Ten Little Wizards: A Lord Darcy Novel

by Michael Kurland

  * * * * * * *

  Twenty minutes later Harbleury tapped his master on the shoulder. “It is time for your appointment, my lord,” he said.

  “What? Oh, yes. Suppose I’d better go. Damn nuisance, though. This fellow—what’s his name...?”

  “Count d’Alberra, my lord. Very highly recommended, my lord.”

  “Yes. Well, I suppose anything’s better than the damn headaches. It’s just that I can’t afford the time right now.”

  “You never can, my lord,” Harbleury told him. “Your cloak, my lord.”

  “You’re right as usual, Harbleury,” Marquis Sherrinford said, rising and letting his assistant help him on with the ornate cloak. “Tidy things up here and go prepare the Map Room for our four o’clock meeting. And—thank you.”

  Marquis Sherrinford left the throne room, traversed the Great Hall, and buttoning his cloak around him against the rain, left the main building. He crossed the outer bailey of Arthur Keep—which was now actually an inner bailey, as construction over the centuries had surrounded Arthur Keep with new layers of castle. He was pleased to see that the drainage system was working well and the bailey was staying fairly puddle-free even under this heavy assault of spring flooding. He must remember to commend the Castle maintenance crew.

  Against what had been the bailey’s outer wall nestled the monastery of Saint Stephain, where pious, dedicated, and Talented men had studied and advanced the healing arts for the past five hundred years. He approached it and knocked at the tiny front door, over which, deeply chiseled, were the words sed libera nos a malo: “but deliver us from evil.” After a moment a lay brother opened the door and admitted him.

  Some of the greatest healers of the past centuries had been Stephainites. In the fourteenth century the Stephainite monk Saint Hilary Robert had the flash of insight that showed a mathematical relationship within certain healing arts. Then he spent the next twenty years of his life working out exactly what that relationship was. When he was done, he published the Mathematicka Manticka, establishing the logical basis for the laws of magic, and the physical world was never again the same.

  Not everyone had the Talent, for unknown reasons, but those who did could study his principles and achieve consistent, reproducible results. Healers could practice the Laying On of Hands, and with the license of the Mother Church, confidently expect to help many, if not most, of their patients. The art of healing was the first of the magical arts to be exploited, and perhaps was the best understood to this very day.

  Over the centuries men and women had come to the Stephainite monastery at Walsingham, where Saint Hilary Robert had lived, or to the other centers at Liverno, Geneva, and here at Castle Cristobel, to be trained in the healing arts.

  But some ills lay outside the skills of the healers. A broken bone, for example, had to be reset by a chirurgeon before the Laying of Hands would speed the recovery. And some ills seemed to lie outside the art of healing.

  The cure for most headaches lay within the healing arts. A headache caused by tension, by anxiety, by the retreat of an overly worried mind into pain, could be eased even by lay healers. Of course, the underlying cause would have to be treated or the pain would recur, but it could be eased. A headache caused by a complex sickness of the mind, or a headache with an underlying physical cause, such as a brain tumor, called for the services of professional healers, usually priests, who were well trained in the specialty in question. But usually these, too, gave way before the healer’s art; sometimes combined with the chirurgeon’s skill.

  But magic and healing were human arts, and thus imperfect; Miracles remained the province of the Divine. Some broken arms failed, for unknown reasons, to heal properly; some infections spread and worsened despite the most accomplished healer’s hands; some headaches refused to depart.

  Marquis Sherrinford’s headaches had at first been minor and easily abated by his family healer. But as they grew more frequent, and more extreme, they proved intractable to the Laying On of Hands. Some of the best sensitives in the Empire had examined him, and all agreed that they could find no underlying physical or mental cause.

  The Marquis bore his affliction with dignity and disdain, refusing to allow it to interfere with his work or his private life. But he also was wise enough not to allow himself to become a martyr. When the possibility of a new cure came along, he was willing to try it, provided it did not sound too silly or take up too much of his time.

