Chapter Four
The next morning I went to The Landmark Casino to track down where Muller lived, as I found no listing for him in the telephone directory. I had taken to sleuthing better than I had imagined and had begun to fantasize about what prestigious feats I could accomplish with the power of the law behind me. Of course, government jobs involve too much of a in-depth background check and I cannot apply for them, but it’s fun to pretend. I wished that I had a fedora on which to pull the brim down while investigating, but they had been out of fashion for a while and I didn’t even own any. (Take it from a man who wore hats when they were in style; unless you are a dapper elderly man or a time traveler, you have no business wearing a fedora or a trilby in this day and age. You look like a damn idiot.)
If you say that you are a journalist it’s simply amazing how much information people will dump upon you to accommodate their own vanity and lust for the possibility of seeing their name in print. All you need is a little notebook and an economical blazer to win their implicit trust. I had to buy the blazer in Las Vegas as I had not brought one with me. It was light brown twill and I had wanted the suede version but I decided that it was a touch too gentrified for a field reporter. It took nothing more than a wink and an introduction (“I’ve left my cards back in Houston, but if you’d like I could scribble down my address,” I offered and then wrote down the street address where I had lived briefly in 1921) and before I knew it the receptionist had wrangled up Muller’s address for me.
Despite Doreen’s insistence that her dear brother was a big shot, I garnered another impression of him when he opened the door of his half of a sterile duplex. I suppose I run the risk of insulting someone, but there was a time for magicians and by 1971 that time had passed. Stage magic was no longer entertaining since the world had become magic in and of itself. Earlier I mooned over television, and you don’t fully grasp it as you were no doubt born into this age of wonder, but, well, people had been to the moon itself not even two years previously. Compared to that, a man pulling doves out of his pocket was just pathetically lackluster.
“You here about the van?” he asked me, as he opened the door. Could there be a more quintessential 1970’s question?
I sort of wished I was there about the van. What a life of leisure that would have been, to have my concern be a van that I would perhaps tool about the southwest in until it ultimately broke and I was forced to face adulthood head on and perhaps get a job at an insurance company or something banal like that. I shook my head. “Eugene Muller?”
“Who’s asking?” Muller wasn’t as heavy set as his sister was, but he had the same sort of almost bulging eyes and dirty blonde hair. The first rule of show business should be thus; either be attractive or be ugly enough to be memorable. Muller was neither, and I was fairly certain I was about to rip out from him his only hope for success. (Rule number two of show business, and everything else for that matter, is don’t screw with immortals.)
“I need to discuss something with you,” I said, taking care to speak in measured, calm tones. A familiar flush spread throughout my body; a quickening of the pulse, a heightening of the senses, an awaking of a mania that controls me and fuels me and torments me, a mania that I am a slave to. It was another three days until I could harvest, but I anticipate it almost eagerly. For all my lucid derision of the abominable act, there is something so innately primal in the gratification of my dark ritual. I am hesitant to compare to sexual relations, since that is a positive act as opposed to literally ripping the life from someone for your own selfish sustenance, but still, there is that same subset of animal fulfillment in the act.
“Discuss what?”
“I would rather do this inside,” I replied, and without waiting for an invitation pushed into his home.
“Who the hell are you?”
“David…something or the other,” I mumbled and closed the door behind me.
“What do you want?”
I glanced around the darkened apartment. It was alarmingly like my bachelor lair. I don’t like to be reminded of the overlap between myself and humanity. If I am not part of it, then what I do isn’t so bad. “I won’t take up more of your time than necessary.”
Muller closed the door. “That scam artist bitch sent you, didn’t she?”
“You shouldn’t say such things about a lady, but yes, I suppose she did,” I answered. “How did you know?”
“You’ve got that same spellbound look about that the rest of them had,” he answered. “You must be her favorite though, she didn’t let the other ones leave her sight long, lest they developed their own thoughts.”
I infer that I was to be offended, but part of me was thrilled to be recognized as Ma Bichette’s favorite. “That simplifies matters then. You know what I’ve come for.”
Muller laughed. “She knows damn well what I want. When she gives it to me, she can have it back.”
I had thought about it on the plane trip down, and while I couldn’t quite piece together why she hadn’t disclosed this to me, I had deduced that their conflict had a great deal to do Ma Bichette’s little performances. No doubt Muller believed it to be a trick, and wanted to learn the secret of the illusion from her. “You want to know how she does her tricks, don’t you?”
