by Josh Lanyon
Anyway, down was not the direction to head. Boz’s clerk had said he lived over the fun house, which meant they needed to go up.
They needed out of this deathtrap, and they needed to go upstairs and see if by some miracle Boz had not yet left the building.
“Dreyfus?” Jason called again—and again, she didn’t answer.
He had never been in a fun house before, but he had a vague understanding of how they worked. Some of the attractions, like that monstrous seven-foot automaton juggler in the corner, were mechanical. But some of the attractions would require human attendants to reset props or jump out at people (thereby setting them up for years of therapy).
That meant there would be service panels and control booths.
There would be interior walkways behind these flimsy plywood walls to reach those control booths.
There would be entrances and exits.
Exits.
He left the railing and went to examine the walls. In several places the wood was buckling, panels popping out. He grabbed hold of one panel and yanked. There was a horrendous tearing away sound, and a section of wall came down, sending up a cloud of dirt, splinters, and mold spores.
Jason tried to cover his nose and mouth with his arm, squinting through the dust and flying particles at the gaping hole in the wall.
Yep, behind the wall was a service passage.
Chapter Thirteen
He had not gone too far when he heard voices.
“You’re just making it worse for yourself,” Dreyfus said. She sounded very young.
“I’m about to make it worse for you, if you don’t shut up.”
They sounded like they were on the other side of the wall. Jason pressed against the studs of the flimsy wooden barrier, putting his eye to a crack through the panel. Dreyfus stood a few feet away, her back to him. There were cobwebs in her ponytail. She had her hands up.
Ian Boz was pointing what appeared to be a Smith & Wesson .357 at her.
From his vantage point, Jason could see Dreyfus’ hands flex, her muscles bunch, preparatory to her jumping for the gun.
No. No. God no.
He took a step back, bumped against the other side of the makeshift passage, and charged forward, launching a kick with all his strength at the fragile plywood. Rusted nails screeched as a section of wall toppled forward like a falling stage set. Jason saw Boz’s astonished face and he saw Dreyfus leap forward.
It seemed to happen in slow motion. Boz realized what was happening and turned back to Dreyfus, but instead of shooting her, he smashed the fist holding the revolver in her face.
Dreyfus cried out and crashed down on the floor at Boz’s feet. Boz turned the gun on Jason.
“Freeze.”
Jason froze.
Boz vented his feelings in a long stream of swearwords. “Get up,” he said finally to Dreyfus. His chest rose and fell in agitation.
She clambered to her feet, holding her hand to her face. Her nose was bleeding. Her eyes met Jason’s, and he could see the apology and misery there.
Jason tried to give her a look of reassurance, and God knew what that looked like because he was scared for her and furious with himself.
He said to Boz, “Listen to me, Boz. Don’t do anything more stupid than you’ve already done.”
He couldn’t tear his gaze from the pistol weaving between him and Dreyfus. He could see Boz’s lips moving, but could barely hear the words over the blood rushing in his ears.
Don’t shoot. Please don’t shoot…
Boz’s words filtered through. “I’m warning you. I won’t go back to prison.”
Talking was good. The longer Boz talked, the less likely he would shoot.
“Okay,” Jason said. “If that’s what you want. Go.”
Boz’s jaw dropped.
“We can’t stop you,” Jason said. “But you need to understand. If you run, it’ll be interpreted as an admission of guilt.”
Boz steadied the pistol, pointing it straight between Jason’s eyes. Dreyfus made a pleading sound, sharply cut off.
“Or you could tell us your side of the story.” Jason was astonished to hear his own voice sounding relatively calm, even reasonable. “Since that’s all we were looking for.”
Boz’s eyes flicked back and forth between Jason and Dreyfus. “Bullshit. Why would the fucking feebs be involved? You don’t fool me. There’s something else going on here.”
Like what? What the hell else was this nut involved in that he imagined the federal government was likely to show up on his doorstep?
