The Other Side of the Mirror

by Lex H Jones

  “I must admit, I never would have took you for a Madonna fan,” Pope commented.

  “Never would have taken you for the breaking and entering type either,” Carl remarked, keeping his gun in hand. His past acquaintances with Pope were complicated to say the least. Whilst his gut told him that there was no need for the weapon, he couldn’t ignore the fact that a hit-man was stood in his own living room. Carl doubted that Pope would accept a contract on his life, but he couldn’t be sure. A job was a job, after all.

  “I apologise for that, but I didn’t want to wait around outside for you. It’s becoming rather dangerous out there, and I had no wish to make my presence known.”

  “You been attacked by Petroni’s boys too?” asked Carl, flipping the switch on the kettle at his side.

  “Yes, there was a single man sent to attack me outside the church, of all places.”

  “Am I going to be finding him in the Styx in the next couple of days?”

  “His head, perhaps,” Pope shrugged as he continued to study the album. “Is this the album that carries ‘Like A Prayer’?”

  “Are you going to burn it if I say yes?” Carl enquired as he made himself a cup of tea, deciding that coffee would be a poor choice given his desire to get a good night’s sleep. He considered offering Pope a drink but decided against it as this would only give him reason to stay for longer.

  Pope chuckled and replaced the record, then asked, “You were attacked yourself, I assume?”

  “Yeah, couple of jerks in Italian suits.”

  “Are they still alive?”

  “What am I, a doctor? I called ‘em an ambulance after we had our conversation, didn’t wait around to see the verdict.”

  “You’re an interesting man, Detective,” Pope remarked. “You condemned me for judging the value of human life differently depending upon an individual’s actions, and yet you gladly do the same. If they are innocent victims then they get your help, if they are beyond innocence, they get your fists or your bullets.”

  “I have a badge that expects me to do just that. You just have a gun and a musty old book.”

  “That book is my badge, as is this,” Pope replied, pointing to the tattoo on the back of his head.

  “How about we get to the question of why you’re in my home?”

  “I am considering your advice regarding Felicity and myself, and have some unfinished business to take care of,” Pope explained. “One of which is the matter of you being the only man to have bested me/”

  “So you here for round two? Or three, if you count the roof of the pharmacy.”

  “After our encounter on that roof, I was worried you had broken one of my ribs... again. So if you were to ‘count’ it, then I’d say it went to you. But no, I am not here for anything of the like. I’ve told you before that I have no grievance with you, Detective, and that hasn’t changed. What I am here for is to make a purchase.” As Pope spoke, he took a brown leather wallet from his inside pocket.

  “If you want the Madonna album just take it, I’d be quite glad to get that crap out of my apartment.”

  “I want your old gun. The one you scarred me with,” Pope explained, pointing to the narrow scar across his cheek.

  “You want that old thing? I thought you were joking about that.”

  “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure, as they say. It is important to me, as a reminder to stay humble. A reminder that we are all of us mortal, no matter our skills.”

  “Glad I could be of service in providing that after school special, but I can’t sell you the gun right now. I’m sure you’ve heard about the serial killer situation we have?”

  “I do read the papers, yes.”

  “Well a friend of mine is worried that he might be on the list of possible victims, so I said he could use the gun if he needed to, as a kind of reassurance. I don’t actually expect him to need it, but... well it makes him feel better.”

  “We all need to feel safe,” Pope nodded. “I understand, of course. If you change your mind then please contact me. I’m considering mounting that weapon.”

  “Have I told you before that you’re nuts? As in, cartoon character crazy? You probably have an underground layer where you keep other people’s guns and crap like that, don’t you?”

  “Not currently, but it might be something I invest in should I purchase a new home,” Pope smiled, causing Carl to wonder if he was playing off the joke himself or whether he hadn’t actually understood it.

  “Well I’m going to have me a nice long sleep and hope the sandman doesn’t screw me over tonight,” Carl remarked with a weary sigh. “Unless there’s anything else, I’d appreciate you not being here when I close my eyes.”

  “I find prayer often leads to an untroubled night. You may wish to consider that,” Pope said warmly as he walked past Carl towards the door.

  “Thanks for the suggestion, but I prefer not to waste my time.”

  “I prayed for your purple-haired friend the night she died. Would you consider that a waste?”

  Carl stared Pope directly in the eye for a moment, and then looked down at the floor and quietly replied, “No. No, I wouldn’t.”

  “Goodnight, Detective. Sleep well.”

  “Night, Pope.”

  Carl closed the door behind the Pope, listening for the sound of the third stair creaking on his way down, only to find that no such sound was made under the hit-man’s footfalls.

  “Creepy sonnova bitch,” Carl sighed as he walked back into his apartment. All was quiet for a moment until the bedroom door opened and Jimmy came through.

  “Is he gone?” he asked sheepishly.

  “What were you doing in there?”

  “Um, hiding? What did it look like?”

  “Would you like to tell me why you were hiding?” asked Carl, sipping his tea.

