Herald of Ruin, page 4
part #2 of The Sanford Files Series
Scanlon went still, but Altman waited a moment to make sure he wasn’t shamming. When a small trickle of blood oozed from the man’s ear, Altman thought, There’s no faking that.
He rose and looked around the room, wondering if it was worth his time to search in case Scanlon had the cup somewhere in here himself. Altman doubted it – he was practically certain, in fact – but Carl Sanford wasn’t a big fan of assumptions. He set down the strange magazine and went through the dresser drawers, and the closet, and checked the bathroom and kitchen cabinets, and even underneath the shabby furniture in the living room. No cup.
He returned to the bedroom, checked to see if Scanlon was still breathing – disposing of bodies was such a chore – and found him still alive. He looked at the magazine, which still appeared entirely harmless with its cover closed, but he was reluctant to touch it again, even with gloves on. He tore off a stained pillowcase and scooped the magazine into his makeshift sack.
Then Altman slipped out of the house to give his boss the bad news.
•••
Sanford sat at his desk, peering at the open magazine through something like a jeweler’s loupe, though the lens was topaz. “Most curious,” Sanford murmured. “You say it was glowing?”
“Glowing, flickering, like a movie was playing on the pages.”
“Curious indeed. Ruby said she gathered the same impression, of light and motion, when she saw Scanlon poring over the magazine at the docks. I detect nothing out of the ordinary, however. Of course, there are many forms of otherworldly adulteration, and even I am not conversant in all of them. Perhaps the effect is limited to one particular page.” He began to leaf through the magazine, slowly, one page, at a time, and then stopped suddenly. Sanford plucked a small rectangular card that had been stuck between the pages. He held it up to Altman. “What do you make of this?” His voice was strained.
The cardboard rectangle was printed with the words:
Tillinghast Esoterica and Exotics
Rare Books and Curios
By Appointment
It bore no phone number or address. He grunted. “Our mysterious new shopkeeper again, eh? Maybe he sent this long-haired lady with the purple fingernails to deal with Tick. Tillinghast is in the book business, right?”
“It’s hardly what anyone would call a rare tome. They print thousands of the things, and this issue is quite new.”
“Most of those thousands of issues don’t glow, though,” Altman pointed out.
“No, they don’t,” Sanford said. “I suppose these things would be even more popular if they projected a moving picture you could hold in your hands. No need to go to the theater and bear the noises and odors of the hoi polloi if you could enjoy such things in your own home, hmm?” Sanford set the card aside, then riffled quickly through the remainder of the magazine. “Whatever ensorcellment this once possessed is gone, or else its magics are dependent on the presence of the intended recipient.”
“Want me to bring Scanlon in? Take him down to one of the basements, see what more we can get out of him?”
Sanford picked up the business card and tapped it on the desk. “No. No, I think we should pursue other avenues instead. Ones more likely to provide satisfaction.”
•••
Altman had never been to the courthouse in Arkham before, but he’d certainly seen its type plenty of times: the entryway featured marble floors, vaulted ceilings, noble pillars, and there were friezes and frescoes of stern-faced New Englanders doing allegorical things with scrolls and swords and scales and sheaves of wheat on the walls all around. It was a place designed to impress upon the public the might and majesty of law and order and civil society.
Altman was not impressed.
Sanford nodded to a dozen people as they walked across the shining floor, murmuring asides to Altman as they went – this or that judge was a member of the Lodge or wasn’t, this lawyer was just crooked enough, this other lawyer was annoyingly un-bribe-able and impoverished as a result. “I have close associations with the county sheriff and his deputies, but I have friends among the city police forces, too, of course,” Sanford confided.
Altman soaked in the information. He never knew when Sanford might dispatch him to have a face-to-face discussion with someone, and the more he knew about the complex associations of power and privilege in Arkham, the better. He’d always had a gift for names and faces, but handling the complex web of entanglements that surrounded Sanford was testing the limits of his faculties.
