shivered with unease as he stood in the plain hallway of the Tower, knowing that somewhere nearby was the largest collection of magical writings gathered in one place outside the Vatican, and that amongst them would be many rituals for the raising and dispatching of creatures like himself. He was not the conventional stuff of which familiars were made, of course. Most were simpering, mindless functionaries, plucked by their summoners from the In Ovo - the space between the Fifth and the Reconciled Dominions - like a lobster from a restaurant tank. He, on the other hand, had been a professional actor in his time; and fêted for it. It wasn’t congenital stupidity that had made him susceptible to human jurisdiction, it was anguish. He’d seen the face of Hapexamendios Himself, and half-crazed by the sight had been unable to resist the summons, and the binding, when it came. His invoker had of course been Joshua Godolphin, and he’d commanded Dowd to serve his line until the end of time. In fact, Joshua’s retirement to the safety of his estate had freed Dowd to wander until the old man’s demise, when he was drawn back to offer his services to Joshua’s son Nathaniel, only revealing his true nature once he’d made himself indispensable, for fear he was trapped between his bounden duty and the zeal of a Christian.
In fact Nathaniel had grown into a dissolute of considerable proportions by the time Dowd entered his employ, and could not have cared less what kind of creature Dowd was as long as he procured the right kind of company. And so it had gone on, generation after generation, Dowd changing his face on occasion (a simple trick, or feit) so as to conceal his longevity from the withering human world. But the possibility that one day his double-dealing would be discovered by the Tabula Rasa, and they would search through their library and find some vicious sway to destroy him, never entirely left his calculations. Especially now, waiting for the call into their presence.
That call was an hour and a half in coming, during which time he distracted himself thinking about the shows that were opening in the coming week. Theatre remained his great love, and there was scarcely a production of any significance he failed to see. On the following Tuesday he had tickets for the much-acclaimed Lear at the National, and then two days later a seat in the stalls for the revival of Turandot at the Coliseum. Much to look forward to, once this wretched interview was over.
At last the lift hummed into life and one of the Society’s younger members, Giles Bloxham, appeared. At forty, Bloxham looked twice that age. It took a kind of genius, Godolphin had once remarked when talking about Bloxham (he liked to report on the absurdities of the Society, particularly when he was in his cups) to look so dissipated and have nothing to regret for it.
‘We’re ready for you, now,’ Bloxham said, indicating that Dowd should join him in the lift. ‘You realize,’ he said as they ascended, ‘that if you’re ever tempted to breathe a word of what you see here the Society will eradicate you so quickly and so thoroughly your mother won’t even know you existed?’
This over-heated threat sounded ludicrous delivered in Bloxham’s nasal whine, but Dowd played the chastened functionary.
‘I perfectly understand,’ he said.
‘It’s an extraordinary step,’ Bloxham continued, ‘calling anyone who isn’t a member to a meeting. But these are extraordinary times. Not that it’s any of your business.’
‘Quite so,’ Dowd said, all innocence.
Tonight he’d take their condescension without argument, he thought, more confident by the day that something was coming that would rock this Tower to its foundations. When it did, he’d have his revenge.
The lift door opened, and Bloxham ordered Dowd to follow him. The passages that led to the main suite were stark and uncarpeted, the room he was led into the same. The drapes were drawn over all the windows, the enormous marble-topped table that dominated the room lit by overhead lamps, the wash of their light thrown up on the six members, two of them women, sitting around it. To judge by the clutter of bottles, glasses, and over-filled ashtrays, and the brooding, weary faces, they had been debating for many hours. Bloxham poured himself a glass of water, and took his place. There was one empty seat: Godolphin’s. Dowd was not invited to occupy it, but stood at the end of the table, mildly discomfited by the stares of his interrogators. There was not one face amongst them that would have been known by the populace at large. Though all of them had descended from families of wealth and influence, these were not public powers. The Society forbade any member to hold office or take as a spouse an individual who might invite or arouse the curiosity of the press. It worked in mystery, for the demise of mystery. Perhaps it was that paradox - more than any other aspect of its nature - which would finally undo it.
At the other end of the table from Dowd, sitting in front of a heap of newspapers doubtless carrying the Burke reports, sat a professorial man in his sixties, white hair oiled to his scalp. Dowd knew his name from Godolphin’s description: Hubert Shales; dubbed the Sloth by Oscar. He moved and spoke with the caution of a glass-boned theologian.
‘You know why you’re here?’ he said.
‘He knows,’ Bloxham put in.
‘Some problem with Mr Godolphin?’ Dowd ventured.
‘He’s not here,’ said one of the women to Dowd’s right, her face emaciated beneath a confection of dyed black hair. Alice Tyrwhitt, Dowd guessed. ‘That’s the problem.’
‘So I see,’ Dowd said.
‘Where the hell is he?’ Bloxham demanded.
‘He’s travelling,’ Dowd replied. ‘I don’t think he anticipated a meeting.’
‘Neither did we,’ said Lionel Wakeman, flushed with the Scotch he’d imbibed, the bottle lying in the crook of his arm.
‘Where’s he travelling?’ Tyrwhitt asked. ‘It’s imperative we find him.’
‘I’m afraid I don’t know,’ Dowd said. ‘His business takes him all over the world.’
‘Anything respectable?’ Wakeman slurred.
‘He’s got a number of investments in Singapore,’ Dowd replied. ‘And in India. Would you like me to prepare a dossier? I’m sure he’d be -’
‘Bugger the dossier!’ Bloxham said. ‘We want him here! Now!’
‘I’m afraid I don’t know his precise whereabouts. Somewhere in the Far East.’
The severe but not unalluring woman to Wakeman’s left now entered the exchange, stabbing her cigarette in the ashtray as she spoke. This could only be Charlotte Feaver; Charlotte the Scarlet, as Oscar called her. She was the last of the Roxborough line, he’d said, unless she found a way to fertilize one of her girlfriends.
‘This isn’t some damn club he can visit when it fucking well suits him,’ she said.
‘That’s right,’ Wakeman put in. ‘It’s a damn poor show.’
Shales picked up one of the newspapers in front of him and pitched it down the table in Dowd’s direction.
‘I presume you’ve read about this body they found in Clerkenwell?’ he said.
‘Yes. I believe so.’
Shales paused for several seconds, his sparrow eyes going from one member to another. Whatever he was about to say, its broaching had been debated before Dowd entered.
‘We
