Chapter #35Memories of Another Life by: Seuzz   Oh, what the hell. You pull off Seth's mask and put the new mask on.
* * * * * *
Memories ...
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
The wind whips around your small body and clutches at your fingers. There is a hint of snow in the air. You had asked your father if you might stay inside, and maybe he himself hadn't relished the idea of going outside, for he didn't beat you for making the suggestion. Not that it occurred to you--you were only seven years old at the time--that maybe he also didn't like the cold.
You've only three paintings today--an exceptionally greedy mark made off with two of them last week--but your business now is to play the violin, and you draw a long and intricate line of notes from it. This is the best part: Time seems to slow as you're playing, especially during the passages that even your gruff father admits sound "brilliant." Most people only stop to listen and to drop a few paper bills into the hat. But you've got to be alert to the few whose eyes settle on the canvases.
You're not sure about these two. One of them--the one in thick glasses under a mop of graying hair over a turtle-like beak of a mouth--seems drawn by the paintings, and he frowns over them intently. The other one, though, with the patchy white beard and the ruddy cheeks, seems deeply absorbed in your melody. Most people just attend to the music, but he seems to be pulling it in, and the faster you play the more he seems to draw the musical strands to himself.
"Well this one isn't just pretty," the turtle-like one honks as he jabs a painting with a bony finger. You're not surprised that he speaks English: The natives of Wroclaw are rare customers, and it is usually tourists who wind up cursing the day they saw you.
"My brother painted it," you chirp in perfect English. You shift your stance subtly: a signal to your father, who is seated across the street at a cafe. He drops a few coins on the table before sauntering over with a languid cigarette dangling from his fingers.
"Then why are you hawking them," the turtle-like one snaps.
"He's sick," you reply. You shut your eyes to concentrate on the violin, but you listen while pretending indifference as the two men jabber with each other. Not until you hear your father's voice do you open your eyes. He asks you about the artist and where he studied, and as per the script you tell him "the Siletsky Institute."
"They're quite good," your father says in a low tone to the foreigners (Americans, by their accents). "Not masterpieces, but the technique intrigues."
"I'm more into the pretty music," says the whiskered man.
"Mind you, he's overcharging," your father continues, ignoring the interruption. "But-- Excuse me, my boy, would you take me to meet this brother of yours?"
You look up, feigning vague incomprehension. "He's sick," you repeat with a shrug. "He doesn't like to see people."
"Well, could you give him this?" Your father hands you the card he has handed you more times than you can remember, in nearly identical circumstances. "My gallery is in Germany, so it probably won't mean much to a Pole," he confides to the foreigners.
"Music is universal," the whiskered man says. "The brother would be better off putting the boy into a music competition."
"Oh, he's just a monkey with a fiddle, Charles," says the turtle-mouthed man. "You think these things could be worth something some day?" he asks, turning to your father and gesturing at the paintings.
Your father smiles as the bait is taken. "Possibly--" he starts.
"The boy here will be more famous," says the whiskered man. He takes out and examines an enormous pocket watch, and there's a hungry look in his eye as he glances up at you. "Can you come with me for an hour?" he asks you. "Play your violin for a friend of mine?" Without shifting your eyes from the stranger, you look at your father; he remains stony.
"Our plane leaves in two hours," cries Turtle Lips.
"I'll buy all three paintings for you if we can take a later flight," says Whiskers. "Five thousand dollars for the set," he says to you, doubling the price.
Your father shifts his stance slightly, so you nod. Whiskers counts out the bills, and his friend crows jubilantly as he grabs up the three paintings. Your father affects a shrug and mutters about "over paying," but you can tell he is ecstatic: You will know how to get home after this odd detour, and he knows you will bring the money with you.
But you don't. It's only some weeks later, long after they have whisked you to America, that you realize the strangers played your father's own con game back at him, and claimed you as their prize.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
"Good golly, Miss Molly," you holler. "Are you done yet?"
