Slaves of Sleep & the Masters of Sleep Read online

  Now she put down her briefcase and took off her small hat and swagger coat and seated herself at a distance from him, placing her materials on a small table before her. She arranged several letters in order and then stepped over to the blackwood desk and laid them before Jan who, to all signs, was deeply immersed in a treatise on aerodynamics.

  Truth told, he was afraid to notice her, not knowing anything to say besides that which had brought her there and not wanting to talk about such matters to her.

  She twitched the papers and still he did not look up. Finally she said, “You’re holding that book upside down.”

  “What? Oh . . . oh, yes, of course. These diagrams, you see . . .”

  “Shall we begin on the letters? This one on top is from the Steamship Owners Alliance, asking your attendance at a conference in San Francisco. I have noted the reply on the bottom.”

  “Oh, yes. Thank you.” He looked studiously at the letter, his ears very red. “Yes, that is right. I won’t be able to attend.”

  “I didn’t think you would,” she said unexpectedly.

  “Uh?”

  “I said I was sure you wouldn’t. They asked you but Mr. Green will go instead.”

  “He wouldn’t want me to go,” said Jan. “He . . . he knows much more about it than I.”

  “You’re right.”

  Jan detected, to his intense dismay, something like pity in her voice. Pity or contempt; they were brothers anyway.

  “But he really does,” said Jan. “He wouldn’t like it if I said I would go.”

  “He’ll be the only nonowner there.”

  “But he has full authority. . . .”

  “Does he?” She was barely interested now. Jan thought she looked disappointed about something. “Shall we get on with these letters?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  For the following two hours he stumbled through the correspondence, taking most of his text from Alice Hall’s suggestions. She wrote busily and efficiently and, at last, closed her notebook and put on her hat and coat.

  “Do you have to go?” said Jan, surprising himself. “I mean, couldn’t I send for some tea and things? It’s late.”

  “I’ll be up half the night now, transcribing.”

  “Oh . . . will you? But don’t you finish these at the office in the morning?”

  “Along with my regular work? A company can buy a lot for fifteen dollars a week these days.”

  “Fifteen . . . but I thought our stenographers got twenty-five.”

  “Oh, do you know that much about it?”

  “Why . . . yes.” He was suddenly brightened by an idea. “If you have to work tonight perhaps I had better drive you home. It’s quite a walk up to the car line. . . .”

  “I have my own car outside. It’s a fine car when it runs. Good night.”

  He was still searching for a reply when she closed the door behind her. He got up, suddenly furious with himself. He went over to the fireplace and kicked at the logs, making sparks jump frightenedly up the flue. In the next fifteen minutes he thought up fifteen hundred things to say to her, statements which would swerve her away from believing him a weak mouse, holed up in a cluttered room. And that thought stopped him and sent him into a deep chair to morosely consider the truth of his simile. Time and again he had vowed to tell them all. Time and again something had curled up inside of him to forbid the utterance.

  Sunk in morbid reverie, he failed to hear Aunt Ethel enter and indignantly turn out the lights without seeing him in the chair. He failed to see that the fire burned lower and lower until just one log smoldered on the grate. He failed to hear the clock strike two bells, and so the night advanced upon him.

  With a start he woke without knowing that he had been asleep. He was cold and aching and aware of a wrong somewhere near him. Once again sounded the creepy scratch and Jan stood up, shaking and staring intently into the dark depths of the room. Someone or something was there. He did not want to turn on the light but he knew that he must. He found the lamp beside the chair and pulled its cord. The blinding glare whipped across the room to throw his caller into full relief.

  The curtains were blowing inward from the open window and the papers were stirring on the blackwood desk. And in the corner by the copper jar stood Frobish, nervous with haste, a knife peeling back ribbons of lead from the seal. For an instant, so intent was the interloper, he did not become aware of the light. And then he whirled about, facing Jan.

  Frobish’s eyes were hot and his face drawn. There was danger in his voice. “I had to do this. I’ve been half crazy for hours thinking about it. I am going to open this copper jar and if you try to stop me . . .” The knife glittered in his fingers.

