An Affair Of Sorcerers

April Marlowe's eyes widened. 'I don't understand what you're getting at.'

'Your brother doesn't talk to you very much either, does he?'

She was about to reply when the waiter brought our food-paella for two. April Marlowe ate and sipped at her wine, and she began to look more relaxed. I felt better too. For a few minutes the nightmare I'd been living for almost twenty-four hours was put at a distance, and I was simply having dinner with a beautiful woman. The mood lasted only as long as it took us to finish our dinner; the fact that the woman's daughter was dying only a city block away was too real and terrible to suppress for long.

'There are rumors that a ceremonial magician by the name of Esobus has set up just such a supercoven,' I said as I signaled the waiter for coffee.

'I don't think that's true,' she said evenly. 'There's been talk of this Esobus for years, but I think he's just a myth. No one could be as powerful as Esobus is supposed to be.'

'Just how powerful is that?'

She considered it for a few moments, then said: 'That's hard to explain without getting into a discussion of the 'tricks' that you don't believe in. Anyway, Esobus is supposed to be a 'black' magician dedicated to evil.'

'So I've been told. Have you ever heard anyone's real name associated with Esobus?'

She shook her head. 'Not with the Esobus we're talking about. Oh, from time to time some witch will adopt the name, but those people are just silly dilettantes. 'Esobus' is a very powerful name. Any ceremonial magician powerful enough to assume that mantle simply wouldn't; he'd adopt a name of his own. That's why I doubt this Esobus is anything more than a legend.'

'This particular legend may have stolen your former husband's book of shadows.'

She put down her coffee cup, frowned. 'What on earth are you talking about?'

'Daniel didn't mention that either?'

April Marlowe slowly shook her head. 'What would there be to tell me? Frank wasn't a witch. On the contrary, he always thought wicca was a big joke.'

Chapter 8

The mysterious, many-mooded creature that is the New York night somehow reminded me of a number of things, including Vincent Smathers; its body was a complex game board of light and dark where there were as many games as there were people and you never knew what move to expect next. Where we were, the beast was feeling good; the block between the restaurant and the hospital was brightly lighted. Children played stickball in the street, using potholes for bases. Older boys and men played basketball and paddleball in a lighted playground in the middle of the block.

As we slowly walked, I told April Marlowe everything I'd learned. She listened with growing agitation, knotting and unknotting the sleeve of the light sweater she'd thrown over her shoulders.

'I just don't understand any of it,' she said when I'd finished. 'Kathy told you that either Esobus or Daniel stole Frank's book of shadows?'.

'That's right,' I said, gently easing her down on a bench under a mercury lamp in a corner of the playground. 'Apparently, she heard him talking to himself.'

'Frank certainly did talk to himself, but I wasn't aware he was even interested in wicca.'

'Well, it's obvious he was. It's also obvious that he was killed-and Kathy probably poisoned-by occultists, most likely witches.'

'But Daniel? They only met once, at some family gathering, and they didn't show any particular interest in each other. If they ever saw each other after that, no one ever mentioned it to me. Even if Daniel had found out that Frank was into wicca, why steal Frank's book of shadows? It doesn't make any sense.'

'Whatever happened makes sense to Daniel, Mrs. Marlowe. I'm certain of it. What I told him about your former husband and Kathy upset him, sure. . but I don't think he was really surprised.'

She put her head in her hands, rubbed her temples. 'I'm sorry,' she whispered. 'It's all just. . totally incomprehensible to me.'

We sat in silence for a few minutes. I lighted a cigarette, offered her one. She declined. 'Please tell me about Frank, Mrs. Marlowe,' I said.

'Please call me April.'

'All right. If you'll call me Mongo.'

She looked up, raised her eyebrows slightly. 'Mongo?'

'It's a circus name.'

'You used to be in the circus?'

'But of course,' I said, smiling. 'Don't you know that the circus is dwarf heaven?' That usually got at least a chuckle from most people; April Marlowe just stared at me. 'I was billed as Mongo the Magnificent,' I continued. 'The name stuck.'

'I'll tell you about Frank,' the woman said softly. 'But first you have to tell me about the time you spent with the circus.'

I did, and was surprised at how easily it all came out. The years I'd spent with the circus were, overall, a painful memory for me. I'd used the money I'd earned to finance my studies. In the course of my earning a Ph.D., the university and I had made the mutual discovery that I was good with students; I'd accepted their offer of a faculty position. The private-detective business had come later, I wasn't rich, but I was reasonably happy. That was what I told April Marlowe.

She'd listened intently, with an interest that I found absurdly flattering. 'You're a fascinating man,' she said evenly. 'From circus headliner to college professor and private detective.'

'Oh, just an average superdwarf.'

She still didn't smile. 'Your self-mockery doesn't always become you,' she said somewhat sternly. 'You're a very remarkable man. Since you're no longer a circus performer, I think I'll call you Robert-if you don't mind.'

I still felt like a performer; I'd always feel like a performer. But I said, 'I don't mind, but no one else is going to know whom you're talking about.'

'You asked about Frank,' she said with a curt nod. 'As I'm sure you know, he was a very successful writer. What you may not know is that he was a very unhappy one.'

'That's not unusual for creative types.'

She shook her head. 'This is more than that. He'd been unhappy for years with the work he was doing. He considered it all junk-and I suppose he was right. You may not realize this-how could you? — but Frank could have been a good writer; he had a lot more talent than you'd suppose from just reading those series genre books he churned out. He felt trapped-felt he'd trapped himself, really. He was making a great deal of money from the stuff he was writing. Naturally, his publisher couldn't get enough of it. But more than anything else he wanted to write what he referred to as a 'big book,' by which he simply meant a good book. He wanted to write something he could put his own name on and be proud of. It ate at him for years-and it finally cost us our marriage. It must have gotten even worse, because I know he was drinking quite a lot this last year.'

The paddleballers on the court nearest us were arguing over one of the players' calls. I'd happened to be looking in their direction while April was talking. When they glanced over at me, I signaled that the ball had been out over the back line. There was some grumbling from the losing side over how I could make a call from so far away, but they went back to their game.

'Why didn't he just write his 'big' book, or at least take a crack at it?' I asked, turning back to April. 'He certainly had enough money to tide him over.'

She thought about it, shrugged. 'I really don't know, Robert. He was so used to what he was doing. Also, of course, his publisher wasn't interested in publishing the kind of 'straight' book he wanted to do; he was under constant pressure to keep turning out the genre books.'