“We’re not— Listen to me. We’re with the Art Crime Team. The items stolen from Michael Khan’s collection are considered to be of historical and cultural significance.”
Boz gave a hysterical laugh. “You’re bullshitting. Stop lying to me!”
“No. I’m not lying. We just wanted to ask you a few questions about Friday night and Michael Khan—”
“I had nothing to do with that. Nothing. He wanted me to help him, I said no. I turned him down.”
Wait a minute. Hit Rewind.
Jason said, “Michael Khan wanted you to help him do what?”
“Hide the collection from Minerva. Help him pretend it was stolen.”
“You’re saying Khan faked the theft of his own collection?”
“Are you deaf? Yes. But I did not help him. Did not. Did not. Did not.”
Dreyfus, her voice squished by the hand clamped to her nose, said, “He couldn’t have done it on his own.”
“Did not. Did not. Did not. Did—”
“Okay, stop,” Jason said. “If you didn’t help Khan, who did?”
Boz waved the revolver wildly. “How would I know? Maybe he hired someone.”
“A name,” Jason pressed. “Your best guess.”
“Zatanna Zatara. How the fuck should I know? It wasn’t me.”
“Where would Khan store the collection?”
“Why are you asking me? I’m telling you, I wasn’t involved. Maybe he hired a moving company. Maybe the collection is on its way across country. I don’t know. I don’t want to know.”
“Did you kill Michael Khan?” Dreyfus asked.
Boz made a sound like a bull about to charge and turned the pistol her way. Jason instinctively put his arm out—because, yeah, that was going to protect her. Clearly, he had seen too many magician posters.
“No. I did not,” Boz said from between his teeth. “Plenty of people had motive to want Mike out of the way, but I wasn’t one of them. We were kind of even friends. Until he asked me to risk going back to prison for him.”
“Then why in God’s name did you flee just now?” Jason demanded. “Why not explain what happened?”
“Like you’re going to believe an ex-con?”
“I believe you so far.” Well, he didn’t disbelieve Boz. He would prefer to believe him. He hadn’t made his mind up either way.
Boz hesitated. “Because…because…then Mike accused me of stealing his collection.”
“Wait a minute…”
“I don’t know what he was trying to pull, but whoever he was working with must have known he was going to double-cross them. That’s why they killed him.”
Khan had tried to recruit Boz to help “steal” his collection. Boz had refused. Khan had then accused him of really stealing the collection in order to cover his own tracks. That was the story?
Maybe Boz believed it. Maybe he was blowing smoke up their asses. He wasn’t telling them everything, that was clear, and what he was telling them was so convoluted…
But the fact that he was talking and not killing them—that was a big point in his favor.
“Okay, let’s call this a misunderstanding,” Jason said. “Why don’t we sit down and talk about it? Because this is not helping you. And it’s not helping us.”
Boz laughed. “Right. The minute we leave here I’ll be thrown in prison and you’ll swallow the fucking key.”
Swallow the key? Wyoming must have one i
nteresting prison system.
“I really won’t. The only thing I care about is getting that missing art back.”
Boz ignored him, looking around with frantic jerks of his head.
“Boz, listen,” Jason said. “You need to make smart choices now. You don’t want to do anything that—”
“Got it,” Boz interrupted. “I got it. Both of you. Head for the clown on your left. The one with the blue hair. There’s a slide inside his mouth. Go down the slide. Hurry up!”
Jason and Dreyfus picked their way across the debris-strewn room to the large clown-shaped entrance. Sure enough, the mouth of the clown led to a small platform at the head of a very tall hardwood slide.
“Go down the slide!” Boz called.
Jason stared into the gloom. He could see about eighty feet down. Was the whole slide even there? He couldn’t tell.
“Where does that lead?” Dreyfus whispered.
Jason shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“Get your asses down the fucking slide!” Boz screamed, losing patience.
