The Six Messiahs

by Mark Frost

  "As a matter of fact that's what Edison calls it," said Jack. With a soft click the lock yielded; Jack turned the knob and gently pushed the door into darkness, hinges creaking. "Switch off the light."

  Presto turned off the device. Jack took out and put on the goggles again and peered in through the doorway.

  "You don't suppose we should have just rung the door bell," whispered Innes.

  Jack put a finger to his lips, asked for silence, and they crept slowly inside, Innes and Presto feeling their way along with a hand on the man in front's shoulder. Jack led them through the first room—a kitchen—and paused in an archway. Innes and Presto waited for their eyes to adjust, but the blackness stayed as impenetrable as the heavy silence surrounding them.

  Jack took the box from Presto and briefly switched it on and off; in the instant of light, they saw a staircase in a central hall leading to the second floor. Double doorway off the hall to their left, a menorah beside it on the floor, the entrance to the synagogue proper. A foyer leading to the front of the temple straight ahead. Jack moved forward again, leading their fumbling procession to the base of the stairs; they stopped.

  Someone still moving upstairs. Soft padded footsteps, measured paces; slippers brushing against carpet. Someone trying not to be heard.

  Jack made himself understood with a touch that he wanted them to stay where they were. Then he started up the stairs without so much as a whisper.

  Time stood still; Innes and Presto, reluctant to move a muscle, aware of each other's presence only by breathing. In need of orientation, Innes reached out and put a hand on the stairway wall; feeling around he found a round knob.

  More footsteps upstairs, then a rush of them; something crashing to the floor, a struggle.

  Innes turned the knob and the lights came on:

  Two figures, all in black, hurtling toward them down the stairs, frozen for a moment by the light from a hallway chandelier.

  Presto pulled the rapier from the sheath of his walking stick and charged up to meet them. The first man vaulted over the banister and landed catlike on his feet in the hall, heading for the door, carrying a loose black bag. Innes gave chase. The second pulled a knife from his sleeve; Presto thrust out the foil with great dexterity and ran the point clean through the man's palm, pinning it against the wall. The man in black dropped the knife; Presto leveraged his weight and punched the man in the jaw, knocking him back; his head clubbed hard against the balustrade and he lay still.

  Innes sprinted out the front door moments behind the man with the black bag, but he was nowhere to be seen. Innes let discretion serve as the better part of valor, went back inside the temple, and closed the door.

  Climbing to the top of the stairs, Presto found a third man in black lying lifeless on the carpeted floor, head jutting at an odd angle from the top of his broken neck. His blade ready, Presto crept toward the half-open doorway, where the lamp they'd seen still burned.

  Innes clenched his fists and stepped carefully over the inert man in black on the stairs. Two steps past him, the man leaped to his feet and went flying down the stairs: Innes hurled himself over the banister—so much for discretion—and landed square on the man's back, driving him into the wall. Squat and muscular, the figure stayed on his feet and whirled around wildly, a bull trying to dislodge a rider on its hump. Innes clamped a stranglehold on the man's neck—thick as a fire hydrant—and called for help.

  "Hold on!" shouted Presto, coming down the stairs.

  The man in black bucked backward, repeatedly slamming Innes against the wall, until they reached the open doorway to the temple and staggered down the center aisle, where they crashed to the floor, the man's compact weight falling heavily on Innes's midsection. The collision knocked every ounce of breath from his body; he wheezed and gasped for breath, crawling helplessly on hands and knees. By the time Presto reached him, the figure in black had fled behind the stage; they heard a crash of broken glass.

  "Go," whispered Innes, waving Presto toward the back.

  Presto switched on the flash-a-light and rushed after the man. He entered a storage room, crept slowly past the ark where the Torah was kept, and pointed the light at a billowing curtain. He stabbed the rapier into it, then drew the curtain aside to discover the smashed window through which the man in black had escaped.

  Innes had sat up and regained his breath by the time Presto returned.

  "You're fairly handy with that thing," said Innes, nodding at the blade as Presto slid it back into his walking stick.

