Dead-Bang

by Richard S. Prather

  Cassiday smiled broadly. “If I can brag a little, I took that angle into consideration, too. I learned from André on Thursday that Lemming was going to make his Bruno’s-the-Archfiend announcement two days later, on Saturday night. Made things a little tight for me, and I knew I’d have to get a move on, but the toughest part then was conning André so he wouldn’t spill the same thing to Doc. Because that angle was like the answer to a prayer. Not only would most of those hundred million start spinning their fingers around near their heads when they spoke of Festus, but his motive, already bigger than Texas, would look the size of—well, the planet? The solar system? The universe?” He smiled again, apparently enjoying himself a lot.

  “Not bad,” I said grudgingly. “Except Festus arranged all that help for you himself. Besides which, a solid motive—even means and opportunity on top of motive—isn’t necessarily enough. There’d have to be some kind of evidence, something solid to point—”

  “Do you think I’m a half-wit? If Lemming was suspected of lacing Bruno’s blood with poison, and a vial of the specific and previously unknown poison—in a kit with hypodermic syringe and some needles, say—was found taped under the little altar in Lemming’s private office at the church, that would be something solid, right? And naturally—here’s the frosting on the cake, Scott—since Festus is the biggest mouth sounding off against Erovite, and I’d have a lock on Erovite, every bit of trouble for Festus would be money in the bank for me.”

  “You don’t mean you were going to plant a kit and some of that crud you shot into Strang—”

  “Not going to. I told you it was beautiful, didn’t I? I talked André into letting me visit Lemming’s office for a couple minutes Thursday night—in the Pastor’s absence, of course. So, it’s already there, it’s done. Just waiting to be discovered at the appropriate moment, preferably by the police. And if they should need a little help, an anonymous tip maybe?”

  I shook my head. “Well, there’s another reason dear old André had to go. I suppose Festus killed him, too?”

  “Naturally. Friction between them. Doctrinal disagreements. Strang was about to leave the L.A. Eden. And—the big one—Lemming discovered André was spilling all the Church beans to the … well, I won’t say it again. Just say to Emmanuel Bruno.”

  “In a way, I’ve got to hand it to you, Dave. I really think you could have made it work. If you hadn’t made so many mistakes.”

  “This is the second time you’ve said that, Scott. And it’s not fair. It’s not even right. True, I had to improvise, and it got a little hairy—after you showed up. But if you hadn’t blundered into the picture I’d have been in the clear. And there’s still not a damned thing to tie me in—except you. If you were dead, I wouldn’t have a thing to worry about. Even now. Right?”

  I thought about it. With me—and Bruno and the lovely Dru—knocked off, I couldn’t really see anything that would keep Cassiday from sliding home free. With Festus Lemming framed for something he didn’t do. Which didn’t strike me as desirable even for Festus.

  I said, “Maybe. Except, as always, for that one little flaw in your otherwise admirable optimism, Dave. I’m not dead—”

  “Sure you are.” He pulled the pipe stem from his mouth. “You already know Monk was a local man. What you don’t know is, Billy Hickel and Ed Loeffler—Ed’s the big guy—came to L.A., at my request, from Chicago. Billy’s the one the girl saw last night. Billy’s the one you just saw Ed kill.”

  That told me more than I wanted to know. The only way Dave could be aware I’d seen the killing was if the big bruiser had very recently told him. Which meant big Ed Loeffler had either phoned Cassiday, or else—

  Dave explained. “The only chance I had today to tell Ed what to do was when Billy left the house for something to eat. Ed called me and I told him to take care of Billy and then come straight here—he couldn’t stay holed up there on Hawthorn after the shooting—and to dump the blue Chrysler on the way. Seemed to me that would smooth out most of the snags all at once. Except for you, of course. Well, Ed does what I tell him to do. And you’ve taken care of my last little worry yourself, Scott, because Ed’s right behind you ready to bust your head open as soon as I say, ‘Bust it.’” He grinned. “I’ll hand you one thing, you came over that fence like a professional gymnast.”

