The Damnation Game (25 page)

I’ll probably die in a warm bed
, Whitehead thought,
with curtains partially drawn against a yellow spring sky, and surrounded by admirers
.

“There is nothing to fear,” he said aloud. The steam billowed. The tiles, laid with an obsessive’s precision, sweated with him: but coldly, where he was hot.

Nothing to fear.

Chapter 36

F
rom the door of the doghouse Mamoulian watched Breer at work. It was an efficient slaughter this time, not the trial of strength he’d had with the dog at the gate. The fat man simply opened the cages and then the throats of the dogs one by one, using his long-bladed knife. Cornered in their cells the dogs were easy prey. All they could do was turn and turn, snapping uselessly at their assassin, somehow knowing the battle was lost before it was truly entered. They dropped turds as they slumped down, slashed necks and flanks spurting, brown eyes turned up to look at Breer like painted saints. He killed the pups too; tearing them from their mother’s lap and cracking their heads open in his hand. Bella fought back with more vehemence than the other dogs, determined to inflict as much damage as she could on the killer before she too was killed. He returned the favor, mutilating her body after he’d silenced her; wounds in return for the wounds she’d given him. Once the clamor was over, and the only movement in the cages was the twitch of a leg or the splash of a bladder giving vent, Breer pronounced himself finished. They went together toward the house.

There were two more dogs here; the last of them. The Razor-Eater made short work of them both. By now he looked more like an abattoir worker than a sometime librarian. The European thanked him. It had been easier than he’d expected.

“I have business inside the house now,” he told Breer.

“Do you want me to come?”

“No. But you could open the door for me, if you would.”

Breer went to the back door and punched out the glass, then reached through and unlocked it, letting Mamoulian into the kitchen.

“Thank you. Wait here for me.”

The European disappeared into the blue gloom of the interior. Breer watched him go, and once his master was out of sight, entered the Sanctuary after him, blood and smiles wreathing his face.

T
hough the pall of steam muffled the sound, Whitehead had the impression that somebody was moving around in the house. Strauss, probably: the man had become restless recently. Whitehead let his eyes drift closed again.

Somewhere close by, he heard a door opening and closing, the door of the antechamber beyond the steam room. He stood up, and quizzed the gloom.

“Marty?”

There was no answer from Marty or anybody else. The certainty of having heard a door at all faltered. It wasn’t always easy to judge sound here. Nor vision. The steam had thickened considerably; he could no longer see across to the other side of the room.

“Is there somebody there?” he asked.

The steam was a dead, gray wall in front of his eyes. He cursed himself for letting it get so heavy.

“Martin?” he said again. Though there was neither sight nor sound to confirm his suspicions, he knew he wasn’t alone. Somebody was very close, and yet not answering. When he spoke he reached, inch by tremulous inch, across the tiles to the towel folded at his side. His fingers investigated the fold while his eyes stayed fixed on the steam-wall; in the towel was a gun. His grateful fingers located it.

This time more quietly, he addressed the invisible visitor. The gun gave him confidence.

“I know you’re there. Show yourself, you bastard. I won’t be terrorized.”

Something moved in the steam. Eddies began, and multiplied. Whitehead could hear the double thump of his heart in his ears. Whoever it was (
let it not be him, oh, Christ, let it not be him
) he was ready. And then, without warning, the steam divided, killed by a sudden cold. The old man raised the gun. If it was Marty out there, and he was playing some sick joke, he was going to regret it. The hand that held the gun had begun to tremble.

And now, finally, there was a figure in front of him. It was still indecipherable in the mist. At least it was until a voice he’d heard a hundred times in his vodka-sodden dreams said:

“Pilgrim.”

The steam shrank back. The European was there, standing in front of him. His face had scarcely conceded the seventeen years since last they’d met. The domed brow, the eyes set so deep in their orbits they glinted like water at the bottom of a well. He had changed so little, as though time—in awe of him—had passed him by.

“Sit down,” he said.

Whitehead didn’t move; the gun was still pointed directly at the European.

“Please, Joseph. Sit down.”

