The Secret of Abdu El Yezdi

“Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!—

Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,

Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted—

On this home by Horror haunted—tell me truly, I implore—

Is there—is there balm in Gilead?—tell me—tell me, I implore!”

Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”

—EDGAR ALLAN POE, “THE RAVEN”

They found Thomas Honesty fussing frantically over the engine of the landau. “It won’t start! It won’t start!” he cried out. He recoiled away from them as they approached, brandished a pocketknife, and yelled, “Stay back! I saw what you did! Murderers!”

“Don’t be a bloody fool!” Henry Arundell barked. “It’s not what it seems, I can assure you. Move over! You’ve opened the inlet valve too wide—no wonder she won’t start. Come on, out of the way! We’re getting soaked to the skin!”

Honesty pressed himself against the side of the carriage, his eyes flitting anxiously from man to man as they climbed into the vehicle’s cabin.

The engine coughed and grumbled.

Arundell exclaimed, “Got it!” and joined his companions, pulling the groundsman inside with him.

Swinburne and Monckton Milnes didn’t enter, but climbed up to drive the vehicle, setting it into motion as soon as the passenger door had been pulled shut.

Eliphas Levi raised his voice over the rumbling of the rain on the wooden roof. “Monsieur Honesty, there is no danger. That man, he was the fugitive Monsieur Arundell told you of, and Sir Richard here is an agent of His Majesty the King. You witness a thing very terrible, but not murder. Non! Not murder!”

“What, then? You drove a stake through the man’s heart!”

“Oui, it was necessary, but to explain, ah, that is a difficult thing.”

“Not now,” Arundell interrupted. “In the name of God, not now! I can’t stand any more of it.” He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his face. “Tom, we are all traumatised. Rest this afternoon and come to the house before the church service tomorrow morning. We’ll give you a full account.”

Honesty looked searchingly at his employer’s face then gave a reluctant nod.

The landau slid and rocked its way along the path, stopped at the lodge, where the groundsman got off, then continued on to the manor, and into the vehicle shed.

An hour later, the men, having washed and changed into dry clothing, met in the smoking room. They’d missed lunch but had no appetite for anything but fortifying brandies and comforting cigars and pipes.

Burton was withdrawn, his thought processes paralysed, an intolerable constriction gripping his heart, but in his room he’d swallowed half a bottle of Saltzmann’s Tincture, and now, when he downed a brandy in a single gulp, its warmth permeated out from his stomach and didn’t stop. He felt it course through his arteries, branch off into the veins, spread through the capillaries, and bleed into the surface of his skin, spreading and flattening and reconnecting him with the exterior world.

Like Time. Dividing, dividing, dividing, until all its many filaments become indistinguishable from one another, the consequences of decisions—made and unmade—taken to their ultimate limits then conflated, unconstrained by context, fully perceptible from every possible perspective.

The unity of multiplicity.

A new mode of being.

The empty glass slipped from his fingers and shattered on the floor.

He realised he was standing by the fireplace and the others were looking at him.

“Sorry,” he muttered. “Clumsy.”

Henry Arundell rang for one of his clockwork footmen and instructed it to clean up the fragments.

“You and me both, Richard,” he said. “My hands won’t stop shaking.”

“A shock prolonged, it is very damaging,” Levi said. “So we must proceed intrépide—undaunted—though it hurt us bad. We act fast and cure this disease before it spread far.”

Swinburne said, “What should we do, monsieur?”

Levi addressed Arundell. “Your family, they are in the chapel, oui? Standing vigil over Mademoiselle Isabel?”

“Yes.”

“Just before dark come, you must remove them.”

“That won’t be difficult. They’ll need to eat and sleep.” Arundell raised his hands to his head and dug his fingers into his hair. “But, Mother of God, no! I know the deviltry you intend, sir, and I’ll not have my daughter’s body so violated without absolute proof that she’s become the thing you claim!”

Burton interjected, “Despite everything I’ve seen, I agree. You’ll not lay a finger on her, Levi, not unless she—” He swayed and grabbed at the mantelpiece for support. “Not unless she rises before my eyes.”

Levi considered the bowl of his pipe. “Then we must witness more horreur, que Dieu nous protège!” He addressed Arundell. “In my room, monsieur, there is a tall floor mirror. You have many such in the house?”

“One in every bedroom.”

“C’est fortuit. Will you have them all put in the chapel? C’est nécessaire.”

“Very well.”

Arundell’s haunted eyes fixed upon the objects beside the occultist’s chair: the second stake, the mallet, and the axe.

He poured himself another brandy.

