A Matter of Temperance (The Adventures of Ichabod Temperance Book 1) Page 3

  I don’t like talk like that.

  “You have to let the natives know who is the master. With my marksman skills, I dominate everywhere I travel. Elephant, tiger, and lion; I destroy all before me. The Darkies have certainly learned to fear my approach. Like some great white God, if I can find you in the sights of my rifle, then you belong to me.” A bit of drool appears at the corner of the superior safarian’s mouth. “With these goggles, that allow sight in dark conditions, I shall rule the night, as well as the day!”

  Oh, Goodness, this horrid man intends to use my wondrous invention for indecent purposes! Subjugation of the African populace is not what I had intended for my device. This man callously murders defenseless folks without a second thought. I think that a switch in conversation is necessary because I think I’m getting upset.

  “I read your interview with Miss Plumtartt, sir. That poor girl. I have heard nice things about her and how clever she is at the running of the Plumtartt assets. I don’t think she would have closed the factories unless she was sure there was a serious problem. Do you think she is getting a fair shake from your article?”

  Spraying our table with spittle Sir Henry explodes into guffaws of mean-spirited laughter.

  “That hysterical little high bred wench? Ho, ho, if only you could have seen how easily I manipulated that buxom bird. I can trick a little twist like that into doing my bidding any time I want. This is a man’s world, boy. Even a silly little American twit like you should be able to see the folly of halting production at a vital industrial resource such as the Plumtartt facilities. That high breasted pigeon’s letting her inferior feminine intellect interfere with what’s good for the country.”

  Sir Henry is growing more repugnant. A loose lipped, and scornful smirk twists his face and his eyes glaze over in distant fantasy. I can tell by looking at him that he is envisioning Miss Plumtartt in his mind. He gives me the impression of enjoying an inappropriate imagination.

  “Mmmm, Persephone...”

  I wish he did not have that smug look on his face.

  “That little chick is off her rocker; still, she is a comely little quail...”

  ~!!!~ I was brought up to be courteous to a lady.

  “A rooster in the henhouse is what she’s wanting.”

  ~!!!~ I think I’m getting upset.

  “Yeah, I think I’m just the man to straighten that little twist.”

  ~!!!~“That’s enough, Sir.”

  “What an uppity little quim like that needs is a bit of the Ol’...”

  That is as far as Sir Henry gets before my fist plows deeply into his smugness.

  I done already popped Sir Henry before I know what I have done.

  “That ain’t no way to talk about a lady, Sir Henry!”

  I am forcibly escorted from the premises by several quick moving restaurant personnel. Before they get me out the door, I add:

  “I choose to default on the commission, Sir! I’m keeping my goggles!”

  Chapter 8 - Disturbance At The Queen’s Hotel.

  Persephone

  A bellboy of the Queen’s Hotel brings me today's newspapers from across the lobby.

  With this fresh information, and what I have already learned about the ghost attacks, I attempt to find a pattern to the perils troubling our nation.

  “Unh!” I am seized by a horrible sense of revulsion, just like last night.

  It is the same loathsome sensation as in the laboratory and in the attack on Plumtartt Manor.

  How can this be? This is the heart of a major metropolis! Surely the horrors that pursued me in the quiet countryside of Elderberry Pond are completely out of place in this modern city! I have never known an evocation to summon something on this order. It cannot be the result of Father’s conjuration, or can it?

  There is a disturbance outside the front doors of the hotel. I hear a commotion and sounds of struggle. Now, there is shouting. The staff of the Queen’s Hotel hurry to ascertain the trouble. A bellboy ducks back in to relate: “Old Tom’s having a fit!”

  Indeed, the distinguished old doorman, who was so charming on my way in a few minutes ago, is in some sort of trouble. I cannot see well from my vantage point, yet from what I can discern, the struggle grows in intensity. The copper and crystal of the entrance is only allowing a shadowy impression of the action outside, but it seems that the old fellow is fighting his fellow employees.

  “My word!” I exclaim at the next sight I behold.

