T. Wright - The Devouring

Mallory, confused, interrupted, "But Jack, what about all this-"

Lucas stuck his hand out. "Give me your notebook. I'll take over."

Reluctantly, Mallory obeyed.

~ * ~

It was the smell that Lucas noticed first. It wasn't a bad smell; it wasn't gut-wrenching. It was almost pleasant-an acidic bitter sweetness, like concentrated lemon juice.

And it came to him-as he stood in the doorway to Alan Pierce's apartment and studied the awful scene in front of him-that he had encountered that smell before.

A uniformed cop appeared behind him. "Captain Lucas?"

"Yeah?" Lucas barked.

"I thought you should know; that boy, Benny Bloom, is going to be all right."

"What boy?"

"The boy who got shot on Baldridge Street."

"No one's named Benny Bloom."

"Sorry, Captain, but he is. Benjamin Bloom. They took him to Buffalo Memorial with a gunshot wound to the right arm."

"Uh-huh. And what about this woman who was attacked?"

"Which one, Captain?"

"What do you mean, which one? The one this boy, this Benny Bloom attacked, for Christ's sake!"

"Sorry. Two women were attacked, sir. One of the women"-he checked his notebook-"her name is Lilian Janus, was attacked by another woman; we don't have her name, yet. But this Janus woman is a mess, sir. Her face was torn to shreds. And the other woman ran off after the shooting."

"Ran off? To where?"

The cop shrugged. "Into ‘The District’, I think. We've got people looking for her right now."

"The district? What district?"

"Sorry, sir. That's what it's called. 'The District.' It's where all those abandoned buildings are-"

"Oh, yes," Lucas cut in. "Yes, I know what you're talking about. You said some people went after this woman. What people?"

Again the cop shrugged. "A couple of uniforms, Captain. The cop who shot this Benny Bloom is one of them, and Detective Spurling-"

"Yes," Lucas said, "I know about Spurling." He studied the grim scene in Alan Pierce's apartment for a moment, then said to the cop, "Thanks. That will be all. Keep me informed."

~ * ~

Gail Newman was at Buffalo Memorial, in a private room on the third floor. Benny Bloom was at Buffalo Memorial, too, in Intensive Care on the first floor. X-rays had shown that fragments of the bullet that struck his arm had ricocheted into his chest, lodging near his right ventricle, and the physician in charge in Intensive Care, Dr. Chandler, had decided to open him up. So, while Benny lay half awake in Intensive Care, awaiting surgery, Gail Newman was playing solitaire two floors above.

And five miles away, Ryerson Biergarten was seeing things.

"Rye?" Joan coaxed. "Is something wrong?"

They were in her living room. Ryerson was in an upholstered rocking chair with Creosote in his lap, the soft plastic duck held loosely in his mouth; Joan was in a wing chair nearby. They had begun to talk about Lila Curtis, but Joan had gotten no more than half a sentence out when Ryerson's eyes glazed over, his mouth opened slightly, and it became clear that his attention had suddenly changed focus.

"Rye?" Joan said again.

He stiffly turned his head toward her.

" Oh ," he murmured, "I'm sorry. I guess I was somewhere else." It was clear, even as he spoke, that he still was somewhere else.

The soft plastic duck fell to the floor as Creosote nodded off. Ryerson glanced at the duck, leaned over as if to pick it up, straightened, glanced at Joan, then lifted his head a little so his gaze appeared to be on the living room wall.

"Talk to me, Rye?" Joan said.

"Yes," he whispered, and began idly stroking Creosote. "Yes," he whispered again.

In his mind's eye, he was seeing the soft, pretty pale blue of an early morning sky.

Joan asked, "Can I get you something?"

He said nothing. In his lap, Creosote began to gurgle raggedly.

Normally, the field of soft, pale blue that Ryerson was seeing would have been very pleasant. But there were dark gray smudges here and there on it, like pieces of a gathering storm. It had a kind of acid bittersweet smell, too, and Ryerson thought in so many words, That's odd.

Then the half-dozen smudges darkened on the field of pale blue so they were like holes in the daylight. And they began to move. Ryerson watched them for several moments, fascinated, until he realized that they were converging, that they were coming together. And, at last, he knew dimly what he was seeing.

He screamed.

Creosote woke in an instant, vaulted from his lap, and darted from the room.

And Joan, in the wing chair, stiffened up, with her eyes wide and her fists tightly clenched, as if Ryerson were about to attack her.

In "The District"

Officer Leonard McGuire was breathing heavily from the adrenaline pumping through him. It had been a good five minutes anyway since he'd caught sight of any of the others searching for the woman who'd been attacked on Baldridge Street and he was getting very nervous.

He was on the edges of "The District." Visible only a block away was a street of trendy shops that were in stark contrast to this place. There were several smells here-the smell of urine combined with an acrid burning odor from the smelters two miles away, and the occasional stifling and stale odor of death from the vermin and stray cats that roamed the area. McGuire wondered if those odors ever found their way to that fashionable street. He decided that the shop-owners had probably had a zoning ordinance passed against it.

He wasn't sure if he should draw his gun. Certainly he didn't need it to protect himself from the woman they were looking for-she was a victim, wasn't she? Of course, that fact posed two questions: If she was a victim , why had she run? And why to here? Good questions, he thought. And until he had the answers, it was wisest to play it safe. He unbuttoned the strap on his holster and withdrew his .38.

He had his back to the high windowless cement wall of an abandoned jeep factory. As he inched along the wall to the corner, and peered around it, deeper into "The District," he imagined that he smelled the tangy odor of oil mixed with other, far less pleasant smells.

He heard suddenly, from perhaps a hundred yards farther into "The District," "We only want to help you. Please come out." He didn't recognize the voice. "We only want to help you," the voice repeated urgently. "Please come out. Please tell us where you are."

And from deeper in "The District," he heard, "Detective Spurling. Over here!"

McGuire broke position and ran at a sturdy, fast clip toward the voice, his .38 pointed skyward.

~ * ~

Detective Third Grade Andrew Spurling thought, Hell, this is more like it! No more damned bad check warrants; now I'm going to get a little action . He was standing to one side of an open doorway, the cop who'd shot Benny Bloom was on the other. Spurling looked at the cop's name tag; he whispered, "What'd you hear, Mathilde?"

Officer Mathilde whispered back, "I heard someone groan in there." He nodded to indicate the darkened interior of the big red brick building; 40 years earlier, tank treads had been manufactured there.

"Male or female?" Spurting asked.

Mathilde smiled to himself. "It was kind of a neuter groan, Detective."

"Uh-huh," Spurting said. From behind him he heard the sound of running feet. He looked. McGuire was closing fast on them. Spurting waved urgently at him. McGuire veered off to the right. "Damned rookies," Spurling said to Officer Mathilde.

Mathilde smiled and nodded.

McGuire came up behind Spurling. "What's up?"

Spurling nodded urgently toward the doorway.