An Affair of Sorcerers

by George C. Chesbro

  John Krowl’s brownstone was four blocks east of the Manhattan Bridge, in a poor but clean working-class neighborhood. I was a few minutes early, but I rang the bell anyway. It was answered by a young man in his early twenties who looked down at me inquiringly. I introduced myself and said that I had an appointment for eight o’clock. He introduced himself only as Krowl’s secretary and told me I’d have to wait a few minutes. He motioned me inside and indicated that I should sit down on one of the three antique chairs just inside the door.

  I was in a large circular foyer with a corridor directly opposite me that extended all the way to the end of the house. There were closed doors to either side of me. Around the perimeter of the foyer were a number of old, heavy tables, their surfaces covered with what looked like valuable African primitive sculpture—most of it erotic. The walls of the foyer were decorated with an odd but strangely appealing mixture of garish Haitian paintings and faded Persian tapestries. All of the exposed wood had been stripped to the grain and polished to a burnished glow. In contrast to the rather dreary facade and neighborhood outside, the inside of Krowl’s brownstone was like a museum. Krowl had taste.

  The art was carefully chosen and interesting, but what intrigued me by far the most in the foyer was a display of at least a hundred plaster hand casts mounted in the spaces around and between the paintings and the tapestries. I got up and went closer to examine them.

  The casts had been expertly made, and all of the details in the palms had been meticulously lined in with India ink. The effect was eerie and startling. The names of the hands’ owners were inscribed in calligraphic script over the base of the wrist and signed beneath. Most of them belonged to well-known New York and Hollywood celebrities, with a few Washington politicians sprinkled around as if to give the display some respectability, like a heavy bronze identification plaque under a muddy painting. Just about everyone who was anyone seemed to be represented in John Krowl’s foyer; it occurred to me that the people represented couldn’t all be idiots, and I found I was impressed.

  Two names in particular interested me. The first was that of Harley Davidson, at one time the hottest young rock star in the country. I’d known him as Bobby Weiss, a gangling, likable student who’d been blundering his way through college. Criminology had seemed to be one of the rare subjects that interested him, and he’d managed to show up fairly regularly for my undergraduate class.

  Bobby had dropped out of school three years before, in the middle of his junior year. A year after that he’d exploded onto the national rock scene as Harley Davidson—Instant Millionaire. He’d signed with Jake Stein, a friend of mine with the William Morris Agency, and I’d kept track of him through Jake. One year I’d even received a Christmas card. I’d thought Bobby spent all his time in Los Angeles, but he’d obviously touched base often enough in New York to hear of Krowl. Seeing the palm print suddenly made me realize that I hadn’t heard anything of Bobby for at least six months—no records, no television, not even a gossip item. I wondered what had happened to him.

  The second name hit even closer to home, and it gave me a jolt. The name was Bart Stone. Stone was a prolific writer of Western pulp novels who had provided the fictional fodder for dozens of Western films turned out by Hollywood.

  I wondered if Krowl, when he’d make the print, had known that “Bart Stone” was but one of the many pseudonyms used by Frank Marlowe. I might ask him.

  I wandered down the hallway to the end, where a narrow balcony looked out over a small, exquisitely arranged garden and patio. The area was encircled by plants which seemed to be miraculously surviving in New York’s sulfurous air; it seemed a tiny piece of serenity in the middle of the most manic city in the world. Across the way, looming up into the drizzling twilight, was a fifteen-story factory building. The side I was looking at was covered with climbing ivy. The windows had been painted black.

  “Mr. Frederickson?”

  I wheeled and was startled to find a man I assumed to be Krowl standing almost directly behind me. The door to the left of the foyer entrance was open, and he’d managed to approach me without making a sound.

  No one had thought to mention the fact that John Krowl was an albino; his wraithlike, ghostly appearance startled me. Krowl’s skin was almost the color of chalk, and he wore his thin, white hair at shoulder length. He wore glasses with tinted lenses, presumably to protect his sensitive eyes from the light. He was five feet ten or eleven, and reminded me of some coloring-book Jesus who hadn’t been crayoned in.

