"Twin vampires?"
She frowned. "That's a bit much, isn't it? Had they discovered blood groups in Bram Stoker's day?"
I got back in bed and pulled the sheet up to my waist, leaning beside her against her against the headboard. "I haven't the foggiest idea."
"That's another way vampires are stupid. They never check the victim's blood group. The wrong blood group can kill you."
"Vampires don't exactly get transfusions."
"It all amounts to the same thing, doesn't it?" I shrugged. "Oh, well," she sighed, "vampires are stupid." She reached over and plucked at the hair on my chest. "I haven't had an indecent proposition in hours," she said, grinning.
So I made one.
Wednesday morning I made a dozen phone calls. Of the nine victims I knew about, I was able to find the information on six.
All six had the same blood group.
I lit a cigarette and leaned back in the swivel chair. The whole thing was spinning around in my head. I'd found a pattern for the victims, but I didn't know if it was the pattern. It just didn't make sense. Maybe Detweiler was a vampire.
"Mallory," I said out loud, "you're cracking up."
Miss Tremaine glanced up. "If I were you, I'd listen to you," she said poker-faced.
The next morning I staggered out of bed at six A.M. I took a cold shower, shaved, dressed, and put Murine in my eyes. They still felt like I'd washed them in rubber cement. Mrs. Bloomfeld had kept me up until two the night before, doing all the night spots in Santa Monica with some dude I hadn't identified yet. When they checked into a motel, I went home and went to bed.
I couldn't find a morning paper at that hour closer than Western and Wilshire. The story was on page seven. Fortunately they found the body in time for the early edition. A woman named Sybil Herndon, age 38, had committed suicide in an apartment on Las Palmas. (Detweiler hadn't gone very far. The address was just around the corner from the Almsbury.) She had cut her wrists on a piece of broken mirror. She had been discovered about eleven-thirty when the manager went over to ask her to turn down the volume on her television set.
It was too early to drop around, and so I ate breakfast, hoping this was one of the times Detweiler stuck around for more than three days. Not for a minute did I doubt he would be living at the apartment court on Las Palmas, or not far away.
The owner-manager of the court was one of those creatures peculiar to Hollywood. She must have been a starlet in the twenties or thirties, but success had eluded her. So she had tried to freeze herself in time. She still expected, at any moment, a call from The Studio. But her flesh hadn't cooperated. Her hair was the color of tarnished copper, and the fire-engine-red lipstick was painted far past her thin lips. Her watery eyes peered at me through a Lone Ranger mask of Maybelline on a plaster-white face. Her dress had obviously been copied from the wardrobe of Norma Shearer.
"Yes?" She had a breathy voice. Her eyes quickly traveled the length of my body. That happens often enough to keep me feeling good, but this time it gave me a queasy sensation, like I was being measured for a mummy case. I showed her my ID, and asked if I could speak to her about one of the tenants.
"Of course. Come on in. I'm Lorraine Nesbitt." Was there a flicker of disappointment that I hadn't recognized the name? She stepped back holding the door for me. I could tell that detectives, private or otherwise, asking about her tenants wasn't a new thing. I walked into the doilied room, and she looked at me from a hundred directions. The faded photographs covered every level surface and clung to the walls like leeches. She had been quite a dish— forty years ago. She saw me looking at the photos and smiled. The makeup around her mouth cracked.
"Which one do you want to ask about?" The smile vanished and the cracks closed.
"Andrew Detweiler." She looked blank. "Young, good-looking, with a hunchback."
The cracks opened. "Oh, yes. He's only been here a few days. The name had slipped my mind."
"He's still here?"
"Oh, yes." She sighed. "It's so unfair for such a beautiful young man to have a physical impairment."
"What can you tell me about him?"
"Not much. He's only been here since Sunday night. He's very handsome, like an angel, a dark angel. But it wasn't his handsomeness that attracted me." She smiled. "I've seen many handsome men in my day, you know. It's difficult to verbalize. He has such an incredible innocence. A lost, doomed look that Byron must have had. A vulnerability that makes you want to shield him and protect him. I don't know for sure what it is, but it struck a chord in my soul. Soul," she mused. "Maybe that's it. He wears his soul on his face." She nodded, as if to herself. "A dangerous thing to do." She looked back up at me. "If that quality, whatever it is, would photograph, he would become a star overnight, whether he could act or not. Except—of course—for his infirmity."
