by Rhys Hughes
“Somehow, the lover had been buried alive; that much was obvious. But the authorities were less interested in this than in the fact that a crime had been committed. In the law-books of this city, one of the most serious offences was the unnatural coupling between the living and the dead. Quite simply, Athanasius was guilty of this offence; it would have been hard for him to deny it. He had been caught in the very act, so to speak. Of course there were mitigating circumstances, no-one with any sense or compassion would have tried to claim otherwise. But this did not mean that the law could be ignored: Athanasius had been discovered in an illicit embrace with a dead woman. He was allowed to recover from his frightful experience and then he was sent to trial on the heinous charge of necrophilia.
“During the trial, it emerged that others who had contracted the same plague had since reawakened in their graves. Some of them—like Athanasius—had even been rescued in time. It appeared that the illness gave only the semblance of death, lulling its victims into a catatonia indistinguishable from the real thing. It might be expected that any Judge who had to deal with this case would be tempted to show leniency. Unfortunately for the lover, the Judge assigned to him was the husband of his former mistress. And just before the start of the trial someone had told him the details of his wife’s affair—Athanasius suspected that it was the wife herself, though she denied it. Thus it was that the lover, dead once and now resurrected, was sentenced to hang by the neck until he was dead again.
“He was taken, struggling and kicking, to the deepest dungeon of the city prison and left to rot until the date of his execution. Far above he could hear the gallows being erected in the market-square. His friends lodged an appeal, but they were too penurious to pursue the case. And so the morning eventually dawned that would be his last. He was led to the gallows by a hooded executioner. A crowd had gathered to watch his final moments, but they were strangely subdued. He realised that his friends were there; they surged forwards to touch his sleeve as if he was some kind of saint. A cowled figure broke free from the mob and fell against him, pressing a piece of paper into his hand. Before the paper was snatched away by the executioner, Athanasius managed to steal a glance at the words written on it. They brought a chill to his bones, colder even than the wind which sang around the market-square. They said simply: ‘Never will I be parted from you.’
“As Athanasius was dragged up the scaffold to his doom, he began shrieking about betrayal and how easily love can turn to hate. This was pure delirium, of course. He did not go to his death bravely; nor was that death a pretty one. In many ways, this destroyed the sympathy that had arisen for him in the wake of his first death. The legend also died then; although his friend, Jerome, carved the whole tale above the city gate, few remembered the lover longer than it took his new corpse to desiccate in the wind. A date was set for its burial and its hands were removed, just to be on the safe side—the authorities wanted him knocking on no more lids. But then the body vanished. A search was made but nothing was ever recovered. It was assumed that some medical student or other had made use of the cadaver.
“Years passed and Jerome became a successful sculptor. One night, he pressed silver coins into the hand of the new sexton at the overgrown cemetery. By the light of a dim lantern, they stood over the grave and exhumed the unique coffin. Inside, much to the sexton’s surprise—if not Jerome’s—were two decaying bodies, locked in an embrace that was an obscene mockery of human desire. The smile on the face of the woman seemed tinged with sadness; because of the condition it was in, it was difficult to be certain. The face of the man could not be seen—and Jerome declined the sexton’s offer of turning the bodies over. The coffin was replaced and the sexton was requested, by means of yet more silver, never to recount what he had witnessed. . . .”
The gate-keeper stopped and blinked up at me. The tale was done. And yet it seemed to me to be lacking in that sense of mystery which makes a true legend worth preserving in stone—as this one had been. Obviously the cowled figure who pressed the note into Athanasius’ hand at his execution had been Melissa. But surely she had merely awakened from the catatonia as he had done? Where was the surprise in that? I pointed out these objections to the gate-keeper, but he shrugged and held out his palm. I pressed another coin into his hand, mimicking Jerome and the sexton, and he scratched his nose with it thoughtfully.
“It was Melissa, as you say. She had promised him that they would never be parted. After he had been dug up, she came to claim him back. It was she who told the Judge about how Athanasius had seduced his wife, effectively sentencing him to death. It was she who cut his corpse down and carried it back to their grave, where they could lie together for all eternity. But you are assuming that the mosquito which bit him had also feasted on her. This was not so.”
I was growing impatient. The city had begun to come to life; soon the business of the day would turn the attention of the gate-keeper away from me. I knew that if I did not have my answers now, I would probably never have them. So I gave the fellow a fair share of the remainder of my money—the money I had saved up to purchase the medical textbooks I so fervently desired—and exhorted him to explain himself. What did he mean by implying that Melissa had not succumbed to the disease? Had not the lovers planned to die together in the same way?
“What really happened, I can only guess. I presume that after the mosquito had bitten Athanasius—and the plague had started to freeze his limbs solid—she had waited for the insect to alight on her. But mosquitoes are fickle creatures. Perhaps it had already gorged its fill on him and had no appetite left. No doubt she waited many long hours, growing increasingly frustrated as the insect ignored her.
“Feeble as she was from lack of nourishment, she was pinned down under the weight of Athanasius and unable to move. It must have appeared to her then that she had been cheated; that she had broken her promise to him. Perhaps as dawn finally illuminated the room, a ray of sunlight fell on something within reach that glittered—the knife that her lover had stolen from the market and then abandoned as useless.
