The Face in the Frost

9

9

Anyone foolish enough to stand on Barren Tor in the booming wind of a certain wintry day in late October would have seen a box carriage scooting past below, like a black beetle. The Tor, a treeless 300-foot-high hill shaped a little like a dog's tooth, was an isolated foothill of the unnamed range of peaks that bordered the Northern Highlands. Northerners did not name mountain ranges; they were afraid that doing so would wake the spirit of the mountains, the rock-buried elemental that had once split the Mitre, a strange double peak many miles to the south. Roger and Prospero, now many days' journey from the clockmaker's cottage, had passed the Mitre a week before: It was there that they heard rumors of the War Council on the Feasting Hill. The kings were gathering, getting ready for a march on the South; they had been told by their astrologers that the fear came from the South, and so, they had not destroyed the wooden bridges, as Roger thought they would; instead, they held both sides of the river with cavalry, and these men waited for the messengers from the Hill. The Southerners, no matter how well organized they were, had only fat plow horses to ride; they would be unable to prevent a march on Roundcourt, a city with beautiful walls of painted wood and a tiny, unreliable garrison. A quick surrender of the capital might save a lot of lives, but skirmishing and raiding could go on for a long time, and Prospero knew the temperament of certain southern rulers, who would-after the victorious northern kings had gone home-hold their own witch trials and take out their anger on "disloyal"-that is, weak-kings like silly old. Gorm.

Meanwhile, the strange early winter threw thin rags and fingers of gray snow over the dirty fast-decaying leaves that clotted the suddenly dry beds of streams; on the empty plain Prospero and Roger had just passed through, the snow moved in eerie swirls, falling into spirals and long lines too regular to be natural. People were terrified of the open spaces at night; in their homes, they sat with blankets over their windows, so that they would not see the mask of frost. Windows broke in the night, and the wind that blew through them had a voice.

On this last leg of the journey, Prospero and Roger traveled all the time, taking turns driving and sleeping as they had for weeks before they got to the farmer's house. With a candle stuck in an ashtray Prospero sat up late, pipe in mouth, turning over pages, looking for what he knew was not there. They passed through shallow valleys where muddy pools of fog blew crazily about; long grasping fingers of it seeped through the floorboards of the carriage and thrust in at the windows. Roger raised his hand, once to wave it away, and for an instant, he felt something hard-the fog curled back and drifted outside again. In one shuttered hiding town, a signboard screeched in a way that made the horses rear and almost tip over the carriage; Prospero raised a curtain and looked out. He was not surprised to see that the board was washed clean of any design. And now, the moon began to rise into a starless sky. We who are used to the empty or rusty night skies of modern cities would not understand the fear that the people of Prospero's world felt when they saw this. They saw a haggard moon, with pinched brows and grieving mouth, rising into a blackness distant and calling. Like children lying on grass and looking into a cloud-vaulted daytime sky, they felt that they were going to fall upwards. Hollow ocean depths hung overhead, so that looking up was like standing on the edge of a cliff.

The road ran over steeper hills now; Prospero was always half surprised when an appalling height flattened out under the wheels of the carriage-from a distance, it looked as though you would have to cling to the gravel with your fingers and toes. At last, though, they were in the mountains. These were not Himalayan peaks, but some of them were tall enough to thrust broken and tilting horns through frozen mats of cloud. Others were long blue ridges covered with pines. On their bristly sides, you could see the zigzag lines of roads built by an ancient people no one in the north knew anything about. Whoever they were, they had dug long tunnels with decorated mouths, had built rope-lashed wooden bridges that never rotted, and had carved the mouths of rock springs into bug-eyed monsters that disturbed the dreams of travelers who came upon them at night. Prospero and Roger, looking out their wide windows at long frightening drop offs, saw a few of these vomiting horrors sticking out of dead leaf clusters or the wiry skeletons of bushes. But, they seemed silly alongside the other fear.