  I didn’t thank him. I started turning my head, slowly, saying, “When your hired slob took off I thought he was just getting away from the scene and the guy he’d shot—and from me. Besides …”

  From the corner of my left eye I could still see Dave, calmly puffing on his pipe, but becoming visible to my right eye was something else. Not furniture or something way across the room. Something very close, and very large, and very depressing. I rolled my eyes around a little more. Yeah. Ed. I’d known he almost had to be there, but it’s one thing to have a mental picture of calamity, and another to be looking at it.

  As I turned my head way around, apparently so I could stare directly into the bore of the Colt .45 automatic in Ed’s large hand, I kept talking, not because that was more rewarding than anything else I could think of but because I wanted both these guys to keep listening.

  “Besides, Dave, I didn’t realize until later that you had to be the guy I was after, so I couldn’t have known Ed might be heading here, not then. Afterward, I guess I was too busy putting the picture together around you—”

  Dave interrupted, and it was clear he wasn’t addressing me this time, “I’d like it better if we don’t have to shoot him. But if he wiggles, give it to him.”

  Ed said, and it was clear he was addressing me, “Hired slob, huh?”

  “Yeah,” I said, “slob. Stinking, sapheaded, lard-assed slob.”

  For, though directed not to wiggle, I was sure as hell going to. It was either cooperate with Dave and Ed while they killed me, or be totally uncooperative while they killed me—and at least the latter way there’d be a chance of living.

  I was sitting directly between big Ed and Dave, and if I moved fast enough—while Ed was still feeling suddenly insulted and griped—when he pulled his Colt’s trigger he might put the slug into Dave instead of me. If he missed me. Besides, the instant I moved I was going to bang off a shot or two from my .38, and even though I was looking at the .45’s bore and Dave was eight feet away in the other direction, it was possible I’d get lucky and hit him. If nothing else, I would for sure make a lot of noise.

  It was about as good as any desperation plan, and possibly the best of several lousy alternatives, so as soon as I spit the last “slob” out of my mouth I was ready to move.

  Ready. But in the well-known phrase there is “ready” and “set” and “go” and all I got was ready, which doesn’t even get a guy off the blocks.

  The reason was that my swift summation of the situation was slightly—approximately seven feet—in error. While I was verbally slapping Ed off guard and getting ready to get set and go and make a lot of noise, Dave Cassiday was not eight feet, but more like one foot, away from me.

  What he was doing so close was swinging that vase, which had been on the table between us and in which were carnations and water and possibly a lead anvil, at—actually, against—my skull. I didn’t see him swinging it, so I couldn’t be positive, but I recalled nothing else handy that was both movable and the right size and suitably solid. Logic says it was the vase.

  It sure wasn’t the carnations.

  19

  At first there were transparent films of gray, like gauzy curtains, one behind the other, each a different shade of grayness. Then there was color, a rosiness, and little darting brightnesses that left fading streaks behind them. And sound, a rustling, something or someone breathing. Voices, a man saying, the words soft and fluttering as if he were very far away, “… ought to do it. After we dump him we both better lay low at See and Cue for a while, at least till we know where his fuzz buddies are looking.…”

  I could still feel the small pain at the bend of my left arm, or though
t I could. I wasn’t sure if it was pain itself or merely memory of pain. But that had been the first thing, the stinging and an odd pressure, and after that the grays and color and brightnesses.

  The sound had faded, was coming back. “… one shot should be plenty. But it’s the old juice, might have lost some strength by now. And this sonofabitch, I don’t know. I’d better give him another squirt and make damned sure. Watch him, Ed.”

  There was thumping, like footsteps, someone walking over a carpet. In the room at … Ed … Ed … yeah, the big guy who’d killed Billy, Ed the slob. And Dave. I was remembering. The room was in Dave Cassiday’s home. I was in his home.

  It was like waking from sleep with my head being squeezed in a vise. I kept my eyes closed, tried not to let my breathing change, held myself still. The pain didn’t lessen; if anything it got worse, but in a few more moments I knew where I was and why and all that had gone before.…

  My breathing stopped.

  It was seconds before I realized I was holding my breath, and I tried to continue breathing with the same slow and even rhythm. But I couldn’t do it, my breathing was too fast, whipped by sudden fright.

