The Resurrection Man

by Charlotte MacLeod

  “What did you do?”

  “Oh, nothing, of course. Barn was older than I, you know. I just slipped into the shrubbery and waited till he’d got tired of snooping and went home. God knows what the poor kid’s life must have been like, now that I think of it. I’ve no idea whether Roderick was taking drugs as well as dealing in them, but he obviously did drink a lot, though never into oblivion, unfortunately. Mother and I could always tell when he was drunk. We’d hear him bellowing at his servants, calling them filthy names, accusing them of stealing things. They didn’t care, he paid well enough and they didn’t half understand what he was saying. Then of course Roderick was American so he didn’t count as a sahib.”

  “Where was Roderick from in America?” asked Max.

  “I’ve no idea. He’d no particularly marked regional accent, that I can recall. He talked the way Carnaby does. Where is Carnaby, by the way?”

  “Upstairs taking a nap,” said Levitan. “He’s got a bodyguard of his own, you may be interested to know. We didn’t think it was smart to leave the man up there by himself, considering what’s been happening around here. Does he have a drinking problem?”

  Arbalest conjured the ghost of a smile. “Oh dear, no, he finds it no problem at all. Carnaby could empty the Heidelberg tun without getting even slightly squiffed. There’s a trick to holding one’s liquor, he says; he picked up the knack from bodyguarding all those Texas oil barons. He’s always having to pose as something he isn’t, you know, and often the role puts him in a position where he can’t avoid keeping up with the party without making himself conspicuous. Why do you ask about a drinking problem?”

  “Because he’s drunk. He passed out.”

  “Surely not. You don’t suppose he can have been drugged?”

  “He didn’t act drugged when I saw him,” said Sarah. “He was singing ‘Melancholy Baby’ and trying to get frisky with Lydia. Max, wait! Don’t you go up there.”

  “Sit still, Bittersohn, this is a job for Supercop.” Levitan was already on his feet, checking his shoulder holster, rushing toward the stairway.

  Bartolo Arbalest looked after him in amazement. “Is he going to arrest Carnaby for being rude to Madame Ouspenska?”

  “Who knows?” Max wasn’t happy at being held back. “What was this Roderick’s last name, Arbalest?”

  “I can’t remember. I must have known, but it’s escaped me. One of Freud’s repressions, I suppose. I disliked both him and his son so intensely, even before—God! How could I have been such a coward, leaving mother there helpless on the floor, with that madman coming to kill her?”

  The dutiful son hadn’t heard about George Protheroe’s climb up the many-limbed idol, or the circle of monks Medea had left lying around it with their throats all slit. Medea must have realized her chances of surviving Roderick’s second attack were nil, or she wouldn’t have given up the diamond, even to her son, Sarah thought. Evidently the woman had drugged herself into believing her own fairy tale about the noble Russian family, and filled her son’s head with it. How else could Arbalest have persevered in honoring his vow after so many years and so many tragedies? If ever the sins of the parents were visited on the child! Now what was this ruckus?

  In through the door came an odd assemblage of arms and legs that turned out to be Jesse Kelling dragging a little man in a red jogging suit. The man was trying to kick his captor in the shins, but Jesse hadn’t roughhoused with his three bloodthirsty brothers for nothing.

  “I got him, Max!”

  “I’ll be damned! How?”

  “Saw him coming across the yard, jumped out the kitchen window, and landed on his back. We can get him for trespassing, can’t we?”

  “And he can get you for unprovoked bodily assault. Nice going, Jesse. Okay, comrade, whoever you are, what’s with the red suit and the athletics?”

  Jesse’s captive made an unintelligible noise; unintelligible except to Bartolo Arbalest, who made similar noises back. The little man quit trying to kick Jesse and made other noises suggestive of entreaty. Arbalest nodded and turned to Max.

  “He says please let him go, he was only doing his job. He says if we hurt him, my boss will be angry.”

  “His boss?”

  “No, mine. Isn’t that intriguing?”

