He Who Walks in Shadow (22 page)

“So you say there are others?”

“Yes,” I said, “for God’s sake, that’s what I’ve been telling you.”

“And you say they are Germans.”

“Yes.”

“I saw them as well, Monsieur,” Guillaume said.

The man nodded several times. Then he took another draw on his cigarette, this time breathing out the smoke through his nose.

“And one of them was a wizard, correct?”

I frowned. I was sick of being in this place, afraid that at any moment Zann and his henchmen might come around the corner and kill us all, police or not, and I was not well pleased with this Frenchman’s lack of faith.

“We’re wasting time. The longer we wait the closer they get to accomplishing their goal.”

“The Germans.”

“Among others.”

He began to laugh. “Yes, my friend. We’ve noticed an unusual amount of activity in the catacombs over these last several weeks. Just last night, we rounded up a small army of your companions. They didn’t go as easily as you, I must say. They certainly didn’t run right into our arms. But now we have you, too, and you are going to help us get to the bottom of whatever is going on down here. Now come on. I tire of this place.”

For the first time, I agreed with him.

* * *

The clacking of typewriters and the ringing of telephones drowned out all thought as I sat and waited in a holding cell to speak with someone who could release us. My requests to be put in contact with the American consulate were met with laughter and French curses. Guillaume, himself a citizen of the Republic, lay on a cot in the corner of the cell. He seemed as unconcerned as one could be in such a place.

“The wheels of justice grind ever so slowly here,” he said. “And there’s nothing you can do to quicken them. When they are ready, they will come. Until then…”

There was nothing more to be said. So we sat, and we waited.

It seemed hours before the detective who had interrogated us in the tombs returned.

“I trust you find the accommodations up to your expectations?”

“Quite,” said Guillaume, who did not bother to rise from his repose. The detective simply ignored him.

“Come with me,
professor
.” He opened the door to the cell, and I followed him down an inner hallway to a windowless chamber.

“So does this mean you believe me?” I asked as I sat in the only chair.

The detective lit a cigarette and leaned against a wall. “About your identity? That’s a funny thing, monsieur. If you are indeed Professor Carter Weston of Miskatonic University, then you are most assuredly deceased.”

“It wouldn’t be the first time.”

“And with all the strange things we have seen in Paris these past weeks, I admit I am inclined to believe you.” The door opened and a man appeared with another chair. The detective thanked him in French and took it. As he sat, he said, “It’s a tactic, you see,” gesturing towards the chair. “Normally during an interrogation we make the accused sit while we tower above them. It adds to the intimidation factor.”

“But this is no ordinary interrogation.”

The man shook his head. “No. Though I do need to find out everything you know about what’s going on in my city.” He held out a hand. “Inspector François le Villard.” I took it.

“The late Carter Weston.”

“Something tells me your demise is related to the incident in the catacomb. Care to share that story?”

“You won’t believe it.”

“When you finish,” he said, “I will tell you some of what I have seen, and I think you will agree that I am ready to believe quite a number of things.”

So I did tell him. I told him about the
Incendium Maleficarum
, about the power it possessed, and of Zann’s desire to have it. I told him about my kidnapping, and my rescue in Germany. And finally, I told him of the ancient beings who once ruled this earth, and of those who would return them to power. He listened in silence, his countenance never changing. If he disbelieved me, he did not show it. In fact, I was quite certain that he put his faith in every single word.

By the time I finished, his third cigarette was nearly gone. He snubbed it out in an ashtray, but not before he lit another.

“Earlier this year,” he said, “in the spring time, there was a terrible murder in the Latin Quarter of the city. Officially, it is unsolved, though I believe I know who was responsible. It was a horrible crime, even as these things go. But what made it even worse was that it was a sacrifice of some kind, a ritual killing.”

“Was the victim a girl?” I asked. He nodded. “Killed with a knife?” He nodded again. “And how was the body arranged?” He seemed to age a decade in that moment, as his mind turned back to the scene of the crime.

