Daughter of Darkness

by Ed Gorman

***

  Jenny was on her way to Ted Hannigan's loft near the River North Gallery District when the news came on the radio. At first, she was tempted to change to another station. Unlike her parents, she had no interest in local politics, and with a city election coming up in six weeks, most of the local news concerned tracking polls and statements from candidates.

  Then she heard, "The man found stabbed to death in the Econo-Nite Motel has now been identified as Earl Benedict of Skokie."

  Her headache was instant and lacerating. She was afraid she might pass out. She gripped the steering wheel, not wanting to smash into the cars on either side of her. She was on the JFK Expressway, and it was extremely busy at the moment. There was no way she could drive in this condition.

  The announcer went on: "A police spokesman said that Benedict was a salesman for a local radio station."

  ***

  At the end of the exit ramp, Jenny shot across the street, pulling into the parking lot of an Arby's. The lunch crowd had descended on the place like a jungle predator on a carcass. Rock and roll and rap music boomed from two dozen cars with the windows rolled down.

  Jenny sat in her car, trembling, and pressing delicate fingers to her temples. She felt suddenly dehydrated as well. She began licking her lips frantically.

  Why would she respond to a news story this way? She didn't have anything to do with a dead man at some cheap motel, did she?

  But she was missing eight days…

  She leaned her head back and closed her eyes. There was something in her mind… something slowly working its way to her consciousness… some ghostly image that she knew she didn't want to see… something that would perhaps explain the eight days she couldn't make register in her mind…

  And the story about the dead man in the motel had seemed to trigger it. But why?

  Then she thought, Maybe it's a coincidence. Maybe I just happened to react at the same time the story came on. Maybe any story would have triggered it.

  She sat in her car for several long minutes. She felt as if somebody had violently assaulted her. She felt isolated, the way she had in the psychiatric hospital.

  It made no sense, responding to a news story like that. It had to be a coincidence…

  She walked unsteadily into Arby's and got herself a small Diet Pepsi. The smell of the meat made her sick. The psychiatric hospital at which she'd stayed had sat next to a farm. She'd frequently walked along the perimeter fence watching the cows go about their cowy business. And suddenly one day, it came to her that it was ridiculous-not to mention inhumane-to raise a breed of living beings for food.

  The human faces about her looked grotesque suddenly. She remembered an old Twilight Zone episode about a party of upscale people drinking their martinis… and suddenly the hero sees them for what they are… pig-faced aliens.

  Steady, she thought. This was the kind of mental self-indulgence she'd had to fight against after coming out of the hospital, these little excursions into phantasmagoria. She didn't tell anybody about them, of course. She didn't want to go back to the hospital…

  Then the people in Arby's were no longer monsters. They were just ordinary people-construction workers, salespeople, college students, mothers and their children-nice people for the most part, she was sure. People who wished her no harm, people who would help her if she asked…

  The spell, or whatever it had been, was starting to pass.

  She sat in her car sipping at her soda. Her trembling had stopped. The worst of the headache had receded as well. It had been like a seizure, a great dark god holding her slender white body in his hand, and squeezing her until her life was almost snuffed out-

  The sun had moved out from behind the clouds now. She rolled down her window. Even the air smelled fresh, and beautifully redolent of autumn-

  She felt better. Even the dread associated with her eight missing days was gone.

  She wanted to go see Ted. He always made her laugh, and she felt so secure in his strapping and powerful presence.

  She started her car engine and headed back for the expressway.

  ***

  Ted Hannigan's loft was located in the River North Gallery District, a section of the city Jenny loved. On a sunny day, it was great fun to stroll up and down the streets that were lined with art galleries. It was a little world unto itself, people here focused on art of every description. Sure, there were snobs and poseurs-a place like River North was bound to attract them-but most of the people were in equal parts enthusiastic, intelligent, and unpretentious.

