Finally someone came in. A big, burly guy with no smile at all lifted my head and gave me a sip of water. “Where—where…uh, where am I?” I asked. The big guy said nothing and left.
Then a familiar voice from behind me spoke up. “You are, Mr. Denning, in one of our most advanced facilities, underground somewhere in Los Angeles.”
It was Nazar Ravna. “Ravna! What the hell are you doing? I promised I’d be at Honey's club to hear her sing tonight,” I said.
“I’m afraid that was hours ago, Denning. The nightclub has long since closed and your desperate little fiancée is most likely frantic and looking for you by now. Isn’t that nice? I love to stir things up—”
“—so, you lousy piece of worthless shit, what is it this time? What are you gonna do to—”
“—not me, Denning, but rather Dr. Schumacher. One of the most famous surgeons in the field of microbiology. Dr. Schumacher is the world’s leading authority on the castration of mice and rats for laboratory experimentation. Of course, she also is just as deft at the removal of the testicles of other, larger creatures.”
“What in the hell are you talking about, Ravna? Get me out of this thing and let’s talk.”
“Cannot do, I’m afraid. You see, what we are about to inflict upon you is rather like—hmmm….how shall we say, punishment, first for talking so crudely to me the other day when I kindly visited your office—but we’re punishing you most of all because of your association with those meddlesome priests of the Catholic persuasion.”
Then a chill ran through me. These guys really were nuts! “So…you’re intending to castrate me, is that it, Ravna?”
“Precisely, Denning. We thought that eliminating surely the main source of trouble in your life—mainly your sexually prolific nature—we’d tame you down a bit. Dr. Schumacher assures us that a castrated rat is so much more docile than one whose male hormones are still carelessly rampant.”
Just then a dark-haired woman dressed in white approached, coming from out of another door across the room. She looked me over. She stood about five-foot five, was very thin and her complexion sallow, as if she’d never been in sunlight. Her hair was slicked back with what appeared to be petroleum jelly. She had a decidedly German accent. “Vell, vell, vell, Herr Denning. Herr Ravna has told me much about you. I believe him to be correct zat you are due for corrective surchery. I am Dr. Else Schumacher. You see, ofer-actiff pituitary leads to ofer-breeding tendencies. Herr Ravna tells me you haff been much too actiff in spreading your seed to so many fine, young vomen. Ve cannot permit zis sing to continue.”
I was looking up at this little vixen with the cold blue eyes in disbelief. “You actually do these things? Have you any idea of the emotional trauma, let alone the legal implications of such a heinous act?”
“You…vorry about your little moral issues…I vill concern myself vis obeying za rules…of correct…medical procedure in such a case…as zis. I haff little or no regard for your emotional velfare—especially since breeders such as you, Herr Denning, must be curtailed vile zey are still—in zeir prime years.”
Now I was sweating—and flabbergasted. It was like a surrealistic dream and I was floating through it, suspended somewhere between rationality and the unbelievable. “You’re not kidding, are you?” I asked, swallowing hard. If this dame was on the level, it would be the end of my family jewels—once and for all!
Dr. Schumacher looked over at Ravna. “Za qvestion is, Herr Ravna, should ve or should ve not use anesthesia?”
“You must recall, Dr. Schumacher, none of this was my idea in the first place. It was Dr. Udter’s recommendation. And the Oculus Council approved it. He mustn’t lose his mind and must be saved for other purposes. That also is an order. Even if he is minus…certain parts…”
“Yes, I do recall. Perhaps, zen, ve should administer a little numbing agent insomuch as za pain won’t be as…debilitating…ya?”
“Yes, Doctor, I think that would be wise.”
“Vell, Herr Denning, ve haff decided to leaff your penis but take bos of your gonads—und giff you a sedative. Dat vay you vill be able to tolerate za pain vizout loossing your sanity.”
“Yeah, well, thanks for nothing, you sell-out Kraut! And you, Ravna, after all we’ve been though, why in the hell are you doing this? I always thought there might be a thin layer of civility in you—”
“—because I don’t like you, Denning. You’re pompous, haughty and definitively need to be subdued into submission. Dr. Schumacher, will you kindly prepare the patient?”
