When Graveyards Yawn by G. Wells Taylor (popular books to read txt) 📖

at around five-thirty. I tried to hurry and finish my painting, climbed a ladder carrying a big can of paint, got to the top of the ladder, and the next thing I remember was waking up dead.”

“You don’t remember falling?” I crushed my cigarette in a blue ceramic ashtray shaped like a puma.

“No. I don’t. It was probably a combination of fatigue, paint fumes and bad luck. I blacked out.” He fell silent. “I must say I thought that would be the end of the questioning. Of course, I had thought the same thing after that detective, what was his name—oh, damn I’m usually good with those things. Grange, or… what was it.”

“Grey, you talked to Owen Grey.” I watched his eyes light up.

“Yes. He was a large fellow, about your height. Short dark hair, kind of a plain dresser. Grey showed up about ten days before I died. He was looking for Julie, and asked me about her pregnancies. I still feel bad about that. I told him that, well in the strictest confidence, that she had had miscarriages. I compromised my Hippocratic oath, but I felt that under the circumstances anything might help. Julie was missing, after all, and this Grey fellow was here by permission of her parents. And they were so worried. I sometimes wonder whether that didn’t figure into my dismissal. Then a little over a week later the Hawksbridges died and Authority came here and questioned me about that. They gave me a warning too.”

“Which was…”

“Actually, Authority told me to speak to no one about my relationship with the Hawksbridges while things were under investigation. But I suppose two years is long enough for that.” He topped up all our drinks, then leaned back and slipped into a professional pose. “Julie Hawksbridge, contrary to all current medical statistics, continued to ovulate after the Change. You see what seems to have happened was that women ceased to ovulate, and men to produce sperm. For as yet undetermined reasons, normal meiosis has halted in the human race—meiosis being the division of sex cells. But here we had Julie, a woman with a pre-Change age of 26 producing ovum.”

“If men don’t produce their part, then how?”

“That’s not entirely true either, and I did say ‘normal meiosis has halted,’” the doctor corrected. “Some men produce a minimal amount of sperm—in very substandard quantities and those grossly mutated. Nothing healthy enough to create normal offspring, but one learns in medicine that there are always exceptions.”

“How many miscarriages did she have?”

“Three that I am certain of. But for some reason, she would not tell me who the father was. At first I thought it was because she couldn’t be sure who he was, then I realized there would not be enough men producing sperm for her to know more than one. The chances against it were astronomical.”

“So that was it. And the…the offspring?”

“None viable. They terminated in the second month—though my post mortem examination showed they had been developing normally. Julie would just begin to suspect a pregnancy and it would be over.”

“And, did you save any specimens?”

Forrester produced a smile then let it drop off his face. “Normally, I would. But the Hawksbridges’ were tremendously concerned about their privacy. As a professional courtesy to them I destroyed any specimens I had.”

“So, no one in the medical establishment found out about it.”

“Mr. Wildclown. I assume a detective has a certain responsibility to his clients. I take my Hippocratic oath quite seriously. Talking to Grey, and Authority, well, those were unique situations. Julie was missing and remains so.”

“I wasn’t finding fault. Just making an observation.” I sipped my brandy. The first two had warmed my blood wonderfully. “What do you think, Doctor? Is it possible that someone could have researched this phenomena enough to attempt to breed a human?”

“Mr. Wildclown, so far as my believing in the impossible, well, I am a dead man, your partner is a dead man, and yet we’ve all just sat here and shared a bottle of brandy.” He smiled. “My answer is, that there is no reason for me to believe that this would be impossible.”

“Julie Hawksbridge was pregnant at the time of her disappearance. Is that correct?” My head ached momentarily—just a twinge.

“Yes, but during her last check up with me, she was showing every indication of miscarrying again. It seems that whatever strange forces are at work upon the human race, there is a willful attempt to stop it here.”

“Thank you, Doctor.” I gestured to the brandy as I stood. My head reeled momentarily. I steadied myself on Elmo’s shoulder. “And for earlier.”

“Certainly, no trouble whatsoever. I haven’t had company lately, and there is a certain excitement to entertaining a detective, even if he is not your average kind.” He smiled shyly.

I picked my hat up, put it on. “I’ve got a feeling about this next question. There were numerous Authority investigations after the deaths of the Hawksbridges?”

“Why yes, as I said.” Dr. Forrester cocked his head at a strange angle. “Numerous.”

“Oh, what the hell!” I shook my head. “There was a funny thing about those investigations wasn’t there. A couple of the investigating Inspectors, different guys…”

“One was a woman!” Forrester broke in.

I paused, a woman. “Okay, a guy and a gal, and the funny thing about it is they all had…”

“The same name, yes, that’s astonishing. I’d almost forgotten that but it’s true. They did—but it was two men and a woman. I had thought it odd, and then attributed it to my hearing, which has never been the best. When I died later that day.” His eyebrows screwed up. “Such synchronicity was suddenly irrelevant.”

“B-something,” I said, adjusting my coat.

“Borden.” He smiled sweetly. “They were all named Borden. I remember bringing that up to the second Inspector. How funny that was. How odd—and what did she say? Oh, she said it was a common name in Authority, and she asked me for a description of the first Inspector I had seen.”

“What did he look like?” I asked already forming a picture of him in my head.

“Short, round and mean.” The doctor’s eyes flared at the unpleasant memory. “I warned him, in fact, I couldn’t help but say something about this terrifically bad habit he had. You see there is a lot of evidence that suggests that though the living are granted this strange immortality since the Change, they are still prey to certain degenerative processes. This first Inspector Borden had the ridiculous habit of chewing a brass toothpick. I pointed out the problems he was going to have, and well…” Forrester looked embarrassed. “He became extremely rude.”

“Was the third Inspector tall, muscular and balding—long scar across his cheeks like a smile?”

“Yes—that’s him. A very blunt individual. Though he was remarkably congenial despite it. He was most conciliatory actually, and, in fact, prompted me to put it behind me. You see: I was upset, and I had known the Hawksbridges, well—for years. This tall Borden told me to get on with life… Quite ironic really, when I think of it…the events later that day…”

“Thank you again, Doctor. I’ll tell you what. If I see any business, I’ll send it your way.”

I staggered slightly as I followed him to the door. I felt Elmo’s hands give me gentle shepherd touches on my shoulders. Dr. Forrester smiled and nodded his head vigorously as we left. I noticed a bullet crater in the bricks where I had fallen. As Elmo lead me to the car, I got the feeling that my hunt had taken a strange new twist. The creatures of the jungle were dangerous. And some of them had found their way right inside my head.