Anathema, page 19
The masts were named, as one moved from bow to stern, the fore, main and mizzen. At the rear of the ship, the poop deck formed the roof of the rear house, or captain’s cabin, and was six feet higher than the main deck. On the poop deck sat the wheelhouse.
“When I tell you to take to the poop deck, you’ll know what the blazes I’m talking about,” Quinn said. “Grab the torches.”
I glanced up at the sky, where dark clouds had now blanketed the sun. Quinn pulled two torches from the trunk. He took out a match, lit mine, and I in turn, lit Joe’s.
We descended through the forward hatch, down the stairway and into a long, dim corridor. Doors were spaced along both the right and left side. The corridor smelled faintly of oil. The right wall was painted with a black liquid. “Last owners tried oil of coal to kill the rot, but it obviously didn’t take.”
“Are there rats aboard?” Prudence asked.
“Maybe a straggler here and there, but there’s nothing aboard to eat.”
“Bring those miner’s lamps down here.”
Joe and I did so. Quinn directed their placement on either side of the corridor. When we were finished, he opened a door in the hallway. “The galley,” he explained. “We removed two massive cast iron stoves, along with tin sinks, metal plates, forks, spoons, knives, pots, pans. Be surprised what that scrap metal is worth.”
I had never thought about the value of scrap metal, but offered a knowing nod.
We reached the amidships stairs. Quinn pointed up at the planks Kurt installed. “Give the bloody bastard only one way in.” He turned to face us. “And no way out!” he roared.
It occurred to me that our leader was the sort of larger-than-life character that might be found in a dime novel titled The Treasure of the Golden Scarab. I wondered if his bravado was genuine, or simply a facade to keep doubt at bay.
“Tomorrow morning at dawn we head up to the Dead Horse Valley.” He turned to me. “Andrews, you will oversee the straw man crew. Joe and I can handle getting our hands on the blasted spawn, stuff it in a sea shroud and lug it back here. If Fausta’s theory is correct, the beast will follow us,” Quinn said. “We put the chrysalis in this cabin. Beast comes down that stairwell, and we let loose with the Howdah, Colt, and the harpoons. It can’t survive that fusillade.”
Quinn waved a big mitt in my direction. “You best remain on the tug when the battle begins. Joe and I can handle what needs to be done.”
“Whatever is best,” I replied. Given my own reticence about the physical aspects of this quest, I had no quarrel with this demotion.
Quinn opened the door to the end cabin. “Soon as we dispense of momma, we take care of baby. If it happens to hatch while we’re busy, well, it isn’t going anywhere. Then we sink the ship and head back to shore.”
“How do we sink the ship?” I asked, curious how that might be accomplished.
We followed Quinn to the stairwell that sat at the midpoint of the corridor and descended one level. We arrived at a dim, cavernous, empty space. The light from our torches danced off the heavy beams overhead.
“The cargo hold, is it not?” I offered, for it looked exactly like the hold of the Ceres, only wider and longer.
“That it is,” Quinn answered.
He led us to the bow area, where numerous rusted canisters were stacked. Oil glistened on the floor. “We took out everything of value except these. They’re rotted and leaking. Not worth the trouble to save,” he explained. “Paraffin oil, as the Brits call it. Carbon oil to us.”
Numerous bales of bundled rags were stacked against the stern wall but Quinn made no mention of their presence.
We descended the final stairwell into the bowels of the ship. Brackish, black water had already covered the last two steps. The walls of this space curved downward, consistent with the shape of the hull.
“Below the water line here,” he explained.
“Why is the ship taking on water?” I asked.
“We stripped off the hull copper in dry dock,” Quinn explained, leaning over my shoulder. “Caulking is shot, too. She’s gonna sink of her own accord, but we’ll hasten that by opening the sea cock.” He pointed at a large fitting protruding from the hull floor.
“Sea cock?”
“A valve that lets sea water in.”
“Why would one let sea water into the hull?”
