Thus over-tired and not in the leastwise quiet in mind, I was presently left to stand a-knocking and a-shivering in this bitter cold -- until at the length comes our ancient door-keeper who -- doubtless supposing to give good cheer -- did detain me in the hall with his presumptuous loquacity. But when at last I had got myself well rid of him I did see nobody else of the household thereabouts -- save only (most excessive slowly a-sweeping of the floor) my old carping nuisance of a suck-nurse whom I had so oftentimes been fain to thrash ever since I was a very boy. No sooner did this crone observe me, than she did gasp and commence her wonted fuss. But the old hen knew well enough now not to hamper me -- tho’ I did hear her clucking still as I did hasten up the stair-case toward my father’s door.
At the first, upon entering, I did perceive nothing -- excepting the overmuch dispiriting darkness of the chamber and its prodigious nauseous smell. Yet by and by I did make out a brace of figures seated over against the curtain’d bed. Approaching thither, I did hear a mumbled sing-song which I could not but surmize was prayer. Now advancing some few steps closer (tho’ as yet they did not remark my presence) I could perceive right well enough who they were: our damnable little worm of a local vicar and my brother’s pious, big-boned, flat-breasted lady -- Millicent.
She it was who did first espy me, raising her plump hand unto her startled mouth. Then it was the little vicar who did observe me, leaping betwixt me and my father’s bed, thinking to oppose my progress with his clutched prayer-book and his pustulous, earnest face. But I was not to be so easily withstood. For in a trice I had unpocketed and cock’d my pistol, held the little sop at bay -- and drawn aside the damask bed-curtain.
Most fortunately, the old fool was still breathing. Yet, without his perriwig and ivory teeth, he did seem now but little more than a most distressful farrago of ill-odour, spew, snot and gasping, rheumy-eyed infirmity. I did remark, howsomever, that his Grace’s hand was even now a-gripping of our grandsires’ cross, a pretty trinket most exceeding aged and rife with resplendent rubies.
I must fairly own that I should not then have endeavoured to remove it. For no sooner had I but ever the most gingerly pull’d at it, than his Grace did start awake from his lamented stupor, taking abrupt -- and in the event, most disastrous -- cognizance of my presence. For now was I fain to hear the first displeasant croaks and behold the first unsightly tremors of the fit. Then indeed did my gorge rise at the sudden gust of his abominable breath and at the plenteous vileness which, at the terrific summit of this paroxysm, he did presently cast up upon my sattin doublet. Nor was this the whole of it. As if o’ertaxed by these prodigious efforts, his Grace did now fall back upon his pillows -- his entire person but a lump of twitchng palsie, his eyes rolling about most idly in his pallid pate.
Now, of course, was I favoured with Millicent’s scolding -- whilst the little sniveling vicar did pell-mell betake himself below-stairs to summon the physician. I, perforce, did doff my doublet and, at once, uncock and wipe my pistol. But Millicent -- doubtless supposing that she had gain’d advantage on me -- still took occasion to pour forth a very torrent of ill words. Indeed, so overlong a sermon I think I never heard in all my life. Natheless, I did hearken to it most soberly -- albeit I did laugh in my sleeve to think how I had lain with her and how, for all her pious countenance, she had so roundly played the whore.
But now, mercifully, in charges the physician and straightways commences to blister my father and to let him blood -- so Millicent could not chuse but mind her haviours and hold her tiresome tongue. I cannot soothly say that I was not already quite piqued by Millicent’s insolence and, moreover, most stomack-sick at the sad spectacle and unutterable odours of infirmity. Natheless, I myself spoke not a single uncivil word -- but did only endeavour to find out some small measure of relief in the smelling of my perfum’d glove. But Millicent, no longer able to forbear from sermonizing, gan presently to whisper me full low that I had best to leave ere my brother did return. For, if ever he found me here, he would further scant my moneys. In fine, she had the unparalleled impertinence to tell me to begone.
By now I had -- unquestionably -- borne quite enough. Thus, in my most softest whisper, I replied that I cared not a fart if my brother were troubled by my visit. I said I did not fear in the least that I would be short of moneys. For, if she did not perswade the duke my father to sign a last will and testament which my own solicitor had penn’d, then I would be fain to tell our beloved Baldric how -- of a sultry Lord’s Day evening, uplifting of her skirts upon a bench in the very pews of her chapel -- she had been full as eager to be swived as a common salt-ars’d bitch.
