Demon

by Shane Peacock

  The man regards him with a questioning look.

  “I am sorry,” adds Edgar. “I have been living in this house and thought you meant us harm. Do you…mean us harm?”

  “My Lord, no,” says the man. He straightens his collar. “Well, I suppose your actions are understandable, after what you have been through.”

  Edgar wonders if he should seize him again. “What do you mean? What do you know of my situation?”

  “Nothing, really, young sir, except that an acquaintance of yours or perhaps your brother was killed here not long ago.”

  “An acquaintance.”

  “I live just down this street and I happened to be about early that morning in the wee hours. My wife told me she had heard you were inquiring if anyone had seen anything suspicious at your door that morning. Neither she nor I were at home when you were asking.”

  Edgar steps close to him again, lowering his voice. “Did you see something?”

  “Yes, I did, my friend, though it seems of no consequence. I would certainly not employ the word suspicious in connection to it. I told the wife that, but she made me come to speak with you anyway. I saw an old woman at your door. That is all.”

  Edgar staggers.

  The man steadies him. “Are you all right?”

  I am the devil. I will do evil to you.

  “Yes, I…I am fine…tell me more.”

  “She was dressed plainly, nothing remarkable about her, certainly of no threat to the young man of a good physique who came to the entrance in answer to the knock.”

  “Jonathan.”

  “Is that the deceased?”

  “Yes.”

  The man removes his hat. “That was all I observed, just an old woman at the door and your acquaintance opening it to her. Oh, that is not quite correct. He opened it to a child first. She had a child with her too.”

  “A child?”

  “Yes, which makes it even less likely that it was they who harmed your friend. An old woman and a child? They killed that powerful young man?” He laughs. “No, something else must have bedeviled the deceased that morning. I keep unusual hours and I was on my way into the city, so I did not linger to watch them. There was no reason to. I moved on. I did not see anything more. There was no noise, no gun shot, no one crying out, as I walked away. It was as quiet as heaven.”

  “Can you describe the little one? Was it a boy or a girl?”

  “Oh, it was a boy all right, but a strange looking one, wearing unusual clothes, bright in color, a pillbox hat, sky-blue coat and scarlet trousers that appeared to billow like a Zouave military getup. Perhaps he was dressed up for a play. Perhaps she was his grandmother.”

  “A Zouave? You mean like a French soldier?”

  “Yes, sir,” the man responds. “I must be on my way. I hope I have been of some help, though I cannot imagine how.” He excuses himself and is quickly off down the street, glancing back a few times.

  “The hag, my boy,” whispers Allen Brim.

  “But this man saw her! Alive on the streets? That is not how she comes. It must be wrong. There was a child with her too, dressed as an old-fashioned French soldier. What sense does that make?” His head turns left and right, his gaze darting up and down the street. “This is what is after us, in flesh and blood?”

  “Do you think Satan will approach you wearing a red suit and sprouting horns from his head? That may be the way he is played in a farce at The Gaiety, but not in the Holy Book or in most of the great poems and novels.”

  “But her and a child? They are connected to that building on Thomas Street?”

  “It is all a puzzle at the moment, indeed, but let us store this information in our minds and move forward.”

  “If this thing can take the form of an old woman and a child and kill without a mark or a sound, and it can enter our very brains, then we are doomed!” Edgar glances up and down the street again.

  “Do not be afraid.”

  Edgar swallows and straightens himself. “Yes,” he says, “keep telling me that.” His mind is swirling though, images flashing through it. He sees Jon’s dead face, the vampire creature, Professor Lear’s last gasp, Godwin with the harpoon in his chest and the large dark feather in the Thomas Street building. Now, this.

  “I shall, Edgar. That, after all, is the sort of thing for which a father exists.” Allen Brim smiles. “Now, where to start, my boy? A return to the Thomas Street building or Drury Lane? I suggest we visit Mr. Shakespeare first—the Crypto-Anthropology Society of the Queen’s Empire! Even if that strange little fellow can tell us nothing, bear in mind that he knows as much about these monsters as anyone and encourages and funds pursuit, and yet miraculously seems to be immune from attack. Nothing has ever pursued him. That is a stone-cold fact. His lair may be the safest place in London for you.”

