by Mike Ashley
“Yes. You might say he killed Lundt after he left the room.”
I snapped my fingers. “The Monkey’s Paw!” I exclaimed.
They all looked at me. Even the elevator boy turned to look at me. “I read this book,” I explained. “It was about this case in Germany where the murderer animated a monkey’s paw and left it behind in the victim’s house. And then, after he had left and gone to establish an unbreakable alibi, the monkey’s paw crawled over and strangled the victim.”
They all kept looking at me. “This victim was shot,” Godfrey reminded me.
“This monkey’s paw had a gun,” I suggested.
The elevator door opened, and we spilled out into the lobby. Chief Godfrey went off to speak to a small cluster of men in brown suits that I recognized as being from the plainclothes protective division of the force. Stryk headed over to the room clerk’s counter and I followed. “I’d like to see your registration book,” he told the clerk, a young man with a prominent nose and watery blue eyes. The clerk looked over at the manager, who nodded, and he pulled the oversized sign-in book from beneath the counter. Stryk opened it and leafed through the last few pages. “I’m interested in anyone who has come in from Chicago recently,” he told the clerk.
The clerk helped him look. There were four Chicagoans in the last three days. The victim, Mr Lundt had checked in yesterday. I was tempted to make a pun about when he had checked out, but decided not to. The other three were a husband and wife named Gilgum who were here for a schoolteachers’ convention and a Mr Bianchi who traveled in salamanders. “One of our regulars,” the clerk assured us. “Salamanders, horned toads, asps. And several sorts of insects. We don’t let him keep his livestock here, of course.”
“Of course,” I murmured.
The clerk nodded. “Just his samples.”
Stryk pointed to a little mark to the right of Lundt’s signature. “What is that?”
The clerk peered. “Ah,” he said. “Mr Lundt checked a piece of luggage in our check room.”
“He did, did he? And where is your check room?”
“Well, actually, you check the bag with me and I take it to the check room,” the clerk said.
“Will you get the Lundt luggage for us, please?”
“Well, under the circumstances – certainly. If you’ll just wait a minute,” he bobbed his head a few times and headed toward that private land behind the counter where only room clerks may go.
As the room clerk departed I pulled Lundt’s wallet from my jacket pocket and waved it at Stryk. “Open,” I said. “Please.”
Stryk sighed and took the wallet. He mumbled a few magical words and tried to pry it open. His hands slid around it as though it had just been buttered.
“Ha!” Stryk said. “I see!” He put the wallet on the counter and contemplated it for a minute. Then he pulled his wand from his belt, intoned a few words and tapped the wallet twice with the back end of the wand. He then flipped the wand over, said, “Exaultet Magnificat!” in a loud clear voice, and tapped the wallet with the tip of the wand.
The wallet flew open, scattering papers and cards and coins all over the counter top and the nearby floor. I gathered them up as best I could, as many as I could find, and looked them over.
There were a couple of ones, threes and tens, and a twenty-five dollar bill; the return half of a round-trip ticket from Chicago to San Francisco, good for a year from the date of purchase, which was last Friday; a driver’s licence from the State of Illinois, stamped for both electric and steam vehicles, and a membership card in the American Amateur Conjurers’ Society.
“He was one of you,” I told Stryk, tossing him the card.
He turned it over in his hand and flicked it with his fingernail. “Prestidigitation,” he said. “Card tricks, coin tricks, box tricks.”
“Box tricks?”
Stryk shrugged. “Lady gets into box, conjurer spins box around and it falls open – no lady. Not magic – a clever illusion.”
“Music hall stuff?” I asked.
“Exactly,” Stryk agreed. “Some of their tricks simulate the Power, but they’re all just tricks.”
Chief Godfrey came up to join us. “The senator will be here in a minute,” he told us. “What are ‘just tricks’?”
I explained.
“So these ‘conjurers’ have not the Power?” asked Godfrey.