  Ted's loft was on the third floor of what had once been a warehouse. He often joked that this was the only place a man with three ex-wives could afford. Ted's interest in women was far more passionate than his interest in art. Ted had never kidded himself. He had adopted a Monet-like style of illustration and taken as his subjects the wealthy and arty set of Chicago. They loved his work, even if most of the major local artisans found it little more than clever commercial illustration and not in any way serious art. Ted had a Rolls Royce, a modest country estate, and spent at least two months of every year living well in Paris. He had made his peace with his own artistic limitations years ago.

  While most of his art was for sale at the Harcourt Gallery right down the street, Ted did private portraits in his loft. Much as he hated such concessions, his portrait work required him to put a small business office in the front part of his loft. This meant a desk, a three-line phone system, two filing cabinets, a copying machine, a fax, and a leather couch and chair for his clients to sit in while they awaited the master. Ted always joked that the next thing you knew, he'd be joining the Chamber of Commerce and voting Republican. Oh, and one more thing came with the office-whatever stunning young thing Ted happened to be sleeping with at the moment. Ted's age range these days had gotten slightly older. The fetching short-haired blonde behind the desk this morning appeared to be at least in her late twenties-which was an improvement on the last one, who'd been a sophomore dropout from Northwestern. This one even dressed somewhat conservatively, in a nicely cut four-button jacket with casual white blouse and pleated blue slacks. Jenny could have lived without the nose ring and the butterfly tattoo on the top of the right hand, but then Jenny had never been much for fads or trends.

  As soon as Jenny introduced herself, the blonde said, "Oh, yes, you're the one who walks on water." Before Jenny could say anything, the blonde stuck out a hand and said, "I'm Andi Teller. Ted's been telling me about you all morning. And I mean all morning. The way he was describing you, I thought walking on water was just one of your many talents."

  Jenny smiled and shook Andi's hand. "Ted's sort of my unofficial uncle. I think he's slightly prejudiced."

  "Well, he sure wasn't exaggerating about one thing, anyway," Andi said. "You're just as beautiful as he said you were."

  Jenny blushed. She'd never been good at accepting compliments, and she didn't like being the center of attention. It put too much pressure on her. And, she was naturally shy. Good looks didn't necessarily make you gregarious.

  "Like some coffee?" Andi said. "I made it, so it's safe to drink. Ted's is like car oil."

  Jenny shook her head. "No, no thanks, I'll just sit down over here if you don't mind."

  "Ted's running late with his sitting." Andi said. "I'll go tell him you're here. That'll hurry him along."

  There was a door in the corner. Andi opened it and disappeared.

  Instead of sitting down, Jenny walked around the reception area. The walls were filled with examples of his portraiture. He made things pretty, Ted did; too pretty, actually. But that was why people paid him so well, because he could deceive them into believing that they were something they were not. The overweight banker became the General Patton-like adventurer; the somewhat worn society matron became the ageless belle of whatever ball she attended. "I make them pay through the nose for their lies," Ted said mockingly to her once. It was the only side of him she didn't care for: the harsh, cynical side. She wasn't sure who he
hated most-his clients or himself.

  Fortunately, she rarely saw this side. Most of the time, Ted was the amusing, even dashing artiste who lived his life exactly as he wanted. He was her father-confessor. She'd told Ted things she hadn't even confided to her mother. He could bind you up with his tenderness. He could make you feel all right about yourself-something not even a long line of shrinks had been able to do most of the time.

  The funny thing was, when she waited for him out in the reception area this way, she always got butterflies, as if she was about to have a date she didn't know very well. She knew why. She wanted him to like her, and she was afraid she'd disappoint him in some way.

  Andi came back. "He said ten more minutes, max."

  "Thanks."

  She sat down next to a table filled with magazines about photography and art. A copy of this morning's newspaper lay across several magazines. She scanned the headlines above the fold. The phone rang. Andi answered it and began chatting with somebody. Jenny turned the newspaper over to see what was on the bottom of the fold.

