CHAPTER 12.

It was ten after eleven when I reached the York estate. Henry came out of his gatehouse, saw me and gaped as though he were looking at a ghost. "Good heavens, Mr. Hammer. The police are searching all over for you! You . . . you killed a man."

"So I did," I said sarcastically. "Open the gates."

"No . . . I can't let you come in here. There'll be trouble."

"There will if you don't open the gates." His face seemed to sag and his whole body a.s.sumed an air of defeat. Disgust was written in the set of his mouth, disgust at having to look at a man who shot a fellow man. I drove through and stopped.

"Henry, come here."

The gatekeeper shuffled over reluctantly. "Yes, sir?"

"I'm not wanted any longer, Henry. The police have settled the matter up to a certain point."

"You mean you didn't . . ."

"No, I mean I shot him, but it was justified. I've been cleared, understand?"

He smiled a little, not quite understanding, but he breathed a sigh of relief. At least he knew he wasn't harboring a fugitive in me. I pulled up the driveway to the house, easing around the turns until the beams of my brights spotlighted the house. Inside I saw Harvey coming to the door. Instead of parking in front of the place I rolled around to the side and nosed into the open door of the garage. A big six-car affair, but now there were only two cars in it, counting mine. A long time ago someone started using it for a storeroom and now one end was cluttered with the junk acc.u.mulated over the years. Two boys' bicycles were hanging from a suspension gadget set in the ceiling and underneath them a newer model with a small one-cylinder engine built into the frame. Hanging from a hook screwed into an upright were roller skates and ice skates, but neither pair had been used much. Quite a childhood Ruston had.

I shut the door of the garage and looked up. The rain had started. The tears of the G.o.ds. Of laughter or sorrow? Maybe the joke was on me, after all.

Harvey was his usual, impeccable, unmoving self as he took my hat and ushered me into the living room. He made no mention of the affair whatsoever, nor did his face reveal any curiosity. Even before he announced me, Roxy was on her way down the stairs with Ruston holding her arm. Billy Parks came out of the foyer grinning broadly, his hand outstretched. "Mike! You sure got your nerve. By gosh, you're supposed to be Public Enemy Number One!"

"Mike!"

"h.e.l.lo, Lancelot. h.e.l.lo, Roxy. Let me give you a hand."

"Oh, I'm no cripple," she laughed. "The stairs get me a little, but I can get around all right."

"What happened, Mike?" Ruston smiled. "The policemen all left this evening after they got a phone call and we haven't seen them since. Golly, I was afraid you'd been shot or something. We thought they caught you."

"Well, they came close, kid, but they never even scratched me. It's all finished. I'm in the clear and I'm about ready to go home."

Billy Parks stopped short in the act of lighting a cigarette. His hands began to tremble slightly and he had trouble finding the tip of the b.u.t.t.

Ruston said, "You mean the police don't want you any longer, Mike?" I shook my head. He gave a little cry of gladness and ran to me, throwing his arms about me in a tight squeeze. "Gee, Mike, I'm so happy."

I patted his arm and smiled crookedly. "Yep, I'm almost an honest man again."

"Mike . . ."

Roxy's voice was the hoa.r.s.e sound of a rasp on wood. She was clutching the front of her negligee with one hand, trying to push a streamer of hair from her eyes with the other. A little muscle twitched in her cheek. "Who . . . did it, Mike?"

Billy was waiting. Roxy was waiting. I heard Harvey pause outside the door. Ruston looked from them to me, puzzled. The air in the room was charged, alive. "You'll hear about it tomorrow," I said.

Billy Parks dropped his cigarette.

"Why not now?" Roxy gasped.

I took a cigarette from my pocket and stuffed it between my lips. Billy fumbled for his on the floor and held the lit tip to mine. I dragged the smoke in deeply. Roxy was beginning to go white, biting on her lip. "You'd better go to your room, Roxy. You don't look too good."

"Yes . . . yes. I had better. Excuse me. I really don't feel too well. The stairs . . ." She let it go unfinished. While Ruston helped her up I stood there in silence with Billy. The kid came down again in a minute.

"Do you think she'll be all right, Mike?"

"I think so."

