We shed our gear.
"Guess we better take these up to the suite," I told Morley. He was looking at the paintings. "What do you think?"
"The man was disturbed."
"And good, too. That's her."
"I'm in love." He stared at the portrait like he might dive in.
"Let's admire her upstairs."
But we had to pass Kaid, Wayne, and Peters to get to the stairway. Black Pete asked, "What's all that?"
No reason not to tell the truth. "Some of Bradon's paintings. I saved them from the fire."
They wanted to see. They hadn't seen Bradon's work before. The man never had shown it.
"Yech!" Kaid said after a couple of war scenes. "That's sick."
"It's good," Wayne said. "That's how it felt."
"But it doesn't look like—"
"I know. It's how it felt."
"Man," Peters said. "He didn't like Jennifer much, did he?"
Somehow I'd managed to save four portraits, the blonde and three Jennifers. Just as well I hadn't salvaged any of these guys. They wouldn't have appreciated them. I'd gotten more than one Jennifer by accident. It had gotten hurried toward the end.
Peters lined the portraits up against the fountain. The third and probably most recent Jennifer I hadn't seen before. It was the ugliest. Jennifer was radiant yet something horrible about her made you doubt the artist's sanity.
Kaid said, "He was crazier than we thought. Garrett, don't ever let Miss Jennifer see these. That would be too cruel."
"I won't. I took them by accident more than anything. I was just grabbing. But the blonde, now. I took that one on purpose. That's the woman I've been seeing. Who is she?"
They looked at me, at the painting, at me again. Their studied blandness said they were unsure about my sanity. They thought I'd let my imagination attach itself to the first thing handy.
Peters played it straight. "I don't know, Garrett. Never seen her before. You men?"
Wayne and Kaid shook their heads. Wayne said, "There's something familiar about her, though."
That seemed to cue something in Kaid's head. He frowned, moved a step closer. I asked, "You know something, Kaid?"
"No. For a second... No. Just my imagination."
I wasn't going to argue with them till I could produce physical evidence. "Let's get these tucked away, Morley."
We started gathering the paintings. Now Peters was frowning at the blonde, something perking in the back of his head. He was a little pale and a whole lot puzzled.
He didn't say anything, though. We collected the paintings and headed for the stairs.
Maybe intuition nudged me. When I reached the fourth floor I went to the rail. Peters and Kaid had their heads together, yakking away. They kept their voices down but were intense.
Morley's ears are better than mine. He told me, "Whatever they're talking about, they're determined to convince each other it's impossible."
"They recognized her?"
"They think she looks like somebody she couldn't be. I think."
I didn't like the sound of that.
36
Morley perched the mystery woman on the mantle in my sitting room, contemplated her intently. I misread his interest. I seldom do that because his interest in the female tribe is definite. "Can't have her, boy. She's taken."
"Be quiet," he told me. "Sit down and look at the painting."
He wouldn't be sharp if it wasn't important. I planted myself. I stared.
I began to feel like I was part of the scene.
Morley got up and snuffed a few lamps, halving the light in the room. Then he threw the curtains open, apparently so we'd get the full benefit of the storm. He settled and resumed staring.
That woman came more and more to life, grabbed more and more of my being. I felt I could take her hand and pull her out, away from the thing that pursued her.
The storm outside intensified what was going on in the painting's background. That damned Snake Bradon was a sorcerer. The painting, once you looked at it awhile, was more potent than the swampscape with hanged man. But this one was more subtle.
I could almost hear her begging for help.
Morley muttered, "Damn her. She's too intense. Got to block her out of there."
"What?"
"There's something else there. But the woman pulls your attention away."
He'd lost me. The rest of the painting was decoration to me. Or arrows pointing out the crucial object.
Morley got paper from my writing table, spent ten minutes using a small knife to trim pieces to cover the blonde. "You damage that thing, I'll carve you up," I told him. I had a notion where it ought to be displayed. There was a big bare spot on the wall of my office at home.
"I'd cut my own throat first, Garrett. The man was crazy but he was a genius."
Curious, Morley calling him crazy without having met him.
Morley killed another lamp. He hung his cutouts over the canvas.
"I'll be damned." The painting was almost as intense without the woman. But now the eye could rove.
Morley grunted. "Let your mind go blank. Just let it sink in."
I tried.
The storm carried on outside. Thunder galloped. Swords of lightning flailed. The flashes played with the flashes in the painting. The shadow seemed to move like a thunderhead boiling. "What?"
It was there for just a second. I couldn't get it back. I tried too hard.
"Did you see the face?" Morley asked. "In the shadow?"
"Yeah. For a second. I can't get it back."
"Neither can I." He removed the cutouts, settled again. "She's running from somebody, not something."
"She's reaching out. You think Bradon has her reaching for somebody particular?"
"Running from somebody to somebody?" he asked.
"Maybe."
"Him?"
"Maybe." I shrugged.
"You? You're the one who—"
"You said you saw her."
"I saw somebody. Just a glimpse. The more I stare at this, the more I think it could have been the other one."
"Jennifer?"
"Yes. They look a lot alike."
I hadn't seen that. I tried to see Jennifer in the blonde. "I don't know. There's a lot of Stantnor in Jennifer and none in this one."
I guess I squeaked. He asked, "What?"
"That face in the background. There was a lot of Stantnor in it."
"Jennifer? Bradon did her bad."
"I don't think so. I got the feeling it was male."
"Around thirty and stark raving mad."
The lightning had fits outside. I shuddered, jumped up, started lighting lamps. I couldn't shake the chill. "I'm spooked," I confessed.
"Yes. The more I look, the creepier it gets."
The chill stayed with me. I wondered if we were being watched. "Think I'll start a fire."
"Whoa! What did you say?"
"I'll start a fire. I'm freezing my—"
"You're a genius, Garrett."
"Nice of you to notice." What did I genius? It went right by me.
"Fire in the stable. You figured right, too. Not for you at all. For something Bradon had hidden. What did you find hidden? The paintings." He gestured at the blonde. "The painting."
"I don't know—"
"I do. What were the others? Crazy stuff. But people we've seen and places in the Cantard."
So I looked at the painting again.
Morley said, "There's the key to your killer. That's why Bradon died. There's why the stable burned. That's your killer." He laughed. It was a crazy noise. Hell. Everything was crazy in this place. "And you slept with her." He started to say something else, caught himself, reflected. "Oh, man." He came and put a hand on my shoulder.