  It was very clear to Jan that he confronted a being whose entire life was concentrated upon one object and who was now driven to a deed which, had conditions been otherwise, would have horrified no one more than Professor Frobish. But, with his goal at hand, it would take more than the strength of one man to stop him.

  “You said you promised,” cried Frobish. “I have nothing to do with that. You are not opening the jar and you were not commissioned to see that it was never opened by anyone. Your cousin was protecting only you and himself. He cared nothing about anyone else. If any harm comes from this, it is not on your head. Stay where you are and be silent.” He again attacked the stopper.

  Jan, his surprise leaving him, looked anxiously along the wall. But there were no weapons on this side of the room beyond an old pistol which was not loaded and, indeed, was too rusty to even offer a threat.

  A sudden spasm of outrage shook him. That this fellow should presume to break in here and meddle with what was his was swelled with years of resentment against all the countless invasions of his privacy and the confiscations of his possessions.

  Shaking and white, Jan advanced across the room.

  Frobish whirled around to face him. “Stand back! I warn you this is no ordinary case. I won’t be balked! This research is bigger than either you or me.” His voice was mounting toward hysteria.

  Jan did not stop. Watchful of the knife, unable to understand how the professor could go to such lengths as using it, he came within a pace. Frobish backed up against the wall, breathing hard, swinging the weapon up to the level of his shoulder.

  “I’ve dreamed for years of making such a discovery. You cannot stop me now!”

  “Be quiet or people will hear you,” said Jan, cooled a little by the sight of that knife. “You can leave now and nothing will have happened.”

  Frobish was quick to sense the change. He reached out and shoved Jan away from him to whirl and again pry at the stopper. Jan seized hold of his shoulder and spun him about. “You’re insane! This is my house and that jar is mine. You have no right, I tell you.”

  Savagely Frobish struck at him and Jan, catching the blow on the point of his chin, dropped to the floor, turned halfway about. Groggily, he shook his head, still unwilling to believe that Frobish could fail to listen to reason, unable to understand that he was dealing with forces and desires greater than he could ever hope to control.

  Once more Frobish flung him away and would have followed up, but behind him there sounded a thing like escaping steam. He forgot Jan and faced the jar to instantly stumble back from it. Jan remained frozen to the floor a dozen feet away.

  Black smoke was coiling into the dark shadows of the ceiling, mushrooming slowly outward, rolling into itself with ominous speed. Frobish backed against a chair and stopped, hands flung up before his face, while over him, like a shroud, the acrid vapors began to drop down.

  Jan coughed from the fumes and blinked the tears which stung his eyes. The stopper was not wholly off the jar and stayed on the edge, teetering until the last of the smoke was past, when it dropped with a dull sound to the floor.

  The smoke eddied more swiftly against the beams. It became blacker and blacker, more and more solid, drawing in and in again and finally beginning to pulsate as though it breathed.

&
nbsp; Something hard flashed at the top of it and then became two spiked horns, swiftly accompanied by two gleaming eyes the size of meat platters. Two long tusks, polished and sharp, squared the awful cavern of a mouth. Swiftly then the smoke became a body girt with a blazing belt, two arms tipped by clawed fingers, two legs like trees ending in hoofs, split toed and as large across as an elephant’s foot. The thing was covered with shaggy hair except for the face and the tail which lashed back and forth now in agitation.

  The thing knelt and flung up its hands and cried, “There is no God but Allah, the All Merciful and Compassionate. Spare me!”

  Jan was frozen. The fumes were still heavy about him but now there penetrated a wild animal smell which made his man’s soul lurch within him in memory of days an eon gone.

  Frobish, recovered now and seeing that the thing was wholly on the defensive, straightened up.

  “There is no God but Allah. And Sulayman is the lord of the earth!”

  “Get up,” said Frobish. “We care less than nothing about Allah, and Sulayman has been dead these many centuries. I have loosed you from your prison and in return there are things I desire.”

  The ifrit’s luminous yellow eyes played up and down the puny mortal before him. Slowly an evil twist came upon the giant lips. A laugh rumbled deep in him like summer thunder—a laugh wholly of contempt.