Now, Prospero had his glasses on, and he was running his finger along a line on a wrinkly map spread over both their laps.

"You see, Roger. Around the next big bend and up a road that goes through a long tunnel. There are three gates, one for wagons and two for men. There's bound to be some barrier, though, if the valley is inhabited, It's the perfect fortified place, too. The mountain is like a big tooth with a cavity..."

"Charming metaphor," said Roger, feeling his jaw with his fingertips.

"Well, it is. Sheer walls and peaks that have been rounded by the wind. The bowl of grass inside must be about a mile across... watch out! Here's the bend."

When the carriage had rounded an upended chunk of rock that looked like the prow of a sinking boat, the carved triple entrance was there. But, "some barrier" proved to be a large understatement. Each of the three wide-lipped arches was blocked by a portcullis of thick square iron bars. Behind each grate, at a distance of about twenty feet, was another grate, and so on as far as they could see in the rising coal-faced tunnels. The two men could only sit there and wonder how the black iron frames had been fitted into place, and whether they were lowered and raised by counterweights or by hand winches.

"Well," said Roger, as he got out of the carriage, "whoever they are, they're protected." He picked up a stone and threw it at the gate. It pinged and flew back at him.

"They certainly are," said Prospero, "and what is more, since I threw the tarots away, I don't believe I have the power to rip up cardboard. Destroying spells have never been much in my line anyway."

"Or mine," said Roger. He pounded his staff on the ground in frustration, threw it down, turned on his heel, and stomped off into some high bushes at the side of the road. By the way that he shoved the branches away from him, Prospero could tell that Roger was angry. He expected him to kick around in the bushes, swearing for a while, so he was surprised when Roger came back immediately with a smile on his face.

"Come here," he said, "I want you to see something"

Roger led Prospero back through the bushes-forsythia, of all things, like the ones in Prospero's back yard-and down a steep sandy path to a little look­out point. Across a small grassy valley, which was already beginning to fill with the reddish-brown mist of sunset, there was a square tower on a tall spiny pinnacle of rock. The light was bad, and even with his telescope, Roger could not be sure, but it looked as though the tower was attached to the face of the mountain by a small arched bridge.

Roger was pointing excitedly. "Look, Prospero! There's our way in. Do you suppose it's a watchtower? If it is, there'll be soldiers, but if they don't have seventeen portcullises to hide behind, we may be able to get in."

Prospero borrowed the telescope and squinted. "No, it certainly doesn't look like a watchtower-at least, it wasn't built for that purpose. It has four little pinnacles with knobby ornaments on them. Looks like a church tower, but where is the church that goes with it?"

"Whatever it is," said Roger, "I'd suggest that we head for it If it's abandoned and it isn't a way in, we can stay there the night. The carriage and horses will have to stay here, but there's some grass by the roadside. If anyone tries to steal the rig, they will go home in a squash."

"All fine and good," said Prospero, "but we are here and the tower is there. It looks about three hundred feet down to the ground, and I doubt if that boat in your bag flies."

"You might look over the edge of the cliff," said Roger.

Prospero did, and he saw stairs, wide stone slabs, some broken, some worn into cups in the middle, running back and forth down the cliff face.

"You wait here," said Roger. "I'll unhitch the horses and get the bags."

Soon, they were picking their way down the steep railless stairway. Prospero's acrophobia was as bad as ever, if not worse-he kept his eyes on the rock wall and rubbed it with his shoulder, though it would have taken a concerted effort or a high wind to throw him off. At some points, they found landings, wide stone platforms with parapets and stacks of boulders. These rocks, which were not too large to be lifted by strong men, had probably been put there to be dropped on the heads of pursuers. They had been there so long that they appeared to have melted into pointed humps, like piles of snowballs that were never used. When the wizards got to the bottom of the cliff, they looked across the grassy field. A light was burning high up in the tower.

