Bed of Nails

by Michael Slade

  “The network that balked at covering this con should have come. Lots of ‘bites’ here.”

  “Ouch!” his date winced. “That pun sucks.”

  “Where were we?”

  “Death as theater.”

  “And speaking of theater,” Zinc said, nodding to an impromptu drama of some sort that was being staged below. Poolside had turned into an amphitheater, with gesticulating actors and more exits and entrances than a bedroom farce. At the heart of it all, still clutching Pickman’s Model as he pointed toward a room in the far corner, was the goth from the bar.

  “Something’s wrong,” said the Mountie.

  The Seattle police had an interview room set up at the horror convention. So, responding from different directions, Det. Ralph Stein and Insp. Zinc Chandler crossed paths by the swimming pool. Both held their badges up to establish authority. No need to ask the goth from the bar to guide them to the corpse. The stampede of gawkers dripping pool water had polluted the path through the jungle.

  “Christ!” Ralph fumed. “Forensics are fucked.”

  “What a place for a killing.”

  “A cop’s nightmare.”

  “With so many maskers spattered with fake blood, a faceless killer stained with real blood blends in. And the con gives everyone an excuse for having been in and out of the murder room if we do locate a clue that fingers a suspect.”

  “Police!” Ralph barked. “Let us through!”

  The swimmers on the patio parted to let the cops reach the sliding door to the murder room. The room was the first one from the left along the back side of the pool’s quadrangle. The suite around the corner abutted it at a right angle. On its other flank was a delivery area. Thanks to a thicket of faux foliage out front, no one could see into the murder room. Despite that, it seemed odd that the killer had left the lights on and the door to the pool ajar. Unless … unless he wanted the crime discovered soon because he—or she—had an alibi in place.

  But what sort of alibi?

  Swimming? wondered Zinc.

  That would be a good blind, the Mountie thought. Kill your victim in a room that opened on the pool. Do it in a bathing suit so the blood is on your skin—a stain-resistant bathing suit to repel wayward drops. Then exit from the murder room and head for the pool. Splash around with the other swimmers to wash off the blood. And when the alarm is raised by someone who spots the crime—someone who you know in advance will go to the room—rush back with the others from the pool for a spectator’s look. The result is that, one, you contaminate the murder scene; two, you invalidate forensic traces you might have overlooked; and three, if blood is found on you, it could have come from anyone you brushed up against in the crush.

  One look at the murder scene, however, and Zinc’s suspicion shot off in a different direction. The victim lay sprawled at the foot of the bed with blood pooled around his head. With so many spikes hammered into his face, the man had had his features mutilated beyond recognition. But his identity could be deduced. An artist by the name of Al Savory—nom de guerre Dexter Ward—had checked into the room. The room was full of Cthulhu Mythos molds and models identical to those that Zinc had seen on display at the Lovecraft’s Realm exhibit in the gallery. The physique of this corpse was similar to that of the thin, sleek, reptilian dealer who had returned, lunch in hand, to sell the exhibit models. He was clothed in the same black slacks and bloodred shirt with a hand-painted illustration of Cthulhu’s tentacle face. His mutilated face was a mimic of that monster, for the spikes, each about a foot long, had been hammered into the skull around his gaping mouth to fashion a yawning maw ringed by steel tentacles. And what this surreal squid face conjured up in Zinc’s mind was an image of Bret Lister buying the Cthulhu model in the gallery where Petra Zydecker lurked.

  Bret and Petra?

  Where were they now?

  Cooking up another sexual alibi in her room?

  The killing of the Cthulhu sculptor banished any concern about tunnel vision from the Mountie’s mind. The spikes hammered into his face were of the same make as—albeit longer than—the non-galvanized flatheads that had been pounded into the skulls of both Hanged Man victims. That information was still hold-back evidence known only to the police. Therefore, Ralph’s concern that the killer or killers might have passed Ted Bundy’s house on any ghost tour, and might have located Maltby Cemetery by using one of the WHC pamphlets distributed to the public, evaporated in Zinc’s mind.

