Mike Shayne's Torrid Twelve

by editor Leo Margules

  Just before Angela he had found out what was wrong with himself. Somewhere, somebody had put him onto a merry-go-round spinning round and round and then, as he grew dizzy, the being at the controls had sped up the motion—more and more, faster and faster—until he was whirling so rapidly that the whole world was blurred and flashes of color made up all that he knew. It was then—on the merry go-round—that bits and pieces of himself flew off into space and he was no longer whole. He began looking for the parts of himself. He found a part with Angela.

  She had wide blue eyes with little gold flecks in them. She had yellow hair, parted neatly down the middle and separated into two ribboned curls at the back of her head. She had had a red mouth and a soft, yielding body.

  Her voice was annoying. Like a child’s, high-pitched and squeaky. At first it seemed to him that she did little more than make noises with her flowerlike mouth, but as they grew to know each other better, they began to communicate.

  “I’ve been ill,” he told Angela. “I was forced to leave the university and come home to mother, to this farm. I have been recuperating here.” He took her hand, played with the stubby fingers. She hadn’t drawn it away. “But I’m much better now. I’ve been better since I found out about the merry-go-round.”

  “What was it?” she murmured in the spring breeze. “Why were you ill?”

  He pressed his hands to his head. “I can’t remember, exactly. I was working very hard. Mental work. Things like that happen sometimes to people who work their brains too hard. Someone gets jealous. That’s when they put me on the merry-go-round.”

  “Who,” Angela had asked, “put you on the merry-go-round? Was it your mother?”

  His head began to throb and he rubbed his thumbs along his temples. His mother? No, not his mother. She had been proud of his brain, not jealous of it. She had urged him not to work so hard. “There’s plenty of time, Alfred. You don’t look like you’ve been getting enough sleep. Are you getting enough rest, Alfred?”

  He had been annoyed, he remembered. “Don’t be silly, Mother. I’ve a long way to go. I’ve the equipment, the ability. I must apply this ability. No matter who you are, you never get anywhere by being lazy.”

  Worry shadows had dulled his mother’s dark eyes, but she had said no more. No—it wasn’t his mother. It was someone else. If he could only see into the dark spot in his mind. But it was heavily curtained.

  He put out a finger, touching Angela’s pretty yellow curls. “You’re very pretty, Angela.”

  The mouth looked haughty. “I haven’t a thing to wear.”

  He had looked down then at the blue-checked dress. “It’s an attractive dress. It suits you.”

  The thin voice grew into a fine line of noise. “That shows how much you know. Why do you think I bury myself out here, away from the world? I could never fit with your fancy, educated crowd. I haven’t a thing to wear.”

  He thought he recognized a bit of himself then, flying above him like a tattered butterfly. He reached up for it, but it swirled about and floated gently down to Angela.

  Her voice was going on. “It seems to me if you’re so fond of me you could prove it. I mean, after all, is it too much to ask that you apply yourself to earning a decent living rather than all this bunk about benefiting the world? Charity begins at home, you know.”

  He moved closer to Angela. He must get his hands on the piece of himself. It was a shining piece. He must get it back in his head. He moved his long hands slowly. Mustn’t excite her. She might jump and it would flit away.

  “For instance,” she was saying, “there’s a dance at the country club next week-end. All the right sort of people in the business world. The ones who could do you the most good. But how could we go? I haven’t a single thing to wear. Not a single thing.”

  She wasn’t looking at him at all and then his hands were almost upon the missing piece of himself. But at the last second she had seen him, and she made that annoying, bawling sound and moved. The almost grasped piece had fluttered, and started to fly away.

  He had reached and squeezed, his hands hard and tight on Angela’s throat. The section of Alfred stopped moving and settled down quietly on the blue-checked dress. When Angela, too, was quiet he had picked it carefully off and added it to the other parts of himself. Then there was nothing to do but consign Angela to the well.

