The Fourth Circle Read online

  And alas, wherever I looked I saw horrid instruments for this exacting of debts; tools that only the most perverse imagination could have invented for exposing the frail human frame to inconceivable suffering. On a blazing hearth were the glowing coals that give to heavy iron its white and raging heat, that it may leave its burning brand on quivering human flesh, the pain of which drives men quite mad. And there, the torturer's table with its iron-winched rack that serves to stretch the body beyond measure and tear its doomed victim apart, plucking his limbs or head from the body. I saw also a great pendulum, its cutting edge finely honed, designed to descend slowly but inexorably from the ceiling, cutting with every fatal arc a deeper slash in the soft body, but so slowly that a seeming infinity must pass before the edge of the pendulum reaches the other side of the poor wretch's frame.

  Other devices of torture were there, the use of which I could not begin to divine but of an aspect so loathsome that those I recognized appeared in comparison to be but the harmless tools of some common trade. To what unimaginable anguish is the prisoner exposed in that narrow, coffin-like chest? Does the window in it, placed where the prisoner's face must be, afford the devil an opportunity to feed in cackling pleasure on the convulsions and screams of the hopeless sinner? What filth bubbles in that large cauldron, under which no fire burns? And what is that slimy, scaly thing within, which swims up to the surface from time to time to let out a harrowing, hungry shriek that instantly curdles even the bravest blood? And what mutilation is caused by those heavy boots, braced tightly with metal hoops, beside which a pile of human bones lies crushed and gleaming in spectral whiteness?

  But of all these dread devices, one in particular, the largest of them all, caused me the greatest perplexity. A huge wheel stood in the center of the second circle of the devil's lair, laid flat like an enormous platter: it had no sharp edges for cutting off a body's extended parts, no sharp spikes to pierce its soft entrails, no raging fire to burn one with insufferable heat.

  Moved by a foolish curiosity, I approached this odd instrument, when on my bony shoulder I felt again Marya's hand, from which a current of reinvigoration flowed anew. I started at this light touch, suddenly afraid that she was preparing me for some new horror, pouring new strength into me that I might better endure yet another test, maybe harsher than all I had so far undergone.

  But a careful, searching look revealed nothing that might support these black suspicions. The upper surface of the great circle looked entirely flat, even smooth, as if an industrious carpenter had spent many days polishing it; only at four places were there broad leather bindings, to fix the victim's limbs and so deny him escape from an unknown but surely warranted fate. It was easy to see that the arms would be outstretched as our Savior's were on the holy cross, the legs spread wide in an immodest manner, so that the hands and feet touched the very edge of the wheel, where was a shallow groove whose purpose I could not, at that moment, yet define.

  When I examined this groove more closely, bending down to aid my failing eyesight, I saw it was filled with strange patterns, signs beyond my ken, such as those found in sacred tomes or those that the Master put at times along the base of his frescoes. I regretted now that I had not obeyed his wise counsel to learn the secrets of such letters, but I had always thought that this knowledge was necessary only to idle monachs and not to ordinary mortals, such as I considered myself to be.

  These signs were drawn on fields of different colors, alternately red and black, and only one of them, quite round, lay on a field of green, standing out in its particularity, as if it were the beginning and end of a closed sequence. Moved by a sudden impulse, I walked around the edge of this massive wheel and counted on the fingers of both hands three times ten and once seven of these symbols. This made me no wiser, for among the marks of neither God nor Sotona could I remember any that would fit that number.

  I looked at Marya, who had not yet taken her hand from my shoulder, but had no time to ask her for an explanation. Nor was it probable that I would get one, even had events not taken a new turn, for this woman of divine countenance but mayhap demonic nature had not yet uttered a word since my first seeing her, as if she knew not how to speak, or thought me unworthy to hear her angelic voice.

  Just then, the sharp ringing of a bell filled my ears with deafening noise from all sides, as if I were standing in a great cave and not in the torture chambers of Hell. I turned around this way and that, seeking with my weak eyes the source of this ringing sound, but saw something else, alas, that filled my soul at once with mighty dread.