Billy crushed his cig out in an ashtray. "I'm going to bed, Mike. This day has been tough enough."

I nodded. "You going to bed, too, Ruston?"

"What's the matter with everybody, Mike?"

"Nervous, I guess."

"Yes, that's it, I suppose." His face brightened. "Let me play for them. I haven't played since . . . that night. But I want to play, Mike. Will it be all right?"

"Sure, go ahead."

He grinned and ran out of the room. I heard him arrange the seat, then lift the lid of the piano, and the next moment the heavy melody of a cla.s.sical piece filled the house. I sat down and listened. It was gay one moment, serious the next. He ran up and down the keys in a fantasy of expression. Good music to think by. I chain-lit another cigarette, wondering how the music was affecting the murderer. Did it give him a creepy feeling? Was every note part of his funeral theme? Three cigarettes gone in thought and still I waited. The music had changed now, it was lilting, rolling in song. I put the b.u.t.t out and stood up. It was time to see the killer.

I put my hand on the k.n.o.b and turned, stepped in the room and locked the door behind me. The killer was smiling at me, a smile that had no meaning I could fathom. It was a smile of neither defeat nor despair, but nearer to triumph. It was no way for a murderer to smile. The bells in my head were rising in a crescendo with the music.

I said to the murderer, "You can stop playing now, Ruston."

The music didn't halt. It rose in spirit and volume while Ruston York created a symphony from the keyboard, a challenging overture to death, keeping time with my feet as I walked to a chair and sat down. Only when I pulled the .45 from its holster did the music begin to diminish. My eyes never left his face. It died out in a crashing maze of minor chords that resounded from the walls with increased intensity.

"So you found me out, Mr. Hammer."

"Yes."

"I rather expected it these last few days." He crossed his legs with complete nonchalance and barely a glance at the gun in my hand. I felt my temper being drawn to the brink of unreason, my lips tightening.

"You're a killer, little buddy," I said. "You're a blood-crazy, insane little b.a.s.t.a.r.d. It's so d.a.m.n inconceivable that I can hardly believe it myself, but it's so. You had it well planned, chum. Oh, but you would, you're a genius. I forgot. That's what everyone forgot. You're only fourteen but you can sit in with scientists and presidents and never miss a trick."

"Thank you."

"You have a hair-trigger mind, Ruston. You can conceive and coordinate and antic.i.p.ate beyond all realm of imagination. All the while I was batting my brains out trying to run down a killer you must have held your sides laughing. You knew pretty well what killing York would expose . . . a series of crimes and petty personalities scrambled together to make the dirtiest omelet ever cooked. But you'd you'd never cook for it. Oh, no . . . not you. If . . . if you were found out the worst that could happen would be that you'd face a juvenile court. That's what you thought, didn't you? Like h.e.l.l. never cook for it. Oh, no . . . not you. If . . . if you were found out the worst that could happen would be that you'd face a juvenile court. That's what you thought, didn't you? Like h.e.l.l.

"Yes, you're only a child, but you have a man's mind. That's why I'm talking to you like I would to a man. That's why I can kill you like I would a man."

He sat there unmoving. If he knew fear he showed it only in the tiny blue vein that throbbed in his forehead. The smile still played around his mouth. "Being a genius, I guess you thought I was stupid," I continued. With every word my heart beat harder and faster until I was filled with hate. "It was getting so that I thought I was stupid myself. Why wouldn't I? Every time I turned around something would happen that was so screwy that it didn't have any place in the plot, yet in a way it was directly related. Junior Ghent and Alice. The Graham boys. Each trying to chop off a slice of cash for themselves. Each one concerned with his own little individual problem and completely unknowing of the rest. It was a beautiful setup for you.

"But please don't think I was stupid, Ruston. The only true stupidity I showed was in calling you Lancelot. If I ever meet the good knight somewhere I'll beg him to forgive me. But I wasn't so stupid otherwise, Ruston. I found out that Grange had something on York . . . and that something was the fact that she was the only one who knew that he was a kidnapper in a sense. York . . . an aging scientist who wanted an heir badly so he could pa.s.s on his learning to his son . . . but his son died. So what did he do? He took a kid who had been born of a criminal father and would have been reared in the gutter, and turned him into a genius. But after a while the genius began to think and hate. Why? h.e.l.l, only you know that.

