He felt a sharp stabbing in his chest. People said that time healed all wounds, but that wasn’t true when the two people you loved most were taken away from you as a child. That was a pain that he’d never quite gotten over.
He went to his workshop. It was filled with tricks that needed repairs. In the corner sat the Spirit Cabinet. Created by the Davenport Brothers in 1875, the illusion had stood the test of time. The trick was simple. The magician entered the cabinet and sat on the stool. Members of the audience tied ropes around his wrists and ankles, with the ends fitted through holes in the doors to ensure he could not move. When the doors were closed, ghostly manifestations occurred, courtesy of an assistant hidden in a secret crawl space. Or, you could perform the trick the way Peter sometimes did, and let real ghosts do the work.
Peter liked ghosts, and ghosts liked him. They’d been talking to him for as long as he could remember, and would sometimes do favors for him. They were his friends, as much as a ghost could be a friend to someone on the other side. Perhaps by talking to them now, he’d better understand what had happened tonight.
Try it, he thought. Nothing to lose.
He entered the cabinet, and shut the door. Inside was a stool with a tambourine lying on it. He picked up the tambourine, and parked himself on the stool. Then, he began to shake the tambourine. The sound had a profound effect upon him, and a shudder passed through his body.
A few minutes passed. The first rule of dealing with ghosts was patience. They had their own timetable, and there was no getting around it.
He heard a faint noise that sounded like a chorus to a song. He strained to make out the words. It was a song.
“My spirit and my voice in one combined,
The Phantom of the Opera was there inside my mind.”
He smiled to himself. He hadn’t heard those lyrics in a long time.
Then, his world changed.
He was standing inside the lobby of the Majestic Theatre, singing the chorus to the dark musical he’d just had the privilege to see. The lobby was filled with people; mostly adults, but a fair number of children as well. None of them were smiling, except for him.
“Peter, hurry along,” his father called out.
His parents stood by the entrance, dressed in warm winter clothes. His father was tall and thin, with unruly gray hair and cheeks the color of tomatoes. His mother was a half-foot shorter than her husband, and might have passed as his daughter had her hair not been snow-white. Peter joined them, and his mother buttoned his coat.
“How did you like the show?” she asked.
“It was scary,” he said. “I loved it.”
“What did you like the most?”
“The music. It was so spooky. I can’t stop singing it.”
“I’m glad you liked it. Your father has a surprise for you.”
With a smile on his face, his father reached into his pocket, and removed the Phantom of the Opera’s soundtrack. His son squealed with delight.
“Can we go home now so I can listen to it?” Peter asked.
“Not yet. We’ve got another surprise for you,” his father said.
Peter looked into his father’s eyes, and saw singing waiters and a table covered with giant plates of pasta. They were going to Mamma Leone’s, his favorite place to eat.
“Can I have the fried pastry for dessert?” Peter asked.
“We’ll see. Now, come along, or we’ll miss our reservation.”
Outside it was snowing, the flakes the size of silver dollars. Standing on the sidewalk was a beggar playing the theme from Phantom on an old violin. The music was as enchanting as a siren’s song, and Peter could not help but sing along.
“Don’t dawdle,” his father said.
Next to the beggar was an open violin case into which Peter tossed a handful of coins.
“You play very well. Perhaps someday, you’ll be in the show,” the boy said.
“I can only hope,” the beggar replied.
“Peter!”
“I have to go now. Good luck.”
His parents had turned into an alley beside the theater which was used as a shortcut by theatergoers. Peter hurried to catch up to them.
“Wait for me,” he called out.
Three men rushed past, knocking Peter to the ground, and ripping his pants. The boy stifled the urge to cry. Lifting his head, he saw the men holding guns to his mother and father’s backs. They hustled his parents to a waiting car at the end of the alley.
“Mother! Father!”
His parents were being shoved into the back of the car. His father was fighting back, and one of the men struck him on the head with his gun. The gift of prescience could be a terrible thing, and Peter knew at that moment that he was never going to see his parents alive again.
“No!!” he shouted.
He jumped to his feet, and ran toward the car. As he came out of the alley, the car pulled away with his parents and their abductors inside. One of the abductors was visible through the side window, and Peter saw a man with crooked teeth and a twisted nose. On the man’s neck was a shimmering tattoo whose silver color made it look alive.
“Give me my parents back!” Peter shouted at him.
His world changed again. He was back inside the Spirit Cabinet, banging the tambourine. The chorus from The Phantom of the Opera had been replaced by the sound of a man’s tortured breathing. After a moment, he realized he was listening to himself, panting for breath.
He was not alone.
The shimmering tattoo he’d seen on the abductor’s neck hovered directly in front of him. Staring into its center, he saw his parents’ distraught faces as they were whisked away to their doom, and felt himself shudder again.
He had wanted a sign from the other side, and he’d gotten his wish. The Order of Astrum had murdered his parents, and now they’d sent an assassin to kill him.
6
Wolfe traveled light. Toothbrush, shaving kit, fake ID, a few thousand in American money, a Zippo lighter from his army days, a disposable cell phone, a laptop, a single change of clothes, and the pocketknife. From time to time, one of the items would break or need replacing, and he’d go through a short period of adjustment. They were his only possessions, and he was attached to them.
Wolfe was sick about losing the pocketknife. It had been given to him as a small boy by an uncle. He had eaten with it, killed with it, and used the corkscrew to open bottles of wine. It pained him that it was now lying in a police evidence bag. It was not the fate he would have hoped for his knife. Better if it had ended up sticking out of the young magician’s chest, like he’d planned.
The cab braked. “Seventy-eight Christopher Street. That will be ten bucks,” the driver said.
Wolfe settled the fare. Soon he was standing on one of the West Village’s narrow streets. He checked the street for any signs of police. Seeing none, he approached a parlor with a hand-painted sign in the window that was home to a Gypsy fortune-teller named Madame Marie. As he opened the front door, a buzzer went off in his ear. He went in.
The parlor was small and scented with sandalwood, the walls covered in dark burgundy fabric. A round antique table sat in the room’s center flanked by two wingback chairs. On the table was a dog-eared deck of Tarot cards, and nothing else.
“Anybody home?” he called out.