At six o’clock, Arundell went to the chapel to relieve his family of their vigil, telling them he would sit through the night with his daughter.

His wife, Blanche, Smythe Piggott, the cousins Rudolph and Jack, and Uncle Renfric joined Burton, Swinburne, Monckton Milnes, and Levi in the dining room. The Birds and Beetons joined them, having spent much of the day since breakfast sitting with Sadhvi Raghavendra, helping to write letters, taking down the decorations, and arranging flowers all over the house.

The meal was a perfunctory affair. Halfway through it, Mrs. Arundell made tearful apologies and retired to her room, and afterwards the family members were quick to disperse, all exhausted by their grief.

Blanche hung back, clinging to Burton’s arm. “Richard—that this should happen at such a time. I am so sorry.”

“We’ve both suffered a dreadful loss,” he replied. “I wish I could somehow comfort you, Blanche, but it’s all I can do to keep myself standing. I don’t know what words I can offer.”

“I have my faith and my Bible. At times like this, religion proves its worth. I would be comforted if you would finally realise the value of it, too.”

His eyes met hers and she flinched at the smouldering anger in them. He said, “I’m afraid, if anything, I’m being pushed rather in the opposite direction.”

A tear rolled down Blanche’s cheek. She took his hand, squeezed it, and left the room.

Burton turned to his companions. “Let’s get this over and done with.”

They waited for Levi to retrieve the tools then followed Burton out into the hallway and along a number of passages to All Saints Chapel, which was incorporated into the west wing of New Wardour Castle, being undetectable from the outside. Semicircular at both ends, almost a hundred feet long, forty wide, and forty high, it was remarkably sumptuous, painted white with gold fittings and decorated with many paintings and vestments.

Leading the group along the aisle between the pews, Burton approached the chancel. He saw Henry Arundell sitting beside an open coffin, which was on a catafalque in front of the altar. The explorer mounted two steps and looked down into the casket.

The chapel fell away, as if rapidly sinking into a dark chasm. He felt hands grabbing him beneath the arms; heard Monckton Milnes’s distant cry of, “Richard!”

There was deep shadow, a confusion of memories and sensations. He smelled the spice-laden air of Zanzibar; listened to parakeets bizarrely cursing him in English; saw his reflection in the facets of a black gemstone; tasted blood.

Nurse! By God! Don’t lose him!

Stand aside, sir. Move! At once!

Is it another attack? His heart?

Will you please get out of my way? How am I supposed to do my job with you breathing down my neck?

He opened his eyes, looked up at Swinburne, and said, “It’s all right. Just a momentary dizziness. Not my heart.”

“No one thought it was,” the poet answered.

“I heard them say so.”

“No. You must have imagined it. The shock hit you hard—you fainted.”

Burton sat up and looked at Henry Arundell. “Why, sir? Why is she in her wedding dress?”

“It’s what she would have wanted, Richard. In the eight years since she met you, she desired only to be your wife. She talked about it incessantly. We thought it appropriate that she be interred in the dress.”

With help from Swinburne and Levi, Burton got to his feet and looked into the coffin again. Isabel lay motionless, white, with silver coins covering her eyes and her hands crossed over her chest. A rosary was wound about her fingers.

He said to Levi, “For pity’s sake, monsieur, we can’t do it. She’s at peace.”

“Pardieu! I wish it to be true!” the occultist replied. He pulled a hand mirror and clove of garlic from his pocket. “We test, oui?”

Reluctantly, Burton nodded.

“Wait!” Arundell snapped. “What are you doing?”

“Sir,” Burton said, “please allow Monsieur Levi to proceed. There will be no defilement at his hands—you know I would not allow it.”

Arundell frowned but conceded.

Levi broke the clove and placed it on Isabel’s upper lip. He waited for two minutes, then removed the coins from her eyes, pulled up the left lid, and held the mirror before it.

Silence.

The men stood motionless, holding their breath.

Burton looked at Levi and opened his mouth to speak.

Isabel cried out. Her arms flew up, knocked the mirror away then flopped back down. She moaned and became still.

Henry Arundell let loose a despairing wail and fell backward against the side of the chancel. He slid to the floor, cradled his head in his arms, and wept.

Burton felt the heat drain from his body. “It happens to all corpses,” he whispered. “The muscles contract. Air escapes. They spasm and emit noises. I’ve seen it many times.”

Swinburne rounded on him and took a hold of his arms. “Richard, you know it’s not the case. And you know what must be done. But you don’t have to be here; you don’t have to witness it. Go. I’ll help Monsieur Levi.”

