Damnation and Hellfire - Chapter Twelve
His lungs felt as if they were on fire as Jules dashed up the final flight of stairs to the fourth floor. After the duel and his race up the staircase, he couldn't help but stop at the top landing, slamming the saber tip down into the carpet as he leaned on the grip and gasped for air. The stitch in his side began to ease, his legs wobbled, and he would have been quite content to throw himself onto the floor and not move for at least a week.
If only he had that luxury! With a groan, he straightened and pushed himself into a light run, searching for the door of the ceremony chamber. He dared not stop to breathe or even to think, if he were to carry out Fogg's instructions in time.
When he'd demanded Fogg's bequest be given to him in writing, it was an insult uttered in a fit of pique. That his request had been honored was his first surprise. The second was Fogg's hand upon his shoulder as Jules ran his eye down the page and the slight squeeze as Fogg said 'paragraph' and 'word.' He'd almost given away the game then, barely able to swallow his startled gasp or hide his excitement - the document concealed a code. Nothing fancy or unbreakable - how the Queen's attorney hadn't spotted it was beyond him and Baron Whitmore seemed clever enough, yet Fogg had given neither of those men reason to doubt him or to look for such duplicity.
The last word of each paragraph contained the key to that paragraph's true meaning. The messages were brief - a warning to fight as if his both their lives depended on it, to let Fogg do as he would throughout the duel, to ignore any blood drawn, to take Fogg's sword on cue and when he was down, to set up a death-blow . . . .
He'd mistaken the cue, Fogg hadn't been ready for him to take his sword and he'd nearly ended up impaling himself; a cold sweat broke out over him even now at the thought of it as Jules hurried down the corridor, searching for the door. He'd gone after Fogg's sword too soon. And, having botched that, to have to stand with that saber held above Fogg and thrust down, not knowing how Fogg planned to evade the blow--?
Damn the man!
Jules recognized the hallway, realized the door he sought was the last on his right, and hurried his steps. Reaching the chamber door, he tugged on the handle, almost crying in relief when it opened beneath his grasp - thank God it was unlocked! He slipped inside the room, closed the door behind himself, then paused.
The candles had been extinguished, for safety's sake he supposed if for no other reason, but moonlight flooded in through the dormer window above him. Silent and dark, smelling faintly of incense, the oppressive atmosphere of the room made him shiver. Jules stumbled forward to the lectern, then hesitated, looking around wildly.
The Book of Sin was gone.
His mind went blank for a moment and he groaned aloud in frustration. Fogg's instructions had assumed the book would be where he had last seen it, on the lectern. But if the head footman had returned with the others to remove the wine goblets and snuff out the candles . . . perhaps the book had been placed back in the locked cabinet inside the lectern?
Jules tossed aside the saber and ripped off the fencing glove, then squatted to examine the lock. He'd seen the head footman use a key to unlock that compartment, but had no time for such niceties now. Slapping the side of the lectern with the flat of his hand in frustration, he then rose to his feet and leaned against his weight full against it.
It shifted.
Planting his feet against the carpet, he pushed with all his might to topple the lectern. It tilted away from the floor, just a little at first, but as he bent his knees and doubled his efforts he felt it begin to sway forward. With a last, Herculean effort, Jules grunted and heaved the thing, then jumped back in alarm as it crashed to the floor within the small rectangle of moonlight from the window above him.
The lectern hadn't shattered completely - a tug on the locked cabinet at the base showed it still to be intact. Jules glanced around, caught sight of an iron candle stand, and grabbed hold of it with two hands, knocking away the candles that hadn't fallen when he'd lifted it from its upright position. It made a perfect pry bar. The fleur-de-lis decorative piece at the top fitted neatly into the gap between the edge of the door and the frame. He tilted the candle stand like a lever, using the flat of his boot for leverage as he pulled the bar downward, attempting to pry the cabinet door upward and away from the lock.
The wood around the lock gave suddenly and he fell, the heavy iron candle holder giving his left shoulder a glancing blow before he could scramble out from beneath it. Jules crawled quickly to the fallen lectern, shoved aside the cabinet door, and then reached inside for the book.