  Lucille had come out from the village with his mother. Her clothes were expensive and in the latest fashion and she had soft brown hair which curled all around her face. His mother had been quite pleased at bringing her. She seemed to think that Lucille would be good for Alfred.

  Alfred had thought so, too. The getting acquainted process had begun, a process that he hated, but had always proved quite necessary.

  “I wish you would take me into the city to the theater, Alfred. It’s terribly dull out here.”

  He had looked around in the twilight, the soft shadows, the gently rolling land. “I find it peaceful.”

  She had shrugged, moved her small high heels impatiently. “Peaceful for you, dull as hell for me.”

  A small shiver had trembled along his backbone. “Please, Lucille. I don’t like to hear a lady swear. It isn’t fitting.”

  She had laughed, a mocking, partly amused look in her eyes. “Honestly, Alfred. You are so—so stuffy and narrow-minded. People just don’t say things like that any more. I sometimes think you’re a throwback to the Victorian age.”

  He had laced his hands together, stared down at his fingers. “You mean I’m old-fashioned? Yes, I suppose I am. But you must admit that the old ways were in many cases infinitely superior to the loose morals of today. Women smoking and drinking, for example.”

  He had thought a peculiar light shone behind her jewel-like eyes. “Oh, yes—wicked women. Not at all like your mother.” Something in her tone made him feel as though his mother needed defending.

  “My mother is a lady, if that’s what you mean.”

  Lucille had looked at him almost pityingly then. “A perfect lady. When your father walked away and left her—and you—she said nothing. She lived a life of silent atonement for some sin she felt she had committed. She thought she had committed a sin simply because your father left her.”

  He had thought he saw something moving in the blue sky, against the sun. “Isn’t that better than weeping and raging and putting the blame on my father?”

  The bright eyes stared through him. “Oh, yes, certainly. But I can just picture Alfred, the boy, asking, ‘Mama, where’s Father? Why did he go away?’

  “And I can picture your mother replying, ‘It was all my fault, Alfred. I failed him as a wife.’ Implying, too, that you failed him as a son.”

  The blood was mounting to his temples. “She never said that!”

  “Well, she made you think it, didn’t she? And when you wanted her—your only parent—perfect and without blemish, she showed you the fatal flaw in her character. Noble and self-sacrificing! It would have been better if she had said, ‘To hell with him. He was a selfish, egotistical brute who made my life miserable.’ Then your hate and your love could have been divided properly, normally, not lying all over each other.’

  He was sure then. This was a dark piece, like an autumn leaf. It would dart down almost to his outstretched fingertips. He reached for it and Lucille had put up a small girlish hand, caught it, and brought it down.

  “Good heavens,” she said, “what’s this awful thing?”

  He had moved then before she could crush it and, of course, afterward he had no place to put her but the well.

  He had encountered Susan in a shop in the village. His mother had driven him into town because, with the new dark piece and the new bright piece, he was feeling much better. Susan was larger than the others had been—almost buxom in fact.

  Alfred’s taste usually ran to the petite, willowy type, but there was something about Susan’s shrewd, penetrating gaze that made him feel she could look deep into his mind, see the missing pieces. Perhaps
she would help him search for them.

  He didn’t say anything to her. They hadn’t been introduced and he preferred to meet her through his mother. “That one—over by the window, Mother.” He whispered, looking around carefully to see that no one else was watching. “Do you know her?”

  His mother looked at him oddly, he thought. But it was probably a trick of his mind. He was sure she didn’t suspect about the others. His explanations had been too smooth, too convincing.

  “I should like to have her out to the house. Invite her to come—for dinner.”

  His mother started to say something, then seemed to think better of it. She closed her thin-lipped mouth, nodded her gray head. “All right, Alfred.”

  He had left her then and gone back to sit in the car, content to wait for Susan.

  He had been very gay at dinner, and afterward—afterward he had walked with Susan in the moonlight. He had helped her over the rough ground, taking care to seem very gallant. He had been quite sure she would appreciate it.