Lorraine Nesbitt, I decided, was as nutty as a fruitcake.
Someone entered the room. He stood leaning against the door frame, looking at me with sleepy eyes. He was about twenty-five, wearing tight chinos without underwear and a T-shirt. His hair was tousled and cut unfashionably short. He had a good-looking Kansas face. The haircut made me think he was new in town, but the eyes said he wasn't. I guess the old broad liked his hair that way.
She simpered. "Oh, Johnny! Come on in. This detective was asking about Andrew Detweiler in number seven." She turned back to me. "This is my protégé, Johnny Peacock—a very talented young man. I'm arranging for a screen test as soon as Mr. Goldwyn returns my calls." She lowered her eyelids demurely. "I was a Goldwyn girl, you know."
Funny, I thought Goldwyn was dead. Maybe he wasn't.
Johnny took the news of his impending stardom with total unconcern. He moved to the couch and sat down, yawning. "Detweiler? Don't think I ever laid eyes on the man. What'd he do?"
"Nothing. Just routine." Obviously he thought I was a police detective. No point in changing his mind. "Where was he last night when the Herndon woman died?"
"In his room, I think. I heard his typewriter. He wasn't feeling well," Lorraine Nesbitt said. Then she sucked air through her teeth and clamped her fingers to her scarlet lips. "Do you think he had something to do with that?"
Detweiler had broken his pattern. He didn't have an alibi. I couldn't believe it.
"Oh, Lorraine," Johnny grumbled.
I turned to him. "Do you know where Detweiler was?"
He shrugged. "No idea."
"They why are you so sure he had nothing to do with it?"
"She committed suicide."
"How do you know for sure?"
"The door was bolted from the inside. They had to break it down to get in."
"What about the window? Was it locked too?"
"No. The window was open. But it has bars on it. No way anybody could get in."
"When I couldn't get her to answer my knock last night, I went around to the window and looked in. She was lying there with blood all over." She began to sniffle. Johnny got up and put his arms around her. He looked at me, grinned, and shrugged.
"Do you have a vacancy?" I asked, getting a whiz-bang idea.
"Yes," she said, the sniffles disappearing instantly. "I have two. Actually three but I can't rent Miss Herndon's room for a few days—until someone claims her things."
"I'd like to rent the one closest to number seven," I said.
I wasn't lucky enough to get number six or eight, but I did get five. Lorraine Nesbitt's nameless, dingy apartment court was a fleabag. Number five was one room with a closet, a tiny kitchen, and a tiny bath—identical with the other nine units she assured me. With a good deal of tugging and grunting the couch turned into a lumpy bed. The refrigerator looked as if someone had spilled a bottle of Br'er Rabbit back in 1938 and hadn't cleaned it up yet. The stove looked like a lube rack. Well, I sighed, it was only for three days. I had to pay a month's rent in advance anyway, but I put it down as a bribe to keep Lorraine's and Johnny's mouths shut about my being a detective.
I moved in
enough clothes for three days, some sheets and pillows, took another look at the kitchen and decided to eat out. I took a jug of Lysol to the bathroom and crossed my fingers. Miss Tremaine brought up the bank statement and humphed a few times.
Number five had one door and four windows—identical to the other nine, Lorraine assured me. The door had a heavy-duty bolt that couldn't be fastened or unfastened from the outside. The window beside the door didn't open at all and wasn't intended to. The bathroom and kitchen windows cranked out and were tall and skinny, about twenty-four by six. The other living room window, opposite the door, slid upward. The iron bars bolted to the frame were so rusted I doubted if they could be removed without ripping out the whole window. It appeared Andrew Detweiler had another perfect alibi after all—along with the rest of the world.
I stood outside number seven suddenly feeling like a teenager about to pick up his first date. I could hear Detweiler's typewriter tickety-ticking away inside. Okay, Mallory, this is what you've been breaking your neck on for a week.