  Father Phillip, the elderly abbot who was in temporal charge of the monastery, met Marquis Sherrinford at the door to his small, uncluttered office, where the lay brother brought him. “Good to see you again, my lord,” he said, waving the Marquis to one of the two hard-backed chairs. “Let us pray that we can do something for you this time.”

  “Visiting you is always a welcome pause in a too-hectic day, Father,” Marquis Sherrinford said, lowering himself into the chair. “And the additional possibility of some alleviation of these headaches makes this a haven indeed. Tell me about this Count d’Alberra. Do you think he can do anything?”

  Father Phillip shook his head. “I would not like to guess,” he said. “He helps some. More than I would have guessed. His record of success in Rome and Como and Verona is very impressive, and is attested by His Holiness himself. So there is no question that this method of his has merit. But he has only been here a few weeks—hardly long enough for me to judge what his system can or cannot do.”

  “Tell me about the man himself,” Marquis Sherrinford said, taking his glasses off and polishing them with a cloth.

  “A very nice, soft-spoken gentleman from the north of Italy. Count d’Alberra is attached to the court of King Pietro and is a professor of something they call ‘Mental Science’ at the University of Verona. His theories of healing come from his studies of the mind. He has written a book called Non-Physical Symptomology of the Mind and its Possible Non-Magical Treatment. He is not, himself, a healer, you know.”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “It is true.” Father Phillip sighed. “One should not attempt to explain the ways of God to man, for life itself is enough of a wonder to spend a lifetime considering.”

  “Well, if he isn’t a healer, than what does he do?” Marquis Sherrinford asked.

  “Count d’Alberra talks and listens,” Father Phillip said. “As far as I can see, that’s what he does.”

  “And he cures people?”

  “In many cases. He seems to.”

  Marquis Sherrinford took off his glasses and rubbed his temples with his thumbs. “I’m not surprised that the man is a scientist,” he said. “His method sounds decidedly unmagical. But if it works, who am I to argue?”

  “I’ll take you in to see him now, my lord,” Father Phillip said. “He was delighted that you decided to come. He says he hopes he can help you.”

  “So do I,” Marquis Sherrinford told the good father, sounding a bit doubtful. “So do I.”

  Count d’Alberra was a small, dark-haired man with a closely trimmed beard and mustache. The beard came to a point, emphasizing the angularity of his head. He dressed in the somewhat more ornate costume common to central Italy, all blues, yellows, and tasseled gold fringes. He met them at the door to his treatment room. “It is a pleasure—a pleasure—to meet you, my lord marquis,” he said, taking Marquis Sherrinford by the hand and wringing it firmly. “Thank you, Father, for recommending me. I shall most sincerely try to help.”

  “I can ask no more than that,” Marquis Sherrinford said, allowing himself to be pulled into the small room.

  “I’ll leave you now,” Father Phillip said. “God bless.” He smiled, nodded, and walked away.

  “Just what is it that you do here?” Marquis Sherrinford asked, looking around the small room. It contained a desk, a chair, and a leather couch.

  “Nothing mysterious,” Count d’Alberra assured him. “I will start by taking a patient history, and then we will talk. You, actually, will do most of the talking. I will ask you to lie
on the couch, since I have found that most patients are able to relax better lying down. But if that bothers you, I can have another chair brought in.”

  “No, no,” Marquis Sherrinford said. “I have no objection to lying down. Quite the contrary. You’ll have a job keeping me talking, though. I’m liable to drift off to sleep. It’s been a busy day, and it’s only half over.” A look of concern suddenly crossed his face. “You don’t ask me about my work, do you? You know I can’t discuss—”

  ”I assure you,” Count d’Alberra interrupted, holding up his hand. “I have no concern with your lordship’s work. Our conversations will revolve mostly about your childhood, your relations with your parents, things of that sort. We may also touch upon how you feel about, ah, the ladies, or what sports you like and why.”

  “That’s all?”

  “That is all.”

  “And this may cure my headaches? Asking questions about my childhood?”

  “If, indeed, as the healers say, there is nothing organically wrong that they can find, it well may.”

  Marquis Sherrinford lay back on the black leather couch. “Go ahead, friend Count, ask away.”

