by Farris, John
Too bad, Bertie thought. But it was hard to grieve for your would-be executioner.
She really didn't want anything more to do with Charmaine as they dawdled over espresso. Charmaine had a murder to confess to the appropriate authorities while Bertie and Eden, once she returned from Los Angeles, concentrated on the undoing of Lincoln Grayle.
Too late, however, to gain a reprieve for Charmaine and who knew how many others like her in Grayle's adopted playground, obliviously flaunting its pleasures and voluptuous frenzies while it continued to spread like a monstrous canker on the very lip of hell.
Their conversation had been, for more than two hours, trivial and gossipy while Bertie tried to guess where Charmaine would be coming from next; tiring of this effort, Bertie introduced a new topic, using her words like a blunt instrument.
"Why was it necessary to kill Lewis Gruvver? Weren't you in love with him?"
Charmaine continued to smile; it was as if she had to hear the question a second time, like an echo in her mind, before she could react. Then the casual good cheer faded from her face; she licked her lips in an expression of feral hostility.
"Are you crazy?"
"I saw him, Charmaine. Face up in the fish pool under the floor in the bedroom of your villa. What did he do to deserve it?"
Charmaine's fingertips caressed the white linen tablecloth in front of her, right hand moving to the sterling handle of a knife partly concealed beneath a linen napkin. Bertie said, "Touch that and you'll be wearing it in your right eye."
"We were getting along so well," Charmaine murmured.
"You think so?"
"I didn't kill him. I made it clear. I couldn't do that to Lewis. Even though he didn't matter to me anymore. The Great One understood. He made… other arrangements."
"Who does matter to you?"
Charmaine caressed her lips instead of the tablecloth, looking fulfilled in a way that Bertie found almost unbearably obscene.
"Who did kill him, then? The Great One himself? But that's not his style, is it?"
Charmaine shrugged one shoulder and smiled secretively.
"Oh, it was—"
They both looked up at a badly timed interruption, the third or fourth (Bertie couldn't remember) time since she had been seated for lunch, causing the usual stir of interest among those in the know fashion-wise. Which seemed to be everybody on the terrace today, followed by those who felt themselves important enough to drop by the table to express their pleasure in encountering a supermodel in the ravishing flesh.
"Oh, Miss Nkambe," said the artistic designer of the luncheon show from Neiman Marcus, a woman with an obvious history of facelifts, nonetheless radiant in five figures' worth of resort wear, jewelry, and neon-purple lip gloss, "I didn't want to bother you before, but it is just such an honor to have you here today! I hope you enjoyed—"
Bertie held an outstretched hand tenderly for a couple of seconds, saying, "Yes—very nice—Pru, is it?" This from a name tag attached by a small safety pin to a crewelwork beach jacket. "Beautiful show. They could take lessons from you in Milano."
"I am so delighted to meet you, and if you're going to be in town for a while would love—"
"Just passing through," Bertie said with a regretful smile, "catching up with old friends; but thank you, Pru." She returned her attention to Charmaine just as a semi-bald man wearing impenetrable dark glasses walked boldly up to the table behind her, saying in a loud, sobbing voice, "I wuh-warned you to stay away from my bruh-brother, bitch!"
And shot Charmaine in the back of the head with his .40-caliber semiautomatic pistol.
Chapter 51
8:25 P.M.
Eden Waring walked off the Gulfstream jet that had returned her from Los Angeles after a series of events she could have done without and delivered her into a new series of events so shocking it made breathing difficult whenever her thoughts returned to dwell on them. She ducked her head beneath an umbrella being held for her but which only partly deflected a grit-laden wind with a few drops of rain in it; the wind was gusting up to fifty miles an hour and had delayed her flight back. She slumped into the back of a limousine, hollow-eyed and with an aching head, and was driven to North Las Vegas Hospital, then around to the emergency entrance, avoiding the main body of the media crews clustered in floodlit self-important knots as close to the buildings as uniformed security people allowed them to be.
Two Blackwelder Organization detectives met Eden and escorted her through a minor electrical storm of camera flashes inside the ward and upstairs to the intensive care unit, where Tom Sherard was waiting.
As soon as Eden looked into his eyes she knew that Bertie wasn't dead. Not yet anyway. Time for tears then, angry tears, tears of exhaustion.
They were shown by a hospital administrator to an empty office where they could talk privately. They sat side by side on a small leather sofa. Eden wanted the overly bright ceiling lights off; she didn't want to have to look at Tom's face for now. The view through open venetian blinds was west; just at one edge of the framing windows was the Lincoln Grayle Theatre in the dark body of mountains: star bright, the only star visible on this cloudy night.
"How long was Bertie in surgery?"
"Five and a half hours."
"Is she Conscious?"
"No. Nor breathing on her own."
"This is my—" Eden began, her body tensing as if she were in danger of flying to pieces.
He used both hands to turn her face to him. He smelled, faintly, of damp clothing and evergreen woods. "Don't ever say, or even think, that again."
The pressure of his fingers close to her temples hurt; but she didn't mind the hurt. He could have shaken her, slapped her, anything, she would have accepted it, only a small part of what she felt was due. She went on hating herself but wanting to kiss him. More tears; Tom relaxed his grip but Eden kept her head still, just licked at whatever drops trickled close to the edges of her mouth.