“Ya, Herr Ravna.”
No one can tell this story, not even to yourself, let alone someone else. The horror that I was living and feeling this minute felt like a trap door had just opened and I was in free fall. And for a man like me, which was worse—death or castration? I guess one could always follow the other. I didn’t know how I’d feel after losing my balls, or how I’d respond, since so much of my life was living with and responding sensually to females. I knew that harems employed eunuchs to protect the sultan’s precious concubines. I don’t know, maybe I’d be okay with it after a while. Protecting people in my line of work didn’t always have to be sexual. In fact a lot of it wasn’t.
Dr. Schumacher bent over me with a needle that squirted a queer yellow fluid and soon she had jammed it into my arm. Slowly, I could feel my anxiety lesson as my brain began to go to sleep and my body stopped trembling. The doc lifted the surgical gown up, exposing my genitals. It was getting blurry, but I could still hear Schumacher’s voice. “Oh, now ve can see vhy ze vomen vere so…so enamored vis Herr Denning here. It is a handsome penis und qvite large scrotum. Such a big pouch, ya, indicates an over-active production of semen. Vell, ve vill take care of zat!”
“Get on with it, Dr. Schumacher, this is not a sight-seeing tour of male anatomy. Simply do your job and get on with it,” Ravna growled.
The doctor said nothing but went to a small table by the operating gurney and picked out a selection of surgical knives and cutting blades. Then she stood over me with gloved hands and smiled. “It von’t be long now!” she said in a sickly, jovial voice.
The last thing I remember is a ruckus in back of me, and a series of gunshots ringing out. I heard Ravna yell out and Dr. Schumacher let out a howl as a bullet went through her brain and she collapsed on top of me, one of her surgical knives missing my leg by inches!
The next thing I knew I was riding in the back seat of a car humming along on a highway. As I came to, I saw Father Carlo Tortelli smiling at me. “Cable, can you hear me…Cable?” He called to the front of the cab. “I think he’s coming around. Would you grab the flask in the glove compartment, please?”
Soon, I was tasting a pretty fine liqueur in my mouth, and Carlo’s hand was feeding me. “Carlo…where…where am I?” I felt between my legs. Everything was still there. “I’m—I’m still intact—what happened?”
“I had a feeling they were gunning for you after we talked this morning. So Father Banducci, Father Grandino and I decided to watch you, just in case. We followed the black Cadillac out to the underground lab and got there—how would I say it?” The priest chuckled. “In the nick of time, I think would be appropriate.”
“I owe you one, gentlemen,” I spoke up. “What about Ravna and his weird accomplice?”
“Morto…dead, I’m afraid. There was no other way. Ravna had two of his goons planted outside of the entrance, so we had to take care of them first. We almost didn’t get to you in time. Now wouldn’t that have been a pity, Cable?”
“And then some, Carlo. Just think, I would’ve had to become a priest or eunuch in a harem.” He laughed. “I am indebted to you. Where are we going?”
“To the safest place you could go right now.”
They propped me up as they walked me up to Honey’s little cottage. They knocked on the door. Honey answered with only a robe on, her face gaunt and worried. “Cable!” she cried out as she ran to me and embraced me. Then she looked at the three priests
. “I knew when he didn’t show at the club he was in trouble—but did he offend God or something?”
“No, signorina,” Carlo answered, smiling. “He almost underwent a life-altering operation at the hands of—well, suffice it to say he’s alright, safe and sound and needs your love and affection for a couple of days.”
Honey took me inside and invited the priests in and offered them coffee. They thankfully accepted. I was still woozy and sat at the table teetering a little. “Thank you so very, very much, Fathers. I don’t know anything about what has happened and I’m not going to ask. I’m just thankful to you all,” Honey said, her face still a bit drawn.
“Aren’t you Honey Combes—the singer who recently recorded It All Depends on You?” Carlo asked.
