'Damn you, Ivan!' she said. 'Of course you can! Of course you can!' She exhaled sharply through her teeth and put her hands to her temples. 'Please. I . . . I don't want things to get worse. You can put an end to this. You can correct your mistake.'

'They will kill everyone,' said Propp.

'Oh, don't be so theatrical,' said Mr Cox. 'We gain nothing from unprovoked murder.'

'You lie. You gain silence.'

Miss DeGroot stood panting, blond cowlick bobbing with each breath. 'He has a point, Peter. Prove that you keep your promises. Cure me.'

'One does not administer the honours like a spoonful of medicine,' said Cox. 'There are protocols and proprieties and . . . '

'Yes, yes, yes, your letter explained it all quite thoroughly. Now are you going to turn me into an immortal monster or aren't you?'

Mr Cox folded his long thin arms. The figure they all seemed to think was Stokeham nodded, impassive behind the mask, then spoke through Cox: 'Mr Loosley. The box.'

CHAPTER 31.

A LITTLE MORE THAN KIN.

The scarred beast known as Mr Loosley set a small lacquered pine cabinet down in the centre of the room. The cabinet was about two feet tall, standing on four brass legs. A key winked in Loosley's dark palm. The monster unlocked the door and took out a jar.

Delphine glanced over at Mother, who sat on a piano stool, wrists bound behind her back. Mother held her right arm at a funny angle, as if she had injured it. When Delphine caught her eye, Mother nodded and raised her eyebrow. A little baffled, Delphine returned the gesture in a show of solidarity.

She tensed her wrists against their knots. Even if she got her hands free, she was hopelessly outnumbered. But what else was there to do? Needs must.

'I suggest you sit down,' said Mr Cox, tamping tobacco into the bowl of a long clay pipe.

'I'll stand,' said Miss DeGroot. She unclasped her silver necklace and dropped it on the floor, fine chain pooling round an oval pendant.

'As you wish. In your own time, Mr Loosley.'

Mr Propp began shuffling on his knees towards her. 'Patience. No.'

Loosley stepped forward and struck Propp across the jaw. On the settee, Alice let out a whimper. Propp moaned.

Loosley backed away from Propp, snarling, and unstoppered the jar. Delphine watched, her mouth gummy. Nothing happened. She squinted. Iridescent in the air above the jar, a butterfly.

No, a hornet.

It bobbed fatly, wings shimmering in the hearth light. It was the biggest she had ever seen. Delphine blinked, her eyes dry and sore from staring. When she looked again, Loosley was smearing a lard-like substance on Miss DeGroot's neck, dipping a claw-hand into a small earthenware pot. Loosley put the lid back on the pot, wiped its hand on a purple handkerchief, and retreated.

The hornet emitted an oscillating drone as it swayed in thermals above the fireplace. It was huge, big as a hummingbird. Delphine felt sick.

Miss DeGroot closed her eyes and tilted her head back. Moving in broad, lazy sweeps, the hornet drew closer. It landed on her throat. She gasped.

The hornet dipped its proboscis into the thick white paste. The entire banqueting hall fell silent, forty vesperi watching with what might have been reverence, or terror, or both. Delphine curled her toes inside her stockings. The roots of her hair tingled, and an unpleasant tickling sensation ran across her forearms. The huge hornet twitched its wings.

It plunged its stinger into Miss DeGroot's neck.

In the fluctuating light of the fire, Delphine swore she saw the hornet's black abdomen pumping obscenely. The hornet withdrew its stinger and flew away, reeling, love-drunk. Loosley swung the jar overarm, caught it and jammed the stopper back in.

Miss DeGroot rubbed the spot where she had been stung. She smiled woozily.

'Well, now . . . that wasn't so bad.'

Mr Cox exhaled a wreath of pipesmoke. Miss DeGroot rested a palm against the fireplace. Her other hand went to her throat. She took a couple of convulsive, clucking gulps. Her lips worked, purpling. She grasped at the air, pivoted and fell, cracking her head on the wall as she went. She writhed. She stopped moving.

'I did tell her to sit down,' said Mr Cox. He turned to Propp. 'People are so very poor at acting in their best interests. A kind of bloodymindedness, wouldn't you say, Ivan?'

'Stop this.'

Loosley belted Propp with a claw-hand.

'Do not! Look! At the herald!' Cox was screaming in Propp's ear.