As they started toward it, Prospero talked to Roger about the quietness and warmth of this mountain valley. The strange snows, the frightening sounds and sights of the plain below were not here. Twilight was drawing on, soft and deep blue, and stars could be seen overhead. It was warm for October, too-Prospero even imagined that he heard the slow finger-and-comb sound of crickets. The remark about this being, perhaps, the eye of the storm was too obvious and too frightening to be made by either of them. When they got close to the tower, they found that they were standing in the middle of jumbled stone blocks,– carved and pie-faced angels stared out of bushes and ditches, and a red flaking iron cross stood upright in the middle of a wild rosebush. This was the church, destroyed by some landslide or earthquake. The tower rose straight above them on its freakish nail of rock, which was wrapped around by another stair, this one railed for a change.

"This is all very convenient." said Prospero, looking up at the long lighted window. "I hope we are not going to be the guests of some ogre."

"We shall see," said Roger. And, they started up.

At the top of the stairs, they saw an open arched door, and in front of it stood a blond-bearded monk. He was holding a metal basket of fire on a wooden stick, and when they reached the last few steep steps, he stuck the torch in the wall and helped them up.

"Greetings," he said. "Welcome to the Green Oratory. I'm here by myself, and I'm probably the only monk for miles."

"I wouldn't be so sure," said Roger. He tipped his hat and showed the bald spot on his red-fringed head. "What are you doing up here?"

"I grow plants," said the monk. "And, I do things with them. Come in and let me show you around."

The guided tour of the Green Oratory showed that the monk indeed grew plants: lime trees in tubs, frazzled cacti in barrels, jack-in-the-pulpits in pots, and Venus's-flytraps in cages. He had built flooring to divide the bell tower into rooms; they were connected by ladders, but Prospero's fear of heights extended to fear of straight-up ladders, so he went up the dumb­waiter with the luggage. When they came to the top of the belfry, there were the bells, dirty and pigeon-streaked, but they had been turned upside down and filled with dirt. Vines and creepers with purple leaves and red waxy droplet flowers dripped over their sides. The monk would not tell Prospero and Roger how he kept the steamy atmosphere of an arboretum in this cold stone building, but he did enjoy exchanging plant information with Prospero.

Now, they were on the roof, where all sorts of night-blooming flowers opened, bells, trumpets, and puffy Chinese-lantern mouths. The roof of the tower was covered with a burgundy-colored moss that Prospero had never seen before. Roger was smiling and shaking his head while the monk walked around, fingering leaves and talking proudly of his collection. Prospero finally had to interrupt him.

"Please. All this is lovely, but we've got to get to the village beyond this mountain. Is there any way in?"

The monk looked unhappy. "I saw you coming down the stairs on the other side, so I guess you know about those gates. The villagers chased me out a couple of months ago when I was picking mushrooms at night. They have plants up there that you wouldn't believe. Why... oh yes. No, that's the only way up. But, why go there? It's really not a very friendly place these days."

"I can't explain," said Prospero, thinking wearily of all the people to whom he had said "I can't explain," "but we've got to get in. Haven't you been wondering why it's still almost like summer up here in this valley? And, haven't you heard what's happening down below?"

The monk pointed to a little white dovecote in the corner. "I've heard, all right-from them-and I hope I can ride it out. I don't know much magic except plant magic, but I can tell you that this is not a healthy place now. It's close and muggy down in that valley there at night. Come over to the edge and look down."

Prospero and Roger saw a blue mist floating below-it was like water, and like water, it distorted shapes. Broken rocks looked wavy, and tall stalks bent sharply at the top. Long grass was rippling like weeds at the bottom of a stream.

"It all looks as though it might blow away in a minute," said the monk "When I'm down there at night, I don't feel real at all."

"I've seen worse than that down on the plain; said Prospero. "And, we may be able to stop all this, God knows how. Isn't there any way up? Think!"

