by William King
Inside the house he normally had a staff of thirteen servants, including six men. Not one of the six was frail and three - the coachman, the groom and his personal valet - were powerful fellows none would be eager to fight. M. Voltigeur ordered that from the day of his decree no more than two of his men should be asleep at any time, and that the others should all go armed; to those who were practised he gave short swords, while those who were unskilled were instructed to carry cudgels.
Naturally, there came also to his aid the valiant Malchance, who loyally promised that he would sleep on a couch outside M. Voltigeur's bedroom door, and would see to it that the six servants were distributed about the house most carefully, so that each and every landing might be kept under perpetual surveillance.
Nor did Malchance stop at such precautions as these. Mindful of the possibility that the Phantom's elusiveness might be laid to the account of magic, he brought into his friend's house the most talented of the town's licensed wizards, a man named named Odo. Odo, declaring that the thief had not yet been born who could steal goods which had been placed under his protection, set magical alarms upon the doorways, which made the entire house into a cunning trap.
Malchance suggested then that M. Voltigeur's valuables should be gathered together into three strong chests, and he sat up all evening, closeted with his friend, compiling an inventory as the things were put away. When that was done, he sent for Odo again, beseeching him to set sealing spells upon the locks of three chests, and also the lock of the room in which they were placed. Though these spells were but petty ones Odo, full of the confidence which wizards always have when their work has not yet been tested, assured M. Voltigeur that in combination with the other precautions they would surely suffice to ward off any vulgar servant of the thief-god Ranald.
That night, M. Voltigeur went to his bed determined to sleep as soundly as he normally did, in order to demonstrate his contempt for the Phantom and his faith in the precautions which he had taken. Unfortunately, his composure was not quite adequate to this intention, and he lay tossing and turning for many a long hour. Whenever he dozed off he found himself beset by horrid nightmares in which men he had sentenced to unusual deaths rose from their paupers' graves to march through the empty streets, heading for an appointed rendezvous with him, which he felt that he would somehow be obliged to keep.
The fourth or fifth time that a bad dream sent him urgently back to wakefulness he felt such an overwhelming impression of dread that he reached for the firecord which he had laid beside the bed, ready for an emergency. Having blown vigorously upon it to make it grow bright he applied it to the tallow nightlight which was nearby.
When the flame caught he took up the nightlight, holding it before him so that its faint radiance spread as far as it could into the four corners of the room. He did this to reassure himself that he was still alone and safe, but the plan misfired.
He was not alone.
Nor, he felt, as his heart seemed to sink into his belly, was he safe.
Seated at the foot of the bed was a very curious person. M. Voltigeur could not tell whether it was man or woman, because a dark hood concealed the cut of its hair, and a leather mask hid its face. Its slimness suggested womanhood, but there was no hint of a breast beneath the black silken shirt which he could see through the gap where a dark cloak was imperfectly gathered about its torso.
There was no doubt in his mind that he was confronted by the infamous Phantom of Yremy.
M. Voltigeur opened his mouth to shout for help, but the figure put a slender finger to the lips of its unsmiling mask. The gesture seemed more conspiratorial than threatening, and the magistrate was very well aware of the absurdity of keeping silent, but he nevertheless stifled his call.
"How did you come here?" he asked, instead - his voice hardly above a whisper.
"Did you really think that you could keep me out?" asked the visitor. The voice was light, but had an odd throaty quality. He could not tell whether it was man's or woman's - and for all he knew for certain, it might have been an elfs.
The Phantom continued: "Did not Helinand tell you that I would come to you within the week, Great Judge? Did you doubt that I meant what I said? Was it not, therefore, a silly thing you did when you issued so public an invitation?"
"What do you want with me?" asked M. Voltigeur, his own voice grating a little because his mouth was so dry.
"Only justice," said the other, "and a punishment to fit your many crimes. I come tonight only to pass sentence upon you - you must wait, as I have waited, for the sentence to be carried out. I will return again tomorrow to hear your plea for mercy... and on the third night, the sentence will take effect."
"What sentence?" whispered M. Voltigeur, feeling an urgent wish to know what the Phantom planned.
"No ordinary fate," said the voice from behind the mask. "Like yourself, I am not so lenient."
Then, and only then, did the magistrate recover sufficient presence of mind to cry for help - and cry he did, letting loose a scream whose clamorous panic surprised all those who heard it. As he screamed, some reflex made him put up his arm before his face, as though to ward off an anticipated attack. But no attack came, and when he dropped his arm again to see what was happening, there was no one to be seen. The room was quite empty.
The door burst open then, and Jean Malchance rushed in, brandishing a full three feet of polished blade, all ready to cut and slash. At exactly that moment the sound of the wizard's voice could be heard from another room, crying: "The alarm! The alarm! The door is breached!" Within minutes the footman and the coachman arrived, and then the other servants one after another, cudgels at the ready.
But there was nothing for them to do. There was only M. Voltigeur, devoid of powder and paint, sitting up in his bed, looking foolish.
