Basement Noir

I’ve always wondered what it would be like to have multiple personalities. Then I remember—I’m a writer. The things I can’t or won’t do end up in stories. The people I admire but cannot be—stories. I have a thousand faces…where do they come from? What purpose do they serve? How do they work together? The real mystery isn’t that people with multiple personalities exist, but that most of us think that we’re just one person, all the time.

And what happens when one of them has got to go? What is murder like, inside the confines of your head?

I was born in an instant. It didn’t feel like being born. It didn’t feel like jumping, fully formed, out of a god’s head like Athena did, either. But that’s what it was.

As far as I can tell, I was reading a newspaper when the phone rang. It was more like a dream of reading a newspaper than actually reading the newspaper, if you know what that’s like. At the time you’re doing it, you know you’re “reading” it, but if you try to think about what the words are on the page, you’re screwed; you can’t make out a bit of it. Anyway, I picked up the phone, which was black and had a long ridge all down the back where the sides of the plastic had been stuck together. The ridge was filled with grime, and the plastic was tacky from being touched and never cleaned. The mouthpiece was full of brown grime, too. I put the phone to my ear, where it bent the small hairs, and saw that the headline of the newspaper now read MURDER in 144-point font. My five o’clock shadow scratched across the mouthpiece.

Before the phone rang, I hadn’t noticed anything. So that was what it was like being born.

Hello?” I said. My voice was unfamiliar to me. A man’s voice when I’d been expecting a woman’s.

We need you.” It was a woman’s voice, husky, like she couldn’t help being a sexpot over the phone. I wondered if she’d sound the same in person. As it were.

I tried to remember who I was, but it was just beyond me. “Yeah? Who is ‘we’? For that matter, who am I?”

Nevermind. Just come to the main entrance, stat.” She hung up.

Statstat…a doctor word.

I stood up and looked myself over as best I could. The dame might say “stat,” but the hell if I wasn’t going to get my bearings first. I was dressed in pants and a jacket. The pants were dark brown and had a small split in the seam near the crotch and were frayed at the hem, but they were clean and pressed. I made a mental note to fix the seam later. I knew I had a sewing kit around somewhere. Jacket, same, getting worn around the elbows and across the forearms. I was a leaner. I probably ate with my arms on the table, too. The tie was scarlet with tan stripes. Polyester. I smelled like I hadn’t bathed in the last few hours, but I wasn’t too bad. A light cologne. The white cotton shirt underneath the jacket was rumpled from wear but not wrinkled. Brown belt, brown shoes, brown socks.

I felt my face. I needed a shave and my hairline was receding. I looked around the room: black file cabinet, desk with peeling veneer on top and a heavy black manual typewriter shoved to one corner, worn phone book sitting under the phone. An open tin can with pens and pencils stuffed in it. A stack of legal pads in a top drawer.

The front door was marked with my name, but I couldn’t read it.

I grabbed a tan trench coat and a fedora off a cheap wooden coat rack near the door. The coat rack threatened to fall on me, and I set it right and turned it so if it fell, it’d fall on the plaster of the wall, which was pale green with dingy white trim near the floor and ceiling.

I stuck my hands in my pockets and came up with unreadable driver’s and private investigator’s licenses in a brown wallet, some keys, some change, and a small hole in my right pants pocket. I moved everything into my left. I had a revolver, but it seemed unresolved as to whether it actually existed or not; I could see through it. I put it back in my shoulder holster under my left. I don’t think I was sure about using it.

I opened the door with my right, turned out the lights with my left, closed the door, and locked it. I used the right key on the first try.

***

It took a long time to make my way to the main entrance. I didn’t get lost; the place was just that big, full of lots of—hell, I don’t know what to call them. Areas. It was like being in a building as big as the world, if by “world” you didn’t just mean everything that existed but also everything you ever made up. There were plenty of times I wanted to stop. Las Vegas. Greece. A place with open windows that looked out onto a desert that went from scrub to weeds to a long open stretch of sand dunes with the sunset off to the left. I stood there for I don’t know how long, feeling the grit in my nose and in the corners of my mouth. I stood there until I started to take off my trench coat to get more comfortable, and then I kept walking. But like I said, I didn’t get lost. There was a red carpet runner that led from my office onward. The edges of it were gold. When I stopped in front of the dunes, sand built up around my feet, and I saw two red footprints where I’d stood, when I looked back.

Of course I looked back. I was that kind of guy.

I kept walking, but I really didn’t think about why. I was that kind of guy too.

