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Chapter Four: When One Door Closes, Another….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                                                                 Lilac Cottage

                                                                                                              3 Bakers Lane, Middlesex

 

 

My darling Wife Eleanor,

 

 

The last time we saw each other was three hundred and seventy-two days in its entirety. At the time my pen presses upon this paper, I can add an additional fifteen hours and twenty-two minutes, give or take thirty seconds in between from the moment I placed that last kiss upon your perfect warm cheek, and took the ship from the East India Docks in the London Canals on that chilly autumn morning of November 2nd 1832.

 

I have oft written many a long letter to you only to put the pen down and scrunch up the paper in frustration. I knew my written words could never do any real justice to what conversations have been lost between us in person since my absence. I am dearly sorry for the scarce letters I have sent since my departure and for what, I can only presume, you found lacking in content. Now it has been many months since I have heard any word from you and I fear you are angry at me. If you were feeling such, you have every right to be so and I ask for your forgiveness. I will explain everything now, and in my evident overcompensation I will apologise in advance for I fear I have written too many pages in this particular correspondence!

 

In my shameful pride I had wanted to write to you only when I had found some new lead as to what it was that I was looking for. That validation that would put both our hearts at ease and know that this choice, my choice, to leave was not in vain. As every day continued I feared the growing disdain you must have felt towards me; you a newly married woman in the world and with no husband by her side. No words can express the guilt I felt in leaving you to pursue my journey only after one month of marriage. I cannot take that back, although it breaks my heart to think upon it even now.

 

Know this, my love, I am writing to tell you that it was not in vain.

 

The days since my departure from your side have been arduous, and served as a constant reminder that I was far from home. While in a physical sense I know I am miles away from you, on another level it made me feel even further from you. A world away. A lifetime even? Missing you has been the hardest part of the journey, and believe me I have experienced many troubles along the way. Why even from our first day of departure, our impressive East Indiamen merchant ship; owned by we the United Company of Merchants of England Trading to the East Indies, started a trying journey. A magnificent ship if ever there was one, but one made for optimal cargo storage rather than passenger comfort. The seas were rough, and the ship sailed ever so slow, making an unforgivably unforgiving journey to Burma. I dare say the nausea did not subside even for a minute until I departed the ship in India, only to be greeted with a hot and sticky climate that churned my stomach once more.

 

Burma is a place full of turbulence and wonder. I knew when I set sail that our expedition was about to collide with the aftermath of the Anglo-Burmese War, of course already seven years in its passing. A victory for we the British East India Trading Company…yet not so much for the Burmese. I recall Father talking to me in great excitement about the victory back in 1826 when he was still a member of the board himself. With a puffed out chest, the pride in his voice was prominent and I can almost hear him now as he spoke of the affair. He told it like one would tell a child's fairy tale; of knights in shining armour, the brave knights of course being we the British, who inevitably won the battle and lived happily ever after. My youthful naivety did not even stop to think for a moment of the improbable concept being put before me. That the outcome of a war could ever be victorious. Surely someone had to lose and suffer?

 

It vexes me to admit I left my journey an ignorant, unknowledgeable and, dare I say, imbecilic person. Oblivious to the ramifications of actions performed by a company I was apart of, and yet I was none the wiser until we actually reached Burma. Then it became abundantly clear and the evidence of the whole bloody affair was still fresh around us several years onwards. That was something I was not prepared to experience, and I believe it has taught me a great deal about the way of life and nature of mankind. At every turn there was poverty, starvation and illness amongst the locals. Thousands of lives were lost during the war, and yet I was unaware of how many more suffered in the years following. Now I could see it before my very eyes.

 

Oh Eleanor, I felt utterly ashamed of the aftermath I had stumbled into. I felt like a vulture, picking at the eyes of the dead. Taking the spoils of a war I had no part in, and yet who else is to blame if not a member of the board? No, to my shame I was ignorant in my part, in how our trading company ruined countless lives in the name of improving exports and gaining control over foreign territories. Our expedition collected many fine pieces, for Burma is a place rich in collectables even at the worst of times. For us it is the best of times, for the people are desperate and keen to sell anything they can for any meagre scrap we were willing to offer. Again, I feel vile in my profiteering off the suffering of others and always paid more than I could have managed to get away with, much to the disapproval of my associate Mr. Burns. He rather bluntly labelled my frame of mind as 'bad for business.'. I care not and stand by this decision, for this journey has made me think long and hard about resigning from my position on the board when I return to London. I am not my father, and while I inherited his position on the board upon his death, I want no part in this company anymore. On that note, I assure you this will be my final trading expedition with the United Company of Merchants of England Trading to the East Indies.

