home from a bookseller’s in Cheapside, a shockingly deformed old man hunched and flapped up to Doyle, seeming to propel himself as much by the swimming motions of his driftwood hands as by the use of his feet. The bald head that stuck out from the collection of ancient clothing like a mushroom growing on a compost heap had at one time suffered a tremendous injury, for the nose, the left eye and the left half of the jaw were gone, replaced by deeply guttered, knotted scar tissue. When the old wreck stopped in front of Doyle, Doyle had already dug into his pocket and produced a shilling.
But the creature was not begging. “You, sir,” the old man cackled, “look like a man who’d like to go home. And I think,” he winked his eye, “your home lies in a direction we couldn’t point our finger at, hey?”
Doyle looked around in a sudden panic, but didn’t see anyone who seemed to be confederates of this ruinous person. Perhaps he was just one of the ubiquitous street lunatics, whose line of gibberish chanced to have a seeming reference to Doyle’s situation. He probably meant Heaven or something. “What do you mean?” Doyle asked cautiously.
“Heh heh! Do you think maybe that Doctor Romany is the only one that knows where the gates of Anubis will open, and when? Think again, Ben! I know ‘em, and there’s one I could take you to today, Jay.” He giggled—an appalling sound, like marbles rolling down metal stairs. “It’s just across the river. Want to see?”
Doyle was bewildered. Could this man truly know the location of a gap? He certainly knew about them, at least. And the gaps are supposed to be frequent around now; it’s not unlikely that there’d be one open on the Surrey-side.
“But,” he said, “who are you? And what will you get out of showing me the way home?”
“Me? I’m just an old man who happens to know something about magic. As to why I want to do you this service,” he giggled again, “it might be that I’m not exactly a friend of Doctor Romany’s, mightn’t it? A case could be made for it being Romany I have to thank for this.” He waved at the destroyed side of his face. “So. Interested? Want to come see the gate that will—or has, or is—taking you home?”
Lightheadedly Doyle said, “Yes.”
“Come on, then.” Doyle’s devastated guide set off energetically down the pavement, again seeming to swim as much as walk, and Doyle started to follow but halted when he noticed something. Dry leaves were clustered in waves along the pavement, and when the old man trod on them they didn’t crackle.
He turned his awful face back toward Doyle when he noticed he had stopped. “Hasten, Jason,” he said.
Doyle shrugged, resisted a sudden impulse to cross himself, and followed. They crossed the river by Blackfriars Bridge, neither of them saying much, though the old man seemed to be as pleased as a child on Christmas morning who, now that everybody is home from Mass, is finally allowed to go into the room where the presents are. He led Doyle down Great Surrey Street and then to the left down one of the narrower streets and finally to a high brick wall that completely enclosed one fairly large lot. There was a stout-looking door in the wall, and with a grin and a horrible raising of both eyebrows, the old man held up a brass key.
“The key to the Kingdom,” he said.
Doyle hung back. “This gate today just happens to be behind a door you’ve got a key to?”
“I’ve known… for quite a while!… what was here,” the old man said, almost solemnly. “And I bought this lot, for I knew you’d be coming.”
“So what is it?” Doyle asked nervously. “A long-term gap, is that what you’re saying? But it’s no good to me until it ends.”
“It’ll be a gate when you get to it, Doyle, there’s no doubt on that score.”
“You make it sound like I’m to die in there.”
“You won’t die today,” said his guide. “Nor any day to come.”
The old man was turning the key in the lock, and Doyle stepped back, but looked on uneasily. “You think not, huh?”
“I know not.” The door was unlocked, and the old man pushed it open.
Whatever Doyle had expected to see, it was not the grassy lot visible through the doorway, with the weak September sunlight shining on the weather-rounded lumps of masonry broken long ago. The old man had scuttled inside, and was picking his way over the green hillocks; Doyle gathered his nerve, clenched his fists and leaped through the doorway.
Aside from the old man and himself and the remains of ancient walls thrusting up through the grass, the walled-in lot was completely empty. The old man was blinking his one eye at him, surprised by the suddenness of Doyle’s entrance. “Close the door,” he said finally, and returned his attention to whatever he’d been grubbing at in the dirt.
Doyle closed the door without letting it lock and strode over to his peculiar guide. “Where’s the gate?” he asked impatiently.
“Look at these bones.” The old man had pulled a piece of canvas away from a pile of very old-looking bones, some of them blackened as if by fire. “Here’s a skull,” he said, holding up a battered ivory sphere on which the cheek and jaw bones clung tenuously.
“My God,” said Doyle, a little repelled, “who cares? Where’s the goddamn gate?”
“I bought this place many years ago,” said the old man reminiscently, speaking to the skull, “just so I could show you these bones.”
Doyle let his breath out in a long hiss. “There is no gate here, is there?” he said wearily.
The old man looked up at him, and if his scarred face bore any expression, it was unreadable. “You’ll find a gate here. I hope you’re as eager to pass through it then as you are now. Do you want to take this skull with you?”
Just a street lunatic after all, Doyle thought, with some knowledge of the magical hierarchy in London. “No, thank you.” He turned and plodded away over the unmowed grass.
“Look for me again under different circumstances!” called the old man.
* * *
When, promptly at noon on Saturday, Steerforth Benner strode in through the open doorway of Jonathen’s Coffee House, Doyle saw him and waved, and pointed at the empty chair on the other side of the table at which he’d been sitting for half an hour. Benner’s boot heels rapped on the wood floor as he crossed the room, pulled out the chair and sat down. He stared at Doyle with a belligerence that seemed to be masking uncertainty. “Were you early, Doyle, or did I misremember the hour of our appointment?”
Doyle caught the eye of a waiter and pointed at his coffee cup and then at Benner; the waiter nodded as he tapped up the three steps to the main floor. “I was early, Benner. You did say noon.” He looked more closely at his table mate—Benner’s eyes seemed to be a bit out of focus. “You all right? You look… hung over or something.”
Benner looked at him suspiciously. “Hung over, you say?”
“Right. Out late drinking last night, were you?”
“Ah! Yes.” The waiter arrived with his cup of steaming coffee, and Benner hastily ordered two kidney pies. “No better remedy for the effects of overindulgence than a bit of food, eh?”
“Sure,” said Doyle unenthusiastically. “You know, we’re both going to have some readjustment to do when we get back—you’ve not only picked up an accent, you’re using archaic phrasing, too.”
Benner laughed, but it seemed forced. “Well, of course. It’s been my intention to seem… indigenous to this ancient period.”
“I think you’re overdoing it, but never mind. Have you got it all set up?”
“Oh yes, yes of course, no problem at all.”
Doyle reflected that Benner must be very hungry, for he kept looking around impatiently for the waiter. “The girl will do it?” Doyle asked.
“Certes the girl will do it, she’ll do it splendid. Where in hell is that man with our pies?”
“Screw the goddamn pies,” said Doyle impatiently. “What’s the story? Has there been a hitch? How come you’re acting so strangely?”
“No no, no hitch,” said Benner. “I’m just hungry.”
