The Black Throne

by Fred Saberhagen

  "Oh," Peters said, and I agreed.

  "I am harmless," the man assured us. "But a patient suffered a fatal heart attack on coming out of a trance I had put him into, and his ignorant relatives held me culpable."

  "Trance? You are a mesmerist?" I inquired.

  "Indeed, sir, and once accounted a fairly good one."

  "I find myself at odds," I said, "with a man using that art in a far more nefarious fashion than yourself."

  "May I inquire as to his identity?"

  "A certain Dr. Templeton," I replied.

  "I am not unacquainted with the man," he told me, "and I do not doubt what you say in the least."

  "You actually knew him?"

  "Yes, and I know, too, that he has not changed his ways. Even now, he and his cohorts—a certain Goodfellow and Griswold, I believe—are up in New York at the Domain of Arnheim, cooperating with the millionaire Seabright Ellison in the manufacture of alchemical gold, to the formula of some German inventor they've hired."

  "What?" I was on my feet, moving toward him, reaching to clasp his lapels. "How could you possibly know such things?" I cried. "You said yourself that you've been here for years."

  "Please, sir! I'm an old man. I only wish you well, which is why I've warned you about this place. Do as you choose with what I've told you, but do not harm me."

  "Just tell me how you came to know their current doings?"

  "It is the affair of the other sane patient I spoke of," he told me. "Mr. Ellison had hired him as a personal secretary and he had been employed at Arnheim for some months. Actually, he was a journalist who wished to write a piece exposing Ellison's illegal affairs, which cover several continents."

  "If the man was discovered, why wasn't he killed?"

  "He was too well-connected, with others knowing what he was about. So Dr. Templeton had him committed elsewhere as insane."

  "They simply took Templeton's word for it?"

  "No. The man, Sanford Martin, was entirely insane at the time of his commitment. It is not that difficult for one skilled in our art to induce this state temporarily. Later, since the condition would pass, they had him transferred to this institution and registered under a different name. He told me of the goings-on at Arnheim."

  I clutched at his sleeve.

  "Sir, did he at any time mention the presence of a lady called Annie?"

  "He did," Dr. Bedloe replied, "as a lady possessed of very unusual ability, who is working as Von Kempelen's assistant."

  I turned away. I sank into a chair and buried my face in my hands.

  "To have come so far," I said at last. "To be so late. . . ."

  I felt Peters' arm about my shoulder.

  "Now, Eddie, yer dunno yer late. As I'd heard Mr. Ellison say in the past, these experiments takes some time."

  "I could arrange for you to speak with Sanford Martin, if you wish to verify what I've told you," Dr. Bedloe said.

  "That won't be necessary, sir," I told him. "You couldn't very well have made up something like that, something that fits so closely with the facts as I know them."

  "Eddie, yer won't make good time travelin' with Valdemar," Peters told me, "and Ligeia won't leave him."

  "I know."

  There came a babble of voices from the rear of the building, seeming headed in our direction.

  "I repeat my suggestion that you depart quickly," Dr. Bedloe said, "and seek your cart somewhere else."

  "Do you want to come with us?"

  He shook his head.

  "Can't," he replied. "And in here I do some good. I've cured a number, to date."

  We got to our feet. We shook his hand again.

  "Good luck, boys," he told us.

  "We'd better run, Eddie," Peters said, as the sounds of angry cries drew nigh.

  We ran.

  * * *

  Once we were off the grounds and into the woods I opened my money belt, extracted gold coins and shared them with Peters, enabling him to obtain transportation for himself and the others. And a new casket for Valdemar. I had suggested that he remain in their company, as protector, while they were on the road north. This was not complete altruism on my part, as I still wondered at the strength of whatever loyalty he might have had for Seabright Ellison. I had never learned its nature or how it had come about. I had the feeling, however, that he, too, was happy about remaining down here while I headed up there, to settle matters.