  I wondered how much Krowl’s bizarre physical appearance had to do with the fact that he’d been drawn to—and succeeded in—the occult. Perhaps, in a sense, Krowl and I had something in common; Garth had always maintained that I’d have stayed on our family’s farm in Nebraska if not for the fact that I’d been born a dwarf. Deformity—any deformity—can crush, but it can also propel a man beyond his normal limits.

  “Is that part of your act?” I asked.

  “Excuse me?” Krowl’s voice was high-pitched, nasal and raspy.

  “I’m Frederickson. I take it you’re John Krowl.”

  “That’s right,” he said coldly, looking at me intently. “Garth left word with my secretary that you wanted a reading. He said it was a matter of urgency. Why?”

  Krowl’s chilly abruptness took me aback. I didn’t want to offend Krowl in light of the fact that Garth had told me he could be a valuable source of information. On the other hand, something about me obviously put him off; he looked at me as if he were getting ready to ask me to leave. I decided it might be a good idea to get a better feel of his territory before I started asking direction questions.

  “I’ve got problems,” I said quietly.

  “Really?” He removed his glasses and stared at me with pink, washed-out eyes. “How do you think I can help?”

  I shrugged. “I thought that was obvious. I was hoping you’d read the tarot for me.”

  Krowl put his glasses back on and smiled thinly. “Frederickson, why do I get the feeling that you think I’m full of shit?”

  I felt myself flush. I had to give him points for frankness. “Let’s say I’m hoping you can help me,” I said, trying to sound humble and offering up my most innocent smile.

  “My fee is forty dollars.”

  “Fine.”

  “Very well,” Krowl said abruptly. “Come with me, please.”

  He turned and walked back down the hall. I followed him through the open door, which he closed behind us. I found myself in a kind of parlor/sitting room carpeted with the finest Persian rugs. There were more Haitian paintings and faded antique tapestries on those sections of the walls not covered by oak bookcases filled with leather-bound volumes. The room was dominated by a round mahogany table in the center. Over the table a stained-glass Tiffany lamp hung like a sparkling jewel in the middle of the room’s dark, earth colors. Although the table was not particularly large, its magnificently carved legs and edges lent it an air of massiveness. There were two chairs.

  Krowl took a small bundle wrapped in black silk out of a drawer in the table, unwrapped it to reveal a deck of tarot cards. He sat down and motioned for me to sit in the chair across from him.

  “Aren’t you going to look at my hand?” I asked.

  He shook his head and began to shuffle the cards. “Not now,” he replied softly. “Perhaps later. Frankly, I get very bad vibrations from you, and I’d like to see what the cards reveal.”

  “I’m sorry you feel that way,” I said, resisting the urge to add something sarcastic.

  Krowl put the deck back together, shoved it across the table to me and indicated that I should shuffle.

  “I still don’t feel that you believe there’s anything to be gained from this,” the albino said, watching me closely as I manipulated the cards. He made a clucking sound of resignation. “You should try to keep an open mind. As you shuffle the deck, meditate on some problem or question you’d like the cards to speak to. By the way, are you involved with a w
oman by the name of Amy? Or Abigail?”

  “What?” I stopped shuffling and looked up at him, startled once again. The names Amy and Abigail were very close to April. I found Krowl’s question distressing for a number of reasons, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to confront any of them. I tried to smile, but it felt like a grimace. “Is that a preview?”

  “You’ll have to tell me.”

  “Don’t you think you should check out my cards?”

  “You’re carrying a woman with you,” he said, looking at me intently. “I thought I saw one of the names mentioned.”

  “No,” I said curtly.

  “All right,” he said easily. “The presence of the woman is what’s important, not her name. Are you right- or left-handed?”

  “Right,” I said, actually having to think about it. My mind was wandering, and I was having trouble concentrating.

