Clive Barker - The Great and Secret Show

It was no use trying to make sense of the signals; not with so much else to occupy him. The boy would come back. In fact that was the only clear message he was receiving: that Tommy-Ray intended to return.

Meanwhile there were more urgent demands upon the Jaff's time. The afternoon had proved profitable. In a matter of two hours his ambition for this gathering had been realized. It had produced allies possessed of a profound purity undreamed of among the Gravers' terata. The egos that had yielded them had resisted his persuasions at first. That was to be expected. Several of them, thinking they were about to be murdered, had produced their wallets and attempted to bribe their way out of the upper room. Two of the women had bared their silicone breasts and offered their bodies rather than die; one of the men had attempted a similar bargain.

But their narcissism had crumbled like a sugar wall, their threats, negotiations, pleas and performances been silenced as soon as they started to sweat out their fears. He'd sent them al] back to the party, milked and passive.

The assembly that now lined the walls was purer for its fresh recruits, a message of entropy passing from one terata to another, their multiplicity devolving in the shadows to something more ancient; darker, simpler. They'd become un-particularized. He could no longer ascribe to any of them the names of their creators. Gunther Rothbery, Christine Sea-pard, Laurie Doyle, Martine Nesbitt: where were they now? Become a common clay.

He had as large a legion as he could hold sway over; many more and his army would become unruly. Indeed perhaps it had already become so. Yet he continued to put off the moment when he finally let his hands do what they had been created, and re-created, to do: use the Art. It was twenty years since that life-shattering day when he'd found the symbol of the Shoal, lost in transit in the wilds of Nebraska. He'd never returned. Even during his war with Fletcher the trail of battle had never led him back to Omaha. He doubted there'd be anybody left he knew. Disease and despair would have taken a good half of them. Age, the other half. He, of course, had remained untouched by such forces. The passage of years had no authority over him. Only the Nuncio had that, and there was no way back from such alteration. He had to go forward, to see realized the ambition which had been laid in him that day, and the days following. He'd flown from the banality of his life into strange territories, and seldom looked back. But today, as the parade of famous faces had appeared before him in the upper room, and wept and shuddered and bared their breasts then their souls for him, he couldn't help but glance back to the man he'd been, who would never have dared hope to keep such celebrated company. When he did, he found something in himself he'd hidden, almost successfully, all these years. The very thing he was sweating from his victims: fear.

Though he'd changed out of all recognition a little part of him was still and would always be Randolph Jaffe, and that part whispered in his ear, and said: this is dangerous. You don't know what you 're taking on. This could kill you.

After so many years it came as a shock to hear the old voice in his head, but it was also strangely reassuring. Nor could he entirely ignore it, because what it warned was true: he didn't know what lay beyond the using of the Art. Nobody really did. He'd heard all the stories; he'd studied all the metaphors. But they were only stories, only metaphors. Quiddity was not literally a sea; the Ephemeris was not literally an island. These were a materialist's way of describing a state of mind. Perhaps the State of Mind. And now he stood minutes from opening the door to that condition, in almost complete ignorance of its true nature.

It might lead to lunacy, hell and death as easily as to heaven and life everlasting. He had no way of knowing, but to use the Art.

Why use it at all? the man he'd been thirty years before whispered in him. Why not just enjoy the power you've got? It's more than you ever dreamed of, isn't it? Women coming in here offering their bodies to you. Men falling down on their knees with snot running from their noses begging for mercy. What more do you want? What more could anybody want?

Reasons, was the answer. Some meaning behind the tits and the tears; some glimpse of a larger picture.

You've got all there is, the old voice said. This is as good as it gets. There is no more.

There was a light tapping on the door: Lamar's code.

"Wait," he murmured, trying to hold on to the argument he'd been running in his head.

Outside the door, Eve tapped Lamar on the shoulder:

"Who's up here?" she said.

The comedian offered a small smile.

"Somebody you should meet," he said.

"A friend of Buddy's?" she said.

"Very much so."

"Who?"

"You don't know him."

"So why bother meeting him?" Grillo said. He took hold of Eve's arm. Suspicion had given way to certainty now. There was a rank smell up here, and the sound of more than one presence on the other side of the door.

The invitation to enter came. Lamar turned the doorhandle, and opened up.

"Come along, Eve," he said.

She pulled her arm from Grillo's grip and allowed Lamar to escort her up a step into the room.

"It's dark," Grillo heard her say.

"Eve," he said, pushing past Lamar and reaching through the door after her. As she'd said, it was indeed dark. Evening had come over the Hill, and what little light fell through the far window scarcely etched the interior. But Eve's figure was visible in front of him. Again, he took hold of her arm.

"Enough," he said, and started to turn towards the door. As he did so Lamar's fist met the middle of his face, a solid, unexpected blow. His hand slipped from Eve's arm; he fell to his knees, smelling his own blood in his nose. Behind him, the comedian slammed the door.

"What's happening?" he heard Eve say. "Lamar! What's going on?"

"Nothing to worry about," the man murmured.

Grillo raised his head, causing a hot gush of blood to run from his nose. He put his hand to his face to stem it, and looked around the room. In the brief moment he'd had to glimpse the interior he'd thought it piled with furniture. He'd been wrong. This was living stuff.

"Lam..." Eve said again, all bravado gone from her voice now. "Lamar...who's up here?"

"Jaffe..." a soft voice said. "Randolph Jaffe."

"Shall I put on the light?" Lamar said.

"No," came the answer from the shadows. "No, don't. Not yet."

Despite his buzzing head Grillo recognized the voice and the name. Randolph Jaffe: the Jaff. Which fact gave him the identity of the forms that lurked in the darkest corners of his huge room. It was lavish with the beasts he'd made.

Eve had seen them too.

"My God..." she murmured. "My God, my God, what's going on?"

"Friends of friends," Lamar said.

"Don't hurt her," Grillo demanded.

"I'm not a murderer," the voice of Randolph Jaffe said. "Everyone who came in here has walked out alive. I just want a little part of you..."

His voice didn't carry the same weight of confidence it had when Grillo had heard him at the Mall. He'd spent much of his professional life listening to people talk; looking for signs of the life beneath the life. How had Tesla put it? Something about having an eye for the hidden agenda. There was certainly subtext to the Jaff's voice now. An ambiguity that had not been there before. Did it offer some hope of escape? Or at least a stay of execution.

"I remember you," Grillo said. He had to draw the man out: make subtext text. Make him tell his doubts. "I saw you catch fire."

"No..." said the voice in the darkness, "...that wasn't me..."

"My mistake. Then who...may I ask...?"