These my whisper’d words did effect a most miraculous conversion. Indeed never, I daresay, did a benighted soul on such a very sudden see the light. For now -- in a wink -- did this erstwhile most pert, refractory and ill-mannered jade declare with quite gratifying meekness that she would henceforth be full fain to do my bidding.
All this meanwhile had his Grace’s limbs and trunk been scarified and cupped, his eyes and mouth beset with leeches, his reverend head salubriously blistered. Inasmuch as he had been given, moreover than this, a cleansing vomit and a glyster, he did now -- by all means possible -- vent the pestiferous excess of his humours. Yet truly I know not whether I was more distressed by the unsightliness of all these medicinal operations or by the most unmanly deportment which his Grace did presently betray.
For no sooner had he waked up from his lethargy, than he did fall to such a womanish weeping and a-whimpering -- that I was, I do confess, quite to my uttermost endurance sicken’d of it. Unless it were in a nursery, I think I never did hear such shameful puling. Nor was I in the least relieved until Millicent, with much ado, made shift tolerably well to hush him up. Yet even then he could not quite entirely forbear from whining . . . until the little pimple-faced vicar had again given him his cross -- the which the old fool did forthwith clutch and commence to drivel and dote upon after the manner of a blubbering child clinging to some well-beloved doll.
Now, meseem’d, at the long-last it was time to make him sign. For but the merest instant Millicent did seem held back by a lingering reluctance. Yet by dint of looking her most sternly in the eye, I did presently prevail on her to wheedle him and offer him the writ. The old addle-pated wretch did only stare and slabber until, finally, she endeavoured to make him take the quill.
Then it was -- as his muddled mind did increasingly comprehend that his right hand must needs ungrasp his cross -- that he did again commence, ever more insufferably louder, a-sobbing and a-snuffling and a-shrieking. It is possible, peradventure, that I should not have done what now I did. But forasmuch as his noxious exhalations had given me the vapours -- and as I was nowise of a mind to be further incommoded by the unseemly tantrums of an ancient child -- I did now take away his little cross.
I must own that I should then have better precautioned myself against the deathworthy intermeddling of the vicar. For tho’ I did intend full well to give the trinket back -- if only his Grace would be pleased to sign the writ -- yet now did this verminous vicar have the most damnable effrontery to tussle me. At his door then, must be laid the entire fault of starting this most objectionable and inauspicious wrestle -- a deplorably unequal combat which (once I had bloodied his nose and box’d him -- as he deserved -- about the ears) did lamentably occasion the aghast stare and altogether displeasant strangulation of his Grace’s final paroxism.
In this manner, then, was I roguishly cheated of my heritance. For when presently I did see that his Grace was now but a loathsome and altogether useless corse, I think I never did bear such exceeding bitter disappointment. Nor did kicking this turd of a vicar very much help to console me. Yet even now I was not put entirely out of hopes. For full soon I did bethink me of my grey-eyed charmer and thereby contrive, in some measure, to rally up my spirits -- my one thought being now that I must needs straightways coach it to the bawdy-house and promptly take possession of her purse and person. Thus (perceivin
g that it would but very little advantage me to parley with a corse) I now did quit this doleful chamber and hie me belowstairs to the kitchen -- where I was fain to suffer the grumbling sullenness of Potter, who had far liefer guzzle up his gin and grope the scullery-maids than attend unto his proper duties as my coachman.
Indeed this raskal was at present so overmuch sullen and drunken and backward to rise up from table, that I did much expect him yet again to mind me of the dead bookseller and endeavour to extort some money. For I did, assuredly, see some such malapert mischief in his eyes. But -- forasmuch as I was now most excessively vapour’d and wearied -- I was not in the leastwise of a mind to suffer such bare-faced impudence. Happily, howsomever, there needed but only to outstare the knave and lift my cane. Hence, at the length, this surly, sneaking fellow did rise up from table, touching of his much cutted and swoln face as if only now he did remember himself of his late, well-deserved beating at the inn.
By my troth, it did do my heart much good to see this varlet cringe and -- like a dog that hath been shown the stick -- trot himself obediently out a doors. Nor whilst he did fetch me my snuffbox and harness the horses and once again load the coach with my trunks and my travelling-cabinet and my cutlass and my close-stool and my perriwigs and my pistols and my portmanteau and my perfume bottles and done my every other bidding in the sharp and sleeting cold, durst this dunghill dog so much as mutter or offer me one impertinent glance.
