The Witch of Napoli (11 page)

Everyone turned to Lombardi. I could see he was annoyed at the request, but he nodded and Huxley took command of the evening.

“A dried up old mummy would be a more accurate description, Professor,” Huxley smiled, “but I found Madame Dubrovsky to be an ingenious – one might even say gifted – impostor.

“Her great grandfather served as a General in the army of Catherine the Great, but she inherited a mystical streak, wasting her childhood in his library reading fairy tales, French grimoires, and the mystic Dostoyevsky. After a brief, failed marriage to the vice-governor of Armenia, she escaped to Constantinople where she met up with a Russian countess and the two traveled arm in arm through Egypt and the Middle East.”

Parenti gave Huxley a wink. “Devotees of Sappho, eh?”

Huxley smiled. “Respectable women are not attracted to mediumship, Professor. I find them invariably odd in terms of their sexual appetites. But they eventually separated, and Madame made her way to the caves and jungles of Hindustan, where she found a little, brown-skinned guru and started receiving messages from spirits who called themselves…” Huxley paused to light his cigar, cleverly holding us in suspense before deadpanning “… the Ascended Masters dwelling in the sixth dimension.” He waited for the laughter to subside. “Curiously, these exalted spiritual beings preach a rather disappointing stew of communism, free love, and suffragette nonsense, which our priestess of Isis turned into a queer religion and a profitable book business.”

“I object, sir!” Baranov interjected angrily. “Jesus preached the same message of sharing our wealth with the poor in the Gospels.”

Huxley knocked the ash off his cigar. “Forgive me, Doctor. I’m a lawyer, not a theologian. But I believe you’re mixing up Saint Mark with Karl Marx.”

“
Touché
!” roared Gemelli. Even I had to laugh at that one.

According to Huxley, Dubrovsky bewitched a wealthy American industrialist in London into bankrolling a salon and she set up court, smoking her opium cigarettes and entertaining London’s upper crust at séances where messages of spiritual instruction from the Enlightened Ones mysteriously materialized in the darkness. After the lamps were turned up, Dubrovsky passed around these letters to her astounded sitters. Everyone in London was clamoring for an invitation. The Earl of Sussex attended a séance and suggested the
London Times
do a story on her, and the
Times
asked the Society to check her out first.

“So you somehow managed an invite?” Gemelli asked.

Huxley chuckled. “You don’t turn down a request from the Society. The president’s wife is a cousin of the Prime Minister.”

The Society had been founded by a group of prominent Cambridge academics interested in metaphysics, and the society’s board was loaded with influential, upper crust people, including the editor of the
London Times
. But shortly before the scheduled sitting, Dubrovsky decamped to India with her American millionaire.

It was too late. Huxley was after her.

The Viceroy of India had boarded at Eton with Huxley’s uncle, and hosted Huxley in Bombay where he spent three months investigating her. He discovered one of Dubrovsky’s Hindoo acolytes named Gandhi had studied law in London, and made his acquaintance. Through him, he befriended her personal staff and secretly put two of them on his payroll. They passed on to him copies of Dubrovsky’s personal correspondence and Huxley matched her handwriting to the letters supposedly written by the Enlightened Ones from the astral plane. They also tipped him off to a secret trap door in the ceiling of the séance room in London which allowed Dubrovsky’s confederates to drop the epistles down onto the séance table when the lamps were extinguished.

“Bravo, sir!” Gemelli exclaimed when Huxley finished. “Is every Englishman a Sherlock Holmes? Your race seems to have a passion for police work. Take a bow.”

Huxley smiled. “They were a gang of vulgar tricksters in league with one another.” He turned to Baranov. “It will all end up in my report.”

Baranov reached into his coat, pulled out a telegram, and shook it in Huxley’s face. “And so will my rebuttal, sir! Shame on you! Endorsing the scurrilous lies promoted by two discharged employees – for theft, mind you! – who were only too happy to slander Madame Dubrovsky. She has sent me her side of the story and I intend to make sure it is heard.”

“I look forward to reading it,” Huxley replied coolly. “Meanwhile, Professor Lombardi has been exceptionally patient, so I suggest we cede the floor to him.”

