The Arcanum (24 page)

Doyle came to meet them, clutching a cavalry sabre in one fist and a Colt .45 in the other.

“Marie, I need light,” he said.

Marie padded from the grand parlor in her bathrobe, holding two gas lanterns.

“They’ve breached the inner fence,” Doyle said to Lovecraft as he picked through a ring of keys. He unlocked a heavy door and swung it open, revealing a small but deadly armory.

“Keep her away from the windows,” Doyle ordered Marie as he flung a .22 Winchester rifle at her. She caught it one-handed, then clasped her other hand over Abigail’s arm and pulled her into the parlor.

“Howard.” Doyle threw a chambered tommy gun into Lovecraft’s hands. The demonologist dropped his blanket to heft the weapon.

“Shoot first,” Doyle recommended as he stuffed the .45 in his pants pocket.

Leaving Marie and Abigail in the grand parlor, Lovecraft and Doyle doused the rest of the lights, then crept through the kitchen to the servants’ quarters, where there was a hidden door in the wall of one of the bedrooms. They stepped through, and onto the Crow’s Head grounds.

A cold wind gusted dried leaves across the lawns. Beyond a row of maple trees, they saw the black, ivy-wrapped gates. Nothing seemed amiss, but still they heard the muffled gonging of Duvall’s alarm. They stuck close to the shadows of the hedges, traveling slowly around to the front of the house.

“An animal, maybe? A raccoon?” Lovecraft whispered.

“Duvall’s enchantment was set to act on invaders only. They’re here, Howard; we just can’t see them,” Doyle answered.

They turned the corner and were now facing the circular gravel drive and the roman fountain, when a flock of white doves erupted from the nearest maple and fluttered away.

A disembodied voice suddenly hissed,
“We mean no harm.”

Doyle whirled around as a man with slicked-back white hair, wearing a white tuxedo, walked calmly across the grass.

“Hold!” Doyle commanded as he pulled out his .45.

“Drop your weapons,”
the phantom voice hissed again.

“Lovecraft.”

“We mean you no harm.”

“Be still.”

“Arthur.”

The voices came from everywhere and nowhere at once.

Something heavy fell onto Lovecraft’s shoulders. He screamed, and fired his tommy gun wildly into the air.

A black cat sprang, hissing, from Lovecraft’s shoulder and sped into the hedges.

The man in the white tuxedo vanished as Doyle fired into the air.

“Show yourselves,” he shouted.

Lovecraft turned and reared back. “Arthur?”

A woman, clad all in black, clung to the wall of the house, as if defying gravity. She hissed at Lovecraft, narrowing feline eyes, then scampered up the wall to the roof.

“Don’t fear us,”
the ghostly voice said.

At that moment, the guns flew out of their hands and suspended, ten feet above their heads.

Doyle held tightly to his sword, gazing at the .45. “What magic is this?”

Lovecraft looked over his shoulder. “Behind us!”

Doyle turned to see a hooded behemoth approaching.

“Be still.”

“Drop your weapons,”
the phantom voice persisted.

“Identify yourself, or I’ll run you through,” Doyle warned the oncoming figure.

But it just kept coming. Doyle’s sabre sliced the air, though the blade stopped in midair, clasped between two giant hands.

The hood fell back, revealing a powerful man with a bald head, a thick moustache, and a pirate’s earring. The giant broke the sabre in half with bare hands.

“That’s enough, Otto,” a firm voice said.

The giant dropped the sabre and backed away.

Lovecraft and Doyle turned to the man in the white tuxedo, whom, they now realized, hovered four feet above the gravel drive. The autumn wind whipped the tails of his tuxedo jacket.

“Greetings to our brothers the Arcanum. We come to you in your time of need, and on behalf of our dear president, Harry Houdini. I am Sebastian Aloysius. We are—”

“The American Society of Magicians,” Doyle finished, with more than an edge of distrust.

LESS THAN TWENTY minutes later, the players assembled before the fire in the enormous library. Sebastian Aloysius introduced the Arcanum to the A.S.M.’s current board of directors.