Propp spat clotted blood. He turned to Stokeham.

'Please,' he said, a red droplet running from a cut beneath his eye. 'No more.'

'Where is the child?' said Cox.

'I told you. I do not know. I sent her far away.'

'This.' As Cox spoke, the masked Stokeham held up an index finger. 'This is precisely what I mean. I give you every opportunity to end our mutual suffering to save lives, no less and instead you play games. Ivan, please.' Cox and Stokeham's gestures began mirroring each other. The beakmask swayed left and right, unreadable. 'I know she was here just yesterday your "dear friend",' they both gestured to Miss DeGroot prostrate by the skirting board, 'told me so. We've been chatting for some time. Do you know,' Cox and Stokeham turned to the rest of the captives, 'he tried to fake his own suicide? Fired a shot just before Mr Loosley broke the door down. Red candlewax, here,' Cox drew a snaking line down his forehead, Stokeham tracing a finger between the mask's red lenses, 'then sat himself slumped in a wheelchair, as if he'd blown his brains out. Everything he does is theatre.' The pair turned back to Propp. 'You simply cannot help but lie. You are an incorrigible mountebank.'

Propp raised his eyes piously. 'I am dance teacher.'

'Your impertinence will be the death of you, boy. I will not permit a tealeaf-reading gypsy to dictate terms to me under my own roof. Presently my staff are searching the Hall room by room. There can be no hiding place because I built every one of them.'

'Well, you didn't think to look in the tunnels!'

Everyone in the room turned to stare at Delphine.

Mr Cox raised an eyebrow. He began marching towards her, vesperi dividing to let him through. Behind him, the birdmask swivelled, turning its tinted sockets upon her. A cold sickness spread from her chest into her throat. Stokeham gestured and Cox spoke: 'What did you say?'

'I said you didn't think to check the tunnels, did you?' But already her bravado was dying in her throat. 'I got out and I got back in.'

Cox stopped in front of her. 'Who is this?'

'Leave her alone!' said Mother. 'For pity's sake, she's just a child.'

Delphine stared into Mr Cox's cobalt-blue eyes. His face was sharp and young. Even his wart gleamed.

'My name is Delphine Venner,' she said, 'and when my father finds you, he '

'Don't look at the herald!' Cox lunged at her, flecks of spit peppering her cheeks. 'Look at me, damn your eyes!' Stokeham punctuated each of Cox's syllables with a boot stamp. 'Look! At! Me!' Mr Loosley was striding across the banqueting hall towards Delphine.

'No!' Mother rocked forward on the piano stool. 'Don't you dare touch her!'

'Enough!' Cox silenced the room with a flourish of his arms. Mr Loosley stopped. Cox turned, walked back towards Propp. 'Enough of this, this . . . circus. Ivan, you will tell me where the child is. I will execute one of your followers every ten minutes until you do.'

Gasps and moans from the guests. Alice the maid began chattering hysterically.

'You can't do this!' cried one of the gentlemen guests. His ceramic dentures sat oddly in his mouth, adding a slurping sibilance to his speech. 'My editors expect me to place a phone call at ten p.m. precisely. If they don't hear from me, they'll know something's afoot and call for the police.'

'Perhaps you doubt my resolve,' said Cox. 'Mr Loosley,' Stokeham clapped hands at the monstrous valet, 'bring in that feckless son of mine.'

Mr Loosley left the room with two vesperi. They returned dragging Lord Alderberen. He had been stripped to the waist. His doughy bluish skin was patterned with damson welts and black bruises. His trousers were torn. He sobbed dryly.

The vesperi dumped Lord Alderberen at the boots of Stokeham.

'Dear friend,' said Propp, looking up into the beakmask. 'Please. Show your face. Speak to me. Not to talk through puppet.'

Mr Cox breathed, glowering. 'Your request for unmediated contact disgusts me. You don't understand at all, do you? This is precisely why you would never have received the honours. Ah, come now, don't look so shocked. Isn't that what this is all about? What other bounty would make kidnapping my daughter worth the risk?' Mr Loosley rolled up its cuffs, exposing lean, mutilated forearms. 'Anything to keep your marrow from the maggots, eh?' Slap. 'Admit it, damn you!' Slap. 'Admit it!'

