As Brisden moved away to sit on the bed, we took his position behind the desk. Lying on the seat of the chair, like some discarded heap of pink leather, was a wrinkled pile of flesh, resting upon the Doctor's empty clothes. There were two dark eye sockets and an opening where his mouth had been. Perhaps the most gruesome detail of all was the indistinguishable area that still held his beard.
Anotine and Nunnly stepped away, both of them in shock. I meant to follow, but as I turned, I noticed something was scrawled on one page of the notebook. The writing was nearly illegible and moved in a downward slant across the page. I leaned over and made out the message. "Shell in pocket" it said.
It was necessary to step away for a few minutes before I could work up enough courage to disturb the pitiful remains. Brisden was lying back on the bed, whispering to himself at lightning speed. Anotine and Nunnly both had found places against the wall, where they had leaned back and sunk down to cover their faces with their hands. Their crying and Bris-den's babble was enough to make me insane. In addition, I played out in my mind the scenario of the Doctor's last minute. As his insides were drawn out of him, bones splintering and brain becoming oatmeal, he had the courage to lift his pen and try to help us.
I shook my head, then returned to the chair to retrieve the shell. When I pulled on a trouser leg to expose the pocket from beneath the heap of flesh, the mess came with it and spilled onto the floor. The sound of it hitting made me dizzy. I wasted no time in fishing in the pocket and bringing out the canister. Once I had it in my hand, I backed away from the desk and shouted to the others in a voice cracking with fear. "Now, let's go!"
I went around the room and, using my foot, nudged everyone sharply and ordered them to move. Anotine was the first to come around, and she helped me rouse Brisden and Nunnly. Before we could leave, Brisden insisted that he take the glass jar of ocean as something to stand in as a symbolic presence we would now find difficult continuing without. Once he had it in his hands, we dashed down the hallway and out into the village. Anotine led us through the passage ways, and I was last, using my spear to prod Brisden in the rear end when he tried to slow down. Our flight was a nightmare, and at every turn I expected to see the gaping maw of the Delicate. Though I had only been told about it, it was now more real to me than anything I could remember.
20
Brisden kept to his own plan and was well into a pint of Tears In The River. He sat at the small table in the back of the room, the signal gun resting in his lap, staring into the glowing ocean sample he had retrieved from the Doctor's. Nunnly was in the chair opposite, following the trail of smoke that rose from his cigarette. I stood by the entrance, looking down the steps and across the moonlit terrace below for any signs of movement while Anotine sat cross-legged on the brown rug, her spear lying next to her and the black box in her hand. No one had bothered to light the spire lamps when twilight gave itself up to darkness. No one had spoken since our return. The loss of the Doctor had left us weak, our mourning compounded with the other impossible elements of our predicament.
As I stood guard, I thought about Hellman and how incredibly I missed him. He had been more vibrant than many of the people I had known on a daily basis back in Wenau. It came to me in the midst of my vigil that he had to be, no more, no less, than some manifestation of Below's personality. I had a hard time reconciling this. In fact, all of my companions on the island were first-rate human beings. Was there an aspect of the Master I had missed? I supposed that everyone, even the most heinous of criminals, could think himself, in some way, righteous and good. This type of delusion could have been the impetus for the creation of the four moral souls I had met, or perhaps Below did harbor a positive side.
It was all too confusing to consider, especially in light of the fact that our time was quickly running out. The sound of the island disappearing had grown stronger since our foray to the Doctor's. What was quickly becoming evident through our siege was that the Delicate was too smart to enter a room full of armed enemies. His plan became clear to me—draw us out into the night, separate us, and devour us one at a time. I had a sense from the little I knew that he was patient and methodical, perfect attributes for a beast of prey.
I hated to have to implicate the others in my decision, but without taking action at this point we had absolutely no chance of survival. It was obvious that we would have to do exactly what the Delicate wanted. As I turned back into the room, I found Nunnly standing behind me, spear in hand.
"Let's go," he said, and one look into his eyes told me we had reached the same conclusion in our thinking.
Anotine got up and came over to join us.
"Stay here with Brisden. Nunnly and I are going to try to lead the Delicate back to the room. As the Doctor said, we don't know what he is capable of. I think we have a better chance of taking him here with all of us working together," I told her.
"I want to go," she said.
"I want you to, but someone has to be ready to charge the trap when we lead him through the door. You're the only one who knows how to work the box."
She reluctantly nodded.
Nunnly leaned over to her and whispered. "Get the signal gun away from Bris. He's more of a danger with that thing to himself and us than to the Delicate."
"Forget about what we discussed earlier," I said. "If the creature comes through the entrance and the trap doesn't work, shoot it. We'll have to risk damaging its face."
"I know what to do," she said. She kissed me, then went back to sit on the rug.
"Someday you will have to explain that lip maneuver to me," said Nunnly as we stepped out into the night.
In addition to the spears we carried, I also had the Lady Claw secreted away in my boot with a piece of sponge protecting the blade. I almost relished the idea of getting in close to our nemesis and practicing some of my old technique. Even considering the dexterity I had lost since my renouncing the mantle of Physiognomist, I was confident I could surgically fillet the bastard with a few passes.
A strong breeze now blew in toward the center of the island, a phenomenon caused, no doubt, by the disintegration at the edges. The noise from out there where the wood was rapidly falling into nothing was a constant distraction. We moved along cautiously, keeping close to the walls of the rooms where the shadows were thickest, communicating only with hand signals and the merest whispers. At one point Nunnly proposed that we not move too far away from Ano-tine's room, but that we should think of it as the center of a circle, and our wandering should not exceed a modest circumference. With this tactic, we would always be the same distance from it. I agreed, seeing that we were only trying to attract the Delicate. Neither of us thought it feasible that we could actually hunt him down.
After following this strategy for over an hour, having made at least ten orbits around our point of departure, we had ceased whispering and now spoke in normal tones. The anxiety that had accompanied us at the start had all but diffused, and Nunnly made the suggestion that we might have been too stealthy.
"I think we need to be more obvious, Cley," he said.
"Should we split up?" I asked.
"Not completely, but we should make it appear as if we have," he said. "You know the course we've been following. Stay on it, but I will follow twenty yards behind you. This way if he shows up, well still be close enough to come to each other's rescue."
"If that should happen, try not to engage him, but instead lead him back to the room," I said.