The Secret of Abdu El Yezdi

by Mark Hodder

  “Letters?”

  Steinhaueser chuckled. “You first regained some measure of wits four days after the accident. The first thing you did was demand a pen and paper. Then you composed an astonishingly lucid letter to your fiancée in which you claimed to have fallen sick with a recurrence of malaria. You wrote that you were fine and she should remain in Wiltshire.”

  “I did? I recall nothing of it.”

  “You’ve written twice since. You also threatened to throttle me if I told her the truth.”

  Burton shook his head bemusedly.

  “As a matter of fact, it’s not so unusual,” Steinhaueser said. “I’ve witnessed such things before with concussion. You took a mighty blow to the head, Richard, but your eyes are far less dilated this morning, so I’ll venture you’re through the worst of it.”

  Burton wondered how much his friend knew. He tested the waters. “Remind me. What happened?”

  “You were over Kent in a rotorchair and set it down in the middle of a road. Mechanical failure, perhaps?”

  Burton shrugged, and winced as a pang sliced through him.

  Steinhaueser continued, “A steam sphere rounded the bend at high speed and smacked into your machine. The explosion knocked you flying. Fortunately, a Scotland Yard man was on business nearby. He found you.”

  “And the sphere’s driver?”

  “No trace. Burned to ashes, I should think.”

  So, the truth had been covered up.

  Trounce. I need to see Trounce.

  “And I’ve been out of commission for ten days, you say? Gad! So soon after the malaria! This year is developing as many holes as a block of Swiss cheese. What have I missed, Styggins?”

  “Not a great deal. You were brought home from hospital a couple of days ago. I’ve been living in your guest room. I had to turn a number of visitors away—Detective Inspector Trounce; Detective Inspector Slaughter; Sir Roderick Murchison; and a rather striking looking lady named Countess Sabina. She left her calling card. Strange. Look.”

  The doctor took a small pasteboard from the bedside table and handed it to Burton. On one side, there was printed:

  Countess Sabina Elisabeta Lacusta

  7 Vere Street, London

  Cheiromantist, Prognosticator

  On the other, written somewhat shakily by hand: Sir Richard. Beware. There is a storm approaching.

  “Ominous, hmmm?” Steinhaueser said.

  Burton sneered and shook his head despairingly. “Why do mediums always insist on the vaguest forms of innuendo? Utter rot!” He tossed the card aside. “And what of the wider world? Much happening?”

  “The usual. Prussia’s prince regent continues to cooperate with Albert, and has sidelined Bismarck by making him ambassador to the Russian Empire. Old Otto must be livid. In theory, it’s a promotion, so he can hardly complain. In truth, it ousts him from the game.”

  “Good show. What else?”

  “Things are hotting up in China. The French have thrown their lot in with us. Even America is caught up in it. There’s been fighting, but reports are sketchy. Elgin is on his way back there already and by all accounts he’s mad as hell and in no mood for compromise. His battleship, the Sagittarius, is nearly complete and will fly out before the year is done. Other than that, nothing to report. Are you hungry?”

  “Famished.”

  “I’ll ask your housekeeper to rustle something up, and will then leave you in her capable hands. A colleague has been looking after my practice. Now you’re on the mend, I should get back to it. Don’t worry, I’m not abandoning you, but I don’t think you’ll require my constant presence any more, hmmm?”

  “Thank you, Styggins.”

  “Don’t mention it. Frankly, now that you’re back in the land of the living, I’m happy to hightail it. You’re a God-awful patient and I’d rather not be exposed to your complaining, stubbornness, disobedience, and bad temper.”

  Burton chuckled. “Am I that disagreeable?”

  “You are. Mrs. Angell will be up presently. No doubt you’ll torture her horribly. I’ll see you tonight. Rest, hmmm?”

  Burton nodded. Steinhaueser departed.

  Over the next few days, Sir Richard Francis Burton healed and grumbled and pondered and chafed and drifted in and out of sleep, Steinhaueser came and went, and Mrs. Angell fussed and cooked and cleaned and endured.

