skeleton in armor was carved on each mahogany door, wooden broad swords in bony hands. Willieboy knocked on a shield carried by one of the skeletal guardians. Seconds later, the doors swung inward.
My nose hairs tried to crawl up into my brain the moment the doors opened. Formaldehyde. Sour, sickening formaldehyde. A mist of it hung in the air-or its scent had been added to the clammy fog that swirled in the motion of the doors. Willieboy gestured with his head. I entered. The fog settled on my skin like airborne excrement, and soaked into my clothes. I resisted the urge to retch on a point of etiquette. It just wouldn't do to vomit at that time. I was a guest.
The doors thudded shut behind us like dirt dropped from a gravedigger's shovel. I shook with a chill-blood loss, and the fact that the place was easily a balmy 55 degrees. Ahead of me were broad circles of light running the length of a long damp Indian carpet. Through the stinking fog, I could just make out a raised dais. I detected movement from within its faint illumination.
'Do come in, Mr. Wildclown.' A voice as cool as the room spoke from the mist-shrouded dais. 'You may approach.'
We approached. Willieboy showing some hesitation. The cold voice spoke again. 'Excellent work, Mr. Willieboy. Excellent. I would prefer to have Mr. Adrian in speaking condition, but accidents happen. Wildclown will do if what you reported is true. Most unfortunate Mr. Adrian's demise. Most unfortunate. I am certain Mr. Wildclown will be only too pleased to help us locate our property. If, as you say, he knows.'
'I saw them talking,' Willieboy said. 'During the gun battle. I saw them talking.' Sweat gleamed on his brow. 'He sure acts like he knows.'
I approached a great foggy tub about ten feet in diameter. In front of it were three wide steps. They were carved from a dark, polished marble. I hesitated, trying to pierce the masking mists. I could see movement within. A round pale head, skeletal arms moved wraith-like. I walked up the steps. I saw now that the King lay in a gigantic tub. Powerful whirlpool jets churned the surface of its contents: formaldehyde, and something else that reeked of sulfur.
When I looked into the tub I almost went back on my decision not to vomit.
Chapter 61
The King was deathly pale where he floated in his bath. Despite the preserving fluid, his corpse had a desiccated, rotten look to it. His features were sharp and gray-veined; his body wasted by age. Stitches of dark green cord held him together. The King had been a rich man at the time of the Change, but he had met with a violent death. It was obvious from looking at the corpse that he had been reassembled. As his limbs moved in and out of the fog, I noticed that his skin hung on him in patches that were slightly different shades, and that on one hand, he had two mismatched fingers. He only wore two things: a ridiculous brown wig that clung to his head like a drowning cat and a golden crown over that.
He was so contemptible I wanted to laugh. Was existence so precious that he would cling to such a battered and run-down excuse of a body? I caught myself, remembering the body I had borrowed. The King paddled around his shallow pool, alligator-style. My guts jumped when he unconsciously drank a long draught of the liquid. Little puffs of vapor blew from his withered nostrils. He looked like something that had crawled out of a rusty can.
'Mr. Wildclown. I would like it very much if you tell me the whereabouts of my property. After that, you may go.' He leaned against the rim of the tub. I noticed that a console of buttons, dials and video monitors was built above the rim.
'If you don't mind taking a walk down a two-way street. I'd like to know what happened to Owen Grey.' I tried to search my battered pockets for cigarettes. My left hand moved out of sync. Willieboy produced a pack and handed me one.
The King squinted at Willieboy.
He paused while lighting my damp cigarette. 'He was the private dick hired by the Hawksbridges to find the girl.'
'Oh, yes.' The King's dead face registered real delight. 'I remember him now. A dinosaur. They are rare, you know, so it troubled me to have him killed.' His features froze. 'Now, where is my property?'
'I don't usually use language like this but fuck you.'
The King showed broken teeth. He was used to dealing with hard cases. He pressed a panel under the console. A drawer eased open. His gray hand reached in and retrieved an automatic-something old and powerful from Smith and Wesson. The smile had remained dead upon his face. 'Now, shall we do this while you can still draw a breath? Or will we do it when each injury precipitated upon you will become an eternal scar that will not heal. A hole or tear that remains open-jagged-baring your raw red secrets to every prying eye. Do not toy with me. I have an understandable contempt for all things living. One look at me should dispel any doubts about whether or not I will take great joy in killing you.'
I smiled. He was correct. His dead face held secret anticipation. 'What do you want to know?'
The King sighed two clouds of formaldehyde gas, set the gun down on the edge of the tub beside him and shook his head. 'Where is my property?'
'Look, I'm not stalling or anything. I just don't think I'll be around long after I talk. Would it be possible for you to explain how Grey met his end?'
The King smirked. 'You posses hubris, Wildclown. I'll give you that.' He sighed. 'Grey became a nuisance. He was pestering me, and, he was drawing the attention of one or two factions in Authority. Now, the Hawksbridges are not of my stature, in wealth, but they did have enough pull to cause me minimal damage. I couldn't have that. So I encouraged Mr. Willieboy to hire a gun to take Grey out. Who was it?'
'Some psychopath. Wiry little guy called himself Jimmy Jay. I don't know much about him, but that he talked a mean streak about religion, and the end of the world. He was in an asylum before the Change, killed his little brother, or some soap opera. Drank like a fish, and oh shit, there was something…' Willieboy rubbed his chin. 'Can't remember. Anyway, he was homicidal, pure and simple. Kill at the drop of a dime. He did Grey for a hundred dollars. Something must have happened to him, because he never collected the money. Grey was out of the way though. I saw the body. Jay called me, told me where to find it. Fucking psychopath. Grey was burned up pretty good.'
'Why did you pay Grey's bills?' I was beset with weird images of Grey's ignoble end. The gasoline dousing the body. The vapor igniting. 'It's not unusual for someone, especially someone in Grey's line of work to welsh on a bet, or skip on the rent.'
Willieboy smiled. 'That was the King's idea.'
I turned to him. 'Bought you time.'
'Certainly. I didn't know how much trouble Grey had already caused, or whether or not he actually enlisted some aid. If his bills were paid, the chances of someone missing him were fewer.' He laughed, 'As it turned out, he didn't have a friend in the world. But, I don't believe in taking chances, and his bills were so small as to be nonexistent. It was an excellent investment.'
'Who made the call to the Hawksbridges?' I stared at Willieboy. 'Why kill them?'
The King spoke to my back. 'They had become a nuisance as well. I believe Grey convinced them that they could find their daughter if they looked hard enough. They turned out to be a larger threat than Grey. Mr. Willieboy called.' Willieboy gave the King a dark look.
'What did you do? Fix their brakes, or just run them off the road?'
'That's inconsequential. They pushed hard at something that was bigger than they were, and it rolled back on them. It's simple physics,' the King chuckled.
'And the girl. Is she alive?' I turned to the corpse.
He shook his head. 'You're boring me.' The King bobbed in his tank. 'Now it's your turn to answer a few questions.'
Transition.
I was floating over Tommy's head. I immediately tried to possess him. He was a wall. I tried again. Below me Tommy had dropped into a catatonic state. His jaw dropped. His lips seemed to try and work around a word. 'Where am I?' He winced as he experienced his wounds for the first time. He reached up to his left shoulder, hissed.
