The Secret of Abdu El Yezdi

  “It sterilise the atmosphere,” Levi asserted. “The odour is unpleasant, but it help drive the parasite away.”

  Arundell wrinkled his nose. “And the crucifixes?” he asked, gesturing at the many additional crosses Levi had added to the room.

  The Frenchman quoted, “‘The Lord will keep you from all evil; He will keep your life.’”

  Henry Arundell had blinked confusedly at this and departed, pulling his wife after him.

  “Whenever Isabel open her eyes,” Levi said to Burton, “she must see the cross; must be reminded of what she most deeply believe in. She not let go of it, not allow Perdurabo to steal her will to live.”

  Later, during a subdued dinner, Blanche asked, “Should we cancel the party, mother?”

  “At such short notice?” Eliza Arundell exclaimed.

  “To be frank with you, ma’am,” Doctor Bird interjected, “even if the crisis has passed, I cannot envision your daughter being strong enough by Saturday.”

  “We’ll postpone for a fortnight, not cancel,” Henry Arundell said. “Which means we have nearly three hundred letters of apology to write.” He addressed the butler. “Nettles, have a couple of the footmen report to my study. I believe Clunk and Tick have the best calligraphy?”

  “They do, sir.”

  “Good. I’ll compose, they can copy.” Turning back to his guests, he said, “It’s the fastest way. They write so rapidly their hands become a blur. We’ll have the letters ready to post first thing in the morning.”

  After dinner, the family took to the chapel to pray for Isabel’s recovery. Their guests socialised for a short time but a tense atmosphere hung over New Wardour Castle and a couple of hours after the sun had set, everyone retreated to their rooms.

  Sadhvi Raghavendra joined Burton to stand watch over Isabel. They lit a wall lamp but adjusted the wick until the light was dim, so as not to disturb the patient, though she appeared to be in an extremely deep sleep.

  “She is dreaming, Richard. You see how her eyes move beneath the lids? But they are not happy dreams. Her limbs are jumping, as if she is imagining herself fleeing from danger.”

  “Dreamt dangers are ephemeral, Sadhvi. I’m more concerned about the real.”

  Burton lowered himself into a chair, removed one of the pistols from his waistband, and held it resting on his thigh. Sadhvi also sat.

  “I’ve hardly seen you today,” he said. “Are you all right?”

  “We Sisters are very sensitive to . . . balance.”

  “Balance? What do you mean by that?”

  “Everything possesses a natural point of equanimity, and we have an affinity with that state, thus we sense when it is disturbed; when things become askew. What is happening to Isabel is an imbalance. Matters surrounding her are out of joint. I feel it and it distresses and tires me.”

  “Why didn’t you say? Go to bed. I’ll recruit Blanche for sentry duty.”

  “No. I prefer to stay.” She smiled. “It reminds me of when we sat up to guard the camp on the shores of the Nyanza Lake. Africa was difficult, but it was a happy time. Already, I miss it.”

  Burton nodded. They gave themselves over to memories and silent companionship, breathed garlicky fumes, and the hours passed.

  In a distant hallway, a grandfather clock chimed two.

  Movement roused Burton and Raghavendra; they had both fallen into a light doze. It was Isabel. She was sitting up, her eyes glazed and her face slack. She pushed the bedsheets back, swung her bare feet to the floor, and stood.

  “Isabel?” Burton asked.

  She didn’t answer or even acknowledge him.

  “Sleepwalking,” Sadhvi whispered.

  Burton jumped up, crossed to the door, turned the key in the lock, then pulled it out and stepped back.

  His fiancée swayed for a moment. She moaned softly, ran to the door, and pulled its handle. A whine of frustration escaped her. She tugged at it, twisted it, then fisted her hands and hammered them against the portal.

  Burton moved behind her and took her by the wrists. “Come away from there, darling.”

  She struggled and whimpered; clawed her fingers and tried to scratch at the door. He pulled her back from it. Sadhvi stepped in front, reached up, and entwined her fingers in Isabel’s.

