Dead Mans Hand wc-7

by George R. R. Martin

  "Sorry," someone said. "Sometimes it's difficult to judge the strength of the dosage."

  He smiled reassuringly and all of a sudden Brennan felt calm and peace flow from the man's friendly grip into himself. Brennan recognized him. He'd seen him the day before in Chickadee's. It was Quincey, Kien's chemist. Quinn the Eskimo. He seemed like a nice man. When Quinn the Eskimo comes around, everybody's gonna jump for joy. Brennan looked at his right arm and wondered why it was bleeding.

  "That's better," Quincey said approvingly. He smiled, and withdrew his hand from Brennan's upper arm. As he did, Brennan could see that three of his fingers had sharp needles protruding from their tips. As he watched they suddenly slipped back out of sight into Quincey's fingertips. "Welcome to Xanadu, Mr. Yeoman."

  Brennan focused on him. "What am I doing here?" Quincey shrugged. "You would know the answer to that better than me. One of my mechanical sentries caught you skulking in the garden."

  "The caterpillar on the mushroom," Brennan said, suddenly remembering.

  "Yes," Quincey said. "One of my favorites. Cost me a fortune to hire the animatronic engineers away from Disneyland, but if one can't have what one wants in one's own pleasure dome, what good is it?"

  Brennan shook his head. He remembered it all now. The strange note he'd gotten at Aces High, the garden, the caterpillar, his capture, the dream. The dream.

  He closed his eyes. It had all been so real. Ann-Marie. The last time they'd made love before she and their unborn child had been killed by Kien's assassins. Chrysalis alive again. Jennifer.

  "So what did you want?" Quincey asked. Brennan opened his eyes. "Chrysalis's killer."

  "Oh my," Quincey said. "Well, you won't find such a person here. This is my pleasure dome. Violence rarely intrudes."

  Brennan looked around. They were the only people in the room, which looked like something out of an Arabian Nights' fantasy. There were rich, colorful carpets on the floor, and brocaded silk tapestries, half of them featuring maidens, half featuring slim young men in Grecian outfits-or nothing at all-cavorting in pairs or in groups. There were numerous sculptures in a similar vein scattered around the room on delicate, expensive furniture, and the bed was canopied, with silk and velvet cushions, and throw pillows scattered around.

  "I'm afraid, though," Quincey said thoughtfully, "this is going to have to be one of those times. I'm putting the finishing touches on an important project. We can't have you nosing about. Excuse me while I make a call."

  The needles extruded smoothly from his fingertips again. They were white as bone-which they probably were-Brennan realized, and hollow. After a moment a clear fluid oozed from the central one, and Quincey plunged them into Brennan's arm again.

  "It'll only hurt for a moment," he confided.

  It seemed very quiet in the house as Jay headed back to the wake. He was surprised to find that Jory had abandoned his post by the door. Instead Waldo Cosgrove stood there, wringing his damp little hands and looking very sorry indeed. Jay went past him, stepping into a strained, icy silence. The mourners had backed off discreetly from the two men in the center of the room, but everyone was watching them.

  Jory stood in the aisle between rows of folding chairs, his face dark with anger. "What did you say, sir?" he asked.

  A newcomer stood over the casket, looking like death incarnate. Tall and slender, he wore a hooded cloak over a black wool suit. At first glance Jay thought he was in a mask; given the occasion, a singularly tasteless mask, too. Then he spoke, and Jay realized that the death's-head-yellowed and noseless, teeth bared in an eternal grin-was his real face. "I said," the joker repeated in a deep, chilly voice, "that this is not Chrysalis," He waved a gloved hand over the young woman in the casket.

  His words made Jay's stomach do a sudden lurch. If it wasn't Chrysalis in the coffin, if somehow he'd been mistaken about the body he'd found, then maybe she was still alive somewhere, and the voice on the phone…

  "I don't recall asking for your opinion," Jory said, his accent deepening under the stress of the moment. "Sir, you're causing a disruption, and I'd thank you to leave."

  "I think not," the man in the black cloak replied. "I came here to see Chrysalis one last time, to make my farewells. And what do I find? Some nat fantasy lying in a coffin, and a roomful of people forbidden to speak her name."