The monk walked around, pounding his fist in his hand. He kicked a tin watering can across the roof.

"Way up. Way up. Say! No, that's ridiculous. Still...wait here a minute."

He went down through the trap door, and made a lot of noise in the room below. When he came back up, he was carrying two pots, and in each one was an ordinary-looking creeper vine.

"This," he said, "is Sensitive Anaconda."

"It looks like Creeping Charlie to me," said Prospero, who had such a plant in his front parlor.

The monk looked hurt. "Well, it isn't. And, it may get you over that wall. Follow me, and may I request silence?"

Prospero and Roger followed the monk, who solemnly carried the plants, one in each hand, across the little wooden bridge that connected the tower with the mountain. On the other side was a narrow rock shelf and beyond it was a dank-smelling mushroom cave. The procession stopped at the mouth of the cave, and the monk set the plants down. He looked up at the slightly fur­rowed granite wall that rose at least a hundred feet above the shelf; it was not only perpendicular, it actually seemed to lean out a bit at the top. Now, he began to conjure, and his style was odd. He stood with his hand over his face, muttering, as if he were trying to remember the answer to a hard question. As he talked, the plants rose, swaying like charmed snakes. They dug green tendrils into the smooth rock, making cracks where they did not find them. Up they went, wriggling and twisting, until the tops of the two vines were out of sight. The monk waited, tapping his foot. Suddenly the vines tightened, vibrating like plucked strings. They had caught hold of some rocks at the top.

Prospero looked pale. "Excuse me," he said, "but I'm not very good at climbing f get dizzy in the lower limbs of apple trees."

"Well, lucky man that you are, you won't have to climb," said the monk. "Hold this."

He put a pot in each man's hand. The vines, imitating the corkscrew motion that the monk now made with his finger, wrapped themselves tightly around the wizards, several times around. He gave each man his bag and staff.

"And so farewell," he said. "Come back and tell me what this was all about."

The vines began to wrap more and more lengths of green cable around the two somewhat alarmed men, who now started to rise, slowly and solemnly. Prospero thought for a second of what would happen if this eccentric plant grower was one of Melichus' helpers, or, God forbid, Melichus himself. But, he shrugged his shoulders as well as he could with six bands of vine around him and tightened his grip on the carpetbag. There was no way up but this, and up they went, scraping their backs on hard rock. The monk, who was waving his watering can at them, got smaller and smaller in the moonlight.

By the time they got to the top of the mountain wall, each now had a fat green rubber tire around him. But, when they were safe on the broad rock rim, the vines loosened and slithered back down the sheer face. Like someone preparing to go on stage, Prospero stood with his back to the little Valley, squared his shoulders, brushed back his hair, and shook granite dust off his sleeves. Finally, he took a deep breath, let it out, and turned around.

The valley below him, gray in the rising moon, was a wide hilly basin of close-cropped grass, dotted with clover. Dark wrinkled rocks stuck out of folds in the ground. Houses, squatty loaf shapes with thatched mops, ran in even rows over the one long central ridge. He counted them-one... two... hmmm... twenty. Where was the cottage he had stayed in? It must be in the shadows at the back of the valley, up under those four upright slabs of stone. Then, he turned and saw Roger.

Roger stood listening. His arms were raised to fend off something, and he was staring in fear at the pleasant little town, as if it were about to fly at him in a hail of boards and stone. Finally, he lowered his arms, wiped his face, and turned to Prospero. His voice showed that he was breathing heavily.

"You... you know, all the way up here I thought to myself, 'What if we are going to the wrong place? What if we are leaving the field of battle, where we ought to meet Melichus and try to beat him?' I don't think that now. There's something here, all right, and it doesn't like us. We are going to have a hard time getting out of this place."

Prospero looked around him. "I don't feel anything. That may be a bad sign, because this fight is mainly between Melichus and me. Maybe I'm not meant to notice anything-yet."

