A dog began barking from somewhere inside the house, followed by gruff commands from its owner. The door swung open a moment later to reveal a stocky middle-aged man who studied them carefully through the screen-door — Elisabeth noted that his gaze lingered appreciatively on her — before speaking. “Can I help you folks?”
“I am Dr. John Leeds.” There was, at last, the barest hint of discomfort, or perhaps it was urgency, in his tone. “This is Elisabeth. I have been told that you are a physician. I have been injured…” He held up his right hand, and the movement caused a fat drop of blood to spatter on the concrete at his feet. “I require medical attention.”
The man’s eyes widened. “Well, goddamn…Why did you come here? You should get to the emergency room!”
Leeds pitched his voice low. “This is a bullet wound. I cannot seek treatment through the normal channels. I was assured that you could help me…Dr. Ayak.”
The man went instantly pale. For a moment, he appeared unable to do anything but stare at them, but then he furtively opened the screen and stepped out, pulling both doors shut behind him. When he spoke again, it was in a low hiss. “Now what the devil are you playing at, here? You folks reporters?”
For the first time since she’d been with him, Elisabeth saw Leeds taken aback. “I — we are not.”
“Read about ‘Ayak’ on the Internet, did you?”
Elisabeth couldn’t tell if the man was taunting them, or making a sincere inquiry.
Leeds inclined his head. “It would appear that I was misinformed. I apologize for disturbing you.”
The man snaked a hand out abruptly and snared Leeds’ shoulder before he could turn. He held the occultist, staring into his eyes for a moment, and then seemed to reach a conclusion.
“We don’t use that secret language bullshit no more. It’s the goddamned twenty-first century, you know.” He gave a weary sigh, and then beckoned them to enter the house. “Unless that’s cherry pie filling you’re dripping on the ground, it’s plain to see you’re hurt. Come on in and I’ll have a look.”
As they followed him inside, the man called out, “Louise, there’s some folks come to speak with me in private. Why don’t you go watch the ‘Wheel’ in your bedroom.”
There was a sound of movement from somewhere in the house, and an abrupt silence when a television set was switched off, but the man said nothing more as he led his guests through a formal dining room, and into a neatly arranged kitchen.
“Put your hand over the sink, and let’s see what bit you.”
Leeds complied, and gingerly began unwrapping the cloth. Elisabeth gasped involuntarily as she saw the ragged wound — raw red, speckled with grisly bits of yellow and white, surrounded by swollen purple skin. It looked as though his hand had been nearly amputated, just above the palm. His fingers flopped uselessly across the back of his hand, one of them still adorned with the gaudy Ouroboros ring.
Their host also looked a little shaken by what was revealed. He shook his head. “There’s not a lot I can do for you. You don’t go to the hospital, and those fingers are as good as gone. Not even sure they can save ‘em for you.”
“Then I have no further use for them,” Leeds replied, his earlier dispassion once more in evidence. “‘If thine hand offends thee, cut it off.’”
The man gave a disbelieving chuckle. “Well. You’re a God-fearing man, then. Let me get my bag.”
As the man headed for the exit, Leeds called out to him. “Time is of the essence, doctor. Before you proceed, I must ask that you put me in contact with the Circle.”
The doctor froze in mid-step, and turned around, his face twisted with the same suspicion that had originally greeted them. “Mister, I don’t know who you think I am—”
“You are part of an ancient and honored rite of brotherhood, a circle of men who stand in defense of the Invisible Empire. As am I. In the name of our shared bond, I call upon you in my hour of need.”
Elisabeth thought Leeds’ pronouncement sounded rehearsed, but then she felt that way about him most of the time. As an actor, she had an ear for such things, and to her, Leeds seemed always to be playing from some carefully prepared script. Yet, as she listened to what he was saying, the full impact of his words hit home.
The Circle…oh, God, what have I gotten into?
“Mister…what did you say your name was?”
“Dr. John Leeds.”
“Dr. Leeds, then. You obviously know a thing or two about me, and in the name of whatever it is you think we share, I’m gonna do what I can to fix up your hand. But let me set you straight about something. Any ‘brotherhood’ I might belong to? That’s got nothing to do with ancient rites or any of that mumbo jumbo. I wear the sheet — yes, I’ll admit it — but only because I’m not about to stand idly by while the country I love is being taken over by a bunch of Jews and niggers and spics.”
Elisabeth winced visibly at the slurs, and immediately felt a flush of fear at having betrayed herself with the reaction.
Leeds again seemed uncharacteristically rattled by this development, but quickly recovered his composure. “It just so happens that a particular nigger is responsible for my injuries. I was hoping that you and your brothers could help me with…a little payback?”
The man stared back through narrowed eyes. “Mister…excuse me, Doctor, this here’s the twenty-first century. We don’t do that lynch mob shit no more. We can’t afford to, if you take my meaning.” He paused and took a breath. “However, I may know a few good ol’ boys who aren’t as, shall we say, scrupulous? They don’t care nothing about rites or ancient mystic brotherhoods neither, but for the right price, I reckon they’d do most anything you want.”
Leeds gripped the man’s forearm with his good hand. “Make the call.”
Joe stood up and crossed to what looked at first glance like a side table. He removed the various decorative accouterments, and Kismet saw that the table was actually an old steamer trunk. Joe unlocked it and threw back the lid to reveal several stacks of leather bound books.
“Here,” Joe said without looking at Kismet. “Is everything we know about Hernando Fontaneda.”
It had not escaped Kismet’s notice that Joe had been consistently using the Spanish form of the name. He rose from his chair and went to stand beside the young man.
“These are Fontaneda’s diaries.”
The volumes might have been from a museum exhibit on the history of bookbinding. Those in the stack on the far left looked rough, hand sewn, while those on the right appeared to have been fashioned using modern — or at least twentieth century — techniques. Kismet gently picked up a book from the left hand stack and opened it.
The old binding creaked in his hands. The thin vellum pages were brittle and the ink had gone blurry in places. There was no question that the book was hundreds of years old, but if he needed any further evidence of that, he found it on the first page; a date:
Anno Domini 14, Junio 1645
The book was written entirely in Castilian Spanish, a language that normally would have posed little difficulty for Kismet. The script however was elaborate and spidery, and like so many writings of that era, the text was rife with grammatical errors and inconsistent spelling. The prose was rambling and disjointed, as if the author had been having trouble keeping the sequence of events straight. Nevertheless, it took only a few minutes of reading for him to begin painting a picture of the life of Hernando Fontaneda and his four hundred and fifty year old secret.