 

Indeed, as I explained to you before I set sail, Burma is located in the middle of the main trading route between India and China, and I have been able to peruse and obtain many a spectacular and rare item since I have arrived. With so many trinkets and pieces, Mr. Burns and I had to arrange more and more wagons the further we continued our journey. I dare say we considered it quite possible that we would sink our ship on the way back! We have collected enough goods on this one expedition alone to live out our days in excessive comfort, for that we are certain.

 

On a lighter hearted note, I do not think I would be blowing my own trumpet in saying I am an eloquent creature of the English dialect, and yet I could never sufficiently articulate to you what it felt like to arrive in India. I could never give the experience justice; of the intense dry heat of the place, or the exotic fragrant spices of cloves, cardamom and ginger that consumed my senses, or the coloured silks brilliant in purple, azure and red that hung from the windows of my room. I cannot properly describe the experience of witnessing elephants and monkeys wandering through the streets as freely as a stray cat or dog would do in London. I cannot explain to you how it feels to have the sweltering sun beat down on your body and the scorching sand burn under your boots as you sweat in the blazing days that felt would never end. Of course when the day did end and the waxy white moon rose, the nights grew cold as ice and the world seemed to transform into something of a shivering paradox. Indeed, India is a very strange place.

 

However, in strangeness there is also a mystifying charm here that I have never experienced elsewhere. There are wise men, referred to as Gurus, who are the gatekeepers of wisdom and insight to the inner soul. Perhaps I find it more so fascinating coming from a medical background, but some of these people focus on healing from a physical and spiritual approach. The very notion that the two are intertwined is intriguing! Why here there are even mystics that bewitch snakes! Indeed! They sit cross-legged on the ground and the tune of their punji, these flute like instruments, sends a deadly cobra to dance calmly out of a reed basket, hypnotized by their master. There are monkeys that serve tea and refreshments in one particular laneway that I used to frequent. Can you believe it? Actual small monkeys that deliver apple tea in delicate coloured glasses to your table, and in turn they are fed sugar cubes as payment in lieu. Some are especially cheeky like children and like to explore my pockets, taking delight in the trinkets I carry with me; for example, the cork of a wine bottle that still smelt of the spirit it had contained. Or the pocket watch you brought me as a gift for my birthday. With playful natures and mischievous smiles, I admit I have grown fonder of the monkeys of this world than most people I have encountered throughout my entire life.

 

That aside, of all the wonders that I have experienced they are incomparable to the simplicity of your company and I miss you ever so much, my Darling. I miss your face, and your dimpled cheek smile. That light hearted laughter, like a flighty lark flittering across a fresh blue spring sky. I lie awake at night and try to hear your laugh in my head. I miss your pale blue eyes, and the scent of your skin that smells like fresh roses from the garden. I miss your touch, and I feel quite alone in this strange place. Even when our small expedition left India and drew closer to an end, that feeling of being alone never left me. I was a step closer to returning to you but it did not put my heart at ease. And so we continued to make our way through the trading routes. Yet at every small shop and stall, at every cart and twist and turn, I still came no closer to what it was that I had been searching for.

 

After too many months spent in Burma, and at the insistence of my associate Mr. Burns, we eventually set back onto the Indian Ocean and sailed towards Persia. History it seemed had repeated itself and we found ourselves walking into the aftermath of a Russo-Persian War, the second one apparently. Mr. Burns advised me that the Treaty of Turkmenchay had recently been signed a few years back, declaring Russian sovereignty over a fair portion of the lands. Even had I not known this, you could tell the moment you stepped into the Persian lands that the locals and the foreigners hated each other with a hostility that was as suffocating as the heat from the desert. There was no warm reception awaiting a group of British merchants! This made our expedition feel even more so foreign in a foreign land, yet thankfully we were left to our own devices as travelling merchants and no misfortune followed. Indeed, it helps to have the privilege of a proper escort to secure our safety and cargo. All I can say is, in this respect, God bless the power and influence of the United Company of Merchants of England Trading to the East Indies. If there was one thing I was ever grateful for during our trek across Persia, it was being a board member. I dare day it is the only reason Mr. Burns and I are still alive today!

 

Making our way through Persia, we finally arrived in Egypt. Mr. Burns was, as ever, exceptional in his known associates and introduced us to the Italian archaeologist Niccola Francesco Ippolito Baldassarre Roellini, a name of such magnitude I'd wager no English noble could even compete with it! Ippolito was leading an expedition in Egypt at the time, the Franco-Tuscan Expedition. The expedition had already secured permission from the Egyptian Khedive and Ottoman Viceroy Muhammad Ali of Egypt. Ippolito kindly took Mr. Burns and I under his wing so we would avoid any problems with the officials, and we were swept along with his expedition to Thebes, where he invested a large interest in exploring the area.

