In the House of Secret Enemies Read online

  Pernod smiled uncertainly. For a moment I thought he was going to drop the knife. I was wrong. Pernod pressed the point into the soft flesh of the girl’s throat and blood blossomed. I groaned inwardly.

  “I don’t believe you, professor. I don’t believe you’d let a young girl die if you could prevent it. But we’ll compromise. If I can’t see you, I want to see the gun I know you’re carrying. I want to see it now!”

  The knife point dug deeper, fractions of an inch away from the girl’s jugular. I pressed the loading lever on the side of the gun and the magazine dropped to the ground. I tossed the rest of the weapon through the window. Pernod reacted as I’d hoped, leaping at the gun, picking it up and aiming it at the window.

  It was a few seconds before he realized there was no magazine. By then I was over the ledge and into the room, standing in front of the girl. Once again, my left arm had come loose from its impromptu sling. I let it dangle.

  Pernod laughed. Apparently he thought he was in charge of the situation. He glanced once at the knife he still held as if to reassure himself.

  “All right, dwarf,” Pernod said without a trace of the manners I remembered, “stick that good arm behind your back and lay down on the floor.”

  “If you put the knife down I won’t kill you, Pernod,” I breathed. I straightened up and smiled.

  Pernod blinked in disbelief before rage gorged his eyes and he came at me. I ducked under the knife and kicked out at his knees. It was a glancing blow, not enough to cripple him. Pernod stumbled and sat down heavily on the floor, a stunned expression on his face. He stared at me stupidly.

  “Stay down, Pernod,” I said, fighting down my own blood lust. “Stay down.”

  I didn’t really want him to, and he didn’t. Switching the knife to his other hand, Pernod rose and lurched toward me. This time I let him get close, feeling the blade of the knife cutting through my shirt and slicing across the skin over my ribs.

  But I had the shot I wanted. I brought the side of my hand down hard on the bridge of his nose, breaking it cleanly. In the same motion, my hand described a lightning arc and drove those shattering fragments of bone up behind Pernod’s eyes and into his brain.

  It was almost over, and almost was the key word. I couldn’t let up now, not even for a moment. If I did, I would be finished but the job wouldn’t. I quickly took the gag out of Elizabeth Hotaling’s mouth and untied her.

  “You—you’re the man. He called you—”

  “Mongo,” I said. “Just Mongo.”

  She was in shock, which was just as well, because I had nothing to say to her. I felt completely empty, devoid of anything I could put into words. I covered her with a blanket and headed for the door, stopping just once to look back and meet her gaze. The look in her eyes stunned me, and I wondered, now, if that was how other people would also look at me.

  A dwarf? Yes. But also a killer, a dangerous man. Never mind the circumstances. Never fool with Mongo. Once I had thought that look was what I wanted. Now I wasn’t sure at all, and I wondered how much of myself I had paid for the look in the girl’s eyes. And whether it was worth the price.

  Clouds had eaten at the sun while I’d been in the house and it looked as if it would rain. I thought I heard the wail of sirens in the distance but I couldn’t be sure. It was almost time. I crouched down in the morning to wait for the plane.

  The reluctant editor mentioned in the introductory article was Ernest M. Hutter, a friend and early mentor who was among the first to begin actually buying my short stories and offering encouragement. But he wasn’t about to buy “The Drop.” If he ever understood that a certain bit of dialogue between Mongo and Garth in the following story was inspired, as it were, by him, he never let on. The important thing to me was that he sent a check.

  High Wire

  I’d been lecturing on Suzuki’s technique of identifying individuals through lip prints and was turning to a chart I’d drawn on the blackboard when I caught a glimpse of the man standing just outside the door to my classroom. I stopped in mid-sentence, momentarily disoriented, suspended in that spiritual never-never land that appears when widely disparate worlds of the mind collide. It had been a few years since I’d seen Bruno Jessum.

  I dismissed my graduate seminar and motioned for Bruno to come in. The students filed out slowly, casting furtive glances at the huge tattooed man who stood shyly to one side. I half smiled; my students were just getting used to the fact that their professor was a genuine, card-carrying, four-foot-eight-inch dwarf, and now their classroom had been invaded by a man who looked for all the world as if he’d just stepped out of a circus. Which, of course, he had.

