Vertigo

by Bob Shaw

  “Whereabouts?”

  “All over the place. One on each floor and a couple extra in places where I found food. You know, places where they’ve been camping out.”

  “Can you remember the exact locations?”

  Morlacher shook his head. “The floors are mostly just wide open spaces. I’d need to look around in daylight.”

  “You’ve really done it, haven’t you?” Werry fingered the controls of his communicator and raised it to his lips. “Victor? I was trying to raise Henry.”

  “I’ve been trying to contact him, too.” Victor Quigg’s voice sounded both tinny and anxious. “The first floor of the hotel is really alight now, Al. You can see the glow from down here on the ground — and if Henry doesn’t get back to that second floor window soon he’ll be in real trouble. The fire is going to cut him off, it looks like.”

  “Have you heard any more explosions?”

  “Explosions? No, Al. What would…?”

  “Victor, you’ve got to contact Henry,” Werry said quickly. “Go up there with a voice magnifier, but don’t go inside — the place is a minefield.” He went on to explain the situation to Quigg, concluding with instructions to tell Henry Corzyn to retrace his exact path to the window by which he had entered.

  “I’m on my way,” Quigg said. “When are you coming back here, Al?”

  “Soon.” Werry’s eyes, cold and unforgiving, remained fixed on Morlacher. “I’ve just one little chore to take care of first.”

  “Let’s get out of here,” Morlacher said in something like his normal manner, moving towards the door. “I’ve got to get to the hotel.”

  Werry continued to bar his way, shaking his head. “You’re going to my hotel, Buck. I’ve got adjoining rooms reserved for you and Starr.”

  Morlacher pointed at him with an unsteady forefinger. “You’ve just lost yourself a good job.”

  “That’s the second time in one night,” Werry said, unimpressed. He took a pack of restraint patches from his pocket and tossed them to Hasson. “Behind their backs, Rob, if you don’t mind. I don’t want to take any chances.”

  Hasson nodded, went to Morlacher and drew the big man’s hands together behind his back. He peeled the wrapper from a square blue patch, placed it between Morlacher’s wrists and squeezed them together, creating an unbreakable bond. Pridgeon submitted to the same treatment almost eagerly, establishing himself as a man who believed in co-operating with the law.

  “Now we can go,” Werry said. He opened the front door, reconnecting the interior of the house to the outside universe, and this time the Chinook Hotel was immediately visible, burning low in the southern sky like a troubled red planet.

  nine

  As Werry had predicted, the vicinity of the hotel had become thronged with spectators, both on the ground and in the air. The roads bordering the hotel land swarmed with the glistening curvatures of automobiles, as though infested with monstrous insects, and the sky was filled with veering constellations of fliers” lights. A bilaser projector had been used to float a huge warning sign in the middle air, the crimson lettering of which read: CAUTION! THERE IS A DANGER OF MORE EXPLOSIONS! GLASS WILL FALL OVER A WIDE AREA! STAY CLEAR! And perched high on its unseen pinnacle, at the unmoving centre of the spangled chaos, the hotel building itself remained invisible except for a partial nimbus of flickering orange.

  “I’m almost sorry I put Buck inside,” Werry said as he got out of the police car. “He should have been here to see this.”

  Hasson tilted his head back, trying to take in the entire spectacle. “How long do you think he’ll stay inside?”

  “His lawyers should spring him in about an hour.”

  “It was hardly worth the trouble of putting him away.”

  “It was worth it to me — I owed him.” Werry grinned vindictively. “Come on. I want to find out how Henry got on up there.” He led the way across the uneven ground to where the impotent fire tenders stood in a line of other vehicles. The television unit was still in operation, surrounded by a cluster of men and women who were using its monitors to obtain a convenient view of the happenings in another world four hundred metres above their heads. As Werry and Hasson drew near, the slim figure of Victor Quigg detached itself from the group and came to meet them. His eyes had grown large and dark with strain, giving his immature face something of the look of a nocturnal animal.

  “Everything okay?” Werry said. “Where’s Henry?”

  “Still up there, Al. I couldn’t find him, and that’s a fact.”

