Текст книги "Illusion"

Автор книги: Фрэнк Перетти

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Текущая страница: 20 (всего у книги 33 страниц)

Oops! She nearly collided with a pretty girl in a blue costume and holding a hula hoop. Great. A cabaret girl who hadn’t learned the rules: no costumed performers on the casino floor. She ought to know that!

“Miss! You don’t belong out here!”

The girl looked astounded that Doris would even address her, which only raised Doris’s temper another notch. “Don’t look at me like that!”

Where was Vahidi? She grabbed her cell phone from her pocket …

Well, now she felt silly and couldn’t remember the number. The phone was blurry and the floor was moving—

The phone dropped to the floor as Doris uttered a truncated scream, lurched and twisted with arms flailing, then toppled to the floor, an arm and a leg broken and blood trickling from her nose and mouth.

A lady vacationer screamed. Security personnel came running. Before she passed out, Doris dizzily searched for the girl in blue. “Not onna casino floor …”

But the girl was gone.

Did that lady really see me? Was I really there?

The girl in blue sank to one knee, her hand on the floor, and worked to keep her balance until there was only the stage and it wasn’t moving. She thought she heard a distant scream from the fading casino floor—somebody must have hit a jackpot—but after that, the only sound was her own windedness.

It was alarmingly quiet on the other side of the curtain. There was no applause at all, just a muffled conversation between two voices. With a mere whisper of a thought she reduced her twelve doves down to the original four—Carson, Maybelle, Lily, and Bonkers—received their cage from a stage guy, and tucked them safely away. She set the hula hoops aside, left the bottles, silks, and cards in a heap, and peeked through the curtain.

The place was empty except for Seamus and the hotel’s entertainment director, Mr. Vahidi, sitting at a center table just a few rows back from the stage.

“Don’t come into the lounge area, miss,” said Vahidi. “You’re underage.”

“She knows,” said Seamus. He had his planner open on the table in front of him.

Were they working a deal? She sat at the edge of the stage, trying to see their faces. The stage lights blinded her.

They were muttering, talking about dates, weeks available, dollar amounts. She heard Vahidi say “one-fifty,” then Seamus said “three hundred,” then Vahidi asked, “What’s she gonna wear?”

She looked at her blue pants outfit with gold embroidery. It was her newest and best, reminiscent of a certain blue gown. “This.”

Vahidi looked her over and told Seamus, “For three hundred you should get her into something striking.”

Seamus began explaining her choices in costume, how she didn’t normally present herself “that way.”

“Hey, this is Vegas,” said Vahidi. “She’s competing with some big shows out there, and she’s got what it takes. You kidding me?”

“We’ll discuss it,” said Seamus.

Come on, Seamus, do what you do best: look out for me.

The stage lights shut down and the house lights came up a little. Now she had a better view of Vahidi, a man who must have been raised on cheeseburgers and Crisco, with a face like a road map and a very expensive watch. Besides the wrinkles and folds on his face he had two scars he must have gotten from a street disagreement in his youth.

“So how’s she bill herself?” Vahidi asked.

“Eloise Kramer,” said Seamus. “Or the Amazing Eloise—”

“Mandy,” she said.

Seamus paused. Vahidi waited.

“What?” said Seamus. “I thought we were—”

“Mandy Whitacre.”

Seamus leaned toward Vahidi, “We can let you know.”

“It’s Mandy,” she said. “M-A-N-D-Y.”

Seamus gave her a corrective glare, which she bounced right back at him. He said to Vahidi, “Eloise Kramer is her legal name; Mandy Whitacre is a stage name. She’d like to use the stage name.” He threw her an inquiry with his eyes, Okay?and she threw him back an answer, Guess it’ll do for now.

Vahidi shrugged and wrote it down. “Does she do escapes?”

“Sure she does,” said Seamus.

Escapes?“Sure I do,” she said.

“We need something big to set up out front. Not just chains and handcuffs,” said Vahidi. “Everybody does that. We need something outrageous to get her in the papers, get her known by the tourist and visitors bureaus, get her in those, those whaddayacallits, the what-to-do loops they play in the hotel rooms. She’s got a great show, but people aren’t going to know if they don’t come in and see it.”

