Star Tales - Steve Cole by Doctor Who

Author:Doctor Who [Who, Doctor]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Science Fiction, Alien Contact, Action & Adventure, General, Short Stories (Single Author)
ISBN: 9781473531994
Google: AOyLDwAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 44281549
Publisher: BBC Digital
Published: 2019-12-04T13:00:00+00:00

‘The Magician Murders!’ The Doctor threw back his latest head and laughed, the roar echoing off the dark tenements along the Chicago River. ‘You’ll be safe then, Harry. You’re not a magician, you’re a Supreme Ruler of Mystery– wasn’t that what you used to put on the playbills?’

Houdini glared across at his old friend, and quickly regretted it. No one could out-stare the Doctor while he wore this form: a mighty voltage blazed in those stone-hard eyes, locked beneath the Victorian preacher brows. This Doctor’s soul matched his dress: austere and dark but with rich flashes of colour, a right companion with whom to venture into cold and moonlit danger.

‘The first man to die,’ said Houdini, ‘was Dean Kellar, “The Dean D’Illusion”.’

‘Terrible title.’

‘Terrible act,’ Houdini snorted. ‘Or used to be. These past few years his Third Eye trick has drawn bill-topping business.’

‘And so perhaps marked him out for murder along with …’ The Doctor consulted the Tribune’s front page article. ‘The Miracle-Monger, Gregor Yarinski?’

‘Yarinski was a relic until he spruced up his act with a bulletproof cage—’

‘Miracle-Monger?’ The Doctor looked nauseated. ‘All right, all right, so what am I doing here – your bodyguard?’

‘I have not asked for your assistance because I fear attack.’

‘Why, then?’ The Doctor’s grey hair was ruffled in the wind blowing in across the river. ‘Why come to the scene of the latest crime on your one night off in weeks?’

Houdini hesitated. Then he nodded ahead to a large, shadowy redbrick edifice beside the rotting docks, far from the nearest streetlamps. ‘Gladstone insists I was seen at his lock-up around the time Yarinski’s murder took place. He threatens to go to the press.’

‘But you weren’t there?’

‘Naturally not.’

‘Then why accuse you?’

‘Envy? Resentment?’ Houdini spoke carefully; the Doctor was as good at scenting lies as selling them, they had that much in common. ‘Like the Dean and Yarinski, Gladstone is an elder of the Magicians’ Innermost Circle, and a spiritualist medium to boot. Such charlatans do not enjoy the way I expose their tricks and hokum.’

The Doctor looked over to the warehouse. ‘What’s kept in there?’

‘I had no idea until Gladstone gave it away,’ said Houdini. ‘It seems that he and Yarinski have pooled their resources over the years and have gathered a vast, secret collection of magic props and paraphernalia, dating back centuries.’

‘Then, we’re here to gather evidence so Houdini can solve the murder, clear his name, win the freedom of the city and put still more bums on seats?’ The Doctor gave him a studied look. ‘Definitely not to steal secrets …’

‘I already have secrets enough for two lifetimes.’

‘And I have lifetimes enough to learn them all.’

They walked on, and Houdini said nothing more. The waterfront was haunted only by the throb of distant traffic, the whole bank of the river deserted. Outside Gladstone’s warehouse, a length of rope strung between sawhorses was the only sign of any police investigation. Houdini led the way cautiously to a side door and looked expectantly at the Doctor who produced his sonic screwdriver.

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