Doctor Who_ Foreign Devils - Andrew Cartmel [23]
Pemberton's wife, who had been standing silently in the shadows, both figuratively and literally, for the past few moments now stepped forward again. She took her husband firmly by the arm, restraining him. 'We ought to leave Mr Carnacki as free a hand as possible, wouldn't you agree, dear?'
For an instant Pemberton flushed with something that might have been anger, then he regained his calm. 'Of course, dear.' He stood back and gestured towards the door of the billiard room. 'It's all yours, Mr Carnacki. I will just show you in and explain how we came to find, er, it.' He glanced at his wife. 'Then I'll leave you alone. You shall have an entirely free hand.'
'Although if you require any help from any of the servants, you have only to ask,' said Mrs Upcott, interrupting and undercutting her husband's authority in a highly effective fashion.
Carnacki shook his head. 'I only ask that you allow me to, as it were, deputise the Doctor, whom I believe even on our short acquaintance will prove to be of invaluable assistance in my enquiries. An effective Watson to my Holmes, or perhaps even a Holmes to my Watson.' 'Of course,' said Pemberton. But it was his wife who gave the Doctor a shrewd measuring look that didn't entirely signify approval. Mrs Upcott was encountering a creature outside her experience and she knew it and didn't like it.
The Doctor smiled toothily and said, 'And I in turn would like to ask your kindness in allowing us to borrow one of your domestics. Zoe here.'
Pemberton Upcott and his wife nodded, not wasting words on Zoe, and Mrs Upcott looked through her as if she were not there as she walked away down the corridor, her feet scuffing down the corridor on the thick carpet.
Pemberton unlocked the door of the billiard room and they went inside, Zoe feeling a liquid fluttering in her stomach as she stepped over the threshold.
The billiard room was, by the standards of Fair Destine, small and cosy. About thirty feet by twenty, it was a windowless wood panelled affair with wall to wall green carpet that echoed exactly the colour of the felt on the long, elegant billiard table that occupied the centre of the room. There was a trio of ceiling lamps hanging over the table, three large milky glass discs, each several feet across, which provided clear illumination for the players. There were no players at the moment; the room was apparently completely unoccupied. At the far end there stood a pair of floral armchairs on either side of a small black card table draped with linen, with an unopened deck of playing cards on it, invitingly ready for a game. A tall standard lamp stood be hind the table, its central column fashioned of ornate gilded metal, its shade a square box of green fabric hung with long tassels of the kind that also concealed the legs of the chairs and the table. Zoe recalled that the Victorians had had a thing about bare legs, even the legs of furniture.
At the other end of the room, near Zoe, there was another table and lamp, accompanied by a single armchair. The table here was covered with an assortment of crystal decanters with tarnished silver stoppers. In the crystal depths of each container gleamed an amber liquid more inviting to some than the playing cards.
Pemberton Upcott moved towards this chair, stepping around the billiard table as he did so. For the first time Zoe noticed that the tip of a man's shoe could be seen on the floor on the far side of the table. Her stomach turned over and she looked away as the Doctor and Carnacki crowded eagerly around the billiard table to join Pemberton. 'This is exactly how we found him. We –'
The Doctor interrupted Pemberton. 'I noticed that when you opened the door the lock was broken.'
Pemberton looked at the Doctor, perhaps taking full account of him for the first time. 'Yes. We had to force the door to get in. But we did so judiciously and, I thought, expertly. I'm surprised you noticed anything.' 'Why did you force the door?' said