“Age before beauty,” Jason muttered. He took his jacket off, gingerly sat down on it, and awkwardly pushed off. He’d hoped there might be some possibility of slowing his descent or at least controlling it. No. It was like flying. He shot down the chute like a rocket—he could hear Dreyfus shrieking as she followed a few seconds behind.
He landed hard on what felt like rotted cushions on crumbling hay bales, and rolled out of the way in time to avoid getting hit by Dreyfus.
“Are you okay?” Jason scrambled over to where he could hear Dreyfus panting. “Dreyfus?”
She moaned. “I’m okay. Where the heck are we?”
“I’m guessing the basement.” He helped her up. “I bet there’s an exit around here somewhere.”
More valuable time was lost stumbling around in the dark. There was some natural light provided by a bank of high windows, but not enough to keep them from crashing into the old concession stands and falling over broken planks in the floor.
At last they found the exit, pushing open the door. The gray daylight seemed dazzling, and the smells of car exhaust and rain were sweet compared to the smells inside the building.
Jason and Dreyfus splashed through puddles on their way around to the front of the building.
Boz was long gone. No surprise there. The surprise was that he’d left his pistol lying on the inside of the doorway. Had he dropped it and not realized?
Jason stared at the silver gun. His scalp prickled.
He bent to pick up the weapon.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
That’s what fear did to you. Colored your vision so that you thought you were looking down the barrel of a Smith & Wesson .357 Magnum when in fact you were staring at an 11” Abbott’s New Bang Gun, circa late forties, probably.
He swore quietly.
“What’s the matter?” Dreyfus asked.
He showed her the pistol. Her eyes widened.
“Yeah. Exactly.” He pulled the trigger, and four tiny arms sprang into view above the barrel. Red and yellow discs spelled out the word B-A-N-G.
One of the unexpected perks of unofficially consulting on another agency’s case was Jason was not required to wait around for the cops with Dreyfus or help her fill out reports. In fact, he was strongly encouraged by SAC Reynolds to get his ass out of there.
Jason interpreted that to mean his “unofficial” assistance really was unofficial—something cooked up by Sam and Reynolds all on their own—and would probably be defined by the Bureau brass as unauthorized and unwarranted.
He told Dreyfus he would meet her back at the office when she was finished talking to Cheyenne PD, and headed over to Boz’s Brew.
Terry looked up as the pixie dust door chimes announced Jason’s return.
“Hi! Welcome to the largest selection of oh.” His face fell. “It’s you.”
“Yep. It’s me.”
Jason limped down the aisle to the sales counter where Terry had been screwing D-rings into the back of a heavy-framed photograph of a mustached man in a tuxedo. The man sprawled on the floor, gazed up in wonder at an angel—or more likely a ghost. The ghost was surrounded by floating magical instruments, and intriguingly, a disembodied hand.
The caption at the bottom of the photo read: Spirit photograph of the Dutch magician E. Chambly, ca. 1890. The rivalry between mediums and magicians had been fierce in the early days of Spiritualism. Some magicians incorporated elements of the occult and supernatural into their acts, but others, like Houdini, believed they had a mission to expose the frauds and tricksters.
Jason said, “I’d like to ask you a few questions.”
“You kind of already did.”
“A few more questions.”
Terry said reluctantly, “I guess.”
“Where do you store extra stock?”
“The storeroom.”
“What about off-site?”
Terry looked confused. “We don’t have an off-site storage facility. We don’t keep that much extra stock. Everything is pretty much out on the floor.”
“What about large items?”
“How large? Boz is refurbishing a Chinese Water Torture Cell in the back. That’s about the biggest item we’ve handled.”
Jason thought it over. “What about other magic stores? Who are your competitors around town?”
“What other magic stores?” Terry scoffed. “Mostly everything is sold online these days. From props to tricks. There aren’t many places left like Boz’s Brew. Not in Wyoming, that’s for sure.”
