by Gorman, Ed
“Well, not this exact story, but one just like it, without the goofy stuff.”
I nodded. The story he was reading took place on one of the moons of Jupiter, where the followers of the eagle cult had kidnapped the beautiful daughter of Earth’s ambassador, who had hired a down-and-outspacer to penetrate the cult and find her.
In Roberts’ story, which had been in Thrilling Detective a year or so ago, the beautiful daughter of the mayor of New York City had been kidnapped by the members of a cult of Satan worshipers, and the mayor had hired a down-and-out private dick to penetrate the cult and find her.
The only reason I knew about Roberts’ tale was that a story of my own had appeared in the same issue of the magazine, right next to his, and I’d read it to pass the time one evening. “The Cult of the Eagle People” was almost word-for-word the same, except of course for the description of the charactersand setting.
Roberts closed the magazine and tossed it on the desk, and I stuck my cigarette in his ashtray and groundit out.
“Did you get lazy, Al?” I said. “Did you figure it would be easy enough to sell the same story twice with just a few little changes? Is that what happened?”
For a second I thought he’d come out of the chair and flatten men. But he got control of himself and settled back.
“You know me better than that,” he said.
I wasn’t so sure I did. It seemed to me the gag would work. Double the money for the same story, with very little work other than retyping. An editor for one publisher wouldn’t know what another one had bought, and the people who read Thrilling Detective weren’t likely to be reading Amazing Stories. Most readers tended to stick to one kind of story or the other. They were loyal to what they liked.
“Not that it’s a bad idea, now that I think about it,” Roberts said. “I’d never do it, though. You might think it’s dumb, but I believe in what I write.” I must have looked a little surprised because he went on. “Oh, sure, I do it for the money. Who doesn’t? But it’s mine, and I’d never screw around with it.”
I felt the same way. I said, “Somebody screwed around with it.”
“Yeah, and I’d sure as hell like to know who.”
“What if it was Thane?”
Roberts rubbed thick fingers across his balding head. “You mean he stole my story?”
“That would be one way to break into a new market.”
“Yeah, but ... Wait a minute!”
I waited.
“You think I killed Thane because he stole my story?”
I didn’t know what I thought. To tell the truth, Roberts seemed to me more likely to beat the hellout of Thane than to kill him.
“Thinking I’d kill Thane is just as crazy as thinking I’d kill him because he found out I’d sold the same story twice,” Roberts said. “Which I didn’t.”
I believed him, but I didn’t know where that left us.
“Besides,” he said, picking up the cape and mask and clenching them in his hand, “what about this?”
“The classic red herring. Everybody’s looking for the Shadow, or the Spider. Nobody’s looking for the killer.”
“If that’s the case, it didn’t work. McCoy doesn’t even believe it was murder. The doors were locked, and Thane was inside the room. Suicide. And McCoy sure as hell doesn’t believe in the man on the roof.”
Roberts was right, but the locked door was easily explained.
“You know as well as I do that the lock on the door would click shut when the door was closed if you set it to do that. You don’t lock your door. You just told me so, and it wasn’t locked when I came in. I don’t lock my door, either, not until I get ready to go to bed. I don’t think Thane locked his, either, not while he was home.”
“You know how those locked-room stories are,” Roberts said. “Unnecessarily complicated.”
“No, they’re necessarily complicated. Only amateurs put in too many complications.”
Almost as soon as I said that, things started to click into place. I didn’t know the why of things, not exactly, but I thought I knew the who.
“You look funny,” Roberts said.
“I blame heredity.”
“Don’t get cute. Tell me what you’re thinking.”
“Let’s talk to Lomax,” I said.
I picked up the cape and mask. Roberts got the magazines.
Five
“I wrote this one,” Lomax said, holding up a magazine to show us. “Except when I wrote it, it was called ‘Death Holds the Cards,’ and it was in one of the Western pulps.”