  “Let us go in and speak to Lucy and Tiger first, tell them what I know, what that man meant to say to them, or at least where I am going.”

  “No, I don’t think that is wise. We must go alone.”

  Allen Brim takes Edgar by the arm and leads him south toward Drury Lane at a brisk pace.

  They walk silently. Edgar wants him to explain how he survived his death, but feeling warm in the clutches of his dear father and not wanting to disturb that feeling, he says nothing and they continue to walk on in silence. There will be time for such questions soon.

  Pedestrians pass by on all sides of them as if they were floating along in a dream, he and his father not even moving their feet. He watches everyone carefully—for faces resembling the hag’s, quick movements from hands in his direction, signs of dark wings sprouting from backs, but held close by his father, he reaches his destination safely.

  “This,” says Edgar to William Shakespeare when the strange little man answers the door, “is my father, Allen Brim.”

  “Where?”

  “This gentleman beside me.”

  “I see,” says Shakespeare. He stands there in another display of colorful clothing, looking up to Edgar’s right.

  “Over here,” says Edgar.

  Shakespeare looks to Edgar’s left and regards Allen Brim with a blank gaze. For an instant, Edgar wonders if the little lunatic cannot see his father, if he is so mad that nonexistent people like his three invisible friends are real to him and certain real people fictional.

  “My my my my my my my!” the little man suddenly exclaims. “Mr. Brim, it is! MR…. SIR…LORD…KING…BARON…Brim…you are most welcome here! You, sir, the sire of our own Edgar Broom, in MY humble abode, my residence, my hut, my shack, my lean-to, my living quarters of Spartan surroundings! ME, Sir William Shakespeare himself! Hosting YOU! You who knew of the monsters! Just wait until Messrs. Sprinkle, Winker and Tightman set their gaze upon you, until they train their deep-thinking cranial sponges upon the wisdom you are surely to disperse for their benefit! LORD Brim, you are most welcome!”

  “Allen will do fine,” says Edgar. “We have some questions for you.”

  “For ME? You have questions for ME? Let us descend to the august meeting room of the Crypto-Anthropology Society of the Queen’s Empire and direct said questions in my direction, whereupon I shall field them and consider them and send them back to you in the form of answers, audial articulations, that I am sure will satisfy. OH! Let us descend!”

  Shakespeare’s eyes are nearly popping out of his head; his lunacy appears to be seizing him more thoroughly than it ever has.

  “You seem especially nervous,” says Edgar.

  “HA!” cries the little man, and he quivers as he scurries down the stairs in front of them.

  The place settings for his three imaginary colleagues rest on the big table, as always, and Shakespeare gestures for his visitors to sit in other chairs, leaving those three spots open.

  “Mr. Winker, wake up!” he shrieks. “Can you not see we have
visitors of the highest standing, you poisonous bunch-backed toad!” The little man turns to his guests. “Where, may I ask, is Master Lear and Mademoiselle Lear and the Tigress, Master Tilley?”

  Edgar and Allen sit without answering, their faces grim.

  “What? What is wrong?” The little man is so taken aback by their expressions that he does not sit. He is at eye level with Edgar.

  “Two of my friends are at home. Jonathan is dead.”

  “DEAD!” shrieks Shakespeare. “Not by the hand of a monster, my dear! Assure me that it was NOT by the hand of a monster! A particular one!”

  Edgar does not want to reveal everything he knows to the little man, not yet. He is not in a trusting mood, especially concerning someone whose activities are now suspicious to him. “We do not know,” says Edgar, “though we think it likely. Someone, some thing, came to the Lears’ door and merely interacted with him…and he is no longer with us.”

  Shakespeare bursts into tears. “Oh, it is my fault! I led you all into this!”

  “And you may help lead us out of it,” says Edgar.

  The little fellow stops sobbing as if he were a tap that someone has turned off.

  “Whatever do you mean?”