They eschewed the corridors that led to the courtrooms and instead went up a grand staircase. On the upper floors, the polish started to fade a bit. Here the floors were scuffed, the wooden doors a bit dingy, and the lights less warm. This was the part of the courthouse where people actually got work done.
Sanford walked the halls with total confidence, entering a warren of offices and leading Altman across threadbare carpeting until he finally reached an unassuming door painted flaking white, and pushed it open.
Altman followed him into a little break room, set up with a scarred kitchen table, mismatched chairs, a small stove, a kettle, and some sad plants drooping in brown pots. A little rectangular window high on one wall let in a slice of distant sunshine. There was only one person in the room, a compact pretty brunette in a neat skirt suit, shaking salt over a peeled hardboiled egg. She widened her eyes and stood up, then looked hurriedly around, as if to make sure she wasn’t being observed, before dropping a curtsy. Altman had never seen anyone curtsy while holding an egg before. At least it wasn’t pickled.
“Master!” she said. “What are you doing here?”
Sanford swept toward her, took the hand that wasn’t holding an egg, and kissed it. “My dear Sister Madeline,” he said. “I recalled that you customarily took your lunch around this time. Please, sit.”
She did, although a bit stiff and flustered, while Sanford arranged himself comfortably in a chair across from her. Altman slid back and stood against the wall, arms crossed. Madeline clearly didn’t know what to do with the egg, so she just kept holding it. Altman couldn’t tell whether she was terrified of Sanford or merely in awe of him, and decided it was too close to make any distinction.
“Madeline, this is my associate, Mr Altman.” Sanford gestured vaguely backward.
The woman frowned, and Altman thought that little worry-furrow in the center of her forehead was pretty close to becoming permanent. She was a little older than he’d thought at first, perhaps even thirty – those wide eyes just made her seem younger. “But I heard that Mr Altman…”
“I’m his brother.” Altman spoke up. “Just joined the family business, as it were. It’s a pleasure to meet you, miss…?”
“Mrs. Mrs Ostler. Madeline.”
“Sister Madeline is an Initiate of the Order, Altman, and a very valued member indeed.” Sanford could sound so warm when he wanted to. “She works at the courthouse as a stenographer, and I couldn’t ask for a better set of eyes and ears on the legal system.”
She blushed, rather prettily, if you liked that sort of thing; Altman could take it or leave it. “It’s nothing, really,” she said.
Sanford leaned forward and briefly patted her knee in a paternal fashion. “But Madeline has other skills, and those are what have brought me here today.”
She didn’t blush this time. She went pale instead. “Oh, sir, must I?”
“You know I wouldn’t ask if it weren’t essential,” Sanford said. “The magazine, Altman?”
He opened the briefcase and extracted the magazine, stuffed into an oversized envelope – he was still reluctant to touch the thing with his bare hands, even if it did seem inert. Sanford showed no such squeamishness when Altman handed it over, extracting the magazine from the envelope and showing it to Madeline. “A woman handled this, not long ago. I need to find her.”
“What is she, a bloodhound?” Altman asked.
“A tracker, of sorts, indeed,” Sanford said. “Madeline is an accomplished psychometrist.”
Altman grunted. He’d attended his share of séances (most were shams, and the ones that weren’t were… alarming), and he’d heard of psychometry before. “So she can handle a dead man’s handkerchief and tell his wife he still loves her from beyond the grave, things like that?”
Madeline shook her head. She made no attempt to take the magazine from Sanford’s hands. “Not really, no. I pick up… impressions… of the people who’ve handled things. It’s stronger if the handling was more recent, and stronger still if they touched the object often. Sometimes I can see a sort of… silver thread… connecting the person to whatever they touched.”
Sanford nodded. “Madeline has been a great help to the police over the years, though most in the department don’t realize it. Her late fiancé was a detective, and took frequent advantage of her skills, sneaking her into the evidence room and letting her handle knives and guns and clubs, and more often than not, she could point him straight to the hand that most recently wielded them. Of course, her evidence is hardly admissible in court, but a motivated detective can manufacture whatever proof is required.”
