FANTASIA

December 10, 1936

When Rupert Powell came floating down from the sky, his arms were crossed, and eyes shut for good. His deathbed, a hearsely chaise longue of mahogany wood and black leather, gracefully carried his prostrate corpse down to greet us.

Even in the darkest of nights, the Yorkshire Dales have a glow about them. A richness that swallows the expanse as a mist, a mist that never parts for long, and so would be enough as to hide the three families from the Bailiffs for some little time. “These are old valleys,” I had said to Emory, the only of the Fischers to brave the night. “These lights are the same lights that guided the once and innocent King Charles II, when he was in flight from the forces of Cromwell. Any good man should have no fear of them.” This, I believe, was the true reason the three families travelled separately - each arriving to St. Crispin’s in staggered intervals. Like a fungus, sin spreads. Intractable and formidable. It bears no claws, but proximity is its weapon. I also believe the Dales can be a redeeming path, and this parish of Gallowsby our own Damascus. That is the only sign I can accept, if ever I were to accept one, of the earnest nature of the three families of Powell, Isambard, and Fischer that confessed to me on this blameless night.

It is essential that the body not be too long deceased for my craft to work.

“Don’t call him that,” Emory said to me coldly, “especially in-front of Helen. She couldn’t bear it.” So soon after his passing, I can understand. “Rupert. His name is Rupert Powell.” Emory insisted, and so I called the body as he wished. “But it has not been longer than two hours. Will that do?”

And now the chaise longue was at our feet, still hovering just above the ground with Rupert Powell in repose. Fresh wounds tore down his face, and bruises marked his skin. He had begun to go pale, but to the touch, he was not yet cold. “Yes,” I said, “he will do.” Then he asked after the clay, but for love nor gold, I could not find clay ripe enough at this hour; but in my stores I had gypsum, an altogether more suitable substance for the task at hand. To his credit, Emory deferred to my expertise and did not pester me for explanation. Though this seemed more so because he was at a loss for words, staring solemnly at his lost friend. And for all the fray that had come before, now he had no energy to move himself. Just like his friend Rupert, his clothes were torn, skin was sooty and marred with blood, and his whole personage offended my nose with a fetor of smoke.

“And the Isambards?” He asked.

And I assured him of their safe arrival in the past hour, as with the Powells. Another go of his at slowing down what was to inevitably come, and so I told him: “My dear, Emory. We must not delay.” We stepped aside, and with a wave of his hand, Emory bid the hearsely sofa enter the church. You’d be forgiven for assuming we were gathered to commiserate the final sacrament, but we were here to celebrate the first.

The funeral procession was short. A few short steps, and we were inside St. Crispin’s flint stone walls - the night halted by the candles that shrouded the baptismal font. This was the first time Helen Powell had seen her husband’s body, and as she and her baby boy buried their heads woefully into his chest, I took my leave to fashion the mixture.

My still room had for a very long time been understocked in the most commonplace of herbs, minerals and tinctures, as my renewed interest in ingredients of the rare variety has led my research into those arcane creatures of our world, and so even a basic form of clay is not in my possession. But gypsum! I have it. From some time ago, this batch was last used for the great statesman Harold Leacon when he died in 1926; to this day I pride myself that his death mask is very much pleased with the result - it tells me so itself.

It is no easy thing to mix the gypsum as so the mask endures. The mineral must be grounded, yes, but the pressure applied must be evenhanded; the squid ink introduced, viscous; the milk added, fresh from the teat of a mourning cow. All acquired this evening.

With the paste mixed, I carried the mortar back to the nave.

“Gypsum?” Isambard bellowed at me. “Good God, man! Why not grab a pile of horse manure while you’re at it.” His huge belly trembled as he spoke. “I’m sure the mask will appreciate it a far sight better.” Indeed, horse manure was once used for this kind of magic, I had told him. There is a sophistry to this art in which even the dullest material may be handled with an ingenuity to make it a thing to behold. But these are no longer the dark ages, however so it seems we are returning to them, and gypsum is a fine enough material.

