Re-Animator (6 page)

“Hello, Mr. Cain.”

Cain quickly knotted the sheet around his waist. “Uh . . . hi. Can we help you?”

West drew Cain’s notice from his shirt pocket, held it up.

“Oh, you’re here about the apartment.” Cain glanced uneasily from West to Megan and back to the bedroom. “Say, would you excuse me just
one
second? It’s . . . cold.”

Cain scooted off. Megan watched him go, then turned back to West. “Won’t you come in?”

“Thank you.”

West smiled tightly and stepped inside, his eyes on the young woman. She hugged her books to her chest.

“I startled you,” he offered unapologetically.

“Yes, you did.”

“This street . . . is rather isolated. I don’t imagine you get many uninvited visitors.”

“I . . . I wouldn’t know. I’m not here that often.”

“Of course.”

Cain came rushing back, buttoning his shirt. “Sorry about that,” he gushed. “Doctors can’t afford to get sick. Bad for their credibility.” He took Megan’s hand. “So—Herbert West, may I introduce my fiancée, Megan Halsey.”

West bowed slightly. “Miss Halsey.”

“Mr. West.”

“And are you also studying medicine?”

She rocked her head from side to side. “Informally. I enjoy it, but I don’t want to practice it.”

Cain swept his hand behind him. “I’m afraid the place is still kind of a mess, Mr. West.”

West’s gaze shifted from Megan to the living room cluttered with an old sofa, an ironing board, two armchairs, books stacked on the floor, and a compact disc setup.

“Call me Herbert,” he said, walking into the living room and taking in his surroundings. “And it’s quite all right about the room. Our instruments must be antiseptic, but not our homes. I like to be surrounded by . . . life.”

His hosts exchanged puzzled glances; spotting the corridor, West headed for it.

“So,” Megan said, following him with Cain in tow, “my father tells me you’ve just come from Europe. Where exactly?”

“Switzerland. Zurich.”

“Lovely city.”

“I didn’t get to see much of the city. My work was extremely time-consuming.”

“That’s a shame,” she said, casting a dark look at Cain.

Cain shrugged. Megan was sizing West up and not liking what she found. Cain gave her a disapproving poke in the back. She ignored him and pressed on.

“And what was Dr. Gruber like? Daddy says he was pretty famous.”

“Yes. He’s ‘pretty’ famous.”

Cain thought he detected mockery in West’s voice; from her unhappy expression, Megan detected more and liked it even less.

West stopped. “Tell me, Daniel, does this building have a basement?”

“Sure does.”

“Dry?”

“Like a desert. They built ’em better a hundred and fifty years ago.”

West nodded approvingly. “Where is it? I’d like to see it.”

“Door to your left. Just watch the steps, though. They’re rotting, and I’m not insured.”

West pulled the heavy door open, and the trio descended the rickety wooden stairs. When Cain tugged the light cord, West’s eyes went wide.

“Oh, yes . . . yes, Daniel!”

“Nice, huh?”

“Nice? It’s perfection.”

Megan put her arms around Cain’s waist. “I think it’s spooky. The owner died down here . . . he wasn’t found for weeks.”

“What a waste,” said West.

Cain and Megan watched with a blend of confusion and distaste as West moved through the dusty old chairs and cartons shut with peeling tape. He looked up at the four transom windows, all of which were bricked up, and nodded approvingly; he bent to examine an electrical outlet and smiled broadly.

“This is simply perfect.”

Cain thought of the bills piled high on the kitchen table and put his doubts aside. “It’s a great room,” he agreed. “I’d always meant to put a pool table down here, with a big Tiffany lamp, but I could never put together the dough.”

“A Tiffany lamp? Come now, Daniel, don’t be so plebeian.”

Cain chewed the inside of his cheek. From silly in the morning to plebeian at night. At least he was coming up in the world; by the following day he might actually be upgraded to a mere fool. Megan squeezed him tightly, and he looked down. She was very cross.

Cain wormed from her arms. “So, what would
you
do with the place, Herbert?”

West peeked under a tarpaulin, examined the small refrigerator underneath. “Make it a laboratory, of course. I’ll pay extra, don’t worry—”

Megan frowned. “Mr. West, aren’t you getting ahead of yourself?”

