Nevermore

by William Hjortsberg

  The magician received no reply and saw immediately why. It wasn’t a man at all, but a plaster department store dummy togged-out in antebellum clothing and folded stiffly into the theater seat. From up close, the figure looked nothing at all like Poe, but the effect had been very convincing at a distance. A small cardboard sign rested on the mannequin’s lap. A single word crayoned upon it. NEVERMORE.

  The lights went out. Houdini spun around. Too dark on stage to see who had thrown the master switches. The magician strained to hear if anyone approached along the curving rows of seats. His body tensed, awaiting attack.

  It came from behind, where he least expected trouble. An acrobatic assailant leaped onto his back, pulling a hood down over his head. Chloroform! Nauseating. Chemical. Overwhelming. Houdini grabbed hold of his attacker, who broke instantly free, jumping away from the magician.

  Pulling at the confining hood, Houdini found it tightly buckled in back. The fastenings locked together in some unfamiliar mechanical manner. As the anesthesia rapidly overwhelmed his senses, he groped in his pocket for the penknife, pulling open the single, razor-sharp blade. Houdini willed himself to remain alert. Slicing through the restraining straps, he never stopped working until his knees buckled under him and he collapsed into unconsciousness.

  Swimming up from dark, cold depths through the vortex of a powerful whirlpool, Houdini opened his eyes and the world continued to spin, a sickening multicolored blur making his stomach lurch. Attempting to sit, he found himself restrained. He lay flat on his back, arms outspread like a man on a cross, each wrist manacled to the floor, his tethered legs bound together at the ankles. He was stark naked, pinioned on the stage beneath the scaffolding he’d observed earlier.

  A strange hooded figure stood on the apron, watching him. The long flowing garment and tall conical hood put the magician immediately in mind of the Ku Klux Klan. Was he the prisoner of racist bigots? On second thought, the sinister garb possessed a stiff formality not usually associated with the hasty bed-sheet habits of night riders. Houdini recognized the traditional robe of the Grand Inquisitor. Just such an anonymous official once condemned heretics to the auto-da-fè.

  “Awake at last,” the Inquisitor said. “I feared you might well sleep through the whole show. Certainly a pity, missing all the action.” Houdini found the clipped, lilting voice very familiar. The hooded figure swept toward him across the empty stage. “If I may allow myself a self-congratulatory pat on the back, it was a most excellent trap, and how eagerly you took the bait.”

  Houdini stared up at the Inquisitor, desperate to control his rising gorge.

  The nonstop boasting continued, acidic with scorn. “I’m most proud of the dust by the stage door. Didn’t you find it convincing? I used face powder, an ironic theatrical touch, of which I’m quite fond. Ditto, the misdirection of the lights. I convinced you the source was on stage. When I switched everything off, you incorrectly assumed the threat came from the front of the house and most obligingly turned your back to the real danger.”

  The magician contained a volcanic rage. He didn’t like playing the fool. Having his nose rubbed in his own foolishness angered him all the more. Stifling the impulse to curse and shout, he grinned through gritted teeth. No percentage in revealing his emotional state to the enemy. Houdini composed his features, although he feared his blazing eyes gave him away.

  “You’re strangely silent, Harry,” the Inquisitor said. “It’s not like you.”

  Who was this bastard with his easy familiarity, Houdini wondered. Where had he heard that peculiar accent before? The voice sounded definitely masculine. Sir Arthur had guessed wrong. The killer was not a woman.

  “I trust you’ve been keeping up on your Poe…?” The hooded assassin swirled beneath the framework of joined pipes. “I saved the very best especially for you.”

  Houdini’s gaze followed the Inquisitor’s uplifted, pointing finger, noting a hairy, muscled forearm when the robe’s capacious sleeve fell back. Fifteen feet above his head, he observed a curious mechanism mounted to the top of the scaffolding: an eccentric collection of cogs and gears resembling the innards of a huge clock. In place of a pendulum, a curved, weighted blade hung motionless like the guillotine’s infernal knife. A keen razor edge caught the light in a sinister glitter.