 

Oh my Darling, I have beheld the Valley of the Kings! I have made sketches of Egyptian idols and imprints of hieroglyphics that time and translation has forgot. I have laid eyes on burial chambers never seen since they were sealed thousands of years prior. My heart was pounding with excitement to witness the mysteries of another era unravel before me and yet, to my disappointment, I was still no closer to that what I had been searching for. That feeling had left me and I knew my journey, while fascinating, was not on the right path.

 

As I stood on the dusty hot sands of the African desert two months back I realised I was a fool. I had found nothing of import, and yet a thousand odds and ends from the time of pharaohs, all of it terribly captivating yet none of it surmounting to a hidden clue or revealing a concealed answer that I knew I was destined to find. I have collected vials and burial masks, stones and even sarcophaguses of mummified cats! There are scarabs made of brilliant blue lapis lazuli, plates, and beaded jewellery that I dare say will pick up a wonderful price when I return, but at the time I felt even more the fool, for it was all for none.

 

While we stayed with Ippolito, his expedition located the tomb of a pharaoh named Ramesses the Great. At first our hearts were throbbing with the prospect of what awaited inside, and yet to our disappointment it appeared the tomb had already been looted a while back. To put further trouble onto the expedition, one of the archaeologists, a Scotsman named Mr. MacLennan was horrifically injured by a fallen stone from a mid-chamber in the tomb. Both his legs were crushed and had to be amputated on site. The poor man was gravely ill, and while Ippolito was sympathetic to his cause and pledged to return him to his home in Scotland immediately, when we returned to Alexandria we were informed by the officials that the boat intended to take Ippolito and his team to France had been delayed by two months. Politics it seemed was keeping Ippolito at bay in Egypt. Thankfully our ship was ready to leave and we were eager to set sail. Mr. Burns and I were determined to return to London immediately with our goods, however we also knew Scotland was only a bit of a divergence to help a man that had suffered so much. Leaving Mr. MacLennan stranded in Egypt for months was not an option, so we took him with us as we journeyed via boat to Scotland.

 

I confess I had little opinion of the Scots before now but Mr. MacLennan has given me a newfound respect for the people of the north. In great pain and with no legs, one could only assume one's spirit would have been defeated, yet Mr. MacLennan held a strength in his heart of a true warrior, oft repeating the words; Dun Spiro Spero. Curiously one day at sea I inquired after its meaning, and he informed me it was his Clan MacLennan's motto. A Latin phrase meaning; While I breathe I hope. In truth the words humbled me more than any words I had ever heard uttered, and I know someday that powerful phrase will serve me with courage. There was power behind those words, I felt it and I heard it in Mr. MacLennan's voice each time he uttered it. While I breathe I hope.

 

We finally returned Mr. MacLennan to his thankful family in the village of Cockburnspath, a coastal village on the eastern coast of Scotland. We were directed to guest accommodation at a dwelling house at Dunglass Castle about half a mile northwest of Cockburnspath. Indeed, that sounds grand, does it not? However no, the castle itself had been all but left in ruins, its tenants I hear quite popular amongst the pigeon community. However, there was a small cottage sitting at the north west end of the enclosure that allowed us comfortable lodgings while we rested and enjoyed the beautiful surroundings of a place time seemed to have all but forgotten. We decided to recuperate there for a day or two before we sought to finally set back to London.

 

Oh my darling, how do I write this? I came across a most strange item in the very room I was staying at in the abode besides Dunglass Castle. Forgive my pen hand as it shakes even now as I write this, but this item is…no…how do I write this and expect you to believe me?

 

I have found what I have been searching for. I have found it! Thank the heavens! Thank the spirit who guided me. Thank whoever it was, for I have found it! I fear to mention what it is for I know you will laugh ever so much, but here I shall proceed….

 

It is a wardrobe. An armoire. A clothing cabinet. Yes, it is as simple as that.

 

I can imagine you frowning as you read this, perhaps muttering to yourself 'a wardrobe'? Yes, but much unlike one of those delicate armoires in our cottage, for this one is a most sturdy of creations, intricately carved in deep reddish-brown heavy oak with two large doors six-foot high. I know, I know of all the things it could possibly have been, it was a wardrobe! A strange wooden old clothing storage piece. Madness! From what I can tell the carvings are definitely Tudor in style, of that grandiose and beautiful Renaissance style from a period when great workmanship was put into fine pieces of furniture. There is an element of gothic to the carvings in the doors, of cathedral etchings on the cupboard doors, each separated by a singular thick piece of wood running down the inside of the wardrobe. One can only assume it was made in the early Tudor period, and for someone of great standing. When talking to the owners of the residence we were staying at, I was informed it was one of the furnishings in Dunglass Castle at the beginning of the 17th century where King James VI resided before continuing to England to take up the throne. Perhaps even old James himself hung his breeches in there!

