Mirrorman Read online

If a palm frond slapped itself across the windshield, Cawdor thought grimly, he wouldn’t stand a chance. At this crazy reckless speed he’d be off the road in seconds. It was a dangerous gamble already, the tyres trying to maintain their traction through sheets of wind-whipped water and sending up plumes of spray in the car’s wake.

  He risked a glance away from the rushing highway to check the time on the dashboard clock. A minute or so after eight. The clerk at the car-rental desk, whom he’d asked for directions, had assured Cawdor he couldn’t miss seeing the distinctive glass pyramid of Grace MediaCorp, even from a long distance. But there was no chance of that, not in this watery murk. On the map, the clerk had circled the location, five miles north of Fort Lauderdale, west of Oakland Park, so Cawdor knew he couldn’t be too far oft

  Body tensed up close to the wheel, he peered out and saw the sign for Hollywood Airport and route 84 connecting with US 1. By his own reckoning he was two exits away from the turn-off point.

  Those were the longest five miles he had ever driven in his life. When the floodlit sign for Oakland Park finally appeared through the swishing wipers he thought it must be a mirage. He slowed and came off the interstate, and followed the long concrete flyover that took him back across the highway. A few minutes later he was driving beneath a huge Beamers symbol of anodised silver, gleaming through the downpour in a battery of spotlights. Reflecting green arrows pointed him to a large open parking lot. Two smaller parking lots were marked EMPLOYEES ONLY, while the larger one, apparently, was reserved for audience members attending the shows. A paved walkway with a flapping canvas awning on a metal frame led to an entrance, above which THE LOVEBEAMS SHOW glowed in red neon. At the end of the walkway, in an area crisscrossed with yellow markings, were thirty or more buses and luxury coaches. Most of the drivers were inside their vehicles, sheltering from the rain. A small group of drivers, who from their peaked caps and green blousons belonged to the same company, were huddled protectively under the canvas awning, smoking and drinking sodas.

  Cawdor drove past the buses and parked the Civic in the first free space nearest the covered walkway. He switched off and sat gazing through the smeared windshield with a stupid look on his face, which was how he felt.

  For the past several hours, right up to this moment, his entire concentration had been focused on getting here in time. His goal – the glass-walled building that now confronted him – had been the final destination, an end in itself. Only of course it wasn’t. He was outside in the parking lot, not inside where he wanted to be. There was no doubt in Cawdor’s mind that there would be guards posted. A large building such as this, permitting access to the public, couldn’t risk not having a tight security cordon. Say he strolled up to the entrance without a valid pass, the guards would simply wave him away. Or worse – should they get suspicious about a guy trying to gate-crash the building – it might enter their heads to detain him, even lock him away somewhere pending further investigation. That was precious little help to anyone, and absolutely none at all to Sarah and Daniella.

  Just how the hell was he going to get inside? Bluff his way in? Sure, Cawdor thought sourly, piece of cake. Nothing easier than to pass off his driver’s licence as police ID or press accreditation or a visitor from Mars …

  Minutes dragged by while he sat there at the wheel, a blank look on his face. There had to be a way. Somehow. Cawdor took out his wallet. As well as his credit cards he had 85 dollars in notes.

  Maybe there was a way after all… Maybe the only way.

  Negotiations didn’t take too long. He was amazed, really, how little time they did take. The only concern the driver expressed as he pocketed the 85 dollars was getting his cap and blouson uniform top returned to him within the half-hour, when the buses were scheduled to depart. Cawdor said he’d be back in ten minutes, at the most fifteen – just as soon as he’d located the person he was looking for. Shirtsleeved arms wrapped tightly to his body, huddled in the group for protection against the gusting rain, the driver was pretty explicit: he didn’t give a hoot about the reason, fella. The less he knew, the better. But be damn sure and get his cap and blouson back to him by departure time or the company would dock his pay.

  As Cawdor stepped inside the glass-walled enclosure at the entrance, the peaked cap pulled down over his eyes, the blouson zipped up to hide his jacket, his brain was racing with a dozen scenarios. He was trusting to instinct, unsure even at this stage how he was going to handle it when the moment of truth arrived.