He nodded. “She tells me, I give it back. Simple as that.”
“Well, if that’s all you want, I can tell you how she does it,” I said.
“You know how to as well?”
“Yes,” I answered slowly. “What do you want to know?”
“Everything,” he answered excitedly.
“Fetch me the film,” I said, “and I’ll teach you whatever she showed you. And more.”
Muller stared at me. “I don’t trust you to do that. I think you’ll just take off with it.”
“You don’t seem to be as empty headed as the rest of her flock,” I commented and pulled out a cigarette, not bothering to ask for his blessing to smoke in the house.
“I’m not.”
I lit the end of it. “How then did you end up with her? Surely you know what sort of man she was looking for.”
“I was at a seminar in Sacramento last year,” Muller began to explain, keeping a wary eye on me. “Some of those new agers have inventive parlor tricks, or at least an exotic name or concept. I…appropriate them for my act. The older audiences like it, it makes all these new and scary foreign ideas laughable. So, when I need to come up with a new act I hit the road, undercover, scope out some new tricks.” Despite his distrust he was more than willing to spill his magical beans. I figured he was proud of himself. It sounded like some stupid scheme Ma Bichette would come up with.
I nodded. “And you saw what she can do, and you supposed that was quite the trick to duplicate. What exactly did she do?”
Muller gazed at me. “I assume you know her whole list of tricks?”
“You don’t know the half of it,” I replied stoically.
“If I could shove a blade through my skin, but not a normal knife, something exciting like a scimitar or a katana, without a box or a scarf hiding the actual mechanics of the trick, if I could do that, I could stop doing matinees. Maybe even get on television.” Muller smiled briefly at the illustrious future that he saw rise before him, but the smile faded when he realized he still had to learn to secret first.
“Let me guess. She told you if you came and worked for her for a brief time, she’d tell you everything you wanted to know, right?” I chuckled. “Honestly, you thought she’d give away her best stuff for a few months of labor?”
Muller shook his head. “I don’t know what she wants, she’s got a gold mine with her tricks but she doesn’t do anything with it.”
I shrugged and rolled up my shirt sleeve. “Once you get the hang of it, you can do pretty much anything that would cause bodily harm.” I crushed the lit cigarette out on my arm, wincing as I felt the initial embers burn, but the pain abruptly ended.
Muller was nonplussed. �
�That’s easy, there are salves that let you do that.”
I didn’t know if he was being honest or if he just wanted to see something more impressive to gauge whether or not I knew all the tricks as well. If you are curious as to why I even bothered with accommodating his demands, it’s because I didn’t feel like searching for the reel without his help. For all I knew it could be hidden under a floorboard or not even at the premises. To save myself frustration, I take the painful way out sometimes.
“Very well. Have you got knives? Not prop ones, real ones.”
“In the kitchen,” he answered.
“Go get them,” I ordered and plopped down on the sofa. “And something to drink. I don’t suppose you’ve got any bourbon, have you?”
Muller returned quickly with a boning knife and a bottle of Wild Turkey with a shot glass turned upside down on the neck. I poured myself a shot first. If you’re going to be inflicting wounds on yourself, it’s best to begin with some fortifying drink. No doubt you’ve noticed that I can still get intoxicated on various things, which doesn’t exactly make sense in the context of the curse or whatever the proper name is for my condition. I’ve wondered about that as well. I’ve got so many unanswered questions.
“Salute,” I said, and threw back the shot I had poured. I picked up the knife and examined it. It was a bit dull, but I had already wasted enough time. I set it back down, then poured another shot and drank it.
“Are you going to do it or not?” Muller asked.
“All in good time,” I answered and tossed back my third shot. Judge me all you like, but I find it highly unlikely that you’ve been in anything even remotely approaching my situation.
“Until you find yourself face to face with it, you never really stop and think about what is inside your own body,” I said and I picked up the small blade. “Lots of things, bones and veins and nerves, all stuffed in there as tightly as sardines.”
Muller scoffed. “I don’t see what that has to do with the trick.”
I suddenly thrust the knife into my hand. The faster I do it, the shorter the pain is. “It’s integral, you need to know where all the bones are, because if you hit one you’re going to spend an awful lot of time mucking about. And not only does that hurt more than necessary, it doesn’t look as clean.” I tuned my hand around and showed him the tip that was protruding from the side. “It’s much more impressive like this, don’t you think?”