  "Her name was Debra-Jo Jory, and she was my daughter!" A vein in Jory's neck had begun to throb.

  "Her name," the joker replied coldly, "was Chrysalis." Father Squid moved close to him. "Charles, he's from Oklahoma, he knows no better. We must respect his grief."

  "Then let him respect ours."

  "He does not mean to give offense," the priest said. "That makes this charade no less offensive." The joker's eyes, deep-set in his skull face, had never left Jory.

  Waldo Cosgrove hurried forward nervously. "Gentlemen, gentlemen, please don't quarrel. This is not the time or the place, is it? Our dearly beloved Chrysalis, oh, ah, Debra-Jo, that is, well, surely she would not have wanted-"

  "What I want," Jory said suddenly, "is for you to throw out this ugly sonofabitch, Cosgrove. You hear that? Either you call what passes for the law hereabouts, or I will, but either way this asshole is going out onto the street." Waldo looked helplessly around the room, searching for some way out of this mess. Jay felt sorry for him. Finally, meekly, the funeral director turned to the joker and said, "Charles, please, it's customary in these matters to honor the family's wishes."

  "Yes," Charles said. He made a gesture that took in all the jokers in the room. "And we are her family, Waldo. Not him. He doesn't even know what her name was." He turned his back on Jory and walked to where Cosmo sat on his chair. Cosmo looked up and adjusted his round, wire-rim spectacles. There was fungus growing on the back of his hand and a gray five o'clock shadow beneath his jaw. He said nothing. "I want to see her, Cosmo," Charles told him. "Show her to me. Show her to me the way she really was."

  "No!" Jory shouted. "I forbid it!" He stormed forward, jammed a finger at Cosmo. "You hear me, boy?"

  Cosmo looked at him, said nothing, looked back at Charles.

  Someone gasped. All eyes went to the casket.

  The color had begun to bleach from Debra-Jo's soft skin. "Goddamn you," Jory swore at Cosmo. He spun around to face Waldo. "You there! Call the police! Now!"

  Waldo's chin trembled as his mouth worked silently.

  In the casket, the smooth pink flesh and hints of rose had faded. Her skin was bone white, as smooth and pale as milk. Here and there, it began to turn waxy and translucent.

  "I'll do it myself then," Jory said. He started for the phone.

  There was a sound like a stack of two-by-fours might make if you broke them all at once. Everything stopped. Jory looked up, and up, and up. Into red eyes that stared down from beneath a huge, swollen brow ridge. From his nine-foot vantage, Troll gazed down at Jory, cracked his knuckles once more, then closed his huge green hand into a fist the size of a country ham. "I don't think that would be such a good idea," Troll said, in a voice that sounded like it came from the bottom of the world's deepest gravel pit.

  All around the room, the mourners mumbled agreement. Her skin had gone all the color of wax paper, and you could see the tracery of veins now, and dark shadows of bones and organs beneath the fading flesh.

  Jory whirled back to the casket and slammed the lid down hard. "Get out of here!" he screamed, distraught beyond words. "All of you, out of here." He looked around at all the joker faces with loathing. "You people," he said. "You all stick together, don't you. Damn you. You did this to her, you rotten-"

  Jay took his hand out of his pocket, pointed. Jory vanished. When the mourners realized what had happened, the tension drained from the room with a rush. Father Squid shook his head, facial tentacles bouncing from side to side with the motion. "Where did you send him, my son?" he asked. "Aces High," Jay said. "A good meal, a few drinks, maybe he'll feel better. It was getting too damn ugly."

  The joker
called Charles stepped up to the casket and opened the lid. Chrysalis lay there now. Skin as clear as the finest glass, perfectly transparent, ghostly pale wisps of muscle and tendon beneath, and under that bones and organs and the blue and red spiderweb of blood vessels.

  It was as much an illusion as the other had been, but it was the one they wanted. It was Chrysalis as she'd looked in life. Jay's last lingering doubts vanished as he stared at the body, and with them any last lingering hopes. Chrysalis was dead; the voice on the phone had been an imposter's.