  "Champion of the epee at Oxford, three years running," said Presto. "Never ran anyone through with it before. Intentionally, I mean."

  They moved quickly up the stairs and into the lamplit room.

  Rabbi Brachman's body lay peacefully in a chair at his desk, slumped over as if while working he had gently laid down his head to rest. The burning lamp illuminated his open eyes, the white parchment of his skin.

  Jack stood facing the body, studying the desk intently as the others entered. "Got away, did they?"

  "Two of them," said Presto.

  "Not without taking their lumps," said Innes, acutely feeling his.

  "Assuming that's your work," said Presto, sliding the sword back into his walking stick. "The one in the hall."

  Jack nodded.

  "You got one?" said Innes. "How brilliant!"

  "Didn't mean to kill him," said Jack coldly. "He's no help to us dead."

  Innes noticed Brachman for the first time. "Good God, is he dead too?"

  "The gift for deductive reasoning runs deep in your family," said Jack.

  "Did they kill him?" asked Innes, too stunned to register the insult.

  "Lethal injection," said Jack, pointing to a dim red mark on the Rabbi's arm. "The same method they used to kill Rupert Selig on board the Elbe."

  "Poor old fellow," said Presto, genuinely saddened. "Twelve grandchildren, I think he said."

  "Arthur was of the opinion that they scared Selig to death," said Innes.

  "Arthur was wrong," said Jack impatiently. "The injection gives every appearance of a heart attack; that's what they want you to believe. Have a look at the one in the hall. And keep an eye out in case the others come back; I've got work to do in here."

  "I'll take a moment first to honor the departed, if you don't object," said Presto, brusquely. "He was a good man; he deserves some consideration of decency."

  Jack stared at him. Innes couldn't tell if it was shock or affront.

  "Or has it not occurred to you, Jack, that if we hadn't stopped to pick up your damn suitcase, Brachman might still be alive."

  Jack stared at the floor, turning crimson. Innes was shocked by the intensity of Presto's anger; although he agreed it was justified, to express it in the presence of a corpse made Innes feel as if he were standing naked in front of his algebra class.

  Presto gently closed Rabbi Brachman's eyes, shut his own for a moment, intoned a silent prayer, crossed himself, and then stalked out of the room. Innes made to follow him.

  "Stay with me," said Jack.

  "Really?"

  "I need you."

  Innes nodded slowly and put his hands behind his back, as he had often seen Arthur do—implying a deeper level of thought—and idled up to Jack's side.

  "Were either of the men you chased carrying anything?" asked Jack.

  "One had a black bag," said Innes, then realizing: "Do you think—"

  "The false Zohar," said Jack, nodding. "They showed it to him, trying to coerce his opinion. So they have their doubts about its authenticity."

  "Unlikely the Rabbi settled them, don't you think? He must have refused; I mean, why else would they kill him?"

  "Because they heard us downstairs; and no, I don't believe he told them anything." Jack moved closer to the body, eyes open as a cat's, glittering with intensity. "Brachman was working at his desk when he heard them enter—fresh ink marks here, on the heel of his palm, the inkwell left open. What does that suggest?"
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br />   Innes paused thoughtfully. "That he was, as you say, working."

  "No," said Jack, closing his eyes impatiently. "What does that say about the state of his desk?''

  Innes studied the scene, nervous as a student at final exams. "There are no papers lying about. He may have hidden something?"

  "In a place that even these professional thieves could not easily find. Where might that be?" asked Jack.

  Innes gazed slowly around the room with furrowed brow, nodding thoughtfully and repeatedly, before admitting, "I haven't the slightest idea."

  "Let's assume the Rabbi had, at best, ten seconds from the time he heard the men arrive to the moment they entered the room."

  "Close at hand then; somewhere in the desk?"

  "I've searched there already. Thoroughly."

  "Loose floorboard? Under the carpet?"

  "Less obvious than that," said Jack, watching him, arms folded.

