The Gospel of Sheba Read Free Page A

Mr. Scovil found the Sheba text. Our meetings generally consist of debate over particular ceremonies found in The Key of Solomon the King —whether incenses and perfumes are of any tangible efficacy when enacting spells, study of the Order of the Pentacles, the proper preparation of virgin parchment and whether blood sacrifice is truly evil if enacted for a noble purpose, that sort of thing.”
    Fighting not to laugh, I gestured with the spectacles in my hand to continue.
    â€œBut then Mr. Scovil announced that a secret library had been found within his very own townhouse in Pall Mall, and that it was full of magical texts, and that one of them— The Gospel of Sheba —was an unprecedented find. Mr. Sebastian Scovil is from a very long line of esoteric scholars, Mr. Lomax, so we greeted his discovery with ardent interest. But the book itself is cursed, I assure you, sir! There is no other explanation.”
    â€œA little slower,” I requested. “As a bibliophile, not to mention a lover of conundrums, your story is terribly interesting. Let me be certain I understand you?”
    â€œBy all means, Mr. Lomax.”
    â€œFirst, speaking historically, King Solomon was renowned for his great wisdom, and for his closeness to God, and the hopes of those studying grimoires ascribed to him are that his words remain largely intact. The Queen of Sheba was the monarch of a lost African kingdom who appears in the Koran as well as the Bible and traveled to meet with King Solomon after tales of his great wealth and wisdom reached her people. Have I got the proper context?”
    â€œAs concise as any encyclopedia and as accurate, sir! The gospel purports to be written in her hand, revealing ceremonial rites more powerful than any King Solomon developed before meeting her. Apparently the King and the Queen were lovers, Mr. Lomax, and brought the study of ceremonial magic to new heights.”
    â€œThe text is in Hebrew?”
    â€œThe text is in Latin, sir, transcribed by a sixteenth century monk, we believe.”
    â€œAnd you claim it has made you physically ill ?” I demanded, awed.
    Mr. Theodore Grange did, to give him credit, look very ill indeed. Even were his colour not similar to candle wax and his limbs not all a-quiver, he seemed to have shrunk somehow in the six days since I’d seen him, his skin shrugged on as if a child were wrapped in its father’s coat. His navy blue suit was likewise too large, twiglike wrists obscenely thrusting out from gaping cuffs.
    â€œNot just me!” he protested. “First my friend Cornelius Pyatt took the volume home to study, and he fell ill almost instantly. Then Huggins had a crack at it, and we’re all three in the same sad straits. No, I tell you, that gospel is the genuine article and Mr. Sebastian Scovil is the single man worthy of its powers.”
    â€œOh, there you are, Mr. Lomax, at last I’ve found you.”
    The gentle, rasping tones of the Librarian startled me out of my rapt attention. My head shifted upward to take in his bowed back, the genial tufts of hair about his ears, the air of absentminded benevolence that wafts about with him like the aroma of his sweet pipe smoke, and prayed that I would not be complimented.
    â€œApologies, sir, did you want me?” I asked.
    â€œOh, no, no, my boy, you appear engaged. But Mr. Sullivan, I should tell you, was most pleased by your assistance with his geological studies. He claimed that you identified a book which shed all manner of light upon his research into sedimentary facies. You are to be congratulated again, Mr. Lomax.”
    There is a many-paned window at the end of the periodicals room, and reflected in its glass I could see Mr. Grange and the Librarian, my own slender seated figure with its mop of wildly curling brown hair, and the six or seven members who had perked up and were now eyeing me with interest, wondering what arcane knowledge I could gift them