  Charles looked at her for a long moment, then turned away, satisfied. He patted Cbsmo on the shoulder before he walked off. Hot Mamma dropped to her knees, smoking hands waving in the air, and began to weep again. Others pressed close around the casket, quiet and reverent. The Oddity stood in the corner, watching.

  Jay caught up to the skull-faced joker as he stepped out of the parlor. "Charles Dutton, I presume."

  Death turned and looked him in the eye. "Yes."

  "Jay Ackroyd," he said, offering a hand. "I'd like to ask you a few questions."

  10:00 P.M.

  "I'm afraid there's not much I can tell you, Mr. Ackroyd," Charles Dutton said. A hot July wind gusted down the Bowery, flapping the joker's long black cloak behind him as they walked. "Chrysalis and I were business associates, but I cant claim to have known her well. She liked her little secrets."

  "You should know, you were one of them," Jay said. "How come no one knew Chrysalis had a partner?" He had to walk quickly to keep up with Dutton's long-legged strides.

  They passed the Chaos Club, and Dutton waved politely to the doorman. "The limelight suited Chrysalis, and I prefer to avoid it," he said. "Tonight was something of an exception."

  "I'd intended to quietly pay my last respects, but when I saw what that posturing fool had done, I couldn't help but get emotional."

  "Jory was her father," Jay said.

  "Her beloved father," Dutton agreed, "who made her a prisoner in her own home for years, because he was so deeply embarrassed by the way she looked. You see, I do know a little of her history. It was not something she liked to talk about, but when she first came to Jokertown, she needed my help to open the Crystal Palace, and I insist on knowing the background of my business associates."

  "You lent her money?"

  Dutton nodded. "She arrived in the city with a considerable fortune in bearer bonds. However, she wanted to buy almost half a block, not only the building that became the Crystal Palace but the adjoining properties as well, all that debris. I don't imagine I have to tell you that Manhattan real estate is expensive, even in Jokertown. There were other costs as well. The restoration, fixtures and furnishings, the liquor license…"

  "Bribes," Jay suggested. A car passed them, going the other way up the Bowery. Jay watched its lights recede in the long plate-glass window of the laundromat they were passing.

  "The city inspectors work so hard," Dutton said, "as do our police and firefighters. Periodic tokens of esteem are always a wise policy, particularly for a joker. Costly, though."

  "So you lent her a lot of bucks," Jay said. He was still keeping an eye on the reflections in the laundromat window. "How much of the joint did you own?"

  "A third," Dutton said. "She held the controlling interest."

  "Don't stop and don't look behind you," Jay said quietly. "We're being followed."

  "Really?" Dutton was good; his pace didn't even falter. "He's across the street, maybe a half block back, trying to slink from doorway to doorway," Jay said. "Real amateur hour. He would have flunked slinking in detective school. He's avoiding the street lamps, but the headlights pick him up every time a car passes."

  "Do you know who it is?" Dutton asked.

  "The Oddity," Jay told him. "Friend of yours?"

  "I'm afraid not. I know him only by _reputation."

  "You got any kick-ass powers you haven't mentioned, or is it up to me?" Jay asked.

  Dutton laughed. "Does wealth count as a power?"

  "Maybe," Jay said. "If the Oddity attacks us, try throwing some hundred-dollar bills at him, we'll see how it works."

  "I have a better idea," Dutton said. He stopped suddenly. They were in front of the Famous Bowery Wild Card Dime Museum. Dutton went up to the doors. "What the hell are you doing?" Jay asked. "The place is closed."

  "I have a key," Dutton said. He opened one of the doors and motioned Jay inside. "The management won't mind."

  "You own the place?" Jay guessed at Dutton relocked the door.

  "I'm afraid so," Dutton said. He punched some numbers into a key box on the wall. A blinking red light went out, and a green one came on. "We're clear," Dutton said. "Come with me. "

  The interior of the museum was dim and cool. They went through a swinging door and down a service corridor. "This place do good business?" Jay asked.

  "Fair," Dutton said. "You've been here, of course?"

