Selected Stories (36 page)

“You don’t go,” he choked. “You need me.”

“You don’t need me,” she said fondly, “and I don’t need you. It comes to that, honey; it’s the way you fixed it. It’s the right way; can’t you see that?”

Right in there was the third thing he understood.

He stood up slowly, feeling her hands slide from his, from his knees to the floor as he stepped away from her. “Oh God!” she cried from the floor where she knelt, “you’re killing me, taking it this way! Can’t you be happy for me?”

He stumbled across the room and caught himself on the lower shelf of the china closet. He looked back and forward along the dark, echoing corridor of his years, stretching so far and drearily, and he looked at this short bright segment slipping away from him. … He heard her quick footsteps behind him and when he turned he had the flatiron in his hand. She never saw it. She came to him bright-faced, pleading, and he put out his arms and she ran inside, and the iron curved around and crashed into the back of her head.

He lowered her gently down on the linoleum and stood for a long time over her, crying quietly.

Then he put the iron away and filled the kettle and a saucepan with water, and in the saucepan he put needles and a clamp and thread and little slabs of sponge and a knife and pliers. From the gateleg table and from a drawer he got his two plastic tablecloths and began arranging them on the bed. “I fix everything,” he murmured as he worked. “Fix it right.”

B
UDGIE SLID INTO THE
laboratory without knocking, as usual.

She was flushed and breathless, her eyes bright with speed and eagerness. “Whatcha got, Muley?”

Muhlenberg kicked the morgue door shut before Budgie could get in line with it. “Nothing,” he said flatly, “and of all the people I don’t want to see—and at the moment that means all the people there are—you head the list. Go away.”

Budgie pulled off her gloves and stuffed them into an oversized shoulder-bag, which she hurled across the laboratory onto a work-surface. “Come on, Muley. I saw the meat-wagon outside. I know what it brought, too. That double murder in the park. Al told me.”

“Al’s jaw is one that needs more tying up than any of the stiffs he taxis around,” said Muhlenberg bitterly. “Well, you’re not getting near this pair.”

She came over to him, stood very close. In spite of his annoyance, he couldn’t help noticing how soft and full her lips were just then.
Just then
—and the sudden realization added to the annoyance. He had known for a long time that Budgie could turn on mechanisms that made every one of a man’s ductless glands purse up its lips and blow like a trumpet. Every time he felt it he hated himself. “Get away from me,” he growled. “It won’t work.”

“What won’t, Muley?” she murmured.

Muhlenberg looked her straight in the eye and said something about his preference for raw liver over Budgie-times-twelve.

The softness went out of her lips, to be replaced by no particular hardness. She simply laughed good-naturedly. “All right, you’re immune. I’ll try logic.”

“Nothing will work,” he said. “You will not get in there to see those two, and you’ll get no details from me for any of that
couche-con-carne
stew you call a newspaper story.”

“Okay,” she said surprisingly. She crossed the lab and picked up her handbag. She found a glove and began to pull it on. “Sorry I interrupted you, Muley. I do get the idea. You want to be alone.”

His jaw was too slack to enunciate an answer. He watched her go out, watched the door close, watched it open again, heard her say in a very hurt tone, “But I do think you could tell me
why
you won’t say anything about this murder.”

He scratched his head. “As long as you behave yourself, I guess I do owe you that.” He thought for a moment. “It’s not your kind of a story. That’s about the best way to put it.”

“Not my kind of a story? A double murder in Lover’s Lane? The maudlin mystery of the mugger, or mayhem in Maytime? No kidding, Muley—you’re not serious!”

“Budgie, this one isn’t for fun. It’s ugly. Very
damn
ugly. And it’s serious. It’s mysterious for a number of other reasons than the ones you want to siphon into your readers.”

“What other reasons?”

“Medically. Biologically. Sociologically.”

“My stories got biology. Sociology they got likewise; stodgy truisms about social trends is the way I dish up sex in the public prints, or didn’t you know? So—that leaves medical. What’s so strange medically about this case?”

“Good night, Budgie.”

“Come on, Muley. You can’t horrify
me.
”

“That I know. You’ve trod more primrose pathology in your research than Krafft-Ebing plus eleven comic books. No, Budgie. No more.”