  “Clever device.” The Inquisitor chuckled smugly. “A rachet lowers the pendulum one-quarter inch at every swing. Tested it out on a stray dog yesterday. Most effective. The canine’s body did not impede the oscillation of the blade in the slightest. Just like slicing luncheon meat. Beast kept on howling until his backbone severed… . Will you howl for me, Harry?”

  “Fuck you!” The magician spat the forbidden phrase, the first time in his life he had ever voiced so distasteful a profanity.

  “Righty-o… . Glad the cat hasn’t got your tongue. I’m so looking forward to hearing you beg for mercy.”

  “Lemme up and we’ll see who does the begging,” Houdini snarled.

  “Still have some fight left? That’s good. Very good… . I trust you’ll put on an excellent show; one of your masterful escape attempts …”The Inquisitor produced Houdini’s penknife and the extra lock-pick from under the folds of his robe. “Of course, this time you’ll have to do so without the aid of these. While you slept like a baby, I took the liberty of conducting a thorough search.”

  The magician glanced away, spotting his clothing in a discarded bundle several yards off. No help there.

  “You should have a word with your tailor,” the Inquisitor said, leaning against the scaffold’s framework. “Such shoddy workmanship… .Afraid I took some liberties with the Poe narrative. As you must recall, his unfortunate hero remains tied for days under the knife. I simply don’t have that kind of time at my disposal.”

  The Inquisitor pulled a cord hanging from the mechanism above. The whir and clank of an escapement and regulator set in motion started the pendulum swinging with a steady sweep. “About two seconds for each complete arc. At that rate, the blade should strike the floor in no more than twenty minutes. Perfect length for a headline act.”

  “Enjoy the show.” Houdini made it sound like a threat.

  “Oh, believe me, I plan on doing just that. Your last performance. I do hope the great escapologist won’t disappoint.”

  The Grand Inquisitor hurried off the stage. Houdini watched him take a seat, front and center. Looking away, the magician studied the handcuffs securing him. His right wrist was fastened by a pair of American Bean handcuffs to a ring bolt screwed into the stage. Regulation U.S. Army cuffs secured his left in a similar fashion. Neither presented a real problem. Houdini glanced up at the slow silver sweep of the pendulum, every passage succinctly calibrating the remaining seconds of his life.

  Houdini regurgitated the cloth-wrapped pick. As his tongue unwound the torn hanky, he breathed slowly and deeply, willing every muscle to relax. He kept his eyes on the silent swing of the scimitar, matching his heartbeat to the steady metronome rhythm.

  The magician stared down at his rope-bound feet, wrapped with a length of chain and padlocked to a ring bolt. He lowered his head, rehearsing the moves in his mind. The Inquisitor presented the biggest problem. Houdini estimated the time it would take the bastard to rush the stage with his chloroform. Fifteen seconds…? Maybe twenty at most, but only if he stayed alert. The magician needed to borrow more time.

  Houdini lay motionless, hoping to lull the enemy into inattention. The magician’s tongue carefully rolled the torn cloth around the end of the pick to give his teeth an additional grip. Better not wait too long, either, he reasoned. Son of a bitch is sure to get all hot and bothered during the finale.

  Houdini stared at the descending pendulum scything ever closer. He’d wait until it closed half the distance. Having made the decision, he gave it no further thought. He used the time to run through the moves, rehearsing them in his mind over and over again, concentrating on smoothness and speed. When the moment for action arrived, the magician would
have mentally made the escape many times.

  Houdini watched the sibilant swing of the blade and thought of Poe. The unnamed narrator in his story didn’t escape until the pendulum actually sliced through the fabric of his robe. He rubbed food on the ropes binding him and rats chewed him free. A true cliff-hanger. Houdini also raced the clock, but it was not the razor’s edge he feared. The ten minutes remaining in the pendulum’s deadly descent allowed plenty of time to effect an escape. The twenty seconds it would take the killer to gain the stage imposed a more stringent deadline.

  The magician planned his first move to be undetectable, slowly sliding the lock-pick up between his lips, grasping the cloth-bound portion in his teeth. He didn’t want the Inquisitor to notice. Too early to start the clock ticking.

  “What’s the matter, Harry…?” the plummy voice called from the auditorium. “Giving up without a try?”

