The Green Man (17 page)

“For whatever reason – and it may simply have been because she sensed a kindred spirit in me – she sat beside me on the bench and proceeded to tell me the most incredible story I had ever heard.

“It was about a magic show she had attended as a child and a magician of such incredible power that, even after all those years, it was impossible for her to forget him.

“The show took place on a hot August night. A boy had pasted a flyer for it to the pole in front of her house. A traveling magician was passing through town and was to give a show at the Caledon depot for one night only. She begged her parents to let her go and, finally, they agreed.

“Her father accompanied her, as did several other parents. But the magician no sooner appeared onstage than he asked them all to leave. This was to be a children’s show. Well, leave they did, though not without some misgivings. For they must have sensed that this was no ordinary magician.

“There was something in his voice, she said … something in his eyes – a power. He performed incredible feats with such ease that he seemed more than human. To look in his eyes was to become lost in them, utterly and willingly lost.

“He seemed to know the secret wish of every child there and to possess the power to grant it. Within the confines of that room, all things seemed possible – to fly, to disappear, to bring things into being with the wave of a hand.

“His words were sweet as honey, his voice melodious as music. When he spoke, it was as if every word was meant for her alone. But, despite it all, something kept catching
in her mind – a doubt that drew her back each time she felt herself about to fall hopelessly under his spell.

“It was more a feeling than a thought. Like a gust of wind parting the painted backdrop of a play, for a moment the magic would fail and something would show itself behind the smooth allure – something with neither blood nor heart nor human feeling. Something of blind implacable power. For an instant it was there – and then it was gone.

“His hooded eyes would flare and there would be a momentary ferocity. The winning smile would flicker and there would be a sudden glint of fang. The melodious voice would falter and, in its place, there would be the sharp bark of command.

“Behind it all, she sensed an insatiable hunger – a desire to possess her wholly, to hollow her out until she was no more than an empty shell. And then it would pass, and again there would be only the wonder.

“Several times during the performance, the magician asked for a volunteer from the audience to assist in an illusion. Everyone who volunteered received a copy of his little book, which he said contained the secrets of his magic art.

“The highlight of the show was an illusion called the Decollation of John the Baptist. The magician called for a volunteer, and a boy went up. He had the boy lie down on a table and covered his head with a cloth. Producing a
long-bladed knife, he reached under the cloth and, with one quick downward motion, buried the blade in the wood of the table. He picked up the cloth and what it contained and carried it to the foot of the table. With a flick of the wrist, he whisked the cloth away.

“There stood the boy’s severed head. Slowly it opened its eyes. The magician asked it questions, and the head answered back. After a while, the magician covered the head with the cloth again and returned it to the body. He spoke some magical words. A tremor went through the boy and he sat up, rubbing his neck. The audience applauded wildly. Clutching his copy of the little book, the boy returned to his seat, apparently none the worse for his experience.

“However, later that year, the same boy was involved in a fatal accident. He was crossing a railway bridge, when suddenly he looked back and began to run furiously for the other side. He had almost reached safety, when he looked back once more and suddenly leapt from the bridge, plunging into the ravine far below. They found him there later, dead of a broken neck. A group of boys who had witnessed the tragedy said it appeared the boy had spotted an oncoming train as he was crossing the bridge. But there was no train.

“No one connected the two incidents at the time. But Miss Potts became convinced that, long before the fall,
the boy had already died. She believed he had died up there on that stage three months before.

“As for the magician, he vanished without a trace. The room he had rented above the depot was empty. The food that had been brought to him sat untouched. The bed showed no sign of ever having been slept in.

“The memory of the magician and that fateful show stayed with her through the years. And the sudden reappearance of the old playbill convinced her that the show was somehow going to return. And that someone else might die.”

Emily leaned forward and butted out her cigarette, exhaling smoke. She looked over at the pack of cigarettes, then up at O. Taking a sip of her tea, she continued her story. She had repeated it time and again in her mind, as one repeats the lines of an unfinished poem, searching for the elusive words that will bring it to an end.

“The initial show took place at the Caledon depot on Saturday, August 8. It was a leap year. Miss Potts discovered that August 8 would again fall on a Saturday that very year, another leap year. She was sure that the show would somehow recur on that day.

“But the depot was no longer in use. My father was busy restoring it that summer with a group of local history buffs. It was to open in the fall as a railway museum.

“As mad as I thought she was, I found myself swept up in her feeling of foreboding. So on August 8, when my father failed to return home before dark from working in the depot, I went looking for him. I pedaled over there on my bike in the pouring rain. As I crossed the threshold of the darkened building, it was as though I had stepped through the door of a dream. The solid world fell away, and I entered the ghostly magic show Miss Potts had described to me in the park.

“I no longer knew who I was or how I had come to be there. The scene flickered like the candles that lit the room. A group of children sat spellbound before a makeshift stage, where a magician was spilling roses from a paper cone. The smell of the roses was overwhelming.”

“The smell of roses?” said O, remembering how several times since arriving at the Green Man, she had noticed the same smell.

“Yes,” said Emily. “It’s like his calling card.” And she gave her niece a long probing look.

“The magician saw me standing there and welcomed me to the show. I sat down with the others. The moon was shining in through the open window. Several times, when he asked for a volunteer to assist him onstage, he would fix his gaze on me. It was all I could do not to go, though I could not have said what stopped me. But when it came down to the last illusion, the Decollation of John the Baptist, a
memory stirred inside me. When a boy went to walk onto the stage, I stood to stop him and found myself drawn up there in his place. Had it not been for Miss Potts’ sudden arrival on the scene to thwart the magician and shatter the spell, he would surely have claimed another victim.