“You’ve met Purrilla, Cat Lady of India.” Sebastian gestured to the spooky-eyed lady in the black satin suit, curled by the fire.

“Then there is Dr. Faustus, Master of the Hypnotic Eye.”

Faustus was an erudite, gray-bearded gentleman in his fifties, bejeweled like a gypsy king with talismans and rings.

“And you’ve met Otto, of course, the strongest man in the world.”

The behemoth lifted a small hatbox off the seat beside him and stood, offering the box to Lovecraft.

“I’ve stopped more than fifty cannonballs with my stomach,” he boasted.

“How nice for you,” Lovecraft replied, weakly.

“For you, friend.” Otto held out the box.

Lovecraft hesitated. “Thank you.”

Otto placed the small hatbox on Lovecraft’s lap, and the demonologist raised his eyebrows. “It’s heavier than I expected.”

Otto grinned. “Is good gift.”

Lovecraft untied the bow, opened the hatbox, and gazed in horror at a human head. Then the head opened its eyes, and Lovecraft screamed.

The American Society of Magicians cackled at his reaction.

“Get it off me!” Lovecraft shrieked.

A small hand reached out of the hatbox and wagged a finger under Lovecraft’s nose. The hand was followed by a slippered foot, and then another. Slowly, an entire human being untangled himself from the hatbox and hopped onto the carpet.

“And Popo,” Sebastian finished. “The greatest acrobat in all of China.”

In one bound, Popo sprang onto Otto’s broad shoulders and curled up comfortably.

Sebastian himself needed no introduction. Doyle knew him as one of the finest illusionists in the world. He also was a notorious con man and charlatan. Years ago, the childless Houdinis practically adopted Sebastian, and Houdini himself had taken the young man on as an apprentice.

In return, Sebastian had turned Houdini against the Arcanum, feeding his paranoia and inflating an already dangerously large ego. Houdini needed praise more than food, and it was this that made him vulnerable to people like Sebastian. Houdini’s imprimatur brought legitimacy to any association, and that was what Doyle believed Sebastian’s aim to be—to practice his former hobbies under an umbrella of respectability. Despite Houdini’s insistence, Doyle was not convinced the man had entirely rejected his earlier lifestyle. On the contrary, Sebastian’s newfound talents would make him a thief to be reckoned with, and it was this reputation that kept the A.S.M. on the periphery of the occult world. But Houdini continued to let the group call him president, despite his complete ignorance of their activities.

Seeming to read Doyle’s mind, Sebastian said, “No strings, Arthur. Let us join forces. What you see here is only a fraction of our might. Say the word, and in half a day I’ll assemble an army at your doorstep. And not just of pickpockets and jugglers, mind, but of engineers, technicians, marksmen, whatever you wish.”

“Forgive me, Sebastian, but I’m an old man, and tired. Perhaps that makes me cynical, but after all we’ve been through, why should I trust you?”

“We’re none of us angels,” Sebastian answered, clearly missing the irony. “I don’t presume to know what’s in your heart, nor should you presume to know mine. But if it puts you at ease, here is my reason: I do this for the only father I’ve ever known. And let’s leave it at that.”

There was an uneasy silence.

“Then, if that is the case,” Doyle rose from his chair, “on behalf of the Arcanum, I accept your generous offer.”

The two shook hands.

“Have you a plan?” Sebastian asked.

“Forming, yes. And your talents will aid us quite well.”

39

PAUL CALEB OPENED the door for Bess Houdini. “Perhaps you can talk some sense into him.”

At the sight of her husband, Bess felt her resolve crumble. “Oh no.”

Houdini stood. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m so sorry.”

Bess reached through the bars of his cell. Houdini took her gloved hands in his, and kissed them repeatedly as she fought back tears and swept back the hair that had fallen over his tired eyes.

“What did they do to you?” she whispered.

Detective Mullin blinked sleepily and looked over at Caleb, who stood in the doorway to the stairwell. The D.A. gestured for Mullin to give them privacy. Mullin got up and stepped past Caleb.

“Think I’ll have a smoke,” Mullin muttered.

