by Jim Musgrave
“Come with me, Doctor. We are going up the stairs to paradise!” he remarked, stepping out ahead. As I followed him up the winding stairs, it was if I were entering a world where there was no morality. The cupids on the balustrades were demons, the handrails were vipers, and I was being led to perdition itself.
We came to a large suite at the end of a hall decorated with paintings of colorful forests where satyrs romped and wood nymphs preened. The inscription on the door of this suite read: WONDERLAND. The bartender opened the door, and I was immediately engulfed by the same mist each patron to Sister’s Row received when he entered the foyer downstairs.
However, the odor of this spray was that of peppermint. It was a candy smell that bespoke childhood innocence. There was no half-naked woman spraying it. Instead, the mist was coming from a machine that was built into the wall. The cloud of mist erupted from an invisible hole in the wall, permeating the room with its luscious smell.
The chamber was large, about four hundred feet square, and the four walls were adorned with images from author Lewis Carroll’s book. On one wall was the caterpillar lounging on a gigantic brown mushroom and smoking from an Eastern hookah. On another were the plump identical twins, Tweedle-Dum and Tweedle-Dee. As I stared at these twins, my mind flashed on the faces of the Maguire twins--Dan and Bill. Dan fell in love with Irene and her love of drugs and was murdered for it.
The third wall had the court of Wonderland. Alice, with her long blonde curls and a flamingo croquet mallet tucked under her arm, stood beside the Duchess of Clubs, whose hand was inserted inside the crook of the girl’s arm. The Duchess was not much taller, but her head was huge, as if this royal personage could devour Alice if she were so inclined. The last wall showed Alice picking up the “Drink Me” bottle from the top of a table. In front of this fourth wall was a duplicate table, and upon it stood a bottle with the same “Drink Me” label.
The bartender saw me looking at the bottle on the table and he said, “That’s the truth serum. Would you care to drink it now?”
I noticed that the great canopy bed in the center of the room had varieties of toys on its forest green coverlet. Dolls were propped up on the pillows, stuffed animals poked about amid the green vines of the bedspread, board games were stacked against the headboard, and even a game of jacks with the red rubber ball and the star-like silver tokens were strewn about, as if waiting for players.
“I suppose we might as well get on with it,” I said, and I strolled casually up to the table with the serum on it. The bartender picked up the small bottle and held it under the gaslight. The crystal red bottle looked quite antique and held about eight ounces of liquid, I would presume. Under the room’s gaslight, it seemed almost magical.
“You need only drink a small sip. A little goes a long way!” said the bartender, handing me the bottle.
I brought the bottle to my lips and thought about my years of sobriety following the war. This was necessary to my plan, so I tilted the bottle up and drank a small amount. After doing so, I set the bottle back down on the table and turned toward the bartender. He was smiling.
“Good! It should take about fifteen minutes for the serum to take effect. Would you like to meet your lady for the evening?”
It was my turn to smile. “Rather! I quite enjoyed these surroundings. I was impressed by Lewis Carroll when I read about his photography work with children. His work showed how much he understood the creative innocence of these emissaries from Heaven.”
“Yes, heaven,” said the bartender, and I could detect a slight hint of sarcasm in his voice. He walked to a connecting door in the wall with the Twins, and he opened it.
Into the room walked a small Alice, but she looked to my eyes as if she were the miniature image of my Becky Charming! It was uncanny. Her blonde curly hair, those piercing green eyes, and she even had dimples in her cheeks. She wore a red cotton dress with a white apron on the front, just like Alice in the pictures. She was not six years old, however. She appeared to be around ten. She walked over to me, took my hand, and asked, “Are you really a doctor?”
I looked down at her, stifling a giggle, as the drug was beginning to have its effect on me, and said, “No, I am not a medical doctor. I am a doctor of philosophy. That means I understand how to investigate reality and use my brain rather than just my senses.”
The charming girl looked up at me and said, “I enjoy the senses! Let’s play!”
Chapter 12: The Devices
The man in the strange suit with the armband stood at the door. “I will now leave you two to your own devices,” he said. “But first, what is your name, sir, and what are you doing here?”
I thought he was asking me a ridiculous question. I wanted to give him an answer, but my lips felt numb. “I am sorry, but my vocal ability seems to be stifled. Can you hear me?” I asked.
“Yes, very well. Who are you and why are you here?”
“I am a whispering wind. I am sand in the desert and a wave in the ocean. I am you and I am me and I am she!” I said, pointing to the girl.
The man at the door made a strange noise. Was it a cough? Did he laugh? I could not make out what it was. Finally, he opened the door, stood there for a moment, and then closed it behind him.
“You are a strange bird!” said the girl. She ran over to the bed and climbed up on it. She opened a board with squares on it. She then opened a box with black and white pieces in it, and she began setting these pieces upon the board. I knew I should know what this game was, but I could not remember. I started to panic because I realized I was here to do something. All I wanted to do was have this child teach me how to behave.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“We can play checkers, Mister Philosopher. Do you know how?” She patted the bed for me to sit down beside her.
