by Brian Hodge
If the hallway below seemed large, the upper hall was immense. To the right, he looked out over an intricately-carved railing and down at the spacious dining room, while above, a giant, glittering chandelier hung from the peak of the sharply-angled ceiling. The aura of opulent, decadent wealth overpowered him. Paying more attention to his surroundings than to where he was going, Alex nearly tripped and fell over Madeline, who had stopped in front of one of the many heavy oak doors lining the hall and opened it.
Stepping inside, he was greeted by the strong aroma of sandalwood. A small desk lamp with a green-tinted globe provided the only light, which he quickly noted set the style for the entire room. Out-of-control spider plants cascaded down the sides of hanging baskets that flanked the windows. The drapes were deep, forest-green velvet over ruffled white linen. The bed was of oak, as was the roll-top desk that held the lamp and the one chair, which was padded in black leather. The carpet was also green.
“Robert called this his ‘jungle room.’” Madeline smiled at him again. “There used to be many more plants here and there were these horrid animal heads all over the walls. It's one of the few rooms I've changed since his death.”
“But it’s extraordinary,” Alex said, genuinely impressed. He set his suitcase by the door of the closet and placed his briefcase on the bed. “I'll just change out of these wet things and join you...?”
“In the sitting room,” she finished. “Downstairs. Just off the main hall to the left, before you reach the dining room.”
She turned to leave, and then glanced over her shoulder with another of those curious little smiles before disappearing into the hallway. Alex felt a prickle of – something – which he managed to dismiss as a product of his fatigued and disoriented state of mind. He turned his attention to getting out of his wet clothes. Grabbing his suitcase, he dropped it on the bed, flipped it open, grabbed the first set of clothes he found, and then headed for the small attached bathroom.
This room was equipped with a round, sunken tub, already filled with water. More of the encroaching plants hung in the corners and spilled over every ledge. In the ceiling above the tub, a shaft topped by a green skylight had been cut straight through the attic to the roof above. Occasional flashes of lightning sent shimmering beams of emerald light down to give the gently rippling water a primeval, fathomless quality.
He stood, and he stared.
Lush green foliage stretching in every direction, blotting out the sky. Warm, loamy air – moist – tasting of forests and rivers. Smelling of vast, endless trees and ropy, hanging vines.
The cries of birds – deafening – padding footsteps crackling through the brush to the left and right. Sunlight filtering through leafy boughs that sway in the grasp of a cool breeze and trace intricate shadow designs on the ground at his feet.
A deafening crack of thunder split the night, startling Alex back to his senses. He found himself gazing dumbly down at the bathtub. Turning, he quickly flicked on the lights and bathed the room in bright, man-made light. He was shivering, and everything around him seemed somehow detached from reality. He went to the sink, splashing water on his face and staring at himself in the mirror.
Why in hell, he thought, is that tub already full, anyway? And what’s wrong with me? His reflection didn't answer, and he shrugged it off. It had been a long, tiring drive.
He stripped out of his wet clothes and hung them across the rack beside the sink. He washed quickly, slipped on clean slacks and a pull-over shirt, and ran his comb quickly through his rain-matted hair.
He grinned at his still disheveled countenance, and it grinned back. He returned to the bedroom and slipped on his shoes. The odd daydream was already fading, and his curiosity returned. He had a lot of questions about the late Professor Robert Auburn Devonshire, the answers to which lay in the study just next door. Although he knew there was plenty of time to get to it later, he had to suppress the strong urge to open the door to that room and explore before meeting Madeline downstairs. He had gone through a lot to be here.
Robert Auburn Devonshire: parapsychologist, archaeologist, linguist, mystic, and Alex’s mentor, had been one of the most controversial figures in several academic fields for decades. His death was as mysterious as had been his life, perhaps more so. One day he'd been teaching at the university, smoking his pipe and smiling the curious, all-knowing smile that Alex remembered only too well; the next day, he was gone. Dead. His heart had stopped; an occurrence that medical science had never been able to adequately explain. It just stopped. It had been seven days since Robert’s death. Reluctantly, with the memories burning brilliantly in his mind, Alex turned away from the study door and descended to the lower floor of the huge house.
