Abarat: The First Book of Hours - Barker Clive - Страница 31

“You’re right. It’s certainly been used for that purpose in the past. Though the results are unpredictable. And they can be grotesque, sometimes tragic. But no, that’s not what Pixler wants it for.”

“What then?” Candy said. Then her eyes grew wide. “No,” she said. “Not the Kid?”

“Yes,” said Samuel. “He wants to use the Conjuration to give life to the Commexo Kid. According to my sources, he was refused. Which, if any of this is true, is all good.”

“What was his response?”

“Outrage. He flung a fit. He kept saying: The Kid is a joy bringer! You can’t deny him life! He could spread so much happiness.”

“But you don’t believe that? About being a joy bringer?”

“Here’s what I believe,” said Samuel. “I believe that if Pixler had the Conjuration of Life, we wouldn’t just have one living, breathing Kid. There’d be armies of them! All of them wearing that idiotic smile as they took over the islands.” He shuddered. “Horrible.”

He turned the key in the lock and pushed open the door. The smell of printer’s ink stung Candy’s nostrils.

“Before you come inside, I should warn you,” Klepp said, “it’s chaos.”

Then he swung the door wide. Chaos it was; from ceiling to floor. There was a small printing press in the middle of the room and dozens of unruly piles of Klepp’s Almenak on every side. Clearly Samuel slept in the midst of his work, because there was an old sofa against the wall, with pillows and a couple of blankets strewn upon it.

But what immediately drew Candy’s eye was a number of faded sepia photographs that were framed and hung up on one of the walls. The first in the series pictured the lighthouse where Candy’s journey had begun.

“Oh, my…” she said.

Klepp came over to look at the pictures with her.

“You know this place?”

“Yes, of course. It’s near my home in Chickentown.”

She moved on to the next picture. It was a photograph of the jetty that had appeared from the ground when she’d summoned the Sea of Izabella. The picture had been taken at a busy and apparently happy time. There were people crowding the jetty from end to end, some dressed in what looked to be frock coats and top hats, others—the stevedores and the sailors—more simply attired. Moored at the end of the jetty was a three-masted sailing ship.

A sailing ship! In the middle of Minnesota. Even now, having walked on the jetty and skipped that sea, the notion still astonished Candy.

“Do you know when this was taken?” Candy asked Klepp.

“1882 by your calendar, I believe,” Samuel said.

He moved on to the next photograph, which showed the other end of the jetty, where there were several two-story buildings, stores advertising ship’s supplies and what looked like a hotel.

“There’s my great-grandfather,” Samuel said, pointing to a man who bore an uncanny resemblance to him.

“Who’s the lady beside him?”

That’s his wife, Vida Klepp.”

“She was beautiful.”

“She left him, the day after this photograph was taken.”

“Really?” said Candy, her thoughts going for a moment to Henry Murkitt, who had also lost his wife when he’d turned his attention to the Abarat.

“Where did she go?” Candy said.

“Vida Klepp? Nobody knows for sure. She took herself off with a man from Autland and was never seen again. Whatever happened to her, wherever she went, it nearly broke my great-grandfather’s heart. He only went back to Hark’s Harbor once after that…”

“Hark’s Harbor? That’s the name of this place?”

“Yes. It was the largest of the harbors that served the Abarat, so that’s where all the big ships came. The clippers and the schooners.”

Of all things to think of at that moment, Candy pictured Miss Schwartz, instructing her class to find ten interesting facts about Chickentown. Well, how about this? Candy thought. What would the look on Miss Schwartz’s face have been had Candy brought these pictures in to show the class? That would have been quite a moment.

“It’s all gone now, of course,” Samuel said.

“Not all of it,” Candy replied. “That jetty—” She tapped the glass covering the photograph.”—is still there. And the lighthouse. But all the rest of it—these stores, for instance—they’ve all gone. I suppose they must have rotted away over the years.”

 ”Oh no, they didn’t rot,” Klepp said. “Remember I said my great-grandfather went back there one last time?”

“Yes.”

“Well, it was for the burning of Hark’s Harbor.”

“The burning?”

“Look.” Samuel moved on to the next to last photograph in the sequence. It showed a somewhat blurred image, perhaps the consequence of an old-fashioned plate camera capturing a scene filled with movement. The photograph was of the burning of the harbor. The buildings at the end of the jetty were all on fire, with smeared bright flames shooting out of the windows and through the doors. There was no attempt to put the fire out, as far as Candy could see. People were just standing along the jetty, watching the spectacle. She couldn’t make out their expressions.

“Was it arson?”

“Well, it wasn’t an accident,” Klepp said. “But it wasn’t strictly arson either. It was a piece of authorized destruction.”

“I don’t understand.”

“As I told you, Hark’s Harbor was the place where most of the business between the islands and the Hereafter was done. It was a very busy place. Sometimes there were as many as ten ships unloading and loading every day. There were cargoes of Abaratian wine and spices from the islands. And slaves, of course.”

“And these people knew where the slaves came from?” Candy said, amazed by the idea. “People knew about the Abarat?”

“Oh yes, they knew,” Klepp said. “But it wasn’t common knowledge, you understand. There was a select circle of merchants from your world who liked doing business over here, and they did a roaring trade. Obviously they didn’t want to have to divide the profit, so they didn’t share the secret. And then of course there were merchants over here who imported art and plants and animals from the Hereafter, and made a fine business out of that.”

“So why the burning?”

“Greed,” said Samuel. “In the end everybody began to get greedy. The Abaratian merchants started to sell things that should never have been seen in your world. Magical treasures that were stolen out of temples and dug up from burial sites, then sold in the Hereafter for enormous sums of money. Obviously, this couldn’t go on. Our people were being soiled by the ways of your world, and probably vice versa. There were bitter disputes. Some ended in murder.

“No doubt there was fault on both sides, but my greatgrandfather was of the opinion that the Hereafter was a place of infinite corruption. He said in the Almenak that it would wither the soul of a saint. Now he had a reason to hate the Hereafter: it had claimed his wife. But I believe he was probably right. The trade between the Hereafter and the Abarat corrupted everyone. The merchants, the seamen and probably the people who bought the merchandise in the end.”

“That’s sad.”

Klepp nodded. “It’s a tragic tale,” he said. “Anyway, it was decided that the trade had to stop. No more selling of Abaratian slaves, or magic.”

“So the harbor was burned down?”

“To almost nothing,” Klepp said. He moved on to look at the last photograph in the sequence. It showed the gutted buildings, still smoking. And a row of people along the jetty, waiting to board a clipper ship.

“The last ship out,” Klepp said. “My great-grandfather was on it. This is the final picture he took in your world.”

“Amazing,” said Candy. “But look.” She pointed to the lighthouse, which was visible in the picture beside the clipper, clearly undamaged by the fire. “Why did they leave the lighthouse intact?”

Klepp shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe one of your people paid somebody to leave it there, in the hope that business would one day resume. Or perhaps they thought it would fall apart in its own time.”