by Daniel Diehl
“Very fetching, Bunny. You look like Blackbeard in drag.” Jason said, his head cocked on one side. “And where, exactly, are you going to wear that thing?”
Refilling the glasses, he explained. “Some of the lads hold a Walperghust Night party every year. The theme is always different, but invariably something dark and spooky as befits the occasion. Last year it was a Faust party; this year it’s the Hellfire club. It’s going to be cracking great fun; you should come with us.” Nodding toward the table where Merlin and Beverley sat, he leaned forward and whispered “No ladies, I’m afraid. Lad’s night out, only.”
“The Hellfire club? Oh, wait, don’t tell me; I know this one.” Jason squeezed his eyes shut as he dredged through his historical trivia. After nearly a full minute he opened his eyes and smiled. “That was Sir Francis Dashwood and his Satanist friends. Right?”
“That’s the lot, but they weren't really Satanists, you know. They were just a bunch of bored, dissolute members of the eighteenth century upper class looking for some excuse to form a private club, drink to massive excess and chase women of easy virtue. Most all of them were perfectly respectable. They say,” Bunny continued, waggling a finger in the air meaningfully, “that even your Benjamin Franklin was invited to some of their events when he served as ambassador to Great Britain before you lot got all rude and antisocial back in 1776.” Bunny wiped a drop of wine from the side of Beverley's glass and placed it on the bar, before turning back to pull Jason another pint of beer.
“Really? Well, they certainly got a load of bad press.”
“Ahh, that was mostly jealousy on the part of Mr Horace Walpole. He connived his way into the club for a while, but fell out with almost all the other members. After they chucked him out he started gossiping about them and writing nasty little tracts telling everybody what horrible people they were. He was a notoriously vicious gossip, you know.”
“I didn't know. In fact, I don't know much at all about the great rakes of the seventeen hundreds. The period is a little too late for my archaeological studies, you know.”
“Pity. You should broaden your literary endeavors, my lad. So much out there to learn.”
“Well, I’ve already learned something about them from you. And if they all wore hats as fancy as that one, they must have been pretty well-to-do.”
“Oh, they were. Among the members of the club - other than Dashwood himself, who was Postmaster General - was the Earl of Sandwich, who was the First Lord of the Admiralty...”
“The guy they named the sandwich after?”
“Indeed. Strange thing that, to be remembered for a slab of meat chucked between two slices of bread with a bit of mustard smeared on it; but such are the inscrutable ways of fame and immortality.”
While he waited for Merlin's double Jack Daniels, Jason counted out the money and urged Bunny, who was obviously enjoying his tale, to continue.
“Oh, there was also John Wilkes, a member of parliament; William Hogarth the painter; the Earl of Oxford and some others. I can't possibly remember them all, but there were about a dozen and a half. Not that they dressed like gentlemen when they got together for their club doings.”
“No?” Jason was less interested in the private lives of the dissolute dead, than in Bunny’s ability to provide endlessly entertaining conversation.
“Oh, no. They were officially known as the Brotherhood of St Francis - in honor of Dashwood - and they dressed in monks’ habits. But that’s not nearly so grand as tricorns and knee britches, it is?”
“Monks?”
“Benedictines, to be precise. They even brought prostitutes from London out to Dashwood's estates in West Wycombe - that’s down in Buckinghamshire - and made the ladies all dress like nuns. All probably a bit sacrilegious, but they were a pretty broad minded bunch and strongly anti-Catholic.”
“Wait. I remember reading something about this, somewhere. Didn't they meet in a ruined abbey?”
“Medmenham Abbey. Right. Dashwood didn't own it, but he rented it for a few years. The abbey was about six miles up-river on the Thames from his estate at West Wycombe. In later years, after 1752, they moved the club to a new sanctum-sanctorum, a huge maze of chalk caves on Dashwood's estate. It just took him a few years to get them opened out and properly done-up before the club could move into them.”
“Wait, wait. Bunny, did you say they dressed up like monks and met in a cave?” Tiny wheels had started to turn inside Jason’s head but he needed help gathering up the dozens of loose ends.
