LXG: Diary of a Mountie - Part Ten
Aug. 30th, 2003 12:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
camwynHi, folks. Yeah, I'm starting the next leg of the Diaries. I'll be integrating the On Dogs material as I go.
Day Eleven - Tuesday, August 18, 1936
London, England
League Headquarters
The rest of our trip back to London was as uneventful as they come. Aside from a little bit of midair rocking I don't think anything happened on the dirigible that couldn't just as easily have happened on a train, or the better classes of passenger ships. I still don't much like flying, of course, but the fact that we've so far crossed Canada, part of the United States, the Atlantic Ocean, and a good stretch of the United Kingdom is reassuring. For me, anyway. Prince has decided that his den is under the couch in the sitting room. I've warned Danner not to sit there without looking - he's more compact than you'd think. I'd rather he not accidentally fire a couch spring into my dog, thanks.
Miss Poppins had most of her official report composed long before we came within sight of London; it seemed like a good idea to follow her example. That's the advantage of keeping a running log on a case like this- you don't have far to go when the time comes to report to other people. As we'd decided, I left out mention of the paperwork we found at the Prufrock offices. If it were a straight criminal case I'd have real trouble with that idea. Reporting the maps to fairy countries where no one ever dies or gets old to a Crown official - why, you might just as well mention in a saloon that you buried a man with a map showing the way to the biggest gold strike in the Yukon under his head and expect the grave not to be dug up. There was plenty to speak of in the report as it stands. If J. manages to prove that it's in the best interests of Oz to have real contact with the British Empire I'll be the first to admit that I was wrong, but for now the burden of proof is on him.
Before I forget, though - there was a funny thing about those papers. I was reading through them as we crossed into England, and ran across something that made no sense at all. Here were all these charts of sea routes, fairy lands, and London skies, just the kind of thing any invading general could ever want, and in among them was. . . a set of plans for a wardrobe. Yes, a wardrobe! There wasn't any other thing it could possibly be. The plans called for a looking-glass set in the door and two rods for hanging coats on; they were neat enough for any carpenter with a halfway decent eye to follow. I'd say they must've gotten there by mistake, but how do you make a mistake like that? It makes no sense at all.
At any rate, most of us composed official reports to J. and attached them to Miss Poppins' report. When we returned to the meeting-room in the League's headquarters, he was waiting for us. Seemed pleased enough with the summary Miss Poppins had made on the first page, that's always a good sign. . . He didn't say much, really. Comments were going to have to wait until he'd had a chance to read the whole thing over, he said. I suppose that's sensible. It gave us a little time to breathe, anyway.
While he was looking over the summary, though, Dorothy - who didn't have a finished report of her own, mostly because she and Lord Wimsey had worked on theirs together - got up and wandered away from the table that ran down the center of the room. There were pictures hanging on the walls - group pictures, mostly - I had seen them before but hadn't bothered to look closely. She moved from picture to picture, looking at them with this odd intensity, as if she expected to spot something in particular. All at once she let out a cry- "Oh! Oh, it is him! It's the Wizard!"
That's a fast way to get attention, all right. I think half of us were up and on our feet as soon as the word died out of the air. Miss Poppins excused herself from Jay and came to Dorothy's side. "What do you mean, dear?" she asked.
Dorothy pointed excitedly to the painting in front of her. "Look, Miss Poppins, it's him! Right there, with the others in the picture! Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkle Emmannuel Ambroise Diggs. That's the Wizard's name, he told me so!"
The others had looks on their faces ranging from skeptical disbelief to a suppressed urge to laugh. Danner's lips were moving as he turned over the names; under his breath I heard him murmur, "Oz Pinhead?"
Dorothy caught that, but it didn't upset her in the slightest. "That's 'zackly right, Mr. Danner! He told me his father gave him all those names, only he didn't like being called Pinhead, so he called himself Oz. Oh, Miss Poppins, do you think he still remembers me?"
