In the Court of the Yellow King (31 page)

The last stop on the tour was the Morgue. Hef’s connections in the city had managed to get him the loan of a number of well-chilled cadavers who were probably getting more action now than they ever had in life. Soft, soothing organ music drifted from the speakers, and many of the bodies were laid out in coffins capacious enough for their “mourners” to climb in with them and try to pump a bit of rejuvenation back into them. Hef knew good and well that it would not be too long before he joined their ranks, and not just in pretense. It would not be long at all. Hell. He was ninety years old this very day! But he planned on making every day count.

By this time, Hef’s virtually vestigial member was throbbing like the old days. It had taken quite a show to build him up to this, but he could tell it was racing toward him now. So he had his nurse wheel him back to the banquet hall and then rang the bell signaling his guests to reassemble there. He found he could not wait for all of them, but most were there, distinctly annoyed, straightening their costumes and trying to shake off their recent berserker lust.

The nurse pulled the hems of Hef’s robe aside and noted with pleasure the first solid erection her ancient boss had managed in many a year. She knew she dared not waste time, so she helped him into a large, stationary, cushioned chair, where she proceeded to sit astride him and lower herself onto his standing lance. This she did with increasing rapidity as the crowd looked on, some cringing, others applauding. At last Hef’s orgasm exploded as the old man screamed. His cry of joy segued seamlessly into a death rattle as the exertion proved too much for his corrupt old heart. He slumped over, as his horrified nurse climbed off him, wiping herself with his robe. She had not counted on a necrophiliac lap-dance.

In the ensuing melee, with coated physicians and paramedics rushing to the platform (they had never been far from their aging employer), no one took much notice of one more figure making his way onto the stage. But as the men with the stethoscopes shook their heads and stepped back, this robed and hooded figure, sporting a color very close to the lemon yellow preferred by the late pornographer, stepped to the front of the dais and spoke with a clear, cold voice that seemed to carry everywhere without rising noticeably.

“Hoyt Hefti is dead.”

Was this man, in costume like the audience, about to deliver a eulogy? Had this, like all the other bizarre details, been planned from the start? Was it all a skit, a cruel joke?

“Okay, who are
you
supposed to be?” shouted an Oscar-winning actress, her gown stained with semen and blood.

“I am the Phantom of Truth. I bring the truth to those who lack it.”

“
What
truth?”

“And take that damn
mask
off! Show some respect for the dead!”

“And what are we supposed to do
now
? We can’t have the police come in here to take the body!...”

His empty tones brought silence, perhaps from mounting fear: “I wear no mask,” though his face did appear to be tightly bound in featureless white linen. “As to what you shall do, that depends. It is up to you. But first hear my truth. Your host contrived to film your unspeakable revels. He required money and planned to release the films to the media if you did not pay him great sums.”

Eyes widened at this, brows wrinkled, faces reddened, mouths muttered agitation, indignation, nothing intelligible except for outrage and panic.

“But I have altered his plan.” Some vague signs of relief followed this, a few smiles.

“I have seen to it that the cameras fed what they witnessed directly to the news bureaus. They have it even now.”

There was weeping and gnashing of teeth.

“Perhaps you will dare to face opprobrium and censure and prosecution. But I have a way in which you may avoid it if you wish.”

Though the terminal issue of
Layboy
did not carry the story, all other media outlets did. The once-billionaire magnate of Layboy Enterprises and his hundreds of birthday guests were discovered stone-cold dead the next day by a delivery man who rang the bell for minutes on end, trying to rid himself of a crate of sex toys and another, a case of absinthe. Looking through the nearest window, he beheld the carnage. It reminded him of that nursery rhyme with the phrase “We all fall down,” only nobody here was liable to be getting up again. Autopsies were indeterminate. There were some indications consistent with poison gas, though no actual trace of any such substance could be detected.

The only corpse clad in yellow silk was Hoyt Hefti.

y apologies, I did not mean to scare you. Most mornings I wake screaming. I have bad dreams, but those dreams, they help keep me sane. The fact that such things still terrify me, in an odd way I find comforting. My sister likes to say that I came back from the war changed, others nod and whisper words like “shell-shock,” but it wasn’t the war that did this to me. It was something worse, something far worse.

It was after the war—I was still in Paris working as security for the American delegation to the Treaty of Versailles. I was on leave following a disagreeable turn of events involving a strange estate on the outskirts of the city and a rather disreputable doctor who, like me, was from Arkham. The Major had given me some time off and I had squandered most of it by wandering through the streets of the city, searching for something, though what exactly I cannot say. There was a sense of ennui within my soul, a longing that cried out to be fulfilled, but try as I might I could not find what I needed. Unable to satisfy myself I instead indulged in more earthly delights.