“On long voyages the crew might keep fish in a tank for food. Or they might need water in a hurry if there were a fire on board. Sea water would feed into a fire pump through a canvas hose,” Prudence explained. I found this all interesting, having no previous understanding of how a large ship operated.
Quinn pointed to what looked like a large water closet at the bow end. “We salvaged the bilge pump and stuffed the opening with baling. Water’s leaking in there, too.”
A crack of lightning, as powerful as a cannon shot, shook the very timbers of the ship. “Storms blow in quick off the ocean,” Quinn said. “Best be on our way.”
We trudged upward to the main corridor. Rain drummed furiously against the roof. I then beheld a remarkable sight. A single rat scampered along the wall of the corridor, its tail whipping, a behavior I understood meant distress in our own lab rats.
My flesh crept. Unlike the stampede on the Ceres, which came upon us with such fury that we could not react, the sight of a single vermin escaping the ship—not normally a cause for alarm—was at this moment akin to the minute hand of a clock moving inexorably toward some appointed and feared event.
Prudence grabbed my arm. “You are thinking the same as I?”
“Anathema is near.”
Quinn’s face screwed tightly, as though barely able to control his fury. “We must be smart about this,” I cautioned but Quinn raced down the corridor, as though he could not wait to commence the battle.
“No!” I shouted.
We followed. At the stairwell, I nudged Prudence against the wall. “Stay here.” I climbed the stairs and exited onto the rain-swept deck.
We stood in front of the foremast and stared the length of the ship. Quinn extended his saber. Joe and I stood several steps behind them. “Show yourself, you bloody bastard?” Quinn roared.
I scanned the deck but did not see our quarry. “It must be here!” I shouted.
Lightning flashed and revealed a dark form hugging the main mast, ten feet above the deck. “There!” I shouted. The creature sprang onto the roof of the amidships cabin.
Amazed and terrified at the sight of what I had only previously imagined, my heart throbbed and filled my ears with the deafening rush of my own blood. My first impression was Anathema was an enormous scorpion. I quickly realized this was not the case. What I had mistakenly identified as the “killing arm” was, in fact, a long tail that lashed to and fro and added considerable length to Anathema.
Anathema’s rear legs were disproportionately large and enabled it to walk in what I would describe as a crouch. Rain glistened on the carapace that covered its thorax and I understood how Caleb Mott might think it an armored warrior. However, contrary to his description, Anathema was not black, but rather a deep, almost metallic, bronze.
Quinn broke toward the gunnysack. The monstrous entity vaulted across the width of the deck and lowered its thorax. Its tail curled high and jabbed at Quinn with blinding speed.
The rotted wood collapsed beneath Quinn’s feet and he disappeared into a gaping hole in the deck. In a chilling instant that intensified my horror, Anathema turned its attention toward Joe and I. It stalked forward, using multiple thin antennae to probe the deck beneath and the space ahead.
Three longitudinal ridges of cartilage accented Anathema’s large, triangular head. The top of the skull was covered with another carapace that formed a brow, beneath which sat a narrow, dark horizontal slit, within which I assumed the beast’s eyes were located.
I honestly could not tell if we faced an insect or reptile, as though nature had conspired to take the most functional aspects of both. The organism was sleek, suggesting an elegant combination of form and function. A primordial presence, it had evolved for speed and agility, rather than raw power.
As I calculated how many steps Joe or I could take before being impaled by the deadly tail, Prudence stepped out of the stairwell. She beheld the horror and loosed a scream. Anathema whirled in her direction. Time stood still as we waited for the beast’s next move.
It did not strike at Prudence, but instead rose out of its crouch to a nearly upright position and extended its leathery wings wide. In that instant, the abomination did truly resemble Deidra’s fanciful dragon.
The familiar, hostile hiss sounded and a long, thick flexible muscle snapped out of the monster’s mouth and quickly withdrew. This was undoubtedly the siphon organ that withdrew blood from unfortunate victims.
The entire display was common in the natural world, intended to assert dominance.
