Shell Game
Page 40
She shook her head. It was not going to happen.
„But, Mallory, you like the edge so much. What’s the worst thing that could happen? A duel? A showdown? Give me the crossbow. If you want to know how the trick is done, it’s going to cost you something – a risk.“
„No way.“
„I’d never hurt you, Mallory. I’ve never lied to you.“
The idea was seductive. Her reflexes were better, faster. And she did not believe that he wanted her dead, but neither was she a practitioner of absolute faith. Training her revolver on his heart, she turned the crossbow upside down and three arrows fell to the floor. Now she held it out to him.
Malakhai accepted the weapon. „But I need the arrows.“ He knelt down on the floor and reached toward them, looking up at her, eyebrows arched to ask, May I?
„Sure,“ she said. „But if you try to cock the crossbow, I’ll kill you.“
„Understood.“ He set down the crossbow and loaded the arrows, slowly dropping them into the slot of the wooden magazine. „Max always stocked three arrows. You wondered about that.“
He stood up, and she raised the muzzle of her revolver to his face. Though she had been trained to fire at the wider target of the chest, aiming at the head was a more deadly reminder that she was prepared to kill him.
Behind her, the music ended, but the chorus boys continued to tap-dance to the screams of Franny Futura. She heard the hiss. And that must be the pendulum slicing through the air. Her finger touched lightly on the revolver’s trigger to feel the cold metal, but no pressure, not yet.
He held the crossbow by the shaft and offered it to her. „Here. The trick is all set up. You only have to cock the bow and shoot me in the heart.“
„Of course,“ she said, clearly meaning, Not a shot in hell. It took two hands to cock the bow, and she would not holster her gun. She took the crossbow in her left hand. Her right hand kept the revolver trained on his face.
„You can do it,“ he said, as though encouraging a child in first steps. „If you want the solution, you’ll have to shoot me to get it.“
Chiming in with Futura’s yelling was the squeal of the microphone feedback. Malakhai looked toward the closed room. „That’s the problem with technical cheats. Now the whole effect is ruined.“ He turned back to her. „Ready for real magic?“ He spread his arms to offer her a clear aim at his chest. „I’m waiting on my arrow, Mallory.“ He smiled so gently. „You can’t do it? Well, in that case, I have some unfinished business to take care of. I never needed your gun for this.“
He was turning when she extended her gun arm. „You move – I shoot you with a bullet. It’s like that.“ But she was not aiming to kill, not willing to become a mechanical prop of Nick Prado.
Malakhai raised one hand to show her a dark metal file. He tossed it in the direction of the open toolbox abandoned by the workman. „I told you I never needed the gun. You should have paid more attention to my shell game. I am sorry about the damage to your revolver, and of course I’ll pay for it.“
Mallory knew what she was going to see before she looked down at the pulled-back hammer. He had filed down the firing pin.
She raised the crossbow as she holstered the gun.
„That’s better,“ he said. „But I don’t think you can shoot me. Well, I’m off. Killing only takes a few seconds when you know how. And I do.“
„Malakhai!“ She cocked the bow, bringing down the lever to pull the string tight. „You know I’ll shoot.“
„Will you, Mallory? In the back? How will you explain that? I’m unarmed.“ He was almost to the door of the back room. „Maybe you’re overconfident in your monsterhood. Personally, I don’t think you have the makings.“
„Stop!“
„Franny’s act is almost done. I have to hurry.“
Mallory didn’t aim to wound him; she picked that place where the shaft would travel into his back and rupture his heart. She squeezed the crossbow trigger. The bowstring released with a twang, and in that same instant, he whirled around. His hand flashed out and caught the arrow in midair.
Impossible.
She knew the velocity of the arrow. He could not have done that, yet there was an arrow in his hand.
„Apparently I misjudged you.“ He came strolling back to her, smiling, taking his own time. „Sorry. No hard feelings?“
„You palmed that arrow.“ She looked down into the magazine. A misfire? She cocked it again and raised the sights to his chest.
