Starburst

by Alfred Bester

  "About that Buchanan family," Herod began.

  "I told him everything before," Ruysdale broke in, pointing to Warbeck.

  "All right. He forgot to ask one question. Can I ask it now?" Ruysdale re-examined the five-dollar bill and nodded.

  "When anybody moves in or out of a building, the superintendent usually takes down the name of the movers in case they damage the building. I'm a lawyer. I know this. It's to protect the building in case suit has to be brought. Right?"

  Ruysdale's face lit up. "By Godfrey!" he said. "That's right, I forgot all about it. He never asked me."

  "He didn't know. You've got the name of the company that moved the Buchanans out. Right?"

  Ruysdale ran across the room to a cluttered bookshelf. He withdrew a tattered journal and flipped it open. He wet his fingers and turned pages.

  "Here it is," he said. "The Avon Moving Company. Truck No. G-4."

  The Avon Moving Company had no record of the removal of a Buchanan family from an apartment in Washington Heights. "The kid was pretty careful at that," Herod murmured. But it did have a record of the men working truck G-4 on that day. The men were interviewed when they checked in at closing time. Their memories were refreshed with whiskey and cash. They recalled the Washington Heights job vaguely. It was a full day's work because they had to drive the hell and gone to Brooklyn. "Oh God! Brooklyn!" Warbeck muttered. What address in Brooklyn? Something on Maple Park Row. Number? The number could not be recalled.

  "Joe, buy a map."

  They examined the street map of Brooklyn and located Maple Park Row. It was indeed the hell and gone out of civilization and was twelve blocks long. "That's Brooklyn blocks," Joe grunted. "Twice as long as anywhere. I know."

  Herod shrugged. "We're close," he said. "The rest will have to be leg work. Four blocks apiece. Cover every house, every apartment. List every kid around ten. Then Warbeck can check them, if they're under an alias."

  "There's a million kids a square inch in Brooklyn." Joe protested.

  "There's a million dollars a day in it for us if we find him. Now let's go."

  Maple Park Row was a long crooked street lined with five-story apartment houses. Its sidewalks were lined with baby carriages and old ladies on camp chairs. Its curbs were lined with parked cars. Its gutter was lined with crude whitewash stickball courts shaped like elongated diamonds. Every manhole cover was a home plate.

  "It's just like the Bronx," Joe said nostalgically. "I ain't been home to the Bronx in ten years."

  He wandered sadly down the street toward his sector, automatically threading his way through stickball games with the unconscious skill of the city-born. Warbeck remembered that departure sympathetically because Joe Davenport never returned.

  The first day, he and Herod imagined Joe had found a hot lead. This encouraged them. The second day they realized no heat could keep Joe on the fire for forty-eight hours. This depressed them. On the third day they had to face the truth.

  "He's dead," Herod said flatly. "The kid got him."

  "How?"

  "He killed him."

  "A ten-year-old boy? A child?"

  "You want to know what kind of genius Stuart Buchanan has, don't you? I'm telling you."

  "I don't believe it."

  "Then explain Joe."

  "He quit."

  "Not on a million dollars."

  "But where's the body?"

  "Ask the kid. He's the genius. He's probably figured out tricks that would baffle Dick Tracy."

  "How did he kill him?"

  "Ask the kid. He's the genius."

  "Herod, I'm scared."

  "So am I. Do you want to quit now?"

  "I don't see how we can. If the boy's dangerous we've got to find him."

  "Civic virtue, heh?"

  "Call it that."

  "Well, I'm still thinking about the money."

  They returned to Maple Park Row and Joe Davenport's four-block sector. They were cautious, almost furtive. They separated and began working from each end toward the middle; in one house, up the stairs, apartment by apartment, to the top, then down again to investigate the next building. It was slow, tedious work. Occasionally they glimpsed each other far down the street, crossing from one dismal building to another. And that was the last glimpse Warbeck ever had of Walter Herod.

  He sat in his car and waited. He sat in his car and trembled. "I'll go to the police," he muttered, knowing perfectly well he could not. "The boy has a weapon. Something he invented. Something silly like the others. A special light so he can play marbles at night, only it murders men. A machine to play checkers, only it hypnotizes men. He's invented a robot mob of gangsters so he can play cops-and-robbers and they took care of Joe and Herod. He's a child genius. Dangerous. Deadly. What am I going to do."