"Watch your mouth, Franz," Nash mutters around the cigarette. "I've a special machine that'll learn you how to blaspheme." He continues to work furiously at the mechanism.
"Shit, Dad's already taught me the finer points of--" Cuck-OO! The clock chimes, and you've just time to see the evil little bird pop back behind its door. "Fuck! That's seven!"
"We know how to count," Giuseppe snaps. His eyes are screwed up in concentration, and his hands tightly grip empty air. "Make it go slower!"
"It's slippery!" Your whole body feels like it's being vibrated to pieces, and you grit your teeth as you glance over your shoulder. In stark contrast to those of the cuckoo clock, the hands on the grandfather clock seem to be moving very quickly.
"Just three more to go," Nash says. His steel-rimmed eyeglasses glint in the candlelight as he pinches two pieces of wire together. A small blue flame arcs, and an acrid odor fills the air. "Frank, has that fellow outside moved any since we've started?"
"I can't see out the window," you cry. "Ask Dum-Dum."
"I was," Nash says, and smiles to himself. "Sorry, I was making a joke. Giuseppe?"
"Still looking the other way."
"I don't suppose you can spare a hand to--" Giuseppe shakes his head. "We shoulda closed the curtains before starting."
Cuck-OO! "Eight!" you yell.
"Okay, I'm gonna try a two-fer," Nash says. "It was nice knowing you boys."
"What do you mean?" you gasp.
Snip snap snip snap. "Nothing. It worked. Now, you two shut up while I get this last one."
Reality seems to wobble beneath your feet: it's like balancing on a basketball. And you're juggling nitroglycerin.
"I think the guard is turning this way," Giuseppe murmurs.
"Joe, you have a comment?" Nash says dryly.
"Fuck! Wait, what did you call me?" He just smiles. You want to snarl, but you're distracted by another sharp stab at one of those invisible hands you're using to balance your trio inside the retarded time stream. "That bastard of a bird! He bit me again!"
"Bit you?" Giuseppe gasps. Nash looks over at you sharply.
You stare back dumbly. "Yeah. All this time he's been nipping at--"
"And you didn't mention it?" There's an iron snap in Nash's voice as he fishes inside his pants pockets. He pulls out a little slip of paper, peels a sticker from it, and peers back inside the panel underneath the cuckoo clock. He pushes aside some wires-- Cuck-OO! But then there's a hiss, and the bird sags on its perch. The red glow in its eyes disappears.
"Well, that was nerve-wracking," Nash sighs. "And for no good purpose." He stabs a finger in your face. "Next time, you tell me everything that's going on. Everything!"
"It's a demon-possessed cuckoo clock! I thought everyone would figure--"
"It wasn't possessed! Just charm-cast! Who told you it was--?" He frowns at Giuseppe, who has now turned pale. "Alright, just let me get inside the safe before that guard turns around. But your old dad will have words for both of you when we get back to Olympia!"
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
"So who's in charge of the mission?"
"You are, Frank." The old man smiles through a beard that has whitened and thinned considerably over the last ten years. But his cheeks are as ruddy as ever.
Giuseppe--"Frank" for the past four years, since Nash Carnes let slip the private joke he'd been sharing with the old man--frowns. "No, I mean, who--"
"Just you two. It's a small job, smaller than you should have for your debut."
You grin at Frank over the table. "I am going to make your life so miserable, you goose-stepping fascist."
"And which of us looks more like a Nazi?" he snaps.
"That's how come I'm letting my hair grow out." You run your fingers through the wiry mop. "I'd rather hit San Diego, but New York is nice this time of year. So we drop into Sleepy Hollow, scoop up the Personae, and we're back in time for fireworks and corn on the cob?"
"That's the idea."
"I love our family business!"
* * * * *
You open your eyes with a lazy smile. Yes, it was a very lucky thing you put this mask on before Patterson did.
Now, do you use this lucky break to help Joe and his brother--a pair of underage, undercover magical policeman who are trying to find the Libra Personae--finish their mission? Or do you use it to save you and your friends from them--and keep the book for yourself?  indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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