For one who knew books and loved them, it was a beautiful thing to hold, the leather softer than an infant's skin. Jules raised one hand to brush across the incised cover, but stopped abruptly, the breath catching in his throat - it was as if the runes inscribed there held an magnetic charge, drawing his hand to them. Even its color seemed too bold; the moonlight tinted the other objects around him in gray, blue, or silver hues, but the cover of the book retained the solid red and brown tones he'd seen in candlelight, the color of dried blood.
He shuddered, nearly dropped the book . . . and then shook off the sense of unease that had claimed him as reason asserted itself - it was only a book, after all. He was to guard it with his life until Fogg caught up with him. Dismissing his unease as foolishness, Jules hugged it to his chest.
That's when he heard a 'click' from somewhere in the darkness.
Jules froze. Realizing that he was unarmed, he turned his head slowly, trying to remember where he'd thrown the saber.
"The sword's over here, Mr. Verne," said Baron Whitmore's voice. "Near the door."
Illumination provided by the moonlight diffused outward from the square in which Jules stood - he could barely distinguish the darker black rectangle against the wall adjacent to the one in which the chamber door was set . . . a hidden passage. Baron Whitmore stepped out of the shadows, his right arm extended, a gun in his hand.
There was only one way out of the room - through the baron.
"Give me the book, Mr. Verne."
Jules tightened his hold around the book and backed up a step, trying to recall the exact layout of the room. There were chairs behind him and a tie beam above them. Through the dormer window he could reach the roof. He had to put distance between himself and that gun. He needed cover.
Fogg would be here soon.
"Mr. Verne?"
Not soon enough.
"No." He punctuated the remark by running for the chairs behind him. Jules scrambled up the arm to the carved wooden back of a chair, expecting all the while to hear the sharp report of the gun and feel the fire of a bullet digging into his flesh. Splinters from the chair directly beside his calf told him the final destination of the first shot, while he heard the second the hit the wall above his head. He'd placed the book onto the flat of the beam and was pulling himself aloft when he heard a series of clicks, followed by Whitmore cursing aloud and a clatter - the gun had been thrown to the floor.
It must have jammed!
After hauling himself up onto the beam, Jules fell flat against the length of it in relief, his cheek resting on the leather cover of the book as if it were a pillow. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, safe for the moment. His mouth felt dryer than a desert; what he wouldn't give now for that glass of water he'd thrown--
THWACK!
Jules' eyes shot open to see the tip of his discarded saber embedded in the beam beside his head, directly at eye level. Whitmore had reached the height of the beam by standing with one foot on either arm of a chair. Even as Jules watched, he was wrenching the saber blade out of the wood, tugging on it.
His heart pounding in his chest, Jules grabbed the book to him and scuttled back along the beam . . . but once Whitmore had freed the sword, the man need do nothing more than move to the next chair for the blade to be within striking distance. There was no safety here.
The beam to his left was about three feet from him. Opening his shirt, Jules tucked the book inside, shifting his suspender to hold it in place. He reached out for the next beam and for a moment was suspended over the floor, hands flat on the one beam and feet resting on the other. Inching his palms forward, he struggled to get his fingers over the far side of the next beam. The saber cracked against the heel of his right boot the very second he pulled away. By his fingertips, he pulled his full weight across the open space and onto the second beam.
Jules balanced on his stomach for a moment, then maneuvered himself sideways. He was lying full-length against a beam again, the book inside his shirt between his chest and the wood of the beam. He turned his head to watch his adversary.
Whitmore was struggling to find purchase on the first beam without setting down the sword - if he placed the sword on the flat of the beam, Jules might be able to reach it. Finally, he struck the edge of the saber into the side of the beam closest to him - it hung there as he began to climb.
Knowing that he couldn't retrieve the sword without placing himself within reach of Whitmore, Jules gave up that option and surveyed his position. On his hands and knees he could barely clear the rafters, but if he crawled back a few feet he'd be at the lower edge of the casement for the dormer window, where the rafters were higher.
Sliding backward wasn't an option - not with his previous experience of splinters from these beams. Jules carefully lifted his hands and knees as he crawled backwards toward the dormer casement and away from Whitmore, who was still fighting to pull himself up onto the beam.
