Amid this clutter was the centerpiece: a Ken doll hanging from a Popsicle stick rafter, a noose around its neck. Red paint had been used to simulate blood, and there was plenty of it. Someone had believed that mere hanging was too good for Ken; a toy knife jutted from the doll's abdomen. Small pink hands clutched its handle. In case anyone missed the point, a pile of bloody viscera was coiled at the corpse's feet. The intestines were fashioned from rubber tubing and glazed with something that simulated slime. The effect was disturbingly real.
The title affixed to this bit of self-expression was Oh, Dearie, Round-Eyes Hara-Kiri: The Wretched Act. Price tag: $150.
I turned away and walked to the man at the school desk. He had short dark hair striped maroon and electric blue on the sides, elfin ears through which safety pins had been inserted, and a hard, hungry shark face dominated by narrow, empty eyes. He was in his late twenties - too old for the teen-age rebel game - and I wondered what he'd played at before discovering that in L.A., looking bizarre could camouflage a host of bad intentions.
He drew triangles and crossed them out, continuing to ignore me.
'I'm interested in one of your artists,' I said.
Grunt.
'Garish.'
Snort.
'You gotta talk to the owner. I just sit here and watch the place.' It was the sneering voice of the phone message.
'Who's the owner?'
'Doctor from Encino.'
'When does he come in?'
An apathetic shrug punctuated by a yawn.
'Never.'
'He never comes in at all?'
'No, man. This is like ... a hobby.'
Or a tax write-off.
'I don't get down here too often,' I said, 'so I'd appreciate if you'd call him and say I'd like to buy one of Garish's tableaux.'
He looked up, stared, and stretched. I noticed old needle marks on his arms.
'The one with the suicide scene,' I continued. 'The Wretched Act. I'd also like to talk to the artist.'
'Tableaux.' He grinned. His mouth was a disaster zone, several teeth missing, the few that remained, chipped and brown. 'That's life, man. That's garbage. Not any tableaux.'
'Whatever. Would you make the call, please?'
'Not supposed to. He's like in surgery all the time.'
'How about cash-and-carry and an extra hundred thrown in for commission?' I took out my wallet.
At that he grew sullen.
'Yeah, sure. Cash for trash.' He feigned apathy, but his eyes had come alive with anticipation, and he held out a grubby hand. 'You want it that bad, it's yours for two fifty.'
'Talking to Garish is part of the deal. Find him for me, and we're in business.'
'This is Voids,' he whined, 'not any freaking missing persons scam.'
'Have him here by six, and the commission goes up to one fifty.'
He licked his lips and tapped his pencil against the desktop.
'Think you can buy me, huh, man?' 'I'm betting on it.'
'Trying to put me in your tableau, Mr. Suit?' I ignored him and feigned nonchalance. 'I can find him without you,' I said, 'but I want to see him today. If you can arrange it, the hundred and fifty's yours.'
The striped head bobbed and weaved. 'Why the freak should I know where he is?'
'You're exhibiting his stuff on consignment. If I buy the piece, you'll owe him his share. Something tells me you communicate once in a while.'
He followed that with a furrowed brow, I wondered how often he sold anything.
'Get him here by six,' I said. 'Tell him Alex Delaware wants to buy The Wretched Act and talk to him.'
He shook his head.
'No messages, man. I can't remember all that.'
'Delaware,' I said slowly, 'like in the state. He knows me.'
He shrugged, defeatedly, and I left knowing he'd hustle for the money.
There was a phone booth in one corner of the parking lot. The door had been ripped off, and traffic sounds blotted out the dial tone. I covered one ear and punched in my service number. The only message of interest was a call-back from Milo.
I reached him just as he was leaving for County General Hospital.
'Heard your boy did himself up pretty good,' he said.
'It was ugly. He had to have been incredibly despondent.'
'Guilt can do that to you,' he said, but the glibness was forced, and he softened his voice. 'What's on your mind, Alex?'
I told him about the bikers breaking into Gary's loft.
'Uh-huh. And you heard this from a wino.'
'He was cleverer than he looked.'
'Hey, I'm not knocking it. Some of my best info's come
from juiceheads.' Pause. 'So you're connecting it with what I told you about the Slasher victims hanging out with bikers.'
'It does seem coincidental.'
'Alex, this Yamaguchi kid is a punker, right?'
'Right.'
