Death out of Thin Air (11 page)

C
HAPTER
XII

The Vampire's Other Voice

T
HE
Count's body stirred after a moment as if his trance were leaving. Mickey and Inez worked over Mrs. Saylor. Diavolo unlocked the door to the kitchen and found a jar of ice water in the refrigerator. He brought glasses of it for both Mrs. Saylor and the Count. His mind, as he did so, was working rapidly.

Don knew that, in spite of the expert manner in which the man had been tied, it had been the Count and the Count alone who had produced the green light and the chalked inscription. The Count hadn't ever escaped those bonds, and, though the chalked words were high up behind him a good twenty feet away, it was he, and not a spirit force, that had made them.

Don had seen another medium do the same thing before.

Draco recovered rapidly now, coming out of the “trance” in a jerky automatic fashion, breathing heavily.

“Were we successful in establishing contact?” he asked. “Did you witness any manifestation?”

“Mrs. Saylor appears to have seen rather too much,” Diavolo said. “Perhaps it would be better if she—”

“No. No. I won't!” Mrs. Saylor protested, weak but insistent. “I am going to see it through. I—I will not faint again.”

Count Draco looked at her. “I admire your bravery, Mrs. Saylor. The force we are fighting is an evil one — a force that grows stronger each day that Gilles de Rais is free in the world. Tonight will be our last chance—our last hope of regaining control over him. If we fail—” Draco shrugged. “Then I fear we have unwittingly let loose a fearful horror upon the world, the results of which only the Devil himself can foretell.

“We have gone too deeply into the realms of darkness, knowing too little. But we shall make one last effort. Your Highness, if you will open that window wide, please.”

The man is a real showman, Don thought as he obeyed the command. He plays upon the emotions of his victims like a master. He works them up to the point that, when the crucial moment comes during which exposure might be feared, they are in no condition to observe properly or think logically.

Diavolo unlatched and pushed the window wide.

The dimly-lit street thirty stories below showed mistily through the white fog that was drifting in from across the Park. On this side the penthouse outer wall was flush with that of the building below. The drop once more was sheer. There were some small interstices between the granite blocks that might offer foothold to a human-fly; but the daredevil who tried it, Don knew, must have nerves of steel.

Diavolo asked, “Gilles de Rais comes in through the window, Count?”

Draco nodded. “Yes. A Vampire, as you doubtless know is — or rather, in life, was human. After death his body obeys another, different set of physical laws — laws of the spirit world. He also takes on certain attributes of the bat. Like the bat, heights mean nothing to him since he is able to fly! If you are all ready” — Draco's eyes closed again and the rigidity of his body began to return — “The lights….”

Diavolo snapped the switch again. The sitters had formed their circle once more, hands linked. And this time Don Diavolo joined them without deception, except that on his way across the room he touched the phone receiver and lightly tapped twice on its surface near the mouthpiece.

As his eyes grew accustomed to the darkness he noticed that this time, with the shade raised and the window open, some little light did penetrate the room. The faint cold beams of a new moon pushed hesitantly through the haze, crept in at the open window, and crossed the room to throw its dim ghostly glimmer on the Count.

The bound man strained in his chair, his body arching, his lips drawn back, his white teeth clenched.

The utter silence and the rigid tenseness that held the persons in that room grew taut and grim. Time itself seemed almost to have stopped.

And then, at last, there was a metallic sound at the window and every head that was not already staring toward it, turned instantly. The dim luminosity of the mist outside moved slowly and then gradually seemed to give birth to a shadow that developed from it. A shadow that grew larger, growing upward from below the sill — a shadow whose outlines were smudged and blurred in the dark and fog — but a shadow that was alive and which came in through the window toward them!

Around him, Diavolo could hear the heavy, labored breathing of his companions and he felt the pulse in Estelle Saylor's wrist pounding madly. His own was not too steady!

Now a greenish glow appeared like the one they had seen before above the Count. This time it grew in front of the shadow and gradually revealed a face — an obscene, hideous monstrosity similar to those of the animals in that heated room of the cages — a wolfish, grinning face like the one Diavolo had seen on the quickly moving figure in Chandler's office that afternoon.

Don thought to himself. “If only Inspector Church were here now.”

Then the Vampire spoke and Don noticed that his lips did not move. The words were a strange, harsh French that Don could only partly understand. He had picked up smatterings of several languages on his world tours, but he had never heard anything quite like this spoken before — he suspected that not many others had either for the last three or four hundred years. When The Bat's voice ceased, Draco's followed, translating.

“
Mesdames, messieurs.
I thank you for your great interest in the hidden secrets, the great alchemical truth. You have, without intending it, enabled the Marshal Gilles de Rais to walk the earth once more — though not quite in human form. But you wish that I do not stay — I feel the force of your wills beating at me, trying to drive me back to join that great company of the dead who are damned to drift homelessly forever between Earth and Hell. I will not go. It is too late now for that….”

Count Draco's voice died away and the Vampire spoke again.

Diavolo decided that it was time now for the fireworks. He waited until the Bat-figure had finished and then, before the Count could translate, Diavolo spoke. Using his ventriloquial skill he imitated the Count's voice. Only one other person in that room knew what was happening — the Count himself. The Bat, Diavolo thought, should get a nice surprise out of this.