It was thus that I found myself one night on the balcony of the hotel that many of our mission had laid claim to. I was intoxicated, but not incapacitated. I was enjoying the view—the balcony was five stories above the square, and provided an excellent point from which to observe the comings and goings of those below, without being too close to those sometimes maddening crowds. As I have said, I was intoxicated, lost in the drink and the beauty of the city, for suddenly I was no longer alone at the ledge. There was a woman standing next to me, staring wistfully out at the city lights and its people. She was an attractive young woman, in a European way, but she was also disheveled. Her clothes were ragged, some of her hair had broken free from where she had pinned it, and three of her fingernails on one hand were broken.

She was uncomfortably close, and when I cleared my throat to gain her attention she stared at me with such a wild look in her eyes, such madness and fear, I was suddenly taken aback. I recognized her, a girl from Guernsey, a singer, or at least a student of the art. She was fluent in both English and French, and therefore had been useful to us in the past. Her name was Evelyn—it seemed to me most girls from Guernsey were named Evelyn—and she looked at me with a touch of madness in her eyes.

Her voiced cracked as she spoke, “Have you seen the prints?”

I stuttered out a puzzled: “I beg your pardon?”

There was a book in her hand, a folio of some kind. She offered it to me. “The prints, have you seen the sepia prints?” The book slipped from her fingers and tumbled to the ground, its contents, photographs, spilled out and scattered across the stones of the balcony, like dry leaves in a light breeze, falling to earth, but with no intent of staying there.

My eyes caught hers, and there was a tear. “The prints,” she whispered.

“Not to worry,” I said kneeling down to gather up the images and the book itself. They were indeed sepia prints. As I crouched there by her feet I saw her weight shift. Her feet rose off from the ground. A shoe, black, shiny, but scuffed, fell back down. I put out a hand to catch it and as I did rose up as well, offering the errant shoe to the young lady like some prize, as if I were a conquering knight.

She was gone.

I was alone.

I searched the balcony, but to no avail.

A puzzled word slipped through my lips, “Where?”

I stood there, a woman’s shoe in one hand, and half a dozen prints in the other. At my feet the folio blew open and more of the sepia-tinted prints leaked out. I was staring at the space where she had been, where she no longer was, and could see nothing but the spot on the railing that had once been covered with a fine growth of ivy, which now was torn and broken.

Then I heard the screams from below, and with a casual glance saw what had caused them. Evelyn was there on the square below, her arms and legs at impossible angles. Her other shoe was rocking back and forth on the masonry like a ship tossed on the sea. Her head had caught the garden fence and had been impaled with such force that it had been torn from her body. It stared back up at me with wide open eyes; eyes that I swore were still filled with fear and madness.

I didn’t wait for the authorities. It would take time to deal with the local police, and they had no love for us Americans. They would have questions, but I had no answers. I didn’t really know the woman, barely knew her name, had barely spoken ten words to her—was it even ten words? They would want to take the book, the folio of prints, but it was the only clue I had, and I needed it. If I were to figure this thing out, I would have to start somewhere. The book was as good a place as any. I cannot even today say why I did this thing. I just did it. As I have said, I was searching for something to fulfill myself, and this girl’s death, or more importantly, understanding the impetus for her death, seemed to provide a taste of what I needed.

I gathered up the loose prints and the thin book that had once held them. I sprinted down the winding stairs, down the hall and out the back door. Leaving the alleyway, I slowed my pace and merged into the pedestrians that were moving along the street. The Mission had another house, a place several blocks away that we used to lodge dignitaries or visitors. I knew it was empty and made my way there, trying not to draw attention to myself as I weaved through the crowd.

In the safety of that anonymous townhouse I held the book and in the dim light examined it and tried to put it in order. It was bound in black leather, but that was faded in spots, frayed at the corners, broken in places along the spine. Traces of gold inlay revealed that there had been stamped letters on the cover once, but the majority of them had been worn away, leaving only a few specks of precious metal here and there. Even the letters themselves had nearly faded completely away. At first glance I thought that the repair of the book would take a significant amount of time, but I was mistaken. While the prints were all the same size, the stains and stray marks that rimmed the edges made matching each to the correct page much easier, and within hours the book was in order and intact once more, and I was able to examine it in its original state.

Investigations begin in odd ways, and no two are alike. The exact way to start is driven by the antecedent conditions, the style of those investigating, and the available clues. I only had two pathways to follow: I could investigate the woman, delve into her personal life and her work, or I could begin with the book. Reasoning that any conversation with family, friends, or coworkers would eventually be tied back to the book, I decided to begin there. It was, after all, already in my possession. It was perhaps the best place to start, and so I began my examination in earnest.