“Yes, do that,” Caleb answered. After a moment, he closed the door, leaving the Houdinis alone.

Houdini kissed Bess through the bars, then lost his composure. He slid slowly to the floor, sobbing. Bess kneeled before him, her hands clasped with his.

“What have I done?” Houdini managed, between sobs. “What have I done?”

“My love, listen—”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Houdini—”

“Don’t . . .” Houdini tore away from her and half collapsed to the ground, his eyes wild, “. . . call me that!”

Bess fought to sound soothing, but her voice shook. “Arthur said—”

“To hell with Arthur!” Houdini scrambled to his feet. “I did it. I did what they say.”

Tears fell from Bess’s eyes as she rose to join him. “Now, you listen—”

“No.”

Bess slapped him through the bars. “Stop it,” she declared, then clasped her hands to either side of his head so he couldn’t look away. “Remember Duvall’s last words. That’s what Arthur said: ‘Remember Duvall’s last words.’ ”

“ ‘He’s in my mind,’ ” Houdini whispered.

“Arthur will fix this,” Bess insisted.

“How?” Houdini demanded.

“Did Duvall throw himself in the path of that car?”

“I don’t—”

“Did he?” she demanded.

“That’s not—”

“Did you hate this woman?” Bess asked sharply.

“No. I—”

“Did you want her dead?”

“No, of course not.”

“Then why did you kill her?”

“I didn’t.”

“I know. And if you didn’t, then someone else did.”

Houdini tugged at his hair. “What would you have me do?”

“You’re Harry Houdini,” she growled. “Look at these bars.”

“No.”

“Yes!” Her eyes flashed. “What other choice is there?”

“That is no choice,” he hissed. “It’s suicide. The world would know in hours. Then Arthur would be next, the others—”

“Then let Sebastian come and get you out.”

“No.”

“Then, what? What will you do?”

Houdini’s eyes squeezed shut. “If I sacrifice myself, he can’t go after the others.”

Bess could see Houdini summoning his resolve, and it horrified her. She knew the look. “Please, my love. There has to be another way.”

“No. I can’t endanger the others. I won’t. There is too much at stake.”

As Bess opened her mouth to protest, the stairwell door opened. Paul Caleb entered.

“It’s time, Mrs. Houdini. I’m sorry.”

Bess hastily wiped her tears away. Houdini clasped her hands tightly through the bars. He kissed her gloves.

“I love you more than life,” he breathed.

Bess touched his cheek, then backed away. She rushed past Caleb and into the stairwell.

AS THE DOOR closed behind her, Caleb approached Houdini. “Well, Harry? I’ve been more than patient. What shall it be?”

Houdini’s gaze burned into Caleb’s. “I won’t lie to save myself.”

Caleb frowned. “You’ve accomplished too much, my friend, to throw it all away now. It’s not worth it. You may even have a career to salvage. What better tonic for a fading icon than a little infamy to spice things up? Do the right thing.”

Houdini took the bars in his fists. “Perhaps my actions in the past have left the impression that I would sacrifice my loved ones for my reputation, but let me set the record straight. You want to nail someone to your cross of righteousness?” Houdini held out his wrists. “Do your worst.”

DOYLE ENTERED THE burgundy salon on the second floor, formerly the sanctum of Konstantin Duvall, and shut the door softly so as not to disturb Lovecraft. The latter paced the room, deep in thought.

“I need time,” Lovecraft complained.

John Dee’s obsidian mirror sat on one of the desks, propped up so it faced the center of the room. Every spare surface was cluttered with books, scrolls, and manuals, as well as a cow bell, a triangle, and a flute.

“Time is precisely what we don’t have,” Doyle retorted.

“It responds to certain vibrations, I can tell you that much. Observe.” Lovecraft took the triangle from the arm of the chair and held it out about three inches from the surface of the mirror. He flicked it with his fingernail, and the gentle chime wavered on the air for several seconds.

“What—”

“Ssh!” Lovecraft snapped. “Look.” He pointed to the mirror.

Doyle stepped closer. As the chime faded, a ripple—almost invisible to the human eye—shivered briefly in the center of the mirror.