The nightmarish apparition whirled, and with four long strides, disappeared over the gunwale. I had never witnessed any animal move with such fluid rapidity.
Slack-jawed, I stood motionless in the rain until Joe slapped me on the shoulder. Prudence was soon at my side, pressing her body against me.
“Ma-aafatu,” Joe said softly.
“It is something out of a nightmare,” Prudence murmured.
Roused from my stunned state, I remembered our leader. “Quinn!”
We stared down into the gaping hole in the deck and called Quinn’s name at the top of our lungs. He did not respond. Prudence pulled me back from the edge. “We must retrieve his body.”
We hustled down the stairway and closed the hatch behind us. The respite from the rain was heartening. We stood in the corridor, dripping wet.
“What is beyond these walls?” I asked Joe and banged on the wall.
“Space between wall and hull.”
“Joe, you must lower me into the hole.”
We opened the hatch and peeked out. The rain had dwindled considerably as the storm’s fury passed. “I am certain the beast has departed,” I said. “It could have attacked but did not.”
We exited onto the deck. Joe grabbed a coiled rope lying near the main mast. “I guess there’s no salvage value in rope,” Prudence said and forced a smile. “I pray Quinn was merely knocked senseless in the fall.”
“I pray that be so. I could not tell if the tail struck him. If it did, he will not survive.”
Joe wrapped the rope about my waist with the familiar bowline hitch. He looped the free end of the rope around the foremast and leaned backward, tensing the rope. I glanced at Joe, who nodded. The rope tightened about my chest and I began my descent.
After fifteen feet, I found Quinn crumpled between two massive ribs of the hull. I immediately checked his pulse and was gratified to find it, faint but steady, at forty beats a minute. Blood seeped from a wound in his scalp. I quickly checked to see if there was any sign of a puncture wound in his clothes, but found none.
“He lives!” I called out and pulled the saber free from his hand. I removed the rope from my waist and looped it around Quinn’s. Several strong yanks signaled Joe and Quinn’s inert body rose. The ribs of the hull stretched off into the darkness on either side of me.
A moment later, the rope dangled in front of me. I grabbed Quinn’s saber, placed the rope loop upon my waist and tugged. Back on deck, I removed the rope from my waist.
“I’ll stoke the boiler. You two prepare to lower Quinn.” I placed the saber inside the gunnysack and slung it over my shoulder. I clambered down the rope ladder and immediately set about my task. Once the fire was roaring, I exited onto the rear platform of the tug.
Prudence descended and together we waited as Joe lowered Quinn’s rope-trussed body into our waiting arms. We laid him on the floor of the cabin. Another check of his vitals indicated that he still lived.
I tapped the pressure gauge with my finger, imitating Quinn. “Anchor!” I shouted and Joe trundled the windlass, then released the mooring rope.
I pushed the brass lever forward and several moments later, the paddles churned. Joe made his way back to the cabin. After a few stops and starts, I finally had the bow of the tug pointed directly at the harbor lights.
Prudence appeared alongside me. She had found one of Quinn’s greasy shirts and pulled it on. Her torso was lost inside it, the sleeves extending past her hands. Warmth radiated from the boiler and her shivering ceased. “Will Quinn survive?”
“I believe so,” I replied, but in truth could only hope for the best.
“What if he can no longer lead us?”
I swallowed hard with the grim knowledge that, like the lights of Madaket harbor, our final confrontation, with or without Quinn, drew inexorably closer.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
“What happened?” Fausta exclaimed as Joe and I carried Quinn inside.
“Anathema. Aboard the Jefferson,” I answered.
Deidra sucked in a breath. “Is he alive?”
“Yes,” I responded.
Fausta headed toward the stairs. “Place him in the spare bedroom.”
When we had situated our injured friend on the bed, I examined his pupils, then checked his pulse. “His condition is unchanged.” I felt his forehead. “He is feverish. We must determine if he was stung.”
