The Death Gods (A Shell Scott Mystery) (32 page)

Working with great
secrecy—to avoid raising false hope among victims of this deadly
disease—scores of experts at Omega had months ago succeeded in
perfecting the vaccine which had since then been successfully
mass-marketed in ready-to-inject sterile glass, and nitrogen-frozen
ampules, by scores of other experts toiling at Belking-Gray. Even
after reading the explanation by the
Times
medical expert, I don’t have
the faintest idea how all those other experts had done what they
did, but probably nobody else did, either.

Well, almost nobody. Those
Omega scientists, who almost certainly knew what they’d done,
included virologists, bacteriologists, biologists, serologists,
vampires, and an impressive array of other ologists and icians,
many of which I couldn’t even pronounce, much less spell without
looking them up. All of whom, it was several times noted, were
under the brilliant supervision of the “eminent” Dr. Wintersong.
Who, in other paragraphs was described as “scientific genius,”
former outstandingly successful neurosurgeon turned top ranking
researcher, award winner, and assuming the Wintersong-IFAI vaccine
fulfilled what was referred to as its almost-certain promise, an
“odds on favorite for the Nobel Prize in Medicine this
year.”

Indeed, Wintersong was
mentioned at least nineteen times, and Belking or Belking-Gray only
about half as often. But there was a separate story, an illustrated
lead article in the newspaper’s second section, about the
pharmaceutical tycoon and the imminent day-after-tomorrow grand
free-to-everybody-and-with-toys-for-the-children opening Hobart
Belking’s Wild Animal Museum. Wherein, come Monday morning, animal
lovers could view more than two hundred objects of their
affection--mounted, stuffed, but mostly freeze-dried “in amazingly
lifelike poses”—in mountain, desert, and jungle settings that were
“faithful replicas of their natural environments.”

I got a little shiver when
I read that, an involuntary goosebumpy rippling among my lumbar and
cervical vertebrae, or whatever those wiggly bones are: and,
remembering folks in black suits standing around the casket,
whispering, “Doesn’t Henry look natural?” decided to read more
about Belking’s amazingly-lifelike exhibits later. There were other
creatures of more interest and importance anyhow. Lots of
them.

Because it was revealed
that “thousands” of animal experiments—the FDA mandated test to
ensure safety and efficacy of any vaccine or drug or other poison
prior to its licensure and injection into or ingestion by real
living beings—had already been concluded. Concluded successfully,
and properly reported to the Food and Drug Administration. Which
after careful, but speedy, study had taken the bold but necessary
step of approving “final clinical trials” of the vaccine without
the usual lengthy delay, a delay during which “uncountable
additional victims of IFAI might otherwise die unnecessarily” due
to unavailability of the Wintersong vaccine. So, to prevent those
uncountable demises, the FDA had cut the usual time for approval
down, from eight or ten years to a couple of months.

I didn’t really understand
what was going on. I’d read other news bits concerning FDA
approvals in the past, but there seemed to be something askew, or
at least different, about this one. Of course, IFAI itself was
different, or so everybody said. Maybe I’d ask Hank what he thought
of this, to him an undoubtedly revolting development.

Yeah, Hank. Sure enough,
he’d told me the “IFAI vaccine” was already prepared, ready and
waiting—for this, for what had just happened. Then, I’d thought
maybe he was nuts. Needless to say, I no longer thought
so.

I got dressed in a
fresh-from-the-cleaners beige gabardine suit, complete with white
shirt and tan tie with small brown Comedy-and-Tragedy masks
scattered upon it. Plus fully-loaded Colt .38 Special in its
clamshell holster. Then, back in the living room, I grabbed the
phone from its stand next to the couch, ready and even eager to get
going on the work of this day. Before punching in a number, I ran
through a mental list of the things I needed to check, or do,
people I intended to see, calls I wanted to make.

It was funny. Peculiar. A
little creepy. For no reason at all, except possibly the fact that
I was imagining some of the good things, and maybe bad things that
might lie ahead of me, those ice worms started slurking around on
my back again. Bigger ones this time. Fat, slimy creepers, going at
my spine like insect chiropractors. Fortunately, only for a second
or two. Long enough.

