The Hanged Man by Don Bapst

Author:Don Bapst
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 1-897109-84-9
Publisher: Signature Editions
Published: 2011-11-25T00:00:00+00:00

7:45 p.m.

At home, there were eleven messages on my machine.

Dad had called to say Mom was in a lot of pain and that it was a good thing I was coming in a few days. I’d already decided I would move my flight up to tomorrow, and this only confirmed it. That stare Salif had fixed on me…not that it mattered now. I just had to go to her.

Be where you must be.

But first the other messages. There were a number of hang-ups, followed by an out-of-breath Dr. Carter. “Glen, I’m sure you’re with your family, but I wanted to let you know I didn’t drop the ball. I called my colleague at the Morgan Library, and it seems the card you were shown — the one flown in from that town outside Milan — well, it’s gone missing. What’s especially strange is that the collector who requested it be flown in — a Mr. Waydren? Waydrag? — can’t be located. This is all being kept confidential, of course, but I thought you’d find it interesting.”

Ouédrago.

After another series of hang-ups, there was Brad. “Glen. I think I saw you the other day in the East Village, but it took me a minute to realize it was you since I thought you were supposed to be back in Chicago. Then Salif mentioned bumping into you, so I figured it must have been you. Anyway, I thought I’d check how it was going and see if there was anything I can do.”

So that had been him at the funeral the other day with Issa. But whose funeral could it have been? And what had they exchanged in that velvet pouch?

“Oh, and whenever you’ve got a moment, I have something to give you. It might be just what you’ve been looking for.”

Another sign.

The next message was from Grace at the museum. In a crisp, authoritative tone, she said she wouldn’t need me to report back as they were fully staffed with volunteers. A chill passed through me. Had she discovered my removal of the paper fragment from the museum?

“As your area of study lies outside the immediate concerns of the museum’s agenda,” she went on, “we feel that you’ll be a better fit elsewhere.” What the hell did that mean?

After that, there were a few more hang-ups, then silence. I deleted all the messages and pulled out the scrap of paper I’d discovered in the house earlier. It was curiously similar to the Visconti decks. Upon closer inspection, I noticed a thin blue and gold border, just like the one on the original cards. What little was left of the image had been lightly chipped and faded away in that subtle yet definite way only centuries can manage.

I pulled out my own reproduction of the original deck. Spreading the cards over the kitchen table, I could find no card with a missing corner. However, four of the cards from the original deck had never been found, and two of them — the Devil and the Tower — were missing from the Major Arcana.

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