Robert Walker - Absolute Instinct

“Can you imagine that,” Darwin commented, leaning now over the edge of the terrace railing, staring down at various late night crawlers on the street below.

She found her place and continued to scan Holcraft's words, reading aloud, “ 'In ancient Thrace and Macedonia, people thought that the backbone of a dead person in time turned into a snake. The Egyptians believed that the sperm came from the spine, and the hieroglyph “ded” stood, among other things, for the spinal column or the sacrum of the god Osiris. In the mystery cult of Abydos, the sacral bone was set up on a pillar, and upon this the head of Osiris was placed, after which the god declared, “I have made myself whole and complete.”'“

Darwin wheeled, his face a mask of anger. “Is 'at what this guy goes home and does? Lifts the bones over his head and chants, 'I am whole and fucking complete now'? Bastard. We gotta catch this guy, Doctor!”

“It's possible, and it's just as possible that he feeds on his victim's vertebral marrow. I get an image of a beast gnawing on a bone.”

He gritted his teeth, the image coming full in his own mind. She lifted his wineglass back to his hand. “Drink up. Become him, Detective, and you may just have a chance at catching him. Cerebral pursuit, I call it. For this kind of monster, I know of no other way.”

Darwin grasped the glass and downed the remainder of the dark burgundy in one fell swoop as if to take her challenge.

She gave him a look of approval. “But beware the journey into the inferno. Put on all your armor and arm yourself with every weapon at your disposal.”

“You're talking about emotional armor.”

“Body armor and emotional armor.”

“Teach me, Dr. Coran.”

“You're sure?”

“I'm putting myself in your hands.”

“You're talking about going into an abyss like none you've ever seen before, Darwin.”

“I have my reasons.”

“I'm sure you must.”

Giles slept soundly and deeply now that he believed a showing of his work was inevitable, that Lucinda's money could and would make it happen. But Lucinda lay awake, making plans for exactly how they must proceed. She didn't want a repeat of the Orion disaster. She pulled herself from Giles's embracing arm and stood. Naked, she slipped out into the studio and returned to the sculptures, admiring them from every angle. Beside the tub with the incredible likeness of a human backbone lying in it, sat a jar of red paint. She reached down and stared at the jar. It had a strange label, simply marked JO. He'd said he made his own paint.

Perhaps the paint could be merchandized, she thought. Curiosity told her to test it out. She found one of his brushes sitting in a can of linseed oil. Wiping it clean, Lucinda returned to the bloodred paint and opened the jar. She was immediately struck by the odor, and it lay thick on the brush. She tried to place the odor. The slightly metallic smell brought back a memory of a childhood injury. Then it hit her full force. Blood. It was blood. Blood labeled JO with which he meant to color the spinal cord lying in the solution.

She set the jar aside with the brush in it just as a shiver rippled over her skin. All the same, she crept on hand and knee nearer the spinal column in the wash tub. Reaching out to touch it, she realized her hand was trembling as it went into the solution.

Her fingers lightly touched bone. She immediately realized that the backbone, like the blood, was real.

“Don't touch it!” he shouted from behind her.

She pulled back, the words It's real… the damned thing is real repeating in her head. Hadn't she overheard someone at the gallery say a woman had been murdered in Midtown? Hadn't something been said about missing bones? At the time, she hadn't paid attention.

Naked and vulnerable, her back to him, she replied, “Giles, you startled me.”

“Couldn't sleep?”

“Just so excited about our collaborating. Your work is so… so beautiful, so unique.” She then slowly rose and turned. Giles stood naked as well, leaning against the door-jamb twirling her panties. Lucinda glanced at the hallway door and quickly back at him, wondering if he had followed her gaze.

I'm closer to the door than him, but can I get past the lock before he grabs me? she wondered.

Giles Gahran had struck her as peculiar from the day she'd met him. Now her brain put him together with a mutilation killing, robbing someone of her spine-three spines, in fact-and creating some kind of sick, twisted evil thing he called art, and she had for a time swallowed it as art. His so-called art was actually murder, and he had the positive arrogance to want to display it in a public gallery.

His eyes widened with a congenial smile. “I'm excited, too, Lucinda, but it's three in the morning.” Shit, she's ruined everything. First Cameron in Millbrook, and now her. Fucking art dealers. How many of them do I have to kill to get my showing? “Are you coming back to bed?” He must calmly entice her back into that sense of security she'd felt with him before now, but how?

“This thing in the tub, it just looks so real…. I can't get over it, baby. What an artist you are! It's so lifelike, so real,” she repeated. “You really must consider leaving it un-painted. At least on one of your sculptures.” Sculpture hell. This is a damn nightmare.

He stepped deeper into the room, his arms welcoming her back. She watched his gaze go past her for a brief second. She knew that he'd seen the blood jar, and that she'd tampered with it. Again, she glanced at the exit door.

He dropped one arm and extended the other out to her. “Come on, Lucinda, I see you opened a jar of paint. Now you know one of my secrets, that there's ox blood mixed in the paint. You know, blood, sweat, and tears.”

“Giles, I'm sorry for snooping, but… but you gotta know this… well, it's all so-”

“In fact, you're finding out all my secrets tonight. The bones in the solution are real. I'm sure that's fueled your imagination.”

“I'm sure there's a perfectly good… ahhh… explanation for… I mean a reason for…”

“Exactly, let me explain. People never understand artistic creation that is in the least foreign to their parochial thinking.”

“I know… I know… like the guy that did the Pieta in elephant dung. Talk about thinking outside the box!”

He glanced back into the bedroom to make certain she'd not also tampered with the box he kept secure below his bed. Untouched. “Ahhh… good, exactly,” he said. “The true artist does not have to explain himself, not to anyone. I'm glad you understand that.”

“I do… I wouldn't be in this business if I didn't understand the… the artistic mind. Hell, I'm the only one I know that got Being John Malkovich, you know? The movie… about the artistic mind?”

“Good, that tells me you do understand what I'm doing here. You know, scatological art, art with a grounding in the arcane, down to earth, gritty, real. You knew from the moment you looked at the sculptures that my work stands out… stands above… that it's important.”

“Yes, Giles, I do understand, and… and I want to help you succeed on…' on every level you wish, to overcome all obstacles and to reach your ultimate goals.”

“I'm glad we're able to talk… about this, Lucinda. I've kept this secret for a long time. Never had anyone I could really open up to and just talk about my work. Not even Mother, I guess especially not Mother.”

“It's a new vision, Giles. I see that. A new way of portraying the mother and child. I can see that clearly now.”

“You have to know that acquiring the bones is difficult and time-consuming…”

“How… how do you acquire them?”

“Allow me to keep at least one secret for now. Look, Loose… Can I call you Loose for short?”