Jack Vance

by Take My Face (epub)

  Dean’s voice was clouded. “Okay, Carr.”

  The apartment was closer than he had expected; he made it in five minutes. He found the name on the directory: George and Dean Bavonette, Apt. 32. He pressed the bell smartly, noticed the door was not quite closed, and walked in. There was no elevator; Carr climbed the carpeted stairs to the third floor.

  He stopped at the head of the stairs, cursing the management for providing such inadequate lights.

  To the left, at the far end of the corridor, stood a man in a tan jacket and gray flannels. The man was looking out the window marked fire escape, with his back to Carr.

  Carr turned down the corridor to the right, and found 32. He rapped; the door opened; Dean stood back. “Come in, Carr.”

  Carr slowly stepped into the apartment, turned back to look at Dean. He was shocked.

  She wore lounging pajamas and a bathrobe. Her face was flushed and dazed, her lipstick was blotched and her hair was tangled. She looked thirty years old.

  “Sit down, Carr. Sit down,” she said in a breathless voice.

  “What’s the matter?” Carr demanded sharply. “You’re acting queer.”

  “Ha.” She laughed—a soft-breathed laugh of wonder. “Ha … You’d be acting queer, too.”

  Carr handed her a small package. “I brought you this from France.”

  Dean took the package and put it on the table. Carr watched in irritation. Dean came to some kind of decision.

  “Carr.”

  “Well?”

  “Something just happened. You’d never guess what.”

  “No,” snapped Carr. “I suppose I wouldn’t.”

  Dean leaned back against the record shelves. “You just missed an old friend.”

  “Are you drunk? Or doped?”

  She smiled. “I wish I were. I feel funny, as if I’d seen a ghost.”

  “Oh, cut the dramatics.”

  Dean ran her hand through her shaggy auburn hair, sat down beside him. “Carr—do you remember Robert Struve?”

  Carr blinked, shifted mental gears. “Naturally. What about him?”

  “You missed him by about a minute.”

  “I’ll be damned!” He looked at her with narrowed eyes. “Was he wearing a tan coat?”

  “Something like that. A tan tweed jacket.”

  “Mmph,” muttered Carr. “I saw him in the hall. He had his back to me. By golly, I thought he looked vaguely familiar!” He glanced sharply at Dean. “What was he doing here?”

  “Oh—well—” Her voice faltered.

  “But great Gadfrey! Robert Struve! How could you stand it?”

  “He’s changed. Oh, how he’s changed …”

  Carr shook his head like an angry bull. “I don’t get it—don’t get it at all. What’s he doing here in the first place?”

  Dean looked moodily at her feet. “Oh—well, if the truth were known—and I guess it is—I don’t get along too well with George,” she said angrily. “He treats me like a—a card table. Something you can pull out and use when you need it, then fold up and push back out of the way. Well,” her voice became hesitant again, “I met—Robert. He knew me, but I didn’t know him. He’s going under a different name.”

  “Go on,” he said in a clipped voice.

  “I met him. I liked him. There was something about him …” She contemplated the image in her mind. “Well, George suspected the worst right away; he nagged something awful. So I kept seeing—Robert.

  “Go on,” he said.

  “There’s not much to say, really. It’s just the weird way this whole thing worked out. Here’s this fellow you think is a nice guy, a stranger. You get to like him; you act a little foolish and then suddenly you look at him, and you see he’s really someone else in disguise. Someone kinda horrible.”

  “What’s wrong with him?” asked Carr curiously.

  She shook her head in perplexity. “He always was a peculiar kind of guy. Remember how he was in football? He’d go a little crazy. He’d get the ball, and they could break his legs but they couldn’t stop him.”

  “What’s that got to do with you? You never did anything to him.”

  “I asked him that,” said Dean. “I said, ‘We were always friendly, Robert. How come you look at me like that?’

  ‘ ‘Dean,’ he said, ‘a salmon is born; it floats down the river into the ocean. Then years later it comes back. It’s got a mission. It doesn’t have any choice. It’s driven by its inner necessity.’

