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A Personal Demon

by David Bischoff, Rich Brown and Linda Richardson

Copyright 1985 David Bischoff, Rich Brown and Linda Richardson

PART ONE

1

Put on your disbelief suspenders, dear reader, as Coleridge might invite, and make yourself welcome outside this cozy little apartment near Powhattan University, that arcade of academia tucked away in the ivy-covered ivory-white pseudo-Greek buildings in the heartland of New England.

Powhattan-"old P.U." to friends and enemies alike-was a yawningly normal institution of higher education, or at least it was until the fateful night of Professor Willis Baxter's faculty party....

Come. Let's peer in and see how it all began.

* * *

Willis Baxter, Professor of Medieval Literature, arose from his near-drunken slouch on the couch and, with five Irish whiskeys in him and the somewhat encouraging voices of otherwise bored partygoers behind him, repaired to his study for the elements he needed to conjure up a demon.

It was, he felt, the least he could do to help alleviate the boredom which was beginning to settle on the partygoers like an unwanted and ragged cloak. They were dutifully in attendance at the insistence of Dean Cromwell Smith, as was Willis himself-although, in truth, since the party was being held (at the "request" of the dean) in Willis's garden apartment, it was also somewhat more than that. Willis was only glad his upstairs neighbors were not at home, since the partygoers made up in loudness what the party itself lacked in interest.

"What's this hubbub all about?" the dean was demanding, having squired the party's wealthy guest of honor, Norman Rockhurst, into the crowded dining room. Hot to trot with the rich man's tax-deductible charity allocations, the dean had devoted the entire evening to attempting to toady to the man-with no apparent success as yet.

"Baxter frequently tries it when he's sloshed," explained Larry Hawthorne, Professor of Renaissance Literature, as he lumbered to his size-fourteen feet and groped about in his jacket pocket.

"Tries what?" Rockhurst asked.

Hawthorne pulled out a Ronson, relit his evening's cigar for the fourth time, and blew out an acrid stream of smoke.

"With some people, it's lampshades," he said, bellying up to the dean and the wealthy contractor. "They down a few drinks over their limit-with Baxter, it's two-then don a lampshade, dance about, and come on to the ladies. But Baxter's more original-when he gets drunk, he tries to summon up demons from the netherworld."

"Ridiculous!" pooh-poohed the millionaire.

"Demons? Balderdash!" echoed the dean-who was precisely the sort of person who would say "Balderdash!" even in this day and age.

"Of course, it's all in fun," chimed in Gertrude Twill, the dean's secretary and office manager.

Gertrude, against Willis's wishes, had chosen to wear a very short dress to the party-the kind of dress that tends to draw male attention to nyloned legs. Although her legs were not drawing much attention, it must be admitted they were indeed her most attractive feature.

It was sometimes bandied about-usually with accompanying snickers-that Gertrude might be Willis's one and only "girlfriend." In truth, they had dated for eight years-and at times the professor wondered what he saw in her. He would think, briefly, of her soft lips; then, involuntarily rubbing his mouth, less briefly of her braces. Most of the time, favoring a martyrlike disposition which had been drilled into him by the Catholic catechism of his youth, he accepted the inconvenience without questioning the therapeutic value of perpetually wired teeth which made kissing somewhat reminiscent of the Spanish Inquisition.

"Well, conjuring, though!" Rockhurst said, suddenly struck. "I suppose a few magic tricks might liven up this party a bit."

"They just might," agreed the dean.

Professor Baxter returned at this moment with a purple-and-red-striped bag with "Macy's" emblazoned on its sides. At a small space he had cleared in the center of the room, he dropped the bag to the floor and, with a certain uncharacteristic flair, requested another Irish whiskey to fortify himself. Gertrude supplied the sacred potion, which Willis slurped down in one quick gulp. He rubbed a hand over his plain, long-hosed features. A hush fell over the crowd as the dimmed lights cast odd shadows across their expectant faces, and even Larry Hawthorne was quietly intent as he puffed his cigar, the smoke of which hung like incense in the air.

