Doctor Who_ The Eleventh Tiger Part 10

Nothing else happened, other than the rain continuing to patter on the leaves, and Barbara suddenly realised that the singing had stopped. Perhaps whoever it was didn't want visitors, and was playing dumb in the hope that the trio would pa.s.s on by.

'h.e.l.lo?' she called.

No answer.

She heard Fei-Hung beside her, and turned to see him lift a lamp from a hook on the eaves. It was old and grimy but, after shaking it and peering inside, he said, 'There's still a little oil in here.' He pulled out some flint and steel and lit the lamp.

In the soft lamplight Barbara could see through the gap in the doorway into the house. The floor was covered in dust that was disturbed only by old footprints made by small paws and claws. There was no furniture in the part she could see.

'It looks deserted,' Vicki said. She was holding Fei-Hung's umbrella now that he had the lamp.

Barbara decided that if anyone was in the house they would either have come to investigate by now or they were unconscious and needed help. More likely, they just didn't exist. She pushed the door open and it juddered over the uneven floor. The rest of the room was as bare as the part she had already seen. There was no furniture, but nor were there spots of wetness, which meant they could shelter from the rain.

The three of them went inside and Barbara almost closed the door, but thought better of it. She didn't want it to jam and trap them inside.

'Well, this is cosy.'

'I suppose,' Vicki said doubtfully. 'Some chairs would be nice.'

'Be grateful, Vicki. The roof is solid, so we won't get any wetter. The gra.s.s is always greener, isn't it?'

'What?' Vicki sank on to her haunches in a corner.

'People always seem to want more, rather than appreciating what they've got.'

Fei-Hung cast the lamplight around the room. He still looked a little nervous, but not as nervous as before. His face set into a look of more practical concern. 'I'd better check we're alone.'

'Of course we're alone.' Vicki said.

'I meant animals. Snakes, especially, like to shelter in places like this.'

Vicki immediately jumped to her feet, looking down as if she expected to see a cobra flaring its hood at her from the patch of dust she had disturbed. Barbara tried not to smile too obviously, and Vicki sat back down.

There were only two doors. Fei-Hung shone the lamplight through first one, then the other. 'No snakes,' he said, sounding surprised.

'Is there any furniture?' Vicki asked. Chairs, or stools?'

No.' He put the lamp on the floor near Vicki. 'You were right,' he said to Barbara. 'This is a good place to wait out the rain.'

Barbara wished she could feel as patient about reaching the Ship and getting the medical kit back to the Doctor as she had been when she was out in the rain. 'Are we for from the TAR-from the old temple?'

The young man frowned in concentration. 'Perhaps another half-mile, but the path leading to it will be on the other side of the road.'

'That shouldn't take us long, once the rain has stopped.'

Barbara turned and went to lean against the door, looking out at the mini-deluge. Though she didn't like getting wet, she had always loved watching rain. It was such a fresh and natural thing, washing away the dirt and dust of the day, bringing life to trees and flowers, and even the potatoes in the family allotment. Sometimes she would stand at her bedroom window, imagining herself to be looking out at a storm from the wheelhouse of one of the steamers her father helped to build.

She had once wondered, setting an imaginary course to search for sunken treasure from the Armada, whether she could grow up to become a sea captain, but her father told her that many sailors were superst.i.tious and thought women brought bad luck. Then, as she got older, she was more interested in the hows and whys of things like the Armada than she was in treasure.

Now, in a deserted house in China, she found herself standing on an imaginary deck, perhaps of a seagoing junk plying between China, India and far Araby. She tried to recall the tune of a sea shanty and hum it, but she couldn't quite get it right. The wrong notes kept insinuating themselves into her ears, so that the humming sounded like the melody of the song they'd heard earlier.

She realised that someone was actually humming the tune, and turned to berate Fei-Hung or Vicki for doing so.

Her heart sprang for her throat with deadly intent, and nearly knocked her over, as she saw a woman in a silk tunic and long silk dress standing at the window, humming to herself. Her feet were hidden under the dress, but there were no wet footprints near her. Barbara's strangled cry alerted Fei-Hung, who leapt into a fighting stance, and Vicki, who cupped a hand over her mouth to stifle a scream.