“Help him what?” Arundell shouted. “Drive a stake into my daughter’s heart? No! No! No!”

Levi held out his hands placatingly. “Je comprends. But if we delay, the horreur you feel now, it is nothing to what will come.”

Arundell angrily wiped the tears from his cheeks. “You’re leading me down the path to hell, sir.”

“I seek only salvation for your daughter.”

“I forbid you to touch her!”

Levi’s shoulders slumped. “Then we have not the choice. We wait. You have the floor mirrors?”

Arundell pointed toward the pulpit. The mirrors were stacked against it.

“Messieurs,” Levi said to Swinburne and Monckton Milnes, “will you assist? They must be put in a circle around the coffin, facing it.” He asked Arundell, “You will allow this?”

The slightest of nods gave him permission and in short order the task was completed. The occultist then walked the length of the nave and turned the key in the chapel’s entrance door.

There were crucifixes of various sizes mounted on stands around the chamber. As Levi returned to his companions, he selected five of them—each about a foot high—then distributed them among the men, keeping one for himself.

“Si vous avez raison,” he said to Burton and Arundell, “if you are correct, I am very happy. But—je regrette—you will soon see the wickedness of the nosferatu. Close to midnight, Isabel will rise. These crucifixes will remind her of her faith. She see herself in the mirrors. She recognise that she is strigoi morti. This, I hope, is sufficient to overcome her hunger. She seek the oblivion of the grave. We help her achieve it.”

“O compassionate God,” Arundell whispered, “I plead with thee, send your Holy Spirit to soothe my suffering!”

No more was said.

The men waited.

An hour passed.

At ten minutes to twelve, Isabel groaned.

Arundell cried out. In a jabbering voice, he yelled, “Gloria Patri et Filio et Spiritui Sancto!”

His daughter shrieked and sat up. Her hands flew to her face, the palms facing outward, the fingers clawed.

“Most blessed glorious Eternal Holy Trinity adorable unity in the Glory of Your majesty in the splendour of Your power!” Arundell babbled.

Isabel’s eyes opened. She hissed like an angry cat. The men—except Arundell—raised their crucifixes. Her father screeched, “Exalted unto the ages of ages! Kyrie eleison! Kyrie eleison! Kyrie eleison!”

As if it cost her no effort at all, Isabel climbed out of the coffin, her white dress flowing around her. She looked at each of the men in turn, her pupils pinpricks, her lips drawn so far back that her teeth appeared almost fang-like.

On his knees, Arundell jabbered, “Kyrie eleison Jesu soter unice eleison! Kyrie eleison Jesu soter unice eleison! Kyrie eleison Jesu soter unice eleison!”

Isabel darted toward Burton but jerked to a stop when he brandished his cross in her face. Her hair came loose and fell wildly about her. She whimpered. “Dick, please! Love me! Love me!”

Hearing her speak, Arundell screamed, “She’s alive! She’s alive!”

“No!” Levi shouted. “She is un-dead! Strigoi morti! Do not let her touch you!”

“Isabel!” Arundell pleaded. “Daughter!”

She turned on him with a throaty growl, and seeing the dead sheen across her eyes and the savage hunger in her face, he moaned and fell backward, clutching the crucifix to his chest. “Kyrie eleison! Kyrie eleison! Kyrie eleison! Holy Holy Holy Lord God Pantocrator who is and was and is to come!”

“Isabel, regardez-moi!” Levi barked. “Regardez-moi! Dieu le commande!”

She spun, cringing away from the crucifixes, and snarled, “Give me my life!”

“Il est allé,” Levi said. “It is gone. Regardez!” He reached to the mirror beside him and adjusted it to face her.

Isabel stared at her reflection. She lifted her hands and looked with an air of puzzlement at the rosary that was entangled in her fingers. She touched the cross that dangled on a silver chain around her neck.

“What has happened to me?” she croaked. “Why am I—why am I—?”

She looked at Burton and saw the dread in his eyes.

“No!” she pleaded. “No, no, no, no!”

Henry Arundell toppled sideways to the floor, unconscious.

Levi stepped forward. “Back!” he commanded. “The Lord God Almighty awaits you. You must be sanctified and delivered unto Him!”

She retreated, confused, panicked, emitting an animalistic keening, and bumped against the table. Her eyes fixed on Burton. “Help me!”

The explorer stumbled into the side of the chancel. He dropped his crucifix and gasped for air.

“Paix éternelle, Isabel,” Levi said. “Eternal peace shall be yours.”

With her eyes fastened immovably on Burton, Isabel hoisted herself onto the table and clambered into the coffin. She sat gazing at him for a few seconds then lay back.