The scenes which followed can easily be imagined. The room, which had no hiding places to offer, was searched with absurd thoroughness. Odo swore by all the gods that no one could have passed through the door until the alarm was raised. The guardsmen at the back of the house were summoned, and stoutly testified that no one had passed them, and that no one could have climbed to the shuttered window (whose shutters were still closed tight) without their seeing him.
On considering these facts, everyone save M. Voltigeur came quickly to the conclusion that no one had entered the room at all, and that he must have dreamed his encounter with the Phantom - but in order to save the magistrate's feelings they assured him that he must have been the victim of an illusionist's magic, which had compelled him to see that which was not there.
Though he was half-inclined to believe them, the magistrate did not like to think that such fear had been aroused in him by a mere illusionist, and he muttered darkly about the possible involvement of necromancy, as evidenced by the evil dream which had disturbed him - but in Yremy as in other cities of the Old World, necromancy was far more often talked about than actually encountered, and even M. Voltigeur could not bring himself to place much credence in that theory.
Unfortunately, the conclusion that M. Voltigeur had only dreamed his encounter with the Phantom seemed slightly weaker in the morning, when he and Malchance went to inspect the room where the three chests of valuables had been so carefully placed.
Though the magically-sealed door was apparently undisturbed the chests were not. One had been opened, apparently by sheer brute force, and its various contents had been scattered haphazardly around the room. Closer inspection revealed that though the wizard's spell had saved the lock from damage, its protection had not extended to the rusted iron hinges, which had been torn apart.
The magistrate and his friend sat down with the inventory, and after two hours of meticulous counting concluded that one object and one only was missing: a silver comb, which the late Madame Voltigeur had often used to put up her lovely hair.
M. Voltigeur swore all those involved in the affair to the utmost secrecy - with the inevitable result that the story was all around the town by
noon, its every detail earnestly discussed by roadwardens and ragamuffins alike.
There is only one thing that the poor people of a town love more than a heroic villain, and that is a mystery. They swapped questions with one another with avid interest. Who could the Phantom possibly be? What magic or trickery had allowed him to enter the magistrate's house and escape again undetected? Why had he taken the silver comb? All these puzzles received careful consideration, but none of course could compare in fascination with the most intriguing question of all, which was: What sentence had been passed on Yremy's Great Judge? What punishment, to fit what crime?
The people racked their memories to recall every criminal on whom M. Voltigeur had ever passed sentence, whether living or dead (for those who are executed rarely die childless, and even in Bretonnia - though it is not the Empire - sons are expected to avenge fatal wrongs done to their fathers). The rumour spread that some unlucky person singled out by the Great Judge for a particularly nasty punishment must in fact have been innocent of his crime, and that the bloody libel of his false conviction was now to be wiped out, and the penalty repaid in full measure.
M. Voltigeur did not stir from his house that day, but this did not prevent him from hearing the cries and cheers of the ragged, hungry children of the street, who informed him with delighted squeals that he was doomed, and that the second morrow would be the most miserable of his whole existence.
The humble people of Yremy were not the only ones who were struggling to recall some particular case which might give a clue to the Phantom's identity. M. Voltigeur himself was as determined as anyone to find that clue, and had called upon loyal Malchance to jog his memory by reading from the scrupulously-compiled lists of indictments kept by the Court all the names of those who had had the misfortune to come before him.
The Clerk did as he was asked. He recalled to M. Voltigeur's mind the three highway thieves whose feet he had ordered flayed, so that they might never walk the roads again. He listed the prostitutes convicted of picking their clients' pockets, whose own "pockets" the magistrate had ordered to be sown up tightly with catgut. He suggested the names of a couple of tax-evaders who had been castrated in order to remind them of the condition which the town would be in if adequate provision were not to be made for its defence against marauders.
But all these were trivial matters, and M. Voltigeur opined that when all things were carefuly considered the only kind of case likely to have evoked such an extraordinary response as the Phantom's would be a case of murder.
Malchance then read out the list of murderers condemned to death by M. Voltigeur, which turned out to number fifty-two, but in the main it was a dull enough list, enlivened only by the occasional cleverness by which the deaths of the accused had been contrived. There seemed to be no one on the list who had not fully merited death.
M. Voltigeur then decided that they must concentrate their attention on those who had committed crimes involving magic - for he was sure that magic of some sort had been involved in the remarkable events of the night.
Alas, Malchance did not need to consult the records closely in order to remind M. Voltigeur that he had never had occasion to pass sentence on an authentic wizard. If such a one had ever committed crimes in Yremy, he had not been apprehended - a fact which, on reflection, could hardly be deemed surprising. In the last thirty years, in fact, the ever-vigilant guardsmen of the town - aided and abetted by licensed wizards and the priests attached to its miscellaneous shrines - had only managed to arrest four petty spellcasters. This tiny group consisted of three illusionists and one apprentice elementalist.
The last-named, who had been turned in by his own master after trying to penetrate the mysteries of his calling ahead of the appointed schedule, and also committing various other misdemeanours, was immediately rejected as an exceedingly unlikely Phantom. In any case, his punishment had been relatively mild and not particularly unusual - he had been buried in the earth up to his neck and slaughtered by a shower of stones hurled in an entirely unmagical fashion by a troop of guardsmen.