Oh. She had a great show. That was nice to know.

“We’ll come up with something,” said Seamus.

“End of this week? We have to premiere it the same day as she premieres, make a big splash.”

“We’ll get right on it.”

“All right, all right,” said Vahidi, scribbling with his pen. “We’re looking at three weeks starting next Saturday, two shows a night, six days a week, three hundred dollars a show. Sound good to you?”

It did sound good. Seamus was nodding at her. “Sounds good,” she said.

“Sounds good,” he told Vahidi.

Vahidi stood as he told Seamus, “We’ll work out the details and get you a contract.” He and Seamus shook hands.

Mandy sat there watching her life being managed, her flesh being peddled. So human warmth wasn’t part of the business down here. Well, okay. She’d live with that. She’d make the best of it. She’d show them.

“And don’t go out on the casino floor either,” Vahidi reminded her. “You’re underage.”

chapter

35

Doris Branson was tucked away in a private room at Clark County Medical Center, stabilized and sedated.

Dr. Margo Kessler, medical director, stood by her bed going over her chart. “Bruising over her face with swelling …” From the air bag, she thought but didn’t say. “A 3.5 linear laceration of the right shoulder overlying the deltoid, running transverse to the axis of her arm and extending down to the muscle fascia.” From a loose object in the vehicle. “Right knee is diffusely edematous, but without evidence of joint space effusion. There is deep ecchymosis in the suprapatellar region.” Just like last time. Interesting that the patient’s clothing had no tears even though the shoulder was lacerated.

She looked at the patient’s face, the expression marred by the bruising and troubled by the dispute over what really happened. The paramedics said she’d fallen down some stairs, but they got that from witnesses on the scene. The patient herself, seemingly intoxicated and erratic, insisted otherwise. For now, Kessler simply noted, “Obtunded mental status secondary to presumed concussion.”

She looked at the crew standing by. “All right, let’s do a CBC and chem panel, and …” Now, this should be interesting: “Let’s get a urinalysis for blood ethanol and drug screen.” She checked the IV. “What’s she getting?”

A nurse answered, “IVD5 normal saline with 20mEq of KCl, 100 MLs per hour.”

“That’ll do for now. Let’s line up a CT scan of the head.”

“The family is waiting to see her,” a nurse told her.

Kessler nodded approval and got out of the room before her facade faltered. A safe distance down the hall she slipped into an alcove, punched a number on her cell phone, and fidgeted until her party picked up. “This is Kessler. Yes, the patient is Doris Branson, the injuries are exactly the same, and”—she nearly raised her voice—“I will need an explanation.” She listened, huffed a flustered breath. “I’ll see you in my office in five minutes.” She caught an elevator to the main floor.

When she reached her office, immediately adjacent to the emergency room, Dr. Martin DuFresne was there waiting for her, expression calm as always, something Kessler found aggravating—that, and DuFresne’s ghostly way of appearing for updates, briefings, and consultations, then disappearing into the bowels of the medical center, never to be seen. As usual, he wore scrubs and a white coat with the CCMC logo on it, something else that aggravated her. As far as she knew, he had no affiliation with the hospital, only that secretive bunch of ghouls in the basement—as if she were not one of them, especially now.

She closed the door and the blinds, then stood facing him down. “Well?”

He spread his hands and perked his eyebrows as if he were asking her the same question.

“Were you listening? I’m sure you’re fully aware by now, Doris Branson just came through the ER—again.”

“I would say she’s had another accident—”

“Don’t insult me. I could show you the chart from her automobile accident three months ago and it would be identical to the chart she has now, the same injuries in the same places, apparently by the same causes. So history has repeated itself and I’m sure you know what I mean even as I don’t.”

He paused, the same mild look on his face.

“Don’t stand there thinking of a clever answer. Just tell me what went wrong down there.”

He gave her half a smile and conceded, “We don’t know. Not yet.” She threw her head back and sighed out despair. “But the Machine is down so the only medical options are conventional. I can assure you, we’re working on it.”

