The Anubis Gates

“Oh, will you look at that, Stanley, on top of it all he can’t hear nor speak. Low as a dog the poor fellow is.”

She waved the bracelet at Doyle, and he took it with a grateful smile. The couple moved on toward the theater, Stanley grumbling, as Doyle dropped the heavy bracelet into his pocket.

And then, he thought as he shambled on, once Ashbless has helped me get on my feet in this damned century, if I decide—as I imagine I will—that I’d rather go home to the time when there are paramedics and anesthetics and health inspectors and movies and flush toilets and telephones, I’ll cautiously get in touch with the fearsome Doctor Romany and work out some sort of a deal whereby he’ll tell me the location of one of the upcoming time gaps. Hell, I could probably trick him into letting me be within the field when the gap closed! I’d have to be sure he wouldn’t find and take away the mobile hook, though. I wonder if it’s too big to swallow.

The tickling itch had been building in his throat over the last few minutes, and an elegantly dressed couple was approaching at an unhurried pace, so he unleashed his much admired cough; he tried not to let himself do it too often because it tended quickly to change from a simulated ordeal into a genuine lung-wrenching paroxysm, and in the last few days it had been getting worse. He supposed glumly that he had picked it up from his midnight dip in the chilly Chelsea Creek a week ago.

“Holy Mother of God, James, that walking corpse is about to cough his livers right out onto the pavement. Give him something to buy himself a drink with.”

“Be wasted on that sod. He’ll be dead before dawn.”

“Well… perhaps you’re right. Yes, you certainly seem to be right.”

* * *

Two men leaned against the iron palings of the fence that flanked the wings of the theatre. One of them tapped ash from a cigar and then drew on it, making a glowing red dot in the shadows. “I asked somebody,” he said softly to his partner, “and this boy is a deaf-mute called Dumb Tom. You’re sure it’s him?”

“The boss is sure.”

The first man stared across the street at Doyle, who had pulled himself together and was lurching away, again pretending to gnaw the bread. “He sure doesn’t look like a menace.”

“Just the fact of him is a menace, Kaggs. He’s not supposed to be here.”

“I guess so.” Kaggs slipped a long, slim knife from his sleeve, absently tested the edge with his thumb and then slipped it away again. “How do you want to do it?”

The other man thought for a moment. “Shouldn’t be hard. I’ll bump him and knock him down, and you can act like you’re helping him up. Let your coat hang forward so nobody’ll see, and then slip the knife all the way in just behind his collarbone, blade perpendicular to the bone, and rock it back and forth a little. There’s a big artery down there that you can’t miss, and he ought to be dead in a few seconds.”

“All right. Let’s go.” He tossed his cigar onto the street and they both pushed away from the fence and strode after Doyle.

* * *

Red-rimmed eyes peered out of the face colorful with grease paint, and Horrabin took two knocking steps forward. “They were watching him, and now they’re going after him,” he said in a growling whisper quite different from his fluty voice. “You’re certain they’re not ours?”

“I’ve never clapped eyes on ‘em before, yer Honor,” said one of the men standing on the pavement below him.

“Then never mind waiting until this crowd’s inside,” hissed the clown. “Get Dumb Tom now.” As the three men sprinted away after Doyle and his two pursuers, Horrabin pounded a white-gloved fist against the brick wall of the alley and whispered, “Damn you, Fairchild, why couldn’t you have remembered yesterday?”

* * *

I’ve got to get back to 1983 before this cough kills me, Doyle thought unhappily. A shot of penicillin or something would clear it up in a couple of days, but if I went to a doctor here the bastard would probably prescribe leeches. He felt the throat tickle building up again, but resolutely resisted it. I wonder if it’s developed into full-blown pneumonia yet. Hell, it doesn’t even seem to be good for business anymore. Nobody wants to give anything to a beggar who looks like he’ll be dead in ten minutes. Maybe the captain would—