Evil Unearthed: Chapter 1

Evil Unearthed
A Tale of Maljardin

By S. M. Hillis

Foreword

This novel is based on Strange Paradise, a gothic soap opera which aired in Canada and parts of the United States from 1969 to 1970. It was created by Jerry Layton and Ian Martin, and I, in writing this new tale of the secluded island of Maljardin, have only endeavoured to build upon its foundation. I owe a great debt to the writing of Ian Martin and hope that I have done him justice. I hope you will enjoy reading this novel as much as I have enjoyed writing it.

SMH

Chapter One

"Mr. Dawson? Sir?" The voice did not seem familiar, but when Stephen Dawson finally opened his eyes, he recognized the face which belonged to it as that of the cheery flight attendant who had served him dinner some hours before.

"Oh," he said sleepily. "Are we landing soon?"

"Yes sir," said Julie or Jinni or whatever her name was. "Please return your seat to its upright position and fasten your seatbelt." Dawson did so, still rubbing sleep from his eyes, and indeed as he looked out the window, he saw the lights of the runway coming closer. He was not looking forward to the next few hours which would involve a probably sleepless night in an airport lounge while waiting for a smaller plane to take him to his actual destination. Still, it would be worth it to see Dr. B. again.

As the plane descended and the landing-gear came down, Stephen thought about what had started him on this journey, and he reflected as he often did that it had all begun with a single word: Maljardin. That word had echoed in his mind and heart ever since he was a small boy, and for him it represented the mystery of mysteries, for it was that name which was forever associated with the strange disappearance of his favourite uncle Matt. In truth, he had never met this long-lost uncle, but his father had given him the middle name of Matthew when he was born, and later, at his request, a photograph of him, and all through his childhood, he had often looked at the young brown-haired man in the clergyman's collar with curiosity and even fear. The story of Uncle Matt's disappearance was not often told around the family dinner table, but it was the kind of thing which could not be kept secret.

According to all who had known him, Matt Dawson had been a devoted minister in the turbulent sixties, especially concerned with helping the younger generation to make it through the turmoil of growing up. He had been affiliated with a home for troubled young girls in New York called Westley House, and it was there that he had met a young heiress named Holly Marshall. Some believed that he had fallen in love with her, and this was all-but confirmed when, shortly after she ran away from Westley House, he suddenly left the church at which he was serving and took off to the Caribbean after her. He had ended up at an island called Port French Leave, and from there, so the story went, he had found his way to the mysterious island chateau of Maljardin, home of the reclusive and eccentric Desmond family. As the investigating detective later told his next-of-kin, the trail went cold after this, with nothing heard of young Miss Marshall or the good reverend after he left Port French Leave in the Desmond supply-boat. Everyone assumed that he was dead, but Stephen had always had a secret hope that one day he would find him, perhaps living some idyllic life with his beloved Holly in a sun-soaked paradise of swaying palms and crashing waves; and now, after years of not knowing, he would finally have the chance to find out what had happened for certain.

Once the plane had taxied to a stop and he had exited the cabin, Stephen walked stiffly through the crowded airport to find his luggage. Having done so with the usual annoyance, he went to the airline counters and found the one for Island Sky, the line with whom his ticket was registered, and the friendly woman standing behind it informed him that his plane for Port French Leave would be taking off, weather permitting of course, at six o'clock A.M. Looking at his watch, his face fell as he realized that it was now six o'clock P.M., and he had nothing to do now but wait.

"The bar's that way," said the woman, pointing a colourfully-nailed hand vaguely in the direction from which could be heard the rattle of dishes and cutlery.

"Thank you," he said, walking off in that direction and dragging his suitcase slowly after him.

The bar was crowded and noisy but Stephen managed to find a corner booth which was unoccupied, and placing his suitcase on the bench across from him, he sat down and opened his carry-on bag. Taking out his Blackberry, he scrolled through the emails waiting for him. Most of them were boring university memoranda, but it wasn't the new mail which interested him. Once his inbox had been cleared, he scrolled to the folder simply labeled 'Barrett,' and looked at the most recent message listed.

"My Dear Dawson," it stated. "It has been a long time, I know, and I do apologize for my procrastination in writing to you, but I felt that I should not disturb your quiet life of lecturing and research unless there was a very good reason for doing so. You told me long ago about the disappearance of your uncle, and it intrigued me so much that I decided to continue the private research I had begun some years ago into the region where he was last seen. I am now on an island in the vicinity of Maljardin, and I have met someone who knew your uncle. This person is a devotee of the unique form of Voodoo practiced in these islands, and I can only tell you that I promise that it will be worth your while to come here. The island is Port French Leave. I've had a foundation on whose board I serve wire you some money. Make up a story that will satisfy the university if you can, and get down here as soon as possible! Till we meet under the Caribbean sun, I remain: Dr. Robert Barrett."

