He checked the bathroom. There was nobody in there, either, and none of the complimentary toiletries had been used. It looked as if ‘Mr Wisocky’ hadn’t arrived yet. If this was a practical joke, he probably wouldn’t arrive. But why spend nearly two hundred dollars to book a room, just for the sake of a practical joke?
He backed out of the bathroom, stowing his gun back into its holster. As he did so, a hoarse voice behind him said, ‘Well, done, fatso! You worked it out!’
He turned around, yanking out his gun again, but two muscular hands gripped his wrist and twisted the gun away from him. He found himself confronted by a tall, angular man with wild white shoulder-length hair and a pale gray face. His eyes were surrounded by smudgy black make-up and his lips were painted into a glistening green grin. For some reason, Walter found it hard to focus on him, as if he were seeing him through a steamed-up window.
‘Got you now, tin man, don’t I? Thought you could stymie my sacrifice, did you? Well, now you can make amends! You’d like to make amends, wouldn’t you?’
‘Sorry, pal,’ Walter retorted. ‘I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.’ His gun had been thrown on to the bed and he glanced at it quickly, trying to work out his chances of diving across the quilt to reach it. Probably nil, for a man of his bulk.
‘You and your friends caused the Grand Freak a whole lot of heartache last night,’ the clown told him. ‘Killing Doctor Friendly, and the Grand Freak’s favorite fire-breather, and his harlequin, too. He never cared too much for Brown Jenkin, but then who did? But you still made the Grand Freak very angry by blowing Brown Jenkin’s head off.’
‘I told you,’ said Walter. ‘I don’t know what the hell you’re blabbering on about. However I do know that you’re under arrest for assaulting a police officer.’ He took out his cellphone and flipped it open, but when he tried to call Charlie, all he could hear was crackling. He hit the phone several times against the heel of his hand, but it still didn’t work.
‘OK,’ he said, unclipping his handcuffs from his belt. ‘Turn around and put your hands behind your back. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.’
‘You think, tin man?’ grinned the clown. He gave Walter a low bow, and then he suddenly whirled around and he was brandishing a long serrated kitchen knife.
‘Put the blade down!’ Walter told him. ‘You even scratch me with that, and you’re going to do so much time you’ll need a Zimmer frame when they let you out.’
‘Scratching you? I wouldn’t dream of scratching you,’ said the clown. He prodded at Walter with the point of his knife. Walter lifted his left elbow to shield himself, and retreated across the room.
‘You don’t want to do anything stupid,’ he warned the clown.
‘Oh, yes I do! Clowns are stupid by nature! Stupidity is our bread and butter! Throwing buckets of water all over each other! Stupid! Tripping over each other’s feet! Stupid! Cramming ten people into one car, so that the wheels fall off! Stupid!’
He kept on prodding at Walter, and Walter kept backing away. For God’s sake, where was Charlie? He must be missing him by now. But then he backed into the coffee table, and stumbled sideways, and lost his balance, and fell heavily on to the floor, hitting his head on the arm of one of the chairs.
As he fell, the clown leapt forward, and seized his right leg. Walter kicked at him, but the clown dragged up the cuff of his pants, pulled down his sock, and sliced through the Achilles tendon at the back of his heel.
Walter shouted out in pain, but the clown took hold of his left leg, twisted off his shoe, and did the same. Walter managed to heave himself up into a sitting position, but now he was completely unable to stand. Blood was running quickly out of the cuts on his heels and spattering the light blue rug.
‘You bastard!’ he gasped. ‘You bastard, what have you done to me?’
The clown leaned over him. Close up, Walter could see that he wasn’t smiling at all.
‘This is only the beginning, tin man. There’s far worse to come — you’ll see! But after what you did last night, you and your friends, what do you expect? Not mercy, surely!’
‘I still don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,’ Walter told him. He was breathing heavily and his face was ashen from shock.
‘Of course you know what I’m talking about, Dom Magator the Night Warrior.’
‘Who the what?’
‘Don’t deny it. You might have been wearing that helmet last night, but I’d know that fat gut anywhere! And who else would be looking for me, by day as well as by night?
He stood up straight. ‘Anyhow, you’ve solved a problem for me. I needed to bring nine sacrifices to Brother Albrecht, as you know — nine souls who would happily commit themselves forever to the most terrible show on earth. Maria Fortales was number eight, and I’m happy to say that you can have the honor of being number nine.
‘As soon as you take your place among your companion freaks, the papal sanction will be broken for ever. The circus will come rolling through to the world of reality! Drums beating! Trumpets blaring! Tarantara! Tarantara! And the world will collapse into wonderful, screaming chaos! Murder! Rape! Wanton vandalism! People set on fire for the fun of it! The human race is headed that way already, of course, but Brother Albrecht’s circus will make sure you arrive in hell so much sooner!’
‘I don’t understand,’ said Walter, weakly. ‘What circus are you talking about? You’re Mago Verde, aren’t you?’
‘Ah! You know who I am! A clever detective, as well as a formidable Night Warrior! Yes, tin man. I am Mago Verde, the Green Magician.’
‘You’re not Gordon Veitch, though, are you? You can’t be. Gordon Veitch must have died a long time ago.’
‘The real Gordon Veitch, yes. The human Gordon Veitch. The human Gordon Veitch was trapped when the cops set fire to Shantytown in nineteen thirty-eight. Smoke inhalation. But he was asleep when it happened, and dreaming, and his dreaming self survived, and his dreaming self is me. Get it?’
‘So Henry Marriott wasn’t shooting us a line after all.’
‘Henry Marriott? Jesus! Is that punk still above ground? He used to be my gofer! What an idiot. Thought he was a clown? He couldn’t make a hyena laugh.’
‘But Henry Marriott told us you were trying to get Gilbert Griffin’s dead wife back. He didn’t say anything about a circus. What circus?’
‘Oh… yes, that’s how it started, with Emily Griffin. I was visiting other people’s dreams, trying to find her. She was very elusive, to tell you the truth, young dead Emily Griffin. It was like trying to catch a shadow, or an echo, or the snatch of a song. I visited the dreams of most of her friends. I visited her parents’ dreams. Never quite caught her.’
He turned back to Walter with a real grin underneath his painted grin. ‘One night back in nineteen thirty-six I stepped into a dream that one of Gilbert Griffin’s stockholders was having; and I was pleasantly surprised to find myself at Brother Albrecht’s carnival and freak show. That was when I first realized what the power of true evil is all about. And, believe me, tin man, the power of true evil is the most intoxicating elixir that man ever drank!’
‘I need you to call nine-one-one for me,’ said Walter. ‘This bleeding isn’t going to stop.’
Mago Verde ignored him. ‘I was looking for Emily Griffin at the time, yes, with the aim of reuniting her with her grieving husband. He was paying me enough, I can assure you! Three thousand dollars in just six months! But when I met Brother Albrecht, everything changed. My whole life was turned upside down. I forgot about Emily Griffin. Who cared about one dim-witted young woman who crossed the street without looking left and right? Brother Albrecht and his circus, that was the future for me!’