was to be demonstrated,’ which
implies it has now been achieved with ease.”

Tim winked and started to remove a number of small boxes the size of paperback books from the safe, passing them to Pip, who
placed them on the desk. Sebastian opened them.

The first contained gold jewelry and five modern gold sovereigns. Yet none was complete. The jewelry had been cut up with
pliers, and several slices had been clipped out of the gold coins. The second box was filled with silver jewelry, similarly
defaced, while in the third was a large platinum and diamond brooch, with most of the stones removed and the precious metal
cut into roughly equal pieces.

“Look at those,” Pip remarked, pushing the diamonds around the box with her finger. “Aren’t they gorgeous?”

“Girl’s best friend,” Tim replied and he ducked down for the remaining box in the safe.

Although it was the same size as the others, the fourth box was heavier. Tim had to reverse out from under the desk to hand
it to Sebastian. He put it next to
the others and opened it. Within were at least a dozen spell keys, each wrapped in tissue paper.

“He’s made these from the jewelry and coins,” Tim said.

“Indeed he has,” Sebastian agreed as he counted the spell keys, “and he is yet to fashion more. There are but thirteen here.
As each spell requires four, he has to make them in multiples of four.”

“So he has to make sixteen in all,” Pip said.

“Or twenty…” Sebastian added.

“… or twenty-four, or twenty-eight,” Tim went on.

Beside the spell keys in the box were several dozen ancient gold coins, each in a plastic money envelope.

“What are these?” Tim exclaimed, slipping one out of its envelope and onto the palm of his hand.

It did not shine like modern gold, with a garish brightness, but with a rich luster. On one side was depicted a kingly figure
standing in a ship holding a sword and shield: the reverse bore a cross, four crowns and four crowned lions.

“They are gold nobles,” Sebastian said. “I have made mention of them to you. They were currency in my father’s time. These
are from the reign of King Henry the Sixth.”

“How much is it worth?” Tim asked as he went to replace the coin in the plastic envelope and return it to the box. Yet he
could not. It seemed stuck to his skin.

“I can’t let go of it,” he said with alarm.

“It is attracted to you,” Sebastian stated, “and you to it. This is Yoland’s intention, that whosoever handles
the coins shall be entranced by them. Being pure gold, it has captivated you, it has stolen your heart as a lover might. I
shall remove it.”

With that, Sebastian muttered a few words, pried the coin away from Tim’s hand and, slipping it into the plastic envelope,
put it back in the box.

“How did you do that,” Pip inquired, “when Tim couldn’t?”

“I have no interest in gold,” Sebastian replied, “and informed the coin of this fact. The spell, as it were, was momentarily
cast asunder.”

“Neither have I an interest…” Tim said.

“You think you have not,” Sebastian cut in, “but did you not ask me its value?”

“It’s a fair question,” Tim admitted, smiling guiltily. “I was wondering what I could buy with it.”

He bent down to return the box to the safe with the others, making sure he put them back in the same order as he had found
them. As his face passed the level of the desk top, his eye caught the lower right-hand corner of the computer monitor.

“Criperooney!” he almost yelled. “It’s six minutes past five!”

Closing the safe, Tim spun the combination wheel. At that moment, the printer stopped. He switched off the socket, yanking
the plug out. Sitting in the typist’s chair, he shut down the computer, the hard disk droning to a standstill. Removing the
printouts from the output tray, he folded them over and put them in his shirt.

“Are we ready?” he asked.

“Chair wheels,” Pip said.

Tim looked down. The rollers on the chair legs had, under Yoland’s weight, made dents in the carpet. Tim moved the chair so
they fitted into them.

“Right!” he said, making certain the keyboard was in the exact position in which he had found it. “Let’s beat it!”

They turned for the door. Pip gasped. The floor was heaving with massive cockroaches over five centimeters in length, their
sinuous feelers stretching out and quivering, testing the air for vibrations. Their backs shone as if they were made of polished
mahogany. Despite their numbers, they made no sound whatsoever.

Pip squeaked involuntarily. At the sound, the antennae stopped wavering, swung in her direction and began to tremble.

Even as they watched, the cockroach cohorts swelled. In seconds, they stood four or five deep, balanced on each other’s carapaces.
They were like the phalanx of a grotesque miniature army. Now they began making a soft scrambling noise as they fought to
keep a foothold on the one below.

“What are we going to do?” whispered Pip, her voice unsteady, her hands shaking and her face white.

“Move slowly to the window,” said Tim.

“No!” Sebastian ordered. “If we go out by the window, we will not be able to close it behind us and Yoland will know someone
has been here. We must leave through a door.”

The cockroach army began to advance, those on top falling forward to be engulfed by those below. It was as
if a vile, brown, living wave was rolling over the floor engulfing everything in its path.

Tim shrugged.

The cockroaches tipped their grotesque heads to one side in unison at his movement.

“Nothing we can do,” Tim said resignedly and, taking two steps back, ran full tilt at the insects.

As one, the insects took to the wing, a solid cloud flying at him, thudding into him, striking him in the face. The smallest
tried to infiltrate his ears and nostrils. The air filled with the insane hiss and rustle of their wings. Tim swatted them
against his shirt and blazer, slapping at his cheeks to dislodge them. He grabbed at them with his hands, squeezing fistfuls
of them, feeling the creamy, viscous pulp of their intestines slick against his skin.

Pip screamed and followed him. Cockroaches beat into her face, landing on her hair, scrabbling down it, seeking a way to squirm
and scratch themselves into her clothing. Their legs were sharp with spines. She could feel them scratching and itching on
her back, down her chest and, scraping lower, towards her stomach. Her mouth closed against them, she thrashed her hands across
in front of her eyes to try to get through the obscene tempest.

The corridor filled with a sibilant blizzard of cockroaches. Tim stumbled towards the vague outline of the front door and
the square of daylight shining through the glass panel, sepia-colored from the fog of cockroaches.

Sebastian followed Pip, lashing the air with his arms,
his hands spread like paddles with which to bat the cockroaches down.

At last they reached the front door. Tim fumbled with the latch and finally tripped it, tugging the door inward. Behind it,
a wedge of trapped cockroaches battered themselves against the glass and, landing on the wall, scurried across it, making
for the cover of the back of a mirror hanging over an umbrella stand.