The Further Adventures of Batman (18 page)

Blood spurted from Mertz’s wrist, made an arc, and hung in the air like a twisting tube of red neon. Shadows fluttered damply and the light flowed as if it were boiling honey. The subway rails quivered and writhed. The support I was leaning against turned soft as a sponge. The inside of my head was on fire and I was melting. The air screeched.

Then it all went away. I felt solid again. The rails quit moving. Shadows ceased to flutter. The light was firm and bright. Blood from Mertz’s wrist shattered its neonlike tube and splattered to the cement and blossomed into rosy puddles.

The razor wove through the air like a conductor’s baton during a tense musical movement. Mertz, without time for so much as a wimper, went to pieces.

Then the dark man came for me. I pulled the revolver and snapped off six shots. It didn’t bother him. I fumbled for my speed loader and pushed in six more. I shot straight at his face now, all six, rapid fire. I could see where the loads were striking him on the cheeks and chin and below the nose, but the holes closed up rapidly as if his flesh were quicksand and my bullets were no more than a series of sad little victims who had stumbled in.

He was so close I could smell him. An odor like exhaust fumes, factory smoke, and open sewers.

The razor went up and caught the light. I ducked low, leaped, and rolled and tumbled over the subway landing, hitting my back across one of the rails. The impact sent a jolt through my spine, and momentarily I was paralyzed. I expected to look up and see the leering face of that big bastard looking over the landing at me, showing me his razor.

That didn’t happen. I felt a vibration in the rails that told me a train was coming. I managed to get up and limp to the far side, nestle myself into an indention there with my back against the wall.

I still had my .38, but I was out of shells, and besides, what did it matter? As a matter of habit, I put it in its holster.

Crider and the three plainclothes had heard the shots and they came running. They were almost on the big guy. They were firing their guns, and not having any better luck than I had.

I yelled, “Run for it,” but they didn’t hear me above the shots and the thunder of the oncoming train. Just as that top-hatted behemoth grabbed Crider by the throat and lifted him above his head and slashed at one of the plainclothes with the razor, the train jetted in front of me and all there was for me to see was its metal side and its many lighted windows—a rickity-tick-tack of glass and steel.

I pushed back as tight as I could against the wall and felt the wind from the train and heard the screech and rattle of the rails, trying not to imagine what horrors were occurring across the way.

It seemed like a century, but the train finally went by and I saw that the big man was gone from the landing. Crider and the plainclothes were spread all over it. It looked like a slaughterhouse floor. On the wall, written in large, bloody letters was: COMPLIMENTS OF SUBWAY JACK—5 MORE AND THAT MAKES 8. I DON’T JUST DO THE LADIES. Some distance away, heading topside up the steps, I could see Barrett. He was stumbling. The razor dangled from his hand as if it were a long, silver finger.

I got out the walkie-talkie and tried to make my voice firm. “Batman. He’s coming up. He’s Barrett now. It’s like that book says. It’s for real. He changes.”

“I got him, Jim.”

Under most circumstances I would have believed that. I’ve seen Batman take some weird ones. But this time . . . even Batman might not be enough.

I got my feet under me and went across the rails and pulled myself onto the landing, then started toward the steps after Barrett.

BATMAN (topside)

Batman, he’s thinking about what Jim said, about how Barrett changes, about that book,
Followers of the Razor
and about the God of the Razor; he’s thinking if Jim says it’s so, then it’s so, and he feels something rare for him, something that matches the moments in his dreams when he sees his parents die and feels the presence of the man-bat at his back, and that rare thing is almost impossible for him to identify—but that rare thing is fear. A quick skuttle goes up his backbone and hits his brain, and then melts away as all his experience and training takes over and he sees Barrett coming out of the subway, wild-eyed, looking up at the sky, trying to spot the moon.

Instinctively, Batman cranes his neck and sees that the moon is behind those rain clouds that were promised, and then he looks back at Barrett who is racing across the street at a lumbering run that makes him look like a puppet being jerked along by strings.