  The smile was ephemeral; I was happy to see Bruno, but he jogged memories I’d just as soon have forgotten. I extended my hand and he shook it, staring down at me with the same soft, gentle eyes that had always seemed misplaced in the giant body.

  “It’s good to see you, Mongo,” Bruno said uneasily.

  I motioned for him to sit down and I sat beside him. “Circus in town, Bruno?” I was trying to put him at ease. I always knew when the circus was in town, although I avoided it as one always avoids something that causes pain. Old habits die hard.

  “Yeah. Been in ten days. Foldin’ up tomorrow.”

  Bruno obviously had something on his mind, but it looked as if it was going to take him a while to get around to it.

  “I have a friend who keeps a bottle in his desk, Bruno. Would you like a drink?”

  Bruno shook his head, which seemed to have the effect of loosening his tongue. “Gee, Mongo, you look funny here. I mean, Mongo the Magnificent teachin’ a bunch of college kids. Know what I mean?”

  “Yes,” I said evenly. I knew what he meant.

  “I heard you was some kind of a doctor.”

  “Ph.D. It’s just a degree. I’m a criminologist. I was going to school during the years I worked for the circus. You could say Mongo the Magnificent was supporting Dr. Robert Frederickson.”

  “I heard you was a private detective, too. I went to your office and your secretary said you was up here teachin’.” Bruno’s eyes shifted away from mine. “I thought I’d come up and say hello.”

  It was more than that, but I figured Bruno would tell me in his own good time. Actually, I didn’t regret the delay. I was having trouble concentrating. Bruno had brought with him the smell of animals, sawdust and greasepaint. It was like a drug, focusing the blurry edges of my life.

  I’d been born with a small body and a big mind, statistically speaking. After a childhood devoted primarily to consuming vast quantities of food, I had discovered there wasn’t much I could do about the small body, but having a measured I.Q. of 156 made it difficult to accept any of the roles society usually metes out to people like myself. True, I’d ended up with the Statler Brothers Circus, but Nature had smiled, endowing me with improbable but prodigious tumbling skills. It made me a star attraction, but I wanted more and I’d worked for it. I’d always been interested in the criminal mind and, as I explained to Bruno, I’d used my circus earnings to finance my education, eventually earning my doctorate and an assistant professorship on the faculty of the New York City college where I teach.

  Not bad for a dwarf, but pride does funny things. I was—and am—a good teacher, but that still left me on the public payroll, so to speak. Some men—my brother, Garth, for example, a cop on the New York police force—are there because they choose to be. I’d longed for the bloodletting of the marketplace and had managed to obtain a license as a private investigator. Clients weren’t exactly forcing the city to repave the sidewalk outside my office, but I was reasonably happy, and that’s not to be discounted.

  “I haven’t changed that much, Bruno,” I said quietly. “I’m still your friend. You used to be able to talk to me.”

  Bruno cleared his throat. “I saw your picture in the paper a few months ago. You were in Italy. Said you helped break up some drug ring. I thought maybe you could help me.”

  “I
can’t help you, Bruno, unless you tell me what the trouble is.”

  “It’s hard,” Bruno said in a voice so low I could hardly hear him. “It’s about Bethel.”

  Bethel Jessum, Bruno’s wife, was petite, beautiful, but with the mind of a child—a mean child.

  “She’s been running around on me, Mongo,” he continued, “and I don’t know what to do about it. It’s driving me crazy.”

  I studied the other man’s face. Pain was etched there, and I thought I saw him blink back tears. I felt as if Bruno had put me in a box and was closing the lid. I don’t normally handle divorce cases, not because I can’t use the money but because they don’t interest me. The fact that I knew Bethel as well as I knew Bruno only served to complicate matters. Of course, I had just finished reminding Bruno that he was my friend; now I had to remind myself.

  “You want to know who she’s seeing?”

  Bruno shook his massive head. “I know who she’s seein’. Half the time they meet right in front of me.”

