The Devil's Graveyard (14 page)

‘That’s my reckoning,’ the King said wearily. ‘Though, even a hit list often has a deposit of cash with it.’ He paused for a moment, before adding, ‘There’s definitely some strange shit goin’ down here today. An’ I don’t like it.’

‘Me either.’

‘Lucky you took that goddam envelope back to reception.’ He paused again, as if suddenly remembering that Sanchez was a serial liar, and just as likely to have thrown the envelope in a trash can somewhere. ‘You did take it back, didn’t ya?’ he asked suspiciously.

‘Oh yeah. Sure. ’Course I did. Mind you, wasn’t a minute too soon. As I was on my way here, that guy Claude Balls who was supposed to have my room showed up at reception.’

‘Did he make you?’

‘Nah! I got the fuck outta there. Guy was huge.’

‘Big fucker, huh?’

‘Yeah. An’ ugly. Looked like he’d make a good hitman.’

‘That bein’ the case, Sanchez, I suggest you clear your suitcase outta the room before he goes up there lookin’ for you.’

‘Yeah. I kinda thought that’d be a good idea.’ He looked round nervously, then added, ‘Thing is, I don’t much fancy goin’ up there on my lonesome, though. If you know what I mean.’

Elvis shook his head and sighed. Sanchez’s cowardice, like his untruthfulness, was legendary back home in Santa Mondega. The King knew perfectly well that his friend didn’t have the guts to go on his own. But for all his friend’s character failings he had always been generous, standing Elvis many a free drink in his bar, the Tapioca, over the years. For good reason, mind.

‘Ten years today since I saved your sorry ass from those vampires in church, ain’t it?’ Elvis said.

‘Yeah. I ain’t forgotten that, neither. But that whole experience always makes me a bit edgy on Halloween. It’s kinda why I took this trip. Thought it’d be nice to get out of Santa Mondega, what with all the undead an’ that.’

‘Come on then,’ growled Elvis, heading out into the corridor. ‘Let’s go get your bag. You can bunk with me, if we can’t find ya somewhere else.’

‘Thanks, man.’ Sanchez, following, was properly grateful.

They reached the elevator at the end of the corridor and Elvis pressed the grey button set in the wall to call it. They waited for little more than a few seconds before the car arrived and the silver doors opened. It looked empty and both men stepped inside. Sanchez turned to his left to press the button for his floor, to be confronted by an unpleasant sight. Slumped in the corner underneath the keypad was the body of a black man in his mid-twenties.

‘
Jeez-uss Christ!
’ Sanchez shrieked like a girl as he jumped back in shock.

‘What floor’s your room on, Sanchez?’ Elvis asked coolly. He’d seen the corpse too, but reacted in a much calmer fashion than his friend.

‘
Fuck!
Fuck, man! Look, he’s…’

‘What fuckin’ floor?’

‘Seven.’

Ignoring the body, Elvis reached over to press the button for the seventh floor. As the doors closed and the elevator began moving up, Sanchez regained a little of his composure. He had a dead black guy at his feet. He’d seen plenty of dead people before, most of them in his bar, but the sight of one crumpled up in an elevator had shocked him, as though he’d been confronted by a spider a second after switching on the bedroom light.

Taking a deep breath and ignoring his pounding heart, he looked a little closer at the corpse, which was half-propped against the wall of the car. The guy was wearing a shiny black suit with a red shirt underneath.

‘Oh my God! It’s Otis Redding!
’

‘No shit.’ Elvis sounded unconcerned, but Sanchez rattled on: ‘That Claude Balls guy must have killed him.’

‘Or paid someone else to.’

‘Jeez.’ Wincing with distaste, Sanchez leaned forward to get a better look at the body. ‘I reckon his neck’s bin broken.’ He sniffed the air. ‘Smells like he’s been shittin’ on the dock of the bay too.’

‘That ain’t funny, man. Matter of fact, it don’t even make sense.’

‘Short notice. Best I could come up with.’

Elvis shook his head. ‘You know, right now jest ain’t the time to be thinkin’ up wisecracks. When we get to your room, be an idea to walk right past it. This Balls guy might be in there. Jest follow my lead from here.’ Elvis was showing an impressive clarity of thought, given the circumstances. ‘An’ if anyone else tries to get in this elevator we’re gonna have to stop them.’

‘Because of the smell?’

‘Nah, asshole. ’Cause if anyone sees us in here with this corpse we’re gonna be prime suspects for killin’ him.’

‘Aw shit. Muthafucker.’

There was a pinging sound as the elevator reached the seventh floor. The doors slid apart. Immediately Sanchez saw four armed security guards in black suits and all with military haircuts, standing at the end of the passageway. In front of his room. Preparing to bust down the door and barge in.

Elvis put a hand up to cover his face and stepped to one side where he couldn’t be seen from the corridor. Then he whispered urgently to Sanchez, ‘Press for ground. We gotta get outta here.’

Sanchez heard the instruction but was so busy staring at the security guards that he paid little attention to which button he was reaching for on the keypad.

All four guards looked back to see who was staring at them from the elevator. What they saw was Sanchez reach for the keypad to press the button for the ground floor.
And miss it.
Instead, he prodded his finger into the open eye of the dead Otis Redding impersonator. The shock of prodding something cold and elastic made him leap back. His action had more disastrous effects, however. The corpse slid from its position against the wall and fell to the elevator floor in front of Sanchez, visible to the four men in the corridor.

‘
Oh shit
.’ Sanchez recovered his senses, located the ground-floor button and pressed it quickly. He was too late. The guards had seen the body and were focusing on it, and on Sanchez. Elvis’s face was safely tucked away out of their line of vision, but the sleeve of his gold suit was poking out past the elevator doors.