Helen stood back from the deceased with her child, and with her permission, I began to apply the substance to the face of her husband. I used a delicate domed brush which made for a smooth application, creating as little marks as possible. Often, families request a certain aspect to be made of the mask, such as the omission of a cleft palate; or the deceased themselves would have provided in their Will for something distinct to be added, such as a cluster of freckles. The Powells had no time for these frivolities, a good thing as my artisanal skills may be impressive, but I would not say they are beyond reproach. 

With the paste applied, I invited Emory to do his part. He bent low, bringing his face close to Rupert’s, and in blowing a cool air, he stiffened the mask. Its dark tones turned to a bright grey, and as I pulled the mask from Rupert’s face, Isambard readied the pedestal on which it would rest: a silver pitchfork four feet tall. The mask fit quite perfectly, and in its pensive state, took on a look of stoicism that was bereft of Rupert’s true character in life.

A gust of heat emanated from Isambard’s staff, and in bringing it up to the mask, he did the work of a kiln, setting the paste into a permanent state of solidity. 

“Is that all?” Helen asked. “Is it ready?” 

I went to inspect it. Despite all that heat, it was now cool to the touch.

“Just one thing remains.” I told them. “A kiss from the beloved.”

There is no sure way to go about the last of these processes. Many different types of magic may imbue different aspects, and as such, the subject’s character is influenced. One mask, I have read, the mask of Aidan the Dweller, was brought to life by a siren’s call and consequently always yearned for the ocean where his originator famously had never set foot in one. In this instance, I regarded the greatest animator to be the love of the widow.

Helen took a tentative step towards the pedestal, and with a tender whisper of words I could not decipher, kissed the mask on its cheek. 

A brazen shimmer rippled across its surface with an echoing clink. 

It was done.

We stood there, stealing unsure looks from each other.

Maroula Isambard all the while had been silent as she mourned for her brother-in-law. But now she frowned her face: “Well?” She asked. “Has it worked?”

“You can see with your own eyes can’t you?” Isambard huffed. “It is unchanged.” 

“Now, give it some time.” Emory urged them.

And now, Isambard swivelled to me in such a blazing fury, turning on his staff, that his medieval chaperon nearly swung off his head. “You! Your mixture is rotten. Go make another! And quickly!”

Maroula rescued me. “Leave the man alone. This isn’t his fault, after all.” She said to him accusingly. Isambard’s fury left him in one breath, wilting from his wife’s scorn.

“There’s no use in blaming anyone at this point.” Said Emory. “We are where we are.”

“Yes. Hiding, with nowhere to go.” Maroula said, despairingly.

“We still have our friends, dear.” Isambard went to touch Maroula’s shoulder tenderly, but she pulled away. And this domestic continued for quite an interminable amount of time until Helen yelled at all of them to stop, whilst rubbing tears from her face. She put her baby boy down and knelt to cradle the face of Rupert. His body now stiff with the unmistakable chill of death. “I just wanted him to be here for this. This one moment.”

And it seemed my work had indeed failed. “I’m sorry.” I said to them. “It appears my craft is not as exemplary as I had hoped.” 

We stood there in silence for some time. My failure punctuated by the cries of  the baby, who felt much upset on first seeing the body of Rupert. It felt wrong to ask whether the ceremony will still go ahead, but there was no time left to mourn.They needed no reminding of the severity of their situation, just of the limitations of my own powers. I could not shelter them from justice for a prolonged period of time. But as I began to stutter out a sentence, a remarkable sound rang through the nave. Laughter! The baby’s laughter. We turned to him, and there he was adoring the death mask of his father, Rupert, which had taken on the peculiar contortions a face does when deep in slumber. And indeed, the mask was asleep. The eyelids fluttered, the nose twitched, the mouth sloped ajar. 

“The mask lives!” Isambard exclaimed with a haughty laugh. “He’s simply asleep.”

“There’s the Rupert I know.” Emory said, grinning from ear to ear.

