DC Comics novels--Batman

by Greg Cox

  “I see only the work, not the woman,” he concluded.

  Was he protesting too much?

  “Say no more.” Alan held up his hand to curb Percy’s strenuous denials. “It’s none of my affair. Forget I said anything.” He contemplated the empty flute in his hand. “I suspect we’ve both partaken more than was entirely prudent.” His eyes widened as he looked past Percy. Chagrin flickered briefly across his wizened features. “Speak of the devil,” he muttered, then added, “No offense.”

  Percy turned to see his wife making her way toward them. She was a handsome woman, sturdy and statuesque, whose patrician features were too often—in Percy’s opinion—marred by a severe expression that betrayed her harsh, unyielding nature. A silk gown, imported from Paris, flattered her figure while her auburn hair was neatly contained in a stylish chignon. She moved imperiously through the garden, fully expecting the other guests to make way for her, as indeed they did.

  She was accustomed to getting her way.

  “There you are!” she said to him. “I was wondering where you’d wandered off to this time.” She politely acknowledged their host. “A lovely party, Alan. I must thank you again for the invitation.”

  “You’re quite welcome,” he replied. “One can hardly unveil the art without artist… and his enchanting better half, of course.” Wayne glanced around. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I must check with the caterers to see about another round of hors d’œuvres. A host’s duties are never done, don’t you know.” Deftly making his escape, he left Percy with Margaret.

  Her courteous façade fell away.

  “Seriously, Percy, is it too much to ask for my husband not to slip away from me every chance he gets? Must I place a leash on you, simply to keep you at my side?” Percy knew she would do so, too, if she thought she could get away with it.

  “My apologies, Margaret,” he replied. “You appeared happily engaged with the other guests, so I assumed you would not mind my absence—in fact, I did not expect you to even notice. I wished only to remove myself from the hubbub for a spell.”

  “Appearances concern me,” she said tersely. “A husband escorts his wife at public functions. It is the expected thing.” She turned a scornful eye toward the sculpture in the fountain. “I should have known I’d find you here, captivated by your own creation. One would think you would have seen enough of this marble strumpet, after all those days toiling away at your squalid little studio.”

  Alan’s warning echoed in Percy’s ears.

  He had to choose his words carefully.

  “You must forgive me, my dear,” he answered. “An artist’s vanity.”

  “Which you have indulged quite enough today.” She took him firmly by the arm. “Now then, the Elliots are dying to speak with you, as are the Cobblepots. Speaking of which, the latter have invited us to bridge on Thursday. I told them we would be delighted.”

  Percy groaned inwardly at the prospect of another tiresome evening playing cards with Margaret’s society friends. He pined for his studio… and Lydia.

  “Must we? Can’t we get out of it, somehow?”

  “Really, Percy.” She gave him a withering look. “You could at least pretend to be sociable.”

  “You know how little patience I have for idle hobnobbing,” he protested. “Left to my own devices, I prefer to occupy myself with my work.”

  “And your muse?”

  He froze, caught off guard by the insinuation.

  “I… I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Oh, please, Percy,” she said. “Do you think me a fool? At least do me the courtesy of not insulting my intelligence.” She led him toward a secluded arbor.

  The jig is up, he realized. There was no point in denying it.

  “I don’t know what to say, Margaret.”

  “Then hold your tongue before you embarrass yourself further.” Stopping out of sight of the rest of the crowd, she fixed him with a basilisk stare. “Let me make myself perfectly clear. I have no inclination to play the wounded spouse. If you must dally with some immodest odalisque—if she satisfies your animal urges, clearing your mind to focus on more vital tasks—please don’t refrain on my account. Far be it from me to come between an artist and his muse.” Her voice was cold as ice as she released his arm. “But for God’s sake, Percy, be discreet about it… and don’t abandon me in public to go mooning over her likeness. I expect you at least to play the dutiful husband. I have my pride.”

