The Compleat Crow

  'To Oxford?'

  'Yes, into the very lion's den, as it were. In the morning I found a suitable hotel and garaged my car, and a little later I telephoned Magruser.'

  'Just like that?' Again I was astonished. 'You telephoned him?'

  'No, not just like that at all,' he answered. 'First I ordered and waited for the arrival of a taxi. I dared not use my Mercedes for fear that by now he knew both the car and its number.' He smiled tiredly at me. 'You are beginning to see just how important numbers really are, eh, Henri?'

  I nodded. 'But please go on. You said you phoned him?'

  'I tried the plant first and got the switchboard, and was told that Mr Magruser was at home and could not be disturbed. I said that it was important, that I had tried his home number and was unable to obtain him, and that I must be put through to him at once.'

  'And they fell for that? Had you really tried his home number?'

  'No, it's not listed. And to physically go near his estate would be sheer lunacy, for surely the place would be heavily guarded.'

  'But then they must have seen through your ruse,' I argued. 'If his number was ex-directory, how could you possibly tell them that you knew it?'

  Again Crow smiled. 'If I was the fellow I pretended to be, I would know it,' he answered.

  I gasped. 'Your friend from the ministry! You used his name.'

  'Of course,' said Crow. 'And now we see again the importance of names, eh, my friend? Well, I was put through and eventually Magruser spoke to me, but I knew that it was him before ever he said a word. The very sound of his breathing came to me like exhalations from a tomb! "This is Magruser," he said, his voice full of suspicion. "Who is speaking?"

  "Oh, I think you know me, Sturm Magruser, answered. "Even as I know your

  V

  'There was a sharp intake of breath. Then: "Mr Titus Crow," he said You are a most resourceful man. Where are you?"

  ' 'On my way to see you, Magruser," I answered. ' "And when may I expect you?"

  "Sooner than you think. I have your number!"

  'At that he -gasped again and slammed the 'phone down; and now I would discover whether or not my preliminary investigation stood me in good stead. Now, too, I faced the most danger-fraught moments of the entire business.

  'Henri, if you had been Magruser, what would you do?'

  'Me? Why, I'd stay put, surrounded by guards - and they'd have orders to shoot you on sight as a dangerous intruder.'

  'And what if I should come with more armed men than you? And would your guards, if they were ordinary chaps, obey that sort of order in the first place? How could you be sure to avoid any encounter with me?'

  I frowned and considered it. 'I'd put distance between us, get out of the country, and—'

  'Exactly!' Crow said. 'Get out of the country.'

  I saw his meaning. 'The private airstrip inside his plant?'

  'Of course, Crow nodded. 'Except I had ensured that I was closer to the plant than he was. It would take me fifteen to twenty minutes to get there by taxi. Magruser would need between five and ten minutes more than that . . .

  'As for the plant itself — proudly displaying its sign, Magruser Systems, UK — it was large, set in expansive grounds and surrounded by a high, patrolled wire fence. The only entrance was from the main road and boasted an electrically operated barrier and a small guard-room sort of building, to house the security man. All this I saw as I paid my taxi fare and approached the barrier.

  'As I suspected, the guard came out to meet me, demanding to know my name and business. He was not armed that I could see, but he was big and heavy. I told him I was MOD and that I had to see Mr Magruser.

  "'Sorry, sir," he answered. "There must be a bit of a flap on. I've just had orders to let no one in, not even pass-holders. Anyway, Mr Magruser's at home."

  ' "No, he's not," I told him, "he's on his way here right now, and I'm to meet him at the gate."

  ' "I suppose that'll be all right then, sir," he answered, "just as long as you don't want to go in."

  'I walked over to the guard-room with him. While we were talking, I kept covert watch on the open doors of a hangar spied between buildings and installations. Even as I watched, a light aircraft taxied into the open and mechanics began running to and fro, readying it for flight. I was also watching the road, plainly visible from the guard-room window, and at last was rewarded by the sight of Magruser's car speeding into view a quarter-mile away.

  'Then I produced my handgun.'

  'What?' I cried. 'If all else failed you planned to shoot him?'

