The Second Reginald Bretnor Megapack

by Reginald Bretnor

  Fifteen minutes later, he and Emmy and Niki were happily chasing each other down the beach, and sometimes catching, and even going swimming with the porpoises. When finally he went to bed between them, he had filed the episode away as one more among the many missed and wasted opportunities of a long and active lifetime.

  * * * *

  The Princess, needless to say, did nothing of the sort. For a time, she paced her bedroom floor tempestuously, cursing in the unknown tongue and promising herself that Papa Schimmelhorn would suffer cruelly for his insolence. She tried to think of cruelties savage and exquisite enough. She reviewed those used by the inventive Turks over the centuries, those practiced by the Romans, Carthaginians, and other less-than-kindly peoples. She went over those inherited from her own progenitors. None seemed adequate—until finally she recalled her latest interview with Meister Gansfleisch. She halted. Instantly, her inner turmoil subsided. Coldly and practically, she reviewed every aspect of the situation, for after all there was much more than vengeance to be considered. She summoned Niobe, who entered fearfully, aware that something drastic had occurred. She permitted her hair to be rearranged. She donned a black and gold peignoir.

  “And now,” she ordered, “bring Meister Gansfleisch to me.”

  She went into her salon, reclined once more on the chaise longue, and closed her eyes, imagining the fate she had in store for Papa Schimmelhorn.

  Meanwhile Niobe—reluctantly, because she feared the alchemist—made her way to his turret quarters. She knocked timidly on his dark door.

  “Go away!” his hoarse voice replied. “Whoever you may be, begone!”

  Niobe knocked again, even more nervously. “B-but Meister Gansfleisch,” she called out, “I—I come from the Princess. She’s sent for you. You must come right away!”

  There was silence, interrupted by muttering and an indignant squeaking. “Very well,” Meister Gansfleisch called back, “if she has ordered it, then I will come. But it will take me a few minutes to make ready. Wait for me.”

  Niobe waited, listening to more squeaking and scurrying from within. As a matter of fact, she had arrived at a critical juncture. After his latest interview with his employer, the alchemist, overcome by despair and despondency, had finally succumbed to Twitchgibbet’s sales pitch and had agreed, if his familiar could put him in touch with the appropriate authorities, to follow Faustus’s example. Twitchgibbet had been delighted, for he knew that the transaction would mean promotion for him, at least to a rank where he would no longer be required to possess any creature as lowly as a rat, and possibly even to the recruiting staff. He had scampered around excitedly while his master rummaged around for the necessary tomes, for black tapers and other oddments, for words of power and protective spells. He had chafed at his rattish inability to assist with the drawing of the complex pentacle the ceremony called for—and then, at the very last moment, with the preparations virtually complete, Niobe’s knock had come.

  He kept on arguing while Meister Gansfleisch tidied up, washed his hands, and put away an assortment of dried lizards’ eyes, pieces of hanged criminals, and other minor tools of wizardry. He even dared to disobey him to the extent of keeping up his protests after he had been ordered to keep quiet.

  As the alchemist joined Niobe in the corridor, he squeaked out, “You’ll be sorry, stupid! You just wait and see!” Then he crouched down by the jar holding the poor homunculus, gnashing his teeth at him through the glass, and promising to make life really miserable for him the next time Meister Gansfleisch’s prolonged absence could be counted on.

  Meister Gansfleisch himself couldn’t help feeling that he had been accorded at least a temporary stay of execution. He had no real desire to convey title to his immortal soul, and only Twitchgibbet’s promise that, were he to do so, the devil would deliver the Princess over to him as certainly as he had delivered Helen of Troy to Faustus had induced him to agree. He followed Niobe agitatedly, wondering what the Fräulein had in mind, hoping—yet scarcely daring to hope.

  She was waiting for him on the chaise longue. She nodded to him coldly as he entered. With a gesture, she dismissed her handmaiden. She motioned him to a chair.

  Obediently, he sat.

  “Gaspar,” she said, piercing him with her eyes, “your opinion has often been given me when it was not asked for. Often it has been absolutely insubordinate. And often it has been completely worthless. Therefore you should be especially grateful for what I am about to say to you.”