I knocked on the door.
I heard the typewriter stop ticking and the scrape of a chair being scooted back. I didn't hear anything else for fifteen or twenty seconds, and I wondered what he was doing. Then the bolt was drawn and the door opened.
He was buttoning his shirt. That must have been the delay; he wouldn't want anyone to see him with his shirt off. Everything I'd been told about him was true. He wasn't very tall; the top of his head came to my nose. He was dark, though not as dark as I'd expected. I couldn't place his ancestry. It certainly wasn't Latin-American and I didn't think it was Slavic. His features were soft, without the angularity usually found in Mediterranean races. His hair wasn't quite black. It wasn't exactly long and it wasn't exactly short. His clothes were nondescript. Everything about him was neutral—except his face. It was just about as Lorraine Nesbitt had described it. If you called central casting and asked for a male angel, you'd get Andrew Detweiler in a blond wig. His body was slim and well-formed—from where I was standing I couldn't see the hump and you'd never know there was one. I had a glimpse of his bare chest as he buttoned his shirt. It wasn't muscular but it was very well made. He was very healthy-looking—pink and flushed with health, though slightly pale, as if he didn't get out in the sun much. His dark eyes were astounding. If you blocked out the rest of the face, leaving nothing but the eyes, you'd swear he was no more than four years old. You've seen little kids with those big, guileless, unguarded, inquiring eyes, haven't you?
"Yes?" he asked.
I smiled. "Hello. I'm Bert Mallory. I just moved in to number five. Miss Nesbitt tells me you like to play gin."
"Yes," he said, grinning. "Come on in."
He turned to move out of the way and I saw the hump. I don't know how to describe what I felt. I suddenly had a hurting in my gut. I felt the same unfairness and sadness the others had, the way you would feel about any beautiful thing with one overwhelming flaw.
"I'm not disturbing you, am I? I heard the typewriter." The room was indeed identical to mine, though it looked a hundred percent more livable. I couldn't put my finger on what he had done to it to make it that way. Maybe it was just the semidarkness. He had the curtains tightly closed and one lamp lit beside the typewriter.
"Yeah, I was working on a story, but I'd rather play gin." He grinned, open and artless. "If I could make money playing gin, I wouldn't write."
"Lots of people make money playing gin."
"Oh, I couldn't. I'm too unlucky."
He certainly had a right to say that, but there was no self-pity, just an observation. Then he looked at me with slightly distressed eyes. "You … ah … didn't want to play for money, did you?"
"Not at all," I said and his eyes cleared. "What kind of stories do you write?"
"Oh, all kinds." He shrugged. "Fantasy mostly."
"Do you sell them?"
"Most of 'em."
"I don't recall seeing your name anywhere. Miss Nesbitt said it was Andrew Detweiler?"
He nodded. "I use another name. You probably wouldn't know it either. It's not exactly a household word." His eyes said he'd really rather not tell me what it was. He had a slight accent, a sort of soft slowness, not exactly a drawl and not exactly Deep South. He shoved the typewriter over and pulled out a deck of cards.
"Where're you from?" I asked. "I don't place the accent."
He grinned and shuffled the cards. "North Carolina. Back in the Blue Ridge."
We cut and I dealt. "How long have you been in Hollywood?"
"About two months."
"How do you like it?"
He grinned his beguiling grin and picked up my discard. "It's very … unusual. Have you lived here very long, Mr. Mallory?"
"Bert. All my life. I was born in Inglewood. My mother still lives there."
"It must be … unusual … to live in the same place all your life."
"You move around a lot?"
"Yeah. Gin."
I laughed. "I thought you were unlucky."
"If we were playing for money, I wouldn't be able to do anything right."
We played gin the rest of the afternoon and talked—talked a lot. Detweiler seemed eager to talk or, at least, eager to have someone to talk with. He never told me anything that would connect him to nine deaths, mostly about where he'd been, things he'd read. He read a lot, just about anything he could get his hands on. I got the impression he hadn't really lived life so much as he'd read it, that all the things he knew about had never physically affected him. He was like an insulated island. Life flowed around him but never touched him. I wondered if the hump on his back made that much difference, if it made him such a green monkey he'd had to retreat into his insular existence. Practically everyone I talked to liked him, mixed with varying portions of pity, to be sure, but liking nevertheless. Harry Spinner had liked him, but had discovered something "peculiar" about him; Birdie Pawlowicz, Maurice Milian, David Fowler, Lorraine Nesbitt, they all liked him.