  Arbalest emitted more sounds and got a spate of frenzied outpourings in return. “He says I am a bad and ungrateful servant and need to be taught a severe lesson. He says he is going to tell my boss on me for consorting with persons of bad character. He says this woman here is too beautiful to be virtuous, she belongs in a zenana. He didn’t exactly say zenana. I do beg your pardon, Mrs. Bittersohn.”

  “Not at all. Ask him your boss’s name. By the way, what language are you speaking, Hindustani?”

  “No, by Jove, Tamil. That’s interesting. I thought I’d forgotten how, but out it popped. Odd how things come back to one. I can’t ask this fellow my alleged boss’s name, Mrs. Bittersohn, he’d think I’d gone mad. Perhaps I have. What’s he doing here?”

  “I don’t know, but your father saw him running across the yard the day before he was killed. George said the man looked like a Tamil.”

  “How bright of father, what a marvelous man he must have been! Good heavens, what’s going on upstairs?”

  “I’ll go see.” Jesse crouched for the sprint.

  Max barred the way with his cane. “The hell you will. Two cops with guns are up there, they don’t need you. Does Goudge go armed, Arbalest?”

  “Now that you mention it, I shouldn’t be surprised if he does. I’ve never asked because I preferred not to know, I loathe guns. Not much of a credit to my father, am I?”

  Sarah wasn’t about to let him start crying again. “I shouldn’t say that, I don’t believe George ever touched a gun in his life.”

  “Oh, Mrs. Bittersohn, you relieve my mind immensely! But Carnaby—I’m all confused. Don’t you think we ought to go up?”

  “No,” said Max. “How did you happen to hire Goudge instead of somebody else?”

  “Through a concatenation of circumstances, as one might say. Back in New York, when I first started out in my own business as an art restorer—I’d worked my way from Madras to New York on a tramp steamer as assistant cook—this was some years after I’d escaped from Roderick. I’d been working here and there in India and also in New York for a while before getting up courage to launch out on my own. But I mustn’t digress, must I? Anyway, there was this little coffee shop where I used to go and this chap would come in.”

  “So you got to know him?”

  “Not really, one doesn’t go accosting strangers in New York unless one’s a mugger. But one does begin to recognize faces. He usually had a camera with him, I assumed he was a professional photographer of some sort. Then I ran into problems, as Brooks may have told you, and moved to the West Coast. On my very first day in Los Angeles, whom should I see but this same chap?”

  “Did you speak to him?”

  “No, I nodded but I don’t think he noticed. Then I didn’t see him again for a long time. I ran into more problems in Los Angeles and relocated to Houston. That was where I met Erminie, but I can’t talk about that. After she—after the accident, I was sitting on a park bench one day wondering whether to kill myself when he came walking by again. He stopped and looked at me, then he said, ‘Don’t I know you from somewhere?’

  “I said yes, in a manner of speaking, we’d seen each other fairly often in New York years ago. So then we got to chatting about what a small world it was and finally decided to go and have a drink together. I’m a person who needs company, as I mentioned before. By then my Texas artisans had learned about my previous fiascos; they’d walked out on me, all except Jacques and he was busy consoling his family. The Dubrecs were badly broken up about Erminie, of course, as who wasn’t?”

  “So you finally got acquainted with Goudge,” Max prodded. “Did he talk about himself?”

  “Yes, he said he hadn’t had much luck in photography so he
’d given it up to become a professional bodyguard. He’d been guarding a Texas oilman who’d got into some kind of difficulty, but that was all straightened out and he was at liberty. Like myself he was trying to decide what to do next. He said he’d come from the east and would like to get back but didn’t have any connections left in these parts.”

  Arbalest sighed. “So that gave me my bright idea. I could set up a maximum-security atelier with a resident bodyguard and keep my artisans from getting killed. I asked Carnaby if he’d be interested. I warned him that I couldn’t pay the high fees he’d been getting from the oil barons, but he said that wouldn’t matter. He was a bachelor, he’d nobody but himself to support, he came from a well-to-do family and didn’t really have to work at all. He merely preferred having something to do, and he liked my idea. Maybe living communally with a group of artists would stimulate him to get back to his photography.”

  “And that’s how it happened?”

