13 “Hail, the powerful magician and miracle worker, Padma!”
CHAPTER VIII
Evil in Two Places
Dinner was an uneasy, tense affair.
Mr. Shivara’s low but insistently penetrating voice was like a dark mist that closed in about the others and shut off all normal conversation.
He addressed himself to Sayre, outlining the weird and intricate beliefs of something called the Karma-mimansa doctrine. Dr. Bent and Judith Allison, after one attempt at changing the subject, fell silent, frowned at their plates, and ate little.
Chan listened attentively and Don whispered to him once: “What about it? Is that sales talk the real thing? Just when I begin to get the drift he drops into Sanskrit or Tibetan and loses me.”
“So far,” the boy replied, “Chan unable to catch Mr. Shivara in error. All patter seems to be A-Number One McCoy. Very interesting.”
Woody, who caught Chan’s answer, put in: “Not to the readers of the New York Press it isn’t. I don’t think we’ve got the type for some of those Tibetan words anyway. What about this story you promised me, Don?”
“Sit tight,” Don promised. “You’ll get it.”
Woody did.
Once the party had returned to the living room where after-dinner coffee was served, things began to happen. Woody got a story that set him back on his heels and made his hair curl — a story that he wasn’t at all sure he wanted to write. He was afraid the city editor would take one look at it and then ask when he’d begun to use an opium pipe.
Sayre started it by mentioning the fact that his collection contained several of the magic phurbas which the Tibetan sorcerers use in their rituals.
“I have heard,” he said, “that these knives can often be animated from a distance and made to kill an enemy when the sorcerer is nowhere near, without arousing any suspicion that he is responsible.”
Shivara smiled his superior smile again and nodded. “Once again,” he said, “simply an instance of directed concentration. All thought is energy. The adept can concentrate so completely as to project this force any distance.
“He can control its emanations and focus them on the phurba until the knife becomes charged with the thought-force and is able to move and perform whatever actions the directing ngagspa wills. This is true of any inanimate object. That brass poker by the fireplace for instance. Om vajra guru padma siddhi hum!”
Shivara pointed and as his gaze fastened on the object his eyes grew round and strained with effort.
“The poker will fall — now!”
Don Diavolo saw the poker tremble, move outward, and drop. He heard the brassy clang that rang from the stone hearth.
Shivara’s voice came again, low and throbbing, as if from a great distance. “The poker moves across the hearth, slowly, then faster — faster — faster.…”
Like some strange rigid snake the poker obeyed, sliding across the stones and out on to the carpet — straight toward Don Diavolo! Except for the Hindu’s hypnotic, commanding voice there was no other vestige of sound in the room.
Then Shivara clapped once, closed his eyes and rubbed a hand heavily across his forehead as if in pain. The poker had stopped with its end touching Don’s foot.
Diavolo asked, “May I examine it?”
Shivara, his eyes still closed, nodded. “You may. And you will find no strings or wires.”
Don picked it up and gave it a rapid, expert scrutiny. “No,” he said. “There are none — now.”
And that made Shivara angry. For the first time, his precise cold little smile vanished. His eyes flashed.
“No,” he said, “you do not believe. I did not expect you would. Your Western eyes are clouded with the doctrine that all effects have physical causes. You cannot conceive that mind is infinitely more powerful than matter, that mind is matter, that mind is all.
“Your unbelief is of no interest to me and yet I will show one other thing — something that even you will admit could not have been done with wires and mirrors. I shall project for you a tulpa, a phantom image of myself!
“In the words of the Dalai Lama himself: ‘A Bodhisatva may, through the power generated in a state of perfect concentration of mind, show a phantom of himself in thousands of millions of worlds. He may create not only human forms, but any form he chooses, even those of inanimate objects such as hills, enclosures, houses, forests.…’ Om vajra guru padma siddhi hum!”
The Hindu stood before them, his back to the tall fire-place that towered above, his slender body in its faultless evening dress, straight and still. Above his dark face the white turban gleamed as if with a dim luminosity of its own.
