Inside, the warehouse is in shadows; it, too, is lit only by naked bulbs, but its concrete floor is clear and reflects the dim light. Pallets packed with crushed boxes fill the center of the room. Packing crates are stacked against the walls. The street lamps outside send a dull glow up through the windows. In the distance, she sees the Empire State Building, back to its usual white light, a vigilant beacon in the harsh, moonless winter night.
Bending so low she's hidden by the pallet loads, Sheila creeps softly toward the front stairwell that leads from the eighth floor to the narrow corridor between the partners’ offices. Shadows cut across the wall and floors, making the dark darker, giving strange shapes to normally routine objects. Her blouse clings to her long, moist spine. She stops to steady herself; sweat slips from her red bangs and kisses her dry lips. She takes in a deep breath, lets it out and sees the stream flow from within her. Composed, as composed as a murderess can be, she heads for the back door.
As she moves within ten feet of it, it swings open with a startling burst and bangs loudly against the wall. Quickly, she darts behind a packing crate, under a reaching shadow. Oh God, he saw me, she thinks. Or did he? Just in case, she dips her right hand in her jacket pocket.
* * * *
"Where the hell am I?” John says aloud to no one. The door swings behind him and slams shut, though with less fury than it had when it chipped the wall seconds earlier.
This better work, he thinks. In his left hand there's a Colt .45 malt liquor bottle filled halfway with hi-test gasoline he'd siphoned from his Caddy. In his right he holds the Bic lighter he tested twenty times in his office before he headed down the stairs.
He turns to his right, toward the mild fumes, to the caged room where flammable liquids are stored each evening in special containers. Squinting—his glasses lay on the Hustler magazine he left on his desk—he sees a calendar with an illustration of Jesus and the Sacred Heart crudely taped against the wall. Superstitious idiots, he thinks. I should worry about them? I'll be glad to get rid of them. He laughs to himself; one of them will probably be blamed for this.
Oh, the genius of this. Not once did I do anything out of my usual routine, except to establish one hell of an alibi. He reviews his evening: Put the Caddy in a garage on 63rd Street near the Odeon Cineplex, buy a ticket at the theater, and sneak away. With his fingers wrapped around the lighter, he runs his hand along his pants pocket and feels the ticket stub near his keys.
Switching the bottle to his other hand, he dips into his overcoat pocket and pulls out a rag. He dabs gasoline on it, twirls it around his finger, and jabs it into the bottleneck, stuffing it until it almost touches the liquid. Positioning the Bic, he reviews the procedure: Flick the lighter, touch it to the rag, throw the bottle near the cage, watch the flaming gas stream flow toward the chemicals, run the hell out the back door, and head toward Times Square. From there, take the subway to 63rd and get back to the garage by the time the movie lets out.
He wipes his forehead with the coat sleeve. The lighter clicks and an orange and blue flame seems to shoot from his thumb. Carefully, he brings the flame to the rag. It catches instantly. Turning slightly, he faces the cage and cocks the bottle behind his ear.
"John,” Sheila says. Her soft voice hits him with the force of a clarion's blare. He turns but before he can reply she slashes at him with an awkward motion, her long arm swiftly moving from right to left across his throat. He feels a cold breeze past his neck, then, oddly, without reason, feels a moist warmth spreading across his chest.
He tries to speak but his voice is gone; a grotesque gurgle comes out instead. Dropping the lighter, he grabs at his carotid artery and jugular vein with his empty hand and feels the wound, deep, open, separating, pouring blood like water from a broken valve. Weak-kneed, dizzy, he falls backward, banging his head hard against the slippery, bloodstained floor. The gas-filled bottle drops near him. Sheila, seeing the flash, turns and bolts toward the back door.
Seconds later, a small crack in the night is followed by an enormous explosion as the short blast from the Molotov ignites the caged room. In an instant, John's body is devoured by burning flames. So is the eighth floor warehouse.
* * * *
Mike Mallory jumps at the sound of the shattering explosion. His heart pounding in triple time, he looks up, then quickly bends to cover his head as glass and brick, mortar and frame shower him.
Instinctively, he turns toward the building but realizes the futility. There's nobody in a warehouse at ten thirty; besides, if there was, there's nothing I could do about it now. Bright orange flames, strewn with black fingers as chemicals burn, burst from the gaping hole in the building. Mike silently counts the stories. Eight; too bad it wasn't Frolic's office on nine. Maybe the old bastard might've been in there with one of his cross-eyed hookers and gotten his butt roasted.