"But somewhere you got hold of the details concerning your birth. You knew that York had only a few years to live and you knew, too, that Grange had threatened to expose the entire affair if he didn't leave his money to her. Your father (should I call him that?) was a thinker too. He worked out a proposition with Alice to have an affair with his lesbian a.s.sistant and hold that over her head as a club, and it worked, except that Junior Ghent learned of the affair when his sister told him that York had proposed the same deal to her, too, and Junior wanted to hold that over Grange's head, and Alice's, too, so that he could come in for part of the property split. Man, what a scramble it was after that. Everybody thought I had the dope when it was lying beside the wall out there. Yeah, the wall. Remember the shot you took at Roxy? You were in your room. You tossed that lariat that was beside your bed around the awning hook outside her window, swung down and shot at her through the gla.s.s. She had the light on and couldn't see out, but she was a perfect target. You missed at that range only because you were swinging. That really threw me off the track. Nice act you put on when I brought the doctor in. You had him fooled too. I didn't get that until a little while ago.

"Now I know. You, as an intelligent, emotional man, were in love. What a howl. In love with your nurse." His face darkened. The vein began to throb harder than ever and his hands clenched into a tight knot. "You shot at her because you saw me and Roxy in a clinch and were jealous. Brother, how happy you must have been when the cops were on my back with orders to shoot to kill. I thought you were simply surprised to see me when I climbed in the window that time. Your face went white, remember? For one second there you thought I came back to get you. That was it, wasn't it?"

His head nodded faintly, but still he said nothing. "Then you saw your chance of bringing the cops charging up by knocking over the lamp. Brilliant mind again. You knew the bulb breaking would sound like a shot. Too bad I got away, wasn't it?

"If I wasn't something of a scientist myself I never would have guessed it. Let me tell you how confounded smart I am. Your time doesn't matter much anyway. I caught up with one of your play-mates that s.n.a.t.c.hed you. I beat the living h.e.l.l out of him and would have done worse to make him talk and he knew it. I'm a scientist at that kind of stuff. He would have talked his head off, only he didn't have anything to say. You know what I asked him? I asked him who Mallory was and he didn't know any Mallory. Good reason too, because ever since you were yanked out of his hands, your father went by the name of Nelson.

"No, he didn't know any Mallory, yet you came home after the kidnapping and said . . . you . . . heard heard . . . . . . the . . . name the . . . name . . . . . . Mallory Mallory . . . mentioned. When I finally got it I knew who the killer was. Then I began to figure how you worked it. Someplace in the house, and I'll find it later, you have the information and Grange's proof that you were Mallory's son. Was it a check that York gave Myra Grange? Somehow you located Mallory and sent him the clipping out of the back issue in the library and the details on how to kidnap you. That was why the clipping was gone. You set yourself up to be s.n.a.t.c.hed hoping that the shock would kill York. It d.a.m.n near did. You did it well, too, even to the point of switching Henry's aspirins to sleeping tablets. You set yourself up knowing you could outthink the ordinary mortals on the boat and get away. You came mighty close to failing, pal. I wish you had. . . . mentioned. When I finally got it I knew who the killer was. Then I began to figure how you worked it. Someplace in the house, and I'll find it later, you have the information and Grange's proof that you were Mallory's son. Was it a check that York gave Myra Grange? Somehow you located Mallory and sent him the clipping out of the back issue in the library and the details on how to kidnap you. That was why the clipping was gone. You set yourself up to be s.n.a.t.c.hed hoping that the shock would kill York. It d.a.m.n near did. You did it well, too, even to the point of switching Henry's aspirins to sleeping tablets. You set yourself up knowing you could outthink the ordinary mortals on the boat and get away. You came mighty close to failing, pal. I wish you had.

