Blood is Pretty

by Steven Paul Leiva

  “But they were close. Best friends. Don’t you think a sense of betrayal could have driven York a little mad?”

  “To call Finch up and cuss him out maybe, but to kill him? No, the person who did this to Finch likes to kill. There was no anger, just an odd joy in the way the body parts were dispersed. That could mean some “Charlie Mansonite,” as the Captain put it, but I don’t think so. I think the killer was a professional with the proper tools. Dismembering a body is not an easy task. But I do believe it was calculated to make the police jump to the conclusion that it was some murderous, anti-film cult nut-case. ”

  “Well if York didn’t —?”

  “York didn’t. But it was done because of York and something to do with this damn treatment. A stupid film treatment, I don’t care how good it is, I don’t care if it’s going to be the basis of the first 500 million dollar domestic gross picture, this kind of crime is just not logical in relation to it. Something else—something else is attendant to all of this. And the only one who can tell us what that is, is Craig York. ”

  Chapter 7

  Veritas

  Although it was twilight when we got to the marina in Portland, it was very near dark. It had rained recently. A lot. Only if the still solid covering of deeply gray clouds broke up, would this evening’s full moon bring some illumination to the scene.

  The marina was quiet. The pleasure craft in their slips were dark and deserted as they gently rocked. A dim light from the living area of the Buck’em, though, indicated that York might be there. When we got to the marina gate Roee examined the lock, snorted a lack of respect for its design, and had it opened within seven seconds. We walked down the ramp quietly and along the docking to the houseboat. There were no sounds coming from it. And no sense of movement to it besides that provided by the river itself. We quietly slipped aboard and made our way to York’s living area. We found him on his bunk, on top of the covers, fully clothed, asleep.

  “Sleeping the sleep of the innocent?” Roee asked.

  “Look at his face. His dreams are not pleasant. ”

  On the table besides him was a small, plastic pill bottle. I picked it up and held it under the small lamp on the table. “Sleeping pills. From a local pharmacy. ”

  “Overdose?” I could feel Roee stiffen, preparing himself for action if it was needed.

  “No. It’s a prescription of 25. There’s at least 22-23 in here. He just wanted to be senseless, not dead. ”

  “Should we wake him?”

  “Not yet. Open his computer. See what’s in it of interest. ”

  Roee went to the computer and turned it on. He was immediately disappointed. “Damn!”

  “What is it?”

  “There’s a lock on this. And it’s not a commercial one. It seems to be homemade. Very clever—very goddamn clever. ” He turned from the computer in frustration. “What now?”

  “Let’s take her out. ”

  “What?”

  “When we wake him, I want him to be down the river, floating in black. No lights, no landscape in sight, no reference points. Except this little cocoon of his — and us. ”

  Roee threw off the lines. I started the engine and piloted us out of the marina and headed down river. The houseboat was a dream to handle. It had been exceptionally well crafted. York’s father must have been brilliant at what he loved. I cruised slowly. I was in no hurry. I took her well away from the center of Portland, to just after Elk Rock Island. We dropped anchor. York remained undisturbed. We drew up chairs around his bed and began to talk about nothing in general in fairly loud voices, entering York’s dreams in this way, and confusing them. Soon his eyes opened. He saw us. He would have screamed if his reflexes were not busy drawing in the deep breath of fear.

  “Wa—what are you doing here?” We stared at him. We said nothing. He pushed with his legs to raise himself up the wall behind his bunk, which he then used to sit against.

  “Do—do you want the money back? It—it’s over there—the—the check. I haven’t even cashed it. ”

  “Yes I know. ” I said. “You’ve been too busy flying to L. A. and back. How’s David?”

  His eyes went wide. He jumped off the bunk and ran for the door. We sat, unmoved. He screamed, when he faced the black of the outside.

  “There is nowhere to hide and there is nowhere to run,” I said loud enough for him to hear. “There is only the black night, the cold river, and my friend and I to talk to. ”

  He came back in. His head began a slight back and forth rhythmic movement. His mouth hung slightly open. It was as if he was a machine stuck between functions. “I—I didn’t mean to do it. ”

  “Do what, Craig?”