“Some do,” said Stryk.” As you know, the Power comes in many guises, partly dependent upon some inner spirit that we do not yet understand, and partly upon the training or practice of the adept or the order he or she is a member of. Sometimes a magician with one limited Power will use some of these conjurers’ tricks to enhance his reputation, to seem more powerful than he is.”
Chief Godfrey shook his head. “Such deceit,” he said.
“It is sad,” Stryk agreed. “Would you like to see a card trick?”
“I think not,” said Godfrey.
The room clerk came scurrying up from the back, with Pierson, the manager, a few steps behind. “They don’t know how it happened,” the room clerk blurted. “It’s very strange.”
“What is?” I asked.
“Mr Lundt’s luggage – it’s not there!”
“Really?” Stryk asked. “Fascinating! Who took it?”
“Nobody knows,” the manager said, putting his arms on the counter wearily. “The chit – the little metal disk we give in exchange for the luggage, has been returned, but nobody remembers receiving it or giving out Mr Lindt’s piece of luggage.”
“What did it look like?” I asked.
“It’s a little brass disk with a number stamped on it,” the room clerk said.
“The luggage,” Stryk said. “What did the luggage look like?”
“Oh.” The clerk put his hands wide apart. “About this wide. It was a sort of trunk, I remember. Rectangular with brass – you know – fittings and things. Like a steamer trunk, but not as big.”
“So a trunk this wide,” Stryk spread his hands apart, “just disappeared?”
“Maybe the night man—” Pierson began. A little bell behind the counter trinkled, and he jumped. “The bell!” he said. “That’s the doorman. Senator Langford’s cab has arrived. I must see to things.” An expression of grave concern crossed his face, and he scurried out from behind the counter.
About five minutes later the senator and his wife, three or four aides, and a bevy of cops crossed the lobby, Pierson walking backward in the lead, making little nervous hand gestures as he talked to the senator. A large luggage cart took up the rear, filled with a large amount of luggage. A large man with the look of a cop stayed with the luggage cart, which was being pushed by two bellhops. His overcoat marked him as having arrived from Chicago with the senator.
Half the group took the first elevator up, half the second, and the luggage cart with its hefty escort, the third. “I think they’re preparing to pay a ransom,” I said. “And I think it’s in that cart.”
“There’s certainly something of value in their luggage,” Stryk agreed.
Melisa made a slight whimpering sound. Stryk dropped his hand on to her shoulder. “Be brave,” he said.
“There is a – a – blackness following those people,” she said. “I have never felt anything like that before.”
“Could it have been from that luggage cart?” Stryk asked.
“It could,” she said. “But I’m not sure. It was like an emptiness – I don’t know how to put it. Not pleasant.”
“The senator’s going to want to see you right away,” Chief Godfrey told Stryk. “Let’s go up.”
“Give them a few minutes to get settled,” Stryk said.
“I don’t think Senator Langford is interested in getting settled,” I said.
Stryk sighed. “You’re right, of course. But I’m afraid this isn’t going to turn out well.”
Chief Godfrey looked at him sharply. “Listen,” he said. “If you fail, you fail.”
“Oh, I won’t fail,
” Stryk said.
The senator was in the President Huey Long suite on the fifth floor. Uniformed policemen were guarding each entrance to the corridor, with a few extra scattered about for fill. When we walked in the senator, a tall, distinguished-looking man with a great shock of gray-brown hair, was yelling, “Just leave everything where it is. When I want to unpack, I’ll tell you to unpack,” at his aides, helpers and factotums. They dispersed without argument to the corners of the room and stood in different postures of discontent, or sat down on whatever was available, leaving the great pile of luggage in the middle of the floor. The two bellboys were standing by the door with the luggage cart, waiting for their tip. Manager Pierson gave them a “scat” sign with the back of his hand, and they scatted sulkily, pulling the cart behind them.
Senator Langford’s wife Mary, an attractive woman despite the lines of grief that currently etched her face and the spiritless slump of her shoulders, was sitting on a white couch to the right of the door, her hands folded over the purse on her lap, staring into space. Langford went to sit beside her and put his arm around her. “We’ll have our little girl back soon, Mary,” he promised. Upon which Mary burst out sobbing and, pulling a small white handkerchief from her purse, covered her face.
