I lurched over the side of the bed, staggered blindly in the direction of the bathroom, and began making myself beautiful. It was a longer process than it used to be, but five minutes later, I was modestly presentable. With breakfast smoldering between my fingers and the coffeemaker belching like a steel worker, I settled into the chair behind my desk and began composing my daily list of things to do.
(1) Get up. Check. (2) Splash water on face. Done. (3) PI breakfast. Almost ready. (4) Lose weight and get into shape. (5) Go see Percival.
The coffee hadn’t even finished brewing, and I’d already covered half the list. I leaned back in my chair and took a drag, feeling like I had things pretty well in hand. When the coffee was ready, I poured a mug and returned to my chair.
Reading while eating breakfast is one of life’s simple joys. Back when I could afford cold cereal, I knew the Cap’n Crunch box like the back of my hand. I fished the now dog-eared blue card out of my overcoat and examined it for the umpteenth time as I downed my coffee. BXK+A261184. I still couldn’t make heads or tails of it. Maybe I should have shown it to the Interpol agents. I’d forgotten to ask.
Staring at the index card started to get me frustrated, so I switched to the Colonel’s notebook. Maybe I’d overlooked something the first time through. I opened it up and saw the three names I’d jotted down when I’d been talking to Paul Dubois: Phoenix, Chameleon, and Professor Perriman. The first two were almost certainly code names, but Professor Perriman sounded like someone I should be able to track down.
Dubois had told me that he’d gotten the name from the Capricorn mole’s report. The mole was working inside the Crusade for Genetic Purity, which was based in New San Francisco. Hopefully, the Professor was also a citizen of our fair-to-middlin’ city.
I pulled up the directory on my computer and found eighteen Perrimans listed. Then I got on the horn and started calling. Eventually I reached a Mrs Perriman, who said her husband taught classes at the University of San Francisco until one o’clock and probably wouldn’t be home until dinnertime.
After my third cup of sweet caffeine, I left the office and flew my speeder to USF. The campus was bustling with fresh faced students who didn’t look old enough to have driver’s licences. One of these, a cute redhead with newly straightened teeth, helpfully informed me that Professor Perriman taught history in the Jerry Rice building.
I followed her directions and found the building shortly before one o’clock. I paused outside the door and joined several students in a pre-lecture smoke. As we puffed, I listened in on their conversation, which was laced with sophomoric philosophy and rumours of huge, post finals keggers.
I finished my cigarette and stepped inside. On the third floor, I found a directory and made my way to room 319. The door was open, and I looked in to see a heavy-set man rummaging through a stack of papers on top of a file cabinet.
“Professor Perriman?”
The large man turned to face me. His hair was thick and untamed and had almost completely lost the pigment battle, though his impressively feral beard still had streaks of black in it. He had a high, broad forehead and a pinkish complexion, with red blotched cheeks that peeked over the top of his beard. A pair of bifocals sat forgotten on the bridge of his bulbous nose. Professor Perriman had the look of a man who had lived a full life and still had a ways to go.
“What can I do for you?” He took a step toward me, so I stayed where I was.
“I’m not really sure, to tell you the truth. A friend of a friend said that I should look you up.”
“Who’s the friend?”
Dubois hadn’t known the Professor, and I didn’t have any other names. I decided to get the point. “Someone who works for CAPRICORN.”
The Professor tilted his head forward and stared at me over his glasses. He looked like Santa, trying to decide if I was naughty or nice. After a moment, he motioned for me to come in and close the door behind me. I stepped into his office and looked the place over. He was a man after my own heart. There was a desk-shaped pile of books and papers and three other mounds with armrests. It pleased me that the Professor didn’t apologise as he cleared space on two of the chairs. When we were seated, he pulled a pipe from his herringbone jacket and tapped it on the side of his desk. “CAPRICORN, eh? I didn’t think they were still in business.”
“I’m not sure they still are.”
The Professor grunted as he packed his pipe. He smoked Captain Gold. The smell it emitted was the only entry in my top 10 list of aromas that wasn’t related to food or women. The old man clenched the pipe in his teeth as he dug through his pockets. I would’ve offered my Zippo, but any smoker worth his salt knew that you just didn’t use lighters on pipes. The old man located a red-tipped match and soon had the nest boiling.
He settled in and turned his attention back to me. “We ought to introduce ourselves.”
I stuck out my hand. “Murphy. Tex Murphy.”
“Benjamin Perriman. So tell me, Mr Murphy, What brings you to my office under such murky pretenses?”
I smiled. “Well, I’m a PI, and, in my business, you’re what we like to call a ‘lead’. It’s like proselytizing missionary work, except I get to smoke, drink, and swear.”
Smoke curled out from under the professor’s expansive moustache. “A private investigator, eh? So this visit is related to a case of some sort. Murder, I hope. Nothing better than a good whodunnit.”
“Actually, their seems to have been a murder committed, though it’s more of a whydunnit than a whodunnit.”
“So how did it happen? In the conservatory with a candlestick?”
“Good guess. We won’t know for certain until the police find the body. All they found so far is a finger.”
The professor leaned forward, holding a pipe in his hand. “Anyone I know?”
I shrugged. “Maybe. You heard of Colonel Roy O’Brien?”
The professor’s brow furrowed, and he puffed thoughtfully for some time before nodding.
“I can’t say that your news is totally unexpected, though it’s certainly unfortunate.”
“You knew him, then?”
Perriman removed his pipe. “We met several months ago. I gave him some information.
From what he told me, I believed he was putting himself in great danger.”
“I’m trying to find out who murdered him.”
Unexpectedly, the Professor smiled, though it could have been more of a grimace. “I would be surprised if you ever do.” He sat back in his chair. “But that’s academic. How does this involve me?”
I leaned forward. “That’s what I’d like to find out. If you’ve got a few minutes, I’ll hum a few bars, and you can jump in whenever it starts to sound familiar.”
Perriman waved his hand, and I started at the beginning. He listened patiently as I told him about being hired by the “Countess.” It wasn’t until I offhandedly described the statuette that I got a reaction. The professor literally sat up. “The Habuh.”
“Excuse me?”
Professor Perriman set his pipe on a stack of books and stood up. Without a word, he walked to a jam-packed bookcase and began searching for something. He quickly found a large, hardbound volume and started leafing through it as he returned to his seat.
Finding what he wanted, he turned the book around and held it in front of me, his finger pointing to a drawing of the countess’s statuette. “Is this the one you saw?”
I nodded, unsure of what this meant. Everything I’d heard about the statuette led me to believe it was valuable and highly prized, but seeing it in this ancient book put it in a whole new light. When the Professor turned the book back around, I caught a glimpse of the title: A complete History of Arcana and the Occult.