Demon

by Shane Peacock

  “This devil-man adored fear. He kept speaking about it. He said it was like an electricity, a power beyond anything else that one might harness. He said it was like the waters of an unimaginably large Niagara Falls. He would talk for hours and I would just sit here as if mesmerized! He gave me his card, told me to report to him, but I never did…because…because he always came here.”

  Edgar’s heart is pounding. He gets to his feet.

  “When was this man last here?”

  The little lunatic does not respond. Edgar can see him swallow.

  “When!”

  “A few days ago.” Shakespeare stares up. “Edgar, his eyes were on fire!”

  “I doubt…”

  “I, Don Quixote, shall now get upon my noble steed, Rocinante, and ride off into the sunset, going in all directions at once!” Shakespeare leaps up and rushes around the room in circles, seizing chairs and side-tables, putting his hands and even his feet on the walls, as if he were contemplating climbing them. “Pay no attention to the things I say, Edgar Broom, no attention at all! Such concerns will kill you! They shall kill us all! Fly away from the devil. That is what you must do! Flight! It is a simple matter!”

  “My name is Brim.”

  “Yes, indeed, Sir Edgar Brim, my dear, dear, dear, dear, dear, dear…acquaintance. That is all you are, you know, we have no real connection; do not say we do if asked! In fact, you may not even be real!”

  Edgar sighs and sinks into a chair.

  “OH!” shrieks the little man, leaping to his feet. “You elvish-mark’d abortive, rooting hog! You have sat upon Mr. Winker! I shall extricate him from beneath your girth and relocate his posterior into another chair!” He seizes Edgar and lifts him with remarkable strength and then grunts as he pulls on an invisible form that had apparently been beneath him, finally getting it out and depositing it into another chair.

  “Master Broom, why would you—”

  “You know very well that my name is Brim, sir! You must stop talking nonsense! We are in desperate need of sanity. There is no one here but us!”

  “Yes…yes, Brim.” He sits on the floor and becomes very, very still, holding his breath. His face begins to turn purple.

  “You have to breathe.”

  Shakespeare lets out his breath. “Thank you, Broom.” He clams up, staring down at the floor. “What will we do?” he whispers. “What if this man is truly a messenger of Satan?”

  Edgar hears a noise and sees his father at the door that gives passage into the inner portion of the apartment where Shakespeare lives. Allen Brim must have been poking around in there. Now, he is beckoning Edgar to him with a finger, an excited expression on his face.

  “What, Father?”

  Allen keeps motioning.

  “I have more to inquire of Mr. Shakespeare,” says Edgar.

  His father, however, does not stop.

  Edgar gets up and heads for the inner door. “What is this about?” he says. Allen Brim has already vanished back into the apartment.

  “Mr. Tightman is in there,” says Shakespeare abruptly.

  “No he isn’t.”

  Edgar pushes the door fully open and goes through it into the narrow hallway, Shakespeare quickly in pursuit. Edgar stops for a moment and listens for the sound of someone moving around farther in the apartment, but he hears no one. Shakespeare almost runs into him from behind.

  “What are you doing?” asks the little man, his voice shrill.

  Allen goes right by the water closet and heads down the hallway and past a couple of rooms. There is a desk in one, with old-fashioned feather-pens and inkpots; another is set up as a small sitting room with an ottoman that looks like it was once the property of an Arabian sheik; and then, at the end of the hall, he encounters a bedroom. There is not much in it other than an elaborate bed with carved bedposts that nearly reach the ceiling and a silky white mosquito net covering it. There are closets taking up almost every inch of the walls, and one of the closet doors is open, and Edgar can see a spectacular array of clothing inside. He recalls with a slight smile the time the little man had provided him and his friends with a remarkable supply of clothes, after they had survived the terrible fire in Dr. Godwin’s laboratory at the top of the Midland Grand Hotel. Allen goes into the room and motions for Edgar to follow.

  “You cannot enter my inner sanctum, Edgar Broom! You cannot!”

  An idea has seized Edgar and he moves into the room and over to the closet as fast as he can. He begins to look through the clothes hanging there.

  “What are you doing, Brim?” shouts Shakespeare. “This is outrageous!”

  Edgar soon finds something that almost stops his heart: there is a sky-blue coat and billowing scarlet trousers hanging in the closet and up above them on a shelf a pillbox hat…like a Zouave soldier would wear.

  “What are you doing?” repeats Shakespeare, sounding perfectly sane.

  “I have more questions for you.” Edgar’s face is red as he turns to the tiny man.

  Shakespeare pauses for a moment and then his eyes light up with a lunatic’s gleam. “Lovely! We shall adjourn to the meeting room and entertain them!”

  Allen Brim follows silently behind them.

  When they are back at the table, Edgar makes Shakespeare sit and stands over him, his hands on the back of the chair next to him, the one usually reserved for Mr. Sprinkle. The little man is squirming in his seat.

  “Broom…Brim, you are, uh, crowding Mr. Sprinkle. Please—”

  “Hold your tongue, you little fool!”

