Lowball: A Wild Cards Novel (10 page)

The murmuring crowd quieted as Father Squid rose and stood at the lectern. “Thank you for coming tonight,” he said, the tentacles of his lower face quivering with each consonant. “As you know, Jokertown has been suffering a series of disappearances. It’s said that some jokers have been snatched from the street. Others have simply vanished.” He looked down at his hands, which rested on the lectern before him in a prayerful attitude. “Sadly, this is not unusual in our community. But the numbers are higher than usual, and many suspect that these disappearances are related.”

Father Squid raised his head, and there was fire in his eyes. “We will not stand for this any longer.” Though the joker priest was old, his muscles going to fat, Eddie didn’t envy anyone who got in his way. “We will band together. We will be vigilant. And, if necessary, we will fight!” The crowd applauded. “Now, not all of us are fighters.” A few in the crowd chuckled at that. “But all of us have a part to play. You have seen the flyers with the photos of the disappeared. If you have any information as to their whereabouts, or any clues as to what has become of them, call the number at the bottom. And if you should happen to observe a kidnapping in progress, or even anything vaguely suspicious, call the same number. Better to raise a false alarm than to let even one more joker vanish.” He looked out sternly at his congregation, and a few “Amen”s were shouted. “We will now open the floor for testimony, remembrance, and ideas.”

Joker after joker now took the podium, telling tearful stories about the vanished ones, or proposing strategies that seemed to Eddie completely ineffectual, or expressing fear and concern for their own lives. But The Gulloon kept his eye on Father Squid, who stood to one side with his still-powerful arms crossed above his substantial belly.

Eddie wasn’t a religious man, and he wasn’t a member of Father Squid’s congregation. But he was a joker. And watching Father Squid standing there, looking over the crowd, he knew that the old pastor would do anything in his power to protect every joker in Jokertown.

Even him.

No matter how much of a worthless little shit he might be.

Eddie got an assignment from the J. Peterman catalog drawing men’s shirts for their incredibly fussy art director—a royal pain, but the job paid really well.

He didn’t peep at all; he didn’t draw any salacious cartoons; he tried hard not to even have any impure thoughts. Instead, he drew a long, hallucinatory fantasy story involving Gary Glitch and Zip the Hamster on a cross-country road trip. But after a couple of days without peeping he woke up from a lucid, lurid dream of The Gulloon peering into basement windows, only to realize that it wasn’t a dream. Eddie hustled his character back to the apartment and dispelled him immediately.

It was far from the first time he’d manifested his characters while sleeping. In fact, that was how he’d started. He hadn’t realized the dreams of his characters wandering his own neighborhood had been the manifestation of a wild card talent until one of the other group home residents described a really strange-looking joker she’d seen peering in her window. But ever since he’d started peeping consciously it happened only rarely.

But now it was starting again. As Eddie stared at the spot on the floor where he’d dismissed the easygoing Gulloon, he wondered what Mister Nice Guy or LaVerne VaVoom might get up to if he couldn’t keep control of them.

For that matter, what if they’d
already
gotten up to something? He didn’t always remember his dreams.

He spent the rest of that night staring at the ceiling and worrying.

“Morning, Eddie,” Beastie said, strolling up to the station house door. It was exactly eight in the morning and Eddie had been nervously shifting from foot to foot on the sidewalk for twenty minutes. If he’d been built for pacing, that’s what he would have been doing. “So Lupo convinced Franny to call you in again?”

Eddie took off his hat to get a better look at Beastie’s face. “No, I’m—I’m here as a concerned citizen. I was wondering if there had been any other sightings in the, uh, the monkey-faced Peeping Tom case.”

Beastie shrugged. “Haven’t heard of any such thing.”

That was a relief, but something else Beastie had said nagged at Eddie’s mind. “Wait, what was that about Lupo?”

Beastie rolled his eyes. “He’s been in here every damn day, hoping for some kind of protection, but after a while he figured out that wasn’t going to happen. Now he’s telling anyone who will sit still that he’s remembered more details about the snatchers and demanding another session with the sketch artist. Some of us are starting to wonder if he really saw anything in the first place.”

Eddie considered the question. “I think he really did. He was a little fuzzy on the details, but I don’t think he was making it up or hallucinating.”

A rough, growling voice interrupted the conversation. “Oh, thank God you’re here!” Eddie looked up to see Lupo running down the sidewalk toward him. Beastie spread his hands in a
see what I mean?
gesture. “I mean that, Eddie,” Lupo panted as he came to an unsteady halt, hands on knees, before the station house steps. “I literally thank my Higher Power that you are here. I was beginning to think no one was listening to me.”

Eddie shook his head. “I’m not here because I got called back for you. I don’t think I’ve ever gotten called back on the same case. Memories fade with time. You have to get them when they’re fresh.”

“This
is
fresh, Eddie. I saw him again! The fourth snatcher!”