  Chastened, he tried to offer an explanation. “Margaret, you must understand. It was never my habit to ‘dally’ with my models—”

  “Spare me your feeble excuses,” she said. “It serves me right for marrying an artist, albeit one of suitable pedigree. The union of our families has benefited us both, even if you fail to appreciate it.”

  It was true that their marriage had been more of a merger than a love match. They had made a good fit on paper, if not in practice. He sighed wearily.

  “What do you want from me, Margaret?”

  “At present?” she responded. “You are going to take my arm, we are going to socialize with our peers, and you are going to do your level best to appear as though you couldn’t be happier spending time in my company. Then, come Thursday, we will join the Cobblepots for bridge.”

  “Very well, my dear. If you insist.” Under the circumstances, Percy judged that a small price to pay.

  “I do insist,” she stated. “And lest you forget, we have a rather more important engagement the following Monday.”

  Percy felt a chill come over him. “To be honest,” he said, “I was thinking of perhaps skipping that meeting. I’m not certain my presence is truly required.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” she said coldly. “The Court of Owls demands your attendance.”

  It was a bad day for busking.

  Strumming his guitar outside the downtown farmer’s market, Zeke glanced at the cloudy gray sky, which was threatening rain. A fair number of people still came and went, milling in the public square at the south end of the market, but the chilly, overcast afternoon had definitely cut into the turnout. Even the folks who were out and about seemed disinclined to pause to listen to him play, let alone pay for the privilege.

  Zeke had snagged a prime spot at the base of a large marble statue of Abundance, depicted as a graceful maiden wearing Grecian robes, bearing a cornucopia that overflowed with fruit and grains. He had done well in this spot before, but today the overturned hat lying at his feet held only a handful of singles and some loose change. When a raindrop bounced off his cheek and a light drizzle began to fall, Zeke considered calling it a day.

  “Help me somebody, please! I’m burning up!”

  What appeared to be a distraught homeless man staggered into the plaza, shouting wildly. He tore at his rumpled, threadbare clothing as anxious shoppers and pedestrians scurried out of his way. His frantic cries were hoarse and barely coherent.

  “Oh my lord, it feels like fire! Fire in my head!”

  Zeke’s first response was to roll his eyes. This was hardly the first time he’d found himself competing with the mentally damaged, vying for the crowd’s attention. Just the other day, a crazed doomsday preacher had shouted himself silly for hours while jaded Gothamites did their best to ignore him. Another day, another crazy.

  “Please, somebody, please!”

  Hang on, Zeke thought, growing concerned. Looking closer, the young musician saw that the homeless stranger looked to be in pretty bad shape. Bloodshot eyes bulged from their sockets. A grizzled face was flushed and slick with perspiration. Despite the damp autumn air, the man was sweating as if it was ninety-plus degrees out. His lips were cracked. He reeled unsteadily.

  “Fire in my brain, in my blood—!”

  The man lunged at a wary onlooker, snatching a plastic water bottle from her grip. Zeke expected him to gulp the water down, but instead he poured the contents of the bottle over his head, dousing himself. Zeke gaped in shock as steam rose from the hom
eless man’s head and shoulders.

  How was that even possible?

  Bulging veins throbbed beneath flesh the color of a boiling lobster. An agonized shriek erupted from the man’s throat.

  Screams erupted from the crowd as he burst into flames.

  * * *

  “Joseph—‘Joe’—Bava.” Gordon identified the latest victim, addressing Batman via the morgue camera. “A few arrests for vagrancy. In and out of various mental-health facilities. A history of substance abuse. A sad story, but not an unusual one… until he spontaneously combusted in front of dozens of eyewitnesses at…” He checked the report. “Two-seventeen this afternoon in the farmer’s market.”

  Day two, and the body count had doubled. Frustrated, Bruce pressed weights in the cave as they conferred. Working out did little to relieve the sense that he wasn’t solving this case fast enough.

  “Same autopsy results as before?”

  “Aside from no punctures this time?” Gordon said. “Pretty much. The poor bastard was baked from the inside out.”

