The Loo Sanction (27 page)

Darling laughed dryly. “That's hard lines for you, mate. I guess you struck out. Now you just rest there. I'll be back in a couple of hours to shoot you.”

“Oh?”

“With more dope. It only lasts four or five hours.”

“Oh, I'm sorry about that. But then, all things are mutable. Except change, of course. I mean . . . change can't be mutable because . . . well, it's like all generalizations being false . . . and angels on the point of a pin. You know what I mean?”

But Darling had left, locking the door behind him.

Jonathan lay nude, spread-eagle on his back, watching with awe and admiration the permutations of the ceiling rectangle into parallelograms and trapezoids. Amazing that he had never noticed that before.

He was cold. Sweating and cold. There were no blankets on the bed. Only one sheet. And the chintzy bastards had taken his clothes!

He pulled the corner of the sheet over his chest and gripped it hard as he felt his body rise, up past the images and ideas above him. He tried to focus on those images and ideas, but they vanished under concentration, like the dim stars that can only be seen in peripheral vision.

It seemed that he had to get out of there. Go to a museum with MacTaint. For some reason . . . for some reason.

It was true what Darling had said. He had well and truly struck out. Struck out. Struck out.

         

Later—four minutes? four hours?—he tried to get up. Nausea. The floor rippled when he stood on it, so he knelt and put his forehead on the rug, and that was better.

Yes! He had to go with MacTaint to get the films from within the Marini
Horse.
Of course! But it was cold. His skin was clammy to the touch.

The window.

Then the pattern on the rug caught his attention. Beautiful, brilliant, and in constant subtle motion. Beautiful.

Forget the rug! The window!

He crawled over to it, repeating the word “window” again and again so he wouldn't forget what he was doing. He pulled himself up and looked out. Fog. Almost evening. He had been out for hours. They would be back soon to shoot him up again.

With both hands he lifted the latch and pushed the window open. He had to wrap his arms around the center post of the casement before he dared to put his head out and look down.

No way. Never. The room was on the top floor. Red tile eaves overhung the window, and below there was a deadfall of three stories to a flagstone terrace. The building was faced with flush-set stone. No cracks, no mortise, no ledges to the window casements.

No way. Even in his prime as a climber, he could not have descended that face without an abseil rope.

Abseil rope. He turned back into the room, almost fainting with the suddenness of the movement.

Nothing. Only the sheet. Too short. That was why they had taken away his bedding.

He was able to walk back to the bed. He reeled, and he had to catch himself on the bedpost, but he had not had to crawl. His mind was clearing. Another half hour, maybe. Then he would be able to move about. He would be able to think. But he didn't have a half hour. They would be back before that.

He lay flat on his back on the bed, shivering with the cold that seemed to come from within his bones. The euphoria had passed, and a dry nausea had replaced it. Now, try to think. How to get rid of the effect quickly when they came back and shot him up again? He had to think it out before they returned, and he again sank into the pleasant, deadly euphoria.

Yes. Burn the dope up! With exercise. As soon as they left next time, he would start exercising. Make the blood flow quickly. Precipitate the effects and burn them off. That might work! That might give him half an hour to move and think before they returned to give him the third dose.

Oh, but he would forget! Once the crap was in him, he would lie there and groove on the ceiling, forgetting to exercise. He would forget his plan.

He looked around the room desperately. There was a narrow mantelpiece over an ornate hearth that had been blocked up. That would do. He would have four or five clear minutes after they put the dope in him and before it got into his bloodstream. During that time, he would exercise furiously to force the onset of the effects. Then, before he started to trip out, he would climb up on the mantel, where he would do isometrics to keep the heart pumping, to get the crap through him and out. And if his mind wandered, if the dope started to float him away, he would fall from the mantel ledge. That would snap him out of it. And if he could, he would climb back and begin exercising again. Somehow he would force the effects to pass off more quickly. He would gain time before the third needle.

Now relax. Empty your head.

There was a sound down the hall. They were returning.