  Hasn’t seen a thing, the magician thought, imperceptibly tensing his arm and shoulder muscles, drawing his legs ever more taut against the length of chain restraining them. His back arched like a bow. With extreme effort, Houdini slowly crossed his ankles beneath the bonds. He heard the Inquisitor’s fitful cough. Bastard didn’t have a clue.

  The trick was to gain some slack. With slack anything became possible. Houdini didn’t mind the pain. He had trained himself to dislocate his shoulders, an excruciating procedure, in order to gain enough slack to slip the cross-bound sleeves of a strait jacket up over his head. The magician’s ankles were double-jointed, capable of amazing contortions. He ignored the pain.

  The time had come. Houdini thrust violently forward, uncrossing his ankles in the same sudden moment. He gained a few precious millimeters of slack in the loop of chain. Drawing up his knees with a sudden jerk, he bent his feet into an exaggerated dancer’s point. The chain slipped free, scraping away a superficial layer of flesh.

  “Bravo, Harry!” The Inquisitor applauded. “Well done, indeed!”

  Houdini sneaked a peak at the hooded killer. The damned fool just sat there clapping his hands. Perfect. An unintentional gift providing precious extra seconds. The magician’s legs remained bound by rope, but this was of little consequence. In a fluid contortionist’s move, he lifted them together and plucked the lock-pick from his teeth with the toes of his right foot.

  “Harry…?” The Inquisitor rose in his seat.

  The next move was critical. The magician bent to the side, his bound feet reaching for his outstretched wrist, turned so the keyhole on the Bean cuffs faced up. His prehensile toes readied the lock-pick. Deftly, he slipped it inside.

  “Damn you!” The Inquisitor struggled over the seat in front of him. “You’re going to die, Houdini!”

  The magician concentrated on the feel of the pick, ignoring the frantic sounds of the killer’s desperate scramble. He held his breath, focusing his entire attention on the problem at hand. Years of performing precise manipulations underwater had taught him never to rush or panic. Somewhere, far off, the Grand Inquisitor snorted like a savage beast.

  Houdini felt the pick in place. His toes gave it a half turn and the lock snapped open. Wrenching his wrist free, the magician caught a glimpse of the robed killer crashing into the orchestra pit. Ten seconds! Houdini fingered the handcuff, not finding the lock-pick. It had fallen out of the keyhole. He slid his searching hand across the dusty stage floor as the Inquisitor stumbled through a thicket of wooden folding chairs, kicking them aside in a frenzy.

  The magician’s fingertips slid upon the lock-pick’s reassuring shape. He seized it and rolled to his left, inserting the pick into the army cuffs in the same motion. Government issue. Simplest mechanism of all. A slight twist and the lock was open. Houdini sat straight up, turning to face his attacker, expecting to see him mounting the stage. The Inquisitor was nowhere in sight. Suddenly, all the lights went out.

  In a single, swift motion, the magician jumped to his feet. He grabbed hold of the scaffolding and hauled himself aloft, working his bound legs like a single appendage. Safe at the top, perched above the clanking mechanism, Houdini untied the knots securing his feet. Somewhere in the distance, he heard a door slam. Assuming this to be further misdirection, he sat very still, listening for the killer’s stealthy approach, holding the rope wound tightly around both his hands. When the time came, he would use it as a garrote.

  27

  BARNSTORMING

  NIGHT HAD NEVER BEFORE seemed so dark. Blackness enclosed him in a void made mad by the rain-stung wind and the propeller’s deafening roar. Houdini felt no sensation of movement, although the fabric-covered aircraft trembled from the exertions of the V-8 Hispano-Suiza engine. He held the throttle wide open, pushing the tachometer up over 1,200 rpms, higher than safety or prudence permitted.

  The magician sat in the open cockpit of a war-surplus Curtiss Jenny, chilled to the bone in spite of an insulated one-piece flying suit with a fur collar, a leather helmet that buckled under his chin, a long woolen scarf, and goggles. Roiling storm clouds obscured both the stars overhead and their mirror-image, the occasional lights lost somewhere on the ground far below. Night and the foul weather commingled, creating a new dimension, one seemingly without space or time, black and empty as death itself.