  “Then the left hand is the hand of your subconscious. Use it to cut the deck into three piles, then put them back in the opposite order.”

  When I’d done as he’d instructed, Krowl looked through the deck, without disturbing the order, until he found a particular card, which he placed face up on the table between us. The card showed a young man stepping off a cliff.

  “This card is the Significator,” he continued. “It will represent you in the read. It’s The Fool.”

  “That doesn’t sound very complimentary.”

  He wasn’t amused. “The Fool is an innocent,” he said. He spoke softly, but his voice had an edge of disdain. “I often use The Fool as a Significator for people who come to see me for the first time. As you can see, the young man is about to step into an abyss; it’s the first step in a journey of the consciousness. Whether you succeed on this journey or are dashed on the rocks below is up to you.”

  “That seems fair enough.”

  Krowl quickly laid the cards out between us. He placed a card on top of The Fool, then another card crossing them both. Moving in a counterclockwise direction, he laid out four more cards, one at each point of the compass around the center cards. Finally he laid out four cards in a vertical line to his right.

  I found myself staring at the cards. The predominant symbol in a number of cards seemed to be swords; I didn’t find that encouraging.

  Krowl sat in silence for almost five minutes, absently tapping his fingertips together as he stared at the cards. He seemed very much interested in whatever it was he was seeing.

  “This is an unusual layout,” Krowl said at last in a soft, clipped voice. He looked at me inquiringly. I felt a fluttering in my stomach, but said nothing. Finally Krowl returned his attention to the cards and exposed the card that had been covering The Fool.

  “The Queen of Swords,” Krowl continued. “We say that the card in this position ‘covers’ you. It represents the general atmosphere surrounding your question. As you can see, it is a woman. The Queen of Swords may be a widow. I’m certain she’s the woman I mentioned—the one in your thoughts.”

  He pointed to the card he had laid across The Fool. “This ‘crosses’ you. It’s the Two of Cups—Desire. You have a very strong attraction to this woman.

  “Frankly, the rest of the layout is confusing. The card at the bottom is The Devil. In this position it represents something which has happened to you in the past—and which is important to the matter. The Devil is a powerful card. And evil.” He hesitated, rapped his knuckles once, hard, on the gleaming surface of the table. “There is evil surrounding the woman,” he said forcefully. “Black magic. Does that mean anything to you, Frederickson?”

  “You’re doing the reading,” I said tightly.

  Krowl took off his glasses and stared at me with his pale eyes. “The Devil can also indicate the psychic. Something dark. Have you had a psychic experience lately?”

  Krowl had shaken me with his comments about a woman; now I felt as if I’d been hit between the eyes with a hammer. The dream. As much as I’d been resisting thinking about it, I had had a “psychic” experience: Transcending all the laws of logic and science, a comatose child had somehow reached out across an unmapped abyss of the spirit and touched my mind in order to tell me she was in danger. The dream had been vivid and complete, from the flames surrounding Kathy to the gown she’d been wearing. The dream had enabled me to save Kathy’s life—but it was an experience I still wasn’t psychologically prepared to examine.

  “Finish the reading,” I said tautly, struggling to keep my voice steady. “Then maybe we’ll see how it all ties in.”

  Krowl made a harsh sound in his throat and started to rise. “You’re uncooperative and hostile,” he said, anger sparking on the hard flint of his voice. “I don’t understand what you’re doing here.”

  “I would like you to finish the reading,” I heard myself saying. “I’m curious.”

  Krowl hesitated, then shrugged and sat back down again. He continued in a perfunctory, almost apathetic, tone. “The card on the left side of the cross shows an influence which may be just passing away: it’s the Page of Swords, reversed. It’s a sick child—perhaps the woman’s daughter.

  “At the top is the Five of Wands. It represents something that may happen in the future. This is a card of violence. There’s violence around you; I can feel it, as well as see it in your cards.”