  It was the most peculiar procession that I had ever seen. At its head strode the Master, garbed in a long black cape spangled with stars reaching to the stone floor. On his head was a cap like the pointed donjon of a nobleman's castle, made of the same star-spangled cloth, adding to his normal stature. I could hardly recognize him thus tricked out and only then remembered that I had not until this moment noticed his absence from this second circle of Hell.

  The most remarkable thing about the Master was not these strange garments but rather what he held in his hands. In one he held a royal scepter, glinting with golden reflections, and in the other a large orb made of some cloudy transparent substance, the surface of which gave off distorted reflections of surrounding objects. I had no time to wonder at my Master's new, unbecoming accouterments, because my gaze slid immediately, irresistibly, to two other figures walking behind him in the procession.

  The first was of such repulsive mien that I would have fled headlong had I not felt Marya's light hand on my shoulder, infusing me with a fresh, steady flow of calmness. It was a huge insect, as high as the Master's chest, with a multitude of legs slender as willow twigs. I could not understand how they bore the enormous weight of that burly body, nor how they moved so harmoniously in a very complex, regular order, as if following with the intensity of a dancer to the sounds of music inaudible to me.

  It most resembled a monstrous spider, harbinger of manifold evil and woe—and verily, he dragged a cobweb after him, not at all thin but matching in thickness the size of the strange creature. A rattling sound reached my ears, driving away that illusion as I recognized, in what I had foolishly thought to be a strand of cobweb, an iron chain with links as thick as a man's finger, which led from one of the spider's many legs back to the third figure. For a moment this calmed me, for I thought that this must be a brave tamer holding his terrible beast under strict control on an unbreakable chain, as the bear-tamers lead their grey animals around at country fairs in the autumn. But when this figure stepped into stronger light, I saw two things at once—and my soul filled with utter horror.

  The thick chain from the spider's leg reached back to the third participant in the strange procession, yes, but did not end in the tamer's hand; instead, it was joined to an iron collar around the man's neck, put there as on the meanest slave.

  Here everything was reversed: this monstrous insect led a man on a chain, not the other way around, as would be the only natural state of affairs and pleasing to the Lord—but lo, he was not even a man. For when I looked more closely, I recognized by many unmistakable signs our host in this underground dwelling place: the fallen angel, the one who dared vaingloriously to gainsay the Lord: the Prince of Darkness, who forever reaches out for faltering human souls: Sotona the mighty, who lured my Master by flattering gifts into the worst sin.

  Above his high forehead stood two blunt horns, disfiguring a countenance that was otherwise human. A hairy tail, terminating in an ominous arrow head, dragged on the cold stone floor after him. His body was thick and humped, enveloped in a black cloak, its hem streaked with dried mud and lined in brightest scarlet, which his tottering gait, akin to the Devil on goat's hooves, caused to blaze forth from time to time.

  Of all this, my gaze lingered most upon his countenance—that of a hopeless convict being led to inevitable execution. A long trail of sweat meandered down his quivering cheek, and his lips pursed in little twitches, revealing vast u
nrest of the soul. Had this been a poor servant of God, these would have been clear signs of mortal fear besetting the wretch in his most difficult, fatal hour. But the Devil himself this was, who stood beyond all fear from the moment in which the Lord decreed the greatest punishment for him. For what could be worse than his lot, to dwell for eternity in the mud and excrement of the nether world? I could not imagine it but was not destined to wait long for an answer to this question to be revealed in all its hellish wonder.

  Although unmarked with the sacred sign of the cross, the great wheel terrified Sotona, causing him to pull back in savage frenzy when it became clear that his guides were proceeding relentlessly toward it. But the strength of the Devil, though it be beyond any human power, was naught to that of the spider, so that he was swiftly dragged to his circular doom despite his cries, so horrendous that even Marya's face twisted in pain for a moment, losing its angelic smile.