  “So you’re the brilliant Alfred Grunner.” She looked at him from her sitting position against a stone wall, her clear blue eyes searching his face as if something about him disturbed and puzzled her. “You’re not the kind of young man I expected you to be.”

  The evening air was soft as silk, and very warm. “I’m not? What did you expect?”

  Her heavy eyelids closed. Long lashes lay on her white and pink cheeks. “Someone as dry as dust with his head in the clouds. Oddly enough,” the eyes opened wide, “you’re a man.”

  His face was wearing a smile. He had a strange feeling inside him, like a brightly glowing pilot light.

  “I suppose I am,” he said.

  She leaned closer. “And I’m a woman.”

  He repressed an urge to laugh. “So you are.” He ran his fingers over her shoulder, felt warmth beneath the summer dress.

  She bent forward, her lips brushing his cheek. “Kiss me,” she said. He couldn’t help it. He drew back.

  “What’s the matter?” she whispered, straining against him with passionate eagerness. “Are you afraid?”

  His head felt heavy suddenly. “I don’t think so.”

  She straightened up. “You mean I don’t appeal to you.” Her voice was harsh.

  “Oh, yes,” he said, “you do. You do.”

  She smiled again. “Well?”

  She leaned against his chest, her body pliable and soft. It was pleasant to move his hand along her back, run his fingers along her hairline. She shivered against him, raised her head.

  He put his mouth on hers and almost instantly drew back in revulsion. He knew she could read it in his face. He fought to hide it, but he could not.

  “What’s the matter?” she said.

  “I can’t explain it,” he said. “It’s nothing personal.” He tried to reach her hand but she pulled it away.

  “I want you—God knows I do. But there’s something in me—” His voice was rising now, cracking in its torment. “Something that won’t let me.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “That never has let me.”

  She was staring at him. “Never?”

  He shook his head miserably. “Never.”

  He was surprised by her laughter. It rose from her throat and climbed up to the sky. Her body shook and between sobbing giggles she gasped, “Good God, good God.”

  While she was laughing he saw it. It was shimmery, like a firefly. But it wasn’t a firefly. It was a part of him, shining around her shoulders. Just before he moved she said, “I’ll have to teach you,” and laughed again.

  She had joined the others in the well.

  He had known Tessie before. She crept out—the memory of her—from the edge of the black curtain. She was not, he thought, an important memory but it was encouraging to know there was an exit slit permitting passage.

  Tessie had a sad pink face, and drooping stringy hair. “I had a baby,” she said. “It died.”

  He remembered, but he felt no pity. He had to think hard to make himself understand why he was without sympathy, and was triumphant when it came to him.

  “You killed your baby,” he said. “It was your own fault.”

  Her face contorted like a child’s, all ready to cry.

  “No,” she said, “not my fault. Never my fault. It was an act of God.”

  He had shouted at her, “Don’t blame God. You insisted on driving on an icy road. You insisted on drinking cocktails before you drove. Was it God who made the car swerve on the slippery curve? Was it God who held the steering wheel?” He was surprised at the rage he felt. “You deserved it. You killed your own baby.”

  Tears flowed down her face, but she made no protest. He watched the tears closely, tried to count them. The rage was gone now. Polite interest had taken its place.

  He offered her his handkerchief. She held it to her face and from behind its folds he thought he heard her murmur: “You could have been there to drive me. You could have cared where I went, what I did.”

  At that instant he saw it lying on the ground. It was black and smoking, and it looked like a piece of charred bone. But he knew it was a part of him.

  She saw it at the same time, must have recognized it the very instant he did, for they reached for it together. They struggled for it, but he fought the hardest, moved by a dreadful fear that he might lose a part of himself forever. Afterward, Tessie, too, went in the well.

