"Quillan!" Miss Moneypenny exclaimed. "I think this might be a reference to it!" Quillan leaned over her shoulder to read the screen. She looked up at his dark face. "Uh, why don't I print this one out for you?" She had forgotten how it felt to have an attractive available man stand so close. It disturbed her equilibrium.
"Certainly, Moneypenny. Let me know if you find more."
She nodded. Her eyes followed him as he walked to the printer. Why had she ignored QR5 for so long? She shook her head at herself and returned to the job at hand. Jules Verne had the next entry, dated in the small hours of Christmas morning. It was by far the longest today. Moneypenny recalled Verne's tremendous memory for detail. This entry would take the rest of the afternoon.
**********
From the Jules Verne journal.
Peaceful and Fogg, two words that never seem to belong in the same sentence. This holiday continues that pattern as this night's Christmas Eve Feast segued into a rescue and even more. The night went on so long and eventfully, if I do not write now I shall forget the details, so I set aside fatigue.
The evening started happily. Both Fogg and Rebecca dressed in their finest and provided me with well-fit evening clothes as well, don't ask me how. Rebecca was particularly stunning in iridescent scarlet and gold, her fiery hair in ringlets and bound atop her head. Fogg toasted her with his eyes as she descended the stair to join us and I told her of her radiance fulsomely in French, the only language fit to describe such exquisite beauty. Fogg handed me a jewelry case and asked that I adorn his cousin with the contents, a heavy gold chain supporting a huge red star sapphire pendant. It must have cost him five thousand pounds if not more - if he hadn't won it at the gaming tables. "An early Christmas present, cousin," he said, that soft fond look in his eyes. Though no stranger to magnificent gifts, Rebecca gasped in wonder, but turned her face away to avoid Fogg's eye and did not seal her brief, cool "thank you" with a kiss. Indeed the cousins had not touched each other since I arrived two days ago. It's not like them to be so remote or Rebecca to act ungrateful. I wondered what new spat lay between them.
As for the party, Fogg's estate manager, George MacIver, installed the new holiday conceit Prince Albert has imported from Germany -- a candle-decorated tree. It bravely lit one end of the ballroom, evoking no few "oohs" and "aahs" and scented the atmosphere with the sharp summer fragrance of an evergreen forest. At the other end of the ballroom, a feast of roast turkey, puddings and other traditional English dishes occupied two long tables. In the middle those few who dared could dance. I did my best to contribute to the holiday delight of the gaily-dressed country maidens, promenading with nearly all.
Fogg does not fancy being master of Shillingworth Magna, that much has been plain since our summer visit. Last night he made brave show, greeting each fermier by his forename, shaking hands, clapping shoulders, until a rather handsome, strapping fellow walked up to us with Rebecca on his arm. "Jules, I want you to meet an old friend of mine," she exclaimed. "Bran Everley, may I introduce the greatest writer of the next generation, Jules Verne. Jules, Bran has supplied Shillingworth with fine horses for many years." Everley bowed first to me, then to Fogg, whom he greeted curtly with his surname, "Fogg."
A year's association with Fogg has taught me his danger signs. His answering bow to Everley barely twitched his shoulders and his body's focused lines bespoke tension and scarce-checked rage. I swear with minimal provocation he would have killed this Everley. Unfortunately, that man proceeded to supply it, saying, "Rebecca tells me you seek a hunter for next summer, sir. Are you planning to hold on to Shillingworth Magna? We've heard so many rumors here in the county." Fogg flushed dark red and rocked forward on the balls of his feet. Everley dropped Rebecca's arm and tensed for a set-to. Rebecca recognized the signs of impending combat as well as I. She intervened. "Of course, we shall. There will always be Foggs at Shillingworth Magna. Am I not right, Phileas?"
"Always," Fogg choked out, "until there are no more Foggs." Rebecca continued, taking her cousin's arm, "Phileas, if I might have a word with you?" Oblivious to the insult he'd just proffered Everley, Fogg followed Rebecca from the ballroom. She rejoined us a moment later, alone, her lips pressed so tightly together they appeared blue. She did not look at Everley again and only spoke gaily of local gossip. Shortly she excused herself to greet a new arrival and left us standing there awkwardly regarding one another.
Around one in the morning, Rebecca sought me out as I left the dance floor to enlist my assistance in her search for Fogg. He had not yet reappeared; and guests, keeping country hours, were beginning to leave. The host should be there to wish the departing safe journey and to distribute baskets of holiday benevolence, fruit and baked goods.