  “Not long ago,” says Edgar, leaning toward Shakespeare and regarding him closely, “I asked you if you had visited the East End recently and you denied it. I have reason to believe you are lying.”

  “That is perhaps harsh,” says Allen Brim quietly.

  “It is time to be.”

  Shakespeare’s head swivels back and forth, regarding Edgar, then his father, then Edgar again.

  “Your father concurs?”

  “Answer the question. The building you visited there is of interest to us.”

  Shakespeare pauses for a few seconds, opens his mouth to speak, closes it, opens it again, closes it and then bursts into tears once more.

  “How, Edgar Broom, could you accuse me of such a thing? Mendacity!” He reaches into the pocket of his tight little orange suit coat (meant to complement his scarlet-and-green checked waistcoat) and pulls out a handkerchief. He holds it up to his substantial nose and blows hard and long. The sound is like a trumpet, a high-pitched note of tenor or perhaps even soprano tone.

  “What were you doing there?” demands Edgar.

  The little man blows his horn again. “Oh! I have denied it and yet you persist with a corollary. Do you make it a habit of poking fun at lunatics?”

  “Do madmen know they are mad?” asks Allen Brim quietly again, into his son’s ear.

  “A very good question, Father.”

  “What…question is that?” asks Shakespeare.

  “Are you indeed mad, sir? Or is this a game you play?”

  A strange look comes over the little man’s face. “I…I…”

  “We are in a desperate situation and we must have allies. It is time for you to stand up and be counted.”

  The little man straightens up. “ONE!” he cries.

  “That isn’t good enough, Mr. Shakespeare, not anymore,” says Edgar. “Tell us what you were doing in the East End or we will take you home with us tonight, strap you to the mouth of our cannon and blow the big bullet through you.”

  “Dear, dear,” says Shakespeare. “Might you do that?”

  “Speak!” says Allen.

  “Well…” he begins, “you see…I…is it hot in here?”

  “Come with us,” says Edgar.

  “NO!…No, I shall tell you.” He pauses.

  “Yes?”

  “In a moment.” He pauses again. Edgar reaches out for him and he pulls back. “No! I shall be frank with you, as frank as a madman can be.” His voice drops lower and it quavers as he speaks. “I have not been visiting the East End. I barely leave this august room, as you know. I have struggled with my sanity for some time, as you well know. What you may not know is that I used to have lucid moments, but they are fewer and fewer these days. I will admit to you that there was a time when I exaggerated my illness, in order to keep the monsters from me. What enemy would seriously consider a lunatic like me a threat? I broadcast my insanity, wore strange clothes, still do, but now, my friends, I have no idea how mad I am. It has all caught up with me. Am I sane now, for example, at this instant? I feel different. I do not know!” He slumps into a chair and looks distraught, then breaks down and cries again, this time intensely, his shoulders heaving. “My God, young Jonathan dead!”

  “No monster ever came here?” asks Edgar.

  Shakespeare sits bolt upright. “Certainly not.”

  “But you said, while you were airing your latest threat about another creature pursuing us, not only that it was the devil—”

  “It is,” whimpers the little man.

  “—but that the devil had been to visit you. You said that twice.”

  Shakespeare stares into the distance. “No I didn’t, I didn’t I didn’t I didn’t I didn’t I didn’t I didn’t I didn’t!”

  “What did you mean when you said the devil had been here?”

  The little one puts his hands over his ears. “I…DID…NOT…SAY…THAT!”

  “Perhaps you merely meant that an evil feeling has come over you in these rooms, the presence of an evil force, twice?”

  Shakespeare removes his hands from his ears. “Yes, that is it! I merely meant that!”

  “But he denied ever having said it at all,” whispers Allen. “He is lying again.”

  “You are lying, William Shakespeare, or whatever your name is.”

  “Don Quixote.”

  “Pardon me.”

  “My name is Don Quixote, not William Shakespeare! Where did you get such a nonsensical idea, you bolting-hutch of beastliness! Thou art a boil, a plague sore!” He glares at Edgar with his eyes on fire, as mad as King Lear.

  Edgar will have none of it. “The devil came to see you…didn’t he?”

