Faerie Tale

  Gloria asked, “Nothing dangerous, is there?” She was obviously thinking of the boys.

  Mark thought a minute, then said, “Possibly. But I don’t think so. At any rate, as long as we don’t spread news of this find around, we should be okay.”

  “Mark,” said Gloria, “I don’t like this. What’s going on?”

  Mark glanced at Gary, and the younger man shrugged. Mark chewed silently a moment, then said, “I don’t really know. I’ve told you a little about what I know about Kessler and his lot back in Germany, and all the strange things that were going on at that time. It may be … there may be some interest in all this. That’s why I want to keep quiet. I’ll have a better idea of what’s going on after we finish here.”

  “How long will that take?” asked Phil.

  “We’ve about finished the rough catalog. There’re less than a dozen documents to record. Then we get to open the banker’s box and count letters. Then I can start translating the German and French”—he grinned—“while Gary gets headaches with the Pahlavi and the others.”

  Gary said, “I’ll start with something less exotic, then work my way up to the Pahlavi. I’ll have to run back to the house and find my linguistic references. I hope I can remember where I put them.”

  “Most of your college texts are on the lowest shelf behind my desk.”

  Gary nodded, finished his sandwich, and said, “I’ll go now.”

  “Good,” answered Mark. “Gabbie and Jack could help me. If you don’t mind,” he directed toward them. “No,” said Gabbie.

  “Sure,” said Jack. Both seemed pleased to be included.

  Finishing his sandwich, Mark killed off the last of his lemonade and said, “Well, let’s go.” Seeing Gloria’s concerned expression, he reached out and touched her arm. Looking her in the eyes, he said, “There’s nothing dangerous about this, Gloria.”

  She returned his look and slowly nodded. She turned away to clean the table as Phil returned to the study and Gabbie and Jack headed toward the basement.

  As he left the kitchen, Mark wondered if Gloria could tell he was lying.

  9

  The last document from the shelves was a rolled-up light vellum. Mark had Jack and Gabbie hold the large sheet flat while he photographed it. Speaking into the recorder, he said, “Document 136: a single sheet of what appears to be vellum, measuring”—Gabbie had the tape out and she and Jack quickly measured, giving Mark the dimensions—“twenty-four by thirty inches.” He knelt to study the vellum. “No writing apparent. Seven lines, in staggered order, placed along the edges to the right as photographed. A single line from the bottom at approximately a 60-degree angle to the bottom running … seven inches, then turning to approximately 250 degrees to the original angle, running for eleven and seven-eighths inches. The line ends in a circle of less than a half inch in diameter. Three marks are clustered in the upper left corner. A line runs in a tightening coil from the circle to a larger circle”—he counted—“encompassing nine full turns counterclockwise before terminating. The nature of this document is not apparent.”

  He had them roll it back up and said, “Well, that does it. Now we can begin translating.” He smiled, obviously pleased with the finding. “Let’s take a short break until Gary gets back.”

  Over coffee in the kitchen, Mark said, “I think we’ll have the answers we’ve been looking for. I can almost feel it within reach.” He seemed both pleased and disturbed.

  “What exactly got you started on this thing?” asked Gabbie.

  Mark thought back. “About ten years ago, I was doing work on a book about secret societies; it never got written in the end. I couldn’t get a publisher, because two similar books had bombed. Anyway, I was digging around for some stuff in Germany, in Münster—where a secret society called the Holy Vehm had operated in the late fifteenth century—when I chanced across some letters from a Catholic priest in Ulm, which is near Stuttgart, dated October 1903. The priest he wrote to in Münster was a friend from his seminary days. The letters were misfiled in the archives of the local diocese and probably should have been buried deep in a Vatican vault. They told of some ‘trials’ and hinted at execution. The priest in Ulm was deeply disturbed by both the events taking place in his parish and the Church’s reaction. That was the first hint I had that something very unusual had taken place in the south of Germany at the turn of the century.

