The Curious Book Seller Near Dupont Circle

On occasion, as part of my research, I locate various antiquarian book dealers in the District and browse their shops for both books and curiosities which may help explain what I have been experiencing for the past several months. Education I know will be the key to my salvation from this madness. The proprietors of these shops tend to be both erudite, in regards to esoteric knowledge, as well as shall I say…eccentric in manner? This past weekend, I found myself preoccupied in the area of Northwest D.C. called ‘Dupont Circle.’

This area of D.C. is home to many of the well-heeled artists, writers and free-thinkers in the Washington, D.C. area. The area is named after a Civil War Rear Admiral, a certain Samuel Francis DuPont, for deeds rendered during the war. This largely residential area began blossoming in the late 1800s, by the turn of the 20^th Century the Dupont neighborhood was a prosperous and vivacious neighborhood in Northwest DC. The area is well known for a small park in the center of the circle with a double-tiered white marble fountain positioned there around 1921. More information about the history of this unique residential area can be found at the following U.S. National Park Service website here: http://www.nps.gov/history/Nr/travel/wash/dc50.htm

As I walked I admired the beautiful architecture. Specifically, I found myself admiring the Richardsonian Romanesque Revival style rowhouses on Q Street. I even managed to snap a few pictures which I placed at the top of this blog entry. Overall, a rather relaxing and prosaic stroll, little did I know my stroll out in the sunshine would degenerate into existential obscurity.

I had heard rumors that an old antiquarian book seller lived on Q Street and dealt in various ancient occult texts. The man did not actively advertise for the simple fact that those who wanted his books found him. Through painstaking research, I only ever discovered a name and general location, “Mr. Rolan Corvino, Q Street NW.” So I put on my heavy winter pea coat, along with hat and gloves and took the metro train to the Dupont Circle metro stop. I exited the to the north side entrance when I arrived. I walked away from maddening holiday crowds, down Q Street on that sunny but frigid day hoping to find a sign by one of the rowhouses which indicated a book seller. No one else was around, so I could not ask anyone which row house may be Mr. Corvino’s residence.

As I walked by a particularly sinister looking yellowish brownstone rowhouse, I happened to look down. This particular ominous dwelling had an English basement entrance to the lower left of the doubled door front entrance. The door to the English basement was a dark green color but what caught my eye was the brass plate attached to the English basement door. I walked down the five steps and stood in front of the door and examined the brass door plate. The plate in large letters simply stated, “Rolan S. Corvino, DFA” and nothing else. Cautiously, not knowing if I had the right person, I knocked.

From inside, I heard a chair scraping against floorboards and light foot steps becoming louder and louder as they approached the door, then several deadbolt locks being slowly disengaged. The door opened wide and standing before me was a well dressed elderly gentleman of average height and girth. He was paler than me; shaven headed with large bright intelligent eyes and gave me a wide smile of unnaturally white pointed teeth.

“May I help you, Sir?” He asked with a slight almost imperceptible European accent, which I could not place. I asked if he was Mr. Rolan Corvino, the antiquarian book seller. His immense smile became even wider and the sunshine gleaming off of the abnormal white teeth nearly blinded me.

“I am indeed, Sir. I thought you might be a buyer, not many solicitors are as well dressed yourself. Please come into my humble studio and we can discuss your specific interests and what type of codex you may be seeking.” Corvino stepped away from the door and with a flourish of his arm, directed me inside.

The English apartment was essentially a studio apartment; only one other door was located inside, at the other end of the room. The walls were lined with huge book cases and various preserved maps of Washington, D.C. and the surrounding jurisdictions from the eighteenth century. The book cases appeared elegantly designed from some type of hardwood and a glass enclosure surrounded the books themselves.

My eyes took some time to adjust to the lack of natural light, only a few dim artificial lights provided illumination. Corvino must have noticed this.

“I keep all my books in the basement of the house, Sir. All the natural sunlight from my rooms upstairs would harm these ancient delicate texts. I converted this basement apartment to be my private studio many years ago. One can only slow the progression of age, not stop it I’m afraid. Please have a sit, Sir.”

He pointed to a couple of cushioned wooden chairs next to a large oak table. We both sat down. I looked around the room once my eyes adjusted, other than the stout table and two matching wood chairs; the only other furniture was a large roll top office desk, also made of oak with a leather back chair in front of it. On top of the desk was a laptop and printer. The room served as a home office which was both sparse and functional. The book shelves were colossal and impressive, containing hundreds of books I estimated, all guarded under lock and key in their glass prisons.

I did not want this established learned gentleman to think me mad, so I portrayed myself as a collector of occult texts. First, I introduced myself and I told him I was looking for a tome of a strange and unusual nature. Corvino cocked his head, closed his pale blue eyes and listening intently, he bade me to continue. I told old Corvino that I was looking for a text which discussed supernatural communication through the use of music, perhaps even a study in this area from some knowledgeable ancient scholar or alchemist. I advised Corvino that I would prefer an English translation but my Latin was passable enough.

