Other new variations on the traditional witch bottle theme include a bottle concealed within a red plastic, squeezable tomato-shaped ketchup pourer, an Italian Chianti wine bottle, complete with its wicker-basket and, for those of you wanting the full 1960s retro kitsch look, a witch bottle disguised a Lava lamp.
But, whatever the shape or contents of the witch bottle, Karl Bartmann’s advice remains the same: they should only ever be used to protect the innocent from evil. “If ever their owners attempt to use them to cast spells or place curses on other people,” warns Bartmann, “they risk opening the door to powerful dark forces and arcane influences they may be unable to control.”
Bartmanns take the sensitive nature of witch bottles so seriously that they will only sell to shoppers calling in person. “People tell me I would sell far many more witch bottles if I had a website and traded online but I feel I still need to look the customer in the eyes. I want the reassurance of being certain they are seeking to fight evil, not spread it further.”
Bartmanns is open from 11am to 4pm on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays.
Bellarmine and Bartmann! Well, well, well. Now there’s a couple of rogues whose names I haven’t heard mentioned in many years. Bellarmine (or Roberto Bellarmino in his native Italian) was a champion of the Counter-Reformation and, during his spell as Cardinal Inquisitor, had Galileo arrested and sent Giordano Bruno to the stake to be burned as a heretic. For his troubles, a grateful Roman Catholic Church made Bellarmine a saint.
As for Bartmann (or ‘bearded man’ in German) that’s a bit rich warning about the risks of casting spells. If Karl Bartmann knows his family history, and I’m sure he does, he’ll be only too well aware that in the late 17th century – at about the same time as they were hanging the witches in Salem – his family produced more than its fair share of wizards who dabbled in the Black Arts.
But it is the description of the building that sends a chill of recognition running through me. It is too much of a coincidence that this ancient, tower-like building, in a city as ancient as London, should have a verdigris-covered bronze front-door? Those words are straight out of Ludwig Prinn’s blasphemous grimoire De Vermis Mysteriis.
Now I know who that woman on Temple station was, she can have only been Fortuna, the Ancient Roman goddess of Fortune and Fate.
* * * * *
The Stranger knocks once
The Stranger knocks twice
The Stranger knocks three times
Hush, hush
There’s someone at the door
Hush, hush
There’s someone climbing the stairs
...from De Vermis Mysteriis
The next day is a Tuesday, perfect for my plans. I walk down Fleet Street and the Strand, my stiletto switchblade sitting comfortably in one of the pockets of my navy-blue peacoat, then up St Martin’s Lane, approaching Cecil Court from its eastern end.
There is The Witch Ball print shop and there, hidden away so I almost miss it, is the tiny alleyway leading off Bellarmine Place.
I make my way down the lane, which really is as narrow as described in the magazine article. And then there it is: the Bartmanns’ shop with a great, green metal door. Being a Tuesday the shop is closed and its windows are covered by heavy wooden shutters. There are no lights visible and nobody seems to be home, nevertheless I knock at the door. I knock again and, when I still receive no answer, I knock once more before trying the handle.
To my surprise, it turns in my hand and I hear the latch pull back. Then, resting my shoulder against the door, I gently push it open.
The doorway leads directly into a gloomy passageway. As I make my way down it, I see that to one side is the shop, which forms a self contained unit with another set of doors, both locked, leading into the shop display space area and counters. Immediately ahead of me is another locked door. I lean my head against it. The door feels warm and I can hear the hum and whir of mechanical equipment operating in the room beyond. This must be where the kiln, mentioned in the Time Out article, is located.
To the side of this door, and set into the floor’s time-worn flagstones, is a circular iron grating. I peer down into the dark and can just make out something fluid and rippling far below. Incredible, the building still has its own well! This part of the house must date back centuries.
As if to confirm my suspicions, beyond the well is the first flight of steps belonging to an ornately carved wooden staircase. The carving on the massive newels, the arcaded balustrade and the square finials surmounting the newels all shout out that this is original Elizabethan woodworking from the second half of the 16th century.