"Oh, I'm sure he does, Dorothy," said Miss Poppins thoughtfully. "But he's awfully young in this painting, wouldn't you say? He was an old man by the time you met him."
Dorothy frowned a little at that. "I s'pose," she said. I guess it hadn't occurred to her.
"Nevertheless," continued Miss Poppins, "I shall see if that is the case. Gentlemen, would you be so kind as to stand back, please?" We looked at each other and backed up half a step. "Thank you," she said - and jumped into the picture.
No, I am not joking. Without so much as batting an eye Miss Poppins simply leaped into the air, vanished from in front of us, and appeared in the painting. It was the most eye-wrenching thing I think I've ever seen, and I haven't got the words to describe it. I had to look away from the painting proper for a bit while the others exclaimed over what'd just happened. As I did that my eye fell on a small brass plaque set into the frame. It read:
LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN
1875
. . . all right, it read more than that - there were names - but I couldn't remember a single one of them if my life depended on it. 1875? Why, the Northwest Mounted Police were only founded in 1873! How old was the League, anyway? How-
I probably could have asked then, or gone and looked at the other paintings, but as I was making up my mind to do so Miss Poppins hopped out of the painting as serene as you please. "I'm sorry, Dorothy," she said, "but this was done when he was a very young man. This version of the Wizard doesn't know you yet, and can't say where the Wizard you know might be."
"Oh," said Dorothy, a bit crestfallen. Then she brightened up. "Well, that's all right. We'll find him anyway, I know we will."
"That's right," said Miss Poppins. She glanced over at J. as she said this, and the man nodded very slowly. "That's right."
Day Twelve - Wednesday, August 19
London
We stayed at League headquarters last night, and in the morning J. summoned us around the table again. "I've read your reports," he said, "and your performance, while not entirely what we'd planned, is satisfactory. I see no reason for you not to continue your investigations of the Prufrock shipping company. The resources of the League are at your disposal for this purpose. All we ask is that you submit your reports on a regular and timely basis, and that you inform us before taking any extraordinary measures." He gave a smile at his choice of words. It didn't touch his eyes.
"Are we confined to London?" asked Tom.
J. shook his head. "You're not even confined to England," said J. "If your investigation takes you to the South Seas, you're free to go - but we need to know about it before you do. Whatever measures seem most appropriate to you are fair game."
Cranston leaned forward. "Then we are free to get other lodgings?" he inquired.
J. nodded.
"My people can assist you in finding a place to let, if you like," chimed in Lord Wimsey.
"That's all right. I'll manage."
"Miss Gale," said J., "you'll be staying in the apartment provided for you. I hope it's satisfactory?"
"Oh, yes," said the girl. "I quite like it. It's much nicer than the asylum."
"I'm afraid you'll have to stay there, unless one of your companions here accompanies you out and about." J. steepled his fingers, looking up to us meaningfully. "London is no place for a little girl to go about alone. Dog or no."
"Oh, I don't think you have anything to worry about," said Lord Wimsey. "We'll look after you - won't we, chaps?" At the general assent that went up, Lord Wimsey smiled. "There, you see?"
"Very well, then," said J., "unless there's anything else any of you wanted to mention. . ."
There wasn't, of course, so we were dismissed.
I'm going to be staying at the headquarters. I've got money, but there's no sense spending it on lodgings when there's a barracks available. There's going to be expenses enough in this investigation as it stands.
You see, I don't think I'm going to be doing much of the ordinary detective work here. This mess is tangled up in areas I've never had to deal with. I could learn quickly enough, I'm sure, but as it stands there are those among us who already know what to do. You couldn't ask for a more English sleuth than Lord Wimsey - when it comes to noticing what's right and what's wrong with a situation by local standards, he's the best one of us, I'm sure. Hugo Danner shows every sign of knowing the shipping trade from the inside; I imagine he must've worked at it before the Great War. And as for the underhanded nature of the Prufrock organization - well, let's just say that I expect Cranston knows that sort of thing the way I know tracking and survival, and leave it at that. I'm not going to jump their claim. I know when to cede the floor to someone else. No, I plan to go about this another way.
