Chapter 19: Golden Rain 01
Hestal heard a knock at the door.
He had just gotten home at the time and had not yet turned on the lights. He had only tossed the bloodstained coat and gloves he had taken off into a bag, tied it shut, and temporarily set it in the corner. His fingers were still covered in the residue of dried liquid, and there was a faint smell of blood in the air—subtle, hard to conceal, the proof of sin.
He paused for a moment, looking toward the door—this door shut out the overwhelming sound of rain from outside, blurring that clamor into something strangely muffled. And his knife was still safely tucked in its sheath; he should have been safe.
Hestal cautiously paced to the door and glanced outside through the peephole. What he saw seemed to give him pause, and then he slowly opened the door.
—Albanino stood at the doorway watching Hestal. The man regarded Hestal with something close to appreciation, taking in the mottled bloodstains that covered him from his fingertips to his elbows, the silver cufflinks inlaid with hawk’s eye stone on his undoubtedly expensive shirt, all coated in a gradually drying, sticky fluid.
The cold autumn wind poured ceaselessly into the entryway. Albanino’s hair had been soaked by the rain, clinging to his forehead in strands. He casually raked his fingers through it, sweeping the unusually curled strands—made even more so by the moisture—back behind his head, and revealed a smile.
Hestal watched him cautiously. Outside, a flash of lightning streaked across the sky, and the room was abruptly swallowed by a fleeting white brightness before being devoured by darkness once more.
And Albanino said, “Good evening.”
It was already past ten at night by now. At this hour, Bart Hardy should be standing at the crime scene; he had likely received that letter about an hour ago. Hestal let his mind wander for a moment, considering how that damned bouquet of mint flowers was faring against the rain. He didn’t believe those soft branches and leaves could survive the storm—the cleverly arranged round flower ball had probably already wilted.
“I thought you were in prison,” Hestal said calmly. Albanino indeed should have been—at the pretrial hearing, the judge had rejected his request for bail pending trial. Until the court date, Albanino was supposed to be in prison.
“As my lawyer, you might be somewhat incompetent, Hestal.” Albanino’s voice was soft and cheerful, even though rainwater was streaming down every inch of his clothing, and his fingers were visibly trembling from the cold. “The charges against me have been dropped—thanks to Bob Landon. He apparently had a habit of keeping parts of his victims as trophies to relive the killing process whenever he wanted. Today, the CSI team found his diary and all the victims’ hair under the floorboards of his house.”
“So they found out that Sarah Adelman wasn’t killed by you.” Hestal said in a low voice. It was impossible to tell whether he was displeased by this fact—at least, nothing in his tone gave it away.
“Yes, although they still can’t figure out how my fingerprints ended up on that knife. But since the evidence is irrefutable, there’s no point in keeping me in prison any longer.” Albanino shrugged, and another drop of rainwater fell from his hair onto his shoulder; he neither commented on the bloodstains on Hestal’s body nor greeted the other, just forcefully squeezed past him into the house, letting out a satisfied sigh at the warm temperature inside.
Hestal sized him up but said nothing, simply closing the door behind him.
Albanino continued in an even voice: “As compensation, the forensics bureau wants me to take paid leave first. Apparently they’ll negotiate… compensation and other issues. I originally went back to the forensics bureau to grab a few daily necessities I’d left there, and then planned to head straight home.”
“I really wish you had stuck to your original plan,” Hestal said quietly.
“I was thinking the same, but Bart sent me a message along the way, so I decided to come straight to you.” Albanino shrugged and held his phone out in front of Hestal: the piercing white light illuminated a patch of darkness, and on the screen was a photo of a corpse:
Bob Landon was hanging from a piano wire. Because his entire body weight was pressing down on a single steel string, his frame appeared grotesquely elongated; when the photo was taken, the rain hadn’t yet grown heavy, and Landon’s body looked abnormally bloated and pale against the night, his chest covered entirely in dried blood and crisscrossing wounds; and his chest had been opened, ribs jutting out, with tender green leaves and small purple flowers where his heart should have been.
“A bouquet made of mint, to replace this murderer’s heart.” Albanino sighed softly, then turned to Hestal, the two of them facing each other in the relatively dark doorway. “It’s quite romantic, don’t you think?”
