Read Online HS01 - Critique of Criminal Reason by Michael Gregorio - Free Book Online Page B

of it seemed to drag them downstairs faster than they wished to go, and we had to push ourselves up hard against the wall to escape being crushed.
    ‘Has he come yet?’ our guide called after them.
    As the labourers stumbled past, I saw how very tall they were. Frederick the Great had set the fashion, visiting every corner of the continent in the search for new pieces to add to his collection of giant soldiers. Now, they flocked to Prussia. Those two were excellent specimens. Even so, they groaned beneath the weight.
    ‘Dunno,’ the soldier at the front cried back over his shoulder. ‘Get a move on, Walter!’
    ‘Are they being punished?’ I asked the corporal as the darkness gobbled them up.
    ‘They’re just obeying orders, sir,’ he replied, and cantered on down the stairway.
    At the bottom of the shaft, a square skylight shone above our heads. The corporal looked up, an expression of bemused terror on his face. The full moon was perfectly framed by the window high above.
    ‘Strike me blind!’ he cursed. ‘Right on bloody time!’
    ‘What are you talking about?’ I asked.
    The corporal looked at me, his expression tense. ‘That doctor’s very keen on details, sir,’ he murmured. ‘He said the moon would appear from the clouds, and there it is!’ The fear written on his face was childishly comical. ‘Better not keep him waiting, sir,’ he said, proceeding quickly on his way towards a door at the far end of the corridor, which opened into a large, empty store-room. It was cold in there, extremely cold. The other two soldiers were hard at work shovelling snow from the box onto a black tarpaulin cover.
    ‘Well, Koch…’ I began to say, vapour forming an ectoplasm in front of my face as I spoke.
    ‘You are just in time, sir,’ a haughty voice accused at my back.
    I turned and gaped. I seemed to have been addressed by one of the age-encrusted ancestral portraits hanging from the walls of my father’s country house. It was the style of his wig that impressed me. Grey curls cascaded from the crown of his head in undulating waves on either side of a long, gaunt face. Large, snow-white hands held a huge cloak of shimmering black velveteen clasped tightly to his body.
    ‘My name is Vigilantius,’ he announced rather stiffly. ‘Doctor Vigilantius.’
    He did not offer his hand or make any sign of welcome, but swept past me, his black cloak billowing and rippling out as he drew close to the waiting soldiers. There was only a hand-span of difference in height between him and the lesser of the two giants.
    ‘I hope you have followed my instructions to the letter.’
    It was not a question, though one of the men stood forward. Wiping his forehead on his sleeve, he said: ‘All as you ordered, sir.’
    ‘Let us begin in that case,’ he said, his attention directed at the labourers, who were sweating despite the cold.
    ‘Begin what ?’ I demanded in a loud voice, stepping forward to assert my authority before Koch and the soldiers.
    Vigilantius arched his bushy eyebrow and stared back defiantly at me, but he did not answer my question.
    ‘What are we doing in this dungeon?’ I insisted.
    ‘I am here to enter the Spirit World,’ he said quite plainly, as if the place truly existed and might be found by any sharp-eyed person on the mappamondo . Before I could speak, he turned on Koch as if he meant to eat him.
    ‘Who are you, sir?’ he said, like a lizard snapping up flies.
    ‘Sergeant Koch is my assistant,’ I shot back.
    The doctor made a face, but no objection. ‘He’ll remain, then. These two men are needed for the first part of the operation. Corporal,’ he said, throwing out his forefinger like a dart, ‘be gone!’
    Our guide hurried out of the room without a backward glance.
    ‘Bring our guest over here,’ Vigilantius ordered sharply.
    Instinctively, I took a step backwards, thinking that they meant to lay hands on me. From the other side of the room, with a tortured shriek like a