“Dr. F. L. Muhlenberg, brilliant young biologist and special medical consultant to the City and State Police, intimated that these aspects of the case—the brutal murder and disfigurement of the embarrassed couple—were superficial compared with the unspeakable facts behind them. ‘Medically mysterious,’ he was quoted as saying.” She twinkled at him. “How’s that sound?” She looked at her watch. “And I can make the early edition, too, with a head. Something like
DOC SHOCKED SPEECHLESS
—and a subhead: Lab Sleuth Suppresses Medical Details of Double Park Killing. Yeah, and your picture.”

“If you dare to print anything of the sort,” he raged, “I’ll—”

“All right, all right,” she said conciliatingly. “I won’t. I really won’t.”

“Promise me?”

“I promise, Muley …
if—
”

“Why should I bargain?” he demanded suddenly. “Get out of here.”

He began to close the door. “And something for the editorial page,” she said. “Is a doctor within his rights in suppressing information concerning a murderous maniac and his methods?” She closed the door.

Muhlenberg bit his lower lip so hard he all but yelped. He ran to the door and snatched it open. “Wait!”

Budgie was leaning against the doorpost lighting a cigarette. “I
was
waiting,” she said reasonably.

“Come in here,” he grated. He snatched her arm and whirled her inside, slamming the door.

“You’re a brute,” she said rubbing her arm and smiling dazzlingly.

“The only way to muzzle you is to tell you the whole story. Right?”

“Right. If I get an exclusive when you’re ready to break the story.”

“There’s probably a kicker in that, too,” he said morosely. He glared at her. Then, “Sit down,” he said.

She did. “I’m all yours.”

“Don’t change the subject,” he said with a ghost of his natural humor. He lit a thoughtful cigarette. “What do you know about this case so far?”

“Too little,” she said. “This couple were having a conversation without words in the park when some muggers jumped them and killed them, a little more gruesomely than usual. But instead of being delivered to the city morgue, they were brought straight to you on the orders of the ambulance intern after one quick look.”

“How did you know about it?”

“Well, if you must know, I was in the park. There’s a shortcut over by the museum, and I was about a hundred yards down the path when I …”

Muhlenberg waited as long as tact demanded, and a little longer. Her face was still, her gaze detached. “Go on.”

“… when I heard a scream,” she said in the precise tone of voice which she had been using. Then she began to cry.

“Hey,” he said. He knelt beside her, put a hand on her shoulder. She shoved it away angrily, and covered her face with a damp towel. When she took it down again she seemed to be laughing. She was doing it so badly that he turned away in very real embarrassment.

“Sorry,” she said in a very shaken whisper. “It … was that kind of a scream. I’ve never heard anything like it. It did something to me. It had more agony in it than a single sound should be able to have.” She closed her eyes.

“Man or woman?”

She shook her head.

“So,” he said matter-of-factly, “what did you do then?”

“Nothing. Nothing at all, for I don’t know how long.” She slammed a small fist down on the table. “I’m supposed to be a reporter!” she flared. “And there I stand like a dummy, like a wharf rat in concussion-shock!” She wet her lips. “When I came around I was standing by a rock wall with one hand on it.” She showed him. “Broke two perfectly good fingernails, I was holding on so tight. I ran toward where I’d heard the sound. Just trampled brush, nothing else. I heard a crowd milling around on the avenue. I went up there. The meat-wagon was there, Al and that young sawbones Regal—Ruggles—”

“Regalio.”

“Yeah, him. They’d just put those two bodies into the ambulance. They were covered with blankets. I asked what was up. Regalio waved a finger and said ‘Not for school-girls’ and gave me a real death-mask grin. He climbed aboard. I grabbed Al and asked him what was what. He said muggers had killed this couple, and it was pretty rugged. Said Regalio had told him to bring them here, even before he made a police report. They were both about as upset as they could get.”

“I don’t wonder,” said Muhlenberg.

“Then I asked if I could ride and they said no and took off. I grabbed a cab when I found one to grab, which was all of fifteen minutes later, and here I am. Here I am,” she repeated, “getting a story out of you in the damndest way yet. You’re asking, I’m answering.” She got up. “You write the feature, Muley. I’ll go on into your icebox and do your work.”

He caught her arm. “Nah! No you don’t! Like the man said—it’s not for school-girls.”