  “Do you mean he’s still inside the hotel?”

  “I guess so. He wouldn’t have come out again without somebody noticing. He should have kept in touch.” Quigg sounded tired and afraid.

  “The crazy old, . .” Werry stood on his toes to get a glimpse of the television image of the hotel. “It looks like the fire will be through into the second floor in no time at all. How’s he going to get back out?”

  “That’s what I want to know. Al, if anything happens to him…”

  Werry silenced the young policeman by raising his hand. “Is there another way out of the hotel? What about the roof?”

  “There must be a way in and out through the roof — that’s the way the kids seem to get in — but I couldn’t find it,” Quigg said. “It’s like a town up there, Al. All kinds of machinery houses and water tanks and things.”

  “Well, we can send for keys or rip a door off’.” Werry paused, looking thoughtful. “Except… if we go inside and start working down we’re likely to stand on one of Buck’s Goddamn bombs. We might just have to take that risk.”

  “Henry should have kept in touch.”

  “What about the windows?” Hasson put in. “Are there no big ones he can put out with a brick?”

  Werry shook his head morosely. “It’s all this modem blastproof — blastproof, that’s a good one — tessellated stuff. They’re supposed to make high buildings more psychologically acceptable, or something like that.”

  “I see.” Hasson moved closer to the television unit and examined the image being sent down by the airborne camera operator. The architect of the Chinook Hotel had extended the tessella motif to the entire outer surface, blending walls and windows into a single mosaic design. Looked at from a purely aesthetic point of view the building was a success, and it would have been unfair to expect an architect to foresee a situation in which anybody would have wanted to launch himself out of a room into the sort of thin cruel air streams that flowed over and above the Empire State Building. Hasson’s imagination, catching him off guard, drew him into the situation he had envisaged and the ground seemed to rock beneath his feet. He turned away from the television monitor, sickened, and was trying to control his breathing when he saw a young woman approaching from the direction of the road. Seeing her in the unusual circumstance and setting, he had a momentary difficulty in identifying her as May Carpenter. She hurried by him, white-faced and distraught, and halted beside Al Werry.

  Werry put an arm around her shoulders and turned her towards the road. “You can’t stay here, honey. It’s dangerous and right now I’m. . .”

  “Theo’s gone,” she said in a taut unhappy voice. “I can’t find him anywhere.”

  “He’ll have slipped out with some of his pals,” Werry soothed. “I’ll talk to him about it later.”

  May shook free of his arm. “I’ve called around everywhere. All the places he goes. Nobody has even seen him tonight.”

  “May,” Werry said impatiently, “can’t you see I’m kind of busy?”

  “He’s up there.” Her words were measured, unaccented, made lifeless by the weight of certainty. “He’s up there in the hotel.”

  “That’s a stupid thing to say. I mean, it’s just. . . stupid.”

  May pressed the back of a hand to her forehead. “He goes out flying some nights with Barry Lutze, and that’s where they always go — up into the hotel.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Werry
said.

  “It’s true.”

  “If you knew that, and didn’t tell me,” Werry replied, his face suddenly inhuman, “you’ve killed him.”

  May closed her eyes and sagged to the ground. Hasson moved in and caught her at the same time as Werry, and between them they bore her a few paces and seated her on the footplate of a nearby truck. Several men looked round curiously and tried to move closer, but Quigg spread his arms and shepherded them away.

  “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” May whispered. “I’m so sorry.

  Werry cupped her face in his hands. “I shouldn’t have said a thing like that. It’s just that… It’s just that… May, why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you let me know?”

  “I tried to, but I couldn’t.”

  “I don’t get it,” Werry said, almost to himself. “I don’t get this at all. If it had been anybody but Theo . . .”

  Hasson felt something heave in his subconscious. “Did he go for the drugs, May? Was he taking empathin?”

  She nodded and a thin glaze of tears appeared on her cheeks.

  “Why did he do that, May?” Hasson said, ideas crystallising in his mind. “Could he see when he was taking empathin?”