  The killer or killers definitely haunted this convention.

  The most likely suspect was Bret Lister. He had spent time with the Ripper in a mental hospital. He’d written a book about the Hanged Man victim in Vancouver, Bret’s hometown. He was here in Seattle, when occurred both subsequent killings where nails were also hammered into skulls. He’d purchased a Cthulhu model from the sculptor whose face now resembled that occult monster. And he was at the Gross-out Contest earlier tonight, when Wes had spun his tale about a hotel-room ambush like the one that happened here. What a good way to frame his rival—turn the tale back on Wes. There was only one problem. Bret had an alibi for last night’s Hanged Man crime.

  So was he currently alibiing up for this crime, too?

  Zinc advised Ralph that he had something important to check out. Then, retracing his steps to the pool, the Mountie traversed the central court to the other side of the quadrangle. There, he entered the path through the green belt marked “Room 104.” As he closed on the unlit patio hidden by the foliage, Zinc caught sight of two pint-sized silhouettes scrambling away. He recognized these peeping Toms as the cannonballers from the swimming pool, the young boys who had lobbed themselves into the water as he and Yvette cooked in the hot tub.

  The little buggers were spying at a crack in the curtains.

  The same crack to which the cop now applied his eye, and through which he spied sweating lovers making the two-backed beast on the bed. Petra was on the bottom, with her long legs wrapped around the buttocks of the lawyer-turned-writer on top, her claws digging into his back while he humped and pumped as if this was the last fuck he would have before going to the gallows.

  Her stud wasn’t Bret Lister.

  It was Wes Grimmer.

  THREE-BACKED BEAST

  April 13 (The next day)

  It would be hard for next year’s World Horror Convention to surpass the excitement of this one. Last night’s festivities had segued into “the dead dog party,” a WHC tradition in which all the food and booze remaining at the dying con is gathered together in one suite for a final gabfest until participants break away to fly home. The five horrific slayings linked to this convention gave them loads to talk about. Meanwhile, Seattle police had locked the hotel down tighter than a submerged submarine exploring the ocean’s depths. No one was going anywhere before running the gauntlet of a witness interview, so that’s how Zinc and Ralph spent the wee hours of the night.

  Sunday morning, at just after ten, the Mountie was strolling along the hall past Morbid Maze when a sideways glance through the open doors of the gallery made him screech to a halt. The locks at the four corners of The Antichrist—Petra Zydecker’s design for the Hanged Man card in her bizarre tarot deck—had been unlocked in order to remove that image from the panel facing the hall. What stopped Zinc in his tracks and drew him into the gallery was the sight of the goth queen standing in front of the painting underneath.

  “Did I win?” he asked.

  Petra turned around. “Sorry, Inspector. The Tarot chose another.”

  “May I inquire who?”

  “Wes Grimmer.”

  “That makes sense.”

  “The Magick is in the cards.”

  “And in bed?”

  “Are you ready for that walk on the wild side, Zinc?”

  “You’re a lucky charm.”

  “Oh?”

  “The man who takes you to bed always seems to have a convenient alibi.”

  “Did you read my statement about last night?”

  “I�
��d rather hear it from you.”

  “Before the Gross-out Contest, Wes asked if I would allow him to use my name in his entry. I said sure. After he was such a hit, he thanked me for being a good sport. One thing led to another until we ended up in bed. You may not want to believe me, but I understand we were peeped by witnesses.”

  “Two little voyeurs.”

  “Three,” said Petra. “Three voyeurs. Two little boys and a big one who deserves a spanking.”

  “At a buck a slap?”

  “I’d rather do it myself.”

  “The problem is, we don’t know when the sculptor died.”

  “That’s weak, Inspector. Al was in here, selling models, until after the Gross-out Contest began. Not only were Wes and I at that event, but so were you. And as for the period after the contest, there wasn’t enough time for Wes—or me—to fuck and kill.”

  “What about Bret?”

  “What about him?”

  “He left the contest in a snit. Did you see him after that?”