This time it was in Fantastic Adventures, and it was called “Ghosts Don’t Bluff.” By Steve Gargan. And it wasn’t a Western. The red sands of Mars took the place of the American desert. The little mining town was pretty much the same, though, and so were the hard-bitten miners involved in the card game that was central to the plot.
“I don’t get it,” Lomax said. “This isn’t my story, but it’s the same thing. The setting and the names have changed, but that’s all.”
“Maybe you’re double-dipping,” Roberts said. “Selling the same story to two different markets.”
“Just a damn minute,” Lomax said, standing up.
Roberts laughed and held up a hand. “Don’t get riled. I’m just saying to you what was said to me. I got just as mad as you did.”
“Then what’s the joke?” Lomax said.
“It’s no joke,” I said. “It’s murder.”
Lomax, like Roberts, went through McCoy’s suicide explanation. I showed him the mask and cape.
“So we did see a man. I thought maybe we’d all had more to drink than usual and hallucinated him.”
“He was real enough. He was a red herring, or maybe just an unnecessary complication, tossed in byan amateur.”
“That’s the second time you’ve used that word,” Roberts said.
“What kind of amateur are you talking about?”
“An amateur mystery writer. Someone who might be okay writing other stuff, but not a mystery. He had his plot all laid out, though, and maybe the complication was necessary after all. If McCoy hadn’t taken the suicide bait, I have a feeling somebody would’ve found the mask and cape. They weren’t hidden very well, hardly at all, really. If the cops hadn’t found them, the killer would have.”
“The killer?” Lomax said. “Why would he find them.”
“To prove there was someone out on that roof and draw suspicion away from himself. Red herring.”
Lomax and Roberts looked at each other, than at me.
“Burke?” they said together.
“That would be my guess. He knows all the editors of the scientifiction pulps. That’s wherehe sells his stuff. What would be easier for him than to take one of our stories, make some changes, and sell it as his own work?”
“Pretty thin,” Roberts said. “McCoy wouldn’t buy it.”
“Okay, then, who was the first one at Thane’s door?”
“Burke,” Lomax said. “He was there when I got there.”
“He said he was out in the hall to use the telephone,” I said. “I think he went into Thane’s room, killed him, and came back into the hall to stand by the locked door, pretending he couldn’t get inside.”
“He couldn’t,” Lomax said. “The door was locked.”
“Burke locked it,” Roberts said, catching on. “And he was the one selling the suicide theory from the start.”
“He’s the one who went to the window and saw the guy on the roof, too,” Lomax said. “He was leading us by the nose.”
“That’s the way I see it,” I told them.
Lomax headed for the door. “Let’s go talk to him.
Burke’s door wasn’t locked, and we didn’t knock. We just barged right in.
Burke looked up from his typewriter in surprise, but he knew instantly that we were onto him. He reacted quickly. He grabbed manuscript pages and carbons from two different stacks and made a run for his window. Before we could get
to him, he’d raised it and stepped out onto the fire escape.
I followed. He clanked down, his long legs taking two rungs at a time. I wasn’t quite as fast, but I was persistent. When he dropped down to the alley, I was close behind him.
Then he surprised me. He stopped on a dime, turned sharply, and kicked me in the knee.
I went down, skidding a foot or so on the side of my face. I jumped back up, my face burning. Burke turned the corner of the alley and disappeared.
I realized that I still had the cap and mask in my hand. I swirled on the cape and snapped it at the neck. Then I slipped on the mask.
Just as I emerged from the alley, Burke looked back. He must have thought that the Spider was after him, or the Shadow. I wished I had the hat, but I was effective enough as it was.
“The Shadow knows!” I yelled, sounding nothing at all like Orson Welles.
It didn’t matter. Burke stumbled in shock. His left foot slipped off the curb, and he joggled intothe street, trying to regain his balance. He almost did, but it was too late. The lights of the on-coming taxicabturned him into a black silhouette just before it hit him.