  “Sleep, Isabel,” she murmured. “Go back to sleep.”

  Isabel slumped into Burton’s arms. He picked her up, carried her to the bed, and laid her down. She moved restlessly. He drew the sheets up to her neck and placed a hand on her forehead.

  She quietened and became still.

  Burton and Raghavendra returned to their chairs. The lamp flickered and dimmed slightly. Prickles ran up Burton’s spine. He checked his pistol, held it tightly, and whispered, “Do you feel it, Sadhvi?”

  “Yes,” she responded huskily. “A sense of—of—”

  “Dread.”

  She nodded mutely.

  Half an hour ticked by and, with every minute of it, the atmosphere in the bedchamber grew more strained, as if imbued with electricity, causing the hairs on Burton’s arms to stand upright.

  The flame in the lamp guttered and died.

  Burton got to his feet and put his gun on the chair. He took a box of lucifers from his pocket and struck one. It didn’t ignite. He tried another. Nothing.

  “Stay where you are, Sadhvi,” he said, retrieving the pistol.

  He walked to the window and pulled open the curtains. Moonlight streamed in. He slid up the sash, then frowned and ran his forefinger around the latch. It was broken. He hadn’t noticed that before.

  Burton leaned out of the window to see whether Swinburne, Monckton Milnes, Levi, or Steinhaueser were in sight. He immediately saw the latter lying motionless on the lawn, but this hardly registered before movement below the window attracted his attention. He looked down and saw a big, shadowy shape clinging to the wall like a lizard. A thick, black-clad arm reached from it, the white muscular hand at its end stretching out, the splayed fingers appearing to dig into the brickwork. The figure heaved itself up.

  As if from far away, Burton heard Sadhvi say, “Richard?”

  He couldn’t reply, couldn’t tear his eyes from the uncanny form.

  A face emerged from the dark hump, white in the moonlight, broad-featured, tousle-haired, with a flat nose and a wide, wickedly grinning mouth. The eyes were completely black.

  John Judge.

  Burton strained to move but it was like pushing through thick mud; his limbs were as heavy as lead.

  Mesmerism. Break free of it. You know how.

  He summoned a mantric formula and made a loop of it, mentally repeating it over and over, establishing a fast and complex rhythm. He visualised interlocking shapes, filling his mind with convoluted geometries; and while he was doing this, the awful figure on the wall climbed closer and closer, its eyes burrowing into him, transfixing him, pinning him like an insect to a board.

  Burton made an association: the hypnotic influence and the mantric chant were one and the same; the emanation from the creature below him was embodied in the serpentine designs he had visualised.

  He broke the rhythm, shattered the pattern, and threw off the influence.

  Leaning down out of the window, Burton pushed the barrel of his pistol against Judge’s forehead and pulled the trigger. The weapon emitted a futile click.

  Judge snatched it from his hand and threw it into the darkness. His arm swung forward and a gnarled fist caught the explorer on the point of the jaw. Burton’s knees buckled and he fell back across the windowsill into the bedchamber.

  With his senses swimming, he fought and failed to regain his feet. He was vaguely aware that Isabel was sitting up in bed again; that Sadhvi Raghavendra appeared to be paralysed in her chair; that the hulking body of John Judge was squeezing in through the window.

  Burton pushed himself upright, pulled the second pistol from his waistband, held it like a club, and faced his enemy. The mesmeric force continued to assault him, more compelling
even than that demonstrated by the Brahmins and Sufi masters who’d trained him.

  The fingers of Judge’s left hand closed over the front of Burton’s jacket and shirt. The king’s agent was hauled off his feet and into the air. He lashed out with the pistol. His foe swatted it out of his grip. Burton punched at the Irishman’s face. Judge weathered the storm for a moment then slapped him hard. Burton went limp.

  In a familiar oily tone comprised of innumerable synchronous voices, Judge said, “The stench of garlic, Burton? The extent of your knowledge impresses me. But I’m afraid it won’t work. John Judge was a good man and the reek stirs him enough to remind him of it, but he is already half-nosferatu and has lost the spirit to resist me. In the absence of willpower, even the most complete collection of virtues and talents is wholly worthless.”