“You said that about Mandy Collins.” She sank into the chair behind her desk, closed her eyes, and breathed, clinging to control.

He leaned over her desk. “As I began to suggest, she had a second accident. She was drinking again, she got disoriented and took the stairs instead of the elevator, she fell down the stairs and then stumbled as far as the casino, where she collapsed and her people found her.”

“ Yourpeople, you mean, covering your backs every moment, but I predict her UA is going to come up zero; no blood alcohol.” He gazed at her as if he could communicate with eyes alone. Maybe he could. She got his drift and rolled her gaze away in disgust. “So you just assume I’ll rewrite the lab report.”

He gave her one, diminutive nod. “And bear in mind, she was never told what her injuries were the first time. She thought she didn’t have any, so for her, history has not repeated itself.”

“Yes,” she said, slightly reassured. “Yes, that’s an important point.”

“And you’ve sedated her, so that will help to fog her recollections. No one actually saw her until she fell and drew attention. By the time she wakes up she will have slept off her intoxication and … you’re the doctor. You can tell her what happened. Your explanation is the only explanation.”

She thought it over. It could work. Maybe. “What about Mandy Collins?”

“She’s the reason the Machine’s malfunctioning. But we know where the problem’s originating, so it’s only a matter of time—pardon the pun. Don’t worry, you won’t be seeing her again.”

The thought. The horrendous, unspeakable thought. She blinked it away.

“Let us know how things go with Ms. Branson.” And with that, the ghostly DuFresne slipped quietly out her door and out of her sight.

The intercom on her desk came to life. “The salesman from Baylor Pharmaceuticals is here.”

She cursed, something she rarely did.

“He had a two-o’clock appointment?”

She grabbed a bottle of water from a minirefrigerator. “Yeah, send him in.” She uncapped the bottle and gulped half of it down. Pharmaceutical salesmen. If it weren’t for the free lunches …

A tap on the door.

“Come in.” She touched up her hair even as the door swung open.

“Hi,” the man said. “I’m Willard Chatwell from Baylor Pharmaceuticals. Not really.”

He sat down in a chair opposite her desk, a briefcase in his lap, and smiled at her, just smiled at her without a word.

If there was a God or gods, they had to have come up with this. Her insides felt pummeled, her face hot. Payday. The time of judgment.

The man was Dane Collins.

Wow! He’d never seen a white-coated professional, a knowledge-is-power doctor looking so fallible. Her hand was trembling. All she could do was gawk at him.

So all he did was smile and let her gawk. The torturous silence was delicious.

“You’re not …” Phlegm made her voice rattle. She cleared her throat. “You’re Mr. Collins.”

“That’s right,” he answered, clicking open the briefcase.

“Isn’t this a little underhanded?”

“You wouldn’t answer or return my calls, not since you called that one time to tell me that I was seeing things.”

Without another word, he produced the promotional photographs of blond Eloise Kramer and the early photos of Mandy Collins and laid them side by side on Kessler’s desk.

The photographs spoke very well for themselves, and Kessler was definitely getting the message. She studied one, then another, her hand going to her face, her head shaking.

“This one”—Dane pointed it out—“calls herself Eloise Kramer. We happened to meet in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, where Mandy grew up. I took her in, trained her, got to know her. It turns out she spent some time in a mental ward because she thought she was someone else. Someone else named Mandy.”

She finally looked up at him. “What … I suppose you have a point to make.”

“Eloise Kramer was the maiden name of my wife’s mother, and Eloise was my wife’s middle name. Eloise is a magician just as Mandy was; she grew up on a ranch near Hayden, Idaho, just as Mandy did; she talks, acts, laughs like Mandy; she even has the same teeth as Mandy.”

Oh, now the doctor was recovering her strength. The know-it-all face was coming back. “And your point?” Her voice was still weak.

“These are photographs taken by people other than myself who are witnesses to their authenticity. These images are not hallucinations, not delusions, not the side effects of medication. I want to hear you say I’m not crazy and that I truly saw what I saw.”

“Well …” She drew a breath and her voice was stronger. “I can’t deny that the girl bears a remarkable resemblance to your wife when she was that age.”