"Well, come on," said Roger. "Let's see what's down here. We may as well give up all hope of sneaking up to the cottage unnoticed. If they can't see two men silhouetted in moonlight on the edge of a cliff, they won't see us if we walk through the middle of their town."

They stumbled down the long slope of loose and broken stones that led to the edge of the sweet-smelling clover field. The houses in the distance had looked dark from above, and now, they looked just as dark.

"This is strange," said Prospero. "It's only eight o'clock at night, and even in a little farming town, there'd be one light. And look! The shutters are closed."

"Yes. They really have a wild life up here."

Prospero and Roger walked on, listening for some sound, some barking dog or screeching night walking cat. When they reached the little town, the houses seemed more than dark-they were empty, abandoned, and dead. Blackness lay in the cracks of the broken shutters, and in the spaces between doors and sills. Prospero walked up to one silent cottage and rapped several times on the door. He heard nothing, but as he stood waiting, his hand passed near the keyhole. A cold draft, so cold that it stung his palm, was blowing from inside the house.

He turned and walked back to Roger, who was looking around him with more and more apprehension.

"Roger, this is more than very strange. Didn't that silly monk say there were people up here who threw him out?"

"Yes, he did. But, they may not have been people."

"Let's go on."

A little farther ahead-nothing was very far from anything else in this tiny town-was the market place, a square plot overgrown with weedy grass and withered dandelion stems. In the middle was a fountain with a low carved curb. Fountains were common enough in market places, but this one was quite elaborate. The sides of the round basin were carved into several bas-relief panels, and in the center was the figure of a hooded man reading. Unfortunately, the fountain was not running, and the basin was full of dirt. And flowers. Very odd-looking flowers.

Prosper sat on the smooth worn lip of the basin and tweaked a leaf with his finger.

"These are strange flowers. You remember what the monk said, Roger. He said they had flowers up here you wouldn't-"

Roger suddenly leaped forward, grabbed Prospero's hand, and jerked him away, so violently that the two of them fell in a heap on the ground, amid many shouts and what-the-devils, all of them from Prospero. He picked him­self up and stared at Roger, who was himself staring intently at the fountain.

"Now, what in God's name..."

"The flowers. You didn't see the monk's drawings, but I did."

"The monk? The one down there with the plants? Why-oh! Oh! Good Lord, the plants in the book!"

"Yes. And, let us now have a look at those carved panels, if we dare." Roger's voice was shaking.

The panels, to neither man's surprise, were familiar: the Witch of Endor, the silhouetted figure in the terrible black window. What the other pictures were they never found out, for as Prospero was straightening up after looking at the first two, he saw a candle burning in a window down the street on the right.

"Look."

"Yes. I see it and I want to run. But, we must go to it."

"At this point, anything else would be insane, don't you think?"

Roger agreed, and they slowly started to walk toward the little haloed light. It was shining in the front window of a stone house that was a little larger than the two on either side of it. Its roof was of slate and the shingles looked newly laid. For whatever good it would do them, Prospero and Roger stayed close to the shadowed walls and eaves of the nearer house as they edged down the lane. Finally, they were at the corner of the large house, and they flattened themselves against the rough stuccoed wall. Prospero was the first to reach the window, and, much against his better judgment and the shouting of his instincts, he looked.

What he saw was an old white-maned man, his back to the window. He was seated at a polished table and he was reading a book. A single candle in a pewter stand dribbled wax on the dark varnished surface. Nearby on the table lay a half loaf of bread from which a piece had been roughly torn, and there was a tin cup that might have had wine in it.

In the few seconds that Prospero stood there looking, he felt terribly afraid. He imagined that the faint steam from his breath on the pane would catch the old mans eye. But, the reading figure did not move. Prospero edged back, and Roger squeezed past him to look. A couple of seconds later they were both on all fours, crawling back to the alley between the two houses. They whispered excitedly.

