The Sorcerer's House (20 page)

"Cuddling."

"As I see." I sat up. "It's good of you. I find that I'm quite chilled."

"No fur." As she spoke, she spread her hair with both hands. It is jet black and very long indeed; I imagine she could sit on it.

"No fur to speak of, but I have a flannel shirt in here." I got it out of the closet. "And something for you. I hope you'll like it."

I gave her the silk robe. She opened the box as eagerly as any child, slipped into the robe very quickly indeed, and dashed around the room
with wide-spread arms to show off the wide sleeves, an exercise she completed with a dozen kisses.

"I'm very glad you like it," I told her. "I wanted to get you something more, but I didn't know what you might like. Shoes seemed the obvious choice, but I didn't know your size." Her feet are tiny.

"Not really needed."

"We'll make a tracing of your foot. I can take that to the store." I opened my bag and got out my stationery and this pen; but when I turned around, she was gone.

I went to the window and looked out. That window, I know, had shown nothing more surprising than a stretch of lawn, a wilderness of weeds and brush, my neighbor's neatly clipped hedge, another expanse of lawn, and his house. It opened upon a forest now.

A real forest of immense and ancient trees, shadowy, silent, and brooding.

The young woman to whom I had given a silk gown was gone, and the gown as well. I wanted to call out to her, but I did not know her name. It occurred to me that she might be in the bathroom; its door stood open, and there was no one inside.

The house felt so silent that I felt certain that the old man and his dog had gone.

You know me, George; you may well know me better than I know myself. Can you guess what I did next? I know that I could not, if I were in your shoes.

I resumed the clothing I had worn from Doris's, found the staff I had cut in a corner of the closet, and climbed out that window.

Try as I will, I cannot explain it. No, not even to myself. There is a streak in my makeup that seems to have no connection with my conscious mind. You will regard what I did as no more than one more instance of self-destructive behavior, I know. I only wish I knew how to regard it.

Before I had taken a hundred steps, I realized that there would be every chance of my becoming lost if I went far. The course of wisdom seemed to be to return to the house; when I had found it again, I might
circle it, locate the front and rear doors and so on, and so gain some idea of the position of the forest.

I turned around, retracing my path to the best of my ability. After a hundred steps (yes, George, one hundred; I counted them), the house was nowhere in sight. A hundred more, counted as carefully as the first . . .

Nothing. Only trees, huge and silent, sleeping giants robed in moss. And then--

"Mr. Dunn! Where are you? Mr. Dunn!"

Someone was calling me. I could hardly believe it. "Here!" I shouted. "Over here."

I saw her before she saw me, a stout, middle-aged woman in a long, loose dress. There was a shawl around her shoulders. I called and waved, but it soon became apparent that though she could hear me, she could not see me. She was groping; I decided that she must be blind, or nearly so.

When I was quite near her, she said, "You're here. I know you're here. I sense it."

"Right here," I said, and took her arm.

She blinked, and focused on my face. "I see you! I see you, Mr. Dunn. But you're Millicent's husband. Where is your brother?"

"I'm Baxter Dunn. George and I are identical twins. Didn't she tell you?"

The woman shook her head.

"Well, we are. May I ask what you're doing in this forest?"

"You dream, Mr. Dunn. This is your dream, and I have entered it in search of you. I myself am in a trance--"

My cell phone chimed. I pushed the button and said hello.

"Mr. Dunn? This is Jim Hardaway. I hope you remember me?"

"Yes, of course."

"Could you speak up? You're very faint."

I raised my voice. "Is this better?"

"A little bit. You must be quite a ways from the tower."

Looking around at the forest, I agreed.

"Can you meet with the lawyer tonight? About the will, you know. He's busy, but he's going to keep his office open for us. His name's Trelawny."

"It is in the laps of the gods, but I'll try."

Mr. Hardaway laughed. "God willin' and the creek don't rise."

"Precisely."

"It's two seventy-one Wilson, third floor. You won't have any trouble. That's very near the corner of Wilson Street and Railway Road. Six o'clock sharp."

Recalling a radio station I had heard far more than I ever wanted to, I said, "Be there or be square."

"Oh, I will, Mr. Dunn. I'll see you at six tonight."

He hung up and I turned back to the woman. "You are in a trance, you say?"

"Even so. My corporeal body is in my own parlor. The thing that you see, the thing you grasped, is my spiritual body."

I ventured that it had felt quite solid. She was, to be offensively frank, of substantial girth; I doubted that I could have lifted her, unaware that I would soon have to try.

"We are spirits, you and I. Do you recall my letter? I am in a trance, as I said. You sleep."

It was rather annoying, since I knew that I did not. "I'm in a forest," I told her, "and it seems to me a most sinister place. But I'm not asleep. I've wandered into this forest--which was foolhardy of me--and I'm trying to get back to my house, quite a large house."

She said nothing.

"It's painted white but in need of fresh paint. Have you seen it?"

"I have come to see it. I am Madame Orizia."

About then I heard a fox bark. I looked around for Winkle and saw the girl who had joined me in bed. I saw her, George, but what a transformation! She wore the silk gown I had given her; but her glossy black hair, which had been loose, was elaborately coiffured and held by two long, ivory-colored needles. Her face had been powdered, and liberally; it was far whiter than my house. She smiled and advanced trippingly, on high platform shoes. "I'm back, Bax. All dressed. Do you like me?"

I embraced her. "I will always like you, dressed or undressed, with makeup or without."

"I love you!"

"I love you, too. And you're Japanese!" One more hug. "I think I must have known, deep down."