Then I made my first call
of this Saturday morning. After that, things just kept picking up,
moving faster, getting better some of the time and worse most of
the time, but all of it like a boulder bouncing down the
mountainside, no way to stop it, even if you wanted to, without
getting squashed into grease spots.

Probably it’s a good thing
we never know for sure, in advance, which of our days will be the
ones we won’t ever forget, won’t forget because we can’t. Probably
it’s a good thing we don’t know; but it would sure help a bunch if
we did.

I started dialing the
Hamilton Building’s number, planning to let Hazel know I might not
make it to the office until late afternoon, if at all—then
remembered this was Saturday and Hazel wouldn’t be at the
switchboard. So, since there’d been no messages recorded on my
answering-machine tape except the one I’d already played back, last
night, I made follow-up calls to several of the same informants I’d
phoned yesterday.

The only info developed
worth noting was a mildly interesting bit from my TV-producer
friend. During the last couple of years he’d gotten actively
involved with a Hollywood based animal-rights organization, a
fast-growing group called “OneLife,” with the result that he had
become quite familiar with who, and what, Hobart Belking was. He
told me that Belking was so close to, and friendly with, Caesar
Velli, born Caesar Vellitano and now vice-president/general manager
of Pegasus Records, that the two men had been on several hunting
trips together, bagging elk and deer in Idaho, and, under special
permit, a pair of Dali rams in Alaska, one of the magnificent
massive-horned beasts for each of them. My friend also said that he
thought Velli was one of the biggest crooks in the record
business.

So, for that matter, did
I. I’d never had anything to do with Velli himself, but several
months ago I’d had as a client a popular lady singer who believed
she’d been screwed out of royalties on several of her recordings
released by Pegasus. As a result, I knew the LAPD Intelligence
Division had a thick file on Velli. He’d never been arrested, or
even indicted on criminal charges, but there was no doubt the man
was connected, a long time associate of several well-known members
of organized crime, some of whom had been indicted, convicted and
temporarily judged.

It wasn’t much, either a
tenuous connection or none at all. But it interested me enough to
play that lone phone-tape message again: “Grinners a dude name of
Francis Harris. Just don’t never call him Francis. Used to do heavy
work for Caesar Velli, the record guy. But that was a year or so
back, and I ain’t heard nothin’ about the dude since.”

That was all. But, again,
the name was Velli. And to Billy Whack, “heavy work” was anything
from muscle to murder; it did not refer to lifting large
packages.

I was about to make
another call, reaching for the phone when it rang. I grabbed it,
said, “Hello,” and listened with instant pleasure to “Shell, is
that you?” in the soft rustling voice that was an aphrodisiac for
earlobes. “Yeah, hi,” I said enthusiastically. “It’s Dane, isn’t
it? I hope.”

“
Yes, this is
Dane.”

“
Wonderful.”

“
I called to ask a favor,
Shell.”

“
You’ve got it, I’ll do
it.”

“
Last night, you offered to
drive me to Omega today, remember?”

“
Sure do. To see Dr.
Wintersong.”

“
Yes, as I told you, he
agreed to let me have another hour of his time to finish my
interview with him and I was supposed to be there at eleven this
morning.”

“
Uh-huh. But now he’s too
busy, right? Or he’s flown off to Stockholm to practice accepting
the Nobel with one hand while patting himself on the back
with—”

“
No, of course not—Shell,
you’re so cynical, and so... it’s just that he can’t see me until
half past twelve. I wanted to let you know my appointment’s an hour
later than I told you. So I’ll meet you in the lobby here at
eleven-fifteen instead of ten-fifteen. If that’s all
right?”

“
You bet.”

“
Good. I was afraid I might
miss you. I only found out about the time change myself a few
minutes ago.”

“
Incidentally, how did you
find out?”