  The doomed man got out of the car and stumbled down the street toward Herod's half of the sector. "What's going to happen when Stuart Buchanan grows up?" he wondered. "What's going to happen when all the rest of them grow up? Tommy and George and Anne-Marie and lazy Ethel? Why don't I start running away now? What am I doing here?"

  It was dusk on Maple Park Row. The old ladies had withdrawn, folding their camp chairs like Arabs. The parked cars remained. The stickball games were over, but small games were starting under the glowing lamp posts . . . games with bottle caps and cards and battered pennies. Overhead, the purple city haze was deepening, and through it the sharp sparkle of Venus following the sun below the horizon could be seen.

  "He must know his power," Warbeck muttered angrily.

  "He must know how dangerous he is. That's why he's

  running away. Guilt. That's why he destroys us, one by

  one, smiling to himself, a crafty child, a vicious, killing

  genius"

  Warbeck stopped in the middle of Maple Park Row.

  "Buchanan!" he shouted. "Stuart Buchanan!"

  The kids near him stopped their games and gaped.

  "Stuart Buchanan!" Warbeck's voice cracked hysterically. "Can you hear me?"

  His wild voice carried farther down the street. More games stopped. Ringaleevio, Chinese tag, Red-Light and Boxball.

  "Buchanan!" Warbeck screamed. "Stuart Buchanan! Come out come out, wherever you are!"

  The world hung motionless.

  In the alley between 217 and 219 Maple Park Row, playing hide-and-seek behind piled ash barrels, Stuart Buchanan heard his name and crouched lower. He was aged ten, dressed in sweater, jeans and sneakers. He was intent and determined that he was not going to be caught out "it" again. He was going to hide until he could make a dash for home-free in safety. As he settled comfortably among the ash cans, his eye caught the glimmer of Venus low in the western sky.

  "Star light, star bright," he whispered in all innocence, "first star I see tonight. Wish I may, wish I might, grant me the wish I wish tonight." He paused and considered. Then he wished. "God bless Mom and Pop and me and all my friends and make me a good boy and please let me be always happy and I wish that anybody who tries to bother me would go away ... a long way away . . . and leave me alone forever."

  In the middle of Maple Park Row, Marion Perkin War-beck stepped forward and drew breath for another hysterical yell. And then he was elsewhere, going away on a road that was a long way away. It was a straight white road cleaving infinitely through blackness, stretching onward and onward into forever; a dreary, lonely, endless road leading away and away and away.

  Down that road Warbeck plodded, an astonished automaton, unable to speak, unable to stop, unable to think in the timeless infinity. Onward and onward he walked into a long way away, unable to turn back. Ahead of him he saw the minute specks of figures trapped on that one-way road to forever. There was a dot that had to be Herod. Ahead of Herod was a mote that was Joe Davenport. And ahead of Joe he could make out a long dwindling chain of mites. He turned once with a convulsive effort. Behind him, dim and distant, a figure was plodding, and behind that another abruptly materialized, and another ...
and another....

  While Stuart Buchanan crouched behind the ash barrels and watched alertly for the "it." He was unaware that he had disposed of Warbeck. He was unaware that he had disposed of Herod, Joe Davenport and scores of others.

  He was unaware that he had induced his parents to flee Washington Heights, that he had destroyed papers and documents, memories and peoples in his simple desire to be left alone. He was unaware that he was a genius. His genius was for wishing.

  The Roller Coaster

  I KNIFED HER A LITTLE. WHEN YOU CUT ACROSS THE

  ribs it hurts like sin but it isn't dangerous. The knife slash showed white, then red. She backed away from me in astonishment, more startled at the knife than the cut. You don't feel those cuts at first for quite a few minutes. That's the trouble with a knife. It numbs and the pain comes slow.

  "Listen, lover," I said. (I'd forgotten her name.) "This is what I've got for you. Look at it." I waggled the knife. "Feel it." I slapped her across the face with the blade. She stumbled back against the couch, sat down and began to shake. This was what I was waiting for.