“Yes. The caves are still there. They were originally Neolithic mines of some sort and Dashwood first used them to quarry stone for surfacing roadways but later he converted them for use as a clubhouse for the lads. I think they’re open to the public. At least, they used to be.”
“Was there anything about water in the caves?” Jason was now unconsciously gripping the edge of the bar so hard his knuckles had turned white from the pressure.
Bunny scowled in confusion. “Water? I understand a river runs through the caves; or at least it did back in the eighteenth century. The silly buggers called it the Styx after the river that supposedly runs through Hell. Why?”
“You know your classical mythology, don't you, Bunny?” Excited now, Jason leaned so far across the bar counter that his face was only inches from Bunny’s.
Rearing back to avoid a head-butt, Bunny muttered, “A bit. Why, is this a test?”
“Was the River Styx ever referred to as the waters of oblivion?”
“Oh, often. According to the story, once Charon - that’s the boatman who ferried the recently dead into the underworld - had taken a person across to the other side, they lost all memory of their home and life. Hence...” here, Bunny threw out his hands as a sign of the obvious “...oblivion.”
Jason could feel his hand trembling against the side of the glass. Holy men who are not holy. The waters of oblivion. What was it the Gnostic gospels said about warriors who were not warriors? “Bunny, wasn't Dashwood a knight? I mean, he carried the title of Sir, didn't he?”
“Of course. So did almost all the members. They were all either government officials or rich lay-abouts with ancient family names and titles. Knighthoods were still fairly essential for someone to be accepted in the right social circles in the eighteenth century. And these were definitely the right sort of people. When Dashwood died in 1781 he left a wine cellar worth more than six thousand pounds; that’s the equivalent of more than half-a-million today. Why? Have I piqued your interest? Do you fancy coming to the soiree?”
Ignoring Bunny's last question, Jason turned his head over his right shoulder and frantically motioned for Beverley and Merlin to join him at the bar. Exchanging quick glances in acknowledgement of the odd look on Jason's face, they both got up and quickly crossed the room.
“Are you alright, Jason? You look like you've seen a ghost?” Beverley laid a hand on his forehead to see if he was feverish.
“Now, Bunny,” Jason began slowly and quietly, “I want you to tell Beverley and my Granddad everything you just told me.”
“About the Hellfire club?”
“About the Hellfire club.”
As Bunny sighed and launched into a repeat performance, Jason reached out and squeezed Merlin's arm as though his urgency would make the words connect in the wizard's mind in the same way they had in his. It was nearly ten minutes later, before Bunny began winding down his tale.
“...and the room in the caves where they had their dinners was evidently covered by a perfectly gigantic silk canopy. In the center was a massive chandelier hanging above a huge mahogany table set with silver salvers, the finest porcelain, and crystal and evidently the dinners were as grand as the setting. Oh, and somewhere behind the dining room, in the rear passage, were some kind of private rooms they called ‘the chapel’ but they were supposedly used for their secret ceremonies involving debauched sexual goings-on of some sort.”
Judging by the stony-faced silence that greeted the conclusion
of his story, Bunny wondered if he had somehow offended his audience. Jason, Merlin and Beverley all stood like statues, their eyes wide with wonder, darted back and forth between each other’s faces. Finally, Jason spoke, his words directed toward Merlin. “Does that cover everything?”
On his fingers, Merlin counted off the items hinted at in the two thousand year-old book of Gnostic prophesy they had been worrying over since the say they discovered it in the library at the Buddhist monastery. “Let’s see, we have a bunch of holy men who were not really holy and that would seem to be the members of Dashwood's club.” Merlin's voice was tense with excitement as he ticked off one finger after another. “And these fraudulent holy men were led by a warrior who was not really a warrior. If we’ve been right so far, this must refer to the club’s use of monks’ robes and Dashwood's knighthood. Next was the allusion to the waters of oblivion - presumably this so-called River Styx. Then it talked about how they went beyond these waters to pay homage to the light of the underworld... I don't quite make the connection...”
