Elric to Rescue Tanelorn - Michael Moorcock [81]
“Have you prepared for that?”
“I have, but I am worried.”
“Of course you are. And you’ve switched off the master control for this entrance?”
“It seemed unnecessary, sir, but I have done it.”
“Better safe than sorry, John.”
“I suppose so, aye. But there again, it would only be a matter of time before…”
“It’s all a matter of time, John. Let’s get going. If the control’s dead, we won’t be able to use the lift.”
“No, sir. We must climb.”
“Off we go, then.”
They left the metal chamber and entered a similar, slightly larger one. John lit the way with his torch. A lift cage became visible, the shaft rising above it. Paralleling the cables and running up one side into the darkness was a metal ladder. John tucked the torch into the waistband of his trousers and stepped back. Jerry reached the ladder and began to climb.
They went up in silence for more than fifty feet until they stood at the top of the shaft. Ahead of them were five entrances to corridors. They took the central entrance. The corridor twisted and turned for a long time. It formed part of a complicated maze and, even though the two men were familiar with it, they sometimes hesitated at various turnings and forks.
Eventually, and with some relief, they entered a white, neon-lighted room, which housed a small control console. The Scotsman went to the panel and clicked a switch. A red light above the panel went off and a green one went on. Dials quivered, and several monitor screens focused on various parts of the route they had just taken. Views of the room at the bottom of the shaft, the shaft itself, the corridors in the maze—now brilliantly lit—came and went on the screens. The equipment operated in silence.
On the door leading out of the room was a fairly large ovoid of a milky greenish colour. John pressed his palm against it. Responding to the palm print, which it recognized, the door slid open. They entered a short tunnel, which led them to an identical door. This John opened in the same way.
Now they stood in a dark library. Through a transparent wall to their right they could see the sea, like black marble streaked with veins of grey and white.
Most of the other three walls were covered with shelves of pink fibreglass. They were filled mainly with paperbacks. The half-dozen or so books bound in leather and titled in gold stood out incongruously. John shone his light on them and smiled at Jerry, who was embarrassed.
“They’re still there, sir. He doesn’t often come here; otherwise he might have got rid of them. Not that it would matter that much, for I have another set.”
Jerry winced and looked at the books. One of the titles was Time-Search Through the Declining West by Jeremiah Cornelius, MAHS; another was called Toward the Ultimate Paradox, and beside it was The Ethical Simulation. Jerry felt he was right to be embarrassed.
Part of the library wall, naturally enough, was false. It swung back to show a white metal door and a button. Jerry pressed the button and the door opened.
Another lift cage.
John stooped and picked up a small case before they got in and went up. It was one of the few lifts in the house that, as far as they knew, did not register on one of the many control panels located in the château.
On the sixth floor the lift stopped, and John opened the door and looked cautiously out. The landing was empty. They both left the lift, and the door (a wall-length painting reminiscent of Picasso at his latest and tritest) slid back into place.
The room they wanted was in a passage off the main landing. They walked silently to the corner, glanced round, and ducked back again.
They had seen the guard. He had an automatic rifle crooked in his arm. He was a big, fat German with the appearance of a eunuch. He had looked very wakeful—hoping, perhaps, for an opportunity to use his Belgian gun.
Now John opened the case he’d been carrying. He took out a small steel crossbow, very modern and beautifully made, and handed it to Jerry Cornelius. Jerry held it in one hand, waiting for the moment when the guard would look completely away