I found no puncture in his clothing. “Remove his boots and socks,” I instructed, and when that was done, a festering sore was revealed on his right ankle.
I examined his boot and found the hole where the talon penetrated. “The thick leather absorbed much of the force.”
Fausta knelt and studied the wound. “Deidra, bring me the suction.” She glanced up at me. “We must remove as much poison as possible.”
When Deidra arrived with the suction device, Fausta inverted the flared glass end over the wound and squeezed the rubber bulb several times to form a vacuum. “Here,” she said, “the poison comes.”
When the poison stopped seeping, she deftly turned the glass over and held it to the light. A thin glaze of yellowish liquid coated the glass. She handed it to me. “I assume you will want to retain a sample for your analysis.”
“My satchel is in the parlor,” I said to Prudence. “Could you fetch it?”
Prudence hustled off. I turned to Fausta. “We must discuss this turn of events.”
Deidra had moved closer to the bed. “Is it indeed a dragon?”
“For an instant, it did resemble what many have imagined a dragon to be.”
Prudence returned with my satchel. I removed my Coddington magnifier and examined the wound. A distinct puncture was visible within the swelling, but hardly the depth suffered by the other victims. “Quinn was lucky, for the poison was not injected deep into his muscle, unlike poor Wilson.”
“Deidra, gather hot water and a towel. Clean and bandage the wound on his forehead.”
Fausta tugged me by the shirt. “A poultice will aid his recovery.” We took the stairs down to the first floor and into her study.
“What shall you use?”
“Bamboo salt made by roasting salt and mud within a bamboo shoot. It is a very effective drawing salve for snake venom.” She removed a bottle from the cabinet and poured salt into the mortar.
“You do not agree with carbolic acid?” I asked as she mixed the salt with a few drops of oil to make a paste.
“Not a natural remedy, even though Lister places great value in it. How did the organism end up on the ship? Most curious, is it not?”
We returned to the bedroom. I watched as Fausta applied the poultice to the wound. “We can do nothing more for him at the moment.”
We repaired to the dining room. Deidra and Prudence bustled about and in short order the table was set. Fausta removed the lid from the tangine. “Lamb, potatoes and carrots. Fresh baked pumpernickel bread. We had prepared it in anticipation of your safe return.”
The feast’s aroma was truly wondrous. I was famished.
Fausta, as usual, led the conversation. “Yet another meeting with our foe. Have we learned anything new?”
“We have expanded our knowledge,” I replied. “It does leap with amazing agility, as you surmised. It can stand upright but drops its thorax low so the tail may strike from above.”
“It is quite menacing in its appearance,” Prudence added. “Its size alone gives rise to alarm. The wings are large and bat-like.”
“The siphon organ is long and flexible,” I added.
“Anything else of its behavior?” Fausta inquired.
“It is aquatic,” I responded. “It disappeared over the gunwale into the ocean.”
Fausta nodded. “All these details, taken together, suggest a formidable foe.”
I touched my napkin to my lips and set it aside. “There is another behavior we should note. When Prudence exited onto the deck, Anathema did not attack her, but chose instead a display of dominance.”
“It also did not attack when I entered the music room,” Prudence added.
“Could it be Anathema sees a woman as a competitor?” I asked. “This is the usual meaning of such a display in nature.”
“Competitor for what?” Deidra asked.
“Men, obviously,” I replied. The others glanced at me. “It has only attacked men thus far.”
“A possible explanation, but one that we need not dwell upon now, although its implications are most interesting.” Fausta reached out and touched Prudence’s arm. “Remember, the display is a prelude to outright aggression. If you threaten the creature, it will not hesitate to attack you.”
She squeezed lemon into her tea and licked the tips of her fingers. “I have a thought concerning why bodies were not found aboard the Ceres. Among bees, there are those who are hygienic, and therefore predisposed to rid their hive of fellow bees that die or are diseased. This tendency has been recorded on several occasions. Likewise, our foe has the same tendency, for it looks upon the vessel as its hive or nest, so to speak.”