He flew backward about ten feet. Manuscript pages sailed and swirled and then settled to the street. Someof them landed on Burke, as if trying to cover him up.
A couple of people stood on the edge of the sidewalk, staring. First at Burke and then at me.
“Better call the cops,” I told them.
They took off, happy for an excuse to get away from me, I guess. I went out on the street and started gathering up pages. Just as I thought I had enough, I heard sirens. I took off the mask and cape. My work as a crime-fighter was done.
• • •
I explained things as I understood them to McCoy, who showed up for a visit a few days later. He’dtalked to Burke in the hospital and got the whole story. Burke had been selling our stories as his own almost from the start. It started with the Westerns. He’d read a lot of scientifiction stories that he said were just Westerns in disguise, so it was easy to convert them. Then he’d moved on to the mysteries, which he’d found equally simple to change for his purposes.
“Why our stories, though?” I said.
“The answer was right there in your hands,” McCoy said. “You guys never lock your doors. If you went out for a beer or a smoke, Burke’d slip in, go through your carbons, and pick out a story he liked. After he’d made it over, he’d find a chance to slip the carbon back.”
“And Thane found out?”
“Right.”
“Must have pissed him off.”
“Not so much. According to Burke, Thane was blackmailing him. He was going to tell you and the others, and Burke was afraid you’d beat the hell out of him.”
“We would have,” I said, meaning Roberts would have. “We’re proud of what we do. We don’t want anybody stealing it.”
“Yeah. Well, Burke wasn’t getting rich, even by stealing from you, and Thane was going to bleed him. So Burke figured he’d just get rid of him. He says he thought it out just like he’d think out a story.”
“He wasn’t much of a mystery writer,” I said.
“Nope.”
“You planning to apologize about what you said when we told you about the man on the roof?”
“I still haven’t seen any man.”
“He was just some goof that Burke hired. You could find him if you wanted to.”
“Don’t need him. We got Burke cold.”
“Thanks to me,” I said.
McCoy admitted nothing. He didn’t even thank me. He just nodded and left.
After he’d been gone a minute or so, I tried on the cape and mask. I don’t know why I’d kept them. Maybe I thought a career as a masked crime-fighter might be an improvement.
Then I thought about the story I was writing, one with a private dick who’d been framed for the murder of his best friend. It was going to be damned good, maybe better than good.
I tossed the cape and mask into a chair and sat down at the Underwood.
Too bad about Thane being so greedy, I thought, and Burke being a thief. But I didn’t think about them long. Things like that were for people like McCoy. I had other things to do. Pretty soon the keys of the Underwood were smoking. It was good to be back at work.
• • •
BILL CRIDER is the author of more than fifty published novels. He won the Anthony Award for best first mystery novel for Too Late to Die (1987) and he and his wife, Judy, won the best short story Anthony for “Chocolate Moose” (2002). His short story “Cranked” was nominated for an Edgar Award. His latest novels are Mississippi Vivian (Five Star) and Murder in the Air (St. Martin’s). Check out his homepage at www.billcrider.com.
BLOOD SACRIFICES AND THE CATATONIC KID
By Tom Piccirilli
Two moves from mateBarry the chronic masturbator started pawing at the white bishop like he was choking his chicken and said, “Heya, hey, look there — ” I turned in time to see the Catatonic Kid get up off his coma couch and cut Harding’s throat with a shiv made from a shard of ceramic ashtray.
Harding the orderly stood six-three and went 230 of mostly muscle. He didn’t go down easy. Arterial spray shot around the intensely white walls of the ward as Mary the Nictophobe started losing her shit. She screamed and sort of danced in place and couldn’t even get herself out of the path of Harding’s spurting carotid.
I didn’t mind watching him go down. He was a rude, rotten son of a bitch who liked to intimidate and humiliate the patients. He had a habit of opening mail and stealing cash or candy bars or whatever appealed to him at the moment. Now he was scrambling on the floor trying to clamp one hand across his slashed throat. But he was so taken by the wondrous and terrifying sight of his own pouring blood that he kept pulling his hand away and staring at the frothing red puddling in his palm.