  “First the history,” Count d’Alberra said, uncapping his fountain pen. “Where were you born?”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The skinny county armsman refused to sit, and instead shifted uneasily from foot to foot as he waited, looking and feeling out of place in the elaborate drawing room of this sumptuous suite. Lord Darcy could sympathize with him; the ornate, cane-bottomed Gwiliam II chairs did look as though they would break under anything but the most delicate behind. He was not entirely at home here himself, but the seneschal had assigned him these quarters, and with the hundreds of people arriving for the coronation, it would not be fair to ask the the seneschal to do a musical-chairs act because Lord Darcy would have been happier in plainer surroundings. At least they had found a large desk and comfortable chair for him.

  The armsman kept making surreptitious moves to doff his hat in the presence of so much finery. But he would remember that he was in uniform and under arms, and in the presence of the Chief Investigator of the King’s Court of Chivalry, and his hands would snap back down to his sides. Then he would try to polish the sole of one boot against the heel of the other, distributing even more drying mud onto the plum carpet in the process. Lord Darcy found the series of motions annoying, and he almost snapped at the man before realizing how unfair that would be. Instead he looked up from the letter the armsman had brought and twisted his lips into a smile, hoping the smile didn’t look as artificial as it felt.

  “I’ll be about ten minutes or so composing a reply to this letter,” Lord Darcy said. “Why don’t you go inside, through that door, and have my man Ciardi fix you a drink, er, of caffe, since you are still on duty.”

  “Very good, my lord. Thank you,” the armsman said with evident relief, and he retreated hastily through the indicated door.

  One of our country cousins, Lord Darcy thought. Then he did smile, recognizing the expression as one that his good friend and companion Mary, Duchess of Cumberland, used to describe the inept or the unsophisticated.

  The message the armsman had brought was from another old friend of Lord Darcy’s, from the days when he was merely the chief investigator of the Duchy of Normandy, instead of Investigator in Chief of the Court of Chivalry for the whole Angevin Empire. It was short and to the point, but the unwritten subtext went on at some length.

  Dear Lord Darcy,

  I hope you won’t think it presumptuous of me to write you after all this time. I heard you were at the Castle Cristobel in charge of security for the coming coronation. His Majesty could not have picked a better man.

  There has been a double murder here in the small town of Tournadotte, at an inn named the Gryphon d’Or. The killings had no motive that anyone here can determine. The identity of one of the victims is also still a mystery. I thought this might interest you, since you are, so to speak, in the neighborhood. The village of Tournadotte is but two stops farther down the Paris-Le Havre line, at the Calais junction.

  It would be good to see you again. I remember fondly how you helped me in the matter of the disappearance of the late Marquis of Cherbourg.

  Your Friend,

  Henri Vert

  Prefect of Police

  Duchy of Normandy

  Lord Darcy remembered the case of the missing marquis well. It had been a long time ago, when life had been less complex. Or, perhaps, it had only seemed less complex.

  What Darcy’s old friend Henri Vert, who was now the highest uniformed police official for the whole duchy, wanted from Darcy was clear: He needed help—or thought he did—in solving these two murders. The fact that he sent an armsman to deliver the letter personally showed that. He could not ask for aid from the Court of Chivalry directly unless one of those killed was noble, or a noble was suspected of complicity in the killings, or the murders were somehow of importance to the Empire. And, clearly, he could not demonstrate that.

  But does not any man’s death diminish us? came the quote, unbidden, into Lord Darcy’s thoughts. And, after all, he was in the neighborhood—less than three hours by train to the Gryphon d’Or, according to the note. Unsolved murders were not good for the soul of the people. When he could get time off from his present duties, Lord Darcy decided, he would go down and see if he could give Chief Henri a hand, if the spring flooding did not close down the railway line, as it was threatening to. He was sure that Master Sean O Lochlainn, the Angevin Empire’s Chief Forensic Sorcerer and Darcy’s good right hand, would also volunteer to accompany him.