"But when that didn't do it you resorted to murder . . . and what a murder. No sweeter deal could have been cooked up by anyone. You knew that when York heard Mallory's name brought into it he'd think Grange had spilled the works and go hunting up his little pet. You thought correctly. York went out there with a gun, but I doubt if he intended to use it. The rod was supposed to be a bluff. Billy heard York leave, and he heard me leave, but how did you reach the apartment? Let me tell you. Out in the garage there's a motorbike. Properly rigged they can do sixty or seventy any day. The noise like a cough that Billy heard was you, Ruston. The sound of the motorbike, low and throaty. I noticed it had a m.u.f.fler on it. Yeah, York had a gun, and you had to take along a weapon too. A meat cleaver. When I dreamed up all this I wondered why n.o.body spotted you going or coming, but it wouldn't be too hard to take to the back roads.

"Ruston, you were born under an evil, lucky star. Everything that happened after you surprised York in that room and split his skull worked in your favor. h.e.l.l seemed to break loose with everybody trying to cut in on York's dough. Even Dilwick. A crooked copper working for Mallory. Your real father needed that protection and Dilwick fitted right in. Dilwick must have guessed at part of the truth without ever really catching on, and he played it to keep Mallory clear and in a good spot to call for a rake-off, but he got too eager. Dilwick's dead and the rest of his lousy outfit are where they're supposed to be, cooling their heels in a cell.

"But where are you? You . . . the killer. You're sitting here listening to me spiel off everything you already know about and you're not a bit worried. Why should you be? Three or four years in an inst.i.tution for the criminally insane . . . then prove yourself normal and go back into the world to kill again. You have ethics like Grange. There was a woman who probably loved her profession. She loved it so much she saw a chance to further her career by aiding York, then using it as a club to gain scientific recognition for herself.

"But you on . . . h.e.l.l." I spit the word out. "You banked on getting away scot-free first, then as a second-best choice facing a court. Maybe you'd even get a suspended sentence. Sure, why not? Any psychiatrist would see how that could happen. Under the pressure of your studies your mind snapped. Boy, have you got a brain! No chair, not for you. Maybe a couple of years yanked from your life span, but what did it matter? You were twenty years ahead of yourself anyway. That was it, wasn't it? Ha!

"Not so, little man. The game just doesn't go that way. I hate to go ex post facto on you, but simply because you're nicely covered by the law doesn't mean you'll stay that way. I'm making up a new one right now. Know what it is?"

He still smiled, no change of expression. It was almost as if he were watching one of his experiments in the rabbit cage.

"Okay," I said, "I'll tell you. All little geniuses . . . or is it genii? . . . who kill and try to get away with it get it in the neck anyway."

Very deliberately I let him see me flick the safety catch on the .45. His eyes were little dark pools that seemed to swim in his head.

I was wondering if I was going to like this.

I never killed a little genius before.

For the first time, Ruston spoke. "About an hour ago I antic.i.p.ated this," he smiled. I tightened involuntarily. I didn't know why, but I almost knew beforehand what he'd say.

"When I threw my arms around you inside there feigning happiness over your miraculous reappearance, I removed the clip from your gun. It's a wonder you didn't notice the difference in weight."

Did you ever feel like screaming?

My hand was shaking with rage. I felt the hollow s.p.a.ce where the clip fitted and swore. I was so d.a.m.n safety conscious I didn't jack a sh.e.l.l into the chamber earlier either.

And Ruston reached behind the music rack on the piano and came out with the .32.

He smiled again. He knew d.a.m.n well what I was thinking. Without any trouble I could make the next corpse. He fondled the gun, eyeing the hammer. "Don't move too quickly, Mike. No. I'm not going to shoot you, not just yet. You see, my little knowledge of sleight of hand was quite useful . . . as handy as to know how to open locks. The Normanic sciences weren't all I studied. Anything that presented a problem afforded me the pleasure of solving it in my spare time.

"Move your chair a little this way so I can see you to the best advantage. Ah . . . yes. Compliments are in order, I believe. You were very right and very clever in your deductions. Frankly, I didn't imagine anyone would be able to wade through the tangle that the murder preceded. I thought I did quite well, but I see I failed, up to a certain point. Look at it from my point of view before you invite any impetuous ideas. If you turned me over to the police and proved your case, I would, as you say, stand before a juvenile court. Never would I admit my actual adulthood to them, and I would be sent away for a few years, or perhaps not at all. You see, there's a side to my story too, one you don't know about.