  When finally strapped by the leather thongs to the smooth surface of the wooden wheel, Sotona fell quiet of a sudden, as if resigned without further complaint to his terrible fate. But his breast heaved rapidly under the black, flame-lined cloak; from his foul mouth a rapid mumbling came in a tongue quite unknown to me, like the last, black prayer before the end that nothing can postpone.

  And at that moment, in my perplexity, I felt something that but an instant before I would have held for ultimate blasphemy and that could be counted among the gravest sins: a sudden wave of compassion for this poor creature of the underworld, whom merciless fate had exposed to final torment on a circular crucifix, torment no less than our Savior's on His cross at Golgotha. If it be the will of the Lord to inflict such revenge on the Devil, then they lie who say His mercy is infinite.

  These doubting thoughts had no time to take hold of my unfaithful mind because my Master stepped nearer to offer me the gleaming orb that he had been holding in his hands with the golden scepter. I stood not knowing what to do with this wondrous gift, which was not for my rough hands, but Marya's touch on my shoulder became a little stronger, and a clear understanding came to me: the ball was to be placed in the circular, patterned groove, there to spin rapidly, describing a blazing ring around the spread-eagled Devil and seal his doom.

  I shrank back from this awful intimation: was I to become his executioner, my ultimate destiny this, to be the instrument of God's harsh vengeance? But why?

  Why me, poor sinner that I am? I had a powerful wish to escape this heavy burden, but there was no resisting Marya's incorporeal will, which flowed from my shoulder into my mind, and I placed the orb into the groove filled with the signs on fields of three colors.

  I gave it no impetus, but nonetheless it began to move at once along the groove, slowly, then faster, and after circling but a few times became a streak of bright light. With each new turn, Sotona's body convulsed more strongly, jerking this way and that, frantically trying to escape, like a wild stallion when a man first climbs upon his back. For a moment I feared that the leather bindings, although they looked sturdy, would not endure such frenzied pulling, that the Devil would free himself from the circular crucifix and punish his unwilling executioner, but it was not destined to be, fortunately or unfortunately for me.

  At the climax of its mad gyrations, when the wheel had begun to shake violently, my Master unexpectedly struck his golden scepter on the stone floor. A sharp sound rang out, similar to the earlier echoing bell, and the spinning ball, as if it had hidden ears, quickly decelerated and lost its brightness. With this, Sotona's convulsions lessened, turning to a slight shaking and the quavering whimper of an exhausted soul.

  Marya and the awful spider then moved a step closer to the wheel, the better to see the final stopping of the ball—and I understood that the Devil's suffering was not at an end. Only the Master remained at the same distance, gazing askance, as if the Devil's fate did not touch him at all, as if he knew it beforehand.

  A moment later, the fateful orb came to a standstill over the round letter on a field of green, and then I had only enough time to register one unearthly sound before an almighty flash, like the wondrous manifestation of the Lord Himself, sucked into its infinite light the entire second circle of the nether kingdom and all of us in it: a throaty chuckle, a thunderous guffaw that gushed forth from the gullet of the spider-like beast....

  9. SHERLOCK HOLMES'S LAST CASE (3) MORPHINE

  WHEN I ARRIVED at Holmes's house the next morning, carrying an armful of books that had drawn curious or suspicious looks from many passers-by along the route, his face looked swollen around the eyes. He was also unshaven; clearly he had spent the whole night reading and had had no time—or had simply forgotten—to perform his morning ablutions.

  Of course, I could not then have suspected that I would never again see him in a fresher condition. All the indications of the approaching catastrophe were even then staring me in the face, but I failed to recognize them. No wonder: to perceive them, one had to have the keen sight of a Sherlock Holmes, while all I had at my disposal was the rather unpenetrating sight of a humble London physician.

  It was a relief for me to unload my burden onto the couch in the corner of the drawing room and wipe the perspiration from my forehead. I could hardly believe how heavy the books were. I had heard a similar remark from Sir Arthur, the director of the British Museum Library, as he, not without effort and with my assistance, deciphered Holmes's list of required books. Actually, when he had called them "weighty," he was referring more to the intellectual level of the books than to their physical properties—but nonetheless, we agreed in principle.