And then, after a moment, a similar glow appeared in the air beside him. At first, faint and nebulous, it gradually grew stronger and as it began to take shape, the outlines of a face appeared slowly beneath it. Dim, wavering and transparent, but growing stronger …
Shivara’s voice droned on, speaking words that no one heard, words that formed a mystic curtain in the background of their minds …
The hazy outline of the phantom shape steadied and grew sharp like an image coming into focus on the ground glass of a camera. Its transparency receded until the watchers could no longer see through to the gray stones of the fireplace beyond.
There, now, two Shivaras stood before them an arm’s breadth apart. Once more the watchers saw the calm, cold smile — two calm, cold, evil smiles on two identical faces!
The thought-form, if that is what it was, took a step forward while Shivara remained in his place. Then another step, the white eyes glittering in the dark Oriental face.
Judith Allison put one hand to her mouth and screamed.
And, in that instant, with another forward step half completed, the phantom vanished!
Don Diavolo heard a door slam and then he heard a deep voice thunder, “What’s going on here?”
He turned in his chair and saw a scowling familiar figure striding toward them from the hall. Behind him the white face of the butler peered and announced somewhat belatedly, “Inspector Church of the New York Police Department!”
No one paid much attention to the Inspector’s question. He looked at the girl and at Dr. Bent who held her hand and leaned over her solicitously. He started to ask his question again. “What is going—”
Then he saw Mr. Shivara.
The Inspector came to a dead stop, his eyes narrowed, and the expression that grew on his face was one of a cat who has just sighted a nice fat mouse.
But his pleased grin died a quick death. His eyes saw Chan, and then, moving rapidly, took in Woody and Don. His jaw dropped.
“You!” he roared, stabbing a thick forefinger at the magician. “I thought I told you I wouldn’t stand for any amateur detect—” The Inspector stopped short as another thought occurred to him.
He began a new tack. “How did you get out of Fox Street without my knowing it? I was to be told the minute you put your nose outside that house. I gave orders that — well, answer me, dammit!”
“Sure,” Don said pleasantly. “As soon as I see a place where I can get a word in edgeways. Do I understand that you had some of your men watching me?”
“You know blamed well I did! How did you get past them?”
“Inspector,” Diavolo said innocently. “Why is it you always prefer to believe the worst? If you had me watched, and got no report when we left, the boys must have fallen asleep on the job. Sad state of affairs I admit, but why blame me? I believe I did see a man named O’Hearn puttering around in my garden earlier this evening. But he wasn’t there when we left. I don’t see that I’m responsible for—”
Church said, “Grrr!” and then, “What are you — and Haines and Chan — doing here?”
Don looked across at his host. Sayre said, “I invited them, Inspector. I didn’t invite you. What are you doing here?”
Church looked at him coldly. “You’re Mr. Nicholas Sayre?”
The millionaire nodded.
Church
looked at Sayre, at Judith Allison, the doctor, and the Hindu. Then he lighted his bomb and dropped it among them. “I’m investigating a murder. I came here to ask some questions about the victim.” He took a step toward Shivara. “I think I’ll begin with you.”
Sayre’s eyes widened. Dr. Conrad Bent stood up very straight and still. Judith Allison’s hands tightened on the arms of her chair. Mr. Shivara returned the Inspector’s cold gaze with the puzzled lift of one eyebrow. His brown face was otherwise as devoid of expression as a blank sheet of paper.
Church’s voice was curt and official. “Your name?”
The Hindu looked at him for a moment, then said, “And what do I have to do with your murder investigation?”
Nicholas Sayre started forward. “Inspector, this is ridiculous. Do you know who I am?”
Church didn’t take his eyes off the Hindu. “Yes. I know. You’re a millionaire. And you know the D.A., the police commissioner, and maybe all nine of the Supreme Court judges. You can phone them if you like. It won’t do you any good. I’m going to have my answers just the same.”
Nicholas Sayre turned to the butler who still stood at the door. “Get Richards down here at once!” The butler vanished.