And yet assoon as this fellow had helped me into coach and I had sat me down, methought, ere he was pleased to shut my door, that I did perceive him mumble something -- and most impudently look at me asquint. But inasmuch as the wind -- at that very moment -- was a-shrilling extremely, I must own that I cannot of a certainty say that I could any more distinctly hear the raskall speak than I could well observe him standing there next my coach, a-sulking and a-shivering in the dark.
For the snow did now fall so exceeding thick and fast, that I could but barely see his whoreson frost-bit face beneath his tricorn hat. But moreover than this -- I know not what to make of it -- some manner of excessive drowsiness did on the sudden overtake me. For albeit I did intend full well to keep a narrow eye upon the rogue -- and cane him soundly if need be, yet in some species of waking dream the falling snow did now so entirely cover his tricorn hat and great-coat, that they did vanish quite . . . and I could not in the leastwise comprehend why, in such bitter cold, he did stand there next my glass-coach in a T-shirt.
Chapter XXI.
An exceeding long chapter containing a prodigious multiplicy of matters, including not only Dr. Smedlow’s journey to New Jersey, Mr. Frobey’s adventures as a Horsefly and Lady Chommeley’s arrival at the brothel, but also two more corpses and a yellow primrose.
“Well now, pal,” said Lemuel Lee, fastenin’ the old gent’s seat belt, double-checkin’ that the silver lighter was in the old gent’s jacket pocket, and then -- rememberin’ his aunt’s stupid-ass instructions -- reachin’ his right hand down into his jeans’ pocket past the Kleenex wads and Trojan until he felt the metal disk: “looks like yer all buckled up and comfy. And here’s the Englishman’s locket -- but don’t you think for one damn second that that I don’t know it’s you in there.”
As a fat, thirteen-year-old pariah at the Camp Tecumseh pool, Smedlow had once been dunked in the deep end and, despite his flabby punches, held down for a solid minute in a bluish submarine horror-world of panicked suffocation -- until his two adolescent persecutors had reluctantly allowed him to surface, floundering and gasping. This was the memory that now came rushing back to him as the coachman in the snowstorm faded before his eyes into a cellophane transparency. For a moment he found himself wondering where this scurvy coachman had run off to. And then, very tentatively, he began to think that perhaps he was really sitting -- not in his coach -- but in the backseat of a limousine wriggling back and forth in its parking space -- and now lurching wildly toward the street.
-- “Damn!” yelled Lemuel Lee, hearin’ the crash, jammin’ on the brake, and seein’ what he’d done to that red Caddy. “Shit! Well, pal, we got ourselves a situation.”
Smedlow, thrown forward by the impact, found himself looking down over his white-trousered kneecaps at his shoes. Those shoes -- Oh my God! -- the burgundy alligator leather, the tapered toes, the tassels -- were the ones they had stolen from him way back in the beginning, when they had tricked him and taken him prisoner in the swamp!
“Naah, on second thought,” said Lemuel Lee, pattin’ Blitz on the head and gettin’ him to lay down again, “we don’t have nothin’ at all to worry about.”
Cause, he thought -- movin’ slow and easy into traffic -- although it was kinda too bad about breakin’ off that Caddy’s side mirror like that and bustin’ up its door, the real good thing was that there wasn’t nobody around to see it. And of course -- him being such a good driver -- it wouldn’t a ever happened in the first place, if he wasn’t still feelin’ so damn tired and outa sorts from last night’s horsefly dream. Yep, it sure was one royal pain in the ass on the day of his big mission to feel this goddamn tired. But then again he figured -- floorin’ the gas and cuttin off a garbage truck -- that maybe feelin’ like shit was just part a the price you had to pay for livin’ with the gift. In fact most probably -- like Old Hattie back in the swamp always used to tell him -- this real tuckered-out feelin’ always happened cause, after you’d been out shapeshiftin’ into yer power animal, some itty-bitty part a you for a little while was still caught out there somewheres in the astral world. This tired-out feelin’, Hattie said, was kinda like jet lag for an astral traveller. So maybe he oughta just take it on the chin. And maybe -- it bein’ such a long time since he’d been out there flyin’ around in the spirit world -- he oughta just see last night’s dream as a real plain-as-day sign that his power animal was givin’ its blessin’ to Plan B.