Might it be better if he sat? Might the death blows be avoided by a feigned meekness? Or was it melodrama to think that this man would stoop to blows?
What kind of dream have I been living in
, Whitehead chided himself,
to think he’d come here to bruise me, to bleed me?
Such eyes have more than bruising on their mind.

He sat down. He was aware of his nakedness, but he didn’t much care. Mamoulian wasn’t seeing his flesh; he looked deeper than fat and bone. Whitehead could feel the stare in him now; it stroked his heart. How else was he to explain the relief he felt, seeing the European at last?

“It’s so long …” was all he could say: a limping banality. Did he sound like a hopeful lover, longing for a reconciliation? Perhaps that wasn’t so far from the truth. The singularity of their mutual hatred had the purity of love.

The European studied him.

“Pilgrim,” he murmured reproachfully, glancing at the gun, “there’s no need. Or use.”

Whitehead smiled and laid the gun down on the towel beside him.

“I was afraid of you coming,” he said, by way of explanation. “That’s why I bought the dogs. You know how I loathe dogs. But I knew you loathed them more.”

Mamoulian put his finger to his lips to hush Whitehead’s talk.

“I forgive the dogs,” he said. Whom was he forgiving: the animals or the man who’d used them against him?

“Why did you have to come back?” Whitehead said. “You must have known I wouldn’t welcome you.”

“You know why I came.”

“No I don’t. Really. I don’t.”

“Joseph,” Mamoulian sighed. “Don’t treat me like one of your politicians. I’m not to be paid off in promises, then thrown away when your fortunes change. You can’t treat me like that.”

“I didn’t.”

“No lies, please. Not now. Not with so little time left to us. This time, this last time, let us be honest with each other. Let us spill our hearts. There won’t be any more opportunities.”

“Why not? Why can’t we start again?”

“We’re old. And tired.”

“I’m not.”

“Why haven’t you fought for your Empire, then, if not because of fatigue?”

“That was your doing?” Whitehead asked, already certain of the reply.

Mamoulian nodded. “You’re not the only man I’ve helped to fortune. I’ve got friends in the highest circles; all, like you, students of Providence. They could buy and sell half the world if I asked them to; they owe me that. But none of them were ever quite like you, Joseph. You were the hungriest, and the ablest. Only with you did I see a chance of—”

“Go on,” Whitehead prompted. “Chance of what?”

“Salvation,” Mamoulian replied, then laughed the thought off. “Of all things,” he said quietly.

Whitehead had never imagined it would be like this: a hushed debate in a white-tiled room, two old men exchanging hurts. Turning the memories over like stones, and watching the lice scuttle away. It was so much more gentle and so much more painful. Nothing scourged like loss.

“I made mistakes,” he said, “and I’m genuinely sorry for them.”

“Tell me the truth,” Mamoulian scolded.

“That is the truth, damn it. I’m sorry. What more do you want? Land? Companies? What do you want?”

“You amaze me, Joseph. Even now, in extremis, you try to make bargains. What a loss you are. What a terrible loss. I could have made you great.”

“I am great.”

“You know better than that, Pilgrim,” he said gently. “What would you have been, without me? With your glib tongue and your fancy suits. An actor? A car salesman? A thief?”

Whitehead flinched, not just at the taunts. The steam had become uneasy behind Mamoulian, as if ghosts had begun to move in it.

“You were nothing. At least have the good grace to admit that.”

“I took you on,” Whitehead pointed out.

“Oh, yes,” said Mamoulian. “You had appetite, I grant you. You had that in abundance.”

“You needed me,” Whitehead retorted. The European had wounded him; now, despite his better judgment, he wanted to wound in return. This was his world, after all. The European was a trespasser here: unarmed, unaided. And he had asked for the truth to be told. Well, he’d hear it, ghosts or no ghosts.

“Why would I need you?” Mamoulian asked. There was sudden contempt in his tone. “What are you worth?”

Whitehead held off answering for a moment; and then he was spilling the words, careless of the consequences.

“To live for you, because you were too bloodless to do it for yourself! That was why you picked me up. To taste it all through me. The women, the power: all of it.”