  Sometimes in the long days that followed it seemed to him that he was almost whole again. The newly found parts seemed to move deep into his being, to shift, to fill the void. But on this day, looking down into the well, he knew that he had been deceiving himself.

  He was not complete, but quite unfinished, like a cake without an icing. One more, he thought—I must find the last one. The crowning, the finishing touch.

  “Alfred!” His mother’s voice climbed over the hill, and echoed in the depths of the well, stirring perhaps the quiet ones at the bottom.

  He went to her quickly, full of hope. She was standing on the porch, his mother—old and straight but without the power.

  He came quietly. A car stood gleaming in the driveway. Someone was standing with his mother on the porch, talking to her. A familiar stranger—a woman small and rounded. Her hair shone like a copper cap and her face was pale and delicate. He wondered where he had seen her before, stopped at the side of the house to ponder.

  Suddenly he heard his mother speak. “He’s much better. Much, much better.”

  The other woman answered. Her voice was high, almost sharp, but there was restraint in it, too. “You were right then, even though I quarreled with you about it. I thought I could help him. I thought I was the only one who could help him.”

  His mother said, “I didn’t really help. I don’t think anyone could. But Alfred himself and the peace, the solitude—yes, that was what did it. I must admit I was very worried for a while. He had some strange, almost terrifying obsessions. But they passed. Thank God, they passed.”

  Footsteps came across the porch and he ducked back. “Where is he? Hadn’t you better call again?”

  His mother raised her voice. “Alfred! Alfred!”

  He made no reply, but he thought they must surely hear the wild beating of his heart.

  “How are you feeling, my dear?” His mother’s voice was gentle.

  The woman sighed. “All right. I’m tough, Mother Grunner.”

  They waited again.

  “Come in the house, Louise. He goes for long walks every morning, but he should be along any moment now.”

  Louise. Yes, Louise. That was her name. He knew now.

  She had paused and was speaking again. “You said he had strange obsessions. What were they?”

  His mother hesitated. “I don’t know that they’re important. They’ve passed—”

  The shrill voice sharpened. “What were they?”

  His mother sighed. “The dolls. He wanted dolls. He gave them names, took them on walks, even talked to them. I didn’
t know how to refuse him, so I brought them for him.”

  “Are you sure he was just pretending? Is it possible that he thought of the dolls as—”

  His mother made her voice crisp. “I didn’t think at all. I just gave them to him. He named them Angela, and Susan, and Lucille, I think, and—oh, yes, the last one was Tessie.”

  The reply was whispered. “Angela. Susan. Lucille. Teresa. Those were names we considered.”

  He shrank back against the clapboards.

  “Don’t try to figure it out, Louise. Whatever their purpose, the dolls must have helped. He managed to lose them all—to forget them. And now he’s well.”

  “I hope so,” the young woman said. “After all, it isn’t as though he were the only man who has ever had to live with tragedy. And he forgot,” her voice sank, “that I had to live with it, too.”

  He saw it, the last missing piece, multicolored and beautiful. It blew around the house and he followed it. It fell at her feet.

  “Louise,” he said and came forward. “Louise, my darling. I’m so glad to see you. You’ll never know how glad.”

  She smiled with her scarlet mouth and her dark blue eyes made him think of the black water in a deep, cool well.

  THE RITES OF DEATH

  by HAL ELLSON

  It’s a hot night. We got nothing to do, so we hang around the corner. But that’s nowhere.

  Some more of the boys show on the scene. Nothing’s happening yet.

  A squad car cruises slow around the corner. The flat-foots give us a bad look. We look back at them the same, and they go on their way.

  I’m set to drift off when Elmo pops up with two other studs. Elmo’s President of the mob, the boss cat.

  He’s not too big, but a rough stud when the chips is down. Mostly he don’t say too much, but his punch is deadly.

  Stovepipe and Fandango is kind of new in the gang. Both on the punky side—I don’t like either. Stovepipe got a mouth bigger than his head. Fandango’s ain’t no smaller.