Eventually the carpet runner led me to an elevator. The inside of the elevator was lined with mirrors, and I finally got a look at myself. When I saw what I looked like, I burst out laughing: yeah, that guy. You probably knew what face to expect before I did, even though you’re just reading words on a page. The mirrors were tinged slightly gold and made me look better than I really did. I wondered what women had seen in him.

I looked at the panel. From what I could tell, there was a lot more to the house than I’d wandered through. A hell of a lot more. The lights above the door said I was on floor -17, the seventeenth basement. The place went down hundreds of floors below ground level, and seventeen floors above. As I watched, the number -17 changed into something I couldn’t read, and an 18 appeared at the top of the list of buttons.

I wondered about the open windows that looked out onto the dunes. How you could look at a sunset from a basement. That kind of thing. But I let it go. That wasn’t what I was there for.

I pressed the brass button marked zero and leaned back against the brass rail, wishing I had something to chew. A cigarette. Some gum. A toothpick. I bit my lips, the inside of my cheek. It suddenly occurred to me that there’s only one thing that doesn’t taste like anything, and it’s your own spit. A breath mint would have been nice. I checked a few more pockets while I pressed into the carpet, but I didn’t find anything. I rose up gently, the bell dinged, and the door opened.

The main entrance had more brass and red velvet than you could shake a Hollywood starlet at. Crystal chandeliers—three of them. Swank. But the place was dirty and there was spray paint on the walls, mostly black. Someone was trying to paint over that grand old lobby and make it look like a dump, as far as I could tell. There was a wooden ladder under one of the chandeliers, which had about half its crystals missing.

There was a group of people—if you could call them that—surrounding something on the floor. I took a quick headcount and came up with seventeen. Several of them were looking up at me when the doors opened, but only three of them kept looking at me: a woman with dark brown hair, cut off just below the ear and above the eyebrows; a little kid with thin, weak blonde hair and a big nose; and a tall but skinny monkey dressed in a bellhop uniform. Yeah, a literal monkey.

May I help you?” The bellhop stood up. His tail followed behind him, curled in a question mark and twitching a little, like a cat’s. He had a surprisingly deep voice. His arms dangled. His fingernails needed trimming or gnawing or whatever monkeys do with them.

Some dame called me up here,” I said. “A doctor.”

The monkey looked at one of the women, who had pretty blonde hair and was wearing a white jacket. The jacket was touched with blood, and the knees of her tan pants were black with it. She looked at me with one eyebrow raised. She had the kind of green eyes that you could lose yourself in but otherwise had all the expression of a dead fish.

Call me Spade,” I said.

Doc,” she said. Yeah, it was the same voice. “I called you because there’s been a murder.”

The woman with the short, dark hair scowled. “We don’t need you. Go away.”

Is this everyone?” I said.

Everyone who’s upstairs,” Doc said. “Including you. And anyone coming up through the basement has to use the elevator.”

The little girl was shaking her head.

I raised my hand. “All right. Everyone get back. I need to see.”

Some went faster, some went slower. I glared at the rest until they moved. It seemed like I was in charge for the moment; there was a teenage boy who refused to move until I pushed him out of the way with force of will. He slid backwards across the marble floor until he dug his shoes in, then squeaked to a stop. He stood and backed out of the way, looking more stunned and sad than anything else.

I walked across the lobby to the body. It was an old guy, the kind of photogenic old guy who showed up in oatmeal commercials to demonstrate that getting old wasn’t unattractive, that you shouldn’t be subconsciously killing yourself eating bacon every morning, just so you could die young and leave a good-looking corpse.

Gramps,” the teenager said.

Of immediate interest were the wounds on his body. Someone had cut his throat from under one ear to the other. I squatted next to him and saw that the gap on the right side was bigger than on the left. I couldn’t tell whether he lay where he’d been cut, because of the tracks that the others had left in the blood. They were all over blood, but none of them had a splatter across them.

Who’s left-handed?” I said.

The little girl raised her hand, and so did the teen. I said, “Where’s the office?”

The bellhop led me behind the counter. The office was slick, full of a big hardwood desk, a green glass lamp on the desk, and leather chairs. Nobody had defaced it, yet. I sat down behind the desk and said, “Bring in that kid. The teenaged boy. And then shut the door.”

Presently, the monkey brought the kid in, holding the door handle as the kid entered in front of him, then closing the door with a soft click.

Well?” I said.

He stood there in his ripped-up jeans and shirt, looking more like a scared dog than anything else. Shivering. Half-crouched. “What?

Have a seat.”

