Free Zod Wallop by William Browning Spencer Page B

might get by hitting a waterbed with a baseball bat. Dr. Lavin rocketed forward, colliding with the opening door that instantly slammed shut and then bounced open again as the psychiatrist tottered backward. The door swung wide as Dr. Lavin fell straight back, a stiff cartoon of a fall, something a stuntman might execute with impunity but hardly the sort of thing a man of Dr. Lavin’s fifty-some years should have attempted. A cool, lilac-laden breeze tossed Gabriel’s hair as she caught the front door and quickly shut it.
     
    The next half hour was a fuzzy one. When it became clear that Dr. Lavin was dead, Gabriel called her hairdresser and canceled that day’s appointment. Then she found a corkscrew and drank some of the contents of what was, she supposed, the murder weapon. Then she saw the book lying next to Lavin, and she took it into the living room and sitting on the sofa she opened it and began leafing through its pages. They were dark, murky drawings, but they did have a certain power.
    The drawing of the woman named Lady Ermine did, Gabriel had to admit, seem a vicious caricature of Gabriel Allan-Tate herself.
     
“I can't catch my breath,” Lady Ermine said. “My breath has outdistanced me. Ever since that beastly child tried to strangle me.”
Lord Draining sighed. “There’s a lesson to be learned,” he said.
Lady Ermine raised an eyebrow. “I mean,” said Lord Draining, “one wants to be absolutely sure the child is tied down, quite secured, before getting too close.”
“Children are treacherous,” said Lady Ermine.
“Truer words were never uttered,” said Lord Draining.
 
     
    Stranger yet, and certainly a sign, she recognized another face. It was the face of Dr. Roald Peake.
    She found Dr. Peake’s number in the directory, and she called his office.
    The secretary was disinclined to connect Gabriel.
    Gabriel said, “I am the major stockholder in Corwin-Smart and Chairman of the Board. I am also a friend of Dr. Peake’s.” She was transferred.
    “Gabriel,” that large, hearty voice boomed. “How are you?”
    “I’m in trouble,” she said.
    “I’m so glad you thought of me,” he said.
    “Well.” Gabriel was always uncomfortable renewing an acquaintance with a request for a favor. But there was no way around it. “This is serious trouble, Roald. I’m afraid I’ve killed someone. In fact, he is lying here on my carpet, even as we speak.”
    “Anyone I know?”
    “Theodore Lavin.”
    The phone exploded with laughter. “I’m sorry, Gabriel,” Peake said. “I just…if you were going to kill someone…well, you are just so consistent, Gabriel. Your taste is always impeccable.”
    “None of this is funny,” Gabriel said, on the verge of tears.
    “Of course it isn’t,” Peake said. “I’ll be right along. I’ll bring Karl; he’s handy in a crisis.”
    “Wait,” Gabriel said, afraid he would hang up. “I can’t stay here another minute. I’ve got to go out. I’ll leave the key in the mailbox.”
    “Of course. Of course.”
    One last distasteful task remained after she put down the receiver. She had to find Gainesborough’s address in the psychiatrist’s pocket. She had seen Lavin tuck the piece of paper away, and so she knew where to look. It could have been worse. But it was nonetheless a terrifying experience. What if he suddenly grabbed her. The way his head was pooched in like a punched milk carton and the large, garish quantity of blood on the carpet were strong arguments that he was dead. But there was a long tradition of corpses coming alive, and although this tradition was a Hollywood one, Gabriel thought it might be based on careful observation, might really be a commonplace occurrence.
    Lavin did not grab her however, and ten minutes later, in possession of Harry Gainesborough’s address, Gabriel locked the door, dropped the key in the mailbox and marched down the drive to her Mercedes.
 
     
    “What do you have in your tea?” Helen asked.
    “I