Doctor Who_ Foreign Devils - Andrew Cartmel [15]
'The term drawing room is an abbreviation of withdrawing room, so called for obvious reasons.'
'Really? Well I still say that they're a dreadfully primitive lot. And superstitious into the bargain. When they've finished all their smoking and withdrawing that young man called Carnacki is apparently going to entertain them by using something called a magic lantern.' The Doctor smiled. 'Oh, that's merely a rudimentary kind of slide projector. The name is more affectionate and ironic than anything else. Have you had any luck getting a lead on the whereabouts of Jamie?'
Zoe shook her head. 'No. He's not among the domestic staff. That's for certain.'
'Nor among the guests, at least as far as I have been able to determine.'
'By the way, how did you manage to convince them that you were a guest?'
The Doctor smiled. 'By the simple expedient of asking to wait in the library before my host came to greet me.'
'Yes, that's where I found you. But what's the significance of the library?'
'I correctly surmised that our host, as a distinguished medical man, would keep copies of any papers he had had published. And I was right. While I was waiting for him I managed to read them all.' 'You always were a fast reader,' said Zoe.
'By the time Pemberton Upcott arrived I had acquainted myself thoroughly with his medical career. I was able to converse with him as an equal and discuss a number of technical matters that interested him greatly. So even though I wasn't an officially invited guest I was soon able to convince him that I was a fellow physician and had come with the express purpose of discussing some esoteric questions with a surgeon of genius. That is, himself.'
'In other words you buttered him up. And he bought it?'
'Certainly. He's champing at the bit to sit down and have a proper talk with me.'
'Well, good for you. It's certainly better than pretending to be a downtrodden menial.' Zoe tugged at her apron again, as if it were restricting her entire being. 'You wouldn't like that at all.'
The Doctor shrugged. 'As for Jamie, I hope nothing has happened to him.'
'Well, something is bound to have happened to him. After all he's been transported through time and space by that ancient Chinese thingy. That's something enough, isn't it? But I agree with you.' Zoe's voice faltered. 'I hope it's nothing bad.' Suddenly her eyes sparked with interest. 'Wait a minute. Why don't we go out and look at the spirit gate?'
The Doctor shook his head firmly. 'Not just yet. I feel we have had enough trouble with that particular artefact for the time being.' 'But Jamie might be out there in the garden, lost in the cold and snow or something.'
'I think not. I gave the grounds a thorough examination through the screen in the TARDIS. No,' the Doctor peered up into the shadows of the house. 'He's in here somewhere.'
After brandy and cigars and a long and boring discussion about politics, mostly concerning the Kaiser's ambitions and the supreme unlikelihood of a land war in Europe, the gentlemen withdrew from the smoking room and met up with the ladies once again in a broad walnut-floored space called the great lounge. Tall leaded windows looked out across the white expanse of the gardens and in the middle distance the black shape of the spirit gate loomed among swirling clouds of snow.
The great lounge was heated by two log fires burning fiercely in deep walk-in hearths at opposite ends of the room. In the centre of the room, against the inner wall between two symmetrically set doorways was a lustrous grand piano standing in the middle of a red and blue Persian carpet. Celandine caressed its keyboard as she walked past. 'Pity,' she whispered to Carnacki, who was hauling in a lengthy rectangular leather case resembling a rifle bag, but considerably longer and broader in cross section. Carnacki glanced at Celandine and