“Is that possible?”
“Certainly.” Again the doctor frowned. “What sort of company have you been keeping just lately, Titus?”
“Fishy company indeed, Harry,” the other answered. “But you’ve interested me. Hypnosis and loss of memory, eh? Well now,” and he rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Listen, could you possibly dehypnotize me? Trace the trouble back to its source, as it were?”
“I can try. If you’ve been under once—well, it’s usually far easier the second time. Are you game?”
“Just try me,” Crow grimly answered. “There’s something I have to get to the bottom of, and if hypnosis is the way—why, I’ll try anything once!”
An hour later, having had Crow in and out of trance half a dozen times, the good doctor finally shook his head and admitted defeat. “You have been hypnotized, I’m sure of it,” he said. “But by someone who knows his business far better than I. Do you remember any of the questions I asked you when you were under?”
Crow shook his head.
“That’s normal enough,” the other told him. “What’s extraordinary is the fact that I can get nothing out of you concerning the events of the last couple of weeks!”
“Oh?” Crow was surprised. “But I’ll gladly tell you all about the last few weeks if you like—without hypnosis.”
“All about them?”
“Of course.”
“I doubt it.” Townley smiled. “For that’s the seat of the trouble. You don’t know all about them. What you remember isn’t the whole story.”
“I see,” Crow slowly answered, and his thoughts went back again to those dim, shadowy dreams of his and to his strange pseudomemories of vague snatches of echoing conversation. “Well, thank you, Harry,” he finally said. “You’re a good friend and I appreciate your help greatly.”
“Now, listen, Titus.” The other’s concern was unfeigned. “If there’s anything else I can do—anything at all—just let me know, and—”
“No, no, there’s nothing.” Crow forced himself to smile into the doctor’s anxious face. “It’s just that I’m into something beyond the normal scope of things, something I have to see through to the end.”
“Oh? Well, it must be a damned funny business that you can’t tell me about. Anyway, I’m not the prying type—but I do urge you to be careful.”
“It is a funny business, Harry,” Crow nodded, “and I’m only just beginning to see a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel. As for my being careful—you may rely upon that!”
Seeing Townley to the door, he had second thoughts. “Harry, do I remember your having a gun, a six-shooter?”
“A forty-five revolver, yes. It was my father’s. I have ammunition, too.”
“Would you mind if I borrowed it for a few weeks?”
Townley looked at him very hard, but finally gave a broad grin. “Of course you can,” he said. “I’ll drop it round tomorrow. But there is such a thing as being too careful, you know!”
VI
Following a very poor night’s sleep, the morning of Friday, 18 January, found Titus Crow coming awake with a start, his throat dry and rough and his eyes gritty and bloodshot. His first thought as he got out of bed was of Carstairs’ wine—and his second was to remember that he had given it to Taylor Ainsworth for analysis. Stumbling into his bathroom and taking a shower, he cursed himself roundly. He should have let the man take only a sample. But then, as sleep receded and reason took over, he finished showering in a more thoughtful if still sullen mood.
No amount of coffee seemed able to improve the inflamed condition of Crow’s throat, and though it was ridiculously early he got out the remainder of last night’s bottle of his own wine. A glass or two eased the problem a little, but within the hour it was back, raw and painful as ever. That was when Harry Townley turned up with his revolver, and seeing Crow’s distress he examined him and immediately declared the trouble to be psychosomatic.
“What?” said Crow hoarsely. “You mean I’m imagining it? Well, that would take a pretty vivid imagination!”
“No,” said Townley, “I didn’t say you were imagining it. I said it isn’t a physical thing. And therefore there’s no physical cure.”
“Oh, I think there is,” Crow answered. “But last night I gave the bottle away!”
“Indeed?” And Townley’s eyebrows went up. “Withdrawal symptoms, eh?”
“Not of the usual sort, no,” answered Crow. “Harry, have you the time to put me into trance just once more? There’s a certain precaution I’d like to take before I resume the funny business we were talking about last night.”
“Not a bad idea,” said the doctor, “at least where this supposed sore throat of yours is concerned. If it is psychosomatic, I might be able to do something about it. I’ve had a measure of success with cigarette smokers.”
“Fine,” said Crow, “but I want you to do more than just that. If I give you a man’s name, can you order me never to allow myself to fall under his influence—never to be hypnotized by him—again?”
“Well, it’s a tall order,” the good doctor admitted, “but I can try.”
Half an hour later when Townley snapped his fingers and Crow came out of trance, his throat was already feeling much better, and by the time he and Townley left his flat the trouble had disappeared altogether. Nor was he ever bothered with it again. He dined with the doctor in the city, then caught a taxi and went on alone to the British Museum.
Through his many previous visits to that august building and establishment he was well-acquainted with the curator of the Rare Books Department, a lean, learned gentleman thirty-five years his senior, sharp-eyed and with a dry and wicked wit. Sedgewick was the man’s name, but Crow invariably called him sir.
“What, you again?” Sedgewick greeted him when Crow sought him out. “Did no one tell you the war was over? And what code-cracking business are you on this time, eh?”
Crow was surprised. “I hadn’t suspected you knew about that,” he said.
“Ah, but I did! Your superiors saw to it that I received orders to assist you in every possible way. You didn’t suppose I just went running all over the place for any old body, did you?”
“This time,” Crow admitted, “I’m here on my own behalf. Does that change things, sir?”
The other smiled. “Not a bit, old chap. Just tell me what you’re after and I’ll see what I can do for you. Are we back to cyphers, codes, and cryptograms again?”
“Nothing so common, I’m afraid,” Crow answered. “Look, this might seem a bit queer, but I’m looking for something on worm worship.”
The other frowned. “Worm worship? Man or beast?”
“I’m sorry?” Crow looked puzzled.
“Worship of the annelid—family, Lumbricidae—or of the man, Worm?”
“The man-worm?”
“Worm with a capital W.” Sedgewick grinned. “He was a Danish physician, an anatomist. Olaus Worm. Around the turn of the sixteenth century, I believe. Had a number of followers. Hence the word Wormian, relating to his discoveries.”
“You get more like a dictionary every day!” Crow jokingly complained. But his smile quickly turned to a frown. “Olaus Worm, eh? Could a Latinized version of that be Olaus Wormius, I wonder?”
“What, old Wormius who translated the Greek Necronomicon? No, not possible, for he was thirteenth century.”
Crow sighed and rubbed his brow. “Sir,” he said, “you’ve thrown me right off the rails. No, I meant worship of the beast—the annelid, if you like—worship of the maggot.”
Now it was Sedgewick’s turn to frown. “The maggot!” he repeated. “Ah, but now you’re talking about a different kettle of worms entirely. A maggot is a grave -worm. Now, if that’s the sort of worm you mean…have you tried The Mysteries of the Worm?”