"I hear ye." Maclaren rubbed a knuckle at his eyes. "The line is ended, an' now I must learn to bear it. But it comes hard, even though I've feared that word all these past three years. It is an end to all hope here."
"So help me to look to those who can still be assisted. Bring lamps, and let us go down to the loch." Darwin started for the door, then instinctively turned back to the bedside to pick up his medical case. Before he reached it, there was a shout and a commotion outside the house.
"Come on, Doctor," said Maclaren. "That's my men calling, something about Colonel Pole."
It took a few seconds to see anything after the bright lamps of the room. Darwin followed Maclaren and stood there blinking, peering up the hill to where the group outside was pointing. At last he could see a trio of Highlanders. In their midst and supported by two of them was a stumbling and panting Jacob Pole. He staggered up to Malcolm Maclaren and stood wheezing in front of him.
"Talk to your blasted men—I can't get them to understand plain English. Send 'em back to the loch."
"Why? Dr. Darwin was worried for your safety there, but here ye are, safe an' well."
"Hohenheim and Zumal." Pole held his side and coughed. "At the loch, but I couldn't help. Both dead, in the water."
Maclaren barked a quick order to three of the villagers, and they left at a trot. While Pole leaned wearily on supporting arms, Darwin stood motionless.
"Are you sure?" he said at last. "Remember, there have been other examples where Hohenheim's actions were not what they appeared to be."
"I'm sure. Sure as I stand here. I saw the boat smashed to pieces with my own eyes. Saw Hohenheim broken, and both their bodies." He bent forward, rubbing at his balding head with a hand that still shook with fatigue. "The galleon they looked at was the wrong ship. I saw it, there's an empty hold in an old wreck, that's what they died for. The wrong ship. That's their end."
"Aye, the end indeed," said Maclaren. He was watching as a silent procession of women carried an unconscious body out of the black-shuttered house and away towards the main village. "An' a bitter end for all. Hohenheim came here of his own wish, but it was no plan of mine that would make him die here." He began to walk with head lowered after the women.
"Not quite the end, Malcolm Maclaren." Darwin's somber tone halted the Scotsman. "There is one more duty for us tonight, and in some ways it is the most difficult and sorrowful of all. Give me ten more minutes of your time, then follow your lord."
"Nothing could be worse," said Maclaren. But he turned and came back to where Darwin and Pole stood facing each other. "What is left?"
"Hohenheim. He came here uninvited, and you asked why. You did not seek to bring him, and I certainly did not. He has been a mystery to all of us. Come with me, and we will resolve it now."
Followed by Pole and Maclaren, he led the way across the turf to the house where Hohenheim and his servant had stayed. The door was closed, and no light showed within.
Darwin stepped forward and banged hard on the dark wood. When no answer came he gestured to Maclaren to bring the lamp that he was holding nearer, and opened the door. The three men paused on the threshold.
"Who is there?" said a sleep-slurred voice from the darkness.
"Erasmus Darwin." He took the lamp from Maclaren, held it high, and walked forward to light up the interior.
"What do you want?" The man in the bed rolled over, pushed back the cover, and sat up. Jacob Pole looked at him, gave a superstitious groan of fear, and stepped backwards.
The man in front of them was Hohenheim. The tunic and patchwork cloak hung over a chair, but there could be no mistaking the hooked nose, ruddy cheeks, and darting black eyes.
"It's impossible," said Pole. "Less than ten minutes ago, I saw him dead. It can't be, I saw—"
"It is all too possible," said Darwin softly. "And it is as I feared."
He leaned towards the man in the bed, who was now more fully awake and beginning to scowl at the intruders. "The deception is over. Hohenheim—for want of a true name I must continue to use your old one—we bring terrible news. There was an accident at the loch. Your brother is dead."
The red cheeks paled, and the man stood up suddenly from the bed. "You are lying. This is some trick, to try and trap me."
Darwin shook his head sadly. "It is no trick, and no trap. If I could find another way to say this, I would do so. Your brother and Zumal died tonight in Loch Malkirk."
The man in front of him stood for a second, then gave a wild shout and rushed past them.
"Stop him," cried Darwin, as Hohenheim plunged out of the door and into the night.
"Is he dangerous?" asked Maclaren.
"Only to himself. Send your men to follow and restrain him until we can reach him."