“Which is something you seemed to anticipate in your warnings to me about my medication, am I right?”

She was struggling, a terrible liar. “I assure you, what we have here is a stunning coincidence.”

“You did tell me that I might see Mandy again, or think I saw her, correct? Well, I did, only she was real, as these photographs prove.”

“I am amazed,” she managed to say.

“But I suggest that you warned me about it because you knew it would happen.”

She wagged her head. “I didn’t know it would happen.”

What did he expect her to say? “No, of course you didn’t. But given the evidence, would you say I’m crazy if I think I saw a girl who exactly resembled my wife?” She fumbled at the question so he asked again, “Am I crazy?”

She indicated the photos. “Given this, I would have to say no, you’re not crazy. You’re the victim of an incredible coincidence I can’t possibly explain, but you’re not crazy. Is that all?”

Her shocked, blown-to-pieces reaction to the photos had already told him volumes. “Good. We’re clear on that.” He began gathering up the photos. “I know this was only a ten-minute appointment, so to get right to the point– thepoint—I believe there’s a reason for what appears to be a stunning coincidence, and now I believe more than ever that you know what that reason is. I’ll be staying in town for a while.” He gave her a slip of paper bearing his cell number and the phone number and address of Preston’s Las Vegas home, now at his complete disposal. “I’d like you to think things over, and if there’s anything you need to tell me, you can get in touch anytime. Also”—he produced Jerome Parmenter’s picture and bio from his briefcase—“I’m looking for this man and what he knows. If you know him, if you ever run into him, let him know I want to see him.” He left a photo of Eloise and a photo of Mandy on her desk. “I’ll leave you these. Of course there are duplicates.”

He snapped the briefcase shut and went to the door. “Give it some thought, will you?”

She said nothing more. She only looked down at the two photos as he closed the door behind him.

“Now, that’s cute, that’s really cute!”

Keisha Ellerman, veteran costume designer, was a grandmotherly type, warm and immediately likable, always ready with pins, chalk, and a measuring tape draped about her neck. She was so delighted, even awestruck with how Mandy’s new outfit looked one would think she hadn’t made it herself. “And you are so perfect for it!”

Mandy turned this way, then that, striking little poses and looking herself over in the full-length mirror in her dressing room. The costume was cute—a pink top with puffy sleeves and matching capris that hugged her hips, both lavishly embroidered and trimmed out in silver. The bare midriff took a momentary decision to like—not that it didn’t come across as teasing, playful, and fun, and not that she’d never dressed in short summer tops before, but just because, well, because she felt she was dressing this way for Mr. Vahidi and her navel was not her own. Something about that man took the fun out of everything.

But the reflection in the mirror captured and held her just as it had back in Idaho, as if the mirror were a window into a real world where that girl who was she, but in some mysterious way, not she, lived, dreamed, loved, and danced. Even the style and workmanship of this costume looked the same as the dresses and gowns she’d worn that day, as if the same person had made them all.

“I just have to ask you,” said Keisha, studying her from across the room. “Have you ever heard of Mandy Collins? She and her husband used to have a magic act, Dane and Mandy?”

Mandy’s heart thumped so hard she could feel it. Her next breath came with conscious effort. Were she and this nice lady living in the mirror’s reflection, or were they here in this room right now and had Keisha really said that? She couldn’t be sure. So much of her heart and memory still lay in that other time when she almost wasthe girl in the mirror, when she danced a waltz through a special world …

When she couldn’t find her voice to say good-bye.

She put on her professional, social interaction smile—or at least half of it. “I, I sure have.”

Keisha shook her head, looking at Mandy and marveling. “You look so much like Mandy Collins you could be her daughter, I swear!”

Her gasp came so slowly it could have been a drawn breath. Keisha’s words played and replayed through her mind as she stared, transfixed, first at Keisha, then at her own reflection.

I look so much like … I could be her daughter?

No one had ever told her that. Maybe Dane had tried in certain ways but she didn’t catch it. Now the girl in the mirror became more than a longing; she became a revelation.

He called me Mandy. He must have meantthat Mandy,his Mandy, the one I look like.

Not me.