“In what way?”

“Well, you’ll want to look at other places, do some comparison shopping.”

“Rooms in Arkham are at a premium. Indeed, I’m curious. How
did
you ever find such a place, Daniel?”

“I was real lucky,” Cain admitted. “The man who owned it died suddenly—a strange guy, a horror writer named Phillips. In fact, he worked down here, even had the windows bricked up for atmosphere. Anyway, when he passed away, the family in California didn’t want anything to do with it. They let me take a four-year lease just as long as I promised not to touch the old man’s junk.”

“Is there an attic?”

“It’s small but empty.”

“Excellent. Then we can move these things up there.” He stopped his examination and looked expectantly at Cain. “I think this will be just fine. I have my things outside. Shall I move in now?”

Megan stepped suddenly between them, facing Cain. “Uh . . . look, I have to go, Dan. I think you and Mr. West have a
lot
to discuss before you decide anything.”

Her eyes said it all: she didn’t want West around. Cain sympathized; he had been hoping for someone a little less austere. He looked over at his classmate, who had already reached into his pocket and withdrawn his wallet.

“Herbert, Meg is right. Don’t you think we should talk about this?”

“Why, Daniel? I’ve already decided.” West pulled out several bills. “What are you paying here?”

“Eight hundred. Utilities included.”

West removed ten one-hundred-dollar bills. “Here’s my share, first and last month. I’ll be paying five hundred since I’ll require the downstairs and the attic.”

Cain stared at the proffered money; Megan tugged the front of his shirt.

“Dan—can I talk to you?”

“You know,” West assured them, “you’ll never even know I’m here.” He paused, said pointedly, “Except, of course, on the first of the month. Dr. Gruber left me quite a bit of his estate. In fact, if you ever need more, just ask. Money holds no particular fascination for me.”

The young woman turned. “Mr. West, may I ask you something?”

“Anything you like, Miss Halsey.”

“You didn’t say
why
you left Switzerland.”

He smiled benignly. “There was no more I could learn there, naturally.” He looked over at Cain. “Do we have a deal?”

The young man looked down at his feet. After a moment, he reached out suddenly and accepted the money. “Done.”

“Done!” West smiled, then took off for the steps. “I’ll get my things.”

“Need any help?” Cain shouted.

West didn’t answer, and, when she heard him scuttle out the front door, Megan slammed her books onto an old upright piano, sending clouds of dust in every direction.

“Tell me, Daniel Jonathan Cain, was I being a little too subtle?”

“What do you mean?”

“Did you miss the fact that I think the guy is a total creep?”

Cain pocketed the money. “Guess what, hon? I don’t like him much either, but his money’s the right denomination, and what does it matter who takes the room? If it isn’t going to be you, it might just as well be Larry Talbot.”

“Who?”

“The Wolfman. All it means is that you’ll have to be a little quieter when we make love.”

She tapped her toe angrily.
“If
we make love, you mean.”

Cain picked up her books and headed for the stairs. “If that’s a declaration of war, I’m sure I can always ally myself with Miss Poland.”

“Be my guest.”

“I’ll tell Professor Norvig you’re spying on him.”

“I don’t care.”

“I’ll tell your dad you slept here while he was in Israel.”

Megan spun. “You wouldn’t.”

He smiled. “You’re right. I’d much rather do it than reminisce about it.”

Cain held out his hand, and, sighing, the young woman took it. “Okay, have yourself your odd little roomie. Just don’t expect me to have much to do with him. He’s obnoxious and he’s short.”

“Frankly, my dear, I get the feeling Herbert West would just as soon you, me, and the rest of the world leave him alone. Which is exactly what I intend to do.”

So saying, Cain walked his fiancée to her car, while, grinning broadly despite his huffing and grunting, West dragged his trunks and suitcases from the rented station wagon along the curving concrete walk.

Dr. Carl Hill sat sipping scotch in his apartment, lying back on the recliner and staring out at the river. Only minutes before, he’d canceled Babette, the girl from Boston he’d reserved for the evening. The appearance of Gruber’s former associate made it impossible for him to think of anything but why the youth had really come to Miskatonic—and if whatever had happened to the professor could possibly happen to him as well.