You see, every one of those maps and charts (except the looking-glass wardrobe - and I have my suspicions about that) came out of a children's story. A fortnight ago I would have written it off as sheer nonsense. I haven't got that luxury any more, not after the things I've seen. I have never in my life seen anything good of rushing into a case without learning the background of the situation first. The Prufrock people believe in the reality of fairy stories. So does J. Dorothy's been to the lands of one of them. Miss Poppins - well - I don't know what to think of her but if she's not an escapee from someone's tales of the strange I'll eat my hat. There might yet be a deception operating, but I'll never know unless I learn. As soon as I've finished this, I'm getting into my civilian clothes and looking for the best bookstores in London.
Not just for children's stories, either. The kind of deception that the Prufrocks seem to be practicing calls for a certain measure of suspicion. Crowds have been deceived before. Whole governments have been deceived before - my mother told me the story of Princess Caraboo when I was a boy, and how she was received as royalty from Formosa before being unmasked as a common servant girl. I have no illusions about what I know and what I don't. I'd like to maintain that state. As long as I'm buying books, I'm looking up histories of frauds, forgeries, and hoaxes. I seem to recall a book by one Charles Mackay on the topic. That'll be a good place to start. There'll be others, I'm sure.
And one last thing. . . I have no intention of being caught off my guard again while I'm here. It's one thing to rely on Prince in the North Country, where the biggest danger is a second man with a gun. Prince is faster than most human eyes can follow, when he makes up his mind to jump, but the Siren army had him pinned. I don't want to have a repeat of that situation. It seems to me that learning unarmed combat beyond the fisticuffs my father taught me would be a wise idea. As I recall, Sherlock Holmes was said to be trained in a fighting art called 'baritsu'. I don't remember whether he learned it in London or some other part of the world, but it can't hurt to look up a teacher as long as I'm here.
Day Eleven - Tuesday, August 18, 1936
London, England
League Headquarters
The rest of our trip back to London was as uneventful as they come. Aside from a little bit of midair rocking I don't think anything happened on the dirigible that couldn't just as easily have happened on a train, or the better classes of passenger ships. I still don't much like flying, of course, but the fact that we've so far crossed Canada, part of the United States, the Atlantic Ocean, and a good stretch of the United Kingdom is reassuring. For me, anyway. Prince has decided that his den is under the couch in the sitting room. I've warned Danner not to sit there without looking - he's more compact than you'd think. I'd rather he not accidentally fire a couch spring into my dog, thanks.
Miss Poppins had most of her official report composed long before we came within sight of London; it seemed like a good idea to follow her example. That's the advantage of keeping a running log on a case like this- you don't have far to go when the time comes to report to other people. As we'd decided, I left out mention of the paperwork we found at the Prufrock offices. If it were a straight criminal case I'd have real trouble with that idea. Reporting the maps to fairy countries where no one ever dies or gets old to a Crown official - why, you might just as well mention in a saloon that you buried a man with a map showing the way to the biggest gold strike in the Yukon under his head and expect the grave not to be dug up. There was plenty to speak of in the report as it stands. If J. manages to prove that it's in the best interests of Oz to have real contact with the British Empire I'll be the first to admit that I was wrong, but for now the burden of proof is on him.
Before I forget, though - there was a funny thing about those papers. I was reading through them as we crossed into England, and ran across something that made no sense at all. Here were all these charts of sea routes, fairy lands, and London skies, just the kind of thing any invading general could ever want, and in among them was. . . a set of plans for a wardrobe. Yes, a wardrobe! There wasn't any other thing it could possibly be. The plans called for a looking-glass set in the door and two rods for hanging coats on; they were neat enough for any carpenter with a halfway decent eye to follow. I'd say they must've gotten there by mistake, but how do you make a mistake like that? It makes no sense at all.