  'Not at all. Oh, I might have tried it, I suppose, but I

  doubt if a bullet could have killed him. No, the gun had another purpose to serve, namely the control of any merely human adversary'

  'Such as the security man?'

  'Correct. I quickly relieved him of his uniform jacket and hat, gagged him and locked him in, a small back room. Then, to make absolutely certain, I drove the butt of my weapon through the barrier's control panel, effectively ruining it. By this time Magruser's car was turning off the road into the entrance, and of course it stopped at the lowered barrier. There was Magruser, sitting on my side and in the front passenger seat, and in the back a pair of large young men who were plainly bodyguards.

  'I pulled my, hat down over my eyes, went out of the guard-room and up to the car, and as I had prayed Magruser himself wound down his window. He stuck out his hand, made imperative, flapping motions, said,' "Fool! I wish to be in. Get the barrier—"

  But at that moment I grabbed and held onto his arm, lowered my face to his and said, "Sturm Magruser, I know you – and I know your number!"

  ' "What? What?" he whispered – and his eyes went wide in terror as he recognized me.

  'Then I told him his number, and as his bodyguards leapt from the car and dragged me away from him, he waved them back. "Leave him be," he said, for it's too late now." And he favoured me with such a look as I shall never forget. Slowly he got out of the car, leaning heavily upon the door, facing me. "That is only half my number," he said, "but sufficient to destroy me.- Do you know the rest of it?"

  'And I told him- the rest of it.

  'What little colour he had drained completely from

  him and it was as if a light had gone out behind his eyes. He would have collapsed if his men hadn't caught and supported him, seating him back in the car. And all the time his eyes were on my face, his pink and scarlet eyes which had started to bleed.

  "A very resourceful man," he croaked then, and, "So little time." To his driver he said, "Take me home . ."

  'Even as they drove away I saw him slump down in his seat, saw his head fall on one side. He did not recover.'

  After a long moment I asked, 'And you got away from that place?' I could think of nothing else to say, and my mouth had gone very dry.

  `Who was to stop me?' Crow replied. 'Yes, I got away, and returned here. Now you know it all.'

  'I know it,' I answered, wetting my lips, 'but I still don't understand it. Not yet. You must tell me how you—'

  'No, Henri.' He stretched and yawned mightily 'The rest is for you to find out. You know his name and you have the means to discover his number. The rest should be fairly simple. As for me: I shall sleep for two hours, then we shall take a drive in my car for one hour; following which we shall pay, as it were, our last respects to Sturm Magruser V.'

  Crow was good as his word. He slept, awakened, breakfasted and drove — while I did nothing but rack my brains and pore over the problem he had set me. And by the time we approached our destination I believed I had most of the answers.

  Standing on the pavement outside the gardens of a quiet country crematorium between Landon and Oxford, we gazed in through spiked iron railings across plots and head-stones at the pleasant-seeming, tall-chimneyed building which was the House of Repose, and I for one wondered what words had been spoken over Magruser. As we had arrived, Magruser's cortege, a single hearse, had left. So far as we were aware,
none had remained to join us in paying 'our last respects'.

  Now; while we waited, I told Crow, 'I think I have the answers.'

  Tilting his head on one side in that old-fashioned way of his, he said, `Go on.'

  'First his name, I began. 'Sturm Magruser V. The name Sturm reveals something of the nature of his familiar winds, the dust-devils you've mentioned as watching over his interests. Am I right?'

  Crow nodded. 'I have already allowed you that, yes,' he said.

  'His full name stumped me for a little while, however, I admitted, 'for it has only thirteen letters. Then I remembered the "V", symbolic for the figure five. That makes eighteen, a double nine. Now, you said Hitler had been a veritable Angel of Death with his 99999. . . which would seem to make Magruser the very Essence of Death itself!'

  'Oh? How so?'

  'His birth and death dates,' I reminded. 'The 1st April 1921, and 4th March 1964. They, too, add up to forty-five, which, if you include the number of his name, gives Magruser 9999999. Seven nines!' And I gave myself a mental pat on the back.

  After a little while Crow said, 'Are you finished?' And from the tone of his voice I knew there was a great deal I had overlooked.

  VI

  I sighed and admitted: 'I can't see what else there could be.'