As it turned out, Fogg found us. His face, open and smiling when he walked in the manor door, subsided into its earlier frown when Rebecca reminded him of his hosting obligations. He did not cavil, saying only, "Certainly, sweet cousin." He tossed an object to Jean. "Wait for us in the library will you, Passepartout? And prepare a tray with brandy, if you please. I'll be there shortly."
The manor's servants also departed for their Christmas holiday, and thus shortly evolved into another hour. When at last we assembled in the library, Jean reclined in a chair fast asleep and came awake with a rather groggy eye. Fogg only gently tapped his arm and twitched a sharp chin toward the fireplace to indicate the blaze needed a fresh stoking. Jean added two of the especial Yule logs set out for the Christmas celebration and came to stand with me at the table. In this part of England such logs are decorated with small, carved figures and pomanders that burn quite fragrantly. The scent quickly blessed our noses.
"I hope the party met your expectations, Rebecca," Fogg said as he poured brandies all around, even one for Passepartout.
"A magnificent effort, I'll concede, cousin. Definitely worthy of a successor in another year." Rebecca settled on the divan, and leaned back with a tired sigh. She'd spent much time dancing and moving about among her guests.
For a moment Fogg regarded his sparkling cut crystal goblet then downed his brandy with a single gulp and immediately poured himself another. "If so you say, my love. Father held it every year, n'est pas?" He turned away from her, as if closing a door on a distressing scene.
To Jean he continued, "The item, if you please, Passepartout." On the table Jean placed the star man's strange gift from last summer. I'd left it with him after we'd spent a fruitless week on tests. Jean told me yesterday he'd thought of a few more to assay.
"Passepartout and I had an adventure about an hour ago," Fogg said looking at me, "and your souvenir seems the origin."
"An adventure?" Rebecca asked behind him.
Fogg looked conflicted for a moment. Finally he turned to her. "Uh, we saved my father and mother from a posse of League creatures."
Rebecca's eyebrows disappeared into the red curls that fringed her forehead. She pointed out the obvious. "Your parents are both dead, Phileas." She stood to look her cousin in the eye, or nearly so considering the great difference in their heights, the depth of her caring painted on her features.
Fogg still rankled from his earlier conflict with Rebecca. He sneered down at her up-turned face. "Forty years ago they weren't. I watched them while they assured each other we Fogg children would survive a hell on earth. You should have been there, cousin, the sweetest love story I've seen outside a novel. It made me wish I'd never been born." He gulped down his second shot of brandy, and as he does when drinking strong spirits sucked his teeth and smacked his lips, savoring its bouquet to the fullest.
In the meantime, Passepartout showed me the artifact's twirling spin. It spun steadily and quite fast. Jean gasped when Fogg said his final words and glanced anxiously around. He relaxed when nothing happened.
Rebecca couldn't let Fogg's words pass unanswered. "And I wish you had a son of your own to raise, so you might know how hard fatherhood can be." With her words something did happen. From what Fogg and Passepartout tell us, exactly what happened earlier. A shimmering fall of liquid air, much reminiscent of the Phoenix aura, a pressing of the lungs and the four of us stood elsewhere in a broad, high-ceilinged corridor that seemed an enhancement of a natural grotto. Intermittently down its length stalactites and stalagmites decorated the walls and from frequent openings entered what little light we had. In one direction the grotto continued straight for about twenty feet then bent sharply. In the other it continued until fading into darkness.
"Damn," Fogg said, looking both ways. "Not even a sword this time. Do you have anything on you, cousin?"
"Just a small dagger in my hair," Rebecca said. "Where the hell are we? Is this a continuation of your adventure, Phileas?" We had no more time for further consultation as we heard a party approaching behind the bend.
Conversation drifted toward us. "She still lives? That's a pity. Expedite her passing. I want to hold my son." My blood chilled as I recognized Count Gregory's booming voice, unnaturally amplified and enhanced by the tunnel's shape.
"In there!" Fogg hissed, gesturing at the nearest opening, an unoccupied medical operating theatre, as it turned out. We ranged along its interior wall, Rebecca forced to move far back due to her billowing crinoline. Although I'm sure it infuriated him to hide, even Fogg knows better than to encounter Count Gregory unarmed.
In the corridor the whirl and clatter of Count Gregory's chair and multiple footsteps approached. We'd missed the reply to the Count's order, but not his next words. "Unnatural? The boy's unnatural? You assured me our Fogg-bred bloodline would be completely normal. I will adopt no monster for a son!"
A naggingly familiar and oily voice answered, "The breeding worked out well, Count Gregory. I believe the Fogg baby to be enhanced. You've perfected Cynara's bloodline for centuries; and I must say, you've created the consummate baby by matching that lineage with Fogg's. A brilliant move, sir." I glanced at Fogg on the other side of the opening, wondering at his reaction to this. His lips formed the same word over and over, "Damn, damn, damn." His fisted hands threatened the air.