“He passed on, then?” Altman said. “I’m sorry for your loss, ma’am.”
“Two years ago,” she murmured, her eyes far away. “Shot by smugglers. I… I helped find his shallow grave… I can still feel him, in the cemetery now, even though it’s consecrated ground, it doesn’t help… you see, he touched me so often… our connection…” She wrung her hands, and Sanford put a hand on her knee again.
“I hate to ask it of you,” Sanford said softly, and Altman could almost believe it. “But it’s a matter of grave importance. Do you think you could try?”
She nodded, tears standing in the corners of her eyes, and took the magazine. She bowed her head, eyes closed. Altman was expecting the sort of dramatics he’d seen among the spiritualists – table rapping, gouts of ectoplasm, or at least her head flung back and her eyes rolling to show the whites. But instead, she simply seemed to concentrate very hard, and spoke softly. “You touched this, and Mr Altman, and before them, a man… he’s in a house near the river now. I think he’s sobbing? His connection is very strong. He didn’t hold the object long, but he held it often…”
“A woman,” Sanford prompted.
“I… yes. Yes, I see, she didn’t hold it long, but it was recent, so I can follow the thread. She had long dark hair. I see her in candlelight. Northside… A lonely house, across from a field, with horses… yellow paint… I think there’s a sign… Kersh Lane? That’s all. I’m sorry.” Her voice croaked, like she’d gone days without water.
“That’s very helpful, my dear. Can you see… any farther? Who gave her the magazine?”
Trying to get a fix on Tillinghast, Altman thought.
“The thread stops at her,” she said. “I don’t understand… normally, something like this, I could reach back and find the hand of the newsagent that sold it, the man who packed it for delivery, the printer who took it from the press… but after this woman, it just stops.” She opened her eyes, blinking furiously, mouth downturned. “I’m so sorry, master, I’ve failed you–”
“Tut, tut,” Sanford soothed. “Nonsense. You did very well.” He took the magazine from her, put it back in the envelope, and handed it to Altman. Then he reached into his jacket and removed a small tin, closing it in Madeline’s hand. “Here. These will help with your headaches. And any… dreams.”
“Thank you,” she whispered. “For everything… everything you did… I owe you… anything you need… I can never repay…”
Sanford rose and said his farewells, and they swiftly departed the courthouse. Once they were back in his Bentley, Altman said, “What did you do for her, to make her so grateful and eager? You could tell doing her trick cost her something.”
“Hmm?” The magus was in the backseat, and distracted, gazing out the window, looking northward. “Oh. I tracked down the men who killed her fiancé, and took them to a remote location, and drove Madeline there. Then I gave her a knife and let her take her revenge. I’d intended to keep proof of her crime and use it for blackmail, you see, to force her to use her powers whenever I needed them – I kept the knife, covered in blood, with her fingerprints, and even told her I’d dispose of her bloodstained clothing, and kept those, too. But do you know, I never even needed to threaten her? She doesn’t even know I intended to. It just goes to show, sometimes the soft touch is the better way. She was so grateful for the opportunity to take revenge, she’s been utterly devoted ever since, and even joined the Order. I’ve considered promoting her to Seeker, though I worry about letting her handle some of the more potent objects in the basements. She’s very sensitive. Even that little display today will have her down with a splitting headache for days.”
Altman grunted. “She cut the killers up herself, did she? I’d say she doesn’t look like a killer, but, well. I know better.”
“Killers can look like anyone at all,” Sanford agreed. “How do you fancy a drive to the north side of town?”
Chapter Four
Gloria in Excelsis
As Altman drove through the winding streets of Arkham toward Northside, Sanford tried to decide whether Tillinghast was going to be a problem, or merely an annoyance. He certainly didn’t seem to be an opportunity any longer.
It was interesting that Madeline had been unable to feel Tillinghast’s connection to the magazine. If anything, the woman had understated her own powers when describing them to Altman – she should have been able to reach all the way back to sense the printer who set the type for the magazine, the papermaker who’d pressed the pulp, the logger who felled the tree to provide it, the hand of a hiker who’d touched the tree. Instead, she’d hit some sort of psychic dead end, something she’d never done before in Sanford’s experience.
