<div dir="ltr">Here is the start, for setting up that it is a scam. I still need to write the second half and make conclusions about lupine, the hound of horror, kiki, and Shell's corroboration of a thin man with funny hands looking for Bax with a Greek. there are one or two unfinished segments in here. Any advice would be welcome.<div><br></div><div>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"># THE SORCERER’S HOUSE: THE INNER RING OF THE TRIANNULIS<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>So I talked all this over with Madam Orizia. She is my
psychic adviser. I said, “Do you think George will hurt his poor brother?” She
tried the cards and looked terribly frightened. After that, the little crystal.
That is the real one, as she told me two years ago. There is a big one, too. It
is plastic but it looks like crystal and it tells everybody what they want to
hear. She uses that one all the time.<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>But the little one is real. She said she saw great
danger for George and his brother (you) too. BE CAREFUL. (Wolfe 114). <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Wolfe has produced a lot of dense masterpieces. His later
fiction can be just as complex as the work which skyrocketed him to, if not
fame, a reputation as one of the genre’s most accomplished literary artists. After a first reading of *The Sorcerer’s
House*, readers should be reminded that his stories are often also entertaining
and fun even if definitive conclusions are never reached. In this novel, an
educated con man struggling to make ends meet after incarceration contacts his
twin brother in a series of letters that serve to flatter his brother’s wife
just as much as they hope to attract his twin’s attention. He claims to inherit
a sprawling and sinister house as well as a strip of land that will guarantee
him a fortune; sorcery, multiple twins of different temperaments, shape-changing
foxes, werewolves, a professional psychic, real estate agents, and his mother from
fairyland all people a fast-paced plot that finally puts he and his brother
George face to face (maybe). It has been labeled as an excellent introduction
to Wolfe, and even the final “compiler’s note” ends with the claim that “Baxter
Dunn was unquestionably a most imaginative and picturesque liar, but all that
he tells us cannot be false. … How much is true? How much fabrication? Perhaps
we shall never know” (300).<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Wolfe usually plays fair, but an ending like that casts
doubt on whether we can ever meaningfully discern the “real” events from the
fabricated or exaggerated ones. Luckily, we have at least one powerful metaphor
to help contextualize the structure of this complex epistolary web. While the
strange symbol of the three-ringed triannulis serves to indicate how the
“magic” in the novel works, it also seems to be, in its own way, yet another
metaphor for the novel as a whole. Everything found on the inner ring is on
each of the external rings, but there are extra figures that appear on each
successive layer, such that some images on the second ring are not found on the
first, while images graven into the external third are not present on the two
more central rings. If we look at the quote which opens this essay, we may have
a fairly good idea of how to proceed: the “smaller” ring introduces truths from
Bax’s real life, which are then embellished according to Baxter’s increasingly
large ambitions. If we follow this metaphor, Baxter is attempting to con his
brother in many of his letters, but the brief and quick notes to Sheldon Hawes,
his cellmate, contain only a fraction of the details included in Bax’s other
missives. At one point, he finds three coins, and pawns one of them at face
value in order to try to get enough to make more money later: “I will sell one
of the larger coins. It should bring a considerable sum, and with that I can
redeem the smallest” (77) Even this act reflects Baxter’s aim: he might be
attempting to “sell” the larger stories in the hopes of material gain to redeem
his actual meager existence – which is a coin sold at “face value” – the truth.