“They were the Hellfire club, right?” Jason nearly shouted out the words. “Hellfire was what they called the burning brimstone, or whatever it was, that was supposed to illuminate hell.”
“You're right, my boy. Absolutely right.”
“Wasn't there something about an opening?” Beverley had not spent as much time worrying over the riddle as had Jason and Merlin, so she felt a little unsure of herself for butting into this frantic conversation.
Jason put a sympathetic arm around her and pulled her close. “She's right, Merlin. How did you translate it?”
“That passage was primarily in Persian, so I can’t be certain. It was either a door, or a portal, or a window, or a hole, and I couldn't be sure if it was referring to the communication device or the gate itself.”
“Well, we still don't know, but we do know a lot more than we did a few minutes ago.”
Finally, Jason turned back to face Bunny who, by now, was staring at them with a completely bewildered and bemused expression on his face. “Pardon my French, but what in the bloody hell are you lot on about? Have you all gone completely bonkers?”
“I’m sorry, Bunny, it’s too complicated to explain right now but this is really important. Is that absolutely everything you know about Dashwood, the Hellfire club and the caves?”
At first, the bartender could only pump his head up and down in mute confusion. Finally, he offered. “Except for the legend about the secret passage, that’s everything I know. There may be more but...”
Merlin reached out a long-fingered hand and grabbed Bunny by the lapels of his coat, nearly pulling him across the bar. “Secret passage? What secret passage are you referring to, young man?”
Jason had never seen Merlin so aggressive and was a little startled. Ever so gently, he pulled Merlin's had away from Bunny and leaned forward across the bar, smoothing out Bunny’s jacket. “Bunny. This could be very important. Now, I need you to tell us anything you can remember about this secret passage.”
“Not just anything, everything. Every single scrap.” Merlin had allowed his hand to fall to his side, but his hypnotic blue eyes were boring a hole through Bunny's head.
“Honest, chaps. There isn't much to tell and I only know what I've read-up on for the party. Somewhere in the caves, maybe more than one place, I can't remember...” Bunny was shaken and starting to babble, so Jason handed him Merlin’s untouched whiskey. After nearly downing it in one massive swallow, the barkeep seemed able to collect himself and started over. “Someplace in the cave, any number of places if I remember correctly, there are symbols carved into the chalk walls. They’re all the same. The Roman numeral for twenty-two - you know, X,X,I,I - and its followed by the letter 'F'. Well, the prevailing theory is that the 'F' stands for Francis - as in Francis Dashwood - and the twenty-two is some kind of clue leading to some secret cave, or passage, or whatever it is.”
Quietly now, so as not to frighten Bunny a second time, Merlin spoke in a low voice, laying a hand cautiously on the other man's sleeve. “And do you have any idea what kind of clue it is that is alluded to by these Roman numerals?”
“All I know is that it’s supposed to be connected to a little poem that goes:
‘Take twenty steps and rest awhile
Then take a pick and find the stile
Where once I did my love beguile.’
But it hardly makes any sense at all. I mean, the poem says twenty paces, and the number is twenty-two, not twenty.”
“Yes, I see. Well, maybe the number is twenty and the double letter 'I' stands for something else entirely.”
“I'd never thought of that, but I never really gave the whole thing much thought. It’s just a fun bit of legend. Nobody takes it seriously.” He drained the last few drops from the whiskey and smiled sickly at Merlin who was staring intently at Jason.
“All these years I just assumed the gateway was in the sky because the passage from Revelations referred to the beasts ‘appearing from out of the heavens’. Could one of these holes…what did you call them?”
“A black hole.”
“That’s it. A black hole. Could one of these black hole things exist on earth as opposed to being in the sky?”
“Oh, Lord, Merlin, that’s a question for an astrophysicist, not an archaeologist, but I think they can exist anywhere. Eventually it would start sucking in everything around it but that would depend entirely on how long it stayed open.”
“So it is possible?” Jason’s nod was uncertain but it was enough to satisfy Merlin. His immediate question answered, the old wizard turned his intense blue glare back to the terrified bartender, offering a weak smile to calm the object of his interrogation. “Just one last thing, Mr Bunny; do you happen to know who owns the caves?”