Mike's eyes begin to burn. In the distance, fire engines wail and push closer. A golden, billowing fire may be beautiful to watch, he thinks, but I'd better get the hell out of here. He begins an awkward trot, a formless jog, away from the furnace. A blue and white police car careens the wrong way up the block, red lights flashing, siren blasting, and cuts him off. A young cop, leather jacket wide open, tie flapping, jumps from the passenger side and pulls his .357 service revolver. “Right there,” he shouts. “On the ground. Now."
"You're kidding,” Mike says. The cop looks like he's twelve years old.
"Mister, I believe I can part your hair from here with this baby,” he says, his voice steady. “I suggest you hit the ground real soon or I'll get my chance."
* * * *
Monsignor Merrill, the last of the evening's mourners, gently lets himself out the front door. Agnes Kepler Frolic, widow, says a quiet goodnight, clumsily kicks her shoes into the hall closet, and enters the oversized living room. Sheila Anders sits on the rose loveseat, her hands demurely folded in the lap of her black dress. What a nice girl, thinks Agnes, taking the trouble to start a fire.
Wood crackles and sends a warm glow across to the peach club chair where Agnes sits. “Well,” she says softly.
"Well,” Sheila replies. “It was a lovely ceremony, Agnes.” Though, she thinks, it's funny how people will stay away from the funeral mass of a man who tried to incinerate his own company.
"What happened to Malloy?"
"Mallory,” Sheila corrects. “He's been released. Lack of evidence."
"As you said he would. That was a good idea, Sheila."
Gave me a chance to slip away, she thought. If only I hadn't tripped on that rat carcass, I would've been gone before the fire engines arrived. She involuntarily rubs her twisted left ankle. “The police said he claimed a young woman with a sexy voice told him to meet John."
Agnes smiles. “I don't think I've ever been told I have a sexy voice before."
She stands and walks to the liquor cabinet. “Sherry?” And, when Sheila declines, “I hope you don't mind if I—"
"Of course not,” Sheila says with a wave.
"You know what I was thinking,” Agnes says and sips. “I was thinking how ironic it would be if it was my father's cleaning solution that caught fire and exploded."
Yes, Sheila thinks. Christ, she's actually pleased that John is dead. For Sheila it was something unpleasant that had to be done, but for Agnes it was an act of joy. Sheila looks at her quaintly tasting her sherry, and sees satisfaction.
"Did you use it?” Agnes asks.
For a moment, Sheila is confused. “The solution,” Agnes adds.
"Oh yes,” she replies. “It's very good for removing blood.” Sheila had soaked the murder weapon in it as soon as she returned home. As the solution bubbled in her sink, Sheila paced her worn hardwood floors and, ears ringing, repeated maybe a hundred times, thank God for reinforced concrete.
"The company belongs to a Kepler again."
"That's true, Agnes. You now hold a majority interest in Kepler Glass."
"Fifty-five percent,” she says.
&nb
sp; They sit still as the older woman finishes her drink. A spitting chip from a burning log in the stately fireplace occasionally cuts the silence. Odd that she should claim the company as hers, Sheila thinks as her face warms in the fluttering glow.
"I have a lot of plans, Sheila."
You do? “Oh?"
"Yes,” she says. “As soon as Arthur prepares the proper papers, I'll assume my father's role as president."
Arthur? “Don't you think that's the way Father would have wanted it?"
Sheila smiles and runs her hands along the line of her dark skirt.
"Don't you think it best that I run the company for a while, Agnes? It may arouse suspicion if you jump in and appear eager to make changes."
"Arouse suspicion? I don't understand. The police know where I was. I was here, in bed, almost asleep, without means to get to or from New York."
"Your car—"
"In a garage. I believe it needed an engine tune-up. Besides, I called Arthur's answering service at nine fifty. He called me here ten minutes later."
The heat from the fire begins to sting Sheila's cheek. Agnes stands to pour herself another drink. “Did you bring it?” she asks.
It: the dual-edged glass cutter John had used to shatter Max's shatterproof dream. First Max, then Agnes, had kept it all these years. How easily it thoroughly slashed across and through John's throat, effortlessly tearing skin and cartilage. There had been fear an autopsy would have revealed the unique cut but now...
"I thought I told you I wanted it back,” Agnes says. “Did you bring it?"
"No,” Sheila says with a shy, thoughtful smile. “I think I'd better hang on to it for a while.” She stands and, with long careful steps, walks away from the heat and thinks, you never know. I might need it again.
Copyright © 1988 by Jim Fusilli. Orginally published in AHMM April, 1988.
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COMING IN NOVEMBER 2006
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