  “I couldn’t understand it,” she said, opening her eyes and gazing sadly at Werry. “I caught him going out through his bedroom window one night and I was going to tell you, but he begged me not to. He told me that when he’s with the other kids and they’re all taking empathin he sometimes gets to see what they can see. He said it comes in flashes. He talked about telepathy and things like that, Al, and he was so desperate and it meant so much to him, and I one time heard you saying that empathin and gestaltin and stuff like that doesn’t do anybody any harm…

  “I said that, did I?” Werry said slowly, straightening up. The communicator on his wrist began to buzz, but he appeared not to notice. “I suppose anybody can make a mistake.”

  May looked up at him in supplication. “He hates living in the dark.”

  “You know what has happened here?” Werry said, adjusting the angle of his cap, slipping back into his old role. “We’re jumping to a conclusion. We’re making one hell of a big jump to a conclusion — there’s no proof that there’s anybody up in the hotel. Anybody apart from Henry Corzyn, that is.”

  Victor Quigg moved closer, fluttering his fingers to attract Werry’s attention. “Al, would you like to answer your radio? I think something has happened.”

  “There we are,” Werry said triumphantly. “This’ll be Henry telling me he has checked the place out.”

  “I don’t think it’s Henry,” Quigg mumbled, looking deathly pale.

  Werry gave him a questioning glance and raised his communicator to his lips. “Reeve Werry speaking.”

  “You shouldn’t have done it, Werry.” The voice from the radio was laboured, the words coming in ponderous succession as though each one had to be examined and checked for meaning before being assembled into the overall message. “You did bad things this day.”

  Hasson lowered his wrist a little and looked at the radio in bafflement. “Is that Barry Lutze?”

  “Never mind who it is. I’m just letting you know that everything that happened tonight was your fault. You’re the killer, Werry — not me. Not me.” Listening to the painfully enunciated words and phrases, Hasson guessed the speaker had been seriously injured. He also developed a dark conviction that a new element of dread was being added to an already nightmarish situation.

  “Killer? What’s this about killer?” Werry grasped the side of the truck. “Wait a minute! Was my boy up there? Was Theo hurt?”

  “He was here when your bomb went off. You didn’t expect that, did you, Mister Werry?”

  “Is he all right?”

  There was a prolonged, pulsing silence.

  “Is he all right?” Werry shouted.

  “He’s with me now.” The voice was grudging, heavy with resentment. “You’re lucky-he’s in good shape.”

  “Thank God for that,” Werry breathed. “And how about Officer Corzyn?”

  “He’s with me, too — but he isn’t in good shape. ”

  “What do you mean?” Werry demanded, his eyes brooding and speculative.

  “I mean he’s dead, Mister Werry.”

  “Dead?” Werry glanced up at the hotel, now visible as a black disk surrounded by a thin corona, like a moon eclipsing a reddish sun. “What are you doing with Corzyn’s radio, Lutze? Did you kill him?”

  “No, you killed him.” The voice had begun to sound agitated. “It was your fault for sending a fat, soft old guy like that in here after me. I only hit him once and…” There was a moment of silence, and when the voice resumed speaking the flat inhuman quality had returned to it. “You should have come up here and done your own dirty work, Mister Werry. I wouldn’t have minded taking you on. Not one bit.”

  “Take it easy, Lutze — let’s try to get some sense into this conversation before it’s too late,” Werry said. What am I supposed to have done tonight? What have you got against me?”

  “The bomb, Mister Reeve Werry. The bomb!”

  Werry stamped the ground. “Is that some kind of sick joke? Are you still swallowing cuckoo capsules up there, Lutze? Buck Morlacher planted that bomb, and you damn well know it. ”

  “What’s the difference? You work for him, don’t you?”

  “I don’t work for him,” Werry said, bringing his voice under control. “I just got back here from throwing him into a cell.”

  “Big deal,” the voice sneered. “He’ll do an hour — with twenty minutes off for good behaviour. The way I see it, that doesn’t seem enough for murdering my cousin and smashing up my ribs.” “Young Sammy isn’t dead. He’s in hospital, but he isn’t dead.” There was a lengthy silence, a pause in the verbal duel, then the unseen speaker made the next logical move. “The tat cop is dead.”

