Image of the Beast

  "Dolores?" Mrs. Pocyotl said.

  Childe could almost see the baron's shrug. The baron said, "Who knows? She's X! A dangerous X! If she can do that to Magda, she can do that to any of us. But I doubt that she could attack more than one of us at a time and I think she'd have to surprise us, just as she must have surprised Magda! So, we'd better hang together, as...

  A shout interrupted him. Footsteps sounded. The group was going around the corner and down the stairs to the cause of commotion. More shouts. He swung the door wider and peeped down the hall. The only one there was Bending Grass, who leaned his stocky form against the wall and cocked his head to look down the stairway. Then somebody called his name and he disappeared.

  Childe ran down the hallway to the only door opened. This was by the head of the steps, and the group had been assembled outside it. He stuck his head in. The room was strange, looked more like a movie director's idea of a Turkish harem than anything else. There were rugs and drapes and cushions and ottomans and even a hookah and a dresser so low that Magda must have had to sit cross-legged while she looked in the mirror. There was a marble-lined bath sunk level with the floor. It was almost large enough to qualify as a small swimming pool. Beyond it was a low marble enclosure which presumably had served Magda as a bed, since it was piled with cushions and pillows and canopied with many silk veils.

  Glam's black soft-leather boots stuck out over the enclosure. Childe walked swiftly in, past the bath, which was full of cold water, and looked over the marble railing. Glam had died with his boots on. Also, his pants. He had stripped off his shirt and undershirt and pulled his pants down around his knees, but he had been too eager to bother taking all of his clothes off.

  There was blood on his pants and much blood on his body. Blood had spurted out from his ears, nostrils, eyes, mouth, anus, and penis. Something had violently squeezed him. The ribs were caved in; the arms were flattened; the hip bones had been pushed inward toward each other. Not only blood had been expelled from every aperture. The contents of the bowels and about six feet of the bowels themselves had been pressed out of his anus.

  Near the bed, a section of wall stood open. Whether Magda had taken this or Igescu had opened it to see if she had taken it, Childe could not know. But he could not linger long here; his route of escape was suddenly no longer a matter of choice. Voices announced the return of the others. He might have had time to slip back through the door and up the hallway, but he did not dare chance it. He went through the opening in the wall.

  Before he had taken a dozen steps, he was seized. He groaned with a despairing ecstasy and braced himself with both hands against the walls while he spouted and shook. Afterward, he cursed, but he could do nothing about his condition. He walked on. His penis still stuck straight out and slightly at an upward angle, like the bowsprit of a ship. The cone was working within him. God knew how long its effect lasted, how long it would take to melt entirely away.

  Almost, he decided to hide in the passageway near, the still open panel and eavesdrop. But every second he was in this house meant recapture and death, and he was frightened because of what had happened to Glam and of what the others had said about Magda. Frightened was not strong enough. He was close to panic. And this was strange, because the terror should have taken from him any sexual stimulation whatsoever. Under these circumstances, he should have been unable to retain an erection.

  But there it was, independent of his other feelings, as if a switch had been thrown to place his genitals on a separate circuit. The cone, whatever it was, must not only be the prime mover of his state, it must also be the prime feeder. It had to be furnishing the energy to keep manufacturing all this spermatic fluid at such an extraordinary rate of speed. Generally, when unusually stimulated, when first in love, or sometimes when the marijuana hit him just right, he could have three or four orgasms within several hours. But, usually, one or two in an hour, and he was done for four or five hours. He had sometimes twitted himself with being the most undersexed private eye in history, without, of course, really believing his self-deprecation. But now, he seemed to be a fountain with a never-ending reservoir. And, of course, he would be so in a situation where it was the last thing he wanted.

  Thus, when he thought he was far enough away from the paneling, he turned on the flashlight. And he saw the white figure of Dolores coming toward him. Her arms were open and she was smiling. Her eyes were half-lidded but bright, and two patches of wetness shone on her thighs. It seemed to be his misfortune to encounter over lubricating women. However, after a century and a half of enforced abstinence, she could not be blamed.