  I embraced the sinister dwarf, with an affection I have felt for few. Under a Hunter's Moon, we parted.

  * * *

  How shall the burial rite be read?

  The solemn song be sung?

  From A Paean,

  Edgar Allan Poe

  XIV

  "You have conquered, and I yield. Yet henceforward art thou also dead—dead to the World, to Heaven, and to Hope! In me didst thou exist—and, in my death, see by this image, which is thine own, how utterly thou hast murdered thyself."

  From William Wilson,

  Edgar Allan Poe

  * * *

  It was night in the lonesome October when I went over the high wall of fieldstone, avoided an armed patrol and began to make my way through the miles of landscape garden toward the main house at the Domain of Arnheim. I could not be certain of the exact location of that edifice, but a recent visitation with Ligeia—who now seemed to have access to the kingdom by the sea—had left me with marching orders for the ascent of the Wissahiccon River. I broke into Landor's cottage that night and slept there, Ligeia having mentioned that Annie might have been confined to the place for a time. I did find there a Spanish comb such as she had once worn in her hair at Prospero's castellated abbey. I kept it, of course, and in the morning I pressed on.

  The magnificence of the landscape gardening would, at any other time, have proved distracting. But I was blind to beauty now. Every night—and sometimes days, as well—came a fresh dream or waking vision, of Annie, of Ligeia, of distant Poe rushing toward his doom. Such a coming together of power and of disturbances told me that something in our relationship was building toward a climax.

  Onward.

  The visions of the local scene had all pointed in one direction: Ellison and his rivals had concluded that it would be better for them to join forces than to fight each other. My supposed benefactor was now in league with the men he had sent me to chase more than halfway around the world. Von Kempelen, here at Arnheim with them, would transmute a large amount of lead into gold. This hoard of precious metal would then be turned over to Ellison, as payment for vast properties—including Arnheim itself—considerable jewelry, and some other items of great worth. Immediately thereafter, all parties to the agreement would witness the destruction of the gold-making apparatus. No further production would occur to cheapen the price of gold and devalue the new hoard.

  Onward.

  The colors of autumn were all about me, as I moved my gaze from the sky-blue lake where the most recent vision had occurred. It involved killing Von Kempelen afterwards, so that the process would not soon be repeated.

  Onward.

  And so at last I reached the center of the Domain, the Paradise of Arnheim, and there I was overwhelmed by a gush of melody, an oppressive sense of strange sweet odor, and a dream-like intermingling of tall eastern trees, bosky shrubberies, flocks of golden and crimson birds, fountains, lakes, flowers, meadows, silver streamlets. For longer than I should have, I stood overpowered by the sensory assault, and then I entered there.

  I took my way cautiously, but I encountered no patrols. Before me, upsprung from the midst of botanical grandeur was a great mass of semi-Gothic, semi-Saracenic architecture, glittering in the red sunlight with a hundred oriels, minarets, and pinnacles. Amazing.

  As I drew nearer, I realized that the place was moated. I circled it, several times, keeping well-concealed by the profuse shrubbery. Seeing no other means of entry I selected a likely causeway and dashed across it.

  Save for a barely perceptible crack down the front of the pl
ace, the masonry looked in excellent order.

  I passed through a Gothic archway and approached a heavy wooden door. I tried it and found it unlocked. I entered.

  There was much old woodwork, somber tapestries on the walls, and an ebon blackness to the floor. I crossed the room quickly and carefully, without making a sound, blade loose in its scabbard, pistol loaded, other surprises hidden about my person.

  I stepped into a hallway and passed along it, inspecting each room that I passed. Seabright Ellison was in the third one to the left.

  * * *

  Seeing no need for a dramatic entrance, I merely walked in. It was a library, and Ellison in a maroon dressing gown of silk was seated on a dark, bulging lounge reading and smoking a cigar, a glass of what was probably sherry on a side table to his right.

  He looked up and smiled as my shadow fell upon him.