However, this does not mean that the genre of the novel is a strict realistic
con game, as there are just enough hints of a different type of supernatural
menace in the short letters to Shell and in the missives from Madame Orizia,
and just enough threat in the opening quote, to suggest that Bax might lose
mastery of his plans, as he does not entirely control the parameters of the
real and unreal.<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Before getting into further discussion, we shall discuss the
triple nature of Bax’s story. At one point, he borrows a wheelbarrow from his
neighbor to transport a recliner left on the curb to his new estate. [That
neighbor is picturesquely named Mrs. Nabor – when Bax names his fox Winkle, he
says, “Do you recall Mother’s pretty white cat, George? The one whose kittens
you killed? Never having been an original thinker, I have borrowed her name”
(41). Mrs. Nabor’s name might be an apt name for Bax to choose for a fictional
person next door if he actually does lack originality.] As Bax sits in the
chair, he notes, “I found fifty-five cents in the crack between the seat and
the back. … fifty-five cents is a significant sum to me just now” (40). Perhaps
the easiest way to make fifty-five cents is with two quarters and a nickel –
three coins. Soon, he finds three gold coins inside a desk in the attic, of
Greek design, and these are the coins which he intends to pawn above. [His
areas of specialty and interest are the classical world of antiquity and
nineteenth century literature]. After this, Bax finds a mattress in the attic:
“Assisted only by [the fox] Winkle, I was – barely – able to drag the mattress
down the spiral stair I have described and into this room. I am seated on it
now, and sit proudly” (77). Of course, he discovers ridiculous amounts of money
in this mattress (but why isn’t he sitting on the recliner?), just as he found
money in the chair and the desk, each find increasingly unbelievable and
unlikely. This triple pattern, three in one, might also shed light on the
organization of the novel as a whole. <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Triplication allows other permutations and elaborations on themes,
motifs, or legends within the novel. When he first goes out to eat with the
interested real-estate agent Doris Rose Griffin, he hears a story from her
about Mr. Black’s old butler, who had a tendency to steal clothes-lines (106).
Her story soon presents the potential immortality of the butler and even
evolves into a suggestion that he serves the head of John the Baptist on a platter,
though the disparate parts of the butler’s tale seem to be cobbled together
from multiple urban legends. In a letter to his old cell mate, Baxter then
indicates that he is learning from the woman who tells this tale: “If I am
really as smart as I like to think I am, I can learn something of shrewdness
from her. As for technique, I have learned quite a lot from both [Doris and
Winker]” (112). <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">In the next letter, a hobo shows up squatting in Bax’s
house, and soon returns claiming to be the legendary butler. Still later, the
“butler” Nick casts aside this identity and a more vampiric iteration of the
butler emerges from the locked trunk of the car in Baxter’s garage. In this
case, we can see how there might be three “uses” of Doris’s story and the hobo:
after his introduction as a story, the tale of the butler becomes real, and he
begins to serve Bax. Soon, when that figure’s role in the story changes, the
butler is re-introduced in the form of a different character, with different
details and features, and the first butler becomes Zwart Black, incognito. If
we are to assume that Bax is constructing different versions of his tale (such
as a tame exaggeration of romantic conquests to entertain his old cell mate)
and a more fantastic one to attract George and Millie (for different purposes,
we would hope), then we have three iterations of the butler: as a story, as a
living man who serves Bax, and as a vampire or zombie liberated from the trunk.
(Though this final figure seems to be a threatening one, Nicholas *still* calls
Bax on the phone with the same verbal habits and subservient attitude as Bax’s
previous butler, in an act which has no previous precedent in the text, perhaps
symbolically suggesting that the man in that trunk actually works for Bax. When
the ghostly figure of the “vampire” jumps out of the trunk, Bax describes it as
“horrible, almost like a skull. Sunken cheeks. Big teeth showing through thin
lips. White, as white as bone.” The police officer Kate Finn asks, “Could it
have been a mask? It sounds like one” (269). Any scene with George present
should at least be considered partially valid, even if it is a set-up, as
George believes when he chases after the figure.) <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">If Madame Orizia’s statement about her larger con crystals
are to be believed, then the inner ring of the triannulis is synonymous with
the small crystal: “That is the real one.” The large, convoluted web of
fabrications resonates with the crystal that just “tells everybody what they
want to hear.” Unfortunately, Wolfe makes life hard for everyone by
corroborating some (but not all) of the supernaturally seeming events in short
letters from Sheldon and Madame Orizia – though after some reflection it seems
that Bax himself describes exactly what Sheldon, who might represent the middle
ring of the con game, would want: “You have been waiting for the sex, if I know
you. The problem is telling you so that you will believe it” (156).<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Wolfe’s late fiction often does two different things at
once, and some of the subtext actually seems to be intended as metatextual or symbolic
illustrations for the reader to begin to piece together the background story.