  'Look!' Crow said, causing me to start.

  I followed his pointing finger to where a black-robed figure had stepped out onto the patio of the House of Repose. The bright wintry sun caught his white collar and made it a burning band about his neck. At chest height he carried a bowl, and began to march out through the garden with measured tread. I fancied I could hear the quiet murmur of his voice carrying on the still air, his words a chant or prayer.

  'Magruser's mortal remains,' said Crow, and he automatically doffed his hat. Bare-headed, I simply stood and watched.

  'Well,' I said after a moment or two, 'where did my calculations go astray?'

  Crow shrugged. 'You missed several important points, that's all. Magruser was a "black magician" of sorts, wouldn't you say? With his demonic purpose on Earth and his "familiar winds", as you call them? We may rightly suppose so; indeed the Persian word "magu" or "magus" means magician. Now then, if you remove Magus from his name, what are you left with?'

  `Why' I quickly worked it out, 'with R, E, R. Oh, yes and with V.'

  'Let us rearrange them and say we are left with R, E, V and R,' said Crow. And he repeated, 'R, E, V and R. Now then, as you yourself pointed out, there are thirteen letters in the man's name. Very well, let us look at—'

  'Rev. 13!' I cut him off. 'And the family Bible you had on your desk. But wait! You've ignored the other R.'

  Crow stared at me in silence for a moment. 'Not at all,' he finally said, 'for R is the eighteenth letter of the alphabet. And thus Magruser, when he changed his name by deed-poll, revealed himself!'

  Now I understood, and now I gasped in awe at this man I presumed to call friend, the vast intellect which was Titus Crow. For clear in my mind I could read it all in the eighteenth verse of the thirteenth chapter of the Book of Revelations.

  Crow saw knowledge written in my dumbfounded face and nodded. 'His birthdate, Henri, adds up to eighteen — 666, the Number of the Beast!'

  'And his ten factories in seven countries,' I gasped. 'The ten horns upon his seven heads! And the Beast in Revelations rose up out of the sea!'

  'Those things, too,' Crow grimly nodded.

  'And his death date, 999!'

  Again, his nod and, when he saw that I was finished: 'But most monstrous and frightening of all, my friend, his very name — which, if you read it in reverse order—'

  'Wh-what?' I stammered. But in another moment my mind reeled and my mouth fell open.

  'Resurgam!'

  'Indeed,' and he gave his curt nod. 'I shall rise again!'

  Beyond the spiked iron railings the priest gave a sharp little cry and dropped the bowl, which shattered and spilled its contents. Spiralling winds, coming from nowhere, took up the ashes and bore them away.. .

  THE BLACK RECALLED

  CROW HAS GONE, dweller now in Elysia. Nothing now remains of him in this earth.

  Or does it . . ?

  [NOTE to this ebook: the paper original from which this ebook was derived was owned by a rare and accomplished psychic, Magus, Adept, and Ipsissimus. He had turned down one page in this volume, for use in future reference to that part of the book, of special relevance to him regarding meaning and reality of the Cthulhu Cycle Deities.]

  `Do you remember Gedney?' Geoffrey Arnold asked of his companion Ben Gifford, as they stood on the weed-grown gravel drive before a shattered, tumbled pile of masonry whose outlines roughly suggested a once-imposing, sprawling dwelling. A cold November wind blew about the two men, tugging at their overcoats, and an equally chilly moon was just beginning to rise over the near-distant London skyline.

  'Remember him?' Gifford answered after a moment. 'How could I forget him? Isn't that why we chose to meet here tonight - to remember him? Well, I certainly do - I remember fearing him mightily! But not as much as I feared this chap,' and he nodded his head toward the nettle- and weed-sprouting ruin.

  'Titus Crow?' said Arnold. 'Yes, well, we've all had reason to fear him in our time - but moreso after Gedney. Actually, it was Crow who kept me underground all those years, keeping a low profile, as it were When I picked up the reins from Gedney - became "chairman" of the society, so to speak, "donned the Robes of Office" - it seemed prudent to be even more careful. Let's face it, we hadn t really been aware that such as Crow existed. But at the same time it has to be admitted that old Gedney really stuck his neck out And Crow.. . well, he was probably one of the world's finest headsmen!'

