When Graveyards Yawn by G. Wells Taylor (good books for high schoolers .TXT) 📕
I pulled my bottom lip. "Looks like the bastard shot you from behind, too."
Billings made fists of his dead hands and pounded the arms of the chair. "I want him!"
Chapter 3
"All right," I said. "How'd it happen?"
Mr. Billings looked uncomfortable as he squeaked around in his seat. I knew the look; he was about to be fairly dishonest with me.
"You must realize the importance of--confidentiality." His eyes did a conscientious little roll of self-possession until they came to rest on me again, quivering and uncertain like bad actors. They were indefinite and restless on either side of his hatchet nose. Perfectly unconvincing so far.
"You may not believe this, but under all this makeup, I'm a god-damned angel," I sneered. "Besides, there are few people who take my word seriously." I flashed him a quick idiot grin.
"May I ask?" The dead man nervously pulled out a package of ci
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“This Inspector Borden told me that around every death, rumors are bound to spring up. He said it had to do with the people’s morbid curiosity. He then assured me that Alan died in an accident, and then offered me an Authority Psychologist. He said it might do me good to talk. I just told him I had my own psychologist, and could look after myself. He said that if I must see the lab, I would have to give him some notice.”
Mrs. Cotton’s expression changed from the blank aspect of the storyteller to a rigid look of determination. “I’d like to hire you, Mr. Wildclown. I didn’t get this far in life without learning to recognize the run around when it’s given me. I don’t care about the cost.”
It was about eight-fifteen when we hit the highway north. Road signs appeared in our headlights like yellow ghosts. I was employed again—the same deal I gave Billings. I now had more intrigue than I wanted. Mr. Adrian was missing. Jan Van Reydner was missing. The lawyer Conrad Billings was dead. Alan Cotton was dead. He was not a ‘cosmetics for the dead’ salesman at all. He was a scientist working on Regenerics. Why would he turn up dead at the Morocco when he could afford a better hotel? Why would Authority try to cover up Mr. Cotton’s true history? I knew how they could. Authority just had to threaten the right individuals, but why? Unless Cotton was more important in all of this than just another murder. What was he doing at the Morocco Hotel? Did he stumble on Adrian and Van Reydner as they were working on Billings? Who turned him into blood pudding? It was obviously an organized bit of work. The type of job that was done on his body led me to believe organized crime was involved, but why would Authority cover for them? Like them or not, Authority still represented the law—even if it was a somewhat rabid law. Then, a name came to me: Mr. King of King Industries: Former Senator William King, the King of the Dead as the media called him. The King made billions from his preservative treatments for the dead. Did he actually contemplate selling them life with Regenerics? Too many questions and not enough answers. I looked at Elmo. His face was strange and inhuman in the glow from the dashboard.
“Elmo, this is a stupid question, but: if there was a way for you to be alive again, would you try it? Even if there were risks.”
Elmo looked at me incredulously. “I’d d-do anything to be alive again.”
“I thought so.” I lit a cigarette. I was certain that this would be the attitude of all dead people. If so: what if Regenerics worked? Any dead man with the slightest amount of pull would do everything in his power to obtain a new life. But, I couldn’t forget Adrian. Regenerics would destroy him. So he would want Cotton dead. But he was missing? Did he step on someone else’s toes? He obviously wanted me out of the picture. So he had his goons try to finish me off. But what happened to him while I was out in the Landfill waltzing with the monkey-twins?
“Pull over at the next filling station, Elmo,” I said. In about thirty minutes we found one. I dropped a dime in the slot of the pay phone. A bit of verbal fencing with the butler, then…
“Hello, Mrs. Cotton. It’s Wildclown, I don’t want to upset you again, but could you answer one question for me?”
I heard a muffled affirmative.
“What was the name of the Authority inspector who claimed Alan’s files?”
“Oh, let me see. Yes, a surly little fellow. Mr. Crane, no Cane. Inspector Cane.”
I thanked her, hung up and got back in the car. “Cane,” I said absentmindedly. “Cane.”
“What’s that, Boss?” Elmo looked over as we pulled out onto the highway.
“Nothing, Fatso. Let’s get home. I could sleep for a week.”
The bars in the broken centerline passed like images in a dream.
Life is but a dream, and like in every dream the images flicker fast. The pictures change, dissolve and strangely intertwine. Nothing’s what it seems. Clocks tick faster, slower, there seem to be recurring themes of the tightening noose, the enemy draws near, he shoots, you die. I had the same feeling about this case. Strange New World aside, things were slipping slowly into the madness of nightmare—far off I heard the click of the heel, the impatient step of doom.
After returning to my office I sat quietly, my mind perusing abstractions for a time. It was about ten-thirty, and a bad time to do official detective research. I wanted to have a look at Cotton’s lab, but had no idea where it was. The time told me that most reputable scientists were fast asleep with visions of atom bombs going off in their heads—or deep in thought in secret laboratories of their own. I had heard that people were afraid of the dark before the Change—living in a world with walking dead while perpetual cloud cover hung overhead had intensified the paranoia to dangerous proportions. The Change had pushed the majority over the edge. You could see madness in the faces on the street—people adapted as best they could, but nothing had prepared them for what the world had become. The hints were there, the cracks in the human spirit evident in the clothing frayed at the edges, the smeared lipstick, or the bus driver’s tears. And so people did not open their doors after dark. And the thought of me showing up unannounced dressed as I was, made the notion as ludicrous as it was dangerous. Then, a name came to my mind. I snatched the phone up, and rummaged in the desk for my address book. I made a call.
