Bradley, Marion Zimmer - Shadowgate 04

by Heartlight (v2. 1)

  "Oh, not at all. I was just catching up on my professional reading; the i place practically runs itself." Dr. Newland gestured toward a familiar pile of professional journals lying on the corner of his desk. "But I'm overlooking the niceties. Would you care for a cup of coffee? Tea?"

  "Tea, but I wouldn't want to put you to any trouble," Colin demurred. Dr. i Newland had already buzzed for Leonie, and there was a short pause while he gave her directions and sent her off again.

  As Michael Davenant had predicted, Dr. Newland had been eager to interview someone of Colin's caliber regarding the upcoming vacancy. Unfortunately, as Davenant had further suggested, Dr. Newland was rather inclined to take the college's view of matters.

  "It's sad, really—the whole Bidney endowment sitting here, all tied up by the institute, while the college goes begging for funds. The trustees won't accept federal money; no, the college still operates on the terms of its 1714 charter, and it is funded entirely by private contributions. But these days ..."

  Colin knew that liberal arts colleges all across the country were closing, unable to keep tuition costs low enough to attract students.

  "But surely, turning over Miss Bidney's bequest to the college isn't the answer?" Colin said tactfully. "I'd think that the presence of the institute could be a major asset to Taghkanic. Very few places offer a degree program in Parapsychology these days, you know."

  "Very true," Dr. Newland said doubtfully. "But it all seems rather pointless, somehow. What are they to do with their degrees once we've awarded them? Psychic phenomena simply cannot be quantified; it merely devolves into smoke and mirrors. The scientific method is anathema to the manifestation of the Unseen World."

  "I don't believe that's completely true," Colin said slowly, unwilling to offend his host. "Certainly psychic phenomena haven't necessarily consistently demonstrated a cause-and-effect relationship under laboratory conditions in the past, but it's possible that this is simply through our own ignorance of the number of variables involved. And human subjects introduce human error— what if you were attempting to prove the existence of perfect pitch, and 99.999 percent of your test group were tone-deaf? You'd need a much larger statistical pool to even begin to isolate the thing you wished to study."

  As Colin paused, there was a knock at the door, and Leonie entered, carrying an enormous silver tray. Staggering a little under the weight, she set it carefully down on the table in the corner, smiled cheerfully at the two men, and flitted out again.

  There was another pause in the conversation as Colin and Dr. Newland moved to the less formal seating in the corner.

  "Good heavens," Colin said mildly, gazing down at the tray. It held macaroons and sliced cake in addition to the tea things. "I wasn't expecting this."

  "I have always held that a proper English tea is a civilizing influence," Dr. Newland said firmly, "and I will admit, I am pleased to be entertaining a fellow tea-drinker. Will you pour?"

  It was not the most bizarre circumstance Colin had ever experienced—to discover that whether or not he got the job he'd come to interview for hinged not on his qualifications, but on his preference for tea over coffee—and he was no believer in accident at the best of times. Though he possessed no psychic gifts, Colin began to believe that he had been foredestined to take Dr. New-land's place.

  As they chatted over tea and cakes, Colin found that Reynard Newland was a parapsychologist of the old school. His interests lay almost exclusively with ghosts—that most subjective of psychic phenomena—and he took very little interest in quantifiable talents such as clairvoyance and psychokinesis. Needless to say, Dr. Newland's worldview did not even admit of the possibility of nonhuman noncorporeal entities, and Colin was wise enough not to raise the question. But it became tragically easy to see how the Bidney Institute had dwindled over the last few decades to simply an extension of Dr. Newland's avocation, and why the college considered it to be moribund— overfunded—dead wood.

  "But surely it would be very difficult for the college to simply assume the Bidney endowment?" Colin asked a little while later.

  "Oh, dear me, no, young man. Taghkanic has always been the residuary legatee for the bequest. In the event that the Bidney Prize were to be awarded, the endowment fund would certainly have to be liquidated to pay it out, and in the event that the institute can no longer support itself afterward, any balance of funds is to be paid to the college."

