Carrion Comfort (30 page)

“I don’t know,” said Saul. “This Melanie Fuller, she was one of them?”

“Yes, almost certainly.”

“And it could’ve been her?”

“Yes.”

“And you’re sure this Nina Drayton woman is dead?”

“Yes. I went to the morgue. I saw crime scene photographs. I read the autopsy report.”

“But she might have killed my father before she died?”

Saul hesitated. “It is possible,” he said. “And Borden— the Oberst— he’s supposed to have died when that plane blew up Friday.”

Saul nodded. “Do you think he’s dead?” asked Natalie. Saul said, “No.”

Natalie stood up and paced back and forth on the small porch. “Do you have any proof that he might still be alive?” she asked.

“No.”

“But you think he is?”

“Yes.”

“And either he or the Fuller woman could have killed my father?”

“Yes.”

“And you’re still going after him? After Borden . . . von Borchert . . . what ever he’s called?”

“Yes.”

“Jesus H. Christ.” Natalie went into the house and came back out with two glasses of brandy. She gave one to Saul and drank the other in one long gulp. She pulled a pack of cigarettes out of the pocket of her sweater, found matches, and lit a cigarette with shaking hands.

“Those are not good for you,” said Saul quietly.

Natalie made a short, sharp sound. “These people are vampires, aren’t they?” she said.

“Vampires?” Saul shook his head, not quite understanding. “They use other people and then throw them away like plastic wrappers or something,” she said. “They’re like those goddamn corny vampires you see on the late show only these people are
real
.”

“Vampires,” said Saul and realized that he had spoken in Polish. “Yes,” he said in English, “it is not a bad analogy.”

“All right,” said Natalie, “what do we do now?”

“We?” Saul was startled. He rubbed his hands on his knees. “We,” said Natalie and there was something like anger in her voice. “You and I. Us. You didn’t tell me that whole story just to kill time. You need an ally. All right, so what’s our next step?”

Saul shook his head and scratched at his beard. “I am not sure why I told you all of this,” he said. “But . . .”

“But what?”

“It is very dangerous. Francis, the others . . .”

Natalie crossed the space, crouched, and touched his arm with her right hand. “My father’s name was Joseph Leonard Preston,” she said softly. “He was forty-eight years old . . . would have been forty-nine next February sixth. He was a good person, a good father, a good photographer, and a very poor businessman. When he laughed . . .” Natalie paused a second. “When he laughed it was very hard not to laugh with him.”

For several seconds she crouched there silently, touching his wrist near the faded blue number tatooed there. Then she said, “What do you do next?”

Saul took a breath. “I’m not sure. I need to fly to Washington this Saturday to see someone who might have some information . . . information that might let us know if the Oberst is still alive. It is improbable that my . . . contact will have such information.”

“Then what?” pressed Natalie. “Then we wait,” said Saul. “Wait and watch. Search the newspaper.”

“The newspapers?” said Natalie. “Search for what?”

“For more murders,” said Saul.

Natalie blinked and rocked back on her heels. The cigarette she was holding in her right hand had burned low. She stubbed it out on the wooden floorboards. “You’re serious? Surely this Fuller woman and your Oberst would leave the country . . . go into hiding . . . something. Why would they get involved in this sort of thing again so soon?”

Saul shrugged. He suddenly felt very weary. “It is their nature,” he said. “Vampires must feed.”

Natalie stood and walked to the corner of the porch. “And when you . . . when
we
find them, what do we do?” she asked.

“We will decide then,” said Saul. “First we must find them.”

“To kill a vampire you have to drive a stake through its heart,” said Natalie.

Saul said nothing.

Natalie took out another cigarette but did not light it. “What if you get close to them and they find out you’re after them,” she said. “What if they come after
you
?”

“That could make it much simpler,” said Saul.

Natalie was about to speak when a tan automobile with county markings stopped at the curb. A heavyset man with a florid face under a creased Stetson stepped out of the driver’s side. “Sheriff Gentry,” said Natalie.

They watched as the overweight officer stood staring at them and then approached slowly, almost hesitantly. Gentry stopped at the porch step and removed his hat. His sunburned face held the expression of a young boy who has seen something terrible.

“Mornin’, Ms. Preston, Professor Laski,” said Gentry. “Good morning, Sheriff,” said Natalie.

Saul looked at Gentry, so much the caricature of a Southern cop, and sensed there the same keen intelligence and sensitivity he had felt the day before. The man’s eyes belied much of the rest of his appearance.

“I need help,” said Gentry and there was an edge of pain to his voice. “What kind of help?” asked Natalie. Saul could hear affection in her voice.