The illusionists seemed for a moment or two to be more promising suspects. Because illusionists were by nature deceptive, it was always difficult determine exactly what had happened before, during and after their capture, and there was always a possibility that the responsible persons might be deluded into thinking they had executed an illusionist when they had in fact allowed him to walk free, or executed a double in his stead. The three in question had all seemed relatively incompetent - they would not otherwise have been captured and tried - but it is one of the best-loved tricks of the master illusionist to disguise himself as an incompetent illusionist, thus to persuade his enemies that they have seen through his impostures when in fact they have merely torn away the first of many veils.
M. Voltigeur, however, had been the presiding magistrate in only one of these three cases, and that a rather sordid case of fraud and petty theft. The case was rendered less interesting still by the fact that in a rare fit of orthodoxy the magistrate had ordered that the thief suffer the commonplace penalty of losing a hand. The only exceptional item on the record was that M. Voltigeur had decided that as there were two counts, the man should also lose the least two fingers from his other hand. It was difficult in the extreme to believe that the Phantom could have achieved his feats with one hand lacking and the other mutilated, so this suspect too was set aside.
His failure to find any inspiration in the Court lists redoubled M. Voltigeur's determination to protect himself from the second promised visit of the Phantom. The guard outside the house was increased to eight. All six of the servants were issued with blades, and Jean Malchance acquired from the governor's own armoury a flintlock pistol with gunpowder and shot, which he gave to his friend with the instrucion that it must be saved as a last resort.
Odo was asked to spread his alarm spells more liberally, with the aid of a wand of jade borrowed from Verena's temple. He was also asked to occupy the room to the right hand side of M. Voltigeur's. One of the minor shrines of the town, dedicated to the veneration of Morr, responded to the unique situation by sending a priest to assist in matters of magical defence - an unusual step, given that priests usually considered their magic too noble to be wasted in petty secular affairs. This priest was a skilled diviner named Hordubal, who was lodged in the room to the left hand side of M. Voltigeur's.
Jean Malchance again elected to place himself outside the bedroom door, as the final line of external defence. He further suggested that as a new precaution he and M. Voltigeur should bring the three chests containing the magistrate's valuables to his bedroom. He helped his friend pack them most carefully, and when they were locked he summoned Odo again, instructing him to place alarm spells as well as magical seals upon the locks. Then he put them away beneath the bed - where, he said, they would surely be safe from any interference.
When darkness came M. Voltigeur made no attempt to go to sleep, having resolved this time to remain awake. He kept no less than five stout candles burning in his room. Alas, as the night wore on, his determination to stay alert was put to an increasingly severe test by a seductive drowsiness which continually crept up on him.
Four or five times the magistrate drifted off to sleep, only to dream each time that all the men he had ever condemned to death were rising from their graves and marching through the streets of Yremy, calling to him to meet them at a place assigned by destiny, to which he knew that he would in time be drawn.
No sooner had he lost count of the occasions on which this happened than he opened his eyes with a sudden start, and saw a figure standing at the foot of the bed, wrapped all around by a dark cloak. Shadowed eyes were staring at him through two holes cut in a leathern mask.
"It will do no good to strive against your fate, Monsieur Magistrate," said the voice, which sounded like the rustling of fallen leaves stirred by a cold north wind. "Sentence is passed, and only remains to be carried out."
This time, M. Voltigeur did not pau
se to debate matters with the Phantom. Nor did he bother to cry out to rouse his friends, but clumsily brought the pistol from beneath his sheet, and fired it.
The effect of what he did was not quite what he had expected. Instead of an instant explosion there was a sinister hiss and a great gout of white smoke which stung his eyes horribly. When the explosion came, after several seconds had passed, he had ceased to expect it and it made him jump with alarm. The recoil - which also came as a great surprise - wrenched the weapon from his hand. To the cloud of white smoke which had already blinded him there was added a much thicker cloud of black, and when he was finally able to see again he was not at all surprised to find that the visitor was no longer standing by his bed.
As the door burst inwards to admit the sword-wielding Malchance, M. Voltigeur leapt to the foot of the bed, fully expecting - or, at least, desperately hoping - to see a corpse stretched upon the rug. But all that was on the floor were the wide-scattered contents of one of the treasure-chests. The lid had been wrenched away by sheer brute force which had burst the hinges asunder.
Next door, the voice of Odo could be heard crying: "The alarms! The alarms! The door is breached, and so is the chest!"
One by one the servants arrived - but it appeared that they already suspected what they might find, for their blades were not held aloft, and when they found that the Phantom was nowhere to be seen they did not seem at all surprised.
Through the rest of the night the magistrate and his friend worked methodically through their inventory, in order to discover what had been taken from the second chest. By the early morning they were certain that one thing and one thing only was gone: a fine embroidered chemise trimmed with the fur of a rare white hare, which the late Mme. Voltigeur had used as her favourite nightshirt.