Commentary on The Catalog of Ships

Tony, Why the hell is your girlfriend showing her ass at the top of the stairs?

Captain Lincoln asked.

Marjorie sat at the top of the staircase, legs pointed in v-shape to the chandelier above her, arms extended outward towards the mirror at the end of the stairs. Jesús, Isabelle's assistant, was in a mirrored pose at the base of the stairs. Arms and legs in agreement, asses in dialogue. Nothing between them except the staircase with its greek inscribed railings. Tony could swear the crystals in her earrings seemed to softly swirl around her like a fastly spinning top.

"Om Vajrapani Hum" chanted the muscular man.

"δύω Ἡρακλεΐδαο" Matched Marjorie matching the same chant.

Tony wiped the beading sweat from his widow's peak as he whispered to the captain,

"She said it's important. She said this is how she did it."

Captain Looked at Marjorie, then at Isabelle, then shook his head and chuckled. Isabelle shot back a sardonic chuckle.

The two officers stood at the top of the stairs with Isabelle, who sighed while trapped between the rock of the two police officers, and the hard place of the v-posed Marjorie. There was a thought that entered Isabelle's mind. How precariously her ass sat on the edge of the stairs. How easy to tip over and make a fool out of a threat.

With a gentle tap of Isabelle's foot, Marjorie could come humiliatingly down the stairs, yet all seemed frozen. Isabelle felt the gaze of the two officers behind her. It was too late for her to pretend she was just “looking around.”

“Your pose is too stiff around the shoulders, Try to be more like Jesús.”

Jesús looked at his employer in helpless agony.

Arranged around the foot of the stairs were a gaggle of police officers, each one coming in to comment on the situation, a few of Marjorie and Tony's old classmates were amidst the boys and girls in blue. They looked up to give Tony a mocking thumbs up.

The small throng of curious police officers, housewives, and witnesses no one has turned away were now in one place at the bottom floor of the stairs of the victorian house and their collective body heat overwhelming the poor ventilation system and AC. Giving what would normally be a winter afternoon feel like a stale summer day. The smell of stale sweat was being suppressed by the essential oils that filled the room. Captain Oliver wondered if this is what this house would have smelled like before AC.

Isabelle, tugged at her "Atlantean" blue robe over her black dress. The robe was reluctantly worn, and only done to prevent Marjorie from touching it. Tony noticed the solid colored robe had faint symbols of waves, fishes, and ankhs. He wondered if the robe was heat sensitive. But whether or not the robe was heat sensitive, Isabelle certainly was, suffering in the heat on the second floor, vainly brushing her fan over face with a fine chinese fan.

Between her irritated face, her now wilting red hair, and the sheen of her sweat covered head and bust, she resembled a Sorcerer Queen from a film that would have been shot in 1985 Argentina to avoid taxes and unions.

She looked over to The Captain's eyes pleading to stop the madness.

"These are just yoga poses, this is just a nice silk robe. Captain, if you think the Yoga is suspicious you will have to arrest every woman on the Eastern Seaboard."

Tony thought out loud.

“And what pose is this?” Tony asked.

“Navasana” replied Isabelle.

“Boat Position” clarified Jesús.

"Boat position....oh! that book, Marjorie found it...a Commentary on The Catalog of Ships."

Captain Lincoln turned to Tony, in the warm lit room.

“And that means what exactly Russo?"

"I don't know, but Atlantean robes, Boat poses, ship books...seems connected right?"

The Captain glared at Tony's shrugged response, and Isabelle's smile indicated she was ready to lob an acidic retort, when Marjorie finished chanting and spoke.

"Occult means things that are hidden. Your movies. Your books. Your fairy tales have give you images of what that means: Sorcerers, secret orders, magic spells. I've spent my life being compared to them. But the true meaning of occultism is that the world camouflages the truth in the mundane. The Scholars of the Esoteric know that the hidden order of the world hides itself not in great crypts but under the welcome mats and fake rocks. Truths hidden in plain sight; places no one would ever bother to look."

Marjorie gets up from the pose,

Jesús remains in the exact same pose with the same chant.

Marjorie moves down the stairs carrying the ornate seaglass letter opener from the office. Her pose seemed deliberate, ritualistic even. Six steps down, two steps back, one step forward.

