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Jerry glanced up at David wryly. "Maybe that's my real problem. Maybe, in
reality, I'm a comic strip character. Jerry and the Pirates."
David said, "Never," and gave his father a friendly cuff on the arm.
Jerry drove David to school, dropping him outside the gates. Then he cruised
slowly back home to Orchid Place, listening to Hilly Rose on KMPC 710 and
thinking about
Japan.
Japan . . . and those hot still days in the Chugoku Sanchi, under a sky the
color of melted lead, hidden deeply in a camouflaged crevice of the forest,
with no sound but the chirruping of insects and the endless warbling of the
radio. He pulled up at an intersection, and for a split second he didn't know
where he was. A garbage truck pulled up behind him and gave him a noisy blast
on its horn to remind him that he was back in the present day.
Tengu
99
On the radio, Hilly Rose was talking to Sergeant Skrol-nik. "Is there anything
apart from the white mask which connects these two murders? Any other clue
whatsoever? I mean, are we dealing with a single murderer here, or a look
alike?"
Sergeant Skrolnik was on his best media behavior, and his voice sounded
strangled. "The connections are many and varied. You understand what I mean.
It's not just the mask. The modus operandi is strikingly similar, in that both
victims were wrenched apart by bare hands. No sign of any kind of blunt
instrument, or weapon of any description. This is a job committed by somebody
of almost superhuman strength."
"Somebody crazy, perhaps?" asked Hilly Rose. "Somebody with lunatic strength?"
"Lunatic strength is a myth," said Skrolnik. "What we're dealing with here is
somebody who naturally and normally possesses unusual physical power; and
that's who we're looking for. Somebody who trains day and night in karate,
something like that. Maybe a bodybuilder."
"What about this white mask?"
"We don't have any clues about the mask so far ... but a police artist has
been reconstructing the mask based on the evidence supplied to us by witnesses
who passed the homicide location on the Hollywood Freeway, and we hope to be
able to show that mask on television tonight, in the hope that it's going to
jog somebody's memory. All I can say about it so far is that it's dead white,
Page 46
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
kind of expressionless . . . and probably varnished. One eyewitness said that
it had some kind of pattern on it, on the forehead, but for tonight's
reconstruction we're omitting that detail because nobody else saw it, and the
witness admits that it might have been a fleck on his own windshield. ..."
Jerry thought, White, expressionless. . . . There was something about the way
in which Sergeant Skrolnik was trying to describe the murderer that made his
stomach turn over, something which disturbed old memories. . . .
100
Tengu
We 've located it, sir. No question about it. We 've taken sixteen radio
bearings and we have it right on the button. In that case, withdraw
immediately. I repeat, immediately. You will be picked up at 2125 hours on the
15th on the beach at Kokubu.
"Yes, sir," Jerry whispered to himself, aloud, as he turned into the driveway
of his home.
He climbed out of the car. A young man in a sleeveless T-shirt and shorts was
sitting on the wall, smoking and obviously waiting for him. The young man was
blond and curly, and looked as if he spent most of his day down at the beach
or sunning himself on a flat roof somewhere. Jerry said flatly, "Good morning.
You looking for me?" "You're Mr. Jerry Sennett?" "That's right. Who wants to
know?" "Mack Holt's my name. I used to be Sherry's boyfriend. Sherry Cantor?
That was in the days before Our Family Jones. But we broke up when she got
into that."
Jerry slung his jacket over his shoulder and climbed up to his front door.
"You broke up, huh?" he asked, as he took out his key. "What happened? Was she
spoiled by
success?"
"She wasn't, but I was. I was a would-be actor in those days, too. And I can
tell you, it wasn't easy, parking cars for a living while she was the toast of
the town. And it isn't easy to accept her death. That's why I came to see you,
I guess. You're her neighbor, after all." "Do you want a drink?" "If it's not
imposing on you."
Jerry gave him a wry smile. "Nothing imposes on me these days, young man. I
have gradually crystallized into a kind of emotional rock formation, upon
which nothing can make the slightest impression, let alone impose."
Mack, following Jerry into the living room, gave an uncomfortable laugh.
"Quiet kind of place you've got here," he said. "Quiet, well, that's the word
for it," nodded Jerry. "What'll you have? There's Chivas Regal or Chivas
Regal."
Tengu
101
"I'll have a Chivas Regal," said Mack, sitting down on the sofa.
"What happened to Sherry, that was a great shock to us here," said Jerry. "She
was a nice girl. Friendly, pretty. Always bouncing and full of life. I wish
now that I could have gotten to know her better."
"She was somebody special," said Mack. "Maybe too special."
Jerry gave Mack a drink and then walked across to the window. "I don't think
we're talking about the usual kind of Hollywood nut murder here," he said.
"Not a Charles Manson, or anything like that."
Mack said, "She was torn apart, you know. Literally torn apart."
"Yes," agreed Jerry. "But who uses a Sherman tank to crush a peanut?"
"You're a military man?" asked Mack guardedly.
Jerry came away from the window. "Used to be, in the days when it meant
anything. Naval intelligence group."
"Now you're . . . ?" asked Mack, indicating the living room with his glass in
his hand. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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