With a relieved yelp, Helen leapt to the mask, picking up her son for him to get a closer look. And even with all the fervour, Rupert’s mask still slept. “My Rupert!” Helen sighed, overjoyed. 

“It appears,” I said with a chuckle. “The magic has had a latent effect.”

“Well, when will he waken?” Asked Isambard. 

“I’m sure it will do no harm to wake the mask now.” I said. And even at this, Helen scowled at me.

“Call him by his name.” She said. “Call him Rupert!”

Isambard did not waste a second, immediately turned to the mask, and bellowed “Wake up, man!”

And as a man who had slept a perfect sleep for one-hundred years, Rupert’s mask yawned, stretched its face into many strange shapes, and slowly blinked itself awake. 

It then took on a very alarmed expression. “What- what- what? What are you all doing in my bedroom?” It shrieked. “Oh my, and I’m naked!”

“Naked?” Isambard laughed. “You haven’t even a body.”

Emory stepped forward. “And this isn’t your bedroom, my friend.”

“Don’t crowd over him,” Helen said, swatting them away. “Let me handle this.”

Too right, always best to break the news gently. It can come as quite a shock to find out one is, in fact, dead.

“Oh, my dear, my dear.” Helen caressed the mask’s face in her wifely way. “You have passed.”

And now the mask was startled. “Passed? Passed?” It trembled, and Helen nodded despairingly. “Dead?” At that word, the mask jumped an inch off its pedestal in fright. I had feared it would fall and break then and there, but it deftly landed back in place. “Oh, what a tragedy.” The mask began in lament, screwing its smooth face into wrinkles. A good grace that these things don’t have tear ducts - how unseemly that would be. “I am deceased!” The mask continued in hysterics. “What a horror has befallen us that I’m taken from my wife so soon. How did it happen? Drowning? A heart attack? Murder?” The pedestal shook with the mask’s shiver.

“My dear,” Helen whispered. “You were-”

“Oh no!” The mask writhed, “I’ve changed my mind. Don’t tell me. I couldn’t possibly know, it’s too terrible, to know one’s own way of death.”

“But it’s already happened.” Isambard said.

“Well, that doesn’t make it any less morbid!” The mask protested. “No. No, I mustn’t know. I couldn’t bear it.” And then the mask caught a glimpse of the feet on the chaise longue, and grew quite enraged. “And who is that, there? Asleep at my demise? The gall! Wake him! Wake him immediately!”

“Alas, we cannot. For that man,” said Emory, “is you.” 

The mask then went calm. “Oh.” And a dour mood took hold of him, as though finally realising that he is actually dead. Or rather that a version of him is. And he said again, “oh.” In a very depressed tone. “Can I…” It stuttered. “Can I see.” 

“I don’t think that’s a very good idea.” Helen said.

“Nor I.” Agreed Isambard. “You may well go into shock and die all over again!”

  At this, Maroula slapped him on the shoulder. “Don’t be wicked.” 

“Perhaps…” Emory tentatively interjected. “Perhaps, it may be good for him.” And I thought that right. In my experience, a death mask seeing its originator’s body helps it to come to terms with the fact that it is not alive. Because these masks do not experience - from their point of view - life as a new thing of their own, which truly is what they are. But they believe they are the reanimation of their dead consciousness. This is a falsehood. A myth. The masks are indeed the essence of consciousness, but not the direct continuity. They are, as perhaps a scientist would say, a clone. A clone of consciousness, and not consciousness transplanted from human brain to mask. And there is the cognitive dissonance that could drive a mask mad, and in the past, very well has. The mask is merely a substance that is imbued with the memories, the memories of flesh as well as mind, of their originator. The last of the electrical signal flowing through the originator before it inevitably petters out. But for a moment, imagine for yourself. Imagine looking down on your body from a new vessel. That body which has carried you through life with all of its pains and triumphs. That thing which is the most essential expression of your humanity, for the very fact that it is the human body, born from the mother. It is one thing to be told that this body was once yours, and is now dead, but entirely another to be told that it was never you in the first place. And so I said, “yes.” To Helen’s alarm. “Yes, let Rupert see his body. As so to reconcile in his mind, his spirit being detached from this body.”

