"Alive, of course. But don't think I'm not appreciative of the distinction. You're a man of keen wit, sir. And I admire you for it. One seldom finds acerbity in these decadent days."
"Look," I said, beginning to recover a little composure. "I'm not used to indulging in character analysis with a corpse. Just what do you want of me?"
"Your services, sir. Your professional services. For which, needless to say, you will be generously rewarded. In perpetuity, I might add."
"Cut the double-talk. I've had enough from Vera, and from poor Cono - "
"Poor Cono? I would hardly endorse the adjective. Were it not for me, my dear sir, Cono would be languishing in an unmarked grave. Whereas, thanks to my efforts, he is among the quick rather than the dead. And if you wish plain talk, sir, you shall have it.
"I am Nicolo Varek, man of science. I have perfected a means, a methodology, a therapy if you like, which defeats what men call death. Defeats death? It goes beyond that, far beyond. For those whom I revive also possess the boon of eternal life. Eternal life!"
Crazy talk. But it was coming from the mouth of a corpse, and I believed it. There was no hint of fakery or collusion - no ventriloquist could open that cadaver's eye, manipulate his dead lips. I saw, and I heard. And I believed.
"Yes, I can give life to the dead. As to the how and the why of it, well, that's my secret. My priceless, precious, perfect secret.
"And what do you think the use of that secret is worth, Sir? What is the proper fee for the boon of eternal life? A million dollars, perhaps?
"There are many men with a million dollars in this world, my friend. Do you think any of them would hesitate to part with that sum if I could assure them of continued existence?
"But there's the rub. They must be assured. And at the same time the secret must remain a secret. For this reason I must continue to operate anonymously. There is nothing men would stop at in order to extract my secret from me - if I were known to them as its possessor. How often I've faced torture and death myself at the hands of those who suspected I might save them!
"You say I have helpers aplenty? That I can summon up an army of the dead, if need be, to assist me in my aims? That is true -but only within certain limits. The dead must be controlled. And I cannot carry out my plans completely without the aid of living humanity. I need a man of prescience, a man of integrity. Such as yourself, sir."
"I don't see what you're driving at."
"A business arrangement. You might even go so far as to call it a partnership. With myself as the silent partner. You as the go-between. Our product: Eternal life. Our goal: Unlimited wealth, unlimited power."
"Sounds a bit too easy."
"Do not mistake it, my friend. There are innumerable obstacles to overcome, many problems to face and to solve. I can provide for them all, however. This has been a cherished dream of mine for centuries. Yes, centuries."
"Who are you, anyway?"
The corpse chuckled. "So many men have asked that question of me, so many times! Yet I find it best not to answer. My handiwork is proof that I speak truth, and that is all you need. Trust me, and we shall rule.
"Yes, rule! Surely you can see what power lies in my secret. The hold it will give us both over the great ones of this world, now and forever! We'll seek our fortunes first, and the rest shall come.
"I have the plans well laid. You will be able to go forth and proclaim the gift of eternal life to the world. Nor shall you lack for assistance. I can summon a host to your command, to do your bidding and mine. We shall broadcast the tidings: There is no more death, for those who can pay the price! Eternal life, and more; special powers, new powers.
"But you'll learn all this and more in time to come. You'll learn the methods I've devised for bringing the news to the world. Of course, it would never do to make a really public announcement or statement; it must all be cloaked in mysticism and the proper formulae. We'll start a cult, attract the wealthy, and reveal the truth only to the select few.
"Now, sir, how does my proposal strike you? Eternal life, eternal riches, eternal power?"
I didn't say anything for a long moment. I stared at the corpse that told me men could live forever.
"Silence means consent," said the voice.
"Not necessarily. I was just wondering - what if I refuse?"
"I'm sorry you even mention the possibility. For it forces me to remind you that you really have no choice in the matter."
"You mean you'll kill me if I don't? Kill me and animate my corpse, I suppose?"