He walked around one of the leather chairs and sat in the one to my left. He leaned forward, then leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest. “I didn’t do it.”

What are you?” I asked. “What’s your name?”

Goat,” he said. “Scapegoat.”

I thought so. What do you think about this place?”

What do you mean?” His shoulders curled up a little, pulling him in tighter toward himself.

This hotel. What do you think about it?”

I don’t know,” he said. I hated to listen to him talk; the whininess of his voice set me on edge. “Uh, it’s uh, I don’t know. I mean, where else am I going to go?”

You ever been outside?”

No. Yes, but not…not very far. Just the doorway.”

I didn’t think so. The others made him stand in the doorway whenever there was someone who needed to take the blame, then shoved him back down when the coast was clear. What else was a scapegoat for?

What did you think about Gramps?”

I liked him,” the kid said, right away. “I didn’t kill him.”

I didn’t say you did,” I said. “Look, I know you get blamed for everything around here. You did something bad a long time ago, so you get blamed for everything.” He started to talk, but I raised a hand to stop him. “I don’t want to hear about it. I don’t care. But right now, I just want you to answer the question.”

I had the feeling I was walking on thin ice, even though I wasn’t sure why. I had to be careful what I said around the kid, or I’d kill him more surely than whoever had killed Gramps. Couldn’t let him forgive himself. I knew that was important.

I liked him,” the kid repeated unhelpfully.

What did he do around here?”

He…answered the door sometimes. He told the rest of us that we just had to understand that that’s the way life works. He went down into the basement sometimes and he took me fishing in a place down there, I wanted to stay there forever, but he made me come back. Whenever I’m in trouble, he’s the one who pushes me hardest toward the door. But I liked him.”

Who answers the door most of the time?” I asked.

The bellhop,” the kid said. “He finds out who needs to go out and tells them.”

Thanks,” I said.

That’s it?”

I waved him off, and he slunk out of the room, bleating a little as he closed the door. After a few seconds, the bellhop returned and waited for me to say something.

Bring me the little girl next,” I said. “And some tea. Or whatever she likes.”

The monkey was shivering when he brought the girl in. He led her carefully to a chair, helped her sit. Then he walked over to a cupboard on the wall behind the desk, opened it, and got out a decanter of something golden and alcoholic. He pulled a cut-crystal old-fashioned glass out of the right-hand desk drawer, poured a double, and offered it to the girl. She took it, dipped a finger into it, and rubbed it all over her face. The monkey bowed and backed out of the office. This time, when he shut the door, it didn’t make a sound.

Whatever I was expecting the little girl to do when she came in, it wasn’t that. The girl continued to rub the fluid over herself, putting it methodically all over her face, neck, arms, legs, etc. She even reached up under her little lacy shirt and fluffy blue skirt to spread it around.

I’m Mad,” she said.

Ah,” I said. I had to think about that for a second. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

What do you care?” she said, rubbing under her waistband. She didn’t have a belly button.

Again, I was walking on a tightrope, here. Say the wrong thing, and I might take her purpose in life away. A guy could get tired really quickly of walking on eggshells like this.

Do—” I cut myself off. “What do you think—” I didn’t know how to ask what I wanted to know. As I tried to put it into words, I realized I didn’t know what I wanted to ask, because I didn’t know what I wanted to know from her. She poured the last of the liquid in her hair and bit the edge of the glass, chewing it. Blood welled up at the corners of her mouth. She licked it away one corner at a time, then took another bite.

Mad, whose house is this?” I asked, finally.

Our house,” she said.

All together? Or is one of you more important than the others?”

Stella,” she said. “Stella’s more important. She’s the one who signs the checks.”

Thanks,” I said. “Stella’s the one with the dark hair…” I waved my finger around my head in a circle, trying to indicate her haircut.

Yep,” Mad said.

Thanks,” I said. “You can go.”

Mad hopped out of her chair, leaving a half-eaten glass behind, stuffed in the corner of the chair. She left bloody fingerprints on the arms of the chair, dripped her way across the floor, and grabbed then door handle.

Hey, Mad?” I asked. “Would you do me a favor?”

Maybe,” she said. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

Ask Stella if she would come see me.”

Okay.” And then she popped out of the door like any normal kid. I felt like I’d just walked away unscathed from an atom bomb. I slumped forward over the desk with the worn spots on my jacket leaning against the wood like I’d done this before.

I was thinking about taking a look at that fluid and finding out whether it was worth drinking when the monkey opened the door and let Stella in.

