Dreamsongs. Volume II

  Joanie was dead, and he did not know the others well enough, hardly knew all their names, didn’t want to know them better.

  So, in the end, like it or not, there was only Randi.

  Willie got to his feet, weary now, unsteady. The wind shifted, sweeping across the yards and the runs, whispering to him of blood until his nostrils quivered. Willie threw back his head and howled, a long shuddering lonely call that rose and fell and went out through the cold night air until the dogs began to bark for blocks around. Then, once again, he began to run.

  ROGOFF GAVE HER A LIFT HOME. DAWN WAS JUST STARTING TO break when he pulled his old black Ford up to the front of her six-flat. As she opened the door, he shifted into neutral and looked over at her. “I’m not going to insist right now,” he said, “but it might be that I need to know the name of your client. Sleep on it. Maybe you’ll decide to tell me.”

  “Maybe I can’t,” Randi said. “Attorney-client privilege, remember?”

  Rogoff gave her a tired smile. “When you sent me to the courthouse, I had a look at your file too. You never went to law school.”

  “No?” She smiled back. “Well, I meant to. Doesn’t that count for something?” She shrugged. “I’ll sleep on it, we can talk tomorrow.” She got out, closed the door, moved away from the car. Rogoff shifted into drive, but Randi turned back before he could pull away. “Hey, Rogoff, you have a first name?”

  “Mike,” he said.

  “See you tomorrow, Mike.”

  He nodded and pulled away just as the streetlamps began to go out. Randi walked up the stoop, fumbling for her key.

  “Randi!”

  She stopped, looked around. “Who’s there?”

  “Willie.” The voice was louder this time. “Down here by the garbage cans.”

  Randi leaned over the stoop and saw him. He was crouched down low, surrounded by trash bins, shivering in the morning chill. “You’re naked,” she said.

  “Somebody tried to kill me last night. I made it out. My clothes didn’t. I’ve been here an hour, not that I’m complaining mind you, but I think I have pneumonia and my balls are frozen solid. I’ll never be able to have children now. Where the fuck have you been?”

  “There was another murder. Same m.o.”

  Willie shook so violently that the garbage cans rattled together. “Jesus,” he said, his voice gone weak. “Who?”

  “Her name was Zoe Anders.”

  Willie flinched. “Fuck fuck fuck,” he said. He looked back up at Randi. She could see the fear in his eyes, but he asked anyway. “What about Amy?”

  “Her sister?” Randi said. He nodded. “In shock, but fine. She had a nightmare.” She paused a moment. “So you knew Zoe too. Like Sorenson?”

  “No. Not like Joanie.” He looked at her wearily. “Can we go in?”

  She nodded and opened the door. Willie looked so grateful she thought he was about to lick her hand.

  THE UNDERWEAR WAS HER EX-HUSBAND’S, AND IT WAS TOO BIG. The pink bathrobe was Randi’s, and it was too small. But the coffee was just right, and it was warm in here, and Willie felt bone-tired and nervous but glad to be alive, especially when Randi put the plate down in front of him. She’d scrambled the eggs up with cheddar cheese and onion and done up a rasher of bacon on the side, and it smelled like nirvana. He fell to eagerly.

  “I think I’ve figured out something,” she said. She sat down across from him.

  “Good,” he said. “The eggs, I mean. That is, whatever you figured out, that’s good too, but Jesus, I needed these eggs. You wouldn’t believe how hungry you get—” He stopped suddenly, stared down at the scrambled eggs, and reflected on what an idiot he was, but Randi hadn’t noticed. Willie reached for a slice of bacon, bit off the end. “Crisp,” he said. “Good.”

  “I’m going to tell you,” Randi said, as if he hadn’t spoken at all. “I’ve got to tell somebody, and you’ve known me long enough so I don’t think you’ll have me committed. You may laugh.” She scowled at him. “If you laugh, you’re back out in the street, minus the boxer shorts and the bathrobe.”

  “I won’t laugh,” Willie said. He didn’t think he’d have much difficulty not laughing. He felt rather apprehensive. He stopped eating.