  She leaned forward intently, and his long, gray fingers fought each other in his lap.

  “Gaspar, where this wretch Schimmelhorn is concerned, you were completely right.”

  Gaspar Gansfleisch’s heart skipped a beat.

  “I have studied the situation very carefully,” she went on, and he noticed that as she spoke her lips drew tightly back from her sharp teeth. “Schimmelhorn’s sexual appetites and proclivities are thoroughly undisciplined. I have—well, I have had other, and very reliable, reports. They are interfering, as you pointed out and as my great collateral ancestor has said, with the alchemical researches and processes in which you are engaged. Therefore I have decided that we must take certain measures….” She paused. “Do you recall mentioning what the Arabs did to Ismail?”

  Meister Gansfleisch jerked. His jagged smile appeared. He licked his lips. “Yes, yes, Princess!” he replied. “Oh, indeed yes. Indeed I do. And I have a wonderfully sharp knife, Your Highness—it would be over in a moment, indeed it would!” He licked his lips again. “Or perhaps we could just let Twitchgibbet bite—”

  She silenced him peremptorily. “Don’t be a bigger fool than you already are,” she snapped. “I can allow no violence to him. We shall accomplish the same end, but quite legally and much more subtly. Among the Golden Doctor’s most secret formulas, those which I have shown to no one, there is one which will serve our purpose admirably. I have certain necessary arrangements to make first, but I want you to have everything ready in your laboratory. Return here in exactly half an hour, and I will give you full instructions. Even if you have to work till dawn, I want it ready for me when I wake tomorrow. Do you understand?”

  Meister Gansfleisch rubbed his hands together excitedly. He told her he understood perfectly—that she could count on him—that it would be a pleasure.

  He backed out bowing, and almost skipped down the corridor, chuckling and cackling to himself.

  Fräulein von Hohenheim waited until he was safely out of earshot. Then she picked up her phone and called Herr Doktor Rumpler. It went against her grain to do so, but Swiss good sense told her that, after all, they were in the thing together, and the stakes were high enough so that no chances should be taken.

  “Gottfried—” she said, in a voice as warm and soft and feminine as possible. “You—you do not mind if I call you Gottfried?”

  She had never used his first name before, and now she could practically feel him quiver over the telephone as he assured her ardently that he didn’t mind at all.

  “Gottfried, my friend, I fear that I have bad news for you, about—about this man Schimmelhorn.”

  “Has something happened to him?” asked Dr. Rumpler anxiously, suddenly seeing mountains of gold vanish into nothingness.

  The Fräulein told him that Papa Schimmelhorn was quite undamaged, but that his extra-professional activities had taken an alarming turn. He was no longer satisfied with Emmy and Niki; he had been pestering all the pretty pussycats on Little Palaeon; the local lads were beginning to look at him with murder in their hearts.

  Warmly, Gottfried Rumpler averred that he had every confidence in her ability to handle Papa Schimmelhorn, and to protect him from the fury of the natives.

  “Ah, Gottfried!” she replied. “You do not understand. Paracelsus himself stated most emphatically that sexual excesses made alchemical research impossible.�
�

  “But, my dear Fräulein”—his tone suggested that after all boys would be boys—“Schimmelhorn’s, er, excesses have never interfered with his past accomplishments. Indeed, his grandnephew Anton Fledermaus—a most engaging and reliable young man—states that they are absolutely essential to his success.”

  She lowered her voice. Things were different now on Little Palaeon, she stated tensely and impressively. Papa Schimmelhorn was neglecting alchemy almost completely. Even Meister Gansfleisch, that good and patient man, was in despair. Strong measures were required immediately.

  “Well, well!” Dr. Rumpler was disturbed. “It if is indeed so, what measures do you propose to take, dear lady? I suppose I could send—well, reinforcements. That is to say, more—”

  The Fräulein permitted herself a fraudulent but quite convincing sob. “I—I was hoping, Gottfried, that you, because you are a man, could think of something practical. Sending more young women would only make matters worse.”