Traffic is nonexistent at this early morning hour, and Batman crosses the street easily, making good time and gaining on Barrett. Then everything becomes lighter, touched with silver, and Batman knows the moon is out. He sees that when Barrett puts his right foot forward it is dressed not in a shoe but in a head, and then the left foot goes forward and it is the same, and then the man running before him, moving much faster, is not Barrett, but the dimensional creature Webb called the God of the Razor.

The God of the Razor leaps more than he runs, and Batman thinks of the legends of Spring-heel Jack, then pours it on, trying to close, wondering in the back of his mind what he’ll do with this thing if he catches it.

Up they go, the God of the Razor leading Batman through a narrow, twisting path that winds its way through brush and shrubs and trees, and Batman knows they are fast approaching the top of the hill where the walls of Old Gotham Cemetery stand.

The God is really moving and he’s almost to the cemetery wall, and with a flex of his whip-thin legs he leaps up and out and over it, effortlessly as a kangaroo, and the weak little shadow of Barrett follows after him and slips over the wall like a wet, pink sheet.

Batman reaches the wall, jumps and grabs and swings himself over. And the clouds have done their trick again. Standing by the stone cross that marks the grave of Rufus Jefferson—the dark open tomb yawning to his right—is Barrett, head hung low, the razor held loosely against his leg.

“It isn’t me,” Barrett says, his voice weak as a signal from space. “I got no control. Nothing stops the power of the moon but the clouds. Just the clouds. Long as he’s got the moon and the need, he’s got control. You got to know it’s not me. It’s him.”

Barrett waves the razor at the God’s shadow that is thin and watery, bent, and partially out of sight down the open grave.

“I know, son,” Batman says, and he moves quickly toward Barrett. “Give me the razor and we’ll set you free.”

“Not like that,” Barrett says. “Can’t give it to you. Not the way you want anyway. Not the way I want. Just the way he wants. I . . .”

The clouds twirl away from the face of the moon.

JAMES W. GORDON

I saw Batman cross the street and head toward the brush and trees that bunched at the bottom of the cemetery hill. I went after him.

I couldn’t keep up with him, he was moving too fast. The cigar smoke that lived in my lungs wasn’t helping either. When I got to the cemetery wall I saw the last of Batman’s cape going over. Then I saw Barrett topping the rise of the hill inside the cemetery; the hill that was higher than the cemetery walls.

My back was killing me. My sides felt as if they were being skewered. I couldn’t help myself. I dropped to one knee and tried to get my wind.

When the skewers quit twisting, I got up, staggered to the wall, and dragged myself over.

When I hit the ground it wasn’t Barrett standing on the hill, it was the big top-hatted monster. The little pale shadow of Barrett was thin as watered milk and getting thinner. I guess the God of the Razor was growing stronger and stronger, and Barrett weaker and weaker, with every transformation.

Batman was charging up the hill with his head slightly bent, charging like a locomotive. His cloak fanned out high and wide behind him like a Japanese fan. Then he ducked and the cape dropped down some and I could see the faces of the monster and the flash of his razor as it sliced off part of Batman’s cape and sent it fluttering away. Then Batman leaped high as the big guy bent low and swiped back at Batman’s ankles. When Batman came down, he brought his fists together at the back of the big guy’s head.

It didn’t seem to do much. Maybe it made him mad. The big guy jerked upright and his top hat didn’t even sway. He raised his arm above his head and brought the razor down like a hammer.

Batman shot out a hand and grabbed the big wrist, stopping the blow. The big guy used his other hand to grab Batman’s throat and—

SPLASH PANEL

Complete Side View Body Shots of Batman and the God of the Razor:
The scene is dark, but not too dark. (Don’t forget that cold slice of moon.) Batman’s head is being pushed back and his teeth are clenched and we can see the muscles swelling in his jaw. His muscles push out his costume in the shoulders, arms, and legs. He has his left hand up, holding back the hand with the razor, and he is using his right hand to push at the God’s other wrist, trying to break the strangle hold the God has on his throat. Batman’s cape is twisted and we can see it hanging limp and touching the ground as his knees are bent and he is forced back.