  ” ‘Yeah,’ I told him, ‘but you’re not a salmon.’ ‘ ‘No—but I have compulsions. I know enough to realize what they are, and the only way I’ll get rid of them.’ “

  Carr asked, “What kind of compulsions? Did he say?”

  Dean shook her head. “I didn’t pretend to understand him, and where he got all that psychological lore I don’t know.”

  “Let’s see,” said Carr. “He’s been out of jail —oh, over a year now, I guess. I suppose he’s bitter.”

  “He got a bum deal. But it wasn’t my fault.”

  “Maybe he got what he was after,” suggested Carr. “Maybe you’re imagining all the other.”

  “Imagining!” cried Dean. “I don’t know what I’m imagining … I don’t know what he’s thinking! I’m scared—”

  “Scared? What’s there to be scared of?” ?

  Dean said miserably, “I don’t know.”

  Carr rose to his feet. “Well—if I were you, I’d go home to San Giorgio. Mother’s mad, but not so you couldn’t bring her around. Actually she’d be glad to see you.”

  “I feel sorry for George,” said Dean. “He’s really a nice guy once you get inside him … I wouldn’t want to hurt him.”

  Carr put his hand on the doorknob. “I’ll be going … Anything you want me to tell Mother?”

  Dean looked out the window. “I’ll give her a ring one of these days. Maybe tomorrow. When I figure things out just a little.”

  “Goodbye,” said Carr. He left.

  Dean sat back down on the sofa, her legs stretched ungracefully out in front of her. She saw Carr’s present, but lacked the energy to open it. She thought about coffee, rejected the idea. She thought about Robert Struve …

  The door opened. Dean saw who it was, looked at him in surprise. “Hello,” she said in a husky voice. “This is—unexpected.”

  go TAKE MY FACE

  “I thought it would be.” He came over beside her. She saw that he carried a butcher knife. Her voice clogged in her throat. “What—what are you doing?”

  “I’ve decided to kill you.”

  “No—you can’t. You’ve had what you wanted from me,” she croaked. “I’ve given you everything you wanted.”

  He shook his head. “No. No. No.” He put his left hand in her hair; she stared up at him limply. He stabbed her in the throat. After a moment, he bent forward, slashed at her face, hacking, slicing. Panting, he stood back.

  He went to the bathroom, took off his rubber gloves, washed his hands. From the kitchen he brought a paper sack, stuffed in the gloves and the knife.

  At the door, he looked back to the couch and the sprawled horrid mess. He compressed his mouth, shook his head slightly, and left.

  CHAPTER VII

  Carr went to a telephone, called the Delta Rho Beta house. “Cathy McDermott, please.”

  “Sorry, she’s out for the evening. Would you care to leave your name?” a voice said.

  “Tell her Carr Pendry called.”

  Carr returned to the bar and finished his highball. He was jealous, lonesome, uneasy, unhappy. Things weren’t going right. It was hard to be angry with Cathy; but after all, she was his girl; that’s the way it had been for years.

  Images began to flow into Carr’s mind, pictures of Cathy dancing with some other man, parking with him, kissing him … He gulped down his drink. He’d show her. Two could play that game. He signaled the bartender.

  “Yes sir?”

  “Say,” said Carr, “where can a man find a lit
tle high-class entertainment?”

  The bartender looked off into space. “Sure I don’t know, mister.” He went away, and came

  back with a card. “I found this on the floor the other day. Personally I don’t know nothing about it.”

  “Thanks,” said Carr.

  “Yes sir,” said the bartender.

  The evening was still young when Carr returned to the street. The Kalmyra Club was not far distant; he wandered in. Manley Hatch’s Trio was in full cry.

  George took a long solo, his austere profile intent over the keys. His fingers made fantastic sounds, a bewildering succession of non-melodic phrases.

  He finished to a storm of applause. Carr looked around in frowning puzzlement. What was in this music? Was there something he didn’t understand?