He found the sitting room with no trouble. Madeline sat in one of two antique Queen Anne chairs pulled close to a small table of the same design. Like all the other rooms, this one spoke eloquently of wealth and comfort. Glass-fronted cases lined the walls, filled with artifacts from the late professor’s many archaeological journeys: grotesque, oddly asymmetrical pre-Colombian figurines from Mexico and South America, frightening tribal masks from ancient Africa, polished jade sculptures from the Far East, depicting inhuman, mythological creatures that somehow, in these surroundings, exuded an aura of disconcerting, eldritch awareness.
“Feeling better, Alex?” Madeline asked as he drew near.
“Almost human,” he said as he sat beside her, again, barely able to keep from staring. This second meeting only affirmed his initial impression of her. She was beautiful. Her long, auburn hair hung loosely over her shoulders and halfway down her back. She was–his mind sought the proper word–willowy. She was tall for a woman, and so slender as to appear almost fae. As before, it was her eyes that held his attention. They reached out to him, speaking a language all their own in a sort of tandem, sensual echo to her words.
“Robert mentioned you many times when you were his student,” she said, handing him one of the delicate china cups of steaming tea. “You may not know it, but you were something of a favorite of his. That's why I agreed to let you come here. That, and the fact that the most important thing in Robert's life was his work. If it does some good, through you, and perhaps through me, his death will have more meaning. Did you know that before Robert and I were married, I was his student?”
“No,” Alex answered. “He never mentioned it. As for giving his work meaning, I hope I can live up to that. Your husband was mostly responsible for my direction in life. I guess you could say I consider him something of a mentor. I was never much of a student before I met him.”
“But you're close to your doctorate now?” She smiled again, and he almost blushed at the combined emotions the praise and her smile elicited.
“Just my dissertation to go. That's why I ‘m here. But what I meant was, Dr. Devonshire gave me a new outlook on academics. I was struggling when I first walked into his class. I wanted to take on the world of archaeology single-handedly, and discover secret places and ancient magic. But I was much better at dreaming than at handling reality–much better.
“Then I met your husband. He was like no professor I'd ever met. He really challenged the class. He'd pull out the most ordinary stone from some ancient battlefield or castle and recreate more from that stone than I could from an entire building.
“I remember his words, ‘Everything you learn on this planet, every morsel of knowledge you gain, no matter how mundane it may seem in the learning, has a purpose to serve. Never look at learning as work, but as something as natural as breathing. When you can take the stone knife of a man who lived a thousand years before your own conception, and you can draw him from the depths of your mind, clothe him and give him thought with your imagination and your knowledge, then you will understand. No lesson learned is ever wasted.’”
“And what lessons have you learned, Alex?” Madeline asked, still smiling. “Have you opened any windows of your own? I recognize my husband's words on your tongue. Have you learned enough
, do you think, to bring him back through them? To clothe him and return his thought? Are you ready?”
The questions caught him completely off guard. They were the sort of questions he'd been asking himself for a thousand-plus miles. Setting his cup down, he felt a kind of release inside–some subtle pressure removed itself from his mind. He started talking, and before he knew it, he’d told this woman, who he hardly knew, things that he'd told no other as though it were the most natural occurrence in the world.
“That is what I want to find out,” he said. “I want the things he stood for to have meaning. Nobody else in the entire academic community wants to believe that he was close to the answers he sought. They are all afraid, and jealous. If I don't do him justice in this thesis – if I fail to prove his value and genius, then I have learned nothing, and they have won.”
She drew a deep breath and her smile seemed to leak into the depths of her eyes. “Somehow I knew you would be the one, Alex. I wonder if you're aware that you were not the only applicant for this work? That others have tried to gain access to his papers before you?”