And, God damn it, I liked him too.
At midnight I was still awake, sitting in number five in my jockey shorts with the light out and the door open. I listened to the ticking of the Detweiler boy's typewriter and the muffled roar of Los Angeles. And thought, and thought, and thought. And got nowhere.
Someone walked by the door, quietly and carefully. I leaned my head out. It was Johnny Peacock. He moved down the line of bungalows silent as a shadow. He turned south when he reached the sidewalk. Going to Selma or the Boulevard to turn a trick and make a few extra bucks. Lorraine must keep tight purse strings. Better watch it, kid. If she finds out, you'll be back on the streets again. And you haven't got too many years left where you can make good money by just gettin' it up.
I dropped in at the office for a while Friday morning and checked the first-of-the-month bills. Miss Tremaine had a list of new prospective clients. "Tell everyone I can't get to anything till Monday."
She nodded in disapproval. "Mr. Bloomfeld called."
"Did you get my report?"
"Yes. He was very pleased, but he wants the man's name."
"Tell him I'll get back on it Monday."
"Mrs. Bushyager called. Her sister and Mr. Bushyager are still missing."
"Tell her I'll get on it Monday." She opened her mouth. "If you say anything about my bank account, I'll put Spanish fly in your Ovaltine." She didn't humph, she giggled. I wonder how many points that is?
That afternoon I played gin with the Detweiler boy. He was genuinely glad to see me, like a friendly puppy. I was beginning to feel like a son of a bitch.
He hadn't mentioned North Carolina except that once the day before, and I was extremely interested in all subjects he wanted to avoid. "What's it like in the Blue Ridge? Coon huntin' and moonshine?"
He grinned and blitzed me. "Yeah, I guess. Most of the things you read about it are pretty nearly true. It's really a different world back in there, with almost no contact with the outside."
"How far in did you live?"
"About as far as you can get without comin' out the other side. Did you know most of the people never heard of television or movies and some of 'em don't even know the name of the President? Most of 'em never been more than thirty miles from the place they were born, never saw an electric light? You wouldn't believe it. But it's more than just things that're different. People are different, think different—like a foreign country." He shrugged. "I guess it'll all be gone before too long though. Things keep creepin' closer and closer. Did you know I never went to school?" he said, grinning. "Not a day of my life. I didn't wear shoes till I was ten. You wouldn't believe it." He shook his head, remembering. "Always kinda wished I coulda gone to school," he murmured softly.
"Why did you leave?"
"No reason to stay. When I was eight, my parents were killed in a fire. Our house burned down. I was taken in by a balmy old woman who lived not far away. I had some kin, but they didn't want me." He looked at me, trusting me. "They're pretty superstitious back in there, you know. Thought I was … marked. Anyway, the old woman took me in. She was a midwife, but she fancied herself a witch or something. Always making me drink some mess she'd brewed up. She fed me, clothed me, educated me, after a fashion, tried to teach me all her conjures, but I never could take 'em seriously." He grinned sheepishly. "I did chores for her and eventually became a sort of assistant, I guess. I helped her birth babies … I mean, deliver babies a couple of times, but that didn't last long. The parents were afraid me bein' around might mark the baby. She taught me to read and I couldn't stop. She had a lot of books she'd dredged up somewhere, more of 'em published before the First World War. I read a complete set of encyclopedias—published in 1911."
I laughed.
His eyes clouded. "Then she … died. I was fifteen, so I left. I did odd jobs and kept reading. Then I wrote a story and sent it to a magazine. They bought it; paid me fifty dollars. Thought I was rich, so I wrote another one. Since then I've been traveling around and writing. I've got an agent who takes care of everything, and so all I do is just write."
Sci Fiction Classics Volume 1 Page 13