Willis stood silently a moment, as if preparing himself for the ritual-while, in truth, he was praising the Irish for inventing so sassy a whiskey. Abruptly he began to mutter the Desiderata in Latin.

"All right, Baxter," Hawthorne said derisively, "precisely which demon are you thinking of inviting to join us in these festivities?"

"What the devil difference does it make?" asked Rockhurst, smiling broadly at his own quick wit. Dean Smith laughed uproariously, and, as he cast a stern eye over the partygoers (university employees, all), so did everyone else in the room.

Hawthorne explained, "I really don't believe in this business, but I've read a little about the stuff-and it's supposed to make a difference. The demon must be summoned by his or her True Name. One of the most respected scholars in the field of demonology, Raymond de la Farte, theorized in his most recent book that the reason it's nearly impossible to invoke a demon in this day and age is simply that most of them have been consigned to Hell forever."

Observing that his knowledge of the obscure had, for once, aroused interest rather than ennui in his listeners, Hawthorne took the cigar from his mouth, struck a pose he often affected in the classroom, and continued: "You see, when someone tries to summon a demon and fails, the ritual requires him to consign the soul of that demon to Hell forever-otherwise, it's believed, the demon can use that entry way to our world at some later date and, without someone there to control it, wreak all sorts of havoc."

"I guess that makes sense," Rockhurst said.

"Yes, but can you believe this sort of thing?" Hawthorne asked, dropping his pose as he turned to the millionaire.

Rockhurst made no answer, so Hawthorne resumed both his pose and lecture: "De la Farte suggested that demons, while endowed with magical powers, might not be able to be in two places at the same time. That is, if indeed there was some 'limit' to their magic, it might be such a thing as this. An interesting possibility. Because, you see, de la Farte demonstrated that, with what was once a considerably more widespread interest in demonology and what with the number of demons being finite, the chances are quite high that most of them would have been summoned by two or more conjurers at or near the same time. The best-known demons certainly, the lesser-known demons almost as certainly."

He paused to note that he had indeed captured the attention of several other partygoers. Not wishing to lose their interest, he continued, "Thus, while one demonologist might succeed in summoning a demon, if another tried to get the same demon while it was doing something for the first, he would fail in the attempt-since the demon wouldn't be there to be called. And, by the requirements of the ritual, the one who failed would have to consign that demon to the netherworld forever. When the demon returned to Hades, after doing the bidding of the successful magician, it would thereafter be unable to leave Hell by virtue of the second conjurer's ritual and therefore could never be successfully summoned again."

Willis, who was busily working with his tools-drawing a pentagram with Silly String, laying out a star within the pentagram with drink straws and swizzle sticks-could hardly contain his amusement at Hawthorne's words.

For you see, dear reader, although Professor Willis Baxter's most daring in-person feat to date had been when he had fondled Gertrude's elbow at a local drive-in movie, he also led something of a secret life. And it was one of his most closely guarded secrets that he was Raymond de la Farte. The good professor reveled in his confidential study much as a fire-and-brimstone preacher might in a private pornography collection.

Hawthorne, turning to indicate his rival with a slight nod, went on: "So if Professor Baxter here hopes to be successful, he'll have to use the True Name of some obscure or lesser-known demon who, one presumes, might not have suffered such a fate."

Willis started to ask, "What's your mother's name?"-but then reconsidered as he remembered Hawthorne's short temper and long reach. He substituted, "What would you suggest, Larry-should I consult the Yellow Pages, under 'Demons, Unlisted'?"

"Well," said Hawthorne helpfully, "there's the new Wilheim, Minor Demons of Egypt."

"Haven't seen it yet," Willis admitted.

"It has a few obscure names in it, I believe. How about Ptenagh? A sort of Pan, I think."

"Obscure? Hardly!" Willis scoffed. "Pembroke. Solomon in Egypt. 1934."

"How about his daughter, Anathae?"

"Daughter?"

Hawthorne brightened, preened at what so clearly demonstrated both his own obscure knowledge and his rival's ignorance. "Yes. Anathae. Half demon, half human."

"All right," Willis said. "It'll do."

