The stench of incense and spice permeated from him, and when he spoke or smiled, eerily perfect teeth broke the line of his dark lips. Madame Chantal found his scent overwhelming; she could not tell if he was Pharaoh or Phantasm. Of one thing she was certain: the magician and alchemist had a larger than life presence without even raising his voice or presenting a move of his hand. It frightened her and escalated the strange revulsion she had for him.
“The Celeste?” she gasped as she read the familiar name upon the paper he had given her. Her face betrayed the concern she felt for obtaining the gem. Flashing like sublime emeralds in the light of the fire, Madame Chantal’s eyes searched Abdul’s. “Mr. Raya, I cannot. My husband has agreed to donate the Celeste to the Louvre.” Trying to remedy her fault at even suggesting she could get him what he wanted, she looked down and said, “The other two I can manage, surely, but not that one.”
Abdul showed no sign of concern for the glitch. With a slow wave of his hand across her face, he smiled serenely. “I do hope you change your mind, Madam. It is the privilege of women like you to have the deeds of great men in their palms, at the ready.” As his elegantly crooked fingers drew a shadow over her fair skin, the noblewoman could feel an ice-cold bolt of pressure imbue her face. Briskly wiping her face where the chill crept, she cleared her throat and composed herself. If she faltered now she would lose him in a sea of strangers.
“Come back in two days. Meet me here in the drawing room. My assistant knows you and will be expecting you,” she ordered, still shaken by the ghastly sensation that haunted her face for a moment. “I will get the Celeste, Mr. Raya, but you had better be worth my trouble.”
Abdul said nothing more. He didn’t need to.
3
A Touch of Endearment
When Purdue awoke the following day, he felt like shit — plain and simple. In fact, he couldn’t recall the last time he’d really cried, and although his soul felt better for the purging, his eyes were swollen and burning. To make sure nobody would know what had caused his condition, Purdue polished off three quarters of his Southern hooch bottle, the one he kept in between his horror fiction books on the shelf by the window.
“My God, old cock, you look the right part for a hobo,” Purdue groaned at his reflection in the bathroom mirror. “How did all this happen? Don’t tell me, don’t,” he sighed. Walking away from the mirror to open the shower faucets, he kept muttering like a senile old man. Fitting, since his body felt like it had aged a century overnight. “I know. I know how it happened. You ate the wrong cuisines, hoping that your stomach could get used to the poison, but instead you got poisoned.”
His clothes fell from him as if they did not know his body, hugging his feet before he stepped out of the heap of fabric his wardrobe had been reduced to since he lost all that weight in the oubliette of “Mother’s” house. Under the lukewarm water Purdue prayed without religion, grateful without faith and deeply sympathetic to all those who did not know the luxury of indoor plumbing. Under the baptism of the showerhead he emptied his mind to exorcise the toil that reminded him that his ordeal at the hands of Joseph Karsten was far from over, even if he played his hand slowly and vigilantly. Oblivion was underrated, he reckoned, being such a glorious sanctuary in trying times, and he wanted to feel its nothingness fall over him.
True to his misfortune of late, Purdue, however, was not to enjoy it for long before a knock at his door interrupted his budding therapy.
“What is it?” he called through the hiss of the water.
“Your breakfast, sir,” he heard from the other side of the door. Purdue perked up and abandoned his silent resentment of the caller.
“Charles?” he asked.
“Yes, sir?” Charles answered.
Purdue smiled, elated to hear the familiar voice of his butler once more, a voice he’d missed dearly while contemplating his death hour in the oubliette; a voice he thought he would never hear again. Without even thinking twice, the downtrodden billionaire leapt from the confines of his shower and wrenched open the door. Completely stumped, the butler stood with a shocked face as his naked boss embraced him.
“My God, old boy, I thought you had disappeared!” Purdue smiled as he let the man go to shake his hand. Fortunately, Charles was painfully professional, ignoring Purdue’s bagpipes and retaining that stiff upper lip business demeanor the Brits always bragged about.
“Was just a bit under the weather, sir. Right as rain now, thank you,” Charles assured Purdue. “Would you like to eat in your room or downstairs with,” he grimaced somewhat, “the MI6 people?”
“Up here, definitely. Thank you, Charles,” Purdue answered, realizing that he was still shaking the man’s hand with his crown jewels on display.
Charles nodded. “Very well, sir.”
As Purdue returned to the bathroom to shave and remedy the awful bags under his eyes, the butler walked out of the master bedroom, secretly indulging a grin at the reminiscence of his jovial, nude employer’s reaction. It was always good to be missed, he thought, even to such a drastic extent.
“What did he say?” Lily asked when Charles entered the kitchen. The place smelled of freshly baked bread and scrambled eggs, smothered slightly by the odor of percolated coffee. The adorable, yet nosy senior kitchen lady wrung her hands inside a dishcloth with eager eyes, probing the butler for a reply.
“Lillian,” he grunted at first, annoyed as usual by her prying. But then he realized that she too had missed the master of the household and that she had every right to wonder what the man’s first words to Charles were. This review done quickly in his mind, his eyes softened.
“He is very happy to be here again,” Charles replied formally.
“Did he say that?” she asked endearingly.
Charles took a moment. “Not in so many words, although his gestures and body language pretty well established his elation.” He tried desperately not to chuckle at his own words, elegantly formulated to convey both the truth and the bizarre.
“Oh, that is lovely,” she smiled, heading to the cupboard to take out a plate for Purdue. “Eggs and sausage, then?”
Uncharacteristically the butler burst out laughing, a welcome sight to his usual stern demeanor. A little befuddled but smiling at his unusual reaction, she stood waiting to confirm the breakfast as the butler burst out in a fit of laughter.
“I shall take that as a yes,” she giggled. “My goodness, my boy, something very funny must have happened for you to desert that firmness of yours.” She took out the plate and set it on the table. “Look at you! You’re just letting it all hang out.”
Charles doubled up in laughter, leaning against the tiled niche next to the iron coal stove that adorned the back door corner. “I’m so sorry Lillian, but I can’t relay what happened. That would just be improper, you understand.”
“I know,” she smiled, dishing up bangers and scrambled eggs next to Purdue’s soft toast. “Of course, I’m dying to know what happened, but for once I’ll just settle for seeing you laughing. That is enough to make my day.”
Relieved that, for once, the older lady would relent at pressing him for information, Charles gave her a pat on the shoulder and composed himself. He fetched a tray and placed the food on it, helping her with the coffee and finally collecting the newspaper to take to Purdue upstairs. Desperate to prolong the anomaly of Charles’ humanness, Lily had to hold back on another mention of whatever had charged him so as he left the kitchen. She feared he would drop the tray and she was right. With the sight still clear in his mind, Charles would have left the floor a mess had she reminded him.