  In an unnatural display of strength, the old doorman grasps, and raises one of the bellboys above his head, and bodily throws the poor lad crashing through the ornate front doors!

  The dangerous doorman enters the wrecked portal directly behind his improvised missile, but this is not the same man who greeted me so charmingly in the minutes prior.

  Something alien is in possession of the wretched fellow’s body.

  With the orbs rolled back he looks upon me with sightless eyes.

  “Eee-Aye-rRoark!”

  The enraged entryman screeches, and lurches towards me, like a clockwork automaton whose brain gears have lost their ratio.

  With certain knowledge that the possessed doorman intends to kill me, I fly from the lobby. The terrible, wrath-filled intelligence controlling Old Tom’s body is in a determined pursuit. I run straight through the palatial dining room and into the kitchen. Behind me, I hear the turmoil caused by the gentlemanly greeter’s reckless chase trailing at my heels. There is a relentless uproar of anger, amidst the screams and bellows of outrage surrounding my pursuer wreaking unchecked havoc at my heels. His hands are as claws, slashing into wreckage table, chair, and dinnerware. I am just able to elude his grasping fingers, as I push through the confines of the kitchen and out the back door into an alley. Heedless of any direction, I blindly run, bursting out into a busy thoroughfare.

  Miraculously, I am not run down by horse or carriage in my headlong flight.

  I risk a look back.

  The stricken doorman has stopped. A heartrending howl is torn from the poor man, the first human sound he has made since being ridden by the foul spirit.

  He shakes. He rises...??? ...

  A green miasma issues from his mouth, as the depleted body falls, the thick smoke coalescing into a form I can hardly fathom.

  An unthinkable creature that has no place in our world, forms.

  Countless legs stretch into existence, and two bubbles expand, blinking open into a pair of bulbous eyes. Crammed with thousands of insectile visual receptors, these fill with life as the unthinkable abomination falls to the street, and comes for me.

  Chapter 9 - A Stroll In The Park.

  Ichabod

  Punching a Knighted newspaper reporter in the nose is probably not the wisest thing I have ever done.

  I sometimes act before I think.

  Maybe a walk through an English park, and a tug on my old clay pipe, is what I need to settle back down.

  Standing on the curb of ‘BirdCage Walk’, opposite to the entrance of the neatly laid out urban refuge, the sign informs me that this manicured meadow is Saint James Park.

  “What’s this?”

  A terrible cry is disturbing the frenzy of traffic filling the busy street.

  The source is an old gentleman in the fancy coat of a hotel doorman is in the middle of the road. Horses rear up in fright from the tortured howl. It is the worst sound I have ever heard from a grown man.

  He holds the unearthly scream long after he should have run out of breath.

  He violently spasms, with severe convulsions.

  He slowly rises into the air! ? ! ?

  An icy hand grips my heart to see this man suspended in the air. My knees turn to jelly and I almost lose consciousness at the unreality of the sight.

  A thick, green, and oily smoke pours from his body, leaving a desiccated corpse to fall to the ground.

  Green mist churns in the roiling tumult of a small emerald thunderstorm, localized just above the fellow’s remains. F
or a fraction of a second, the image congeals into a horrible nightmare. A creature from beyond imagination is briefly glimpsed in reflective silhouette, and then suddenly it is gone.

  Or is it? In a trick of the light, or my eyes, I seem to be able to catch partial, and fragmentary glimpses of shadowy movement towards the park.

  The horses certainly see it! They are all going out of their minds!

  A woman’s scream cuts the night.

  My legs have re-solidified and are already running in the direction from which came the scream before I realize what they are doing.

  Chapter 10 - No Escape.

  Persephone

  “No!”

  A chilopodal worm of enormous size, and moving with alarming speed, makes straight for me.

  I dash headlong into a city park that lies before me and across a long bridge in the middle of the erstwhile sanctuary.

  A marked and insistent, high speed, mechanical tapping compels me to turn and look back.

  The monster's countless legs, working in an unearthly coordination, beat a blood-curdling rhythm, as insectlike appendages propel the centipedal horror. The grotesquely grown grub glides across the masoned bridge to the industrial accompaniment of its cobblestone symphony.