The oily voice continued as sounds of passing dwindled down the corridor. "It may be best to leave him by his mother until she dies. He seems aware of her condition and we don't want to . . ." We lost the rest in distance.
Fogg quieted. His head leant back against the rock wall. "Well, Rebecca," he whispered, "you wished me a son. Verne's souvenir seems to have found one for me."
"Phileas, if wishes were babies, the begetting of children would be a good deal less complicated. How can that thing find a son for you? It doesn't make sense."
Jean broke in, "Passepartout know. Same as last trip we go. Mr. Fogg wish to know why father had family and he find out."
Fogg's eyes found Rebecca's and his face relaxed into a half smile. "My mother talked him into it," he admitted.
While they conversed I prowled the room. It had been meagerly scrubbed after the last, and apparently recent, operation. The rough stone floor still retained traces of blood and other less identifiable remnants. Light came from a strange globe hanging from the overhead rock. Two wrapped wires fed it and I surmised it to be electrical in nature. A bare steel table on wheels occupied the center of the room, and various shiny medical implements both large and small lay in trays or hung on the far wall. Piles of folded linen and operating robes completed the room's furnishings.
By this time Rebecca and Fogg had joined me and Passepartout watched the door. Gathering up some of the largest operating tools -- a wicked looking ax likely used for amputations and two very large knives -- I thrust them in their hands, saying, "I've got an idea."
Rebecca answered. "Sorry, Jules. No ideas until I strip for action. May I have that scalpel, if you please?" With Fogg's help, she cut off her heavy outer skirt, untied and dropped her crinoline, and pulled off the gloves that covered her forearms up to the elbow. "Now," she said as Fogg unhooked her gold and sapphire necklace, "let's hear it, and please tell me it includes finding Phileas' son." Fogg stood behind her, chain in hand, a bemused expression on his face. I could almost hear his thought, "Rebecca rides to the rescue."
And ride she did. Rebecca protested the passive role my plot assigned her; however, operating robes could not adequately disguise her half-clad feminine state. She finally consented to lying with our appropriated weapons on the rolling steel table, a sheet cast over all, whilst Fogg, Passepartout and I followed behind costumed in robes. All in all we hoped to pass for local habitué. League men are an incurious lot, and as it happened we encountered only one small party of enstudded slaves. They passed us by after a single glance.
Passepartout had had the fewest League encounters so to him fell the duty of thrusting his head into each doorway. It took five, and all except the last of those doors opened on empty rooms, before Jean found Cynara Bonander and her son.
"Here be your lady, Master!" he whispered in excited accents. Passepartout had not cared much for Baroness Bonander; but if she had borne Fogg a son, he was prepared to change his mind. We quickly entered the indicated room. Passepartout helped Rebecca dismount the cart and together they took up stations on either side of the entry in readiness to dispatch intruders, Rebecca armed with the ax and Passepartout with the longest knife.
A veritable kaleidoscope of emotion crossed Fogg's face as he bent over the unconscious woman and tiny babe. He touched the child's cheek with one finger and whispered, "Cynara," to the mother. Considering that when he last saw her, she'd planned to shoot him, he treated her with uncommon tenderness. The memory of that day led me to another recollection and another after that, until finally I connected the oily voice that a few moments ago had spoke to Count Gregory. It belonged to the hunchback that shot my love, my only sweet Clarice, in Paris last spring. The bastard hid in this pile of rock!
Cynara's eyes flickered open. "Phileas, thank God," she sighed. "Our son, you must save him." Weakly her hands moved to offer her child. "Quickly, Gregory will know your presence. Spying machines watch this room!"
"Master!" Passepartout cried at the door, "I think Gregory thing come back!" Indeed, we could already hear the rattling clatter of the returning chair. It seemed to be moving at high speed.
"Verne!" Fogg cried, "take the babe!" Even as I bent and picked up the tiny bundle, it was already too late! Count Gregory and two enstudded slaves carrying firearms of mysterious design blocked our door. Fogg raised his hands in surrender. Rebecca and Passepartout stayed hidden just inside the entry.
"Oh, how very convenient! Both of my prize studs in one room!"
Both? Had Clarice been part of his evil plan? No, I would not credit it! Fogg glanced at me. I shook my head in answer. One thing I still own is a cursed virginity. We need seek no child of mine.
Fogg made answer. "Well, thank you, Count, but we prefer to do our own procuring. A matter of taste, you know."
"If you think such hubris impressive, Fogg, let me point out I've won again. I have your woman Cynara and shall raise your son as my own."