  William Shakespeare stands transfixed in front of Edgar, then stares back and forth between him and his father, and then falls on his knees in front of his accuser, clutching at his shoes, his face to the floor.

  “Long ago, I, Don Quixote, was visited by a devil-man! Yes!”

  Edgar swallows. “Not Don Quixote, you. What form did it take? Was it Satan in the flesh?”

  “I don’t know.” His voice is barely audible. “But I can tell you that I was not insane then, that much I know.”

  “Tell me about this person, if that is indeed what he was. Or was it a she?”

  Shakespeare lifts his face from the floor and, still on his knees, looks up at Edgar. His eyes glaze over. “It was a man. He first came many years ago, about the time I met Professor Lear, but before he had actually killed the Grendel creature, when, as I said, my mind was better and I was merely investigating the possibility of the existence of human aberrations and dark forces. I was still writing literary criticism, intrigued by the monsters inside some stories, who seemed so terribly real! I had inherited a good deal of money, as you know, and had given Lear funds to do his researches. This devil person had seen one of the pamphlets I distributed on the streets asking anyone who had experienced the hag phenomenon to come to my residence to converse about it, for a fee.”

  “What did he look like?”

  Shakespeare’s voice is shaky. “A large man with a shaved head, dressed in black, wearing a crucifix and in possession of the most penetrating black eyes I have ever seen on a human being. I have been too frightened of him to ever tell anyone!”

  “What did he do and say that day?”

  “He asked me why I was distributing the pamphlets, what I knew about the hag phenomenon, what I thought the human mind could be exploring as it conjured such a creature, and if I thought that creature might be real.”

  A shiver goes down Edgar’s spine. He has the sense that his father has left the room
but he does not take his eyes off the little man.

  “What else?”

  “That was all, at first. I answered as best I could. He came back.”

  “How much later?”

  “About a year later. He had a way about him.” Shakespeare quivers.

  “What do you mean?”

  “He got things out of me. Just like you!”

  “What things?”

  “About Professor Lear.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Lear was in London at that time, recovering from the grievous wound Grendel inflicted upon him, and had come to see me about his situation, and I was petrified by it all. It unhinged me and began my steep decline. Am I making sense?” A tear rolls down his cheek.

  “Yes, go on.”

  “I seem to have lucid memories of these things.” He pauses. “The devil-man, he then got it ALL out of me! He had been telling me about his own studies, his researches, his fascination with religion, with the occult, with the extraordinary power of the human brain. He told me, that second day, that he suspected he had unlocked some of the secrets of the mind, of existence, of God and of evil. It frightened me so, and I responded with a veritable flood of details…he asked me with his beckoning eyes and I told him. The story of Professor Lear and Grendel riveted him. I even added that I wondered if there were other monsters about, human aberrations, some of them captured in the great works of literary art. The idea excited him so much that I thought he might fly about the room!”

  “Was that the last you saw of him?”

  “No, he returned another time.”

  “Once more?”

  “I…I must admit…I must tell you it…has been…many times…and on each occasion everything feels darker.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He looked different as the months and years passed. His face grew grayer, the shaved dome on his head more like leather, and his eyes somehow more intense. He would come perhaps once every three months or so, talking more and more of his accomplishments, his knowledge of human life, of his mastery of black magic, of evil, of secret societies, of the mind. He pressed me more about the monsters. As Lear began to speak to me about a presence near the College on the Moors, which he feared was a new monster in pursuit of him, I told my visitor all about it. It excited him to no end too! He asked me if I thought that the greatest monster in existence might be the devil, alive and living in London.” Shakespeare pauses and looks pleadingly at Edgar. “So, that means it isn’t HIM, is it?” He does not wait for an answer. “After you came here with Miss Tilley the first time, I told him about you as well, your remarkable dreams, your unprecedented hag phenomenon. He often asked about Lucy Lear and Jonathan too. He followed you, all of you, and observed your efforts as you destroyed the revenant-vampire creature, and possibly your elimination of Dr. Godwin, the Frankenstein monster, in the Arctic.” The little man puts his hands on either side of his head and looks at the floor.