 

From the style and structure, I can agree to it being made from the old Tudor period…however there is something so utterly strange about this item that has nothing to do with age. I walked into my guest bed chambers, weary after such a tiresome trip and there the wardrobe was, sitting in the corner of the room. I froze as my eyes fell upon it. I knew it was what I had been searching for. As God is my witness, I swear it. When I drew near it, voices whispered in my mind and vibrated the very blood in my veins. I know you hate of me speaking about such strange and unexplainable things, and naturally of the dead, but the spirit that told me that this was my life's endeavour, that I would find it one day…well she whispered to me that yes I had finally found what I had been looking for. Directly into me ear she whispered 'You have found it…'

 

Oh Dearest, for all the unexplained chain of events and circumstances that led me to this very moment, to a place where I would never have ventured to in a thousand years. To a place that held the key to my life's mystery, I cannot explain it and yet it excites me so much that I write eagerly to you now, sitting here in bouts of laughter in disbelief. This is the very proof that fate does exist! I am lost for words, although it would seem otherwise!

 

Just know this, I am returning home immediately. I said I would leave only for a year and I am terribly sorry that I was unable to keep that promise, but I shall return now. This is what I have been searching for, and I have bought the item off the owners for a sum I'd wager they knew was substantially more than an old wardrobe was worth. Little do they know! My darling this is it! Now I can stay in Middlesex with you and continue my work, with you by my side. Finally, we shall be together once more, and before Yuletide it seems! What a gay time awaits us this upcoming festive season! 

 

My excitement aside, all I want is to be by your side once more. I am leaving Dunglass Castle today and traveling back to London immediately, and hopefully this letter will arrive before I do. What merriment we shall endure then! Everything I had hoped for has now come to fruition, and we can be together once more.

 

Thank you, my darling. Thank you for your patience. Thank you for letting me be selfish in this endeavour and to go off in search of the unknown. You are a better person than I could ever have been in your situation, and even now as I write this I am in awe of such a woman as yourself. A woman that I am more than ever proud to call my wife.

 

Your loving Husband,

Edgar R. Evans

Dunglass Castle, Dunglass; East Lothian, Scotland

November 9th, 1833

 

 

It was an icy and cold mid-morning in December on Pageantmaster Court as a tall and well-dressed gentleman paced his shop, Le Cabinet des Curiosities. A gentleman that every person in Ludgate Hill knew as the curious Mr. Edgar Robin Evans. If you saw him on the street you would note his extremely tall height on passing by, for he was easily six foot four if not more. He held a very elegant thin frame with a pasty, dare one say, deathly white complexion revealed on his ghostly face and concealed under his ever black attires of waistcoats and fine woven woollen pants. With short dark brown hair and a matching pair of dark hazelnut eyes, that looked even larger in the gauntness of a face that evidently did not take cheer in food, he was a man best described as oddly distinctive yet strangely striking in appearance. One may have even considered him amiable in the revelation of his elegant smile and delicate facial features, yet that was in itself a rarity to bear witness to. His expression was always serious; of a man consumed by his own troublesome thoughts and there was nothing else left to distract him even if it dared try.

 

Evans was a reputable entrepreneur, an odd gentleman in his late thirties, with an outlandish skip in his step and a face that always looked preoccupied and deep in concentration, too consumed by his thoughts to acknowledge there was a world outside his head that ran by the clock. Mr. Edgar Evans was oblivious to the world for indeed the world had been oblivious to him for quite some time. He deplored labels, and yet that was quite possibly because he knew his would have been his defining characteristic. An eccentric. Or perhaps he was too fond of the notion of being considered an oddball to give credence in taking sentiment to titles. Indeed Mr. Edgar Evans was the sort of person you noticed for their quirks, and he had been well aware of this since he was a lad.

