DOCTOR MARVEL AND THE ORDER OF THE UNBLINKING EYE

A most illuminating history of a most unenlightened brotherhood, as related by Doctor Marvel, Professor of Unnatural Philosophy, Adept of the Lesser Mysteries, and Unindicted Practitioner of the Higher Arts.

Ladies, gentlemen, and those among you who have not yet made up your minds which category best describes you—draw near! I am about to relate a tale of secret societies, supernatural grievances, and the sort of bookkeeping that can sour a man's relationship with eternity!

The Order of the Unblinking Eye,

a secret society so secret even they don't know what they're doing half the time.

The Order of the Unblinking Eye!

Ah! The very name sends a shiver down the spine, does it not? It ought to. They have spent nearly seven centuries perfecting that particular shiver, and I should know, having been on the receiving end of several.

The Order was founded, according to its own records, in the year 1349 by a disgruntled Byzantine astrologer named Gregorius the Watchful, who claimed to have observed an eye in the heavens that never closed. According to other records, the Order was founded in 1622 by three Venetian merchants who wished to avoid paying taxes on a shipment of counterfeit relics. And according to my own investigations, it began when a group of men in expensive robes discovered that if you whisper nonsense in a candlelit room, people will pay handsomely to hear it.

All three accounts may be true. Such is the beauty of historical research.

The Order's principal doctrine holds that somewhere behind the visible universe there exists an All-Seeing Intelligence, an enormous cosmic eyeball that observes every human folly, every unspoken sin, and every dishonest card trick performed within a radius of seven thousand miles.

Naturally, they have dedicated their lives to interpreting its gaze.

Unfortunately, the Eye has never communicated with them in any language recognized by the Royal Society, the Vatican, or the manufacturers of spirit trumpets.

Consequently, the Order has developed a complicated system of initiations, passwords, hand signals, and ceremonial squinting, all designed to determine what the Eye might be thinking.

Their highest-ranking officers are known as the Grand Pupils. Beneath them are the Keepers of the Lid, the Brethren of the Moist Corner, and the humble Initiates of the Lower Eyelash. I once met a man who claimed to be the Supreme Ophthalmic Hierophant of the Seventh Veil. He was unable to find his spectacles.

Now, you may wonder what all this has to do with me.

East Texas. Nineteen eighty-five.

A regrettable year for several reasons, not least of which was the hairstyle.

I was then touring under the modest billing of Doctor Marvel's Midnight Cabinet of Wonders, Mysteries, and Other Phenomena Not Yet Prohibited by Law. 

In a rented hall outside Nacogdoches, I presented a séance advertised as an opportunity to commune with departed loved ones, recover lost memories, and, for an additional fee, receive advice from the spirit world regarding troubled marriages.

I shall not trouble you with the technical details. Suffice it to say that the spirits were unusually forthcoming, the ectoplasm was of an excellent consistency, and the deceased Uncle Wilbur made several observations about his nephew's business practices that caused considerable embarrassment.

Unfortunately, one of my patrons was an emissary of the Order of the Unblinking Eye.

He had come seeking confirmation of a prophecy concerning the Cosmic Gaze. What he received instead was a message from a deceased aunt who informed him that he was a disappointment to the family.

He demanded a refund.

I explained that the dead, unlike the living, do not honor guarantees.

He threatened litigation.

I offered him a complimentary ticket to the following evening's performance.

He threatened excommunication.

I told him I was already on speaking terms with several people who had been excommunicated, and they seemed a perfectly pleasant lot.

That, ladies and gentlemen, was my first and last attempt to do business with the Order on American soil.

Or so I believed.

Thirty-seven years later—or perhaps considerably less, depending upon which calendar you consult when passing through a temporal disturbance—I found myself in a fog-choked bazaar on the outskirts of Constantinople.

Not the modern Constantinople, naturally. The other one. The one that materializes on maps drawn by lunatics under a full moon, where the street vendors sell bottled shadows, the money changers accept memories as collateral, and the local police have been dead since the Fourth Crusade.

There, among the stalls of counterfeit talismans and pre-owned prophecies, I was approached by seven cloaked figures.

Their leader wore a silver medallion depicting a single, unblinking eye.

'Doctor Marvel,' he hissed, 'the Order has not forgotten East Texas.'

'Neither have I,' I replied. 'Though I must confess the barbecue was better than the séance.'

They demanded restitution for the 1985 performance.

I offered to refund the admission price, adjusted for inflation.

They demanded interest.

I offered a discount on my elixir of life.

They demanded my immediate surrender to the Eternal Tribunal of the Watchful One.

I asked whether the Tribunal accepted gift cards.

At this point, their leader made a grave mistake. He blinked.

All seven of them gasped.

One dropped his ceremonial dagger. Another began consulting a small leather manual entitled What To Do When the Grand Pupil Blinks. A third whispered that this might be the Sign of the Unforeseen Eyelid.

In the confusion, I performed a modest transposition, exchanging the leader's silver medallion for a brass button from my waistcoat, and departed through a doorway that had not existed when I entered the bazaar.

And so, my friends, we arrive at the present state of affairs.

The Order of the Unblinking Eye remains active, though its membership is divided into seventeen competing factions, each claiming to possess the authentic interpretation of the Eye's silence. The Grand Pupils are at odds with the Keepers of the Lid. The Lower Eyelash has threatened to secede. And somewhere in the world, a committee of solemn men is preparing a document explaining why none of them is responsible for the last committee's decisions.

They are still looking for me.

They have circulated my portrait throughout the hidden cities of the world, though the artist appears to have confused me with a moderately successful undertaker.

They have placed a bounty upon my head, payable in gold, mystical artifacts, or certified evidence that I have repented.

And they continue to demand their refund.

Well! Let them come!

I have faced mesmerists in Marseilles, alchemists in Alexandria, and a gentleman in Arkansas who claimed to have invented a machine that could extract the soul through the left ear. 

I have escaped a temporal customs inspector, outwitted a fraudulent oracle, and once sold a bottle of ordinary rainwater to a State Marshall who believed it had been collected during the Great Deluge.

Do you suppose I tremble before seven fellows who cannot agree on whether their god is watching them?

No, indeed!

For I have learned one immutable truth in my travels through the shimmering frontier between science and sorcery:

The universe may be infinite. The mysteries may be profound. The cosmic eye may indeed be watching us all.

But wherever men gather in secret to explain the unknowable, there will inevitably be one among them who has misplaced the minutes of the previous meeting.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is where Doctor Marvel thrives!

Now, if you will excuse me, I have a train to catch. It departs yesterday at midnight, and I should hate to miss it.

Especially with the Order of the Unblinking Eye waiting at the station.

Step right up! The truth is stranger than fiction—and considerably more negotiable!