by Jack Gerson
'Shut up, Harry!' said Anne, starting to laugh.
Ignoring the interruptions, Martindale went on. 'Ornstein, the American psychologist, defines it as the silent side of man. Where creativity comes from, where aesthetics have their source.'
'And where he believes the psychical aspects of the mind originate,' Crane came in smugly. 'I've read Ornstein.'
'Good!' Martindale nodded, his greater smugness annihilating Crane's. 'Then you will recall his theory that the two hemispheres are in fact separate entities but in close communication. With the left having the upper hand. But what happens when it loses the upper hand? When you sleep... under stress conditions or... or hypnosis... the left loses its control of the right. Result... visionary and even auditory hallucinations.'
'This can only happen when the left is "off its guard" so to speak?' Crane questioned.
Martindale nodded. 'Somewhere there are your explanations of telepathy, clairvoyance, what-have-you.'
'With varying degrees of susceptibility,' Anne came in. 'Or acceptability in different people.'
'Of course. No two minds are alike,' Martindale agreed.
'And what if the two hemispheres were to be surgically separated?' asked Crane.
Gilchrist snorted loudly. 'Now this is really getting into the realms of science fiction!'
Martindale glared at him. 'Jekyll and Hyde was based on fact!' Then he turned back to Crane. 'But tell me, Tom, what prompted you to write those articles in the first place? What motivation did you have?'
Crane shrugged, frowning. 'I suppose... the subject interested me.'
Not to be put off so easily, Martindale probed further. 'You're an intelligent man. Lots of subjects must interest you. Why this one? Or shall I tell you what I think?'
'Go ahead.'
'An inner compulsion. A curiosity, the origin of which you are not even conscious.'
Crane stirred uneasily and took a sip of whisky. 'Look, I'm a freelance journalist. This is another job of work. I get paid for it so I do it. That's the only reason. Nothing else.'
There was a short silence, Gilchrist nodded in vociferous if silent agreement. Martindale sat, unmoving, a slight smile hovering on his lips as if his mild amusement covered his disbelief at Crane's protest.
Crane glanced at his watch. Time to move. A walk over to the Grassmarket. And then Drexel and the interview he could count as work. Better than talking about work, healthier than theorising despite his interest in Martindale's exposition.
'Anne, will you excuse me?' he broke the silence. 'I think I really have to go now.'
Before Anne could reply Martindale broke in. 'I seem to have disturbed you, Tom.'
'It takes a lot to disturb me, Dr Martindale. I've simply had a long day, I'm tired. I would like to discuss this further. Perhaps we can meet again?' The moment he uttered the last sentence Crane regretted it. Did he really want to meet this supercilious, possibly arrogant man again?
Martindale however did not miss his opportunity. 'How about tomorrow evening? Come to dinner.'
'I'm not even sure I'll be in Edinburgh.' Crane stood. 'Anyway you'll excuse me just now. I have to confess I have another appointment.'
'At this hour?' Martindale's eyebrows proved themselves elastic again.
Anne ignored him. 'Someone interesting, Tom?'
'A man called Drexel. Used to be quite... famous.'
'Never heard of him,' Harry Gilchrist muttered.
'Infamous rather than famous, surely, Tom?' Martindale pushed his chair back and stood. 'He had quite a reputation in the late forties. An exponent of the occult. That him?'
'The same.'
'Used whatever so-called abilities he had to impress young people,' Martindale explained. 'Mostly women.'
'A phoney?' Gilchrist asked, yet it was less a question than a statement.
'Oh, almost certainly,' responded Martindale airily.
Again Crane felt his dislike of Martindale rise within him, a choler based on unreason yet reinforced by the man's overweening self-assurance.
'I don't think you can dismiss him as a phoney,' he found himself insisting. 'I don't know why I say that but I believe it.'
'He must have impressed you. And where is he now? Surely not in Edinburgh?'
'I undertook not to reveal his whereabouts.'
Anne came round the table to Crane. 'I must say I'm intrigued.'