  Margaret Bidney s entire fortune had been willed to fund research into the psychic sciences—incidentally creating the Bidney Institute—but her will also made proviso for a prize of one million dollars to be awarded to the individual who conclusively provided absolute and verifiable proof of paranormal abilities. Though competitors had been attempting to attain it for over half a century, the prize had never been claimed.

  "I don't suppose you consider the possibility of someone winning the prize very likely?" Colin asked diffidently.

  "Oh, my, no," Dr. Newland said, smiling gently. "When I came here back in the thirties, I'll admit that I was all on fire with the thought that someone might come in and claim the prize at any moment, revolutionizing the world of science as we then knew it—and certainly a week didn't seem to pass without someone trying for it. But the criteria for its bestowal are so very strict— this is one of the reasons why the institute keeps a stage illusionist on retainer—that no one has ever managed to claim it."

  "A magician is a very wise idea," Colin agreed.

  "Oh, Miss Bidney wasn't at all softheaded—I had the privilege of meeting her once, as a young man—though naturally people tend to equate a belief in the Spirit World with gullibility. Anyone who successfully claims the prize will have earned it indeed."

  By the time that Colin signed the contract that made him director of the Bidney Institute a few weeks later, he felt that he'd worked as hard as any of those hopeful contestants for the million-dollar prize.

  Though in one sense he felt that it was preordained that he become the institute's new director, in another, there were a large number of people to convince. The institute's board of directors, for one, and the president of Taghkanic College, for another. Neither was easy, for opposite reasons.

  Next, there was all the minutia of relocation to attend to, though fortunately he'd wound up his involvement with Selkie Press right on schedule, and Alan had even found a buyer for his backlist—Blackcock Books, spurred by the success of John Cannon's postmortem bestseller, had decided to take a strong position in New Age titles.

  Fortunately, Colin was lucky enough to obtain a lease on an old Colonial-period farmhouse out on Greyangels Road. It was only about a half-hour drive from the institute—at least in good weather. The place had a peace and solitude that reminded him of the house he'd grown up in, and the view from the bedroom windows—of the apple orchard and the river beyond—was breathtaking. He'd moved into the farmhouse in time to enjoy the full glory of a Hudson Valley summer, finding to his relief—since there was no possibility of installing an air conditioner with the house's wiring in the state it was—that the proximity of the river tempered the heat and the humidity to something closer to the northern California summers he'd been spoiled by.

  He'd be taking over the directorship in September. At the moment the institute followed Taghkanic's academic year, one of the many things Colin intended to change. There was no reason for that, just as there was no reason for all of the institute's staff to be accredited teachers and members of the Taghkanic faculty. The more Colin reviewed conditions at the institute, the more he found things that he wanted to alter. Fortunately—despite the board of directors of the institute and the trustees of the college—the director had sweeping powers to define the institute's mandate, and Colin intended to exercise them in full.

  Even while he was settling in to his new job, Colin kept up with the news from San Francisco, and little of it was good.

  Simon had been sent home at last, though a long series of operations was still scheduled for his hand and
eye. He was walking—even driving—without particular difficulty, and had even accepted a post as guest conductor at the symphony for the 1974—75 season.

  But Alison reported that he was as determined as ever to play again, and was willing to go to any lengths—and for Simon, that meant magick—to regain his full abilities as a musician. She had all but severed her relationship with him, and made sure that the local occult community knew of her displeasure. Once Simon would have been crushed by that, but now—according to Claire, who'd remained Colin's faithful correspondent—he'd simply laughed and marked Alison's behavior down to the timidity of old age. Claire was still staying with Alison, but by now she'd lost all hope of being able to intervene with Simon and was planning to return East.

  Colin had debated the wisdom of interceding himself, attempting to awaken Simon to the spiritual danger he was in, but from the first time they'd met, he and Simon had always tended to clash. It would be too easy for Colin's intervention simply to antagonize Simon and drive him further down the reckless path he was following.

  In the end, Colin had written Simon a careful, formally-worded letter, laying out the arguments against Simon's present course of action with scrupulous disinterest, though his own psyche still smarted from the aftereffects of his own disastrous choice.