  Shakespeare starts, but recovers himself quickly, squeezes his thumb and forefinger together and runs them across his lips as if sealing them.

  “We are at the end of games, Mr. Shakespeare, or whatever your name is. You need to be straight with me!” Edgar lets go of Sprinkle’s chair and passes directly behind the little man. “You, sir, were seen at the Lear home, in the company of a particular person, wearing those ridiculous clothes you now have in your closet, that Zouave costume, in the early morning hours when Jonathan was murdered. In fact, it was you, sir, and the person who was with you, who were somehow the agents of his death!”

  There is a long stretch of silence. Edgar cannot see the little man’s face, but when he comes around the chair and looks at him, the expression upon it has changed. He looks deadly serious. Edgar keeps quiet and sits in Sprinkle’s spot, directly upon him, and Shakespeare says nothing for a long while.

  “I was not responsible for the death of Master Jonathan Lear,” he finally says. He speaks in such a calm, collected voice that it startles Edgar. “I know little of that, nor am I aware of this particular person you mention. Jonathan was an admirable young man! The clothes you refer to are not ‘Zouave’ as you say. If you examine them closely you will see that they are merely rather loose pantaloons, the kind of habiliment, along with riding jodhpurs and ancient breeches and outrageously bright jackets and coats and blouses, that I have employed publicly over these last years as a means to accentuate the appearance of my lunacy. When you accuse me of murder, you are jumping to conclusions based on something someone else has told you. You have been exaggerating everything of late, Master Brim. You are in danger of losing your mind too! In fact, that may have already happened.” He glances toward the inner door where Allen Brim had stood. “I have had deep concerns about you over these past few weeks. You must remain calm in our hellish situation, though I must say that serenity will do nothing to save you from your fate.”

  “Which is?”

  “Certain death; that will also be the fate of your friends.”

  Edgar swallows. “How can I trust you when—”

  “Who told you about me and my supposed companion appearing at the Lears’ home, Edgar? Have you ever seen this so-called neighbor before in your life? Do you really believe that this informant lives on the Lears’ street? Why
is he suddenly materializing with this story?”

  Edgar wonders if he told Shakespeare that the witness lived on the Lears’ street.

  “The devil,” continues the little man, “who may be the power behind the person who came to see me, or even the actual individual himself, is in pursuit of you. He or it possesses an evil beyond our comprehension; he may have the ability to infiltrate your very soul, sir. Now, do you think this demon would have any trouble assuming the role of an informer, neighbor or not? Do you think he would not consider it best to have you accuse me, add to your paranoia, perhaps harm me, when I am your only ally left? He has likely been in the back rooms of my apartment, seen my clothing. Why would I intend any harm to Jonathan Lear! Who did he say was with me? Some demon from your dreams? The hag? That would be perfect! Be careful what you are thinking, for your mind may now be working for your enemy.”

  “Do you really believe we have brought the devil himself down upon us?”

  “I fear we have. I have been trying to warn you!”

  Edgar is shaking. “What do we do now?”

  “We? Very different things. I remain mad. My visitor, or his leader, does not fear ME or intend ME harm. I am not in pursuit of monsters in any real or threatening way. I have made sure that is the perception. You, however, must flee. To where, I do not know, for if this demon is whom we fear he is, he will track you to the end of the earth. In fact, it seems he has already begun to accompany you inside your brain! You believed that I, William Shakespeare, came with a figment of your imagination and murdered Jonathan Lear! Remember, it is written that he is capable of all such powers and more in the Bible itself!” The little man is beginning to sound shrill again.

  “Surely, you don’t believe—”

  “Why would such great men, why would God, write of such a force, over and over and over, if it does not exist?”

  “I must get away,” says Edgar to himself and his heart pounds.

  “Do not be afraid,” says his father from somewhere behind him, but for the first time, Edgar thinks those words nonsense.

  “Yes, flee, and do not return here!”

  Edgar starts for the door but turns back. “I don’t know where to…”

  “It is the devil!” shouts Shakespeare. “It is Satan himself! RUN! FLY AWAY! HIDE SOMEWHERE EVEN GOD CANNOT FIND YOU! FEAR YOUR ENEMY IN A MANNER YOU HAVE NEVER FEARED ANYTHING BEFORE! AND MAY GOD BE WITH YOU!”

  Allen Brim turns back to William Shakespeare. “If we discover that you had anything to do with the death of Jonathan Lear, it is YOU who had better run, for we will come back for you!”

  Deep in his terror, Edgar has the very same thought.

  “I need to see Tiger and Lucy,” says Edgar.

  “That is not advisable.”

  Allen Brim is trying to keep up to Edgar as he rushes along Drury Lane bumping into gentlemen and brushing past ladies’ billowing dresses and sending goods flying from mongers’ hands, drawing shouts and curses. He does not so much as even look back.

  “This is the devil, Father. I cannot do this alone. I have to try to trust them. I have to trust someone.”

  “You have me.”

  Edgar stops and regards his father. He reaches out and touches Allen Brim, caressing his face. “Yes, I do,” he says. A man in a tall black top hat and his purple-bonneted wife stare at them. A string of schoolchildren hand-in-hand with their teachers, notice too, and giggle.

