Tigab was so stunned that he could barely mumble. All the same, his new inflection was equally unmistakable. My grin broadened.
"Got to pay up and go home. The wife's got to get used to my new singsong. Me too."
He pulled a pouch from a pocket, opened it, and dumped green pebbles on a table. "Cluster coin-of-the-realm," he grunted. "Take as many as you like. You earned it and I'm obliged."
They were raw, uncut emeralds. Adam picked up the smallest stone and returned the rest. "This is too much, Mr. Tigab, but since you say you've made your pile I won't feel too guilty. Nan?"
I followed Glory as she escorted Tigab out. He was humming. When we returned, we three looked at the hitching post portrait.
"I've seen blackamoor posts," I said, "and jockeys, but what demented designer used Beethoven for a model?"
"Like I said, Alf, there's no end to fascinating phenomena in this world. D'you think Rigadoon's going to print this?"
I shrugged it off. "And I spotted what you replaced those first four notes from Beethoven's Fifth Symphony with."
"Did you?"
"Yes I did now; the main theme from 'Rhapsody in Blue.' Is Tigab going to be haunted by the ghost of George Gershwin now?"
"All depends on the hitching posts," Adam laughed.
"If I understand it correctly, there's got to be an exchange. Why can't you just remove some unwanted aspect of the psyche?"
"The danger," he explained, "is squatters moving in on your psychique, Seele, nao-tzu. Farstayst? Had a woman once with a wild idea; she wanted to leave a vacanza, a vacancy, in her heart for her lovers. I went along with it to see how it would work out.
"But a damn black widow spider nipped in ahead of her studs and that was that. Oh, sure, every living thing, animal or vegetable, has a soul. Never again. Borgia, her name was. Lucy Borgia."
The front door was suddenly enveloped by a pillar of cold, corposant fire. It advanced into the reception room and out of it stepped the towering figure of Mephistopheles.
We had to give him a big hand.
He bowed graciously. "Merci! Merri! Merti! I am the tenth Count Alesandro di Cagliostro."
"Ah yes," Adam smiled. "Descended from the original Cagliostro, adventurer, magician, liar, cheat. Died in the fortress prison of San Leo in 1795."
"I have that honor, M'sieur Maser."
"The tenth Count Alesandro? Then you must be from the late twenty-first or thereabouts, eh?"
"Paris. Early twenty-second, M'sieur."
"Welcome. We're honored. This is—"
"Your assistant of the serpents, Ssss." Apparently he pronounced it properly. "But this gentleman from les Etats-Unis I do not know."
"Alf, from Rigadoon magazine. He's associating with me while he prepares a feature on the Black Hole Hockshop."
"Delighted, M'sieur Alfred. I felicitate myself. You know, of course, that your admirable writings will never be received as fact. Who could believe the magique wrought by M'sieur Maser, eh? Yet he is as genuine as my great-great -etcetera grandpapa was— Pardon, Maitre. How does one translate simulateur?"
"Faker."
"As the grandpapa was a faker."
"Thank you, Count Alesandro. I hope this is a social call, we'll amuse each other. Dr. Franz Gall, who developed phrenology, paid a social call. Said he wanted to explore the bumps on the head of a charlatan. I was amused but he wasn't."
"Why not?" I asked.
"He was dumbfounded. Said I had no bumps at all, which threatened to undermine his entire theory. I started to reassure him with a— How does one translate craque, Count Alesandro?"
"Tall story."
"With a tall story about my brain being where the bowels usually are,, and vice versa. Said I was a freak and offered to let him feel the bumps on my belly. He left in a huff."
We laughed. Then Cagliostro said, "So sorry to disappoint you, Maitre, but I am come on an affair of business. I wish to purchase these," and he handed Adam a cassette.
Adam pulled the end of the tape out and began running it between thumb and forefinger. The tape seemed to be composed of flickering fireflies. Cagliostro caught my curious stare and said, "Phonotact of the twenty-second. There are in all six hundred and sixty-six items."
Adam whistled softly. "The Number of the Beast in Revelations, six hundred, threescore and six. Are you going to brew a beast, Count Alesandro? A warlock's familiar, perhaps?"
"You forget what follows: Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man."
"Quite right. Then you're making a man."
"An inconnu, unheard-of man."
"Curiouser and curiouser."
"I intend to synthesize an android unique. Not the clumsy simulacrum that laboratories cook, but a brilliance which can communicate with and control the deepest well-spring of human behavior, the primal layer of motivation. No, not an android, my friend."
"An Iddroid!" Adam said, eyes seeming to flash. "But this is fabulous! Your grandpapa, nine times removed, may have been a faker, but you are a genius absolute!"
"A thousand thanks, Maitre. Then you will help me?"
"I insist on helping. I'm grateful for this splendid challenge. Have you any idea of your chances for success?"
"Chacun la moitie. Fifty-fifty."
"Good enough odds for me. Now, about what you require for your Iddroid synthesis; I have many of the items in stock, but I shall have to go out and locate others. Just to mention a few: a sixth sense, scrying by aggression, a freak superstition, an inconnu absolu, and—this number's a killer—origins of Humanity's Collective Unconscious."
"All essential, Maitre, and I'm prepared to pay handsomely."
"No way, Count Alesandro! I'm collaborating for the glorious defi. Now, est-ce que cela presse? Are you in a rush?"
"No hurry at all."
"Can you give me a week?"
"I shall give you two or even longer. Au revoir," and Cagliostro exited in a pillar of purple smoke.
Before I could express my astonishment the red Macavity's persona power took over. "Ready, Nan?"
She nodded. He was certainly whelming her.
"Right. We'll be in and out, Alf, jumping to and from times and places. You mind the store."
"Hey! Wait a minute! I can't monkey around with psyches. I don't know how."
"Of course not." To Glory, "Don't forget the tape." To me again, "Just stall the clientele till we get back."
"Stall them? How? I'm no linguist. What if a dejected Druid comes in?"
"Fake it, Alf," he laughed. "Fake it with chutzpah. Go the whole nine yards."
And they were gone.
And before I could decide whether to keep the kettle boiling or get the hell out of there, the hitching post ne Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) came tramping in storming German.
Jeez.
"Me no speakie kein Deutsch," I faked. "You, du, efsher, dig der Ingleitch?"
He felled me with a scowl, strode to the harpsichord and banged three octaves, probably to help him shift gears, and then growled, "Dot verdammt Shakespeare. His schatten, ghost haunted mich und give mir schone, beautiful inzpiration. Dies ist dein fifth. G-G-G-E flat. Dis ist your funste. F-F-F-D. All in key of C Minor. Wunderschon!"
"Would that be fifth as in symphony?"
"Ja! Ja! Funste symphonic. I listen to ghost waiting for more, wanting to komponieren, compose, und suddenly cursed schatten change inzpiration."
"How?"
"Kein more Fifth Symphonic in C Minor. Now verdammt Shakespeare ghost zing me halbton, flat tones, flatted dritte und fu'nste und siebente, thirds, fifths, sevenths. Blue intervall. Mit synkopieren! Unheard of! Auslandisch! Verruckt! Ein Symphonic in Blau!"
Oy gevald.