Corvino stood up from his chair, from a pocket underneath his charcoal colored cardigan wool sweater he pulled out a pair of thin, black framed glasses. He put the glasses on and walked over to one of the book shelves and peered at each of the texts, almost lovingly. As he inspected each of the spines of the text, he spoke with his back to me.

“I keep all my occult related texts in this particular bookcase, makes tracking them at my age much easier. Let me see here…I have a copy here of various fragments of the ‘Pnakotic Manuscripts’ but in all honesty, I’m not really sure what language it is, a while back I sent it to a professor of ancient languages at Miskatonic University in Massachusetts. He hastily sent it back to me along with a very odd and frantic note…”

“Ah-ha! This is what I was looking for!” Corvino shouted and his eyes widened. He took from the pocket of his dim colored chino pants a small metal key and proceeded to open the glass display case. From the shelf he gingerly pulled out a leather bound text. He placed the text on the table in front of me.

“This, my good Sir, is a genuine Silas Andrus edition, from 1820, of Cotton Mather’s ‘Magnalia Christi Americana.’ I think you will find the chapter on the witch trials in Salem to be of particular interest to your ‘research.” He stressed the last word with great prominence. I asked Corvino how the witch trials in seventeenth century Massachusetts would relate to what I had described to him earlier.

“In the text, Mather describes hearing testimony from a teenage witness who felt she had been bewitched. Specifically, she describes washing clothes near a river one early morning. When she began her washing, she suddenly stopped because she heard a ‘queer sort of music’ in the air. She testified that ‘the music’ made her body sway to and fro. She could not explain this occurrence and it was, of course, attributed to witchcraft.”

I looked at the text on the table, the cover resplendent in rich leather. Corvino hand me a pair of white cotton gloves, so I could turn the pages without putting undue stress on the antique pages. The pages were yellowed but still firm. I found the chapter old Corvino spoke of and as I scanned it quickly, the testimony of the young woman Corvino described was listed. Mather himself seemed to have found it fascinating as well.

Grippingly, the young woman was found dead not long after the witch trials. She was found in bed one morning by her father. According to the authorities of the town, her entire throat had been torn out some time in the night, along with her tongue. Yet, no one else in the house heard an attack; in fact they all had slept extraordinarily soundly through the night. The young woman’s father had to break down the door in order to access her bedroom, it had been locked from the inside and the bedroom contained no windows, only a small closet to store her things. The authorities, who had at this time tired of witchcraft and the supernatural, had listed her death as a ‘suicide due to a lingering madness’ leftover from the long, exhausting witch trials. Yet no one could explain how she killed herself, without access to a knife or what happened to her the remains of her throat…or her tongue which also was never found.

“It makes for a strange read, doesn’t it, Sir?” Corvino remarked with a smile, from his thin bloodless lips, showing his perfect, white canine resembling teeth. Inwardly, I shuddered slightly. I suddenly wanted to be out of that basement tomb, full of odd and ancient damned texts, which smelled of festering mould and other fungi. I was finding it harder to breath and I felt my heart beating faster, my head began to swim and my respiration increased. I quickly made my apologies to Corvino, advising him that although I was interested in purchasing the book, I would have to be back later, since I was not feeling well.

I remember well, Corvino’s last words to me, “Tomorrow, by cover of night, Sir, I am receiving a particularly fascinating tome, which I can translate for you, it is in German and speaks of many ancient deities and their cruel worshipping cults.” He winked at me and gently ushered me out the front door. Once outside, back in the sunshine and after several minutes of walking and taking in the crisp winter air, I began to feel better.

A week later, feeling both brave and inquisitive about the text which Corvino remarked on during my departure, I decided to go back to his English basement studio in Dupont. I never asked him for a phone number or email, so I hoped he would be at his studio. When I arrived at the location, I found a strange sight. Some workmen in overalls were carting away Corvino’s heavy but meager furniture. I stopped one and asked him what was going on and where I could find Rolan Corvino. The workman advised me that Corvino had suddenly left the area, with all his books and had quickly sold his property to a neighbor. Corvino had left no forwarding address and according to the workman, who had seen him the day before, he appeared to be in a ‘bizarre and frightful’ state. I have scoured the internet and attempted to locate him through other antiquarians but no one has heard or seen Rolan Corvino since he fled Dupont Circle in his panic stricken state.

