The Secret of Abdu El Yezdi

by Mark Hodder

  “Maybe so,” Burton responded grimly, “but he doesn’t guide us any more. He’s fallen silent.”

  “I am aware of that.” She finally lowered her arm. “It is because the storm comes. The continuing deterioration of Time has made it possible for—” a tremor ran through her and she hugged herself, “—for a man to hop from one twig to another; to break through from his own version of existence into ours. You saw the lights that turned night into day. They marked his arrival. He is in our world, and Abdu El Yezdi must remain hidden from him.”

  “This man is the storm? Who is he? What does he want?”

  The seer shook her head wordlessly.

  “Then where is he? How can I locate him?”

  Countess Sabina’s lips stretched against her teeth. She rocked back and forth. When she answered, her voice was hoarse and quavered. “If I reach out my mind to search, he will find me. Others have attempted it. They sensed his arrival and tried to contact him. They died.”

  Burton remembered the newspaper headlines—the twelve dead mediums.

  “But Abdu El Yezdi has made me stronger than most,” she went on. “And you are you, so I shall try.”

  “Wait! ‘You are you’—what do you mean by that? What is my significance in this affair?”

  She didn’t answer. Her eyes rolled up into her head until only the whites showed. She rocked in silence and two minutes passed.

  Burton sat and watched. His thoughts ran over one another. What she’d told him was more incredible even than a tale from A Thousand Nights and a Night, yet, somehow, he found himself totally convinced of its truth.

  Countess Sabina jerked in her seat. Her head snapped back then fell forward, revealing that her eyeballs had become utterly black. She smiled wickedly and said in a deep, oily, and unpleasant manner, “Well! This is a surprise! Hallo, Burton. How perfectly splendid to see you again. You look considerably younger. So you’re consulting with a genuine medium? Good chap! She’s a powerful one, too. Most gratifying.”

  The explorer gaped. Plainly, whoever was now addressing him, it was not the countess. He couldn’t credit that her throat was even capable of producing such a voice, for it sounded as if hundreds of people were speaking the same words, in exactly the same tone, and in perfect unison.

  “Who are—are—” he stammered. “El Yezdi?”

  “I don’t know the name,” the other chorused. “You don’t recognise me, then? I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. We met in Africa, my friend, under rather taxing circumstances, and I gave you my word it would not be our last encounter. I’ve travelled far to keep that promise. Regretfully, for you, it will not be a happy reunion. I feel obliged to prove myself, you see, so where before you witnessed my failure, this time the reverse must be true.”

  “We’ve met?” Burton interrupted. “Where in Africa? When? Who are you? What failure?”

  The countess emitted a nasty chuckle. “Do you play chess, Burton?”

  “I have done.”

  “Are you good?”

  “Adequate.”

  “Then brush up your game. I’m counted an excellent player, and as such, I’ll not forecast my moves other than to tell you this: I intend to break your spirit and drive you to your knees. For certain, it would be better to kill you outright, but I possess too much respect for you to do that. I don’t want you dead. I admire you too much. You could even call it hero worship. Perhaps that explains my desire to have you, above all others, as one of my pawns. I’m afraid it’s a fault of mine to demean the things I love the most. But we are what we are—and I am the Beast, Perdurabo; he who will endure to the end.”

  The countess threw back her head and let loose a peal of laughter.

  Flatly, Burton said, “I’m reminded of a pantomime I visited in childhood.”

  The laughter stopped. The countess regarded him.

  “Oh, bugger it!” she said. “I do it every time. I don’t know when to stop, Burton. Always, I stray into the melodramatic and end up looking like an ass. Let us say au revoir before I embarrass myself any further. I have the royal charter. I’m on my way. We shall meet soon. Say goodbye to the countess.”

  Before Burton could respond, Countess Sabina’s eyes snapped back to normal and her head suddenly swivelled around until he was looking at the back of it. With the neck creasing and crunching horribly, the revolution continued through a complete circle, and the countess’s face swung back into view. Dead, she slumped forward onto the table and slid loosely to the floor.

