by Mick Farren
"Did you do it?"
"Did you kill the president?"
"Who are you working for?"
"The Hind-Mancu?"
"Were you the only one?"
"Why did you do it?"
Gibson wasn't given any chance to answer the questions, although he was certain he'd be asked a lot more of the same once he got inside. He was hustled from the car and into an elevator. In some respects, it was almost like arriving for a concert at Madison Square Garden or London's Wembley Stadium when the Holy Ghosts were at the peak of their fame, except that he'd never done the run from the car to the stage door with a blanket over his head before. He grimly told himself that he'd always liked to be the center of attention and now he was undisputedly just that.
In the elevator, beyond the range of the photographers and TV cameras, they took the blanket off his head. Gibson and his escort rode the elevator up to the third floor, where a smaller circus waited for them. Up there, it was all cops. The media was mercifully missing, as was the pandemonium of the basement, and there was no elbowing, jostling, or shouted questions. The massed cops watched him in hostile silence and stepped aside as he was brought through. Doubtless, just about every one of them would have been more than happy to tear his head off on the spot, but discipline kept them in check, and he was taken to a secure interview room without incident.
The interview room was like something out of a forties gangster movie. A single hardwood chair was set up in the center of the small room. A metal floor lamp was positioned so it would shine directly into the face of whoever was sitting in the chair. His escort was now down to the three original uniformed officers who had been in the car with him. They removed his handcuffs and, without giving him a chance to massage the circulation back into his hands and wrists, had him empty his pockets out onto a table against the wall. The officers poked perfunctorily through the few odds and ends that the streamheat had allowed him to bring to the Crown building. About the only thing that held their attention was the wallet with Leh Zwald's ID in it, and they passed that from one to the other. The largest of the cops, the one who'd been sitting in the back of the car with him, pointed to the chair under the light.
"Sit."
"Can I have a cigarette?"
"Later. Sit."
Gibson seemed to have no option but to do as he was told. He sat and continued to sit, with the officers leaning against the wall, watching him in silence. After about ten minutes, a policewoman came in with a portable fingerprint kit and took a set of prints from him. She was fast and businesslike but avoided looking him straight in the eye and wasn't quite able to disguise her distaste when she had to take hold of his hands to roll the balls of his fingers and thumbs across the ink pad. The next visitor was a police photographer who showed up with a bulky flash camera and proceeded to take head shots of him from a dozen different angles. A new set of problems was unveiled with the arrival of the photographer. He set his camera down, looked at the cops, and men pointed to Gibson. "He's going to have to be cleaned up before I can do anything with him."
The largest of the policemen scowled. "Cleaned up?"
"I can't photograph him looking like that."
Gibson, who hadn't seen himself in a mirror since he'd been arrested, wondered just how bad he did look.
One of the officers left the room and returned widi a bowl of water and a sponge. As he went to work, none too gently wiping off Gibson's face, the truth quickly became apparent.
"He's a fucking albino."
The three other men gathered around him, peering at the white skin that had been revealed under the makeup.
"Dirty freak."
The big cop clenched his fists. "I ought to show you what we think about your kind, you bastard."
One of his partners put a restraining hand on his arm. "Leave him for the brass. It's your ass if you mess him up before they get here."
The big cop spat on the floor. "I hate fucking freaks. They disgust me."
Gibson sat very quiet, anxious not to do anything that might cause me big cop to break through his tenuous restraint.
The brass arrived about twenty minutes after the photographer was through with his business. Initially there were three of them. A short, fat individual in gray suit and white hat appeared to be in command. Flanking him was a tall thickset man in the uniform of a high-ranking police officer that was heavily decorated with medal ribbons and gold braid, and a worn-looking man in a rumpled suit who had the kind of deceptively lazy eyes that, while seemingly half-asleep, actually missed nothing. There were no formal introductions, but along the line Gibson discovered that the one in the hat was Luxor Police Commissioner Layen Schubb; the uniform belonged to Assistant Commissioner Lar Boveen, the head of the city's uniformed force; and the individual with the eyes was Chief of Detectives Revlich Valgrave. Gibson was certainly getting the full treatment. These three men ran the entire civil police force of Luxor, and they had come down to personally supervise his interrogation. As far as they were concerned, the crime of the century had been committed in their city and they weren't going to entrust the investigation to subordinates or turn it over to any of the half-dozen paramilitary national agencies. For almost a minute, they stood looking at him as though inspecting something so low and disgusting that it was beyond even their experience.
Finally Schubb pushed back his hat and shook his head. "You've really done it, haven't you, boy?"
Gibson avoided looking directly at Luxor's top cop. He stared down at the floor trying not to think about what might be going to happen next. "I really don't have anything to say."
Schubb walked slowly around Gibson's chair. "That's not a good attitude, boy. You've just shot the president of the UKR and a lot of people are going to want to hear what you've got to say for yourself and, I have to tell you, some of them are not going to be as patient as I am."
This time Gibson looked up at him. "I don't expect you to believe me, but I didn't shoot the president."