Relax. Make them think you're still out. He produced the image of a still pond on the backs of his eyelids. This time control mattered. He had to get under quickly.

Darling preceded Leonard into the room. He clicked on the lights, and they advanced on the bed with its still form stretched over a wrinkled puddle of sheet.

“Still out,” Darling said, as he opened the black leather case. “Gor, what's this? Look at him! The sweat's fair pouring off him! He's cold! Here. Put your hand on his chest. Feel his heart thumping there. What do you think, Leonard? Maybe he's one of them low tolerance blokes. Another dose might do for him.”

But Leonard took the syringe from Darling's hand and, snapping Jonathan over by his arm, drove the needle into the shoulder muscle and squirted home the contents, not caring if there was air in the ampul.

“He didn't even flinch,” Darling said. “Took the fun out of it for you, didn't it? I told you he was out. If he dies before Mr. Strange wants, remember that I'm not taking the blame.”

They left, turning out the lights and locking the door behind them.

Slowly, Jonathan opened his eyes. He allowed his body's demand for oxygen to take control of his breathing rate. He felt all right; weak but in control. But he knew that the delightful killer was in there, mixing with his blood. He rose from bed as hastily as his sketchy balance would allow and brought the small sheet with him to the open window. After some fumbling, he tied one end of it to the center post, allowing the seven feet of slack to dangle outside. Then he lay down on the floor and began exercising. Sit-ups until his stomach muscles quivered, then push-ups.

For more than a minute, he sensed no effect from the dope. Up. Down. Up. Down. Up—and up, and up. He seemed to rise so slowly, so effortlessly. That's it, he told himself. The exercise was working. He was bringing it on quickly. He decided it was time to get on the mantel. He stood up. But the room was telescoping on him—all the lines rushing into the corners in exaggerated foreshortening.

“God,” he muttered. “I waited too long! It's coming too fast!”

The gas hearth was there, way over on the other side of the room. He put his arms out and leaned toward it, hoping he would reel and fall in that direction. But the crash came from behind. He had staggered backward and hit the wall behind him. The room seemed filled with the rasp of his breathing. He was afraid they would hear it.

Can't walk to it. Get down on the floor and crawl. Safer. Beautiful. Beautiful rug. Oh, no! He was alone in an endless sea of floor. He didn't know which direction to go. He could see the mantelpiece when he looked up, but it kept changing directions, and it didn't get any nearer.

He sat on the floor, one foot under him, the other leg stretched out before him, his head hanging down and his chin on his chest, his oral breathing shallow and rapid. He felt weightless. And contented. He was comfortable, and it was too funny—this trying to find a mantel.

No! He ground his teeth together and forced himself to think. Keep crawling. Find a wall. Then crawl along it. Must lead to the hearth eventually.

He crawled on. Once he rested with his face in a corner of the room, and the walls felt soft and comfortable against his cheeks. He wanted so much to sleep. But he snapped himself out of it and crawled on. Then his hand touched marble—beautifully grained, somehow luminescent marble. That was the mantelpiece.

Now climb up on the ledge!

Too high. Too hard.

Climb.

Twice he slipped and fell back to the floor, and it took all his mental strength to resist the desire to stay there and enjoy the ceiling.

At last he stood on the narrow ledge of the mantel, his back against the wall, his arms cruciform, fingers trying to hold on to the flowers in the wallpaper. He was frightened and his heart pounded. The floor, rippling and blurring, was so far down there.

Good. The fear was good. It made his pulse race. It would burn off the dope. Now exercise. Isometric tension . . . release. Tension . . . release.

He had the impression that he could see by means of darkness as other people saw by means of light. And so much darkness was coming in through the open window that he could see details in the room clearly. There were bursting sacs of light behind his eyes. The rug. Beautiful color. It floated up toward him slowly, seductively.

The pain and shock of the fall brought him briefly to his senses. He was lying facedown on the rug. He couldn't breathe through his nose. Blood. It didn't hurt. It made him want to sleep.

