The Chemickal Marriage

able to form the words.
    ‘Doctor Svenson,’ groaned the Contessa. ‘May we
please
–’
    Svenson raised his hand in acquiescence, but his expression clouded as he saw the hoses and wires connecting the two tables. He called sharply to the acolytes standing at either side. ‘What is this? Who is responsible? These are wrong!’
    ‘They cannot be wrong,’ protested an acolyte. ‘Professor Trooste –’
    ‘I don’t give a damn about Professor Trooste.’ Svenson was on his knees, pulling at the undercarriage of each table. ‘Celeste! Look at me! Celeste Temple!’
    She looked down, ready to spit again, though her eyes were swimming. He rapped his hand on the brass fittings that connected the black hose. ‘The direction of force is incorrect, Celeste? Is it not? It must pass through the tubs’ – he indicated the line of rubber reservoirs – ‘then through the mineral compounds and into the book. The whole reaches Chang and the bloodstone. The discharge, the corruption, is strained off and sent to you. But if these are misaligned, the bloodstone will come into play too soon –
look
at me, Celeste!’
    He shoved aside the acolytes and with a few rapid tugs flipped a line of brass switches, toggling the flow of the hoses. Then, pivoting on his heels,cigarette pinched in his lips, the Doctor took a glass flask from his tunic and poured the raw bloodstone – with a spasm of pain Miss Temple knew it on sight – into a chamber beneath her own table. But she perceived within her fog of nausea that the Doctor’s actions bore no resemblance whatsoever to his words. There was no call for bloodstone on her table, and the brass switches now sent the purifying energy to
her
instead of Chang.
    ‘What are you doing?’ called the Contessa.
    ‘Exactly what you want, damn you!’ Svenson stood. ‘Ask Celeste!’
    On cue Miss Temple began to froth and spit. She did not know what he intended, but knew what was required.
    ‘You’re a bastard,’ she croaked.
    Svenson stepped back and wiped his hands on an acolyte’s robe. He waved for the acolyte with the Contessa’s book to join him. ‘On second thought, I should prefer my book to be cleaned as well –’
    He quickly knelt and extracted the book from the leather case. As he extended his hand for the one book and offered up the other, the Doctor’s gaze fell on Mahmoud.
    ‘Wait – watch that man!’ he shouted.
    Mahmoud had indeed stepped nearer to the tubs and at the Doctor’s cry every carbine swung its aim to his chest. Mahmoud went still, staring at the Doctor. Then, his arms raised, he slowly sank to his knees. Svenson cleared his throat to regain the acolyte’s attention and handed him a book. ‘
Gently
, please – and when you’ve finished, put it back in that protective case.’
    ‘Damn you to hell,’ growled Mahmoud.
    ‘I am sorry,’ Svenson told him. ‘I cannot help you more than I have. You must make your own choice. I know it is an impossible position.’
    Svenson slid the glass book into the brass machine and stood.
    ‘My Lady Lucifera, at last, all is prepared.’
    Miss Temple did not know what the Doctor had done. He stood with his cigarette – his last, perhaps – and brushed the hair from his eyes with thin fingers. She would not escape. Once the Doctor had been shot for his impudence, the Contessa would try again – or simply cut Miss Temple’s throat. But that he had done something, that he had tried to the last, touchedMiss Temple in her sick isolation, like a rope snaking down into a well. She would never be pulled up, but even a glimpse of a world beyond her fate eased her heart.
    She was not afraid. She had been exhausted by corruption and fever – she did not desire that
life
. She did not want to live without Chang either, and Chang was gone. And, since she did not imagine he would reciprocate her feelings, that they might perish together without her being subject to his rejection was perhaps an inadvertent benefit of the Contessa’s victory. Miss Temple smiled, and bile burnt the corners of her mouth.
    The Contessa stood with one hand hovering over the brass knobs controlling the tubs, the other on a larger knob, the size of an apple, at the centre of the rostrum.
    ‘You must do it all together,’ explained Doctor Svenson. ‘Secondary cables will begin the rendering of the remaining metals. The minerals will advance in the proper sequence and temper the incarnation. The infusion of
identity
will travel directly