She turned to Keisha and tried to answer. “Is that … really?”

“I did her costumes. I was Dane and Mandy’s designer for years.”

Mandy felt her jaw drop open. She turned away from Keisha and toward the girl she longed to be. So her costume had a family, all beautiful; she’d met them, worn them; she could see the resemblance, feel the kinship.

So this was what Mandy Collins looked like?

A knock on the door drew her back from the mirror, back into the room. “Come in.”

It was Seamus. “All set. Hey!”

She turned so he could admire her, and he did, and she might have appreciated his gaze up and down her frame, she wasn’t sure.

“Well … that should make Mr. Vahidi happy.”

Whatever smile she’d managed fell away.

“Be careful you don’t get it dirty.” He prodded her toward the door. “Great work, Keisha! Magnificent! We’ll do another one, something in the same style to complement this one, maybe in blue. Bring us by some ideas, some swatches, all right?”

Mandy gave Keisha an adoring hug and the sweet lady kissed her on the cheek. “Good luck, dear.”

Seamus draped her in an overcoat and they walked through the lobby of the Orpheus, past the jangling gambling machines—an adult could accompany a minor across the floor of the casino provided they kept moving—and out a side door.

“So how’s the room at Priscilla’s?” he asked.

I look like her. That’s why.

But Seamus had asked her a question about her lodging. Right, the room at the bed and breakfast. Priscilla was a sister of Seamus’s cousin’s friend—or something like that—who ran the place. With kind words and some dealing, Seamus had secured a room there for Mandy, something she could rent by the week.

“It’s very nice. I even have my own bathroom.”

“My invitation is still open, of course.”

She knew he was going there. “I appreciate the offer but I haven’t changed my mind.”

“If you saw my place, you might decide you like it.”

She yanked her own leash but her feelings slipped through. “Could we wait till I’m through risking my life to talk about this?”

He backed off.

Out in the parking lot, a gaudily decorated stage was set up, the silver bunting shimmering in the light breeze, and in the middle of the stage was a big, green, ugly-as-an-alley Dumpster. Canned music, obnoxious stuff, was playing over a portable PA system, and behind the stage was a banner: MANDY WHITACRE, A DIFFERENT KIND OF MAGIC. The stage and Dumpster had drawn a crowd of maybe fifty. A clown was busily making balloon animals for the kids—all four of them—and a keno runner, not to miss an opportunity, was taking tickets for the next game. Mandy and Seamus ducked behind a barrier and hurried to the rear of the stage, where she shed the overcoat and took her place just behind the Dumpster on a small platform charged with a thousand pounds of compressed air.

Andy the stage manager checked his watch. “Two o’clock straight up. Ready?”

Focus, girl. They need you now, all your emotions, your whole mind, your best.

The music changed to a fanfare. She crouched, just as they’d rehearsed. Things worked pretty well the last several times they tried it; here was hoping. She steeled her muscles; her hands clenched involuntarily.

“One, two, three …”

Ba-boom! Smoke exploded around the Dumpster, the people jumped and shrieked, and like a pink Peter Pan, Mandy shot up from behind the Dumpster and landed like a feather on the lid, striking a pose. That got an excited round of cheers and applause. Good start.

With a wide, exaggerated wave and a pull on thin air, she beckoned a wireless microphone to come to her and it did, circling around her, then plopping into her hand. The crowd stirred at that one. They were with her.

She noticed the folks were wearing jackets, hats, even some gloves. The sun was out, which helped, but a sign across the street said the temperature was fifty-seven degrees. Not bad, really, for the pit of winter.

But she couldn’t wait to get into the stunt and into some coveralls.

“Helloooo, everybody, and welcome to the Orpheus, where anything can happen and dreams can come true!” Vahidi must have written that opener. It was her job to say it. “I’m Mandy Whitacre, opening tonight in the Prospector’s Lounge, bringing you a Different Kind of Magic.” She flung her hand out, and Lily the dove appeared. One more fling and Carson followed Lily as they circled over the crowd. While the doves did a circle, and then, to everyone’s astonishment, a series of vertical loops, a police siren sounded and a Las Vegas Police Department squad car pulled out from behind some landscaping.