  “Then what the devil can we do?”

  “Gottfried, dear friend,” she answered, “I am afraid that there is one way only. We must deprive him, if not of the desire, at least of the ability.”

  She heard her associate’s gasp of horror.

  “But—but we could not do that! It—it would not be legal! And such a cruelty! My dear Fräulein—”

  “Oh, Gottfried, Gottfried!” she interrupted him. “You, of all people, need not call me Fräulein—to you, I am Philippa.” She sobbed again. She promised him they would not injure Papa Schimmelhorn. She told him about Paracelsus’s formula—perfectly harmless and quite temporary since there was an infallible instant antidote. “You, dear Gottfried, must phone Frau Schimmelhorn; she will understand; she will give us her permission.”

  The change in her demeanor, her obvious wish to take refuge behind his own strong masculinity—these were potent arguments, but still he hesitated.

  She sobbed into the telephone. “Oh, please,” she begged, “only try to understand. Gottfried, he has even been molesting me!”

  Abruptly, Dr. Rumpler saw Papa Schimmelhorn in a new light. “It is an outrage!” he cried out. “It is beyond belief! The man is nothing but a beast! My Philippa! My dear Philippa! I shall telephone Frau Schimmelhorn immediately! Then I shall call you back.”

  He broke the connection, and the Fräulein replaced her own phone on its cradle. Dummkopf! she thought at the no longer listening Doktor. It is fortunate you are such a male chauvinist! If you had not been, my little play would not have been so beautifully successful. She laughed unkindly. Well, after the formula has worked on Schimmelhorn, probably I shall have to use it on you too. Dear, dear Gottfried, I can hardly wait.

  Smiling to herself at this pleasant prospect, she sat back to await the Rumpler call.

  It came sooner than she had expected. Mama Schimmelhorn had been at home, knitting a comforter for Pastor Hundhammer. She was surprised, she told the Herr Doktor, not at the news of Papa Schimmelhorn’s transgressions, but that he had managed to misbehave under the very eyes of eminent Swiss bankers, and that they had been unable to prevent it. Und now he vas shpoiling eferything so maybe der church vould nodt get der shteeple after all?

  Dr. Rumpler told her somberly that he sincerely hoped the church would not lose out, but that he was much concerned—and besides, surely the Rumpler Bank and its associates were entitled to a modest profit on their investment? To this, she wholeheartedly agreed—and did the Herr Doktor want her to fly at once to Zürich to take disciplinary measures?

  Hastily, he assured her that this would not be necessary, that there was a simpler way to reform her husband than by twisting his ear and applying an umbrella-point to his brisket. Then he outlined the Fräulein’s proposal: the subtle substance to be used had been invented by one of the greatest of all Swiss physicians; it had been thoroughly tested and was guaranteed to be instantly reversible.

  “So it does nodt hurt Papa?” she replied. “It only, for a vhile, takes der lead oudt of der pencil, so he iss like old Heinrich Luedesing und cannodt chase die naked vomen any more? Vell, maybe it teaches der old goat a lesson!”

  Then, congratulating the Herr Doktor on his perspicacity, she gave her formal permission for Papa Schimmelhorn’s deactivation; and he said good night with her chuckles still echoing gruesomely in his ear.

  “And did you record the conversation, Gottfried?”

  “Natürlich, dear lady!”

  “Ah, Gottfried,” she whispered, “you are so resourceful! I do not know what I would do without you….”

  * * * *

  Master Gaspar Gansfleisch returned to his turret in fine fettle. He entered briskly, whirled around two or three times in glee, ignored Twitchgibbet, and, humming an unmelodious but triumphant tune, set to work erasing the almost-completed pentacle in which the sale of his soul was to have been consummated.

  Twitchgibbet realized that, as he had feared, his hopes for a quick promotion had evaporated. Trying not to grind his yellow teeth, he pleaded with the alchemist to reconsider.

  “Master,” he whined, doing his best to sound truly humble, “how come you’re doin’ this to me? Okay, I’m just a petty fiend and not a VIP like Mephistopheles and all those higher-ups, but I got some rights, ain’t I? Ain’t I always done everything you said, like the contract called for? Ain’t I, huh?”

