Read 1977 - My Laugh Comes Last for Free Online Page A

am sure you have a headache, but make the effort. Take a look,' and he hung up.
    A hoax call? A nut?
    I sat still. No, not a hoax call. A cold chill swept over me.
    I dragged myself upright and walked slowly to the elevator.
    I rode down to the garage. I reached my car and unlocked the trunk. I swung up the lid.
    Curled up, like an obscene foetus, blood on his crumpled white suit, his beard matted with blood, was the squat man.
    His blank eyes gazed up at me as only dead eyes can gaze,
     
     

chapter three
     
    A s I opened the door of my apartment and walked unsteadily into my living room, I saw him, sitting in my favourite armchair, his legs crossed, his hands resting in his lap, relaxed and at ease.
    He could have been anything from fifty-five to sixty-five years of age. His thick, snow-white hair was immaculate.
    Everything about him was immaculate: his charcoal-grey suit, his white silk shirt, the Pierre Cardin tie and the glistening black shoes. His face could have been chiselled out of teak: nut brown, a thin beaky nose, a slit for a mouth, big slate-grey eyes and flat pointed ears.
    The shock of finding the squat man dead in my trunk had stunned me. I felt as if I were experiencing a horrible nightmare, and in a few moments, I would wake up and find, to my utter relief, all this had never happened, and it was just another Sunday morning.
    This man, sitting facing me, was just an addition to this nightmare. I closed the door and leaned against it and stared at him.
    T found your door open,' he said. 'Excuse me for taking the liberty. The name is Edwin Klaus: K-l-a-u-s.'
    I felt a trickle of sweat run down my aching cheek. This was no nightmare: this was for real.
    'What do you want?'
    His slate-grey eyes, as expressionless as blobs of ice, regarded me.
    'I want to help you.' He waved to a chair. 'I can see you are suffering. I told Benny to be careful.' He lifted small, brown hands in a gesture of resignation. 'He doesn't know his own strength. Do sit down, Mr. Lucas.'
    Because my head began to ache again, and my legs felt shaky, I moved to the chair and sat down.
    "You have a problem, Mr. Lucas. It would seem you too don't know your own strength,' Klaus said, in his soft, gentle voice. 'But your problem can be arranged if you care to accept my help.'
    'Who are you?' I asked, staring at him.
    "We won't go into that for the moment. The problem is Alex Marsh, whom you murdered. What are you going to do about the body, Mr. Lucas?'
    I closed my eyes. The scene came back to me. I had wanted to kill him. I remembered smashing my fists down on his up-turned face. I was lifting my fists to hit him again when I received a blow on my head. I had hurt him: probably broken his nose, but I was sure I hadn't killed him. If only this pain in my head would go away so I could think clearly!
    'I didn't kill him,' I said, meeting Edwin Klaus's slate-grey eyes.
    'That is for die judge and jury to decide, isn't it, Mr. Lucas?'
    I got to my feet and, moving unsteadily, I went into the bathroom and swallowed four Aspro tablets. I ran the water, then picking up a sponge, I bathed my face. I was now beginning to think more clearly.
    I didn't know who this immaculately dressed man was, but my instincts told me he was a blackmailer. I put my hands on the toilet basin and forced myself to stand upright.
    I stared at my reflection in the mirror above the toilet basin.
    I stared at a stranger: someone remotely resembling myself, but with a puffy bruised cheek and wild, frightened eyes. I remained staring for some five minutes, and then the pills began to work, and the pain in my head began to recede to a dull throb.
    Alex Marsh! So the squat man had been Glenda's husband!
    Who was this man, sitting in my living room so quiet, so relaxed, offering to help me?
    I waited, still holding on to the toilet basin, still staring at myself in the mirror until the throb in my head became bearable. He had asked me what I was going to do with the body in the