Finding Duncan

by F.W. Armstrong

Chapter Two

(Find Chapter One in the previous issue of Writer Online)

John Towne gave Ryerson a chubby, red-faced smirk which, under the glare of the street lamps, was full of elliptical shadows. "Biergarten, if I didn't know better, I'd say you were afraid.”

"Of course I am," Ryerson said. "But you're assuming, as well, that it's somehow necessary to the formation of character to meet our fears head-on, to grapple with our demons as we might grapple with our nightmares—"

"I don't need foolish speeches, Biergarten." Towne stopped grinning. The elliptical shadows on his face flattened. "I need you to complete the assignment I’m paying you to complete.”

Ryerson had been holding Creosote under one arm during this exchange; the dog squirmed to be let down, now, and Ryerson accommodated. Creosote lifted his leg at once and peed, missing Towne's black oxfords by mere inches. Towne hopped backward, which actually shook the sidewalk, Ryerson thought, and exclaimed, "Good Lord, Biergarten, have you no idea how to train that animal? He nearly pissed on me."
Ryerson grinned very quickly, apologized, gave Creosote's leash a desultory tug—to which Creosote merely looked annoyed—and said,
"Will you hold onto him, then?"

Towne looked confused. "You mean your dog? You want me to hold onto your little dog? Why?"

"Because"—he held the leash out—“whatever you might imagine is in that place to frighten me will frighten him a thousand times more."

Towne harrumphed.

Ryerson continued holding the leash out. Towne took it, looked down at Creosote with cringing distaste for several seconds, and when he looked up again, Ryerson was halfway to the Terrance Building.

*****

Christmas lights. They were small and white and had been tastefully entangled in the spiky trees which lined the walkway that led to the huge, empty building. The very fact that the lights had been put up was grotesque, Ryerson thought. It was like perfuming a corpse.

He glanced back, saw Towne fifty yards off. Creosote stood at Towne’s feet and seemed to be shivering. Ryerson stopped walking and called,

"Pick him up. He's cold."

Towne merely glanced at Creosote, who glanced up at him. Ryerson sighed, turned, walked again toward the building's entrance, and dug in his pants pocket for the key. "Don't share that with anyone," the city historian had admonished him. "You've no idea how many kids have tried to break in there. Lord knows why. There’s nothing to steal but the linoleum and some ratty furniture." Ryerson found the key in a fistful of chewing gum wrappers, change, and lint, fished it from his pocket, glanced at it. It was silver, shiny. It should have been tarnished, he thought.

He looked at the building and saw a short rise of glass, dark red brick, aluminum—the first two floors illuminated quietly from within; the rest of the building was married to the darkness above.

Ryerson saw reflections of the tasteful white Christmas lights on the trees that lined the walkway, too. The reflections were at slight angles to him—a few degrees up, a few degrees left, right, down

He could see into the building—softly lighted doorways, speckled gray linoleum, a desk here, a chair there. The city historian had turned on some of the lights, but there weren't enough of them. They lit the inside of the huge structure as if it were a bedroom.

Ryerson put the key in the lock, hesitated, glanced back. Towne and Creosote were still standing together on the icy sidewalk, and even at this distance, Ryerson felt certain the little dog was shivering. Pick him up! Ryerson wanted to yell, but turned back to the door, held it open, and peered into the building's cavernous lobby. It was all-but empty, except for a large blue Mediterranean-style couch in a far corner, and a gray, three-drawer file cabinet, missing its middle drawer, in the center of the room.

He smelled what could have been baby powder. The odor dissipated and he smelled nothing at all. Strange, he thought. He had expected the building would smell of mildew and decay, not briefly of baby powder, and then of nothing at all.

"...going in?" he heard from just behind him. He lurched a little, turned his head quickly; Towne—holding Creosote under one arm—gestured with his free hand. "Christ, Biergarten, are you going in or not?”

Ryerson nodded quickly, turned to look into the building again, stayed put.

The smell of baby powder moved past him, again. It was brief, not entirely off-putting. It seemed to ebb and flow on a breeze he couldn’t feel.

He glanced at the blue Mediterranean-style couch, the file cabinet, the blue couch again; he held his gaze on it—it was a point of focus. Against the gray walls, it seemed, oddly, to attract the soft light and harshen it. He tried to imagine people on the couch. It would hold four people, he thought, but not if they were large. The people who sat on it would have to be thin. And they would have to be unconcerned about personal space. Elbows would hit elbows and knees would hit knees on that couch.

"For Christ's sake, go inside, Biergarten!"

I am inside! he wanted to call back, but realized he wasn't. He was half in and half out. His back was holding the glass door open.
He glanced around, saw that Towne was holding Creosote in both arms, now, stepped quickly into the building and heard the glass door close behind him with a soft whump.

*****

Copyright 2003 by F.W. Armstrong

F.W. Armstrong has been in and out of the world of dark fantasy for a decade and a half. His first two novels, “ The Changing,” (TOR BOOKS, NYC, 1985) and “The Devouring,” (TOR, 1987) were critical successes, but he has yet to release a third novel. “Finding Duncan,” he tells us, should be released by Leisure Books, NYC, some time in 2005.