  By Wednesday, the explorer had left his bed, relocated to the study, and taken root in his dilapidated old saddlebag armchair, from which he barely moved for the remainder of the week. He read, wrote letters to Isabel, and meditated. His hair started to grow back, covering the scars on his scalp. The dull ache in his arm faded. His bruises turned a dirty yellow. A seething fury developed slowly and implacably. He couldn’t shake from his mind the picture of Darwin’s children—some unconscious, the rest terrified.

  Days passed.

  On the morning of Friday the 7th of October, he received a visit from Detective Inspectors Trounce and Slaughter. Upon seeing him, Trounce, who had a cardboard file holder in his hand, exclaimed, “I say! You look almost human again.”

  “You mean, as much as I ever did?” Burton quipped. He pushed himself to his feet to greet his guests.

  “Brandy?” he asked Trounce.

  “Thank you. That would go down a treat.”

  “Milk?” he enquired of Slaughter.

  “God, yes! Most considerate of you. Brandy would kill me.”

  After Mrs. Angell had delivered the milk and the brandy had been poured, the men settled in chairs.

  “Your health,” Slaughter toasted.

  Burton laughed. “What little of it remains!”

  “I’ve never seen anything like it,” Trounce said. “I found you hanging from a tree. I thought you were nothing but a bundle of bloody rags until you moved your head and whispered, ‘Get me down, there’s a good chap.’ It’s a blessed miracle you lived.”

  “I recall nothing of it. There was no sign of Burke and Hare?”

  “None.”

  “What happened after you regained your senses in Darwin’s garden?”

  “I calmed Mrs. Darwin and her brood, then took to the air and immediately saw the smoke rising from the road to the north. I landed and discovered you. Unfortunately, by then our birds had flown. Who was driving the lead sphere?”

  “Hare. Burke was following with Darwin in his vehicle’s luggage compartment.”

  “By Jove, Burton, it was a damned brave thing you did.”

  Burton waved the observation aside, and Trounce went on, “Confound it! I took a shine to old Darwin. Whoever’s behind all this will pay, so help me, they will.”

  Something occurred to the explorer. He reached for a cord hanging beside the fireplace and pulled it to summon back Mrs. Angell.

  “Has there been any progress?” he asked the detectives.

  Slaughter answered, “I’ve been sifting through missing-persons reports. Hundreds vanish without a trace every year, but I looked for any that involved DOGS or medical personnel. So far I’ve found just one of interest. A young surgeon named Joseph Lister, the first assistant to James Syme of the University of Edinburgh. Something of a prodigy, apparently, but he hasn’t been seen since the nineteenth of August.”

  Burton sipped his brandy. “Any suggestion he was abducted?”

  “None, but neither did he have any reason to take off of his own accord.”

  Trounce added, “We know that Isambard Kingdom Brunel and Nurse Nightingale were seized by the two Indian chaps, while Galton and Darwin were taken by Burke and Hare—who also made an unsuccessful play for Brunel. Who abducted Charles Babbage, Samuel Gooch, and possibly this Lister chap, we don’t know—but whichever way we look at it, it appears that two opposing groups of kidnappers are at work.”

  There came a knock at the door and the housekeeper poked her head in.

  “Mother Angell,” Burton said. “What happened to the clothes I was wearing when I had the accident?”

  “I
believe the hospital burned them, sir.”

  “And the contents of my pockets?”

  “Here.” His housekeeper crossed to one of the desks, took a small tray from it, and handed it to him. She turned and stalked out of the room, muttering, “Right in front of his bloomin’ eyes, it was. Up and down the stairs like a blessed yo-yo and half the time for nothing.”

  “Formidable woman, hey?” Slaughter murmured.

  “She is,” Burton agreed. “Ah ha!” He picked something from the dish and held it up.

  “A tiepin?” Trounce asked.

  “Burke downed you with a very queer-looking pistol. It fired spines coated with some sort of venom. They knocked you out in an instant. I received one in the gut but for some reason it had no effect. I’ve been wondering why. This is the answer. It was in my waistcoat pocket and the spine hit it.” He stretched his arm forward and the two detectives saw the pin was topped with a small round disk of gold. There was a tiny dent in the middle of it. “I took it from Oliphant’s cabin on the Orpheus.”