  "A long time ago," Jay said. "When I was very young. The only thing I remember is the jars. Dozen of big jars, with deformed joker babies floating inside. It really freaked me out." The memory had been buried for a long time, but the moment he spoke, it came back so vividly Jay could taste it: endless small bodies, twisted and terrible, floating in formaldehyde behind a wall of glass. One of them, bigger than the others and especially grotesque, had been mounted on a rotating pedestal, and Jay could still remember his fear as its face slowly turned toward him. It was going to open its eyes and look at him, he had screamed, and nothing his father had said had calmed him down. "It gave me nightmares," Jay said, astonished by the sudden realization. He couldn't quite repress a shudder. "Jesus," he said to Dutton. "Those are long gone, right?"

  "Sadly, no," Dutton said. "The Monstrous Joker Babies were one of the original exhibits. The tourists have come to expect them. But I have made considerable efforts to turn this into a legitimate museum since acquiring it from its original owners, and our new attractions are quite different. Let me show you."

  He led Jay through an access door. "Here," Dutton said. "This is our Syrian diorama."

  Jay peered through the glass at a dramatic waxwork tableau. In the foreground, Carnifex was wrenching an Uzi away from a terrorist, while a pregnant Peregrine raked his face with metal talons. Tachyon, dressed like a color-blind Arab fop, was out cold on the floor. Elsewhere, Jack Braun raced toward a gunman, bullets whining off his body. One of the richochets had struck Senator Hartmann; you could see the blood seeping through his sport coat. Way in back, Hiram Worchester glared up at a giant economy-sized Arab Rambo, while a woman in a black chador held a bloody knife over a fallen prophet.

  "I'm sure you recall the incident," Dutton said. "Yeah," Jay said. "From the tour. Getting wounded did wonders for Hartmann's presidential campaign."

  "It never hurts to be a hero," Dutton agreed.

  Jay indicated a panel of buttons in front of the diorama. "What are these?"

  "Our new exhibits are state-of-the-art," Dutton said. "Sound effects, dramatic lighting, animatronics. One button lights up Braun's golden force field, another turns on the Nur's green glow. That one at the end will actually make Sayyid fall. He's the giant. Worchester made him too heavy to support his own weight."

  "I didn't know waxworks could move," Jay said.

  "We've been moving away from wax on the animated exhibits," Dutton said. "Sayyid is three-quarters plastic."

  "Doesn't he crush those other figures?"

  "He never hits the ground," Dutton said. "The children love it. They all squeeze their little fists, pretending to be aces."

  "Hiram will be so thrilled," Jay said dryly. "Come, let me give you the tour," Dutton said.

  "Only if we skip the Monstrous Joker Babies," Jay said. "I got enough problems without running into them again." Dutton laughed, and escorted him through a maze of dim-lit corridors where heroes and villains of years gone by watched from the shadows. They passed Jetboy, the Four Aces, the Lizard King. Hardhat and the Radical stood locked in eternal combat, whi
le a squad from the joker Brigade stood off Charlie in some hellforsaken part of Nam. In the Hall of Infamy, the Astronomer hung from a wall, embedded in the brick with only his face and hands visible. The mortar had turned red with his blood. Nearby Gary Gilmore stood surrounded by pillars of salt, and Gimli exhorted a maddened crowd with upraised fist. The dwarfs glass eyes seemed to follow them.

  "Great waxwork," Jay said. "Looks real."

  "It is," Dutton said. "Gimli's empty skin was found in an alley not far from here. There was no family, so we, ah, acquired the remains."

  Jay gave him a look. "You stuffed him." He'd heard that story on the streets somewhere, but somehow he'd forgotten. Dutton cleared his throat. "Yes. Well. He has been quite a popular attraction."

  "I think I've seen enough," Jay told him.

  "Fine." Dutton took him across a cavernous hall where the Turtle's old shells hung suspended from the ceiling. The adjoining gallery was still under construction. Dutton guided Jay through the tangle of ladders, tarps, and sawhorses to a snack-room square in the center of the building. He turned on the lights and stood in front of a bank of vending machines. "Would you prefer coffee or a soft drink?" he asked.