Curtains (4 page)

"Congratulations, Mick. In three weeks,
you've escalated to the top of your time slot. We've got sponsors
lining up to take your show. We can pretty much name our price.
Freddie in sales is shopping for a new BMW, he's so confident this
is going to be his big payoff. This 'death' thing is a stroke of
genius. You should go into marketing."

And spend even more time with people like
you, I thought. I'd rather eat digitalis cheesecake. I enjoyed
having Pudge over the fire, so I rotated the spit a little.

"Well, I think we need to automate the show.
People just love spending the night on hold." I was about to fan
the flames a little more when smugness crept like a shadow across
his doughy face.

"Oh, by the way," he interrupted, with an
undisguised note of glee, "there's a policeman waiting in the
lounge to see you. I hope you're not into those awful drugs
again."

I'd been expecting this. The cops were slow
in this town, but even they could follow a beacon like the one my
show had become. I flipped Pudge a finger and walked past the
studio into the lounge. At the table sat a short, wiry man in a
rumpled tan suit. His eyes were beady and intelligent, like those
of a field mouse. He was eating a glazed donut.

"You must be Mickey," he said, a jawful of
pastry muffling his words. "I'm Detective Dietz from homicide."

He held out his hand for me to shake. My hand
came away a little bit sticky.

"I've heard that you might know a little bit
about this 'Night Owl' character. According to witnesses, she's
called here at the station on at least two occasions, apparently
just after committing murder."

"I can't control what people are going to
say. There's that little matter of the First Amendment."

"There's also a matter called 'withholding
evidence,' and its kissing cousin, 'aiding and abetting.' Surely
you're familiar with the judicial system by now."

I was about to protest when he held up a
hand. "Society considers those debts paid, Mickey. Or should I say
'Michel'? We just want to stop the killings. All this city needs is
a female Charles Bronson running wild. The next thing you know, the
papers pick up on it and we got a slew of imitators."

"You already know as much as I do. She says
she killed some guys who did her wrong."

"Well, she seems to think you're on her side.
You haven't done anything to encourage her, have you?" Dietz wiped
the crumbs off his chin and licked his rodent lips.

"Look, she's good for ratings. The audience
loves her. She connects with people. Maybe there's a murderous
streak in all of us. It's not my place to censor immorality."

"That's why there's a Federal Communications
Commission, my friend. I'd be willing to bet that a death forum is
not what they consider 'in the public interest.'"

"What can I do?" I shrugged. I got the
impression that Dietz would be on me like a fly on stink until he
wrapped up this case.

"We want to set up a wiretap in the studio
and wait for her to call again. You'll need to keep her going long
enough for us to get a trace. Our technician tells me that takes
about two minutes if she's on a local exchange."

I shrugged again. He would have no problem
getting a court order if necessary. "I never know when she's going
to call."

"We'll wait. We're on salary. And you have
good donuts here. We start tonight."

My Honda broke down, so I had to catch a bus
back to WKIK that night. As I walked to the entrance, I noticed a
sign with my name on it. It was a good space, right next to the
GM's. I noted with satisfaction that it was a little closer to the
door than Pudge's.

It was a little past midnight, so I was late
signing on. Dietz and an engineer who looked like a junkie were
already on the job. The engineer was splicing into the phone
system. Bits of bare wire littered the floor like copper worms.

I checked the transmitter readings and
apologized to the jock who had to stay late to cover for me. He had
a little acne around his mouth. Probably an intern. He looked at me
with a flash of something like hero worship in his eyes.

"No problem, Mr. Nixon," he said, handing me
the playlist. For a second, I thought he was going to ask for my
autograph.

I settled behind the console like a pilot
about to launch a jumbo jet. Dietz slouched in one corner with a
Styrofoam cup of coffee. The engineer held an earphone against his
gaunt head and nodded at him. All systems go, prepare for lift-off,
I said to myself. I flipped over the mic key and addressed the
waiting ears of Topeka .

"Have some fear, Mickey's here, welcome to
'Death Radio,' only on the Kick. Give me a buzz and let me know
what's going down in the dark corners of your mind."