  Because my mind had reached back to brush over what had gone before and stopped on the thought and picture of André Strang, slumped forward in a chair, his face like something carved from candles, his leg fleshed with gray-white putty, and on the floor beneath him, blood …

  It was when I knew what it was Cassiday had shot into my arm that my breathing stopped. Knew not its name, but that it was whatever had been forced into Strang’s blood before his leg was cut, and he bled and bled and bled and grew chill and short of breath and died.

  It was in me now, in my blood. In me.

  I heard the soft thump of footsteps again. Dave coming back.

  “… give him another squirt and make damned sure,” he’d said.

  I felt my eyelids tremble as I tried to open them slowly, lift them enough so I could see, but without bringing a yell out of Ed if he was looking at my face. There wasn’t any yell. With my eyelids barely cracked and quivering I could see, as if I were looking through inches of water, Cassiday a few feet from me, fat hypodermic syringe in his right hand, inverted bottle in his left, bright needle thrust through the bottle’s rubber-covered top and into a murky liquid. He pulled on the plunger, sucking fluid into the syringe.

  A blur moving on my right, four or five feet away, was undoubtedly Ed. I let my right eye close, opened the left one wider. I could see little lines etched on the glass tube in Dave’s hand, darkness already half-filling the syringe. I lay on some kind of long polished table in Cassiday’s living room. My arms rested on my chest. My wrists were not bound, but I couldn’t see my feet. And I couldn’t afford to move them to find out if they were tied or free. It wasn’t time to move them, not quite yet.

  The men weren’t speaking, but I could hear a voice, soft, well-modulated. I concentrated on it, heard the phrase, “Citizens FOR,” and then something about “The Church of the Second Coming.” Television, probably a news commentator. At least it wasn’t another man here in the room. I wondered what time it was, how long I’d been unconscious. And I wondered about the girls, the lovelies, marching … or had they marched already?

  But I allowed those thoughts in my mind only for a moment because that fat syringe was filled, Dave was stepping nearer. I let the lid slide almost shut over my eye, could barely see movement, the arm extended close to me.

  “Better hold him down, Ed, just in case,” Dave said. “Looks like he’s out for the night, but when I shove this needle in him he might—”

  I didn’t wait for the needle. Or for Ed to get his big paws on me. Dave was on my left, syringe held point up before him, his other arm extended as he reached toward me. I snapped my eyes open and yanked up my legs, pulling with my left hand against the table’s edge and swivelling on its top.

  Inches beyond my shoes I could see Dave’s startled face, mouth stretching open as he let out a high soft yell, an almost girlish shriek, and then I uncoiled my legs and drove the heels of both shoes at him. One hit his right hand, drove it back against his chest, and the other scraped along the side of his chin instead of landing solidly where I’d aimed.

  Dave reeled backward, and there was a grunt behind me as I half slid and half fell from the table, hitting the carpet with both hands and a knee, managing to get one foot planted beneath me. I jerked my head up to see Ed coming around the end of the table, not more than six feet away, that .45 automatic in his hand again. He stopped, bent his thick legs slightly, and slapped his left hand over the slide, cocking the gun, then shoved it six inches forward like a man uncorking a gut punch.

  As soon as his hand hit that slide I’d grabbed at the .38 Special beneath my coat—or, rather, the empty clamshell holster, because my gun wasn’t in it. Ed’s lips were stretched away from his clenched teeth and I knew his finger was tightening on the trigger. I started to flop and roll but suddenly Dave’s voice cracked out, startlingly loud, “Hold it, Ed! Ed, back up!”

  Ed managed to hold his fire, but it was close.

  As I landed prone on the carpet, Dave yelled again, “Stay, away from the sonofabitch, don’t let him get close to you. And don’t shoot him unless it’s got to be that way. He’s already dead, you goddamned fool! Keep the gun on him, but stay away from the bastard.”

  By the time he’d finished yelling I was getting to my feet. But that’s all I did. Dave was well to my left and behind me, but Ed was still hunched over with the gun aimed at my middle, moving his big square head toward Dave and back to me, like a very slow thinker trying to reach a decision.