  Randi took a deep breath and looked him in the eye. She had very lovely eyes, Willie thought. “I think my father was killed by a werewolf,” she said seriously, without blinking.

  “Oh, Jesus,” Willie said. He didn’t laugh. A very large invisible anaconda wrapped itself around his chest and began to squeeze. “I,” he said, “I, I, I.” Nothing was coming in or out. He pushed back from the table, knocking over the chair, and ran for the bathroom. He locked himself in and turned on the shower full blast, twisting the hot tap all the way around. The bathroom began to fill up with steam. It wasn’t nearly as good as a blast from his inhaler, but it did beat suffocating. By the time the steam was really going good, Willie was on his knees, gasping like a man trying to suck an elephant through a straw. Finally he began to breathe again.

  He stayed on his knees for a long time, until the spray from the shower had soaked through his robe and his underwear and his face was flushed and red. Then he crawled across the tiled floor, turned off the shower, and got unsteadily to his feet. The mirror above the sink was all fogged up. Willie wiped it off with a towel and peered in at himself. He looked like shit. Wet shit. Hot wet shit. He felt worse. He tried to dry himself off, but the steam and the shower spray had gone everywhere and the towels were as damp as he was. He heard Randi moving around outside, opening and closing drawers. He wanted to go out and face her, but not like this. A man has to have some pride. For a moment he just wanted to be home in bed with his Primatene on the end table, until he remembered that his bedroom had been occupied the last time he’d been there.

  “Are you ever coming out?” Randi asked.

  “Yeah,” Willie said, but it was so weak that he doubted she heard him. He straightened and adjusted the frilly pink robe. Underneath the undershirt looked as though he’d been competing in a wet T-shirt contest. He sighed, unlocked the door, and exited. The cold air gave him goose pimples.

  Randi was seated at the table again. Willie went back to his place. “Sorry,” he said. “Asthma attack.”

  “I noticed,” Randi replied. “Stress related, aren’t they?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Finish your eggs,” she urged. “They’re getting cold.”

  “Yeah,” Willie said, figuring he might as well, since it would give him something to do while he figured out what to tell her. He picked up his fork.

  It was like the time he’d grabbed a dirty pot that had been sitting on top of his hotplate since the night before and realized too late that he’d never turned the hotplate off. Willie shrieked and the fork clattered to the table and bounced, once, twice, three times. It landed in front of Randi. He sucked on his fingers. They were already starting to turn red. Randi looked at him very calmly and picked up the fork. She held it, stroked it with her thumb, touched its prongs thoughtfully to her lip. “I brought out the good silver while you were in the bathroom,” she said. “Solid sterling. It’s been in the family for generations.”

  His fingers hurt like hell. “Oh, Jesus. You got any butter? Oleo, lard, I don’t care, anything will…” He stopped when her hand went under the table and came out again holding a gun. From where Willie sat, it looked like a very big gun.

  “Pay attention, Willie. Your fingers are the least of your worries. I realize you’re in pain, so I’ll give you a minute or two to collect your thoughts and try to tell me why I shouldn’t blow off your fucking head right here and now.” She cocked the hammer with her thumb.

  Willie just stared at her. He looked pathetic, like a half-drowned puppy. For one terrible moment Randi thought he was going to have another asthma attack. She felt curiously calm, not angry or afraid or even nervous, but she didn’t think she had it in her to shoot a man in the back as he ran for the bathroom, even if he was a we
rewolf.

  Thankfully, Willie spared her that decision. “You don’t want to shoot me,” he said, with remarkable aplomb under the circumstances. “It’s bad manners to shoot your friends. You’ll make a hole in the bathrobe.”

  “I never liked that bathrobe anyway. I hate pink.”

  “If you’re really so hot to kill me, you’d stand a better chance with the fork,” Willie said.

  “So you admit that you’re a werewolf?”

  “A lycanthrope,” Willie corrected. He sucked at his burnt fingers again and looked at her sideways. “So sue me. It’s a medical condition. I got allergies, I got asthma, I got a bad back, and I got lycanthropy, is it my fault? I didn’t kill your father. I never killed anyone. I ate half a pit bull once, but can you blame me?” His voice turned querulous. “If you want to shoot me, go ahead and try. Since when do you carry a gun anyway? I thought all that shit about private eyes stuffing heat was strictly television.”