The climb back up was cerebral. His sense of balance was gone, along with his sense of direction. He had to tell himself that tops tend to be above bottoms. He had to think out the fact that leaning out would cause a fall. Eventually he was on the mantel ledge, on his knees. He could not stand. Kneeling, his chest now against the wall, he began the isometric exercises. Tension . . . release. Tension . . . release.

An infinity of timelessness passed. He needed to sleep. Right now. He rested back on the supporting air.

This time, he slept through the fall and crash.

The cold woke him up. He was sweating and cold. His mouth was dry from oral breathing, and his upper lip was stiff. He touched the stiff lip. It was flaky, gritty. The blood from his nose had congealed. He had been out for some time. But he knew from the nausea and the cold that the hallucinatory effects of the drug had passed. He was weak and dizzy, but he could think and he could move. He got to his hands and knees slowly and looked around the room. Dark shadows, a rectangle of gray city smear at the window. The window. He remembered.

With the help of the bedpost, he got to his feet and reeled to the window. The night air was freezing cold as it flowed over his sweating, naked body. He stood, supporting himself on the casement and sucking in great breaths of damp refreshing air. The sheet was still knotted about the center post.

Looking down, he could just make out the stone terrace three stories below. A mist of light from a room below spilled out over the wet flagstones. He climbed up onto the sill and stood in the frame. Then he gripped the underledge of the eaves and leaned out. And instantly he was overcome by vertigo, drowning in dizziness. Desperately, he scrambled back. Too soon. He would have to wait until the last moment. Just before they came in. Give his mind a chance to get as clear as it would ever be.

         

Leonard and Darling left their dart game with fellow employees and crossed the deserted Art Deco salon, their reflections following them along the wall of mirrors that hid the Aquarium. They took the long curving stairway two steps at a time because they were a little late for the next scheduled injection. Leonard unlocked the door, and Darling switched on the lights.

“Christ!” Darling ejaculated.

In a rush they checked the closet, the bathroom, and under the bed. Then Leonard noticed the open window and the sheet knotted around the center post. He slammed his fist against the casement in fury.

“The Guv won't half be browned off at this!” Darling said. “He'll have our arses for it!” He looked down to the terrace below. “Can't have got far. That sheet didn't help much. Must of broke both his legs. Come on!”

They ran from the room, Leonard charging down the staircase to examine the grounds, while Darling ran up the corridor to his room, where he snatched up the revolvers he had liberated from Jonathan's attaché case.

         

Head downward on the steep sloping roof, Jonathan lay tense and still. When he had heard them approaching the door, he had gripped the underedge of the eaves and swung out, tuck-rolling up and over. For a terrible moment, only the lower half of his body was on the slippery roof, his torso and head dangling over. The incline was greater than he had expected, and the sharp overlapping edges of the tiles prevented him from scrambling up. Only his fingertip hold on the underside of the edge prevented him from falling to the terrace below, but the pressure out against his reflexed wrists was agonizing and enervating. He clenched his teeth to keep from screaming with the pain as he pressed against his wrists with all his force, his jaw muscles roped and his head shuddering with the effort as he wriggled up against the sawtoothed set of the rough tile edges, gouging skin from his knees and rib cage and abrading his scrotum. His leverage was spent before he could get his chin past the eaves, and his angle on the roof was such that he could maintain his purchase only by keeping the throbbing wrists locked and by spreading his legs, increasing the area of traction to the maximum. Blood rushed to his head, and his racing pulse thrummed with dry lumps in his ears.

The lights came on in the room below, dimly illuminating the fog around him. He heard Darling say, “Christ!” then there was the sound of a search through the room. Would the sheet mislead them? His lungs needed air, and he opened his mouth wide to breathe, so the intake would make less noise. Some of the dope was still in him, making thought slimy and vision uncertain. The strength was leaking out of him, draining from his wrists and shoulders.

He slipped . . . only a couple of inches, but he couldn't get it back. Now even more weight over the edge. Vertigo. The dim flagstone terrace so far below. No strength. Wrists winced with pain.