  The next day, Burton took the atmospheric railway from London to Yorkshire, and was then driven by horse-drawn carriage to Fryston Hall. Monckton Milnes greeted his friend’s unexpected arrival with surprise and delight, which quickly turned to shock when the explorer conveyed the news of Countess Sabina’s death. Indeed, Monckton Milnes was so deeply affected that, for hours, he could barely speak.

  Burton distracted him with an account of the prognosticator’s revelations, which sent both men rummaging through Fryston’s library, piling Monckton Milnes’s collection of esoterica onto tables and leafing through every book and pamphlet in search of information pertaining to the evocation of spirits.

  “I’m now of the opinion,” Burton stated, “that what we call magic is, at root, nothing less than a science of communication between multiple realities, but I do not believe it’s been well understood by its practitioners, and I think the truth of it is buried beneath an enormous heap of extraneous claptrap. We need to dig it out. If we can secure the working principles, perhaps we can employ them in such a manner as to discover where this Perdurabo has come from.”

  Monckton Milnes, moving toward a table with a stack of books held precariously between his hands and chin, said, “We might begin with the premise that, through ceremonial actions, rhetorical exhortations, and a deep concentration upon the symbolic meaning of magic squares, one can literally will into existence a channel between alternate histories. That, after all, is what Oliphant appears to have done.”

  “Quite so. But did he do it independently, or does such a feat require simultaneous rituals in both realities?”

  Setting down the books, Monckton Milnes divided the tottering pile into two stable ones, then took up a volume and waved it at Burton. “And how can we account for this? De occulta philosophia by Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa. Published in 1533. If history didn’t bifurcate until 1840, how is it possible that so many treatises about magic date from centuries earlier, before there were any realities other than the original?”

  Burton, who was sitting Turkish-style on the floor with open books arranged in a circle around him, dug his knuckles into his lower back and stretched, massaging the muscles to either side of his spine. He groaned, got to his feet, and said, “I wonder—on how many occasions have you experienced what you might call a turning point in your life and felt it was predestined?” He stepped over to the fireplace and leaned with his shoulder blades against the mantle, pulling a cheroot from his pocket and lighting it.

  “Many a time,” Monckton Milnes replied. “Back in ’twenty-seven, when I entered Trinity College, my falling in with Tennyson and his cronies propelled me into literary circles in a manner that felt utterly precipitous yet strangely appropriate. In 1840, Abdu El Yezdi’s exhortation, via the countess, that I should finance Disraeli’s opposition to Palmerston, had about it a whiff of the preordained, too.”

  Burton blew smoke into the room’s already polluted atmosphere. “I’ve also had such moments. Being posted to India was one. Meeting Isabel. Berbera. As a matter of fact, I feel I’m at such a juncture right now, what with this king’s agent business and all.”

  Monckton Milnes plonked himself into an armchair. “Your point?”

  “That perhaps Time isn’t the unidirectional phenomenon we take it for. What if there exists, within any given history, certain moments—in the lives of individuals, of nations, of the world as a whole—that possess such potency they send out ripples in all directions? Thus, hints of a signi
ficant future event can be sensed long before it occurs, so when it finally happens, it feels as though it was always meant to be.”

  “How does that relate to magic?”

  “What bigger moment in Time can there be than the breaking of its mechanism? Surely the ripples caused by the bifurcation of history have echoed far into the past, as well as into the future. I don’t consider it inconceivable that Agrippa and John Dee and Edward Kelley and all the others who’ve presented their theories of magic were engaged not with what was then a feasible science, but with the foreshadowing of one that would, long after their deaths, become viable.”

  Monckton Milnes grappled with the concept, scratched his head, grunted, and murmured, “Sideways, too.”

  “Pardon?”

  “Those ripples. If they extend backward and forward through time, then maybe they go sideways, too, into the alternate histories. The war the countess spoke of—you said she claimed it occurs in all versions of reality. I’m wondering whether it originates in one—perhaps the original—and the rest suffer as they are battered by the—the—”

  “The resonance,” Burton offered.

  “Yes! Resonance! Brunel’s Clifton Suspension Bridge!”

  Burton frowned. “What?”

