Now what?
He was standing in the street, outside the Hallmark card shop three doors along from his flat. The hazy winter night was sharpening with sporadic gusts of rain, finer than sea spray. He found it hard to believe that they were really watching him. That evening in the Holborn chamber he had only seen a few of their faces; he would remember Barwick's moley features, but none of the others. And they were only the members of the inner circle. What was it Dr Masters had said about there being as many as fifty in the League? It was clear that he had to go along with this lunacy, at least until he figured out if they were just trying to scare him, or whether they really meant business.
He tried to recall his arrangement with Pam tonight. They were going to eat, then meet up with Louie, who was heading for a gig at the Jazz Café with some people from college. If he didn't show up she'd be annoyed with him, and might think it odd. Failure to appear was pretty normal behaviour within their group but Vince was known for reliability. He should have told her about the letter. Now it was too late. The rules forbade him from calling her back. He could feel the panic of indecision setting in.
Concentrate on the problem instead, he decided. Look at the key.
He studied the numbers again.
12 and 18371901.
They meant nothing to him. Serial numbers for a standard key, the key to anything from a bicycle lock to a petty-cash box. Big deal.
If he was going to get through this, he knew he would have to start thinking like Sebastian.
'Hey Vince, you okay, man?'
There was a crash behind him as Mr Javneesh pulled down the shutter of the card shop window. He had installed a new display of birthday cards that celebrated the recipient's year of birth. Each card had a montage of that year's events depicted on its cover, and featured the date in large black letters. 1953. 1965. 1972. He had been meaning to buy one for Pam.
'You should get inside, man. Looks like rain.' Mr Javneesh zipped up his jacket and headed off towards his car. Vince looked back at the numbers on the key. 18371901.
Could they be dates? 1837 – 1901?
Sixty-odd years. He looked back at the cards. Sixty glorious years. Queen Victoria 's reign. Victoria. His fingers gripped the key. A locker key. The left-luggage lockers at Victoria station.
He was on his way.
The litter-filled ticket hall at Tufnell Park tube station was crowded with loitering drunks and wild-haired kids. As he punched coins into the ticket machine he wondered if members of the League were watching him.
'Oi, you got any spare change?' A sixteen-year-old white boy with dreadlocked yellow hair and a blue nylon sleeping bag wrapped around his shoulders was tapping him on the back. He stared at the boy in alarm. What would happen if he replied? Would they hurt the boy? He bolted for the escalator and the safety of the underground platform, unable to shake the feeling of being monitored. There were closed circuit security cameras mounted at either end of the platform. Who was studying their screens?
Mercifully, a southbound train arrived within a minute. At Victoria he made his way through the homebound commuters and reached the racks of grey metal lockers, locating number 12 at the end nearest the platforms. Four minutes to seven.
As he fumbled with the key, he checked about him, but it was hopeless. Everyone looked suspicious. Scanning the station forecourt, he noticed more tiny black lenses peering down at him from the steel superstructure, more robot periscopes jutting from shadowed corners. Now that he thought about it, the city was filled with cameras. Traffic, security, safety. Who was watching?
The key turned smoothly, raising tumblers. Inside the locker was another envelope, identical to the first – nothing else.
He tried to tear it open, but his bitten nails would not catch under the flap. Slow down, he told himself, take it easy. You made it here in time. The station clock read 6:58 p.m. He managed to rip open the envelope and partially tore the letter inside. You've got about thirty seconds to memorise the letter before it starts falling apart.
There were two sheets of paper inside, folded in half. The first read:
Dear Vincent,
The ten members of the Inner Circle of the League of Prometheus have been allowed to set you one problem each.
Welcome to your starter challenge, posed by our youngest member, the Hon. Barnabus Hewlett. I trust you will find it easy enough to afford you some small enjoyment, and you are allowed an apéritif upon reaching its solution.
Good luck, and may the best man win.
In God And Honour,
– Sebastian
He turned to the second sheet of paper. At the top were a few neatly printed lines, three quotes, and beneath them, a piece of poetry. My God, he thought, I'll never be able to retain so much information before the paper starts to self-destruct. He hastily scanned the page.
'I don't want any music. My husband has threatened to kill me tonight.'
'She made one great mistake, possibly the greatest mistake a woman of the West can make. She married an Oriental.'
'A person who honestly believes that his life is in danger is entitled to kill his assailant if it is the only way he honestly and reasonably believes he can protect himself.'
'Mine are horrible, social ghosts -
Speeches and women and guests and hosts,
Weddings and morning calls and toasts,
In every bad variety:
Ghosts who hover about the grave
Of all that's manly, free and brave:
You'll find their names on the architrave
Of that charnel house, Society.'
Time Allocated: 1 Hour
There was nothing else.
He could smell the bitter chemicals rising from the pages. Clutching the envelope and its desiccating contents, he slammed the locker door shut and set off across the crowded concourse. His mind was swimming. He could not think lucidly, not in the way they expected him to. What if he did nothing? Would they really carry out their threats? He needed a place to sit, to clear his head.
He found an empty bench in a relatively quiet corner of the station and watched the commuters streaming past to their trains, their homes, their loved ones, oblivious to his ludicrous dilemma. They would think him deranged if he reached out to ask them for help. Everyone was guarded these days. It was absurd – how could he suddenly find himself so alone in such an immense city?
And that, Vince realised, was what Sebastian and the other members of the League had intended for him. They aimed to render him as helpless as if he had been stranded on a barren moor without a map. They planned to make an example of him, to show him up for what they felt he was, vulgar, uneducated, stupid, blind, paralysed.
Obviously, he had no choice but to thrash them. Working-class men had more logical minds, better intuition, firmer resolve, everyone knew that. Perhaps the news hadn't filtered through to Sebastian and his friends yet.
If only he believed it. Vince turned his attention to the second sheet of paper and reread the quotes, reminding himself that he was seeking a location somewhere within the city. Sebastian's personal note had already crumbled through his fingers, but the clue sheet appeared to have been treated with a milder solution. It was drying out and starting to crack, but at a much slower rate. He concentrated on the words.
'My husband has threatened to kill me…' The site of a female victim, then, something prescient she might have said, just prior to her husband attacking her, perhaps.