Levi approached the casket. He leaned over it and held the crucifix before her face. In a low, crooning voice, he recited:

Go forth, Christian soul, from this world

in the name of God the almighty Father,

who created you,

in the name of Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God,

who suffered for you,

in the name of the Holy Spirit,

who was poured out upon you.

Go forth, faithful Christian!

May you die in peace this day,

may your home be with God in Zion,

with Mary, the virgin Mother of God,

with Joseph, and all the angels and saints.

May you return to your Creator

who formed you from the dust of the earth.

May holy Mary, the angels, and all the saints

come to meet you as you go forth from this life.

May you see your Redeemer face to face.

She closed her eyes and became still.

“Sir Richard,” Levi said quietly. “Come here.”

Algernon Swinburne looked at Burton, who was immobilised, then stepped over to him, slipped an arm around his waist, and pushed him forward, guiding him to the side of the coffin.

“Feel for the pulse,” Levi ordered.

Burton did so, moving like one of Arundell’s clockwork footmen.

“You detect it?” Levi asked.

“No,” the explorer responded hoarsely. “There is none, and her skin is cold.”

“As in death?”

“Yes.”

Levi addressed Monckton Milnes. “The tools, monsieur, they are by the lectern. Fetch them, s’il vous pla”t.” He turned to Burton. “It is very terrible, what we must do, Sir Richard. Pardieu! To have to ask it of a man! But, you comprehend, non? You understand how she must be released?”

The explorer nodded wordlessly.

Monckton Milnes passed the stake to Levi, who positioned it over Isabel’s heart. With his other hand, the occultist took the mallet and held it out to Burton. “It is best by the hand of someone she loves.”

Like a mirage seen in the Arabian Desert, everything around Burton was visible but a long way off, indefinite and impossible to grasp. He observed but was utterly detached; was conscious but empty of thought. He knew Swinburne was prising the axe from his fingers; heard Levi say that burning would not be necessary; watched him sprinkle holy water onto Isabel’s remains then close the coffin and seal it; stood frozen while the others took the floor mirrors and stacked them against a wall.

Flowers were placed on the casket. All signs that anything untoward had occurred were removed. Henry Arundell was revived and reassured that his daughter was now with God. He knelt and prayed and prayed and prayed. The men waited for him to finish. By the time he did, he appeared to have achieved some degree of inner peace and said, “I will stand vigil over my daughter for the rest of the night. It is my duty.”

Monckton Milnes and Swinburne took hold of Burton and guided him out of the chapel. They trailed after Levi, back into the main house where, at the foot of the spiral staircase, they found Clunk, the footman, lying spreadeagled on the ground. His canister-shaped head had been twisted off and was ten feet away, under a small decorative table.

“What the blazes?” Swinburne uttered.

“There are spots of blood on the floor,” Monckton Milnes observed.

Burton pulled himself from their grasp. His senses clicked back into focus. He said, “I hear someone in the sitting room.”

Leading the others, he strode across the vestibule and entered the chamber where he found, on chairs and sofas around the fireplace and wrapped in dressing gowns, Blanche, Smythe Piggott, Lallah Bird, Samuel and Isabella Beeton, and Bram Stoker. Sam Beeton was holding a bloodied handkerchief to his nose. His right eye was blackened and swollen shut. Smythe Piggott, obviously in considerable pain, was cradling his left wrist.

“It was the gardener, Cap’n!” Bram Stoker blurted the moment he saw Burton.

“Tom Honesty? What was? What has happened?”

“He attacked us,” Sam Beeton said, his voice muffled by the cloth. “The man might be small but he’s dashed strong!”

“What? Wait! Start from the beginning.”

“He woke the boy up.” Beeton nodded toward Bram.

“Aye, sir! Shook me awake, so he did, and he looked like the devil himself. He said, ‘Congratulate your master. Tell him it was an admirable attempt and we shall meet again.’ Then he left the room, an’ I was so afeared, I ran an’ knocked on the bedroom doors until I woke Mr. Beeton.”

Beeton resumed the account. “The lad was hardly making sense, but I gathered there was an intruder of some sort, so roused Doctor Bird and Smythe Piggott. We caught Honesty descending the stairs with Sister Raghavendra over his shoulder. We tackled him but he fought like a madman. Knocked us about like a damned prizefighter. I called for one of the footmen to stop him—”

“We saw what happened to it,” Burton interjected. “Are you telling me he’s made off with Sadhvi?”

“Yes. We couldn’t stop him.”

