After Anastasia's abduction and the dramatic events that had followed after, I still remained incapable of speech or deed: I was paralysed, a dull spectator in a tense theater.
"My dear, we really must leave now," Lady Rudolphine Bing said gently to me. "The Cardinal and his henchmen might come back at any moment. Drink some brandy."
I heard the words. I knew what they meant. I even knew that I was supposed to answer. But I was incapable of reply. I had to be very careful. The pain in my chest was so intense that I had to watch every breath. I was standing high, very high, precariously, on a tight rope, cradling an infinitely fragile and awkward object in my arms, and I could neither stand still nor walk, and if I fell and the object broke, something terrible would happen, because the fragile thing I was holding was my shattered heart...
I had never before realized that heartbreak is not a metaphor, a convenient figure of speech to use in chaffing conversation with old girlfriends, but that it is a literally true expression of a physical reality. The rending pain in my chest was certainly not metaphorical. It was all I could do to stop myself from screaming aloud at the agony. My head was spinning and I saw little stars before my eyes, cold stars, distant and cruel, mocking my anguish with their indifference. I felt oddly lucid. I knew I was about to faint.
"Drink this," a brusque voice commanded. I gritted my teeth and opened my eyes. Otto Hell stood before me, holding a tumbler full of brandy. With great effort I stopped myself from throwing up. I shook my head from side to side. "Goddamn it, you young fool, drink it, I say!" Hell shouted angrily. I groped for the glass and poured the brandy down my throat. The acrid fumes rose to my head and choked me. I spluttered and coughed. Tears ran down my cheeks. I felt slightly better when I opened my eyes. Hell was still standing there, scowling at me. "Thought I'd told you to follow orders," he said, still angry.
"I don't work for you any longer," I replied hoarsely.
"You'll do what I tell you and you know it."
I looked at Hell sullenly. A sharp anger rose in me with the last brandy fumes. "Who the hell are you to give me orders?" I asked wildly. I closed my eyes. "Goddamn murderer..." My voice trailed off drunkenly.
A strange grating noise roused me, like a rusty chainsaw rasping against sheet metal. Hell was laughing. "Shock therapy. How's your heart?"
I blinked. Hell was right. I was still in pain like I had never felt in my life, a dull bruised ache which permeated every tissue and muscle in my body as though I had been beaten to a pulp, ruthlessly, but the sharp vice around my heart seemed to have disappeared, at least for the time being. On the other hand, I no longer had the hopeful sense that I might die at any moment. I stared at Hell without gratitude. "Just who are you, Lord Hades?" I demanded again, coldly. "How do you know how I feel? And what makes it your business?"
"Told you to call me Otto," Hell replied, glaring at me. "And you know damn well who I am. At least you should. Maybe you would know if you could drag yourself for just a moment out of the nice cozy little mire of self-pity in which you are wallowing." I glared back at him, stung. "Young swine!" Hell bellowed. "Get out of the mire before you drown! There's work to do! Or have you already forgotten Anastasia? Don't you want to see her again? What were her last words before Axel took her away? `Unless'? Unless what?"
I saw the error of my ways and leaped to my feet. I wanted to salute but it seemed too ridiculous. Neither of us was wearing uniform. "What did she mean, Otto?" I asked eagerly. "Unless what?"
"Can't tell you," Hell answered moodily. "Got to figure it out for yourself."
I felt like hitting him. But then I realized that he was right. It was up to me to save Anastasia. What was I to do? Where should I even begin? I sat down and plunged my head in my hands again. It was all too hopeless. I wished I were back in Mongolia.
"Bet your grandfather would tell you the same thing. Begin at the beginning. First of all, stop whining and start thinking," Otto said grumpily. I gaped at him. How the hell did he know...
"What you were thinking?" Hell asked, a wicked glint in his nut-brown eyes. Pipi sidled up to her new fiance, curled about his elbow, and offered him another enormous snifter of cognac. "Later, girl," he said gruffly, taking the cognac without looking at her. "No time for fun. Yet. We've got work to do first." Pipi purred and rubbed herself against him.