  “May I?” Trounce asked, reaching out.

  Burton passed the pin over and the detective peered closely at the two letter-like inscriptions engraved into the metal.

  “Ho! Well I never!” he said. “This is from the place Darwin mentioned—the League of Enochians Gentlemen’s Club. I’ve been investigating it. These two symbols appear on all its literature.”

  “Do they, indeed?” Burton exclaimed. “So both Oliphant and Galton are members.”

  Trounce handed the file over. “Here, I brought you the report. You’ll learn more about the club by reading it than from me trying to sum it up. One thing worth noting, though, is that it’s only since March, when the founder died and a gentleman named Edward Vaughan Hyde Kenealy became its president, that the clubhouse closed its doors and became a ‘by invite only’ affair.”

  “March?” Burton mused. “Just when Oliphant joined and his behaviour took a turn for the worse. It appears we have a focus, at last. Trounce, I want you to keep a round-the-clock watch on the place. Record all the comings and goings. See if you can identify anyone who visits it.”

  “I’ll rope in Spearing,” Trounce replied. “He might be the youngest detective on the Force but he’s as sharp as they come. We’ll do it in shifts. Incidentally—” He hesitated.

  “What is it?”

  “I can’t be certain, but since I started asking questions about the Enochians, I’ve had the conviction I’m being followed.”

  Burton raised an eyebrow. He thought a moment then asked, “Do you carry a weapon?”

  “Not usually.”

  “It’s time you did. In fact, I recommend that all of us keep a gun handy.”

  The Scotland Yard men nodded. Burton addressed Slaughter. “Your line of inquiry has been fruitful, so keep up with it. Stay focused on engineers and medical personnel. There’s a common thread to all this.”

  “Which is?” Slaughter asked.

  “Eugenics—a science that Galton developed. It strikes me that Burke’s weapon might be a product of it, which suggests there’s work being done in that illegal field. It would require medical knowledge and machinery.”

  “I see. Rightio, sir.”

  “Gentlemen, I’m likely to be out of commission for a few days longer. I rely on you to be my eyes and ears.”

  “You can count on us, Sir Richard,” Slaughter said.

  With that, the policemen departed and Burton settled down to read Trounce’s report. The detective’s handwriting looked like a spool of unravelling thread, undulating across the pages in a regular, quick, and fluid motion.

  “Efficient mind,” Burton mused.

  He read the first paragraph, blinked, and read it again.

  The League of Enochians Gentlemen’s Club. Registered, 2nd January 1841. Occupied Mildew Street building the following day. Club originated in meetings held at The Hog in the Pound public house, Oxford Street. Same place where Edward Oxford had worked as a pot-boy.

  “Edward Oxford!” Burton cried out. “The bloody Assassination again!”

  He moved on to the next paragraph.

  Current membership estimated at approximately 150.

  Club founder: Henry de La Poer Beresford, 3rd Marquess of Waterford (replaced as president upon his death by Edward Vaughan Hyde Kenealy). Born 26th April 1811. Inherited title in 1826, along with Curraghmore Estate in County Waterford, Ireland. Gambler, drunkard, prankster. Notorious. Nicknamed “The Mad Marquess.” January 1837, moved to England and purchased Darkening Towers Estate on the outskirts of Waterford Village. (No connection with the Irish county. Vanity? Fancied himself as marquess of an English estate?) Occupied the manor from 28th February ’37.

  “And yet another coincidence, Trounce,” Burton muttered to himself. “The start of the Great Amnesia.”

  Beresford killed in a horse-riding accident on the 29th of March, this year (1859). The marquessate passed to his brother, John.

  The rest of the page was blank. Burton gazed at it for a moment, dwelling on the dates, then turned to the next sheet. It was Henry Beresford’s criminal record: a long list of minor affrays, vandalism, drunken pranks, violent behaviour toward women, and petty thefts. The most recent of them dated from February 1837.

  On the next sheet, Trounce had written:

  Visited Darkening Towers, Monday 19th September 1859. Interviewed John Beresford. He claims his brother was a harmless eccentric and showed me a significant (because of its strangeness) entry in Henry Beresford’s diary. Copied below, misspellings and other errors intact:

  20th June 1837.