  His second highball conveyed only the faintest flavor of whisky to his palate. He called the barmaid back. “Take away this slop and bring me a drink.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  She brought him another, very little better. Perhaps it was the same drink. He let it stand on the table, fuming.

  The set ended; George Bavonette sauntered past. Carr reached out and caught his coat. George looked down with a frown. “If you want a souvenir, I’ll give you my autograph.”

  “Sit down,” said Carr. “I want to talk to you.”

  “Can’t be done,” said George, and started to walk away.

  “About Dean,” said Carr.

  George whirled. “What about her?”

  “I’m her brother,” said Carr.

  George looked down at him with glowing eyes. “You’re her brother, are you? Her royal brother. What are you doing here?”

  “Just looked in,” said Carr. “That music is very interesting.”

  George settled himself into a chair. “How come this swift brotherly love?”

  “I just got back from Europe,” said Carr. “This is the first chance I’ve had to see Dean.”

  “Oh,” said George, “you saw Dean, did you?”

  “Yes. Early this evening.”

  George nodded. “How many guys ran out the back when you opened the door?”

  Carr said frigidly, “There’s no call for that kind of talk.”

  “Ha!” laughed George. “It makes no difference now. Because the song is ended. From now on”—he made a flat gesture—”she digs her jive; I dig mine.”

  “You mean,” said Carr in sudden hope, “that you’re planning to leave her?”

  George rose to his feet. “Leave her? Man,

  I done left. I’m gone.” He made a casual sign of farewell and sauntered away.

  Carr sat thinking. This was good news. Dean could come back with him to San Giorgio, plan a new life for herself.

  Carr left the Kalmyra and drove to the apartment. As before, the door was ajar. He ascended the steps, knocked at the door to 32.

  No answer.

  He tried the door. It swung open.

  About three o’clock the police let Carr go. He drove in a dream to the Fairmont, booked a room, rode glassy-eyed up in the elevator. He staggered into his room, slipped down in a chair and broke into a dry sobbing.

  The face so familiar, now so dreadfully strange, with all the secrets of its structure laid open … He clenched and unclenched his fists. When they caught the murderer—When they caught the murderer. Would they catch him? So many of these crimes were unsolved—

  By God, he’d see they solved this one! He’d keep riding them until they pulled someone in! Lieutenant Spargill of Homicide seemed efficient enough—a tall sensitive-looking man with thin sandy hair.

  Carr had told him everything: about Dean’s

  unhappy marriage, her peculiar affair with Robert Struve. “Just tonight she told me she was afraid of him. He threatened her.”

  “Robert Struve, eh? Where’s he live?”

  “Well, I don’t know.”

  “What’s he look like?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t know that, either. And it’s probably not the name he’s going under.”

  “You don’t know the name he’s using?”

  “She never mentioned it. I meant to ask and forgot.” Carr jumped up from his chair, strode back and forth. “If only I could lay my hands on the fellow …”

  “Just relax, Mr. Pendry. We’ll get him …”

  Up in his hotel room, Carr presently fell asleep.

  He woke up with a fearful headache. He called Room Service and ordered coffee, then forced himself to telephone San Giorgio.

  The conversation was as bad as he had feared. Worse. He prevailed upon his father not to come down to San Francisco, and promised to return to San Giorgio at once.

  At ten o’clock he called Lieutenant Spargill. Spargill was polite but evasive.

  “We’re looking the situation over, Mr. Pendry. In fact, I think we’re getting to the bottom of it.”

  “Good!” said Carr savagely. “I hope you hang him higher than a kite.”

  “We’ll certainly do our best.”

  “Is there any reason why I should stay in San Francisco?”

  “Why no, I guess not. Where will you be if we need you?”

  “In San Giorgio. You have my home address.”

  “Very well, Mr. Pendry. We’ll call you if we need you.”

  When Carr arrived in San Giorgio the Herald-Republican had already headlined the news:

  LOCAL GIRL FALLS VICTIM TO MUTILATION MURDERER

  Carr’s mother was in bed under sedatives; his father was dangerously taut. Carr told the whole story again. “You probably don’t remember him. He never ran with our crowd.”