"Or, Mike, and this is an important 'or' . . . I may kill you and claim self-defense. You came in here and in a state of extreme nervous tension hit me. I picked up a gun that dropped out of your pocket"-he held up the .32-"and shot you. Simple? Who would disbelieve it, especially with your temperament . . . and my tender years. So sit still and I don't think I'll shoot you for a little while, at least. Before I do anything, I want to correct some erroneous impressions you seem to have.

"I am not a 'few' years ahead of my time . . . the difference is more like thirty. Even that is an understatement. Can you realize what that means? Me. Fourteen years old. Yet I have lived over fifty years! G.o.d, what a miserable existence. You saw my little, er, schoolhouse, but what conclusion did you draw? Fool that you were, you saw nothing. You saw no electrical or mechanical contrivances that had been developed by one of the greatest scientific minds of the century. No, you merely saw objects, never realizing what they were for." He paused, grinning with abject hatred. "Have you ever seen them force-feed ducks to enlarge their livers to make better sausages? Picture that happening to a mind. Imagine having the learning processes accelerated through pain. Torture can make the mind do anything when properly presented.

"Oh, I wasn't supposed to actually feel any of all that. It was supposed to happen while I was unconscious, with only the subconscious mind reacting to the incredible pressures being put upon it to grasp and retain the fantastic array of details poured into it like feed being forced through a funnel down a duck's gullet into its belly whether it wants it or not.

"Ah, but who is to say what happens to the mind when such a development takes place? What may happen to the intricate mechanism of the human mind under such stimulation? What new reactions will it develop . . . what new outlets will it seek to repel the monster that is invading it?

"That is how I became what I am . . . but what I learned! I went even farther than was expected of me . . . much farther than the simple sciences and mathematics he he wanted me to absorb. I even delved into criminology, Mr. Hammer, going over thousands of case histories of past crimes, and when this little . . . circ.u.mstance . . . came to my attention, I knew what I had to do . . . then figured out how I could do it. wanted me to absorb. I even delved into criminology, Mr. Hammer, going over thousands of case histories of past crimes, and when this little . . . circ.u.mstance . . . came to my attention, I knew what I had to do . . . then figured out how I could do it.

"I researched, studied and very un.o.btrusively collected my data, putting myself not ahead ahead of you in the commission and solution of criminal actions, but on an approximate level. With your mind highly tuned to absorb, a.n.a.lyze and reconstruct criminal ways, your close a.s.sociation with the police and past experience, you have been able to run a parallel course with me and arrive at the destination at the same time." of you in the commission and solution of criminal actions, but on an approximate level. With your mind highly tuned to absorb, a.n.a.lyze and reconstruct criminal ways, your close a.s.sociation with the police and past experience, you have been able to run a parallel course with me and arrive at the destination at the same time."

He gave me a wry grin. "Or should I say a little behind me?" With his head he indicated the gun in his hand, ". . . seeing that at present I hold the most advantageous position."

I started to rise, but his gun came up. "Remain seated, please. I only said I didn't think think I would shoot you. Hear me out." I would shoot you. Hear me out."

I sat down again.

"Yes, Mr. Hammer, if I had but given it a few days more study your case would have been a hopeless one. Yet you did find me out with all my elaborate precautions, but I still have a marvelous chance to retain my life and liberty. Don't you think?"

I nodded. He certainly would.

"But what good would it do me? Answer me that? What good would it do me? Would I ever have the girl I love . . . or would she have me? She would vomit at the thought. Me, a boy with an adult mind, but still a boy's body. What woman would have me? As the years pa.s.sed my body would become mature, but the power of my mind would have increased tenfold. Then I would be an old man within the physical sh.e.l.l of a boy. And what of society? You know what society would do . . . it would treat me as a freak. Perhaps I could get a position as a lightning calculator in a circus. That's what that man did to me! That's what he did with his machines and brilliant thoughts. He crumpled my life into a little ball and threw it in the jaws of science. How I hated him. How I wish I could have made him suffer the way he made me suffer!

"To be twisted on the rack is trivial compared to the way one can be tortured through the mind. Has your brain ever been on fire? Have you ever had your skull probed with bolts of electrical energy while strapped to a chair? Of course not! You can remain smug and commonplace in your normal life and track down criminals and murderers. Your one fear is that of dying. Mine was of not dying soon enough!