"What is Bertie's—what do they call it, prognosis?"
"Too early to tell. The bullet that killed Charmaine Goferne passed completely through her head; what remained of it struck Bertie in the left temple, but at greatly reduced velocity. It shattered bone but didn't penetrate her brain. Otherwise she would have been killed instantly. The lovelorn Mr. Crigler—as the cops are perfectly willing to have it—continued to fire in what was described by onlookers as blind rage. Bertie was hit twice more as she fell to the floor, and one of the waiters took a slug in the ribs; no major damage. Mr. Crigler saved the last round for himself and died with no further explanation for his actions, other than what he shouted at the girl before blowing out her brains."
"Tom, there's a body in the villa next to ours—"
"Yes, the investigators discovered the late Mr. Gruvver a couple of hours ago. Shot once in the temple with what should prove to be a .40-caliber semi. So the official version has it that Bertie was an innocent victim of a love-triangle killing. We'll leave it that way."
Eden pulled his hands away and lay against him.
"And all of this was stage-managed by the magician. To get Bertie out of the way. He was afraid of her powers, of what together we might do to him." There was a gleam in her eyes of contempt, but when she realized just how alone she was now with Bertie near death, her expression revealed no less fear than she was ascribing to the magician.
He felt compelled to tell her, "Mordaunt has accomplished more than that today. Gwen is… gone." Sherard explained what he and Courtney Shyla had discovered at the magician's house on Mount Charleston, with emphasis on the photos Gwen apparently had used to access the era in which she might now be living. He said nothing about the rest of his harrowing day, and Courtney's fate. There was no point in overloading Eden's nervous system.
"I didn't think it was possible to take her away from me! It's like I've lost—" Eden sat up and shook her head slowly. "Part of my own soul. He had no right. He doesn't own… either of us." She rubbed her reddened eyes, and trembled. "But what
do I do now?" she concluded miserably, staring at Tom. Her left eye was turning in from tiredness and he was reminded of his late wife, whom Eden so closely resembled. His heart absorbed the impact like a hammer blow.
"Whatever is done, we will do it together" he said fiercely. "Understood?"
"Yes," she said. Putting her hands in her lap, she began to rock gently from the waist up. "But, ab—sorry. Can't think straight. I'm so tired. Tom, I know... I did some good in L.A. Did I tell you?"
"When you called from the plane. Sounds as if the Patriarch is one potential victim Mordaunt's surrogates won't get their hands on."
"So I did some good," Eden repeated, reassuring herself. She looked around the office they'd borrowed.
"That must be a bathroom in there. I need to… freshen up." She stood but didn't move away from him immediately, as if she were unsure of her footing. "Then, if I could just lie down for a couple of hours—"
"I'll see to it that you're driven back to the villa."
Eden shuddered. "No, please! I don't want to go there. I want to be close to you, and Bertie. The couch is big enough for me. And you'll come immediately if there's any change in Bertie's condition."
"Of course I will. Is there anything I can get for you now; a sedative?"
"Not now. But if I can't sleep—" She bent to kiss him. It was chastely meant, but she was still trembling; he was a man and had to know what she wanted above all else just then. Particularly when there was every chance she would never see him again. Eden took some breaths to shore up her stamina, smiled, and headed for the bathroom, brisk in motion but devastated in spirit. In spite of which she managed to call back to him with a semblance of cheer, "Two hours, Tom? Then maybe we could have something to eat."
Chapter 52
9:57 P.M.
Following a dress rehearsal that had lasted nearly three because of the introduction into his act of new illusions requiring some complicated props and machinery, the magician had begun to unwind, nude and alone, beneath colored lights in the spectrochrome chamber of his duplex dressing suite. The colors he had chosen to bathe his pineal gland, solar plexus, and the soles of his feet were a lush purple and indigo. Aromatic oils were diffused into the chamber. He orchestrated both hues and oils with a keypad by his right hand as he lay face up on a simple massage table.
Those remaining in the Lincoln Grayle Theatre after dress—stagehands, office personnel, and the night security force—knew not to disturb the magician during this period of meditation and recuperation. If he was to be disturbed, the circumstances had better justify it.
He frowned and touched a key in response to a call and the face of one of his assistants appeared on a plasma screen overhead.
"What is it, Perk?"
"Sorry, sir, but there's a young woman outside the theatre who insists she has an engagement with you tonight."
"Perk, that's such a tired routine. I'm surprised at you."
"But—she asked me to give you a message that seemed to imply there is a relationship of some sort."
The magician said with a stir of interest, "Tell me."
She said, "I want Linc to know that what began at Shung-wa-ya"—she stumbled over the pronunciation—"must be finished tonight."
The magician sat up on the table.
"Let her in, Perk! Give me five minutes, then bring her to my suite."
He sat on the edge of the table for ten seconds, blankly astonished, then ran a hand through his unruly hair, still a little damp from his recent shower, and laughed.
Within five minutes he was combed and dressed in white beachcomber pants, sandals, and an unbuttoned long-sleeved shirt. He was pouring Tuscan wine into two glasses when Eden was shown into the suite.