'Which means ten to one he's into nasty drugs, like glue and speed. Outlaw bikers are one of the main sources of illegal speed in this state. They call it crank. You don't need much of an IQ to cook it up, which sticks it right in those scumbags' bailiwick. Yamaguchi was probably buying from them and didn't pay on time.'
'He was dealing,' I said.
'Even better. It was a business deal gone sour. The leather boys tend to favor violent retribution over binding arbitration.'
'All right,' I said, 'I just thought you should know.'
'You were right to call, and if you think of anything else, don't hesitate to give a toot - that is, if Souza doesn't get bent out of shape about your fraternizing with the enemy.'
I considered telling him about The Wretched Act but knew it could be dismissed as nothing more than a pseudoartist's conception of murder, gleaned from the papers. Instead, I said:
'Souza fired me this morning.'
'No use for you anymore, huh?'
'That's the general picture.'
'Makes sense. The kid's got progressively worse since the arrest, and with the suicide attempt there's probably enough to back up a temporary incompetence order. Given sufficient shilly-shallying, the case may never come to trial.'
'What kind of shilly-shallying?'
'Paper games. One delay after another.'
'How long can that last?'
'Keep paying a guy like Souza, and he'll figure out how to delay sunrise. All he's got to do is keep the kid out of the public eye until nobody gives a shit about the case anymore. Great system, isn't it?'
'Terrific'
'Cheer up, pal. It's pretty clear Cadmus shouldn't be walking the streets. At least this way he'll have soft walls.'
'Yeah. I guess so.'
'Anyway, now that we're not on opposite sides of the skirmish, how about dinner and amusing conversation sometime?'
His voice was buoyant, and I made a silent guess.
'Two or four?'
'Uh, four.' Pause. 'He called, and he's coming back tomorrow.'
'I'm glad for you, Milo.'
'Yeah, I know that. Thanks for the shoulder when I needed it.'
'Anytime.'
I returned to Voids Will Be Voids just before dark. When Stripehead saw me, he jumped up and began bobbing his head nervously.
'All set?' I asked.
He bobbed at a blank space on the wall where The Wretched Act had hung.
'Someone came in, after you were gone and outbid you, man.'
'I thought we had a deal.'
'Hey, man, free enterprise - '
'Who bought it?'
'Some suit.'
'You can do better than that.'
'That's it, man. I never look at their faces.'
'How much did he pay?'
'What's the diff? You like that kind of shit, take another one.'
I could have pushed it, but purchasing the sculpture had just been a ploy to get to its creator. And Stripehead was still my only link to Gary.
'That's okay. Are we still in business on the other mat
ter?'
'Sure.' Palm out. 'Two hundred.'
'One fifty added to the price of the sculpture. Since you ripped me off, it goes down to one twenty-five.'
He screwed up his face, shoved his hands in his pockets, and paced. The promise of temporary affluence had heightened his appetite for a chemical dream.
'Fuck, no. One fifty.'
I took three fifties out of the wallet, gave him one, and withheld two.
'When I see him, you get the rest.'
Cursing, he snapped up the money and went back to his desk.
'Wait here. I'll tell you when it's time.'
He went back to his doodling, and I spent ten stuporous minutes walking around the gallery. Nothing looked better at second glance. Finally he stood, motioned, and led me through a rear door through a storage area and out to the darkening alley. Wiping his nose on his sleeve, he held out his hand.
'Give.'
'Where's Gary?'
'He'll be here soon, man.'
'Then you'll get paid soon.'
'Up yours,' he hissed, but he backed off and stood in the shadows.
I looked around. The alley was a band of lacerated asphalt, checkered with tilting, overflowing dumpsters. Garbage confettied the ground, and potholes full of waste water glistened stagnantly. More stink. I thought of Jamey's use of the word and wondered what kind of decay had fuelled his visions.
Within seconds there was movement from behind one of the Dumpsters and scratching, rodent sounds.
Two shadows slid along the backs of buildings, then stepped out into the open. A bare bulb above the gallery's rear door spat a triangle of cold light onto the asphalt. The shadows stood away from it but absorbed enough illumination to be rendered three-dimensional.
The larger of the two was Gary. His thick black hair had been sheared off except for a Mohawk centre strip, dyed aquamarine. Roofing nails had been glued to the strip and lacquered stiff, creating a high, jagged cock's comb. He wore a vest of chain mail over bare skin and filthy black jeans gouged with holes and tucked into black plastic rain boots. A rusty razor blade dangling from a steel chain formed a necklace that came to rest over his sternum, and a feathered earring stretched one lobe. His belt was a section of rope, and from it hung a clasp knife. I remembered him as severely myopic, but his glasses were gone. I wondered if he was wearing contact lenses, or did physical correction clash with his new set of values?