Harding checked around the room looking for mercy. Our eyes met and he saw I wasn’t going to help. I mouthed, Fuck you, prick. He glanced up at Barry and, even as he bled out, an expression of disgust crimped Harding’s features as he got a look at the unholy sight of what Barry was currently doing with my black rook.
The rest of the nuts, freaks, depressives, hysterics, deficients, and paranoids didn’t seem to notice and just kept up with their muttering, hand-wringing, floor-licking, and carrot-waxing. Mary had crumpled trying to rub the blood out of her eyes.
The Catatonic Kid riffled Harding’s pockets and snatched his wallet. He unclipped the huge key ring from Harding’s belt, drew out Harding’s smaller set of car keys from the orderly’s back pocket, and even pulled the dripping watch from Harding’s wrist. I thought that was going a little far.
Harding croaked, “Please — ” and the Kid kicked him in the face.
Harding tried to lever himself to his feet one last time and toppled across the ping pong table. It collapsed under his weight and he lay unmoving atop the crushed net.
The Kid had been in a non-responsive fugue state for the three months we’d been here. He came in the same day I did and both of us were placed into the same group therapy. They tried to snap him out of his unresponsive state by pretending that he wasn’t in one. They talked to him, asked questions, waited for answers. I thought the doctors were some ripe stupid assholes.
They finally wised up and dumped the Kid in the community lounge where he’d lay on his coma couch and stare at the ceiling. The other nuts kept clear of him. The doctors and nurses came in and flashed a light in his eyes every so often, tossed pills down his throat, and fed him. He’d eat slowly, hardly ever blinking. They’d wipe his chin and let him lie back down, and the rest of us would pass him by like he was a piece of furniture.
He’d been faking the entire time and I admired the amount of willpower it had taken. Not just to pretend, but to pretend for so long and then still manage to make it all the way back. I knew guys in prison who’dtried to fake insanity so they could get out of solitary or into the hospital wing. Some of them faked it so
well for so long they just went crazy.
The Kid knew which key got him out of the ward. He’d been watching, aware, careful. He moved with a certain predator canniness, swift but cautious, with a restrained sense of power. During the nights he must’ve been exercising, keeping himself fit and sharp.
I followed along behind him, silent in my little baby booty slippers. When he got to the next security station, where Jenkins sat filling out his logbook and helping one of the nurses get medication ready for the patients, the Kid slid along the wall holding his shiv up like he was going to kill them both. I grabbed his wrist and pulled him into an alcove.
He tried to talk but his voice was inhuman, clogged with months of dust. I said, “Not through the front. There’s a three-man team at the gate, two in a booth and one patrolling in a truck, and the administrative offices are between you and the door. Besides, Jenkins is a nice guy, not like that fucker Harding.”
I let go of his wrist. I could see him thinking about stabbing me with his shard of ashtray. His eyes were red with bridled excitement. He was on the move for the first time in weeks and he wanted to cut loose. The taste of murder was in his teeth. I waited for him to try it.
But he wasn’t just cunning, he was smart. He checked the halls and gracefully eased toward the east exit. It opened up onto the back grounds, the landscaper’s shed, and the staff parking lot.
I followed him to the door and watched him unlock it and push through. I stayed behind. It was too chancy to shoulder my way into his escape more than I already had. He turned around. I waited. He rushed back.
His voice was returning. He tried a few more words. They didn’t sound like English. He spoke again and I recognized what he was saying. “Come on, old man. Let’s go.”
“Hey,” I told him, “I’m here for voluntary committal. I’m depressed, not nuts. Choose one of the other loons for your big breakout.”
“Now or you’ll get the same thing that bastard Harding did.”
“What do you want me for?”
“I might need help along the way.”
“How do you know I’ll be any help?”
“Because I’ll stab you in the heart if you’re not.”