Sheriff Gentry looked down at his hat. He creased the crown with a graceful motion of his chubby, pink hand, and looked up at both of them. “I’ve got nine citizens dead,” he said. “The way they died doesn’t make a damn bit of sense no matter which way you put it together. A couple of hours ago I stopped a fellow with nothing in his wallet but a picture of me. Rather’n talk to me, this fellow cuts his own throat.” Gentry looked at Natalie and then at Saul. “Now for some reason,” he said, “for some reason that doesn’t make any more sense than any of the rest of this godawful mess, I have a hunch that you two folks might be able to help.”

Saul and Natalie returned his stare in silence. “Can you?” asked Gentry at last. “
Will
you?”

Natalie looked at Saul. Saul scratched his beard for a second, removed his glasses and put them back on, looked back at Natalie, and nodded slightly.

“Come inside, Sheriff,” said Natalie, holding open the front door. “I’ll make some lunch. This may take awhile.”

T
ony Harod and Maria Chen had breakfast in the small hotel dining room. They were downstairs by seven
A.M.
, but the first wave of breakfasters had already eaten and left for the ski trails. There was a fire crackling in the stone fireplace and Harod could see white snow and blue sky through the small, paned window on the south wall.

“Do you think he will be there?” Maria Chen asked softly as they finished their coffee.

Harod shrugged. “How the fuck would I know?” Yesterday he had been sure that Willi would
not
be at the family estate, that the old producer
had
died in the jet crash. He remembered the mention of the family estate from a conversation he and Willi had held five years before. Harod had been quite drunk; Willi had just returned from a three-week trip to Eu rope and suddenly with tears in his eyes, he said, “Who says you cannot go home again, eh, Tony? Who says?” and then gone on to describe his mother’s home in southern Germany. Naming the nearby town had been a slip. Harod had seen the trip as a way to eliminate a disturbing possibility, nothing more. But now, in the sharp morning light, with Maria Chen sitting across from him with the 9mm Browning in her purse, the improbable seemed all too possible.

“What about Tom and Jensen?” asked Maria Chen. She was dressed in stylish blue corduroy knickers, high socks, a pink turtleneck, and a heavy blue and pink ski sweater that had cost six hundred dollars. Her dark hair was tied back into a short ponytail and even with makeup on she looked fresh and well scrubbed. Harod thought she looked like a young Eurasian girl scout out for a day’s skiing with her dad’s friends.

“If you have to eliminate them, take Tom out first,” he told her. “Willi tends to Use Reynolds more easily than he does the nigger. But Luhar is strong . . .
very
strong. Make sure that if he goes down he stays down. But if push comes to shove, it’s
Willi
you have to take out first. In the
head
. Eliminate him and Reynolds and Luhar aren’t any threat. They’re so well conditioned that they can’t take a piss without Willi’s OK.”

Maria Chen blinked and looked around her. The other four tables were filled with laughing, talking German couples. No one appeared to have heard Harod’s soft instructions.

Harod gestured the waitress over for more coffee, sipped the black brew, and frowned. He did not know if Maria Chen would carry out his instructions when it came to shooting people. He
assumed
she would— she had never disobeyed an order before— but for a second he wished he had a woman along who was not a Neutral. But if his agent was not Neutral, then there was always the chance that Willi could turn the person for his own Use. Harod had no illusions about the old kraut’s Ability— the mere fact that Willi had kept two catspaws around him showed the strength of the bastard’s power. Harod had believed that Willi’s Ability had indeed faded— dulled by age, drugs, and decades of decadence— but in light of recent events it would be foolish and dangerous to continue to act on that assumption. Harod shook his head. Goddamn it. That fucking Island Club already had him by the balls. Harod had no interest in getting involved with that ancient Charleston broad. Anyone who had played that goddamn game with Willi Borden— von Borchert— whatever the fuck his name was— for fifty years, was not someone Tony Harod wanted to mess with. And what would Barent and his asshole buddies do when they found out that Willi was alive?
If
he was alive. Harod remembered his reaction six days earlier when the call came about Willi’s death. First there had come the wave of concern— What about all of the projects Willi was developing? What about the money?— then the rush of relief. The old son of a bitch was dead at last. Harod had spent years containing his secret terror that the old man would find out about the Island Club, about Tony’s spying . . .

“I imagine Paradise as an Island where one can Hunt to his heart’s content, eh, Tony?”
Had Willi really said that on the videotape? Harod remembered the sensation of being immersed in ice water that had hit him when Willi’s image had spoken those words. But there was no way that Willi could have known. And besides, the videotape had been made before the airline crash. Willi was dead.