Rockhurst, obviously a bit tired of all the talk, suddenly grinned and asked, "When do we get to the good part? You know, virgin's blood and all that? More important, where do we get the volunteers?"

Willis glanced briefly at Gertrude-but decided it was better not to broach a potentially touchy subject in front of everyone. Instead, he said, "We'll have to make do with mine," and pricked his finger with a pin.

Then he raised his hands-slightly bloody finger and all-for silence.

He was determined to try his best to make the ritual look impressive-since, despite his scholarly interest in the subject, no matter what demon he decided to call nor how inebriated he became, he did not expect the summoning to work. For, indeed, he had no belief in these things; it was the correctness of the form, the proper incantations, the very antiquity of the ritual itself which appealed to the scholar in him and therefore held his interest.

As he lowered his hands in a curving gesture, a hush settled over the company.

When all was quiet, Willis's fingers began to twitch like a squid's tentacles and he started to incant the appropriate phrases in guttural Franconian-to capture the soul of the meaning, and also to mask its more than slightly obscene content.

A fevered zeal-which some may have believed only to be the effects of the alcohol-suffused his face with a red tint, and his guests began to murmur to themselves uneasily, like a crowd watching a trapeze artist working without a net.

But as Willis stooped to light candles the circus air seemed to dissipate; the room darkened as he became stationary at the north tip of the pentagram.

The silence surrounding Willis's words was somehow ominous-it was almost too quiet. His discourse slipped into Old Bavarian-"Gueliche lande cumen ger..."-his arms wriggled like frightened snakes, snapped together with a flourish: "...Anathae!"

The stillness and silence which had hovered around his chant like a voiceless swallow gave way to the feel and sound of wind.

Wait a minute.

Wind?

In an inside room of the apartment?

Yes, the causeless breeze seemed to ruffle through Willis's rumpled hair, and even the candle-thrown shadows began a slow dance up the wall. Then he heard a tentative whisper, a feminine voice as soft as a butterfly's wing: "In francia fui."

Frankish, thought Willis. Quite frankly Frankish.

His breathing hastened. No longer entirely aware of the people around him, Willis Baxter felt very much alone with that silken voice-which, he knew instinctively, was no joke.

"Guaes ge dar daden?" he whispered tremulously.

And that voice, young-girl-sweet, responded: "Disnaui me ibi."

There was now no question that the wind was a wind; it blew full and strong and whooshed to a mighty crescendo.

Then there was a blinding flash of light, like that of a tiny nuclear explosion-and, just as suddenly, the wind stopped and the room was quite normal again.

Only... not quite.

For there, in the south corner of the pentagram, facing Professor Willis Baxter, stood a girl-not more than sixteen, by her features-clad only in long, tawny red hair.

2

Two tiny horns sprouted from her forehead, and a short barbed tail curled from the base of her spine just above her smooth, absolutely bare, undeniably perfectly formed derriere.

Her breasts were firm, her nipples large and creamy pink.

Her lithesome legs tapered to a pair of dainty hooves; a sprinkling of curly red hair grew up almost to her knees.

Her waist seemed almost too thin when, suddenly, it curved deliciously out to meet the well-formed curve of her delicate hips.

She angled her angelic (fallen variety, of course) and faultlessly freckled face about, surveying the people around her with curiosity. Her eyes darted like captive birds until they lighted on Willis-whereupon they turned mischievously green and she fluttered long dark eyelashes at him.

"So it was you who called," she breathed huskily, her voice the coo of a nightingale in heat. "Did you have anything special in mind? Or do you want me to be... inventive?"

Willis swallowed hard, his disbelieving eyes abulge, and stepped back-scattering a couple of the swizzle sticks which made up the pentagram. "You," he gasped, his tongue taking on the texture of a potato chip, "are Anathae?"

"None other-and yours, for so long as you may desire," she said. She curtsied with admirable grace, her slender hands outstretched as if to hold what was her entirely nonexistent dress. "Do you desire me now?"

As a teacher, Willis had usually been able to appreciate the beauty of young women who had taken his courses without feeling any particular desire-or, if human enough to perhaps at times feel the desire, not any real need-to become intimate with any of them. But the female before him, although younger in appearance than any P.U. coed, did not (he admitted to himself) precisely inspire him with fatherly feelings.