  "Weighty stuff," Sir Arthur had said. He was a rather stocky man, balding, with a smooth manner and round reading glasses with metal frames. These he wore low on his nose—apparently leaving them on even when he was not reading—and he watched his interlocutor over them, causing his forehead to wrinkle in a permanent frown. A long golden chain belonging to a pocket watch flowed out of one slit in his waistcoat and into another. The waistcoat was too tight, clearly having been made at a time when the owner was considerably slimmer than he was now.

  "Mr. Holmes is about to embark on a major investigation," I had said, feeling a need to justify my friend's choices, "which demands familiarity with some very diverse fields of knowledge."

  "It must be an extremely strange case," Sir Arthur had replied, no doubt trying to satisfy his curiosity but in as unobtrusive a manner as possible. "Mr. Holmes frequently borrows books from us, but I do not remember him ever taking so many at once."

  "This is not a case," I hastened to explain. "Rather, he is involved in entirely academic research into a strange phenomenon that has apparently manifested itself in all eras and climates."

  "How extraordinarily interesting," my interlocutor remarked. "I did wonder what such diverse titles might have in common. See here."

  He began sifting through the books, which had been brought to us from various shelves by his assistants; each time he picked up a tome he cast a meaningful glance at me over his glasses. "Introduction to Advanced Mathematics. History of Chinese Cooking. The Cosmogonies of Early Civilizations. Floral Ornaments in Islamic Architecture. A Compendium of Secret Societies. And what do you say to this: God and Musicl Nobody has asked for this book for...let me check...yes, a full century! Mr.

  Holmes will certainly get dust in his lungs reading this."

  "I am afraid that I cannot tell you anything more specific," I replied, hoping to bring the conversation to an end by preventing Sir Arthur from questioning me further. "Not because of any secrecy that Mr. Holmes's research involves but simply because I am almost entirely ignorant concerning it. My role in all of this is quite marginal. That of the errand-boy, one might say."

  "You are too modest, Doctor Watson," said Sir Arthur, blinking at me over his glasses. It was clear he did not believe me. "It is well known that you are Mr.

  Holmes's right hand." He stopped for a moment, as if contemplating something, and then added, "In any case, I am honored to have m
ade your acquaintance. I hope I will have the pleasure of being at your service in the future, too; pray convey my greatest respects to Mr. Holmes."

  Though his curiosity was undoubtedly piqued, he observed the unwritten rule of gentlemanly conduct: do not bang your head against a brick wall. He respected my indication that I was not particularly willing to reveal details of Holmes's schemes. But what, in fact, could I have told him: that behind all this lay a slightly unhinged message from one malicious dead man, written on very valuable, indestructible Italian paper, all of which greatly excited my friend? That would really have complicated matters.

  I began to recount my conversation with Sir Arthur to Holmes, but he dismissed this with a wave of his hand, plainly uninterested, and threw himself on the books—quite literally. He jumped onto the couch amidst them and started to browse through the old tomes. He was not leafing through them in a normal manner: he was acting, so it seemed to me, like a man who had misplaced something valuable in one of the books and was now trying impatiently, almost in panic, to find it. His movements were so hurried that here and there a page became detached from the weakened bindings.

  I knew Holmes's passion well, that mighty inner drive that would force him to attack with all his energies a case that he judged to be a worthy challenge, but I had never yet seen such violence. In his eyes was a stare that would on any other face offer a sure sign of madness. With Holmes it could have been, admittedly, the result of a night without sleep, but now for the first time, I feared that it might be something of a much graver nature.

  Since he was paying no attention to me nor had any wish for conversation, I started to look around the drawing room, unsure of what to do. My gaze inevitably fell on the massive table, strewn with books from Holmes's extensive private library. Besides the books, most of which lay open, there were many sheets of paper, covered with drawings and short comments. Holmes had, it was clear, worked through the night; it was no wonder he looked the way he did. I picked up one of the drawings and looked at it more closely.