Alex started slightly. He'd been under the impression that he was utterly alone in his interest. “Who?” he blurted, realizing his outburst might sound rude, flavored as it was with a sudden, inexplicable outrage.
“Other students, one of his old colleagues–even the university tried to obtain custody. They offered to buy his notes.”
“But why? They never believed in him. All they ever did was question his work, even his sanity. Why would they want his notes?”
“Don't you see? They wanted to finish him off. He died trying to prove his theories with virtually no support. If they could get control of his papers, they could pass them off as whatever they wanted, seal them away in some vault in their library, and that would be the end to it. That was why I waited. I am very glad that you have come here, Alex. Very glad.
“But don’t forget,” she added, “that the dissertation is not the end in itself. The knowledge – the seeing – are what he would have had you pursue. Robert had very little concern for the likes of his ‘peers.’ But his students, his true students....”
She leaned toward him, and her eyes grew larger, filling his vision. For just an instant he felt a touch of vertigo, and he wondered – almost hopefully – if she meant to kiss him. She stopped just short, and said softly, “Robert would have been proud to know that you came.”
She drew back, and the spell of the moment parted like the gossamer thread of a spider's web. For those few seconds, it was as though the professor had never died. His spirit seemed to inhabit every corner, every shadow and flicker of light, surrounding them with the aura of mystery and promise of power just beyond the ordinary senses that made every thought, every motion sensual and vibrant, alive with purpose and meaning. Alex knew that she must feel it too–that it was a shared emotion.
He sat back and reached for his tea, which had begun to cool. Without a word, she warmed it with a splash from the teapot at her side. She refilled her own cup, never once dropping her gaze from his. Was she challenging him? His heart thundered, for she was such an amazing, exotic, unbelievably attractive woman. He found himself suddenly–perhaps wrongly, though he couldn't help it–looking forward to more than the studies to come.
Finally, rising, she said, “You must be exhausted, so I'll let you get to bed. I'm afraid I'm a bit of a night owl, so I may not rise as early as you. You’ll find food and coffee in the kitchen. Make yourself at home. You may want a bath–the tub in your bathroom is actually a converted spa. The water cycles through once a day from an automatic pump and drain system. The temperature control is on the wall. Another of Robert's eccentricities. He did like his creature comforts. I must admit, I've found that tub...interesting...at times.”
So that explained the full tub. Alex almost laughed. Still, he thought, it would be easy to slip into that water first thing in the morning, when the light of the new day's sun was cleansing the shadows from the world. He wondered what she'd meant by “interesting,” but at the mention of bed, his body almost melted from a sudden awareness of his fatigue.
“Until tomorrow, then,” he said, also rising. “It has been a pleasure to meet you, Madeline. Again, thank you for this chance…this opportunity.”
She nodded, then turned and left the room. He watched her go, and again, very unscholarly thoughts rushed through his mind, synchronized with the subtle swaying of her hips. He drained the last of his tea and returned to the stairs.
Upon reaching his room, he undressed quickly and slipped between the sheets of the huge old bed, letting his head fall softly onto the pile of down-filled pillows. He was unused to such luxury. With green-fringed shadows all around and the scent of newly laundered sheets filling his senses, he drifted off to exhausted sleep. And he dreamed.
The world was heavy with the moisture of vast forests and roaring rivers. Exotic flowers perfumed the air, along with the hint of lush green foliage and the faint musk of unseen animals. Insects buzzed and flitted about him, some larger than any he’d ever seen, and in wonder he moved forward, parting branches and hanging vines with a brush of his arm.
Alex was on a rough path, seldom used, walking toward the sound of moving water. As he shifted his gaze to the right and left, he saw the impossibly huge trunks of trees, the leaves of which he didn’t recognize, and splashes of colored flowers in hues so subtle he couldn’t put names to them. There were butterflies and large, bee-like insects humming among the blossoms. Like harmonic accompaniment to the sounds of water and insects, birds flushed from perches so far above him that they were out of sight in the vast greenery, rustling and calling out to one another in warning at his approach.