This was in part because her voice was the epitome of seductiveness-Bo Derek rising from a foaming sea, disdaining a towel, yet with young-girl innocence glowing off her in cool, stunning waves. At the same time, her words and fiery gestures seemed to invite, if not actually beg for, frantic, clutching debauchery.

The girl-demon wiggled excitingly toward Willis, her bare breasts bobbing only slightly and her long red hair flowing behind her in the afterwake of the breeze. Willis continued to step back as he tried desperately to summon up such words, thoughts, feelings as he had used like a shield to protect himself on the rare occasion when a P.U. coed had caught more than his passing fancy-what people would say of him, how it might have an adverse effect on his career, how he should feel ashamed of having such feelings about a female obviously so much younger than himself. But he could not help but believe that, somehow, the summoning up of a demon had been, comparatively speaking, a piece of cake-at least, he couldn't easily shake the strong feeling of desire which this petite red-headed female, with so few words and movements, had sent coursing through his veins.

She followed him out of the pentagram, stepping over the breach he had caused. And then, with nimble hands, completely ignoring the partygoers around them, Anathae plucked at the top button of his shirt. She had the shirt half off and was licking her ruby lips in moist anticipation when the stunned silence of the forgotten company erupted into an excited babble.

Willis heard a squeal and noticed, peripherally, that Gertrude had fainted dead away.

"What is the meaning of this outrageous spectacle?" demanded the dean.

"Don't be a killjoy!" Rockhurst shouted out enthusiastically. "This is better than any show in Vegas!"

Willis had turned slowly toward the dean, hoping some explanation might occur to him before he would be called upon to open his mouth, when he felt a small hand give his pants zipper a frenzied tug.

Aghast, he looked down.

Sure enough, Anathae had his trousers halfway down, exposing his purple polka-dot underwear for the assembled multitude to see.

He said the first thing mat came to mind: "Stop that and get out of here!"

Anathae withdrew her slim hands from their mad disrobing lore and pouted prettily at him.

"Later," she said, licked her lips, then winked naughtily-and, with another flash of light, she disappeared.

Given a choice in the matter, Willis would have preferred to believe she had never been there at all. But then his trousers, freed of her hands, fell all the way down to his gartered socks, and several of the faculty wives present gasped and clutched at their husbands for support.

Willis's face quivered at the redder levels of the spectrum as he made a violent attempt to resheath his bare, pale legs.

But this hasty and, indeed, decidedly frenzied action set him off balance-he teetered in the middle of the floor, wavered, stumbled forward a few wobbling steps, tripped on the manacles which had once been his trousers, and fell headfirst into the ample lap of Mrs. Hildagarde Boothbuthle, who immediately began to yelp in the contralto that was the pride of the Powhattan University Glee Club.

Willis, asprawl across her lap, tried to mumble an apology-but Mrs. Boothbuthle merely shrieked again and heaved him onto the carpet.

From this vantage point, he managed to work his trousers back over his knees by holding his legs up off the floor; he then regained his feet, pulled his pants back up over his hips, and zippered his fly.

He immediately saw, somewhat incongruously, that the dean, Rockhurst, and most of the other partygoers had turned their attention to efforts to revive Gertrude, who seemed to be making noises somewhat between that of a castrated sheep's bleat and a ship's foghorn. Only Horace and Hildagarde Boothbuthle and Larry Hawthorne continued to regard Willis-the two former with looks of indignation and horror, the latter with a pitying smile.

Hawthorne sidled up to Willis.

"Well," he said conversationally, "it certainly looks as though you may have cooked your own goose here. Of course, the dean probably would've named me head of the department anyway-but a stunt like this... Frankly, old man, I can't begin to understand what you could've had in mind. By the way, in what topless bar did you pick up that delicious-looking female?"

Willis intended to say that it had not been a magic trick. He also intended to explain, in the properly frigid tones, that he was not in the habit of frequenting topless bars-but the words he tried to form never reached his lips.