H
uxley could command an audience, but Lombardi matched him that evening.

He described his invitation from Rossi to come to Naples, and his dramatic sitting with Alessandra. Lombardi deliberately left out his mother’s ghost, but his excitement was infectious as he described Alessandra’s bizarre personality transformation, the bell suddenly jerking forward on the table, how it rose slowly in the air and hung there for at least three seconds, even sounding a note before being flung across the room by an unseen hand, and finally the stinging slap to his face from some invisible force.

“I freely confess, before I encountered
Signora
Poverelli I did not consider it worthy of the dignity of a
savant
, and a naturalist, to be present at such spiritistic séances. I shared that degree of distrust and suspicion which should always accompany the observation of the abnormal. Yet these telekinetic phenomena are incontestable facts – for I cannot deny what I have seen with my own eyes.”

He looked around the room.

“However, let me be clear. I do not believe in the supernatural, spirits of the dead, or the absurd doctrines of Spiritualism. The force which moved that bell was not a spirit from a non-existent afterlife. It was produced by the mind of Alessandra herself.”

He described Alessandra’s unhappy childhood, including being forced to witness the murder of her father, powerless to do anything about it. “My hypothesis is that her repressed, inner rage, focused on an object or person, produces the telekinetic levitations, raps, pinches, and blows frequently reported during her sittings. But her most dramatic telekinetic effects are produced when this
soi-disant
Savonarola personality emerges.”

He was used to dealing with psychopaths in his asylum for the criminally insane, but Alessandra’s transformation was unsettling, even to him. He could understand why an earlier, superstitious age believed in demonic possession.

“Frankly, I wasn’t prepared for the hatred which emanated from this Savonarola personality – a rage that was barely contained and, if let loose, appeared capable of wreaking severe injury.”

He stared into space for a moment, then shook his head.

“Many years ago, on a hike through the countryside, I knocked at a farmhouse hoping for a glass of water. The door was flung open, and I was surprised by a vicious dog on a short chain, fangs bared, eyes burning, mere centimeters from my face. Fortunately, the dog’s master had a good grip on his beast.” He grimaced. “I did not get the feeling that
Signora
Poverelli had a secure grip on hers. I hope to explore this with Dr. Freud in Vienna.”

Lombardi paced back and forth, throwing out questions which demanded Science’s attention. Were mediums like Alessandra freaks of nature? Or were we all capable, in certain extreme mental states, of moving objects with our minds? Did weather – temperature, barometric pressure, humidity – have any effect on telekinetic powers? There was so much to learn!
Andiamo!
Let’s go!

The crowd erupted in an ovation of approval, and Gemelli signaled to the waiters to serve the brandy. Lombardi returned his notes to his portfolio, then turned back to his audience.

“I’m sure some of you have questions. Shall we start with our host?”

Gemelli pointed his glass at Huxley. “I’ll defer to our English guest. I’m curious what he has to say about all this.”

Everyone looked at Huxley.

H
uxley stubbed out his cigar, rose to his feet and walked to the front of the room. He stood there for a moment, as if collecting his thoughts, then launched his devastating cross-examination.

“The first question I suggest we ask is not
how
Madame Poverelli’s telekinetic powers work, but whether she
has
any.”

He looked around the room, a condescending smile on his face. “Are we dealing here with telekinesis…or trickery?”

Lombardi stiffened.

Huxley fixed his gaze on Lombardi.

“I presume that Alessandra knew in advance that you would be coming to her apartment? Several days, or even a week before you visited her?”

Lombardi looked puzzled. “She was expecting me, yes. Professor Rossi told her.”

“And the séance took place in Alessandra’s apartment. Is that correct?”

“Yes. I was frankly surprised. I expected it to be held in Professor Rossi’s home.”

“And who changed the location?”

“Professor Rossi.”

“Did he say why?”

“Yes. He said Alessandra felt more comfortable there, and she performed best in familiar surroundings.”

Huxley raised an eyebrow. “So Alessandra knew in advance you were coming, and she picked the place for the séance, her own apartment – a place she is familiar with, a place she has furnished to suit her taste – or her needs….”

