"Modred, look," said Kira.
She pointed at the ring on Billy's hand. The fire opal runestone was glowing softly.
The broom came out onto the balcony. "Breakfast is ready and there's a call for you," it said to Modred. "Person to person, from Paris, France, no less. I guess they don't believe in sleeping, either."
"Broom, has it ever occurred to you that you don't need to sleep?" said Merlin.
"Oh, sure, I should just do housework around the clock, right?" said the broom. "I should stay up all night and catch the roaches when they all come out. Maybe I should take the opportunity of all the peace and quiet to scrub the kitchen floor? Or you want maybe I should give the whole apartment a brand new coat of paint? Baking, maybe? I should stay up all night and bake that tasteless Irish soda bread you like so much? Or maybe I can—"
"Never mind, Broom," Merlin said wearily. "If you want to sleep, then by all means sleep, however it is you manage to do it."
"With you people staying up until all hours and phone calls from Paris in the middle of the night, I don't manage to do it," said the broom. "If you wanted to be useful, you'd make with the hocus-pocus and give me a soundproof broom closet. Maybe then I'll get some rest! Now are you coming in to breakfast or you want to wait until the toast gets cold and the maple syrup sets up?"
"We're coming in to breakfast, Broom," said Modred, coming back out onto the balcony. "And then we've got to pack. We're going to Paris."
"What, now?" the broom said. "In the middle of the night?"
"That was Jacqueline," said Modred. "There's been a murder in the Rue Morgue. And the victim had necromantic runes carved into her body. The same pattern we've seen before, in Whitechapel and Los Angeles."
"The Dark Ones," Wyrdrune said.
"It begins again," said Merlin.
Chapter
THREE
Suzanne Muset was in no mood to go to work. Fortunately, her employer at the Cafe Noir was an understanding man. He had read about the murder in the papers and before Suzanne had even asked, he told her to take as much time off as she felt was necessary and said that if there was anything that he could do, she had only to ask. He even offered to help with the funeral expenses. Suzanne's roommate, Gabrielle, had offered to remain with her, but Suzanne had insisted that she would be all right. After all, they both had bills to pay and she could not depend on their employer's charity. It was kind of him, but it simply wasn't right. She needed to return to work herself, but not just yet. She needed some time alone.
It had not been easy for Gabrielle, either. They had both found Joelle's body together. She would never forget that terrible sight. Joelle lying nude in a pool of her own blood, her young, innocent body horribly mutilated. They had both become hysterical and if it wasn't for Mr. Rienzi, who lived across the hall, Suzanne didn't know what they would have done. He had responded to their terrified screams and he immediately took control. He quickly ushered them both out of the room, into his apartment, and he had done his best to try to calm them down, talking to them and giving them strong brandy, before he summoned the police. He would not allow them to go back into their apartment, insisting that they stay overnight with him. He even gave them his bedroom while he slept on the couch.
Suzanne would be forever grateful to him. It was ironic. Until that night, they had never really known each other. They had said polite hellos when they passed each other in the hallway or met in the market, but they had never really talked. All she knew about Stefan Rienzi was that he was a struggling writer who lived by himself and kept late hours. He was working on a book. He was not a bad-looking man at all and she guessed that he was in his thirties, but he seemed very self-contained and shy. He was soft-spoken and hesitant in his manner and she and Gabrielle had often joked about him. Gabrielle had flirted with him outrageously and it always seemed to embarrass him. They wondered if perhaps he didn't like girls. He had seemed like one of those gray little men who went through life making as little noise as possible, taking pains to remain inconspicuous, like a mouse hiding in its hole. But after the night of Joelle's murder, Suzanne's opinion of Stefan Rienzi changed completely.
He had taken complete control of the situation, hovering over them while the policemen asked their questions, making sure they were all right. He had simply taken care of everything. After the body was removed and the police had gone away, he stayed up with them, trying to give them comfort. And when they finally dropped off to sleep, utterly exhausted and drained by their ordeal, he had gone out to an all-night market and bought groceries and toilet articles for the two of them. He knew that the apartment would be sealed for at least another day or two until the forensics investigators could complete their work. He had even offered to move out temporarily, so that they could use his apartment in privacy.