  Monckton Milnes slapped the arm of his chair enthusiastically. “When an army marches over a bridge, it breaks step so as not to establish a rhythm that’ll resonate through the structure and cause it to swing—potentially to such a degree that it’ll collapse. Wind blowing at the right speed and angle can have a similarly disastrous effect. Brunel built dampeners into the Clifton Suspension Bridge to prevent such a phenomenon. Don’t you see?”

  “See what?”

  “That Abdu El Yezdi is attempting the same! He’s been manipulating people and events in order to dampen the resonance. He must know the causes of the war in the other histories and, in this one, just as the countess claimed, he’s been trying to change them. He’s making our version of history break step!”

  Burton considered for a moment before answering. “In which case, I think we can discard entirely the idea that there exists an Afterlife, for it seems far more likely to me that El Yezdi is a visitor from the future.”

  Monckton Milnes emitted a whistle and shook his head. Sotto voce, he quoted Plato: “How can you prove whether at this moment we are sleeping, and all our thoughts are a dream; or whether we are awake, and talking to one another in the waking state?”

  It was a rhetorical question, and one that perfectly summed up the sense of unreality that held both men in its grip.

  On Wednesday the 19th, a telegram was delivered to Fryston. It originated from France and stated simply, En route. The sender arrived two days later. He was ushered into the library by the butler to be welcomed with enthusiasm by Monckton Milnes, who cried out, “Monsieur! This is indeed an unexpected pleasure. It was not my intention to wrest you from your studies. May I introduce you to my friend, Sir Richard Francis Burton? Sir Richard, this is Monsieur Eliphas Levi. In matters of the occult, no man has greater knowledge or experience.”

  Burton stepped forward and shook the visitor’s hand. Levi was a tall, broad, and wide-faced man, with a spade-shaped beard and clear blue eyes. He wore the robes of a monk. When he addressed Burton, he did so in a deep, booming voice. “Your recent achievement, it cause a sensation even in my own country, Sir Richard, and—mon Dieu!—you know how reluctant we French are to celebrate the deeds of any man not of our own nation! But à tout seigneur tout honneur, eh?”

  Burton bowed his thanks.

  Monckton Milnes instructed his butler to bring a pot of coffee, then hustled Levi and Burton into armchairs. The men settled, and Levi said, “I have no choice but to come. The information you send—oof!—ça me donne des frissons! So to England I travel aller au fond des choses—to get to the bottom of things. Commençons par un bout. Tell me all about it. All about it, je vous prie!”

  Monckton Milnes looked at Burton. “Richard, I assure you, Monsieur Levi can be trusted. I recommend you hold nothing back. I will take responsibility.” He then addressed the Frenchman. “But, monsieur, please understand that much of what you will hear has been classified as secret by the British government. It must not be repeated.”

  “I understand. Bouche cousue! Now, you speak and I listen. Cela vous dérange si je fume?”

  Monckton Milnes flicked his hand in consent then looked on in amazement as Levi pulled a perfectly enormous calabash pipe from his pocket and began to stuff its exaggerated bowl with tobacco. A minute later, the Frenchman was leaning back in the chair with his eyes closed, giving every indication of being asleep but for the thick plumes of foul-smelling smoke that he puffed into the air.

  Burton tried to counteract the pungent odour with one of his Manila cheroots, and while doing so, described Laurence Oliphant’s ritual before going on to detail the course of his investigation, his encounter with Countess Sabina, and his and Monckton Milnes’s theory.

  Levi sighed and emitted a breathy whistle.

  “Monsieur?” Monckton Milnes murmured.

  “Attends, je cherche!” Levi responded. Wait, I’m thinking!

  They sat quietly while he ruminated. Five minutes passed.

  “Bien,” the Frenchman finally said. “On commence à y voir plus clair! Yes, yes! I see all now!” He reached into his pocket, produced the letter Monckton Milnes had sent him, and held up a page upon which the magic squares had been transcribed. “The four central numbers—mille, neuf cents, dix, et huit—I think you now comprehend, non? They are exactly what they appear when written: une année! They are 1918, fifty-nine years from now.”

