Free Carter Beats the Devil by Glen David Gold Page A

which he quickly determined fit over the ball-shaped nose: cones, grids, planes with raised bumps.
    Then he found the brochure:
VIBRATION IS LIFE
What woman hasn’t lost her fair share of life to the mysterious ailments that incapacitate her zest and zeal? Feminine complaints can constrict the flow of the vital humors, leading to restlessness, furtive amativeness, a corruption of morals and the downfall of her happy home.

Treat yourself to an invigorative cure! Lindstrom Smith White Cross Electric Vibrators provide 15,000 pulsations per minute, relieving pain, stiffness and weakness. Just five to ten minutes with the Electric Vibrator, and all the pleasures of youth will throb within you. Steady and frequent application treats hysteria, chlorosis, greensickness, neurasthenia and all manner of hysteroneurasthenic disorders, and even simple fatigue and melancholy.
Apply to the area that feels the most congestion, and let the Lindstrom Smith White Cross Electric Vibrator relieve you with its thrilling, penetrating, scientifically-proven action. The application, when pursued for five to ten minutes (time will indeed fly!), leads inevitably to a convulsion of the affected region, followed by blissful relaxation and sometimes a tranquil slumber.
Can be used in the privacy of the dressing room or the boudoir.
    The text didn’t help—he still hadn’t a clue what he’d found. Feminine complaints? Corruption? The diseases would no doubt be listed in the dictionary, but he suspected the definitions would, in the maddening way of dictionaries, lead back to themselves with the practiced evasiveness that excluded children.
    Then his eyes fell on an electrical outlet. He would have been less surprised to find a zebra grazing off the makeup table. That his mother had an electrical outlet in her dressing room made him breathe shallowly, as he’d stumbled across yet another adult mystery.
    Without further thought, he sat on his mother’s fainting couch and plugged the device in. An illustration showed a woman holding it to her cheek. This Charles did, and the sensation was indeed pleasant. He pretended to have come home from a hard day at work.
    Gradually, however—in truth rather quickly—he grew bored. After five minutes of studious application to the cheek and forehead had passed, he looked at the brochure again, for he hadn’t proceeded through any convulsions; nor did he wish to slumber. He gave it another minute about his head and neck, and then turned the vibrator off, for his face was beginning to go numb.
    A strangely incomplete feeling nagged him as he wound the cord around the appliance and packed it back up just as he found it. The light against the walls felt different, as if he’d peeled back a curtain on the world and found there only more curtains and drapes and odd masking. He wondered how Joe Sullivan had made the nickel vanish.

    That afternoon, James read a book and Charles visited the attic, where he was not allowed. It was a well-organized place, free of dust, and illuminated by windows on all sides that today showed friendly slices of blue sky. In one corner, under a bell-shaped glass, was a small marble figurine, a nude that had once been on top of their piano. It was very delicate and cold to the touch. Charles inspected it carefully, running the tips of his fingers around its breasts.
    He was proud of how responsibly he held this piece. Admiring it in the light, turning it to better see the details. “This one,” he said to himself, “comes from Italy. It is an Italian woman—note the texture.”
    And then, without even seeming to slip, it dropped through his fingers. It hit the floor and shattered.
    He gasped. He stooped to see if he could somehow patch it, explain the noise. He paused. Who was going to scold him?
    It was New Year’s Eve. Every year, he had been put to bed early and told that when he was old enough, he could stay up to ring in the New Year. And now, he was allowed to do whatever he