  “Kill—kill David. ”

  Roee gave me a look. I would have given myself one if it had been possible.

  “You killed David?”

  “We argued. He—he was really mad. Crazy. He—he hit me. Pounded me. It was weird. He wouldn’t stop. But I had to stop him, didn’t I? I—I saw his letter opener. I thought if I waved it at him he would stop. But he just got angrier. Threw himself on me. Lunged at me. We fell against a bookcase. Fell down. I got up. Da—David didn’t. ‘Get up,’ I said. I said, ‘Get up! Get up! Get up!’ But he didn’t. He just lay there on his stomach. But then—then—then he turned around, and the letter opener was in his heart, and he just looked at it, wide-eyed, you know, he couldn’t believe it, I guess, and then he grabbed it and pulled it out, and then, my god, it was like—it was like a fountain!

  Craig stopped talking but the whole scene seemed to still be playing in his head. His breathing was rapid and shallow. “Sit down, Craig,” I said. “ My friend Roee here will make you a cup of coffee. Do you have any food? Are you hungry? I want you to be comfortable, Craig. And then you can talk some more. You’ll want to do that. And Roee and I will be happy to listen. ”

  *

  Roee fixed a fine cup of coffee. They have some very good coffees in the Pacific Northwest. York and I sat on green leather benches in the built-in dinning area, facing each other across a Formica covered tabletop. Roee stood about, hovering like some large bird of sharp claws and tearing beak. York drank his coffee in disturbing big gulps. He asked for a second cup. Roee obliged. Then he began to talk.

  “I—I was angry. David—David shouldn’t have done it. It was screwing everything else up. I—so I had to fly down there and talk to him about it. ”

  “A phone call wouldn’t have sufficed?” I asked.

  “No, no, no, I had—I had—you know, in person. I mean, selling ‘V’ under his own name? Screwing me like that? I mean, we were supposed to be friends. Friends don’t do that. At least that’s the way the world use to be, uh? Anyway, I flew down there and I went to his apartment and I confronted him about it. Why? I asked him. I mean, it was just a simple question: Why?”

  “And what was his answer?”

  “Well, then, he just—he just—well, then he just went nuts. And—and—and started screaming at me at the top of his lungs that I was denying him his opportunity, that he could be the greatest filmmaker that ever was, and ‘V’ was his. Somehow he was really convinced that he had given me the idea for ‘V’ and that—and that it was his ticket, or—or—or something, to proving how—how—how to make a good movie. He started screaming how everybody was screwing it up, how nobody knew how to make movies anymore, like—like the great masters of old, that only he knew how to do it, and that—that all he was trying to do was get the opportunity, that—that—that he would have shared the money with me, but that he had to get that opportunity. ” He stopped and took a quick sip of coffee. “And so he’s screaming how that ‘fucking Hinckley’ wanted to take it away from him, and I wanted to take it away from him, and everybody was working against him and everybody was after him and they were afraid of his talent and they were afraid of what he knew, and—and—and he just kept screaming, and—and then he beat at me, he clasped his hands together and started to beat at me. I thought—I thought he
was going to kill me—I thought he was going to kill me! So I just—like I said—you know, I—I grabbed the opener—and then—God. He was dead. ” York’s eyes went glassy peering well below the top of the table. “God—dead. I’ve known him since we were kids. We—we had done so much together. ”

  “Then what did you do?” York did not answer. “Craig!”

  “Huh? Oh, well, the blood was just, you know, spurting out so I guess I just panicked and I ran. I got back in my rental car and I got back to the airport and I came home. ”

  “Craig, if the blood was spurting out, David was not dead. ”

  “Wh—what?”

  “His heart was still beating. Why didn’t you try to help him? Why didn’t you apply pressure to the wound?”

  I—don’t know—I—don’t know about that stuff. I stabbed him in the heart, he had to be dead!”