“She was sliced from her throat all the way down, her internal organs removed. Her arms were spread apart and tied down, like so.” He illustrated with his own arms, holding them as wide as he could. “The same with her legs.”

“Like a St. Andrew’s Cross?”

“Yes,” he said, apparently thinking of it for the first time. “Yes, exactly like that.”

“Were there any markings, any writing?”

“The room was covered in symbols and runes, all in her own blood, none of which were familiar to me in the least.”

“But were there any that stood out, any that you noticed?”

Inspector Villard gazed down at his palms and furrowed his brow. I knew that he was transported back to that place, that he saw it as clearly as if he stood in the darkened chamber once again.

“There was one,” he said. “I remember it for several reasons. It was drawn beneath the altar on which we found the body, but in chalk, yellow chalk, instead of blood, which made us suspect that it had been made first. And it was very large, and very strange.”

“Can you tell me what it looked like?”

He reached into his pocket and removed a sheet of paper and a pen. He began to draw, describing what he saw as he did. “It was a great circle,” he said. “Unbroken, but for a single point at its base. In the center was something even stranger. An object that appeared to be three spheres melded together, as if one circle but with three lobes. It was an unnatural thing, and for reasons I cannot fully explain, it hurt my eyes to look upon it. Actual, physical pain.” He ceased drawing, studied the image for a second, and then nodded. “Yes, I think this is it. Very close indeed.” He held up the page for me to see. I recognized it instantly and gasped, for it was the stuff of legends.

“The three-lobed burning eye…” I whispered.

“Then you know it?”

I shook my head. “I know of it. But I’ve never seen it, at least in anything other than obscure writings and legends, even in all my years and all my travels. To tell you the truth, I never thought it was real.” I picked up the paper, and it seemed to vibrate in my hands. “I’d like to send this to a colleague at Miskatonic, just to make sure I’m right. A second opinion you might say.”

“Of course,” Villard said.

“But you should know this,” I said. “If the people we are dealing with have completed this ritual, and if this is the sign that marks them, we are in far deeper danger than you could ever have imagined.”

Journal of Henry Armitage

July 26, 1933

We arrived at the headquarters of La Sûreté Nationale early in the morning, having departed Abbeville-la-Rivière on the first train out. While we returned to Paris empty-handed, our journey had been far from a waste. In fact, I had learned several important pieces of information. Obviously, the knowledge we gained as to the location of the staff was critical to our quest, and we were desperate to alert Carter who, even at that moment, was deep beneath the surface of the city, risking his life in a search that was entirely fruitless. But I also became painfully aware of a deep rift that had developed between Rachel and Margot. What drove it, I could not say. All I knew for certain was that if we were to divide our forces again, I would not suggest sending them off together.

When we returned to our hotel, neither Carter nor Guillaume was there. Rachel was beside herself, as was Margot. For different reasons, most likely. Or perhaps for the same, at least in part, which might explain the hostility. We debated our next move. Pursuing the men into the catacombs was madness. We would never find them, and we would likely become hopelessly lost ourselves. And so the only options that were before us were to wait or to go to the authorities.

“Carter and I have seen many things, gone on many adventures together. And I can tell you this, the police were never our friends. They don’t take kindly to treasure hunters or troublemakers, and we fit the bill for both.”

Rachel paced the hotel room from window to door, her hands clasped in front of her as in prayer. “Yes, I understand that,” she said, “but I don’t think I can stand to sit here and wait, either.”

“This is not about you.” Margot veritably spat the words.

“No, it is about my father, and about Guillaume. And right now they could be lost in the darkness, with no light to guide them and no hope of escape. Or perhaps worse, Zann could have found them. So you tell me, should we sit here and do nothing? Hope for the best? Or should we go to the police?”

So we went to the police.

What we found, we did not expect, even if perhaps we should have. The police had indeed heard of Carter Weston. In fact, they had him in custody at that moment. And to make matters even more interesting, he was in the process of being interrogated by the lead detective for that precinct on suspicion of murder.