In the case of *The Sorcerer’s House*, perhaps Madame Orizia’s and Bax’s
contradictions, suggestions, and hints might point to the inconsistencies in
the more fantastic version of the story. Besides Bax’s willingness to lie in
the narrative at certain points (“I was lying, to be sure, but I was not under
oath” (93)), he also offers a few other guidelines for telling truth from
fabrication: “[A]nything one disbelieves is forgotten very readily” (161). At
the very beginning, Bax offers two discussions of the broken side door of the
Black House which seem to be mutually exclusive. When he considers how the
young and strangely dressed twins might enter the house and determines that it
must be from a cellar entrance, he notes, “Earlier, you see, George, I had
searched the house from within; it was by that means that I discovered the
broken side door” (53). However, when he
first describes the house to George, he says:<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"> >Please pay
attention. It is important to me at least.<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>[The house] stands half a mile, perhaps, from the
Riverman. I had noticed it more than once, a white house in good repair but a
house that had clearly been vacant for some time. A few windows were boarded
up, and the lawn was full of weeds; a few days ago, I investigated further. <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>The front door was locked, as I expected. The back door
was locked also; but a small side door had been broken open. I went in. A
vagrant had certainly camped in the house at one time. (12)<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Would Bax truly forget that the broken side door was the
method through which he originally entered the house from the outside? However,
given the entrance of Madame Orizia and George later in the text, it is
difficult to deny that the house exists, even if Bax’s story of entering it is
not consistent with later details. Wolfe’s “Please pay attention” suggests that
this is not an unintentional error on his part, but a telling inconsistency. This
is not the only inconsistency, of course. Late in the novel he explores the
basement searching for the reporter Cathy Ruth, accompanied by Doris Griffin.
When a large rat threatens her, Bax clubs it with his flashlight, “and it dropped
to the floor and scuttled away” (227). When they come to a locked door, Doris
tells him to shoot the lock. Inside, he confronts the malevolent dwarf Quorn,
whom he jestingly notes seems based on the Dickens character Quilp from *The
Old Curiosity Shop*. Even though Bax pulls the trigger of his gun, “the pistol
did not fire” (228). Later, Bax will request advice from Sheldon: “I told you
about the old guns and shooting the wolf. I shot at a door with one, too. After
that I wanted to shoot at a rat. He was a great big bastard and I thought I
could not miss, but my pistol would not fire. Since then I have been shooting
at bottles in the river” (252). There is no mention of the evil dwarf, and the
rat in Bax’s earlier letter accosted Doris before they reached the locked door.
<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">There are several other key items in the text which are
always described differently, though this might be easily understood by their “magical
character.” The ring he discovers in a fish, which probably belonged to the
sorcerer Ambrosius (if we are to buy into his surface story) is first described
as a bit of junk. Later, Dorris will see it as a “cat’s-eye opal” (which
supposedly has healing properties – here Doris seems to be attempting to get
over the death of her husband Ted, though there is reason to believe she is
primarily interested in money). When Bax runs into the pawnshop man again, he
identifies the ring differently: “You brought in a ring – costume jewelry – for
me to look at yesterday. I’d like to see the one you’re wearing now … That’s a
fire opal, I believe, the best I’ve ever seen” (48). [The fire opal was often
noted for healing deficiencies in vision and straightening the sight –
definitely something which resonates with all of the strange “window” visions
outside of Bax’s house]. Later, the jeweler, named Dick Quist, says, “that’s a
star sapphire, the best I’ve ever seen” (190). [The star sapphire was
supposedly valued as a love charm in antiquity]. While “magic” would explain
the different appearances of the ring, the three-in-one pattern of the novel
might also be established in these scenes. However, our hint as to whether this
ring might exist at all is probably found in Emlyn’s casual discussion of the
triannulis: <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">“The middle ring has everything that’s on the inside ring
and some more things of its own. Look here. See this symbol?” <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>I did. It was an oval surrounding something that might
have been a flame.<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>“It’s not on the inner ring, but it is on middle ring.
See?” (63)<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">While the talk of “rings” might here be coincidental, the
oval with the flame could very easily be describing a cat’s eye opal – it
appears on the middle ring, but not on the central small ring – in other words,
it is not real. The other possible interpretation of the flame might be the
“longlight” which allows sorcerous numen to accumulate. This could be the
clearest indication that Ambrosius’s ring is in fact not legitimate, given its
appearance. Bax’s story suggests that he is wearing two rings – one a plain golden
band that belonged to Ted Griffin. When the man in the post office asks to see the
ring, Bax says “both the rings I wore were mine” (48) However, the response is “Are
there two? The gold ring with the large stone” (48) It seems that only one is
visible, and in light of later developments, they might ultimately be Ted A.