This was the note that had started it all. This was the message that had awoken the obsession which had lain sleeping for so many years, and for three months, Stephen had worked in a fever of activity, booking flights and hotels and making sure that the powers that be at the university would not miss him and would be assured of the research money from Barrett's foundation. Once they had been satisfied, there had been only one other thing to take care of, for as well as being a scholar, Stephen Dawson was a serving Jesuit priest. True, his priestly duties had become less important to him over the years than his duties at the university, but he felt that he could not give them up since his conversion to Catholicism had been such a sore point with his family. He felt that if he were to leave the priesthood, he would not be worthy of all the struggles he had overcome to get there; so he stayed, day after day, serving a mass in which he only half-believed and absolving people of confessed sins which seemed pale in comparison to his own, until, of course, the message from Dr. B. had come to awaken him out of the half-dream which his life had become. Fortunately, it was this very state of ambivalence which allowed him to convince his Bishop that he needed to take some time off, and Bishop O'Hara, who was a genuinely sympathetic man, agreed that some time away from all the stresses of his current life would renew his spiritual vigour; therefore, he had willingly granted the requested personal leave without question or comment.

Now, Stephen thought, as he switched off his Blackberry and sipped his rapidly-cooling coffee, he was taking a journey into mysterious places, and not all of them were to be found on a map. No; for him this would not simply be a fishing expedition for news of his uncle. If Dr. B. was involved, it was sure to be something much deeper: a journey along the unknown paths of the mind and the spirit. When he had learned that his PH.D. dissertation advisor was going to be Dr. Robert Barrett, Stephen had been overjoyed. Barrett had a reputation as an adventurer. It was always said of him that he did not read books for his research but rather wrote them as a result of it. His field research was some of the most dangerous kind, for he had a knack of insinuating himself into any culture he came across and penetrating very deeply into the mysteries of their rituals and practices. When Stephen had first met him, he had expected him to be Indiana Jones complete with bullwhip and fedora, so when he had seen a balding man in his fifties dressed in a rather sedate brown suit, he had felt a strange kind of disappointment. However, as they had worked more closely together on his own research, Barrett had told stories and had shown him some of his field notes, and then once the dissertation was finished, he had taken Stephen to his house and shown him his private and secret files. It was then that Stephen realized that this man was no mere scholar, and that underneath his brown suits and horn-rimmed spectacles there beat the heart of a true spiritual athlete. He had been initiated into several shamanic and magical belief-systems, had taken drugs which had never been classified in any pharmacopoeia, and had learned more than any other of his colleagues about the religions he had studied. Yet, though his books were perhaps a little more interesting than those of his contemporaries, they were never disrespectful to the cultures portrayed in them. In fact, Stephen had been the first to see the private records of his sojourns among the populations he had written so sedately about in his public work. These private notes had taken the form of a spiritual journal of sorts, but even in those pages, Stephen had the suspicion that not all which could have been written had been. What they had told him was that Barrett was a man of honour and a true spiritual seeker, and though he was a priest and perhaps should have decried Barrett's spiritual choices as idolatrous and false, he respected him for going the distance, for refusing to let his academic mind deter him from penetrating to the heart of things.

In fact, it had been in Barrett's private notes that he had discovered a connection to Maljardin. If not for that, he would never have told the professor about the Dawson family mystery at all, but Barrett had intended to study the Voodoo on the islands in the vicinity of Maljardin, and though he had not yet done so firsthand, he had collected research on the region dating back several hundred years. After hearing Stephen's story, he had allowed him to photocopy the Maljardin notes, which was a thing unprecedented for him, and had sworn to him that he would share anything pertaining to his uncle's disappearance with him if ever he had the chance to visit the area. Now at last Barrett had been able to keep his vow, and after this interminable night, passed in inevitable discomfort on a chair in the Island Sky lounge, Stephen would be seeing his old friend again for the first time in fifteen years. More than this, however, he would finally be joining him on one of his amazing adventures, and it was this which had caused the fever to burn in him for the past three months, for somehow he knew that he was going to find truth on this journey, and nothing would stop him from doing as his mentor had always done and going the distance required of him.