  Lord Darcy spent the whole ten minutes composing his answer. He would have to speak to Coronel Lord Waybusch, commander of the Castle Guard, to see if he could get free for a couple of days. He couldn’t just leave, even though he was not in charge of security, as Chief Henri thought, but merely on hand to observe and advise on security for the coronation. But there was no point in antagonizing the Coronel, a friendly, hard-working trooper who welcomed his advice. And in case he couldn’t get free, or the railroad did stop running, he didn’t want Master Henri to have been waiting for him instead of investigating on his own.

  When Lord Darcy was happy with the reply, he made a clean copy, then folded it and sealed it with his signet, and called the armsman back into the room. “Tell Prefect Henri that I will look forward to working with him, if I can get away,” he said, handing the paper to the armsman.

  Ciardi came to the door as the armsman was leaving. “Lord Peter Whiss to see you, Your Lordship,” he said.

  “Lord Peter? At midday? How strange. What does he want?” Lord Darcy asked.

  “He didn’t say,” Ciardi replied. “And it is well past midday, my lord. It is almost four o’clock.”

  “So it is,” Lord Darcy agreed. “Show His Lordship in, please, Ciardi.” He stood up and slipped into his jacket, which had been hanging over the back of his chair.

  “Sorry to bother you, Lord Darcy,” Lord Peter said, barely sticking his head around the door. “But, much as I regret it, I must drag you away from all this.”

  “If you must,” Lord Darcy said, buttoning his jacket and adjusting the lace cuffs of his shirt. “Are we going outdoors? No? Good, then I won’t need my rain cape or overboots. Lead the way!”

  A minute later they were bustling together down the long castle corridor. “You are the last of the invited guests to be notified,” Lord Peter explained. “And we’re running a few minutes late, as it took me longer than expected to locate His Grace the Archbishop. I must say, Darcy, that you are surprisingly uninquisitive for a man who has just been suddenly pulled away from his work. I expected at least a couple of questions, if not an argument.”

  “You said that you must drag me away,” Lord Darcy pointed out. “I took you at your word. You are not frivolous with language.”

  “That is so,” Lord Peter admitted. “These days I will admit I seldom feel frivolous about anything.�
�� He stopped at the Map Room door, which, Lord Darcy noted, had an armed guard from the King’s Own standing at attention beside it. “Well, here we are. After you, my lord.”

  Lord Darcy entered the Map Room ahead of Lord Peter and greeted the five people already there: His Grace Archbishop Maximilian of Paris; His Highness Duke Richard of Normandy, the King’s brother; Master Sir Darryl Longuert, the Wizard Laureate of England; His Lordship the Marquis Sherrinford, the King’s Equerry; and Goodman Harbleury, the Marquis Sherrinford’s amanuensis and shadow.

  “Good day, Lord Darcy,” Marquis Sherrinford said. “Please sit down, and we’ll begin.”

  The Map Room, a part of the Royal Archives, was a fourteen-by-twenty- foot room, equipped, as its name indicated, to store, display, and examine maps. The rear wall was one vast walnut cabinet of long, wide, flat drawers for storing unfolded maps. Along the wall to the right of that, below the high-set windows, were rows of oblong bins, crafted of the same wood, for storing rolled-up maps. The front wall contained devices for hanging maps for study, and the large, walnut table that dominated the room was inlaid with a complex set of brass fittings that would enable one to hold down, examine, magnify, or pantographically duplicate or enlarge a map.

  Lord Darcy dropped into the nearest straight-back walnut chair and rested his hands on the table. He had spent many hours in this room during the years he was Chief Investigator for the Duke of Normandy, examining and committing to memory the plans of the kingdom’s major castles and many of the minor ones. It was a knowledge that had proven useful more than once.

  Marquis Sherrinford pushed himself out of his chair. “Thank your lordships all for coming,” he said. “I’ll be as brief as possible, as I know you all have important duties that you put aside to come here.”

  “And without a word of explanation too,” Duke Richard said. “It is a mark of the esteem in which we all hold you, my lord marquis.”

  “I would not abuse your confidence, I assure Your Highness,” Marquis Sherrinford said. “I wish to read you a letter that arrived this noon, addressed to me.” He took the letter from the table and unfolded it. “It was first opened by Lord Peter, and he passed it directly on,” he said, then began reading.