Martindale frowned at her. 'Too many people were. Too many women. Can't think why. He was, I believe, the sort of man one should go out of one's way to avoid.'
'Did you meet him then?' Gilchrist asked.
Martindale lifted his whisky glass and took a sip. 'Briefly, some years ago. To some people he was rather unlucky, so they say. I won't go into the lurid details...'
'Oh, come on, why not?' said Gilchrist exuberantly.
'On two or three occasions people involved with Drexel came, in one way or another, to a rather sticky end. People who had seemingly opposed him in some way...'
'How "sticky"?' asked Anne.
Martindale contemplated his glass. 'Their deaths were apparently self-inflicted or accidental and Drexel had watertight alibis each time...'
Gilchrist laughed, a short staccato guffaw. 'So what are you going on about? How can you possibly know..?'
'One was an old friend of mine,' Martindale replied giving Gilchrist a cold glance. 'John Lawson, a well-respected doctor. And concerned about Drexel's effect on some of his more neurotic patients. He was about to expose Drexel... they were possibly criminal charges... when his accident happened.'
'What exactly did happen?' Anne asked, her face serious.
Martindale hesitated. For once his arrogance had gone. Then he finally spoke. 'He was found in his surgery burnt to death. His body was in a chair that had been barely scorched. Yet two thirds of his body were almost carbonised!'
'How on earth..?' Gilchrist gasped.
'I don't know. The police said he must have accidentally set some inflammable fluid on fire in his hand and it splashed onto his suit. But it is strange only the body was burnt. And of course at the time it happened Drexel was ten miles away. Indeed there was nobody with Lawson. He was in his surgery working late with the door locked on the inside.'
'I think I read.about that business,' Crane said. 'There was even some talk about it being one of those odd cases of spontaneous combustion in the human body.'
Martindale smiled sardonically. 'I've never quite believed in that kind of fantasy. It was either accidental... or
engineered in some way by Drexel. Though God knows how.'
Gilchrist gave a nervous giggle. 'I think old Roy's trying to frighten you, Crane, with his ghost stories.'
'There have been many stories about Drexel,' Crane said. 'All to be taken with a pinch of salt.'
Martindale gave a depreciatory shrug. Crane cleared his throat and again announced his departure. He shook hands briefly with Gilchrist and then turned to Martindale.
'Goodnight, Dr Martindale, I hope we meet again,' he said, trying to convince himself that the insincerity in his voice was not as obvious to the others as it was to himself.
'I shall look forward to it,' Martindale replied evenly.
Anne showed him to the door where he thanked her.
'I'm sorry about Roy,' she smiled the apology. 'When you get to know him, you'll find he'll grow on you.'
He muttered something about being glad to have met Martindale, thanked her again, assured her he would telephone her if he left Edinburgh quickly and took his leave.
When she returned to the lounge, Martindale and Gilchrist were both seated. They rose. Gilchrist had somehow changed, the amiable look of bland scepticism had gone.
'So that was Tom Crane,' he said coolly.
Martindale nodded. 'If he is all we think he is, then it's been a worthwhile evening. The beginning, shall we say.'
Anne stared at him.
'As long as we're all honest with him eventually then I don't mind tonight. But I
do feel rather two-faced.'
'My dear, you did what you had to do. Invited an old friend to dinner. Now what's wrong with that?' Martindale patted her shoulder in reassurance.
'I... I only hope... I only hope he'll be all right with this man Drexel,' she said, unable to restrain a shudder. She walked over to the drinks tray and poured herself a large neat whisky.
FIVE
There was a brief shower of rain as Crane walked into the Grassmarket and though it did not last, dark clouds hid the moon and loured over angular rooftops. Outside Drexel's shop a broken rone pipe dripped onto the cobbles and a puddle grew under the shop window. A gleam of light shone from within.
Crane stepped inside. As he did so he felt a tremor of excitement. Or perhaps it was rather of anticipation.
The girl, Morag, was sitting in exactly the same spot, head down, eyes riveted on her book. The bare electric light bulb above her head was the only light in the room.
Drexel sat by a dying fire, flames flickering on the hearth. He did not look up as Crane crossed the room.