  He'd received no reply, but Colin made a solemn vow not to give up on Simon, though it might be years before Simon was ready to listen to him. In the meantime, he threw himself wholeheartedly into the work of the institute.

  I'll never get used to these blessed monkey suits, Colin thought resignedly, cautiously tugging his bow tie into shape in the blotchy bathroom mirror. But the invitation had specified formal dress, and Colin had already learned that since the nearby artist's colony was capable of putting on the style on occasion, the college followed suit.

  The party tonight would be at President Quiller's house, and the occasion was the formal announcement of Colin's appointment and his introduction to college society.

  He wasn't looking forward to this. But politics seemed to be a function of every human endeavor, and he knew perfectly well that his appointment was not popular with the elements of the administration that had hoped to see the institute dismantled at Dr. Newland's retirement.

  While Colin sympathized intellectually with the college's administrative plight, he thought that the administration should be focusing on the good the institute could do for the college. Properly run, the parapsychology program could certainly generate a respectable amount of revenue through student tuitions alone. And its value to the college in terms of research and prestige could hardly be overestimated.

  All he needed to do, Colin thought wryly, was sell them on that.

  President Quiller's house was on campus, an exuberant example of Riverboat Gothic built almost a hundred years ago on a bluff overlooking the Hudson. Light streamed out through the mansion's windows, glittering in deep scarlets and greens. There was a gravel drive in front with several other cars parked in it, and Colin pulled his new Volvo in at the end of them. He'd had to replace the van—dependable though it was—simply because he'd be doing a lot more driving here, and under worse conditions. And because, much though he deplored it, he'd have to live up to certain expectations of behavior suitable to the Bidney Institute director.

  Though sunset came early here in the Hudson Valley, there was still enough light when Colin arrived to give him a breathtaking view of the river, the far bank reduced to a black silhouette against the shining sky. After a moment's appreciation, he turned to the house.

  Leonie Nesbit opened the front door as he ascended the steps. She was wearing a velvet pantsuit in a dark jewel print with an extravagantly ruffled blouse.

  "Doctor MacLaren!" she chirped excitedly. "Come in!"

  "About half the guests are here now," she said, ushering Colin into the main parlor. "Dr. Quiller is having the college for cocktails and then just department heads and the institute for dinner, so you can get to meet them."

  And then the college will have the institute for breakfast, Colin finished sardonically. Well, he would do the best he could to smooth things over, though he knew it would be a task of months, perhaps years. A great work, but one he felt equal to.

  "Colin!" Dr. Newland's greeting was filled with genuine warmth. "Come in, dear boy, and meet everyone. Harold—President Quiller—is here somewhere ... at least, I'm sure I saw him just a few minutes ago. ..."

  At fifty-three, Colin reflected, there were fewer and fewer people who were entitled to address him as "dear boy," but Dr. Newland had that privilege if anyone did. Leonie tactfully dropped back, and Colin allowed himself to be conducted by Dr. Newland in search of their host.

  But President Quiller did not seem to be anywhere in the front of the house, and after a few moments of fruitless searching, Dr. Newland conducted Colin over to a small group of people.

  "I suppose I should at least introduce you to someone, dear boy; Lee Chapman—John Dexter—Miriam Gardner—Morgan Ives," Dr. Newland said, introducing the two men and two women. "All my respected colleagues. But let me leave you to get acquainted and I'll see if I can find Harold. I know he'll be anxious to meet you."

  If there's anything left after the lions are finished, Colin thought, surveying the group. These four people were most of the current staff of the institute, and this was the first time Colin had been given the chance to meet them.

  Of the four of them, only Morgan Ives and John Dexter looked really comfortable in formal dress. Morgan wore her quilted satin maxiskirt and pleated gold lame peasant blouse with the slapdash eccentricity of a diva, and her wrists were weighted with bracelets until she had the look of a woman chained.

  "Colin MacLaren," she said in greeting, extending her hand. The bracelets clinked. Her nails were long and blunt-tipped, lacquered a deep arterial red. "How charming to meet you. I'm certain we shall deal splendidly together."

