It is possible that if such bodily exposure continues, Professor Herrmann will have to pay a fine. Princess Noor herself made no statement as, according to theater manager O. E. Thomason, she speaks no English.
The great magician says he will follow his New York stop with a national tour and engagements in Europe at the earliest opportunity. Performances continue tonight and through Saturday next. As of last night, the entire run is sold out.
23
COLONEL NELSON A. MILES WAS DRUNK, A CONDITION WITH which he had no prior experience.
The men of Omaha could have given him lessons. Most of them could consume a high percentage of their weight in beer and spirits and go about their business with confidence. And while the town’s saloons boasted of serving the best cuts or having the comeliest dance-hall girls or the most skilled prostitutes, in Omaha this made little difference. A man drank closest to where his thirst struck him—or nearest the spot where he woke in the morning.
This alcoholic culture notwithstanding, no one had ever seen Nelson Miles in the town’s bars, not even for a friendly whiskey. Until this evening, his had always been a steady hand: dependable in battle and formal in bearing and conversation. When he arrived at the Big Cheese around six, Horgan, the bartender, noted that Miles looked pale. The colonel started on beer but switched to whiskey around two hours in. Twice, he attempted to straighten up and leave, but the room had not cooperated, spinning both times like a dust devil and reuniting him with his chair. Now it was nearing ten; Miles rested his arms on the table and buried his head within them as if mourning a lost love. When he heard a kindly voice speak to him, he was unsure if it was coming from inside his head or out.
“Hello, Nelson,” the voice said. “If my life depended on predictin’ someone’s future, I’d choose yours. Tomorrow morning you’ll have a head like a medicine ball.”
The colonel looked up to see John McGarrigle dressed in “store” clothing. Miles raised his eyes from his arms. The dim light of the oil lamps stabbed them.
“Go away, old man.”
“Sure, sure, I’ll get away and glad to,” Prophet John said. “Now that I’m a respected member of the business community, I need to be particular about who I’m seen with.”
Several tables burst into laughter. Horgan pounded the bar and coughed. “Shit,” said Vic Mitchell, the whoremaster of the Silk Purse, drawing the word out and separating it into two syllables. The voices cut through the colonel’s brain like a steam drill.
“Drinkin’s like any other activity you’d like to become good at,” McGarrigle said. “It takes years of practice. Look, young Julius is here. Isn’t that right, Julius? Shouldn’t a man know what he’s doin’ before he does it?”
Julius Meyer ignored the prophet. He placed his hand gently on Miles’s wrist; though he was drunk, his pulse was racing.
“Anyway, Colonel, we know why you’re here,” McGarrigle said. “By now, the whole town’s heard tell of it. I reckon the best we can hope for is that it’s not as bad as they say.”
Miles looked up from his folded arms. There were tears in his eyes.
“Whatever you may have heard, John McGarrigle, I can assure you it is worse.”
Julius took his hand from Miles’s arm and sat facing him.
“Worse than what we’ve heard is hell,” Julius said.
“Yes, hell, Mr. Meyer—and I was there. Not as a sinner but as a demon charged with torturing wretched souls. Only in this hell, Mr. Meyer, the demon’s work is unjustified because the damned are not guilty but innocent—their only sin being red.”
Miles reached for his half-full glass and drained it.
“Come now, sir,” Julius said. “Whatever happened out there, you had your orders.”
“Oh, yes, our orders were clear. The Poncas were to be relocated and there was to be no more delay about it. Indian Affairs said we had already dithered with them too much. The Sioux may be all but defeated, they said, but there are a million of them in their nations. That many people with guns and arrows can make a lot of trouble—the Dakotas and Brulé demanded that we remove this thorn from their sides.
“And so we went. But when we gathered to escort the tribe from the Niobrara, I tell you, I wondered how any nation, white or red, could be threatened by so few people. My God, with all of their chiefs and their slaves and half-breeds, they numbered less than eight hundred—that’s fewer souls than at Kearney—probably fewer than the Chinese in Omaha.
“Like a fool, I assumed that this detail would be as others had been. When we’ve had to move Fox or Omaha, the government had always provided the necessaries: dried meat, salt pork, and the like. There was always clothing and blankets and wood for the fires. But from the first, it was obvious there were too few supply wagons. The food contained in the hogsheads amounted to less than a half-pound a day per person—and our blessed government in its wisdom saw fit to provide only a single blanket for every two Indians.”
The glass slipped from Miles’s hand and shattered on the floor. The colonel seemed not to hear it.
“We started out sixteen April. None of the Poncas had horses, for fear they would escape, and so they trekked on foot. When we crossed the Niobrara, it was still frozen. Before long, the snow was marked by bloody footprints. Further south, it began to rain—rained as if Noah would return and gather the beasts. We were lucky to make ten miles a day. My men at least, had their warm underclothes and oilcloth coats. But there was no such protection for the Indians. They were hip-deep in water and mud, the women trying to hold their infants above the muck. Corporal Hedges, an old campaigner with fifty Indian lives to his credit, burst into tears at the sight. Three children died on that one day alone.