I gazed at Hell as though I were seeing him for the first time. The stumpy bent old figure, the dewlapped wrinkled face, the deep grouchy voice, the careless eccentricities of dress, these features with which I had become familiar, and therefore blind, in the days when I worked for Hell at the University of Truth and Justice, stood out for me now in bold relief like a mask painstakingly wrought by the anonymous artisans of an ancient people, and I felt like one of those civilized nineteenth-century barbarians who wrote learned monographs about these peoples but who were too blind to feel the elemental potency of the tribal divinities whose images they took back to their sterile museums and condescendingly labelled primitive art. In that grumpy face, that crusty voice, those hooded eyes, I now saw to my awed amazement a spirit who could never be blinded by the illusory phantasms of desire and fear, untouched by cowardice or greed, ageless, stern, and very noble. Hell was a well too deep for me to plumb yet, but I was content to lower myself into its dark depths and to learn.
"You're already learning," Hell muttered.
I gaped again at the old devil. Ever since we had first met, I had uneasily suspected that Hell could read my mind. Of course, it made communication that much easier. But did I really want my life to be an open book?
"Otto, was that really Axel von Schadenfreude who abducted Anastasia?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"She's his wife, ain't she?"
"What will he do to her?"
"How the devil should I know?" Hell growled. "Only met the feller once. Too churchy for me. Probably make her wear ladylike clothing and drag her to mass every Sunday. Force her to kiss the Pope's hand at glittering Vatikan receptions and to be polite to everyone. Make her clean the house."
"Not that!" I was appalled. I could not imagine a worse torture for my darling witch. I was sure that Anastasia would have preferred to burn at the stake, suffering abominably and yelling foul curses at all around. "How do we get Anastasia out of Axel's clutches?"
"Probably clutching her body right now," Hell said viciously. "Making up for all the years of sexual deprivation ever since she left him."
I yelped in anguish at the thought. Lady Rudolphine looked concerned. "Must you be so graphic, Otto?" she chided.
"He'll make her wear modest cotton pyjamas," Hell continued remorselessly. "Force her to brush her teeth. First prayers. Then sex. She will be constantly pregnant."
"Stop it!" I shrieked, stopping up my ears. "Nobody could be so cruel!"
"He's a good Catholic. He can afford it."
"How can I save her?"
Hell shrugged. "Could try prayer."
"Never," I declared fervently. "But I'd sell my soul to the Devil..."
A broad grin creased Hell's old brown face. "You already have. Let's get to work."
I gulped down the rest of the brandy straight from the bottle and rubbed my hands. I felt the flush of energy which only anger and strong liquor can produce. I was ready for battle. "Where do we start?"
"Good question." Hell looked at me and stayed silent.
I scowled at Hell. He was obviously not going to make this any easier for me. I took a deep breath and dived into a churning whirlpool of feelings. My emotions jostled like snakes in a basket. I nearly gagged as I made contact with my worst fear but held on, drawing it out like a writhing eel, slimy, repulsive, terrifying. "Oh fuck."
"Go on."
"It's my fault, isn't it?"
"What is?"
"Anastasia's kidnapping. It's my fucking fault."
"How?"
"Axel didn't come here tonight to stop Prince Ludwig's suicide. He came with his men because he knew Anastasia was here. Who told Axel?"
"Ludi didn't," Pipi said helpfully. "He was talking to me about money all day long."
"None of the servants would have told Axel," Lady Rudolphine said slowly. "They are all devoted to Anastasia. And the Cardinal arrived too late to have given Axel enough warning."
"I made a phone call before dinner," I said in a strangled voice. "I called my friend Floss in England. I told her where I was. Godfrey must have overheard. He works for the British secret service. But why would he have told Axel?"
"Does this Godfrey work for Killjoy-Yuck?" Hell asked. I nodded. "Well, then. There we go. The circle squared, our question answered. That fellow has a great deal to answer for."
"Terence told Axel?" I was baffled. "But why? What's the connection between an Oxford don who works for the British secret service and an ultra-Katholic German publisher?"
"My enemy's enemy is my friend," Hell replied calmly. "Guess whom they both can't stand?"
I sighed. "Xox?"