I grinned at Dietz as the board lit up. "Go
ahead, caller. You're on," I said, cranking up the pot.

A woman with a stuffy nose began talking.
"Mickey, I just wanted you to know how much we love 'Death Radio'
here at Floyd's Truck Stop. You don't know how many loafers sit
around here on their lazy hind ends soppin' up free refills and
listenin' to your show."

"Glad to have you aboard, honey. So, have you
killed anybody lately?"

I saw Dietz wince as she laughed. "Now, I
don't think that girl's as bad as all that. So she shot a few,
sounds to me like they had it comin'. And all the guys around here
been tippin' real good this week. Been mindin' their manners, and
eatin' with their hats off. Ever bad wind blows somebody good, I
say."

"Amen to that," I said. I was beginning to
wonder, and not for the first time, if I was playing to people's
fears just to be a big shot. To be honest with myself, I was
enjoying the success. Let people die if it was good for the
ratings. I was beginning to think like a television news producer.
Give the people what they want and damn the consequences.

I steadily punched up callers, and every one
had a story about some man they knew who was finally shaping up or
had died trying. A few knew, "first-hand", about somebody who met
their Maker over a little marital indiscretion. Dietz was pale,
furiously scribbling on a note pad with the stub of a pencil. He
hadn't realized just how out of control the show had gotten.

"Folks, I love you," I said at the end of the
shift. "Thanks for opening your hearts to me, not to mention a few
holes in people's heads. Night Owl, if you're out there, fly right
and keep your barrel smoking. Tune in again tomorrow, skip work if
you feel like it, and deep-six somebody if you must. This is Mickey
Nixon, stick a fork in me, I'm done."

Dietz was as white as a nurse's bra. He would
probably be in an all-day powwow with the District Attorney's
office, scrambling for offenses to charge me with. Georgie Boy
walked in and surveyed the electronic carnage the police engineer
had inflicted. I winked at him and poked the Denon machine with my
finger. The Cars started playing "Let The Good Times Roll."

Three nights passed that way, with Dietz as
my co-pilot and the skeletal technician as navigator. The phone
lines stayed busy. Other stations were covering my show as a news
event, and a few were trying their own Death Shows. But I was the
only one with Night Owl. She called that Tuesday at about 4 AM,
just after the hourly station ID.

"Hey, Mickey, honey, it's Night Owl," her
voice purred over the speakers.

Dietz jumped up, spilling his coffee and
adding another stain to the studio floor. The police tech rolled
the tape recorder and watched his meters. I reached a trembling
finger to my mic switch.

"Hello, Night Owl, it's good to hear your
voice. I was beginning to think you'd forgotten old Mickey
here."

"I'd never do that. Just thinking about you
gets me all hot and bothered. I've been listening, and I like what
I hear. It seems like murder's the biggest game in town."

"Yes, but nobody does it like you. Have you
done it lately?"

"Well, now that you mention it, I was just
with a gentleman who knows how to show a lady a good time. He even
did the driving. It's funny how if you walk down certain streets at
night, guys just pull over and ask if you want a ride. They'll even
try to give you money. But, oh my, the things they ask you to
do."

"What did this one want?" I was excited and
scared at the same time. Dietz flicked his eyes from the tech to
his wristwatch, then to my sweaty face.

"You know I don't talk dirty over the phone,
Mickey. That would be unladylike. Let's just say we wound up on a
dead-end road. I could feel the pounding of his cheap heart beneath
his polyester suit. He said I could do it any way I wanted. The way
I wanted was to put it right between his meaty chins and scatter
his pea-sized brain all over his nice, clean upholstery."

"Way to go, girl," I said. The switchboard
was clogged with callers wanting to talk to Night Owl. There was no
time to punch someone in. The tech started nodding down the
seconds, his bony head wobbling like a frog on a wire, and I felt
dread squeeze my throat.

"Mickey, nobody knows how to treat a lady
anymore, except you. Thanks for keeping me going when the rest of
the world is going crazy. If only every man were like you--"

I suddenly felt sick.

