The Secret of Abdu El Yezdi (48 page)

German Trickery!

Do not believe the lies you have been told.

Prince Albert is German.

He is working for German interests not for British.

The Central German Confederation wants our trade.

It is greedy for our territory and for our influence.

Resist those who promote this foreign power and undermine our own.

Fight for Britain! Fight the enemy among us!

Burton made a small exclamation and held one of the leaflets up to the light. He snapped his fingers, went to a desk, returned, and handed a pamphlet to Trounce. “You remember this?”

“‘The Language of the Angels.' Yes, of course, it's from the League of Enochians Gentlemen's Club.”

“Look at the paper, Trounce. It's the same brand, and printed with the same ink.”

“By Jove! Are the Enochians spreading this sedition? Then we've got them. We have cause to raid their headquarters.”

“We do, but hold off. Such tactics will get us nowhere. Is Thomas Lake Harris still at the Regency?”

“Yes. I have Spearing keeping a round-the-clock watch on him.”

“I intend to approach him tomorrow night—see if he'll take me into the club as a guest. I daresay I can find out more from posing as a friend than if we storm the place swinging truncheons at them.”

“Messieurs,” Levi said, “this hate of the Germanic countries, it link again the Enochians to Perdurabo.”

“The—what did you call him?—
Nefertiti
?” Trounce asked.

“
Nosferatu
.”

“How so?”

“You recall Captain Taylor of the
Royal Charter
—he report voices in the crater where Perdurabo take possession of John Judge. They suggest a battle against German forces,
non
? Too, Countess Sabina, she claim that Abdu El Yezdi try to prevent a war.”

“With a united Germany, you mean?” Burton asked.

“Oui. It explain why all this business occur at this moment in time, with the Alliance, you see?”

Burton nodded. “I think you're right. I'd venture that, while Abdu El Yezdi has manipulated the government to broker peace and avoid a conflict, Perdurabo is using the Enochians to provoke the war early, before Germany has the manufacturing power it would gain from the Alliance.”

“
Exactement!
”

Trounce scratched his head. “Provoke it by stirring up the Cauldron? That's a stretch. The place is a hive of criminals and paupers—what influence do they have?”

“They have the weight of numbers,” Burton responded. “Plus a lack of education and a grudge against the better-off. Mobilise that, and you have an army eager to fight, whatever the cause. Besides, I suspect this—” he waved one of the leaflets, “—is just the beginning.”

“I know you can't sit still at the best of times,” Burton whispered to Algernon Swinburne, “but this is beyond the bounds. Will you please control yourself? You're attracting attention.”

“I can't help it. Betsy has a very strong right arm. You should've come with me to Verbena Lodge, Richard. The madams are the strictest in London.”

“I've spent the day in peaceful meditation, Algy. I find it preferable to having my arse striped.”

Behind them, a portly woman leaned forward and hissed, “Shhh!”

Swinburne rolled his eyes at Burton, as if to say,
Good grief, somebody actually wants to listen to this balderdash!

The balderdash in question was spouting from the mouth of Mr. Thomas Lake Harris, who was standing on a podium in Almack's Assembly Rooms addressing a crowd of about three hundred, Burton and Swinburne among them.

He was a tall man, with low black eyebrows, a long black beard, and a sallow countenance. His eyes blazed intensely as he declaimed, “At this moment, drew near a Spirit who represented a Mercury or messenger, though indeed as to form he was beautiful as fabled Endymion. He appeared in the flower of his youth, and moved as if borne on the breath of the swift electric atmosphere. I heard a sound as of melodious voices, and in a moment beheld a multitude gathered together, assembled by proclamation; the character of which was, that news from Earth was permitted to be uttered through a man who, as to his body, was a resident of the natural world, but who, as to his spirit, was elevated into their society. These spirits all appeared to be in the acknowledgement of one Lord God. The beginning of all things they acknowledged to be not in Nature, but in the Divine Ability of One Eternal Spirit.”

“Hogwash, phooey, and bunkum,” Swinburne muttered, imitating Harris's American accent. “How much more of this has my sore bum to endure?”

“You've no one to blame but yourself,” Burton noted.

Swinburne giggled. “Swish! Thwack! Swish! Thwack! Utterly delicious!”

The woman behind him leaned forward again and said, “Sir, if you persist in talking through Mr. Harris's presentation, I shall have little choice but to apply my umbrella to the top of your head.”

“Madam,” Swinburne responded, “I should prefer the other end, and a weapon with a little more bite.”

“Well!” the woman exclaimed indignantly. “I never did!”

“No matter, for Betsy already has!”

Burton pushed his companion to his feet. “Come on, Algy. I think we've heard enough from Mr. Harris for now.”

“I'd heard enough five minutes after he started,” Swinburne complained as they edged through onlookers to the side of the auditorium. They moved along the wall until they came to a door, passed through it into a side hall, and followed it to the double doors that opened into the club bar.

A couple of minutes later, they settled at a table, each with a pint of beer. Burton took a long draught. The previous day's dose of Saltzmann's had worn off, leaving him thirsty.

“I've arranged with the manager for us to meet Mr. Harris when he finishes,” he said. “We'll wait here. I find a glass of beer much easier to swallow than all that hokum about angels.”

“Not half,” Swinburne enthused.

“I hope he'll be our key to unlock the Enochians' door, but as soon as we've had a poke around enemy territory, we'll then do the same at Battersea Power Station, as a matter of urgency. I trust you're set for a long night.”

They'd consumed two pints each by the time the audience filed out of the assembly room. The bar began to fill up with club members and was soon noisy and wreathed in tobacco smoke.

Almack's manager entered with Harris, spotted Burton, and ushered the American over. He introduced them, then made a polite withdrawal, his presence being required elsewhere.