“Cap’n,” Bram put in. “His eyes, they were black as tar.”

Burton swung round to Eliphas Levi, who cursed, “Quel désastre! The nosferatu, it must transfer to this man in the instant before John Judge die. It dormant in the groundsman until night come. We fail! Merde! Merde! We fail!”

The explorer snapped at Beeton, “When?”

“Ten, maybe fifteen minutes ago. Bird, the cousins, and some of the staff are out looking for him, but it’s still pouring with rain, so—” His words trailed off. He pulled the handkerchief away from his face but immediately reapplied it as blood dribbled from his nose.

Burton ran from the room. He crossed to the front door, yanked it open, and stepped out. The rain pounded against him. He could hardly see a thing.

“Doctor Bird!” he bellowed. “Doctor Bird!”

A voice sounded to his left. “Here!”

Burton set off toward it but had taken only a few steps before the doctor emerged into view and shouted, “He made off in Steinhaueser’s steam sphere. I thought to follow in one of the other vehicles but they’ll never keep pace with it. Besides, in this bloody weather, he’d evade us in an instant. Hell! We’ve lost Sister Raghavendra, Sir Richard. But why in heaven’s name has he taken her? What’s come over the man?”

Burton swiped a fist through the air and yelled his frustration.

Great-Uncle Gerard, the owner of New Wardour Castle, returned in time for a weekend of funerals, grief, and rain. Burton was introduced to him but hardly realised it. His thoughts had folded in on themselves. Events were enacted around him but failed to register.

Swinburne was the first to penetrate this state of fugue. “I don’t think she’ll be welcomed by the family,” he said, “but I have it in mind to send for one of the girls from Verbena Lodge.”

Burton blinked and mumbled, “What are you talking about?”

“A dolly-mop. The vigorous application of a switch to your rear end, Richard. If you must be whipped into action, I’m just the man to arrange it.”

The explorer sighed and massaged his forehead with the heel of his hand.

“You can’t afford another day of mourning,” Swinburne went on relentlessly. “It may be considered a little premature, but it’s time to leave. This Catholic desolation is not for you. It’s stultifying. Closed curtains and bloody flowers stinking up the house. Black crepe everywhere. You need to get back to London. Whatever madness you’re caught up in, it has no regard for etiquette, and every minute you spend here is another minute of peril for Sister Raghavendra. Have you given up on her?”

Burton’s eyes finally slid into focus. “Of course not, but how—where—?”

Swinburne threw out his hands, stamped his foot, and screeched, “Almack’s! Almack’s! Have you forgotten? That American fellow is speaking there tomorrow night! We must go!”

“Tomorrow? Today is the seventh?” Blank despair suddenly gave way to grim determination, and Burton examined the knuckles of his right fist, as if assessing their potency for destruction. “Will you find Bram, Algy? Tell him to pack our bags. I must say my goodbyes.”

Midway through the morning, the guests departed. The Arundells had presented Burton with a new pocket watch. A lock of Isabel’s hair—cut while she was dressed for the vigil—had been inset inside its lid. He accepted it with gratitude and such an acute tightening of the chest that tears blurred his eyes.

Burton, Swinburne, Levi, Bram, and Monckton Milnes travelled together by steam landau to Salisbury, where Monckton Milnes parted from them, bound for Fryston.

After bidding him farewell, the rest booked passage on the atmospheric railway.

Sitting in the carriage, Burton peered out at the massive bellows, which were slowly inflating. In a few moments, they’d constrict, sending the train rocketing forward to the next pumping station.

As had occurred frequently these past few days, he suddenly sensed that something had eluded him. This time, after a moment’s thought, it slotted into place.

“The bloody poem,” he murmured.

“Poem?” Swinburne asked.

“Abdu El Yezdi’s. I still haven’t fathomed it.”

“Battersea Power Station.”

Burton started. “What?”

“I thought you must have it. After all, it’s as plain as the nose on your face.”

The poet recited:

Whene’er you doubt thy station in life

Thou shalt take to the tempestuous sea.

To all the four points it shall batter thee

Until you find thine own power, and me.

He concluded, “Station, sea, batter, power, and four points. Bleedin’ obvious!”

Burton muttered, “It is, and I feel an absolute dolt.”

A warning bell jangled and the guardsman’s voice sounded through a speaking tube. “Brace for departure, please. Brace for departure.”

The passengers sat back in the forward-facing seats and waited for the countdown bell’s three clangs. They came. Outside, the bellows squeezed shut. The train shot forward as if fired out of a cannon. Bram Stoker hollered his delight.

London, Burton thought. And vengeance.