“What was that?” Doyle whispered.

“It’s a window,” Lovecraft said.

“A window? To where? And what is on the other side?”

“For John Dee and Edward Kelly, it was a way to speak to angels. I suspect it depends on the frequency of sound one uses. It might also be used to contact . . .” Lovecraft hesitated “. . . other things.”

Doyle didn’t like the sound of that. “What do you mean, ‘other things’?” Then he spied a tall cabinet of solid oak wedged at the back of the study. It was secured by a dozen locks, requiring as many keys, but also with glyphs of warning in seven separate magical languages seared directly into the wood.

Its doors stood open.

“Howard, that’s Duvall’s vault.”

“I know.”

“You were instructed never to go in there.”

“Was I?”

Doyle suddenly recognized the nature of the books surrounding them—likewise forbidden.

“Have you completely lost your senses?” Doyle exclaimed.

“Not yet,” Lovecraft replied.

“These are the books of the Cult of Cthulhu.”

“I know what they are.”

“And you risk more than madness breaking their seal. Do you truly intend to open a portal to the Deep Ones and their kind?”

Lovecraft spun on Doyle, his eyes fierce. “Darian seeks ancient knowledge. Well, I intend to give him what he wants.”

“At what cost to yourself?”

“Leave me now,” Lovecraft responded, turning back to the mirror.

“Howard—”

“We can’t let him succeed, Arthur.” Lovecraft’s voice was dispassionate, certain. “No matter the cost.”

Doyle weighed the words, then nodded briskly, stirred by Lovecraft’s willingness to sacrifice himself for something.

As Doyle left the study, Lovecraft called after him, “Lock the door. And barricade it. Whatever you may hear, do not come in. Is that understood?”

Doyle paused, then nodded again. “As you wish.”

“Thank you.”

Doyle threw one last look at Lovecraft before shutting the door.

It took Otto on one side, and three men on the other, to heft the walnut armoire up the stairs from the library to barricade the front of Duvall’s study. The armoire covered not only the door but a great deal of the wall, and that was how Doyle wanted it.

Otto was posted as guard, with stern orders to ignore everything he heard inside the study. The same orders were given to the several new arrivals from the A.S.M., who were scattered about Crow’s Head in a flurry of activity and construction.

The cacophony of saws and hammers filled the house, accompanied by a cloud of sawdust. The bottom floor of the manor swarmed with dwarves, sword swallowers, and other carnival folk, and was strewn with piles of manila rope, wire rope, turnbuckles, shackles, hooks, clips, chain hoists, and anchors.

By three A.M., the bulk of the carpentry was completed, and the workers stole a few hours of sleep.

OTTO SLEPT AS well, seated upright on one of the velvet dining room chairs that had been set before the armoire. An empty jug of Chianti hung from his finger. His nose made a painful digging sound as he snored loudly.

Then a shout like a rifle report snapped his eyes open. He blinked several times, trying to remember where he was.

Another horrendous gasp echoed from behind the portal— followed by a breathless, gulping laughter that lasted a full thirty seconds and was neither funny nor joyful.

Less than a minute went by before the next shocked cry.

As Otto waited for the next outburst, the silence became menacing. It was deep and long and pure. Though Otto could not quite put into words what was most disturbing, he felt that the silence was somehow conscious, somehow primordially intelligent.

The next scream was even worse. This time, there were words in it: unintelligible, guttural.

Then more silence.

Otto writhed in dreadful anticipation. The longer the silence held, the more he wished for it to end. And the more he feared the next terrible sound. He looked at his pocket watch, then placed it back carefully in his vest pocket as a wail worse than all the rest erupted from the study. It was indescribably sad, and lasted an infinity of seconds. Begging, pitiless.

Otto threw himself against the armoire, attempting to remove it, when Doyle appeared at the end of the corridor.

“Leave it,” he ordered.

“Is not right,” Otto shouted back.