Griffin’s rings. <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Late in the novel, Winkle takes Bax to a lion-headed figure
from Asian myth identified in the letter title as Manjushri. After showing the
mysterious figure the “challenge” written by his brother George which suggests
that each of the brothers will their estates to the other and struggle to the
death, the bodhisattva gives Bax some practical advice, saying that he will
“find” his brother only after he and the policewoman Kate Finn team up. While
he actually employs her in the letter to help him search for his brother, she
serves a vital role in the final court scene in getting the sentence of “George
J. Dunn” commuted to community service, and “George” drops his own
countercharge against her. Manjushri symbolizes transcendent wisdom, and, more
importantly, is depicted with a flaming sword which cuts through ignorance and
duality. In this sense, the symbolic implication of Manjushri actually implies
cutting through multiplications like Ieuan, Emlyn, and even, ultimately George,
possibly leaving only one twin left in reality. (Baxter’s discovery of his
brother’s challenge is also strange, considering that he has been lost chasing
after Nicholas the Vampire Butler in the house and also seems to have been
arrested for violating his parole, further highlighting Madame Orizia’s
suggestion, found a few paragraphs down in its entirety, that attention must
always be paid to who is present at each supernatural manifestation.)<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">There are other small details which seem contradictory,
including Bax’s claim to box and fence at university: “I will not say I was
expert at either; those who were regarded with contempt. Yet I did those
things.” (54) Earlier, (right after he switches hands for the second time in
the novel), he finds Winkle in the attic and describes himself in a slightly
different fashion: “I have never been athletic, as you know, but I mounted the
oak rungs without great difficulty and managed (rather less easily) to clamber
into the attic itself” (41). (Boxing, especially, is an athletically demanding
sport even for its less accomplished practitioners, though I admit to bias here.)
Of Winkle, Bax asserts, “In the presence of others she would become (I believe)
an ordinary fox, red with black markings. You need believe nothing of this, of
course” (55).<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Having established these small inconsistencies, we should
consider that Madame Orizia offers further advice to Bax that might just as
well serve critical readers of Wolfe’s novel:<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>[I]t would be well for you to review all recent
manifestations. I would suggest that you give each one a short name, such as
“Gray Figure in the Garden” or “Piano Played at Midnight.” Be as specific as
possible regarding times and places. Also, *persons present*. It is a key element. I will question you as to
other details. Just what was seen, if anything? Just what was heard, if
anything? Was there an odor? A sensation of cold? (221) <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Madame Orizia’s final advice in this particular note might
also be worth considering: “Your sister-in-law has told me you were attacked by
wolves of more than natural size, and mentioned, as you did in your letter,
that you feel that your car, as well as your home, is a site of supernormal
activity. Such may be the case, but I think it unlikely. More plausibly, it is
*you yourself*. We must examine this possibility” (222). While Bax mentions multiple
romantic interests and obtaining a house in the short letters shared by he and
Shell, he does not mention fairyland – nor does he ever speak directly of the
twin brothers who haunt his house, Emlyn and Ieuan, the sons of Zwart Black. After
all, as Bax says, “Words really mean very little. Men can be defrauded with
words and women can be seduced with words, and it really comes to about the
same thing” (195). One of the most telling techniques for discerning truth and
fiction in Bax’s own letters involves his ability to write with both hands:
“Have you ever seen me write different things simultaneously, Millie? One with
each hand? It is a parlor trick, I confess, but since I have very few I am
absurdly proud of it” (167). This might
describe Wolfe’s writing practice in the latter half of his career, and at each
point that Bax “switches” hands we should consider that he is about to perform
some trick – and perhaps these “tricks” might indicate how he could at least
afford to rent a sprawling house and be in a position to fool his brother when
he arrives.<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Of course, the problem with assuming that all of the drama
in Medicine Man is merely an elaborate set up undertaken by Baxter to lure his
brother into a trap does seem to involve some initial investment. Where could
that money have come from? When Baxter first learns that Mr. Black has left him
the house through Martha Murrey, we get a discussion on the painting of the
house, which was originally black. When Martha suggests that she might have
painted it dun rather than white, Bax says, “A yellowish gray, isn’t it? With