Church asked his question of Shivara once more. “What is your name?”
The Hindu smiled and told him. “Rimpoche Tsong Gungaram Siddahshivara, the Nawazi Kahn of Rajgarh.”
Church blinked rapidly, felt the control of the situation slipping from his grasp, and made another mistake. “Address?” he said icily.
“The Road of the Three Flowers, Shahjahanpur, India.”
Richards arrived then, just as the Inspector seemed on the verge of bursting with the sort of dull thunderous roar that Boulder Dam might make if it suddenly gave way.
“Richards! This man is an Inspector of Police. He insists on asking some questions. You will take the whole conversation down in shorthand and type it out for submission to my lawyers.”
Richards jumpily produced a notebook and pen. He threw a nervous, frightened look at the Inspector and then lowered his head above his notebook and made a few experimental scrawls with his pen.
The Inspector took one look at Richards, started to fire another query at the Hindu, stopped, looked at Richards again, and appeared to go into a sort of trance. He brought himself out of it after a moment, shook his head in a dazed fashion, and returned his attention to Shivara.
“India,” he growled. “Did you ever meet a man out there named T.G. Alexander?”
For the first time, Don thought, Shivara gave the impression of being just a wee bit off-balance. He took a gold-tipped cigarette from a thin silver case and regarded it thoughtfully for a second before he spoke.
“Alexander? No I don’t believe so.”
“How well did you know Theodore VanRyn?”
Judith Allison was suddenly on her feet, her eyes cold and angry.
Shivara answered, “The name is a strange one.”
The Inspector’s look flicked sideways toward Judith for a moment, then centered again on the Hindu. “Where were you at two-thirty this afternoon?”
Shivara’s eyes were on Don Diavolo as he answered. “I was here, in this house, with Mr. Sayre.”
Church looked across at Sayre. The latter said, “Yes. Mr. Shivara was with me at that time. Why did you speak of Theodore VanRyn? What—”
The Inspector turned to Miss Allison. “You have heard the name, I think?”
Judith nodded. Her voice was little more than a whisper. “Yes.”
“Would it surprise you to know that he was here in New York this morning?”
That was apparently just a little more than Mr. Shivara’s inscrutable calm could withstand. Don Diavolo saw the tiny jump that he gave. Nicholas Sayre and Dr. Bent stared wide-eyed at the Inspector. Don was sure he detected a hesitant tremor in the hand that held Richards’ pen.
Judith Allison’s face was white. “I don’t understand,” she said faintly. “Ted died a year ago.”
“I’m sorry,” Church replied. “But I am not so sure of that. I think he died at two-thirty this afternoon in the Winfield Hotel on Thirty-fifth Street.”
The girl swayed on her feet, then fell forward.
Dr. Conrad Bent took a quick step and caught her in his arms.
He glared at the Inspector wordlessly. Then he lifted the girl’s limp body in his arms and said, “Get out of my way!” Church got. Bent went out, through the hall and up the stairs.
“Inspector,” Don said, “I do wish you wouldn’t blunder around like a herd of elephants running amok. Perhaps, if you’d just take it slow and easy and ask—”
Church’s voice rose above Don’s, growling, “When I want your advice I’ll ask … what’s that?”
Diavolo repeated the latter part of his sentence. “If you’ll ask Mr. Shivara where his astral double was at two-thirty, you might get even more interesting results.”
“His astral—” Church closed his eyes and braced himself for the shock he knew was coming.
Don Diavolo was dealing cards from up his sleeve again and the Inspector, from past experience, knew that he was not going to like any part of it. “His astral double?” he finished. “Okay. Let’s have it. What is an astral—”
“Mr. Shivara,” Don said slowly, “would seem to need more than one alibi. Just before you arrived, Inspector, he was busily demonstrating that he has the very curious ability to be in two places at once!”
The look that Shivara sent across the room at Diavolo was as thoroughly venomous as the tongue of a cobra.
