Old Tin Sorrows

36

Morley perched the mystery woman on the mantle in my sitting room, contemplated her intently. I misread his interest. I seldom do that because his interest in the female tribe is definite. "Can't have her, boy. She's taken."

"Be quiet," he told me. "Sit down and look at the painting."

He wouldn't be sharp if it wasn't important. I planted myself. I stared.

I began to feel like I was part of the scene.

Morley got up and snuffed a few lamps, halving the light in the room. Then he threw the curtains open, apparently so we'd get the full benefit of the storm. He settled and resumed staring.

That woman came more and more to life, grabbed more and more of my being. I felt I could take her hand and pull her out, away from the thing that pursued her.

The storm outside intensified what was going on in the painting's background. That damned Snake Bradon was a sorcerer. The painting, once you looked at it awhile, was more potent than the swampscape with hanged man. But this one was more subtle.

I could almost hear her begging for help.

Morley muttered, "Damn her. She's too intense. Got to block her out of there."

"What?"

"There's something else there. But the woman pulls your attention away."

He'd lost me. The rest of the painting was decoration to me. Or arrows pointing out the crucial object.

Morley got paper from my writing table, spent ten minutes using a small knife to trim pieces to cover the blonde. "You damage that thing, I'll carve you up," I told him. I had a notion where it ought to be displayed. There was a big bare spot on the wall of my office at home.

"I'd cut my own throat first, Garrett. The man was crazy but he was a genius."

Curious, Morley calling him crazy without having met him.

Morley killed another lamp. He hung his cutouts over the canvas.

"I'll be damned." The painting was almost as intense without the woman. But now the eye could rove.

Morley grunted. "Let your mind go blank. Just let it sink in."

I tried.

The storm carried on outside. Thunder galloped. Swords of lightning flailed. The flashes played with the flashes in the painting. The shadow seemed to move like a thunderhead boiling. "What?"

It was there for just a second. I couldn't get it back. I tried too hard.

"Did you see the face?" Morley asked. "In the shadow?"

"Yeah. For a second. I can't get it back."

"Neither can I." He removed the cutouts, settled again. "She's running from somebody, not something."

"She's reaching out. You think Bradon has her reaching for somebody particular?"

"Running from somebody to somebody?" he asked.

"Maybe."

"Him?"

"Maybe." I shrugged.

"You? You're the one who—"

"You said you saw her."

"I saw somebody. Just a glimpse. The more I stare at this, the more I think it could have been the other one."

"Jennifer?"

"Yes. They look a lot alike."

I hadn't seen that. I tried to see Jennifer in the blonde. "I don't know. There's a lot of Stantnor in Jennifer and none in this one."

I guess I squeaked. He asked, "What?"

"That face in the background. There was a lot of Stantnor in it."

"Jennifer? Bradon did her bad."

"I don't think so. I got the feeling it was male."

"Around thirty and stark raving mad."

The lightning had fits outside. I shuddered, jumped up, started lighting lamps. I couldn't shake the chill. "I'm spooked," I confessed.

"Yes. The more I look, the creepier it gets."

The chill stayed with me. I wondered if we were being watched. "Think I'll start a fire."

"Whoa! What did you say?"

"I'll start a fire. I'm freezing my—"

"You're a genius, Garrett."

"Nice of you to notice." What did I genius? It went right by me.

"Fire in the stable. You figured right, too. Not for you at all. For something Bradon had hidden. What did you find hidden? The paintings." He gestured at the blonde. "The painting."

"I don't know—"

"I do. What were the others? Crazy stuff. But people we've seen and places in the Cantard."

So I looked at the painting again.

Morley said, "There's the key to your killer. That's why Bradon died. There's why the stable burned. That's your killer." He laughed. It was a crazy noise. Hell. Everything was crazy in this place. "And you slept with her." He started to say something else, caught himself, reflected. "Oh, man." He came and put a hand on my shoulder.

He could have slept with a mass murderer and thought nothing of it. Maybe he'd have smiled and cut her throat afterward. A lovable rogue most of the time, but there's a cold subterranean stream inside him.

He knew how it would hit me before it hit. He was there when I started to rattle.

It wasn't as bad as I feared, but the idea did shake me. "I've got to pace."

He let me get up and try to walk it off. That didn't do much good. The whoopee-making noises outside didn't help. The thunder ripped at my nerves like cats howling at midnight.

Then I recalled promising Jennifer I'd see her later. The old mind fixed on that, telling me I could clean out a whole bird's nest with one stone.

"Where you going?" Morley demanded.

"Something to do. Promises to keep. Almost forgot." I got out before he pressed me, sudden as that, not quite sure I was thinking right.