  She barred his way. She was solid flesh enough, no man knew that better than he, yet he hesitated to attack her. The fate of Magda was warning enough. Moreover, there was the chance that if he did what she wanted, he might work off the effect of the cone. It was just possible. And he thought that he probably had no choice, anyway. So he put down his purse, turned off the flashlight, and dropped his pants. She pulled him down on her and he put his penis in swiftly and began to thrust without preliminaries of any kind. He had hoped that he would come at once, but even though he now had her soft wet flesh around his penis, and though the pleasure was somewhat heightened, he was unable to disengage himself from the automatic effects of the cone.

  At length he came and then, when; he tried to pull himself away, he found himself unable to. Her arms looked feminine and soft enough and felt so, but she had the strength of a python in each.

  Thinking of pythons made him think of Magda, and he became even more alarmed. If she came upon them now, she would have him helpless...those coils...Glam...He shuddered even as he began to pump again. His skin had turned cold and his hairs felt as if they were bristling in the static of terror. His anus was a dot of ice, a bull's eye for Magda if she crawled up behind him and raised her head to unloose a hammer stroke.

  He groaned and muttered, "I must be out of my mind, I'm really believing that crap!" and then he groaned again, this time because he was coming once more.

  It was no use. Lying with Dolores was not canceling or even diminishing the effects of the cone. And he was certainly not stupid enough to bang away at her for the sheer pleasure of it while his life was in danger. Especially since he had had enough of this "pleasure" to last him for a long time.

  He tried to break loose. Her arms did not tighten, but they also did not relax. He was not going to get out until he had satisfied her or was unable to keep an erection, and she was not going to be satisfied for a long time and he did not know how long he would last, but he suspected that it would be for hours and hours.

  Remembering what he had done to Mrs. Grasatchow during the fight, he bit down upon Dolores' nipple. His bite did not take the nipple off, but it was painful enough to cause her to open her arms and to scream. He was out of her embrace and had jumped away to where she could not reach him, pulled up his pants, stooped to pick up the flashlight and purse, and was running down the passageway, before she had stopped screaming.

  The noise, of course, would be heard in Magda's room if the paneling were still open, and they would be investigating. His flashlight beam bounced up and down and then went off into darkness at a corner. He stopped and probed around. Apparently, he was at a dead end, but he did not believe it. Shouts behind him sent him into a frenzy of tapping and poking against the wall to activate whatever mechanism moved this section. He felt somebody brush his shoulder, somebody spoke in Spanish, and a white arm reached past him and touched a cornice. Another arm pushed in on another cornice. The blank wall became a blank darkness in which the thin beam was lost. A hand pushed him on through--he seemed to be paralyzed for a few seconds--and then he turned just in time to see the section swing back into place. Beyond, the beam from a large flashlight flicked into existence.

  A hand, still sticky from playing with his penis, slipped into his and the white figure led him down a passageway and up a flight of steps. The dust was thick here; he sneezed resoundingly several tim
es. Igescu would have no trouble following them because of their newly made footprints. They had to get out of the secret ways, for a while, anyway.

  Dolores, whose footprints were as clear as his, seemed to realize that they betrayed them. She stopped before a wall, unfastened several latches and slid back the section. They stepped into a room with gray-and-white marble walls, red marble ceiling, black-and-red marble floor, and furniture of white or black marble. The chandelier was a mobile composed of thin curved pieces of colored marble with sockets for candles.

  Dolores led him across the room. She had dropped his hand and her right hand was pressed against her breast, which must hurt very much. Her face was expressionless, but the hot black eyes seemed to promise him revenge. If she had wanted it, she could have abandoned him in the passageway, he thought. Perhaps she wanted to take revenge personally.