  Werry took a deep breath. “Listen tome, Barry. If you didn’t intend to cause Henry Corzyn’s death, that changes things. We can talk about it later. Right now the only thing on my mind is making sure that nobody else gets hurt or killed. Are you listening to me?”

  “I’m listening.”

  “What you’ve got to know is that Buck planted about twenty of those booby traps all over the hotel. They’re on every floor, and they’ve got special fuses to trigger them off if you even get close. Where are you now?”

  “Third floor.”

  “Well, you’ve got to bring Theo down to the second-floor window, the one with the hole in it. Only walk in places you’ve already been today. Come out through the window, and we’ll take it from there.”

  “Take it from there!” The radio on Werry’s wrist emitted a humourless laugh which ended in a wheeze. “I’ll bet you would. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

  “You’ve got no choice,” Werry said. “It’s the only thing you can do.”

  “No deal, Mister Werry. I’m not even sure I could reach that window — things are getting pretty hot down there. And even if I could, I don’t think I could jump out far enough to clear my field. I’m bound to drop way down below the first floor before I can pick up any lift.”

  “Nobody will interfere with you in any way. All I want is to get Theo out of there. I swear to you. I swear to you, Barry, I’ll give you any guarantee you want.”

  “Save your breath, Mister Werry — we’re going up to the roof. I can be sure of getting away from up there, and I’ll be in Mexico by tomorrow.”

  “You can’t do that,” Werry said, beginning to pace in frantic circles in a manner which pained Hasson to watch. “Use your brains, man.”

  “That’s what I’m doing,” the voice assured him. “For all I know, those other bombs don’t exist — but, even if they do, this is a pretty big place and I’ve got myself a pathfinder. Theo can go in front.”

  Werry stopped pacing. “I warn you — don’t do this.”

  “Now, I don’t want you to worry about a thing, Mister Werry.” T
he voice was elated, nervous, mocking.” Theo and I are going for a quiet little stroll up to the roof. With any luck, you can pick him up there in about five minutes. Just make sure nobody tries to pick me up, that’s all — I’ve got the fat guy’s gun and I know how to use it.”

  Lutze! Lutze!” Werry squeezed the instrument on his wrist as though trying to force it to respond, but the radio link had been broken. May Carpenter covered her face and gave a low sob. Werry traced the outline of a CG harness on his torso with a finger and pushed Quigg away in the direction of his car. Quigg nodded understandingly and ran. Werry strode to the television unit and the group around it melted out of his way.

  “What are things like on the second floor?” he said. “Can I still get in that window?”

  “See for yourself, Al.” The technician in charge pointed at the image of the lower section of the hotel. All the visible windows of the first floor were blocked in with sheets of flame which were turning from orange to a searing white. “You could probably get in, but that second floor looks like it’s about to cave in at any second.”

  “I better go in higher up.” Werry ran to a fire truck and returned some seconds later carrying the bayonet-like shape of a thermal cutter. Victor Quigg met him with his CG harness and handed it over without speaking. Hasson stood by, his mind lurching out over dizzy chasms each time he thought of Werry’s intention, and watched him pull the broad straps tight around his body. He felt weak-kneed and helpless, and — in some indefinable way — responsible for the other man’s plight.

  Werry gave him a grim smile as he made the last connection. “Here it is again, Rob — no two ways.”

  “1 don’t know,” Hasson said, donning the mantle of Judas. “It may not do any good to bull your way in. There are so many things that could… I mean, it might be better to wait.”

  “The way you would do if it was your son up there?”

  Hasson backed away, ashamed and afraid, as Werry switched on his lights, moved a control on the harness’s waist panel and made an easy leap into the air. He went up fast, falling into the sky, a dwindling light, a star being recalled to the rightful business of stars. Far above, as though making ready to receive him in battle, the black disk of the hotel building hurled out a streamer of yellow fire from its south side. The outburst, a solar prominence in miniature, faded almost at once and the watchers on the ground heard a dull powdery report. Quigg snatched his voice magnifier from his pocket.