  "Perry," he remarked, "and right on time."

  I was not about to play it his way and ask what he meant by that. I simply responded with my most important question:

  "Where is she?"

  "Here, and quite comfortable," he replied. "No one here would harm her, believe me."

  "She is being held here and forced to do something against her will."

  "I assure you she will be well-paid for her efforts," he said. "For that matter, you are owed considerable recompense yourself for your activities on my behalf."

  "I believe I recall your offering a bonus If I killed Griswold, Templeton, and Goodfellow for you. I'm willing to do it now. Is the offer still good?"

  He paled slightly, then grinned.

  "I'm afraid it expired several months ago when I came to an agreement with these men."

  "You're partners now?" I asked.

  "More or less, yes."

  "And Von Kempelen's here?"

  "So he is. You have been doing your homework. Would you care for a glass of sherry?"

  "So long as you'll keep talking."

  "Of course. What can I tell you?"

  He found me a small brandy snifter, from which a few drops were ordinarily inhaled. He filled it halfway.

  "You say you'll pay Annie," I stated. "But you're still forcing her to do something she doesn't want to."

  "For her own good, as I can demonstrate."

  I took a sip.

  "Demonstrate it, then."

  "I spoke of her share in a great fortune, so great that—"

  "I see. And Edgar Poe?"

  He rose. He jabbed the air with his cigar and paced through the smoke.

  "What of Edgar Poe?" he asked. "If he has become a friend of yours—and Annie's—I'm sorry. Truly. But the unique relationship among the three of you could not go on forever."

  "Oh, could it not?"

  "It could not." Ellison nodded, as if I had simply been agreeing with him from the beginning. "Because Poe no longer exists—not in this world, our world, the world of practical affairs. He must go his way as we go ours. He has chosen the dreamer's way—I did not choose it for him, nor did you."

  "The separation is your choice, though."

  "Not a bit of it, my boy. No, not a bit. Dreams and the world of practical affairs can never mingle long."

  I took a final sip of the sherry and put the glass aside.

  "I want to see her."

  "Of course," he said.

  He walked across the room and made a small gesture. I followed him.

  He opened a door and we passed into another larger room, also filled with books and pictures. He continued through it, but I paused before a painting in a niche to the left. It was a portrait of a woman with curling hair and large dark gray eyes. She wore an old-fashioned bonnet and an Empire robe with rounded neck and shoulders, possessed of a floral design. I halted and stared at those mysterious eyes, the dark masses of hair.

  "Come on," Ellison called, halting on the threshold.

  "Seabright Ellison sounds almost like a stage name," I said. "You ever do any acting?"

  His eyes narrowed.

  "Perhaps. Why do you ask, lad?"

  I studied him in turn. The painting was a larger version of one which I possessed in miniature—my only picture of my mother, Elizabeth. I doubted he could know I owned it.

  "The lady looks somehow familiar," I said.

  He shrugged.

  "It came to me as part of an estate I bought. Just fit that piece of wall."

  My head spun. Nothing I had encountered since meeting the man had shocked me as much as this.

  "Oh," I said, and turned away.

  He passed through the door and into another high-ceilinged room of books, armor, and art. I took a quick step back and ran my thumb over the painting's dusty brass nameplate.

  Elizabeth Arnold, I read there, and I hurried after.

  It was my mother's name, though I'd hardly needed that confirmation of the actress' identity. If he were really the man who'd abandoned her. . . .

  But this was this world, not my original one. Ceteris paribus, he was Poe's deserting father, not mine. But all things were not equal between this Earth and my Earth, which meant I could never know for certain whether he were truly, intentionally sacrificing his own son in this enterprise. Or if my own father had been a person similar to him, back home.

  "Lovely place," I said, catching up with him. The doors had ceased after those first two rooms and now we passed through Gothic archways hung with red or blue cloth. I began realizing that this gallery passed along the entire side of the building.

  "You don't remember your folks, do you?" he said, after a time.