“Anything you have in there
can’t
be worse than my imagination!” she snapped.

“Sorry. It’s what you get for barging in on me before I’ve had a chance to think something through. You see, this wasn’t exactly two people.”

“I know!” she said sarcastically. “Siamese twins.”

He looked at her distantly. “Yes. ’Taint funny, kiddo.”

For once she had nothing to say. She put one hand slowly up to her mouth and apparently forgot it, for there it stayed. “That’s what so ugly about this. Those two were … torn apart.” He closed his eyes. “I can just see it. I wish I couldn’t. Those thugs drifting through the park at night, out for anything they could get. They hear something … fall right over them … I don’t know. Then—”

“All right, all right,” she whispered hoarsely. “I can hear you.”

“But, damn it,” he said angrily, “I’ve been kicking around this field long enough to know every documented case of such a creature. And I just can’t believe that one like this could exist without having been written up in some medical journal somewhere. Even if they were born in Soviet Russia, some translation of a report would’ve appeared somewhere.”

“I know Siamese twins are rare. But surely such a birth wouldn’t make international headlines!”

“This one would,” he said positively. “For one thing, Siamese twins usually bear more anomalies than just the fact that they are attached. They’re frequently fraternal rather than identical twins. More often than not one’s born more fully developed than the other. Usually when they’re born at all they don’t live. But these—”

“What’s so special?”

Muhlenberg spread his hands. “They’re perfect. They’re costally joined by a surprisingly small tissue-organ complex—”

“Wait, professor, ‘Costally’—you mean at the chest?”

“That’s right. And the link is—was—not major. I can’t understand why they were never surgically separated. There may be a reason, of course, but that’ll have to wait on the autopsy.”

“Why wait?”

“It’s all I can do to wait.” He grinned suddenly. “You see, you’re more of a help than you realize, Budge. I’m dying to get to work on them, but under the circumstances I have to wait until morning. Regalio reported to the police, and I know the coroner isn’t going to come around this time of night, not if I could show him quintuplets in a chain like sausages. In addition, I don’t have identities, I don’t have relatives’ releases—you know. So—a superficial examination, a lot of wild guesses, and a chance to sound off to you to keep myself from going nuts.”

“You’re
using
me!”

“That’s bad?”

“Yes—when I don’t get any fun out of it.”

He laughed. “I love those incendiary statements of yours. I’m just not flammable.”

She looked up at him, up and a little sidewise. “Not at all?”

“Not now.”

She considered that. She looked down at her hands as if they were the problems of Muhlenberg’s susceptibility. She turned the hands over. “Sometimes,” she said, “I really enjoy it when we share something else besides twitches and moans. Maybe we should be more inhibited.”

“Do tell.”

She said, “We have nothing in common. I mean, but
nothing.
We’re different to the core, to the bone. You hunt out facts and so do I, but we could never share that because we don’t use facts for the same things. You use facts only to find more facts.”

“What do you use them for?”

She smiled. “All sorts of things. A good reporter doesn’t report just what happens. He reports what he
sees
—in many cases a very different thing. Any way …”

“Wonder how these biological pressures affected our friends here,” he mused, thumbing over his shoulder at the morgue.

“About the same, I’d judge, with certain important difficulties. But wait—were they men or women, or one of each?”

“I didn’t tell you, did I?” he said with real startlement.

“No,” she said.

He opened his mouth to answer, but could not. The reason came.

It came from downstairs, or outside, or perhaps from nowhere or everywhere, or from a place without a name. It was all around them, inside, behind them in time as well as space. It was the echo of their own first cry when they lost the first warmth and found loneliness, early, as everyone must. It was hurt: some the pain of impact, some of fever and delirium, and some the great pressure of beauty too beautiful to bear. And like pain, it could not be remembered. It lasted as long as it was a sound, and perhaps a little longer, and the frozen time after it died was immeasurable.

Muhlenberg became increasingly conscious of an ache in his calves and in the trapezoid muscles of his back. They sent him a gradual and completely intellectualized message of strain, and very consciously he relieved it and sat down. His movement carried Budgie’s arm forward, and he looked down at her hand, which was clamped around his forearm. She moved it away, opening it slowly, and he saw the angry marks of her fingers, and knew they would be bruises in the morning.