A self-important looking gentleman with a brush moustache and a receding hairline stalked over to us and extended his hand in the general direction of whoever wanted to take it. “Harold Fenster,” he said. “Senator Langford’s legislative aide. Would one of you be Dr Stryk?”
“That would be me,” Stryk said.
Fenster aimed the hand more directly at Stryk. “Glad to meet you,” he said. “Come speak with the senator.”
The senator stood up as we approached. “Stryk?” he asked. “Have you discovered anything?”
“Deborah is alive,” Stryk told him. “Or at least she was a couple of hours ago.”
“Where is she?” Langford demanded, reaching forward as though he would clutch Stryk’s jacket, and then drawing his hand back. “Could you tell where she is? Is she all right? What have they done with her?”
“She was alive and unharmed physically,” Stryk told him. “She is surrounded by dark forces. There is sorcery at work here, clouding my attempts to see better.”
“But she was alive?”
“Yes.”
“Thank god!” Langford turned to his wife. “Mary, she’s alive.”
Mary nodded without looking up. “Bring her to me,” she sobbed.
“I will, I will,” Langford told her. “As soon as we get further instructions.” He turned back to Stryk. “They’ve asked – whoever they are – for two million dollars, all in twenty-five dollar bills. I have it here. They are going to let me know how to deliver it.”
I did a quick calculation. “That’s eighty thousand bills. Quite a big stack.”
“It’s a trunkful,” Langford said, pointing to the pile of luggage. “That black trunk there. Two million. It’ll just about wipe me out, but of course that doesn’t matter if we get Deborah back.”
He couldn’t help it, of course. Our research on him had shown that he was worth between ten and fifteen million dollars, in these days when a family of four can live well and keep two servants and an electric – or even a horse and buggy – on sixty dollars a week. One would think that, for a man worth at least ten million, losing two million would be a major insult but only a minor inconvenience. But it isn’t so. It really hurt. It really felt like he was losing almost everything. He would brood and cry about the loss of ten percent of his worth more than you or I would about losing our life savings and our favourite hunting dog. During the crash of ’32 plutocrats were jumping out of office windows because they were down to their last two or three million. But again I digress.
Fenster pulled the black trunk free of the pile of luggage and took a square of parchment out of his jacket pocket. He held it in his left hand with his right on the trunk and began mumbling something in Latin. By some of the words, I recognized it as the release on a protective spell on the trunk – think of it as the key for a specific lock. Otherwise the person using the spell would have to carry the magician around every time he wanted to get into the trunk.
When he was done mumbling he folded the parchment up and put it back in his pocket. Then he produced a heavy brass key from another pocket, turned the lock, and lifted the trunk lid.
Stryk and Melisa passed a look between them, but I could not tell what it portended.
“Two million dollars,” Fenster said. “In twenty-five dollar bills, all used and non-sequential. That’s what the kidnappers want, and that’s what they shall have. May each and every bill burn their fingers whenever they touch it.”
We looked. A five-by-six array of portraits of President Roosevelt stared back. The first woman president and head of one of the most influential Wiccan covens on the East Coast, Eleanor Roosevelt had presided over the passing of the most far-reaching social legislation yet seen. She – and it – were the reason that congress had passed the strict laws against any sorcerer, warlock, wizard or witch holding public office or any position of trust in the government. It must have been witchcraft, the Tories had decided. And they weren’t going to put up with a willful woman again, if they could help it.
Fenster closed the top and relocked it. A good thing, because the sight of that much money all in one place gave me a throbbing sensation in the back of my head, right above the neck.
“How are you going to deliver it?” Chief Godfrey asked.
“They’ll tell us,” Senator Langford said. “They’ll be in touch any time now.”
“How?” I asked.
“They didn’t say.”
There was a knock at the door and we all jumped. Well, I know I jumped; I wasn’t really looking at what everyone else was doing. A white envelope had been pushed under the door, and it was just sitting there smirking at us. Pierson, who was right by the door, jerked it open and hopped into the hall like a great rabbit. Then he turned back to us. “Nobody here,” he said. “The hall is empty.”