"To think he is up here!" said Roger. "But, it does make sense, in a way. Do you think he knows we're here?"

"No," said Prospero, crossing himself. "If you want my opinion, I think that hell could gape and not tear him away from that cursed book. He's caught, but then maybe we are too."

"At least, we know why he stopped chasing us," said Roger. "Which way is your cottage? Do you have any idea of which way it is?"

"North," said Prospero, pointing up the dark valley. "I think we had better go on hands and knees till we get out of this lane. And then, run like the devil for the back of the valley! Follow me."

The two men crept along slowly, lifting their satchels and setting them down softly a few feet in front of them And, when they were in the open, behind the houses, they ran, but nothing followed them from that dark house.

The shadows of the four monoliths rose higher over them as they ran. Roger tripped on a stone and almost fell.

"Where is it? Maybe he's torn it down."

"No... no, there it is! Just a little farther."

There it was, a narrow wooden house with Gothic pointed windows and a steep roof. As they got closer, Roger could tell that this had been mainly Prospero's work, not Melichus'. The posts that held up the sagging porch roof were carved into beanstalks, and a few traces of the original yellow paint could be seen in the cracks. Knobby white wooden icicles dripped from the eaves, and the deep-paneled front door had an oval stained-glass inset. Up on the creaky porch, the two wizards set down their bags and stared a minute at the dark jeweled glass. Roger lit a match.

"Do you suppose that key the farmer gave you fits this lock?"

"No," said Prospero, who was rummaging in the inside pocket of his winter cloak. "I have carried the key to this door with me for years. When I'm looking for the key to the root cellar or the linen closet, I always come across the thing and wonder why I keep it."

He pulled out a small iron ring full of different-size keys. Selecting a big one with a quatrefoiled handle, he placed it in the cherub-mouth of the lock plate. The door rattled open, Roger shut it after them and lit another match, and they saw the shadowy outline of a few small wooden chairs. An empty copper candlestick stood nearby on a dusty table, and Prospero stuck a lighted candle-his last one-in it.

"Well, here we are," he said. "Now, if I can only remember where I put that globe."

"If it's still here," said Roger. "Look at the floor."

The dusty gray boards in front of them were covered with long narrow footprints. Prospero stood looking at them. He bit his lip several times until it hurt, and he started nervously clenching and unclenching his fists.

"It was to be expected. But, he can't take it away." His voice dropped "At least, I think he can't. Come on. I remember where I put it, and I was the last one out."

He grabbed the candlestick and led Roger to a corner cupboard at the back of the cottage's one large room. The round-topped door stood on a little waist-high sill, and its knob, a piece of blue-streaked porcelain, was startlingly cold to the touch. While Roger held the candle, Prospero opened the cupboard. Inside, he could see stacks of bowls and plates, last used-as far as he knew-by Melichus himself. On a separate shelf, over the others, was the green-glass paperweight. He was almost afraid to touch it, and he reached for it twice, pulling his hand away each time. Finally, he closed his fingers on it-it was colder than the knob had been-and he lowered it carefully. Roger saw that he was covering it with his hand.

"Let's light more candles," said Prospero. "I don't want to look at this strange little thing in the dark."

He set the green object on a table and, with Roger, searched about until they found a bundle of candles on the mantelpiece, tied up with some rotted string. They spent several minutes sticking them in wall sconces and dishes all around the room, then lit them all. Prospero was still not satisfied, and besides, he wanted an excuse to keep him from looking at the magic globes. So, he decided to build a fire. The logs that he and Melichus had left there so long before lay near the fireplace, soft honeycombs of mushy sawdust. He kicked one and a swarm of beetles crawled out, scurrying away to find cracks in the floor. But, another log pile lay nearby, further evidence that someone had been there recently. Roger knelt in front of the black sooty-smelling hearth, laid a small fire, and struck several matches before he could get the pile of twigs to light. Prospero was pacing up and down, looking at the door.