Muller nodded excitedly. “Yes, very impressive!” he exclaimed. The lack of blood only serves to confirm that it is an illusion, I think, and I was content to let that assumption continue for as long as possible.
I poured myself another shot. Manipulating the bottle was rather awkward since I had to take care not to bump the knife around. “Get the film.”
Muller stood up and went to his bookshelf. He took a thick book from the shelf, reached into the gap, and pulled out the canister. “Yeah, yeah, here it is,” he said as he handed it to me.
I recognized her spidery handwriting on the label. “Ma famille heueuse (sic)” it proclaimed in red ink. My happy family. I opened the metal tin to make sure that there was indeed film in it. “This is the one, right? Because I will be very unhappy if you are trying to pull a fast one on me.”
“How many home movies you think I got laying around here? Yeah, that’s the one. Now, hold up your end of the bargain.” Muller sat down next to me and studied the knife in my hand.
“All right. First you have to die,” I answered.
He laughed. “That’s a metaphor, right? Your type loves metaphors.”
“Believe me, I’m not that type,” I replied drolly.
“Then how did you get mixed up with her?”
“That’s a story for another time,” I said. “Do you want to know how to do this? Then shut up and listen. You have to die first, actual death, soul ejected from the body, heart and brain and lungs stop, the whole shebang. It’s not worth it. Stick to card tricks.”
Muller leaned forward. “Stop bullshitting me. I gave you what you wanted, now you give me what I want.”
I ripped the knife from my hand. “You don’t want what I have.”
“Don’t tell me what I want and don’t want. Show me how the trick is done.”
“I showed you. It isn’t a trick. I’m really dead. Undead rather, but I’ve never been sure on the terminology.” I’m really not quite sure what to call myself. Immortal implies that I never died and I always had been immortal, but that isn’t the case. Undead is an umbrella term for all sorts of mythical beings. I don’t really like the moniker of ‘undead’ for two reasons; one being that it is applied to fictional things like vampires and zombies, and secondly, because it logically would be defined as not dead, which would mean everyone who is just normally alive. Unkillable I rather like, because it sounds fairly badass, but it’s not really a word, as my computer informs me with a little red zigzag (it wants to replace it with ‘inclinable’). Oh, the endless sufferings I must endure.
“Bullshit,” he repeated again. “You don’t really buy into all that garbage she’s dishing out, do you?”
“Of course not.” I was really starting to get annoyed by Muller. His suggestion that I was an idiot had touched a nerve. “If you want to believe that this is a trick knife, well,” I quickly whipped the knife up to his throat.
Muller seemed too stunned to react. His wise guy routine has hit an abrupt end.
“Listen to me very closely,” I said without changing the modulation of my voice. I was terribly annoyed by this whole business, but I believe that if I started exhibiting emotion I would go down in their memory not as the badass unkillable, but as the crazy person. Ma Bichette can go down, time and time again, as the crazy one, but not I. “If you want to believe that this is a trick, shall we try it out, right now? Because I am fairly certain that she expects me to kill you to cover all of this up. But, I like your sister. Doreen was quite nice to me and seems to think the world of you. I would not want to upset her.”
“What do you know about my sister, you psychopath?” Muller growled at me. I had to admire his couilles somewhat.
“Nothing that you need to concern yourself with. I won’t bother her anymore, presuming that you don’t give me reason to. Do I make myself understood?” I don’t like making threats against innocent people, and should push come to shove I wasn’t going to do a thing to Doreen, but then again I had a knife to the gentleman’s throat and I don’t believe he would call my bluff.
“Crystal clear,” he answered.
I pulled the knife away and set it on the table. “Excellent. I believe our business here is complete. Unless you have any further questions?”
“Get out of my house,” he said clearly.
“Gladly,” I answered. I picked up the bottle of Wild Turkey. “I’ll be taking this for my trouble. You have yourself a good day.”
“Wait,” he interjected suddenly.
I had my hand on the knob, but my proper breeding stopped me from exiting before I had replied. “Yes?”
“You’ve got this incredible skill. Why don’t you use it?”
I laughed. “Because I look like an old man in a top hat. Au revoir, Houdini.”
My Wholly Heartbreaking Heretic Page 6