Manly Wade Wellman - Judge Pursuivant 01 (8 page)

 
          
 
"That's an old one, in every
language."

 
          
 
"Probably because it
happened so often.
There's your human hand, with the beast-paw forming
upon and around it, then vanishing like wounded ectoplasm. Where's the weak
point, Wills? Name it, I challenge you."

 
          
 
I felt the glass shake in my hand, and a
chilly wind brushed my spine. "There's one point," I made myself say.
"You may think it a slender one, even a quibble. But ectoplasms make human
forms, not animal."

 
          
 
"How do you know they don't make animal
forms?" Judge Pursuivant crowed, leaning forward across the desk.
"Because, of the few you've seen and disbelieved, only human faces and
bodies showed? My reply is there in your hands. Open Richet's book to page 545,
Mr Wills. Page 545 . . . got it? Now, the passage I marked, about the medium
Burgik. Read it aloud."

 
          
 
He sank back into his chair once more, waiting
in manifest delight. I found the place, underscored with pencil, and my voice
was hoarse as I obediently read:

 
          
 
"'My trouser leg was strongly pulled and
a strange, ill-defined form that seemed to have paws like those of a dog or
small monkey climbed on my knee. I could feel its weight, very light, and
something like the muzzle of an animal touched my cheek.'"

           
 
"There you are, Wills," Judge
Pursuivant was crying. "Notice that it happened in
Warsaw
, close to the heart of the werewolf
country. Hmmm, reading that passage made you sweat a bit - remembering what you
saw in the Devil's Croft, eh?"

 
          
 
I flung down the book.

 
          
 
"You've done much toward convincing
me," I admitted. "I'd rather have the superstitious peasant's behef,
though, the one I've always scoffed at."

 
          
 
"Rationalizing the business didn't help,
then? It did when I explained the Devil's Croft and the springs."

 
          
 
"But the springs don't chase you with
sharp teeth. And, as I was saying, the peasant had a protection that the
scientist lacks - trust in his crucifix and his Bible."

 
          
 
"Why shouldn't he have that trust, and
why shouldn't you?" Again the judge was rummaging in his book-case.
"Those symbols of faith gave him what is needed, a strong heart to drive
back the menace, whether it
be
wolf-demon or
ectoplasmic bogy. Here, my friend."

 
          
 
He laid a third book on the desk. It was a
Bible, red-edged and leather-backed, worn from much use.

 
          
 
"Have a read at that while you finish
your drink," he advised me. ''The Gospel According to
St John
is good, and it's already marked. Play
you're a peasant, hunting for comfort."

 
          
 
Like a dutiful child I opened the Bible to
where a faded purple ribbon lay between the pages. But already Judge Pursuivant
was quoting from memory:

 
          
 
"'In the beginning was the Word, and the
Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with
God. All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that
was made . . .'"

           
 
"Blood-lust and
compassion."

 
          
 
It may seem incredible that later in the night
I slept like a dead pig; yet I had reason.

 
          
 
First of all there was the weariness that had
followed my dangers and exertions; then Judge Pursuivant's whisky and logic
combined to reassure me; finally, the leather couch in his study, its surface
comfortably hollowed by much reclining thereon, was a sedative in itself He
gave me two quilts, very warm and very light, and left me alone. I did not stir
until a rattle of breakfast dishes awakened me.

 
          
 
William, the judge's servant, had carefully
brushed my clothes.

 
          
 
My shoes also showed free of mud, though they
still felt damp and clammy. The judge himself furnished me with a clean shirt
and socks, both items very loose upon me, and lent me his razor.

 
          
 
"Some friends of yours called during the
night," he told me dryly.

 
          
 
"Friends?"

 
          
 
"Yes, from the town.
Five
of them, with ropes and guns.
They announced very definitely that they
intended to decorate the flagpole in the public square with your corpse. There
was also some informal talk about drinking your blood. We may have vampires as
well as werewolves hereabouts."

 
          
 
I almost cut my lip with the razor. "How
did you get rid of them?" I asked quickly. "They must have followed
my tracks."