  Levi rose and paced to a window. He gazed out of it at the clear blue sky.

  “As you surmise, messieurs, these calculations they open a passage from une réalité différente from this, our own—but also from that world’s future. Three intruders, we have! Three! But only one, he come through this way, for the lights in the sky, they are caused by the method, and they never are seen before, non? So, who are our visitors?” He turned to face them and raised a finger. “Numéro un! Edward Oxford. He arrive, I think, by means of the white suit.”

  “The suit!” Burton exclaimed.

  “Oui, for it is seen in 1840 and in 1837, where it vanish in front of Henry Beresford. It is magical—it operate on scientific principles of which we have no conception.”

  Burton examined the glowing tip of his cigar, which was by now little more than a stub. He flicked it into the fireplace. “Then, based on his physical resemblance to the queen’s assassin, I’ll wager the future Oxford and the Mystery Hero are one and the same. Which means he’s dead.”

  “Oui, probablement he is killed by intruder numéro deux. That person, he hit Detective Inspector Trounce, and he resemble you, Sir Richard. You have the countenance of an Arabian. Abdu El Yezdi is an Arabian name. So, this we add up and—voila!—El Yezdi is our second traveller in time. But by what method? We do not know. But he have the rifle, which tell us he come from Africa in 1918. Also, we know he stay, and is here still.”

  Levi sucked at his pipe for a moment. When he spoke again, it was from behind a veil of blue smoke.

  “Numéro trois. Perdurabo. It seem he also come from Africa, 1918, but he journey through the passage conceptuel Oliphant create. This is very significant, for it mean he here only as volonté, as willpower.”

  “You mean he has no physical presence?” Monckton Milnes exclaimed.

  “Exactement. Our Beast is une personne insubstantielle—a phantom—but volonté, it must have un corps physique to survive in the world. It mean he take possession.”

  “Of another person?” Burton asked.

  “Oui. This I must study. Possibly, it is the key to his defeat, for he has the bad intentions, non?”

  Monckton Milnes jumped up and started to pace back and forth, pulling his hair. “It’s too much!” he cried out. “I feel my brain will explode! I don’t know what to think or do!”

>   “You don’t have to think or do anything,” Burton said. “Your help has been invaluable, but the rest is up to me.”

  “Non, monsieur,” Levi said. “Not only. I will assist. I have knowledge. This Perdurabo, his nature I must better understand. I fear what he might be, so I will research, research, research!”

  Burton gave a nod of gratitude.

  “And you, Richard?” Monckton Milnes asked.

  “I have to locate Abdu El Yezdi. I’m certain he’s an ally in all of this. The line of inquiry leads us to Wallington Hall and the poet, Swinburne.”

  “That idle clock at Westminster which may well hold its hands before its face for very shame, had cost the Nation the pretty little sum of £22,057. We never knew a richer illustration of the homely truth that Time is Money.”

  —PUNCH MAGAZINE ON THE CRACK IN BIG BEN, 1859

  They had to wait until Monday—when they were expected at Wallington Hall—to meet Swinburne, and on that day their patience was tested further, for when they arrived they were informed that the Trevelyans and their guests were on a day trip to Tynemouth. So a steam carriage was hired, and Burton, Monckton Milnes, and Levi set off in pursuit.

  They arrived at the seaside town in the middle of the afternoon, disembarked on the Grand Parade, and strolled down a sloping road to the Longsands Beach. A stiff breeze was blowing from the southwest—sultry and not at all refreshing—and the sea was agitated, bulging up and crashing noisily onto the sand.

  “Strange weather,” Monckton Milnes commented. He pointed to the sky inland, where inky clouds were being ripped into ribbons, curling around themselves and looking more like a gigantic swarm of insects than vapour.

  There were a few individuals on the beach, but about halfway along it, strolling slowly toward the headland that sheltered Cullercoats Village, a larger group was visible. Among them, a tiny figure with long blazing-red hair was skipping about like a child, and—as Burton and his companions hurried toward the party—it detached itself from them, divested itself of its clothes, and plunged into the sea.