He kept coming. „It won’t work this time either.“ He was closing the gap between them. Futura was still shouting for help from his little room.
She fired the weapon at his chest. The string released, but the arrow did not fly. „You jammed the magazine? That’s not the way – “
„Just the way Max did it. Felt a slight kick though, didn’t you? Oh, I see the confusion. How could the arrows fly for the dummy, then jam for the human target? Well, you’re really going to hate this part.“
He held up the arrow and twisted the metal tip. It screwed up and down on the shaft. „This elongates the arrow. Only the first one drops straight into the bed – that’s for the test shot on the dummy. When you load the second arrow, the long one, its tip digs into the wood of the magazine as you press down on the other end. And the third arrow? That kept the audience from seeing that the second arrow never fired.“
„But cops loaded the magazines in both – “
„Not when Max did the routine. The policemen only handed him the arrows, all identical, all the same length. He loaded them. Oliver and Charles got that part backward. So as Max loaded the second crossbow, he twisted the tip.“
He put the arrow into her demanding outstretched hand.
„So that’s all there was to it? Max rigged a crossbow?“
„Oh, no,“ said Malakhai. „He rigged two bows. Now Charles’s solution was good, but when Max did the illusion, the effect was brilliant, electrifying. He evaded the first two shots, and the tension was unbearable while he struggled with the handcuffs. Then he broke the post, and the audience screamed – they howled. The crossbow fired – then the arrow was in his hand, caught in midair to thunderous applause. And the last shot? It appeared that his timing was off, that he had failed to catch the last arrow before it pierced his heart. Max died there on the target. When he came back from the dead to pull the arrow out of his own heart, a man in the front row fainted.“
„So he had two arrows hidden in his jacket.“
„Right. It was a thrilling effect.“
„But the jammed arrow could’ve been dislodged by the kick when the first arrow fired.“
„That actually did happen in a rehearsal with the dummy. It was always a possibility. When I saw Max take the arrow in his heart that night, I wasn’t sure. Only someone as tall as Charles could’ve avoided the fatal arrow. Even with one free hand, Max didn’t have that much room to maneuver. Still, Charles risked his life. You don’t see that kind of courage every day. That’s why Max’s routines were never stolen.“
Malakhai smiled as he watched her use an arrow to push the jammed one into the shaft, still determined to shoot him.
Behind her the music began to play again.
„And now, the best for last.“ He tugged on his shirt cuffs and showed her his empty sleeves. Then he held up two closed fists for her inspection.
His fingers slowly uncurled, and Mallory heard the distant scream of real pain coming from two directions at once, the stage and the back room. She listened to the audience reaction, the great white static of a hundred whispers all seeking reassurance in the dark. The screaming grew louder as his hands opened wider, as if Malakhai were working the other man’s pain like a ventriloquist.
She turned to the stage where the pendulum was swinging in a wide arc between the glass boxes. The edge of the crescent razor was stained red. „Max Candle didn’t use blood in the act.“
„No, Mallory. Neither did Franny.“
„Not a microphone
in the box.“
„Oh, yes there is – but so is Franny.“ He caught up one of her hands as she was rushing the stage. When he swung her back to his side, the crossbow clattered to the floor. „It’s the sound equipment you hear in the back room. Nothing to cheat you and disappoint you – not this time. It’s all quite real.“
She tried to pull away. Her leg was rising and she needed space for the groin shot. He wrenched her wrist sharply, and she was wrapped in his arms.
„The pendulum won’t stop for you, Mallory.“ He spoke so softly, so reasonably – this from a killer. It was the voice of reason that chilled her, as if he could believe that this was a sane act.
„It’s not a device you can switch off,“ he said. „It has to play out the movements of the gears. That machine doesn’t care if you’re a cop.“
She tried to break Malakhai’s hold, writhing in his grasp until she faced the stage. He held her closer – like a lover, like a jailor, imprisoning her hands in his, arms binding her tighter than ropes.