The path ended in a clearing that revealed the bank of a river so wide he could just make out the tree line on the far side. The water was a green and algae-ridden. Further out, he saw bubbles and foam moving rapidly downstream, but nearest the shore a small, nearly stagnant pool was trapped by a cut in the bank. The odor of rotting vegetation and the hum of insects was overpowering.
Turning again to the path, which now paralleled the river, he followed the line of trees whose branches overhung the water, draped with curtains of moss and clinging vines, until he reached a larger clearing.
In the center was a stone table–an altar? On the altar he could make out a prone form. He moved closer as if mesmerized. As he approached, he could see long tresses of auburn hair dangling from the end of the altar. It was a woman–Madeline, he realized with shock–and she was dressed in a gown of pure white linen. Her arms were folded on her breast and her eyes were closed. He stepped closer and reached out a tentative hand to touch her shoulder, but as he did so, a sudden mist rose and masked her from sight. He leaned forward, but when he should have touched her skin, all he felt was rough stone, and his sight couldn’t penetrate the hazy shroud.
His senses slipped away from him then, with an odd twist, like vertigo, or a dream of falling from a great height, and darkness suddenly claimed him....
“Madeline!”
He cried out and sat up in the bed, sweat pouring from his brow. He couldn't immediately place his surroundings, and the shadow tendrils cast by the small forest of spider plants along the walls moved disorientingly about, as though a breeze blew swiftly through the room. It took a long time and several deep breaths to get his thoughts under control, and to realize it had been a dream.
“Damn,” he muttered to himself. The sound of his voice rang comfortingly in the darkness, and the shadows receded into themselves. He almost laughed, but a slight chill remained in his heart. That hadn’t been a run-of-the-mill nightmare. So vivid! He would almost swear the scent of decaying algae lingered in the air–and he still felt the muggy dampness of that primal atmosphere.
He rose and retrieved his journal from his briefcase. His eyes were already beginning to droop with weariness again, but before he returned and dropped off to a —thankfully – dreamless slumber, he recorded
everything he could remember about the dream, adding a couple of comments about his strong attraction to Madeline Devonshire. The rest of the night passed without incident.
The next morning he rose early and made his way to the kitchen. The first thing he did was to put on a pot of strong, black coffee. He found eggs and bacon, and made some toast, and allowed his mind to ease slowly into full wakefulness. When he’d finished eating and cleaned his dishes, he poured the rest of the coffee into an insulated pitcher he found in a cupboard.
He'd hoped that Madeline would, despite her warning, be up and around to give him an initial tour of the study, but she was nowhere to be seen. He grabbed the coffee pitcher and his cup and headed back to the stairs. With any luck, though, the professor's notes would prove to be organized in his typical fashion, and it would be a simple matter to sort through them.
Approaching the study door, he found it to be much like the others on the upper floor, with a single notable exception: a brass plate was screwed into the wood at eye level.
“Enter with an open mind, depart with understanding.”
Alex smiled as he slowly opened the door. He had seen those words, years before, the first time he'd entered Devonshire's classroom. He hadn't known at the time what a depth of truth was to be found in them. He had come to understand more in his two semesters in that classroom than he had in a lifetime of adolescent dreams and study.
The study proved to be an imposing sight, which was essentially what he'd expected, but he was undaunted. The desk itself was huge, covered with impeccably-stacked papers and writing materials. There were shelves and glass cases, tapestries hanging from the walls, all depicting various ancient lifestyles and religious beliefs – a wonderful hodge-podge of things that had made up the professor s life. The familiarity of it was comforting.
He moved around the desk, sat down in the comfortable leather chair, and focused his attention on the lower drawer, the large one designed to accommodate files. Pulling it open, he smiled broadly, for there they were! The notebooks, literally hundreds of them, each labeled with that meticulous, mechanical script that he'd always admired. It would take countless hours to labor through these, but the rewards!