  I must declare today quite the most astonishing, for this afternoon whilst I was out ryding, I was crossing the estate on my way back to the stables when my horse did shye, and upon looking down I beheld a man prone upon the ground, apparently in a dead faint, and garbed in a most outlandish costume of shimmering white. So taken aback was I that I gave a cry, and had to look and look again to be sure the vision was not some strange hellucination. When finally I concluded that it weren’t, I dismounted to examin the figure more close, but as I did so, I glanced back at my horse for the briefest of moments, it being nervous, and upon returning my attention to the sward I found that no figure was upon it and the grass were un-bent, giving not the slytest indication that a thing had disturbed it.

  Instantly, I douted my senses, and askt of meself wether I had seen the thing at all or was, p’raps, the victim of some trick of the light or, far worse, of some failure of the brain. The more I considered the question, the more afeared I become, specially so ’cause the impression the vision had made was fayding with un-natural rapidty, as if I were un-able to prop’ly imprint a memry of it on my mind. Indeed, I was overcome by a strange confusion, being muddled in intent, the world around me all of a sudden appearing un-familiar, as if I had been engaged in some activity and then un-expectedly snatcht away from it and robbed of my powers of recollection.

  I confess that a great panic overcome me, and in a trice I re-mounted my steed and dasht home, flying through the door and yelling at Brock to take care of the nag. I raced into the study, throwed meself into the chair at my desk, and as fast as I could write, in-scribed the following onto a sheet of vellum:

  “The man was tall and thin and wore a suit comprised of a single piece, white and scaley in texture, that lay flush against his skin, outlining his sinyewy form in a most overt manner, though covering it entirely from the base of his neck to his wrists and ankles, and with nary a flap, opening, button, nor hook in sight. His head was consealed by a black helmet, round and shiney and flickring all over with blue flame. A flat circlar lamp, dented and crackt, was attacht to his chest, and his booted feet were strapt into stilts, of p’raps 2ft in height.”

  Within minutes of setting down this slight account, the memry was reduced to the vaygest of impressions, the merest glimmering awareness that I had seed something inexplcible but knew not what.

  The vellum is before me as I write,
and now the description is trans-scribed into my diary, too.

  Did I dream? I cannot believe so. Something strange has most certainly occurred. I feel uncannily diffrent but cannot put into further words the sensation, for there are none what fit it.

  Trounce had added:

  The suit Beresford describes matches exactly and without a shadow of a doubt the one I saw in the thicket in Green Park. Beresford’s brother showed me portraits of the Mad Marquess but he bore no likeness to the man who knocked me cold that day.

  As to the rest of the diary, after the above-copied entry, Beresford made fewer and fewer contributions to it, none of significance. By September, he’d ceased keeping it altogether. His brother informed me that the marquess, from the date of his vision, became increasingly fascinated with the 16th-century writings of Doctor John Dee and Edward Kelley. He (John Beresford) said their body of work was the subject of Henry’s meetings in The Hog in the Pound, which commenced soon after Queen Victoria’s death and quickly led to the establishment of the League of Enochians. He also stated that his brother believed The Assassination to be “a moment when magic was manifest in history.”

  The detective’s notes moved on to the League of Enochians’ current chairman:

  Edward Vaughan Hyde Kenealy: Born 2 July 1819. Current address unknown (possibly resident in the club building). From Cork, Ireland. Lawyer. Called to Irish Bar, 1840, and English Bar, 1847. Extremely erratic in character. Often violent. Has apparently published poetry concerning the physical manifestation of God on Earth (have not been able to locate any of it).

  The remainder of the file’s contents consisted of pamphlets published by the League of Enochians prior to March. They all advertised club meetings, with titles such as: “A Discussion of John Dee’s Quinti Libri Mysteriorum”; “On the Words of Uriel”; and “The Secret Art of Scrying.” Two in particular caught Burton’s attention. The first was “The Language of the Angels.” Printed under the title were twenty-two symbols, each with a name. They apparently corresponded to Latin letters, the equivalents being displayed beneath. Among them were the two from the tiepin—Ur and Graph—which translated to L and E—the initials of the club.