  “Struve,” said Pendry, a thin man with silky gray-blond hair and a dapper mustache. “Robert Struve. I can’t place him.”

  “He’s the kid that wrecked my motor-scooter, remember?”

  “Oh, yes …”

  The Herald-Republican got news of the arrest before the Pendrys. Carr read the story with amazement. “They’ve taken her husband. They’ve arrested Bavonette!”

  “Bavonette!” said his father. “But you said …”

  “There’s been a terrible mistake,” Carr muttered. “I talked to George myself down at the night club.”

  Pelton Pendry frowned dubiously. “They wouldn’t move unless they were pretty certain.”

  “I know those cops,” said Carr viciously. “They grab whoever looks easiest and call it a case. They probably just don’t know where to find Struve.” Carr rose to his feet. “I’m going down there.”

  “Maybe I’d better come, too,” said Pelton Pendry.

  Lieutenant Spargill greeted them with courtesy. “There’s no question about it,” he told them. “Bavonette did the killing.”

  “But I saw him myself!” cried Carr. “I talked to him in the Kalmyra Club.”

  “Yes, but how long after you’d left your sister?”

  “Oh—” Carr blinked and fell suddenly quiet.

  “Well?”

  “I guess it was a couple hours,” said Carr. “Around eleven-thirty.”

  Spargill nodded. “There you are.”

  “But surely—when he’s playing in a night club he can’t get away without someone notic-ing!

  “From nine forty-five till almost ten minutes after ten, the band took an intermission. He had all the time he needed.”

  “That still doesn’t prove anything. Dean was afraid of this Robert Struve! He’d threatened her! He was—”

  Lieutenant Spargill interrupted: “George Bavonette was known to be insanely jealous. Dean was known—well—begging your pardon—well, she was a pretty friendly girl. On more than one occasion they quarreled.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Then, there’s evidence which we haven’t released to the papers. In strict confidence—we’ve found the murder weapon and a pair of rubber gloves. They were in a paper bag in the garbage pail behind the Kalmyra Club.”

  “Couldn’t it be a plant?” asked Carr in a subdued voice.

  “We’l
l check every angle,” said Spargill. “But I’m sure we’ve got our man. These things fall into a pattern.”

  A quiet funeral was held the next day, and Dean Pendry was laid to rest in the family plot.

  There was a follow-up on the murder story in the Herald-Republican. George Bavonette had confessed to the killing.

  Carr Pendry hurled the paper to the floor. “This thing is a frame-up!”

  “He admits it, doesn’t he?” his mother inquired. “He wouldn’t say he did it if he hadn’t done it.” Her eyes were inflamed, but after five days she was able to speak without lapsing into tears.

  “You don’t know these cops,” said Carr. “Bavonette is unstable. He’d confess anything if they kept after him long enough. I’m going down and talk to the guy myself.”

  He had no difficulty about seeing Bavonette, who came up to the netting with a face like a gaunt marble mask.

  “Hello,” said Carr, trying to keep his voice from shaking. After all, this might be the guilty man.

  “You remember me?” asked Carr. “I’m Dean’s brother.”

  “Yeah,” said George. “I place you now.”

  Carr delivered the speech he had rehearsed. “I read in the newspaper that you had confessed.”

  George sat looking at Carr.

  Carr said, “But we’re not convinced you’re the guilty man.”

  George said nothing.

  “Well,” Carr asked sharply, “did you do it?”

  “So they say.”

  “Did they force a confession out of you?”

  “I didn’t sing out of joy.”

  “Do you have a lawyer?”

  “What good’s a lawyer? They got me cold.”

  Carr nodded. “You don’t want to give up hope. Plead not guilty. Say they forced the confession out of you. I know who really did the killing.”

  George showed a flicker of interest. “You do, do you? What are you going to do about it?”

  “All I can. But I’d like some help from you.”

  “I can’t give you any help. They got me here in the clink. You can see that for yourself.”