Then, starting awake, the fat leech-like creature had come bloating like a monstrous mushroom from his bed, erupting into frantic activity, desperate to set the “spell,” as he imagined it, down on paper, and secured in his memory, before the dream could disappear into some subconscious limbo. And it had taken that entire day before he was satisfied that at last he had it.
The proof of that had come with the door itself: that weaving, near-invisible shimmer on the rim of his awareness, like a hole in the material of space-time, beyond which there was only the ultimate, infinite darkness of the Möbius Continuum. But as for what it really was or where it led—if it led anywhere at all and not simply outside—that had been a question for which there had been no immediate answer.
It irritated, frustrated Hemmings that he had created something he couldn’t fully understand, over which as yet he had no control; and for endless hours through that first night, to the exclusion of all else, he had given it his uttermost attention, calling up and erasing the door over and over again, attempting to familiarize himself with it as if it were a living thing. He knew it would better suit his morbid purpose if the “refuse” he disposed of were to vanish completely from the world of men…but what if it did not? What if the bodies should be discovered somewhere, and what if he had left a trace of himself—a hair, a blob of drool, or the smallest speck of DNA—on the clothing or flesh of a victim? The odds against it were enormous…but no, Gordon J. Hemmings was a perfectionist; he would never again submit himself to the mentally debilitating concerns, the overwhelming worries he had known following the murder of Professor Emeritus Latimer Calloway.
Oh, that had worked out all right in the end (the official post-mortem verdict had been a heart attack; which it had been, after Hemmings was done, or almost done, with the doddering old simpleton,) but oh how he had fretted and sweated until at last the verdict had come in, when he’d learned the supposed “facts” of it in the newspapers. For he had been disturbed at the scene of the crime that time, almost caught red-handed—not to mention red-faced!—there in the evening woods close to Calloway’s country house, when a courting couple had arrived all unexpected on the scene out of the velvety dark.
But no, satisfied that Calloway was dead or dying—if not drained completely—Hemmings had fled into the trees and made his way back to Dalkeith. And now, recalling how he’d read with relief and satisfaction of the old Professor Emeritus’ supposed natural death in the papers, the solution to this other problem when finally it dawned on him had seemed not only the very simplest thing but therefore the most obvious answer. And the next night, after making some necessary purchases under a false name at a ship-chandler’s on the coast, he had put it to the test.
Shortly after midnight, having brought into being a portal, Hemmings had fired a volley of three Very lights into the darkness beyond the door. And since his considerable but incomplete knowledge of abstruse mathematical matters, along with a limited understanding of certain parts of the weird formula, had led him to the paradoxically mainly correct conclusion, that beyond the door space and time must be either non-existent or infinite—or perhaps both,—then the three signal flares would probably still be active whenever, wherever, if ever they returned to contemporaneous reality. And if by chance that emergence should take place in the vicinity or within sight of observors, it was surely reasonable to expect that so curious an occurrence would soon be reported…where else but in the newspapers?
Which was why, impatient and excited following his initial experiment, Hemmings had lain mostly awake in his bed, tossing, turning, and managing only a hour or so’s sleep at best. And in the morning when the town awakened, he had been among the first customers at the news-stand, buying copies of several local and national papers.
At first disappointed, eventually on the eighth page of the Montrose Monitor he had come across the following late entry:
A FOOLHARDY HOAX!
News flash!—or “flashes”—of a sort: three of them, in fact! Last night, just a few minutes past midnight, residents of Stonehaven, enjoying a late-night engagement party on the beach, witnessed a strange sight out at sea: three brilliant globes of light, apparently descending from a great height over the fairly placid ocean.
The same lights were observed by workers on the Seagasso oil and gas rig who took them—in spite of their exceptional altitude and the calm nature of the sea—as signal flares indicating a request for assistance from a vessel, possibly a fishing boat in difficulty. The Aberdeen Coastguard was at once informed; they launched a high-speed lifeboat, but despite a thorough search of the area assisted by the Seagasso rig’s powerful searchlights, neither an endangered boat nor any evidence of such was discovered.
As for the opinion of the Coastguard Commander: “This could only have been an incredibly stupid hoax by foolish people out in a speedboat, who decided to have some ‘fun’ at the expense of the public, the coastguard, and the hard-working folk aboard the Seagasso. Idiotic pranks such as this are not only a waste of time and resources, but could easily cost the lives of innocent folk, putting the lifeboat crew in unnecessary jeopardy while performing an utterly pointless task to the best of their ability.
“Anyone who thinks he may be able to identify the responsible person or persons should call the information in at once to the nearest police station, where punitive action will be taken…”
And then, as a footnote:
Among the forementioned partygoers, a prominent member of the Aberdeenshire UFO Society (name withheld) has told this reporter that sightings of this sort are not unusual at this time of year. He states that:
“The UFO Society has records of previous occurrences of a like nature in these northern latitudes, and as no other rational explanation is forthcoming, it seems only prudent to at least accept the possibility of an extraterrestrial visitation.