I climb the stairs, keeping to one side of the treads to minimise the creaking of the old wooden boards. At the top of the first flight is a landing with two doors, both locked, leading off it. At the top of the second flight it is the same story: two more locked doors. Then comes the final flight of stairs, much dustier and unkempt than the other steps I’ve just climbed, leading up to a scuffed and faded wooden door with rounded top. I’ve clearly reached the building’s attic.
Unlike the other doors I’ve encountered, this door is partially ajar, so I push it fully open with my foot.
Standing beyond the threshold is a wizened old man. His skin is wrinkled and his face lined and weather-beaten from too many years of campaigning in harsh climates but I’d still recognise him anywhere. It is him, the General. The most wanted man on Earth – and the focus of my current quest.
“Come in, come in, my dear,” he says. “I’ve been expecting a visit like this all my life. I’ve just made a fresh pot of tea, why don’t you take a cup with me?”
I sit down at his table and watch as the old man pours tea from a bamboo-handled pot into two small, porcelain cups. The tea is green and smells of toasted rice. I wait until I see the General drink from his own cup before taking a sip from mine. It is Japanese genmaicha tea, something I haven’t tasted since before the war.
The General talks... and talks. About his battles. About his wars. About the millions slaughtered at his command during his years in power. A decade-long reign that saw South-East Asia, the Middle East and North Africa torn apart in a swathe of devastation from the Mekong Delta to the Atlas Mountains.
As he pauses to refill our cups, I ask the question his victims, whose bleaching bones still litter the deserts of Arabia, the Taklamakan and the Sahara, must have all wondered and wanted answered: “Why?”
The old man shrugs his shoulders and smiles. “You, my young friend, would never understand but I was obeying a higher calling.”
“And now this?” I reply gesturing to his spartan accommodation. “No belongings, no friends and, apparently, no security.”
“To have no friends is to enjoy the freedom of never having to worry when they are going to disappoint or betray you. No belongings? No matter. We enter this world with nothing and we can take nothing with us when we leave it. Besides, the Bartmanns provide me with everything I now need.”
“And where are they now?” I ask.
“They live in rooms leading off from those doors you passed as you made your way up the staircase. This strange old house hides a warren of chambers, cellars and passageways. But you needn’t worry, the Bartmanns are away and will not be returning until tomorrow evening. They have another house in the countryside, in what the English charmingly like to call their Home Counties.”
“So we are alone?”
The General nods his head in acquiescence. “But, if you are familiar with the Bartmann family’s history and reputation, you will know they are more than capable of protecting their own property, even when they are a hundred miles away.”
“Does that include you?”
“Oh no, my presence here stems entirely from a debt of honour they incurred with me a very long, long time ago. I am responsible for my own security – or at least the lack of it. It was always going to be a case of when, not if, my hiding place would one day be discovered. Fate, kismet, karma, chanc
e, luck, providence. Que sera, sera. Whatever will be, will be. No man, or woman, can hide from their destiny forever.”
I laugh out loud. “I’ve rehearsed this conversation with you in my head on so many occasions but I never thought I’d hear the General, the 21st century’s answer to Tamerlane, quoting a Doris Day song lyric back at me!”
The old man doesn’t smile. “Study your history more closely. That phrase was coined by the first Earl of Bedford in 1549 and later used by Kit Marlowe in his play Doctor Faustus. In fact Kit wrote most of that play in this very room.”
“Now that’s a tale I haven’t heard before.”
“It is no tale my friend. I saw him do it.”
“I know you are old but you cannot be that old!”
“There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”
“Don’t tell me,” I reply, “Shakespeare also wrote those lines in this room.”
“No,” answers the General with a grin. “He wrote that while he was living in Southwark. But did you ever wonder who advised him on the witchcraft scenes in his play Macbeth? A scene,” he adds, giving me a knowing look, “I suspect you, my little stregha, are only too familiar with!”