"The globes aren't dusty either," he said. "And, there were marks of hands scrabbling in the dust on the shelf. What do you think? I'm afraid."

"So am I," said Roger, who was pumping the fire with a cracked old leather bellows. "So am I."

He straightened up. The fire was crackling and throwing long jumping shadows on the opposite wall.

"Well, that's that. Now, let's look at that thing on the table. Prospero! For heaven's sake, stop pacing!"

"Oh, very well. I'd feel better if he'd just burst in on us. But, he's not going to. Let's see what the globes are doing."

They pulled two chairs up to the round oak table where the glass pyramid sat sparkling between two candles, like some strange shrine. At first, the globes were empty and transparent. A few bubbles frozen inside them made specks in the green water-shadow that floated on the table. Then, slowly, the three lower spheres began to form a picture. There was the crossroads, there were the high banks, the bare trees, the leaning stone marker, and the softly falling snow. Prospero pulled the paperweight closer and stared hard at the uppermost globe. From the pinpoint bubbles, rounded images expanded till their bowed and distorted shapes filled the whole ball, and then, they burst to let new images form. All these pictures were familiar to Prospero: his bookcase, a hatrack, a bust of some Roman dignitary. Finally, after much swirling, the ball focused on a single scene: Prospero's house, seen from the front lawn. The porch was piled with leaves, the shades were drawn as Prospero had left them, and long bands of that uncanny snow lay in curving ridges around the house. With an effort, Prospero brought the house closer, till he could see the square window in the front door. It was covered with the frost-mask, two running empty eyes, and a long howling mouth. He tried to get close enough to look in the window, but the empty face filled the glass and burst. The ball was clear and green again.

"Now," said Prospero "I'm going to speak to Melichus."

Roger jumped up and put a hand on his arm. "No, don't! You don't know what will happen if you meet face to face."

"That's right, I don't. But, we can't just sit here fiddling with this ball while he scares the world to death or destroys it. He may not know were here, but he will soon. Anything after that is up to him."

Roger sat down and folded his arms. "Very well. You make about as much sense as anything does right now. But, if you need my help, just grab my hand."

"All right. But, relax. This may take quite some time. Melichus isn't some­thing I own or someplace I've been. He can resist if he wants to. And, he will want to. In fact, this globe may be the only way to reach him."

Prospero put both hands on the glass and stared at it. Slowly, it began to fill with a flat blue ink, till the whole ball was blanked out. This was all that happened. For a full half hour, Prospero squeezed the ball, hammered it on the table, spoke to it, made signs over it. Nothing happened. At last, he stood up with the thing clenched in his hand. The sweat on his face shone in the firelight.

"Melichus! I call on you by the secret name you were given by Michael Scott. That is..."

He spoke the name and the room grew darker One candlestick fell over and the others burned blue. The flames in the fireplace leaped up the flue with a shriek, leaving the half-burned logs suddenly gray and cold. In the dark chilly room, the two men bent over the glass ball. It seemed to be coming apart. The glass remained intact, but the blackness inside split along a jagged line, like an egg opening to a burning white center.

The light hurt Prospero's eyes and he turned away, but when he looked again, the light was gray and sullen, like a winter afternoon. He saw an old man whose duty red eyes were sunk in wrinkled hollow caves. The thin white lips were parted and the yellow teeth were set on edge. His hand held the trembling page of a book, and Prospero could see that it was the last page. The stare that met his was not one of knowing hatred, scorn, or bitter triumph. It was much more frightening than that. What Prospero saw was the blank angry glare of an animal that has been interrupted at its meal. He could not even tell if Melichus recognized him. The two rheumy eyes focused on his for a second, and then they seemed to be looking past him. Prospero relaxed for a second, and the two halves of the egg slammed together with a boom that made him drop the glass on the floor. It did not break, but a crooked line of white was etched into the outer surface of the globe.