  I cannot outrun it! The massive and wrongful form is already upon me.

  The Creature strikes!

  Chapter 11 - The Ghost.

  Ichabod

  Swift on my feet, in spite of my heavy boots, I am off like a shot.

  I know many of these English dandies kit themselves out with some interesting hardware, but I augment my defenses in the American Style, with a ‘72 Colt .45 revolver.

  The farther I run into this park, the further I get from the gaslights that line so many London streets. It is hard to see and I don’t know which direction to search. I fear that I have lost the path of the poor woman that I heard scream and her horrible pursuer.

  I have my ‘Beauties!’

  Pulling the goggles off my hat and onto my head, I spin up the generator.

  Saint James blooms into an eerie, phosphorescent green meadow. Under the ‘Green Beauties’s’ view, it is impossible not to see the hideous monster. What was invisible to me before, now glows with a sickly luminescence. I am very nearly unable to comprehend what I see. Perhaps the size of an overgrown pig, but with hundreds of insect legs, a creature that does not belong in our world is running through this London park.

  Flying along at an alarming pace, the monster kicks up a clickety-clackity, clickety-clackity ruckus from the paving like that of an automated typesetting machine. The appearance of the creature and rapidity of its hundreds of legs mesh oddly with the sounds echoing from the passage of the grotesque horror over the long bridge spanning this urban artificial lake.

  I pour all my efforts into catching and dispatching this outrageous worm, for even though I dearly love most all of our Earth’s creatures, this disgusting bug definitely does not rate consideration.

  No! I am too late! It has overtaken a woman and I won’t be there in time!

  There is a blinding flash of light! A sphere of intense energy has burst from the girl. This burns brightly for a moment, expanding out in all directions to swiftly collapse back into a bubble that surrounds the young woman.

  With this thin shield she holds the beast at bay.

  Whatever the power is that emanates from the victimized girl, her strength wanes as the creature becomes more enraged.

  I stop, aim, and put a round through the creature’s head. By head, I mean the end with the mouth: the circular, row upon row, daggertooth lined mouth, that appears equally bitey/suckey. This opening can be found beneath the two large hemispheric protuberances that are as overcrowded by fly-eyes.

  My pistol shot has no effect! The monster does not even take notice. The fanged aperture continues to push its way through the protective energy bubble in a persistent effort to bite and devour the girl.

  I put five more rounds square into the creature’s head with no result.

  This is no time to be disheartened, for the lady can barely keep the creature from latching hold.

  Drawing my Bowie knife, I pounce on the monster’s back, going into a frenzy, stabbing the foul, armoured, larva.

  Again, my weapon has no effect. The knife passes through the chitinous plate like air.

  The paramount parasite is bent on devouring this poor girl, and there ain’t nothing I can do to stop it!

  The disgusting, mouth/nozzle of the oversized demon prawn begins to apply a terrible suction towards the poor girl. I stab again and again without effect. In fact, it’s my hand, not the hilt of my Bowie, making contact with the beast. I’m gonna drop the knife and punch him. Ow, that hurt. I’m gonna jump off and give him a kick!

  “I felt it! That was a good lick! All right, big boy, there’s more where that came from! Un, unh, unh! How do you like them apples?! Uh oh, I guess I got what I wanted. You have turned from the girl to me.”

  My blood runs cold and an icy hand of fear clutches my heart filling it with a nameless dread as thousands of fractal eyes focus upon me. I can feel an inhuman intelligence push itself into my mind and I almost lose heart.

  It springs! Either I am lucky, or just blessed with good self-preservation instincts, but I am able to roll out of the way of the leech’s launch. The creature twists after me as quickly as I can scramble away. Scrabbling to stay ahead, I get to my feet and run. It is on my heels. Zig-zag, jump, dodge, bounding over deck chairs, the filthy, leggy larva is just at the back of my calves. Vaulting into a gazebo at full tilt the monster is my shadow. I aim low diving under the rail and the 500 pound leech passes over my head. I barely get to my feet when the monster has already turned on me. I leapfrog the charging beast in a grotesque version of the way children play. I grab hold of something growing from the beast’s back as is passes between my legs mid-leap. Could it be hair, or a prehensile horn? I don’t know what I have a hold of, but despite the flip following the leap, I hang on tight.