A cold shiver runs down my spine. It is one of those someone-just-stepped-on-my-grave moments. My left brain knows full well this is caused by a subconscious release of the stress hormone adrenaline, nevertheless the sensation unsettles me. I change the subject. I’m wasting valuable time here.
“Tell me old man,” I ask, “do you have a god you would like to pray to?” As I speak, I discretely remove the switchblade from my pocket and, with the knife hidden beneath the table, press the spring-release catch.
“Not a god but gods! I still pray and sacrifice to the Elder Gods, who haunt dark, forgotten places, to gibber and bay on moonless nights. But come, enough of this talk, we both know why you are here. Let us end this now. Do what you have to do,” he says, before springing up from the table with more agility than I’d credit him for, throwing back his head and spreading out his arms in a Christ-like pose.
I stab once, I stab twice, I stab a third time. Then, with a twist, I am behind him and, grabbing his hair and yanking back his head with my left hand, I slit his wizened throat from ear to ear.
I let the old man’s now lifeless body fall to the floor and then complete the final part of my assignment. Pausing only to force open his mouth, I remove a small black velvet bag from the inner pocket of my coat, pull apart its drawstrings and pour its contents straight down into the General’s throat. Thirty genuine silver denarius coins from the reign of the Roman emperor Tiberius Caesar.
Although I can guess at the thirty pieces of silver allusion, I long ago realised that questioning my clients’ motives and instructions could only lead to madness – or my own early death.
There is still some green genmaicha tea in the pot, so I pour myself a final cup. It would be a pity to waste it in such straitened times as these.
As I drink, I watch the pool of blood grow as it oozes from the old man’s body. How can that withered little frame hold so much blood? Did he somehow absorb the blood of his victims?
The blood spreads across the floor before seeping through a gap beneath the door and running down the staircase. Down, down it flows until it reaches the flagstones on the ground floor, before finally trickling through the iron grating and dripping into the dark waters far below.
I put down my empty cup and shake my head. Why am I sitting here drinking tea and watching a corpse bleed out? I need to be gone! Being caught with a bloody stiletto in your hand and a murder victim at your feet is not a good career move for any professional assassin. I must be getting sloppy in my old age.
Yes, I am old. Perhaps not as old as the General but I’ve experienced more than my fair share of life and death.
I move to get up but then slump back in my chair. My legs, my arms, my entire body feels leaden.
The sly old goat must have slipped a Mickey Finn into the tea to knock me out! If I’m lucky it will be only choral hydrate. But how did he do it? With my own eyes I watched him pour the tea into the cups and take the first sip...
But of course! He must have doctored the whole pot. He knew I was here to kill him so he didn’t care if he also drank it. But why? So I’ll still be here when the Bartmanns return?
Then a sudden loud noise catches my attention.
It comes from downstairs... It isn’t a door opening, it is more of a metallic clang. A metallic clang followed by a harsh scraping sound. Then comes the chill shock of recognition. It is the sound a heavy iron grating makes when it is being popped open from the inside! Someone – or something – has pushed aside the iron grating and climbed out of the well near the foot of the staircase!
What was it the General said about the Bartmanns? That they are more than capable of protecting their own property, even when they are a hundred miles away!
I hear the wooden staircase creak. That someone – or something – is climbing up the stairs and doesn’t care who hears them!
Using all the remaining strength I can muster in my drugged body, I ease my chair around to face the door. Hecate, Diana, Brigid, I commend my soul to thee.
With my stiletto in my hand, I prepare myself to face whatever is going to come through the doorway. It is a futile gesture that I know is unlikely to save me but the thought of dying in battle makes me feel better. As the General said, you cannot hide from your destiny forever!
Hush, hush
Something evil is climbing the stairs
Hush, hush
Something evil is at the door
...from De Vermis Mysteriis
Ends
Empire State of Mind
AGENCY-PROJECT-SYBOT#29-COMMENCE-RUN-SIMULATION-
‘GO ON, OPEN IT’ says Nick.