“With a turn in the weather, thunderstorms and tornadoes came. I saw once-brave Ponca men holding their hands before their faces as if they could stave off the lightning. Tipis shredded like paper. Horses and men were thrown a quarter-mile. One of my lieutenants was separated from his rifle in mid-air; and when they both returned to earth, it triggered and shot him dead.
“By the time we reached the Quapaw reservation in Oklahoma, a third of the tribe was gone. They had died of the sick or their spirits had been killed, which for an Indian is the same as murder.”
Miles looked about for a glass, and Prophet John offered his. The colonel poured another drink, trembling as he knocked it back.
“At Quapaw, the Poncas found there were no preparations made for their arrival. The land was only sand and rock. The food, the mill, the pledged threshers and reapers had either never been shipped or had been stolen by stronger tribes. What corn there was had burned to death in the fields. Half-naked people moved about mumbling to themselves. Bodies littered the ground awaiting burial—some gnawed by animals. On the day we rode in, the local Indian agent ran toward me. His eyes were wild, and he begged to know if we had brought some promised quinine. ‘The malaria,’ he shouted at me. ‘The scrofula!’ I had nothing for him.”
Miles leaped up from the table. His legs crossed one another and he nearly fell to the floor.
“Steady, man,” Julius said.
Miles leaned on an old oak chair. He removed his hat and gripped it in his hands as if to transfer his pain.
“In due course, we were relieved. As our detail rode away, my second lieutenant, a young man named Bateson, third in his class at West Point, made the mistake of turning his horse about for one final look at that hellhole. To that moment, he had been the model of decorum, never allowing his personal emotions to interfere with his duty. But at that final unspeakable sight, his eyes filled with tears. He hunched over the neck of his horse and vomited on the ground.”
Miles reeled. Before he could fall, Julius and Prophet John took his arms and guided him back to his chair.
“Through it all, I marveled at the conduct of Standing Bear. He was like a stone carving: silent, straight, and strong, never complaining or demanding. What our generals could learn from him! When a child shivered in fright, h
e became its father. When an old woman perished in the dirt, he was her priest.”
Miles placed his elbows on the table and put his hands over his eyes.
“His daughter, Prairie Flower, had been the same. As the hunger and diseases took her people, she saved those she could and comforted the rest. Newly orphaned children came to her—competing for the privilege of dying in her lap. If she cried, I never saw it. Perhaps she didn’t have time. There was always another woman to console, another infant to pray over.
“Through even this, Standing Bear remained a rock. But on five June his daughter, that fine and brave young woman, died in his arms.”
Julius’s eyes opened wide. His mouth was suddenly dry as he gripped the rough edge of the table.
“As the people keened and wailed in despair, he came to me and asked in sign for a spade. I had to avert my eyes as he dug a hole in that awful place. He buried his daughter in the filth and mud, with only one of their little spirit purses to mark her grave. I could only hope he was consoled that she would rest in the land of her ancestors; we had traveled fifty days and were less than twenty miles from the village we had left.”
Julius marveled that his body remained upright. It was as if he had been hollowed out—as if all the bone and muscle inside him had vanished and been replaced with a thin bile that poisoned his mouth and threatened to leak from his eyes and ears. Then, as clear as a spoken word, Julius heard the courting flute, crisp and piercing. Only now, all its sweetness was gone, replaced by the kind of squeaks and screeches made by a young man learning its secrets. Each bitter tone brought its own measure of grief, its own quantity of anger. Taking a single step, Julius found he was staggering nearly as badly as Miles himself. His legs seemed fashioned from yarrow stalks and he moved as if through water. No words came in any language he knew.
McGarrigle turned to Julius. He had seen that same stunned look many times: after scouting parties were attacked, after massacres of civilians. He had even possessed it himself on two occasions: when some renegade Oglala had killed the officers leading his party, and again when the Blue Coats took their revenge.
“What you need now, Colonel, is rest,” the prophet said. “We’ll take you to a doctor and then to my rooms. We’ll write General Crook. If need be, we’ll pay him a visit. But for now, we need to get you horizontal.”
Miles looked at the two men with a sad smile.
“If only this was the end of the horror,” he said. “Two days ago, south of the Niobrara, Chased By Owls wiped out a Mormon settlement. The men and women dead, the children carried off. I fear that this vengeance is only the beginning, and that the heartlessness shown the Poncas will soon sacrifice more innocents of both races.”
Miles reached into a pocket of his tunic and produced a crumpled scrap of paper.
“This arrived at my camp last night.”
Miles handed it to Julius. At the top of the note was a small symbol of an animal seemingly cut in two, with only a head and forelegs: Half Horse. Near the bottom was another drawing: two birds with spread wings and enormous eyes: Chased By Owls.
In the center, between the two, scratched out and written several times until its spelling was correct, was a single word in English:
BURN
24
THE GREAT HERRMANN WAS MORE THAN SATISFIED.
There was no place in London—or the world, for that matter—that served a steak and kidney pie like Simpson’s. When paired with their famous treacle sponge and some Earl Grey, it was a meal to turn a good American like himself into a Jack-waving Brit.
