Merciless Reason by Oisin McGann

outside,” Gerald suggested, as if the idea had just occurred to him.
    Daisy thought again of Ainsley, and she tried not to pull back from Gerald’s grip. The corridor off the lift was not a welcoming place. It was dimly lit, and she always found the décor disturbing; the walls were hung with gloomy oil paintings of savage Biblical scenes, particularly those of the Old Testament, while the patterns of the carpets and the wallpaper suggested raw flesh opened by sharp edges. She told herself this was all in her imagination. She told herself this any time she came up here.
    But she would not allow Gerald to see her fear. He was headed for the stairs that led up to the roof, so she walked in front of him, striding up the steps and opening the door. The wind caught her hair and skirts as she did so, giving her the wild appearance of a banshee. They were thirty stories up and the gusts were cold and violent. She was not wearing a coat and her green silk dress was heavy in the skirts but thin round the shoulders and waist. The chill wind cut her to the bone.
    They walked out onto the section of flat roof that sat between the tiled turrets at the top of the tower. The Wicklow mountains framed the view to the south, the sea was visible to the east, the fields of Kildare out to the west and the city of Dublin to the north.
    Daisy was becoming wise to Gerald’s ways. Since taking over the family, he had become far more interested in human nature and how to manipulate it. He had studied Edgar Wildensterns journals, learning how to wield power. She knew that leading her out here into the cold was intended to make her tense up, increase her unease. She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself, turning to face him.
    â€œMake this quick, Gerald. I haven’t got time for pneumonia.”
    He put his hands into his pockets, drew out a slim silver case and a box of matches and lit one of his favorite French cigarettes, cupping the flame against the wind. Sucking smoke into his lungs, he held the gasper inside his hand and gave her a friendly smile.
    â€œHow goes your search for Nate?” he asked.
    â€œClancy perseveres, but without success—as I suspect you know already,” she snapped.
    She had given up trying to keep the search a secret, since Gerald could monitor all the correspondence coming into the house. But she knew he was listening to how she answered, not the answer itself. She glared at him for a moment and then lost patience with him.
    â€œGerald, what the bloody hell are you building in the church? It’s not another bomb, is it?”
    â€œDaisy, Daisy, Daisy,” he chided her. “You have such a suspicious mind. And your language is positively foul at times.”
    â€œDon’t patronize me. What are you up to?”
    â€œI have been studying the work of Isambard Kingdom Brunel,” Gerald replied. “It has been quite enlightening. You probably don’t know of him. He is an engineer—”
    â€œBuilder of the Great Western Railway in Britain and much of the track in Ireland,” Daisy cut in, rubbing her arms, her hair whipping across her scowling face. “Yes, I’ve heard of him. Studied Euclidean geometry before the age of eight. He is the designer of various wondrous bridges and pioneer of propeller-driven iron ships, as well as being largely responsible for laying the latest bloody transatlantic telegraph cable. What about him? What’s he got to do with our church?”
    â€œHe had a stroke in eighteen fifty-nine,” Gerald said. “It was only his knowledge of engimals that saved him from paralysis, possibly even death. He has since become a master of engimal reconstruction. Some joke that he is almost half engimal now, he has transplanted so many of their parts into his own body. His theories on engimals are very mechanical , but fascinating. Funny … Nate took the opposite view—he always thought of them as animals. A