  “I heard someone working the lock... don’t ask me how he opened it... and so I went for your gun, the one in the second drawer? Anyway, I looked through the crack in the door and saw who it was. I recognised him from your descriptions of him—the tattoos, the coat, who else could it have been? Anyway, gun or not, no way I was getting messed up with him, so stayed hidden under your bed. Not too brave, huh?”

  “Sensible,” Carl assured him. “You must have been silent like a goddamn ninja for him not to have known you were there.”

  “I was scared to even breathe. Now I can’t stop shaking.”

  “Well, in the unlikely event that he ever comes back, you don’t need to be afraid of him, okay? Just tell him who you are and he’ll be fine.”

  “He’s one of the good guys, then? A friend of yours?”

  “Not exactly... I mean, he’s not technically a bad guy, but... it’s complicated. Just trust me when I say that he’s okay.”

  “Oh and when he started looking through my albums! How dare he insult Queen Madge?”

  “He didn’t insult her, technically. He just asked if a song was on the album.”

  “He’s Catholic, he probably hates her. What does he know, anyway? Stupid hit-man with his baldness and his coat.”

  “I almost wish you had come out of that room, been funny as hell to see how he dealt with you,” Carl laughed.

  “Can we talk about something else now?”

  “Well I gotta hit the hay soon, but okay, what’s on your mind?”

  “I saw the papers this morning.”

  “Brilliant,” Carl sighed. “Look, papers have a way of blowing everything—”

  “Oh, I know all that, that’s why normal people read news on the net,” said Jimmy, pushing the comment away with a flip of his hand. “It just got me thinking. Have you ever actually gone after a serial killer before?”

  “Yes and no,” Carl replied.

  “What kind of answer is that?”

  “Well, we thought it was a serial killer but it was a gang of three people doing the same type of murders, so...”

  “What were they doing?”

  “Drilling thr
ough the side of people’s skulls.”

  “Oh my God! Why were they doing that?”

  “I didn’t ask, I just shot two of ‘em and arrested the third.”

  “How’d you find them?”

  “Once the CSI guys figured out that it was three guys... forensics showed it somehow, some clever shit to do with the angles of the injuries suggesting different heights and bodily strength and stuff... anyway, we found out that the idiots had been dumb enough to pay for the drills on a single credit card. We traced the card, found the owner, and found the two friends who’d been living with him.”

  “There must have been a reason why they were doing it,” Jimmy protested.

  “Poor little rich kids looking for something more exciting than Playstation,” Carl shrugged. “The surviving one is probably back on the streets now, given the money his dad can throw at the legal system.”

  “Why don’t we just kill all the bad guys. Wouldn’t it be easier?”

  “No,” said Carl, backing up the word with a firm shake of his head.

  “Why not?”

  “Because where do you draw the line with stuff like that, and who gets to draw it? Do we kill the starving kid selling dope to buy his next meal? What about the homeless addict who buys it? What about guys like Pope, who are murderers themselves but get rid of people who are even worse? It’s impossible to judge, and once you open that box there ain’t no putting everything back in.”

  “You’ve shot a lot of guys dead though, right?”

  “Not a lot,” Carl replied. “Maybe twenty, I think. I know you read these magazine interviews with guys who say they see the faces of everyone they’ve had to shoot every single night... but it’s bullshit. If I took the decision to kill them, then I knew there and then that they weren’t worth being haunted over.”

  “Would you shoot this serial killer if you had the chance?”

  “Depends on the context of the situation in which I was given the opportunity.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, if I had him bang to rights and he wasn’t going anywhere, I might shoot him in the leg or something to make sure he didn’t try and run for it. But killing him would be a little out of line. If he was coming at me with a weapon of his own, or I knew there was no way to physically stop him and keep him alive, then yeah I’d kill him.”

  “So if you came home and he was here—”

  “Oh for God’s sake, I knew it’d come back to this,” Carl sighed, rubbing his tired eyes.

  “You can’t blame me for worrying about this, Carl!” Jimmy protested.

  “If I came home and he was here, I’d empty my clip into his head and then load up another and empty that one as well. Happy?”

  “Thank you Carl,” Jimmy smiled. “You always make me feel safe. I wish I could do the same for you.”

  “You don’t need to do that.”

  “I’ve always wanted to. All I ever wanted was to be like a brother to you.”

  “Well you already are, buddy. More like a sister sometimes, but still...”

  “If there was ever a situation where it could be me protecting you for once, you know I’d do whatever I had to, don’t you? And that whatever it was, I’d only be looking out for you?”

  “Yeah, I know,” Carl assured him. “But don’t be going after Pope or the serial killer with my gun or anything stupid, alright?”

  “I wouldn’t even know how to reload it.”

  “Remind me to teach you,” Carl smiled as he moved towards the bedroom. “Time to hit the sack.”

  “Sweet dreams,” Jimmy called after him. “Am I okay to quietly play my Madonna albums whilst I read?”

  “Depends if you want your ass kicked or not.”

  “Okay, I’ll just read in silence.”

  “You do that,” Carl nodded as he closed the bedroom door behind him.