“After it was all over, she made me promise that I would continue to believe in the possibility of the impossible, that I would watch and wait and be ready for him when he came around again.

“I did continue to believe – I became a poet. Every day, poets must believe in the possibility of the impossible. As I guarded the truth of that, so too did I guard the truth of this other, darker thing that had fallen to me.”

“Twenty-eight years passed. I spent a lot of it away from home, traveling, working at this and that, living out of a car, with the backseat reserved for the other passenger in my life – poetry. Two suitcases full of pieces of paper salvaged from the storm of life – pieces I would from time to time assemble, like a puzzle without a box, putting out little books and sending them into the world.

“And all the while, in the back of my mind, I could feel the clock ticking away, the months and years slipping by, and the time approaching again when day and date would align as they had then. As that time drew near, I was drawn back here, hoping against hope it was all a
madness I had lived through, something that could not possibly happen again.

“I was forty-two when I returned to Caledon. I stayed with your aunt Elizabeth and her family. This was before they up and moved down South. Her daughter, your cousin Alice, had a job that summer at the local library. The new head librarian was planning to stage a Punch and Judy show with an antique set of puppets he’d discovered among the large collection housed at the library. He asked Alice if she would assist him in mounting the performance.

“The Caledon depot had been destroyed in a fire years before. I racked my brain, wondering how the magic show could possibly be performed again when the place in which it had occurred was no longer there. The local history material that had been salvaged from the blaze was now being stored at the library. Among the items on display was an old playbill for a magic show.

“Alice had become suspicious of my behavior, so I took her into my confidence. Of course, she thought I was crazy. Nevertheless, as the date grew ever nearer, I became more desperate. Late one night, I came home and found her waiting up for me. She was clearly afraid. She spoke of the change that had come over Mr. Dwyer, the head librarian, since he had begun to work on the Punch and Judy show. It was as if he was under some sort of spell. She suspected
it had something to do with the old set of puppets they were using for the show, in particular the frightening devil figure he would play.

“Alice felt a terrible foreboding whenever she was in the library now. And then, that day, something had happened. Out of the blue, Mr. Dwyer informed her he was changing the date of the puppet show. It was to be performed on August 8.

“The blood froze in my veins as I suddenly realized that this puppet show was a manifestation of the same darkness that had informed the magic show Miss Potts and I had seen and that, as the assistant in the show, Alice was in grave danger.

“I knew I had to prevent it from taking place. On the eve of the performance, with her help, I broke into the library. I could feel the magician’s presence there, and as I felt my way down the dark stairs into the basement, where the puppets were stored, it was as if I was entering his lair. I found the puppet set and destroyed the devil puppet, with its glowing eyes and its evil grin. And the darker magic was defeated again.

“Afterwards, I decided I’d had enough of moving around, enough of terror. I settled down here in Caledon and put the whole of it out of my mind for a long time. I threw myself into poetry with all my heart. And I threw myself into this shop.

“For years, I absolutely refused to think about it. It was like something that had happened to someone else, in some other lifetime. But all the while, in some dusty corner of myself, I could feel a presence quietly biding its time. It hung about there in the shadows, just out of sight.

“And then a year ago, as the time approached again, it suddenly grew bolder. It would stride out of the shadows and show itself without fear. I tried to frighten it back into hiding, but it stood its ground and mocked me with a grin.

“I began to dream the show again, though it was slightly different now. I saw the magician’s face whenever I shut my eyes. I heard his voice whenever silence fell. I don’t know how many sleepless nights I must have called your father. I felt that I was going mad, and I’m sure he must have, too.

“Then, one day last fall, I was sitting in the shop and I heard a noise. This shop is haunted by spirits, as I’m sure you know by now. They are friendly spirits, poets largely, most of them not really aware they are dead. But, this day, I looked up and the magician was standing just the other side of the desk, glaring at me. I screamed – and everything went dark. That was when I had my little ‘incident,’ as they call it. It was Leonard who found me and took me to hospital.

“And now this mysterious playbill has appeared out of nowhere. And I realize that the dreams I have been dreaming these past months are all drawn from it.

“I feel the show approaching again – like a storm on the horizon. The magician is a master of illusion. He can assume any shape he pleases to serve his end. And that end is death. I have no idea what shape he will take this time to lure his victim in. Nor do I have any notion where or how the show will take place. I only know it will come from somewhere I least expect.”

T
hings were a little strained between them for several days. O had no idea how to take Emily’s story of the magic show. A large part of her wanted to dismiss the whole thing as madness, but another part secretly began counting down the days till August 8.

She tried to make herself busy to avoid the tension that surfaced whenever the two of them were in the same room. She’d planned to paint the outside of the shop and decided this would be the perfect time. Breaking off a piece of the flaking paint from around the front window, she took it to the paint store down the street, matched it with a chip, and bought a gallon of Forest Green. At the same time, she picked up a paint scraper, a large brush, a roller and tray, and a drop sheet.

It was a lovely sunny morning – Saturday, July 25, according to the paper in a newspaper box she passed. She popped the lid off the paint can now, gave the rich thick paint a good stir, and dipped in her brush to begin. A lot of people she knew disliked painting, but O found
it calming. It was a chance now to escape the thoughts whirling around in her head.

She decided to hone her skills by starting on the bins for the bargain books. Spreading the drop sheet on the sidewalk under the awning, she set the empty bins on them. She cleaned off the dirt and dust and scraped away the loose paint. Then she applied the first brushstrokes and stood back to admire their deep rich color.

In no time at all, she had finished the first bin and moved on to the second. There was a nice breeze, and the sun was warm on her back. The Green Man swung in the breeze above her, muttering in his creaky, somehow comforting way. She dipped and painted, and her thoughts drifted.