But I can recall it when I want. It was losing the accent that got me
interested in mimicry. I started in show business as a comic who did
imitations of famous people. Now I imitate Billy lames Plover, the man
I used to be.”
“How did you get in here?” Graham demanded.
“I went around the side of the house and broke a window.
“Get out. I want you out of here.”
“You killed Dwight,” Prine said. “I drove by the Bowerton Building
after the show. I saw all the cops. I know what you did.”
He was very pale. His face was lined with strain.
“Killed who?” Graham asked.
“Dwight. Franklin Dwight Bollinger.”
Perplexed, Graham said, “He was trying to kill us.”
“He was one of the best people. One of the very best there ever was. I
did a program about vice cops, and he was one of the guests.
Within minutes we knew we were two of a kind.”
“He was the Butcher, the one who-” Prine was extremely agitated.
His hands were shaking. His left cheek was distorted by a nervous tic.
He interrupted Connie and said, “Dwight was half the Butcher.
“Half the Butcher?” Connie said.
Graham lowered his hand from the switch and gripped the pillar of the
brass table lamp.
‘llwastheotherhalf,”Prinesaid.”Wewereidentical personalities, Dwight and
l.” He took one step toward them. Then another. “More than that. We
were incom 3W plete without each other. We were halves of the same
organism.” He pointed the pistol at Graham’s head.
“Get out of here!” Graham shouted. “Run, Connie!” And as he spoke he
threw the lamp at Prine.
The lamp knocked Prine back into the easy chair.
Graham turned to the foyer.
Connie was opening the front door.
As he followed her, Prine shot him in the back.
A terrible blow on the right shoulder blade, a burst of light, blood
spattering the carpet all around him …
He fell and rolled onto his side in time to see Ira Preduski come out of
the hallway that led to the kitchen.
He floated on a raft of pain in a sea that grew darker by the second.
What was happening?
The detective shouted at Prine and then shot him in self-defense.
Once. In the chest.
The talk-show host collapsed against a magazine rack.
Pain. Just the first twitches of pain.
Graham closed his eyes. Wondered if that was the wrong thing to do. If
you go to sleep, you’ll die. Or was that only with a head injury? He
opened his eyes to be on the safe side.
Connie was wiping the sweat from his face.
Kneeling beside him, Preduski said, “I called an ambulance.” Some time
must have passed. He seemed to fade out in the middle of one
conversation and in on the middle of the next.
He closed his eyes.
Opened them.
AL “Medical examiner’s theory,” Preduski said.
“Sounded crazy at first. But the more I thought about it .
I’m thirsty,” Graham said. He was hoarse. “Thirsty? I’ll bet you
are,” Preduski said.
‘Get me . drink.”
“That might be the wrong thing to do for you,” Con the said.
“We’ll wait for the ambulance.” epil c The room spun. He smiled.
He rode the room as if it were a carousel.
,l shouldn’t have come here alone,” Preduski said miserably. “But you
see why I thought I had to? Bol MMDAY linger was a cop. The other
half of the Butcher might be a coP too. Who could I trustz Really.
Who Craham licked his lips and said, “P rine. Dead?
afraid not,” Preduski said.
The?
“What about you?”
‘Dead?”
,you’ll live.”
sure?
“Bullet wasn’t near the spine. Didn’t puncture any vital organs, I’ll
bet.”
“Sure?
“I’rll sure,” Connie said.
Graham closed his eyes.
Ira Preduski stood with his back to the hospital window. The late
afternoon sun framed him in soft gold light. “Prine says they wanted to
start racial wars, religious wars, economic wars . . .”
Graham was lying on his side in the bed, propped up with pillows.
He spoke somewhat slowly because of the pain killers he had been given.
“So they could gain power in the aftermath.”