The rafter structure changed at the dormer - there was more than enough clearance for Jules to kneel upright. Frantically, he ran his hands along the wooden frame of the window and the glass, but there was no visible latch; the window was made of a piece and had never been intended to open. The panes of glass were cold and a brisk draft from the warped window frame chilled him. Beyond the window he could see the slope of the roof, which ended at a decorative wrought iron grate that ran the length of the roof edge. A look over his shoulder confirmed that Whitmore had reached the first beam.
The only escape was the roof. Jules pulled the book out of his shirt, grasped the bottom of it tightly with both hands, and swung it against the center of the glass.
The glass shattered along with the wooden frame; his momentum carried him through the window after the book. In a shower of glass fragments, fingers cut and bleeding, Jules tumbled out the window frame and landed on the roof tiles. He slid down the incline of the roof, twisting as he fell, unable to stop himself. The book escaped his grip and he reached for in, only to see it spin away. It came to rest against one of the posts of the iron railing and a few seconds later so did Jules with a loud, "Ooof!"
His fingers closed around the book instantly and he drew it to his chest again, gasping - the landing against the iron railing had knocked the breath out of him. The sound of more breaking glass was startling; he flipped over to see Whitmore using the flat of the saber to clear fragments away from the frame before stepping through.
Jules shook the remaining shards of glass from the book and tucked it back into his shirt. Grabbing hold of the railing, he pulled himself to his feet and scrambled across the edge of the roof. Ahead of him stood the brick side of the building, which rose above the pitch of the tiled roof as a wall in the form of a battlement. Built in a crenellated manner, each of the merlon sections was a little higher than the previous one so that they formed a series of brick steps that rose to meet the left chimney, which stood at the center and uppermost point of the wall.
He had nowhere else to go. Driven forward by the bitter, cold wind, Jules made his way to the battlement. His fingers were growing stiff with the drop in temperature; he had difficulty flexing them enough to hold onto the top brick edgings of the merlons, using it to draw himself up the incline as he attempted to scale the roof. If he could reach the other side of the chimney, it might provide him some protection from Whitmore's saber.
The saber blade crashed down near his heel - Jules scrambled up onto the last merlon, the outcropping that stood flat against the chimney, his back against the warmth of the brick as he stared down at Baron Whitmore. Again, the blade hampered Whitmore's mobility - he couldn't pull himself closer to Jules without using both hands, yet that would mean abandoning his weapon. The furthest swing of the blade barely reached the tips of Jules' boots.
He glanced down over the side of the building - four stories to the ground. Cabs and private carriages crowded the street before the club, including several police wagons - he could see people being loaded into them by the lanterns of the carriages. Above the roar of the wind in his ears he swore he could hear his name being called from below, but there was too much distance between his perch and the ground to discern a face or a person in the crowd. More faces seemed to be turned upward now, looking in his direction, pale spots illuminated by lamps held high.
"It's a long way to fall," warned Whitmore.
Jules turned his attention back to the baron - he was standing at the end of the roof, leaning against the iron railing as he tapped the side of the saber against the brick wall beside him.
"You can't last much longer - not in this wind. Give me the book and you'll live."
Where the hell was Fogg? As long as there was a chance Whitmore could escape through that secret passage with the book, Jules wasn't about to give it up. He opened his shirt enough to take the book out and held it before him - it proved to be little protection against the wind.
Whitmore grinned when he saw the book. Setting the saber blade flat against the top of the brick wall, Whitmore placed his hand over the sword. He climbed up onto the merlon carefully, rising to stand upright with the sword in his hand. A moment passed as he found his balance, then he swiped the blade experimentally before him - the foible was still a good distance from touching Jules' shins.
Swallowing, Jules grabbed hold of the chimney edge with his right hand and held the book in his left, over the edge of the roof. "One step closer and I'll drop it."
"Drop that book and I'll skewer you." Whitmore's grin faded. "It means nothing to you. Save your life, Mr. Verne - give me the book."
"Never!" hissed Jules.
Baron Whitmore bared his teeth in a snarl, then raised his left boot, taking a tentative step up to the next merlon in the brick wall.
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End of Chapter 12
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