  DEAD MAN DISCOVERED IN MOTEL

  Jenny had an image of an ax being buried in the precise center of her forehead. The headache was that visceral. She grunted so sharply with the pain that Andi looked up, cupped the phone, and asked, "Are you all right?"

  But instead of answering, Jenny staggered to her feet, grabbed her purse, and hurried to the front door. The bathroom was down the hall. It was a large room with a dusty skylight. The fixtures were new and the paint was fresh. She went into the first of the two stalls and threw up.

  She was terrible at throwing up, and always had been. It terrified her. She felt she was going to choke and die. Her mother had always been there to hold her, to comfort her, to reassure her. But Jenny was too old for that now, of course.

  It took two passes, kneeling next to the new white toilet bowl, to empty her stomach.

  She stood up and walked shakily to the twin white sinks and the long mirror that stretched out above them. She opened her purse and took out a plastic toothbrush holder, a tube of Colgate white, a tiny vial of Chanel Number 5, and a bar of beauty soap. She spent ten minutes working on herself. She wanted to be perfectly fresh for Ted.

  The headache had subsided but not her dread of what she'd read in the newspaper. Twice now a reference to the Econo-Nite Motel had made her head erupt with blinding pain. But why should it? What did she have to do with what had happened at the Econo-Nite Motel? Nothing.

  But she couldn't recall eight days and nights of her life…

  She swallowed two aspirins, then hurried back to meet Ted.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Quinlan drove his Mercedes sports coupe to the private airport where the hangar he leased housed his Lear jet. When people swooned at the extravagance of such a purchase, especially for a man whose business rarely took him out of the city, he pointed out that the Lear was nearly ten years old, and that he needed to escape from his work every now and then. He had been known to favor the Caribbean.

  His pilot, a chunky thirty-seven-year-old redhead named McReady, was climbing out of the cargo hold when Quinlan arrived.

  "You think there'll be room for everything?" Quinlan asked.

  "Should be," McReady said. "I've never seen you take this much on a vacation before."

  "Well, I'll probably be staying longer than usual."

  Much longer, Quinlan thought. After McReady took him to London, Quinlan would disappear into a clinic where plastic surgery would turn him into a new man. "Quinlan" would never be seen or heard from again. As soon as his last task was finished in Chicago, which should be tomorrow, "Quinlan" would be gone forever.

  "What're the weather people saying?"

  McReady, wiping his hands on his gray overalls, said, "Some storms over the mid-Atlantic. But they don't look like much. Should be an easy go."

  "Great." Then, "I've got something I want to load up myself."

  McReady smiled. "Be my guest. My daughter's got a dental appointment. I'm supposed to pick her up at school and take her. I'll be back here in a couple of hours."

  "No hurry. Everything looks like it's moving along fine."

  McReady nodded and walked out of the hangar, his whistle echoing off the curved steel ceiling.

  Quinlan moved quickly. He had a small gym-style leather bag that he wanted to put in the very back of the cargo hold. He climbed in and began rearranging trunks and bags. When he had cleared out a place against the rear wall of the hold, he slipped the bag in there, then covered it up with the trunks and other bags.

  Eight million dollars in cash. It had taken him four years to accumulate it in various ways. About a third of it had come from his inheritance. His father had been a Los Angeles attorney who'd attached himself to some very powerful studio people. After he'd helped extricate one of them from a difficult-and potentially criminal-tax situation, they'd all pushed some very high-visibility WORK his way. He'd made a lot of money and had left half of it to Quinlan-the only thing he'd left Quinlan. He'd been a terrible, absent father. Quinlan hadn't thought much more of his mother, a very beautiful but strictly decorous woman who'd died of a brain tumor. He'd overhead one of the maids laugh one day, "I didn't know she had a brain." And cruel as the remark was, he had to agree with it. His mother had been a dope.

  Eight million dollars in cash.