"Come now, surely you give me credit for more subtlety than that? I've already gone to a great deal of trouble and risk to bring you here, as you know. I cannot jeopardize my plans to any further extent. And you would be of no use to me as a corpse. Besides, there is no need for me to kill you. If you walk out of here, you're as good as dead anyway."
"Meaning?"
"Meaning that you are wanted for murder. For killing this poor one-eyed citizen of a free republic. The bartender."
"But he's alive, you've revived him - "
"Not like the others. It's purely temporary, you understand. I can keep him animated as long as I choose, and I will do so if you consent. I'll even put him back to work in the bar." Again the chuckle. "It won't be the first time a dead man has walked abroad with none the wiser. If only you knew or even suspected how many of the dead presently mingle with the living, thanks to the Varek method!"
I shuddered. The single eye of the corpse was omniscient. The voice purred on: "If you refuse, he becomes a corpse again. With a dozen witnesses to swear you killed him. I'll not wreak vengeance - the full majesty of the law will attend to that. And your story of mysterious women and corpses that talk and a walking dead man will not help you or save you. I believe you realize that.
"But you won't refuse. Because you can see what I'm offering you. Wealth and power. The goals, the dreams of every man. A chance for eternal life yourself, such as I enjoy. Think it over, sir, think well upon it. Life or death?"
I thought. I thought well upon it. And everything within me clamoured for assent. Oh, it's easy enough to be a hero when there's no temptation. But the cynic who said every man has his price knew human nature. There aren't many who wouldn't settle for eternal life, eternal wealth and eternal power even at the price of their souls - and the souls of everyone else, for that matter.
The souls of everyone else…
I looked at Cono. My friend, Cono Colluri. The late Cono Colluri who went to his death looking like an overgrown college boy. Cono, who left me eight thousand bucks and a promise to clear his name.
Where was Cono now?
He wasn't here in this room. His body was here, and it moved and it talked, but the soul…
There was a tic, there was torment, there was twisting torture. Not real life. This was a stranger, a bulking walking corpse. No emotions, no warmth, no humanity.
Sure, I could sell myself out. But I couldn't sell out the world.
So I stared down at the corpse and I said, "No. I'm sorry, Varek. I've got to refuse, and take my chances."
"The decision is final?"
"Final."
"Very well. You've had your chance."
The mouth shut. The eye closed. The dead bartender was truly dead again. I saw the light fade away from the countenance, then I moved back. Back, into Cono Colluri's arms.
I might have known Varek would lie. That he'd never let me out of that room alive. If I hadn't realized it before, I knew it now. Because the cold arms wrapped around me. And the great thumbs rose up to my neck, ready to press and squeeze.
"Cono!" I gasped. "It's me - your friend - don't - "
You can't argue with a corpse.
You can only fight. Fight and pant, and try to keep the strangling hands away from your throat. I hit him with everything I had. Nothing happened. Nothing happened, except that he bent me back, back…
I sagged then. Sagged so suddenly that he went down with me. As I fell, I twisted.
His grip broke. I rolled under the trestle. He groped after me. I dumped coffin and all on his head. He went down. Blind corpse-eyes sought me. I ran. I made it down the hall with no one to stop me. He lumbered to his feet, came groping after me.
I knew the front door would be locked. But there was a glass panel, and next to it in the hall somebody had placed a large urn.
I grabbed it up, smashed the glass, and stepped through.
Then I was out on the street, running. It was night. The air was cool.
It was good to be free.
Free, and wanted for murder.
Have you ever wondered what it feels like to be a murderer?
I can tell you.
It feels like rabbits who bear the baying of a hunting dog. It feels like lying in bed with the covers pulled over your head and Pa coming up the stairs to give you a spanking. It feels like waiting for the Doctor to sterilize the instruments.
You don't walk down the street when you're a murderer. You skulk through the alleys. You don't take the streetcar and you don't pass any cops. And when you finally get down-town to your hotel, you walk a long time before you go inside the lobby. You look around very carefully to make sure it's deserted.