“Hello, Pogo,” I said with false charm. “Oh, well, I’m Wildclown, a private detective, I’d like to speak to Pogo. Not there? Have him call me, it’s important and may benefit us both.” I gave my number and hung up. Pogo knew just about everybody in Greasetown. Pogo did more than pimp. The fact that he boosted his profits by trafficking drugs like Greaseasy, and syncrak, told me that he had the acquaintance of a few chemists, to say the least. I remembered Pogo telling me once that he had people working for him that were trying to develop new ‘chemical entertainment’ as he called it. If you can’t talk to a reputable scientist, try a disreputable one.
Elmo came in. He was carrying three tall Styrofoam coffee cups on a cardboard tray. I took one of them and poured three steaming ounces into a dirty glass that had stood for months on the filing cabinet beside my desk. I replaced the coffee with three ounces of Canadian Club to cool it down, took a taste, and then smiled around a cigarette.
“Excellent work, Elmo.” I smiled at the comforting sting of the whiskey and then kicked my boots onto the desk to think. I pushed back until the chair was tipped enough to give me a precipitant weightless sensation. Elmo sat opposite me with a cigarette and coffee of his own. He could become silence, at such times. That was one of the great things about a partner like Elmo: he could sit quietly for hours. He didn’t feel a need to clutter the air with pleasant conversation just to pass the time. I could think. I’d often fix my eyes on Elmo and let them glaze over. He didn’t seem to mind. A half-hour slipped by. The phone rang.
“Wildclown Investigations.” I had almost upset my chair answering.
“Wildclown, you crazy monkeyfucker. It’s me, Pogo.” The voice was charged with adrenaline.
“Pogo, my friend. How are you this evening?” I could tell he was a little paranoid himself.
“Ah…” Pogo’s voice dropped. “It’s been bad, real bad. Almost caught one of those bastards that cut me. He lit out on a motorbike before I could lay a knife in him!”
“That is bad.” The Brotherhood of White Order had become Pogo’s white whale. And with good reason too. He took his disfigurement in stride, but he had vowed revenge. “But you’ve still taken three of them out.”
“Yeah.” Pogo seemed to catch his breath. “But he was close.” A coughing fit struck him before he continued. “So, what you want?”
“Pogo, we have known each other a while, am I right?”
“Yes, yes, you could call it a while—a year or so.” The voice continued with strain. “You could call it that.”
“Pogo, I need some information about science, scientists, and laboratories. Not the developing, procuring or trafficking of illegal substances, but about science—genetics, microbiology, that type of thing. I believe you may have people in your employ that could answer a few questions. Or failing that, may have a direction in which to point me.” Pogo knew my feelings about drugs. The Pandora’s box was open. I would be there to count survivors, if the whiskey didn’t get me first.
“This ain’t no Authority fuckover?” It was a rhetorical question. Pogo knew I had no allegiance with any authority. “What’s in it for me, Wildclown?”
“You could add to the betterment of mankind. Failing that, you could help me put the screws to some local nasties.” Local nasties was a term I used specifically to set Pogo off. He always talked of competing local nasties when he was ripe and paranoid with the effects of his own products.
“Local nasties! Oh, fuck, sure Wildclown.” He fell silent for a moment, but in the background I could hear the persistent car-start sounds of giggling.
“Can I talk to someone tonight? What is it, eleven—a little after?”
“Oh sure, we’re open twenty-four hours…” Again the giggling. “But I got to straighten up first.” There followed a lot of coughing and the sounds of partial regurgitation. “Yeah, Wildclown. I’ll, I’ll send a runner over. He’ll take you to my scientists…” More giggling and coughing.
“I appreciate it…”
“Don’t worry about it, Wildclown. You’ve been good shit to me, even if you are one crazy monkeyfucker!” Giggling ensued. “Besides, if you can take down a local nasty. Hey, fuck I’ll help put the boots to him. Just don’t push my scientist around or anything. He’ll help—no shit. I’ll ask around—microbiology, ge-genetics—try to find out who to send you to.” Pogo laughed spasmodically. “Hey, you ain’t thinking of cloning yourself are you? I couldn’t take that.” I made sure I laughed patronizingly that time. Finally he chuckled. “Give me some time.”
I thanked Pogo and hung up. I looked at Elmo. “I believe the ball is rolling again.”
The runner was a lean whippet of a dead man. He wore a tight-fitting suit covered by a long, loose trench coat of the same dark purple. A broad-brimmed hat sat low over his eyes. I could tell by the unbalanced way he walked that he carried a cannon in his left armpit. He had a dark Spanish complexion that, despite his dead state, still added a sultry carnality to the set of his liquid eyes and leering thick-lipped mouth. He introduced himself as Moreau. Moreau was a runner. A runner was someone who carried money or drugs. Moreau looked capable of taking care of himself.
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