  It was arriving right now – in the shape of three hulking great security guards manning the desk in the small lobby that led through to the building’s central reception hall. One was seated behind a curved desk, shielded by a perspex barrier, a clipboard in front of him. The other two lounged in the background with hard, impassive faces that failed to hide their boredom. Any diversion was welcome, and all three paid attention as the bus driver hurried forward and stood there breathing heavily, clearly agitated, rainwater dripping off the peak of his cap.

  ‘I’ve gotta find Mrs Gribble, her kid’s throwing up in the bus. She’s gotta come see to him this minute –’

  ‘Who?’ the seated guard frowned. ‘What’s wrong? What’s the problem?’

  ‘There’s this sick kid in my bus!’ Cawdor burst out, jerking his thumb. ‘Kid wasn’t feeling too good earlier, so I said he could stay with me while his mother watched the show. But he’s real bad now, burning up like a furnace.’ He became indignant. ‘And I’m not going to be held to blame. Not my fault.’

  ‘What’s the name again?’

  ‘Mrs Gribble. Redhead, about thirty. Big woman.’

  ‘She’s here in the audience?’

  ‘Yes,’ Cawdor ground out.

  ‘OK, calm down. I’ll have her paged.’ He pressed a button and swung a swivel mike over.

  ‘Listen, ain’t my responsibility if the kid croaks, understand me? I did my level best –’

  ‘All right, I get the point,’ the guard said testily. One of his colleagues leant over and tapped his watch. ‘Right, yeah,’ the guard said. He looked up. ‘The show’s about over,’ he told Cawdor. ‘All right, you can go through. Wait by the elevators – you’ll see ‘em come up.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  The magic eye activated the inner doors of smoked glass, which sighed open to admit Cawdor to the marble-floored hall, which was now filling rapidly with chattering, laughing people. He halted and stood watching numbly as more of them spilt out of the elevators, a knife twisting inside him. Whatever the dreadful thing was that had driven him compulsively to get here – it had happened. He was too late. He had ignored the premonition when the black suffocating wave had first swept over him on the sunlit terrace. Now the payoff. The price to be paid for being such a blind, stupid, ignorant fool.

  With forlorn, diminishing hope, Cawdor scanned the faces for a sight of Sarah and Daniella, even while aware it was all in vain. And then, as he stood there, a kind of frenzy took possession of him. He pushed through the groups of people and made straight for the elevators in their column of glass and steel.

  ‘You were splendid,’ Messiah Wilde said to Daniella. ‘And you looked absolutely wonderful up there. Don’t you think so?’ In his black silk robe, slippers of soft black leather on his bare feet, he reclined on the dark-red couch in his dressing room, a crystal glass of Jameson’s Irish Whiskey in his hand. He smiled up at the two chaperones, and raised his dark eyebrows to elicit their agreement.

  ‘Oh, she was great,’ said the clean-cut young man, nodding vigorously. Terrific.’

  Daniella sipped 7 Up through a straw and gave a modestly demure smile. Reflected several times over in the bright mirrors, her face was a ghostly luminous oval with glassy grey-blue eyes as big as saucers. She caught sight of her own image and it seemed to perplex her, as if she were looking at a stranger named Daniella Cawdor.

  Messiah Wilde thanked the two chaperones for taking such good care of Daniella and dismissed them. As the door closed, he l
azily rose to his feet and freshened his drink at the bar in the corner alcove. His long, narrow, silk-clad back was towards her, but he could see her face, wan and vacant, in the diamond-shaped mirrors behind the bottles.

  ‘What’s the matter, pretty pussy? Why so sad?’

  Daniella made an effort and perked up, blinking. ‘Uh, sorry… Just my head, it feels… kinda fuzzy. I guess it’s the excitement and the audience and being on TV and everything…’ Her voice tailed off to a whisper.

  ‘Becoming the Chosen One a bit too much for you, eh?’ He turned to her, grinning, swirling his drink so that the ice cubes clinked. ‘Well, it’s not over yet, pretty pussy.’ He took a swallow and winked at her over the glass.

  ‘But I thought… Isn’t that it?’ Daniella said.