  Finally he straightened up, stepped backward another two or three yards. He seemed to shudder slightly, then stood quite still, holding the gun on me. His lips relaxed, formed a recognizable mouth again.

  I felt a little dizzy. Maybe it was from the blow on my skull, the tension and emotion of these last seconds. I hoped that was it.

  Dave was swearing softly, looking down toward the right side of his chest, and as I glanced at him he yanked his shirt open. He didn’t do it neatly, just grabbed its front in both hands and jerked. Buttons flew and one of them bounced to a stop inches from the syringe on the floor. The glass tube was broken, a dark stain on the carpet beneath it. A stain much like a splotch of dark wetness on Dave’s shirt.

  He stared at his bare chest, ran his fingers over it, then lifted his head, sighing, a half-smile on his lips, his expression one of almost ridiculous relief. He regained his composure, then spoke, but his voice was still higher than normal. “All right, Ed. Hold him where he is. Keep him nailed there. We’re still going to do this according to plan. Scott?”

  I looked at him.

  “If you take one step toward Ed, just one, he’s going to plug you. We took your gun. No way you can get to him. No way.”

  “So?”

  “So don’t try anything. Don’t even move. I don’t want to … kill you.”

  I laughed. It was a mechanical sound. “Of course not,” I said, and then I told him what he was full of. He didn’t seem to mind. Perhaps because he knew what I was full of.

  “Well, I don’t want you shot.” He cut it off, moistened his lips, glanced at the broken syringe and then at my face. After a few moments he said, “I don’t want you shot—here. You’re not stupid, Scott. And I know you saw the hypo, the syringe. Hell, you broke it. I suppose you’ve guessed, but I might as well tell you what I was going to do.”

  He put a little too much emphasis on “going.” He was about to tell me, not what he’d done, but what he was going to do? Of course, Dave couldn’t be aware that I already knew he’d shot his gunk into me, and maybe he didn’t even suspect it. Not that his ignorance was likely to do me much good.

  He went on, “You’re going to go like André Strang, Scott. André, and … maybe some others. I can’t say it’s something to look forward to, but it’s a lot slower than getting shot in the head.” He paused. “You try
to pull another trick like this last one and you’ll be dead in a couple of seconds. This way you live longer, you’ve even got a chance to stay alive. You’re supposed to be one of those never-say-die bastards, aren’t you?”

  I didn’t answer him. I’d become aware of an odd, creepy sensation, like a million cell-sized goose bumps starting to freeze on my skin. And there was another mild wave of dizziness, fortunately brief. Normally none of it would have seemed serious, or have been very disturbing to me. At least not physically disturbing.

  Dave was going on, “I’ve got to get another syringe, fill it, pump the juice into you. Even then we’ll have to take you away from here before.… Hell, you’ll have all kinds of chances.”

  “You’re all heart, Dave. Incidentally, what the hell is this juice, as you call it?”

  I was a little surprised when he told me. Maybe I shouldn’t have been. Even though Dave couldn’t be sure I knew the stuff was already in me, he knew it was. “It’s one of the company’s experimental drugs,” he said easily. “This one’s made from a few common chemicals and, primarily, an extract from seaweed. Seaweed, isn’t that interesting? It’s a blood thinner, like coumadin, meant to dissolve blood clots or prevent them, help stroke victims, that sort of thing. Only it doesn’t work. That is, it works too well.”

  “Too much of a good thing, huh?” I said, feeling sick. At the moment I didn’t notice any dizziness or prickly goose bumps, but I felt sick anyway.

  “We checked it out in the lab,” Dave said casually. “Injected it into mice, guinea pigs, dogs, and even a couple of horses. Killed them all. If they were cut or had open sores they bled externally, bled to death. If not, they bled internally, hemorrhaged, their body cavities filled up with blood. They went into shock, keeled over, and kicked the bucket.”

  I was feeling very sick, but I managed to say, “Mice and guinea pigs, even dogs and horses. Killed them all, huh? You dedicated scientists, you’ll do anything to save a life, won’t you?”