'Good evening, Mr Crane,' he said. 'What can I do for you this time?'
'You suggested I come back, remember?'
'Ah, yes,' Drexel stirred and stood slowly. 'I'm sorry I can't help you.'
Crane frowned. 'But you said...'
'I changed my mind.' Drexel turned away. 'Anyway you'd be wasting your time.'
'I think you've already wasted it for me.'
Drexel smiled, a smile without humour. 'Very well. I've wasted your time. I apologise for that. But I have nothing to say to you.'
To Crane came the thought, it wasn't a smile on Drexel's face but a gallows grin. The phrase amused him. He said lightly, You've decided not to astonish me then?'
Drexel gave him a look. 'I've decided not to!'
'May I ask why the change of mind?'
The smile had gone now, the face was grim. 'In both our interests it would not be a good thing.'
'Of course I could make something of that,' Crane responded, putting the imagined story into words. 'Edward Drexel today refuses, or is unable, to give any demonstration of the powers of clairvoyance he once so readily laid claim to.'
Drexel faced him now and he could see the anger in the older man's eyes. 'I do not have to prove anything, Mr Crane! My record, my life speaks for itself. With many voices over the years.'
Crane, ignoring his interruption, went on, 'And, in addition to his inflated reputation, Drexel seems to have been something of a Jonah to people who have, over the years, become involved with him.'
Something at the back of Drexel's eyes flared up, a cold fire of rage. He looked across at Morag who obediently rose, book in hand, and walked to the door, an abrupt invitation. 'This missing woman?' he pressed on. 'The one who disappeared from Morningside, was she another of your unfortunate acquaintances? Is that why, the last time I was here, you spoke of her "body", as if she was already dead? Perhaps, like the late John Lawson, she was about to make trouble for you?'
Behind Crane the girl, Morag, dropped her book. It thumped heavily onto the wooden floor. Crane ignored it. He was staring at Drexel whose face seemed, in its anger, to twist and twitch, as if trying to reshape itself.
'You seem well informed, Crane,' his voice had a strained, rasping quality. 'Although I should of course question the accuracy of your information.'
He paused, as if gathering some kind of inner strength, and then went on. 'No one makes trouble for me, sir. Not if they possess a sense of self-protection.'
'Are you threatening me now?' Crane asked.
'I am merely suggesting you leave well alone. Don't meddle in things that don't concern you, things you do not know enough about.'
'And if I persist?'
'Then I should have to stop you.'
It occurred to Crane that he had drifted into performing in some old-fashioned melodrama, with this old man in front of him as a very theatrical villain.
'Be very interesting to know exactly how you would stop me.'
Drexel tugged the lobe of his right ear as if considering some course of action. His face had ceased twitching and was now immobile but for the merest hint of irritation.
'You want me to show you?' he said. 'You want to bait me into some action. All right. But I'll ask you this. You want me to put fear into you? To make it course through the marrow of your spine? I can do that.'
The last four words were a simple statement, delivered with calm assurance. Crane found himself trying to suppress a smile, to appear suitably impressed.
'Do I sit down and wait or does it happen elsewhere?'
Drexel sighed, as if suddenly weary. 'You will find out. Very soon. Let's say I have to do something to warn you off, since I cannot convince you. Not that in the end I would admit there were any incidents for which I could be held responsible.'
'You interest me, Drexel.'
The older man made a vague gesture with his hand. 'One simple demonstration. One small salutary warning. And then you will leave an old man in peace. You will leave Edinburgh and if you don't, there will be another demonstration, one you might not survive.'
Crane felt amused at the theatricality of the gesture and the words. 'It would be appropriate for me to leave now, Drexel. Allow you peace to do what you have to. So I'll say goodnight.'
'Let me give you some advice, Crane. Leave psychic investigation alone. If you... survive... you will find things within yourself you will not like.'
At the door Crane hesitated and looked back at Drexel who was still standing motionless in front of the fireplace.