Futura’s pain was a continuous shriek. Malakhai’s voice was at her ear. „You wanted to know what I did in the war? Then watch.“
„No! Stop it!“ She called out to the dancing boys, „Move the coffin out of the way!“ Mallory’s shouts mingled with Futura’s screams. The assistants faced the audience as they danced at the edge of the stage, ignoring cries for help, and the music played on. Her heart was banging in a sympathetic rhythm with Futura’s terror, his bleating and his bleeding.
And Malakhai was whispering, „Rare justice, Mallory. For Louisa, for Oliver.“
The pendulum was splattering the stage with blood, drops of it landing on the costumes of the dancing boys. Their backs were turned on the coffin as they kicked their feet in unison.
Malakhai tightened his embrace. „See those people at the back?“ Two shadowy forms were rising in the dim light of the audience. „Those men are coming to save Franny. They’ll be too late, of course, but they’re coming. Only two of them. Look at the rest.“
A lone woman’s scream rose above the sound of shrieking pain in the coffin.
„Mallory, think of Oliver Tree – all those arrows. He was your Oliver, too, wasn’t he? You always called him by his first name.“
Blood splattered the edge of the stage. The pendulum swung in a wider arc, and red drops hit the dresses of two women in the front row. Only one woman was screaming as loud as Franny Futura and with the same pain. The rest of the audience sat in stunned silence, except for the two men who had made their way to the center aisle. Now they raced toward the stage.
„Only two rescuers,“ said Malakhai.
There were spots of blood on a woman’s dress in the second row. The pendulum swung out again, red and wet. And now a man in the front row had a trickle of blood streaming down his face, as did the man next to him. The two rescuers were climbing onto the stage.
„Mallory, look at the people in the front rows. They know it’s gone wrong – never doubt that. They know Franny’s dying, and they can’t take their eyes away. Now this is theater – a small window on World War II, the way it really was. A leftover minute of horror.“
The two rescuers could not reach the coffin. They were surrounded by flapping red capes in a tight formation of tap-dancing chorus boys. Blood pooled beneath the table.
One desperate woman’s scream harmonized with shrieks from the glass coffin, echoes from the back room, and a shrill electronic squeal of sound equipment.
And then the screaming stopped – Mallory’s and Franny’s.
The pendulum continued to swing in silence, to cut the flesh and break the bones, not knowing or caring that the man was dead. The blood was lessening, trickling only, with no more coming to fuel the spillage.
The dead did not bleed.
Malakhai released her. „And now you’ve been to war, Mallory. Wasn’t it sublime?“
The music ended, the dancing stopped – all silent now as the caped chorus boys and the two men in suits slowly approached the coffin.
Mallory sank down to the floor. Though spent and drained, she would not let go of the rage. She beat one clenched hand on the floorboards until the pain flooded her eyes with tears.
Malakhai knelt down beside her, and Mallory turned her face away to hide it.
„You’re a fraud.“ He caressed her hair gently. „You have more compassion than those people out there with blood on their faces – the ones who only watched.“
She shot out one fist.
He was faster, catching her balled hand and engulfing it in his own. „Of course, you did try to kill me. No one can ever take that away from you. And I do think you’re ruthless – if that’s a consolation.“ He stood up slowly, releasing the uncurling fingers of her fist, which had lost its power. „But, Mallory, we can’t all be monsters. As I said – you don’t have the makings.“
Head bowed, she drew up her legs very close to her body and listened to his footsteps leaving her, then the closing of a door. Over the babble of the audience, she heard the sirens wailing on Broadway, coming closer by the second, louder now, almost there. Mallory closed her eyes and hugged her knees, rocking, rocking, shell-shocked and wounded by her minute in the war.
Chapter 22
Even at this distance from the stage, the air was dank and clammy – all that blood. And there was a stink of defecation and the dead man’s dinner, undigested before he was cut in two.
Detective Riker had arrived to find Mallory leaning into the glass coffin. She had allowed him to wash the blood off her hands, but pushed him away when he made a mess of her cashmere blazer, smearing and spreading the red stains with wet paper towels.