  I am being tested, Innes realized. Well, Arthur told me the man was peculiar. He studied the desk, glanced into its pigeonholes as if trying to sneak up on them unawares. Scrutinized the inkwell. Lifted the ink blotter; found a slit cut in its side.

  "Aha," said Innes.

  "No; looked there; empty," said Jack.

  Innes stepped back to gain perspective, put his hands on his hips, and his right elbow knocked the lamp off the desk. It shattered as it hit the ground; small flames from the oil pooled on the floor. He stomped them out, nearly catching his boot on fire and plunging them into darkness again.

  "Bother," said Innes, not at all comfortable being in the dark so near to a recently dead body. "Sorry."

  Jack switched on the portable light, illuminating the broken shards on the floor.

  "You've done it now," said Jack.

  "I said I was sorry...."

  "No: you found them."

  Innes looked down and saw papers among the pieces of the lamp.

  "Well, it had to figure, didn't it?" said Innes, happy to take the credit. "I mean, the lamp right at hand. So little time."

  Jack picked up the papers and studied them under the light: one a printed list of participants in the Parliament of Religions. The other a handwritten note.

  "Everything all right?" asked Presto, reentering.

  "Quite," said Innes, trying unsuccessfully to peer over Jack's shoulder at the note.

  "What are you standing in the dark for?" said Presto.

  "I was searching the lamp," said Innes. "Accidentally knocked it over."

  "This man in the hall has that same scar on the inside of his left arm: a circle broken by three lines. What have you got there?" said Presto, moving closer.

  "At the regrettable cost of Brachman's life," said Jack, pointedly, "the answer we've been looking for."

  "I want your opinion of my friend Jack," said Doyle quietly.

  Walks Alone looked at him for a long moment. Then she nodded. "He is very sick."

  "Tell me how," asked Doyle.

  She chose her words carefully before continuing; she sensed the concern this man had for his friend, and she did not want to upset him unnecessarily. "I can see the sickness in him: It is like a weight, or ... a shadow in here." She pointed to her left side. "In him it is very powerful."

  They were sitting before a fire in Doyle's Palmer House suite, Walks Alone cross-legged on the floor near the hearth, Doyle in a wing chair, savoring a brandy. An exhausted Lionel Stern lay asleep on the davenport, the crate holding the Zohar resting on the table between them.

  "You sound like a doctor, Miss Williams," said Doyle.

  "I was taught by my grandfather; he had strong healing power. But our medicine is very different from yours."

  "In what way?"

  "We believe sickness comes from the outside and enters into the body; it can hide there for a long time, and grow, before it makes itself known."

  "How so? I'm a doctor myself," said Doyle, genuinely curious, deciding to confide in the hope of receiving the same. "That is, I was trained as one. And I do believe some people have an inborn talent for healing. I wish I could say I was one of them. I worked hard at medicine but it never came particularly easy to me."

  "So you became a writer of books instead."

  "One has to put bread on the table, don't they?" he said, with an apologetic smile.

  "I am sorry I have not read any of them."

  "Quite all right; it's a bit of a relief, actually. So, you are considered a doctor among your people, Miss Williams?"

  Walks Alone waited again. She trusted this man for some reason; unusual for her to trust a white. He seemed as ignorant about her ways as all whites did, but he offered her a straightforward respect she was not used to receiving. He had strength but did not need to make a big show of it like so many whites did. She wondered if people were like him in his home country; she had never met an Englishman before.

  "Yes," she said.

  "And you can see so plainly that my friend is sick?"

  "More: His life is in danger."

  Doyle sat up straighter; he took her seriously. "So this is a physical illness."

  "The sickness is in his spirit now, but will go into his body one day. Soon."

  "Could he be cured before that happens?"

  "I would need to see him more before I could say."

  "Do you think you could help him?" "I would not like to say now."

  "How would you treat this sickness?"

  "The sickness needs to be taken out of him."

  "How would you do that?"

  "In our medicine, as a doctor, you remove sickness from a person by inviting it to leave them and come into your body."

