Elric to Rescue Tanelorn - Michael Moorcock [82]
Jerry stepped out, aimed the crossbow, and pulled the trigger. But the guard had heard him and jumped. The bolt grazed his neck. There was only one bolt.
As the guard began to bring up his gun, Jerry ran towards him and grabbed the fingers of his right hand, hauling them off the gun. One finger snapped. The guard gurgled and his mouth gaped, showing that he was tongueless. He kicked at Jerry as John came in with a knife, missed his neck, and stabbed him through the left eye. The blade went in for almost its entire six inches, driving downward and coming out just below the left ear. As the German’s CNS packed it in, his body was momentarily paralyzed.
It softened as Jerry lowered it to the floor; he reached down and slid the knife out of the German’s face, handing it to John, who was as limp as the corpse.
“Get away from here, John,” Jerry muttered. “If I make it, I’ll see you in the cliff room.”
As John Gnatbeelson rolled off, Jerry turned the handle of the door. It was of the conventional kind, and the key was in the lock. He turned the key when the door resisted. The door opened. Jerry took the key out of the lock. Inside the room he closed the door quietly and locked it again.
He stood in a woman’s bedroom.
The heavy curtains were drawn across the big windows. The place smelled of stale air and misery. He crossed the familiar room and found the bedside lamp, switching it on.
Red light filled the place. A beautiful girl lay in a pale dress on the bed. Her features were delicate and resembled his own. Her black hair was tangled. Her small breasts rose and fell jerkily, and her breathing was shallow. She was not sleeping at all naturally. Jerry looked for hypodermic marks and found them in her upper right arm. Plainly she hadn’t used a needle on herself. Frank had done that.
Jerry stroked her bared shoulder. “Catherine.” He bent down and kissed her cold, soft lips, caressing her. Anger, self-pity, despair, passion were all there then, flooding up to the surface, and for once he didn’t stop them. “Catherine.”
She didn’t move. Jerry was crying now. His body trembled. He tried to control the trembling and failed. He gripped her hand, and it was like holding hands with a corpse. He tightened his grip, as if hoping pain would wake her. Then he dropped it and stood up.
“The shit!”
He pulled the curtains back from the windows and opened them. The night air blew away the odour in the room.
On her dressing-table there were no cosmetics, only bottles of drugs and several hypodermics.
The labels on the bottles were in Frank’s tiny printing. Frank had been experimenting.
Outside, someone shouted and began to bang on the metal door. He stared at it uncomprehendingly for a moment, then crossed to it and shot bolts at top and bottom.
A sharper, colder voice interrupted the yelling.
“What’s the trouble? Has someone been boorish enough to enter Miss Catherine’s room without her permission?”
It was Frank’s voice, and Frank doubtless guessed that his brother Jerry was in the room.
There were confused shouts from the guards, and Frank had to raise his voice. “Whoever you are, you’ll suffer for invading my sister’s privacy. You can’t get out. If she’s harmed or disturbed in any way, you won’t die for a long time, I promise. But you’ll wish you could.”
“As corny as ever, Frank!” Jerry shouted back. “I know you know it’s me—and I know you’re shit-scared. I’ve more right here than you. I own this house!”
“Then you should have stayed and not turned it over to me and Catherine. I meant what I said, Jerry!”
“Send your Krauts off and come in and talk it over. All I want is Catherine.”
“I’m not that naïve. You’ll never know what I fed her, Jerry. Only I can wake her up. It’s like magic, isn’t it? She’s well turned on. If I turned her off now, you wouldn’t be so keen on hopping into bed with her after ten minutes.” Frank laughed. “You’d need a dose of what I’ve got out here before you’d feel up to it—and then you wouldn’t want it any more.