darker mane and tail. Horses are that color sometimes. Do you play the races,
Mrs. Murrey?” (20) It is at this point when he pulls the first of his “tricks”
by changing his writing hand:<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>(This is getting lengthy, I find. I shall switch to the
other hand.)<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>“I did for a while,” I said. “It cost me quite a bit of
money in the long run, though I enjoyed it at the time. I’ve always liked
horses.” (20)<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">He will switch hands again right before he introduces Winkle
(as a being named after something from his past, his mother’s pet, whose
kittens he blames George for killing, establishing a motive for his hatred). Later,
when Doris takes him out, he orders a dinner special called the Lakeshore Hat
Trick: “Three kinds of fish, all cooked different. There’s pike blackened with
Cajun spices, a blackfish cake – that’s a Chinese delicacy, sir – with a sweet
Oriental glaze, and whitefish in black butter. Three small portions, sir, but
taken together they make a big meal, and it’s only nine ninety-five.” (37). The
Hat Trick is not actually a term denoting some kind of sleight of hand (though
in this case it might metatextually show us Bax’s trick) – it is achieving
three goals or notable achievements in a sport in a row (after which, according
to the original coining of the term, a hat might be passed around for impressed
onlookers to donate to the victor). Bax might actually be a shrewd sports
bettor, and have funded the house through either legal or illegal gambling. His
“second” benefactor is Alexander Skotos (though eventually this persona
collapses into Zwart Black – even though Zwart supposedly attends Skotos’s
funeral at about the same time that Bax was incarcerated). In any case, Bax
says that the name Skotos sounds familiar, though he cannot place it:<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>I said that, George, because I judged it contrary to my
best interests to commit myself one way or the other so early. How was I to
know whether I had, at some time in what I know you will concede has been a
checkered career, come across an Alexander Skotos? Perhaps I had. Or more
likely, Alexander Skotos was a name assumed by someone I had known under another
appellation. I knew a man called Sandy Scott at Churchill Downs, for example.
(97) <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Often in Wolfe, a possibility which is originally put forth
seems to be a clear incidental detail or misunderstanding which actually
engenders a fuller understanding of the truth once other patterns are
established. Churchill Downs is the home of the Kentucky Derby horse races, and
perhaps the mention of betting on horses when he meets his first benefactor,
Martha Murrey (who will assume the mantle of his birth mother as the story goes
on) in conjunction with his first mention of betting on horses actually does
reveal the trick of how Bax came into the money necessary to fund his con-game.<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Even if we take Bax’s letters to George and Millie at face
value, there are still some inexplicable moments in the text involving his
trips to Lakeshore with Doris that must be explored (including the
manifestation of a huge white horse that might be understood as a water spirit
or kelpie on <span style="background-color:yellow;background-position:initial initial;background-repeat:initial initial">the surface,
or might remind us of Bax’s love of horse races), and this serves as Bax’s
final switching of hands in the story, and so might be worth some examination:</span>
<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">## What They Want to Hear<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">It is quite clear that Millie, George’s wife, wants to hear
beautiful things, proving her gullibility with every word she writes, and that
Bax had anticipated both her gullibility and her discovery of the letters from
the very start. George, more skeptical, is eventually provoked to seek out his
brother based on the vague promise of wealth which he feels is owed him after
being defrauded by Baxter, or for the more certain possibility of proving Bax’s
insanity. Bax knows how to exploit George’s quick temper to his own ends.<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Given that Sheldon Hawes goes by the nicknames “Shotgun”
Shell, it might not be out of line to consider that he is a weapon that Bax
plans to utilize. The story Bax feeds Sheldon might be more realistic than the
letters sent to George and Millie, but Bax might still have an agenda here,
especially given his knowledge that Sheldon will be interested in Bax’s
romantic entanglements, giving the incarcerated friend a chance to provide
insight and advice and feel like a valued member of Bax’s inner circle. <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Madame Orizia, on the other hand, is something of a con
woman all on her own. When she first offers her services to Bax, she indicates
that her fees are “$500 to $5,000,” in addition to her travel expenses. In
Bax’s more fantastic letters, we learn that she is saved from rape and agrees
to perform her services gratis: “To prove my gratitude, I will charge no fee.
