I confess that a great panic overcome me, and in a trice I re-mounted my steed and dasht home, flying through the door and yelling at Brock to take care of the nag. I raced into the study, throwed meself into the chair at my desk, and as fast as I could write, in-scribed the following onto a sheet of vellum:
“The man was tall and thin and wore a suit comprised of a single piece, white and scaley in texture, that lay flush against his skin, outlining his sinyewy form in a most overt manner, though covering it entirely from the base of his neck to his wrists and ankles, and with nary a flap, opening, button, nor hook in sight. His head was consealed by a black helmet, round and shiney and flickring all over with blue flame. A flat circlar lamp, dented and crackt, was attacht to his chest, and his booted feet were strapt into stilts, of p’raps 2ft in height.”
Within minutes of setting down this slight account, the memry was reduced to the vaygest of impressions, the merest glimmering awareness that I had seed something inexplcible but knew not what.
The vellum is before me as I write, and now the description is trans-scribed into my diary, too.
Did I dream? I cannot believe so. Something strange has most certainly occurred. I feel uncannily diffrent but cannot put into further words the sensation, for there are none what fit it.
Trounce had added:
The suit Beresford describes matches exactly and without a shadow of a doubt the one I saw in the thicket in Green Park. Beresford’s brother showed me portraits of the Mad Marquess but he bore no likeness to the man who knocked me cold that day.
As to the rest of the diary, after the above-copied entry, Beresford made fewer and fewer contributions to it, none of significance. By September, he’d ceased keeping it altogether. His brother informed me that the marquess, from the date of his vision, became increasingly fascinated with the 16th-century writings of Doctor John Dee and Edward Kelley. He (John Beresford) said their body of work was the subject of Henry’s meetings in The Hog in the Pound, which commenced soon after Queen Victoria’s death and quickly led to the establishment of the League of Enochians. He also stated that his brother believed The Assassination to be “a moment when magic was manifest in history.”
The detective’s notes moved on to the League of Enochians’ current chairman:
Edward Vaughan Hyde Kenealy: Born 2 July 1819. Current address unknown (possibly resident in the club building). From Cork, Ireland. Lawyer. Called to Irish Bar, 1840, and English Bar, 1847. Extremely erratic in character. Often violent. Has apparently published poetry concerning the physical manifestation of God on Earth (have not been able to locate any of it).
The remainder of the file’s contents consisted of pamphlets published by the League of Enochians prior to March. They all advertised club meetings, with titles such as: “A Discussion of John Dee’s Quinti Libri Mysteriorum”; “On the Words of Uriel”; and “The Secret Art of Scrying.” Two in particular caught Burton’s attention. The first was “The Language of the Angels.” Printed under the title were twenty-two symbols, each with a name. They apparently corresponded to Latin letters, the equivalents being displayed beneath. Among them were the two from the tiepin—Ur and Graph—which translated to L and E—the initials of the club.
The second pamphlet—a sheet folded to make four sides of print—was entitled “The First Call of Enoch.” The inside-front page bore a long passage printed in the symbols. The facing page transposed them into Latin characters, the words looking like randomly grouped letters.
The back page offered an English translation: garbled nonsense concerning the power of angels.
However, it provided the key he needed.
He got up, crossed to one of his desks, and retrieved from it the telegraph message Christopher Spoolwinder had given him aboard the Orpheus.
With the pamphlet as his guide, he was able to give meaning to what had originally appeared to be gobbledegook:
THE BEAST . . . THE BEAST . . . THE BEAST . . . YOU SHALL BOW DOWN FOR . . . I REIGN OVER YOU . . . BORN FROM THE WRECK OF SS BRITANNIA AND . . . IN POWER EXALTED ABOVE THE FIRMAMENTS OF WRATH IN WHOSE HANDS THE SUN IS AS A SWORD . . . TO REND THE VEIL . . . FROM THE FALLEN EMPIRE . . . NOW . . . LIFT UP YOUR VOICES AND SWEAR OBEDIENCE AND FAITH TO HIM . . . FOR THE ROYAL CHARTER . . . WILL DELIVER HE . . . WHOSE BEGINNING IS NOT NOR END CANNOT BE . . .
He stared into space, stunned by the implication. That telegraph machines the world over had been affected by the aurora borealis was an established fact. That the one aboard the Orpheus had spewed out this message, which employed a language also used by the Enochians, suggested—incredibly—a causal relationship between Oliphant’s ritual and the atmospheric phenomenon.
“By God, Oliphant,” he murmured. “Did you truly summon something?”
“He who knows not, and knows not that he knows not, is a fool. Shun him. He who knows not, and knows that he knows not, is simple. Teach him. He who knows, and knows not that he knows, is asleep. Wake him. He who knows, and knows that he knows, is wise. Follow him.”
—ISABEL ARUNDELL, FROM THE PERSIAN PROVERB
The next ten days of recovery were interspersed with visits to the British Museum’s reading room, where Burton researched John Dee, the Elizabethan alchemist and occultist who’d sought to identify the purest forms and expressions of existence, primarily by communicating with divine beings. Dee claimed to have achieved this through scrying, which was undertaken by his associate, Edward Kelley. Together they’d learned—or created, Burton suspected—the language of the angels.
The hours of reading didn’t provide him with any further revelations, but it gave him a solid grounding in the theories that apparently motivated Henry Beresford, Thomas Lake Harris, Laurence Oliphant, Edward Vaughan Hyde Kenealy, and the League of Enochians.
By Monday the 17th of October his bruises had vanished, his ribs healed, and his arm offered only the occasional twinge. With a loaded Beaumont–Adams revolver concealed beneath his light jacket and swinging his swordstick as he walked, he left the house, tipped his hat to Mr. Grub the vendor, who was cooking corn on the cob on his brazier, and made his way to Baker Street. Eschewing the cabs—after so many days of inactivity he preferred to walk—he headed toward Portman Square. It was autumn but unseasonably warm and humid. The air was thick with dust, soot, and steam, and stank to high heaven. The flow of sewage through the new north-to-south tunnels was still being slowed by sluice gates, which would not be fully opened until the big intercepting tunnel was complete. Foul viscous liquid was seeping up through the streets and only flower sellers were happy about it, for it had become a necessary fashion to walk with a fragrant bouquet held to one’s nose.
By the time Burton reached the square, perspiration was running from beneath his topper and he had grit in his eyes, so he stopped, sat on a bench, removed his headgear, put it down, and mopped his brow with a handkerchief.
He sat back and watched a herd of geese being guided along by a farmer and his two boy assistants, obviously on their way to market. A man on a velocipede attempted to steer his vehicle past them. His penny-farthing hit one of the birds, squashed it, wobbled, and toppled sideways, expelling steam with a hiss that matched those produced by the angry flock. The man sprang to his feet and shook his fist at the farmer. An argument ensued. Punches were exchanged. A constable arrived on the scene and separated the combatants. The velocipedist rode back in the direction he’d come, his machine clanking unhealthily. The geese were shooed on. Once the participants were out of sight, the constable picked up the killed bird, examined it, and carried it away with a satisfied grin on his face, undoubtedly anticipating a goose supper.