Valgrave stepped forward and turned on the light. Gibson closed his eyes, temporarily blinded. The lamp was a powerful photoflood, and it was only a matter of inches from his face. The three ranking officers and the patrolmen in the background were nothing more than indistinct shadows.
Valgrave's voice came out of the darkness beyond the light. "Let's start with some basic details. Your name is Leh Zwald, right?"
Gibson squinted into the light and shook his head. "No."
"It's not?"
"It's not."
"That's what it says in this wallet."
"I'm not Leh Zwald."
"So who are you?"
"My name is Joe Gibson."
" Jogibson? What kind of name is that?"
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you."
"Try me."
Gibson took a deep bream. He might as well tell them in front; it was going to come out eventually. "It's a name from another dimension."
Schubb broke into the exchange between Gibson and Valgrave. "What are you talking about, boy? If you think you can worm your way out of this by acting crazy, you can forget it. Nobody's going to go along with that."
"I said that you wouldn't believe it."
Boveen took a turn. "You don't know how lucky you are, son."
"You could have fooled me."
Schubb stabbed a finger at him. "Don't get smart, boy. We don't have much time."
Boveen resumed. "You don't know how lucky you are being held by us. The Luxor Police Department, unlike some of the national law-enforcement agencies, don't use torture as a routine technique in the interrogation of suspects."
Gibson took another deep breath. There was no answer to that.
Schubb nodded. "Not so cocky now, huh, boy? The mention of torture usually takes the wind out of the sails of little shits like you."
Boveen was looking at his watch. "The way I figure it, we have maybe ten minutes before delegations from State Security, the Treasury Police, and the Presidential Guard wi
ll be all over us demanding we give up custody to them. They want you badly, and every last one of them will be quite prepared to do their worst to get a confession out of you."
"And will you give me to them?"
"We don't want to. Right now you're in our jurisdiction. The president was shot in Luxor, and we want to be the ones who crack the case. The trouble is that you can't fight politics. Unless you've given us something to work on we may not be able to keep you. It's as simple as that."
Gibson nodded. Either the commissioner was telling the truth or it was one of the most elaborate Mutt and Jeff setups that he'd ever heard. "I see."
"You understand our position?"
It might be a Mutt and Jeff play but Gibson was still thoroughly intimidated. "I do."
"So shall we start again?"
"I'll tell you what I can."
Valgrave took over. "Name?"
"Joe Gibson,"
Valgrave sighed disappointedly. "I thought you understood your position."
Gibson was starting to get a little desperate. "Believe me, I'm trying to cooperate. I'm not Leh Zwald. My name is Joe Gibson. Joe, first name, Gibson, second name. Leh Zwald was originally supposed to shoot the president but he tried to back out and was killed. I was forced to take his place.
"Who killed this Leh Zwald?"
Gibson shook his head. "I don't know for sure. I do know who ordered it, though."
"Who ordered it?"
"Verdon Raus."
Valgrave's eyebrows slowly went up. "Are you serious?"
"Perfectly serious."
Boveen sharply sucked in his breath. "That's some name, boy. Are you sure you're not just using it to buy some time for yourself?"
"Verdon Raus was at the head of the whole conspiracy."
Schubb's eyes were narrow piggy slits. "Even assuming that there was such a conspiracy, why should a man like Verdon Raus use a piece of garbage like you to do his work for him? "
"I've already told you, I wasn't the assassin."
Vaigrave tried the kid gloves again. "So why were you selected to replace this Zwald?"
"Because I look exactly like him."
Schubb had the expression of a man who thinks he's just uncovered a conspiracy of mutants. "Zwald was another albino?"
"No."
"Then how could you look exactly like him?"
"We were identical apart from our color. That was the only difference."
Schubb rubbed his chin. "That's quite a big difference, boy."
Vaigrave eased back into the interrogation. "Explain your role in this, how you replaced Zwald."
"They told me that I was going to be a decoy. I was to go through the motions of pretending to be the assassin. I was led to believe that our purpose was to stop the shooting. It was only when I was actually inside the Crown building, I found that I'd been lied to. I found that I was being set up as the fall guy."
Even the low-key Vaigrave couldn't keep a certain mild excitement out of his voice. "You admit that you were in the Crown building? "
Gibson nodded. "I was beside French when he shot at Lancer."
"French?"
"This is where it becomes difficult."
Up to that point, Gibson had been feeling that Vaigrave might be buying his story. Then Commissioner Schubb stepped back in.
"Don't be telling me tales of other dimensions, boy. That would make me very unhappy."
"Maybe I should get a lawyer."
"You'd be better off with a priest if you start lying to me."
"If I tell the truth, you're just not going to believe me."
Valgrave stroked his chin. "I believe we've reached an impasse."
Schubb wasn't having any. "I believe we're dealing with a lying piece of shit who's trying to convince us that he's crazy."
Gibson tried a desperation play. "French wasn't the only shooter."
Now he had their attention. "What?"
"There was one, maybe two more."
Valgrave was leaning close to him. The chief of detectives' breath smelled of garlic. "In the Crown building?"
"No."
"Where?"