Though the letters on the cover were gone, the title page made it clear what the collection of photographs was. I did not even need to translate from French, for the title was repeated in English.

I knew the Palais Garnier by its more common name the Paris Opera House, a magnificent edifice, a cornerstone of Parisian society, albeit one that was occasionally drenched in a little blood. Since the building had been completed there had been rumors that it was haunted, and these rumors came to a head in the early 1880s with the strange affair of the Opera Ghost. That phantom was not the only scandal that had befallen the opera house, for there were still rumors of strange figures haunting the halls, balconies and alleyways of the edifice. Indeed, I recalled some mention of a fire that had taken the lives of an entire cast, and even some audience members.

Below the title there was a stamp in blue ink that identified the book as part of the collection of the Bibliothèque-Musée de l’Opéra, a library with which I was not familiar. I consulted a guide book and learned that the library-museum was attached to the Paris Opera House and served as an archive of both the opera house itself and of opera in general, holding thousands of scores and librettos, as well as costumes, props and memorabilia of performances themselves. This book, it seemed, was part of their archive and documented a lavish performance that had occurred almost two decades earlier.

Lavish was an understatement.

The costuming was magnificently decadent and purposefully grotesque. I had heard stories concerning the Opera’s production of Don Juan Triumphant, but I could not imagine that it was any more extravagant or ostentatious than what was in these images. First, the set was decadently detailed, with great banners and glass chandeliers hanging in the background, while the foreground was reminiscent of the art deco style of designer Erte. There was hedonism rampant in every set piece, and through it all ran a hypnotic triple spiral motif that drew the eye and threatened to make me dizzy. That design, which was a kind of trimaris but only in the most abstract sense, continued into the costumes for each character. It could be found in the lace that trimmed the gowns of the twins Cassilda and Camilla, and in the crown of the regent Uoht, and his wife Cordelia’s headdress. Aldones spectacles were three-lobed, and Thale’s staff bore a triple spiral. It could even be seen in the pale cloak of the Phantom of Truth, and the bindings that held together the Pallid Mask. Only The Stranger seemed to be without any influence from the weird design, and this served to set him apart from the others, to make him an outsider amongst a society of the strange.

Each character was photographed in two costumes, one in a kind of formal attire, and then again in a kind of masquerade, each with its own mask, one simple, one ornate. Heavy makeup had been applied to all the actors which suggested that beneath their masks they were all horrifically scarred. The only exception to this was The Stranger, who had one simple costume and appeared to have only one mask, or perhaps none at all.

As I progressed through the images I began to develop a strange idea, a suspicion really, one that was confirmed with a single ensemble photograph. For each character there were two actors, one in common costume, and the other in fancy masquerade. The resemblance between actors playing the same part was astounding—indeed I suspected that some of them were twins or at least siblings—but there were subtle differences. There was a facial mole in one photo that was absent in another. One actor for Uoht had very different earlobes than the other. The actor playing the fancy Aldones was missing the tip of his left index finger. The girls playing the twins Cassilda and Camilla were no doubt sisters, or perhaps cousins, but certainly part of the same family.

All except The Stranger, of course—he seemed to be played by just one actor.

But then there in the photograph I saw something that suggested that my conclusion was mistaken. There was in that ensemble photograph of the entire cast in costume a plethora of arms. One arm too many to be precise, it was off to the left, and nearly hidden behind the cloak of one of the Phantoms, but it was there. It was right where it should have been if one were to balance out The Stranger on the far side of the photo. An errant arm existed, one belonging to an actor that had been cropped out.

I flipped through the pages more carefully this time and sure enough I found suggestions of him throughout the other images: A shadow figure in the background, a hand that didn’t belong, and a boot that seemed out of place. It was then and only then that I realized I was missing a page. It had been excised, I could see where the leaf had been cut, and the line was smooth and tight to the binding. I had seen other books, rare manuscripts that had been vandalized, and those looked similar to this. Whoever had done this not only wanted to take the images, which could have been done by simply taking the prints, but to erase all trace of their existence and hide what had been done.

Reviewing the images and the death of Evelyn must have had a profound impact on me, for that night my dreams were invaded by the wildest of images. I was sitting on a stage, surrounded by the set from the images. The actors, or more precisely the characters from the prints, were walking around me, and seemed to be engaged in some great undertaking on my behalf, though what it was exactly was unclear. Aldones, the dwarf, seemed to relish what was going on, dancing around me to some strange staccato beat. The twins used me as a maypole, effectively binding me to the chair with ribbons. The giant Thale brought me coffee in an ornate silver cup, but when he saw I couldn’t drink it, my hands being bound by the girls, he sighed and lamented about what he would have to do with the pie he had made.