  "That sounds as if it could be dangerous for you."

  "It is."

  Doyle studied her by the firelight; solemn and heartfelt, staring at the flames. The modest, confident strength she radiated. He remembered Roosevelt's eye-popping diatribe against the American Indian and shuddered at the thickheaded compendium of cliches he himself had been carrying around about them. If Mary was any example, they were clearly different from whites—the product of a different culture, even a different race—but that was no reason to fear or despise her. And in spite of the bias of his conventional training, yes, he could believe she had the power to heal.

  "What do you do with the sickness once you've taken it from them?"

  "I send it somewhere; into the air, the water, or the earth. Sometimes into fire. It depends what kind of sickness it is. This is what we learn to do."

  Doyle recalled Jack's stories about the En-aguas in Brazil. "You use various herbs and roots to help you, medicinal compounds."

  "Yes," she said, surprised that he knew this. "Sometimes."

  "What causes this kind of sickness? You say it comes from outside."

  "When the world is made unsound, it creates more sickness. This goes out from the world and into the people."

  "And how did the world become sick?"

  "People have made it so," she said simply. "When the sickness goes into them, it is only returning to where it came from."

  "So before man you believe that the world was whole?"

  "It was in balance, yes," she said. Before the whites came, she thought.

  He looked at her openly, honestly. "So if a person becomes sick, you believe it is only a reflection of what is already inside them." "That is true most of the time."

  "Miss Williams, I ask you to tell me plainly: Is there a chance that you can heal my friend?"

  "That is difficult to say. I do not know if that is what your friend wants."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Sometimes a person will become attached to the sickness; sometimes they come to believe the sickness is more real than they are."

  "Is that what has happened to my friend?"

  "Yes, I think so."

  "So he could not be healed. Not by anyone."

  "Not when the attachment is so strong. Not unless he decides that is what he wants. He is too much in love with death."r />
  She sees him clearly, that much is certain, thought Doyle. He finished the last of his brandy. Jack could certainly be diagnosed as mad by any medical standards. Whether any sort of medicine could bring him back remained to be seen.

  A sharp knock at the door startled them. Doyle cautiously opened it a notch.

  "See here, Doyle, we need to talk," said Major Pepperman. Judging by the lethal blast of his breath, he had been drinking heavily.

  "Sorry, it will have to wait until morning, Major—"

  Before Doyle could react, Pepperman had stuck a gigantic boot through the crack of the door and wedged it open. He took a step into the room, saw Walks Alone rising by the fire, Lionel Stern on the sofa.

  "I knew it!" said Pepperman, pointing a finger at the woman. "You're up to something dastardly in here, Mr. Doyle; I must insist upon my right to be informed...."

  "Major, please—"

  "Sir, I don't think you appreciate the risk I've taken in bringing you to this country. I have over five thousand dollars of my own capital invested in this enterprise, and if you are unable to fulfill the obligations of our agreement, it will leave me teetering on the brink of the abyss!"

  "Major, I have every intention of fulfilling my obligation____"

  "I know exactly what you're up to!" "You do?"

  "Running around with shady characters at all hours of the night, smuggling unconscious women into your rooms; why, it's been all I can do to keep the house detective from breaking down your door!"

  Pepperman strode about, gesticulating wildly. Doyle exchanged a helpless, apologetic look with Lionel Stern, who hovered protectively over the crate holding the Zohar. Walks Alone's eye drifted to the iron poker leaning on the hearth.

  "I must have some assurance, sir; I must be provided with a proper guarantee or I shall be forced to submit this matter to the attentions of my attorney! We have laws about these things in America! I have a wife and five red-headed children!"

  The door behind him opened. Jack, Innes, and Presto hurried into the room.

  "Rabbi Brachman has been killed," said Jack, before noticing the giant pacing in the corner.

  Pepperman took in this disturbing information, stopped dead in his tracks, and began to cry. "Murder. I'm ruined!" moaned Pepperman.

  "Oh, my God," said Stern, sinking back down on the sofa.