  He caught a glimpse of them as they passed a tall mirror. They looked like two lovers who had been interrupted in bed and who were fleeing a jealous husband. She was naked, and his penis, still wet and tipped with a globule of spermatic fluid, was projecting from his fly. They looked comical enough; the purse added an incongruous, doubtful, touch.

  There was nothing comical about the pack behind them. He crowded on Dolores' heels and urged her to go faster. She said something and half-ran through the door and down a luxurious hall with thick carpeting. Near the end of the hall, by a curving stairway with marble steps and a carved mahogany handrail, she pushed open another door. There was a suite of four rooms done in opulent Edwardian style. The bedroom contained the entrance to the intramural passageway; a bookcase slid aside to reveal an iron gate of two sections secured by a combination lock. Dolores turned the dial swiftly as if she had much practice with it. The two sections of gate were pushed aside. When they were on the other side, she pushed them together and spun the combination dial on this side. Apparently, this action activated a mechanism, because the bookcase slid back into place. The light through the opening had shown him that they were not in a passageway but in a small room. Cool air moved past him. Dolores turned on a lamp. He saw several chairs, a bed, a TV set, a bar, a dresser with mirror, books, and cabinets. The cabinets held cans of food and delicacies; one cabinet was the door to a well-stocked refrigerator. A door off the room led to a bathroom and a closet full of clothes. Igescu could hide here for a long time if he wished.

  Dolores spoke in Spanish, slowly. He understood the simple sentence. "Here we are safe for a while."

  "About my biting you, Dolores," he said. "I had to. I must get out of here."

  She paid him no attention. She looked at her breast in the mirror and murmured something. Teeth marks and a red aureole ringed the nipple. She turned and shook her finger at him and then smiled, and he understood that she was gently reprimanding him for being over passionate. He must not bite her again. After which warning, she took his hand and pulled him toward the bed.

  He lunged away, tearing loose from her grip, and said, "Nothing doing! Show me the way out of here! Vamanos! Pronto!"

  He began "to inspect the walls. She spoke slowly behind him. Her words were clear and simple enough. If he would stay for a little, he would be shown the way out. But no more biting.

  "No more nothing," he said. He found the control, a piece of corner carving which could be moved on a pivot. The dresser moved out on one side. He went through while Dolores yelled at him from the room. She sounded so much like Sybil giving him hell, although he understood not a word, that he was able to ignore her. He carried a sharp-edged rapier, one of a set on the wall, in one hand and the flashlight in the other. The handle of the purse was over his left shoulder. The sword gave him confidence. He did not feel so helpless now. In fact, if he got a chance, he would leave the passageway and walk out the front door and if they got in his way, they would get the blade where it would do them the least good and him the most.

  The way out did not come easily, however. The passageway ran into a stairway which led steeply upward into the shadows. He backtracked to look for one-way windows or entrances to rooms but could find no unlocking controls. He returned to the stairway, which he walked up with as little weight on his feet as possible, He stuck the sword through his belt and held the flashlight in his teeth while he braced his arms against the walls. If the stairway straightened out, it would not drop him down a chutey-chute.

  The stairs held, and he was on a narrow landing. The door was easily opened by a conventional knob. He stepped cautiously out into a curving-walled room with a great window lit by the moon, a dim pale eye in the haze. Looking through the window, he saw the yard and trees and driveway at the front of the central portion. He was in the cupola on the left wing, just beside the original Spanish building. It contained three rooms, two of which were empty. The door to the third was part way open, and light streamed through it. He crouched by it and slowly extended his head, then had to withdraw it while he shook and spurted and clenched his teeth and clamped his lips to keep from groaning.