After the terrible wailing came a frantic, constant stream of whispering, as if Lovecraft were spilling all the secrets of the world to a friend and his time was short. His voice grew hysterical, breaking several times, then soaring into higher and higher registers—until it sounded like he was sobbing and talking at the same time. Like he couldn’t stop. Like his mouth had run away from his mind and he couldn’t catch up.

Abigail suddenly burst from her room and ran toward the armoire. Doyle caught her, and held her back.

“No! Let me go,” she wailed.

“Please, Abigail. It’s necessary.”

“But something terrible is happening.”

“There’s nothing we can do. Abigail.” Doyle turned her around and took her firmly by the shoulders. “This is for us. For you. If we go in now, we risk killing him. Do you want that?”

Abigail’s eyes were filled with confusion and panic.

“Listen to me.” Doyle took her hands in his. “There’s no more qualified man in the world to swim these waters than H. P. Lovecraft. If we can keep him in our hearts, I wager he’ll find his way back. Can you do that? Can you conjure him in your mind?”

Abigail nodded tremulously, and Doyle kissed her on the forehead.

“Then, that will be his beacon.”

The workers, too, had nervously converged before the barred study door. They huddled there, unblinking. Some held their ears to block out the screams and the relentless, freakish chatter. But worse were the drawn-out, swollen silences that conjured in each of them an unutterable dread.

AT LONG LAST dawn broke—to an eerie stillness.

Doyle and Marie stood beside the armoire with Sebastian, Otto, and Dr. Faustus. They had all aged that night. The evidence was in their eyes and hollowed cheeks, in the pallor of their skin. Doyle had seen such results before, an exposure to the Mythos, he called it—like a sunburn of the soul. And indirect though this exposure was, it forever changed a person. So what would be the condition of the person at the epicenter?

“Proceed,” Doyle said grimly.

Otto took hold of the bottom of the armoire, and pushed it several feet across the floor, exposing the door to Duvall’s study.

Doyle fit the key in the lock and turned the knob. Just before opening the door, he said, “Let me go first.”

Marie and the others nodded and stepped back.

Doyle advanced into the study and shut the door.

The room was in shambles: chairs toppled, shelves swept clean, scrolls and tomes tossed haphazardly about. At first, there was no sign of Lovecraft at all, and Doyle had the suspicion that the obsidian mirror had somehow swallowed the demonologist—shoes and all.

But then he spied a limp hand behind the rolltop desk.

“Howard?”

The hand didn’t move.

Doyle circled, to find Lovecraft slumped brokenly against the desk.

“Howard!”

Doyle dropped to his knees and took the man in his arms. Lovecraft’s clothes were soaked with sweat, and his glasses were cracked and hung from one ear. A sour-smelling paste was congealed on his lips. His skin was so pale, it seemed faintly blue. Doyle pulled back his eyelids and checked his pupils, which were fixed and dilated.

“Christ,” he muttered. He felt for a pulse and, to his great relief, found one, faint as the beat of a butterfly wing. He snapped a vial of smelling salts under Lovecraft’s nose, and the man’s head jerked back. But Doyle persisted, until Lovecraft pushed him away.

What followed was a full-blown seizure.

Lovecraft kicked and thrashed in a panic, while Doyle held him down as best he could.

“Howard? Howard, it’s me. It’s Arthur.”

Lovecraft scrambled to his feet, eyes staring blankly, then turned and pitched noisily over the desk. The impact seemed to knock some sense back into him.

Doyle hovered as Lovecraft attempted to stand, more gingerly this time.

“I’m blind,” he said.

Doyle took Lovecraft’s hand and placed it on his arm so he could guide him.

“What day is it?” Lovecraft asked.

“Monday. You were only in here for a night.”

“Can you see my journal anywhere?”

“No. And I think we should get you into a bath. You’re ice-cold.”

“I should get these thoughts down before they fly off . . .”

“I think you’ve done enough for one day,” Doyle said firmly as he led him toward the door.

“I wonder if I’m blind for good?”

“If I were a betting man, I’d say it’s temporary, attributable to shock. Not unlike the reports one reads of war survivors and their periodic episodes of psychosis.”

“Really? How interesting,” Lovecraft replied.