Collected Fiction

by Henry Kuttner

  Again the light beam flashed out.

  Kerry vanished. The hatchet thudded onto the carpet.

  The radio walked back to its place and stood motionless once more. A faint clicking proceeded from its radioatomic brain.

  “Subject basically unsuitable,” it said, after a moment. “Elimination has been necessary.” Click! “Preparation for next subject completed.”

  Click.

  “We’ll take it,” the boy said.

  “You won’t be making a mistake,” smiled the rental agent. “It’s quiet, isolated, and the price is quite reasonable.”

  “Not so very,” the girl put in. “But it is just what we’ve been looking for.”

  The agent shrugged. “Of course an unfurnished place would run less. But—”

  “We haven’t been married long enough to get any furniture,” the boy grinned. He put an arm around his wife. “Like it, hon?”

  “Hm-m-m. Who lived here before?”

  The agent scratched his cheek. “Let’s see. Some people named Westerfield, I think. It was given to me for listing just about a week ago. Nice place. If I didn’t own my own house, I’d jump at it myself.”

  “Nice radio,” the boy said. “Late model, isn’t it?” He went over to examine the console.

  “Come along,” the girl urged. “Let’s look at the kitchen again.”

  “O.K., hon.”

  They went out of the room. From the hall came the sound of the agent’s smooth voice, growing fainter. Warm afternoon sunlight slanted through the windows.

  For a moment there was silence. Then—

  Click!

  THE END.

  COMPLIMENTS OF THE AUTHOR

  The book gave all the answers. The being, who wrote it had reduced all human affairs to a few situations, figured the answer to every one of them. But there was one human situation the owner off the book had forgotten—

  “If you know what’s good for you,” said the cat, “you’ll get the hell out of here. But quick!”

  Sam Tarbell thoughtfully patted the bottle in his topcoat pocket. The gesture was only a momentary confession of weakness, for the Journal reporter wasn’t drunk. He had several vices, including a profitable side line of blackmail; but dipsomania wasn’t one of them. No, there was a simpler explanation—ventriloquism.

  Tarbell’s gaze went past the cat to where Baldwin Gwinn’s house loomed darkly above him, a big, ramshackle place in an isolated section of Laurel Canyon. There were no cars in the driveway. Good. Tarbell didn’t want witnesses during his impending interview with Gwinn—Gwinn would pay off, of course. The evidence against the man was overwhelming. And, since Tarbell was the only one who possessed that evidence in its entirety, an attempt to collect hush money was clearly indicated.

  The principle was nothing new, either in Hollywood or to Sam Tarbell. He was a lank, dark, saturnine man of forty-odd, with a permanent sneer of cynicism on his aquiline face, and a profound trust in his own ability to come out on top. Till tonight, however, he had not had occasion to cross swords with a magician. But that didn’t matter—Gwinn had made a mistake, and the result should mean cash in the bank for Tarbell. He could always use money. A succession of very interesting blondes, to which he was partial, the Santa Anita track, the casinos along the Sunset Strip, and zombies, minks and melodious howlings—the Hollywood equivalent of wine, women and song—combined to keep the bank account overdrawn. But Tarbell had excellent connections, and was always willing to suppress a scandal, C.O.D. He never put the squeeze on widows or orphans, either. They seldom had money.

  Now in one pocket he had a bottle of whiskey, in another certain significant photostats, and in a third a useful little automatic, very handy for bluffing his way out of tight spots. It was night. Gwinn’s house was in a pocket of the Hollywood Hills, isolated, though a few lights gleamed from distant slopes. Stars and a spotlight of a moon were garish overhead. The reporter’s sleek dark coupe was parked unobtrusively under a pepper tree, and a fat black cat with white mittens of paws sat on the curbstone twitching its whiskers at Sam Tarbell.

  “Ventriloquism, Mr. Gwinn,” said the reporter gently, “is O.K. for the sticks. But don’t waste it on me.”

  “Ventriloquism, hell,” the cat replied, glaring balefully. “Don’t you know a familiar when you see one? Baldy knows you’re coming, and he’s all upset. I’d hate to lose him. He’s a fine master. I warn you, louse, that if you hurt Baldy, I, personally, will take steps.”