Hell nodded. "Too many plots, too few targets," he replied mysteriously. "Let's get back to Prague and do a little research."
"My dear, we really must leave now," Lady Rudolphine Bing said gently to me. "The Cardinal and his henchmen might come back at any moment. Drink some brandy."
I heard the words. I knew what they meant. I even knew that I was supposed to answer. But I was incapable of reply. I had to be very careful. The pain in my chest was so intense that I had to watch every breath. I was standing high, very high, precariously, on a tight rope, cradling an infinitely fragile and awkward object in my arms, and I could neither stand still nor walk, and if I fell and the object broke, something terrible would happen, because the fragile thing I was holding was my shattered heart...
I had never before realized that heartbreak is not a metaphor, a convenient figure of speech to use in chaffing conversation with old girlfriends, but that it is a literally true expression of a physical reality. The rending pain in my chest was certainly not metaphorical. It was all I could do to stop myself from screaming aloud at the agony. My head was spinning and I saw little stars before my eyes, cold stars, distant and cruel, mocking my anguish with their indifference. I felt oddly lucid. I knew I was about to faint.
"Drink this," a brusque voice commanded. I gritted my teeth and opened my eyes. Otto Hell stood before me, holding a tumbler full of brandy. With great effort I stopped myself from throwing up. I shook my head from side to side. "Goddamn it, you young fool, drink it, I say!" Hell shouted angrily. I groped for the glass and poured the brandy down my throat. The acrid fumes rose to my head and choked me. I spluttered and coughed. Tears ran down my cheeks. I felt slightly better when I opened my eyes. Hell was still standing there, scowling at me. "Thought I'd told you to follow orders," he said, still angry.
"I don't work for you any longer," I replied hoarsely.
"You'll do what I tell you and you know it."
I looked at Hell sullenly. A sharp anger rose in me with the last brandy fumes. "Who the hell are you to give me orders?" I asked wildly. I closed my eyes. "Goddamn murderer..." My voice trailed off drunkenly.
A strange grating noise roused me, like a rusty chainsaw rasping against sheet metal. Hell was laughing. "Shock therapy. How's your heart?"
I blinked. Hell was right. I was still in pain like I had never felt in my life, a dull bruised ache which permeated every tissue and muscle in my body as though I had been beaten to a pulp, ruthlessly, but the sharp vice around my heart seemed to have disappeared, at least for the time being. On the other hand, I no longer had the hopeful sense that I might die at any moment. I stared at Hell without gratitude. "Just who are you, Lord Hades?" I demanded again, coldly. "How do you know how I feel? And what makes it your business?"
"Told you to call me Otto," Hell replied, glaring at me. "And you know damn well who I am. At least you should. Maybe you would know if you could drag yourself for just a moment out of the nice cozy little mire of self-pity in which you are wallowing." I glared back at him, stung. "Young swine!" Hell bellowed. "Get out of the mire before you drown! There's work to do! Or have you already forgotten Anastasia? Don't you want to see her again? What were her last words before Axel took her away? `Unless'? Unless what?"
I saw the error of my ways and leaped to my feet. I wanted to salute but it seemed too ridiculous. Neither of us was wearing uniform. "What did she mean, Otto?" I asked eagerly. "Unless what?"
"Can't tell you," Hell answered moodily. "Got to figure it out for yourself."
I felt like hitting him. But then I realized that he was right. It was up to me to save Anastasia. What was I to do? Where should I even begin? I sat down and plunged my head in my hands again. It was all too hopeless. I wished I were back in Mongolia.
"Bet your grandfather would tell you the same thing. Begin at the beginning. First of all, stop whining and start thinking," Otto said grumpily. I gaped at him. How the hell did he know...
"What you were thinking?" Hell asked, a wicked glint in his nut-brown eyes. Pipi sidled up to her new fiance, curled about his elbow, and offered him another enormous snifter of cognac. "Later, girl," he said gruffly, taking the cognac without looking at her. "No time for fun. Yet. We've got work to do first." Pipi purred and rubbed herself against him.