  “Yes, just like that. Carnaby and I flew east together. He helped me find a house and get a security system set up. Grilles on all the windows, an intercom system, locks and safety catches everywhere, it was most reassuring. I began interviewing artisans and picked out a few who were ready to go along with my concept—you’ve met them—then I sent for Jacques, who’d promised to join me as soon as I got set up, and here I am. And there, I suppose, I go. But where?”

  “You never once suspected that Goudge might have been stalking you all these years?”

  “Oh no.” Arbalest was shocked. “Why should he?”

  “You could ask,” said Max. “Here they come.”

  25

  “BARNABY RUDGE!” HOWLED ARBALEST. “I know you now, Barn. You’ve had plastic surgery, but I ought to have recognized those mean little eyes. You’re Roderick Rudge’s son. He murdered my mother!”

  The man who’d been calling himself Carnaby Goudge smiled a mean little smile. “Au contraire, Barty, old bean. She murdered my father. Slashed his throat from ear to ear. Prettiest job I’ve ever seen, I got some lovely photos. I never did care much for old Roddy.”

  “Then what happened to my mother?”

  “Nothing much, for a while. She and I got rid of Roddy’s body, I don’t suppose you’d care for the details. I made my servants mop up the gore since Medea’s had sloped off, as so often happens just when one needs them most urgently. Then I moved in with her. Our own bungalow was rather a shambles by that time. Roddy had had this impetuous habit of tearing out walls and floorboards when he got into one of his moods.”

  “You mean you and she—”

  “Oh yes, Medea could be quite good company, in her way. Had a temper, of course. She was really pissed at you for running off with her diamond, Barty. Made me swear to track you to the ends of the earth and take revenge on you for your perfidious betrayal of her trust and so forth. Medea had quite a gift of rhetoric, as you surely know.”

  “But mother gave it to me herself! She knew Roderick was coming back to kill her, she told me to flee from the doom that o’er-shadowed her and guard the family jewel with my life, as a sacred trust.”

  “Did she really? That would seem to put a somewhat different complexion on the matter then, wouldn’t it? And did you keep faith?”

  “Of course.”

  “Good lad. That was what Medea couldn’t stand about you, Barty, she used to go on about how damnably nice you were; she said you were just like your father. I must say that after spending so much time in your cozy little ashram, I’ve developed a deeper understanding of what she meant. You’re a bloody bore, Barty.”

  The Resurrection Man lifted his shoulders and let them fall. “I’m sorry you haven’t been happy with us, Carnaby. Or Barn, if you prefer. I did try so hard. But then you haven’t made me all that happy either, have you? Am I to infer that the terrible string of tragedies that have plagued me ever since I got to America have been your way of honoring the oath you swore to my mother?”

  “Well, yes, in a way. And it was something to do. One does like to keep busy. That was what attracted me to Medea, she always could think of something to do. She had this simply marvelous scheme all worked out: We’d find a temple that contained an idol with a truly impressive jewel in its forehead, drug the monks who were guarding it, pry out the jewel, and slash the monks’ throats as a farewell gesture. Rather clever, don’t you think?”

  “It’s been done before,” said Max Bittersohn.

  “Really? Well, anyway, while we were still scouting around, trying to find a suitable idol, Medea got knocked down and killed by a very large Bengalese on a motorbike. Call me sentimental if you like, but I hadn’t the heart to pursue the matter without her. I was only fourteen at the time, you understand, though quite mature for my age. So I decided to come back to the States and get on with the revenge as a tribute to her memory.”

  “How did you manage the trip?” Jesse Kelling was all set to take notes.

  “Quite easily,” replied Goudge. “Money was no problem. Roderick had done quite well out of his drug-running enterprise; he’d completely carpeted the space under the floor of our bungalow with wads of rupees done up in aluminum foil to keep the bugs out, a fact I’d never happened to mention to Medea. I beguiled the time for a week or two exchanging them for travelers’ checks and American dollars, then attached myself to a nice American gentleman who agreed for certain considerations to pass me off as his son, and booked a flight to New York under a forged passport.”

  “Why a forged passport?” said Levitan.