As I gazed at the checkered board, I gradually had an awakening. In my mind, I was supposed to be playing the adult version of this game. I was supposed to be playing chess against the Dark Queen. I was here to tell this girl how to escape Wonderland and come back to my world. First, I needed to escalate my dose of truth serum. I knew it would be quite dangerous, and I might die, but this was the only way to get back my faculties, so I could understand what I needed to do next.
“Could you wait a moment, Princess?” I asked.
“Yes, but don’t tarry too long. I don’t have all day with you!” she admonished me, giving me a wink.
I walked over to the table near the wall with the picture of the little girl picking up a drink. I picked up the drink, brought it to my lips, and took a sip of the liquid. I hoped I had taken enough. My body should tell me very soon.
I stood there, expecting to be transported to some other world, perhaps a world where children were free to play all day without the strict contrivances of adults. I could hear the girl tapping the checkers on the board and humming to herself. I then heard music coming from the wall where the gentle, peppermint mist sprayed.
The girl seemed to know the words to the lyrics. She sang them with a beautiful, lilting soprano voice:
Lullaby and good night,
With roses bedight,
With lilies o'er spread
Is baby's wee bed.
Lay thee down now and rest,
May thy slumber be blessed.
Lullaby and good night,
Thy mother's delight,
Bright angels beside
My darling abide.
They will guard thee at rest,
Thou shalt wake on my breast.
As the music finished, my body became infused with energy, and I knew what I was doing. The drug was reacting on me the way Doctor Foote said it could. It was acting as a stimulant rather than a depressant. I now knew I was there to solve the mystery of the taijitu emblem and bring the members of this organization to justice. I first needed to explain my plan to this girl.
“Hello dear. What is your name?” I asked the child.
She looked up at me from her check
erboard. “Cassie. What’s yours?”
“My name is Patrick O’Malley. I am here as an undercover detective. Do you come from the Taijitu Orphanage?”
“Yes. They sent me here to play with you. They told me there would be games, and then I was to make you happy just the way I made the others happy.” There was a mischievous gleam in the girl’s eyes as she said the last sentence. She was obviously much older than her ten years.
“Forget about all that. I am going to explain something to you very fast. The group that sent you over here will attempt to lure you by using some kind of machine. I am going to leave this room shortly, and I will be waiting outside the building around in the alleyway. This is where they will be taking you. I am going to follow you and see where they take you. Once we see where you are, we will be able to enter the premises and rescue you. Is this clear?” I did not want to tell her that I believed they were taking her in order to kill her, as I believed she would have been too frightened to carry through with our plan.
This was the moment when my entire life up to that point changed forever. As a detective in 1868 New York City, I had established certain rules by which I could do my job. The laws of physics and natural phenomena were the underlying principles upon which I based my decisions. What happened inside the Wonderland Suite at the Sister’s Row can be explained now because I have lived through it. At the time, however, I thought the drugs had done something to my mind, or perhaps I was even having a mental breakdown of some kind caused by my wartime experiences.
The ten-year-old girl standing in front of me, who said her name was Cassie, slowly began to wriggle, the way a piece of wet clay can shape in one’s hands. What was beyond science was the fact that the girl’s shape and clothing seemed to be made of the same, pliable substance. One minute she was a child who resembled Becky Jones as a young girl, and the next minute he was the six-year-old son of Missus Bessie Mergenthaler.
“Seth!” I gasped, moving on shaky legs over to the bed where I sat, or fell down, on the soft mattress in a complete state of awestruck fear.
“Don’t be frightened, Mister O’Malley. I told you before. I am a mazikeen. We can change shapes, we have wings to fly, and we can disappear. I took the form of a girl who was being held at the Taijitu Orphanage. She won’t mind, as she has not changed at all. I just borrowed her image for a short while. I knew you would be here,” he smiled up at me, his twinkling brown eyes radiating under the gaslights.
“How?” I asked, still attempting to regain my mind’s ability to reason. I rubbed my eyes and massaged my temples with both hands.
“My mother told be about how you portrayed Doctor Ronald Wentworth when you went down to Tennessee to rescue my father. My father is a mazikeen as well. He did not die. He simply disappeared. When I was being held captive, I overheard the captors talk about the appointment made with a professor from England, a Doctor Wentworth. That’s when I knew I could escape by using Cassie’s image. They decided to send her, and I came in her place. Now we can work on a case together. Aren’t you happy?” Seth pushed out his thin chest in a boasting manner.
“Yes, but please allow me to arrange these new facts in my mind. As you can imagine, things are now happening a bit too fast for me to grasp them all at once.” I tried to stand, but I was still a bit groggy, so I sat back down.
“Tell me what you have planned,” said Seth.
“Until a moment ago, I was going to tell you to wait until someone comes for you. He or she will bring a steam-powered machine with them. They will perhaps attempt to lure you to go with them by promising you other toys or some other type of gadget. I was going to follow you to discover where they take you, and then we could raid the place. However, now that you’ve changed, I suppose it’s not possible.” I stood up again, and this time I was steadier on my feet.