  "Go ahead, you bitch. Answer me."

  "Please, David," she muttered.

  Dull. Not so good.

  "I'm on my way out," I said. "You lousy hooker. You're like all the rest of these cheap dames."

  "Please, David," she repeated in a low voice.

  No action here. Give her one more try.

  "Figuring you for two dollars a night, I'm into you for twenty." I took money from my pocket, stripped off the twenty in singles and handed it to her. She wouldn't touch it. She sat on the edge of the couch, blue-naked, streaming blood, not looking at me. Just dull. And mind you a girl that made love with her teeth. She used to scratch me with her nails like a cat. And now . . .

  "Please, David," she said.

  I tore up the money and threw it in her lap.

  "Please, David," she said.

  No tears. No screams. No action. She was impossible. I walked out.

  The whole trouble with these neurotics is that you can't depend on them. You case them. You work them. You build to the climax. You trigger them off, but as often as not they dummy up like that girl. You just can't figure them.

  I looked at my watch. The hand was on twelve. I decided to go up to Gandry's apartment. Freyda was working Gandry and would most likely be there setting him up for the climax. I needed advice from Freyda and I didn't have much time left.

  I walked north on Sixth Avenue—no, The Avenue of the Americas; turned west on Fifty-fifth and went to the house across the street from Mecca Temple—no, The New York City Center. I took the elevator up to the PH floor and was just going to ring Gandry's bell when I smelled gas. I knelt down and sniffed at the edge of Gandry's door. It was coming from his apartment.

  I knew better than to ring the bell. I got out my keys, touched them to the elevator call-button to dissipate any electrostatic charge on them, and got to work on Gandry's door. I barbered the lock in two or three minutes, opened the door and went in with my handkerchief over my nose. The place was pitch dark. I went straight to the kitchen and stumbled over a body lying on the floor with its head in the oven. I turned off the gas and opened the window. I ran into the living room and opened windows. I stuck my head out for a breath, then came back and finished airing the apartment.

  I checked the body. It was Gandry all right. He was still alive. His big face was swollen and purple and his breathing sounded a little Cheynes-Stokesish to me. I went to the phone and dialed Freyda.

  "Hello?"

  "Freyda?"

  "Yes?"

  "Where are you? Why aren't you up here with Gandry?"

  "Is that you, David?"

  "Yes. I just broke in and found Gandry half dead. He's trying suicide."

  "Oh, David!"

  "Gas. He's reached the climax all by his lonely lone self. You been building him?"

  "Of course, but I never thought he'd—"

  "He'd try to sneak out on the pay-off like this? I've told you a hundred times, Freyda. You can't depend on potential suicides like Gandry. I showed you those trial-cut scars on his wrist. His kind never give you any action. They—"

  "Don't lecture me, David."

  "Never mind. My girl was a bust, too. I thought she was the hot acid type. She turned out to be mush. I want to try that Bacon woman you mentioned. Would you recommend her?"

  "Definitely."

  "How can I find her?"

  "Through her husband, Eddie Bacon."

  "How can I find him?"

  "Try Shawn's or Dugal's or Breen's or The Greek's. But he's a talker, David, a time-waster; and you haven't much time left."

  "Doesn't matter if his wife's worth it."

  "She's worth it, David. I told you about the gun."

  "Right. Now what about Gandry?"

  "Oh, to hell with Gandry," she snapped, and hung up.

  That was all right with me. It was about time Freyda got sense enough to lay off the psychotics. I hung up, closed all the windows, went back to the kitchen and turned on the gas. Gandry hadn't moved. I put out all the lights, went down the hall and let myself out.

  I went looking for Eddie Bacon. I tried for him at Breen's, at Shawn's, at Dugal's. I got the break at The Greek's on East Fifty-second Street.

  I asked the bartender: "Is Eddie Bacon here?"

  "In the back."

  I looked past the juke box. The back was crowded. "Which one is Eddie Bacon?"

  He pointed to a small man alone at a table in the corner. I went back and sat down. "Hi, Eddie."