Don spoke rapidly, trying to get as much of it as possible across before the Count could interfere. “I shall,” he pretended to translate, “from now on act through Count Draco only. Mlle. Zsgany, the medium whose real name was Marie VanReyd, was unworthy. Unbelief had entered her mind. When she sought the assistance this afternoon of the skeptic Diavolo I appeared before her and sent her soul to join the Vampire legions. I—”

Don got no further. The green glow that shone on the Vampire's face vanished, his shadow appeared briefly in the window opening and he was gone. Count Draco in his chair, strained forward, his eyes wide, his trance shattered, his swarthy face shining white and damp in the dim light.

Don Diavolo grinned to himself. The others broke into frightened, astonished talk. Someone called, “The lights! For God's sake, the lights!”

Don slid out of his chair, moved quickly to the switch and snapped it on. Then he crossed to the window and, without looking out, hurriedly pulled it to and locked it.

In his Maharajah voice he said, “There is going to be one other occult demonstration on the bill this evening, ladies and gentlemen. And
I
shall supply it.”

The Count stared at him, his black eyes blazing. “Saylor,” he said from between clenched teeth. “Cut these ropes and let me out of this chair!”

Don Diavolo shook his head. “No, Mr. Saylor. Stay where you are. We'll untie the Count when I have quite finished. We'll all be much safer.”

Diavolo moved to the table on which rested the drumhead made of the wooden hoop and the animal skin.

“This,” he said, holding it up, “is a Magic Drum. It is an occult invention of the Transylvanian gypsies. It is used, as Count Draco knows, for the discovery of thieves. I am going to see if it can tell us who took the Saylor diamonds!”

C
HAPTER
XIII

The Magic Drum

C
OUNT
D
RACO
, when Diavolo had previously thrown out a hint on the subject of diamonds, hadn't reacted at all. But now the calm confidence of the Maharajah's statement shook him visibly.

“What are you talking about?” he said heavily, leaning forward in his chair, his black eyes staring at Diavolo.

“It's just a hunch, Count, Diavolo said, and then noting Draco's amazement at his sudden colloquial command of the English language he decided to discard his Maharajah identity and raise his true colors.

He looked down at his empty palm. Slowly reaching up, he plucked a lighted cigarette from midair. This, in a way, was Diavolo's pantomimic signature. Nearly always, when taking a bow at the close of his act he nonchalantly performed this gesture, until it had become associated with him. The Saylors, and the Count as well, recognized it at once.

“Don Diavolo!” Draco said, his jaw dropping.

Don bowed. “Yes. The Maharajah does a quick change and becomes Diavolo, the Scarlet Wizard. And he's going to wiz now.” Don looked at the Magic Drum and started to say, “The gypsy divination method is….”

The doorbell cut him off with a short ring followed by a long steady one. Diavolo stopped, went across to the door and opened it slightly.

A voice outside said, “Message for Mr. Kendall Worthington.”

Don shook his head. “Sorry. You have the wrong apartment. Try the desk clerk downstairs.”

He closed the door, returned to stand before his audience, and placed the Magic Drum, which he still held, upon the floor in the center of the rug. He pointed out the Roman numerals that were arranged in a symmetrical pattern on the stretched skin of the drum-head and he continued from where he had been interrupted.

“The gypsies associated each of these numbers with the name of a suspect. There are several ways of doing this. We shall use the simplest. Each of you shall choose a number for yourselves. Mrs. Saylor, will you be the first?”

Ogden Saylor stood up. “Are you insinuating that the thief is one of us?”

Diavolo smiled. “I'm not insinuating. I merely thought it would be interesting to find out. If the thief is not present, we would at least have eliminated several suspects. Your number, Mrs. Saylor?”

Estelle Saylor, whose belief in occult things was as deep as her ignorance about them, said, “The mystic number — seven.”

Rapidly Don queried the others and they chose. Ogden, number one; Inez LaValle, three; Chandler, four; Mickey, nine. The Count refused. Instead he demanded “Are you going to untie me?”

“Yes,” Diavolo answered coolly. “But later. And if you won't take a number, I'll give you one. You're six and I'll take eight.”

Diavolo paused. He looked steadily at the Count and explained, “The gypsies who use the Magic Drum divine the thief's name by casting as many datura seeds upon the drum as there are numbers upon the skin. The rim of the drum is then struck a like number of times. The skin vibrates and the seeds jump. They
always
come to rest upon the number that indicates the thief.”
⁸
He paused and Mickey was sure from his manner that there was a hidden meaning in his next words though she did not know what it was. “Count Draco, I wonder if you can supply me with the datura seeds I need?”

Draco gave him a startled look, then quickly shook his head. “I have no datura seeds. And if you're a magician you have no need to ask me for them.”

“Of course not,” Don agreed. “But I thought you might be kind enough to save me the trouble, little as it is.” Don closed his empty right hand into a fist, made a mystic conjurer's pass above it with his left. When he opened his fist again and tipped his hand, a trickle of small flat white seeds fell on to the drumhead!

Ogden Saylor stared at them wide-eyed. “Dammit, man,” he cried. “You can't do a trick like
that
on the spur of the moment. Those
are
datura seeds!”

“Yes,” Don replied calmly. “Datura, the poison of the Indian thuggees.
⁹
But their toxicological properties don't interest us just now. We'll come to that later.”

Dramatically Diavolo struck the edge of the wooden hoop; the stretched skin vibrated; the small seeds jumped. “One!” he said, and struck again, “Two! Three! Four! …”

The drumhead was inscribed with the figures one to nine. Diavolo struck nine times and on the ninth count the seeds were all clustered on the figure
six
— Count Draco's number!