Ghosts by Gaslight - Jack Dann [30]
Scheuch looked away from both Angelos and the hodjas, wrapping his arms around his own shoulders. Griffith started to speak and then stopped. Mr. Emanetoglu could not take his eyes from Angelos. To his own considerable surprise, his heart hurt for the Englishman in that moment, as it would have hurt for Ekrem. Hodja Cenghiz continued, “But that voice—the voice of the Sorrowheart—that voice your friend will never stop hearing. It is not just, for he surely meant no harm. But Allah’s justice is not ours.” Hodja Cenghiz cleared his throat. “For what it is worth, which is nothing, I am sad for you, Mr. Angelos.”
Griffith was already dozing off again, and Vordran’s eyes had turned as unfocused as when he first listened to Angelos’s stethoscope. Scheuch seemed to be the only person reacting to the reality of what Angelos had just been told. He said loudly, “I say, you can’t do that! Set that voice trailing him everywhere—haunting him forever! Who do you chaps think you are, anyway?”
Neither Hodja Abbas nor Hodja Cenghiz even bothered to look at him, so Mr. Emanetoglu plucked up his courage and intervened, saying sternly and earnestly, “Mr. Scheuch, these gentlemen are scholars, healers—even what you would call magistrates, when necessary. Surely you must be at peace with their judgment.”
“No, I mustn’t be at bloody peace with a damned thing,” Scheuch mocked him. “And you’re a bloody hypocrite for saying so, Emanetoggle.” He had never gotten closer than that to the proper pronunciation. “You heard him say it—it’s not right, and you all buggering know it! Like Job in the bloody Bible, and I never understood that story either, if you want to know. How you can stand there and say be at peace . . .”
He was very tired, and he ran out of words and rage at more or less the same time. Mr. Emanetoglu, looking on heartsick, saw Vordran puzzled and irritated, and Griffith not entirely among those present. Angelos, of them all, remained as strangely calm as though he were opening a letter that promised to be interesting. He said, “Well. Don’t exactly see myself staying on in Geraldine Row, I suppose.”
Hodja Cenghiz coughed and cleared his throat. “Mr. Angelos, I am afraid that you cannot really stay anywhere, not for long. The Sorrowheart, the deepest pain of the world, has chosen to speak to you, and wherever you go it will follow—wherever you rest, those near you will hear its voice and feel its grief. It will spread like a marsh under a poorly drained road, growing steadily deeper and wider, and sucking everything—everything—down into it on every side.” His own voice was very nearly imploring. “Do you understand, Mr. Angelos? Please, do you understand me now?”
“I understand you.” Angelos rocked on his heels and ran a hand through his hair. Such ordinary gestures, Mr. Emanetoglu marveled dazedly, for someone who has just had his life shattered, undeservedly. Could I behave so? I wonder. Angelos said, “Well, if you will excuse me, I’ll need, as the phrase has it, to get my affairs in order. I can be gone by tomorrow night.” Mr. Emanetoglu saw nothing but affable flatness in his expression.
The hodjas consulted, the elder stooping like a hawk to mutter in the younger man’s ear. Hodja Cenghiz said, “Hodja Abbas will speak to the other voices in the house and tell them to be silent. It will take some little while.”
“By all means. Fumigate the baseboards to your hearts’ content.” Angelos bowed formally to the two old men. “I will be at Christ’s, seeing whether I can possibly pry some of my fees out of their grasp, since I will clearly not be attending classes this term.” He turned to Mr. Emanetoglu, holding out an envelope. “My usual payment.”
Mr. Emanetoglu accepted