Doctor Who_ Foreign Devils - Andrew Cartmel [43]
He was turning to open the front door when Elder-Main appeared. 'She's gone walking again, sir,' he said quietly. Carnacki froze, then turned slowly around. 'What do you mean?'
'Miss Gibson, sir,' said the butler. 'She's up and on the prowl again.' 'Nonsense!' Carnacki turned and ran to the library, the Doctor and Zoe following. He flung the door open and they all stepped in to find the low sofa bed empty. 'She's gone.'
'She was moving like a sleepwalker,' said Elder-Main, drifting through the doorway behind them.
'It's you!' cried Carnacki. 'You've done something with her.' He threw himself towards Elder-Main, but the Doctor restrained him. 'This is madness,' Carnacki shook himself free and turned his back on the butler. 'Celandine is not the killer. I still believe Roderick Upcott lives. Who knows what effect it had on his cadaver, being blasted out of his last resting place by a million volts of electricity?'
'No, it's your lady, sir,' insisted the butler doggedly. 'Walking in her sleep and heading towards the arboretum.'
'The arboretum, you say?' Carnacki flung himself through the door
and his footsteps could be heard outside the library, racing in that direction. Zoe moved to follow, but the Doctor hung back for a moment, speaking to the butler in a confidential tone.
'The other day you mentioned fireworks . . . ?'
'Certainly. Half a ton, sir, in the cellar next to the wine cellar.'
'Would you be good enough to get them out,' said the Doctor. 'All of them sir?'
'All of them. And pile them around the spirit gate. I think we might be in for a pyrotechnical display before the night's out.'
Chapter Eleven
The revolving door of the arboretum swished as they pushed through it into the warm perfumed air. Zoe followed the Doctor into the tall structure, thick with lush greenery and heavy with the moist smell of loam and growing things. Carnacki was waiting for them. His eyes were glowing with excitement and he looked very young. 'I've found someone,' he said. 'Celandine?'
'No, someone else. Come and look.' He led them to the far side of the arboretum, past a small verdigrised fountain that bubbled over a sloping bed of plantings, through dense ferns and past beautiful nutating orchids with delicate blue and white markings resembling fine china. They finally came to a corner shrouded by elephant plants with great hanging green leaves. Passing through these they found themselves in a secluded bower where nothing grew but dense clusters of red and white poppies.
And lying there among the countless small blank alert petalled faces lay a young man. 'Jamie!' Zoe leapt forward, crushing poppies under foot. The Doctor followed, picking his way more delicately. It was Jamie all right. Zoe cradled his head in her lap. 'Doctor, what's wrong with him?' 'He's in some kind of trance,' said Carnacki.
'Like Celandine?' Zoe stroked Jamie's forehead. His skin felt dry and warm.
'No,' said Carnacki staring at the unmoving body. 'Deeper. More profound.'
The Doctor examined Jamie swiftly and expertly. 'Indeed. Perhaps
a laudanum-induced trance.'
'Laudanum?'
'Yes,' the Doctor gestured impatiently around them. 'Look where he is lying. All around him . . . opium poppies.' Zoe looked at the flowers, their lush scent seemed suddenly to fill the hot house. 'Why poppies?'
The Doctor frowned. 'Someone – or something – is taking revenge on the Upcotts for the devastating suffering they caused by their involvement in the opium trade in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, when they helped turn the Chinese into a nation of addicts. This family was knee deep in that whole despicable historical episode.' 'How do you know?' said Zoe.
'I found a ledger in the library that makes the extent of their responsibility all too clear. It contains lavish details of Roderick Upcott's buccaneering days in China.'
'Doctor, look,' interrupted Carnacki in a low, awed voice. The Doctor and Zoe followed the direction of his gaze. All Zoe could see were poppies, lush red and white blossoms, filling the