"Well, what do you make of that, my friend?" Zarnak let the massive book fall closed.
The other's eyes had closed during the reading but now sprang open. "But wasn’t the author of the Necronomicon himself something of a wizard? So Ibn Khallikan attests. And the Al-Azif has the reputation of a kind of occult Bible. I'm afraid I don’t understand, Dr. Zarnak."
"I have thought long and hard on the very matter you mention. Here is what I have discovered, or at any rate surmised. To put it perhaps over-simply for the moment, I have concluded that the Al-Azif and the Necronomicon are not in fact one and the same. The former was the work of an eighth-century Yemenite demonologist, Abd al-Hazrat. The more notorious Necronomicon, while it incorporates various bits and pieces of lore filched from the older Azif, is substantially a new work, a series of mediumistic revelations made to Dr. John Dee while he gazed into his scrying crystal.
"Once he had transcribed the visionary material, he stood aghast at the character of it. Suspecting demonic inspiration for the larger pare of it, he tried to disguise its true origin by fathering the work on the obscure Arab al-Hazrat. It was a day when Christians commonly believed their Saracen rivals to worship idols and monsters such as Termagant and Iblis, so the attribution seemed natural. Dr. Dee dared not simply destroy the blasphemous text outright for fear of what vengeance might be wrought upon him by whatever alien influences had imparted the revelations to him. Afterward he petitioned his God for the gift of the tongue of angels, that spoken by the antediluvian revealer Enoch, that henceforth he might receive the oracles of God without admixture.
"What I have just read you comes from the original work of al-Hazrat. I do not care to say how it came into my hands. But I am fairly certain that in this passage we have some clues to our mystery. I will keep my own counsel about some of it till events corroborate my guesses, but I will tell you this. It would be a waste of rime to approach our Mr. Phillips again. He would surely grow suspicious, no matter what pretext we used to cloak the reason for our interest in his affairs. We must retain the element of surprise, and here is how we shall do it ..."
MIDNIGHT found a lonely trio trudging through an even lonelier landscape, as Anton Zarnak, accompanied by his servant Akbar Singh and the somewhat reluctant young scholar Jacob Maitland, made their way through Hubble's Field, trying to get as near as they dared to the old Hiram Stokely mansion without being seen in the wan moonlight.
The farthest quarter of the vast and desolate expanse harbored a very old cemetery, with headstones dating in some cases to pioneer days. Excavations some years before had disclosed the shocking fact that pretty much the whole of Hubble's Field had long been honeycombed with clandestine burials dating back further still, but of course none of those makeshift graves was marked.
Work at the site had been suspended while the appropriate county boards had met to decide what to do next. Finally, two considerations had persuaded them to discontinue the operation and to reroute the planned utility lines elsewhere. First, the presence there of ancient Indian remains made the place sacred in the eyes of the surviving Hippaway, who appeared as if from nowhere to make their case quire vociferously. Second, since there was no possibility of identifying any of the skeletal carcasses, some of them seemingly mummified, it was thought best not to bother reinterring them elsewhere. Best to let the place alone, dreaming of its enigmatic past. No one came there any more, not even to lay flowers at the graves in the tiny cemetery that lay close to the mansion. Most of these graves were so old that no one survived to memorialise dead relatives resting there.
It was here that Zarnak chose to start digging. To Maitland's nervous questioning the unflappable occultist replied, "It is always easier when paying a visit to begin by locating the door. These even have their residents' names listed. Rather like your apartment house." It was a grim jest, but neither man laughed.
Akbar Singh's huge muscles swelled as he attacked the moldy mound of graveyard soil, unearthing the rotting lid of a coffin in surprisingly few minutes. They seemed long to Maitland, who was in constant terror, not of the supernatural, but simply of being apprehended by the local police—as if any were likely to be patrolling the God-forsaken area. He winced at every blow of the Sikh's shovel against the yielding wood of the old casket. Wood splintered as Akbar Singh pulled free what was left of the lid.
"Just as you surmised, my Master—nothing!”
Maitland and Zarnak both advanced to the lip of the emptied grave. Maitland spoke first. "You mean we've taken all this insane risk for nothing? I told you—"
"No, young Mister Maitland; please take a closer look. Don't be afraid. Indeed, the coffin is untenanted. That is as I suspected. I believe we will find something else instead. Now, let Akbar Singh finish his work." The Sikh set to work again, this time roughly tapping this and that section of the exposed coffin bottom, shredding what was left of the once-fine silken lining. Then a sudden splintering sound.
"The false bottom, sahib." Zarnak joined him, drawing forth an electric torch.
“And the steps? Yes, there they are. Not much, barely more than an uneven incline, I fear, but we ought to be able to make it. Come, gentlemen.”
Jacob Maitland’s reaction to this development may readily be imagined. With a quick prayer, the first he had uttered in many a year, the young scholar followed Akbar Singh, Zarnak bringing up the rear, down the stairs in the crypt.
When they finally reached the end of the slippery ramp, which seemed to be a huge mud hill lent what little stable structure it possessed by an underlying heap of yellowed bones, the three venturers were glad to attain level ground again—until, that is, their descending feet splashed through fully a foot of scummy standing water. As they made their slow way forward, feet emerging from the mire with a sucking pop! each time, they tried hard to gain a sense of their bearings in case a speedy retreat should prove necessary. That was of no use: The place was a labyrinth. Echoes defined the height of the ceiling variously the further they went. Once or twice their heads bumped the rock above them, but then they would shortly hear the distinct sounds of leathery wings fluttering stickily far above them. Once they had to retrace their steps, losing an hour or two, when the ceiling began to close over their heads again and finally lowered to such a degree that passage was impossible.
Eventually, they judged, they must be in more or less close proximity to the mansion. If so, there would soon be visible piles of gemstones, ancient coins and treasures: the gathered loot of the centuries, mined and excavated by the wriggling scavengers who served the repellent Ubb, blasphemous totem of the eaters of the dead.
Though none cared to point out the fact, it would also be soon that they would encounter one of the nonhuman subjects of Father Ubb, unless of course the statement of Winfield Phillips had indeed been a fiction or a macabre joke after all. Too much of it had proven out already for that welcome alternative to hold out much hope.