At any rate, most of us composed official reports to J. and attached them to Miss Poppins' report. When we returned to the meeting-room in the League's headquarters, he was waiting for us. Seemed pleased enough with the summary Miss Poppins had made on the first page, that's always a good sign. . . He didn't say much, really. Comments were going to have to wait until he'd had a chance to read the whole thing over, he said. I suppose that's sensible. It gave us a little time to breathe, anyway.
While he was looking over the summary, though, Dorothy - who didn't have a finished report of her own, mostly because she and Lord Wimsey had worked on theirs together - got up and wandered away from the table that ran down the center of the room. There were pictures hanging on the walls - group pictures, mostly - I had seen them before but hadn't bothered to look closely. She moved from picture to picture, looking at them with this odd intensity, as if she expected to spot something in particular. All at once she let out a cry- "Oh! Oh, it is him! It's the Wizard!"
That's a fast way to get attention, all right. I think half of us were up and on our feet as soon as the word died out of the air. Miss Poppins excused herself from Jay and came to Dorothy's side. "What do you mean, dear?" she asked.
Dorothy pointed excitedly to the painting in front of her. "Look, Miss Poppins, it's him! Right there, with the others in the picture! Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkle Emmannuel Ambroise Diggs. That's the Wizard's name, he told me so!"
The others had looks on their faces ranging from skeptical disbelief to a suppressed urge to laugh. Danner's lips were moving as he turned over the names; under his breath I heard him murmur, "Oz Pinhead?"
Dorothy caught that, but it didn't upset her in the slightest. "That's 'zackly right, Mr. Danner! He told me his father gave him all those names, only he didn't like being called Pinhead, so he called himself Oz. Oh, Miss Poppins, do you think he still remembers me?"
"Oh, I'm sure he does, Dorothy," said Miss Poppins thoughtfully. "But he's awfully young in this painting, wouldn't you say? He was an old man by the time you met him."
Dorothy frowned a little at that. "I s'pose," she said. I guess it hadn't occurred to her.
"Nevertheless," continued Miss Poppins, "I shall see if that is the case. Gentlemen, would you be so kind as to stand back, please?" We looked at each other and backed up half a step. "Thank you," she said - and jumped into the picture.
No, I am not joking. Without so much as batting an eye Miss Poppins simply leaped into the air, vanished from in front of us, and appeared in the painting. It was the most eye-wrenching thing I think I've ever seen, and I haven't got the words to describe it. I had to look away from the painting proper for a bit while the others exclaimed over what'd just happened. As I did that my eye fell on a small brass plaque set into the frame. It read:
LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN
1875
. . . all right, it read more than that - there were names - but I couldn't remember a single one of them if my life depended on it. 1875? Why, the Northwest Mounted Police were only founded in 1873! How old was the League, anyway? How-
I probably could have asked then, or gone and looked at the other paintings, but as I was making up my mind to do so Miss Poppins hopped out of the painting as serene as you please. "I'm sorry, Dorothy," she said, "but this was done when he was a very young man. This version of the Wizard doesn't know you yet, and can't say where the Wizard you know might be."
"Oh," said Dorothy, a bit crestfallen. Then she brightened up. "Well, that's all right. We'll find him anyway, I know we will."
"That's right," said Miss Poppins. She glanced over at J. as she said this, and the man nodded very slowly. "That's right."
Day Twelve - Wednesday, August 19
London
We stayed at League headquarters last night, and in the morning J. summoned us around the table again. "I've read your reports," he said, "and your performance, while not entirely what we'd planned, is satisfactory. I see no reason for you not to continue your investigations of the Prufrock shipping company. The resources of the League are at your disposal for this purpose. All we ask is that you submit your reports on a regular and timely basis, and that you inform us before taking any extraordinary measures." He gave a smile at his choice of words. It didn't touch his eyes.