Unsettling Murmurs at George Washington Masonic ‘Temple’

While checking my email inbox the other day, I received a most distressing email from a gentleman who wishes “to remain anonymous.” The gentleman in question, while doing research on the internet, came across my curious Washington, D.C. area blog and had a tale of his own to add. I have kept the errors, he appeared to be typing in a hurry. Said gentleman wrote his email as follows:

Dear Sir,

I hope this email finds you well. The other day I came across your extraordinary web log and wish to relate to you a strange and unpleasant incident which occurred just before the peculiar incident at Fort Ward Park. I am not sure if the tale I am about to relate corresponds with what occurred at the park, yet, the close proximity of the two locations bears some consideration. I don't have much time.

However, please allow the indulgences of an old man and allow me to provide you some background information. I have lived in the Washington, D.C. for many years. I have been retired for the past thirteen years (previously, an officer in the United States Army, my last post was at the Pentagon). I tell you this so you do not think of me as some addle brained old fool who sits around idly and makes up tales to entertain himself. I was an infantry officer, Sir! And a damned fine good one!

When I retired my wife and I purchased a modest but tasteful colonial style house on Hilltop Terrace, in the city of Alexandria. For many years, I was a serious runner but due to knee surgery and other physical ailments, I had to stop and took up walking instead. I am very familiar with Fort Ward Park, Sir, since I would take long walks around that area, from my home no less (I told you I wasn’t some frail, indolent old chap).

At any rate, my dear wife passed on a few years ago from cancer. In order to ameliorate my grief and loneliness (we never had any children due to my constant deployments), I purchased a most astonishing Welsh Corgi. “Jacob” as I call him, is smart as a whip, like many of his breed and a wonderful companion to an old widower such as myself. Jacob loves going on long explorations outdoors on his leash and me at the helm. We go for long walks together around Alexandria, especially down by the Potomac River.

As I stated before, I live on Hilltop Terrace, in the shadow of the George Washington Masonic Memorial, or the ‘George Washington Temple’ as many of us in the neighborhood refer to it. It is a beautiful stone structure with a large expansive well kept lawn at its front. The building is in phenomenal shape considering it was built in the 1920s. Jacob and I have always enjoyed walking around the outskirts of this building on our way home from our outdoor excursions. However, during the bitter and overcast winter months, the building takes on a sinister façade. The cyclopean stone structure becomes forbidding and almost sinister. For the most part, I have always dismissed these sentiments as a seasonal affectation, until recently.Jacob and I were completing our daily walkabout, both of us looking forward to a well deserved supper. As we walked up King Street, with the ‘Temple’ on our left, I observed a most strange affair. I observed a small cluster of men in dark hooded robes dashing into the ‘Temple.’ I had never watched anyone with such strange raiment near the ‘Temple’ before. My first thought was that the men were a part of some religious order, although the robes appeared too dark to be a Catholic sect. I must admit, although I am not a nosy man by nature, curiosity got the better of me. These people clearly were not the usual tourists who come to take pictures!

Jacob and I began mounting the grassy knoll towards the main entrance, it was steep and my joints were taking a pounding, but the devil was upon me at that moment and I had to know what was going on! Jacob and I came to the column adorned main entry. Inside, I swore I heard some sort of outlandish chanting from within. I could not make out the language for the life of me (I know some Latin and a smattering of ancient Greek and it was clearly none of these languages). I even walked up and placed my ear to the door. The language was intolerable. I could only describe it as hoarse, guttural utterances. A strange transformation overcame Jacob, usually quiet and well behaved, he began to make a low growl and foam at the lips. Throughout the chanting, I only heard one word repeated over and over again, it was ‘Dagon’ I believe. It was then I heard the terrible, retched voice behind me hiss.

“This is a private ceremony, you will leave now!” I turned around a man in a light blue security guard uniform stood before. In his left hand he held a large heavy flashlight, as wicked looking as any police baton. I noticed the man’s right hand hovering near the revolver he wore on a shiny leather pistol belt around his narrow hips. Even in the waning twilight light I noticed his queer physical appearance. He was going absurdly bald, with large round bulbous eyes, an unpronounced chin that had failed to grow into adulthood with him. His form was almost skeletal to behold and his skin, my God, his skin was afflicted by some sort of eczema, giving it a dry, scaly look. He appeared to have some sort of speech impediment, which gave his voice a raspy, raucous quality.

I have witnessed such horrors on the battle field, Sir, but I am ashamed to say, I could not be in the same proximity as this creature of a man anymore. “I am sorry, I was merely curious, we are leaving now.” I mumbled to the man as I as quickly walked away, while Jacob still in a state of frenzy barked at the man (?) and tried to break from his leash, it took all my strength to drag him away.

The worst…the worst I have saved for last. The smell, my God!!! The smell that emanated from that creature. I can only liken the smell to what one smells when standing on a beach and the stench of decaying fish hits ones nostrils from the wind coming off the water. The smell made me want to retch and it took all my discipline to keep my stomach acids where they belong!