“Since some of these visits have been repetitive over several days and/or nights, a few local members of the society will be keeping a lookout for further events. Detailed reports of any future sightings are of course welcome and will always be appreciated…”
Over the sea!…Hemmings’ parallel continuum emptied its dead or dying freight out over the deep blue—or grey—North Sea! And where better, unless it were nowhere at all? No words could adequately describe his excitement as he waited for darkness to fall once again, the midnight hour, when he would call up another door and repeat the experiment. He must, if only to ensure that the coordinates of the exit remained constant. And thanks to the efforts of the Aberdeenshire UFO Society’s jubilant report in the Montrose Monitor the next morning, Hemming’s second test had proved beyond further doubt that employing his “spell” to despatch drained victims to their fate, he could be sure they would all end up in the same location: at the bottom of the sea…
All of these events, then, and the evil that had followed them, had been the outcome of Hemmings’ initial revelatory dream. But now as he dreamed once again of the formula, much of the original thrill and excitement of his discovery had evaporated away. Having grown far more familiar with the thing through monstrous usage—or familiar at least with its mundane interface,—now in his dreams, or his “von Stradonitz pursuits,” as he was wont to think of them, he would sometimes find himself pondering its mazy intricacies. Mathematical prodigy that he was, still there was so much he didn’t understand about it; which was galling to say the very least.
For instance: that irritatingly awkward equation or involution which seemed to control distances, heights, and space-time coordinates in general. While in practice it suited the purpose of the formula overall—as Hemmings had ascertained first with his Very lights rehearsals, then with his rather more important and pertinent evictions,—still it didn’t look right. Mathematically misshapen or perhaps misarranged, it felt oddly skewed, more than a little out of kilter with the rest of the formula.
But misarranged or misconstrued? Was it really so? This was his spell, his discovery, his formula, wasn??
?t it? He, Gordon J. Hemmings had conjured it from his own dreaming mind, hadn’t he? How then could it be misarranged? For after all it was his arrangement!
Which led him to inquire of himself: Well then, why not re-arrange it? Would that be possible without losing it—without collapsing it entirely—he wondered? Not that any such loss or degradation need be permanent; he could always call it up again in its original form and as often as he desired. But…he was still somewhat in awe of what he had achieved, and perhaps even afraid of it.
Who could say what unforeseen and possibly disastrous event some further experiment might bring about? What if that unknown region beyond the portal was Reality, The Origin, while the physical universe of three-dimensions was a mere offshoot? What if he should mistakenly conjure a spell to reverse that status quo as he understood it? And how horrible if he should find himself central to the inversion, helpless in an inchoate, hostile non-environment without recourse to the mathematics and metaphysics which formed the foundation of everything that held meaning for him!
And so, while fully aware that this was something he would be obliged to investigate eventually—that the currently enigmatic but imagined Aladdin’s cave of fantastic functions hidden within or supplementary to his spell was something that must be explored, and sooner rather than later,—for the time being he would resist any such temptation. Better safe than sorry…
And meanwhile there were other matters to occupy his mind. For one, he was once again experiencing the pangs of hunger, an inner emptiness, the feeling that he was gradually fading away; and oh-so-very soon after the last time he had fed! That was a major concern…but one which he would mitigate in just three days’ time. And in the interim he could find a way to preoccupy himself, perhaps subduing or alleviating something of his needs by rehearsing and improving his lecture notes.
So much for the future, and as for now:
On the point of waking up, and fighting with his bedclothes as his subconscious mind delivered up one last piece of imagery—a disquieting memory from the all too recent past—the great leech stopped struggling and lay still, barely breathing, suddenly rapt upon that other unacceptable possibility: that beyond the conjured portals there might be intelligent life! Awake, he had considered it a figment of his imagination; but asleep, even as his dream began to surrender to consciousness, he now found himself once again staring in astonishment into the utter darkness beyond the shimmering frame of that immaterial door—
—And saw, as in the mirror of a rippled pool, a face looking back at him! A face whose jaw fell open in shock and horror at what its owner had seen; the face of a man that Hemmings had yet to meet in the flesh—that of the Necroscope, Harry Keogh, of course.
With which the monster drew breath and came snarling awake, glowering all about his room, gradually regaining his composure as the bulk of his dream receded. But as for that face: however blurred, its general outline and contours would remain there in Hemmings’ mind like some menacing phantasm, ever a backdrop and an obstruction to his every mental process: a source of anxiety and uncertainty, and yes, even of fear. And this time it wasn’t about to go away.