“
Dr. Wintersong phoned me
himself, from Omega. He’d been absolutely deluged with calls for
the past hour, he said. Which under the circumstances, I’m lucky he
can see me at all today.” She paused. “I assume you’ve heard the
wonderful...” She paused again, then went on, “...at least the
exciting news about his IFAI vaccine?”

“
Yeah,” I said. “Read it in
the morning
Times
.
And it is pretty...exciting.” I remembered my error in starting to
phone Hazel earlier, and said, “Do Wintersong and his people work
at Omega on Saturdays? Weekends?”

“
Only until noon today, I
think. But I suppose some employees have to be there all the time.
I don’t really know.”

“
Must be somebody there to
feed the animals. Plus security animals to shoot stray people, if
necessary. It’s probably not important.”

“
Well, I’m glad I caught
you, Shell. See you at eleven-fifteen.”

“
On the dot,” I said, and
she said “Bye” as we hung up.

* * * * * *

Hobart Belking’s Wild
Animal Museum was on Macadamia Street, which extended from
high-powered and high-priced Wilshire Boulevard for a mile and a
half to its end at Almond. This had once been a residential area
for money, or at least people who possessed an unusual abundance of
it; and there were still toward the southern or quiet end of
Macadamia Street a dozen or so of these large and grand old homes
that look like yesterday. But, moving toward them from bustling
Wilshire, were a smattering of commercial buildings and business
offices, hard-edged and modern, brash and belligerent newcomers
that weren’t going to be denied their rezoned space. In a few more
years, all of those ancient two-story thirty-and forty-room wooden
homes would be gone, crowded into the past by cement and stone and
glass and reinforced steel of an insistent now and impatient
tomorrow.

Part of that tomorrow
appeared already to have arrived on Macadamia Street. The “dead
animal mausoleum” as it was sometimes referred to by militant
vegetarians—which almost certainly pained Hobart Belking severely,
since he had from the beginning insisted it be called “Hobart
Belking’s Wild Animal Museum, dammit,” possibly so it wouldn’t be
confused with somebody else’s Wild Animal Museum—was centered in a
full city block of only a quarter-mile from Wilshire real estate. A
year or two ago, that bit of land had been occupied by four of
those outmoded turn-of-the-century houses, each accompanied by
ample space for lawns and gardens, trees, flowers and shrubs. All
of which had been bulldozed in a jiffy, immediately after Belking
purchased the site and got cracking, taking his typical no-nonsense
do-it-now hang-the-expense attitude toward getting the job
done.

Well, he’d done one hell
of a job at that, a fine and impressive job, even I had to admit.
If, of course, what you wanted was an impressive soaring, gleaming,
beautiful glass-steel-and-stone Wild Animal Museum.

It had been reported that
Belking spent nearly fifty million dollars to complete his project.
Of course, that included initial payment for the site, cost of
bulldozers, and hauling the previous landscape away even before
construction commenced. Still, it looked as if he’d got his money’s
worth. And, almost with dismay, I had to confess I really liked the
looks of the damned building.

I was in my Cadillac,
engine idling, momentarily parked and looking across Macadamia
Street at the Museum. It was centered on the lavishly-landscaped
site, with a wide cement walk leading from Macadamia to a series of
curving steps rising to twenty-foot-high entrance doors. The doors
were light-colored wood, intricately carved, though I couldn’t
distinguish much of their design from here.

One of several things I
liked about the sprawling sand-colored building’s appearance was
that it didn’t look boxlike or angular. The outer walls on the left
and right rose and then actually curved inward before rising again
and then curving inward again, and again. There was a lot of glass,
and atop the oddly graceful building was visible a sign, not
excessively bold, which identified the place as HOBART BELKING’S
WILD ANIMAL MUSEUM.

Not bad, I thought. Not
too shabby. Not, at least, on the outside. I put the Cad into gear,
moved ahead and then left into a driveway running alongside the
building and leading to what a small sign at the entrance promised
was a parking lot. Another sign said, “Do Not Enter!” And one a
foot below it said, “No Admittance. Trespassers Will Be
Prosecuted.”