  Behind him, the charred remains of the newest victim were visible on the autopsy table. The blackened cadaver was almost indistinguishable from the professor’s, including the severe damage to the cranium. Bruce would need to test a tissue sample to confirm the presence of electrum, but he already knew what the result of that analysis would be. Bava had suffered the same fate as Morse.

  But why?

  What connection did a homeless street person have to Morse or Joanna Lee or the Court of Owls? Or, for that matter, to the disappearance of a model named Lydia, decades ago? In his mind Bruce was assembling a puzzle, and Bava’s fiery demise didn’t fit into it, which could only mean he still wasn’t seeing the whole picture.

  “Anything to connect Bava with the Court’s other targets?”

  “Not that we’ve been able to determine,” the cop replied. “You?”

  Bruce put down the weights. “Let me work on that.”

  Fortunately, he knew just who to ask.

  “This is fascinating,” Barbara Gordon said.

  The police commissioner’s daughter operated out of the Watchtower, a penthouse looming over the Old Gotham historic district. Covert contributions from the Wayne family fortune had equipped the facility with a state-of-the-art security system, as well as an advanced computer station that rivaled the nerve center back at the Batcave.

  The backside of a gargantuan clock face, built into the ancient red-brick walls of the tower, contrasted with the high-tech gear that filled the space. Century-old newspaper clippings, sepia-toned photographs, and archival legal records filled an array of screens and monitors. Barbara’s fingers worked a keyboard as confidently as her costumed alter ego, Batgirl, traversed the rooftops of Gotham and matched blows with some of the city’s deadliest criminals.

  “I thought you’d be intrigued,” Bruce said. Dressed for daylight in civilian attire, he was impressed by the vast array of information Barbara had already managed to excavate from the dustier corners of cyberspace. He stood behind her, preferring to remain on his feet. “And that it would be right up your alley.”

  As Batgirl, Barbara was a first-rate crime-fighter, easily as good in the field as Nightwing, but for the moment he didn’t require another masked vigilante. He needed one of the best researchers on the planet, the slender redhead who sometimes prowled the digital realm under the code name “Oracle.”

  “Hush. You could dig up this info yourself,” she protested. Stylish eyeglasses flattered her lightly freckled features, in lieu of the computer-enhanced contact lenses she wore as Batgirl. “What with being the world’s greatest detective and all.” There was a hint of mischief in her voice.

  “If I had the time and didn’t have an escalating situation on my hands.”

  Here in the twenty-first century lives were at stake and the clock was ticking. With Barbara’s help, he could ferret out the connections that hadn’t made it into the “official” history of Gotham.

  “In other words,” she said, “you want me working the past while Batman addresses the present.”

  And while Dick keeps an eye on Claire Nesko, he thought.

  “Exactly.” Bruce judged it a sound division of labor. “Plus, it can’t hurt to have another pair of eyes searching the historical record.”

  “Happy to oblige,” she said with a smirk. “And to give Alfred a break from being your only sounding board.”

  Bruce grunted, only partly in amusement. “That, too.”

  “Consider me on board.” She sipped from an oversized coffee mug as she returned her attention to the myriad screens and pop-up windows. “What do we know so far?”

  “The basics,” he said. “Percy Wright was considered a Renaissance man in the Gotham of the early 1900s—a renowned artist, scientist, and scion of one of Gotham’s most prominent families. He was definitely a member of the upper crust, a man of wealth and privilege, which means he fits the profile for membership of the Court of Owls.”

  “Then again,” Barbara pointed out, “the same could be said of Bruce Wayne… and his ancestors.”

  “True enough.” Bruce appreciated her role as devil’s advocate. “In fact, as it happens, Wright was a friend and associate of my great-great-grandfather, Alan Wayne, who commissioned many of the monuments and buildings adorned by Wright’s sculptures. Before Alan was assassinated by the Court of Owls, that is.”

  “Small world.”

  “Too small,” he replied. As far as Bats and Owls are concerned.

  Barbara scrolled through the data on her screens. “Says here that, aside from his artistic endeavors, Wright dabbled in chemistry, publishing scholarly papers in various scientific journals of the day. A real Renaissance man, like you said.”

