Cornelius Gallows stepped into the doorway carrying an old brown metal oil lamp in one hand and a revolver in the other. His face carried more lines than his mug shot and his eyes had sunken even further back in their sockets. He was wearing a dirty lab coat and a black rubber gas mask worn high over his head like an insect-faced hat; around it his fine hair was standing on end as though someone had rubbed a balloon over it.
‘Detective Mandrel, we meet again!’
Abe narrowed his eyes. ‘Cornelius Gallows. So you’re not dead after all.’
‘No, I’m very much alive, as you can see. While the fire raged in the east wing, I calmly strolled into one of the consultant’s offices and took his I.D. and certification; I merely ensured that the doctor in question was in the path of the blaze and was, therefore, incinerated beyond recognition. Then I just had to put on this precious lab coat and walk right out of here. The emergency services actually helped me to safety; they assumed that I was one of the doctors!’ Gallows laughed, the lantern up-lighting his face to ghoulish effect.
‘But you’re not a doctor, are you, Cornelius – you’re a patient.’
‘How dare you!’ Two pinpricks of blush appeared on Gallows’ sallow cheeks.
‘You were struck off years ago, when you published that wacko book.’ Abe sidled towards him. ‘And I should have known you’d be here – in the madhouse where you belong.’
Gallows pointed the revolver at him threateningly. ‘It suits me perfectly: no disturbance – until now of course – just peace and quiet for my work. It even has its own graveyard.’ He gave a withering laugh. ‘I know you’re trying to goad me, detective, trying to make me lose my temper like the judge did at the trial. You won’t catch me out this time. Not that it matters; as far as anyone knows, I’m dead, so you can’t convict me. Officially I don’t exist.’
‘We know you’re not dead. We’ll tell on you,’ said Lil.
Gallows shifted his gaze to Lil. ‘Ah, you’re assuming that you will be getting out of here alive. On the contrary, little girl – you will both be quite dead by morning.’
‘No!’ said Lil.
‘Yes!’ said Gallows, his pale eyes burning with a cold flame. ‘Everyone who gets in my way comes to a sticky end, mark my words. No one even noticed when I was bumping off those small-time hoodlums, my former henchmen who sang like canaries at the trial. No one batted an eye – except that interfering news pamphlet and you, Mandrel, always poking that sticky beak of yours where it doesn’t belong.’ He spat out the words. ‘You blundering oaf. Even when you finally managed to capture Ramon, who isn’t even particularly smart, the turncoat split on me and got away scot-free. But I’ll make him pay.
‘You all deserve to die. I’ve been patient, oh yes! Revenge is indeed a dish best served cold. For nine years I worked here in the darkness, until my experimental procedure was complete, until I, Dr C. Gallows PhD, finally held the secret of life after death. Until I was ready to create the ultimate criminal.’
‘That explains all the rabbits. Gallows must have been experimenting on them all this time,’ Lil mumured under her breath. ‘They were ghosts too – that’s why I couldn’t see them.’ She looked at Nedly but he had retreated into a corner, as far away from Gallows as he could get.
Gallows’ flimsy hair swayed in the unnatural draughts that swirled around him, the whites of his eyes shone in the gloom and his lips trembled excitedly.
‘One year ago, with my research complete, I put my theory into practice: I weaponised Leonard Owl.’
‘You killed him, you mean,’ said Lil.
‘I turned him into an instrument of fear.’ Gallows waved the gun at her dismissively. Every day for the last year we have practised until sad little Leonard Owl was ready to become Mr Glimmer: a disembodied spirit that cannot be seen, stopped or caught. I made him who he is today.’
‘You murdered him.’
‘Owl knew what he was doing. He sacrificed himself in the name of science.’
‘He just wanted Gallows to like him,’ said Nedly miserably. He wasn’t looking at the evil genius any more but a point near the window where a cobweb of ice crystals was forming on the glass.
Out of the corner of her eye Lil saw Abe’s torchlight flicker and wondered if Owl was there too, listening in.
‘You’re just using him,’ she said to Gallows.
‘Of course I am. Why else would I have spent ten years of my life with a quivering idiot who can’t stop lighting matches?’
‘He thought he was your friend.’
‘I don’t need friends. Leonard is useful to me. Well, he was. Now, I’ve realised that if you want to scare someone to death, you have to find someone really scary. Leonard’s just a troubled boy; he never really enjoyed frightening people. But I’ve got a new line coming out – I’ve found myself the perfect source to recruit my subjects from –’ Gallows held a finger to his own mouth to stop the words – ‘but that’s a secret. I’m not going to fall for that old trick of revealing my master plan and then risk you escaping from the elaborate death I have planned for you to thwart me at the final hour.
‘My reign of terror is almost ready to begin, but first I just have one last loose end to tie up and it will give my new accomplice a chance to flex his muscles, so to speak. Mr Grip, I call him – he hasn’t been out much so he’s eager to get his hands dirty.’ He laughed maniacally. ‘Oh yes! I will give Peligan City the fright of its life!’
