Phyllis Wong and the Waking of the Wizard

by Geoffrey McSkimming

  His glossy black hair was in disarray, and was sticking up at strange angles all over his head, like dark crests on the top of a hairy meringue cake. He had a long, fine nose; a pencil-thin, neat moustache; high, angular cheekbones; and ears that were small and a little pointed at the tops.

  He stayed on the stairs for a moment, blinking, accustomising himself to the place he had just stepped into. His eyes glowed strangely, pulsatingly, a vibrant, sharp green—not just his irises, but the whites of his eyes as well.

  Then he opened those eyes wide and surveyed the cavernous basement. His gaze fell upon Phyllis and Daisy on the sofa, and he smiled.

  ‘Great-granddaughter,’ the man said, his voice deep and smooth.

  Phyllis jumped, and Daisy sprang to her paws, leapt off the sofa, and raced across to the stairs. She bounded up them like a furry miniature steam train, yapping loudly and excitedly.

  The man scooped her up. Holding her under his arm, he came down the steps and over to Phyllis, who was on her feet and beaming.

  ‘W.W.!’ she exclaimed, rushing to give him a hug. ‘I was wondering when you’d be back!’

  Phyllis’s thoughts about her mum were instantly washed away as she embraced Wallace Wong, Conjuror of Wonder!

  ‘Why,’ he said, tousling her hair, ‘it’s been hardly any Time at all since we last Transited. How long?’

  ‘Oh,’ she answered, ‘only a couple of months. By here Time, that is.’

  ‘Ah, yes, you were brilliant in your investigation of those foul papers.’*

  He squeezed her and then Daisy yapped even louder—it was getting a little airless where she was, trapped between Wallace Wong’s waistcoat and Phyllis’s shoulder. Wallace quickly stepped back and deposited Daisy on the floor.

  ‘Let me look at you,’ he said to Phyllis. ‘Ah, you are appearing well, my dear girl. But—’ he squinted slightly, his eyes throbbing green and curious ‘—I detect the merest hint of something sad? Tell me, Phyllis, are you troubled by things?’

  Phyllis managed a smile, which wasn’t difficult, so happy was she to be with Wallace Wong again. ‘Not really. Not by anything I can’t do something about.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Yep.’ She beamed at him, then rushed into another hug.

  ‘For troubles can be like the bent coin that has been dropped into the donut batter,’ he added in his muddled manner.

  She looked up at him, strangely.

  ‘Oh, I know what I am meaning,’ he said quickly. ‘Are you really all right?’

  ‘I’m swell. Hey, W.W., I’m tickled pink to see you again!’

  Wallace laughed—he was always delighted that Phyllis had picked up so many of the sayings from the old movies he’d appeared in. ‘I, too, am tickled pink to be reunited with my dauntless girl,’ he said, grinning. ‘Come, let us sit, and I shall tell you why I have returned.’

  They settled themselves on the sofa and Daisy sprang up to wedge herself between them in the I’m going to take up the most space here way that small dogs often do.

  Before Wallace could begin, Phyllis asked, ‘Where have you been Transiting to lately, then?’ (For Wallace Wong was a Transiter—one who is able to move from place to place and Time to Time—and he had passed on the knowledge of this secret to Phyllis, who he had been thrilled to discover also had the gift for being able to see beyond the here-and-now.)

  Wallace gave her an inscrutable smile, and answered her question with a question of his own: ‘Do you remember, my dear, when you asked me why I Transited so much? Why I never stayed in the one spot for very long?’

  ‘Yes,’ Phyllis replied.

  ‘And do you remember what I answered?’

  ‘I sure do. You said you were searching for something.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And that you’d been searching for this “something” for nearly a century, and that it’d become a way of life for you that you loved. And when I asked you what it was, this “something”, you wouldn’t tell me. I remember your words—I wrote them down in my journal. You said that it wasn’t the nowness to tell me, and that you’d tell me what you were searching for when the nowness was ready.’

  ‘Ah, you are very thorough. Well, Phyllis, I am pleased to tell you that the nowness is ripe.’

  Phyllis bounced on the sofa. ‘You’re going to tell me?’

  ‘I am. First, however, I want you to recap something.’

  ‘Okay, what?’