 

While some people were curious of the gentleman, others were downright disapproving. For Evans lived as a free man, as free as one could possibly live in a life of social constrictions, rules and regulations in London. And naturally his freedom came with a price, a common disdain from the less than free populace surrounding him, who looked upon each other with jealous competition that people often thrived off. The people who praised wealth and social standing, class and breeding, possessions and property; these were the people that looked at Evans with disapproval. Mr. Edgar Evans held a freedom that sprouted from his indifference to the trivial opinions of others, and where the opinions of others did not matter it became apparent the social pack had a lack of power over the man. In turn, whilst still a gentleman of the middle to upper class, Evans indifference to the opinions of others meant he lacked knowing his proper place in the order of all things. Of that gilded ladder that the fine men and women of London endeavoured to climb. When confronted with someone who did not show an interest in even attempting to mount the ladder, the good people of London knew they were dealing with an oddity. Evans was well aware of what others thought of him, and it changed nothing. In all honestly he had too many of his own opinions to contend with to burden himself with the opinions of those around him.

 

There was no explanation for the man and thankfully his position as a wealthy gentleman and successful entrepreneur gave him the luxury of needing none. All that Evans had craved since he was a boy was discovering the curiosities of a world that had seemingly forgotten them. There were unexplained phenomena in the vaults of his mind, fuelled by the books he read in his father's extensive library. There was also his gift. When Evans was a child he saw ghosts; spirits of the dead who spoke to him. Many were ghastly creatures, oft injured and bloody, demanding him to speak to them about happenings he was not privy to and people he was not acquainted with. Whenever the boy walked into a town square where executions had once been commonly held, he was overwhelmed by these frightening spirits. They followed him day and night, and finally he lost his fear and began to accept that they were just another annoying form of human to contend with. For even as a child, the other children and adults surrounding Edgar considered him somewhat of a strange character and treated him with as much contempt. Evans liked them as much as they did him. As he grew up, nothing changed.

 

As an adult, Evans followed on in the footsteps of his father and became an entrepreneur and merchant. A merchant who collected unique antiquities, particularly items that were strange in nature. A Pandora's box of items that really should not have been released into the realm were eagerly collected by Evans over the years. These odds and ends and trinkets were held dearly by the man in his shop Le Cabinet des Curiosities. Evans did not sell most of what he collected, but some he did to the right and deserving buyer, treating his items more like dear children being bestowed to parents rather than chattel to purchasers. In fact, Evan's was not even concerned with money, a strange stance for a shop owner to hold. No, Evan's only concern was in discovering the unknown, and over the years he had come across that very thing he had been searching for ever since he was a boy.

 

The cabinet.

 

It was the one item he had stumbled across in Scotland, the one moment in his life that had changed everything......

 

'Would you stop pacing man, yer going to give us both a flaming headache!' chastised Helena, throwing a concealed look out into the street for any sight of Craven as she wrapped her black shawl tighter across her frame. Through the hail that now pelted heavily outside, the torrential sound of the ice raged a racket of its own on the tin roof of the shop, and there was nothing else to be seen outside but a flurry of jumping ice chips on a tired cobblestoned lane.

 

'It has been days.' remarked Evans irritably, stirring into his milky tea two sugar cubes with a great deal of agitated attention. 'Surely if he was to come he would have done so already?'

           

'Hah!' cackled Helena 'some strange lass comes up in an opium den asking him to come meet with another stranger at some even stranger shop. Do you really think he would be a hop, skip and a jump to the place the next morning? What does it matter if we wait a few days?'

 

Evans gloomily took another sip of his tea. 'We need him Helena,' he replied sternly 'a few days may mean all the difference.'

 

'The difference between what and what?' she muttered, apparently unconvinced 'You never say, do you?'

 

Evans frowned. He knew how time could change things, what the difference a collection of days could bring. One day he was happily writing to his wife about his discovery of the cabinet in Scotland, returning home with a smile plastered across his face in an excitement that he could not contain. The next, he had arrived to his abandoned cottage in Middlesex, his wife's clothes and possessions all removed. All that remained was one brief letter written half a year prior informing him she had waited long enough for him and upon reflection, in his absence, Eleanor had fallen out of love. Ironically she fell out of the loving arms of Evans and into the arms of another man.

 

Yes, his wife had left him. Heartbroken in his discovery, Evans soon learned life inevitably continued irrespective of one's saddened disposition. He was inclined to think perhaps it was that cruel and all too well known scenario that when one area of one's life falls into place, another goes terribly wrong. Or perhaps one of the tombs he had entered into in the Valley of the Kings had cursed him with some misfortune? Evans had found his life's purpose, but had lost his other half along the way. Perhaps it was also fate? All Evans knew was life had now become bitter-sweet.

 

Selling his manor in Middlesex and his shares on the board of the United Company of Merchants of England Trading to the East Indies, Evans found himself in the possession of more money than he knew what to do with. Pursuing a fancy of his own, he decided to settle as a dealer of fine antiquities. Evans bought a shop in Ludgate Hill on Pageantmaster Court, befittingly naming the shop Le Cabinet des Curiosities, for even at that time he had no idea what the wardrobe did or what riddle it held. All that he knew was he had found what he had been looking for.