I gazed at Hell as though I were seeing him for the first time. The stumpy bent old figure, the dewlapped wrinkled face, the deep grouchy voice, the careless eccentricities of dress, these features with which I had become familiar, and therefore blind, in the days when I worked for Hell at the University of Truth and Justice, stood out for me now in bold relief like a mask painstakingly wrought by the anonymous artisans of an ancient people, and I felt like one of those civilized nineteenth-century barbarians who wrote learned monographs about these peoples but who were too blind to feel the elemental potency of the tribal divinities whose images they took back to their sterile museums and condescendingly labelled primitive art. In that grumpy face, that crusty voice, those hooded eyes, I now saw to my awed amazement a spirit who could never be blinded by the illusory phantasms of desire and fear, untouched by cowardice or greed, ageless, stern, and very noble. Hell was a well too deep for me to plumb yet, but I was content to lower myself into its dark depths and to learn.
"You're already learning," Hell muttered.
I gaped again at the old devil. Ever since we had first met, I had uneasily suspected that Hell could read my mind. Of course, it made communication that much easier. But did I really want my life to be an open book?
"Otto, was that really Axel von Schadenfreude who abducted Anastasia?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"She's his wife, ain't she?"
"What will he do to her?"
"How the devil should I know?" Hell growled. "Only met the feller once. Too churchy for me. Probably make her wear ladylike clothing and drag her to mass every Sunday. Force her to kiss the Pope's hand at glittering Vatikan receptions and to be polite to everyone. Make her clean the house."
"Not that!" I was appalled. I could not imagine a worse torture for my darling witch. I was sure that Anastasia would have preferred to burn at the stake, suffering abominably and yelling foul curses at all around. "How do we get Anastasia out of Axel's clutches?"
"Probably clutching her body right now," Hell said viciously. "Making up for all the years of sexual deprivation ever since she left him."
I yelped in anguish at the thought. Lady Rudolphine looked concerned. "Must you be so graphic, Otto?" she chided.
"He'll make her wear modest cotton pyjamas," Hell continued remorselessly. "Force her to brush her teeth. First prayers. Then sex. She will be constantly pregnant."
"Stop it!" I shrieked, stopping up my ears. "Nobody could be so cruel!"
"He's a good Catholic. He can afford it."
"How can I save her?"
Hell shrugged. "Could try prayer."
"Never," I declared fervently. "But I'd sell my soul to the Devil..."
A broad grin creased Hell's old brown face. "You already have. Let's get to work."
I gulped down the rest of the brandy straight from the bottle and rubbed my hands. I felt the flush of energy which only anger and strong liquor can produce. I was ready for battle. "Where do we start?"
"Good question." Hell looked at me and stayed silent.
I scowled at Hell. He was obviously not going to make this any easier for me. I took a deep breath and dived into a churning whirlpool of feelings. My emotions jostled like snakes in a basket. I nearly gagged as I made contact with my worst fear but held on, drawing it out like a writhing eel, slimy, repulsive, terrifying. "Oh fuck."
"Go on."
"It's my fault, isn't it?"
"What is?"
"Anastasia's kidnapping. It's my fucking fault."
"How?"
"Axel didn't come here tonight to stop Prince Ludwig's suicide. He came with his men because he knew Anastasia was here. Who told Axel?"
"Ludi didn't," Pipi said helpfully. "He was talking to me about money all day long."
"None of the servants would have told Axel," Lady Rudolphine said slowly. "They are all devoted to Anastasia. And the Cardinal arrived too late to have given Axel enough warning."
"I made a phone call before dinner," I said in a strangled voice. "I called my friend Floss in England. I told her where I was. Godfrey must have overheard. He works for the British secret service. But why would he have told Axel?"
"Does this Godfrey work for Killjoy-Yuck?" Hell asked. I nodded. "Well, then. There we go. The circle squared, our question answered. That fellow has a great deal to answer for."
"Terence told Axel?" I was baffled. "But why? What's the connection between an Oxford don who works for the British secret service and an ultra-Katholic German publisher?"
"My enemy's enemy is my friend," Hell replied calmly. "Guess whom they both can't stand?"
I sighed. "Xox?"
Hell nodded. "Too many plots, too few targets," he replied mysteriously. "Let's get back to Prague and do a little research."