The woman turned. She was pale and delicate, her skin the tone of a paper-thin china cup, nearly transparent in its fineness.

'I like to watch the rain too,' she said. Her voice was soft and distant, but carried quite clearly.

'You startled us,' Barbara said. 'We didn't hear you come in.' How could she have, without brushing past her? Or, Barbara thought with a shiver, pa.s.sing through through her. her.

'I didn't.'

Barbara immediately felt guilty as well as foolish. 'I'm sorry - the door fell open and we called out, but there was no answer. We only wanted to shelter from the rain.'

'That's all right.' The woman smiled pleasantly. 'This isn't really my home any more, anyway. It used to be.'

Fei-Hung stepped up beside Barbara and said in a low voice, 'I looked in both the other rooms. There was no-one there, and no place for her to have been hidden.'

Barbara felt her insides tense again, just a little. 'A back door...?'

'None.'

Barbara swallowed, hard. 'We heard singing earlier, the same tune you were just humming. Was that you?'

'Yes. I sing to my beloved. He's dead now.'

'I'm sorry.'

'That's all right. He wouldn't have gone off to the army if I'd asked him to stay with me.'

Barbara felt an immediate sympathy. The poor girl was probably still in mourning for a man killed. If the song was a lament that would explain its melody.

'It can't be your fault,' she said.

'It was my fault for not telling him I love him, and for not luring him to marriage. He'd still be alive then, and I'd still be a lover.' The woman looked around. 'The house would not be so cold and empty.'

Barbara, chilled and touched, couldn't help looking round as well, to better empathise with this story. She regretted it immediately, because the table, chairs, ornaments and platters of food would have been so enticing if they had been there even a moment ago.

Now the smell of a large, spicy repast filled a room bright with the light of many candles, and Vicki was knocking over a chair as she ran for the door. Fei-Hung was chanting something, and keeping his guard up, as he physically shoved Barbara outside.

Fei-Hung cursed himself, and the gwailo gwailo women. He had known the house would be haunted; known it in his heart and his bones, and he should never have let them shelter there. women. He had known the house would be haunted; known it in his heart and his bones, and he should never have let them shelter there.

'Run!' he told them, pushing Barbara ahead. Neither she nor Vicki needed to be told twice, and Fei-Hung hoped the ghosts would not pursue them.

They burst out on to the Baiyun road and headed for the old temple, pursued only by the soulful notes of the lament that had drawn them to the house in the first place.

The rain had stopped, thankfully, and it didn't take long to reach the temple. Fei-Hung didn't feel entirely confident that it would be any more spiritually unpopulated than the house, but he had nowhere else to go. The gwailos gwailos had said this box of theirs was a place of safety, so even if the temple was haunted, at least there was some sanctuary to be had. had said this box of theirs was a place of safety, so even if the temple was haunted, at least there was some sanctuary to be had.

He recognised the fallen stones and overgrown pathway from the previous night, and hesitated. Then he continued towards the box that his father had said must belong to the gwailos gwailos on Xamian Island, and the Doctor had said belonged to him. Sure enough, Barbara was heading straight for it, a key glittering in her hand. on Xamian Island, and the Doctor had said belonged to him. Sure enough, Barbara was heading straight for it, a key glittering in her hand.

Barbara turned this way and that, dizzy from fear and the pungency of rotting undergrowth. Then she saw the windows of the TARDIS doors gazing affably at her from the archway, and felt the weight lift from her shoulders.

She tried the key in the lock. At first she thought it was going to stick and reject her, but then the door opened. She entered, embraced by the Ship.

Inside, she could finally relax. The TARDIS was too clinical and technological to feel like a home, or even a refuge, but it was welcoming and protective all the same. It would defend those who travelled with it, and keep them safe while they were in its care.

Barbara felt the urge to pat the nearest panel of the central console, and did so a little self-consciously. Maybe it was her imagination, but the ever-present buzz of the Ship's mechanisms seemed to change for a moment, the way a cat's purr does when you stroke it. If so, she couldn't help but wonder whether the maybe-imaginary change in tone was for the same reason.

Having caught her breath, she went through into the antechamber where the food machine loomed. It took her a moment to realise that the one indented roundel that didn't glow was the cupboard door she was looking for. The first-aid kit and vaguely paintbrush-like object the Doctor had described were indeed there, along with various other devices and knick-knacks.