  “The phrase is packing heat, and it is. I only bring mine out for special occasions. My father was carrying it when he died.”

  “Didn’t do him much good, did it?” Willie said softly.

  Randi considered that for a moment. “What would happen if I pulled the trigger?” The gun was getting heavy, but her hand was steady.

  “I’d try to change. I don’t think I’d make it, but I’d have to try. A couple bullets in the head at this range, while I’m still human, yeah, that’d probably do the job. But you don’t want to miss and you really don’t want to wound me. Once I’m changed, it’s a whole different ball game.”

  “My father emptied his gun on the night he was killed,” Randi said thoughtfully.

  Willie studied his hand and winced. “Oh fuck,” he said. “I’m getting a blister.”

  Randi put the gun on the table and went to the kitchen to get him a stick of butter. He accepted it from her gratefully. She glanced toward the window as he treated his burns. “The sun’s up,” she said, “I thought werewolves only changed at night, during the full moon?”

  “Lycanthropes,” Willie said. He flexed his fingers, sighed. “That full-moon shit was all invented by some screenwriter for Universal; go look at your literature, we change at will, day, night, full moon, new moon, makes no difference. Sometimes I feel more like changing during the full moon, some kind of hormonal thing, but more like getting horny than going on the rag, if you know what I mean.” He grabbed his coffee. It was cold by now, but that didn’t stop Willie from emptying the cup. “I shouldn’t be telling you all this, fuck, Randi, I like you, you’re a friend, I care about you, you should only forget this whole morning, believe me, it’s healthier.”

  “Why?” she said bluntly. She wasn’t about to forget anything. “What’s going to happen to me if I don’t? Are you going to rip my throat out? Should I forget Joan Sorenson and Zoe Anders too? How about Roy Helander and all those missing kids? Am I supposed to forget what happened to my father?” She stopped for a moment, lowered her voice. “You came to me for help, Willie, and pardon, but you sure as hell look as though you still need it.”

  Willie looked at her across the table with a morose hangdog expression on his long face. “I don’t know whether I want to kiss you or slap you,” he finally admitted. “Shit, you’re right, you know too much already.” He stood up. “I got to get into my own clothes, this wet underwear is giving me pneumonia. Call a cab, we’ll go check out my place, talk. You got a coat?”

  “Take the Burberry,” Randi said. “It’s in the closet.” The coat was even bigger on him than it had been on Randi, but it beat the pink bathrobe. He looked almost human as he emerged from the closet, fussing with the belt. Randi was rummaging in the silver drawer. She found a large carving knife, the one her grandfather used to use on Thanksgiving, and slid it through the belt of her jeans. Willie looked at it nervously. “Good idea,” he finally said, “but take the gun too.”

  THE CAB DRIVER WAS THE QUIET TYPE. THE DRIVE ACROSS TOWN passed in awkward silence. Randi paid him while Willie climbed out to check the doors. It was a blustery overcast day, and the river looked gray and choppy as it slapped against the pier.

  Willie kicked his front door in a fit of pique, and vanished down the alley. Randi waited by the pier and watched the cab drive off. A few minutes later Willie was back, looking disgusted. “This is ridiculous,” he said. “The back door hasn’t been opened in years, you’d need a hammer and chisel just to knock through the rust. The loading docks are bolted down and chained with the mother of all padlocks on the chains. And the front door…there’s a spare set of keys in my car, but even if we got those the police bar can only be lifted from inside. So how the hell did it get in, I ask you?”

  Randi looked at the brewery’s weathered brick walls appraisingly. They looked pretty solid to her, and the second-floor windows were a good twenty feet off street level. She walked around the side to take a look down the alley. “There’s a window broken,” she said.

  “That was me getting out,” Willie said, “not my nocturnal caller getting in.”

  Randi had already figured out that much from the broken glass all over the cobblestones. “Right now I’m more concerned about how we’re going to get in.” She pointed. “If we move that dumpster a few feet to the left and climb on top, and you climb on my shoulders, I think you might be able to hoist yourself in.”