  “What I’ve been able to piece together is pretty much what I told Phil and Gloria before: All sorts of pagan practices were revived.” He fell silent for a minute. “People were returning to a set of beliefs rooted in Gotho-Germanic culture and myth, some involving primitive rites centered on the worship of the White Goddess: much like the druidic practices of ancient Britain. From what I could discover, it got pretty bizarre for a while. There were hints of terrible things … even, possibly, human sacrifice.” Again there was a moment’s reflection, as if he was uncertain what he should say next. Then he relaxed and said, “It fired my imagination. I’ve since worked on other projects over the years, but always had it in the back of mind that one day I’d find out what the hell went on back in Germany eighty-five years ago.” He smiled in recollection. “When I finished my book on voodoo two years ago I decided to take a vacation. I guess my subconscious was at work, for I picked Germany. I did the Oktoberfest in Munich, then wandered over to Ulm to poke around. Again I got lucky. I couldn’t get a thing out of the local Catholic or Lutheran church records, but I found a little bit in the archives of the local paper about a group of local businessmen who had suddenly departed for the States, Canada, and Africa. That’s what put me on to Kessler and his cronies.” He shook his head. “Whatever they were involved in, they took great pains to cover their tracks, and some records were lost in both world wars. I couldn’t even get agreement from story to story on how many men were in … whatever they were in. Sometimes it was as many as twenty, sometimes as few as ten. And they changed names—even nationalities along the way, if they could.

  “I chased three others of that group to dead ends, losing track of one in Alberta, Canada, another in New South Wales, Australia, and the third in what was then German East Africa. Then I followed Kessler. If I’d picked old Fredrick first, who knows? I might have uncovered some of this stuff earlier. But it doesn’t matter now.” There seemed to be some hidden meaning in those words, and Gabbie was about to comment on his mood when Mark pressed on. “When I came back from Germany, I spent a few weeks in New York, called Gary back from Seattle, and moved to Pittsville. We started poking around after news of old Fredrick Kessler, trying to uncover the truth. And at last it looks like it just may happen.”

  Gary returned, carrying three large books under one arm and several more in a book bag in the other hand. “Well, I may not be able to decipher those scrolls, but I’m as equipped as I’ll ever be.”

  Mark put down his cup of coffee. “Good; let’s get started.”

  10

  Gloria stuck her head through the basement door and said, “Mark! Are you two going to work all night?”

  Mark looked up from where he sat with open notebook, translating one of Kessler’s books, and glanced at his watch. “It’s after eight?”

  “Yes. You’ve worked straight through dinner.” Mark recalled her announcing it and his saying he’d be up, then proceeding to forget to eat. “Aggie’s here, and getting ready to go home. Why don’t you two call it a day and come up for a bite and a nightcap?”

  Gary stood slowly, limbering joints stiff from sitting on a concrete floor, and said, “I’ll second that.”

  In a few minutes they had put the basement in order, even to the point of closing and locking the door to the secret room.

  Upstairs, Phil offered both a brandy and Gloria gave them plates of reheated dinner. Gary asked, “Where are Gabbie and Jack?”

  Phil shrugged, but Aggie said, “Over at my house, I expect.”

  Phil sipped his drink, then said, “Well, we’re dying to know what you’ve un
covered.”

  Mark and Gary exchanged glances and Mark said, between mouthfuls, “I’d prefer to dig deeper before I make any guesses about what we’ve found.”

  Gloria took him by the arm and steered him to a chair. Sitting him down, she said, “But you’re with friends, so you don’t need to worry about having to retract later what you say now, and if you don’t share, I’ll bop you one over the head with the biggest book down there.” Her bantering manner did little to disguise her concern.

  Mark smiled as he held up a hand in a defensive posture. “All right, I give.” His smile slowly faded as he paused; at last he said, “I’ve got a pretty wild idea.” He glanced at Gary, who seemed content to follow his lead. “But keep in mind we may have to modify our theories as we go. It may turn out Kessler was someone like us who was investigating, something like an amateur historian.”