Cox and Loosley backed away. Cox was panting. 'Dogs like you have brought this once-glorious country to its knees. England used to treat the world as a master treats his hounds. Our justice was swift, dispassionate. Now we're down in the kennels, fighting over scraps. Our finest men died on the battlefields of Europe, and in their place rise cabals of cosmopolitan adventurers: rats who scurry and pilfer but know neither the harrow nor the sword. Even now, the great rural estates are fading, the powerhouses of northern industry, and little lanterns of Britishness gutter and snuff in India, Ireland and the Orient.

'Well. I bring a new way. Mr Loosley.'

The two vesperi grabbed Lord Alderberen by his bare arms and wrenched him up onto his knees. Delphine was surprised at their strength. Lord Alderberen's face was wet. They turned him towards Stokeham.

'Look at you.' Cox spat the words. 'It sickens me to think I once called you my son.'

The sturdy buttons of Stokeham's overcoat gleamed as the beak-mask regarded a rumpled, greyblue old man. Lord Alderberen moaned.

'Stokeham blood finds its truest expression in you, Lazarus. Cowardice is the family's Habsburg jaw. Your whole line has been a failure, culminating with that supreme defective, Arthur. Smothering him in his crib would have been a mercy. For dogs like you and Ivan, death is a mercy.'

Stokeham clapped. Mr Loosley unhooked a duelling pistol from his belt, uncapped a powder horn and tapped out some gunpowder.

'No!' Delphine jerked forward, kicking and scrambling. Three vesperi turned, their eyes widening. One drew its dagger; the other two grabbed her shoulders, their thin fingers biting into her flesh. She tried to wrench loose but they dragged her back down, chair legs creaking beneath her. 'Don't do it!'

Loosley withdrew the cleaning rod and slid it back into place under the barrel.

'You can stop this, Ivan,' said Cox. He took a puff on his pipe. 'Where is the girl?'

'Oh!' Propp rolled his head. 'No, no, no . . . He did not know. It is not his fault.'

'Where is the girl?'

Loosley took five paces back, raised the gun.

'No,' said Propp. 'Shoot me. He is your son. Take me.'

'The girl, Ivan.'

Lord Alderberen tried to twist his head away. His false teeth were missing; he babbled, smacking his gums. His upper lip retreated into his skull.

'You will regret,' said Propp. 'For as long as you live, you will regret.'

'Regrets die,' said Cox. 'I am for ever.'

Stokeham turned to face the door. Mr Cox took a step back. Against the glow of the fire, he became a silhouette.

'Don't!' said Delphine.

Propp closed his eyes.

Lord Alderberen breathed a single word: 'Mercy.'

CHAPTER 32.

THE ISLE IS FULL OF NOISES.

Gideon Venner was very ill.

Half-deranged, he walked weightlessly through empty corridors. The sling round his shoulders jankled with fire-bombs: turps-filled milk bottles stuffed with rag wicks. He sloshed turpentine over the rug as he went. Arthur had explained. There were 7s in everything. He was setting them free.

The carpet felt cool beneath his bare feet. Its pattern of orange swirls pointed the way. Doors hung torn from their hinges. He walked into the library. Books had crawled from the shelves and lay scattered across the floor like strange, beached crustaceans. Ripped pages quivered in the breeze from the jagged window. Spines scintillated in the moonlight.

He lit a firebomb. Smoke rose in dirty yellow twists. He held it above his head. He was the sun. Shadows stretched and swung. He looked up and watched smoke fold against the ceiling's sunken panels. He was upside-down and the smoke was falling darkness pouring out of him.

A mosaic showed Arthur slaughtering a bull. Gideon planted his heels and threw the milk bottle.

Glass broke with a high sweet note. Golden ivy bloomed up the wall, dripped onto the floor, spread to the edge of the bookshelves. A wave of love burst against his skin.

Sweat soothed his forehead. His hands tingled.

There was a noise at the door. Angels had appeared. They ran towards him, their black wings spread, gabbling in one of the seven forgotten tongues of Heaven. He lit another firebomb, the wick curling shyly. He threw the bottle and the angels' dark flesh peeled away. They grew fierce new plumage, waving arms in praise of God. They were perfect. He had freed them.

He watched as they lay down to sleep, and then they were gone.

He was surrounded by light. The flames pointed to the open window, urging him to jump.

'Can't leave yet,' he said, or Arthur said, or God said. His eyes welled. He had to free everyone. He understood now.

Salty smoke bathed his wounds. He followed the path Arthur had left for him between the flames.