"Oh, yes!"

Madame Orizia said, "Won't you introduce me to your pet? I love animals."

I had begun to say something about having heard Winkle nearby when the girl I had been hugging bowed. "This lowly person is called Winker Inari."

"I am Madame." Madame Orizia offered her hand; the girl who called herself Winker Inari sniffed it, smiled, and backed away.

"She is shy," Madame Orizia explained. "That is only to be expected in a wild pet, and is no bad thing in any pet. I would have to prove my peaceful intentions, which I should be glad to do if only I had the time. It might take weeks, however, while I will scarcely have an hour."

I protested. "You're talking as though she were an animal."

"She is a fox, Mr. Dunn."

"I know the expression, but still--"

Madame Orizia raised a hand. "You are about to say she is a person. Of course she is. Many animals are."

Winker kissed my cheek. When I turned to look at her, she smiled. Then she barked. "I'm sorry, Bax. Oh! Very sorry! I love you."

"I love you, too." It was the second time I had said it. I touched her hair, and we kissed. I have never been kissed, George, as I was there in that brooding forest. I never expect to be kissed so again.

Here I wish I could recount our search. I will not, because I have neither paper enough nor time. Strolling for miles through a noble forest spread across whispering hills, we discovered hidden springs and beautiful glades, arching ferns higher than many a noble tree, and caverns we dared not enter. We saw white deer (and once a bear with a leering human face) as well as many other creatures that I will not describe because you would not believe me.

At last, guided by Winker's nose, we found the house and the very
window through which I had come. I offered to help her in, but she dived through with one amazing bound.

Madame Orizia was another matter.

I heaved, my shoulder against her hips; she clawed at the window frame, and Winker lent her small strength from within the room. It was comic, I suppose, though not for us.

And in the end--no pun intended--we failed. I told Winker to remain where she was, and said that we would walk around the house until we found a door.

"It is a terribly strange house," I explained as we walked. "For one thing, it seems to grow bigger all the time."

Madame Orizia nodded. "Strange, but not unique, Mr. Dunn."

"Also, the rooms seem to move around. Or perhaps it is only that--"

I had heard a mechanical noise I did not at first identify as an automobile horn. "What's that?"

"A Klaxon, I believe. Should I take it that the fox is your chief difficulty, Mr. Dunn?"

"Winkle? No, not at all. Winkle's no problem. I'm not quite sure I have a difficulty, but if I do it's a girl called Lupine. Lupine frightens me, I confess."

Madame Orizia pointed, and I saw that the old man was tapping on a window we were approaching. We stopped before it, and he raised the sash. "Mr., ah, Joseph is here, sir. He has returned our automobile."

"I see. We're trying to get into the house, but we haven't found a door."

"The window, sir?"

I shook my head. "I could climb through, but Madame Orizia could not. We tried."

"I see." The old man was silent for a moment. "Mr. Joseph desires his, ah, quittance, sir. His remuneration."

"Yes, I understand."

"May I propose a solution, sir?"

I said, "I wish someone would."

"Permit me to climb out this window, sir. You might then enter the house by it and attend to Mr. Joseph. I shall guide the lady to a more commodious entrance."

"If you can."

"It is false confidence, perhaps, sir. Yet I am confident."

Madame Orizia said, "I must remain with you, Mr. Dunn."

"You will soon be with me again," I told her, "if you make haste to follow my man."

He was already coming through the window, and doing it remarkably well for a man of his age. A moment later, he knelt and offered me his knee as a step. I declined, jumped and pulled myself through with my phone ringing all the while.

As soon as I had gotten out of bed I answered it, more than a little out of breath. "Yes?"

"This is Doris, Bax darling. You'll be at the reading of the will tonight? Mr. Hardaway just told me about it."

"Yes," I repeated. "Excuse me. I've been exerting myself."

The Klaxon sounded somewhere outside, and I made my way through the kitchen to the back door.

"What was that?"

"A horn. Ask not for whom the horn blows, Doris. It blows for me."

"Another woman's picking you up."

"Hardly."

"A temptress. A seductress. Alice Vrba." Doris giggled.

"No, but I like her name." I opened the door, knowing that it was quite unlikely that I would see the old man and Madame Orizia. Instead, as I expected, I got a fine view of my own sunlit backyard; the wood beyond it prevented me from seeing the river.

"Alice or Vrba?"

"Both." I set out for the garage.

"Can I pick you up for an early dinner? My treat."

I said, "I owe you."

"You
don't
. You paid last time, when we got back from the Strip. Besides, I'll put it on the expense account."

"What about a late dinner, after the will?"

Joe was seated behind the wheel of the huge car Les and I had found. He got out as he saw me approaching.

"I was hoping you'd say that, Bax. Meet you at Trelawny's office?"

"Yes, but wait. I want you to talk to Joe. Joe, please tell Doris that you are neither a temptress nor a seductress." I handed him my telephone.

"This is AAAA Autos of the World, ma'am. You got a foreign car?"

. . .

"Sure. Like you've got a Porsche. There's no dealer here. Or a Fiat, maybe. Same thing."

. . .

"Well, you ought to get one. Or you want an antique car restored, like Mr. Dunn here. We do that, too." He covered the tiny transmitter with his thumb. "She wants to know if you'll drive your car to the lawyer's office so she can see it."

"Can I?"

"Sure." Joe returned to Doris. "He says sure, if you want him to. He says anything for you, babe." He winked at me.

. . .

"You bet. I'll lay it on thick." He returned my phone. "I didn't hang up. You better do it."

Hearing only a dial tone, I did.