"Are we confined to London?" asked Tom.
J. shook his head. "You're not even confined to England," said J. "If your investigation takes you to the South Seas, you're free to go - but we need to know about it before you do. Whatever measures seem most appropriate to you are fair game."
Cranston leaned forward. "Then we are free to get other lodgings?" he inquired.
J. nodded.
"My people can assist you in finding a place to let, if you like," chimed in Lord Wimsey.
"That's all right. I'll manage."
"Miss Gale," said J., "you'll be staying in the apartment provided for you. I hope it's satisfactory?"
"Oh, yes," said the girl. "I quite like it. It's much nicer than the asylum."
"I'm afraid you'll have to stay there, unless one of your companions here accompanies you out and about." J. steepled his fingers, looking up to us meaningfully. "London is no place for a little girl to go about alone. Dog or no."
"Oh, I don't think you have anything to worry about," said Lord Wimsey. "We'll look after you - won't we, chaps?" At the general assent that went up, Lord Wimsey smiled. "There, you see?"
"Very well, then," said J., "unless there's anything else any of you wanted to mention. . ."
There wasn't, of course, so we were dismissed.
I'm going to be staying at the headquarters. I've got money, but there's no sense spending it on lodgings when there's a barracks available. There's going to be expenses enough in this investigation as it stands.
You see, I don't think I'm going to be doing much of the ordinary detective work here. This mess is tangled up in areas I've never had to deal with. I could learn quickly enough, I'm sure, but as it stands there are those among us who already know what to do. You couldn't ask for a more English sleuth than Lord Wimsey - when it comes to noticing what's right and what's wrong with a situation by local standards, he's the best one of us, I'm sure. Hugo Danner shows every sign of knowing the shipping trade from the inside; I imagine he must've worked at it before the Great War. And as for the underhanded nature of the Prufrock organization - well, let's just say that I expect Cranston knows that sort of thing the way I know tracking and survival, and leave it at that. I'm not going to jump their claim. I know when to cede the floor to someone else. No, I plan to go about this another way.
You see, every one of those maps and charts (except the looking-glass wardrobe - and I have my suspicions about that) came out of a children's story. A fortnight ago I would have written it off as sheer nonsense. I haven't got that luxury any more, not after the things I've seen. I have never in my life seen anything good of rushing into a case without learning the background of the situation first. The Prufrock people believe in the reality of fairy stories. So does J. Dorothy's been to the lands of one of them. Miss Poppins - well - I don't know what to think of her but if she's not an escapee from someone's tales of the strange I'll eat my hat. There might yet be a deception operating, but I'll never know unless I learn. As soon as I've finished this, I'm getting into my civilian clothes and looking for the best bookstores in London.
Not just for children's stories, either. The kind of deception that the Prufrocks seem to be practicing calls for a certain measure of suspicion. Crowds have been deceived before. Whole governments have been deceived before - my mother told me the story of Princess Caraboo when I was a boy, and how she was received as royalty from Formosa before being unmasked as a common servant girl. I have no illusions about what I know and what I don't. I'd like to maintain that state. As long as I'm buying books, I'm looking up histories of frauds, forgeries, and hoaxes. I seem to recall a book by one Charles Mackay on the topic. That'll be a good place to start. There'll be others, I'm sure.
And one last thing. . . I have no intention of being caught off my guard again while I'm here. It's one thing to rely on Prince in the North Country, where the biggest danger is a second man with a gun. Prince is faster than most human eyes can follow, when he makes up his mind to jump, but the Siren army had him pinned. I don't want to have a repeat of that situation. It seems to me that learning unarmed combat beyond the fisticuffs my father taught me would be a wise idea. As I recall, Sherlock Holmes was said to be trained in a fighting art called 'baritsu'. I don't remember whether he learned it in London or some other part of the world, but it can't hurt to look up a teacher as long as I'm here.
