It was then that she looked out of the kitchen window and saw a blaze of light from the vacant lot adjacent to her own property.
It was a fire.
Mrs. Maule quickly laid down the saucer in her hand and ran out into the backyard. She fumbled in the dark for the pail and filled it from the water faucet. As she ran towards the vacant lot water from the pail sloshed on her dress but she was not conscious of it.
The fire came from a mound in the center of the lot and although it burned fiercely it did not spread. Hurriedly she emptied her pail. The water made an arc through the flames and suddenly Mrs. Maule jumped back.
“Oh my God!” she wailed.
Outlined in the fire was a human head the color of charcoal and as the water sizzled all the hair fell out. A blackened tongue protruded from the mouth and then the flames closed over it.
Two fire extinguishers were used up before the fire could be put out. The odor of burnt flesh and clothes was very strong.
Mrs. Maule had to be given a sedative.
It was not until a week later that the police were able to identify the thing in the vacant lot.
His name was Frank Misano.
The Black Cat was just beginning to fill up when Carl Rieger came in and sat down at the bar.
Behind the bar, Joseph smiled and laid down the glass he had been wiping. “Good evening, Mr. Rieger.”
Carl nodded. “Give me a double scotch and soda. Is Dunn around?”
“Not yet, Mr. Rieger. He should be in very soon.” Joseph only laced the scotch with carbonated water.
“You know how I like it,” said Carl.
Joseph smiled. “That’s my business.”
“I’ll be in a booth. Tell Dunn I want to see him when he comes in.”
Carl took his drink and sat in the booth so he could see anyone coming in. He wiped his damp face with a handkerchief and his hand came in contact with the gun strapped under his arm. His left eye twitched nervously.
There was a brunette sitting on the bench with the pianist. She was going over the music.
Carl finished the scotch and signaled to Joseph who served him another from a silver tray. Fifteen minutes passed before Harvey Dunn folded his large frame and slid into the seat opposite Carl.
“ ’Lo, Harv.”
Harvey Dunn did not smile. “What can I do for you, Carl?”
“Nothing. Just making my rounds. This is my last night in L.A. for awhile.”
“Oh? Where are you going?”
Carl shrugged. “Mexico. South America. My first stop is Acapulco.”
“Nice climate down there.”
“Yeah. I guess you heard about Frank and Rocco.”
“Everybody has, Carl.”
Carl licked his lips. “They were too hot I guess.”
Harvey Dunn shook his head. “You know it wasn’t the syndicate.”
Carl looked at him suspiciously. “I do?”
“Funny coincidence you three guys here the night I lose my singer, and now there’s just you.”
“You talk too much.”
“She was a nice kid, Carl.”
Carl lit a cigar and blew a smoke ring. “They’re all nice,” he said. “Well, I guess I’ll see you around.”
“I don’t think so.”
“What do you mean?”
Harvey Dunn smiled and rubbed his hawk-nose. “Just that you’re the last.”
“Go to hell,” said Carl. But he shivered as he said it.
When he left, Harvey Dunn was still sitting there with a smile on his face.
Outside, the smog and fog had mingled in a dark haze that formed a heavy layer over the street. Carl spat on the sidewalk and threw his cigar in the gutter. He walked to the parking lot and slid behind the wheel of his sedan.
Too late, he realized that someone else was in the car and there was a long moment as he froze, afraid to turn his head. He could hear who ever it was breathing. His eyes twitched nervously. There was the gun under his coat but he could not move. He heard a loud, rasping sound and finally realized that it was his own breathing. He smiled faintly. It had been his imagination. There was no one in the back seat. He turned to make sure and saw the hand with the ice pick.
Carl threw his hand up in defense and the long point of steel pierced the webbing of skin between the thumb and index finger. The shriek that tore past his lips was cut off as the ice pick descended again and plunged into his throat. He gagged and his tongue slithered out of his mouth like a huge red worm.
“Thank you, Mr. Rieger. Now I’m finished.”
Carl Rieger’s body was not found by the parking lot attendant until the next day. The police were not surprised. They even found the ice pick. It was a very ordinary ice pick and of course any prints had been wiped away.
They found it sticking in Carl Rieger’s left eye.
It was the middle of the afternoon and the visiting hour at Green Valley Sanitarium. Every seat in the waiting room was occupied so the man leaned his back against the wall and waited.
Finally a gray haired nurse in a white starched uniform called his name and he followed her down a long corridor. Through the open doors he could see the visitors and patients talking in subdued voices. It was so quiet in the hall he could hear the rustle of the nurse’s starched uniform.
“It was a terrible thing,” the nurse said.
“I would rather not talk about it,” he said.
“Of course. But you mustn’t give up hope. The withdrawal isn’t always permanent. Many patients recover completely from the shock they received.”
“I would rather not talk about it.”
“Of course.”
The nurse led him out on a wide flagstone veranda. From the veranda he could see green grass that descended to a grove of eucalyptus trees. It was very beautiful and still.
He felt better. It was a fine sanitarium. The nurse was right. There was always the chance of recovery. The nurse left him and he walked to the end of the veranda where a girl with yellow hair sat in a chaise lounge. She was looking off towards the grove of trees with the sunlight reflected in her hair and singing in the sweet, childish tone of a little girl.
He pressed her hand very gently and knelt beside her.
“The last one is dead,” he said.
Cathy smiled, without understanding the words of the strange man and continued her song.
Joseph was smiling at his daughter but there were tears in his eyes.
The Last Fix
by Jack Belck
After forty years on the side of The Law... he’d finally found the courage to turn down a fix.
“See you around, Ward,” the fat, red-faced man said slipping off his stool. He gave the Sheriff’s broad shoulder a hearty thump and puffed over to the cash register to pay his check.
Sheriff Ward Cogan barely grunted in reply, his thoughts wandering through the haze of forty years’ memories, memories of all the other fat men, and the thin ones, the young, the old, the shy, the brash, who had slapped him on the back and called him by his first name because he was the law. And they were all sons, daughters, wives, in-laws and what-have-you of the politicians, the powers in the state. They all wanted the same thing: special consideration.
Cogan stared morosely into his steaming coffee mug, glad the diner’s crowd had thinned out and he could spread his elbows. The fat man was a poker pal of the State Police Captain up at the barracks, so he’d have to remember the name and pass it on to his deputies. They would write it down in their books with “S.C.” after it, and then they’d wave the fat one on instead of stopping him for speeding. “S.C.” rated a smile that turned a cop into a nobody who bowed and scraped to the people with influence.
“About the only citizens you can still pick up if they do something wrong are the migratory farm workers,” Cogan reflected, wondering how long it would be before they had somebody behind them so they could also put in the Fix.