The Sex Life of the Gods

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Sometime near midnight, Beth took the car and went home. Nick poured acup of the coffee she had made for him and went back into the study tolook at the paintings a second time. It was good, professional work, andhe wondered if he could do the same stuff again. Hell, he decided, it'llbe a long time until I get back at an easel. He finished the coffee andwent up to bed.

  It took awhile to get to sleep. Thoughts of the wrecked plane, Beth, thestrange men and Nolan Brice kept running around in his head withoutfinding answers to the enigmas they presented to him. Finally he slept.

  * * * * *

  He was looking at himself, in the dream, but it was not in a mirror. Hewas standing inside a polished room and the other Nick Danson lay on abed wrapped in sleep. Nick blinked at the still duplicate of himself onthe bed and turned away to look at the room he was in. It wasn't large.It appeared to be some kind of bedroom, and it was well lighted althoughthere were no lights to be seen; the walls seemed to glow, andeverything was of a bright metal. The mirror caught his eye and he sawhimself in the same blue and yellow uniform that he'd worn before. TheDanson who lay asleep on the bed was dressed in blue dress pants and awhite shirt. The tie had been loosened at his throat and his clothingwas wrinkled badly.

  Suddenly the other Danson opened his eyes and looked at Nick. For amoment he appeared to be startled at seeing him, then he smiled. Thesmile erupted in a chuckle that became a laugh. The other Danson's facegrew large and full, roaring out laughter at Nick until the whole scenechanged from one of odd curiosity to one of absolute horror, the kind ofweird horror that can come only from peals of loud, echoing laughterrolling through the caverns of the mind.

  * * * * *

  Nick awoke gasping, his fingers knotted in the sheets of the bed and acold sweat beading out upon his face. His heart hammered in his chestlike a drum, threatening to leap to his throat at any moment. He lookedaround anxiously for Beth, but the silence of the room reminded him thatshe had gone back to the city and her job. Dawn was breaking and the dimlight filtered through the unwashed windows. There was little point intrying to sleep now. Might as well get his clothes on and try to startunraveling a long thread of odd events.

  He pulled on his clothes slowly and slid his feet into his shoes,wondering where to begin the climb back to himself. It would be badenough for an amnesia victim to regain all his memory if given anunlimited length of time - this way, with people closing in on allsides, the whole damned thing seemed impossible.

  He hooked the last button on his shirt, stuffed it into his pants, andheaded for the kitchen. He warmed up last night's coffee and it tastedlike warm sulfuric acid, but it brought him around to fullconsciousness, even if his stomach did object to it.

  When he had finished the coffee, he found the library in the den andbegan reading a few of the titles; often, he remembered, a lot could betold from a man by his reading habits. There were books by Bridgeman,Zaindenburg and Loomis, almost everything on the shelves pertained toart in some form or another - except for the last row. There were aboutfifteen science fiction volumes, mostly collections of short stories,from Asimov to A.E. van Vogt. He had a fleeting idea to start readingthe stuff in an effort to determine whether or not his strange dreamscame from somewhere within the pages, then he rejected it. It would takea hell of a long while to even skim through that mass of literature andhe didn't have the time.

  He shoved a copy of H. Beam Piper back onto the shelf and straightened.To hell with it. He had the whole house to search, before he startedfumbling through something as far out as science fiction. He startedrummaging through the various rooms of the place with systematiccarefulness. Hoping...

  When he finished the search, it was noon. He knew a lot about the cabin,but damned little about himself. The cramped, dismal attic containedwhat was left of pictures, odd bits of furniture and clothes after thelocal field mice and porcupines had their annual convention up there.The three bedrooms revealed nothing except the usual gear to be found inany bedroom, and of the downstairs section of the place, only the artstudio and the combination den-library was of interest. And even theseplaces shed no light upon the ghost of the man that haunted him. Thestudio contained all of the trappings of an artist, even though it wasin rather battered up shape, and the den was a wall to wall replica ofwhat a woodsman might have owned. There were the books, the stuffedheads and, of course, the guns.

  The rack, on the far side of the room, contained a table with bulletloading equipment scattered around it, with cans of DuPont powder on thefloor. Above it, in the gun rack were the weapons - enough to hold off asmall revolution. There were two handguns and three rifles and ashotgun. He looked them over.

  A Smith and Wesson .38, model 36 and a Ruger Blackhawk .44 Magnum thatlooked like the old peacemaker model. One of the rifles was a Marlinsaddle carbine, model 336 and the other was a Winchester African riflewith a .458 bore. The last gun on the rack was a Stevens .410 singlebarrel shotgun. Nick grinned at the arsenal and took the .44 magnum downfrom the rack to clean it. It wasn't in too bad of shape, even for aslong as it had remained idle; even the western style holster and gunbeltcontained enough oil to make them pliable.

  He slipped the magnum into the holster and buckled the gunbelt about hiswaist, letting it hang a little on the right side. To hell with it, hethought. If those two characters show up now, at least I'll have anedge. He pulled five .44 Special slugs from the belt and loaded theweapon, being careful to see that the hammer hung on the empty chamber.Then he decided to see how good he was.

  Where the hill rose sharply for a small distance behind the house, Nickfound a good area where he could test his marksmanship. He lined up fivecans, a few feet apart, at the base of the rise and snapped off fivefast shots at them as quick as the single action would operate. Eitheramnesia had nothing to do with a man's gun knowledge, or he was anatural. All five cans were blown to hell and sent skittering againstthe side of the hill. Stunned, but satisfied, he reloaded the revolverand dropped it back into the holster.

  He prowled the grounds about the cabin with the aimlessness of a manlooking for something but not sure what. Beyond the lawn furniture andthe shed that contained his tools, the only other interesting thing wasthe creek. A fast running little stream, barely a foot deep but filledwith numerous little holes that bragged of trout. He walked along thegurgling water for a ways, then he went back to the house, still unsureof what to do.

  He went back to the cabin and shoved the door open and stopped dead!

  She was just like the painting. Her raven black hair hung loose and freewhile, beneath the scant confines of the shorts and halter, the warmflesh rose and fell temptingly. Nick stood there, unable to say a word.It was Janet and the light in her eyes made him wonder what kind of aguy he'd been more than ever. She gave a little gasp of pure pleasureand flung herself into his arms, planting the ripe sweetness of her lipssquarely on his.

  "Janet," he managed, but she had a strangle hold on him.