None! I must ask you to compensate my travel costs, however” (229). In her
final report, she demands a travel reimbursement of “$4,387.76,” though she
admits “I promised to charge you no fee” in connection with Mr. Quorn (294).
This sum might be enough to consider Madame Orizia firmly in Bax’s employ,
though her earlier impressions might be reliable. It might be worthwhile to
consider the versions of each story as a whole before coming to some specific
symbolic conclusions.<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">## The Story Bax Tells Sheldon Hawes and Other External
Points of View<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Bax reveals to his roommate over the course of many letters
that he has come to Medicine Man “to get away from my brother George and his
friends (the people whose money I took) and the university” (23). He has been
unsuccessful in finding work and misses his old cellmate and their friend Lou
(who might be a forger and is not allowed paper and writing materials). He says
“I am going to try to get my brother to front me some money if I can” (9). In
his next letter to Shell, he reveals that he has come into a large house
somehow, though the side-door is a problem and kids come in at night – in
addition, he is hearing many noises there. He has resolved to fix up the house
and sell it if possible, and is trying very hard to get power returned to the
estate.<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Sheldon writes that he hopes to “get to this haunted house
you got before Halloween” since he has a hearing coming up in September (41).
He shares some personal childhood memories with Bax about how much he enjoyed
freeing himself from the others at summer camp, calling it the best time of his
life, and noting that “With the other guys I say it was the night I screwed
some bitch, and sometimes it is a bitch I really screwed and sometimes just one
I wanted to. But I have told you the truth” (44). This sentence might inspire
Bax to embellish his romantic conquests, despite Sheldon’s honesty.<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"> In his next letter to
Shell, Bax reveals that he has come into possession of three golden coins, but
fears that trying to sell them might get him in trouble with the law. While he
notes that he found the coins in an old dresser in an attic, he makes no
statement about the other supernatural events which bookend this event in his
longer letters to his brother George, which we shall omit here. He asks Sheldon if he knows of a lawyer, also
indicating that he has met several women without giving any descriptive details
[though they are probably at this point Martha Murrey and Doris Griffin.].<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Sheldon tells Baxter of a local attorney who likes to see
his name in the paper named Ben Ramsey (whom Bax will employ for his brother
when the time comes). A man named Rick knows about Ramsey, and he is described
as a a “Tall guy, boosts cars, bad complexion” (99). Shell also advises Bax
that there are only two types of women: “There are women who make trouble for
you and women you make trouble for” (99). By this point in the book, Bax has
become aware that he might even be left a lucrative plot of property known as
the Skotos Strip, but he gives no indication to Sheldon at this point that this
is the case, instead noting that he has given his parole officer his change of
address. “I still haven’t gotten a job, but I am starting to see some
possibilities. Not office work, but something that might keep him off my back”
(112). He reveals more details about the women in his life: a small and
submissive Oriental woman and the widowed Doris: “She has tattoos in unexpected
places … She likes money, but I cannot hold that against her. So do I” (112).
He characterizes her as shrewd, and vows to learn from her [which supports the
idea that he has perhaps begun to fabricate many details about his life to his
brother George]. <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">At this point in the book, Baxter begins getting letters
from George’s wife, Millicent, who has talked over some of the letters with her
psychic advisor, Madame Orizia. Millicent warns Baxter about Doris and suggests
that he pursue Mrs. Murrey, whom Bax has not seemed to mention directly to
Sheldon yet. Soon, Baxter also receives a note from Madame Orizia, who suggests
that his home is a node and “may well be possessed” (135). She offers her
services and notes that her fees are between $500 and $5000, though she must be
compensated for travel (136).<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Bax’s letters to Sheldon seem to skip over many important
events, as the next one we have access to indicates that his brother has come to
town and has faced a hostile welcome: “I have never been present before while
someone held a gun on someone else. That happened last night, and the someone
else was my brother George” (155). He
tells Sheldon how he has convinced his parole officer that he is earning a
paycheck, saying he “bought into everything I told him” (155). [This parole
officer never appears in Bax’s letters to George and Millie.] Bax has
established a bogus business, A Plus Tutors, and suggests that the president,
who signs the checks, might be recognizable to Shell. It is only here that
Sheldon learns of the inheritance from Alexander Skotos:<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>A kindly old gentleman called Alexander Skotos has left
me a nice piece of real estate. Does that name ring bells with you? Skotos is
Greek, so he would be Greek or at least look Greek enough to pass. I have been
rummaging through every last memory I can turn up, and I have not found a
Skotos or anyone who owed me and might use that name. Ask around please. I
could handle everything here much better if only I knew who Skotos really was.