  ‘Tell me once more about the Pockets. I want to make sure that you still remember their types and what they are capable of. And I am keen to know whether you have made any new discoveries about them which perhaps I am not aware of.’

  The Pockets. Phyllis smiled. ‘No, no new discoveries. Not since the last time I saw you.’

  ‘Have you been Transiting since then?’

  ‘No. I almost did, but . . . well, I guess the foul papers trip sort of left me with a lot to think about.’

  ‘Ah, yes.’ Wallace Wong placed his hand on Phyllis’s. ‘It is good, I have found, not to pile on the Transits. It is a wise idea to leave some Time between trips, in order to reflect on where you have been and what has occurred during the Transiting. Not to mention, you need to get over the Transitaciousness. Me, I should listen to my own advice and leave more Time between my Transits . . . maybe then my eyes would settle down again more quickly.’

  His eyes were still bright and green and throbbing, Phyllis observed.

  ‘Yes,’ Wallace went on, ‘that is the major mistake most Transiters make; they are no sooner back in one place and one Time than they run up some stairs again and are off, all willy-nilly, faster than a slippery pickle in the hands of a bricklayer.’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘Oh, I know what I am meaning. Now, clearly, concisely, tell me what you remember of the Pockets.’

  Quickly, Phyllis recapped what Wallace Wong had taught her: that as far as they knew, there were four different types of TimePockets—Anamygduleons, Andruseons, Anvugheons and Anaumbryons. These were all different in size and power, and they were always to be found on stairs.

  She stopped and smiled at her youthful great-grandfather. He smiled back. Their smiles were nearly identical.

  ‘Very good,’ he said. ‘I knew you would retain the knowledge.’

  ‘Best things I’ve ever learnt,’ she said. ‘Now it’s your turn. Tell me: what is it that you’ve been searching for all this Time?’

  Wallace Wong, Conjuror of Wonder!, stood. He walked to the centre of the rehearsal space and, as though he were back on stage in an enormous theatre, turned and faced Phyllis and Daisy.

  ‘Here is the next part of my story, Phyllis my dear,’ he began, his voice so powerful it sent ripples of anticipation through Phyllis. Without realising it, she brought her hands together and interlocked the little finger on her right hand with the thumb on her left hand, and curled the rest of her fingers gently around the backs of her hands. She always did this whenever she wished to focus deeply.

  ‘I am seeking something so wonderful,’ Wallace announced, ‘that it defies the imaginations of many. Something that I hope still exists somewhere in the wide world of the past and, perhaps, the present. A secret, Phyllis. The most profound and wonderful secret ever created!’

  Phyllis felt goose bumps popping up along her arms and shoulders. Daisy, sensing the power in Wallace’s voice, remained still, watching him.

  ‘It is the secret of the Pockets I am looking for, my dear girl,’ Wallace said. ‘It is the reason for the Transiting, the whole method behind these extraordinary places where people like you and me are able to step through the boundaries of what is normal, what is logical, what is real!

  ‘And to find this secret, to find the reason why all of this is possible, I must find the one who created it. The one person who, long ago, discovered the first Pocket and developed it and created all the rules of Transiting . . . Phyllis, I am searching for the greatest magician the world has ever seen!’

&n
bsp; * See Phyllis Wong and the Return of the Conjuror to find out more about this incident . . .

  Who? Houdini?

  Wallace Wong stayed silent for what seemed like a week.

  Phyllis felt like taking off her top hat and throwing it at him. ‘Great-grandfather,’ she implored, ‘Who? Who is it?’

  She saw that Wallace’s eyes were no longer green, and that his irises had now reverted to their deep darkness. ‘Whom do you think it might be?’ he asked her.

  Daisy got to her paws and stood there on the sofa, watching him with the sort of perfectly still, I am not a dog but a rock covered with fur concentration that only small dogs can muster.

  ‘The greatest magician the world has ever seen.’ Phyllis repeated his words slowly, thoughtfully. ‘Apart from you, you mean?’

  ‘Apart from me,’ said Wallace Wong.

  Then it hit her and she gasped. ‘You mean Houdini?’

  Wallace laughed. ‘Ah, no, my dear. Not Harry. He was always my friendly competition, as you are aware. Ha! He had the strangest fussiness about his socks, a fact that is not widely known. He always insisted that they must have small purple borders around the tops, little woollen purple bands. He felt lucky when he . . . Ah, but I digress. No, not Houdini. Someone far greater than even myself and Harry Houdini put together. Someone far greater than all the most brilliant magicians you can think of rolled into one person . . .’