  That was the best way to start a new life. And to inaugurate a new face. The very best way.

  ***

  Most of the private investigators Coffey knew were jerks. They would literally do anything for a buck. Especially since the hi-tech revolution made spying a rather simple process. But the card Margolis had given him at the cab company led him to a surprising neighborhood.

  He had low expectations of International Investigations, Inc. In spite of the imposing name, the place would be a dusty walk-up in an ancient four-story office building. There would be a pebbled-glass door with chipped black paint giving the name of the place. Inside, he'd find a waiting room with a few spindly chairs and some very old Time magazines on a scarred and wobbly table. Cummings himself-that was the name on the card-would be dumpy, vaguely unclean, and smell of beer or whiskey. Or both.

  This was Coffey's composite sketch of private detectives.

  So he was surprised when he found that International Investigations, Inc. shared a new one-story, concrete-and-glass office building in part of the city that was bouncing back from urban blight.

  The cars parked in back of the building, in the International section of the lot, also surprised Coffey, a new Mercedes four-door sedan and a silver Jag. The silver Jag.

  Coffey parked on the edge of the lot with his motor still running. Whoever had hired this firm to check him out had money. This was not a sleazy gumshoe operation. They probably had indoor plumbing and everything.

  He sat there for ten minutes, trying to glimpse the clientele, when a young man in an Armani suit came out and walked over to the silver Jag. The man's hair was so sun-bleached it was almost white-just as it had been the other night when Coffey glimpsed him by the motel. The silver Jag was a prize, a collectible that could make people gasp. There had never been a car quite so dramatic in the sculpting of its body.

  The young man looked dour. Whatever was troubling him had made him lose appreciation for the gorgeous machine he was driving.

  He got in the silver car and drove away. He didn't even glance at Coffey.

  After a few minutes, Coffey drove away, too.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Coffey had just returned from the library-and was making a fresh pot of coffee-when the front doorbell rang.

  He walked through the house, his cats Tasha, Crystal, and Tess trailing him, and went to the front door.

  Takes one to know one, he thought, peering out at the woman who stood on his front porch.

  It was easy to spot a male cop, that was for sure. It was the way they carried themselves, with a curious mixture of arrogance and humility-arrogance because they
carried the badge, humility because police work was not easy. You failed a lot. Now even the women cops had started to look like cops. This one had curly red hair, wore gray slacks, a gray tweed sport coat, a crisp button-down blue shirt with a small scarf wrapped around her neck. She was looking around the porch and then at the adjacent yards. The combination of arrogance and humility was easy to see on her round, slightly snub nosed face. The hard blue eyes were especially coplike. He wondered what the hell she wanted.

  He opened the door.

  "Hi," she said, "are you Mr. Coffey?"

  He nodded.

  She reached into the left pocket of her tweed jacket and brought out her ID.

  "Hey," he said, trying to act surprised, "you're a cop."

  "Homicide detective, Mr. Coffey. Margie Ryan."

  "Homicide? Wow." He intentionally tried to sound naive and surprised. He was having a little fun with her. He wondered if she knew it.

  "I'd like to speak to you for a few minutes if I could."

  "My house is sort of a mess."

  She smiled. "So's mine." She had a nice, girly smile. The kind that could trap bad guys into believing that she wasn't tough at all. That would be a fatal misperception on their part.

  "I guess," he said, "we could have a game of house mess macho."

  "House mess macho?"

  "You know, whose house is a bigger mess."

  "I'd win walking away, Mr. Coffey. I have a three-year-old and a five-year-old at home." She was obviously getting tired of his stalling. "So why don't we go inside and talk?"

  He poured them fresh coffee. They sat at the kitchen table. The sun was out. In the window was a cardinal, which was soon replaced by a blue jay. There was an autumn haze over everything in the distance. The air would smell sweetly smoky. Coffey wanted to be outdoors. Today would be a good day to rake the leaves in the backyard.