In fact it was more than likely, he thought (seein’ that the Park drive was closed at 72nd Street and that now, God freakin’ damn it, he was stuck with going South on Fifth) that his power animal had come to him at this extra tryin’ period of his military mission in order to give him the spiritual benefit of its guidance and support. Hell, it was only cause he’d been so damn nervous about things maybe goin’ wrong, that he’d spent all a last night down there in his subway car -- just restin’ up and gatherin’ his thoughts. Why, it took one entire six-pack and a forty a malt liquor and a whole lotta skin magazines and adult videos before he was even startin’ to feel calm. But then, well, maybe it was seein’ his big old python layin’ there so nice’n quiet in his terrarium -- just lookin’ at him there and gettin’ himself a real good whiff a reptile -- that had finally done the trick.
Cause that’s when he started gettin’ sleepy and takin’ off his jeans and beginnin’ to sneeze -- most likely on account a all the mouse muss and dustballs on the floor. But whatever the reason, he sure as hell was sneezin’ -- and standin’ there in nothin’ but his tightie-whities and reachin’ into his jeans’ pocket for a hankie -- when his fingers grabbed a hold a the Englishman’s locket, which he musta put into his pocket by mistake. Well, at the time he didn’t think nothin’ too much about it, but just blew his nose, opened up the locket so as he could see what the goddamn fuss was all about, put the locket next to his mattress -- and then took a leak and otherwise got himself ready to lay down.
-- “Don’t worry, pal,” he said, interruptin’ his memories, seein’ that there was a police barricade across 57th Street and that instead he’d have to go west on 55th, “this is definitely somethin’ we can deal with.”
So anyways there he was now layin’ on his mattress in his BVD’s -- listenin’ to all them far-off, rumblin’, screechin’ subway sounds -- when all of a sudden it started to happen. In fact he hadn’t hardly closed his eyes before the same thing happened that always did -- that kinda painful, itchy feelin’ as all them changes started all at once: him gettin’ a whole lot smaller while meanwhile his eyes was gettin’ huge, his nos
e was stretchin’ down like an elephant’s trunk and two antennas was poppin’ outa his head; he was gettin’ a whole bunch a extra mouths; and, of course, two wings and two extra legs was sproutin’ outa his sides at the same time as his ass was bulgin’ out behind him and his privates was beginnin’ to feel a whole lot different. But once it was all over, it was sorta like bein’ in the cockpit a some kinda fancy jet plane -- except, of course, that it wasn’t a jet plane but a bug.
But anyhow, as soon as he realized what was goin’ on -- that he had shapeshifted into his power animal in the astral, that’s when them antennas on his head started twitchin’ like crazy -- cause they’d picked up somethin’ that smelled extra, extra good. What he felt now, see, was kinda like bein’ real hungry and smellin’ a sizzlin’ steak, exceptin’ that this particular dandy smell didn’t make his mouth water none but gave him a real powerful horny feelin’ somewheres back there on his other end right between his wings. Now of course it’s more than likely that what he was feelin’ now had a lot to do with all them adult videos and skin magazines he’d been lookin at just before he went to lay down on his mattress. But however you wanna explain it, he now really just didn’t have no choice but to start flappin’ his wings -- so that pretty soon he was circlin’ all around the subway car lookin’ for whatever that scrumptous-smellin’ thing was that he was pickin’ up on his antennas.
Of course that’s when he saw himself down below in his BVD’s -- layin’ there snorin’ on his mattress. But, hell, now he didn’t really have no time at all for himself. Cause he was just too goddamn busy flyin’ -- from a greasy fryin’ pan on the stove . . . to that big chewed-up bone layin’ next to Blitz on the floor . . . to a wad a wintergreen chewin’ gum stuck on a window at the other end of the car . . . and then back to one a them subway benches so as he could waste his precious time checkin’ outa whole lotta plastic bags stuffed with nothin’ but egg-roll wrappers, ducksauce, empty Chinese food boxes and used chopsticks. But that, see, is when he picked up the vibes on his antennas that Beelzelbub (who was chowin’ somethin’ down in his terrarium) was sendin’ him some kinda radio broadcast and tellin’ him to fly on over to the locket.
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