 

His cabinet of curiosities.

 

It finally arrived from Scotland with the rest of his collections made during his year long trip abroad, and the heavy oak wooden wardrobe was carefully placed in the far corner of the shop under the staircase leading to the second floor of the shop where he now lived. Months went by and Evans attentively analysed every part of the wooden piece of furniture for endless hours a day, desperately trying to shine some light on the curious piece. Why was he drawn to such a strange item, and why did it make him feel the strange way that it did? The spirit that once spoke to him of this item had not uttered one word to him since he was in Scotland. Not one word. In his darker moments, Evans wondered why he had sacrificed everything for this one piece of furniture that showed no more promise than a pleasant way to store one's collection of waistcoats?

 

And then it happened…

 

On February 10th 1834, on a particularly cold and snowy day when Evans was sitting at his shop window with his usual hot cup of tea and watching the feather light snow flakes flutter across the wintry air and onto the covered cobblestones of Pageantmaster Court, the right door of the cabinet flung open and a woman tumbled out and onto the floor of his shop. Not easily shocked, Evans was so caught off guard he dropped his porcelain cup on the ground, and even now he could clearly recall the sound of the delicate china shattering into pieces onto the wooden floorboards. A terrified and wide eyed female with long and wild wavy chestnut hair dressed in a strange green farmers styled dress looked fearfully around the shop as she remained on her hands and knees. The smash of the cup made her turn to Evans like a startled deer in the forest, and in further fright she jumped up and crossed herself as she muttered in Scottish Gaelic…...

 

'Evans? Hello? Are ye even listening to me?' inquired the Scotswoman shortly, hands on her hips as she now stood directly before him.

 

Evans may have been of a higher class and nearly a foot taller but Helena looked upon and spoke to the man like he was her true equal. Indeed, for that was what she was to him, from the first moment they encountered each other. Neither of them respected titles or position, and although from quite different walks of life they were quite similar in many regards. He respected her for her rather unique strong willed nature that he had rarely come across in a woman. Yes, although their union was entirely unexpected, Evans was glad it was Helena Rose that stumbled out of his wardrobe.

 

Shaking his head, Evans looked towards her 'Sorry, I was just thinking about…everything that has happened. As I was saying, we need Craven to come to us now. A day may make no difference, but then again it may make all the difference in the world.'

 

'Do you not think I already know this?' she replied rolling her eyes 'God grant me patience with you man, lord knows you had it more than yer deserved while we planned for this very moment.'

 

'I did not think we would have had to wait for over a year and a half until reaching out to him.' muttered Evans.

 

Casting his brown eyes to his companion, Helena merely shrugged in response.

 

'Well I dare say he would have wished a great deal longer considering what we were waiting for to happen.' she replied regretfully 'I still wonder whether we could have saved his family, ye ken? Surely if we had the knowledge, we might have been able to save them?'

 

'Do you really think it is wise to intervene?' replied Evans defensively 'Apart from the catastrophic conditions that could have prevailed upon one interfering with events that have already come to pass. Apart from that minor factor, Craven would have thrown us into an asylum before believing our story. We did not even know when his wife and child would die, so what were we to do? Go up to him a year and a half prior and tell him that they would die, at some point in the future, and we knew because…'

 

'Fine, aye, fine.' replied Helena, cutting off the rant she had already heard a thousand times before 'I just wish some good would have come out of all of this 'tis all. And I wish you would quit yer moaning. It was a year and a bit of waiting, who was to say it would have been five years or even more? We have waited and watched Craven ever since he became a part of the puzzle. Now we wait for him to come to us.'

 

'What if he does not come at all?' asked Evans, looking up hastily as the bell to the entrance of the shop rang.

 

His hopeful expression fell into disappointment as he spotted a portly lady entering, her interest turning to a table laden with an assortment of Egyptian stone tablets.

 

'He has to come.' replied Helena with an ever so slight hint of uneasiness in her voice. 'None of this makes sense, but surely everything has a reason? Why else would you have found that damn wardrobe? Why else would I have come here? Why else would I have seen him sitting in that laneway coffee house the very first time we met?'

 

'All excellent questions!' replied Evans more cheerfully, as if Helena's words had stoked the embers of his hope once more. 'Every action has a reaction. Every moment has a counter moment, and we are in a chain of events that have already happened.' observed Evans, although in all truth he was only speaking to himself. Nodding with a sigh, he looked back to Helena. 'Yes you are right, it takes as long as it takes. Craven will come. He will, because what has happened has already happened.'