Now she sat at a desk near the stage door. A lamp cast her rigid shadow on a nearby wall of message boxes. She seemed unaware of the odors and the heavy traffic of patrolmen and detectives, the medical examiner’s investigators and the district attorney’s man. Her eyes were blind to everything in the immediate world.
Riker knew she was replaying Franny Futura’s death in her mind, repeating the images over and over, hunting for the imperfections in her work.
And that must stop.
He accepted a paper cup from a stagehand and gave the man five dollars for his trouble. Mallory eyed the container with mild suspicion, and Riker took that as a sign that she was feeling more herself.
He placed the cup in her hand. „It’s water.“
She took one sip. „It’s not.“
„Oh, that’s the booze you’re tasting. But there’s water in there, too. Drink it all down, kid. You need the vitamins.“ Riker thought she might also need a blood transfusion. He glanced toward the stage where two men were lifting the body from the coffin. When he turned back to his partner, her paper cup was drained, and she was crumpling it in a tight fist. Another good sign.
„They suckered me, Riker.“
This was true, and they would probably get away with it, but he would never throw that up to her. He pulled out his notebook. „The first cop on the scene took statements from the old guy’s assistants. They all thought the voice in the coffin was a microphone.“
She nodded. „A two-way feed. The sound equipment is in the back room. It worked like an intercom with a stuck button.“
„These magicians all swear they saw Futura leave the coffin before the pendulum dropped. How could – “
„They’re not magicians,“ said Mallory. „Just a pack of chorus boys. What they saw was a man in a red cape. That was Malakhai. He ducked under the coffin drapes and came out again on cue. The boys were so busy dancing their little brains out, none of them noticed that Malakhai was taller.“ Her face lifted, and she was staring at the suspension bridge overhead. „I would’ve caught that if I hadn’t been up there on the catwalk.“
„Don’t beat yourself up.“ He held out a copy of Faustine’s rod with a single key plug screwed into the end. „Look familiar? We found this near the body. It looks like Futura dropped it before he could unlock his cuffs.“
„So then Malakhai plan ted a key? Pretty slick. We’ll never prove murder.“
„I never saw Malakhai go on stage, never saw him duck under the table. Prado’s job was misdirection. If I can’t nail him for Oliver’s murder, I’ll get him on conspiracy for this one.“
„I don’t think so, kid. Malakhai did the hands-on murder. There’s nothing to tie Prado to conspiracy.“ Riker pulled up a wooden chair next to hers and straddled it, resting his folded arms across the back. „We can’t even make a case for motive.“
„I should’ve shot Malakhai on sight,“ said Mallory. „And I knew that. Another mistake.“
Riker looked over his shoulder to see Jack Coffey walking toward them with a damp raincoat slung over his shoulder. Had the lieutenant heard that last remark?
Coffey stopped in front of the desk. He wore his bad-news face as he looked down at Mallory. „I just finished with Prado. He claims you contributed to the accidental death of Futura. He says you actually prevented him from assisting the – “
„Prado engineered that homicide,“ said Mallory. „The act didn’t need any help. It worked just fine. Franny Futura is really, really dead.“
Riker put one hand on her shoulder to keep her from leaving the chair. „Easy, kid. Nobody believes it’s an accident. But Prado just killed the case. The newspapers will say it was your fault. Then they’ll crucify the whole department.“
Coffey sat on the edge of the desk. „Prado says he isn’t going to put that version in his formal statement. When he told me that, it had the smell of a deal. I’m taking your side on this, Mallory, but we can’t arrest either one of them. They both walk away.“
Mallory’s voice was too calm. „Did you take a close look at what they did? That didn’t make you sick?“
Riker was staring at her hands, folded tightly over one another to hide the slight tremor. This was not a symptom of frayed nerves, but a warning sign that she was close to losing her temper, her judgment and her job. She was containing the anger, but how long would that last?