  “Who hides his work in a secret room?” scoffed Aggie. Gary said, “A paranoid amateur historian?” They laughed, then Gloria said, “So what’s your wild story, boys?”

  Mark said, “I’ve only managed to translate a part of one book—we’re skimming to get the sense of these things, not being particularly exhaustive. But it seems all those books and scrolls are related to some sort of … tradition.”

  “Tradition?” said Phil. “I don’t understand.”

  “Maybe a religion of some sort, a cult. Remember I was investigating secret societies when I stumbled across the letter that first began all this. Anyway, if Kessler and his cronies were responsible for, or at least involved with, all the weird business in Germany at the turn of the century, then that was only part of something much larger.”

  “Can you be more specific?” said Aggie, obviously fascinated.

  “Not until we’ve spent several weeks translating. Some of those documents, if authentic, date back a long time.”

  “How long?” asked Phil.

  Gary said, “Those Pahlavi scrolls to the eighth, maybe seventh century. A couple of the Greek are … maybe centuries older. Maybe as far back as first century B.C.”

  “Is there a problem with condition?” asked Gloria. “I’ve read those old scrolls can crumble.”

  “No,” said Mark. “These are in surprisingly good condition. Someone’s ensured they were stored well. If you check that room in the basement, I think you’ll find it’s been insulated against cold and dampness. Also … they may be copies, not originals. We’d need the equipment to test the materials—parchment fibers, ink or whatever they used to write with—to be sure. But since they’re that old, we’re running into the usual problems with ancient documents: scribes who misspell, who have their own little shorthand, or who use provincial dialect. The chance of screwing up is pretty high.” He sighed, started to speak, halted, then started again. “Phil, I don’t like saying this, but … I would think it best to keep this secret for a while longer.”

  “You said something earlier,” said Gloria. “Would you mind elaborating?”

  Mark said, “I … I’m not sure, but it’s possible someone”—his hand swept about in a general gesture—“might be interested in all this.”

  “If those documents are as old as you seem to think,” interjected Aggie, “I’m sure any number of historians would be interested.”

  Mark shook his head. “No, I mean someone might be interested in keeping things hushed up.” He put aside his now empty dinner plate and sipped a brandy.

  Gloria looked upset. “Do you—”

  Mark interrupted. “Probably not. I’m saying ‘just in case,’ and I can’t emphasize that enough. Don’t get worried over this until we know for certain.”

  Aggie shrugged. “Mysterious Mark Blackman.”

  Mark seemed on the edge of a sharp retort, then said, “Sorry. I’m tired. Really, I don’t think there’s anything to worry about. Let’s just say I’m being overly cautious, okay?”

  Phil said, “Okay by me. I’d rather take it slowly anyway. I’ve a book to finish, and a house full of historians would be a little disruptive.”

  Gary drank his coffee and said, “It’s going to be a while before we know exactly what we’ve got here, anyway. I’m cracking this Russian thing, a church letter, from down around the Black Sea somewhere, and it keeps referring to things the reader’s supposed to know about. I get phrases like ‘I agree with your conclusion,’ and I don’t have a hint what that’s about. I hope the letter that the writer’s answering will be there, so I know what he’s agreeing to.” His bantering, pained tone made them all laugh.

  “Do you find a lot of stuff like that in this sort of work?” asked Phil.

  “We don’t usually do this sort of work. There’re centuries of collecting in your basement,” said Gary. “There’s stuff from all over the world. We’ve got letters, scrolls, books written in Hebrew, classical Latin, Church Latin, ancient Greek, Old High German, Middle High German, Middle English, others I don’t even know what they are, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, or some mix of Asian languages. At some point we’re going to have to farm some of this out to experts, people who can get the translations right.” He looked knowingly at Mark. “Soon.”