Maclaren moved to the door and shouted orders to the startled group of villagers who were still waiting near the black-shuttered house. Three of them set off up the hill in pursuit of Hohenheim's running figure. When Maclaren came back into the room, Jacob Pole was slumped against the wall, his head bowed.
"Is he all right?" Maclaren said to Darwin.
"Give him time. He's overtired and he's had a great shock."
"I'm fine." Pole sighed. "But I've no idea what's going on here. I never saw any brother, or any deception. Are you sure you have an explanation for all this?"
"I believe that I do." Darwin walked around the room, studying the cases and boxes stacked against the walls. He finally stopped at one of them and bent to open it.
"Why did these men come to Malkirk?" he said. "That is easily answered. They came to seek treasure and the galleon. But there is a better question: How did they come—how did they know a galleon was in the loch? There is only one answer to that. They heard it from the actors hired to tempt me here. And is it not obvious that we have been dealing with stage players here? You saw them and heard them. Think of the gestures, all larger than life, and of the hands that drew materials from the air. Their magic spoke to me strongly of the strolling magician, the attraction at the fairs and festivals throughout the whole of England."
"But how did you know their feats were not genuine?"
"Colonel, that would lie outside the compass of my beliefs. It is much easier to believe in prestidigitation, in the cunning of hand over eye. I reached that conclusion early, but I was faced with one impossible problem. How could a man be here today, and a few hours later be in Inverness? No stage magic or trickery would permit that. Accept that a man cannot be in two places at once, and you are driven to a simple conclusion: there must be two men, able to pass as each other. Think of the value of that for impossible stage tricks, and think how practice would perfect the illusion. Two brothers, and Zumal as the link that would travel between them to protect it."
"But you had no possible proof," protested Pole. "I mean, a suspicion is one thing, but to jump from that to certainty—"
"Requires only that we use our eyes. You saw Hohenheim, at the village. And the next day you saw him again, at the loch. But in the village he favored his left hand, constantly—recall for yourself his passes in the air, and his seizing from nowhere of flasks and potions. Yet at the loch he had suddenly become right-handed, for casting lines, for working the boat, for everything. We were seeing brothers, and like many twins they were one dexter, and one sinister."
Maclaren was nodding to himself. "I saw it, but I had not the wit to follow it. Now one of them is dead, and the other. . . ."
"Knows a grief that I find hard to imagine. We must seek him now and try to give him a reason for living. He should not be left alone tonight. With your permission, I will stay here, and when he is brought from the loch, I will talk to him—alone."
"Very well. I will go now and see if they have him safely." Maclaren walked quietly to the door.
"And here is your proof," said Darwin. He lifted from the open chest in front of him a long cloak. "See the hidden pockets and the tube that can be used to carry materials from them to the hands. No supernatural
power; only skills of hand, and human greed."
Maclaren nodded. "I see it. An' when ye find the reason that makes him want to go on livin', ye can tell it to me."
He left, and Jacob Pole looked across at Darwin. "Does he mean that? Why would he think to stop living?"
"He has had a bad shock tonight. But for him I do not worry. Malcolm Maclaren is a brave man, and a strong one. When he recovers from his present sorrow, his life will begin again-better, I trust, than before."
Pole went across to the empty bed and sat down on it with a groan. "I'll be glad when tonight is over. I've had too much excitement for one day. Let tomorrow come, and I can go to the loch again and seek the real galleon." His eyes brightened. "If there's one thing to pull from this sorry mess, perhaps it will still be the bullion."
Darwin coughed. "I am afraid not. There is no treasure—no galleon. It was only a part of the tale that was used to draw us here."
"What!" Pole lifted his head. "Pox on it, are you telling me that after all our work we came three hundred miles for nothing? That there is no treasure?"
Darwin nodded. "There is no treasure. But we did not come for nothing." Now it was his eyes that showed a sparkle of excitement. "There is still the Devil. Tomorrow we will go again to the loch and learn the true nature of that animal. For that I would travel far more than three hundred miles. I want to study the beast thoroughly and determine what—"
He paused. Something in Jacob Pole's unhappy look told him that the night's bad news was not yet complete.
FURTHER READING
FICTION
Aickman, Robert. "Niemandswasser," Cold Hand in Mine.