“Yes, exactly. Now, I insist…” The mask said. “No, I demand to see my body.” Emory looked to Helen, as if to ask, may I? And she begrudgingly nodded. Emory delicately picked up the mask. 

“Careful now.” The mask quipped. “I’m fragile goods.”

“You can trust me.” Emory said, walking over to the chaise longue, all the while smiling. 

And the mask smiled back a comforting smile. “I know.”

Now they were above the body of Rupert Powell, Emory tilted the mask so that it could see the whole of it and the devastation wrought upon it. The church fell silent as the mask gazed upon its originator. How sad it looked. Almost as a child peering into the open casket of its parent. And here, something miraculous did happen, for I have never in my days seen it. A crystal coloured liquid formed in the corner of the mask’s eye, and as though its nose were running, it sniffed in that sad way when sorrow takes over all your facial functions, and then a tear. I crept forward to see it. Indeed, a tear tipped over the crevice of its bottom eyelid, flowed down its face to its chin, then fell from it to land on its originator’s pallid face. 

“I remember.” It whispered remorsefully. “I remember how I died.”

“Oh, Rupert.” Helen cried. 

“But why? Why have you brought me back? Why am I here now?”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t deserve to live again. I should remain dead. All of me.”

“Now don’t say that,” Isambard said. “You’re upsetting her.” And Helen was upset. The joy of seeing her husband revived was now all gone. Her face was flushed with rosy anguish.

“Why have you brought me back?” The mask agonised.

“Because we need you!” Helen now could not hold back her pain, and tears gushed from her eyes. 

“It’s alright.” Maroula said to Helen, leaping to embracing her sister.

“I need you.” Helen went on. “I can’t do this without you, Rupert.” 

“The baptism, Rupert.” Said Isambard. “It can’t be done without you.” 

“Well then, lets get it over with.” The mask said sullenly. “Then you can send me back to the dirt. All of me.”

And then, we were found. 

The church was struck from without by a mighty fist, and with it a great clang rang throughout the building. We all looked to the entrance, and to my relief, it remained intact. But then came another clang, and once again the church shook. “They’ve found us.” Helen panicked.

“We must finish our business before they get in.” Said Isambard, and Emory ran back to place the mask upon its podium. But as if mockingly, a third thump landed on the door, and this time the force was such that the bell in the tower shook, and the bell droned in a dull and surly tone as the front doors were beaten off their hinges, breaking into pieces upon the ground, and with it, a deathly chill swept through the nave. 

I had only ever known the Bailiffs by reputation, and have heard of the wreckage made of their bodies in service of the Praesidium, and that they are heralds of a much darker fate than would come from crossing them. Even so, they are not to be crossed. And now, there they were. Two giant figures that the frame of the doorway was too small to encase. My astonishment threw me. They were a man and woman, but no man or woman of this plane. So tall. So tall. Clad in some obsidian leather - the top halves being fastened by corsets, and the bottom, loose with rigid skirts - and topped in tall, crimson velvet capirotes that rose to four coning points. Their collars coiled round their necks in some creeping fashion, as alive, covering their chins, leaving only the pallid noses and mouths that protruded from them to be discerned, of the same complexion as the corpse lain before us. Yellow toothed and black tongued and thin lipped. These things could not be disobeyed. And yet:-

“No!” Maroula Isambard leapt up, holding out the palm of her hand as though it alone could stop them. These beasts that have torn the heavy church door to pieces and made the bells ring in distress! 

“Maroula!” Isambard was horrified. “Don’t be stupid!” 

