Lockwood & Co.: The Screaming Staircase

held pillowed on a bulging bicep. We waited.
    Finally there came a slow, painful tapping of a stick across the lobby, and Fairfax entered. Light gleamed on the metal skullcap; it shone too on the great hook-nose, giving him more than ever the appearance of a stooped and hulking bird of prey. Hesitantly, he advanced to a leather chair below the wall of photographs and, with an extended sigh of relief, sank down into its depths. As he sat, the edges of his metal corset spread out about him with a gentle clinking sound.
    ‘At last ,’ he said. ‘We were hanging around that cursed cellar for hours after we heard the explosion. All right, Grebe; you can take it off. We’re safe from ghosts in here.’
    He bent his neck and removed the helmet, before pulling off the goggles. They’d left a red weal across his brow. The jet-black eyes were screwed up with discomfort; the face was etched with age.
    Up on the wall the photo of his youthful self stared out in all its swash and swagger: Fairfax the actor, smooth and handsome, all codpiece, earrings and too-tight leggings, moodily contemplating a plaster skull. Below the picture, the real thing slumped bent and careworn, wearily coughing in his chair. It was strange to see how completely the years hadchanged him, how they’d steadily devoured his strength and drained that vitality away.
    Grebe took off his helmet too. He turned out to have a remarkably thin head, much too small for his body’s muscled bulk. It looked like an upturned skittle. He wore his hair in a cropped military cut, and his mouth was thin and cruel.
    Fairfax set his goggles and the helmet down on the nearest side-table, on top of the books Lockwood had studied several hours before. He glanced around the room with an air of satisfaction. ‘I like this library,’ he said. ‘It’s my frontier. At night it forms the borderland between the worlds of the living and the dead. I come here often to test the latest equipment my factories are producing. All the iron keeps me fairly safe, but I have my armour too, which allows me to walk deep into the house unscathed.’
    George stirred. ‘That armour: it looks like you’re wearing a dress.’
    Fairfax’s eyes narrowed. ‘Insults at a time like this , Mr Cubbins? Is that wise?’
    ‘Well, when you’re being held at gunpoint by a geriatric madman in a metal skirt, you’ve kind of hit rock-bottom anyway,’ George said. ‘It can’t really get much worse.’
    The old man laughed unpleasantly. ‘That remains to be seen. But you’re wrong to be so dismissive. This “dress” is made from an advanced type of steel – mostly iron, which gives it its warding power, but with an aluminium alloy thatmakes it much lighter than usual. Ease of movement and full protection! The helmet is state-of-the-art too. Did you know that the most vulnerable part of every agent is the neck, Mr Lockwood? This rim removes the danger . . . Don’t you wish you had one?’
    Lockwood shrugged. ‘It’s certainly . . . unique.’
    ‘Wrong again! It’s sophisticated, unusual, but not unique. Fairfax Iron isn’t the only company to be working on remarkable innovations. These goggles, now—’ He collected himself. ‘But perhaps we’re getting off the point.’
    Fairfax sat back in his chair and regarded Lockwood for a few moments without speaking. He seemed to be weighing his words. ‘Down in the cellar,’ he began slowly, ‘I overheard you discussing a certain locket , and certain proofs attached to it. In a spirit of casual interest, I’d be keen to know what you mean by “proofs”, if indeed you mean anything. And after that’ – he smiled thinly – ‘perhaps you can tell me where the locket is, and how exactly it may be found.’
    ‘We’re hardly likely to help you there,’ George said. ‘You’ll only chuck us down the well.’ His pale and bloodied face was set in an expression of fierce defiance. Mine (I guessed) was similar, though also laced with deep repulsion. I could hardly bring myself to look at Fairfax at all.
    But Lockwood might have been chatting with a neighbour about the weather. ‘It’s all right, George,’ he said. ‘I can give the man his proofs. It’s important we show him just howhopeless his position is.’ He crossed his legs and sat back with every appearance of contentment. ‘Well, Fairfax, as you guessed, we found the locket on Annabel Ward’s body. We immediately knew that it had been given to her by her killer.’
    Fairfax