“Well now,” Harris said, in a nasal New York accent, “the Nile, hey? That's quite something, Burton; yes, sir, it sure is! I gotta tell you, I'm a big admirer of yours. I've read your books, an' you don't beat about the bush like the rest of the English. I like a straight-talkin' man. You're a fella after my own heart.”

“Thank you, Mr. Harris. Would you join us for a beverage?”

“Sure, I'd be happy to. Whisky. A large one. All that speechifyin' has left me dry.”

Burton called a pot-boy over and ordered the whisky and two more beers.

“I'll take a beer as well,” Harris put in.

“And I'll have a whisky, too,” Swinburne added.

“Say, Swinburne, what business are you in?”

“I'm a poet, sir.”

“Is that so? I do a little in that line myself. Whaddya think of this?” Harris spread his arms wide and recited, in too loud a voice:

To God be praise! This happy work is done:
It spreads towards man the Solar Angel's pinions.
My mind conceived this poem of the sun
Long years ago, when all the world's dominions
In clouds of fantasy were veiled; while death
Held empire in man's universal breath.

Swinburne glanced at Burton. “That's—um—very interesting, Mr. Harris. Am I then mistaken in my assumption that limericks are the principle form of verse in America?”

“Limericks, sir?”

“Quite so.
A spiritual man from Rhode Island, had an uncanny knack to beguile and, seduce lovely women, and leave their heads swimmin', but he—
”

“Mr. Harris,” Burton interrupted hastily, “I'm intrigued by your thesis concerning the nature of angels. Have you been contacted directly?”

“Yup. I'm blessed with vivid dreams, Burton. Blessed is the word. The Lily Queen has revealed much of the true nature of existence to me.”

“Ah, yes, the Lily Queen. She is your wife, if I'm not mistaken?”

“My spirit wife, sir. She exists in Lilistan, the interspace inhabited by the angel folk, and has so far borne me two celestial children.”

Harris had turned to face Burton. Behind his back, Swinburne waggled a forefinger against his temple, stuck his tongue out, and crossed his eyes. Burton tried to ignore him, a task made easier by the arrival of fresh drinks.

“Good health, sir,” Burton toasted.

“Yours, too,” Harris responded. He downed the whisky in one, picked up his pint, and half-emptied it in a single swig. “You see, Burton, we ain't alone in the universe. All the planets that circle our sun are inhabited by spiritual beings, and there are Lunarians on the far side of our moon who remember Oriana, the world where evil originated, an' which the moon once orbited.”

“I see,” Burton said.

“This was revealed to you during dreams?” Swinburne asked. “Do you perhaps take anything to help you sleep?”

“It was, an' I don't. The thing of it is, if a man could attune himself to the rhythmic chord that leads the harmonic vibrations between these worlds, why, he could live forever. Immortality, Burton! How does that sound, hey?”

“Quite difficult to grasp.”

“Incomprehensible,” Swinburne agreed. “My hat! You appear to have finished your beer already, Mr. Harris. As have I. Shall we order another?”

“Sure, but what say you we get out of this place?” Harris said. “Never mix work with pleasure, that's my motto. This place is work. Meetin' you gents is a pleasure.”

“The Red Lion on Derby Street isn't far from here,” Burton said. “Shall we?”

This was agreed, and the trio settled up at the bar, retrieved their hats, coats, and canes from the cloakroom, and exited into King Street.

The day had been cold and damp, with rain-heavy clouds filling the sky. Now the atmosphere was saturated with water—too thin to be classified as rain, too thick to qualify as mist. Street lamps flared, particles of their orange light seemingly borne aloft by the droplets and sent swirling around the three men as they passed along St. James's Street and turned left into Pall Mall.

“I should very much enjoy hearing you speak again,” Burton said to Harris as they entered Whitehall. “I understand you'll be addressing the League of Enochians Gentlemen's Club tomorrow. Do you think I might attend?”

“Phew!” the American exclaimed. “If it was up to me, for sure, but the Enochians are an exclusive set, Burton, an' as their guest, I ain't got the right to invite another.”

“I understand.” Burton waited until a loudly clanking steam-horse had passed by, then went on, “May I ask how you were approached by them?”

“By the Enochians? I got a letter last May from a fella named Laurence Oliphant. An insightful guy—he'd seen the importance of my philosophy and wrote that he recognised me as the twelfth messenger of God.”

“Received in America in May,” Swinburne muttered. “So probably posted in March or thereabouts.”

“The Enochians' president, Doctor Kenealy, then arranged for me to come here.”

They arrived at the Red Lion, found a corner table, and ordered more drinks.

For the next three hours, Burton plied Harris with alcohol and gave every indication that he was fast becoming an ardent admirer of the spiritualist, artfully hiding his true opinion that the man was a conceited—and only partially sane—nincompoop.

It was near midnight before Harris succumbed to the considerable amount he'd imbibed. Burton picked his moment, then asked, “What are the arrangements for tomorrow? Perhaps I could have dinner with you before you go to the Enochians' Club?”

“'Fraid not. I have to meet a fella named Count Sobieski outside Saint Martin's Church at eight o'clock. Gotta work on my presentation beforehand. Perhaps another night, though?”

“Very well,” Burton said, silently vowing to be at the church, too, unseen, ready to follow Harris to what he suspected was a secret entrance to the club.

He nudged Swinburne. “Are you still with us, Algy?”

“Yesh,” the poet slurred. “But I shushpect I might have had one too mummy—money—many.”

“We should get you home. You, too, Mr. Harris. It sounds as if you have a busy day ahead of you.”

They stood and fumbled with their coat buttons; picked up, dropped, and retrieved their hats; tripped over their canes; and stumbled out into the night.