"Jambo!" he said, holding up one of the glasses in a welcoming salute. "And I must say I like the sound of 'hello' better than good-bye. Which is where we left it, I believe, at Kenyatta Airport."
Eden acknowledged him with a smile of such diffidence it was as if she had neglected to bring a personality with her—or at least the lively spirit to which he had been attracted on their first meeting. Her hair was shorter now, and redder. Cut with some flair, as if she'd found time to visit a salon, or Bertie Nkambe's personal hairdresser. Which reminded him.
"I heard about Bertie. Terrible, just terrible." Perhaps he was referring to the fact that she hadn't been killed instantly.
A muscle jumped in Eden's face, affecting one eye, but otherwise she didn't respond, just continued to look around, eyes skipping over his face a couple of times as if he were furniture.
"Will she make it?" he persisted.
"I don't know. I can't talk about it."
"Would you like to sit down? How about some wine?"
"Yes, thank you."
She took the glass from him, still not meeting his eyes, moved sideways to a grouping of comfortable leather chairs amid a collection of props, puzzling to someone outside the profession, that had been employed by magicians a century ago. She had a sip of wine, holding her free hand close to the glass as if she were afraid of a clonus that would cause her to spill the contents on his Turkish carpet. Her lips did tremble slightly. Her eyes were rimmed with a fine mist of perspiration. They were restless, as if she couldn't focus on anything for more than a second or two. He wondered if she were in shock.
"Do I get to do all of the talking?" he said genially, sitting next to her on the arm of a cream leather sofa. Eden was wearing a shawl-collar cashmere sweater and a blue skirt. No ornamentation except for a plain gold chain around her neck with a pendant made of a dark lump of metal that didn't look as if it had monetary value. He didn't remember having seen her wear it in Africa.
"I'm sorry," she murmured. Another sip of wine braced her. She lifted her head and was able to look at him. "I don't mean to be… bad company."
"It's understandable. Still, as long as you're here..." His expression was a mixture of pleasure and skepticism.
Her eyes wandered off again, to a framed one-sheet of a magician in Chinese dress. "I had no idea your theatre was so huge."
"Why don't I give you a tour? While we talk about our 'unfinished' business."
"There's not much to say, really. I thought about... what choices I have left, and I've come to be with you. For as long as you want me."
"Quite a change of heart."
Eden finished her wine in a couple of swallows and stood.
"But there are conditions. Of course I know what—who you really are. You wanted Bertie out of the way. It's done. Even if she recovers she won't be the same. You have no reason ever to hurt her again. And you won't hurt Tom."
"Granted," the magician said with a shrug. "He's no problem to me."
Eden walked toward the double doors in the vestibule of the suite. More framed posters there. Movie monsters. The Creature from the Black Lagoon. Boris Karloff's Frankenstein. Surrounded by them Eden looked threatened, haunted.
"One other thing. I want Gw—my doppelganger back."
"In all sincerity, Eden, that's out of my hands. She's in a... slightly altered state, and on her own now. I don't even know if she made it to where she was going."
"You've taken away so much from me. Has anyone ever denied you anything?"
"Not for long. As I reckon time. Don't be afraid. It won't be such a bad life, Eden."
"You mean after the nightmare you have in store for me? I don't want to see it coming. I don't want any memory of it later. Can you do that, Magician? Take away my mind until it's over?"
"If you'd like you may sleep through insemination and your pregnancy. Which should reach full term in about seventy-two hours."
"Don't shit me," Eden said in a snarly tone.
"True. Spectrographic enhancement of your vital life-giving processes. Theoretically it ought to work. My all-too-human flaw is, I hate to wait."
Eden held her bowed head in the palm of one hand, like a sorrowing bride.
"And what, theoretically, am I expected to give birth to?"
"If only it has your eyes," he said, "I'll be pleased."
"Thank you. I need to walk now; otherwise, I swear to God, I'll turn to stone. So give me the hurry-up tour. Bring the bottle. Wine will relax me while I'm learning more about the wizardry of Mordaunt the Great."
Chapter 53
10:18 P.M.
Tom Sherard found the note from Eden taped to a sofa I cushion in the empty hospital office.
TOM:
THE TERRACE OF THE
LINCOLN GRAYLE THEATRE.
SHOWTIME WILL BE
TWELVE MIDNIGHT.
I WILL ALWAYS LOVE YOU.
The windows in the office rattled, further aggravating his nerves. How had she slipped out of the hospital without his knowing?
Midnight.
Why?
Sherard checked his watch. He could have used more time.
But if Eden was with the magician now, he might already be too late.
Chapter 54
11:55 P.M.
He had shown her everything behind the scenes, a hidden and mostly subterranean complex of tunnels, trapdoors, elevators, flying rigs, suspension systems that could hold an elephant steady twenty feet above the stage floor. They had visited his menagerie of blue-eyed tigers and snow-white lionesses, and other lissome felines that were a combination of leopard and lion.
Eden, having regained her normal tongue and a measure of self-assurance after consuming most of the wine from the bottle she had with her, was unimpressed.
