“I’m sorry, ma’am,” he said, charming her with his smile, “but I do not partake of strong spirits.”
The waitress stared at him. “It’s just champagne.”
He wagged a finger. “Nonetheless. Spirits destroyed the prophet, you know.”
The waitress and Lenore exchanged a look, then a shrug. The waitress disappeared.
Lenore reached behind herself and snapped open the bustier.
“Just a moment,” he said, holding out a hand. “You don’t need to do that. I want to talk.”
“No doubt.” She pushed his hand away and crawled onto his lap. Her bare breasts tickled his nose.
“I mean it!” he said, holding her back. “This is not-”
“Do you want me to lose my job?”
He relaxed. Even in a semiprivate room, the night must have a thousand eyes. “At least give a man a chance to breathe, would you?”
Lenore giggled. “Whatever.” Her hips began to sway.
“That’s not necessary, either.”
“Got to please the client.”
“Rest assured you will receive my highest encomiums.”
“Just relax,” she said, stroking the back of his neck. “We have to look as if we’re doing proper business. Even if we’re not. Believe me, girls who don’t follow the rules don’t last long here. And I’ve got a living to make.”
“Some living. A girl your age. Performing lap dances for strangers.”
“I don’t do lap dances,” she replied. She squeezed her thighs together, tightening her grip on his groin. “I do friction dances. It’s my specialty.”
He felt his internal temperature rising.
“Now what is it you wanted to talk about, you stud?” she growled in his ear, her hips grinding. She was eager and energetic but not that practiced. “Don’t I interest you even a little?”
“This isn’t-isn’t-”
“I know what to do.” Her hand found the zippered fly of his trousers.
He knocked her hand away. “Stop!” This was becoming too intense, too potentially awkward. “I want to go somewhere private.”
“We are somewhere private.”
“Someplace else. Away from here. Someplace we can do… more than this. You know what I mean.”
“I don’t know if I think that’s a good idea…”
“Please. Vouchsafe me this one cherished boon.”
She peered at him with a harsh eye.”If we leave the club, I’ll be out for the entire evening.”
“Yes.”
“You’d have to compensate me for the loss. Me and the management.”
“I understand.”
“Do you? We’re talking, like, three thousand dollars here.”
“I can do that.”
She gave him a long look. “I can’t pretend it wouldn’t be good for me. Bring my average up. You’re sure?” She hesitated only the merest of moments. “Okay, I’ll do it.”
“Most munificent of you.”
“Let me clock out and get my coat.” She stopped just before she left the room. “You’re sure? You’re serious about this?”
He nodded, smiling pleasantly. “Dead serious.”
I was pumped. For the first time since I got out of the hospital I was actually feeling somewhat good. I might not have the case solved, but I’d had some breakthroughs-the eyewitness, and now the decoded messages. My first steps in the psychologically right direction.
I decided to treat myself. Dinner at Elmer’s. Not a million-course buffet, not fancy French cuisine. No elaborate décor. No décor at all, really. Just good old American down-home comfort food, ribs and chicken-fried steak served straight, at a very affordable price. Once upon a time, Vegas was famous for places like this, for their ninety-nine-cent all-you-can-eat shrimp and buck-ninety-nine filet mignon. Nowadays, the big resorts hired Michelin-quality chefs to entice people to pay for the prestige of a ridiculously overpriced meal in a room with minor French impressionist paintings. Wolfgang Puck had four restaurants here, for Pete’s sake.
Elmer’s was much more to my liking. It had a lot of sentimental value. David and I used to come here on our anniversary. I hadn’t been back since he died, and hadn’t wanted to. But I had a sense now that I was ready.
I felt like Dolly Levi after a long absence. I smiled at the maître d’, a freckle-faced kid engaged in a losing battle with acne. “Party of one, please. I’d like a table-”
“By the window. With a view of the skyline.” He grinned. “Good to see you again, Miss Pulaski.”
I was floored. “What a memory you must have.”
“Not at all. You’re one of our most regular customers.”
“I-you mean, before-”
“On the seventh, every month. It’s your anniversary date, right?”