  Willie considered that. “What if it’s still in there?”

  “What?” Randi said.

  “Whatever was after me last night. If I hadn’t jumped through that window, it’d be me without a skin this morning, and believe me, I’m cold enough as is.” He looked at the window, at the dumpster, and back at the window. “Fuck,” he said, “we can’t stand here all day. But I’ve got a better idea. Help me roll the dumpster away from the wall a little.”

  Randi didn’t understand, but she did as Willie suggested. They left the dumpster in the center of the alley, directly opposite the broken window. Willie nodded and began unbelting the coat she’d lent him. “Turn around,” he told her. “I don’t want you freaking out. I’ve got to get naked and your carnal appetites might get the best of you.”

  Randi turned around. The temptation to glance over her shoulder was irresistible. She heard the coat fall to the ground. Then she heard something else…soft padding steps, like a dog. She turned. He’d circled all the way down to the end of the alley. Her ex-husband’s old underwear lay puddled across the cobblestones atop the Burberry coat. Willie came streaking back toward the brewery building speed. He was, Randi noticed, not a very prepossessing wolf. His fur was a dirty gray-brown color, kind of mangy, his rear looked too large and his legs too thin, and there was something ungainly about the way he ran. He put on a final burst of speed, leapt on top of the dumpster, bounded off the metal lid, and flew through the shattered window, breaking more glass as he went. Randi heard a loud thump from inside the bedroom.

  She went around to the front. A few moments later, the locks began to unlock, one by one, and Willie opened the heavy steel door. He was wearing his own bathrobe, a red tartan flannel, and his hand was full of keys. “Come on,” he said. “No sign of night visitors. I put on some water for tea.”

  “THE FUCKER MUST HAVE CRAWLED OUT OF THE TOILET,” WILLIE said. “I don’t see any other way he could have gotten in.”

  Randi stood in front of what remained of his bedroom door. She studied the shattered wood, ran her finger lightly across one long, jagged splinter, then knelt to look at the floor. “Whatever it was, it was strong. Look at these gouges in the wood, look at how sharp and clean they are. You don’t do that with a fist. Claws, maybe. More likely some kind of knife. And take a look at this.” She gestured toward the brass doorknob, which lay on the floor amidst a bunch of kindling.

  Willie bent to pick it up.

  “Don’t touch,” she said, grabbing his arm. “Just look.”

  He got down on one knee. At first he didn’t notice anything. But when he leaned close, he saw how the bras
s was scored and scraped.

  “Something sharp,” Randi said, “and hard.” She stood. “When you first heard the sounds, what direction were they coming from?”

  Willie thought for a moment. “It was hard to tell,” he said. “Toward the back, I think.”

  Randi walked back. All along the hall, the doors were closed. She studied the banister at the top of the stairs, then moved on, and began opening and closing doors. “Come here,” she said, at the fourth door.

  Willie trotted down the hall. Randi had the door ajar. The knob on the hall side was fine; the knob on the inside displayed the same kind of scoring they’d seen on his bedroom door. Willie was aghast. “But this is the men’s room,” he said. “You mean it did come out of the toilet? I’ll never shit again.”

  “It came out of this room,” Randi said. “I don’t know about the toilet.” She went in and looked around. There wasn’t much to look at. Two toilet stalls, two urinals, two sinks with a long mirror above them and antique brass soap dispensers beside the water taps, a paper towel dispenser, Willie’s towels and toiletries. No window. Not even a small frosted-glass window. No window at all.

  Down the hall the teakettle began to whistle. Randi looked thoughtful as they walked back to the living room.

  “Joan Sorenson died behind a locked door, and the killer got to Zoe Anders without waking her sister right across the hall.”

  “The fucking thing can come and go as it pleases,” Willie said. The idea gave him the creeps. He glanced around nervously as he got out the teabags, but there was nobody there but him and Randi.

  “Except it can’t,” Randi said. “With Sorenson and Anders, there was no damage, no sign of a break-in, nothing but a corpse. But with you, the killer was stopped by something as simple as a locked door.”

  “Not stopped,” Willie said, “just slowed down a little.” He repressed a shudder and brought the tea over to his coffee table.