“Not unless the boy is using voodoo,” he told himself without quite believing it.

He put the glass to his lips, realized there were many ways to poison someone, and reluctantly put the glass aside. He folded his hands on his belly. Sighing away his fears, he retrieved the glass.

“Life is full of danger,” he decided. “Death is all around us.”

The loft, for example, had once been death—an Ogan Chemical processing plant which had been closed down when the river turned red and all the fish died. Kenneth Ogan had taken the spillage seriously enough to leave his San Clemente estate and fly east to personally lock the door.

“Now they’re busy burying the stuff in the Appalachian Mountains,” Hill mumbled, feeling the effects of the drink and the two Valium he’d washed down. “You can’t live in fear of dying, or you can’t live at all!” He saluted the bottle of Valium. “Without chemicals, life itself would be impossible!”

Still, West’s presence troubled him. After their meeting, he’d borrowed the youth’s file from Dean Halsey. In it, West had outlined, very amorphously, studies of the brain he hoped to accomplish. That was why Halsey had taken pains to introduce them. West had an ambitious program to study the rage center of the brain and find a way to subjugate it without lobotomy. That sounded laudable enough on the surface, but nothing in his file from Switzerland hinted at any similar work. Most of his classes were in chemistry, not the brain.

Halsey, of course, hadn’t bothered to make that analysis. All he saw was the last student of a brilliant scientist asking to enroll in his institution.

“What does research matter when prestige can be had?”

It was amazing, he reflected, that so shallow and plain a man as Halsey could have created such a radiant creature as Megan. He looked over at the thick file he’d brought home, the file he’d expected to go through slowly, lovingly, before Babette arrived tonight. The photographs, the notes, the mementoes—

He got up and refilled his glass.

“No sense getting aroused now,” he cautioned himself, and put the file back in his briefcase. He sat back down, and his mind returned to Herbert West.

The youth was obviously a hothead and would tip his hand soon enough. What he had to do was encourage that, not let the boy bait him as he had today, force him to lose his temper. He must retain the upper hand.

West was only twenty-four, half his age. He’d seen nothing of the world and even less, he was sure, of medicine. The surgeon fell asleep in the recliner, relishing all the ways he could use his position to draw and quarter the brash young man . . .

CHAPTER

4

T
he students watched attentively as Scott wheeled the table into the classroom. On it was a young woman, whom Cain recognized as Wendy Grant. Her parents had wanted her body donated to science, and Hill had wasted little time claiming it; he wanted a fresh brain for this morning’s class. As usual, what Hill wanted Dean Halsey was only too happy to give.

Cain noticed that the incision in her torso where the autopsy had been performed was only perfunctorily repaired, and for the first time in his brief career he felt an unpleasant sense of ghoulishness. Since she had been entrusted to them, ailing, to her final appearance here in Hill’s class, the poor young woman had been nothing more than a slab of meat.

Scott situated the table so that the very top of the woman’s head overlapped the sink. Thanking his assistant, Dr. Hill rose from his desk and stood behind the body. He was wearing rubber gloves, a green smock and cap, and a white apron; his manner was casual as he picked up a scalpel in one hand and, after examining it, bent over the dead girl and put the other hand beneath her head. Lifting it slightly, he made a slow lateral cut, speaking while he did.

“You make the incision at the base of the skull, cutting away enough of the fascia to get your fingers in.”

He lay the scalpel on the tray and snaked his fingers beneath the flap of skin.

“Then, grasping firmly with both hands, you pull the skin forward, over the skull.”

There was a slurping sound as flesh separated from bone, clots of blood plopping and oozing into the sink.

“It’s very much like peeling a large orange,” Hill said, glancing briefly into the classroom, a half-smile playing about his lips. The quip defused some of the queasy tension that had settled on the room, although one student, a proctologist who was taking the course to meet a minimum requirement, had to turn away to keep from vomiting.

Hill quickly regained his serious demeanor. “Once the skull is plainly visible, you take the bone saw and cut around the perimeter.”

As Hill did just that, Cain marveled again at his hands. Hill held the instrument firmly but delicately as the fanlike blades threw bone dust into the air. His dexterity and attentiveness must make him quite a doting lover, Cain couldn’t help but reflect.