  “So, it is as I thought it might be. You are a man and you have loosed me. And now you speak of a reward.” The ifrit laughed again. “Sulayman, you say, is dead?”

  “Naturally. Sulayman was as mortal as I.”

  “Yes, yes. As mortal as you. Man who freed me, you behold before you Zongri, king of the ifrits of the Barbossi Isles. For thousands of years have I been in that jar. And would you like to know what I thought about?”

  “Of course,” said Frobish.

  “Mortal man, the first five hundred years I vowed that the man who let me free would have all the riches in the world. But no man freed me. The next five hundred years I vowed that the man who let me out would have life everlasting even as I. But no man let me out. I waited then for a long, long time and then, at long last, I fell into a fury at my captivity and I vowed—you are sure you wish to know, mortal man?”

  “Yes!”

  “Then know that I vowed that the one who let me free would meet with instant death!”

  Frobish paled. “You are a fool as I have heard that all ifrits are fools. But for me you would have stayed there the rest of eternity. Tonight I had to break into that man’s house to loose you. It is he who has held you captive, who would not let you go.”

  “A vow is never broken. You have freed me and therefore you shall die!” A thunderous scowl settled upon his face and he edged forward on his knees, unable to stand against the fourteen-foot ceiling.

  Frobish backed up hastily.

  The ifrit glanced about him. Near at hand were the Malay krisses and upon the largest he fastened, wrenching it from the wall and bringing the rest of the board down with a clatter. The great executioner’s blade looked like a toothpick in his fist.

  Frobish strove to dash out of the room but the ifrit raked out with his claws and snatched him back, holding him a foot from the floor.

  “A vow,” uttered Zongri, “is a vow.” And so saying he released Frobish who again tried to run.

  The blade flashed and there was a crunching sound as of a cleaver going through ham. Split from crown to waist, Frobish’s corpse dropped to the floor, staining the carpet for a yard about.

  Jan winced as something moist splashed against his hand and swiftly he scuttled back. The movement attracted the ifrit’s attention and again the claws raked out and clutched. Jan, assailed by fuming breath and sick with the sight of death, shook like a rag in a hurricane.

  The ifrit regarded him solemnly.

  “Let me go,” said Jan.

  “Why?”

  “I did not free you.”

  “You kept me captive for years. That one said so.”

  “You cannot,” chattered Jan, “you cannot kill a man for letting you free and then kill another for . . . for not letting you free.”

  “Why not?”

  “It . . . it is not logical!”

  Zongri regarded him for a long time, shaking him now and then to start him shivering anew. Finally he said, “No, that is so. It is not logical. You did not let me free and I said no vow about you. You are Mohammedan?”

  “N-N-No!”

  “Hm.” Again Zongri shook him. “You are no friend of Sulayman’s?”

  “I . . . n-n-no!”

  “Then,” said the ifrit, “it would not be right for me to kill you.” He dropped him to the floor and looked around. “But,” he added, “you held me captive for years. He said you did. That cannot go unpunished.”

  Jan hugged the moist floor, waiting for doom to blanket him.

  “I cannot kill you,” said Zongri. “I made no vow. Instead . . . instead I shall lay upon you a sentence. Yes, that is it. A sentence. You, mortal one, I sentence,” and laughter shook him for a moment, “to Eternal Wakefulness. And now I am off to Mount Kaf!”

  There was a howling sound as of winds. Jan did not dare open his eyes for several seconds but when he did he found that the room was empty.

  Unsteadily he got to his feet, stepping gingerly around the dead man and then discovering to his dismay that he himself was now smeared with blood.

  The executioner’s knife had been dropped across the body and, with some wild thought of trying to bring the man back to life, Jan laid it aside, shaking the already cooling shoulder.

  Realizing that that was a fruitless gesture he again got to his feet. He did not want to be alone for the first time in his life. He wanted lights and people about him. Yes, even Green or Thompson.

  He laid his hand upon the door but before he could pull, it crashed into his chest and he found himself staring into a crowd in the hall.