‘Hey, you.
Freeze!
’ yelled the nearest member of the security team. He had drawn a handgun with impressive speed and was aiming it at the elevator.

Elvis reached across and shoved Sanchez to the side. ‘Get back up against the wall,’ he hissed. ‘Don’t let ’em get a good look at you!’

With horrible slowness the elevator doors began to close as the four security guards came charging down the corridor.

Johnny Cash – or his impersonator, at least – had well over an hour to wait before his audition. He’d been hanging backstage with the other singers, and had impressed everyone with his cool, unflappable confidence. Little did they guess that underneath the laid-back exterior he was shitting himself. A million bucks was at stake. There was nothing for the runner-up, not a cent. It didn’t matter how well he had coped with pressure in his career up to now, this was a whole different ball game.

The backstage waiting room was a hive of activity, chock-full of hopefuls dressed as their favourite dead singers. There were comfortable sofas, chairs and beanbags scattered around, and a table laden with drinks and snacks had been set up against each of the four walls. None of which seemed to be helping to calm anyone down. There was more nervous energy and tension in this one room than the rest of the hotel put together.

The person Johnny most envied was Luther, the Otis Redding performer. Lucky bastard. His audition was done and dusted, and now he was off somewhere relaxing, knowing that he was almost certain to make the final. Johnny wished he could do the same, but needed a pick-me-up, a kind of confidence-booster to get him through the agonizing wait before performing. He also wanted to be sure that the other contestants backstage were really as nervous as he was. Not just faking it.

He looked around at the other performers still waiting to audition and picked out his target. Sure enough, Kurt Cobain looked edgy and uneasy from all the waiting, too. He was standing on his own by the exit to the corridor out back, sucking at a tepid can of Sprite through a straw.
Aw, what the fuck
, thought Johnny and headed over to him.

‘Yo, Cobain! How goes it, man?’ he asked, offering a confident smile that belied his own nervousness.

The ratty-looking singer smiled back, snorting a little Sprite out of his nose. Didn’t look like he was used to people approaching him in a friendly manner, and he was in any case probably wary of Johnny’s intentions. Kurt looked like an outsider, and appeared to be doing nothing particularly to fit in.

‘Be honest, I’m shittin’ myself,’ he responded honestly.

‘Yeah? Well, I may have somethin’ that can help with that.’

‘For real?’

‘Yeah.’

Kurt eyed him suspiciously. ‘You ain’t gonna try to sell me on Jesus an’ the Power of Prayer, are you?’ he asked.

‘Nah,’ Johnny grinned. Ignoring the other’s powerful body odour, he leaned in and whispered in his ear, ‘Wanna do a line of coke?’

‘You got some?’

Jeez-uss, this guy was somethin’ else
, thought Johnny. ‘No, I was just offering,’ he said with heavy sarcasm, before adding, ‘’Course I got some. You in?’

‘Yo! Show me the way, buddy.’

Johnny nodded towards the exit and Kurt followed him out into the corridor. They made for the men’s washroom on the right and, after a quick look around, Johnny ducked in through the door with Kurt close behind.

The washroom was empty and they headed straight for the second stall. The place was antiseptically clean, and the white-tiled floor looked as if it had recently been mopped. Checking for a final time that they hadn’t been followed in, Johnny’s eyes darted round the room before he bolted the door shut behind them. The toilet in the stall they had chosen was as clean as the floor outside. Not so much as a drop of piss on the shiny white seat.

Kurt pulled the toilet-seat lid down and stepped aside to allow his companion to do his bit. Johnny produced a small bag of cocaine from one of the front pockets in his pants. He had hoped not to have to resort to the stuff, because he had wanted to perform with a completely clear head, but he had known full well when he slipped the bag of white powder into his pants pocket that morning that he would end up using it.

He opened the bag and watched Kurt’s eyes light up, then poured a little of the powder on to the toilet lid. Next, he pulled a straight razor from the breast pocket in his black shirt. He used the blade to divide the powder into four lines each about four inches long. It took him less than thirty seconds, and he could tell his partner in crime was impressed.

‘You wanna go first?’ he asked.

The answer was an emphatic yes. Kurt was already holding a short red-and-white-striped plastic straw in his hand, ready to go. Minutes earlier, he had been sucking Sprite through the straw. He hadn’t dared hope that he would find a much stronger stimulant.

‘Step aside, my good man,’ he said, with mock formality. Then, crouching down on the tiled floor, he held the end of the straw to one nostril, pressed the other closed with one finger, and quickly set about snorting up the nearest line. He inhaled it in one long sniff, all of it, then sat back on his haunches and blinked a few times. He wiped the end of his nose with the back of his hand and sniffed hard to drag up any remnants of powder that might be loitering at the end of his nostril.

‘That is
good
shit
,
Mister Cash. Oh yeah.
Very
good shit!’ he said. Then he held the straw up to Johnny, who took it and, crouching, leaned over to snort up the line nearest to him.

Outside, someone opened the main door to the men’s washroom. Johnny heard footsteps walk in, boots clacking on the tiles. He’d just finished snorting up his first line and was blinking furiously while trying to control the urge to shout about how good the coke was.

The person outside walked slowly across the tiled floor of the washroom. Johnny peered under the bottom of the locked door and saw a pair of scuffed black boots walking past the first stall. The boots stopped outside the door behind which he and Kurt Cobain were crouching, like two schoolboys with a tit mag. He glanced at Kurt, who looked as concerned as he was. Being caught by security taking illegal drugs on the premises would result in disqualification from the competition, so it went without saying that they should both stay absolutely quiet. Kurt obviously understood.