And when you do go in, you don't ask for the key to your room. The police might be waiting up there. Or somebody else. Somebody that's dead, but alive. Waiting to grab you and -
I had the feeling, but I kept it out of my face and voice long enough to ask the clerk and the desk whether or not there had been any message for me.
You see, I had to play one hunch; that the hotel hadn't been tipped off. Varek wouldn't, as long as he thought I was coming in with him. And now, there was still that chance. If I could only get the message…
It was waiting for me, the precious little yellow envelope stuck in the pigeonhole. The telegram from the carney. I ripped it open and read:
GREAT AHMED AT FORTY THREE EAST BRENT STREET UNDER NAME RICHARDS.
That was all, and it was enough. Brent was a street on the near North side. Walking distance, I could take an El and bypass the Loop, if I was willing to risk it.
I was. Ahmed, or Richards, had the money.
I had to. Ahmed, or Richards, could save me.
I did. Ahmed, or Richards, was the answer.
Brent Street was about a mile across the bridge after I left the El. It was a long, hard mile, I kept to the shadows, kept my face averted from passersby. But nothing happened. I stopped in front of the dingy old brownstone frost that was graced with the numerals 43, lit my last cigarette, and went up the steps to preas the buzzer.
Then I waited.
It was a good two minutes before the door opened. During that time I speculated quite a bit about the man I was going to meet.
Would it be the Great Ahmed in a turban? A swarthy man with a pointed beard, deepset burning eyes and a singsong voice?
Would it be the suave, cultivated, cosmopolitan Mr Richards, a con man from the carney, dressed a little too garishly, with a voice too soft and smooth?
It was important for me to know. Because I'd have to throw myself on the man's mercy.
The door opened to answer my question.
"The Great Ahmed?" I asked.
"Yes. Please come in."
I came in. Into the light of the hall-way, where I could see my host.
He wasn't Ahmed and he wasn't Richards, either.
He was nobody.
A small man of about fifty, with thin, greying hair. Wrinkled face, watery blue eyes, almost grey. Come to think about it, his skin was grey, too. And he wore a grey suit. Quiet and inconspicuous. About as far away from a carney type as I could have possibly imagined.
How to describe him? In Hollywood, he'd be what they'd call a Barry Fitzgerald type without the smile and the brogue. Somebody's uncle. The kindly bachelor uncle.
I hoped he'd be mine.
"You are the Great Ahmed?" I asked, still not sure, still not sold.
"Yes. You want a reading?"
"Uh… yes."
I might as well stall for a while until I was sure. The way things had been happening, I wouldn't have trusted my own brother.
It was a big house, an old house, one of those places built for people to live in at a time when most families had eight or nine children instead of a television set.
The Great Ahmed led me down a long hallway, past two or three doors leading, inevitably, to a sun porch, a parlour, a library. The room he ushered me into was a sort of secondary parlour, towards the rear of the house. It had plenty of solid mahogany in it; old pieces, but durable. There was a massive centre table and the inevitable grouping of chairs as if for a seance. But there was nothing of the medium's workshop or the clairvoyant's clip-joint about this place.
I took advantage of the light in the room to study my host a little more closely, but I can't say I learned much. He was just a tired, middle-aged man, and I wondered how he managed the grift with a tough carney outfit. He didn't look the part of an Oriental mystic at all.
Even when he told me to sit down and produced a crystal ball from a cupboard, I wasn't impressed. The ball itself was small, and a trifle dusty. As a matter of fact, he brushed it off with his sleeve, smiling sheepishly as he did so.
Then he sat down, stared into the ball, and smiled again.
"The reading is three dollars," he said. "An offering, you understand, not a fee. Fee's against the law here."
"Shoot the three bucks," I said.
"Very well." His eyes left my face. They focussed on the ball. Grey eyes, a trifle bloodshot.
I sat very quietly while he stared. He cleared his throat. He fidgeted. Then he spoke.
He told me my name.