  "I don't think so. I was pretty young."

  We came to the end of the gallery and turned right. A short length of hallway took us past an entranceway to a courtyard about which numerous armed men lounged, eyeing each other from opposite ends of the place.

  "Athletic teams?" I suggested.

  He chuckled.

  "Yes. Mine and theirs. We brought them along to keep each other honest."

  "So you had to go in together to meet Von Kempelen's price?"

  He nodded.

  "The man drives a hard bargain."

  "If he were me he'd have brought his own athletic team, to keep the other two honest."

  He clapped me on the shoulder.

  "Spoken like a true soldier," he observed. "One of the reasons I hired you. You're going to have to tell me all about your odyssey when this thing's done."

  "What is Von Kempelen's edge, anyhow?"

  "He's got something we want," he said.

  "And after you get it how does he walk out of here?"

  He took a deep draw on his cigar and let it go. He showed me a lot of teeth then, but said nothing.

  "Care to see his lab?"

  "I want to see Annie."

  "She's probably there."

  "What happens to her," I asked, "when this is all over?"

  "She's the greatest natural psychic in the world, you know."

  "What does that mean?"

  "A powerhouse like that is worth money in a lot of other endeavors."

  "What if she doesn't want to work?"

  "She's becoming dependent upon certain chemicals. She'll work for them."

  I felt tears come into my eyes.

  "I'm glad you're not my father," I said, on impulse.

  He stepped back as if I had struck him. My hand was on the hilt of my blade. I let it drop. I still needed him.

  "And I'm not Poe's father either," he said through clenched teeth.

  "Never said you were. Do you have any children?"

  He turned away.

  "None to speak of," he said.

  I followed him in what I took to be a northerly direction.

  "You hate me, don't you?" he asked, after a time.

  "That's right."

  He paused at the head of a wide stone stairway. He turned and leaned back against the wall.

  "I'd like to clear that up before tonight."

  "So that's what you meant about my timing?"

>   He nodded.

  "Tonight's the night. But you must have known that, at some level."

  "I guess I did."

  "I get to keep all the gold," he said then. "But I had to surrender a lot of my holdings, including most of this place."

  "And Annie?" I asked. "She's a part of the price?"

  He nodded again.

  "But I'm going to want you on my side tonight, Perry, when it's time to pick up the pieces. Yes, I promised them Annie. I'd have promised them anything to get the work done. But afterwards. . . . They're going to have to be happy with the real estate, the jewels, the foreign holdings. I get the gold, you get Annie, the hell with everybody else."

  "You're too Byzantine, Ellison," I said, "too Machiavellian. There's no way I could trust a man like you even if I wanted to."

  He sighed. Then he stared downward at his feet. A full minute must have gone by. Either he really had at one time been an actor or there was a great internal struggle in progress.

  Then, "All right," he said, and he reached beneath his dressing gown and withdrew a silver flask. He unscrewed its top, removed it and waved it under my nose. It smelled like whisky.

  He filled the top, which was the size of a shot glass, and he tossed it off in a single swallow. Then he refilled it and extended it toward me. I accepted it and did the same.

  "I crossed over by accident myself, during a strange storm," he said, "apparently in exchange for my counterpart. So I knew it could be done. It took me a long time to figure how it might be managed—which is how I first came to know Griswold and Templeton. We worked together to discover the means. But they'd gotten greedy on a recent deal." He offered me the flask again. I declined. He took another slug himself, capped it, and put it away. "So I've no qualms about reneging on part of a deal with them. If the lady really means that much to you, she's yours."

  I sat down on the top step, massaged my brow.

  "Consanguinity makes these things easier," he said at last.

  "Damn you, sir," I said.

  "I'm not asking filial piety, just cooperation," he said. "We'll finesse these bastards and come out on top. I'll get my gold, you'll get your Annie and they'll still be rich enough not to complain too loudly. It'll be better than death."