“No!” Maroula continued. “You are not to enter this sanctuary, you cruel things. You may not enter under here!” She was now right in-front of them, the palm of her hand still held up to them. But they were both unconvinced, and the female of these beastial Bailiffs stooped to step forward - and this is the one they call Bailiff Sinister. Isambard had ran up to hold his wife, but there was little he could do also. And now Bailiff Sinister reached into her bosom, and I winced, thinking it meant to draw out a weapon of some sort, but no weapon emerged. Rather, a rolled up parchment that the beast dutifully unfurled and candidly handed to Isambard. The male of her species had so far been unmoved, but now his gruesome lips - all slime and rot - parted. This was the one they call Bailiff Dexter; and with a wry and wispy voice he declared:-

“Warrant of arrest.”

“Mercy. Mercy, please.” Maroula cried. “Spare us a moment.” And the Bailiffs looked to one another, considering this request. “Just a moment.” Maroula pleaded.

I don’t think it was mercy, I think it was something more sly, but Bailiff Sinister stepped back behind the threshold all the same, allowing us the time to perform the Baptism. 

For your records, I shall list the attendees:

Rowan Powell - Baptizand

The Death Mask of Rupert Powell - Essence of Father 

Helen Powell - Mother

Emory Fischer - Godfather

Maroula Isambard - Godmother

Edmund Isambard - Observer

Bailiff Sinister - Observer

Bailiff Dexter - Observer

The candles surrounding the baptismal font had survived the arrival of the Bailiffs, but there was this unsettling sensation that came over me every now and then, being watched by those two creatures that stood just beyond the door; omens of a future fraught with danger, observing this most holy sacrament of Baptism that ushers in glad tidings.

Helen gave her baby over to Emory, who held him at the baptismal font, but not before Emory took out a shining pendant from his pocket, and laced it around the baby’s neck. It was a fish. A symbol of his house, I assume. It seemed a glistening silver banded with some other type of white element, perhaps a marble of some kind? It was the most enchanting of objects.

As time was short I condensed the ceremony, going on so hurriedly my words pressed and muffled together in such streams and stutters they tumbled out of me as I repeated them:-

“Is it your will that Rowan be baptised in the faith of the Catholic Church, which we have all professed with you?”

“It is.” The mask answered, resolutely. 

“Rowan, I baptise you in the name of the Father…” I said, scooping a cup of water and dousing the baby’s head. He squirmed in Emory’s arms as I went on. 

Pouring the cup again, I continued “… and of the Son…” The water crept round, following the patterns of his thin silken hair like a gentle river. In this moment, I felt, as I always do, a jubilation sweep in my soul and cast out any pains subject to me, as a torrent consuming flame.

“… and of the Holy Spirit.”

I washed the water over Rowan for the last time. 

It seemed then that all the horror of this night had been worthwhile. The movement of these three families in the suspecting dark - in which only villains move; the undignified transport of Rupert Powell’s body, and entry into St Crispin’s Church on a chaise longue (of all things); the hurried affair of the Baptism of Rowan Powell - God mustn’t be hurried. And for a moment, it seemed that this small act of bringing baby Rowan into the light had washed away the heinous acts committed on this night from his head. Here, from this holy font, the sins of the father are extinguished. But, of course, this was not true. This was a crime that could not possibly go unanswered, and if it took ten generations, justice would be served. 

In his heart, Isambard knew this. And with a last grasp of Maroula, he squeezed her affectionately, then softly moved away. The Bailiffs stepped forward, growing impatient. 

As Isambard motioned towards the door, his wife’s hand slipped from his, and with a final glance to us all, he turned away. With each step, his staff tapped away at the floor in dignified resignation. He was the one the Bailiffs had come for, and it was he alone that could sate their demands. Though he was not forlorn, nor sanguine, but he took on every aspect of a man who knew exactly what he needed to do. His crimson cape rustled against the chill wind that still blew from the open doorway, made evermore raspy by the presence of those two unearthly beasts that stood at the entrance. With a flourish of his chaperon, the Young Man Isambard greeted the Bailiffs with no protest or qualm, and with a knowing smile that ensured the safety of those three families - Powell, Isambard, and Fischer - Edmund Isambard gave himself wholly and completely over to them as their willing captive, to be escorted, gladly, to his doom.

- Father Faulkner