An Affair Of Sorcerers

smooth and fitted easily into mine. 'I'm April Marlowe; Kathy's mother.'

I motioned for her to sit down again, then sat beside her. 'How's Kathy?' I asked.

For a moment I thought she was going to cry, but she didn't. 'Dr. Greene says that she seems stable.'

'But she's still in a coma?'

April Marlowe nodded. 'Yes, but I'm confident the doctors are doing all they can.' She paused, dropped her eyes. 'Dr. Greene and my brother told me about all you've done. You saved Kathy from the fire, and I know you're still trying to help. Please don't be offended, but I know you're a professional detective; I'd. . like to pay you.'

'I'm not offended, Mrs. Marlowe, and paying me isn't necessary. Kathy's already taken care of my fee.'

'Kathy-?'

'Never mind; it's not important. I assume Dr. Greene has asked you about Kathy's medical background?'

She nodded slowly. 'Kathy doesn't have any allergies. It seems she's been. . poisoned.' She suddenly reached out and touched my hand. 'Mr. Frederickson, how can I thank you?'

'How long have you been here?'

'Three or four hours,' she said. 'My brother picked me up after he'd spoken with you. Why?'

'Then you haven't eaten?'

She shook her head, clasped her hands together tightly. 'I'm not hungry.'

'I am. If you don't mind eating with an unshaven dwarf, I'd like you to have dinner with me.' She glanced at me quickly, puzzled and perhaps a little frightened. 'I know a nice restaurant in the next block,' I continued. 'I'll leave word at the nurses' station where to reach us if there's a need, but I suspect we could all be in for a long siege. There's nothing to be done here now, so let's eat. I'd like to ask you some questions.'

She thought about it, then gave a barely perceptible nod of her head. I took her elbow and helped her to her feet. I left word at the nurses' station that we'd be at The Granada, and wrote down the number.

'Where's your brother?' I asked the petite woman as we headed toward the elevator. 'Maybe he'd like to go with us; in fact, I'd like it if he did.'

'He won't talk to you,' she said softly. 'He'll find us if he wants to see us.'

It was true that Crandall could always check at the nurses' station to see where we'd gone, but I sensed that April Marlowe hadn't meant it that way. I glanced sideways to see her face, but she was obviously thinking about something else. I guided her into the elevator and pushed the button for the ground floor.

At the restaurant I insisted she have a drink, and she ordered a Dubonnet on the rocks. I felt sufficiently rested to have a double Scotch.

'I can't drink at all,' the woman said, flushing at the first sip of her wine.

'It's all right,' I said, smiling. 'You're in safe hands. Go ahead and drink it; it's good for you.'

The waiter took our order, then brought rolls and butter. April Marlowe absently buttered half a roll, nibbled at it. 'I must apologize for my brother,' she said hesitantly. 'I know he must seem. . strange to you.'

' 'Strange' is a polite way of putting it, Mrs. Marlowe. His niece is dy. . very sick; I'm sure he knows something about this business but he won't say what it is. Now, that does seem 'strange' for a loving uncle. There's prima facie evidence that a crime has been committed, and I think it would be a good idea if the cops sweated him a little.'

'Oh, that wouldn't do any good!' she said quickly, dropping her roll. Her blue-gray eyes were suddenly filled with alarm. 'Daniel loves Kathy; he'd no more hurt Kathy-by omission or commission-than I would.'

'You're not a loony.'

April Marlowe put her elbows on the table, clasped her fingers together under her chin and stared at me. She almost smiled. 'Daniel didn't tell you, did he?'

'Tell me what? Your brother won't even give me name, rank and serial number.'

'Obviously, he didn't tell you that I'm a witch,' the woman said evenly. 'Wicca has been a way of life in my family for generations.' Again she almost smiled. 'We lost three ancestors in the Salem witch trials; two were burned, one was hanged.'

'I didn't mean to offend you, Mrs. Marlowe,' I said quickly, embarrassed.

She took another bite of her roll. As she ate, I noticed that she had a pale brown birthmark on her left cheek; it was a small imperfection that somehow made her even more beautiful. 'You didn't offend me, Mr. Frederickson,' she said. 'You don't know any better because you don't understand. How could you be expected to? There's so much misinformation and prejudice about wicca that you couldn't be expected to know there's more to it than dancing naked around bonfires.'

'I'd like to know more, Mrs. Marlowe. Will you tell me about it? It could help me understand what's happened to Kathy.'

'I don't think it will,' she said distantly. 'The people who have done this thing are as alien to me as they are to you. Wicca is not evil, Mr. Frederickson; it's neither good nor evil, any more than Christianity, in itself, is good or evil-despite the evil that some men have done in Jesus' name. Wicca is simply an Earth religion which emphasizes sensitivity to the natural forces in the world around us. A Sabbat is no different from any other religious ceremony.'

'Except that your average participant at a prayer meeting isn't trying to do tricks,' I said-and immediately regretted it, because I recognized almost as soon as the words were out that I was wrong.

And the woman knew I was wrong. She smiled gently, as at a child. 'Wicca, among other things, teaches that you can change your life-and the lives of others-through an intimate relationship with Nature. 'Tricks' aren't really the point; the witch is concerned with that part of human consciousness we refer to as the 'deep mind,' which is really a commonly shared racial consciousness. It's true there are mysteries involved in what we believe-numbers, dates of the year and so on. But that's true of all religions.'

She sipped delicately at her wine, patted her mouth with her linen napkin. 'It's really very simple,' she continued quietly. 'Wicca requires no massive organizational structure, no ornate buildings for worship, and no money to sustain it. In this sense, it's very close to what the early Christians practiced. In fact, the reason why witches were burned was primarily socioeconomic, and the church knew exactly what it was doing.'

'You see, in the 1600s the vast majority of people were peasants, and they practiced wicca. This posed a threat to the social and economic well-being of the rich landowners who controlled the Church; their answer to the problem was to start burning people.' She paused and smiled disarmingly. 'So much for a very biased history lesson. Anyway, we believe that the best way of nurturing and refining our deep minds is through the coven.'

'Daniel doesn't belong to a coven.'

'That's true, but what Daniel tries to do is far beyond what most witches concern themselves with.'

'I've heard him compared to a priest.'

'That's a good analogy,' April Marlowe said thoughtfully, nodding in agreement. 'He works on his own deep mind, and the deep minds of others, alone-without the protection of a group. That can be dangerous. Daniel eventually reached a point where a higher plane of consciousness and control could only be reached by going on alone. That was when he started on the road of the ceremonial magician.'

'A hard road, I take it.' I felt sarcastic, hoped I didn't sound it.

'Yes,' the woman replied evenly.

I picked up a roll, slowly and meticulously buttered it. 'Mrs. Marlowe, I don't know anything about the tough life of a ceremonial magician, but it seems to me that your brother is playing spiritual games at a risk to Kathy's life.'

'No,' she said quickly. 'I trust and respect Daniel. Whatever he does, he does for a reason. And he always goes his own way, even if that way is incomprehensible to others.'

I vividly remembered the force of Crandall's tap on my forehead, and the hypnotic power of his presence. 'What if thirteen of these ceremonial magicians got together and formed their own coven?'

She thought about it, shrugged. 'Well, you'd certainly have a powerful coven-at least, in theory. Who knows what would happen? I've never heard of such a thing. I know that's not much of an answer, but it's an odd question. I can't think of any reason why a group of ceremonial magicians would want to form a coven.'

'Maybe they'd want to burn a man to death and poison his daughter.'