George Chesbro - Two Songs This Archangel Sings

A sulphurous, gun-toting angel-a lone American-draped in a strange robe and hovering over a jungle filled with soldiers in a country that might or might not be Viet Nam, but was almost certainly in Southeast Asia.

A close examination with a magnifying glass revealed no hidden messages or symbols, at least none that I could detect, and when I scraped paint from one corner I found nothing beneath but canvas. Garth could be right about an insane Veil Kendry going over the edge and falling into some black abyss in his admittedly complex and problematical mind, but I didn't think so. Wherever he was, I was still convinced he'd been pushed there and that, with time, the painting would tell me where and why. The problem was that I didn't know how much time I had.

The smell of burning TV dinner sent me padding into the kitchen. I managed to salvage most of my meal, ate it in front of the television set while I watched the Cable News Network. I'd hoped to pick up some news item that I could possibly link to Veil's disappearance, but the vast majority of the coverage was given over to background reports on, and interviews with, Kevin Shannon's cabinet nominees, which didn't interest me at all. My time with the people involved in the Valhalla Project had convinced me that nations were neither moral nor immoral; only individuals could make those kinds of choices, and only time, not television appearances, would determine in which camp Kevin Shannon and his new crew on the Potomac belonged.

When I began to doze, I turned off the TV, threw away the rest of my dinner, worked up enough energy to brush my teeth, then fell into bed, exhausted. I fell asleep almost immediately.

I exploded awake, jackknifing forward in bed as the air exploded from my lungs. Then, writhing and rocking back and forth helplessly, I imploded into a small, airless world of throbbing agony centered in the pit of my stomach. Doubled up in a fetal position tighter than a clenched fist, I kept gasping-but air wouldn't come, and the veins and arteries in my neck and head felt about to burst from the pressure of effort and need. Gasping in my universe of pain, I vaguely realized that the lights in my bedroom were on. Two men in business suits were standing at the left side of the bed, staring impassively down at me. Just before I got my head over the edge of the bed and threw up on their polished surfaces, I found myself looking down on two pairs of expensive, wing-tipped shoes, one brown and one black.

I was just managing to drag some air into my lungs when two sets of hands with strong fingers gripped my arms and legs and pushed me back on the bed. Ropes were quickly looped around my wrists and ankles, pulled taut, and secured to the four corners of the bedframe. Thus spread-eagled, the joints in my shoulders, arms, and legs immediately began to ache. I was still unable to breathe right, much less scream for help, and so I concentrated on getting air into my lungs while I studied my uninvited guests and fought against rising panic.

The brown-suited night visitor standing at the foot of the bed looked to be in his late twenties or early thirties. He was clean-cut, with short brown hair that matched his cold eyes, and a neatly trimmed mustache. Despite the fact that it was the middle of the night, he, like his partner, appeared to be freshly shaven and smelled of cologne. He could have been an up-and-coming stockbroker, except that instead of an attach6 case he held the blackjack that had served as my alarm clock in his right hand. In his left hand he held Veil's painting.

The second man wore a charcoal-striped suit. He was middle-aged, with thinning gray hair and thick eyeglass lenses. Standing to my left, he suddenly bent down, and when he straightened up I could see that he was holding one of my bath towels, which was sopping wet.

They were top-of-the-line professionals, I thought, tough-minded and cold-blooded. They were also obviously well equipped, since by breaking into my apartment without a sound they had managed to bypass not only a most suspicious concierge in the lobby, but my own alarm system and a double lock as well. I was impressed. It occurred to me to ask what they wanted, but I was fairly certain they'd get around to that in time, and I wanted to conserve what little breath and energy I had.

"I'm sorry for your discomfort, Dr. Frederickson," the older man said in a soft voice that was just above a whisper. There were no chairs in the small room, and so he eased himself down on the edge of the bed, a foot or so from my head, and casually crossed one leg over the other. Then he snaked the wet towel out across the floor, like a whip. "I hope we won't have to hurt you again. Experience has taught us that it is often best to begin with an intense, sudden burst of great pain, so as to save a person even greater agony over a prolonged period of time." He paused, gently rubbed my diaphragm, helping me to breathe. "See? I think you're feeling better already, no? Please answer all our questions fully, without raising your voice. We certainly don't want to wake up any of your neighbors, and everyone knows that even the best buildings in New York have walls that are notoriously thin."

I most certainly did want to wake any and all of my neighbors, whether those on either side of me or those across the hall. I sucked in a deep breath and was just about to let loose with what I hoped would be a blood-curdling scream when the thick, wet towel snapped through the air and slapped across my face. A fraction of a second later the blackjack thudded into the bare sole of my left foot. A pain with a quality quite unlike anything I'd experienced before shot up through my left leg, slammed into my groin and belly, then traveled in a shock wave up my spine into my skull, where it seemed to expand to the point where it felt as if my eyeballs were being pushed from my head. It got a blood-curdling scream out of me all right, but, with the wet towel over my face, I was the only one who heard it.

No sooner had the shock waves from the first blow begun to subside-gradually, like water sloshing in a pail-than the blackjack slammed into the sole of my right foot, starting the process all over again. Another smothered scream.

Just as it seemed I would pass out from pain or lack of air, or both, the towel was removed from by face. Sucking air, my chest and stomach heaving, I turned my head as far as I was able and vomited again. When I was finished, the man with the thick glasses used a corner of the wet towel to wipe my face clean, then heaved a deep sigh and slowly shook his head. With a flick of his wrist, the towel was snaked back into snapping position.

The younger man at the foot of the bed who had hit me held up Veil's painting.

"Please, Dr. Frederickson," the man sitting on the side of my bed said in the same, soft voice. "Save yourself needless suffering; no more nonsense. Tell us about the painting."

"What the hell do you want to know that you don't already know?" I sobbed, gasping for breath. My joints felt locked, welded together with pain. "You wouldn't even know about me or be here unless you'd had Kendry's phone tapped. You've already heard everything there is for me to tell."

"Who else have you discussed this matter with besides your brother?"

"Nobody."

"Are you sure? We don't want to have to hurt you again."

"I'm sure."

"We wish to know every place you've been since leaving Mr. Kendry's loft this morning."

"If you know when I left the loft, then you must know where I went. Weren't you following me?"

The younger man let his right hand drop, and the cold black leather cover of the sap brushed my sole. I cringed and closed my eyes, but no blow came. When I opened my eyes, I found my interrogator looking at the younger man with a distinct air of disapproval. "You were just a bit too quick for us in the subway," he said, turning his thick lenses back on me. "I'm afraid that lapse on our part is what necessitates this conversation. We have quite a few lost hours to account for."