  Petra laughed. “Three voyeurs aren’t enough for you? You want to add a fourth?”

  “Is that a no?”

  “No, I didn’t see him. What does Bret have to say?”

  “You didn’t ask him?”

  “We’re estranged at the moment.”

  “Because of Wes?”

  “You may have noticed that those two are in a pissing contest.”

  “It seems Bret was all over the place. He went to the contest. Had a drink in the bar. Took a dip in the pool. Danced at the Vampire Ball. A lot of people saw him. But few recall at what time.”

  “Is that not what you’d expect at a lively convention?”

  “What about Friday night?”

  “I told you. I fucked Bret.”

  “Is that the truth?”

  “What more do you want? Did you check with room service?”

  “Yes. They back up your story.”

  “Did you time how long it takes to drive to the cemetery?”

  “Yes.”

  “And?”

  “Getting there’d be tight.”

  “How tight?”

  “Real tight.”

  “Well, that does it. Unless you think we flew there on my witch’s broomstick.”

  “No.”

  “Accept it. I fucked him. Like that.” The goth queen pointed at the painting on the panel, the image that Petra had locked away behind The Antichrist. It was a graphic depiction of a male and a female having sex. The legs of the male arched like those of a spider toward the top of the canvas, and between them—seen from the rear—his grossly enlarged genital organs were poised to thrust into the vulva of the female, who was spread below him. Her legs curved up to meet his at both sides of the canvas, and together they could be the jaws of a ravenous shark. Her genitals were drawn with obsessive gynecologic detail, and her engorged clitoris bore the face of a grinning skull.

  “The title?”

  “Jaws of Death.”

  “And which card in the Tarot does that represent?”

  “The Lovers.”

  “I should have guessed. Are you heading home?”

  “Yes,” said Petra.

  “Stick around Vancouver. I may have more questions to ask.”

  “Better be quick.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m off on Tuesday.”

  “Where to?”

  “The Cook Islands. In the South Pacific.”

  “You’re not a writer.”

  “No, I’m a writer’s muse.”

  “To inspire Wes?”

  “Uh-huh. He invited me last night. Right after I told him the Tarot had selected him for the Lovers.”

  “I feel jilted.”

  “Then come along. There’s space left on the Odyssey.”

  PART III

  ELOI

  Fe-fi-fo-fum

  I smell the blood of an Englishman!

  Be he live or be he dead,

  I’ll grind his bones to make my bread!

  —Jack the Giant Killer

  GET AWAY FROM IT ALL

  Vancouver

  April 14 (The next day)

  “You’re in trouble,” Ghost Keeper cautioned Zinc Chandler on Monday morning. The Special X inspectors crossed paths at the foot of the stairs that climbed to the chief’s office on the upper floor of the old Heather Stables at RCMP H.Q.

  “I have my shield,” Zinc replied, hiding behind a book.

  “You need a sword, not a shield,” the Cree advised as he glanced at the book’s title. “By the way, from my point of view, that biography is about one of the bad guys.”

  “Good,” said Zinc. “That makes it an offensive weapon.”

  Climbing the stairs to DeClercq’s inner sanctum was like taking a ride in a time machine, for hung sequentially on the wall flanking the staircase was a series of paintings that captured great moments in the history of the Force. One of the paintings, titled The St. Roch in the Ice, was a rendition of the RCMP vessel skippered by Sgt. Henry Asbjorn Larsen that had finally conquered the Northwest Passage to extend Canada’s sovereignty to the North Pole.

  The St. Roch gave Zinc another idea.

  A backup weapon.

  “I know where I’m going,” the inspector announced as he knocked on the chief superintendent’s door and entered, wielding the book as if he held Excalibur in his hand.

  “Where’s that?” his boss asked frostily, looking up from the piles of paperwork spread around his horseshoe-shaped desk.

  “The Cook Islands,” Zinc said, pointing to the title Captain Cook in his other hand.

  “The last time I checked, the South Seas weren’t off the coast of Seattle, Inspector.”

  “I had to detour, Chief.”

  “Why?” DeClercq asked skeptically.