The flame of Gallows’ gas lamp guttered.
‘Mr Glimmer can still have his fun. Tonight there will be a second fire at Rorschach Asylum, and tomorrow the papers will report that a scruffy ex-police detective and a big-eared child perished in it … and no one will know why!’
There was no more time for subtlety. ‘You don’t have to do what he says,’ Lil yelled at the window. ‘Don’t listen to him!’
‘Ah, but he does,’ said Gallows, picking up the knitted humpty and shaking it.
‘It’s Wool,’ cried Nedly. ‘It’s controlling him.’
The little bells tinkled and a look of dread crossed Nedly’s face.
‘He has to do exactly what I say, when I say it. Leonard was smitten when he found that filthy toy.’ He pointed at Wool. ‘So I thought that as a special treat I’d bind his spirit to it. That’s the key, you see. It’s my remote control.’
Lil backed away from the window as Nedly stepped into what she calculated to be Owl’s path, to shield herself and Abe. She could see his shoulders trembling in the moonlight.
‘But why did you have to kill Nedly, I mean Ned Stubbs?’ she asked Gallows.
‘Who?’
‘Ned Stubbs,’ Lil repeated with dry contempt.
Gallows rubbed his hairless chin with mock thoughtfulness. ‘Was he another orderly?’
‘No!’
‘A patient?’
‘No, he was an eleven-year-old orphan!’
‘Was that his name?’ He gave Lil an icy stare. ‘I’d quite forgotten about him. He got in the way. Tried to mess up my experiment with his last-minute heroics. If he hadn’t been trying to free Owl, then he wouldn’t have got electrocuted. The correct timing of the experiment was essential. In fact, he could have ruined everything.’ Gallows eyed Lil scornfully. ‘Children shouldn’t poke around where they don’t belong. There are very clear signs on the gate that say “No Entry” and “Trespassers will be Prosecuted” and “Danger”.’
Lil’s hands formed into fists. She could feel herself shaking with anger.
‘It wasn’t all fun and games for me either, little girl,’ Gallows continued. ‘I had to bury them both, digging the graves myself. Well, I dug a grave and put them both in it. It was abominably hard work, I can tell you.’ He pondered. ‘If I’d thought it through I would have got Leonard to dig it before I killed him. Oh well, hindsight’s a wonderful thing.’
Gallows looked up with an expression of disgust. ‘Is that you snivelling, Mr Glimmer? Stop it immediately; you’re embarrassing us both,’ he hissed in the general direction of the cold spot beside the window. ‘If you can’t act like a proper henchman, I’ll have to dispose of you.’ Gallows viciously kicked Wool across the floor with a sweep of his foot. Wool bounced off the skirting board, and then lay still, face down, one arm outstretched as if reaching for something.
Gallows cleared his throat and continued, ‘Now, where was I? One final act and my revenge will be complete; Ramon LeTeef must pay for his betrayal, and he will. Once Mr Grip gets hold of him – he’ll be begging me to kill him!’
Abe snorted. ‘Good luck with finding him, Cornelius. LeTeef vanished straight after the trial and no one has set eyes on him since. Or didn’t you know that?’
Gallows narrowed his eyes. ‘Are you serious?’
‘Deadly,’ Abe replied.
Gallows sighed. ‘No. I mean, are you seriously telling me that you don’t know where he is?’
‘No one does.’
Gallows allowed himself a self-satisfied smile. ‘I do. I have always known. Surely it doesn’t take a genius to work it out?’ He looked at Lil; she stared blankly back at him. ‘No? Oh, well, maybe it does.’
Abe was losing patience. He took a step towards Gallows. ‘Look, I have no problem with LeTeef getting iced. But why don’t you just save yourself a lot of bother and tell me where he is, and I’ll put him away for you.’
Lil was furious. ‘Abe! Aren’t you going to say, “You won’t get away with it!”?’
Abe shrugged. ‘If he can find Ramon LeTeef and make him pay, I’ll be happy to see justice done at long last.’
‘But he killed Nedly.’
Abe clenched his jaw. He nodded to himself, ashamed. ‘You’re right, kid. I’m sorry, I forgot. You won’t get away with it!’ he yelled at Gallows.
Gallows shook his head derisively.
Abe’s eyes were on the revolver that was hanging heavy in Gallows’ limp fingers. ‘You’re waving that gun around all right,’ he said. ‘But you don’t have the first clue about how to use it.’
Gallows placed the gun in the large pocket of his lab coat. ‘I won’t need it.’
‘Is that right? Ha! You haven’t caught us yet,’ said Abe. ‘And I won’t go down without a fight.’
‘Yes, detective, you will,’ said Gallows, and he lowered his gas mask as the room filled up with a cloud of yellow mist.