For at the end as the face had slowly faded along with Hemmings’ dream, so its brows had gathered in a frown, its eyes had narrowed, and its mien had changed from a look of horror to one of grim, silent accusation…
That same morning, after a sparse breakfast of coffee and toast, the Necroscope also found himself staring down at a blurred image—his own—where he stood on the bank of the bight in the river beneath which his mother’s remains lay buried in silt and weeds. She knew he was there, of course, could sense his living warmth and deadspeak musing; and so said:
Hello, son! I intended to contact you earlier, but you were deeply asleep. You obviously needed it so I left you to it. But yes, we’ve done what you asked of us; alas that the results are all but negative. By which I mean that while we’ve succeeded in seeking out the souls in question, our efforts have been mainly in vain. In other words, while we are convinced that your suspicions are justified, still we can’t definitely validate them.
Harry wasn’t especially disappointed; he already had all he needed by way of evidence, despite that it remained circumstantial; any further corroboration seemed unnecessary, for he fully anticipated that Gordon J. Hemmings’ guilt would become all too murderously clear the moment he actually confronted him, man to monster. But still:
“Good morning, Ma,” he said, in answer to her greeting. And then: “So what have you found out—or maybe I should ask what haven’t you found out? I take it you tried to contact Hemmings’ father, and also Latimer Calloway?”
More than tried! she told him. And as I said we succeeded—in part. Then, with her deadspeak even more subdued, but with a greater depth of feeling: That’s because there wasn’t much left to work with, Harry.
A statement which, however latent, seemed in itself to bear Hemmings’ signature. And: “Go on,” said the Necroscope, however grimly. “Tell me about it.”
First, as you supposed, we made contact with that evil creature’s father, she replied.
“He was still there, in the cemetery in Dalkeith? He hadn’t moved on?”
Probably because there wasn’t enough of him to move on! We believe that the higher powers that govern access to the Beyond by means of the compelling allure they exert upon the incorporeal souls of the innocent dead…we believe they simply failed to understand that he was there at all! They couldn’t hear him, didn’t recognize him! One has to want to move on, Harry, before the Beyond will acknowledge, consider, and react to one’s needs in that fashion. But as for Hemmings’ father: he’d lost or been robbed of the ability to want anything!
“And yet you got through to him. How?”
By force of will. We approached him en masse, until finally he heard us. But even so he was unable to answer our questions, for he was even more distant than those poor murdered souls under the sea…by which I mean how they used to be, before you spoke to them. Before you, well, galvanized them.
So she knew about that. But:
“It was their wish, Ma!” Harry vias quick to defend himself. “It was how they wanted it. But I know how much it’s cost them, and something of what they’re planning, so I feel I should warn you that I’m not finished with that yet. I gave them my word on it.”
Oh, I didn’t mean to criticize you, Harry, she replied. You do what you do because you are the only one who can! An eye for an eye…isn’t that how it goes?
At first unwilling to argue that last, Harry was silent for a moment before answering: “Only if it’s very necessary, if the dead require it, and if I feel I really must participate—and only then if there’s no other way.” (Which wasn’t quite true in every case; and so, in order to change the subject): “Anyway, you told me you got through to the old man. How was that, if he had nothing to say?”
Oh, but he did! But nothing relevant, or perhaps it was. He said only: ‘My son, my son, my son!’ And he kept on saying it—over and over again, growing ever more weak and distant—until at last what was left of his soul was recognized and drawn away to the Beyond. At least, that’s our understanding of what happened.
“So contacting him wasn’t in vain after all,” said the Necroscope, relievedly. “He’s far better off for what you’ve done; moved on to a place where he may even find help to recover something of what was stolen from him. But while in his case we can consider that a worthwhile result, what of Latimer Calloway?”
He sensed his Ma’s deadspeak nod, as she answered:
A different story there, Harry, for there was more of him—more of his soul, his life-force, that we could work with—but not very much more.
“You actually spoke to him, made sense of him?”
Barely, she replied, but enough to discover that he’s certain he was murdered, if not by whom. We didn’t tell him of your other investigations, your suspicions; in fact we were lucky to reach him in time, for he had heard the Be
yond calling him, and he was ready to move on. But we did explain about you—how you were searching for a loathsome killer—and how much you would appreciate any opportunity to speak to him about it. He said he would wait a while but that you should hurry, because he wasn’t sure how long he could ignore the Beyond’s attraction, its irresistible promise.
“Then I’ll speak to him at once, this morning!” said Harry. “I take it you have the coordinates?”
Of course, son, for I knew you would need them. Then, after a moment’s pause and just a little regretfully: Now I fear that we’re almost done, and it may be a while before we can work together again. For from now on until this is over you’ll be very busy. But may I ask how you intend to continue, or more specifically what you’ll do next?
“Oh, but you know what I’ll do next!” Harry replied. “After I speak to Calloway—perhaps depending on how that goes—then in all likelihood I’ll be meeting face to face with his murderer!”
To which his Ma made no immediate reply, but Harry felt the wave of fear that washed out from her. And so:
“Now don’t you start worrying before the fact, Ma!” he told her. “You know I won’t be going in blind, all thanks to you and the Great Majority. And besides, there’s something I need to do before that, something I need to play around with.”