  “To see for myself. Remember our brainstorming session in this office after Gord and Joey—the pimp and the hooker—were killed in the high-speed chase that started at the North Van hotel where the Hanged Man murder occurred?”

  “Vaguely.”

  “You said that Internal wouldn’t touch me as long as I was a hero, so what I should do to protect my own ass was check out the various alternatives as if I was tying up loose ends, and if I hit a dead end myself, leave it at that.”

  “I’m listening,” said DeClercq. He sat back and locked both hands behind his head, a signal that he was giving Zinc enough rope to hang himself.

  “So that’s what I did,” Zinc explained to duck the noose. “Nothing came to light that switched my focus away from Gord and Joey as our prime suspects for that murder. Internal was kept at bay because I remained the hero, and eventually the case became yesterday’s news. However, you’ll recall the worry that nagged at me. What if the pimp and his hooker had only supplied the vic with drugs, I asked you, and they bolted from the bar because they were coked up and afraid I was going to bust them for trafficking? Remember your reply?”

  “No. But do turn my own words back on me.”

  “You said, ‘In which case, there could still be two psychos loose. But at the moment that possibility is a dead end too. If the Tarot drove someone else to kill, we won’t know until the phantom psychos kill again.’”

  “Have they?” DeClercq asked.

  “A troubling question. Do you understand why I had to see for myself?”

  “Yes. A serial killing would open up that can of worms.”

  “Am I off the hook for going?”

  The chief sat up straight and motioned Chandler to one of the two minion chairs in front of his desk. “How did you get involved this time around?”

  “Ralph Stein called.”

  “Who’s he?”

  “A Seattle detective. We go back a few years to a cross-border sex case. One day, while Ralph was recuperating from a ladder accident, we chewed the fat about bizarre homicides. I happened to mention the M.O. in the Hanged Man murder, and Ralph recalled it when he responded to an eerily similar killing on Friday nigh
t.”

  “So he called you?”

  “Uh-huh. He caught me out on the deck of the lodge at the regimental dinner, a few minutes after you and I spoke in the rain.”

  “I see,” said DeClercq.

  “I had to go myself. If the Seattle killing matched the Hanged Man killing here, that meant that two innocent patrons died in the Lions Gate bar because of me, because I freaked out two armed cokeheads who weren’t involved in the murder. If the phantom psychos had now materialized, it would be my ass in the wringer. I was at the murder scene in North Van a year and a half ago, and I had to see the murder scene in Seattle with my own eyes.”

  “I understand,” DeClercq said. “You’re off the hook with me.”

  “But I’ve dropped into the can of worms.”

  “It’s the same M.O.?”

  “Damn close. A male victim. Same sex as up here. Strung up like the Hanged Man, albeit in two different places. And the nails hammered into his skull match those used up here. The type and length of nails used was hold-back evidence.”

  “Sex assault?”

  “Ralph’s waiting on forensics.”

  A sudden bang caused both Mounties to wince. It sounded like a bullet had passed through the window, which was now vibrating. There was no bullet hole, however, so it had to be something else, and the clue that solved the mystery for them was a tiny feather stuck to the shimmering glass. Because DeClercq had the corner office at Special X, the world beyond the windows on one side could be seen from outside the panes of the other angle. A bird had tried to take a shortcut across the room.

  Zinc saw a fortuitous opening. “We got it right, Chief. Back when we discussed the Hanged Man killing a year and a half ago. It’s all about trying to break through to the other side.”

  “The Ripper?”

  “Uh-huh. It all goes back to him.”

  “He’s still at FPH?”

  “Securely locked away. When we discussed the Hanged Man case after Cardoza was killed, the Tarot connection raised the same question. But when I checked with the hospital to see if anyone suspicious had spoken to the Ripper, the response I got was that no one had visited him except his legal representatives. Next, we discussed the possibility of a copycat. I said something like, ‘Is that necessary? The Tarot has enough influence on its own to spawn a Tarot killer.’ So that’s when we left it at Gord and Joey … until I got the call from Ralph.”