  ‘Certainly not, pretty pussy. Your big moment’s yet to come. You really believe we went to all that time, trouble and expense for one lousy shot on TV?’ Messiah Wilde was shaking his head. ‘Oh no, pretty pussy, indeed not. We have a little extra something planned. Hell of a lot of fun, believe me. It’ll kill you.’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Of course you don’t, pretty pussy. It’s a surprise.’

  ‘Will my mom be there? I want to see her.’

  ‘Well, now.’ Messiah Wilde appeared to be considering this, eyes thoughtful as he gazed off into space. ‘She might, and then again she might not. But – the more I think about it – not.’ He shrugged, and gave her a look of commiseration.

  ‘Can I see her… please?’

  ‘Haven’t I just told you, pretty pussy slut bitch tart? The answer is no. N. O. Nein. Nix.’

  Daniella drew herself in, her legs twined together under the chair. Her face wore a puzzled, cloudy expression. ‘What are you saying? Why did you call me those names?’

  ‘Don’t get upset. No harm done. No bones broken.’ When he saw huge tears welling in her eyes, Messiah Wilde said with a pained sigh, ‘Can’t you take a joke? Don’t you have a sense of humour? Don’t you know I’m teasing you? Can’t you tell, pretty pussy virgin cunt?’

  Daniella shuddered, as if something clammy and malignant had crawled over her skin. She tried to get up out of the chair, to stand on her feet, but even this small effort, it seemed, was too much.

  Messiah Wilde finished his drink and put the glass down on the bar-top. ‘Nearly time to go. You ready, sweet tits?’ He loosened the belt on his robe and opened it down the front. Daniella turned her head sharply away from the pale body and its thick patch of pubic hair. She forced her eyes tight shut. Tears spilt out and ran through the makeup that covered her cheeks.

  Messiah Wilde slipped out of the black silk robe and tossed it on to an armchair on his way to a wall-length closet. He took out another sheer silk robe, this time a white one, with a hood, and pulled the shroudlike garment over his head with the hood hanging down at the back. He turned, the robe whispering against his skin, and said to the girl sitting there with eyes clenched shut, ‘But it’s a fact, and I won’t deny it, pretty pussy. Your mom’s a gorgeous juicy fuck. Tell you the truth, I came like an express train. And did she take it? Every last drop. What a woman!’

  Daniella bent forward and covered her ears. She was trembling from head to foot. The bodice of her dress vibrated with the pounding of her heart.

  Smoothing down his robe and arranging the folds in the wide voluminous sleeves, under his breath Messiah Wilde was humming, ‘We’re off to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of Oz.’

  Then he turned to her, shaking his head. ‘Come on, pretty pussy, don’t be such a wet blanket.’

  Next to the alcove bar in the corner there was a wall of dark-grained wood. He slid open a panel. Behind it was a small cubicle, his own private elevator, its interior of studded black leather gleaming in the soft glow of concealed lighting. When he turned back, face lean and stern, dull sparks of red kindled in the dark depths of Messiah Wilde’s eyes. ‘Ready, baby doll? The party’s about to begin.’

  4

  The elevator took him down five levels and slid smoothly to a halt. The indicator on the illuminated panel read STUDIO. Outside the elevator doors Cawdor dithered, trying to make up his mind. Identical corridors branched off the hallway. The audience had gone, and the hallway was empty except for two people dressed all in white – a tanned blonde girl and beefy young man – who stepped past him into the elevator as he was coming out.

  There were no signs to guide him. Choosing at random, Cawdor set off down one of the featureless corridors. At a T-junction it divided into two more corridors, as anonymous as the first one, and Cawdor became alarmed, fearing he was heading in the wrong direction. Or simply getting lost. He took the one to the left, again at random, and forged ahead, heart hammering, the filtered air making the back of his throat dry. The corridor ended in a pair of swing doors. He pushed through. Several large observation panels were set in the wall. Beyond them, to his relief, was the dark cavern of the studio, a quiet bustle of activity under the dimmed stagelights.

  Cawdor took off the peaked cap and wiped his forehead. He hoped to God he’d guessed right. Because, if his wife and daughter weren’t around here someplace, he wouldn’t know where else to start looking.