  * * *

  CHAPTER 18

  Afterward, he looked through the doorway again. The baron's great-grandmother was sitting on a high stool before a high table with a sloping top, such as old-time bookkeepers (Bob Cratchit) used when they wrote accounts (for Ebenezer Scrooge). He could not see what was on the table except that it was a large paper of some sort. Her jaws were moving, and now and then he could hear something but could not tell if the words were English or not. The only light was from a single lamp suspended from the ceiling directly overhead. It dimly showed walls with large, thick, black painted symbols, none of which he recognized; a long table with racks of bottles containing fluids; a globe of Earth with all sorts of curlicues painted in thin lines over it, sitting at the end of the table; a large birdcage on a stand in one corner with a raven, its head stuck under a wing; and a robe hanging on a hook on the wall.

  After a few minutes of muttering, the baroness got down off the stool. Her bones snapped and creaked, and he did not think she would make it to the robe, she shuffled so slowly and shakily. But she got the robe down and put it on with some difficulty and then proceeded with one foot dragging after the other toward the long table. She stooped, groaning, and straightened up with more creakings and with an enormous book in her arms which she had taken off a shelf beneath the table.

  It did not seem likely that she could get far with this additional burden, but she made it, huffing and creaking and even lifted the book above her head to slide it over the front of the tilted-top table. The book slid down until stopped by a strip of wood fixed horizontally halfway up the top. Another strip at the lower edge of the top kept the paper from falling off. He could see that it was a map of the Los Angeles area, just like the maps service stations give to their customers.

  His view of it was blocked by the baroness, who climbed back upon the stool, swaying so that he once started to go after her to catch her. She did not fall, and he settled back, asking himself what he cared if she fell. But conditioning took over at the oddest moments, and he had been taught to be kind and respectful to old ladies.

  The back of the robe was white with a number of large black symbols, some of which duplicated those on the wall. The old woman lifted her arms to flap the wide sleeves as if she were an ancient bird about to make a final flight. She began chanting loudly in a foreign tongue which sounded like that used at times by others in the household. Her arms waved; a large gold ring on a finger glinted dully at times, seeming like an eye winking at him.

  After a while she quit chanting and clambered down off the stool again. She tottered to the table and mixed up several of the fluids in the bottles in a glass and drank the contents. She belched loudly; he jumped at its loudness and unexpectedness. She got back on the stool and began to turn the pages of the huge book and, apparently, read a few phrases from each page.

  Childe guessed that he was looking upon a genuine magical ritual, genuine in that the witch believed in her magic. What its object was, he did not know.
But he felt chilled when he suddenly thought that perhaps she was trying to locate or influence him by means of this ritual. Not that he believed she could. It was just that he did not like the idea. At another time and under different circumstances, he would have laughed. Too much had happened tonight, however, for him to make light of anything in this house.

  Nor did he have any reason to crouch here in the doorway as if waiting to be born. He had to get out, and the only way was past the baroness. There was a door beyond the table; that door, as far as be knew, was the sole exit from the cupola, except for the way by which he had come. That door probably led to a hallway which would lead to a stairway to the lower floors or to a window to the top of a porch.

  He doubted that he could get by her without being seen. He would have to knock her out or, if necessary, kill her. There was no reason why he should be gentle. She had to know what was going on here and probably had participated in her younger days or, for all he knew, still did.

  Sword in hand, he stood up and walked slowly toward her. Then he stopped. Above her, a very thin haze, greenish-gray, shapeless with some short curling tentacles, had appeared. It could be accounted for if she were smoking. She was not. And the haze grew thicker and spread out sideways and down but not upward.

  Childe tried to blink it away. The smoke flowed over her gray Psyche knot of hair and down her neck and over the shoulders of the robe. She was chanting even more loudly and turning the pages of the book more swiftly. She could not be looking up to read the book; her head was bent so far forward that she had to be staring at the map.

  Childe felt a little disoriented again. It was as if something were wrong with the world, however, not with him. Then he shook his head and decided to tiptoe by her if he could. She seemed so intent, she might not see him. If the smoke grew thicker, that is, if there indeed was smoke and he was not suffering another hallucination, he would be hidden from her.