  Mark shook his head no. “Not until we have an overall sense of how this stuff is likely to fit into a larger pattern, how it all hooks together. There’s some central core of … something here.

  “If we were archaeologists from the future, and we blundered into part of a library, we might struggle for years before we figured out that the only things the section we found had in common was that the authors were listed alphabetically. Or we might hit nonfiction and find the section on contemporary politics. Those books, scrolls, and letters are about something. Once we discover what that something is, a cult, religion, secret government organization, whatever, then we’ll get into the detail stuff.”

  Aggie rose. “Well then, I’m for home.”

  Mark and Gary agreed it was past quitting time, and bade Phil and Gloria good night as well. They walked Aggie to her car, then followed her out the driveway.

  As Mark’s car pulled away, Phil said, “Secret societies, huh?”

  Gloria was quiet, then said, “And weird documents. It’s all kind of scary, somehow.”

  Phil looked at his wife. “Scary? I would have said exciting. And there’s still the question of the gold. Maybe that wasn’t such a story after all.”

  Almost sarcastically, Gloria said, “Want to get a shovel and go look for buried treasure?”

  Grabbing his wife playfully, he swung her about and said, “Got all the treasure I want right here.” He kissed her, slipping his hand down to squeeze her rump. Gloria remained tense, not returning Phil’s playful affection. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

  Gloria put her head on Phil’s shoulder. “Mark’s lying to us, Phil. He’s been covering something up since he set eyes on the room.”

  Phil looked down at his wife. “Aren’t you making a bit much of this? Aggie told us Mark likes to keep quiet on his work. He’s even said he doesn’t like talking about it. He’s just being cautious.”

  Gloria sighed. “Maybe you’re right.” But she knew he wasn’t.

  11

  Gloria hung up the phone. “That was Mark.”

  Phil, sitting behind his desk, looked to where his wife stood in the hallway and said, “What’s up?”

  “He’s flying out to New York tonight. He says they’ve hit a wall, so they’re going to consult with some people. Gary’s taking copies of some of the more exotic stuff to his friends at the University of Washington and Mark’s going to talk to some people he knows at NYU.”

  Phil was alerted to an odd note in his wife’s voice. “Something worrying you, hon?”

  Gloria stood hugging herself and shook her head as if clearing it. “No, I don’t think so. It’s just.…”

  “What?”

  “I don’t know, but I had the strangest feeling when Mark hung up that … that I’d never hear from him again.”

  Phil began a quip, then stopped himself as he
realized that his wife was really disturbed. He rose and went over to her. “Hey, Irish, what is this?” he said softly, taking her into his arms and holding her gently.

  “You haven’t called me that in years,” she said. She rested her head on his chest. “It’s just a cold feeling.”

  Phil hesitated a moment, then reached around his wife and picked up the phone. He dialed as Gloria said, “What?”

  “Wait.” The phone at the other end rang, then was picked up. Phil said, “Mark, Phil. When are you leaving?” An answer came, and Phil said, “Well, look. Why don’t you and Gary both come by, then we’ll all drive up to Buffalo together for dinner? Then we’ll hang out with Gary in the airport bar until his plane leaves. That way he won’t have to sit around the terminal by himself for two hours. And you won’t get stuck for long-term parking fees. No, no trouble. We’d enjoy it.” He hung up.

  Gloria said, “What was that?”

  “Mark’s plane leaves at ten tonight and Gary’s catching the red-eye at midnight. And this way you can shake that feeling you’ll never see Mark again.” He glanced at his watch. “You can see him in about two hours. He’ll be here at five.”

  Gloria smiled. “Thanks.”

  “For what?”

  “For not making fun.”

  He shrugged off the remark as the door in the kitchen banged closed behind the twins. “Ma!” echoed through the house as Patrick announced his brother’s and his arrival. The swinging door opened and the twins marched into view, Sean holding a bunch of envelopes. “Mail’s here,” he informed them.

  Phil took the mail as Gloria said, “Guess who baked some tollhouse cookies today?”