Prospero stood there a long time, looking down at the scarred globe. The candles were burning brightly again, and a stiff wind was rattling the front windows of the house. Finally, he bent over, picked the thing up, and put it back on the table. Now, as Roger sat staring at him in amazement, he began to walk around the room, touching things, looking under chairs, running his finger over dusty panes.

"Hah! I thought so! He's crazier than I thought!"

"What do you mean?"

"He's put it all back. The way it was. Look, we know Melichus was here-it could hardly have been anyone else. And, the marks in the dust show that he moved things around, that he probably took the globe off the shelf and looked at it. Well, before he left, he put everything back the way it was when I left. When we first lit candles and I could see the way the room looked, I thought 'It's all the same, every bit of it!' You see that book over there on the edge of the chairs?"

"Yes."

"Well, when I left here, Lord knows how many years ago, I stood at the door with a book in my hand. I even remember the title, Roman Divination. I was wondering whether or not I wanted it. I decided that I didn't, so I threw it onto that chair over there. It skidded to the edge and almost fell off. It's still there, hanging on the edge, though the dust marks show it has been picked up recently. Now, either Melichus has gotten fanatically meticulous in his old age, or this is a circle he doesn't want disturbed."

"What about the new pile of firewood?"

"That's new, but all the old things were put back. He must have found that it felt very wrong for things to be out of place. Now, as I say, it might have been just fussiness. But, let's see."

Moving around the room in quick jumps and darts, Prospero started upset­ting things. First, he tipped over the table-the paperweight hit the floor and skidded into a corner Then, he pitched the book into the fireplace, smashed a chair against a wall, and finally, grandiosely, he swept his arm along the mantel-dishes, candles, bottles, and cups fell and flew up in a splintering dusty cascade. He stopped, panting, in the middle of the room.

"There! Now, if that doesn't stir him from his bibliophilic torpor, then..."

"For God's sake! Look!"

Roger was pointing at the door. The stained glass oval, a beautiful flower design in cobalt blue and deep crimson, was shining, as though someone had thrown a light on it from the outside. And, on the wall opposite, the door a watery light pattern appeared. It was full of skeletal winding shadows, and it formed, like the frost patterns, a distorted blank face. The long mouth moved and a harsh, flat, angry voice spoke.

"Put it back. Put back the globes."

Prospero stood there in the middle of the room, and in the ghastly light, the face threw on everything, his own face looked corpse like and frozen. He swallowed hard, and all the ridged muscles in his face and throat convulsed.

"No. I will not."

The voice began to speak again, this time in a high, almost hysterical chant. The words were ugly and strange, but Prospero knew their meaning. The dusty air of the dark old room was full of this rising and falling sound. Prospero raised his arm, pointed at the trembling blotch of light, and spoke a single word that shook his whole body. The door slammed open and a cold earth-smelling wind blew in. The face spread into a mottled screen that covered the whole wall, writhed, shot halfway across the ceiling, and then slowly began to draw together again, into a tighter, more recognizable, and more brightly shining mask. Roger leaped up and struck at the wall with his staff-it bounced out of his hand and flew across the room. His arm was numb to the elbow and he found that he could not move. The chant went on, rising. Prospero turned and started to stumble slowly toward the table, moving his arms like someone struggling in water. He got to the far corner of the room, stooped, picked up the glass object that was now totally black in all its globes, and started for the door, moving his free arm in front of him, as if he were clearing something away. He stopped and turned in the black doorway. His face was very pale, but he was smiling.

"Good-by, Roger. I hope we meet again." And then, to the face, which was shaking like the light of a lantern in someone's trembling fist: "If you want this, come and get it."

He reeled out onto the porch. The face flew apart into wild jabs and streaks of light that shot all over the room. Roger suddenly found that he could move again, and he rushed to the door and looked down the moonlit path. Prospero was running with his cloak bundled tightly around him, and halfway down the road he simply disappeared.