Several people rushed into the hall to verify what he said. It was so.
“The senator’s name is on the envelope,” Pierson said.
“Here, let me look at it,” said Godfrey, taking the envelope. He poked at it, peered at it, probed it, sniffed it, wrinkled it, listened to it, and finally handed it to Senator Langford.
The senator took a deep breath and slit it open. There were two folded sheets of paper inside. He unfolded them. Several of us peered over his shoulder as he read. The first one contained a message in printed block letters. It said:
BELOW IS A COPY OF THE CHALDEAN RITE OF TRANSFERENCE. RECITE IT, PRONOUNCING THE WORDS AS THOUGH THEY WERE WRITTEN IN ENGLISH. EVERYONE IN THE ROOM MUST SAY THE RESPONSES. THEN PLACE THE PAPER ON TOP OF THE TRUNK CONTAINING THE MONEY AND SET IT AFIRE. YOUR DAUGHTER WILL BE INSTANTLY RETURNED TO YOU.
Langford turned to the next sheet. There were about forty lines of “Chaldean.” Just to give you the flavor of it, here are the first four:
MANAY TIKEY FONDO DIN PRATE ORG KANDO MU RESPONSE: TONDO LU TIMMIT
TISSA YUBIT STIPPA ROOG BISTA MEM KOOKRA BIM RESPONSE: TONDO LU TIMMIT
Langford passed the page over to Stryk. “What do you make of it?” he asked. “It looks like gibberish to me.”
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Stryk confessed. “But then ancient Chaldean isn’t my specialty. I must admit that many magical incantations and rites seem like gibberish to the lay person.”
Langford took the page back and stared at it for a long time, looking pained and bewildered.
“Do it, Tom, do it,” his wife urged from her seat on the couch. “Whatever it is, do it.”
Fenster said. “Might as well, sir. Look, it’s the same response each time. I’ll just make some copies and hand them around so we can all respond together.”
“What’s supposed to happen?” Senator Langford asked.
“I have no idea,”
Stryk confessed.
Langford shrugged. “What the hell,” he said. “I’ve never felt so helpless.” He turned to Fenster. “Make those copies.”
“Yes, sir,” Fenster said. He took some scraps of paper and hurriedly wrote “TONDO LU TIMMIT” on each one, then he passed them around.
Senator Langford stood up and coughed. “Don’t anybody laugh,” he said. “Whatever else this is, it isn’t funny.”
He recited the seeming gibberish in a clear, loud voice, and we all responded at the proper times. Then Fenster took the page from him, put it on top of the trunk, and struck a match.
A thin stream of black smoke lofted toward the ceiling as he applied the match to the paper. Then it grew to a cloud of black smoke. Then Fenster leapt back as the smoke itself seemed to catch fire, and burned with a bright blue light that filled the room for a few seconds, and then went out with an audible “pop.”
“That’s it?” Godfrey asked.
“What happened?” Senator Langford asked.
Fenster took his brass key and put it in the lock and lifted the trunk lid. A cloud of residual smoke billowed into the room. Someone coughed. “The money’s gone,” Fenster said.
“What do you mean, ‘gone’?” demanded Langford, advancing toward the trunk.
“Gone!” Fenster repeated stubbornly.
I peered over the edge of the trunk and saw that, indeed, the five-by-six rectangle of stacks of twenty-five dollar bills had disappeared, its place taken by a charred, black empty space. And beneath it . . .
“Oh, my good lord,” Fenster said as the smoke cleared. He reached inside the trunk and lifted out a small, unconscious girl child.
“Deborah!” her mother called, and in a second she had the child in her arms. Another second and Langford was holding both of them, and then we were all surrounding the mother and child and saying inane things, or laughing, or crying.
“She won’t wake up,” Mary said after a minute, and instantly we were all silent, and looking down at the motionless little girl.
“Look at her face!” cried someone.