  It is a dang sight safer riding on this monster’s back than having it nipping at my fanny.

  This monster is mad and full of fight. It’s twisting and turning in a full on frenzy! Now it’s chasing its tail like a dog, but it can’t get to me on its back. It tries to squish me with a ‘gator roll, but I ain’t having it. I’m sticking to this Hellish armadillo like a Tennessee tick.

  Now it's making a break. Man, oh man, does this buggy have some busy legs. I put him at somewhere abouts halfway to qualifying as a millipede. I can't help but watch in fascination as waves seemingly pass through the coordinated centipede stampede.

  After a tour around the park we hit upon a lane towards the entrance of St. James. We are causing quite a stir at this point. Some boys take up a pursuit. They can almost keep up. Hey, they cannot see the creature, just me floating over the ground by about five feet and traveling faster than they can run. They must think I am flying!

  My invisible stallion carries me out of St. James Park and into the crowded street, Birdcage Walk. The traffic consists of many fancy carriages carrying fashionable folks to evening dinners and sophisticated theater. Every horse on the ridiculously named thoroughfare begins to scream and panic. No driver can control his terrified horse for even if they cannot see it, every animal knows there is an abomination on that street. Nothing will keep them there. After several indecisive spins, my own horrid mount turns toward the river. All the carriages, carts, four-wheelers and hansoms are backed up at Great George Street. My worm and I smash full tilt into a gorgeous hansom, exploding the two wheeled carriage into splinters. I fall from my steed and my goggles are knocked loose. I can no longer see the monster! I scramble for my ‘Beauties’, getting them back on in time to see the creature rise up and leap upon me. I barely get my hands to its ugly face to keep that disgusting sucker/mouth from clamping on my head.

  My legs are outnumbered. As I try to kick them away, the many legs of my fiendish foe catch my own pair. The legs seem
to ripple, as each leg begins to move just after the previous one did, with machine-like efficiency, and in this manner, the knitting appendages propel me towards the intake chute.

  I cannot allow it to bite me!

  I kick and fight for all I am worth but cannot release my grip lest I feel those awful teeth. I catch and isolate the last of the creature’s forelegs with my feet. I get it locked out against its own joint, and then kick. One insect leg does not work with mechanical efficiency anymore, since it is at a right angle to the others. The mammoth roly poly shrieks in an unspeakable rage. Risking the release of one hand from the creature’s face, I tear the stricken limb from this hungry HellSpawn. With all the strength of a man who would not be a meal, I plunge the serrated, chitinous limb as far into the alien cranium as my arm will reach.

  Succumbing to a violent series of tremors, the beast shudders with a few last death throes, before expiring with insectile ignominy.

  Chapter 12 - Aftermath at the Queen’s Hotel.

  Persephone

  Blind with tears and half out of my wits, I stumble away from the ravenous horror. I have to get away from the repulsive segmented worm. I fear for the gallant cavalier that came to my rescue, but I am too done in to help the man. I feel a craven sense of cowardice for the relief I feel when that horrible consciousness is turned from myself to that unwitting victim.

  Though blinded by fear and emotion, I manage to stagger out the North end of St. James.

  My heart breaks again as I hear scores of horses go mad with terror on the far side of the Park. The hands of kind strangers catch me as I slump to the ground.

  Helpful young gentlemen assist me in gaining conveyance back to the Queen’s Hotel. The streets are congested with onlookers trying to discover the source of the troubles wrought by the brain-fevered horses. General confusion and disarray make for a slow and tedious ride through a crowded throng. Many carriages are damaged, and the horses still nervous, but the disturbances seem to have subsided. I catch snatches of conversation moving through the crowded street. No one knows why, but every horse on BirdCage Walk, for a few moments, went mad with terror.