 

'How much do we tell him?' she asked in a hushed whisper, determined that the customer was not able to hear their odd conversation 'I mean, surely you cannot expect the man to believe half of what we have to say? Let alone all of it.'

 

'We should endeavour to start just at the beginning. About how I came to find the cabinet, and how we…. met.' replied Evans with a great deal of doubt in his voice.

 

The Scotswoman scoffed 'Aye he'll sure to be satisfied with that much. No reason to ask why our mad tale involves him?'

 

'Of course he will want to know where he comes into all of this,' muttered Evans rubbing his brow tiredly 'I just do not wish to overwhelm the man. Especially now, considering his new condition.'

 

Looking up, he eyed Helena as she idly gazed down at a silver pillbox before her on a bench.

 

'You've been awfully quiet since your meeting with him.' he remarked, a subtle hint of accusation behind his words.

 

'Have I?' she replied softly, running her fingers over the silver lid almost hypnotically 'I suppose 'tis strange to meet someone you already know. I mean, to meet them again for the first time…. that was not in fact the first time.'

 

'Yet you seem sad?' he replied curiously, throw a pleasant nod to the female customer as she departed the shop.

 

'The man I met in that disgraceful den was a shadow of the Craven I knew.' Helena muttered 'Of course he has always had that sombre and serious persona, an underlying dark but wee bit cheeky nature wrapped in his lordly distinction. Nay, it was something else. 'Twas the opium that made me sad. If you could only have seen what that damnable stuff is doing to him. The light in his eyes had diminished.'

 

'Opium is the disgrace of the medical profession.' scorned Evans 'My time studying medicine taught me one thing and one thing only. We have come no further from curing the sick since the time of administering leeches in the dark ages. There is no miracle pill to cure ails, the concept is ludicrous in itself. Yet look around us Helena, half of London if not more is consumed with this wonder drug.'

 

'Feeling guilty?' replied Helena accusingly 'Yer damnable East India Trading Company is the reason London is rife with the damn stuff!'

 

'Oh you blame me for London being overrun by opium now?' chortled Evans 'However do I manage to get any work done with all the accusations you hurl at me? Of plotting this and that in my diabolical ways!'

 

Helena laughed in reply but Evans knew there was an element of truth in her observation. He knew she blamed him, in part, of stumbling into a world rife with chaos.

 

'I never was involved in the decision to import opium.' replied Evans defensively 'Not once did I partake in those expeditions to China and Turkey. We members on the board were all selfish in our endeavours, I grant you that. However, as you well know, I pursued the strange antiquities of the world. Others desired to bring back tea, spices and fine weaves, and others…opium.'

 

'Ah take no notice of my bitterness, 'tis not you who made Craven ingest the damn stuff.' she replied apologetically 'I only meant to say Craven very looked sick. We have more to contend with than just convincing him of the truth now.'

 

'Yes, he needs to stop consuming opium.' sighed Evans 'The hardest part will be convincing him he needs to stop, and then ensure that he does not return to his old habits. Even then, his body will suffer terribly from withdrawals. I have seen it before, as have you. We shall need to pray he has not been taken entirely hold of the devilish powder.'

 

'Half of London is drinking laudanum like it is water.' muttered Helena in disgust 'And they call us the odd eccentrics of the town? We are the only ones with common sense, ye ken? Of course we are the outcasts, drinking our tea with milk and sugar. We are the only ones not out of our minds on opium!'

 

Evans chuckled 'The moment society deems you normal Helena is the moment you know your life has gone terribly, terribly wrong. At least take some comfort in that.'

 

'You never craved a normal life?' she grinned 'Aye not even a wee moment, walking down the street knowing there would be none staring at you with a look of disapproval?'

 

Evan's looked up in surprise 'Do they do that? Why on earth would anyone disapprove of me?'

 

'Oh aye I see the way they look at you.' mocked Helena 'I once heard a woman say you were one of the fay.'

 

'A fairy?' laughed Evans, taking another sip of his tea with a broad smile 'Whatever did I do to procure such an opinion? Steal a farmer's daughter at sundown into my underground kingdom?'

 

'You ought to stop doing that.' smirked Helena 'Aye, I think the best course for you my dear sir is to start living a normal life.'

 

'It sounds terribly boring.' he teased, taking another sip of his tea 'Lacking trinkets that cannot be explained does not render a life worth living.'

 

'Oh the dramatics! You would have been hanged as a witch long before me.' scoffed Helena 'You can thank the fates you were born into your precious position on the board of the East India Shipping Trading Company, and are now a wealthy man of the world.'