The girl next to him was no more than fifteen and tiny -four feet ten or eleven. She had a petulant, snub-nosed, baby-doll face graveled with acne and topped by a Medusa mop the color of borscht. Her face was powdered white, and dark rings had been penciled around her eyes, but bad living had begun to etch its own shadows. She had an overbite that made her lips hang slightly open; her lipstick was black, and beaming through the inky flesh was the silvery glint of orthodonture. I wondered if whoever had paid for the braces was still looking for her.
Despite the getup and a studied attempt at surliness, both of them looked soft and innocent, Hansel and Gretel corrupted by the witch.
'Okay, man?' pressed Stripehead.
I handed him the pair of fifties, and he scurried back inside. 'Gary?'
'Yes?' His voice was soft and flat, as emotionless as the music blaring inside the gallery.
With anyone else I'd have made an attempt at rapport, using small talk and the reeling in of memories sweetened by time. But the old Gary and I had never had much to do with one another, and the creature before me obviously had no appetite for chit-chat.
'Thanks for coming. I want to talk to you about Jamey.' He folded his arms across his chest and the chain mail tinkled.
I took a step forward, and he backed away. But his
retreat was cut short as he stumbled in a rut and lurched backward. The girl caught his arm and prevented him from falling. Once he was stabilized, she held on to him protectively. Up close I saw (hat his eyes were strained and unfocused. No contacts.
'What do you want?' he asked. The bare bulb backlit the spikes in his hair.
'You know about the trouble he's in.' 'Yes.' Unmoved.
'I've been asked by his attorney to evaluate his mental status. But I'm also trying - personally - to understand what happened.'
He stared at the blur that was my face, silent and impassive. His inflection and manner were mechanical, as if his personality had been excised, fed into a synthesizer, and ejected as something only partially organic. He'd never been easy to talk to, and the punk armor was yet another layer to peel. I continued, without much hope of success.
'The others at the project said that you were friends, that he talked to you more than to any of them. Do you remember his saying or doing anything that could relate to what happened?'
'No.'
'But the two of you did talk.'
'Yes.'
'About what?'
He shrugged.
'Don't remember?'
'That's the past. Extinct.'
I tried the direct approach.
'You did a sculpture that combined elements of his father's suicide and the Lavender Slashings.'
'Art imitates life,' he recited.
'You titled it The Wretched Act, Gary. That's a phrase Jamey used to describe suicide.'
'Yes.'
'Why? What does it all mean?'
A faint smile tiptoed across his lips, then vanished.
'Art speaks for itself.'
The girl nodded and clutched him tighter.
'He's a genius,' she said, and I noticed for the first time how thin they both were.
'Sometimes,' I said, 'geniuses aren't appreciated in their time. What percentage of each sale does Voids give you?'
He pretended not to hear the question, but something that looked like hunger filled the girl's eyes.
Starting to feel like a mini-foundation, I reached into my wallet and peeled off some bills. If Gary saw the money, he chose to ignore it. But the girl reached out and took it, examined it, and tucked it in her waistband. It didn't guarantee cooperation by a long shot, but maybe they'd use some of it for food.
'Gary,' I asked, 'was Jamey on drugs?'
'Yes.'
The casual answer threw me.
'How do you know?'
'He tripped.'
'Like on acid?'
'Yes.'
'Did you ever actually see him drop acid?'
'No.'
'So you're just inferring it from his behavior.'
He touched the feathered fringe of his earring.
'I know tripping,' he said.
'Dr. Flowers and the others were sure he was straight.'
'They're low-level androids.'
'Is there anything else you can tell me about his drug use?'
'No.'
'Did you ever see him take anything other than acid?'
'No.'
'Do you think he did?'
'Yes.'
'What kind of stuff?'
'Speed. Downers. Hog.'
TCP?'
'Yes.'
WHEN I got home, Robin was already in the kitchen, tossing a Caesar salad. She wiped her hands and gave me an anchovy-garlic kiss.
'Hi. Billy's manager called today and said Roland Oberheim can meet with you tomorrow at three. I left the address on your nightstand.'
'Great,' I said listlessly. 'Thank him for me next time you see him.'
She looked at me quizzically.
'Alex, it took some effort to set up. You could show a little enthusiasm.'
' You're right Sorry.'
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