 
          
 
"Lucky there was more snow after we got
in," he replied, "and they came here only as a routine check-up. They
must have visited every house within miles. Oh, turning them away was easy. I feigned
wild enthusiasm for the man-hunt, and asked if I couldn't come along."

 
          
 
He smiled reminiscently, his mustache stirring
like a rather genial blond snake.

 
          
 
"Then what?"
I prompted him, dabbing on more lather.

 
          
 
"Why, they were delighted. I took a rifle
and spent a few hours on the trail. You weren't to be found at all, so we
returned to town. Excitement reigns there, you can believe."

 
          
 
"What kind of excitement?"

 
          
 
"Blood-lust and
compassion.
Since Constable O'Bryant is wounded, his younger brother, a
strong advocate of your immediate capture and execution, is serving as a
volunteer guardian of the peace. He's acting on an old appointment by his
brother as deputy, to serve without pay. He told the council - a badly scared
group - that he has sent for help to the county seat, but I am sure he did
nothing of the kind. Meanwhile, the Croft is surrounded by scouts, who hope to
catch you sneaking out of it. And the women of the town are looking after Susan
Gird and your friend, the Hen Doktor."

 
          
 
I had finished shaving. "How is Doctor
Zoberg?" I inquired through the towel.

 
          
 
"Still pretty badly
shaken up.
I tried to get in and see him, but it was impossible. I
understand he went out for a while, early in the evening, but almost collapsed.
Just now he is completely surrounded by cooing old ladies with soup and herb
tea. Miss Gird was feeling much better, and talked to me for a while. I'm not
really on warm terms with the town, you know; people think it's indecent for me
to live out here alone and not give them a chance to gossip about me. So I was
pleasurably suqjrised to get a kind word from Miss Susan. She told me, very
softly for fear someone might overhear, that she hopes you aren't caught. She
is sure that you did not kill her father."

 
          
 
We went into his dining room, where William
offered pancakes, fried bacon and the strongest black coffee I ever tasted. In
the midst of it all, I put down my fork and faced the judge suddenly. He
grinned above his cup.

 
          
 
"Well, Mr Wills
? '
Stung
by the splendor of a sudden thought' -all you need is a sensitive hand clasped
to your inspired brow."

 
          
 
"You said," I reminded him,
"that Susan Gird is sure that I didn't kill her father."

 
          
 
"So I did."

 
          
 
"She told you that herself. She also
seemed calm, self-contained, instead of in mourning for
-
"

 
          
 
"Oh, come, come!" He paused to shift
a full half-dozen cakes to his plate and skilfully drenched them with syrup.
"That's rather ungrateful of you, Mr Wills, suspecting her of patricide."

 
          
 
"Did I say that?" I protested,
feeling my ears turning bright red.

 
          
 
"You would have if I hadn't broken your
sentence in the middle," he accused, and put a generous portion of pancake
into his mouth. As he chewed he twinkled at me through his pince-nez, and I
felt unaccountably foolish.

 
          
 
"If Susan Gird had truly killed her
father," he resumed, after swallowing, "she would be more adroitly
theatrical. She would weep, swear vengeance on his murderer, and be glad to
hear that someone else had been accused of the crime. She would even invent
details to help incriminate that someone else."

 
          
 
"Perhaps she doesn't know that she killed
him," I offered.

 
          
 
"Perhaps not.
You mean that a new mind, as well as a new body, may invest the werewolf- or
ectoplasmic medium - at time of change."

 
          
 
I jerked my head in agreement.

 
          
 
"Then Susan Gird, as she is normally,
must be innocent. Come, Mr Wills! Would you blame poor old Doctor Jekyll for
the crimes of his alter ego, Mr Hyde?"

 
          
 
"I wouldn't want to live in the same
house with Doctor Jekyll."

 
          
 
Judge Pursuivant burst into a roar of
laughter, at which WilHam, bringing fresh supplies from the kitchen, almost
dropped his tray. "So romance enters the field of psychic research!"
the judge crowed at me.

