A flat sound, a black flail which curled, slapped the air and smote home to the face. A glowing weal sprang into being. The face sighed and the eyes twisted up into their folds of greenish tissue.
Kerlin the Curator laughed, a shrill yammer on a single tone. He stopped short and the laugh vanished as if it had never begun. He turned to Guyal and Shierl, who stood pressed together in the door-frame.
"How now, how now? You are after the gong; the study hours are long ended. Why do you linger?" He shook a stern finger. "The Museum is not the site for roguery; this I admonish. So now be off, home to Thorsingol; be more prompt the next time; you disturb the established order ..." He paused and threw a fretful glance over his shoulder. "The day has gone ill; the Nocturnal Key-keeper is inexcusably late ... Surely I have waited an hour on the sluggard; the Lycurgat shall be so informed. I would be home to couch and hearth; here is ill use for old Kerlin, thus to detain him for the careless retard of the night-watch ... And, further, the encroachment of you two laggards; away now, and be off; out into the twilight!" And he advanced, making directive motions with his hands.
Guyal said, "My lord Curator, I must speak words with you."
The old man halted, peered. "Eh? What now? At the end of a long day's effort? No, no, you are out of order; regulation must be observed. Attend my audiarium at the fourth circuit tomorrow morning; then we shall hear you. So go now, go."
Guyal fell back nonplussed. Shierl fell on her knees. "Sir Curator, we beg you for help; we have no place to go."
Kerlin the Curator looked at her blankly. "No place to go! What folly you utter! Go to your domicile, or to the Pubescentarium, or to the Temple, or to the Outward Inn. For-sooth, Thorsingol is free with lodging; the Museum is no casual tavern."
"My lord," cried Guyal desperately, "will you hear me? We speak from emergency."
"Say on then."
"Some malignancy has bewitched your brain. Will you credit this?"
"Ah, indeed?" ruminated the Curator.
"There is no Thorsingol. There is naught but dark waste. Your city is an eon gone."
The Curator smiled benevolently. "Ah, sad ... A sad case. So it is with these younger minds. The frantic drive of life is the Prime Unhinger." He shook his head. "My duty is clear. Tired bones, you must wait your well-deserved rest. Fatigue—begone; duty and simple humanity make demands; here is madness to be countered and cleared. And in any event the Nocturnal Key-keeper is not here to relieve me of my tedium." He beckoned. "Come."
Hesitantly Guyal and Shierl followed him. He opened one of his doors, passed through muttering and expostulating with doubt and watchfulness, Guyal and Shierl came after.
The room was cubical, floored with dull black stuff, walled with myriad golden knobs on all sides. A hooded chair occupied the center of the room, and beside it was a chest-high lectern whose face displayed a number of toggles and knurled wheels.
'This is the Curator's own Chair of Knowledge," explained Kerlin. "As such it will, upon proper adjustment, impost the Pattern of Hynomeneural Clarity. So—I demand the correct sometsyndic arrangement—" he manipulated the manuals "—and now, if you will compose yourself, I will repair your hallucination. It is beyond my normal call of duty, but I am humane and would not be spoken of as mean or unwilling."
Guyal inquired anxiously, "Lord Curator, this Chair of Clarity, how will it affect me?"
Kerlin the Curator said grandly, "The fibers of your brain are twisted, snarled, frayed, and so make contact with unintentional areas. By the marvelous craft of our modern cerebrologists, this hood will compose your synapses with the correct readings from the library—those of normality, you must understand—and so repair the skein, and make you once more a whole man."
"Once I sit in the chair," Guyal inquired, "what will you do?"
"Merely close this contact, engage this arm, throw in this toggle—then you daze. In thirty seconds, this bulb glows, signaling the success and completion of the treatment. Then I reverse the manipulation, and you arise a creature of renewed sanity."
Guyal looked at Shierl. "Did you hear and comprehend?"
"Yes, Guyal," in a small voice.
"Remember." Then to the Curator: "Marvelous. But how must I sit?"
"Merely relax in the seat. Then I pull the hood slightly forward, to shield the eyes from distraction."
Guyal leaned forward, peered gingerly into the hood. "I fear I do not understand."
The Curator hopped forward impatiently. "It is an act of the utmost facility. Like this." He sat in the chair.
"And how will the hood be applied?"
"In this wise." Kerlin seized a handle, pulled the shield over his face.
"Quick," said Guyal to Shierl. She sprang to the lectern; Kerlin the Curator made a motion to release the hood; Guyal seized the spindly frame, held it. Shierl flung the switches; the Curator relaxed, sighed.
Shierl gazed at Guyal, dark eyes wide and liquid as the great water-flamerian of South Almery. "Is he—dead?"
"I hope not."
They gazed uncertainly at the relaxed form. Seconds passed.
A clanging noise sounded from afar—a crush, a wrench, an exultant bellow, lesser halloos of wild triumph.
Guyal rushed to the door. Prancing, wavering, sidling into the gallery came a multitude of ghosts; through the open door behind, Guyal could see the great head. It was shoving out, pushing into the room. Great ears appeared, part of a bull-neck, wreathed with purple wattles. The wall cracked, sagged, crumbled. A great hand thrust through, a forearm...
Shierl screamed. Guyal, pale and quivering, slammed the door in the face of the nearest ghost. It seeped in around the jamb, slowly, wisp by wisp.
Guyal sprang to the lectern. The bulb showed dullness. Guyal's hands twitched along the controls. "Only Kerlin's awareness controls the magic of the baton," he panted. "So much is clear." He stared into the bulb with agonized urgency. "Glow, bulb, glow ..."
By the door the ghost seeped and billowed.
"Glow, bulb, glow ..."
The bulb glowed. With a sharp cry Guyal returned the switches to neutrality, jumped down, flung up the hood.
Kerlin the Curator sat looking at him.
Behind the ghost formed itself—a tall white thing in white robes, and the dark eye-holes stared like outlets into non-imagination.
Kerlin the Curator sat looking.
The ghost moved under the robes. A hand like a bird's-foot appeared, holding a clod of dingy matter. The ghost cast the matter to the floor; it exploded into a puff of black dust. The motes of the cloud grew, became a myriad of wriggling insects. With one accord they darted across the floor, growing as they spread, and became scuttling creatures with monkey-heads.
Kerlin the Curator moved. "Baton," he said. He held up his hand. It held his baton. The baton spat an orange gout—red dust. It puffed before the rushing horde and each mote became a red scorpion. So ensued a ferocious battle, and little shrieks, and cluttering sounds rose from the floor.
The monkey-headed things were killed, routed. The ghost sighed, moved his claw-hand once more. But the baton spat forth a ray of purest light and the ghost sloughed into nothingness.
"Kerlin!" cried Guyal. "The demon is breaking into the gallery."
Kerlin flung open the door, stepped forth.
"Baton," said Kerlin, "perform thy utmost intent."
The demon said, "No, Kerlin, hold the magic; I thought you dazed. Now I retreat."
With a vast quaking and heaving he pulled back until once more only his face showed through the hole.
"Baton," said Kerlin, "be you on guard."
The baton disappeared from his hand.