  Tarbell aimed a kick at the cat, which was deftly avoided. The creature cursed in a fervid undertone and went behind a convenient bush, from which low, searing oaths proceeded. Tarbell’s cynical sneer increased in intensity. He walked up the steps and rang the bell.

  “The door’s open,” said the cat. “You’re expected.”

  Tarbell shrugged and obeyed. The room in which he found himself was big, comfortably furnished, and didn’t look at all like the home of a practicing magician. Etchings hung on the walls. A Bokhara rug, slightly singed, was on the floor. At a big table by the window a fat man with a cast in one eye was sitting, staring down unhappily at an open book before him.

  “Hello, Gwinn,” the reporter said.

  Gwinn sighed and looked up. “Hello, Tarbell. Sit down. Cigar?”

  “No, thanks. You know me?” Gwinn pointed to a crystal ball on a tripod in one corner. “I saw you in that. You won’t believe it, of course, but I’m really a magician.”

  Tarbell grinned. “Sure. I believe it. So do lots of other people. Like Ina Phairson.” Gwinn didn’t turn a hair. “Such things are necessary in my profession.”

  “Rather tough on Ina Phairson, though. And it’d look bad in the papers. In fact, it’d look awful.”

  “It would mean the gas chamber, or at best a long prison term. I know. Unfortunately, there’s nothing I can do about it.”

  Tarbell took out the photostats and laid them on the table. He didn’t say anything. Gwinn shuffled through the documents, nodding. His thick lips pursed.

  “You have all the evidence, I see. The trouble is that I can’t pay blackmail. It isn’t allowed.”

  “Blackmail’s an ugly word,” Tarbell said. “Let’s call it a dividend. Five thousand bucks and this evidence goes up the spout. I’ll raise my price tomorrow.”

  Gwinn said, “You don’t understand. I made a pact with the devil some years ago, and there were certain terms in the contract. One of them is that I’m not allowed to pay blackmail.”

  “Suit yourself.” Tarbell shrugged. “You can keep those photostats. I have the originals, of course. There’ll be a story about you in tomorrow’s Journal.”

  “No . . . no. I don’t want that.” Gwinn glanced worriedly at the book before him, and closed it with a snap.

  Tarbell’s face didn’t change, but a new look came into his eyes. That small volume had the look of a diary, or an account book. It would be interesting to thumb through it. There might be names, facts, and figures, all of which would be useful and perhaps profitable.

  The book had a plain cloth cover, and on the front was a small white oval against the brown. In gold script was engraved Baldwin Gwinn. Tarbell read the name upside down.

  “I haven’t all night,” he said. “Give me an answer. I don’t care what it is. I’ll act accordingly.”

  Gwinn fingered his thick lower lip. “It’s no use, of course,” he said under his breath. “Still—”

  He threw a handful of nothing at the fireplace, and flames blazed up with blue brilliance. Then he plucked a wax figurine out of empty air and examined it thoughtfully. It was about six inches high, and was a perfect replica of Tarbell. He threw it into the fire. “I’ve heard of that,” Tarbell said. “But I don’t believe it.”

  “Then it won’t work,” Gwinn muttered, but waited, nevertheless. For a brief moment Tarbell felt uncomfortably warm. He didn’t show it. He grinned tightly, and the feeling went away.

  Then, without warning, there was a third person in the room. Hi
s name was Andy Monk, and two years ago he had died at the hands of the law, as a result of a feature story Tarbell had written. Monk wouldn’t pay blackmail, either. And Tarbell had always been afraid of the man and his handiness with a knife. For months, till Monk was captured, he had gone in fear of shadows—

  Monk was a shadow now, and Tarbell knew that. Hypnosis was old stuff. But the hatred blazing in the man’s eyes was horribly disturbing.

  Monk had a gun, and he fired it at Tarbell. The bullets weren’t real, of course. Tarbell braced himself against the impact; almost to his surprise, he realized that he was trembling violently. Hypnotism—but—

  Monk threw away his gun and took out a long-bladed knife. Tarbell had always been afraid of that knife. He tried to look through the phantom, but Monk was visibly, if not tangibly, real. Maybe he was tangible, after all. Bullets were one matter. Ghost bullets. A knife was another, somehow. Blue firelight rippled up the blade.