'Go quickly now, Crane,' Drexel did not appear to be speaking but his voice echoed in Crane's head. 'Don't loiter. You won't like it if you do.'
Crane stepped into the narrow street. The door swung shut behind him and he heard the key turning in the lock. Despite his relaxed feeling, all at once a chill struck him. He shivered, pulled his coat collar up and walked along the lane into the Grassmarket.
He looked from left to right. The street was deserted. 'Under the yellow street lamps a trace of mist seemed to swirl around a few feet above the cobbles.
Seemed? Why seemed? Why did the mist seem to be there? Why did the street seem to be empty and yet just beyond the shadowy darkness under the walls of buildings shapes seemed to move? In the blackness of doorways there was another deeper shade of black as if the darkness itself had volume and mass and a slow mobility.
Crane started to walk along the pavement, his feeling of relaxed affability draining away, the very blackness syphoning it from him. His footsteps echoed against the darkness and seemed to re-echo back to him doubled in volume, an echo within an echo.
As he walked he was aware of a growing, irrational fear within himself. It came from his mind and spread down into his chest and he felt the tightness of panic. He shook his head as he walked trying to shake away a terror he had not felt since he'd been a child. But it was useless, the terror was there constricting his breathing so much that he found himself staggering and put out his hand to steady himself, touching the ice-cold stonework of the buildings.
Then he found himself not merely staggering but tripping and stumbling, his breath now coming in short gasps. Ridiculous. Nothing wrong. He was healthy, fit and quite strong. Yet against the grey stone he leaned and faltered, his fingers scrabbling the stone like a drunk trying to remain erect.
He was not moving now but merely standing, slumped against the wall. His hand slid over the glass of a shop window and he peered into the dust-laden interior as if seeking reassurance from the items in the window of a reality that was slipping away.
He tried to straighten up and partially succeeded. He found himself still staring at the window and he seemed to see, not the customary bric-a-brac of an antique shop but dust and traces of something having scrabbled in darkness.
No! No, he found himself asserting the denial of the shapes he could see before his eyes.
He forced himself away from the glass and stone
of the shop and started to walk, swaying slightly, a man who has had too much to drink. But, damn it, he hadn't had too much, he said to himself, two whiskies and one glass of wine. Yet the effect of the drink or of his own dull perception seemed to have taken over his body.
He started to walk again. As he walked he felt something behind him and turned, stumbling to the view of the empty street. No one in sight, nothing out of the normal.
He stood for a moment now, completely still. The row of street lamps seemed to stretch to infinity. Eventually he forced himself to move but, as he turned to walk on, the furthest street lamp went out. He thought nothing of it and started to pace forward again. As he did so he seemed to hear, very faintly, a distant pulsing sound intermingled with a low shuffling behind him.
Again he looked over his shoulder. A second street light had gone out and as he peered through the yellow light of the lamps a third street lamp went out.
He wanted to run but it took him all his time to keep moving forward. Behind him he knew, one by one the street lights were going out, candle flames snuffed to blackness by some unseen enormous hand.
Some technical failure of the lighting system, he told himself. But he knew it wasn't so. Street lamps went on in blocks these days, controlled by some central series of switches.
Yet one by one, behind him, they were going out.
The pulsing sound was louder now as was the shuffling noise.
The sounds and the lights failing followed him.
He forced himself now to try to run although it was as if he was trudging through water. His hands were damp with perspiration and starting to shake.
He knew something was behind him.
Something that needed darkness, that clung to darkness, that eliminated light.
Something.
He was running now, his feet slithering over cobbles. He tripped, falling forward and only saved himself by throwing out one hand and pushing himself back onto his feet. His hand was covered in mud and grit and seemed to be cut but he ignored it, running on. The sounds were still with him, the pulsating like a gigantic heartbeat, the shuffling as of some creature, some animal.
Something following.
He couldn't see the end of the street even though the lamps ahead of him were still lit. The buildings lining the pavement disappeared into shadows in front of them and the entire street seemed so much longer than he remembered it. Fleetingly he imagined he was passing shops and entries he had already passed. And behind him, one by one the street lights were going out.