  "Cut it out, Morgan. MacLaren eats table-tippers like you for breakfast," Dexter said amiably. His hands were thrust deep into the pockets of the tuxedo that he wore as easily as if it were a business suit. For some reason, he looked oddly familiar to Colin.

  "I never tipped a table in my life, Dexxy," Morgan snapped, withdrawing her hand and glaring at him.

  "Maybe not—but you fall for every single person who does," Dexter said, before turning back to Colin. "John Dexter. I've followed your debunking work with great interest."

  Suddenly Colin realized why Dexter had seemed so familiar. "Have I the honor of addressing Theophrastus the Great?" he asked.

  "Ah. You've heard of me?" Dexter said, pleased.

  "I had the opportunity to watch you work once at the Magic Castle. I've never seen more artful closeup work," Colin answered honestly.

  "The classic stage illusions are fun," Dexter said, "but essentially the audience knows it's being fooled and doesn't really care how. Closeup, they've got no choice but to care." He produced a coin from nowhere and walked it across the back of his fingers, grinning engagingly.

  "I see you've met Newland's pet magician in a previous life," Lee Chapman said ungraciously, "though professional bully might be closer to the mark. Once our Mr. Dexter has finished what he calls 'making sure they're not cheating,' my psychics are so demoralized they can't possibly demonstrate their powers."

  "Possibly because they haven't got any to begin with," Dexter responded, with an irritability that suggested that this was a feud of long standing. He flipped the coin up into the air and it vanished. "In all my years practicing the Art, I've never seen—"

  "Gentlemen," Miriam Gardner said, firmly enough to silence both of them. "There's no point in trying to scare him off—like it or not, he's our new boss. So let's be nice to him." She smiled at Colin a little nervously.

  Miriam Gardner was somewhere on the far side of forty, partridge-plump and short. She was wearing a dress in a trying shade of bronze that looked as if she had run it up out of a set of old brocade curtains, and her short-cr
opped hair was hennaed an unconvincing shade of red. She reminded Colin very much of a forest creature caught far from cover, blinking confusedly in the light of oncoming headlights.

  "Well, then, he'll hear all of our nonsense soon enough," Chapman said with ponderous jocularity—and more generosity than Colin had expected of him. "I'm willing to bury the hatchet for tonight."

  "I'm looking forward to talking to each of you individually about the future of the institute," Colin said. "Though I doubt that what any of you will have to say is nonsense, Mr. Chapman."

  Chapman's field was telepathy and remote viewing, while Ives was interested in mediumship as it related to personality survivals and transfers— ghosts, in mundane parlance. Gardner seemed primarily to be a folklorist, from what Colin was able to glean from the records kept at the institute.

  "It's all nonsense," Dexter assured him with the blithe confidence of the devout unbeliever. "Let's talk about something else. Oh, here's Lion; Lion, come meet our newest victim—"

  Colin had just begun to exchange pleasantries with Professor Lionel Welling—Lion to his friends—when he felt a ripple around him, rather like the reaction of a school offish to the approach of a shark.

  "Ah, Dr. MacLaren," Harold Quiller said, appearing at last. "There you are. I've so looked forward to meeting you."

  President Quiller moved toward Colin in much the fashion of an ocean liner cutting off a tugboat. From the corner of his eye, Colin could see that the institute staff had vanished with the ease of long practice.

  Colin had met Quiller previously, during the interviewing process; the man was a born politician, and had gone after the Bidney money with the single-minded rapacity of a seventeenth-century corsair after a Mughal treasure ship. That Colin had achieved his appointment over Quiller's own candidate—a man who had championed the notion of a series of "pass-throughs" from the institute's budget to the college's—the Taghkanic president considered to be a setback, nothing more.

  Their conversation this evening had more in common with a fencing match than with any real exchange of information. What Quiller wanted tonight was assurances that Colin would take his cue from the administration; Colin was prepared to offer no such promises. After several minutes, Quiller surrendered the field, and wished Colin a long and happy future at the institute. As he walked off, Colin had the relieved feeling of one who had baited a tiger and gotten away with it.