“Oh-oh. Aerobatic birds without a license!” she quipped. She extended her arms and the doves came to rest, one on each arm.

Oh, the folks loved that!

Andy brought the doves’ cage and they tucked themselves back home as an officer stepped onto the stage, handcuffs in hand.

“Officer Steve Dykstra of the LVPD!” she announced.

They applauded, though a few booed. The Las Vegas cops were great sports. She put her hands behind her and he handcuffed her. Then he did the same to her ankles. “Don’t worry,” she said, “you’ll get ’em back—I hope.”

She hopped into a large canvas bag that lay open on the stage, then Andy and crew member Carl pulled the bag up around her and cinched the top closed.

The Orpheus liked doing things big. They’d hired a crane just to hook that bag and hoist it into the Dumpster. It was noisy, it was big and noticeable, it was great show business.

And she was blind to the world, trying to keep her body moving, kicking a little so they’d know she was still in the bag as it dangled on the end of the cable. They’d worked this through. Come on, don’t let me swing too much …

She felt Andy and Carl’s hands steadying her as the crane lowered her into the Dumpster. Eeesh. The Dumpster was empty but it still smelled like garbage inside. She touched down and settled to a sitting position against the Dumpster wall, Andy unhooked the cable, and then SLAM, the lid closed and she was in the dark.

Now for the trick, and quickly, before the garbage truck arrived. She drew a breath, relaxed, and thought of the ranch, the white rail fence and the three aspens, the long driveway. She reached outside herself … and nothing happened.

He never loved me. He was in love with his wife. He said so.

She winced, concentrated. Reach out … if not the ranch, then—no, not the hospital. Don’t go there.

My invitation is still open.Was she supposed to feel flattered? Seamus was such a child! At least Dane Collins showed a little honor, a little respect!

But he told me to go away and never come back. He’s in love with her, and I just look like her.

She could feel the wad of cloth in the bottom of the bag, a pair of coveralls she was supposed to slip into after she got free of the cuffs. Other magicians would have picked the locks by now; they would have been free of the bag, they would have been wearing the coveralls and using some trick to get out of there—a double, a secret panel, a mirror system, a false bottom.

But she had no trick. She was still stuck in this world, this present where the handcuffs were cold, tight, and unyielding.

She reached in her thoughts, her will, but the ranch would not clarify in her mind; she wasn’t welcome there.

She wriggled against the cuffs, but that was pointless.

I never told him my real name. At least that would have been honest.

Oh, no. She could hear the garbage truck roaring around the corner of the hotel. Concentrate!

On what?

The crowd was stirring—and growing—as a garbage truck rumbled up to a ramp on one side of the stage and lurched to a halt, brakes hissing. Climbing out of the cab like it was just another day, another Dumpster, the driver and his partner walked up the ramp onto the stage and rolled the Dumpster down the ramp toward the truck, the huge casters grating and shrieking, the lid on top rattling.

The floor of the Dumpster was jittering and banging under her backside, and the sound of the lid clapped her on the ears. This was a new experience. She was supposed to be out of the Dumpster by now.

The driver went to the levers on the side of the truck and operated the boom. Down came the forks like an elephant’s tusks, ready to pluck the Dumpster into the air. The crowd was stirring, getting playfully nervous. She’s not in the Dumpster anymore, is she? It’s all a big act. Isn’t it?

The handcuffs hurt, as real and secure as cold steel could be. The cloth of the bag was scratching her face; she was starting to sweat.

Rumble … scrape … clank! The garbage guys rolled the Dumpster forward, pushing the slots on the Dumpster over the forks on the boom.

Oh, dear God, now or never. What if there’s no soft garbage in that truck for me to land on?

With a powerful roar from the truck and a surge of hydraulics, the Dumpster arced into the air over the cab of the truck, over the container in back, and tilted completely upside down.

The crowd screamed, laughed, waited to see …

The lid wouldn’t fall open. The driver jerked the levers, jerking the boom, shaking the Dumpster like a salt shaker, which made the crowd groan and gasp, feeling the pain for the poor soul inside.