Gabrielle, always the more decisive of the two, had insisted that they couldn't put him out, that he had already done more than enough. Suzanne couldn't bear the thought of going back to their own apartment, not even for a moment. Gabrielle took it upon herself to find other lodgings for them. One of the girls at work knew of an inexpensive apartment for rent in the building where she lived and Gabrielle had gone to make the arrangements. Stefan offered to help them move as soon as the new apartment was ready. Suzanne felt guilty that she wasn't doing her part, but after the initial shock of Joelle's death wore off, she had simply become numb.
She blamed herself. She should have kept more careful watch over her sister. Joelle had always been too impulsive, too impatient, too anxious to grow up. She had wanted to be just like her older sister, a dancer in a chorus line, but Suzanne wanted something better for Joelle than dancing naked in a nightclub. Since their parents died when Joelle was only nine, Suzanne had raised her, but as Joelle got older, she grew more difficult. She became more willful and independent. Much like me, Suzanne thought. She had her own circle of friends and she had started going out with older men and there had been nothing that Suzanne could do to stop it. She had to work and she could not watch her all the time. And now she was dead.
At least they had caught the brute that did it. Max Siegal, the famous painter. Suzanne trembled when she thought of him. Why? Why had he done it? A man who could have any woman that he wished. He must have gone insane. No sane man could have done what he had done. When Joelle had told her that Siegal had asked her to model for him, Suzanne had been against it, but she had known that if she had forbidden her, Joelle would have done it just the same. Besides, Max Siegal was a very famous and well-respected man. He often came to the club and her boss had told her that most of the stories about Max Siegal were wildly exaggerated. He was an artist, temperamental and a bit eccentric, but he was not the sort of man to take undue advantage. He said that if Joelle posed for him, it could lead to bigger things, perhaps even a contract with a modeling agency. Maybe that was why her boss was going out of his way to try to help her now. He felt guilty for reassuring her about Max Siegal. But how could he have known? How could anyone have known? What could have possessed the man to do such an awful thing?
There was a knock at the door and she got up to answer it, thinking it was Stefan returning from the store. She opened it and came face-to-face with Max Siegal.
"Suzanne Muset?" he said.
She gasped and brought her hand up to her mouth, involuntarily taking two steps backward. "Oh, my God! It's you!"
"Please, I need to speak with you,", said Max, coming into the apartment. "I just came to tell you how sorry I am about—"
"What are you doing here?" she cried. "How did you get out of jail?"
"Suzanne, let me explain. I didn't—"
She screamed. "Get out! Get out of here! Murderer! You killed my sister!"
"Please, you don't understand, I didn't—"
She screamed hysterically and ran into the kitchen, looking for a knife, something with which to defend herself. He followed her. She yanked open a drawer and pulled out a large carving knife, holding it before her.
"Get away from me! Get away!"
Max held up his hands. "Take it easy," he said. "I'm not going to hurt you. I understand how you must feel, but—"
Suzanne screamed and lunged at him with the knife. He caught her hand and they struggled, Suzanne screaming hysterically and kicking at him, but he managed to wrest the knife out of her grasp and shove her away. And then Stefan was mere suddenly, spinning Max around and punching him. The knife fell from Max's hand as he tried to defend himself,
but Stefan kept hitting him and Max had no choice but to fight back. His size was an advantage. He blocked the slightly built writer's blow and struck him in the mouth, then again in the stomach, winding him. He hit him once more in the face, dropping him to the floor.
Suzanne scrambled for the knife, grabbing it and crouching protectively over Stefan. "Get out!" she screamed, sobbing. "Murderer! Get out!"
Max backed away helplessly. "I'm sorry," he said, wiping the blood from his mouth. "I didn't mean. . . I'm sorry. . . ."
"GET OUT!"
He turned and ran out of the apartment. Suzanne dropped the knife and bent down over Stefan, sobbing. He groaned.
"Oh, Stefan, Stefan," she sobbed, kissing him. "Stefan, darling, are you all right?"