  The camera and sound operators were packing away their equipment, the technical crew winding up cables. High above, shadowy figures on the lighting gantry flitted about like spiders. All were too preoccupied to notice Cawdor as he came down the metal stairway into the auditorium and made his way on to the side of the stage. Behind and either side of the stage was where the scenery flats, turntables and props were stored. Here there were signs aplenty – BAY 4, SCENE DOCK A, SWITCH TERMINAL, VTR CONTROL, F/X FACILITY – but they served only to confuse rather than enlighten him.

  The backstage area was starkly functional: caged globes on bare grey walls, matt composition floors, a maze of low-roofed corridors extending into the depths of the sub-basement. Slowly, Cawdor turned and stared about him, looking one way and then the other, fists clenched at his sides.

  This was pretty damn hopeless. He wasn’t lost, because to be lost you had to have some idea where you were going; know what you were actually seeking. His frustration was compounded by the fact that he didn’t know either of these things. The same inner compulsion drove him on this quest that had made him rush headlong from the Troth Foundation. It had no logic to it, obeyed no rules of rational behaviour. There was no reason he could articulate to explain this desperate mission, none at all, except for the panic fear and the sense of foreboding that consumed him like a fever.

  He had to find Sarah and Daniella. That was all he knew.

  Sarah had been a guest on the show, so she must have come backstage afterward, and Daniella with her, presumably. Back to where – the hospitality suite? A dressing room? Or, it occurred to him, had they been taken elsewhere in the building? God alone knew how many floors there were in this vast pyramid of glass. He could search and search and never find them. Cawdor’s hopelessness grew like a monster until he felt lost in its shadow, engulfed by his own despair.

  Sweat trickled down from the tight headband of the cap. He was perspiring heavily but daren’t risk unzipping the blouson in case he ran into the security people. He had to have some cock-and-bull story to fob them off with, no matter how implausible.

  Again he chose a corridor at random, because it was the only choice he had. Two of the technical staff in brown coveralls walked by, skeins of wiring looped round their shoulders. They didn’t spare him a glance. Cawdor quickened his pace. He arrived at an intersection, with more signs and arrows pointing in all directions, none of which were any help. He turned left, for no good reason. Any reason was as good as the next, which was none at all.

  At the next corner, forgetting caution completely, he’d taken two or three paces into the corridor and was striding on before he caught sight of uniformed figures loitering about twenty feet away. Cawdor ducked back swiftly from view. He removed the cap, swabbed his forehead with t
he heel of his hand, and peeked out. The two guards hadn’t spotted him; they were still whiling away the time, he saw. He saw something else. A few feet beyond them lay a strip of red carpet with gold edging. Cawdor followed it with his eyes from the four-way intersection to the end of a short corridor and a set of double doors. There was a sign on the wall, adjacent to where the guards were standing. He leant further out and squinted, trying to read it, but his angle of vision was wrong and it was too far away. One of the guards stretched and swivelled round on his hips, and Cawdor whipped back out of sight.

  Pressed against the wall, he waited for a shout or the sound of running footsteps. None came. But the breath was still locked tight in his chest, his body tense. Cawdor knew he’d found the clue he was looking for. Red carpet meant celebrities; it was not for the comfort of security guards or for backstage blue-collars to trample over.

  Cawdor looked at his watch and waited, fretting as the seconds ticked by. Nothing else he could do. Whatever tale he might concoct, however plausible, he was damn sure the guards would never let him through. They were far more likely – absolutely deadly certain, in fact – to escort him back up to the reception hall and march him outside double quick.

  He looked at his watch again. Another eternal minute dragged by. If this was their allotted station, guarding the short corridor leading to the double doors, then they were never going to move, Cawdor realised. And he could be standing here all night, enduring the agony of endless waiting.

  Was there another way in? Suppose he went back the way he had come and tried a different –

  From along the corridor came the squawk and crackle of a radio transceiver. Cawdor pressed close to the corner and strained to listen as one of the guards unhooked it from his belt and thumbed a button. ‘Say again.’ Impossible to make sense of the reply. The bare corridor distorted the tinny voice, which was already blurred by static, so that it sounded like an alien in a blizzard.

  ‘Yeah, unauthorised person. Got that. Male or female?’ the guard asked. ‘Bus driver? Last sighted where, what level?’ He listened some more to the alien. ‘OK, we’ll check out the elevators first on level five, then work from there.’