However, as I was pulling Jacob away from the property, I had enough sense to take out my digital camera from my jacket (I carry it with me during our walks, in case something strikes my fancy and I wish to preserve it). As I raised the camera, the security guard turned around and stared straight into the lens, I snapped off a quick picture and retreated home quickly.

In the safety of my living room, near a roaring fire, I fortified myself with some Virginia Gentleman bourbon whiskey. Once my frayed nerves were calm, I looked at the hideous picture of the security guard, he glared back at me with his leering countenance. What horrific gene pool could have produced such a monstrosity? I put the camera on my book shelf and sat on my favorite leather sofa, throwing back another glass of bourbon. Jacob had also calmed down as well and was whining for his supper.

The following day, I had several errands to run in the morning and this distraction was exactly what I needed considering the previous evening. I put Jacob outside in the large fenced in back yard, since it was warm and the sky was completely blue. As I pulled my dark Red Jeep Patriot on to King Street, I noticed two men in a black Chevy Tahoe staring at me, both men wore dark watch caps and dark wraparound sunglasses, such unusual characters in such as middle class neighborhood full of families and retirees. Since most of the windows appeared tinted, I could not make anything else out. As I drove to Costco, I assumed my paranoia was due to recent events. As I drove north, my mind calmed and I thought the men were probably undercover police officers on duty.

I returned home much later in the afternoon than I had anticipated. What I found chilled me to the bone. As I parked my Jeep and closed the garage door there was a profound silence hanging in the air. I walked out back to see to Jacob, instead…I found nothing! Jacob was no where to be found. The only door to the fence was shut and secured. I checked inside the house and Jacob was not there either. My heart began to pound against my rib cage and my breathing increased exponentially, I began to panic. I ran outside calling his name like a mad man! Neighbors came outside when they witnessed my frenzied state. Once I was calm enough to talk, I told them about Jacob missing. Several of the other retirees (who also greatly prized their dear pets) offered to help me search the neighborhood; we did. It was to no avail, Jacob was never found.

Once the sun had gone down, I knew I could do nothing until morning. I collapsed on my comfy sofa, which this night gave me no succor. It was while lying on my sofa that I noticed it or I should say the lack of it. My digital camera was not on the bookshelf, where I distinctly remembered placing it. I searched the house anyway, no camera was found. Suddenly, a dreadful thought came into my mind. I walked outside and looked at my front door, I observed very faint scratches around the area where the key inserts into the lock. Sometimes, I forget to engage the dead bolt and for my lack of detail in fully securing my home, Jacob had paid the price.

don’t know why, intuition maybe? At that moment, standing outside, looking at my lock, I turned my head around. Standing at the other end of the street was a figure, who appeared to be watching me, without my glasses, I could not make out any detail, every fiber of being whispered to me that this watcher was part of this violation of my domicile. As I started walking towards the man, he simply turned and disappeared around a bend in the street. By the time I reached the bend, he was gone.

Time ticked by inside my abode, I reached for my phone on several occasions but I stopped myself every time. How could I report this to the police? Someone broke in and stole my dog and camera? How could I explain that several expensive art pieces, gold coins, computers and a flat screen TV were untouched, even the petty cash I kept in the kitchen hadn’t been handled? They would think me an elderly fool who lost his dog and misplaced his camera. I knew then that the watchers, whoever they were would eventually stop watching and instead act. So for the past week, I have discontinued my long walks, I rarely go out at all. Instead, I comb the internet, searching for information. Every night I sit in my well fortified study with my freshly cleaned .45 ACP…waiting. Already, as I sit here typing, I smell that noxious miasma hanging in the air outside my door step, they have come for me, but I will not go without fight, Sir!

That was the end of the email. I have tried to contact our anonymous retired soldier on several occasions, but get no response. I will continue to attempt contact…

For those unfamiliar with the George Washington Masonic Memorial in Alexandria, further information can be found here: http://www.gwmemorial.org/

From the above referenced website:

This magnificent structure is privately funded through the grateful contributions of Freemasons and others, yet remains open to the public, free of charge, seven days a week.

The George Washington Masonic Memorial is more than a colossal memorial and museum. It is a tourist attraction and destination; research center and library; community center; performing arts center and concert hall; banquet and celebration site; and meeting site for local and countless visiting Masonic lodges and organizations. However, first and foremost, it is a memorial to honor and perpetuate the memory, character and virtues of the man who best exemplifies what Freemasons are and ought to be, Brother George Washington. The George Washington Masonic Memorial provides a diverse set of impressive facilities for public and private functions complete with a variety of furnishings and amenities.

I have never been on the public tour myself, it is offered a few times a month I'm told. I have heard that both the Memorial Hall and North Lodge Room are quite impressive. I cannot help but wonder what better place for a repugnant secret society or cult to hide then in the confines of a more public and accepted ‘secret society.’