The check Fogg held on his rage began to slip. "Not while I still walk this earth!"
Gregory laughed, a joyless rasping sound, and addressed someone who stood behind his chair. "Doctor Garridan, please summon more guards." That hunch-backed bastard, Clarice's murderer, now entered, on his way to a speaking tube, I suppose. In my helpless anger I squeezed the child I held. It began to cry in vehement yowls. Her hidden position about to be compromised by the Doctor's entrance, Rebecca chose that moment to attack. She hit Garridan with the flat of her ax. Passepartout kicked his feet out from under him.
The slaves immediately began firing their weapons. I ran to one side carrying the babe. Fogg tried to push Cynara's wheeled bed to safety, but she heaved up and fell off to the floor. She cried out to Fogg, "Run! Save our son!" and crawled in the direction of the door. Blocked from helping her and under fire, Fogg ran to join the babe and me.
Although many, many bullets flew, the slaves aimed from outside the entry. Their narrow field of fire prevented direct hits. Ricochets, however, went everywhere. One even providentially burst the electric globe light in the ceiling. The resultant shower of sparks gave me yet another idea. We had to act quickly. Count Gregory would soon note we failed to return his fire.
"Fogg!" I yelled. "The gold chain, throw it at the metal rails of Gregory's chair! Wrap it across as many as you can!" My friends have a disturbing faith in my wild ideas, risking their very lives on my say so. Fogg didn't even glance at me in question. He pulled the gold chain from his pocket. Running into the line of fire, he threw it high and hard. It hit its intended target, Count Gregory's chair that still franticly maneuvered in the entry a dozen feet away. After Fogg ran to Cynara and laid his body over hers.
As I'd hoped, Count Gregory's chair uses electricity for propulsion and even perhaps to feed his hideous flesh. It certainly has something to do with his fusion power process. The gold chain, an excellent conductor of electric power, wrapped two posts and touched another. It arced the fittings of the chair and wild currents ran throughout the entire assemblage. Sparks showered and great gouts of lightning. Gregory's enstudded slaves dropped their weapons and writhed on the floor. Their flesh ignited in horrid fire as some shorted circuit fed through them. As for the Count, his monstrous body twitched and jumped, each piece of him finding its own direction. His chair spun, much resembling a rudderless boat in a whirlpool, and under specious power sped down the hall.
The burning slaves provided us a faint, albeit malodorous light. Passepartout helped Fogg arise. Rebecca felt Cynara's neck for a pulse. She looked up to meet Fogg's eyes and shook her head. The tiny babe had already lost his mother. In my arms he cried most piteously.
Rebecca said to me, "We must flee. Jules, do you have any more brilliant insights? We could use another just now."
I negated.
Fogg, ignoring all worry of escape, reached out for the babe, saying, "Give me my son."
Two miracles followed - first, in Fogg's arms the child stopped his cries, almost gasping his cessation. The second followed hard, the return of the shimmering air and the breathless, liquid transition the star man's gift imparted.
We stood back in the Shillingworth manor library, by all appearances only minutes after we left. Night still darkened the windows. In the fireplace Passepartout's two fresh Yule logs, the decorations still visible, had just begun to burn. The time we spent elsewhere had not passed here.
We've made a bold stroke against the League tonight, but there shall be a price to pay, and soon. The League has the technology to strike quickly and forcefully almost anywhere. Fogg insisted we all arm ourselves with loaded pistols. He gave me one as long as my forearm for the bedside table. "We'll shoot it off in the morning, if nothing else," he says. Apparently the English discharge weapons on Christmas Day. . . or perhaps he means a League arrival.
Fogg and Rebecca guard his son in the nursery and catch what sleep they can. Passepartout warms milk in the kitchen and I suspect prepares weapons and supplies for the morning. I've taken a room next the nursery and leave my door ajar, just in case.
I am skeptical the Count suffered any serious damage. He resurfaces again and again, buoyant as refuse in fetid water. And I regret I had no opportunity to ascertain Garridan's death, as Rebecca doubts she delivered a mortal stroke. If Gregory values him, he may well return.
Jean promises to write an account of their first trip for my perusal. We must know how this came to pass and if, God forbid, it shall happen again. In the meantime the star man's gift lays next my candle, bound in my shirt to prevent a spin. When that ethereal creature tendered it to me, I thought it filled with information or possibly a communications device. Passepartout and I tried every energy and chemical test imaginable with no results. Now a simple wish has activated it and we regard it with unholy fear. Would I have refused this legacy if I'd known of tonight's events? Could I have resisted knowing where it would lead? I question myself even now. Although the star man looked an angel, could it have been a devil in disguise?
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