"Hang up, there's a police trace!" I screamed
into my mic, covering it with saliva. I heard a click on the
monitors. It was the sound of my world coming to an end, in a
stream of dead air instead of the guitar feedback I'd always
imagined.

Dietz rushed at me, anger twisting his face
into a mask. The tech threw his scrawny arms up in surrender. I
leaned back in my swivel chair and stared at the zeroed-out volume
meters. "Good-bye, Night Owl," I said, to no one in particular.

Everything moved in slow motion after that.
Dietz read me my rights and was about to snap on the cuffs, but in
my condition, I was about as dangerous as a goldfish. Once he
regained his composure, he was kind enough to let me run the board
until another jock showed up. They couldn't reach Pudge, but the GM
sent in the pimply intern. I signed off with The Who's "Song is
Over."

I've got a battery of lawyers from the
American Civil Liberties Union, and they tell me my case will be
tied up for years, years I probably don't have. Night Owl left a
message on my answering machine at home.

"Mickey, you said you'd never do me wrong,
but you're just like all the rest." Sadness had replaced the fire
in her voice, and her words twisted in my chest like a corkscrew.
"All the joy's gone, but at least I still have my work. I'll see
you around. And now I think I'm supposed to say, 'Don't call me,
I'll call you.'"

I kept my deejay job. There was no one to
fire me. It seems Pudge was found dead in his car. Ballistics tests
match those of the other Night Owl murders. The GM decided I have
just enough notoriety left to draw a few listeners. They've removed
the interface from the studio, and all we have is a request
line.

So now I sit and wait. I heard there's been a
string of shootings over in Council Bluffs , with a familiar M.O.,
and it's not a long drive to get here. The request line blinks, as
lonely as the last morning star. Wayne is on the other end.

"Looks like it's just you and me," I say.

"Rock on, dude."

I do.

###

HOW TO BUILD YOUR OWN COFFIN

Blood and nails, that's all you need.

Larry ran his hand over the wood. Smooth as a
baby's ass and a mother's tit. He'd planed the cherry himself, by
hand, not with one of those machines. Sure, he'd caught a few
splinters, but that was the
blood
part of this business.

And what were a few calluses? Skin turned to
dust just as surely as brain and bone did. And your heart probably
crumbled faster than any of it. The meat didn't matter. What
mattered was how you walked off the stage. That's what they
remembered. And Larry McMasters was going to go out in style.

He dipped his brush into the shellac and
lifted it to the lamplight. The thick, golden material hung from
the brush like honey. If he sealed the wood, it would keep
underground for a few months longer, maybe even a year. Would that
be honest, though? Wouldn't that be putting just another layer
between him and his return to the dirt?

Larry wiped the brush clean on the edge of
the bucket and set it to soak in turpentine. Best to go with plain,
bare wood. Like what surrounded him here in the barn. The barn
itself was like a coffin, except it was filled to busting with
life, chickens and pigs and old Zaint the horse. Zaint was so far
faded he was about half glue, but he kept heading to the pasture of
a morning and turning up again every night.

Larry's pastures had seen more drought than
plenty. His days in the world hadn't added up to much. Fourteen
years loading produce on trucks paid him with a bad back and a
smoking habit. Oh, he'd had about eighteen good years before that,
when his parents were still around to pay the bills, but those were
so long ago and far away that they might as well have been in a
book, or somebody else's memory.

Once in a while over the years, he'd had
stretches where getting out of bed wasn't such a lost cause. This
last year had shown some promise, which made it the cruelest and
slowest of them all. And the blame belonged squarely on Betty Ann
Armfield. Betty Ann. Betty Ann.

Larry gritted his teeth and laid the crown
molding along the edge of the coffin to test for length. When you
mitered the joints, you had to allow for that little bit of extra
distance. There would be no putty or wood filler used on this job.
No crack could be wider than a spider's leg. Larry's coffin had to
be as airtight as possible so the rotting would be proper, from the
inside out.