  'Our mutual enemy,' Gifford nodded, 'and yet ,here we pay him homage!' He turned down the corners of his mouth and still somehow summoned a sardonic grin. 'Or is it that we've come to make sure he is in fact dead, eh?'

  'Dead?' Arnold answered, and shrugged. 'I suppose he is - but they never did find his body. Neither his nor de Marigny's.'

  'Oh, I think it's safe to say he's dead,' Gifford nodded. 'Anyway, he's eight years gone, disappeared, and that's good enough for me. They took him, and when they take you . . . well, you stay taken.'

  'They? The CCD, you mean? The Cthulhu Cycle Deities? Well, that's what we've all suspected, but—'

  'Fact!' Gifford cut him short. 'Crow was one of their worst enemies, too, you know . .

  Arnold shuddered - entirely from the chill night air - and buttoned the top button of his coat just under his chin. Gifford took out and lighted a cigarette, the flame of his lighter flickeringly illuminating his own and Arnold's faces where they stood in what had once been the garden of Blowne House, residence of the white wizard, Titus Crow.

  Arnold was small, thin-faced, his pale skin paper-thin and his ears large and flat to his head. He seemed made of candle wax, but his eyes were bright with an unearthly mischief, a malicious evil. Gifford was huge - bigger than Arnold remembered him from eight years earlier - tall and overweight; his heavy jowls were pock-marked in a face lined, roughened and made coarse by a life of unnatural excesses.

  'Let's walk,' the smaller man finally said. 'Let's see, one last time, if we can't somehow resolve our differences, come to an agreement. I mean, when all's said and done, we do both serve the same Master.' They turned away from the ruined house, whose stone chimney stack, alone intact, poked at the sky like a skeleton finger. Beyond the garden, both lost in their own thoughts, they followed a path across the heath.

  Arnold's mind had returned again to that morning eight years ago when, greatly daring, he had come to Leonard's-Walk Heath and passed himself off as a friend and colleague of Crow, actually assisting the police in their search of the ruins. For on the previous night Blowne House had suffered, a ferocious assault - a `localized freak storm' of unprecedented fury - which had quite literally torn the place to pieces. Of Titus Crow and his friend Henri-Laurent de Marigny, no slightest trace; but of
the occultist's books and papers, remains aplenty! And these were the main reason Geoffrey Arnold was there, the magnet which had lured him to Blowne House. He had managed to steal certain documents and secrete them away with him; later he had discovered among them Crow's notes on The Black, that manifestation of Yibb-Tstll which years earlier Crow had turned back upon Arnold's one-time coven-master, James D. Gedney, to destroy him.

  Yibb-Tstll, yes ...

  Ben Gifford's mind also centred upon that dark, undimensioned god of lightless infinities - his mind and more than his mind - and he too remembered James Gedney and the man's use and misuse of black magic and powers born of alien universes. Power_s which had rebounded in the end.

  In those days Gifford and Arnold had been senior members of Gedney's cult or coven. And they had prospered under the man's tutelage and had shared his ill-gotten gains as avidly as they had partaken of his dark rites and demoniac practices. For Gedney had been no mere dabbler; his studies had taken him to all the world's strange places, from which he rarely returned empty-handed. All the lore of elder earth lay in books, Gedney had claimed, and certainly his occult library had been second to none. But his power sprang from the way in which he understood and used those books.

  It was as if, in James Gedney, a power had been born to penetrate even the blackest veils of myth and -mysticism; an ability to take the merest fragments of time-lost lore and weave them into working spells and enchantments; a masterly erudition in matters of linguistics and cryptography, which would unlock for him even the most carefully hidden charm or secret of the old mages, those wizards and necromancers long passed into dust, whose legacy lay in Gedney's decades-assembled library.

  And uppermost in Gedney's itinerary of research and study had been the pantheon of Cthulhu and the star-spawned Old Ones, lords and masters of this Earth in its prime, before the advent of mere man and before the dinosaurs themselves. For in those ages before memory Cthulhu and his spawn had come down from strange stars to a largely inchoate, semi-plastic Earth and built their cities here, and they had been the greatest magicians of all!