“At any rate, Jerome found her that morning with a cut throat; a gaping smile that mocked the more serene one on her lips. Her death, at least, was clear-cut, in a manner of speaking. This is why she was returned to the grave after Athanasius was removed from it by the first sexton; this is also why the lover could not escape prosecution for the unmentionable crime. His was an open and shut case; that is coffin humour. But all this is totally irrelevant. He would have been hung anyway. In this city, suicide is a capital offence.”
I shook my head and he let loose a guffaw. As I watched, he pulled open his shirt to reveal two mummified hands resting around his neck on a leather thong. Doubtless these had been obtained by his ancestor and handed down through the generations, to provide proof that the tale was true. I moved away into the most beautiful of walled cities—not very beautiful really, because few of our cities are walled—and cast back a single glance at the wizened gate-keeper. He was stifling a yawn with a hand, but not one of his own. Beyond, the marshes were steaming under the sun, breeding new terrors to harass the populace. I prayed.
The Evil Side Of Reginald Burke
The wind roared and the rain lashed, and the man on the balcony stood aghast at the storm, because it was not stormy enough.
Where was the lightning and hail? He blinked at the black clouds and turned back into the house. Moisture trickled into his eyes and down his cheeks. He had expected such a tumult in the heavens that his voice would be drowned out, even with the windows bolted. But he was slicked only lightly. The fire in the grate wiped him just once with its forked tongues and then he was dry.
So the natural effects were cancelled. . . .
It scarcely mattered. The potions were making amends, bubbling and frothing in tall flasks. And the candles flickered ominously.
The low table stood between him and his guests.
“Gentlemen,” he said, “I bid you unwelcome . . .”
It was
a pitiful introduction; the one he had dreamed about.
“. . . to this, my first transformation!”
There was no applause, and the absence of thunder accentuated this. The faces which floated through the other half of the room were unhelpful. There was a range of expressions, most clustered at the disparagement end of the sentiment spectrum. There were lanterns to supplement the hearth, but these were a foolish detail: the setting sun still jabbed a spare ray through the occasional gash in the amateur tempest. At last, to rupture the awkward silence, one of the guests demanded:
“What silly game are you playing, Reginald?”
It was Trumpton Mackay, the merchant banker. He was dressed in a yellow suit, his amethyst rings contrasting nicely with his sickly cuffs. An expensive gold tooth flashed in the inadequate gloom and a speck of green, perhaps a sliver of asparagus, clung to the metal like moss.
His heckle was taken up by Davy Lewis: “Aye, what nonsense is this?”
Reginald smirked and removed his spectacles, wiping them carefully on a grimy sleeve and replacing them in such a way that his ears squeaked. He alone boasted weak eyes; the eyes which glared across the table were strong and clear. Apart from Trumpton and Davy, a mutant handful of alternative belligerents focussed on his weaker chin, for which no medicinal apparatus was yet available. Herbert Ogerepus, a surveyor, squinted at the grease which had protected it from the precipitation and snarled: “We are waiting.”
“A modern form of alchemy, gentlemen,” replied the host. “Do not confuse me with the anaemic devotees of Zosimus, Geber or Trithemius. I offer no claim but that of action; no gold or philosopher’s stone. Those can relax the future; my metamorphosis will ease the past.”
The shuffling of feet was uneasy as well as mocking.
“No need to massage the past, old boy,” rumbled Billy Terbun, the stiffness of his blazer looming among the soft furnishings like an obelisk.
“Pfwooarumph!” exclaimed Augustus Summers.
“But my history is stiff and cramped,” said Reginald firmly. “And it has caused me much pain for several decades.”
A sigh went around the gathering, and although the note was the same from each throat, its timbre was different, so that a simple melody was almost composed, there by accident in the modest apartment of an insignificant man.
“You didn’t invite us here just to drag up those complaints,” muttered Nigel Diamond, though whether this was an assertion or a question remained unclear.
“Pain?” Trumpton licked his gold tooth. “I doubt you know the meaning of the word. Once, I lost a fortune. Luckily it wasn’t mine. But the fellow in question suffered badly and I was forced to view his face. And then he jumped out of a tall building. I didn’t catch him.”
“Thank goodness for that!” consoled Justin Legg.
“Well, malaria caught me back in ’98. That hurt,” snorted Myron Kettle. “I still come out with regular fevers. And those are my own.”
“Not here please,” clipped Billy Terbun.
“Gentlemen!” hissed Reginald, waving his hands among the smokes and vapours of the bubbling flasks, so that his gesture itself seemed to be aflame. Then he clutched his head a little, peering at them from between his fingers until it became evident that the storm outside was forgetting its rôle altogether, fading and sinking back to the horizon, so that now the eaves dripped and nothing more.
Many cheeks blushed, with anger, opacity and disbelief.
“I mention my troubles only in passing,” continued the host, “for in one sense I am grateful for them. They gave me the determination to pursue my arcane researches. This is not the place for comparisons. I know, for instance, that Herbert Ogerepus once witnessed a landslide which killed several of his employees. And Davy Lewis was in charge of the Dolaucothi pit when it flooded to the brim and drowned all his miners. But those catastrophes didn’t occur at formative stages of your lives. You were already established in the mainstream of society. They did not push you outside civilisation.”