"I'm not sure, somewhere else on the square. Maybe the grassy knoll at the far end."
There was a long silence. Gibson had the impression that they might finally be taking him seriously. Valgrave walked over to the table where the contents of Gibson's pockets were still laid out. He picked up one of the packs of Luxor Camels.
He came back and held out the pack to Gibson. "Cigarette?"
Gibson took one. "Thank you."
Valgrave took one for himself. He put it in his mouth and lit it, and then he lit Gibson's with the same flame. "How many?"
Gibson was confused. "How many what?"
"How many other shooters?"
"I don't know. At least one more, maybe two."
"You know who they were?"
Gibson shook his head. "No."
Before Gibson could elaborate, there was an urgent rapping on the door of the interview room. One of the patrolmen opened it and looked out. After a couple of seconds, he closed it again and faced Schubb. "There are some men out there who want to speak to you."
"Did you tell them that I was interrogating a prisoner?"
"They seemed pretty fired up about talking to you. The word they used was imperative."
Schubb nodded. "Imperative, huh? That's what I hate about those college-boy, national-agency assholes. They've always got to use some big-ticket word when a simple one would do." He looked at Valgrave and Boveen, "You keep at our boy and I'll go talk to the assholes."
In fact, while Schubb was out of the room, the other two didn't keep at him. Valgrave smoked in silence, and Boveen watched the door. The cigarette smoke drifted lazily through the lamplight.
Valgrave smiled wearily at Gibson. "Better hope that the commissioner's feeling really feisty. He's going to have his work cut out keeping State Security and the rest of them off of you."
There was the sound of raised voices outside the door, and Schubb's was one of the loudest. After about three minutes, the door flew open and Schubb stormed back in again, slamming it behind him. "Goddamn it to hell!" He ducked into the lamplight and glared at Gibson. "You better be giving me everything you've got and no more crazy shit, you understand me? I've gone out on a limb to hold on to you, and there's three national agencies trying to saw it off right now."
Gibson looked straight back at the commissioner with a strangely detached tenor. "I can only tell you what I know."
"So tell me. Start at the beginning."
"But you aren't going to believe me. I'll get to the part about the streamheat and you're going to get crazy and call me a fucking liar and hand me over to State Security."
"I'm trying to avoid that, but you aren't making it any easier."
Boveen glanced at Schubb. "We could turn him over to a couple of my boys for a half hour to loosen him up a bit."
The three patrolmen at the back of the room looked as though they were ready to volunteer. Schubb thought about this. He stared hard at Gibson. "What's it going to be, boy?"
Gibson was desperate. "I'm trying to help you, believe me."
Valgrave motioned to Schubb that he wanted to take over the questioning. Schubb deferred to the detective and stepped back.
Valgrave looked almost sympathetic. "What are the stream-heat, Joe?"
"They're the ones who got me into this mess. They're the ones who set me up."
"But what exactly are they?"
Gibson shot a nervous glance at Schubb. "They're… from another dimension."
Schubb didn't say anything but he appeared to be keeping his temper with some degree of difficulty. Valgrave went on. His voice was soft and calm.
"What do you mean by another dimension, Joe?"
Gibson nodded to Schubb. "He's going to kill me if I tell you."
To his surprise, Boveen came to his rescue. "Forget this crap about other dimensions for the moment. Tell me about ho
w you came to kill one of my patrolmen."
Gibson swallowed hard. He had been hoping against hope that, since they hadn't so far mentioned the murder of Klein, they hadn't tied him in with that killing.
He heard his voice come out as a blurt. "It was self-defense. He was going to kill me. He was a part of it."
"Part of what?"
"Part of the conspiracy, part of the setup that put me here."
Boveen's face hardened. "Are you telling me that one of my men was in on this?"
"He wasn't one of your men."
"What?"
"He was streamheat. He was one of the ones who brought me here. He was only dressed as a cop. God knows where he got the car from."
Schubb looked as though he was going to work Gibson over himself. "You're starting with that shit again."
Gibson did his best to defend himself. "You must have the body in the morgue. Fingerprint it, run an autopsy. You'll find out that it isn't one of your men."
Schubb started to steam. "Don't tell us how to do our jobs."
Valgrave and Boveen, however, exchanged significant glances, but before anything else could be said there was a second knocking on the door of the interview room. Once again one of the patrolmen opened it, and a man in a dark civilian suit came in. Although Gibson was able to see past the blinding light a little better than when it had first been turned on, he still had to squint to make out any details of this new arrival. He didn't have to squint too long, however, before it became plain that the newcomer was a lawyer of some kind. He and Schubb fell into immediate head-to-head discussion, the gist of which was that they had troubles.
"I can't see any way that we can go on refusing to hand him over."
Schubb removed his hat and ran a handkerchief across his bald head. "I'm damned if I'm going to turn him over to those glamour boys in State Security. We caught him in our city and our jurisdiction and we're going to hold on to him."
The lawyer, who, Gibson was to discover later, held the office of city solicitor, the Luxor equivalent of the DA, shook his head. "You can't do that. They've been to a judge and obtained an order. They'll serve it by force if need be."