  Bacon glanced up at me. He had a seamed, pouchy face, fair silky hair, bleak blue eyes. He wore a brown suit and a blue and white polka dot tie. He caught me looking at the tie and said: "That's the tie I wear between wars. What are you drinking?"

  "Scotch. Water. No ice."

  "How English can you get?" He yelled: "Chris!"

  I got my drink. "Where's Liz?"

  "Who?"

  "Your wife."

  "I married eighteen feet of wives," he mumbled. "End to end. Six feet each."

  "Three fathoms of show girls," I said.

  "Which were you referring to?"

  "The third. The most recent. I hear she left you."

  "They all left me."

  "Where's Liz?"

  "It happened like this," Bacon said in a sullen voice. "I can't figure it. Nobody can figure it. I took the kids to Coney Island..."

  "Never mind the kids. Where's Liz?"

  "I'm getting there," Bacon said irritably. "Coney Island's the damnedest place. Everybody ought to try that trap once. It's primitive stuff. Basic entertainment. They scare the hell out of your glands and you love it. Appeals to the ancient history in us. The Cro-Magnons and all that."

  "The Cro-Magnons died out," I said. "You mean the Neanderthals."

  "I mean prehistoric memories," Bacon went on. "They strap you into that roller coaster, they shove you off and you drop into a race with a dinosaur. He's chasing you and you're trying to keep it from ending in a dead heat. Basic. It appeals to the Stone Age flesh in us. That's why kids dig it. Every kid's a vestigial remnant from the Stone Age."

  "Grown-ups too. What about Liz?"

  "Chris!" Bacon yelled. Another round of drinks came. "Yeah . . . Liz," he said. "The girl made me forget there ever was a Liz. I met her staggering off the roller coaster. She was waiting. Waiting to pounce. The Black Widow Spider."

  "Liz?"

  "No. The little whore that wasn't there."

  "Who?"

  "Haven't you heard about Bacon's Missing Mistress? The Invisible Lay? Bacon's Thinking Affair?"

  "No."

  "Hell, where've you been? How Bacon rented an apartment for a dame that didn't exist. They're still laughing it up. All except Liz. It's all over the business."

  "I'm not in your business."

  "No?" He took a long drink, put his glass down and glowered at the table like a kid trying to crack an algebra problem. "Her name w
as Freyda. F-R-E-Y-D-A. Like Freya, Goddess of Spring. Eternal youth. She was like a Botticelli virgin outside. She was a tiger inside."

  "Freyda what?"

  "I don't know. I never found out. Maybe she didn't have any last name because she was imaginary like they keep telling me." He took a deep breath. "I do a crime show on TV. I know every crook routine there is. That's my business—the thief business. But she pulled a new one. She picked me up by pretending she'd met the kids somewhere. Who can tell if a kid really knows someone or not? They're only half human anyway. I swallowed her routine. By the time I realized she was lying, I'd met her and I was dead. She had me on the hook."

  "How do you mean?"

  "A wife is a wife," Bacon said. "Three wives are just more of the same. But this was going to bed with a tiger." He smiled sourly. "Only it's all my imagination, they keep telling me. It's all inside my head. I never really killed her because she never really lived."

  "You killed her? Freyda?"

  "It was a war from the start," he said, "and it ended up with a killing. It wasn't love with her, it was war."

  "This is all your imagination?"

  "That's what the head-shrinkers tell me. I lost a week. Seven days. They tell me I rented an apartment all right, but I didn't put her in it because there never was any Freyda. We didn't tear each other apart because there was only me up there all the time. Alone. She wasn't a crazy, mauling bitch who used to say: "Sigma, darling ..."

  "Say what?"

  "You heard me. 'Sigma, darling.' That's how she said good-by. 'Sigma, darling.' That's what she said on the last day. With a crazy glitter in her virgin eyes. Told me it was no good between us. That she'd phoned Liz and told her all about it and was walking out. 'Sigma, darling,' she said and started for the door."

  "She told Liz? Told your wife?"

  Bacon nodded. "I grabbed her and dragged her away from the door. I locked the door and phoned Liz. That tiger was tearing at me all the time. I got Liz on the horn and it was true. Liz was packing. I hung that phone up on that bitch's head. I was wild. I tore her clothes off.