  I winced. “It’s not as hard as it used to be to get a divorce, Bruno. At least not in this state. All you have to do is establish some kind of residence, then state your grounds. You don’t have to prove adultery. I have a friend who’s a lawyer—”

  “You don’t understand,” Bruno said sharply. “I don’t want a divorce. I love Bethel, and I want us to stay together.”

  “You know who she’s seeing, and you don’t want a divorce. Why do you want a private detective?”

  It might have been a hint of impatience in my voice, or simply what Bruno considered my stupidity. In any case, he nailed me with his eyes in that way only an intensely gentle man can manage. “I didn’t say I wanted a private detective, Mongo. I said I thought maybe you could help me. As a friend.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said softly. “Go ahead.”

  “Last winter in camp we picked up this guy who calls himself Count Anagori. Real good. Works the high wire. Statler saw him at a tryout and signed him on the spot. He’s headlinin’ now.”

  “What’s his real name?”

  “Don’t know. Guess a guy who walks the wire like he does don’t need no other name. Ain’t unusual. I never knew your real name until I saw it under that picture.”

  It figured. Circus people are an insulated group, held together like electrons in an atom by strange, powerful bonds; a man’s name wasn’t one of them.

  “Anyway,” Bruno continued, “Bethel and this count guy hit it off real well together, like I told you. He’s a good-lookin’ man, sure, with lots of manners. But he’s no good for her. Havin’ a fancy European accent doesn’t make you good for a woman. He’s gonna hurt her sooner or later, and I want her to see that. I want her to see what a mistake she’s makin’.”

  “I still don’t understand what you want me to do, Bruno,” I said gently.

  “You got an education. You know all the words. I thought maybe you could talk to her, make her see she’s makin’ a mistake.” The tears in Bruno’s eyes were now a reality, and he made no effort to wipe them away. “Would you do that for me, Mongo?”

  Knowing Bethel, words weren’t going to do much good, but I couldn’t tell that to Bruno. Instead, I told him I’d talk to his wife after the show that evening.

  Bruno’s face brightened. “I’ll leave a ticket for you at the stage door. Best seat in the house.”

  “Then I’ll see you up on the swings?” I wanted to sustain the mood. When I knew him, Bruno had been one of the best catchers around. His smiled faded.

  “Don’t work the trapeze anymore. Got scared. Happened all of a sudden. One day I just couldn’t go up there anymore. Statler hired me as a clown.”

  I was sorry I’d asked.

  Bruno had been right; it looked as if the count was up in the world in more ways than one. His name was on every circus poster in town. It seemed odd to me that a talent like that should have been discovered in a winter tryout camp, but I didn’t give it much thought; the fact that Count Anagori might be a late bloomer didn’t seem to be part of the problem.

  I walked around to the side of Madison Square Garden and went in the stage door; it was like stepping back through time. Charlie Ruler was in a straight-backed chair, riding herd. Charlie was ageless, like an old prop the circus packed away at the end of a run and carried on to the next town. His pale eyes were watery and now almost colorless, but his grip was still strong.

  “Mongo! Bruno said you’d be here but I didn’t believe it! How’s the one and only superdwarf?”

  I grinned and slapped Charlie gently on the back. We talked for a few minutes, and I could hear the house band starting. Charlie got on the phone and a few seconds later Bruno came hurrying down the corridor leading from the arena floor. He was dressed, but the wide grin beneath the paint was real. For a moment I thought he was going to pick me up and whirl me around. He didn’t act like a man whose wife was cheating. He reached for me and I backed away good-naturedly.

  “Easy, Bruno. You have to remember that I’m basically undernourished.”

  “It’s all right, Mongo!” Bruno was practically breathless. “Everything’s all right! Goin’ to see you was the smartest thing I ever did in my life!”

  “I’m flattered, but I haven’t got the slightest idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Bethel!” Bruno absentmindedly put his hand to his mouth. His fingers came away blood red.

  “Take it easy, Bruno. Slow down and tell me what you want to say.”

