burn through until it was nothing but blackened ash. He picked up a heavy brass poker from the fender and broke the blackened ash down further, thrusting the fragments deep down among the glowing embers of the coal.
‘What was that all about?’ Caleb asked.
‘Oh,’ said Lucius, ‘nothing really – a silly note that was in the pocket of this suit here. You can show some interest then; you do have a tongue when it suits you.’
‘What?’ Caleb protested.
‘We have driven through the streets of this most remarkable city,’ said his father, who seemed suddenly and inexplicably cross. His trembling hand held the heavy brass poker out towards Caleb almost like a weapon. ‘A great technical achievement, one of the great wonders of the modern world and much of it due in no small measure to my efforts, and you have said what exactly? Nothing or next to nothing, no comment at all. I despair of your generation, my boy, sometimes, I really do.’
‘I was looking at everything. You saw me, I was trying my best to take it all in,’ said Caleb, puzzled by the clenched fury of the outburst. It was so unlike his father and to Caleb it seemed that he was lashing out in anger because he was upset. What was his father frightened of? What did the letter mean, that one word? And why burn it like that, as if it was diseased, as if it might attack him? Caleb knew instictively that something was up, something connected with the letter. But he said no more about it.
His father switched attention to the boxes. They contained two Halloween costumes, each specially tailored to their measurements. His father’s was a formal black Victorian suit except it had the bones of a skeleton printed all over the outside front. It was to be worn under a long cape, so that the white of the bones would only show properly when the cape was swirled open or removed. Caleb’s box contained a similar formal suit but without the bones printed on it. Instead, he had been supplied with a skull mask to wear. The crumpled skull grinned back at him, making the box with the neatly folded suit inside look like a miniature coffin.
Caleb was still getting used to the stiff and awkward Victorian clothes they had to wear. He got undressed in his little bedroom, which was made to feel smaller by the decoration, more foliate-patterned wallpaper, more pictures in gold frames, watercolours of highland cattle, and views of the Pyramids. He was looking forward to a dreamless night in the old-fashioned brass bedstead.
He had been fidgeting with the clothes all day, fussing with the trousers which were worn high up on the waist, held up by tight elastic braces that pressed down on his shoulders. The hard leather ankle boots had hurt his feet. He hung the jacket on a hanger next to the velvet-collared top coat, and the deep buttoned waistcoat. This white shirt had the devilishly difficult to fix, detachable and very stiff collar, which had left a red itchy weal around Caleb’s throat, and which was held in place, front and back, with solid gold studs.
He brushed his teeth at the sink, dabbing the brush in the round tin of dentifrice, which tasted strongly medicinal. He looked up at himself in the mirror. His hair was flat with pomade, there were red marks on his shoulders where the braces had rubbed; he hardly knew himself.
His father woke him early. ‘Authentic breakfast,’ he said.
The morning papers were laid out in a fan shape on the side table at breakfast. Caleb’s father ignored them as he ate his way through a bowl of porridge. Caleb picked up a London Mercury . There was a dramatic engraving of a sinister-looking man in a cape, a tall hat, and a black face mask. Caleb held out the picture to his father and read aloud the headline caption. ‘“ The Fantom is back. New victim found in Shoreditch, with severed limbs and head removed. The head was later recovered from the top of a building scheduled soon for grand public demolition ,” it says
‘What was that all about?’ Caleb asked.
‘Oh,’ said Lucius, ‘nothing really – a silly note that was in the pocket of this suit here. You can show some interest then; you do have a tongue when it suits you.’
‘What?’ Caleb protested.
‘We have driven through the streets of this most remarkable city,’ said his father, who seemed suddenly and inexplicably cross. His trembling hand held the heavy brass poker out towards Caleb almost like a weapon. ‘A great technical achievement, one of the great wonders of the modern world and much of it due in no small measure to my efforts, and you have said what exactly? Nothing or next to nothing, no comment at all. I despair of your generation, my boy, sometimes, I really do.’
‘I was looking at everything. You saw me, I was trying my best to take it all in,’ said Caleb, puzzled by the clenched fury of the outburst. It was so unlike his father and to Caleb it seemed that he was lashing out in anger because he was upset. What was his father frightened of? What did the letter mean, that one word? And why burn it like that, as if it was diseased, as if it might attack him? Caleb knew instictively that something was up, something connected with the letter. But he said no more about it.
His father switched attention to the boxes. They contained two Halloween costumes, each specially tailored to their measurements. His father’s was a formal black Victorian suit except it had the bones of a skeleton printed all over the outside front. It was to be worn under a long cape, so that the white of the bones would only show properly when the cape was swirled open or removed. Caleb’s box contained a similar formal suit but without the bones printed on it. Instead, he had been supplied with a skull mask to wear. The crumpled skull grinned back at him, making the box with the neatly folded suit inside look like a miniature coffin.
Caleb was still getting used to the stiff and awkward Victorian clothes they had to wear. He got undressed in his little bedroom, which was made to feel smaller by the decoration, more foliate-patterned wallpaper, more pictures in gold frames, watercolours of highland cattle, and views of the Pyramids. He was looking forward to a dreamless night in the old-fashioned brass bedstead.
He had been fidgeting with the clothes all day, fussing with the trousers which were worn high up on the waist, held up by tight elastic braces that pressed down on his shoulders. The hard leather ankle boots had hurt his feet. He hung the jacket on a hanger next to the velvet-collared top coat, and the deep buttoned waistcoat. This white shirt had the devilishly difficult to fix, detachable and very stiff collar, which had left a red itchy weal around Caleb’s throat, and which was held in place, front and back, with solid gold studs.
He brushed his teeth at the sink, dabbing the brush in the round tin of dentifrice, which tasted strongly medicinal. He looked up at himself in the mirror. His hair was flat with pomade, there were red marks on his shoulders where the braces had rubbed; he hardly knew himself.
His father woke him early. ‘Authentic breakfast,’ he said.
The morning papers were laid out in a fan shape on the side table at breakfast. Caleb’s father ignored them as he ate his way through a bowl of porridge. Caleb picked up a London Mercury . There was a dramatic engraving of a sinister-looking man in a cape, a tall hat, and a black face mask. Caleb held out the picture to his father and read aloud the headline caption. ‘“ The Fantom is back. New victim found in Shoreditch, with severed limbs and head removed. The head was later recovered from the top of a building scheduled soon for grand public demolition ,” it says
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