  “You did not stab him in the heart, but in an artery. He might have lived if you had helped him. ”

  “No!”

  “Why didn’t you call the police?”

  “Uh—li—like I said, I panicked, I just panicked, so I ran, I just panicked. ”

  “Craig?”

  “What!? I told you. ”

  “Craig?”

  “I panicked, I told you. ”

  He took another sip of coffee. Just as it was passing over his tongue, I screamed: “Craig!” It had its effect. York jumped at the shout, spilling coffee, gagging on what had been in his throat. Once he got over his amazement at being verbally slapped, I continued. “You didn’t call the police. But you did call someone. Who did you call?”

  “I didn’t call anybody! I told you, I ran!”

  “Who did you call!?”

  “I didn’t call anybody!” He poured his eyes into the muddy brown of his creamed coffee.

  “Craig, listen. Listen to every word now. Are you listening?” I snapped my arm out and grabbed his head, clutching on the handle of his left ear. I applied a great deal of pressure as I brought his head up close to mine and forced his eyes to look directly into my own. “Someone came in after you left and mutilated the body of David Finch! Are you listening? They cut off David’s head!”

  “No!”

  “And they cut off David’s arms!”

  “No!”

  “And they separated David’s legs from the trunk of his body. ”

  “No. ”

  “And then they did a lovely mural on the wall of a devil’s head in David’s blood to try to convince the police that David was killed by some cult weirdo—instead of his best friend!” I jerked his head violently on each of these last words, and then threw it back to him. With all the disgust I could convey, I said: “They violated David’s body to protect you

  “No!”

  “Who did you call? Who wants to protect you?”

  “Ah—ah… ” The pain was searing. That was good. “My—my partner. ”

  “Your partner?”

  “My—my investor. ”

  “Your investor?”

  “I—I—yes—I was scared, so I just called this man who—who’s investing in something. ”

  “Who’s investing in something you created with Jim Skinner at Caltech. ”

  “No—no! It’s mine! I mean, it’s—it started with Jim, yeah, but, it’s mainly mine, and—and my investor has given me a lot of money —”

  “And it was your investor who told you to fly down to Los Angeles. You called him and told him of my visit. Of Paul Hinckley. Of what David did. And he told you to fly down to L. A. and take care of David. Why? Why was David Finch important?”

  “Well—well because we—we needed him to do something. ”

  “You needed him to do something with Jim, or to get to Jim, because you and Jim weren’t talking anymore, weren’t getting along, were you?”

  “Yeah, well, you know, David still talked to Jim. ”

  “He was still friends with Jim, and you weren’t, and you needed him to get close to Jim to do something. ”

  “Yeah. ”

  “But then you found out that he had given ‘V’ to Paul Hinckley, maybe to others. And for some reason you, or maybe just your investor, did not want ‘V’ to be seen by anyone. Is that what you meant when you said, ‘It was screwing everything else up’?” York stared at me, offering no answer. “What is ‘everything else’?” And why is ‘V’ so important to it?”

  “Oh—oh, it really has nothing to do with ‘V’. ”

  “Yes it does!” I slammed my hand against his coffee cup, sending it crashing against a porthole. “’V’ has something do to with what you created at Caltech, doesn’t it? ‘V’ reveals what you created at Caltech, and your investor did not want that information out. Right?”

  “Well—well it really just sort of hints. ”

  “It must detail your creation. Or, at least your investor must think so. So he told you to take care of David. Did that mean he wanted you to kill him?”

  “No—no, just talk to him. Get all copies of ‘V’. ”

  “And what about Hinckley?”

  “He—he said he could take care of Hinckley. ”

  “So you went down to L. A. to talk to David, to ask for copies back, to watch him dump the ‘V’ file from his computer. But David went nuts, and David attacked you, and you killed David. ”

  “It was an accident!”