"Call the police," said Stefan.
To Merlin, the flight to Paris seemed much longer than it was because of the in-flight movie. While the plane winged its way silently across the Atlantic Ocean without benefit of engines, levitated and impelled by the sorcerer-pilots in the cockpit, the passengers were treated to a showing of the recent film, Ambrosius! Produced by Ron Rydell, who had made a fortune with his lurid series of Necromancer films, Ambrosius! was supposed to be Rydell's first effort at serious, big-budget moviemaking, based upon the life of "The Father of the Second Thaumaturgic Age, the Legendary Archmage, Merlin Ambrosius!" For Merlin, watching it was an excruciatingly painful experience.
The title role was played by that hammy, golden-throated British actor, Burton Clive, who never delivered a line so much as he declaimed it. He played Merlin in a broad, Shakespearian manner, all expressive eyebrows and elaborate gestures, with his eyes bulging and his nostrils flaring and his theatrical voice dramatically rising up and down the scale. It was like watching a man on the verge of an epileptic fit. Sex symbol Jessica Blaine simpered her way through the part of Guinevere, dressed in outrageously revealing costumes and heaving her bosoms with every breathy line. Lancelot was portrayed by action movie star Reese Richards, who took every opportunity to bare his chest and flexed even through the love scenes. The fact that the real Lancelot was rather homely and built like a fireplug didn't seem to matter in the least. Arthur was underplayed by veteran character actor Cleeve McCain, who mumbled all his lines and whose facial expressions seemed limited to a tic at the corner of his mouth and a squint. And Morgan Le Fay was played by Rydell's new discovery, a fashion model named Heather Hyatt, who was decked out for the occasion in skin-tight black leather and spike-heeled boots. And as if all that weren't bad enough, they'd-made the film a musical, with the action stopping every fifteen minutes or so for someone to turn to the camera and break into song about "the shining glory, Camelot," or "the dreadful passion of our love."
Merlin suffered through the first half hour of the film, then decided to magically bum up the print in the projector, but Billy, who was enjoying the movie, prevented him and the two of them sat there, squirming, arguing like two movie critics trapped in the same body, much to the amusement of Modred and the others and the irritation of the nearby passengers.
"If he calls that ridiculous talking owl 'my faithful Archimedes' one more time, I'm going to blast that screen into oblivion!" said Merlin.
"You won't, either," Billy said. "I like the owl."
"I'm not surprised," said Merlin. "He's giving a better performance than anyone else in this disaster."
"'Ey, come on, it's not so bad," said Billy.
"Not so bad? It's a bloody horror!"
"It works for me," said Billy.
"That electronic cacophony you call music works for you," said Merlin. "You have the taste of a barbarian bogtrotter. I'm going to sue Rydell for defamation of character!"
"Now 'ow the 'ell can you sue someone when yer dead, eh?"
"He's got you there," said Modred, chuckling.
"I fail to see what you find so amusing," Merlin grumbled. "Look at the moron they've got playing you!"
The part of Modred had been reduced to a minor supporting role, played by the popular rock star, David Stone, complete with feathered, dyed blond hair and earring.
"I'll admit the earring is a bit much," said Modred, "but he does bring a certain feral energy to the part that's not entirely out of character, though personally, I could never hit such high notes. If I tried to sing like that, I'd hurt myself."
"I suppose you think it's funny," Merlin said.
"No more so than all the other books and films they've based upon us," Modred said. "At least Clive is merely overacting. Hyatt's playing my mother like some sort of lesbian stormtrooper. I particularly liked the bondage seduction scene where I was conceived. Under the circumstances, I'm amazed that Arthur could even get it up with her."
"That's disgusting," Merlin said.
"Oh, I don't know, I found it erotic, in a kinky sort of way," said Kira.
"You're all degenerates," said Merlin.
"Oh, sod off," said Billy.
The movie ended with the climactic confrontation between Arthur and Modred, in which both died, and in the final scene, the offscreen voice of Burton Clive talked his way through a song in the manner of stage actors who cannot really sing, intoning portentously about how "one day the magic will return, when souls cry out and cities burn" while the camera slowly zoomed in on a majestic tree growing up out of a rock promontory.