“Well, yes, it was, but-”
“And you never miss a month. Very admirable.”
My neck stiffened. “But-I haven’t been here for more than a year.”
He blinked, still smiling. “You were just in last month.”
“I-was?”
“And the month before that. And the month before that.”
“But-I don’t…”
“Shall I have the bartender bring you your favorite?” He winked. “Or maybe we should save time and have him bring you a pitcher.”
My stomach felt like lead.
“When you’re finished, let me know. I’ll call you a cab.” He winked again. “I think that’s best, don’t you?”
The elation I’d felt before deflated like a collapsed artery. The gnawing in my gut, the panicky, breathless, acidic sensation reasserted itself. “All of a sudden, I-I’m not feeling well. Maybe I’ll skip dinner.”
I stumbled out of the restaurant, knowing damn well that I was not skipping dinner. Only mutating its form.
“Where are we going?” she asked as they made their way to his truck. She had pulled a white embroidered wrap-a kimono, perhaps?-around herself to cover her virtual nudity.
They arrived at the pickup. He opened the passenger side door for her. “Huh. I didn’t figure you for a pickup man.”
“What did you have in mind?”
“I don’t know. Thought you were more the Lexus type.”
He closed her door securely, then walked around to the other side. “I find my truck very practical. And reliable.”
“Yeah, I guess that’s right. Mind if I turn on the radio?”
He winced, ever so slightly. “Would it be more music such as what they play in your workplace?”
“Guess you’re pretty tired of that, huh?”
He smiled. “I don’t mean to be bilious with you. But one must have standards.” He looked over his shoulder, making sure the path behind him was clear. “That noise does not even qualify to be called music. It is an assault on the eardrums.”
“It wouldn’t be so bad if they didn’t play it so loud. But it helps with the dancing. And it creates a party atmosphere. Most of the girls are so stoned they don’t hear it anyway.” She glanced down at the seat. “What’s this?”
She had found the axe which he had left lying on the floor beneath the glove compartment.
“That’s… just what it appears to be. I have some stumps on my property that require removal.”
“Oh.” She handed it to him. “Creepy.” She slid into the seat. “Do you have one of those new places out in Grover Mills? I’ve heard those are-” She stopped again. “Now what’s this?”
Edgar turned. His eyeballs bulged as he realized what she had found. “Don’t-”
“There’s something rattling around in there.” She picked up a shoe box he had left under the seat. “I think it may be broken.”
She opened the box.
And screamed.
The box fell out of her hands and all of sweet Annabel’s teeth, all thirty-two of them, caked with blood, flew across the cab of the pickup.
“Oh, my God,” Lenore said, pressing her hands against her mouth.
“I can explain,” he said rapidly. “I’m a dentist and-”
“I heard about that girl-” She pushed open the passenger side door. “I’m getting out of here.”
He grabbed her arm. “Please don’t.”
“Look, keep your money. I’m leaving.”
“But I can explain.”
“Let me go!” She brought her fist down on his arm, as hard as she could. It was all he could do to hang on.
“Give me one more chance.”
“I’m not giving you anything, you pervert.” She sank her teeth into his wrist.
“Oww!” She’d hurt him, broken skin.
She scooted toward the door, but he managed to grab her shoulders and yank her back. The kimono slipped, exposing her. “Stop this immediately!”
“You stop, asshole.” She rolled back, bringing her legs around and kicking him in the face. He slammed back against the driver’s-side door.
She was already upright and moving toward the open door. With a sudden lunge, he sprang forward and grabbed her by the neck, then flung her head against the dash.
She was slowed, but not unconscious. “I’ll scream…,” she mumbled.
“No, you won’t.” He snatched a loaded syringe out of the glove compartment and jabbed it into her neck. “Sweet dreams, Lenore.”
It took more than a moment for him to regain his composure. Perhaps the insufferable music was a blessing after all, he noted, since it ensured that no one inside could possibly hear anything that happened out here.
He had to remember not to blame the girl. What could she know? She only acted out of fear, ignorance. He bent over and lightly brushed his lips across her forehead.