That suggested Tillinghast had enough power to hide himself from psychic discovery – or that he possessed a relic that provided such camouflage. Sanford had encountered such items, once or twice, though he didn’t currently have any in his own possession. He’d certainly like to. If Tillinghast had such relics, and he’d brought them to Arkham, then, ultimately, he’d delivered them to Sanford. This was his city, after all, and anything he desired in its limits would be his eventually. Sanford might have been willing to make room for Tillinghast, if the man proved useful, but now he’d stolen the so-called Grail of Dreams out from under Sanford’s very nose and that insult could not be borne.
“Coming up on Kersh Lane now,” Altman said, stirring Sanford from his reverie. They’d left Eastside and traversed downtown and made their way to Northside without the magus even realizing.
This Tillinghast was taking up far too much of Sanford’s time and attention. He wanted to track the newcomer down, retrieve the grail, drive the interloper out of town, and move on with more important business. “I don’t recall a yellow house around here,” Altman said, “but I haven’t committed every little shack to memory.”
“I’m impressed you know as much as you do about our environs, given your relative newness to the city.”
“Oh, I visited my brother from time to time, and he liked to ramble around and point out places of interest. I’m naturally an attentive person.”
“Surely it’s training as much as inclination,” Sanford said. “Noting potential escape routes that should be eliminated, composing a mental map to use in the case of house-to-house fighting, and the like.” Sanford didn’t know exhaustive details about Altman’s life, but he knew the man had been a mercenary like his brother before him, and he’d observed this Altman long enough to draw certain conclusions.
“Let’s just say I’ve learned it pays to keep my eyes open and my wits about me.” Altman cruised slowly along Kersh Lane, peering left and right methodically at the houses they passed. The dwellings were spaced out a bit more widely here, on the edges of things, with backyards merging seamlessly with fields or stretches of woodland.
“Do you know, I worried about employing you at first,” Sanford said. “I was afraid you’d blame me for your brother’s death. I feared you might seek revenge.”
Altman barked a laugh. “I would have sought revenge against the cultists who killed Reggie, not the man who employed him. You got all the revenge for me before I reached town, anyway. Left the whole cult in a watery grave, and in pieces at that.”
“True. But I was surprised you took my word for that.”
“Oh, no, I got Ruby drunk. Or tried to. She’s got a high tolerance, for a flap. She told me what she knew about my brother’s fate, and her story accorded with yours well enough, but not so perfectly I thought you’d rehearsed it together.”
Sanford chuckled. “It gratifies me to know you did your due diligence before accepting my offer of employment. An excess of trust can be a danger in our line of work.”
“What line of work is that, exactly? I know we’re looking for artifacts and relics and items of unnatural provenance, but you’ve been a little short on details when it comes to the ultimate purpose of all this acquiring.”
Sanford clucked his tongue. “Don’t be foolish, man. Power is its own purpose. Sufficient power permits one to do whatever one wishes.”
“So… it’s freedom you’re after, then.”
“Succinctly put,” Sanford agreed. “And freedom means making sure no one else has the power to limit me.” Something outside the passenger window caught his eye. “There, Mr Altman. I see a flash of yellow through the trees. Looks like fresh paint.”
“That explains why I didn’t recall it from my last meander around these parts.” Altman didn’t slow from his already stately pace but swiveled his head to look at the house. It was a single-story structure, neat and trim, set well back from the road behind a split-rail fence, with open fields lying fallow on either side. A curl of smoke rose from the chimney. It looked like a picture postcard for cozy country living.
Altman drove on until he reached a side road and followed that on a meandering course toward the back of the house. He pulled off to the side, behind a copse of trees, glimpses of the yellow backside of the house visible here and there between the branches. “How do you want to play this?” Altman asked, pulling on his gloves. “Shall I slip in and… prepare the ground? Get her in a receptive mood for your questions?”