  Two prowler car men, guns in hand, were in front. A servant stood behind them and after that he could see the strained faces of Aunt Ethel and Thompson and Green.

  A flood of gladness went through him but he was too shocked to speak. Mutely he pointed toward Frobish’s body and tried to tell them that the ifrit had gone through the window. But other voices swirled about him.

  “Nab him, Mike. It’s open and shut,” said the sergeant.

  Mike nabbed Jan.

  “Deader’n a doornail,” said Mike, looking at the bisected corpse. “Open and shut.” He took out a book and flipped it open. “How long ago did you do it?”

  “About five minutes!” said Thompson. “When I first heard the voices in here and sent for you, I didn’t expect anything like this to happen. But I heard the sound of the knife and then silence.”

  “Five minutes, eh?” said the sergeant, wetting the end of his pencil and writing. “And what was this all about, you?”

  Jan recovered his voice. “You . . . you think I did this thing?”

  “Well?” said Mike. “Didn’tcha?”

  “No!” shouted Jan. “You don’t understand. That jar—”

  “Fell on him, I suppose.”

  “No, no! That jar . . .”

  Intelligence flashed in Aunt Ethel’s needlepoint eyes. She flung herself upon Jan, weeping. “Oh, my poor boy. How could you do such an awful thing?”

  Jan, startled, tried to shake her off, urgently protesting to the sergeant all the while. “I told him not to but he broke through the window and pried at the stopper . . .”

  “Who?” said Mike.

  “I’ll handle this,” said the sergeant in reproof.

  “He means Professor Frobish, his guest,” said Thompson. “The professor came to see him about an Arabian ship model this afternoon.”

  “Huh, murdered his guest, did he? Mike, you hold on here while I send for the homicide squad.”

  “Don’t!” shouted Jan. “You’ve got it all wrong. Frobish broke in here to let—”

  “Save it for the sergeant
and the boys,” said Mike, shaking him to quiet him down.

  Jan glared at those around him. Thompson was looking at him in deep sorrow. Aunt Ethel was wiping her eyes with the hem of her dressing gown. And all the while Nathaniel Green was pacing up and down the room, squashing fist into palm and muttering, “A murder. A Palmer, a murderer. Oh, how can such things keep happening to me? The publicity—and just when the government was offering a subsidy. I knew it, I knew it. He was always strange and now, see what he’s done. I should have watched him more closely. It’s my fault, all my fault.”

  “No, it’s mine,” wept Aunt Ethel. “I’ve tried to be a mother to him and he repays us by killing his guest in our house. Oh, think of the papers!”

  It went on and on. It went on for the benefit of the newspapermen who came swarming in on the heels of such a name as Palmer. It went on to the homicide squad. Over and over until Jan was sick and wobbly.

  The fingerprint men were swift in their work. The photographers took various views of the corpse.

  And then an ambulance backed up beside the Black Maria and while Frobish was basketed into the former, Jan, under heavy guard, was herded into the latter.

  And as they drove away, the last thing he heard was Aunt Ethel’s wail to a latecoming newsman that here was gratitude after all that she had done for him too, and wasn’t it awful, awful, awful? Wasn’t it? Wasn’t it? Wasn’t it?

  Chapter Three

  Eternal Wakefulness

  Jan was too stunned by the predicament to protest any further; he went so willingly—or nervelessly—wherever he was shoved that the officers concluded there was no more harm left in him for the moment. Besides, a gang of counterfeiters was occupying the best cells and so a little doubling was in order. Jan found himself thrust into a cubicle, past a pale, snake-eyed fellow, and then the door clanged authoritatively and the guard marched away.

  Seeing the cell and the cellmate and believing it was a cell and a cellmate were two entirely different things. Jan sat down on a bunk and looked woodenly straight ahead. He was in that frame of mind where men behold disaster to every side but are so thoroughly drenched with it that they begin to discount it. It was even a somewhat solacing frame of mind. Nothing worse than this could possibly happen. Unlucky Fate had opened the bag and pulled out everything at once and so, by lucid reason, it was impossible for said Unlucky Fate to have any further stock still hidden.