He couldn’t think. A busy spider scurried across his brain, trailing gray threads of fuzzy silk, webbing him in, slurring his thoughts.
No! He had to know who!
A key. There was a clear thought. A key, it had to be someone with a key. Remembering, thinking back, he seemed to hear again the tiny click of a key, just before the door had swung open.
They had to have a key; he had locked the door; he remembered that. The door was always locked, this was New York, Manhattan, one always locked doors.
There were only four people in the world who had keys to this apartment, aside from Denton himself, only four people in the world.
Nancy, his wife, from whom he was separated but not divorced.
Herb Martin, the chief writer for The Don Denton Variety Show.
Morry Stoneman, Denton’s business manager.
Eddie Blake, the stooge-straight-man-second comic of the show.
It had to be one of the four. All four of them knew that he would be here, alone, watching the show at this hour. And they were the ones who had keys.
One of those four. He let the remembered faces and names of the four circle in his mind — Nancy and Herb and Morry and Eddie — while he tried to figure out which one of them would have tried to kill him.
And then he closed his eyes and almost gave himself up to death. Because it could have been any one of them. All four of them hated his guts, and so it could have been any one of them who had come here tonight to kill him.
Bitter, bitter, that was the most bitter moment of his life, to know that all four of the people closest to him hated him enough to want to see him dead.
His own voice said, “Oh, come now, Professor.”
He opened his eyes, terrified. He’d almost faded away there, he’d almost passed out, and to pass out was surely to die. He could no longer feel anything in his legs, below the knee, and his fingers were no longer really parts of him. Death, death creeping in from his extremities.
No. He had to stay alive. He had to fool them, all four of them. He had to somehow stay alive. Keep thinking, keep the mind active, fight away the darkness.
Think about the four of them. Which one of them had done this?
“Gott im Himmel,” cried a gruff voice, and the canned laughter on the TV set followed dutifully.
Denton strained to see the television screen. Eddie Blake was there now, doing that miserable Professor routine of his. Denton watched, and wondered. Could it have been him?
Eddie Blake stood in the doorway of the dressing room. “You wanted to see me, Don?”
Denton, sitting before the bulb-flanked mirror, removing his makeup, didn’t bother to look away from his own reflection. “Come on in, Eddie,” he said softly. “Close the door.”
“Right,” said Eddie. He stepped inside, shut the door, and stood there awkwardly, a tow-headed, hook-nosed, wide-mouthed little comic with a long thin frame and enough nervous mannerisms for twenty people.
Denton made him wait while he removed the rest of his makeup. It was a little after six, and the show had just been taped. Denton wasn’t happy with the way the show had gone, and the more he thought about it, the more irritated he got. He finally turned and studied Eddie with a discontented frown. Eddie was still in the Professor costume, still in makeup, his left hand fidgeting at his side. Once, years ago, he’d been in an automobile accident, and his right arm was now weak and nearly useless.
“You were lousy tonight, Eddie,” Denton said calmly. “I can’t remember when you’ve been worse.”
Eddie flushed, and his face worked, trying to hide the quick anger. He didn’t say a word.
Denton lit a cigarette, more slowly than necessary, and finally said, “You back on the sauce again, Eddie?”
“You know better than that, Don,” Eddie said indignantly.
“Maybe you just weren’t thinking about the show tonight,” Denton suggested. “Maybe you were saving yourself for that Boston date.”
“I did my best, Don,” Eddie insisted. “I worked my tail off.”
“This show comes first, Eddie,” Denton told him. He studied the comic coldly. “You ought to know that,” he said. “Where would you be without this show, Eddie?”
Eddie didn’t answer. He didn’t have to; they both knew what it was. The answer was nowhere. Eddie was basically a straight man, a stooge, a second banana, and he’d spent years either as an unsuccessful single or second man to a string of second-rates. It was The Don Denton Variety Show that had finally given him his break, gained him exposure to a large national audience, and allowed him to develop routines of his own like the Professor bit. One of the results was outside jobs like the Boston night-club gig coming up this weekend.
“This show comes first, Eddie,” Denton repeated. “You don’t do anything else anywhere until you’re doing your job on this show.”
“Don, I—”
“Now, in your contract, you know, I’ve got to approve any outside booking you take on.”
“Don, you aren’t going to—”
“I’ve been pretty lax about that,” Denton went on, smoothly overriding Eddie’s protests. “But now I see what the result is. You start doing second-rate work here, saving yourself for your other jobs.”
“Don, listen—”
“I think,” Denton said, “that you’d better cut out all other jobs until you get up to form here.” He nodded. “Okay, Eddie, that’s all. See you at rehearsal Friday morning.” He turned back to the mirror, started unbuttoning his shirt.
Behind him, Eddie fidgeted, ashen-faced. “Don,” he said. “Listen, Don, you don’t mean it.”
Denton didn’t bother answering.
“Don, look, you don’t have to do this, all you have to do is tell me—”
“I just told you,” said Denton.
“Don... listen, listen, what about Boston?”
“What about Boston?”
“I’ve got a date there this weekend, I—”
“No, you haven’t.”
“Don, for God’s sake—”
“You’ll be rehearsing all weekend. You won’t have time to go to Boston.”
“Don, the booking’s already been made!”
“So what?”
Eddie’s left hand darted and fidgeted, playing the buttons of his shirt like a clarinet. His eyes were wide and hopeless. “Don’t do this, Don,” he begged. “For God’s sake, don’t do this.”
“You’ve done it to yourself.”
“You dirty louse, you’re the one who was way off tonight! Just because you can’t get a laugh that doesn’t come off tape—”
“Stop right there.” Denton had risen now and stood glaring at the furious ineffectual comic. “Don’t you forget the contract, Eddie,” he said. “Don’t you ever forget it. It’s still got four and a half years to run. And I can always throw you off the show, cut off your pay, and still hold you to the contract. I can keep you from making a nickel, Eddie boy, and don’t you forget it. Unless you’d like to wash dishes for your dough.”
Eddie retreated to the door, obviously not trusting himself to stay in the dressing room any longer. “Don’t push it, Don,” he said, his voice trembling. “Don’t push it too far.”
“X plus Y,” said the heavily-accented voice on the television set, “iz somezing un-prro-nounz-able!”
Denton blinked, trying to keep his eyes in focus. His sight kept blurring. He stared at the grinning figure on the screen. Eddie Blake? Could it have been Eddie Blake?
There was a way Eddie might figure it. With Denton out of the way, the contract between them was no longer a problem. And who would be the most likely immediate replacement for Denton on the show? Why, Eddie Blake, of course, who already knew the show. Denton’s death, in Eddie’s eyes, might be the stepping-stone to top banana.