  Chapter Thirty-Six;

  The Real Number Three

  C arl awoke to see the neon pink of the “Jesus Saves” sign buzzing in his window, the night sky set against it as a soft snowfall drifted lazily down to the street below. He reached for the alarm clock and read the time as 8.pm, the date next to it revealing that he had indeed slept for almost a full twenty-four hours. To his surprise, he did seem to have lost the weariness that had been creeping up on him more and more with every day. Carl wasn’t sure if he had actually slept solidly through twenty-four hours, but he certainly felt rested; so much so that his eyes remained willingly open as he got out of his bed. A stretch and a yawn preceded his trip to the bathroom, where he was glad to see that the bags under his eyes had lessened considerably. They weren’t gone completely, of course; a single day’s rest wouldn’t achieve that given the depth of exhaustion he’d been feeling, but any improvement was something.

  A shower, a shave and an actual breakfast of toast and cereal, and Carl felt more ready to venture out into the night than he had done in weeks. The detective found some confirmation that his sleep might have been somewhat restless to start with, in the form of the bruise on the back of his right knuckles. It looked as though he’d banged it against the bedside table, but he hadn’t remembered doing it when awake. The skin was a little tender but nothing more, so Carl ignored it and began to dress for work. He actually chose a fresh shirt to wear for the day, a dark purple in colour that went nicely with his black leather jacket and black tie. He didn’t actually remember buying the shirt, but it was in his size, so it was quite possible that Jimmy had purchased it as an unannounced gift. It was also ironed, which made it even more unlikely that Carl himself had placed it in the closet. He had just finished forcing his tie to remain straight despite the poorly crafted knot when his house phone started ringing.

  “One day I’m gonna be up more than five minutes before you start mouthing off at me,” Carl grunted as he reached for the phone. “Duggan.”

  “Hey, Carl. How you feeling?” Trent asked. “You sleep okay?”

  “Yeah, actually I did. Please don’t tell me you’re just calling to ask about that, you soft sack of shit.”

  “No, afraid not. We have a real number three. Another dead gay guy.”

  “Where and when?”

  “He was killed last night, looks like. In his own place, like the others. Landlord heard a ruckus, called the cops.”

  “Did he go and help out?”

  “He said the guy his tenant came home with was huge, so no. Anyway, we got CSI's on it already and the witness statements were taken under my supervision.”

  “I thought you weren’t in on this one?”

  “I’m not, but I know you’d want someone you could trust so I worked a little extra shift.”

  “Great. Make me feel guilty for taking the night off.”

  “Never mind that, the fact is I think our newspaper idea worked, to some degree at least. He’s broken his pattern.”

  “What’s he done different?”

  “No gun,” Trent replied. “Glass is looking into the specifics, but from the state of the bed, I’d say the guy’s head was bashed repeatedly against the headboard. And not in the way he might have been hoping.”

  “The back of his head?”

  “Yeah.”

  “So the vic was facing his killer this time. Any evidence of a struggle?”

  “Yeah, the guy had bruises on his forearms, like he’d been held down, and his jaw was broken, like he’d been hit hard to shut him up.”

  “He’d somehow figured out what was going to happen and fought back. So the guys grab his head and bashes it into the headboard until he’s done,” Carl thought aloud, allowing the scene to play out in his mind. “Why no gun?”

  “No clue, no evidence it was fired at all on the scene. No empty cases or the like,” Trent replied.

  “Maybe he didn’t take it. Or maybe he did take it and the thing jammed on him or whatever.”

  “This does seem kind of desperate,” Trent agreed. “Like a last ditched attempt to salvage the kill.”

 
“Who were the witnesses?”

  “Just the landlord himself, no one saw the murderer leave. Must have taken the fire-escape.”

  “And was our guy wearing a mask?”

  “No, he was wearing makeup, white theatrical stuff, kinda like that movie where the guy comes back from the dead, you know?”

  “He changed his look, the son of a bitch,” Carl hissed. “The papers were all over the red mask shit, so that’s what everyone is looking out for. Guy turns up to a gay bar with a painted face... no-one bats an eyelid.”

  “I think I messed up,” Trent admitted. “Should have left the mask part out when I spoke to the papers.”

  “Spilled milk, and all that crap. Better to focus on what we can do now.”

  “That’s another reason I called you. Glass finally made a breakthrough with the bullets we found in the other two guys.”

  “What do we got?”

  “Carl...” Trent said quietly, then took a breath. “You still got that old service revolver? The one you asked to keep when everyone else gave ‘em back in?”

  “Yeah, it’s in my drawer.”

  “You sure? You might wanna check.”

  “I’m not liking this, Trent,” Carl said grimly was he took the cordless phone with him into his bedroom and opened the second drawer in his beside cabinet. “Oh shit.”

  “Bullets matched your gun, Carl,” Trent said with a sigh. “Serial number’s still on file from the days it was standard issue. Can’t be sure it was your exact gun, but only cops would have that model, and to my knowledge no one else still owns one.”

  “Son of a bitch,” Carl said under his breath.

  “Any theories? You haven’t pawned that thing or something lately, right?”

  “No, but Charles Pope said he wanted it. Something about keeping it as a souvenir, but...”