  Houdini gripped the stick in his gloved hand, the throttle in his left, thrilled to be at the controls of an aircraft once again. Famous as a pioneer aviator, the magician hadn’t piloted a plane solo since those first flights in Australia more than thirteen years before. His boasts to Conan Doyle had been chiefly exaggeration; the spin in the Stinson while filming in California consisted merely of taking over from the pilot for a few minutes, cruising the clear blue skies above Hollywood. His longest flight in the old Voison was less than ten minutes. Two hours flying the Jenny far surpassed his lifetime total aloft.

  Using a flashlight, Houdini studied the gauges on the instrument panel. The oil pressure remained steady; the altimeter indicated twelve thousand feet. Mail pilots never flew above the clouds at night, navigating from one bonfire to the next along their routes. No such beacons awaited the magician. Storm conditions demanded he seek an altitude where the wild, buffeting winds diminished. Upon takeoff, Houdini discovered the ceiling to be under one hundred feet. Afraid of flying so low in the gale’s force, he climbed, slowly and patiently, high into darkness.

  The magician was flying blind, navigating by the crude kerosene-filled “whisky” compass on the instrument panel. He held to a course of E-NE, according to directions received at the airfield, along with a tattered road map with the estimated flying times between refueling stops marked out in pencil. In many ways, his situation had not measurably changed from that four hours earlier when he had perched naked above the scaffolding on the dark, abandoned stage of the Majestic Theater.

  Houdini had clung there, waiting to strangle his attacker, until his eyes adjusted to a faint light filtering into the auditorium. Darkness favored the enemy. Patience, together with a secure vantage point, were on the magician’s side. Satisfied nothing moved in the shadows, Houdini climbed down and retrieved his clothes. It didn’t take long to find the master light switch two rows behind the dummy. Further search revealed only an open lobby door and the discarded leather mask, still reeking of chloroform. The magician took it with him when he headed out into the night to flag down a cab.

  It was 2:00 a.m. before the driver dropped him at an airdrome in Skokie. A light drizzle glistened on the grassy landing field. The place looked deserted. Like earthbound angels, silhouetted biplanes stood randomly grouped in front of darkened hangars. Houdini wasted no time in waking a night watchman from his dreams. At first, the big-bellied guard proved uncooperative, but the magician’s intensity and a five-spot convinced him to search out a barnstorming pilot he remembered might have bedded down in Hangar B.

  Desperate apprehension gnawed at Houdini. Sir Arthur’s séance with Isis, scheduled for the next evening, plagued him with worry. Conan Doyle had every reason for believing her to be the kille
r. He carried a loaded revolver in his pocket. The unexpected proved commonplace with Isis. What if the knight misinterpreted her eccentric behavior? The chances of an accidental shooting seemed vividly possible. Haunted by an image of her pale flesh torn by bullets, the tiny fetus shattered within her womb, Houdini had attempted to place a toll call to Conan Doyle in New York, but was informed by the long distance operator that trunk lines down in an Indiana storm made this impossible. He had the taxi driver take him next to an all-night Western Union office and sent a wire to the Plaza Hotel, which he knew would not be delivered until the following morning. Following the burly night watchman through the rain, the magician implored him to hurry. Houdini had to reach New York in fifteen hours.

  They found the barnstormer, a lanky, sandy-haired Midewesterner who’d flown Spads in France and called himself “Ace” although he hadn’t actually seen any aerial combat, bundled in a tattered crazy quilt on a folding canvas cot at the rear of the empty hangar. Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, the pilot blinked at his unexpected visitors. “Fly you to New York, mister?” he grinned. “Sure thing. When do we leave?”

  “Right now.”

  “You mean tonight?”

  “The sooner the better.” Houdini locked his eyes on the pilot like a man possessed.

  “Hell, mister, I don’t fly at night.”

  “I’ll pay you fifty dollars.”

  “You can pay anything you like, I don’t go up at night.”

  The magician remained undeterred. “What’s the matter? Mail pilots fly at night.”

  “Then find yourself a mail pilot.” The barnstormer wrapped the quilt around his shoulders, searching along a workbench for a pint bottle he’d hidden behind the metal lath. “We lost fifteen airmail pilots this year alone,” he said, taking a slug. “Ain’t that right, Charley?”

  “It’s a fact,” Charley agreed.