The New Weird - Ann VanderMeer [107]
"Starstruck?" Gwynn smiled. "Answer me another question, Siegfried. What do you think it is about people like us ― Miss Skye, our profession in general, even my unworthy self ― that so fascinates the good citizens of this town? That they will take an interest in what you write tonight, I have no doubt; but out of what matrix of habit, hope, imagination, appetite?"
Siegfried had been recording his own thoughts on exactly that matter, here and there among his other notes. He answered eagerly. "There are lots of reasons. You're artists. You're heroes. You're not chained by ordinary fears. You have freedom and power most people only dream of. Some people think you're angels, sent to wipe away the faulty so that the upright can survive."
"Ah. A generation whose teeth are like swords and whose fangs are like knives, to devour the wretched from off the earth and the weak from among the people."
"It seems you also have a poet's disposition."
"Those aren't my words. That was something I once heard a man of religion say. You like it, eh?"
"Very much. I've always liked predators better than prey."
"Is that a fact? Again, de gustibus..." Gwynn blew a smoke ring, which the wind ruined in an instant, while Siegfried continued vivaciously.
"All you swordslingers and knife-fighters and all ― you've got the power of life and death. That's a pretty fascinating power. I guess I'd like to be able to put holes through people, too, sometimes. I've always admired you folks."
"Well, thank you, that's very nice. But tell me, do you take the orthodox view that we're enactors of divine justice ― instruments of a moral universe?"
There was a change in the man's voice, an undercurrent appearing which Siegfried heard but could not precisely name, so that he hesitated again, crossing out what he had started to write. He said, "I'm not really sure."
Gwynn crushed his cigarette out and stood up. He looked around the base of the stone, where a few gentians and wild white poppies were growing. He broke off the head of a poppy and carefully tucked it into his buttonhole. He gave Siegfried a foxy look.
"Choose a number between one and five."
"A number?" Siegfried was nonplussed. The man hardly seemed the type to play parlour games. He shrugged. "All right. Four. But I don't ― "
Gwynn drew one of his twin revolvers. He emptied two rounds out of the chamber, leaving four in. After appearing to give it a moment's second thought, he removed a third and a fourth round. He spun the chamber and snapped it shut.
"Stand over there," he said, pointing the muzzle of the gun at the open ground past the thornbush.
Siegfried swallowed hard. Was this some kind of ceremony, an initiation ritual ― a test of his courage and trust? Perhaps he had to survive this in order to be admitted to certain secrets. He had heard of such things happening.
Gwynn aimed the gun to point at Siegfried's face. "Move," he said.
Siegfried's heart vibrated as if someone had struck a gong inside his chest. Slowly, he put the notebook away in his pocket. There was nowhere he could run to, except over the cliff. He had no doubt that Gwynn's other gun was fully loaded. He had no idea of what else to do, so he got up from the stone, shakily, and stood a little behind the bush.
The gun muzzle waved. "Further back."
Siegfried walked haltingly backwards toward the cliff. He felt sick and weak-gutted, and wished he'd relieved himself back at the cafe, which now seemed to belong to another world.
"Further. Further. Stop!"
Siegfried couldn't see the end of the ground, but he knew it must be close behind him. Have I been a fool? he wondered. Gwynn was taking aim. The gunman's hair lifted suddenly in the wind, floating up to form a black halo radiating around his starkly moonlit face.
The shot was very loud.
Blood and matter erupted from the back of Siegfried's head, and his body fell backward into the empty sky.
Gwynn stalked to the verge of the cliff