Bunny shook his head and shrugged his shoulders. “No idea. I mean, we’re not really going there for the party, or anything. Is it important?”
“It might be; I don't know yet.” Turning from the bar, Merlin motioned his companions back to their table.
“That was a little weird.” Jason seemed almost as surprised at the unexpected turn of events as Bunny.
“Unexpected, possibly, but I told you it was you who would solve the riddle.”
“I didn't solve anything. Bunny did. It was just dumb luck on my part.”
“Not at all, Jason. He provided the clue, but you applied it to the riddle and thereby gave us the solution. Now, of course, we have the new problem of having more information than we can possibly deal with all at once.”
“You mean the stone things in the Ark and the location of the cave?” Jason was pressing the knuckles of both hands into his temples so hard his fingers were turning white.
“Precisely. May I suggest that to make the best possible use of our time and limited manpower, we divide forces?”
“You mean man and woman power, don't you?” Beverley had no intention of being left out of whatever it was the old man was planning.
“I did, and I apologize.” He acknowledged his mistake with a nod, stroked his long beard and eased himself against the high back of the upholstered settle, deep in thought. Finally, he spoke. “Jason, since we now know the cave is here in England, I think I should go there and see what I can find out.”
“Now wait a minute.” Jason's voice was adamant. “If Morgana is about to move the communications equipment to this cave in West Wycombe, it could be dangerous. She is obviously going to have people with her and I don't want you getting into any trouble.” Merlin put on a face as innocent as a child’s, raising his hands in surrender. “Don't you dare do that, old man. You know exactly what I mean. You have a way of doing things...”
Merlin cut him off in mid-sentence. “I promise to be careful. Now it will be up to you to go to Axumia, what do you call it...?”
“Ethiopia.”
“Yes. Ethiopia. Once there, it will be your duty to locate the Ark of the Covenant and find out if the Urim and Thummim are st
ill inside.”
“That’s kind of a tall order, Merlin. Nobody has even seen the thing in more than three thousand years. Even if I did manage to find it, what makes you think they would let me see it, much less look inside?”
“We will arm you as best we can for that eventuality, but simply seeing the Urim and Thummim will not be enough. You have to bring them back here with you so I can use them to close the gate.”
“Oh, Christ, Merlin, you've got to be kidding.”
“I have never been more serious in all my life and don't blaspheme. We are talking about some of the most sacred objects in the history of the world, here. Show some respect. This is no time to be flippant.”
“While you boys are fighting over who gets to go where, I want to know where I go. And quite frankly, I can't take the time off from university to go to Ethiopia, so I think it’s best if I go to Buckinghamshire with Merlin.”
“Oh, no.” Jason became instantly defensive, pointing an accusing finger at Merlin. “If he gets himself into trouble there's nothing much I can do about it, but I do not want you involved.”
“Jason Carpenter, I’m not a child. I can take care of myself.”
“Bev, sweetheart, I’m sorry, but these are really, really bad people. They’re violent. They tried to kill Merlin and me, what, three maybe four times, while we were in Mongolia.”
“Ok, they’re dangerous. But at the moment, Morgana thinks Merlin and you are both dead. So at least until she finds out otherwise, we’re all pretty safe. Besides, Merlin said it looked like it would be a lot of work to get this communicating thing ready to move. We should be able to get into these caves and back out long before she gets there. We just need to go to check things out.” She turned to Merlin for both support and reassurance. “That is all we’re going down there for, isn't it? To take a look around and see if we can find this secret passage, or whatever it is?”
“She's quite right, Jason. I just need to see what I can learn so that when the time comes and we are in possession of the Urim and Thummim, I’ll know exactly where the gate is. A good reconnoiter now will vastly reduce the time we have to spend in the cave later and thereby reduce the chances of a nasty encounter with Morgana's guards. Contrary to what you may think, I really would like to survive this thing, and any information we can gather beforehand will only work to our benefit.”