“Yes. That’s me, I guess.”
“I’m a big fan, Miss Combes…I love good musica.”
“Thanks. Just call me Honey. What can I do for you?”
“May I have your autograph—or even an autographed record, if you could spare it?”
“Are you kidding? The three guys who save my fiancé’s ass deserve the best. I’ll be right back.”
Just at that moment Zelda came wandering in. “What’s—what’s all the commotion? It’s four o’clock in the morning, you know.” She looked at the priests. “Oh, God, did someone die? Cable?” She looked at me teetering at the table.
“Yeah, Zelda. I’m okay. Just had a close shave, that’s all. These three swell priests saved my butt from—well, from the removal of some of my most valuable possessions.”
“Oh, Lord, Cable! I’m so glad you’re here—and okay.” She was dressed in her flimsy nightgown, the yellow one through which her nipples stood at attention—and if she should happen to lean over too far, all of heaven would be able to view those ample breasts of hers.
Honey came back into the kitchen with an album in hand. “This is my latest two-record album. It has four of my favorite songs. It All Depends on You, Love Me or Leave Me, Makin’ Whoopee and Red, Red Robin. I hope you’ll like them. I autographed the inside…here….”
“Molte grazie, Honey,” Carlo said.
“Thank you, Fathers. And here I thought the bum was out makin’ whoopee somewhere…we’re going to be married in December.”
All three priests congratulated us. Then Carlo grew somber. “Since we more or less know one another, I think it only fair to tell you to take any and all monies out of investments and stock market speculations. There is advance word of an imminent financial collapse.”
We all looked at each other. “In the middle of a prosperous time?” Honey said, looking curiously at the gathered priests. “Besides, Cable and I haven’t made any investments into stocks, bonds or the like.”
“But my father has,” Zelda chimed in. “He invested all the family earnings into some stock investments—the money he’s received from his inventions, including the world’s largest strawberry.”
“I’d advise him, then, to withdraw as soon as he can and keep the money under a mattress somewhere,” Father Tortelli responded. Then he cleared his throat. “Well, we must be on our way. It’s late.”
“How can I get a hold of you?” I asked. “I want to take you guys out to lunch or dinner or something swell—for saving my—my, uh, butt tonight.”
“You can’t. We’ll contact you, Cable. Good night, now.” Honey and I escorted the three priests to the door. We watched as they made their way down toward the street and disappeared.
Honey was still looking toward the empty driveway. “There but for the grace of God, eh, Cable? You’re really in trouble, aren’t you?”
“Nothing a good night’s sleep won’t cure,” I grinned.
“Cable! Please! Don’t lie to me! I know you’ve been keeping things from me besides old girlfriends. If you can’t tell your own wife-to-be, then who can you tell?”
“No one, toots.” We closed the door, said good night to Zelda and went into the bedroom and I started undressing. Honey saw the welt Dr. Schumacher’s needle had made on my upper arm.
“And that was part of it, wasn’t it?”
“Honey…I can’t talk about it tonight. I’m dead tired.”
“When I first met you I thought the life you led was exciting. Now I think it’s just dangerous. I don’t know if I can live that way, Cable. What if we do have children? What would I say—oh, your father may or may not be home tonight—he’s in a gun fight in a warehouse somewhere—”
“—Honey! Some other time, please? Let’s get to sleep.”
As we got into bed she tried to drop it, but I could feel her restless body next to mine. And what the hell was this stock market thing Carlo Tortelli was warning us about? For Christ’s sake, it was a booming era!
Chapter 19
THE EXCHANGE
It seemed to me the more things that happened to me, the less I knew about life. Nothing stays simple. Everything changes. I could feel Honey’s attitude take on a different color as our wedding date approached. Maybe she was having second thoughts about being married to a gumshoe that constantly lived on the edge of danger—not to mention mysterious dimensions I had never really explored with her. She always shut me down when I mentioned the Cave of the Seven Truths and Lei-tao and all the stuff that happened on that adventure. In a way I couldn’t blame her. Some dames like a calm, predictable life at home, without all the unsettling crap my profession brought to the dinner table. But then, of course, we seldom had dinner—because of her career.