  Tarbell didn’t want even an intangible knife slicing at his throat. He was scared now. His heart was pounding violently. He hastily took out his automatic and said hoarsely, “Turn it off, Gwinn. Quick!”

  He couldn’t see Gwinn, because the room was very dark, and Monk was plunging forward, laughing, the knife driving up viciously. Tarbell chewed his lip, gave back a step, and fired. Instantly he regretted the weakness.

  He regretted it even more as Monk vanished, and he saw Gwinn slumped in his chair, the top of his head blown off.

  The magician’s eyes were wide open, but unseeing. Tarbell stood quite motionless for several minutes, breathing hard. Then he shoved the gun back in his pocket, stepped forward, and picked up the brown book from the table. He didn’t touch the body. He took out his handkerchief and wiped the doorknobs as he went out of the house, and, standing in the friendly darkness, he found the whiskey bottle in his coat and drank deeply. It helped.

  “But I couldn’t—” he said aloud, and broke off, with a quick glance around. Nothing stirred.

  Except the cat. The cat came out of the shadows and looked at Tarbell with luminous green eyes.

  “There’s still revenge,” it said, waving its tail. “And I’m a particularly nasty sort of familiar. I was fond of Baldy. Run along, Sam Tarbell. You won’t get into any trouble with the police. But you’ll get into trouble with me—and my friends. It’ll be harder, since you’ve got the book, but I’ll manage.” It yawned, flicking a pink tongue at Tarbell.

  The reporter thought of posthypnosis, and slowly drew his automatic. The cat went away, with the magic peculiar to cats. Tarbell nodded and descended the steps, getting into his car and starting the motor with a nervous jerk.

  It was awkward turning the car around on the narrow, winding road, but he managed it without too much difficulty. Going down the canyon in second gear, Tarbell kept his eyes on the black center line and thought hard. Murder. First-degree, at that. But there was ho evidence.

  He chewed his lip. He was getting shaky, firing at shadows. Unfortunate that Gwinn happened to be behind that particular shadow. Still—

  Still, it couldn’t be helped, and the worst possible thing to do was brood about it. Much better to shove the incident to the back of his mind. Hell, in the old days in Chicago murder hadn’t meant much. Why should it mean anything now?

  Nevertheless, it did. Tarbell had always taken pains to keep his skirts clear of messes. By a natural trick of compensation, he had come to regard his blackmailing activities with tolerant satisfaction. In this world, the race was to the swift. A slow horse was handicapped—unless he got the needle. A man smart enough to use a hypo stimulant wasn’t necessarily a rat, except according to narrow standards, which did not concern Tarbell.

  If you were clever enough to get your hands on smart money, that was all to the good. And it was far, far better than living on a reporter’s salary alone.

  But Tarbell was shaken. “Selfdefense,” he said under his breath, and lit a cigarette, illegal in this fire-hazard area. He put it out immediately. It wouldn’t do to be stopped by an officer.

  A giant stood threateningly in the glare of the headlights, gnarled and menacing. Tarbell wrenched at the wheel in sudden panic. It was nothing but-an oak; just the same, the illusion was frightening. Briefly Tarbell had seen the huge face of a hag peering at him, loose mouth writhing, eyes flaming green—

  It was gone now, but the aftertaste of fear was sour in Tarbell’s mouth. He turned the car into a side road and parked, staring at nothing. Not so good. He couldn’t afford hysteria. He drank whiskey, shuddered, and wiped his lips with his hand. It was trembling a little. Tarbell lay back and breathed deeply, his eyes closed. He’d be all. right in a minute. The canyon road was steep and winding, and he preferred not to risk it till his hands stopped shaking.

  Meantime he remembered Gwinn’s diary. It lay on the seat beside him, a flat brown volume rather smaller than an 8vo, and Tarbell picked it up, switching on the overhead light.

  Oddly enough, the gold script on the front said Samuel Tarbell.

  Tarbell looked at that for a long time. He touched the white oval with an exploratory finger. It was smooth arid glossy—parchment, perhaps. Finally he opened the book at random. The page number—17—in the upper right-hand corner was in large block numerals, and there was only one sentence, in crude type that seemed hand-set. It said:

  “Werewolves can’t climb oak trees.”