"You can't understand how much the human body can suffer punishment. It's like a giant machine that can feed itself and heal its own wounds, but the mind is even greater. That simple piece of sickly gray matter that twists itself into gentle shapes under a thin layer of bone and looks so disarming lying in a bottle of formaldehyde is a colossus beyond conception. It thinks pain! Imagine it . . . it thinks pain and the body screams with the torture of it, yet there is nothing you can call physical in the process. It can conceive of things beyond normal imagination if it is stirred to do so. That is what mine did. Things were forced into it. Learning, he called it, but it might as well have been squeezed into my brain with a compressor, for it felt that way. I knew pain that was not known by any martyr . . . it was a pain that will probably never be known again.

"Your expression changes, Mr. Hammer. I see you believe what I say. You should . . . it is true. You may believe it, but you will never understand it. Right now I can see you change your mind. You condone my actions. I condone them. But would a jury if they knew? Would a judge . . . or the public? No, they couldn't visualize what I have undergone."

Something was happening to Ruston York even as he was speaking. The little-boy look was gone from his face, replaced by some strange metamorphosis that gave him the facial demeanor I had seen during the wild mouthings of dictators. Every muscle was tense, veins and tendons danced under the delicate texture of his skin and his eyes shone with the inward fury that was gnawing at his heart.

He paused momentarily, staring at me, yet somehow I knew he wasn't really seeing me at all. "You were right, Mr. Hammer," he said, a new, distant note in his voice now. "I was in love with my nurse. Or better . . . I am in love with . . . Miss Malcom. From the moment she arrived here I have been in love with her."

The hard, tight expression seemed to diminish at the thought and a smile tugged faintly at the corners of his mouth. "Yes, Mr. Hammer, love. Not the love a child would give a woman, but a man's love. The kind of love you can give a woman . . . or any other normal man."

Suddenly the half smile vanished and the vacant look came back again. "That's what that man did to me. He made an error in his calculations, or never expected his experiment to reach such a conclusion, but that man did more than make me a mental giant. He not only increased my intellectual capacity to the point of genius . . . but in the process he developed my emotional status until I was no longer a boy.

"I am a man, Mr. Hammer. In every respect except this outer sh.e.l.l, and my chronological age, I am a man. And I am a man in love, trapped inside the body of a child. Can you imagine it? Can you think of me presenting my love to a woman like Roxy Malcom? Oh, she might understand, but never could she return that love. All I would get would be pity. Think of that . . . pity. That's what that b.a.s.t.a.r.d did to me!"

He was spitting the words out now, his face back in the contours of frustration and hatred, his eyes blankly looking at me, yet through me. It had to be like this, I thought, when he was on the brink of the deep end. It was the only chance I had. Slowly, I tucked my feet under me, the movement subtle so as not to distract him. I'd probably take a slug or two, but I'd lived through them before and if I managed it right I might be able to get my hands on his gun before he could squeeze off a fatal one. It was the only chance I had. My fingers were tight on the arms of the chair, the muscles in my shoulders bunched to throw myself forward . . . and all the time my guts were churning because I knew what I could expect before I could get all the way across that room to where he was sitting.

"I have to live in a world of my own, Mr. Hammer. No other world would accept me. As great a thing, a twisted thing that I am, I have no world to live in."

The blankness suddenly left his eyes. He was seeing me now, seeing what I was doing and knowing what I was thinking. His thumb pulled back the hammer on the .32 to make it that much easier to trigger off. Behind the now almost colorless pupils of his eyes some crazy thought was etching itself into his mind.

Ruston York looked at me, suddenly with his boy face again. He even smiled a tired little smile and the gun moved in his hand. "Yes," he repeated, "as great as I am, I am useless."

Even while he had talked, he had done something he had never done before. He exposed himself to himself and for the first time saw the futility that was Ruston York. Once again he smiled, the gun still on me.

There was no time left at all. It had to be now, now now! Only a second, perhaps, to do it in.

He saw me and smiled, knowing I was going to do it. "Sir Lancelot," he said wistfully.

Then, before I could even get out of the chair, Ruston York turned the gun around in his hand, jammed the muzzle of it into his mouth and pulled the trigger.