  “It doesn’t matter! You killed him! And then you panicked and you didn’t run, you called your investor, and your investor told you to go back to Portland, and your investor said he would take care of it. ”

  “Yeah—yeah. ”

  “And your investor took care of it by savagely mutilating the dead body of your best friend. ”

  “I didn’t know he was going to do that. I didn’t ask him to do that. ”

  “I don’t doubt you. I’m sure he didn’t need to be asked. But he did it nonetheless. ” York started to cry, trying to hold it in, wanting to let it pour, upsetting the rhythm of his breathing over the conflict. “Who’s your investor, Craig?”

  “I—I don’t—I—I can’t tell you. ”

  “Craig, who’s your investor?”

  “I promised not—not to tell anybody. ”

  “Craig! Your investor mutilated the body of your best friend! Your investor is not a person you need to owe loyalty to! Who is your investor?”

  “I can’t tell you!” York shouted out then buried his head in his folded arms, now more angry than scared—angry at being scared

  “Okay, Craig. I’ll find out. In fact, I’m sure I know who it is. But tell me this. What does V stand for?”

  “Nothing,” he said in a muffled voice. “I mean, really, nothing. It doesn’t stand for anything. ”

  “What does V stand for?”

  He raised his head to plead. “It’s meaningless. Really, it’s meaningless. ”

  “Craig, does V stand for virtual?”

  York started to laugh, an involuntary chuckle sort of laugh that had a history behind it. “That’s what you would think. That’s what they may all think. But no—no—you stupid bastard! V doesn’t stand for virtual—it stands for Veritas!”

  Like the sting of a rebuke, I suddenly knew what he meant. “Of course—”

  Thump!

  You wanted to believe it was some strange knocking, but it wasn’t. It was an explosion, obviously located at the bottom of the boat, in the stern, as the rear of the Buck’em raised up out of the water throwing Roee forward to fall against the computer set-up, and smashing me into the edge of the built-in dining table, knocking the wind out of me as if I had taken the good, solid punch of a heavyweight. York was pushed against the back of his bench as my coffee cup smashed into his chest.

  Thump!

  There was hardly three seconds between the first and second explosions — another underwater explosion, which accounted for the muffled sound of the shock, from the bow this time. York was thrown out of his bench and onto me, which did not make my efforts to recover my breath an
y easier.

  Roee was the first one to get his wits about him.

  “The boat’s sinking!”

  “What? What?” York said as he clamored to get off me.

  “Where are your life jackets?” Roee shouted.

  “In a chest. At the stern. ”

  Roee ran out. I got myself up.

  “Wh—what happened?” York wanted to know, needed to know.

  “Somebody just blew holes in your boat. Unless this area of the river is mined. ”

  “Who would do that?”

  “We’ll go through your Rolodex later. But right now, we’ve got to get off. ”

  Roee ran in with the life jackets, throwing one to each of us. I caught mine and quickly put it on. York let his hit him and fall to the deck. “No, my boat, my dad’s boat. ”

  “Craig put on the jacket, let’s go!”

  “No, the computer!”

  I ran to grab York when the third explosion hit. Not muffled like the first two were, this one was piercingly loud, accompanied by a huge fireball. The engines in the stern were blowing. The boat was suddenly on fire. I grabbed the Bag ‘o Tricks and tossed it at Roee. “Go! I’ll get York. ” Roee was out and gone. I heard a splash. “Come on York!”

  “Wait!” York was at his computer grabbing a stack of gold TDK CD-R recordable compact disks, stuffing them into a bag. “I’ve got to get these. ” I grabbed him, scooped up his life jacket, and dragged him out onto the deck. Although the light of the fire was invading the deep black of the night, I could see nothing but the immediate cold water of the river, which was almost at our level. “Get this on!” I pushed the jacket at him

  “Wait, I’m missing a disk. ” He was staring at the CD-Rs. “I’ve got to get —”

  “Forget it! Grab this! Jump!”

  “No!” He screamed as he broke away from me.

  Then, from out of the dark, a graceful loop of rope fell over him and cinched around his trunk. With a yank from out of nowhere, York flew off the boat. I heard a splash, and could see York, like an inanimate bundle, being dragged across the river.