CHAPTER IX
Murder by Magic
AFTER one brief horrible moment in which nightmare shapes crawled out from the dark recesses of his mind to leer and gibber and make impudent faces, Inspector Church pulled himself together and put his foot down with a bang.
He wheeled, strode to the door, and returned with Lieutenant Brophy. He announced in thunderous official tones that he’d had all the nonsense he was going to put up with; that, starting now, he’d ask the questions and no one else: that he’d hear the answers and any suggestions that anyone (he gave Don an angry glance) wanted to make; and, finally, that the lieutenant would place under immediate arrest the first person who disobeyed those orders.
“Something damn funny has been going on around here and I’m going to find out what,” he finished. Then he faced Nicholas Sayre. “Where can I interview these people one at a time?”
Sayre gave him a long look as if he were debating whether or not to tell the Inspector to go jump in the lake. Then he gave in and indicated a door across the hall. “The library,” he said. “You may have that. Richards! Phone my lawyer. Tell him to come over here immediately!”
Richards jumped to his feet, dropped his notebook, stooped hurriedly and gathered it up, and then started out, half running.
Church’s voice pulled him to a stop. “Just a minute! There’s a phone in the library, isn’t there, Mr. Sayre?”
Nicholas nodded.
“He can phone from there, then,” Church said. “I think I want to question Mr. Richards first.”
The Inspector and the secretary vanished behind the library door. The group they left behind them waited in uneasy silence. Lieutenant Brophy hovered over them with a grim determined air.
Nicholas Sayre sat down heavily and proceeded to give a lifelike imitation of a kettle coming to a boil. Mr. Shivara moved across to the tall window that looked out on Fifth Avenue and stood there looking out. He still retained some portion of his studied calm but it fell short of its usual perfection. The puffs he took at the long cigarette were angry, nervous ones, and he smiled no more.
Woody Haines crossed to where Diavolo stood and asked, “Got a light?”
The magician produced a match and held it to Woody’s cigarette. In a low whisper the reporter said, “The Hindu’s stunt. What was it? Twins and a secret opening in that fireplace behind him?”
Don shook his head. “No. I’m afraid n
ot. And it wasn’t mirrors either.”
“Then what the hell was it?”
Don Diavolo looked at the match he held. It snuffed itself out with no apparent cause. “That,” he said, “is what we’ve got to find out.”
Woody lifted an eyebrow. “You don’t mean to tell me that the Great Don Diavolo doesn’t know?”
Slowly Don said, “There’s only one way to do what he did — and it’s impossible! Go sit down and stop bothering me. I need to think.”
“What I need,” Woody said, sitting down, “is a drink.”
“What you’ll get,” Brophy cut in heavily, “is a trip to headquarters in the wagon. Shut up!”
Ten minutes passed and then Richards came from the door across the hall.
Church’s voice followed him out. “Brophy,” it said. “Bring Sayre.”
The lieutenant took him.
And then Don said quickly: “Woody! Richards went off down the hall. I’ll bet the Inspector told him to come back here. Get behind that door over there and when Brophy comes in again, duck out and tail Richards. I’ll keep Brophy’s attention.”
Woody hesitated. The last time he had run errands for Don on the scene of a murder investigation, he had ended up behind bars. He had sworn he wasn’t going to be caught sticking his neck out like that again. And now, with the Inspector howling like a Kansas tornado, and even Lieutenant Brophy whistling around their ears like a three-quarter gale, he wasn’t so sure that this was just the time to …
Don’s whisper was commanding. “Quick!”
Woody’s ever-present desire for a scoop overcame his better judgment. He streaked across the room and flattened himself against the wall to the right of the door. Don threw a nervous glance at Shivara and hoped that that gentleman wouldn’t break it up too soon. He still faced the window staring inscrutably into the outer dark.
As Brophy turned and came back, a deck of playing cards appeared in the magician’s hands. He leaned forward toward the high wing-backed chair where Woody had been sitting. Its back was toward Brophy. He fanned the cards with a smooth expert gesture and said, “Take one. Thank you. Now remember it and return it.”
Death from Nowhere Page 15