And if he wasn’t killed then, thought Harod, he soon would be. “Ready?” he said.

Maria Chen dabbed at her lips with a linen napkin and nodded. “Let’s go,” said Tony Harod.

“So that’s Czech oslovakia?” said Harod. As they drove northwest out of town he caught a glimpse past the train station of a border-crossing barrier, a small white building, and several guards in green uniforms and oddly shaped helmets. A small road sign read
Übergangsstelle
.

“That’s it,” agreed Maria Chen. “Big damn deal,” said Harod. He drove up the winding valley road, past turn-off signs to the Grosse Arber and the Kleine Arbersee. On a distant hill he could see the white slash of a ski run and the moving dots of a chair lift. Small cars with tire chains and ski racks darted up roads that were little more than corridors of packed ice and snow. Harod shivered as cold air blew in the rear windows of their rented car. The tips of two sets of cross-country skis Maria Chen had rented that morning at the hotel protruded through a gap in the rear window on the passenger’s side. “Do you think we’ll need those damn things?” he asked, jerking his head toward the backseat.

Maria Chen smiled and raised ten lacquered nails. “Perhaps,” she said. She looked at the Shell road map and cross-checked with a topographic map. “Next left,” she said. “Then six kilometers to the private access road.”

The BMW had to slip and slide the last kilometer and a half up the “access road” that was nothing more than two ruts in the snow between trees. “Someone’s been up here recently,” said Harod. “How far to the estate?”

“One more kilometer after the bridge,” said Maria Chen.

The road took a turn through a thick cluster of bare trees and the bridge came into sight— a small wooden span behind a striped barrier more solid-looking than the roadblock on the Czech border. There was a small, alpine-looking hut twenty yards downstream. Two men emerged and walked slowly toward the car. Harod half expected everyone in these rustic parts to dress in the winter equivalent of lederhosen and felt caps, but these two wore brown wool pants and bright goose-down jackets. Harod thought they looked like father and son, the younger man in his late twenties. The son carried a hunting rifle loosely in the crook of his arm.

“Guten Morgen, haben Sie sich verfahren?”
asked the older man with a smile.
“Das hier ist ein Privatgrundstück.”

Maria Chen translated. “They wish us good morning and ask if we’re lost. They say this is private property.”

Harod smiled at the two. The older man showed gold caps in a return grin; the son showed no expression. “We’re not lost,” said Harod. “We’ve come out to see Willi— Herr von Borchert. He invited us. We came all the way from California.”

When the older man frowned his incomprehension, Maria Chen translated in rapid-fire German.

“Herr von Borchert lebt hier nicht mehr,”
said the older man.
“Schon seit vielen Jahren nicht mehr. Das Gut ist schon seit sehr langer Zeit geschlossen. Niemand geht mehr dorthin.”

“He said that Herr von Borchert’s no longer living,” translated Maria Chen. “Not for many years. The estate is closed. It’s been closed for a very long time. No one goes there.”

Harod grinned and shook his head. “Then how come you guys are still guarding the place, huh?”

“
Warum lassen Sie es noch bewachen
?” asked Maria Chen.

The old man smiled. “
Wir werden von der Familie bezahlt, so dab
dort kein Vandalismus entsteht,”
said the old man.
“Bald wird all das ein Teil des Nationalwaldes werden. Die alten Häuser werden abgerissen. Bis dahin schickt der Neffe uns Schecks aus Bonn, und wir halten alle Wilddiebe und Unbefugte fern, so wie es mein Vater vor mir getan hatte. Mein Sohn wird sich andere Arbeit suchen müssen
.
”

“The family pays us to see that no vandalism occurs,” translated Maria Chen. “Uh . . . sometime soon . . . someday soon, this will be part of the National Forest. The old home will be torn down. Until then, the nephew . . . von Borchert’s nephew, I guess Tony . . . the nephew sends us checks from Bonn and we keep poachers and trespassers out, just as my father did before me. My son will have to seek work.” She added, “They’re not going to let us in, Tony.”

Harod handed the man a small three-page treatment of Bill Borden’s upcoming project
The White Slaver.
A hundred-mark note was just visible between the pages. “Tell him that we came all the way from Hollywood to scout locations,” said Harod. “Tell him that the old estate would make a great haunted castle.”

Maria Chen did so. The old man looked at the flier and the money, and casually handed both back.
“Ja, es wäre eine wunderbare Kulisse für einen Gruselfilm. Es besteht kein Zweifel, dab es hier spukt. Aber ich glaube, dab es keine weiteren Gespenster braucht. Ich schlage vor, dab Sie umdrehen, so dab Sie hier nicht stecken bleiben. Grüb Gott!”