Baker, Carlos. "The Prevaricator," The Talismans and Other Stories.
Benson, A.C. "Out of the Sea," The Thrill of Horror.
Bloch, Robert. "Terror in Cut-Throat Cave," Creature!
Bradbury, Ray. "The Fog Horn," The Stories of Ray Bradbury.
Bradbury, Ray. "The Woman," The Stories of Ray Bradbury.
Brennan, Joseph Payne. "Slime," Monsters, Monsters, Monsters.
Buzzati, Dino. "The Colomber," Restless Nights.
Coburn, Anthony. "The Tale of the Fourth Stranger," The Saturday Evening Post Stories.
Cooper, Basil. "The Flabby Men," And Afterward, the Dark.
de Camp, L. Sprague. "Dead Man's Chest," The Purple Pterodactyls.
Drake, David. "Out of Africa," From the Heart of Darkness.
Engelhardt, Frederick. "The Draken," Phoenix Feathers.
Gallun, Raymond Z. "Davy Jones' Ambassador," Earth Is the Strangest Planet.
Greene, Sonia. "The Invisible Monster," The Horror in the Museum and Other Revisions.
Heifer, Harold. "Sea Serpent of Spoonville Beach," The Bear Went Over the Mountain.
Hoch, Edward D. "The Theft of the Silver Lake Serpent," The Thefts of Nick Velvet.
Hodgson, William Hope. "The Sea Horses," Deep Waters.
Hodgson, William Hope. "A Tropical Horror," Creature!
Hope-Simpson, Jacynth. "The Water Monster," Monsters, Monsters, Monsters.
Jenkins, William Fitzgerald. "De Profundis," Far Boundaries.
Kagan, Janet. "The Loch Moose Monster," Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, March, 1989.
Kipling, Rudyard. "A Matter of Fact," Kipling Stories.
Mansfield, Katherine. "At the Bay," The Art of the Novella.
Masefield, John. "Port of Many Ships," The Faber Books of Animal Stories.
Miller, P. Schuyler. "The Thing on Outer Shoal," Famous Monster Tales.
Mitchison, Naomi. "The Sea Horse," Modern Scottish Short Stories.
Moravia, Alberto. "Back to the Sea," The Existential Imagination.
Outerson, William. "Fire in the Galley Stove," Davy Jones' Haunted Locker.
Reed, A.W. and Hames, Inez. "The Monster of Cakaudrove," Monsters, Monsters, Monsters.
Schmitz, James H. "Grandpa," The Arbor House Treasury of Modern Science Fiction.
Usher, Gray. "Ebb Tide," The Graveyard Companion.
Waldrop, Howard. "God's Hooks," Bestiary!
Walter, Elizabeth. "A Monstrous Tale," Dead Woman and Other Haunting Experiences.
Wyndham, John. "Phase Two," Weirdies, Weirdies, Weirdies.
NONFICTION
Baumann, El wood D. The Loch Ness Monster.
Bendick, Jeanne. The Mystery of the Loch Ness Monster.
Canning, John, (ed.) Fifty True Mysteries of the Sea.
Clair, Colin. Unnatural History: An Illustrated Bestiary.
Cohen, Daniel. The Encyclopedia of Monsters.
Costello, Peter. In Search of Lake Monsters.
Costello, Peter. The Magic Zoo: The Natural History of Fabulous Animals.
Mackal, Roy P. The Monster of Loch Ness.
Morris, Rowana and Desmond. Men and Snakes.
Sweeney, James B. Sea Monsters: A Collection of Eyewitness Accounts.
Thompson, C.J.S. The Mystery and Lore of Monsters.
Welfare, Simon and Fairley, John. Arthur C. Clarke's Mysterious World
Table of Contents
Preface by Gardner Dozois and Jack Dann
Algy by L. Sprague de Camp
Out of Darkness by Lillian Stewart Carl
Leviathan! by Larry Niven
The Horses of Lir by Roger Zelazny
The Mortal and the Monster by Gordon R. Dickson
Man Overboard by John Collier
The Dakwa by Manly Wade Wellman
The Kings of the Sea by Sterling E. Lanier
Grumblefritz An Open Letter to Readers Living in Manhattan by Marvin Kaye
The Devil of Malkirk by Charles Sheffield
FURTHER READING
Sea Serpents Page 27