  “Perdurabo,” Burton mumbled. “‘I will endure to the end.’”

  “As indeed I shall.”

  The massive figure lowered Burton to the ground and released him. The explorer bunched his fists but knew it would be useless to fight. John Judge was simply too powerful to take on. Better to get as much information out of him as possible while he waited for Swinburne and the others to discover Steinhaueser. Then, perhaps together they could find a way to overpower the intruder.

  “You really don’t remember me?” Perdurabo asked. “It is such a pity. That, however, is the nature of existence; all the diverse versions of ourselves, the slowly fragmenting mechanisms of Time, the breakdown of natural laws.” He smiled nastily. “It is glorious!”

  Judge looked to his left, at Sadhvi Raghavendra sitting entranced; to his right, at Isabel, who’d fallen back onto her pillow, her glazed eyes fixed on him; then back at Burton.

  “I intend to take these women from you, Burton; to wound you so deeply, you’ll be immobilised by your suffering. And while you wallow in self-pity, I shall make my move and defeat the power that has blocked my path in so many different histories. When that is achieved, I shall come for you. I will take you into the future with me, into the new world I shall build, a world in which the only law is: Do what thou wilt.”

  He likes the sound of his own voice. Keep him talking.

  “Why?” Burton asked. “Why am I of any significance?”

  “Because I regard you as my predecessor, and because you, of all people, possess insight enough to understand my motives. Nevertheless, if I allowed it, you would try to stop me. Therefore, I shall not allow it. But once I am done, only you will properly appreciate the results. I am a narcissist, Burton. I confess to it. And I want your approval—that is the depth of my respect for you.”

  “You’ll not get it.”

  Perdurabo shrugged. “Then let us not waste further time in discussion. Sleep.”

  A crushing weariness descended upon the explorer. He fought it—tried to use his Sufi training to again break the mesmeric spell—but this time it was too strong.

  He collapsed to his knees, toppled forward, and was unconscious before he hit the floor.

  An immeasurable period of nothingness.

  A hammering on the door.

  Trounce. Why does he never ring the blessed bell?

  He opened his eyes and saw the rug beside his face, and beyond it, the floorboards and the gap at the bottom of the door. There were feet on the other side of it. Fists pounding on wood. Voices shouting his name.

  With his mind muddled and the room spinning around him, he crawled to the portal, fumbled the key from his pocket, clumsily slid it into the lock, and twisted it until he heard the latch click. He fell back, struggling to get to his feet as Henry Arundell, Doctor Bird, Swinburne, Monckton Milnes, and Levi burst in.

  Swinburne helped him to stand. “I saw him!” the poet panted. “But he ran into the darkness and I lost sight of the blighter.”

  “Are you all right?” Monckton Milnes asked.

  Burton grunted an affirmation. He saw Eliphas Levi bent over Sadhvi Raghavendra. She was collapsed across the side of her chair, the ends of her long hair touching the floor.

  An anguished moan came from Arundell. Burton looked to the bed and felt the blood drain from his face. Isabel’s father was kneeling, his face buried in the sheets, his hands clutching his daughter’s.

  “I don’t understand,” Doctor Bird said. “How can it be? There’s no reason for it. No cause.”

  Burton sagged against Monckton Milnes. “No reason for what?” he asked, an awful presentiment making his voice thin and hoarse.

  Bird’s eyes met his. They were steeped in sorrow.

  “I’m sorry, Sir Richard. I am so sorry. Isabel is dead.”

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  Sir Richard Francis Burton stood at a window in the smoking room, facing the black night. Clouds had concealed the moon, and the darkness made the glass reflective. In it, he saw Sir Richard Francis Burton glaring back at him, vague and ghostlike but for the eyes, which burned with an accusatory fire.

  He’d left the family upstairs, gathered around Isabel. The screams and wails of her mother, heard throughout the house for the past two hours, had finally dwindled to an occasional cry of despair, but they still echoed loudly in the explorer’s mind. Probably, they always would.