“I can change right back to my friend Cassie again. I retain her image in my memory. Your plan can still be put into action, Detective O’Malley! Watch!” Seth immediately began to fold and twist into a curly, blonde-haired girl, until he was in Cassie’s exact image once more, complete with the Alice in Wonderland aproned dress.
I smiled, in spite of my inner fear. “Good job, Seth. I mean, Cassie. I will leave now, so you just play with some toys until they come for you. I will be following you, so don’t be frightened. I still have a plan, even though I really don’t know what will happen after this,” I said. “Were you able to see any of these captors?” I asked.
“No, sadly. I can become invisible and change my shape, but flying cannot help me move out of a physically confining space. I will follow your orders, and we can see where they take me.” The girl Seth was impersonating got back onto the bed and began to play with the checkers again. He/she looked up at me and smiled, “This game was invented in 3000 BCE. In a city called Ur in Mesopotamia. I played it then, and it’s still enjoyable.”
As I left the Wonderland Suite and walked down the hall to the stairway, I kept thinking about all that had happened to me and what was going to happen from now on. During my first case, I attempted to prove that Edgar Allan Poe was murdered and did not die an alcoholic in Baltimore in 1849. There were supernatural visits in my dreams, and Becky showed me how to connect with the Over Soul, but I did not believe I was heading toward this type of supernatural phenomenon.
During the second case, when I was tasked with finding the kidnapped inventor and industrialist, Doctor Arthur Mergenthaler, little Seth came into my life. He proved to be the link to my finding clues which solved the case. But now, as I tried to make sense of my current predicament, I realized that Seth and all the characters involved in my life, had been leading me to this very moment. It was as if I were chosen to be discovering a hidden conflict that was much bigger than the Civil War or even world politics. This was a fight between entities I was going to discover as I proceeded into this abyss.
As I passed the bar downstairs, the bartender waved at me and smiled. “Please, Professor, come over here.”
I was suddenly filled with panic. What did this man want from me? Did he know how the world had changed and what we were trying to accomplish? I came up to the bar and stood there. “Yes?” I said.
“What did you think? Was it worth another thousand?” he whispered, his hand at the side of his leering mouth.
“I’m afraid I don’t have the cash with me. I will return tomorrow, if you don’t mind,” I said, remembering the additional cost of the rendezvous.
“All right, Doctor. I know you will return. Perhaps you can make another appointment for the future,” he said.
“By all means. Thank you so much for your hospitality,” I said, remembering to put on my British accent.
Outside, it was beginning to drizzle, and as I passed the corner of the building where the alley was, I was thinking about how my detective skills would have to change drastically in the future. I now had a supernatural assistant who could support me in my cases, in addition to my own sorceress, Madame Becky Charming.
The stench in the dark alleyway was putrid, even though this was one of the wealthiest city neighborhoods. I could see the room where I had been moments before. It was on the second floor, and I look up to see the outside window. This must be the back room from where Cassie had walked into the suite.
I could also see that there was a fire escape on the side of the building. This was where they would bring Seth in a few moments from now. I was ready to put my plan back into action. The machine made me nervous, and so did the fact that Seth had become a creature from Judaic folklore.
Most anything could happen now, of that I was certain. What I asked myself was why flying angel humans never appeared to me before this. Why not when I was in combat, when I really needed one? Why not when all those people were starving to death in Ireland? I did not know why, and I suppose we were never meant to know. If it happened it happened to you alone, and it was your problem or your salvation. Just like the taijitu: yinyang and the dualities of existence. Whenever good
became extreme goodness it suddenly changed into evil. And whenever evil became too extreme goodness came from it.
As I gazed up toward the windows the drizzle got into my eyes, so I had to wipe my eyes as I watched the two adults bring down the body of Cassie/Seth. The child was wrapped in a tarp of some kind, and they had to come down the fire escape in short and careful increments, stumbling at one point, and I was fearful they would drop their cargo. I ducked behind a stuffed waste bin, so they couldn’t see me.
After they hit the pavement, I noticed they had a conspirator parked at the street end of the alley. He was driving a one-horse hackney, and he left it to start walking down the alleyway towards us. I was envying Seth’s ability to become invisible, as I retreated behind the disgusting bin so they could not see me. I could hear them talking.
“An easy two thousand dollars. She went out right away after we gave ‘er the injection,” one voice said.
“Let’s get ‘er back. We got deliveries comin’ from all over the city. She wants ‘em there before midnight,” another voice responded.
I watched them as they carried Seth down the dark alleyway toward the hackney. I did not know how to proceed from this point. Should I rush them and confront them? No, they were probably armed, and I would be overpowered at once.
My only chance was to use my intuition. Becky taught me how to connect to the Over Soul, and this was certainly a moment when I needed to see what logic and its connection with destiny had in store for me.