At least he was alive.

I demanded to see him, and the man behind the counter turned to his compatriot and snickered. He said something in his native tongue that I did not understand, the words apparently not part of a classical French education. He looked back to me and said a single word in English—“No.”

“But I am his lawyer,” I lied.

“His lawyer?”

“Yes. And unless you allow me to see him at once, you’ll have a diplomatic incident on your hands!”

It was bluster and bull, of course. The officer looked me up and down as if he was studying an alien life form, but I suppose I can strike an intimidating figure at times, though less so perhaps than in my younger days. He tore off a sheet of paper and picked up a fountain pen.

“Name?”

“Henry Armitage,” I said. “Esquire.”

He wrote it out with a flourish and then disappeared into the back room. A few excruciatingly long minutes later, he returned with another man of evident authority.

“Dr. Armitage,” he said, holding out his hand, “a pleasure to make your acquaintance. You know, in some jurisdictions it is a crime to impersonate an officer of the court.” I blanched, and his amusement was evident. “Do not worry, doctor, I have no intention of arresting you. Come, you and I and your friend have much to discuss.”

I followed him into an interior office where Carter was leaning over a table, his arms spread wide, examining a number of photographs. He looked up at me as I entered and said, “You’re going to want to see these.”

They depicted a crime scene, one as horrific as anything I had ever before seen, in war or in peace. Carter moved a large photo of the victim to the middle of the table.

“See the precision of the cuts,” he said, tracing his finger down what had been the center of her body. “At first glance you might say she was ripped apart, but that’s not right at all. This was a cold, calculated dissection. Opening up the skin and the abdomen, breaking the sternum, and pulling her ribs apart so they could get to the heart. And of course, all of it while she was still alive.”

“And how do you know that?” the detective, whose name I had learned was Villard, asked.

“A ritual like this requires a living victim. Blood is critical, as is the removal of the organs. But just as important are the less tangible forces that are unleashed. Fear. Pain. The inevitability of death. Only the living can provide that. No, she felt every minute of it, right until the end.”

“I wish I could say you were wrong,” Villard said. “But our expert concluded the same.”

I had picked up several other photographs, if for no other reason than that I could not look at the dead girl anymore. They were pictures of sigils, runes, and other strange forms of writing that had not been seen for a thousand years—and never in the civilized world. But one in particular chilled me to my core. I glanced at it, just from the corner of my eye. The photo was underneath a pile of others, and I might not have noticed it at all were it anything less significant. I slipped the photo out, and horror replaced curiosity.

“Oh, my God. It’s exactly as it was described.”

“Indeed,” said Carter. “I sent a copy to Dr. Foster, back at Miskatonic, to see if it could be anything else. I’m not sure what will surprise him more. Seeing that, or seeing a letter from me.”

“Not to take anything away from you, my friend, but frankly, resurrection is less remarkable.”

Villard cleared his throat, and we were stirred from the stupor of our own fascination. “Obviously, we knew that the murder was related to a ritual of some kind, but your Dr. Weston claims to know this cult, and he claims that they are responsible for the excavations in the catacombs. Do you agree with that opinion?”

I let the photo fall to the table. “I do. There can be no doubt of it.” I pointed to the arcane image. “The three-lobed burning eye can be the sign of no other.”

“Does this cult have a name?”

“It does not. Nor has it ever. It was nameless and forbidden long before Stonehenge rose on the plains of Salisbury or your ancestors entered Chauvet. And what they seek to bring about is no less than the end of the world and the beginning of a new one.”

“Or an old one, depending on how you look at it,” Carter said. “Which is why it is critical that we get back into the catacombs and find the staff before they do.”

“The staff’s not in the catacombs.” Carter and the detective both turned and looked at me, and in Carter’s eyes was nothing but dejection.

“What?” he said.

“But I know where it is. Our trip south, it turns out, was not a total waste.”