"I give it one and a half stars," said Wyrdrune.
"I hear they're already talking about a sequel," Kira said with a smirk. "Ambrosius 2—The Second Coming."
"Perhaps they should call it Ambrosius, Out Of His Tree," said Modred.
"That's it!" said Merlin. "I've had enough. I'm going to sleep. Wake me when we get to Paris."
Jacqueline met them when they landed at the Charles De Gaulle airport. As usual, they traveled light, with only one small suitcase for each of them. With Modred's vast resources, built up over the centuries, they could easily buy anything they needed and Modred always insisted on staying in the very best hotels. He had booked rooms for them at Le Ritz, on the Place Vendome, a luxury hotel dating back to the nineteenth century. In the pre-Collapse days, royalty and the cream of the upper crust had stayed at the Ritz, which boasted accommodations and service so refined that the word "ritzy" had become part of the language. The hotel was actually two town houses joined together, with courtyards and gardens on the grounds. The rooms were elegantly furnished with antique, bronze-trimmed chests, marble baths and crystal chandeliers. The lobby boasted Louis XVI antiques and tapestries. The hotel had undergone some damage during the street riots of the Collapse, but it had been extensively refurbished and as much of the original decor and furnishings as possible had been painstakingly restored.
They were delivered to the front entrance by a chauffeured limo. Jacqueline brought them up-to-date en route. They were conducted to their rooms and while they unpacked, Jacqueline telephoned Inspector Renaud, to see if he'd made any progress with his inquiries. Unfortunately, he hadn't. Even worse, there had been a second murder and Max had been arrested once again, this time to be held without bail.
"What do you mean, he's been arrested again?" Jacqueline said while the others listened. "I thought he was in jail all this time!"
"Regrettably, mademoiselle, Max Siegal has many friends," Renaud replied wryly. "A collection was apparently taken up to meet his bail and he was released shortly after we last spoke. And he promptly committed another murder."
"No," said Jacqueline. "That's impossible. There must be some mistake."
; "I am afraid not, mademoiselle," Renaud told her. "He returned to the scene of the crime and killed again."
"I don't believe it," Jacqueline said. "What proof do you have?"
"After he was released from jail," said Renaud, his tone very curt and official, "he made his way back to the Rue Morgue. He went back to the apartment where Joelle Muset had stayed with her sister, Suzanne, and her roommate, Gabrielle Longet. He found the apartment vacant, but the two girls were staying temporarily with a neighbor in the apartment across the hall. He apparently discovered that fact and forced his way in. We have witnesses this time. Stefan Rienzi, who was renting the apartment, came home to find Siegal assaulting Suzanne Muset with a knife. They fought and Rienzi managed to get the knife away from him, but he was injured in the struggle, sustaining a slight concussion and a broken nose. Suzanne Muset called the police, but by the time they arrived, Siegal had fled. A warrant was immediately issued for his arrest. However, before he could be apprehended, he returned to finish the job, while Rienzi was getting treatment at the hospital. Suzanne had accompanied Rienzi to the hospital, but Siegal found her roommate, Gabrielle Longet, alone at the apartment and he killed her. The method of the murder was identical to that of Joelle Muset.'"
"I simply can't believe it," Jacqueline said, stunned. "There must be some other explanation."
"I am afraid not, mademoiselle," Renaud said stiffly. "After our discussion, I was tempted to give your friend the benefit of the doubt, but now that is no longer possible. Another innocent girl has died and the newspapers are blaming us for releasing Siegal from custody. This time, he will remain in jail, where he belongs, until his trial and execution."
"Listen to me, Renaud," Jacqueline said, "I know you think that Max is guilty, but I assure you, he did not commit those murders, no matter what it looks like. You have to make those calls—"
"I am sorry, mademoiselle," Renaud cut her off, "but I have already listened to you long enough. I will not be a party to some scheme to get a demented killer back on the streets of Paris once again. Good day to you."
[Wizard of 4th Street 04] - The Wizard of Rue Morgue Page 5