Eddie and Beastie looked at each other. “When?” Eddie asked.

“Just this morning.”

“Really?” Beastie asked, not quite condescendingly. “The timing is awfully convenient.”

Lupo raised a hand. “Swear to God.” The raised palm was scrubbed and pink, though lines of dirt remained ground into its creases. “I saw him on Bond Street, just around the corner from my hotel.” The whites showed all around his eyes. “They’re looking for me, Eddie! They know I saw them, and now they’re going to snatch me too!”

Beastie didn’t seem convinced. “You’re absolutely sure it was him?”

“Look, I know I haven’t always been the most reliable witness. But my mind is much clearer now. I haven’t touched a drop in two days.” Lupo crouched down, bringing his head to Eddie’s eye level. “You gotta give me another shot, Eddie.”

“It’s not my decision.” Eddie looked to Beastie. “But for what it’s worth … I believe him.”

Lupo’s heavy, lupine head swiveled between Eddie and Beastie. “I can give you a good description of the fourth snatcher now. Please.” His big brown eyes were impossibly sad and soulful. “Please?”

Beastie sighed. “I’ll pass the information up the line.”

Lupo and Eddie sat on a hard bench outside the wardroom door while Beastie went in to talk with Franny. This wasn’t exactly how Eddie had planned to spend the morning, but if he could get another few hours of composite sketch work out of it he wouldn’t turn the money down. Anyway, pulling himself away from the desperate, pleading wolf-man would have seemed rude.

“I’m a new man, Eddie, I swear. You’ll see. I was all messed up last time.”

Eddie had to admit that Lupo was not only cleaner, he seemed more alert. And his voice, though still sounding a bit odd because of the shape of his mouth, wasn’t at all slurred. “You’re really serious about this.”

“I’ve never been more serious in my life. There’s nothing like the fear of getting snatched to make a man sit up and take notice of what’s going on around him.” He sighed. “Or what’s going on inside him. I’ve made a mess of my life, I admit it. Maybe this is the wake-up call I’ve needed. I hope it isn’t too late.”

“It’s never too late,” Eddie said, though Lupo looked to be sixty or seventy … not an easy time of life to make a fresh start. “Even for people like us.”

“People like us?”

Eddie winced, sure he’d crossed a line. Not even jokers liked to be equated with an ugly lump of flesh like him. “Sorry…”

“No, no, I’m not insulted. Just surprised to hear you say it. You’re an artist, a professional … I figured you for an East Village type, not a J-town boy like me.”

At that Eddie snorted. “Hardly. I live in an efficiency about a mile from here. Heart of Jokertown.”

“No shit? Why haven’t I seen you around the neighborhood?”

“I don’t get out much.”
Not in person, anyway
. Eddie cleared his throat. “I hear things, though. Rumors. Some kind of monkey-faced Peeping Tom, looking in windows at night. Maybe a whole gang of Peeping Toms. Have you heard about anything like that?”

“Not lately.” Lupo’s lip drew back, exposing yellowed fangs. “But two years ago … I was staying at my sister’s place, and she came screaming out of her bedroom saying that some big-eared little bastard was on her fire escape watching her undress. I couldn’t get the window open, but I got a look at the guy before he escaped.” His hairy hands balled into fists. “I might be a joker, I might be an alcoholic, I might even have sold a few things that didn’t exactly belong to me, but I’d never stoop that low. If I ever catch that little asshole…” He smacked a fist into the opposite hand, and Eddie realized there was still some serious muscle under the ex-bartender’s fat. “He’ll be sorry.”

Eddie was ashamed to admit that he had no idea which of the many women he’d peeped in on had been Lupo’s sister. The incident didn’t stand out from so many similar ones in his memory. “Sorry to hear about that,” he said aloud.

“You wouldn’t believe the shit that goes down in Jokertown.” He blinked. “Or maybe you would. How long you lived here?”

“Almost ten years.”

“So you never saw the Palace before the fire?”

“No. I’ve heard about it, though. Was it really as crazy as they say?”

“Crazier.” He grinned, an evil thing full of yellow teeth. “One time I was damn near killed by a panda bear. A panda bear! In a bar! Where else but the Palace?”

He went on like that for a while, sharing fascinating anecdotes about people and places that were nearly legends to Eddie, until the wardroom door opened and Franny emerged. “Beastie tells me you saw the fourth snatcher?” he said to Lupo. He seemed half hopeful and half dubious.

“It’s true! Swear to God!”

Franny didn’t look convinced. He turned to Eddie. “You’ve been talking with him. Do you believe him?”

Eddie nodded. “I do, actually.”

“Would you be willing to do a few more sketches?”

“Sure, if you’re paying. But I don’t have my stuff with me.”

The detective set his jaw and did his best to look decisive. “All right. Come back in an hour and I’ll try to find you an interrogation room.”

After Franny left, Lupo said, “Thanks for standing up for me.”

“You’re welcome. And thanks for the stories.”