Mirkwood: A Novel About J.R.R. Tolkien

“Ah, yes. The Professor had worked out several invented Elvish languages from remnant sources, the Welsh Karbindoos for one. But these documents only showed that his languages were a pale imitation of the reality. The power and breadth of true Elvish, even slightly comprehended, is breathtaking. It captivates the reader like a fly in a web. That’s why I came back to the United States. I was overwhelmed. I fell away. I had to. The Professor, stalwart to the grit, stayed to his task. But I’ve disclosed too much already.”

“So you still remember how to read it?”

“You don’t ‘remember’ this thing. It’s really a logic path, and a dense one. Not unlike the organic chemistry I once knew. Of course, as I discovered, there are deeper subtleties. Elf can be playful or diabolical. It deliberately misleads. It hides. It reserves its true import for the, shall we say, native speaker. So grazing on the most amateurish level, I can translate some and do a passable, if unsophisticated, job. If you’ve got someone else for the task let me know.”

Perplexed, Cadence tented her hands, bit her thumbs, and looked back into those sad eyes. The man behind those eyes wasn’t needy, he was lost. She decided to take a chance. “Great, so you can decipher some of these documents?”

“Look, I still am the novice on this, which is to say, the wise king in the world of the utterly clueless. Which is pretty good. I can probably translate the ones in basic Elf. The ones that look like Old English or Anglo-Saxon, that not even Chaucer would’ve found readable, no. There was once a kind of key, and to get anywhere we would need that.”

The fall of a book in some nearby stacks, like an angry clap, startled them both.

Osley leaned down to the tabletop and whispered like a wind battering against the eaves. The voice of the prophet returned.” We have talked like fools! We must leave at once. First I, then you follow.”

Then he stopped. A curtain inside him seemed to part. “Those … long ago things that stalk and edge closer. They have reappeared. They grow desperate enough to approach the watch fire of our diligence. Cadence, be careful. I will tell you more when I can. I will see you at the West End Bar. Tomorrow at ten.”

“In the morning?” But he was gone. This guy had a tedious way of coming and going. And he never told her where those archives were.

That evening Cadence found Osley’s trail on Wikipedia, the article dated March 2, 2005:

Osley, Ludwin A.

Legendary elusive genius and fugitive chemist, Osley was a follower of the LSD cult of Dr. Timothy Leary (“Tune In, Turn On, Drop Out”). He pioneered the mass-production of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) in the early 1960s, while he was still an undergraduate at the University of California at Berkeley. His academic records, partially missing, state that he was admitted to UC Berkeley at the age of 16 from Los Gatos High School. He had a double major of organic chemistry and linguistics. Osley branded LSD capsules he mass-produced as “Osley’s Blue-Dot.” He operated out of mobile laboratories hidden in semi-trailers that crisscrossed the United States.

Sought by FBI and state authorities in numerous jurisdictions, Osley was reportedly non-violent and apolitical. He associated with “psychedelic” rock bands such as Lothar and the Hand People, Country Joe and the Fish, and Electric Banana. There are no known photographs or fingerprints, and his California DMV records are missing. He frequented legendary venues such as The Family Dog emporiums on Filmore Street in San Francisco and Colfax Avenue in Denver.

Osley was last seen in August, 1967. He was dropped from the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives List in 1975.

Cadence fidgeted with the Wikipedia article, checking the footnotes and clicking through links to old articles in the Los Angeles Times and Rolling Stone. She leaned back and sized up her situation. For some reason, she was sure he posed no danger. The danger was in the terrain they were traversing.

She felt like a small forest animal, easing through the oneway gate in a camouflaged live trap. She was inching forward, tantalized by the elusive, irresistible scent of a secret.

Chapter 18 OCTOBER 23

The next day Cadence had a hunch. She decided go back to the library to check on her own on Professor Tolkien’s brief visit at Columbia. Charming an intern at the research desk paid big dividends. In that random way that old records yield clues, the intern found a batch of index cards, held together with disintegrating rubber bands, crammed in a drawer. There, miraculously, was a card for the Professor’s materials left behind when he departed the University so long ago.

An hour later, she stood, backpack and notepad in hand, at the entrance to C-ar-47. The notation, inscribed like runes over the arched brick entrance, was itself a relic. It predated by ages the cataloguing systems of Mr. Dewey and the Library of Congress. The intern told Cadence the code referred to the seldom-visited “inactive archives” section of the library. “You know, where they keep the stuff no one ever wants to see, but they’re not supposed to throw away?”

“Like what?” she asked, milking him for more information.

“Like old handwritten notes, lecture transcripts — there’s a box or so for every professor who ever taught here or even just visited and didn’t take it with him. Sometimes the boxes are books and office stuff, you know pictures, paperweights — that kinda thing.”

“So, how do I find something in particular?”

“Alphabetical, by last name. If it’s not there, then by year. If nothing turns up, try by subject or just snoop. It’s all a mess.”

“Ooo-kay, but …”

“And here’s the catch. After I unlock this door,” he had his hand on the steel cage door that ran almost to the top of the arch, “you’re on your own. There’s a sort of diagram of the place over there on the wall, but don’t trust it too much. When people do come down here, they’re always complaining that they got lost. No one’s scheduled down here through this weekend. Not many people know it exists. Anyway, this door only opens from the outside. Entry, no exit. The only way out is down at the far, far end. You’ll find it.”

She wasn’t so sure. He turned the key and pulled open the door with a disquieting heave. After a squeal of rusty iron hinges, he extended his arm to usher her in.

He shut the gate behind her, wished her good luck, and left.

The diagram was in a dusty frame on the wall and wasn’t very helpful. Several labels had been crossed out and written over. She studied it anyway, especially the long corridor that seemed to lead to a stairs down to a warren of stacks that was a virtual maze. Then she stepped around a corner and saw the corridor. It led off into an indistinct haze. Occasional high windows, mullioned and unwashed for decades, dotted one side of the corridor, filtering a thin, grey light past a barrier of dirt and cobwebs. Dust motes floated lazily in the few intact rays. The shadows of tree branches moved like snakes across the linoleum floor.

She stood and stared. This undulating floor, leading down this mystic hallway, was a crossing. Her heart thudded in tandem with jumpy internal juju drums that talked up and down her spine. As she prepared to move forward, she knew her steps, once taken, could not be retraced.

So here I go! She stepped forward with an explorer’s panache.

She made it all the way to the end of the corridor, and then down the dim stairs into the maze of shelving, before she heard the sound.

Like a doe hearing a fallen branch, Cadence froze. In the waiting silence, she recalled and interpreted the sound: the furtive movement of feet and rustle of clothing by someone sneaking. Now the only sound was the hiss of a radiator. It was as if they were waiting — each for the other — with the infinite patience of the hunting ritual. Cadence the Hunted held perfectly still. She looked carefully and made out the shadow of a bookcase, tilted and surreal, along one wall. There was a silhouette attached to it. Tall and thin and still, as if waiting. A man. No mistake.

She couldn’t wait anymore. She grabbed a heavy book off a shelf and stepped forward. Provoke the thing. It did not move. She stepped again and came around the corner of the bookcase. She was met by an untended cart,