  Phyllis bit her lip, thinking hard. She conjured up, in her mind, images of the great magicians from ages past, their images fresh as though they had just stepped out of any of the wonderful old magic posters that were hanging at the back of the basement. The names of the prestidigitators swirled around her brain—Thurston, Robert-Houdin, Maskelyne, Devant, Carter the Great, Adelaide Herrmann, Blumen, Kellar, Chung Ling Soo—and their faces became a mixed-up, shifting galaxy. But none of them stood far above the rest as being the greatest in all of History.

  She shook her head. ‘I give up. I’ve got no idea. W.W., tell me, please!’

  Wallace Wong gazed at her, his eyes bright. ‘Myrddin Emrys!’

  ‘Huh?’ She hadn’t heard of that one.

  ‘Merlinus Ambrosius!’

  Phyllis blinked. ‘Who?’

  ‘Otherwise remembered as . . . Merlin.’

  She shook her head. ‘Did you say . . . Merlin?’

  ‘The greatest magician ever,’ said Wallace Wong.

  She frowned. ‘Wait a minute. Do you mean the Merlin who helped Arthur become king of England? The one who put the sword in the stone?’

  ‘Amongst many of his accomplishments. He did a lot of things in his Times.’

  Phyllis took off her top hat, put it on the sofa next to her, and pushed her fringe back off her forehead. ‘But . . . isn’t all that stuff just . . . legend? I mean, isn’t it all the stuff of myths? It’s just made up, isn’t it?’

  Wallace Wong smiled. ‘One thing I have learnt from my Transits, Great-granddaughter, is that the line between what is myth and legend and what is real and History is a line that is in a constant state of shimmer. Time is a great bookend to our lives, my dear girl, but it also turns the dimness of a long-past reality into a state where people believe things that took place never really happened!’

  He began pacing around the cleared space. ‘You see, Merlin did exist. He does exist. Somewhere out there, he is still alive and breathing. And I have been searching for him. I have been uncovering his trail in my Transits, my dear, but I am yet to find where he resides. Where he exists now. Perhaps the wizard detects me looking for him; perhaps he is one step ahead of me, and is always moving forward or backwards, or sideways, trying to throw me off his trail. Perhaps he does not want me ever to find him. But I shall keep trying . . . it has become my life’s quest, to find Merlin the Great. Myrddin the Mighty.’

  ‘Holy moley,’ Phyllis gasped. ‘You’re serious about this.’

  ‘As serious and determined as the grasshopper who fell in love with the stick of chalk,’ he intoned.

  She gave him a weird look.

  ‘Oh, I know what it is I am meaning,’ he said quickly.

  ‘And Merlin . . . he invented the Pockets?’

  ‘He did. I do not believe that anyone else knows this. I came across the information when I was researching the life of the wizard. There are several accounts written about Merlin, you know: Geoffrey of Monmouth wrote his History of the Kings of Britain in the twelfth century. It was he who gave breath to the memory of Merlin the enchanter; the memory that remains alive today. He also wrote another, earlier, work about Merlin: Vita Merlini (Life of Merlin), in 1132. Oh, this account is fascinating, Phyllis. I learnt much about the wizard before he became so powerful. I learnt about the man who dwelt with the beasts in the forests; he who had their knowledge and who was able to communicate with them . . . and learn the magic of nature itself . . .’

  ‘So he didn’t always wear a pointy hat with stars on it?’ Phyllis asked, half-jokingly.

  Wallace sighed. ‘You have watched too many cartoons, my dear. Myrddin was much more real than that . . . is much more real than that.’ He saw the look of puzzlement on Phyllis’s face, and went on, ‘Ah, yes, I prefer to call him Myrddin. That is the Welsh form of his name, and it is believed by some scholars that Merlin—Myrddin—was Welsh. Some think he was a Welsh king. I like to call him Myrddin because it seems right, and also because if anyone overhears me speaking of him, there is less chance that they will know of whom I speak. Merlin is a name which many people know. Myrddin is not. I do not want people knowing for whom I am searching.’