He told me where I'd been working.
"You are a friend of the late Cono Colluri," he said, his eyes downcast. "And you are here to collect his money. A sum amounting to eight thousand, two hundred and thirty-one dollars."
He paused. I felt the perspiration running along the collar of my nice white shirt - the one from the funeral parlor, probably stolen off a stiff.
He paused, and I stared at him. Nice little man in grey, but he knew too much. I'd never believed in "occult powers", and yet here he was, telling me these things.
After what I'd gone through in the past three days, I felt that I couldn't take much more. My whole concept of the universe was shattering, and along with it, my sanity. Dead men walking, me a murderer, and now a man who actually reads minds. It was too much…
"Take it easy, friend." The Great Ahmed stood up, slowly. "I didn't mean to upset you so. It was a cheap trick, I guess."
His hands moved upwards from under the table. They held an envelope and a sheet of paper.
With a start, I recognized Cono's letter.
"Picked it out of your pocket when I brushed against you in the hall," smiled the little man. "Then held it under the table and read it while you thought I was reading the crystal. Old bit of business, but effective."
I nodded, and tried to smile in a way that conveyed my relief.
"So you're Cono's friend," said the Great Ahmed. "He wrote me about you, you know. A couple of weeks ago. Didn't mention the money, though. It was a tragedy, wasn't it?"
"Then you know about the confession?"
"Yes. Louie was a rat." The smile left his face. "Too bad, a messy business. I'm glad I left the show."
He walked around to the cabinet, stooped, and opened the lower drawer with a small key. He took out a big black tin box. Another key opened it. He began to pile bills on the table - big bills, hundreds and thousands.
"Here's your money," he said, sorting a pile and pushing it across to me.
"But… don't you want some kind of paper, some kind of identification or signature?"
"You're Cono's friend. I trust you."
He smiled shyly, and his hands made a gesture of dismissal.
"You trust me, eh?"
"Why not?"
I took a deep breath and came out with it. I had
to come out with it to somebody, or go crazy. "Because I'm wanted for murder, that's why!"
The Great Ahmed sat down again, still smiling. "And you want to tell me all about it, is that it? Well, go ahead. I'm listening."
I went ahead, and he listened. It took up a long time, but I told him the whole story - from the time I hit town until the time Cono hit me.
He sat there, a little grey idol, quietly gazing off into the gloom.
"And so now you want to clear your name, eh? And rescue Cono, I suppose? And put the finger on this man Varek, whoever he may be?"
I nodded.
"That's a big order. A mighty big order, friend. You know, of course, that your whole story sounds a bit implausible?"
"It sounds screwier than blazes," I told him. "But it's true. Every word of it."
"Granted. So the problem arises, where do we go from here?"
I glanced at the eight grand plus, lying before me on the table. Suddenly I shoved it back across to him.
"Will this help you to figure things out for me?" I asked. "Because if it will, take it. Part of it or all of it. Whatever it may cost to clear me, to save Cono. To pin a rap on that rat, Varek."
"You trust me to come in with you?" he asked.
"I've trusted you with my story. With my life. The money isn't important. If you're Cono's friend, you'll help."
"Good enough." The Great Ahmed sorted the bills and stacked them up next to the tin box. "From now on, I'm your man. Full time. Now to our problem." He pushed the crystal ball aside. "This won't help us any, I'm afraid. We have to face facts."
"Fact number one," I said, "is that the heat is on me."
"Which means you'll have to lay low. That makes me the outside man," he said.
"Correct. So it's your move."
"My move is to the hotel," Ahmed answered. "To your room. Sooner or later somebody is going to show up there, looking for you. The law will be around. But so will your blonde charmer, and some of the rest of Varek's friends. Perhaps even Cono himself. At any rate, chances are I'll find someone to tail; someone who will lead me to the funeral home or wherever else Varek hides out. He probably has a dozen or more places to hang his hat. If he wears a hat."
Stephen Jones (ed) Page 54