Her hands were in fists, and she hadn’t shaved her legs. She was wearing black boots with thick soles and so many holes to lace up that they also had zippers up the sides, a short black skirt that would have gotten her beaten by decent nuns anywhere, and a too-small black shirt with red lace on it. She had a belly button. Her skin was pale and showed off bruises. Then, suddenly, she was dressed in blue jeans and a gray sweater. Then a blue sweater. Then nice slacks and a blue sweater.

I said, “This isn’t a trial. Wear what you want,” but her clothes didn’t change back. I stood out of respect, but she glared at me. She glanced at the seat where Mad had been sitting, then sat in the other chair, grabbing the arms. She seemed to shrink inside the chair, getting smaller until the arms of the chair were even with her shoulders.

What do you want?” she asked.

I’m asking the questions here,” I said. “There’s only one person here who could have killed Gramps, and it’s you. Why did you do it?”

Ask anyone. I have witnesses.”

I’m sure nobody saw you do it,” I said. “Look, I’m pretty sure I know how this works. It was a mistake to call me here.”

I didn’t call you,” she said. “Doc called you.”

It was a mistake,” I repeated. “I find things out. You should have called somebody who wouldn’t find things out, who would just look like he was finding things out. If you didn’t want me to find out, babe, you shouldn’t have made me a detective.”

A fist flashed across her face. No, I can’t describe it better than that. Her clothes shifted to a shapeless orange prison uniform, and she started to stand up.

I won’t tell them,” I said. “I mean, I’m grateful. I get to live. I’ll do what you want. But as long as I’m here, you won’t really be able to lie to yourself. Is that what you want?”

Stella’s head turned back and forth, not a denial so much as something invisible slapping her face, back and forth, back and forth. Her eyes glazed over, and she collapsed back in her chair.

I heard a soft huffing noise from outside the room. The revolving door was turning in the lobby, bringing someone in or letting someone out.

Stella opened her mouth so hard the cords stood out on her neck, and I heard Mad scream, “Get out! Get out! Get out!”

I jumped over the desk, threw open the door (the blood on the handle was still tacky), and rushed into the lobby. A ghostly man was standing in the lobby. I could see the stripes in the black marble tiles through his legs. He was hanging onto something with one fist and hitting something with his other. Stella.

The longer I stared at him, the more real he became. The others were flinching away from him, sliding backward toward the elevator or doors leading to places unknown.

I walked up to the bum and used a judo hold to put him on the floor. His head hit the marble tiles and bounced twice with his eyes rolled up in their sockets. I grabbed him by his arms and shoved him through the revolving door. He was heavier than he looked.

I went outside with him, dragging him by the arms across the sidewalk and into the street, which looked for all the world like a girl’s bedroom, with walls covered in posters heavy with black and red, a bed with a pink comforter, and stained tan carpet. From there, I went into the hall, down the stairs, and out the front door. A woman was screaming at me. My arms were shaking with the strain. By then the guy was starting to wake up.

I said, “Touch me again and I’ll shoot you.”

He cursed at me. I pulled the gun out of the pocket of my trench coat. It was plenty real then, a Python .357. I cocked it and aimed it at him. His mouth gaped open. From his perspective, the girl had pulled it out of thin air.

I squeezed the trigger, letting the bullet fly straight into his left foot. He screamed. I went back into the house, shoving the woman out of the way and locking the door behind us. “You should call somebody,” I said. Good luck if the cops tried to trace that bullet. I went upstairs, down the hall, into the room, back onto the sidewalk, and into the hotel.

Everyone else was in the lobby but Stella. I said, “Everything is not going to be okay,” and went back into the office.

She was sitting in the chair and shaking.

I handed her the gun and said, “This is yours. It always was. Gramps told you to put up with him—your stepfather? But he was wrong. There is no peace or comfort or oatmeal in this fucking place. It’s time to get out.”

I miss him,” she said, meaning Gramps.

And when this is over, you can call him back. Not to run the place or answer the door. Just to keep you company. Or you can kill us all off. And just be yourself.”

She took the gun and put it in her trench coat pocket. It pulled one side of the coat down; she was too small to fit the coat properly. It didn’t make me any less proud of her. “I’m not ready.”

Come on,” I said. “You have stuff to do before the cops get here.”

You wouldn’t mind going downstairs?” she said. “When all of this is over?”

I shook my head. “I know this place out by the desert I want to see, for starters. This fucking lobby…it’s too small. It’s always been too small. You ready?”

She licked the corners of her mouth, one at a time, and said, “I’m ready.”

***