"The very concept of recording numbers is an esoteric truth. Every number in the bible tells a sacred truth, when the Greeks record 40 ships sent by each King, is it just a headcount or a Kabbalistic number of change?"

Marjorie strikes the iron railing filled with greek letters. She strikes at the μ. The clack of the iron sounds brittle somehow.

"But the number more relevant to our case is 15 million. When a woman takes out insurance policies for 15 million dollars, is it just a payout? Or a marker of a woman's greater ambitions?"

Isabelle turned over to the captain who now finally seemed interested in the whole affair.

Isabelle growled.

"For most, 15 million might just symbolize a comfortable windfall, but 15 Million is how much it would cost to buy out Charles Krammer's stakeholders. Rendering the Krammer family the sole stakeholders."

“Speculation! All of this! Idle Speculation!” Isabelle shouted insults Marjorie, turning the growing candle vigil of cellphones turned to her. A soft breeze cooled the room above. Tony felt more comfortable even as Isabelle grew less so.

"I will not be accused of murder in my own office. I did not kill my husband! Jesús, help me please."

"Jesús, keep those legs where I can see them!" Ordered Tony.

Marjorie continued her steps, 6 forward, 2 back, 1 forward.

Now halfway down the stairs.

She continued while Jesús whimpered, his pose wobbling.

"I’m not condemning you Isabelle. I’m exonerating you.You didn't murder your husband.Why would you need to? Too messy if an actual body showed up. Plus you don't know if you actually are the beneficiary in the will anymore, do you?"

Marjorie's paused but did not look back to meet with an icy glare.

She inhaled in a cold breath. Her earrings seemed to glow brighter now.

In fact the whole room seemed to drop in temperature, as Marjorie continued her ritual descent. Isabelle lost her lustre, and goosebumps began to form.

"All of your policies were for Death OR disappearance, and as a partner in his companies you could act on his behalf."

Isabelle shoved her now freezing arms into her sleeves to bask against the seabreeze.

Tony, let out a soft whistle, mist emerging from his breath. The symbols on Isabelle’s robe were more distinctive.

"The Innsmouth Group, You were gonna sell Charles' restaurants to Private Equity!" Tony exclaimed.

The temperature of the room could not have gotten any colder as the growing hisses and gasps, and whispers, filled the bottom floor of Buffalonians. Even Jesús looked surprised.

“You told me we only needed the money for producing our show!”

“Shut up, Jesús!”

When Isabelle looked down to the teal green angry crowd of her Yoga clients and Officers something in her slipped, and she gripped the iron rail with white knuckles. The murmur seemed to almost roar like the sea.

"Why do you all care! My Husband did nothing of value! They were just chains! Who cares who owns your god damn Pizza Huts."

She shouted over the growing roar of the waves.

“My kid works for that Pizza Hut you fuckin’ witch!”

Came a voice from the teal tinted throng below.

Marjorie's stole glowed in the aquamarine blue of the light as she finalized her descent, and tapped the M rail for the last time.

The mirrors along the walls shimmered and rose cresting at the large mirror at the end of the stairwell.

Marjorie stood at the base of the stairs facing the cresting mirror, adjusting her cufflinks.

"Most women would have to use a beachhouse or Caribbean island, but a woman of your skills and resources had a better island location to hide him. Atlantis!"

The lights from the chandelier and the lamps went out and the house was bathed in a dark cyan hue.

The streets and houses of Elmwood Avenue outside the painted windows were gone.

Outside of the windows with Madame Isabelle’s business hours were pitch black but for the light blue luminescent pillars and obelisks. Tony saw the symbols on Marjorie’s Cravat glow the same color as those on Isabelle’s robe, Captain Lincoln tasted salt on his lips.

Soft blue and green lights darted in the distance like airplanes at night.

The mirror broke into a portal of an aquamarine and fish flying sky with Copper and Red Rock pillars.

Each mirror in the house now showed a different window.

The mirror next to the coffee machine showed men with ancient looking armor with bioluminescent cloth. Each warrior was carrying a large harpoons, other mirrors opened to the sea with previously unfathomed beasts swam past.

And in the corner of the room surrounded by torches and stone walls was a groaning human silhouette amidst the soft lights.

The figure wrapped in large robes lay on a bed in a painted temple. Only his silhouette was visible as groaned and wailed.

“Get Out!” He cried.

That’s when the room exploded. Panic broke out. Jesús wept.