  “We must pursue Satan and this devil-man before he or they pursue us,” says Allen.

  “But we really know nothing about him. Even his appearance!”

  “You must face him, no matter what.”

  “So, all the better to be with my friends and with the rifle and the cannon too. We have more chance of survival in greater numbers.”

  “Those are merely earthly weapons and your foe is supernatural. This is not just a mere revenant or a creature made by the hand of man. And how can you survive if your allies are your enemies?”

  “I do not know that for certain.”

  * * *

  —

  They argue all the way to Kentish Town, the elder Brim beginning to fall behind as they near. When they finally reach the house, Allen stays out on the street. Edgar approaches the door, and then turns back to his father.

  “I won’t remain with them for long if I suspect anything,” he shouts. “You know where to find me.”

  The door opens. Tiger is standing there, rifle in hand.

  “Who are you shouting at?”

  Edgar watches his father move backward down the street and out of sight. He hears Dr. Berenice’s voice saying: Do you have close friends whose loyalty you have recently begun to doubt? You must stay away from these friends until you are sure about them.

  “No one.”

  Lucy appears at Tiger’s shoulder and her face glows when she sees him.

  “Edgar! We were worried sick. Where did you go?”

  It is time for supper, almost past it. The sun will soon set. Edgar has been gone since just after the noon hour.

  “I…I went to the hospital to speak with Lawrence, to tell him we are ready to team with him and make use of his assets,” Edgar lies, “and he wasn’t there.”

  “That wouldn’t have taken five or six hours,” says Tiger, who is almost pointing the gun at him now.

  “I…I went to see Shakespeare too.”

  “I thought we were going to do that together,” says Lucy. She looks at him with a longing expression.

  “It turned out not to matter,” says Edgar quickly. “Shakespeare does not know anything. The devil-man visits were imaginary. He is a lunatic.”

  Lucy looks down, as if she knows he is lying.

  “Shakespeare is mad? Thanks for the news,” says Tiger, and she sounds just like Jonathan when she says it.

  Edgar decides not to tell them about the woman and child at the door, not yet.

  “May I come in?”

  “Why did you do all of this on your own?” asks Tiger. “We know something awfully powerful is pursuing us. Why risk being out on the streets alone?”

  “I don’t know, I just went, perhaps it wasn’t rational, perhaps I thought that if our enemy got to me then that would be just one of us, better one than all three.”

  “How noble of you,” says Tiger.

  “Thanks, Jon.”

  Tiger glares at him.

  “May I come in?” he repeats.

  “Of course,” says Lucy, who takes him by the hand and pulls him indoors.

  They eat in near silence, only asking each other to pass the salt or pepper or the boiled pork and bread and butter that Lucy cooked for them. They sit on the settee afterward, Tiger at one end and Lucy beside Edgar but her hand cold where it touches his thigh.

  “We should go to that room on Thomas Street again,” says Tiger, getting to her feet and taking up the rifle, which she has kept cradled on her knee.

  “I thought you were against that, Tiger. Besides, we’ve already been there,” says Edgar. “What else could we learn from—”

  “You claim Shakespeare knows nothing. What other option do we have? I am not staying here like a sitting duck waiting for this thing to descend upon us. We have to DO something; seek this devil! Maybe take it by surprise!”

  Tiger looks to Lucy and Edgar thinks she gives her a slight nod.

  “I cannot face it, not after dark,” says Lucy. “Perhaps tomorrow I will be able. I am going to bed.” She squeezes Edgar’s leg, gets up and makes her way to her room.

  “It is just you and me,” says Tiger to Edgar, “like the old days. Let’s go to Thomas Street this minute.” Her face is lit up as if she were possessed.

  “Uh…no, not now.”

  “Why?”

  Edgar is wondering what it would be like to be alone with an armed Tiger Ti
lley if she wanted to harm you, if she were under the influence of Satan: alone in that dark room in Thomas Street.

  “I…I think we should have Lucy with us.”

  “Lucy? We would be better off without her!” Tiger’s voice is rising.

  “I…I don’t want to leave her alone.”

  “But—”

  “I am going to bed too. We will be more rested in the morning and will be able to function better in that dim room with some daylight getting through its windows.” He turns quickly and makes his way down the hall to his bedroom before she can respond. “Go alone, if you must,” he says over his shoulder.

  She doesn’t, which worries Edgar even more.

  His room is the middle one in the hallway, between the two girls. Edgar lies awake trying to sleep, worrying that enemies surround him, terrifed that Satan will attack at any second, wondering about the devil-man who visited Shakespeare, and frightened that the hag will come for him again, tonight. The devil can take on her form, he thinks, walk around the streets of London! He tosses and turns, with all his clothes on under the sheets, forcing himself to stay awake. Then he hears Tiger’s door open: there is just a slight creak. It moves slowly, tentatively, as if whoever is pushing it does not want to be heard. Edgar leaps to his feet and rushes to his own door. In an instant, he is in the hallway and sees a dark form standing outside Lucy’s room. It turns.