“Most people probably wouldn’t see it that way, Mr. Bax.” Hestal’s voice still sounded as cold as ever, as though the topic they were discussing stirred not the faintest ripple in his heart. “So, what makes you think that after looking at a photo of a murder scene, you should come to me?”
“Curiosity.” Albanino’s voice had dropped almost to a breath. He took a step forward. The master of this empty, lifeless residence furrowed his brow, already nearly backed against the wall, though he showed no intention of retreating further. “The Pianist stabbed that victim many times—too many… By tomorrow we’ll have the detailed autopsy report from the Forensics Bureau. Landon was still alive when he did it. I think the blood must have inevitably stained his fingers.”
The corner of his mouth lifted slightly. He reached out and seized Herstal’s right wrist, slowly raising his hand. By the faint, blurry light from outside the window, he could see the crust of dried blood on his skin, the stubborn stains soaked deep between his fingernails, impossible to clean.
Albanino tilted his head slightly, the interest in his eyes seeming to deepen: “Latex gloves are better at preventing blood from sticking to a killer’s skin—that’s true. But rubber is too… industrial. Touching skin and flesh through it—it’s not intimate enough, is it?”
“What do you want me to answer?” Herstal asked. He didn’t seem truly troubled, nor did he truly seem to want an answer.
“‘Yes, just like how a lot of men don’t want to wear a condom when they sleep with someone,’ I think that kind of answer is pretty witty.” Albanino murmured, appearing strangely absorbed, as if he hadn’t really been listening to the other’s derisive snort.
His fingers slowly slid across Hestal’s knuckles, brushed over the protrusions of the joints, then traced their way to his wrist. Hestal looked down, watching his movements without saying a word. The corner of Albanino’s mouth was still slightly raised as he pinched the blood-soaked fabric—he could picture the scene: Hestal taking off his coat, kneeling in a dark alley, plunging his hands deep into the dead man’s chest, the pristine white fabric of his shirt gradually soaking through with the blood that kept pouring out.
His fingers deftly worked around the shirt cuff, nimbly unfastening the cufflink. Hestal heard a faint click as the sterling silver cufflink slipped from between his fingers, landing on the ground with a series of crisp sounds and rolling away.
Albanino slowly pushed the brownish-red stained fabric up a few inches, revealing the pale skin on Hestal’s wrist that almost never saw the light of day. Then Albanino saw the scars on Hestal’s wrist: all of them old, layered upon one another, pale and raised, arranged in parallel lines.
“Albanino,” Hestal said in a warning tone.
But Albanino’s fingers still slowly brushed over those wounds. Near the deepest cuts were many shallower, more chaotic parallel marks. Albanino applied a slight pressure with his fingers, trying to wipe away the bloodstains, causing the skin on the inside of the other’s wrist to redden slightly. Hestal’s shoulders were tense, but for some reason, he didn’t pull his hand away.
“Hesitation cuts,” Albanino said in a low voice.
“Don’t analyze me with your forensic pathologist routine.” Hestal’s voice was as tense as his body language.
“Sorry, occupational habit.” Albarino smiled, then he lifted Hestal’s hand and examined it with a critical eye—and then, unexpectedly, he suddenly leaned forward and pressed his lips to his knuckles.
Albarino heard the other’s faint intake of breath with considerable satisfaction; it was the most vivid reaction he could wring out of the man.
And Hestal could feel those soft lips against his skin—skin covered in blood—too soft, given the nature of the person before him. He tentatively brushed his lips across the bones, like a carnivore scenting its territory. Then, Albarino suddenly licked with the tip of his tongue, a wet, soft sensation tentatively grazing the blood on his knuckles.
“What does it feel like? To take a person’s life that way?” Albarino said in a low, indistinct voice, given that he was almost lewdly using his tongue to clean the blood from between another’s fingers. “I hadn’t even imagined it before… From an artistic creation standpoint, it’s not necessary, is it? You don’t have to make the paint yourself to paint a picture, so—”
Hestal looked down at him, and the other slightly lowered his head, a posture that made him seem a little shorter than him no matter how you looked at it.
