Cities of the Red Night by William S. Burroughs Page A

has squeezed her vast wealth out of the poorest people. She has other interests than money. She is a very big operator indeed. She owns immense estates in Chile and Peru and has some secret laboratories there. She has employed biochemists and virologists. Indication: genetic experiments and biologic weapons.”
    And what of the Countess de Vile? “De Vile: very wealthy but not Gulpa’s strata. A depraved, passionate and capricious woman, evil as Circe. Extensive underworld and police contacts. On close terms with Mafia dons and police chiefs in Italy, New York, Morocco, and South America. A frequent visitor at the Countess de Gulpa’s South American retreat. Several unsolved missing-person cases, involving boys of Jerry’s age, point to the South American laboratories as terminal.”
    I glanced through the questionnaire. “Medical history: scarlet fever at the age of four.” Now, scarlet fever is a rarity since the introduction of antibiotics. “Could there have been a misdiagnosis?”
    All this I was feeding into the recorder in pieces, and a lot more. An article I had just finished reading when Mr. Green came into my office. This was an article on head transplants performed on monkeys, the Sunday Times, December 9, 1973. I now took it out of a file and read parts of it into the recorder. “Monkey heads transplanted onto monkey bodies can now survive for about a week. The drawing above portrays controversial operation. ‘Technically a human head transplant is possible,’ Dr. White says, ‘but scientifically there would be no point.’”
    My first meeting with Mr. Green: the smell of death, and something shifty about him. From talking to Jerry’s friends, I found out that this was a family trait. They all described him as hard to figure or hard to pin down. Finally I turned on the TV. I played the tape back at low volume while I watched an Italian western with Greek subtitles, keeping my attention on the screen so I was subconsciously hearing the tape. They were hanging a rustler from horseback when the phone rang.
    It was Dimitri. “Well, Snide, I think we have found your missing person … unfortunately.”
    â€œYou mean dead?”
    â€œYes. Embalmed, in fact.” He paused. “And without his head.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œYes. Head severed at the shoulders.”
    â€œFingerprints check?”
    â€œYes.”
    I waited for the rest of it.
    â€œCause of death is uncertain. Some congestion in the lungs. May have been strangulation. The body was found in a trunk.”
    â€œWho found it?”
    â€œI did. I happened to be down at the port double-checking the possibility that the boy may have left by freighter, and I saw a trunk being carried aboard a ship with Panamanian registry. Well, something about the way they were carrying it … the disposition of the weight, you understand. I had the trunk returned to customs and opened. The uh the method of embalming … unusual to say the least. The body was perfectly preserved but no embalming fluid had been used. It was also completely nude.”
    â€œCan I have a look?”
    â€œOf course.…”
    *   *   *
    The Greek doctor had studied at Harvard and he spoke perfect English. Various internal organs were laid out on a white shelf. The body, or what was left of it, was in a fetal position.
    â€œConsidering that this boy has been dead at least a month, the internal organs are in a remarkable state of preservation,” said the doctor.
    I looked at the body. Pubic, rectal and leg hairs were bright red. However, he was redder than he should have been. I pointed to some red blotches around the nipples, crotch, thighs and buttocks. “What’s that? Looks like some kind of rash.”
    â€œI was wondering about that.… Of course it could have been an allergy. Redheads are particularly liable to allergic reactions,