  ‘I understand,’ Phyllis said. As a magician, she knew the vital rule that there was power in holding onto secrets closely, and was always mindful that it was best not to reveal too much.

  ‘Other writers wrote about him too,’ Wallace went on, as he paced around with his hands behind his back. ‘And about his involvement with King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, and about how Myrddin created the magic sword of Arthur.’

  Phyllis nodded.

  ‘I have sifted through these stories and poems and through other forgotten texts written hundreds of years ago—old manuscripts from the fifteenth century, dusty volumes in ancient abbeys and libraries in France and Scotland and Wales—trying to put together clues as to the mystifications and wonders and whereabouts of Myrddin.’

  Phyllis could feel something inside her emerging—a sort of unfolding curiosity, expanding like the petals of a flower opening up to the morning sun. Her breathing became quicker. ‘Do you think you’ve come close to him yet?’ she asked. ‘Have you sighted him at all?’

  Wallace stopped pacing. ‘Not that I am aware,’ he answered quietly. ‘I have made copious notes as to where he might be, and have crisscrossed the world time and time again—have Transited carefully and watchfully—but, to my knowledge, I have not crossed paths with him. Why, Phyllis, that is what is so hard about my search: it seems the wizard has hidden himself away so thoroughly that he may as well have vanished from the face of the Earth. But I don’t believe he has. And I’ll tell you why.’

  He reached into the breast pocket of his tail coat and withdrew a long, narrow book, bound in dark purple leather. ‘One of my Myrddin journals,’ he told her. Quickly he opened the journal and flipped through the pages, coming to a stop near the middle of the book. ‘Listen to this—it’s from a manuscript written in the fourteenth century, by a monk named Certinus of Alsace.’ He cleared his throat and, in his commanding stage voice, read aloud:

  ‘ “Stories have been written about the end of the Great One. According to some accounts, Myrddin met the end of his earthly days in the forests of Brocéliande in Brittany. There, his mind, filled brimful with images of things that men were not to know, overflowed and Myrddin fell, sinking into the leaves until he became one with the ancient soils. Other tales tell of Myrddin sleeping beneath a towering hill at Drumelzier in Scotland, or in a cave where, when the day is right, he will awaken again and come forth to help t
he world avoid an Overwhelming Darkness, the likes of which humans have never known. But these are tales only, and nothing more.

  ‘ “The truth is something different. The truth is that the wizard has not left us. He still resides in our world, and he will for another millennium. The wizard may appear to have gone, but he will dwell near the minds of men for another thousand years. He will always be needed. He will be closer than he seems.” ’

  Wallace Wong stopped there and closed the journal, slipping it back into his tuxedo.

  Phyllis was wide-eyed. ‘W.W.! Is that all?’

  ‘That is the last entry that Certinus of Alsace wrote about Myrddin. But, Phyllis, is it not marvellous that Myrddin is still—somewhere—with us? I do not believe that anyone else has read the tomes of Certinus. I had the dickens of a time finding them myself . . . I had to Transit back to the fifteenth century, and by that Time, the volumes were becoming ruined by dampness and mildew. To think that Myrddin is still here! The man who discovered the Pockets and Transiting!’

  ‘It’s making me giddy,’ Phyllis said. She felt like her mind was sloshing back and forth inside her cranium. ‘To think that Merlin—’

  ‘Myrddin.’

  ‘—Myrddin . . . really lives, and that you’ve been looking for him . . . this is—’

  Wallace’s eyes lit up and he rushed to Phyllis on the sofa, falling to his knees and clasping her hands in his. ‘Oh, think, Phyllis, what secrets of magic we could truly discover if we could locate Myrddin and share his knowledge! How did he discover the secrets of Transiting? How did he develop such a thing? Imagine what we could accomplish if we knew the origin of such power . . . imagine what we could do with such knowledge!’

  Phyllis took a deep, calming breath.

  ‘Now, Phyllis, I want to ask you something.’

  ‘Fire away.’

  ‘Would you like to help me? Would you care to accompany me on the next stage of my search for Myrddin?’

  Phyllis scooped up Daisy and leapt to her feet. ‘Did Shakespeare wear tights?’

  Wallace Wong laughed. ‘Good. It will be wonderful to have you with me, at least for the next stage of the journey. I cannot guarantee anything beyond that, but I can at least set you on the trail as well.’