  “Chemistry.” Instinctively Bruce’s voice dropped into the lower register he employed as Batman. “The Owls are fond of their exotic potions and chemicals.” He didn’t need to elaborate. They both knew about the serums that could revive “dead” Talons from hibernation, and gift them with extreme regenerative abilities. Batman himself had once been drugged with a hallucinogenic compound laced with electrum, causing him to doubt his own senses while trapped in the labyrinth.

  Electrum, as had been found in the carbonized remains of Herbert Morse.

  “It stands to reason,” he said, “that the Court would boast a few cutting-edge chemists in their ranks.”

  “Like Percy Wright?”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised.”

  “But what about now?” Barbara asked. She called up the Wright family tree on the screen, but this was a path he had already explored.

  “The Wright family and fortune are currently controlled by Vincent Wright,” he said, “whom I know socially, if superficially. The Wrights hadn’t come up in our earlier dealings with the Court, but we’ve only just begun to grasp how deep their claws are sunk into the city. The Wrights are a grand old Gotham family, with a long history of wealth and influence, so if they are involved with the Owls, it shouldn’t really come as a surprise.”

  “But as victims or villains?”

  “Too early to say.”

  Bruce couldn’t recall the last time he’d rubbed shoulders with Vincent Wright, most likely at some charity gala or golf tournament.

  It’s probably time to renew our acquaintance.

  “Let me guess,” Barbara said. “Vincent Wright just landed on your engagement calendar.”

  “Being a Wayne does have its advantages.” He gazed at the fruits of Barbara’s digital sleuthing. “In the meantime, what do we have on that model, Lydia… and her disappearance?”

  “Plenty,” Barbara said. “Meet Lydia Doyle.” She called up a vintage black-and-white photo of an old-fashioned “Gibson Girl,” the sort who epitomized femininity back in the early twentieth century. Lydia Doyle was blessed with classically beautiful features, porcelain skin, and dark, entrancing eyes that gazed back at Bruce across the gulf of time. Flaxen ringlets framed her highly photogenic f
ace.

  “Another fascinating slice of history,” Barbara said. “Although she’s largely forgotten today, she was hugely in demand as an artist’s model back in the day, so much so that she was once known as ‘Miss Gotham’ because her likeness could be found all over the city. You could even buy postcards and calendars of her. In a way, she was Gotham’s first supermodel and pin-up girl.”

  “Until she vanished.”

  “Yep. She went missing in 1918, more than a hundred years ago. The tabloids were all over the story, hyping the mystery for all it was worth. There were scandalous rumors about her relationship with Percy Wright, as well as some suspicion that he was responsible for her disappearance, but nothing ever came of it. At this late date, it’s hard to sift through the sensationalism to get to the real story. Eventually the police extracted a confession from”—she squinted at a vintage newspaper clipping—“Billy Draper, a jealous suitor who claimed to have killed Lydia and disposed of her body in a furnace. No evidence of her remains was ever found.”

  An ancient newspaper photo of Draper depicted a sullen-looking perp with a lantern jaw, bad skin, pomaded hair parted straight down the middle, and wide staring eyes of the sort that Bruce had encountered in far too many psychopaths. He certainly looked the part of a stalker, circa 1918.

  “Which begs the question,” Bruce said, “of whether or not he was just a patsy set up by the Court to take the fall instead of Wright.”

  “Or maybe the police just wanted to pin the disappearance on someone to appease the press?” Barbara suggested. “As a cop’s daughter, I hate to cast aspersions on law-enforcement, but you and I both know that the GCPD has a dubious history at best. Maybe they just wanted to close the books on the case, regardless of whether Draper was guilty or not.”

  “That doesn’t explain the Court’s present interest in Joanna Lee and her research. I can’t imagine they’d dispatch a Talon to cover up a long-forgotten tale of an unlucky model murdered by a stalker.” He shook his head slowly. “The Owls had to have been involved in Lydia’s disappearance… and they need to have a good reason for still wanting to keep the truth under wraps, a full century later.”