“Hm. Good point.” Jason considered Terry’s indignant expression. “Why do you think your boss ran like that?”
“He doesn’t like cops.”
“We’re not the cops. We’re the feds.”
Terry said with an unexpected flash of humor, “Nobody likes the feds.”
“Ouch.” Jason smiled. “I know he’s got a record. And I know he and Michael Khan were pals.”
“Maybe.”
“No?”
Terry said, “Michael Khan only cared about Michael Khan.”
“What makes you think so?”
“Do you know he’s the Kubla Khanjurer?”
“No,” Jason lied. “What’s a Kubla Khanjurer?”
“It’s not a what. It’s a who. Khan was a hack. He couldn’t cut it as a real magician, so he tried to build a career out of revealing the secrets of magic.”
“The secrets of magic? And that made people angry?”
Terry said hotly, “Of course it made people angry. Khan tried to claim that it was because he loved magic so much that he wanted to force magicians to abandon old and tired tricks and reinvent the art so that it would be able to compete in the modern world. It was total self-serving bullshit. He didn’t care if the art was able to compete. He didn’t care if he ruined peoples’ acts and spoiled everything for the audience. He didn’t care about magic—real magic—he just wanted to make a fast buck, and that was the only way he could.”
“Is that how most people feel? People within the community, I mean.”
“That’s how everyone feels. His own wife can’t stand him.”
“But he and Boz managed to stay friends? He helped Boz open this store?”
Terry said grudgingly, “Yes.”
Jason gazed around the room appreciatively. “It really is a great store. It probably functions as a center for the magic community?”
“Yes. But it’s all changed now even from when I was little.”
“Those posters are amazing. They’re the real thing?”
Terry’s smile was genuine. “Oh yeah. Absolutely.”
“Where do you find stuff like that?”
“Auctions. Estate sales. The Internet. Yard sales. People bring in stuff. They don’t always know what they’ve got.” He studied Jason curiously. “Are you interested in magic?”
“Not like I was when I was a kid, but I appreciate a good magic show.”
&nb
sp; Terry said wisely, “Magic is performance art, but it’s also a way of life.”
“I’m beginning to see that. Who do you think killed Michael Khan?”
Terry stared at him as though the question did not compute. He said finally, tentatively, “Whoever stole his collection?”
“Your boss suggested Khan stole his own collection.”
Terry blinked that over for a moment. “You mean the whole thing was sleight-of-hand?”
“That’s an interesting way to put it.” Jason glanced down at the framed sepia photo. “When people bring things in—people off the street, I mean—what’s your policy for handling items that aren’t accompanied by original bills of sale?”
Terry looked taken aback. “Almost nothing that comes in like that is accompanied by bills of sale. We don’t…don’t check for provenance, if that’s what you mean. We’re not an art gallery or a museum. We’re more like a thrift store.”
Not with posters going for three to five grand, they weren’t, but Jason just nodded. “I see. Just out of curiosity, where were you Friday night?”
Terry licked his lips. “Me?”
Jason nodded.
“At a memorial service for a friend.”
“Where was the service held?”
“At a pub. Hocus Pocus. It’s on East 17th Street.”
A memorial service at a pub? A magic-themed pub at that. Jason made a mental note. “Was Boz there?”
“Maybe for a little while. I don’t recall. If he was, he didn’t stay.”
“Do you have any idea where Boz might go now?”
Terry looked confused. “You didn’t catch him?”
“No. We didn’t catch him.”
“I don’t know.”
“Does he have family here? Friends?”
“I don’t—I don’t think so. He’s from Florida, not Cheyenne. He’s only been here a few years.”
Jason held Terry’s gaze. “Do you think he might get in contact with you?”
Terry looked terrified. “Me? No. I just work for him.”
After a moment, Jason handed Terry his card. “If he does get in contact with you, give me a call. He assaulted a federal officer, so now he’s in trouble.”