“No…”

“You’re looking sick, Mamoulian—”

He called the European by his name. See that? God, the ease of it. He called the bastard by his name, and he didn’t look away when those eyes glinted, because he was telling the truth here, wasn’t he? They both knew it. Mamoulian was pale; almost insipid. Drained of the will to live.

Suddenly, Whitehead began to know he could win this confrontation, if he was clever.

“Don’t try to fight,” Mamoulian said. “I will have my due.”

“Which is?”

“You. Your death. Your soul, for want of a better word.”

“You had all I owed you and more, years ago.”

“That wasn’t the bargain, Pilgrim.”

“We all make deals and then change the rules.”

“That’s not playing the game.”

“There is only one game. You taught me that. As long as I win that one … the rest don’t matter.”

“I will have what’s mine,” Mamoulian said with quiet determination.

“It’s a foregone conclusion.”

“Why not just have me killed?”

“You know me, Joseph. I want this to finish cleanly. I’m granting you time to organize your affairs. To close the books, clean the slates, give the land back to those you stole it from.”

“I didn’t take you for a Communist.”

“I’m not here to debate politics. I came to tell you my terms.”

So, Whitehead thought, the execution date is a while away. He quickly put all thoughts of escape out of his head, for fear the European sniff them out. Mamoulian had reached into his jacket pocket. The mutilated hand brought out a large envelope, folded on itself. “You will dispose of your assets in strict accordance with these directions.”

“All to friends of yours, presumably.”

“I have no friends.”

“It’s fine by me.” Whitehead shrugged. “I’m glad to be rid of it.”

“Didn’t I warn you it would become burdensome?”

“I’ll give it all away. Become a saint, if you like. Will you be satisfied then?”

“As long as you die, Pilgrim,” the European said.

“No.”

“You and I together.”

“I’ll die in my time,” Whitehead said, “not in yours.”

“You won’t want to go alone.” Behind the European the ghosts were getting restless. The steam simmered with them.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Whitehead said. He thought he glimpsed faces in the billows. Perhaps defiance wasn’t wise, he decided. “…Where’s the harm?” he muttered, half-standing to ward off whatever the steam contained. The sauna lights were dimming. Mamoulian’s eyes shone in the deepening murk, and there was illumination spilling up from his throat too, staining the air. The ghosts were taking substance from it, growing more palpable by the second.

“Stop,” Whitehead begged, but it was a vain hope.

The sauna had vanished. The steam was discharging its passengers. Whitehead could feel their prickling gaze on him. Only now did he feel naked. He bent for the towel, and when he stood upright again, Mamoulian had gone. He clutched the towel to his groin. He could feel how the ghosts in the darkness smirked at his breasts, at his shrunken pudenda, at the sheer absurdity of his old flesh. They had known him in rarer times; when the chest had been broad, the pudenda arrogant, the flesh impressive whether naked or dressed.

“Mamoulian …” he murmured, hoping the European might yet undo this misery before it got out of control. But nobody answered his appeal.

He took a faltering step across the slippery tiles toward the door.

If the European had gone, then he could simply walk out of the place, find Strauss and a room where he could hide. But the ghosts weren’t finished with him yet. The steam, which had darkened to a bruise, lifted a little, and in its depths something shimmered. He couldn’t make sense of it at first: the uncertain whiteness, the fluttering, as of snowflakes.

Then, from nowhere, a breeze. It belonged to the past: and smelled of it. Of ash and brick dust; of the dirt on bodies unwashed for decades; of burning hair, of anger. But there was another smell that wove between these, and when he breathed it the significance of that shimmering air came clear, and he forsook the towel and covered his eyes, tears and pleas coming and coming.

But the ghosts pressed in nevertheless, carrying the scent of petals with them.

Chapter 37

C
arys stood on the small landing outside Marty’s room, and listened. From inside, there came the sound of steady sleep. She hesitated a moment-unsure of whether or not to go in—then slipped down the stairs again, leaving him unwoken. It was too convenient to slide into bed beside him, to weep into the crook of his neck where his pulse ticked, to unburden herself of all her fretting and beg him to be strong for her. Convenient and dangerous. It wasn’t real safety, there in his bed. She’d find that by herself and in herself, nowhere else.