  Meister Gansfleisch paid no attention. He finished rubbing out the pentacle, and started putting away the black tapers and the other clutter he had brought out for the ceremony.

  “You just listen to me, Master—me, who’s been your faithful servant,” squeaked Twitchgibbet, keeping the whine in his voice. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you. And now you’ve let this what’s-her-name Princess catch you by the balls—”

  “Silence, vermin!” roared Meister Gansfleisch.

  Instantly, Twitchgibbet subsided, but to himself he muttered, You just wait, old Meister Smartass, you think you got me the way that gal’s got you, but there ain’t been a contract yet ain’t got no loopholes in it. Just wait and see….

  The alchemist finished tidying up. He changed into his more formal robes. He locked the door behind him.

  Promptly on the half-hour, he knocked on the Princess’s door.

  Niobe admitted him.

  He advanced, bowing his servility, and the Princess nodded to him coldly, condescendingly. Again, she was reclining on the chaise longue, holding on her lap an ancient book in tooled white pigskin and closed with brazen clasps.

  She opened it. She beckoned to him to advance. “Here,” she told him, “is the formula of which I spoke, written in Paracelsus’s own hand. You will sit at my table here and copy only it. Then I will check your copy against the original. After that, we will do the same with the following formula, which reverses the effect. You will not sit with your back to me, and you will not attempt to look at any other pages of the manuscript. Is that completely clear?”

  Meister Gansfleisch, who would gladly have mortgaged away his narrowly saved soul for a chance to read the book from start to finish, indicated that it was.

  “Very well,” she said. “Begin.”

  With a trembling hand, while the Fräulein watched him like a hawk, he copied the crabbed Latin of the manuscript. Scarcely concealing his excitement, he read it back to her. He did the same with the successive formula.

  She closed the book. “Now,” she commanded, “you will return to your laboratory, and you will set to work at once to make an adequate quantity of each of these. As you are aware, I know enough of the arcane sciences to know that you have all the necessary substances, and that the entire operation should not take you more than two or perhaps three hours. Therefore, when you have finished, you will bring them to me instantly, no matter what the time of night.”

  “Of course, Your Highness, of course!�
� crowed the alchemist. “Oh, I can hardly wait to see the expression on that old lecher’s face when—when—”

  “I am sure,” she told him, with a momentary smile, “that it will be adequately rewarding. But”—her expression hardened—“you will do your gloating very quietly, and only to yourself. You will not indicate to Schimmelhorn in any way that you are gloating. You will treat him with special courtesy, and you will obey any and all of his requests pertaining to his work. I have business appointments I must keep in Zürich and I shall remain here only long enough to make sure our treatment is effective. I shall be gone for at least a week. During that time, if Schimmelhorn gives you what you call his shopping lists, you will go to Athens and faithfully purchase everything he requires.”

  Meister Gansfleisch started to protest, but she cut him off peremptorily. “Be still!” she ordered. “For the time being, you must be content with what you will be doing to the man. Later—well, we shall see.”

  She made a gesture of dismissal. Wisely, bowing, he started to back away from her.

  “I shall compound this—this medicine, he-he!—oh yes, Princess! I shall compound it speedily, and with all my art.” In his mind’s eye, he again saw Papa Schimmelhorn’s countenance as it would appear in the first dreadful moment of realization. “Yes, yes, Your Highness! And I shall have it ready this very night, I promise you! And—”

  Decisively, she pointed at the door; and, clutching his copies of the formulas, he backed into the corridor.

  Niobe shut the door.

  “What a revolting creature!” remarked the Princess. “Niobe, go and bring Mavronides to me. It will be refreshing to talk to a man so simple and honest and devoted.”

  While she waited, she leafed through Paracelsus’s comments and instructions, as she often had, taking mental notes of those that might be useful to her either in her capacity of princess-priestess or as a power in the Swiss banking world. When Niobe appeared with Mavronides, she laid the book aside almost reluctantly.