Instead, in their place, he found himself saying in what sounded very much like Anathae's breathy soprano, "Eat camel dung, eunuch! Copulate with syphilitic lepers! Suck the rotten eggs of a vulture! French-kiss a Nile crocodile!"

Hawthorne's eyes grew wide-but no wider than those of the distraught Willis. Good grief, he thought, she's possessed me. Well, at least it's limited to my tongue.

Not so, lover boy, rejoined a voice in his mind-and, to his horror, he found that his right hand with a will of its own was folding into a fist.

"No!" he shouted, stepping back quickly so that Hawthorne would be out of reach. Nonetheless, he felt the urge to swing.

Ah, Willis, you're no fun, he heard the demon-girl's pouting voice claim in his mind.

I've got to get out of here, he thought as much to himself as to her, before she makes me do something I might regret.

Willis's shout had drawn the attention of the partygoers back to himself. He stammered apologetically, "I'm... I'm sorry. Pardon me. I'm afraid," he managed to smile, "I've had a bit too much to drink. Please, all of you, stay. I think, perhaps, if I got a breath of fresh air...."

"Yes," Dean Smith was quick to say, "I really believe that would be... advisable, to say the least, Professor."

Rockhurst, one of the few people at the party without female accompaniment, was able to verbalize his disappointment: "Will there be a second act to your show tonight?" he asked.

"I'll be back," Willis promised.

"Good man!"

Willis turned, shuddering, trying desperately not to see the hocked, stunned, and even horrified expressions on the faces of the other members of the faculty present. They seemed to be saying that they found their previous boredom preferable to what they had witnessed, whatever that might have been, and they were wondering why he had not had sense enough to perceive this beforehand.

His feet seemed not to be his own as he stumbled to the hall closet, threw on his camel-hair overcoat, and attempted to propel himself in the direction of his front door.

Wait a sec, Anathae's voice sounded in his mind. It's going to be cold out there-let's at least bring a bottle.

No! he wanted to shout back-but found his unwilling legs propelling him toward the kitchen. He struggled against the notion even while conceding to himself that another drink certainly couldn't hurt him and just might help, and gave up the struggle when his trembling arm opened a cabinet, reached in, and snared a half-full bottle of Teacher's Scotch.

There. Now we can go, if you like.

Willis slipped the bottle into a coat pocket, and negotiated his way back toward the front room of his apartment.

Dean Smith, he noted, cast a disapproving frown at the bottle in his pocket as Willis went by but apparently did not want to interrupt what he was saying to Rockhurst.

Blushing, Willis heard the words of others hanging in the air-"disgraceful," "undignified," and even "shameful"-which he realized his guests were using in reference to what they thought had happened. Mrs. Petruccio, the chemistry professor's wife, was smiling and whispering something in her husband's ear.

Then he was out of his apartment into the chill early January air.

He checked only to make certain that his nosy neighbor, Henrietta Bradmorton, wasn't peeking out of her apartment window, as she so often did, with her hand on the phone ready to call the police if anything she saw should displease her.

Then, slipping and sliding on the icy sidewalk, Willis made his way to his dented green Volkswagen, which, as always, was parked out front.

Leaning against it, he shook his head breathlessly, half in disbelief and half trying to clear the alcohol he had already consumed from his enfeebled brain.

3

"Okay," Willis said, his voice a whisper, "you've had your amusing bit of fun."

He drew in several bracing breaths of the cool night air. "You've probably also ruined my career," he added in a weak, tired voice. "Now kindly, if you please, get the hell out of my head!"

But, Will, it's so nice and comfy in here! Really, you're quite extraordinary, you know-although not always in a positive way. For instance, I've just been leafing through your piles of pleasant childhood memories-

"Out, I said!" Willis shouted. "Or would you like to hear me use an exorcism?"

"Oh, Will, you're so... forceful," she cooed. "At least, you are when you're sloshed."

He found himself staring at the nude, shivering Anathae, who had appeared seemingly out of nowhere and was now perched on the fender of his car. He wondered, inanely, if he should let her call him Will-and then, almost instinctively, he drew off his coat and put it over her shoulders.

"Thank you." She smiled. "I'm really not used to this sort of clim...