 
          
 
I stiffened, outraged. "Judge Pursuivant,
I certainly did not
- "

 
          
 
"I know, you didn't say it, but again I
anticipated you. So it's not the thought of her possible unconscious crime, but
the chance of comfortable companionship that perplexes you." He stopped laughing
suddenly. "I'm sorry.
Wills.
Forgive me. I
shouldn't laugh at this, or indeed at any aspect of the whole very serious
business."

 
          
 
I could hardly take real offense at the man
who had rescued and sheltered me, and I said so. We finished breakfast, and he
sought his overcoat and wide hat.

 
          
 
"I'm off for town again," he
announced. "There are one or two points to be settled there, for your
safety and my satisfaction. Do you mind being left alone?
There's
an interesting lot of books in my study. You might like to look at a copy of
Dom Calmet's Dissertations, if you read French; also a rather slovenly Wicked
Bible, signed by Pierre De Lancre. J. W. Wickwar, the witchcraft authority,
thinks that such a thing does not exist, but I know of two others. Or, if you
feel that you're having enough of demonology in real life, you will find a
whole row of light novels, including most of P. G. Wodchouse." He held out
his hand in farewell. "William will get you anything you want. There's
tobacco and a choice of pipes on my desk. Whisky, too, though you don't look
like the sort that drinks before
noon
."

 
          
 
With that he was gone, and I watched him from
the window. He moved sturdily across the bright snow to a shed, slid open its
door and entered. Soon there emerged a sedan, old but well-kept, with the judge
at the wheel. He drove away down a snow-filled road toward town.

 
          
 
I did not know what to envy most in him, his
learning, his assurance or his good-nature. The assurance, I decided once; then
it occurred to me that he was in nothing like the awkward position I held. He
was only a sympathetically - but why was he that, even? I tried to analyze his
motives, and could not.

 
          
 
Sitting down in his study, I saw on the desk
the Montague Summers book on werewolves. It lay open at page 111, and my eyes
lighted at once upon a passage underscored in ink - apparently some time ago,
for the mark was beginning to rust a trifle. It included a quotation from
Restitution of Decayed Intelligence, written by Richard Rowlands in 1605:

 
          
 
. . . were-wolves are certaine sorcerers, who
hauvin annoynted their bodyes, with an oyntment which they make by the instinct
of the deuil; and putting on a certain inchanted girdel, do not only vnto the
view of others seeme as wolues, but to their own thinking haue both the shape
and the nature of wolues so long as they weare the said girdel. And they do
dispose theselves as uery wolues, in wurrying and killing, and moste ofhumaine
creatures.

 
          
 
This came to the bottom of the page, where
someone, undoubtedly Pursuivant, had written: "Ointment and girdle sound
as if they might have a scientific explanation," And, in the same script,
but smaller, the following notes filled the margin beside:

 
          
 
Possible Werewolf Motivations

 
          
 
I. Involuntary lycanthropy.

 
          
 
1. Must have blood to drink (connection with
vampirism?).

 
          
 
2. Must have secrecy.

 
          
 
3. Driven to desperation by contemplating
horror of own position.

 
          
 
II. Voluntary lycanthropy.

 
          
 
1. Will to do evil.

 
          
 
2. Will to exert power through fear.

 
          
 
III. Contributing factors to becoming werewolf

 
          
 
1. Loneliness and dissatisfaction.

 
          
 
2. Hunger for forbidden foods (human flesh,
etc.).

 
          
 
3. Scorn and hate of fellow men, general or
specific.

 
          
 
4. Occult curiosity.

 
          
 
5. Simon-pure insanity (Satanist complex).

 
          
 
Are any or all of these traits to be found in
werewolf? Find one and ask it.

 
          
 
That was quite enough lycanthropy for the
present, so far as I was concerned. I drew a book of Mark Twain from the shelf -
I seem to remember it as Tom Sawyer Abroad - and read all the morning.
Noon
came, and I was about to ask the judge's
negro
servant for some lunch, when he appeared in the door
of the study.