Thus I pacified Psyche and kissed her, / And tempted her out of her gloom…
He threw a tarp over her, hid the axe behind the seat, and pulled out onto the street.
That was sloppy, he scolded himself, driving away. He’d been clumsy, foolhardy, as if he wanted to be caught. And it had almost cost him everything.
He could take no more risks. His work was too important. She was the third, the final component in the sacred trinity. First Helen, then Annabel, and now Lenore. The chosen offerings. After this, there would be only rejoicing. He was the Instrument who would usher in the Golden Age. As it was meant to be. As it was foretold.
10
It was a miracle I woke at all, much less before nine o’clock. I didn’t know which was dragging me down more-the reading all night or the drinking all night. I’m not sure when I finally gave it up. I was in the middle of “A Tale of the Ragged Mountains”-a jolly Poe yarn about someone being killed via a poisonous leech-when my eyelids finally gave in.
A quick glance at the watch told me I had less than thirty minutes until I was supposed to pick up Darcy, who was about ten minutes away. My first instinct was to just grab my keys and go-what would he care if I was groomed or not? But O’Bannon might be lurking about, and he’d know something was up if I came in looking disheveled, distraught, or drunk. He’d fire my sweet ass in a heartbeat, and then I’d have no chance of reclaiming Rachel. So I showered quickly, steaming the smell out of my skin, and I brushed my teeth relentlessly.
I stared at the smoky brown liquid resting at the bottom of the bottle on my nightstand. If I polished that off, I could ditch the bottle. That would be smart. Get rid of the evidence, just in case Lisa or O’Bannon dropped by.
But if you start drinking first thing in the morning, I reminded myself…
Don’t be idiotic. It was barely a swallow. I raised the bottle to my lips and downed it. It burned going down, but it burned good.
And then I brushed my teeth some more.
I may have violated a few traffic regs making my way to O’Bannon’s, but they were minor ones, I’m sure. After I’d been in the car a few minutes, my cell beeped out the theme from
Dragnet.
“Pulaski.”
“Susan, it’s Colin. I’ve got something for you.”
“Talk to me, Einstein.”
“Those messages you left behind-they really are messages. Coded messages. I can confirm it.”
Since he couldn’t see my face, I figured it was safe to smile.
“It’s a code, but an insanely complex one. A normal substitution cipher has twenty-six characters, for obvious reasons. This one has three hundred and forty.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“And given the relative brevity of the messages, that leaves a lot of characters to decode on not much information. Over half of the symbols appear only one or two times. See, he starts by substituting each letter for another symbol, then transposes these symbols, creating a hybrid substitution-transposition cipher. The cipher alphabet changes after every seven letters. So each letter of the plaintext is represented by several different symbols in the cipher-text. It’s called polyalphabetic cryptology.”
“So,” I ventured, “have you cracked it?”
“No way. It’s a major accomplishment just to have figured out what it is. I suspect a full decoding will require one of those mainframe code-breaking computers at the CIA. All I have is a few words. That first cipher says something about a grave. A deep one, I think.”
“ ‘Deep, deep, and for ever, into some ordinary and nameless grave.’ ”
There was a pause. “Could be. Where’d you get that?”
“And the other one reads, ‘In the multiplied objects of the external world I had no thoughts but for the teeth.’ ”
“Teeth?” He fairly squealed into the receiver. “No wonder I didn’t- What kind of message is that?”
A damn good question. “You ever read Edgar Allan Poe?”
“ ‘The Gold Bug.’ ”
“ ‘The Gold Bug’?” I hadn’t gotten that far yet. “What’s that?”
“Short story. Big hunt for pirate treasure. Which they find by solving a substitution cipher.”
“Poe wrote about ciphers?”
“He was the first writer to ever use one in a story, if I’m not mistaken. He’s probably the granddaddy of American codes and code breaking. He was really into it. The story gives a mini-lecture on how to solve cryptograms. As I recall, he ran ciphers in whatever magazine he was editing at the time and challenged people to send him one he couldn’t crack. I don’t think he was ever stumped.”
Codes were important to Poe. And so of course they were important to anyone to whom Poe was important.