“That’s right, boyo!” spat Davy.
“What are you getting at exactly?” inquired Lyndon Williams, mildly.
“Only foolery!” muttered Billy.
Reginald tapped one of the flasks with his finger. The glass shrieked quietly. They all felt this note of subdued hysteria rather than heard it, and it entered their mouths, not their ears, a solution, so to speak, to the riddle of their sighs. Not that the earlier exhalations had any mystery about them, but some riddles are just that, empty and all the more unkind for it. The little coals under the vessels pulsed like winks.
Without knowing why, Lyndon asked: “Nearly ready?”
Reginald inclined his head. “Almost, but not quite.” He stood back and pointed, so that his finger became sharper than when it had tapped the potion, more able to slide between the weave of thick jackets and enter flesh to hearts. “My metamorphosis has been a long time coming.”
“This is pathetic,” blurted Trumpton, his amethyst rings catching light from the several different kinds of naked flame and seeming to swell on his fingers like miniature plums. “I demand a resolution to the jest.”
“No jest. I bid you unwelcome . . .”
“Pahwahumbugah!” rumbled Augustus.
“Yes, get a move on,” groaned Herbert.
“Or I’ll catch the next train back, mun!”
“It’s a farce! A farce! And the smell is awful.”
“You tell him, Billy. He hasn’t changed.”
“Not at all! Not since . . . since . . .”
“You know when! I know when! Best days of our lives?”
“Not really,” chuckled Trumpton. “But I won’t complain.”
“In that case, who will? Who?”
“Who always does? Him, him, him!”
Reginald gasped and now he seemed close to tears, his face puckered in among its own defects, the eternal pimples and pallor. He fiddled with his glasses, but they were stuck fast by the glue of the squeak. He almost fell forward, gripped the edge of the table, communicating his tremble to the wood. But he had chosen it for its stoutness and nothing upon it was upset, except a small beetle in the grain, and that only in an emotional way, if such is possible. Almost certainly not.
“I can see you are impatient. Therefore I will alter my schedule and introduce you to my servant without delay . . .”
“Your servant?” they all chorused with frowns.
Reginald rang a bell on the table. “His name is Monkey Jekyll.”
A door in the far wall opened and closed. Between these minor events lurked a major silhouette. It was not quite a monkey. No tail. Very hairy and ugly to human sight. But it had a gentle face when viewed from the safe vantage of drunken tolerance. It was a gorilla of some kind. Worse: it carried a razor and a basin. Obvious thoughts rarely profited this sophisticated gathering, and to announce one in public would invite derision, so a substitute hypothesis became compulsory.
Trumpton went first. “You have trained a pet barber?”
Reginald shook his head vehemently, and the gorilla copied the action, probably because it would have been too remarkable if it had instigated it. “That’s rather unlikely, isn’t it? A barber! No, my servant is a murderer.”
“Don’t be soft, boyo!” cried Davy.
“I assure you that Monkey Jekyll is a ruthless killer. He wasn’t like that at first, of course. I had to overcome his instinct for kindness.”
“How did you manage that?” asked Lyndon.
Reginald shrugged. “It wasn’t easy. Anyway, here he is. This is what my transformation business is all about. Something happened to me when I was younger. It damaged my confidence, forced me into hiding. I became socially inept. While others enjoyed the normal affairs of their age, I missed out on everything. In short, while you had fun, I did not. I embraced obscurity. And there are many different kinds of that.”
Lyndon counted them off on his fingers. “Cultural, political, hygienic . . .”
�
��And mental,” stressed Reginald. “My thinking became abstruse. I developed an interest in the rarest truths. I purchased peculiar books. In my lonely bedroom . . .”
“Whooarphmgwmphagog!” spluttered Augustus.
“Occultism!” roared Trumpton. “Always the refuge of the precocious failure. I should have refused to take you seriously from the outset.”
Reginald bowed. “You underestimate your prior achievements.”
Billy smoothed a rogue crease on his blazer. “There have always been plenty of cheap bookshops in this city dealing with volumes of sorcery.”
“Grimoires,” said Herbert, “bound in toad skin.”
“All daft, if you ask me,” snorted Davy. “The books, I mean.”
“The toads too,” corrected Myron. “In fact, the whole game is a waste of effort and time, unlike cricket.”
“Or rugby, mun. Nothing hidden there. Bruises and warts out in the open.”
Reginald smiled, but his feeble eyes were cold, like little orbs of melting ice flavoured with lemon. The flecks in his irises were magnified by his powerful spectacles, as if the pimples on his cheeks had set up outposts in lands of vile jelly, failing to sprout properly and burst, but just leaking aimlessly into a warped vision.
“I was never one for physical pursuits,” he countered, “because of my isolation, which is essentially an indoor condition. But now I may exert myself to a degree beyond my current anatomy.” He turned to face the gorilla. “Why did you not bring the spade? You have forgotten it! The spade is important.”