  A large, invisible hand planted itself on my chest and pushed me back in the chair. My gaze rose to the Tiffany lamp over the table; more than half the shards in its glittering surface were the color of blood. The hand reached inside my chest, wrapped itself around my heart and squeezed. Images swam in the glass; the faces of people I’d known—some good, some evil, all dead. In an age when most detective work was sterile and boring, done with computers and phone checks, I continually found myself involved with high-fever cases that grew into epidemics of death. It seemed wherever I went in my career, I left a foaming, bloody wake filled with bodies; whatever garden I set out to till ended up Golgotha. But I survived. I was a carrier. Now Kathy and April had been exposed.

  My neck and ears felt hot. Krowl had been reading my mail, and I found that the fear I’d initially felt was rapidly metamorphosing into anger. There could be any number of explanations for what seemed to be the deadly accuracy of Krowl’s reading; he could very well have read about me and the violence that usually attended my investigations. What Krowl could not possibly know—because I hadn’t realized it myself until he’d pointed it out to me—was the importance April Marlowe had suddenly assumed in my life. Krowl had hit that target dead center. The truth was that April Marlowe distracted me as much as—or more than—the plight of her daughter, or the Senator’s. It was ugly, hard for me to admit; but it was true. It made me feel ashamed.

  Krowl pointed to the card on the right side of the cross. It showed a dog baying at the moon. A large, ominous-looking crayfish was crawling out of a pond at the dog’s feet. “The Moon,” Krowl said, placing his forefinger on the card. “Its position represents something that may happen soon. The Moon may stand for deception, unforeseen perils … secret enemies.” He pursed his lips and squinted at me. “Possibly bad luck for one you love.”

  “What kind of bad luck?” I asked quickly. My voice sounded strange in my ears, shrill and strained.

  Krowl smiled broadly, as though he’d won a major concession from me. “I don’t know,” he said quietly. “The woman is sad now; I pick that up from you. She’s surrounded by trouble, and I sense that you carry much of that trouble with you; you bring it to her.”

  “What do the rest of the cards tell you?” I asked, pointing to the vertical line of cards on his right. I hoped my voice was steady, put I’d experienced an unnerving flash of the “bad luck” I’d brought to others in the past. Like Garth: A woman he’d loved had died in the desert sands of Iran, six thousand miles away. Garth himself had fired the bullet that killed her.

  “The Nine of Swords,” he said, pointing to the card at the bottom of the vertical line. “Its symbols speak for themselves. The card is in the pos
ition representing your fears—in this case suffering and illness, possibly the death of one you love.” He frowned and suddenly swept his hand over to the Page of Swords on the opposite side of the cross. “Or the woman’s daughter,” he added quietly. “It’s the woman’s daughter you fear for. And—” He abruptly stopped speaking and stared intently at the cards, as though looking for something. Finally he shook his head, continued.

  “The next position represents the opinion of family and friends. As you see, the card is Strength. All it means is that you know they have faith in you.

  “The next card is the Six of Swords, and it’s in the position of your hopes. The card is a logical one for the ‘hope’ position. A man—you, obviously—ferries a woman and her daughter across a lake toward a more peaceful place.

  “The last card represents the outcome. It’s the Ten of Swords: disaster.”

  Krowl let the prediction drop perfunctorily, then removed his glasses, leaned back in his chair and crossed his hands behind his head. The light from the overhead lamp danced eerily in his pink eyes. “Normally, at this point I’d try to be upbeat,” he continued casually. “I’d try to assure you that the trends shown by the cards don’t necessarily have to come to pass. I’d tell you that the cards reflect your present state of mind, and what could happen if you don’t change your present behavior patterns. But I don’t think you care about what I have to say. I still think you came here for some other reason.”

  “You’re very perceptive, Krowl,” I said, meaning it. My stomach was churning, and I felt light-headed. I hoped it didn’t show. I found I disliked Krowl; he was arrogant and—to judge by the way he’d handled my reading—cruel. He was also, as I’d been warned, damn good.