The God of the Razor looks happy as a winning politician. His smile is so wide his teeth are brushing his ear lobes. His left eye (the only one visible to us) appears to be lit from within by a hot, red bulb. His ragged coat is bulging with muscles. His thin legs are knotted with the same, and his prominent head-shoe is splitting across the forehead and teeth are popping out of the mouth like popcorn because of the pressure of his left-leg-forward stance. Barrett’s pathetic, near colorless shadow is flowing loose and distorted into the darkness of the open grave.

In the background is a great oak tree. Through its naked branches we can see the silver curve of the moon, and to the right of that, a dark cloud.

A yellow block at the bottom of the panel alerts us to what Batman sees as his head is being slowly pushed back:

IN WHAT SEEMED LIKE HIS FINAL MOMENTS, BATMAN SAW A DARK RAIN CLOUD ABOUT TO SLIDE OVER THE FACE OF THE FRAGMENTED MOON LIKE A WOOL MASK.

JAMES W. GORDON

—I pounded up the hill toward them and dove for the big guy’s leg, grabbing him just above the knee.

I might as well have been a flea. He kicked me off and I tumbled away.

I was on my hands and knees, about to try it again, when suddenly it grew darker, and in that same instant, Batman, still clinging to the big guy, dropped to his right side and stuck out his foot to catch the creep’s knee and send him flipping forward toward the open grave.

Just before he disappeared into the darkness, I saw that it was Barrett falling, the big guy’s shadow following after him like black silk sliding over polished bone.

From inside the tomb came a snapping sound, and Batman rolled to a squatting position and produced from his utility belt a little penlight. He shone it into the grave. I went up the hill and stood behind him and looked down into the little pool of light. I watched as Batman moved it up and down Barrett’s body.

Barrett lay face up with his back across the steps. His head was pointing down, and his legs had swiveled so far his buttocks were pointing up. You didn’t have to be a doctor to know his spine was snapped.

His right hand was outstretched and open. The hilt of the razor was in his palm, the blade gleamed against a damp, moss-covered, stone step.

It started to rain.

BATMAN CASE FILE A-4567-C, last of the informal notes (computer entry—November 1)

The Barrett boy was boxed up and sent home to his parents. I don’t know what Jim told them—an accident of some kind, I think. Whatever he said, it wasn’t enough. No one could say enough, but at least Barrett won’t be charged for his crimes. It won’t look good on Jim’s record that Subway Jack got away. The files will read OPEN, but that’s fair play for Barrett. The killings have stopped and it wasn’t Barrett anyway. It was the God of the Razor, and he’s gone to his dimension to wait for some other fool to let him loose.

That won’t be as easy next time.

Jim and I carefully stored the razor in a metal box and hid it. After Barrett and what was left of Jim’s men were hauled away, we took the box and put it in a metal drum and filled the drum with concrete. We let it set and harden. The next night we met at the docks and took a police launch out to the middle of Gotham Bay and pushed the drum overboard.

It’s deep there. I like to think that’s the end of the bad things the razor can do. It won’t bring Jim’s men back, and it won’t bring those bag ladies back, and it won’t bring Jack Barrett back, but at least it’s out of sight and grasp of others.

When we were through we sat there on the boat and looked at the water, watching the bay gather in drops of rain. I thought about my parents and how their deaths had led me to become Batman. I thought about my strangest cases. I thought about the God of the Razor, over there safe and happy in his wild dimension. I thought about a lot of things.

Then, just before morning, the light rain stopped and I looked out at the water where we had pushed over the barrel, and there on the face of the bay was the wavering reflection of

the . . .

. . . moon.

This story is for Keith Lansdale

The Sound of
One Hand Clapping

A BATMAN AND ROBIN STORY

Max Allan Collins