“What’d he say?” demanded Harod. “He agreed that the estate would make an excellent set for a horror movie,” said Maria Chen. “He says that it is indeed haunted. He doesn’t think it needs more ghosts. He tells us to turn around here so we don’t get stuck and wishes us a good day.”

“Tell him to go fuck himself,” said Harod while smiling at both men.
“Vielen Dank für Ihre Hilfe,”
said Maria Chen
. “Bitte sehr,”
said the old man
.
“Think nothing of it,” said the young man with the rifle
.

Harod drove the BMW back down the long lane, turned west on the German equivalent of a country road, and drove half a mile before parking the car in shallow snow fifteen feet from a fence. He took wire cutters out of the trunk and snipped the fence in four places. He used his boots to kick the strands apart. The cut would not be visible from the road because of the trees and there was little traffic. Harod went back to the car, exchanged his mountain boots for cross-country ski boots with funny toes, and let Maria Chen help him into his skis.

Harod had been skiing twice, both times on cross-country tours at Sun Valley, once with Dino de Laurentiis’s niece and Ann-Margret, and he had hated the experience.

Maria Chen left her purse in the car, slipped the Browning in the waist-band of her knickers under her sweater, put an extra clip in the pocket of a goose-down vest, hung a small pair of binoculars around her neck, and led the way through the cut in the fence. Harod poled clumsily along behind.

He fell down twice in the first mile, both times cursing to himself as he struggled back to his feet while Maria Chen watched with a slight smile. There was no sound except for the soft sloosh of their skis, occasional squirrel chatter, and the ragged bellows of Harod’s breathing. When they had gone about two miles, Maria Chen stopped and consulted her compass and the topographic map.

“There’s the stream,” she said. “We can cross it down at that log. The estate should be in the clearing about another kilometer
that
way.” She pointed toward a dense section of forest.

Three football fields more
, thought Harod as he fought to catch his breath. He remembered the hunting rifle the young guy had been carrying and realized how useless the Browning would be in a match-up between the two. And for all he knew, Jensen and Luhar and a dozen other of Willi’s slaves were waiting in the woods with Uzis and Mac-10s. Harod forced in another breath and noticed the tension in his gut.
Fuck it
, he thought. He’d busted his ass to come this far. He wasn’t leaving until he found out if Willi was there.

“Let’s do it,” he said. Maria Chen nodded, slipped the map in her pocket, and skied gracefully ahead.

There were two corpses in front of the house.

Harod and Maria Chen huddled behind a thin screen of spruce trees and took turns looking through the binoculars at the bodies. From fifty yards away the two dark lumps in the snow could have been anything— bundles of abandoned laundry perhaps— but the binoculars showed the pale curve of a white cheek, the sprawl of limbs twisted at an angle that would have brought excruciating pain to a sleeping person. These two were not sleeping.

Harod peered again. Two men. Dark overcoats. Leather gloves. One had been wearing a brown fedora; it lay six feet away on the snow. The snow itself was spattered with blood around the two bodies. A trail of red joined the footprints to the large french door of the old manor. Another thirty yards to the east, there were deep parallel gouges in the snow, another trail of footsteps to or from the house, and great circular ridges of powdery snow as if a huge fan had been pointed downward.
Helicopter
, thought Harod.

There were no signs of automobiles, snowmobiles, or other ski trails. The lane that connected with the entry road where he and Maria had been stopped earlier was little more than a snowy break between the trees. They could not see the alpine cabin or bridge from here.

The main house itself was something more than a typical mansion, definitely something less than a castle. A huge heap of dark stones and narrow windows, the estate broke off into wings and levels, giving the impression it had started out as an imposing central hall and been added onto over the generations. The color of stone and size of windows changed here and there, but the overall effect remained gloomy: dark stone, little glass, narrow doors, heavy walls painted with the shadow of bare trees. Harod thought that it suited Willi’s personality better than the banana republic villa in Bel Air.

“What now?” whispered Maria Chen. “Shut up,” said Harod and lifted the binoculars to look at the two corpses again. They lay not far apart. The face of one was turned away, almost buried in the deep snow so that Harod caught only a glimpse of dark, short-cut hair stirring slightly when the breeze came up, but the other one, the one lying on its back, showed pale cheek and an open, white eye staring toward the line of evergreens as if awaiting Harod’s arrival. Harod guessed that they had not been dead long. It did not look like the birds or animals had been at them.