 

'Now that is something we can both agree on.' nodded Evans 'I can thank my father for that, and I assure you I did not take my position in life for granted. Money, status and general public unease are the only things that keep me from the general plights of hardship that others endure. I dare say it keeps me from the tower of London itself!'

 

The Scotswoman laughed heartily. 'That is what I like about you Evans,' smiled Helena 'even after all the misfortune you have experienced you still consider yourself lucky.'

 

'Misfortune indeed!' he chortled 'There has been little of it. I have lived a lonesome life in its entirety perhaps, and yes my heart was broken along the way…but I have seen things you would never dare dream of. To witness the brilliant splash of orange, red and purple of a Persian desert sunset, or the piercing blue colour of a piece of lapis lazuli carved in the form of the Goddess Isis by hands that were thousands of years older than my own. To inhale the sensual scents of ginger, cloves, cardamom and turmeric whilst walking down a dusty street with merchants selling brightly coloured fabrics and intricate woven carpets. To feel the sun rise and heat my skin the very moment it fell upon the Valley of the Kings. I have never felt so humbled as the sun god Ra turned his eye upon me, throwing a golden cloak of the first rays of morning sunlight over my shoulders, and gave me a small taste of what it truly felt like to stand as a pharaoh. To follow a trail so random in search for something I had no clue of, and to find it led me to the very place in the entire world I was meant to be. I found what I was searching for. It is here in my shop and every day we draw closer to unlocking its secrets. Helena, I am the luckiest man in the world!'

 

'What if there are secrets that should not be unlocked?' asked Helena seriously 'Have you ever asked yourself that maybe you are too curious for yer own good?'

 

'Life is too short to be ignorant.' he dismissed 'There was a stirring within my very flesh that made me search for this wardrobe, even before I knew what it was or where to find it. I was meant to locate it, and to unlock its mysteries. That is my purpose. That is your purpose…and that is Cravens.'

 

Helena frowned, looking more than a little unconvinced. 'Look at what we have lost along the way? Even if there was an explanation to all of this, how can you or I possibly justify it? Aye, I know you and your poetical ways Edgar, but when yer talkin' to a woman of Alba you talk to her straight up. That damn wardrobe destroyed my life!'

 

'Did it?' replied Evans, perhaps a little sadly.

 

'Aye ye ken it did.' murmured Helena 'Had I not stumbled through it I may still be living the life I was meant to be living.'

 

'Good or bad, it depends how you see it.' argued Evans 'Because of that cabinet Eleanor left me for a redcoat. Returning here to a note saying she had run off with a Captain James Briggs to an encampment in Darlington. The very notion! The way I see it, I gained a blessing in the form of a betrayal. Imagine being married to a woman like that in the long run? Who runs off with a redcoat anyway?'

 

'No lass I know with any self-respect.' replied Helena bitterly.

 

Evans shook his head 'I know what you are saying about this wardrobe changing our lives, but even you were with a man that betrayed you in the end. Tearlach would have seen you hung by that gibbet! Your friends, your family. Why Helena your entire village wanted you dead! Would you really have been happy, knowing that now, going back to a life with a man and people like that?'

 

'He was the father of my bairns.' she replied bitterly 'For all the hate I have for him, the damn bastard gave me the two most precious possessions in my life.'

 

'He also gave you a beating whenever the ale was up, which from what you mentioned was all the time.' replied Evans bluntly 'You lived amongst heathens that were about to kill you. You want me to be straight up to the woman of Alba, well there you have it. You are better off here!'

 

'Thank you for reminding me my wee bairns were left under that bastard's protection, Edgar.' she replied angrily in thick Scottish accent, marching towards the stairs 'Again you miss the point, that damn wardrobe made me lose my children, you blasted fool! Always were the practical one, aye? And you wonder why Eleanor left you in the end! Let us hope Craven takes his time coming here, I hope you sit by that damn window watching the rain and hail for the next fortnight. Hopefully the frost will come through the window and warm your heart of ice yer damn callous brigand! Curse you! Thalla gu Taigh na Galla! '

 

'Helena wait...' called out Evans regretfully, but it was too late as he heard her heavy footsteps ascend the staircase, followed by the slam of the upstairs bedroom door, shaking the very foundations of the shop.

 

Evans sighed, retiring to his pot to pour some more tea. Unfamiliar with Scottish Gaelic, he was more than familiar with an insult when he heard one. Of course he knew all too well it was unwise to unleash the fury of a Scot…but Helena Rose? Well, that was a raging tempest on the sea whose fury, whether human or paranormal, even he dared never to intentionally pursue.