Lombardi turned red as it finally dawned on him where Huxley was leading him. “I’m not a fool, Mr. Huxley. I recognized the opportunity this gave to
Signora
Poverelli to cheat if she wanted to. I thoroughly inspected the premises before we began.”

“So you inspected the premises for concealed doors, or hidden mechanical devices. Tell me, Professor – are you familiar with the magician’s trade?”

“No,” Lombardi shot back. “Are you?”

“Oddly enough, Professor, I am. I find that knowledge quite helpful in my business.” He smiled, then continued. “Did Alessandra cooperate with you when you requested permission to search her apartment?”

“Yes. For the most part.”

Huxley cocked his head. “Meaning?”

“
Signora
Damiano objected to having the window closed and locked.”

“
Signora
Damiano, the head of the Spiritualist Society of Naples, and good friend of Alessandra’s. But you wisely insisted, given that it provided access to the room from the outside?

“It was a reasonable request under ordinary circumstances. It was extremely hot and humid that night. But I felt it needed to be closed and locked for my purposes that evening.”

“I applaud your caution, professor. Did your inspection before the séance began also include an inspection of
Signora
Poverelli’s person?”

Lombardi shot him a look of disgust. “No. Is that something you regularly do in your trade, sir?”

Huxley turned to the group. “I’m sure all of us here tonight would enjoy such an assignment,” he said. He waited until the laughter stopped. “Alas, most mediums are reluctant to allow men to play in their petticoats. That’s why I always bring along a woman friend to perform the inspection. Women have been deceiving men since the Garden of Eden. They’ve had centuries of practice.”

“Your suggested protocol is duly noted,” Lombardi replied stonily.

Huxley smiled. “Indeed, we caught one clever vixen bringing to her sittings a bell which she would place on the table – for the ‘spirits’ to ring – while concealing a second bell in her skirt. In the dark, it’s quite difficult to tell exactly where a sound is coming from.”

Huxley paused for a second to let his audience ponder that troubling point, then resumed.

“And the illumination in the room…was the light adequate?

“Bright enough to observe everything clearly, including Alessandra’s movements.”

“But you were not observing in full light?”

“No.”

“And I see you wear…spectacles.”

Huxley picked up his brandy glass, took a sip, then put it back down on the table.

“So let me understand, if I may, Professor. Alessandra knew in advance you were coming, the séance was held in her apartment, you attempted an inspection…”

“
Conducted
an inspection! A damn thorough one!”

“My apologies….conducted an inspection of the apartment, though not an inspection of
Signora
Poverelli’s person, who performed her magic in dim light…”

Lombardi exploded. “Damn you, sir! Enough! I know what I saw that night!”

Baranov hopped to his feet, “Hear! Hear!”

Lombardi stepped towards Huxley, his face flushed, and jabbed his finger in Huxley’s chest. “Do you think I would risk my professional reputation if I weren’t completely convinced of that? Knowing that people like you would be waiting to attack my observations, to ridicule me?”

Gemelli rose from his chair. “Gentlemen! Gentlemen! Please!”

Huxley raised his hands in mock surrender.

“Forgive me, Professor. I wasn’t there, and you were. But if I were a betting man, I’d wager a hundred pounds that your Alessandra is a jumped-up trickster.”

We all let out a gasp.

Huxley dropped his bombshell. “Did you know Alessandra’s first husband was a street magician?”

Lombardi looked like he had been punched in the stomach.

“How would you know that?” he finally said.

Huxley nodded at Renard. Renard looked embarrassed.

“I was told that by Professor Rossi,” Renard said. “I’m not sure how he learned that. But yes, that is what he told me.”

Lombardi looked at Huxley. “Your point?” he said weakly.

“You don’t find it both convenient and suspicious that your Alessandra was married to a magician – and has had twenty years to perfect the tricks she may have learned from him? I think the conclusion is obvious.”

I felt sick.

“Objection, Mr. Huxley.” Renard rose to his feet. “We can all agree that Madam Poverelli had the opportunity to cheat. But the possibility of fraud is not proof of fraud. The question is, did she? What would be helpful is for Madame Poverelli to demonstrate what she can do – under conditions acceptable to an investigator with your experience. May I make a proposal?”