‘Oh, you guys,’ I reply. ‘You remembered my birthday.’ I pull away the wrapping paper from around the parcel to expose an antique coffee mug. Not just any antique coffee mug, but a genuine 20th century, vintage TV serial memorabilia coffee mug. On the sides of the mug, printed in now-faded red lettering are the words: I am not a number, I am a free man.
It’s curry and beer night. Nick has just sent an email reminding me it’s curry and beer night tonight. Of course it’s curry and beer night tonight. It’s the third Thursday of the month and ‘the crew’ - well, at least those of us still left from the original crew - have been going out after work for a curry and a few beers every third Thursday of the month for the past 25 years.
Everybody knows that. Everybody who works at the Agency knows about our third-Thursday ritual. Although, admittedly, not everybody is quite so enthusiastic about it as we are. It’s been years since we’ve found any new recruits and the other day I even overheard Jody, the office PA, refer to the crew as the ALC. Turns out this is office grapevine shorthand for the Agency Losers Club.
It began innocently enough, when we were all young, single, fresh out of university, full of high hopes, bursting with ambition and excited to be working for the Agency. But then life began to get in the way. Marriages, mortgages, management intrigues. Debts, deadlines, divorces. The usual suspects.
The one constant was the curry and beer night. Trouser hems flared and narrowed, narrowed and flared back out again. Waistlines expanded, hairlines receded. And still we kept eating those curries and drinking those beers. Though it’s noticeable that over the years our beer consumption volumes have declined, and the hot vindaloos of our youth have given way, in middle age, to milder kormas as our curry of choice.
Now it really is curry and beer night. We are at our favourite curry house, where the decor and the canned music has hardly changed in a quarter of a century. The conversation is, as ever, relaxed. And the subject matter is, as ever, predictable, as eight middle-aged men the wrong side of 45 complain how badly life has treated them. How their wives, partners and children, and ex-wives, ex-partners and estranged children, don’t un
derstand them.
Mark complains that marrying his second wife was the worst mistake he ever made. In contrast Welsh Davey (to distinguish him from the other David on the crew - Little Dave) says walking out on his partner was the worst mistake he ever made. Mikey moans that since his children left home, they never keep in touch and he feels cut out of their lives. While Jez says his children look like they’ll never leave home. And so it goes.
But this evening something different happens. We’re about half-way through the meal and into our fourth round of drinks. We’ve finished grumbling. We’ve pretty much finished gossiping about the other people in our office which these days is largely taken up with speculating about Jody’s reputedly rich and varied sex life. We’re almost at that point where we might even start talking about work and discuss the Agency’s latest initiative, when Little Dave suggests we play a game of What-Ifs. It’s a bit like Truth or Dare, or Consequences, only played by sad old gits like us.
‘What we have to do,’ explains Dave, ‘is each pick a choice we’ve made in the past that, if we could live our lives all over again, we’d decide in a different way. You know,’ he adds, ‘the path not taken, the stone left unturned.’
We go round the table in a clockwise direction. Nick kicks off by announcing the choice he regrets, and would now handle differently, was deciding not to wear a condom when he had sex with his first live-in girlfriend because he thought it would be safe. Turned out she’d forgotten to take the Pill regularly, with the result Nick found himself a father of twins in his finals year at university.
Nick’s revelation is met with an awkward silence. Nobody knows whether he is kidding or not, as he’s always given the impression he was happily married from the get-go and deliberately chose to start a family early.
Next up is Welsh Davey, who brings down a torrent of abuse on his head by saying that if he could have his time over again, he wouldn’t have accepted the job offer from the Agency. ‘Yeah, right!’ shouts Mikey. ‘Like staying back home in the Rhondda Valley would have been a better career move.’
The Hot Chick & Other Weird Tales Page 9