Touching his napkin to his lips, he rose from the table and picked up a large Gladstone bag. He paid his bill and strolled out onto the Strand. His belly strained against his waistband. Many more meals like this, he thought to himself, and they’ ll tap me for Father Christmas.
A few streets up, he turned into a narrow alley, puffing slightly. The occupant of the building for which he searched had written that he would know it by a rusted sign in the form of a horse’s head, a leftover from its days as a stable.
He knocked on the door with his cane. A boy of about thirteen, grimy and starved-looking, answered and waved him inside. The floorboards moaned like abandoned souls. The wallpaper peeled from the plaster and, from behind it, he could hear the skittering of rats.
As he followed the boy into a dark passageway, a piercing cacophony assaulted his ears: mallets beating metal; saws churning through wood; a hammer on an anvil; men shouting and cursing. At the end of the hall, a creaking door opened and the gloom gave way to sunshine provided by a mammoth skylight cut into the stable ceiling. The Great Herrmann instantly felt at home, so much did the shop remind him of his own back in Brooklyn. Only here, everything—the equipment, the machines, and the men—was poorer.
At the center of the din stood a small and somewhat sad-eyed man; his clothing was the best amid a shabby lot, and even this was worn and threadbare. Along with a co-worker, he was leaning inside a green metal cabinet inset with a solid oak door and a lock of unique design. At first, the magician couldn’t make out exactly what sort of apparatus might contain something deserving of so much attention; but at length, the two men exited the steel box and the object inside was revealed.
It was a toilet.
The emaciated boy leaned over and whispered in the man’s ear. Without hesitation, he put down his wrench and signaled to the assembled workmen.
“Hi, there, hi! We’ll be taking dinner a spot early today as I have business with this gentleman. As this could take some time, I ask that you do not return to your respective benches until the usual hour. And fear not. This additional leisure will not be deducted. Thank you.”
The crew dispersed. The man hurriedly removed his gloves and goggles and placed them on the workbench beside him. He smiled nervously and offered his hand.
“I assume I have the pleasure of addressing the great Professor Compars Herrmann?”
“Just so,” Compars said. “And I can only surmise that you are Mr. John Nevil Maskelyne.”
The man blushed. “Yes, sir. And to be him today is a great privilege. To think that I, so early in my career, should be paid a visit from the finest conjurer of our age—sir, I am overwhelmed.”
Compars smiled and bowed. “I too am pleased, Mr. Maskelyne. For many months, all of London’s smaller playhouses have been abuzz with praise over your fine illusions. Acting upon these happy rumors and incognito, I personally visited the Marylebone in the Edgware Road this Wednesday evening past. Allow me to offer you my congratulations.”
Maskelyne’s eyes brightened. “Oh, sir! I said before that I am overwhelmed: now I must add to that, stunned! For the Great Herrmann himself to witness my poor little performance in that squalid shoebox …”
“From such shoeboxes are great careers begun,” Compars said. “I myself spent many years in filthy egg crates all over Europe, perfecting my craft so that when it came time to perform before those not exhausted from work or besotted by drink, I was well prepared, as you will be very soon. But I am afraid my curiosity has gotten the better of me.”
Compars pointed to the white porcelain commode.
“This object, while indispensible, is not exactly something I expected to find in a magician’s atelier. At least not beside a workbench.”
Maskelyne flushed with embarrassment, but soon broke into a broad grin. “I suppose in the interests of decency, I should have placed a drape over it. As you have been kind enough to note, I am, if one can call oneself such a thing in your presence, an illusionist. But I am also an inventor with several minor patents to my credit. If you will be so kind as to step closer, I will prove that what you see before you is far more than an ordinary convenience.”
Maskelyne approached the contraption and closed the oaken door.
“Professor, if you will please approach the cabinet and attempt to reopen it.”
Compars did as asked. The door would not budge.
“Very good,” Maskelyne sa
id. “Now, do you notice anything odd or different about the lock itself?”
Compars inspected in carefully. “It has no key entry. The handle is of a design that I have never seen, and the whole appears to be attached to a metal box on the door’s reverse side.”
“Excellent! Now if I may beg you to insert this royal penny into the slot and turn that little handle.”
Compars dropped the coin in and turned the handle clockwise until it clicked, and the door swung open. For a moment, the magician stood perplexed.
Then he broke into laughter.
“I see what you are getting at here. Capital! Capital, Mr. Maskelyne. Yes, there’s a fortune in this for every pub owner, restaurateur, and hotelier in Europe herself, surely, and the world, undoubtedly! The functions of the body held hostage for a penny! By God, it’s brilliant. Please allow me to congratulate you again.”
“Thank you. I can only hope that a bit of that good fortune finds its way to this poor inventor. Especially in the current circumstances.”
Compars turned away from the cabinet and stepped closer to his host.
“Yes, the current circumstances. In fact, Mr. Maskelyne, it is those current circumstances that have brought me before you today.”
The younger man smiled. “I’m afraid I don’t understand.”
“It’s quite simple. For your apparatus here to succeed, you need the financial means to market it to the establishments for which it is designed: hotels, public houses, and the like. In turn, its success will allow you to bring your magic out of the smaller houses and into the finer theatres where it belongs.”
Magic Words Page 20