I worked hard that week…handling all the miscellaneous cases that came across my desk. Things like catching Mrs. Fletcher’s husband in bed with her sister and taking the all-important Kodak quickie, while they were having their quickie, going to court to verify photos I had taken regarding a divorce proceeding, escorting a beautiful blonde from the East coast to her boyfriend’s lair in the Hollywood Hills, and last but not least, serving eviction papers on a poor, wretched couple who had fallen on bad times and couldn’t pay the rent anymore. The landlord was a merciless Turk who owned seven houses in the neighborhood, one more bug infested than the other. I knew the type. Continue to collect the dough until the houses were condemned, then move on.
On Thursday the 12th Adora called and wanted to see me and help me celebrate my birthday. I told her I was up to my ears and tomorrow I was going to see Honey at the club and she had prepared a little shindig for me to help celebrate my twenty-ninth year on planet earth. I could feel her pain when I said I couldn’t see her. You know why? Because I was experiencing an equal pain. I just wanted everything complicated to go away—take Adora’s hand and run across a meadow somewhere, take her into my arms and make love to her in the grass beside a bubbling brook. But I told her my truth, the one that said I didn’t know when we could be together again. Soon, I hoped. She hung up and I could hear the tears of disappointment. I knew this couldn’t go on much longer, but I didn’t know how to cut it off. It would be like cutting off a leg. She had made my heart feel like when the sun bursts out from behind a cloud after the rain. She was sunshine and I was in love with her. There was no way around it.
I had hoped against hope that after Ravna’s death at the hands of my benefactor priests, the Oculus Pyramis Mandatum would release its stranglehold on me. Life always contains a certain number of unresolved items, dangling participles with question marks that never quite settle to resolution, but sit in your craw like a group of unsettling thoughts, reminding you that you’re in a crap game and when you spit on the dice and roll them against the bank, you never know what numbers are going to come up.
It was getting on to sunset as I sat in my desk chair smoking a Lucky Strike and sipping on a gin and tonic. Suddenly I got a chill all over and something made me look toward my bedroom. There, standing at the threshold, stood Toggth. He did not look happy. The little creature approached me. “She seduced you, Cable, and you succumbed. Now she is with a child that cannot possibly be born. What happened? We talked about it. Why couldn’t you have simply wal
ked out on her when she shape-shifted into that alluring hussy who trapped you?”
“Well, hello to you too, Toggth,” I said, trying to make the situation amenable. “I know the whole thing…I was taken in a dream to the palace of Daiyu Guang, her teacher. She filled me in.”
Toggth seemed puzzled. “Oh. Daiya Guang summoned you?”
“Yep, and I heard the most magnificent music…”
“The liuqin…music of the astral spheres.” Then he looked at me with those wonderful eyes of his. “But I’m still angry with you. Why, Cable, when you knew it could destroy her?”
“The human animal drives are incessant. It’s like desire bangs up against your brain, Toggth, until you can’t stand it anymore—and you’re addicted to the feeling of that warm, pumping motion when she opens—”
“—I don’t need the details, Cable. Somehow she must abort the embryo. What you don’t know is that in Lei-tao’s womb, the fetus will grow exponentially faster than in a human female’s. ‘
“So what do you want me to do?”
“Stay out of the way. She came to me and told me she was ill. She was convulsing because your seed is incompatible with hers. Our sacred Red Dragon Lady suffers greatly. You must let go of her in all ways, even with your mind. Do you understand?”
“I’ll—I’ll do my best. Shit, how could I have known—”
“—you said that before, too. Just forget you ever knew her. Forget the Fen de Fuqin and all that it has to do with. You were not supposed to know as much as you do. Lei-tao loved you, an emotional wave-form her kind are not allowed. Now you see the trouble it has caused.”
Golden Throat (Cable Denning Mystery Series Book 1) Page 46