(156)<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Obviously, this has occurred after the reading of Skotos’s
will and George’s interruption, but he leaves out many of the details leading
up to this, including the murder which occurred while he was eating dinner with
Martha Murrey. Once again, he describes Winker and Doris, but no mention is
made of Martha at all. <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Baxter ends the note with the almost metatextual
imprecation:<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>Remember, please, that the big question is “Alexander
Skotos.” Who was he? Any information at all. Have you head of a Mary King?
There is probably no connection, but she and Alexander Skotos lived here in
Medicine Man or close to it, and both are dead. Please let me know, Shell.
(157) <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">This is the most trouble detail in reconstructing a coherent
picture of what has and has not happened, because if the timeline established
in the note is to be believed, this is written right after George arrives in
Medicine Man and is presented before Doris and Baxter pick up the ghostly
hitchhiker who disappears from the car named Mary King. The emphasis in this
section, of determining who Mary King, a minor character, and who Alexander
Skotos, a major benefactor, are, seem to be given a lot of weight, especially
since Mary King will not appear in his other notes (possibly on the same night
that George was arrested) until several letters later, when Bax and Dorris stop
to pick up a hitchhiker (the third female Bax picks up on the road in his
narrative) who calls herself Mary King, saying that she is going, “Where you
are going” before disappearing as they
pass by a cemetery visible under a full moon obscured by clouds (200). <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">In Shell’s next letter, which is *still* presented before
the appearance of Mary King, he says he is writing quickly because of what
Baxter said about having two women. Shell tells Bax he has heard something
about the Greek and warns him against having two love interests. “You never
trust a prosecuting attorney, a automatic, or a chick. Never!” (197) Shell
describes how his acquaintance Iron Mike was put in touch with a Greek who
wanted to talk to him at a diner. “The Greek came all right and had a long
skinny torpedo with him. He says the skinny guy never said a word, just grinned
the whole time. … The Greek ordered two coffees, only the skinny guy never
touched his” (198). The Greek asks about Baxter and who he was close to. The
threat made if Iron Mike should lie echoes the story of the Butler who stole
clotheslines: “the skinny guy gets out a piece of clothesline and starts running
it through his fingers. Mike said he had funny fingers” (198). This is external
corroboration of a Greek man and the tall figure who will at the very least
assume the part of Nicholas in the main narrative, and it seems they have been
looking for Baxter, but it is not clear if they are hostile to Baxter or not.
(This also gives us no indication how the skinny man might have wound up in the
trunk of Baxter’s car, however). We shall return to the implication of this
later. <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Mary King finally makes her appearance in the next chapter,
which is addressed not to George or Millie, but to Mrs. Pogach/Madame Orizia,
and Bax tells her that he fears the paranormal activity actually extends beyond
his house to an antique limousine in his garage. He describes how Mary King
disappeared, though does not mention his second hitchhiker Kiki or werewolves,
and invites Madame Orizia to come. In his letters to Millie right after this,
he mentions that they are surrounded by wolves on the drive back, but makes no
mention of Mary King. Instead, he notes that Emlyn “introduced” him to a woman
he admires: “Lupine, the psychotic I had met beside the river” (202). None of
this is related to Sheldon Hawes.<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">In his next letter to Sheldon, Baxter assures him that the
Greek must have been the man he referred to earlier, but he is puzzled by the
identity of the tall man, asking Shell to pay attention to any further news. He
sends a package with smokes and candy to Shell, some of which he might be able
to trade (and perhaps suggesting in their coded language that *he* wants to
trade for Shell’s services). He also signs up Shell for magazine subscriptions
and offers to send money to his wife. He closes by saying that he has succeeded
in shooting *something*: “I hit the animal, but it was just about on top of me
and I could hardly miss” (210). <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">The next letters not written by Baxter are from Madame
Orizia and Millie. Orizia suggests that he begin noting the persons present at
strange manifestations and that Bax himself might be the actual locus of the
supernatural activity. She also suggests that the wolves he wrote about to
Millie were not werewolves. The letter from Millie asserts that she has
received a call from George, who cannot leave town without being arrested