  “The man who wanted to adopt me thought we’d better both use the same name. He was a bit sensitive about being suspected of evil designs. I ditched him as soon as I got off the plane and headed for Connecticut, where Roddy’s parents were still living at the time. I presented myself on their doorstep with my fingernails cleaned and my hair slicked down and broke the news of how Roddy had sacrificed his own life to rescue a tiny tot from the jaws of a crocodile on the banks of the great gray-green greasy Brahmaputra River far away. I further explained that their devoted son’s last words had been (a) Mater! and (b) Pater! It was that sort of family, you see. So of course they were overjoyed to see me and lost not a moment in shoving me off to the right sort of prep school and thence to the right sort of college, where I acquired the old-school-tie manner that has stood me in such good stead as a bodyguard.”

  Goudge smiled benignly at the little group who were hanging on his words, all except the man in the red suit, who seemed only bewildered. “Having thus won my grandparents’ hearts and made sure they’d revised their wills in my favor, I gave them a really splendid double funeral and decided it was time to get on with the revenge, for want of more pressing business. You can fill in what happened after that, can’t you, Barty old pal? Now if you minions of the law would kindly uncuff yourselves from my person and direct me to a competent bail bondsman—”

  “Not a chance,” said Levitan. “Not after the way I caught you trying to strangle Officer Greenaway. How’s the neck, Greenaway?”

  “Awk,” replied the lesser minion.

  “Let me get you something to drink.” Sarah felt she ought to be making herself useful and there didn’t seem to be much else that needed doing just now. “Hot tea? Coffee? Soda water? Perhaps a spot of whiskey for medicinal purposes?”

  “Awk!” said Greenaway.

  “Soda water,” growled the lieutenant, “with plenty of ice. Why did you off George Protheroe, Goudge? Or Rudge, or whoever you are?”

  “Goudge is the family patronymic, Barnaby Rudge was just Roddy’s bit of fun. Offing dear George was my own little treat. Do bear in mind that I’d had to stand at attention for two long, long evenings watching him and Barty play verbal patty-cake. It was obvious to the discerning onlooker, namely me, that they had to be father and son, and that Barty was coming down with a serious case of filial piety. One could hardly let that sort of thing go unchecked, could one? Furthermore, Mrs. Protheroe had been quite insistent that we drop in again when
we were out this way, it would have been uncivil not to take her up on the invitation. I may add that this house is quite immorally easy to break into. You really ought to drop the old duck a cautionary word about getting a locksmith out here, Mrs. Bittersohn.”

  “Thank you, I’ll do that. And what was your rationale for stabbing Mr. Dubrec?”

  “Not upon me be the onus, dear lady, that was your fault. I’m fairly clever at eavesdropping without being noticed, cad that I am. I overheard Monsieur Dubrec burbling on to you about his secret mission and it crossed my mind that George might have fobbed off a lump of glass on Medea and been letting Dubrec baby-sit the real diamond all these years, though I couldn’t imagine why. Anyway, I thought I might as well give it the old school try. Unfortunately, there was nothing in Dubrec’s pockets worth pinching except a gold toothpick and the ancestral silver corkscrew. Quite a nice one, actually; I’d be glad to show it to you if I weren’t wearing these handcuffs.”

  “So you went and searched his room, right?” said Levitan.

  “Bang on, Your Worship. I didn’t dare take the time to do a thorough job. I’d planned to go back once my good Samaritans left me alone and I’d recovered from my drunken stupor, but you botched that for me by planting—Greenaway, is it?—at my bedside. I do apologize for my clumsiness in not finishing you off Mr. Greenaway. I’m not usually so inept.”

  “That’s okay, I don’t mind.” Officer Greenaway was still croaky, but the soda water was helping.

  “Thank you,” said Goudge. “That’s very generous of you. I also regret not being allowed to finish my search, however. I can’t help thinking the diamond may still be up there.”

  “No, it isn’t.” Bartolo Arbalest patted his necktie. “I’ve had mother’s little treasure right here, under my shirt. You’ve been guarding the idol’s eye ever since I hired you, Carnaby, and didn’t know it.”