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By Root 652 0

his feet, smelled the acrid, leftover odour of cigarettes on the edge of the air, heard his own breathing, the muffled knock of his heart - all so vividly. The cat padded softly across the front porch, a mouse rustled in the attic, the pilot light on the stove hissed steadily, in an upstairs closet a chip of flaking paint finally fell. It was all so clear. At last, everything was so clear.

Downstairs in the gallery, the magician stood behind Teddy, his hands resting on his shoulders. There was something comforting in his touch, its assurance. Teddy felt supported, borne up. The two of them looked at his sculptures. They really were beautiful, Teddy thought in surprise. He'd always known they were, of course, but now he was seeing them as if someone else had created them, and their artistry amazed and humbled him. I really have done something, he thought. And he understood what the magician had wanted to show him.

'Let me ask you,' Thales said to Fitz and Anji. 'Do you believe in magic?'

'Well ' said Anji uncertainly, as Fitz shrugged. They were seated in Thales's neat kitchen, which appeared to serve as his parlour. To their surprise, when they had returned to the museum in the evening and Anji had pressed the bell at the gate, Thales had looked out of the door and buzzed them in. Almost as if he'd been waiting for them.

He'd apologised for being distraught earlier, showed them the damage from the breakin, offered coffee. He was a timid man, Anji thought, watching him take painted mugs from the cupboard and cream from the fridge, and strange, but nice, really. He managed his crutches with practised ease. She sensed it would be an insult if she tried to assist him. Possibly Fitz sensed the same thing; in any case, he didn't offer to help.

'I ask,' Thales explained, setting a tall blue china coffee pot on the table,

'because you say you're here for help. I get the impression you believe I might know of some charm or spell you could use to trace your friend.'

'Not exactly,' said Anji, then hesitated. 'I'm not sure what we thought you could do,' she admitted. 'The thing is, some of the people we've got involved with apparently do believe in magic'

"The hell with that,' said Fitz. 'Some of them actually do it.'

'Well,' she said sceptically, 'according to Acree.'

Thales looked startled. 'Teddy Acree?'

'The sculptor.'

'But that's who broke in here.'

'You're joking,' said Fitz.

'No. He was extraordinarily upset. I believe he'd been seeing things.'

'According to Teddy,' said Fitz, 'someone tried to sacrifice the Doctor to a demon last night and got eaten.'

Thales blinked. 'Who got eaten?'

'Jack Dupre,' said Anji.

'What about the Doctor?'

'He was all right then. But he's gone now.'

'And Dupre?'

'No sign of him. A homicide detective the Doctor - we - know went up to his house yesterday afternoon, but he wasn't there and it didn't look as if he'd been home.'

'I've met Lieutenant Rust.'

"That's him,' said Fitz. 'He phoned us with the news. Said there were two days of newspapers on the porch.'

'Dupre is not, I believe, a man of regular habits. Surely it's going a little far to presume from two unclaimed newspapers that he was eaten by a demon.'

'Teddy said he was,' Fitz persisted, 'and you say he acted as if he'd been seeing things.'

'Well, yes, but Leave that aside for the moment.' Thales poured himself some more coffee. 'Whatever happened, the Doctor was all right. His being missing now may have nothing to do with all that. If he is missing. Are you sure he hasn't just gone off on some tack of his own?'

'Could be,' Fitz conceded after a glance at Anji. 'Been known to happen.'

Anji shook her head."There's something wrong here. Something to do with the drowned plantation.' Thales stared at her. 'Do you know that story?'

'Yes.'

'Only the son of the family survived. We traced him to a town in Vermont, where he supposedly died about fifteen years ago. But he isn't dead.'

'Not dead?' Thales was still staring. 'Where is he?'

'We don't know. But