  Tarbell read it again. It still said the same thing. Frowning, he turned the page.

  “He’s bluffing.”

  That was all—two words. Cryptic, to say the least. Obviously, this wasn’t Gwinn’s diary. It was more like “Finnegan’s Wake.”

  Tarbell flipped the pages. Page 25 said:

  “Try the windshield.”

  Page 26 said:

  “Declare the truth and fear no man.” A few pages later, Tarbell found this: “Deny everything.”

  There were other ambiguous comments. “Don’t worry about poor crops,” “Aim at his eye,” “Don’t speak till you’re back on earth,” and “Try again.” As a collection of aphorisms, the book was more than a little cryptic. But Tarbell had a queer feeling that he was on the verge of a mystery—an important one, somehow. Only he couldn’t find the key.

  The hell with it. Gwinn was a screwball. This volume meant nothing. Or—

  It was growing chilly. Tarbell, with a wry mouth, dropped the book on the seat beside him and started the engine. The one inexplicable thing was the discovery of his name on the volume’s brown cover. Previously it had had Gwinn’s name—or had it? Thinking back, he wasn’t quite certain. At any rate, the doubt was comforting.

  He backed the car, turned, and drove on down the canyon, branching into Laurel, the main thoroughfare. As usual, there was plenty of traffic, since the road was a short cut between Hollywood and the Valley.

  The accident came not quite without warning. On the left of the road was a gully; on the right, an overhanging tree. The headlights picked out something definitely abnormal about that tree. For the second time Tarbell saw the gray, rugose, sagging face of a hag, toothless mouth agape in a grin, the deformed head nodding as though in encouragement. He was quite certain that, mingled somehow with the trunk and branches, was the monstrous figure of a woman. The tree had become anthropomorphic. It was wrenching, straining, hunching its heavy shoulders as it swayed and lurched toward the road—

  It fell. Tarbell caught his breath and jammed his foot down on the accelerator, swinging the car to the left. The cold motor stuttered hesitantly, without gaining speed, and that was unfortunate. The tree crashed down, and a heavy branch seemed to thrust itself under the wheels. Tires blew out-with sickening bangs. The breath-stopping sickness of imminent danger froze Tarbell into paralysis as the coupé went over the curb, toppling, skidding down, turning over and over till it came to rest on its side.

  Tarbell’s head rang like a bell; white flashes of pain lanced through it. He was jammed awkwardly behind the steering wheel, which, luckily, had
not snapped off. He had avoided impalement, at any rate. He reached fumblingly for the key, to snap off the ignition, but a flicker of fire told him he was too late.

  The car was ablaze.

  Painfully Tarbell tried to right himself. The shatterproof glass had not broken, and he thrust upward against the door, now above his head. It was jammed. He could see stars through the glass, and a coiling veil of thin smoke that partly obscured them. A reddening glow grew brighter. When the fire reached the gas tank—

  He heard distant shouts. Help was coming, but probably it would not come in time. With a choking cry Tarbell strained up against the door; he could not budge it. If he could break the glass—

  He sought for a tool. There was none. The dashboard compartment was jammed, and, in his awkward position, he could not remove a shoe to hammer against the glass. The acrid smell grew stronger. Red light flickered.

  The sharp corner of something was jammed against his side, and Tarbell, hoping it might be a loose bit of metal heavy enough to serve his purpose, clutched at it. He found himself staring at the book. The white circle on the cover was luminous, and traced darkly against the whiteness were two Arabic numerals:

  25

  The need for self-preservation sharpens the faculties. It was instinct that brought vividly to Tarbell the memory of what he had read on Page 25 of the book. The enigma of the message was suddenly elucidated.

  “Try the windshield.”

  Tarbell thrust at the long plate of glass with his palm, and the windshield fell out. A breath of cool air blew in against his sweating face. The crackling of flames was very loud now.

  He kept a tight grip on the book as he wormed his way through the gap, skinning his shin rather badly; and he ran down the gully, gasping for breath, till the red firelight had faded. A booming roar told him the gas tank had exploded. Tarbell sat down, feeling weak, and looked at the book. It was an oblong, darker shadow in the faint moonlight.