Vicki was torn between following Barbara into the blessed sanct.i.ty of the TARDIS, and staying to rea.s.sure the increasingly jittery Fei-Hung. She paused on the threshold of the Ship and turned back to him. Barbara would be out in a moment anyway.

She thought back to what had happened in the house. The woman appearing from nowhere was bad enough, but the whole place had suddenly changed. It was like being in a museum when the holographic exhibits were switched on, but no such thing had been invented yet.

It must have been a ghost after all.

4.

Xamian Island was vaguely cigar-shaped, and nestled in a bay against the southwest corner of the city where the great Pearl River split in two. The main river continued southwards, but another one turned eastwards for a while.

The sun rose, casting light and heat across the roof tops, and across the parks and courtyards, and across the parade ground at Xamian, and finally across the faces and skin of the people who were up and about at that hour.

Sergeant Major Anderson was only 5 foot 4 inches, but n.o.body could have mistaken him for anything less than hard as nails. Perhaps it was the Glasgow accent, or the flattened nose cultivated by years as a bare-knuckle bantam. Maybe it was just because no-one in the regiment had ever seen him smile.

Captain Richard Logan knew better than that. Anderson was a tough nut, but in Logan's eyes this was simply because he was insane. Not in the devil-may-care, courageous way that the major was insane, but in a sour and s.a.d.i.s.tic way that thrived on taking out his troubles on whichever poor b.u.g.g.e.r caught his glance the wrong way.

Logan envied the major his extra lie-in in bed. He would much rather get up at a more leisurely pace than be out here with the Scottish devil, watching the men form up at reveille.

The company stood in lines and Logan walked along them, adjusting a b.u.t.ton here, ordering a polish there. The sergeant major, who had already been up for ages and seemed to have an inhuman lack of need for sleep, marched in step with him, glowering at the men.

'Everything seems in order, Sarn't Major. Have them fall out for breakfast.'

'Aye, sir.' As Logan headed for his own office, where his batman would already be waiting with his breakfast, he heard Anderson bellow at the men to fall out and report to the mess.

Anderson stayed where he was as the men fell out, silently counting the seconds in his head, seeing how long he could glare at nothing in particular without blinking. There were plenty of men around to watch him from the corners of their fluttering eyes, fearing his wrath, wondering at his motives.

Thinking he was insane, which he knew Logan did. He liked that, because it kept them on their toes.

After two and a half minutes his eyelids rebelled, forcing a blink on to his features. He turned on his heel and marched towards his billet, satisfied that the men's fear and wonder had been properly reinforced.

The major felt that another, equally hot and burning, sun was rising from the nape of his neck to the centre of his skull. Far from waking him, it baked the inside of his head and battered the back of his eyeb.a.l.l.s with waves of heat. He reached up to touch the side of his head, behind his ear. The whole area was hot to the touch under his fingertips, and the light pressure of his fingers sent a bolt of agony through his brain that almost had him dropping to his knees with a scream.

A batman had delivered a tray of devilled eggs, ham, toast and marmalade to his quarters. The major didn't have any appet.i.te, but forced down about half of each thing as he knew that not eating anything would lead him to feel a great deal sicker later on in the day.

Then he put on his uniform, and walked around the parade ground to his office. It was small and cluttered, as company staff offices usually were in his experience, but a little more homely than most, thanks to a few souvenirs on the walls. A picture of the major with his fellow officers at a billet hung next to the portrait of Queen Victoria. He wondered idly how he knew who she was. A curved, broad-bladed sword hung on another wall and, of course, the major's helmet - currently resting on a spare chair - had a pagri pagri wrapped round it and no plume. wrapped round it and no plume.

He sat down in his chair and turned to look up at the photographic print next to the portrait. It had a caption identifying the men as members of a Hussar company at Jaipur, in 1860. Everyone wore full dress uniform and, after a moment, the major recognised a face on the far left of the picture as the same one he had seen in the mirror that morning. The face in the picture had a full beard rather than just its present handlebar moustache, but he recognised it all the same.

'So, I've been to India...' He looked at the sword on the other wall. It looked Indian to him, though he wasn't sure what gave him this idea. He just felt it.

Before he could explore his office further, there was a knock at the door.