again. She demands the keys to their good car, which was left at the airport if
Bax sees George, and she hints that Madame Orizia did not believe her story
about werewolves: “This was the only time I have ever said anything and had her
not believe it. Don’t you think that is sad? I do” (224). <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">In Shell’s next letter, he indicates that he gave a woman
named Vicki Bax’s address “and told her to get in touch if she needs some
money” (235). (Presumably, this is Shell’s wife, and she will not appear in the
text, though it is tempting, given the appearance of Ben Ramsey, to suggest
that all of the characters mentioned in Shell’s letters eventually show up in
Medicine Man). Shell proceeds to give him some shooting advice, advising him
not to stall.<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">At this point, a letter from Millie indicates that she has
grown increasingly upset from Bax’s letters, and that she has heard from Madame
Orizia in an unconventional fashion:<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>She has never phoned me before and I do not know how she
got my number. She told me a lot, especially about Geroge. I do not think she
really likes him but she would not say that. I explained that I do not, either,
but she still would not say it. She had seen him in the lobby. She had seen you
in a trance, so she thought George was you! When she saw George, she wondered
what you were so mad about!<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">>She thinks that house is dangerous and you ought to move
out right away. (238-9)<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">(This seems to contradict Madame Orizia’s earlier conviction
that it was Bax himself who might be the source of supernatural disturbances.
We will discuss this further below.) <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">In Bax’s next letter, he indicates that Shell should tell
him anything their friend Les might want to tell him. Bax seemingly
corroborates some details from the climactic excursion in the basement of his
house which we shall describe below, in which he shoots at handle of a door and
at a large rat. He also indicates he has been practicing his aim by shooting at
bottles in the river. He does reveal an interesting feature of a dueling pistol
which comes up for the first time in Shell’s letters: “the touchhole … was
clogged with burned powder. There is a pick to clear it screwed into the butt
of each gun; they have had work to do from that time until this” (252).<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"> He indicates that he
is going out of town with a man he knows to practice shooting at targets, and
says that antique guns are not illegal for a felon to have. He also reveals
that George “punched out a nice copchick I know” and made bail before
disappearing, though he does not know what might have befallen his brother
(252).<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">“My brother and I do not get along well. I know I have told
you much more about that than you ever wanted to know. Now a woman who knew the
man who gave me the pistol thinks he did it so my brother and I would use them
on each other – that he wanted one of us to kill the other.” (252) <span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Here he attempts to present a more benevolent attitude
towards his brother: “I have not the least desire to kill George, although he
has never treated me like a brother; but if I must kill George to keep him from
killing me I will” (253). He also
suggests a job offer on letterhead from Martha Murrey’s company, GEAS Inc., if
it might accelerate Sheldon’s parole (though he does not mention Martha Murrey
by name).<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">In his final letter to Bax, Sheldon gives him further
shooting instructions, and finally suggests that Bax cheats in order to win.
“He’s going to shoot you, so shoot back first. Only I do not think any of it
will really come off. Take it easy. Be cool” (272) This imprecation to “be
cool” has far more significance in light of Bax’s discussion of Emlyn and Iuean
as “hot” and “cool” tempered individuals, further insinuating that Bax
corresponds with Iuean rather than “Emlyn the Good.”<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">There are three more letters from external points of view,
and two of them are strangely contradictory ones from Dorris Griffin. She
admits in a “Dear John” letter that she was interested in the money which Bax
had, then says “You were not particularly good in bed, but you were getting
better but all this is just too crazy. You are crazy, your house is crazy, and
when I am with you I am crazy too” (273).
She mentions the woman Bax picked up while driving, Kiki, and says that
she has quit her job. A postscript indicates that he should “keep Ted’s ring
until I send you my new address” (274).<span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal"><span> </span></p>
<p class="gmail-MsoNormal">Her next letter, titled “A Terrible Mistake,”<span></span></p>
</div></div>