  He stared at his translucent other.

  A different me in a different world, where Isabel might still be alive.

  But you are in this one, where she is not.

  And it is my fault.

  His fault.

  Perdurabo had been unequivocal: I intend to break your spirit and drive you to your knees. The statement, made via a medium, had felt as intangible to Burton as every other aspect of the affair—mysterious abductions; his supposed presence at The Assassination; the Mad Marquess’s vision; the bifurcation of Time; Abdu El Yezdi. All of it was fantastical, and he’d approached it just as he’d approached Africa, as an observer of the unfathomable, a man willing to explore and investigate but who employed a shield of sullenness and cynicism to create an emotional distance, for exploration and anthropology demand a surveyor and the surveyed, and never the twain shall meet, else scientific credibility is lost. Burton felt comfortable with such a conceptual separation. Too comfortable. He had applied it to every aspect of his life.

  Except Isabel.

  Only she had seen past his caustically sardonic front. Only she had realised that his detachment was born not from analytical necessity but from resentment, the resentment born of uncertainty, and his uncertainty born of an upbringing that had ill-prepared him for the complex protocols of British society.

  She had saved him.

  She had anchored him in reality.

  And now she was dead, and this reality was just one of many.

  More than one world.

  More than one Isabel.

  He looked at his nebulous reflection and whispered, “I shall find you. Somehow, I shall find you.”

  Was he addressing her? Or himself? He didn’t know.

  In the glass, he saw the door open behind him. An ill-defined memory squirmed uncomfortably, causing him to whip around and raise his hands defensively, but rather than Laurence Oliphant, it was Levi, Swinburne, and Monckton Milnes who stepped into the room.

  “Mon Dieu!” Levi announced. “These Sisters of the Noble Benevolence, they fill me with wonder. Perdurabo, he feed much on the volonté of Mademoiselle Raghavendra, but still a small flame of life remain, and it grow more strong tr
ès rapidement. She is not strigoi morti.” He pulled the calabash from his pocket and stuffed tobacco into it. “Doctor Bird, he rub brandy on her lips, gums, and inner wrists, and she wake a little and say she must go into deep sleep now, to recover. She is cold and her pulse very slow, but I think she know what to do to make herself better.”

  The Frenchman moved over to the fireplace, leaned against the mantel, and lit his pipe. He drew on it and exhaled a thick, billowing cloud, through which he peered at Burton. “The night has been long, Sir Richard, but when the daylight come—” He glanced back at a clock by his shoulder. It was half-past five in the morning. “Then we must hunt again for the nosferatu.”

  Swinburne threw out his hands. “Where? Where? We’ve already searched high and low.”

  “The ravens,” Burton said. His voice was flat and emotionless.

  “Ah, oui!” Levi exclaimed. He addressed Swinburne and Monckton Milnes. “Sir Richard suggest they gather around John Judge to be near Perdurabo, who inhabit the body but is not secure within it. I think he is correct.”

  “The old castle, then?” Monckton Milnes said. He looked at Burton. “But you’ve been there twice.”

  Swinburne nodded. “We explored every part of it.”

  “And obviously missed something,” Burton said.

  Levi loosed another plume of smoke into the room. “So. At midday, when the Beast is the most weak, we go there.”

  “And if we find him, we shoot him?” Monckton Milnes asked.

  “Non. To destroy a nosferatu, there are méthodes spécifiques, but I will not talk of them now, for they are not pleasant, and we must sleep for an hour or two, if we can, non? Best not to have the nightmares, I think.”

  “It strikes me that we’re already caught up in one,” Monckton Milnes responded. “But, yes, you’re right. I’m all done in.” He pushed himself to his feet and crossed to Burton, taking him by the elbow. “Come on, old man. I’ll see you to your room. If you can’t sleep, you can at least rest a while.”

  Mutely, Burton allowed himself to be guided out of the room, up the stairs, and into his bedchamber, where he sagged down onto the mattress and looked up at his friend. He whispered, “I have nothing now. Nothing.”