  “Funny, the way it worked out,” he said, taking a deep breath and slowly letting it out. His joy was like that of a small boy who has won a reprieve from the woodshed. I was beginning to suspect that his shift from catcher to clown might have involved more than a bad case of nerves; heights, over a long period of time, can do funny things to a man’s head, even the best of them. “Right after I talked to you I told Bethel you were comin’ to see her. That’s when she said everything was going to be better.”

  “Just like that.”

  “Well, not exactly. At first she laughed, made fun of both of us. Then she went off to see Anagori.”

  “How do you know that?”

  Bruno flushed. “She always went to meet him that time of day. Anyway, about half an hour later she comes back and tells me she’s sorry. Asks me to forgive her! Can you imagine Bethel asking anybody to forgive her for anything?”

  I couldn’t, but the question was obviously rhetorical. I also couldn’t imagine her having such a rapid change of heart. “What did she look like?”

  “Real pale. Shakin’ like a leaf. Guess it hit her all of a sudden. I’m sorry if I put you to any trouble.”

  “No trouble, Bruno. It’s always good to see an old friend. I’d still like to see Bethel.”

  Bruno looked up sharply. “Why?” His voice was sharp, suspicious, as though the mere suggestion threatened to upset some delicate balance he had made in his mind.

  “Just for old time’s sake,” I said easily. “She was my friend, too.”

  The music was playing louder, and I knew Bruno was supposed to be out on the Garden floor. Bruno knew it, too.

  “Uh, can’t we make it some other time?”

  “You’re folding tomorrow.

  Bruno avoided my eyes and shuffled his feet. The sharpness was gone from his voice, and now he was just a man asking me to understand something he couldn’t understand himself.

  “I’ll spell it out for you, Mongo. Bethel doesn’t want to see you, at least not tonight, not here. I guess maybe she’s ashamed of the circus, now that you’re a college professor and all.”

  “Is that what she said?”

  Bruno shook his head. “I’m just guessin’. I only know she made me promise to tell you not to try to see her tonight. Maybe tomorrow, when she’s not so upset. We’ll both come see you and maybe have a drink together. Okay, Mongo?”

  “Sure.”

  “Mongo, I really feel bad about all—”

  “Forget it,” I said, smiling. “Y
ou’d better get in there before Statler has you selling peanuts.”

  I felt like the mouse who’d just removed the thorn from the lion’s foot. Bruno grinned, mumbled something about seeing me again real soon and ran back down the access tunnel to the arena floor. I absentmindedly took my ticket from Charlie, who was discreetly standing back in the shadows, and headed for the seats.

  It was an odd sensation, reentering that world, even as a spectator. People stared at me, as though the circus was the last place they would expect to find a dwarf as one of them. I found the seat Bruno had reserved for me and sat down, cloaking myself in the shadows as the last of the paraders exited and the lights dimmed.

  The first two acts weren’t much by professional standards, and it suddenly occurred to me that perhaps the circus was an outmoded institution in an age of nuclear terror, guerrilla warfare in the streets and mass refugee camps that no one could seem to find a way to eliminate. Yet the circus staggered on, and apparently there were enough throwbacks, enough men of skill, to keep it on its feet a little longer. From what I’d heard, the count was one of them. I was anxious to see him perform. His connection with the Jessums only sharpened my anticipation.

  Now the spotlight swung up to the ceiling, glinting off the thin wire strung here, then sweeping back and forth to reveal the platforms to which it was anchored. A balance pole, heavily taped in the middle, was in place, waiting for its master to take it and step out into the air.

  “Ladies and gentlemen! Before we bring on the great Count Anagori, let me introduce another great performer, one of the finest circus acrobats of all time, a man who is our guest here tonight. Ladies and gentlemen, let’s have a round of applause for … MONGO THE MAGNIFICENT!”

  The light struck at me like a snake, blinding me. I immediately experienced two conflicting emotions: disgust and elation. Together, they made a heady brew. I slowly stood up and acknowledged the applause, which was surprisingly hearty considering the fact that Mongo the Magnificent is not exactly Richard Burton. For just a moment I experienced yet another emotion that I thought had been purged from my system forever—the desire, the need, to perform, to please, to entertain. I quickly sat down.