Then Hestal abruptly said, “Like a theremin.”
Not sure if it was meant as repayment, Albanino curled his fingertips into his own mouth. His mouth was much hotter than his hands.
The other gave a vague hum, which barely counted as asking a question. Hestal continued, “Your fingers only come into contact with flesh, never touching the soul in the metaphorical sense, yet following the strings you cannot touch, the soul is indeed between your fingers—”
Albanino choked out a vague laugh, lifted his head, released Hestal’s fingers, and licked his glistening lower lip without a care. He picked up the thread with a smile: “Hoarse from screaming—”
“—a mournful cry.” Hestal finished the sentence, staring him down. “Indeed.”
“As I said, it’s quite romantic.” Albanino concluded airily, casually helping Hestal straighten his sleeve. “Though perhaps the floral arrangement technique could use some improvement, overall the flaws do not overshadow the merits.”
This was certainly a rather polite assessment for the Sunday Gardener to make, especially considering there was still a bouquet of flowers on the corpse. Although Hestal knew this to be true, it did not stop him from giving a cold snort through his nose.
“So, did you get what you wanted?” Hestal asked, beginning to grow impatient with this roundabout conversation.
Albanino smiled silently. He released Hestal’s hand and slowly rubbed the bloodstain on his fingertip. Then he suddenly took another step forward and, catching him off guard, shoved Hestal against the wall.
—In that same second, a cold blade pressed against his neck.
Albanino could barely even tell how Hestal had drawn the knife, but that didn’t matter. The sharp edge pressed lightly into his skin, the tip trembling faintly with the rhythm of the pulse in his neck, like a thin, cold sliver of light in the dimness.
“I want too many things, Mr. Armalite.” Albanino kept smiling, and kept that posture of pinning the other against the wall with one hand. “As I said, I’m very curious. If I were to tell you all my vast and tangled thoughts, you might find it tiresome.”
“That’s not a good answer.” Hestal spoke slowly, his voice carrying a trace of mockery, and the blade sank a little deeper into the other’s skin. He knew exactly how much force it would take to cut through the other’s trachea. “It seems you still haven’t found the position where I ‘should be,’ have you?”
“Indeed.” Albanino replied. With a courage bordering on suicide, he pressed forward another step, slamming his whole body into Hestal and pinning him against the wall. Hestal’s hand was steady. As their positions shifted, the knife remained pressed against Albanino’s neck, but it did not cut any deeper.
Albanino did not even try to suppress the smile at the corner of his mouth: “Though perhaps the progress is worrying, just like this imprisonment—just like the trial you’ve put me through—I have at least seen some of the things I wanted to see.”
“What did you see?” He felt that Hestal’s voice sounded smoother and more sinister now, and he wondered if that was the voice the Pianist’s victims heard before they died; Albanino unabashedly gazed into those eyes—cold, ruthless pale blue, pupils dilated, like a pool of sin.
“I see beauty. Mr. Amaretto, right now.” Albanino pressed closer to him, the distance between his own not-yet-extinguished lips and the corner of the other’s mouth, but that did not stop him from blowing blood-tinged breath onto the other’s skin. “You look like Danaë in the bronze tower.”
Note:
[1] Hesitation cuts: Refers to the superficial cuts made by a suicide victim before forming the fatal incised wound, for various purposes such as psychological conflict, testing the sharpness of the blade, and experiencing the sensation of pain. They are generally relatively shallow and short, variable in number, and may appear in isolation or as multiple non-continuous superficial incisions, mostly parallel to the main wound of the fatal incised cut, appearing in isolation at the upper or lower edge of the main wound.
[2] The theremin is the world’s first electronic musical instrument, invented in 1919 by the former Soviet physicist Professor Lev Termen. Its principle of operation relies on two LC oscillator units that sense the distributed capacitance between the human body and the earth, each producing changes in oscillation frequency and amplitude respectively, making it the only electronic instrument in the world that requires no physical contact to play.
[3] King Acrisius heeded the warning of a prophet that he would be killed by the son born to his daughter Danaë. King Acrisius was greatly terrified, so he imprisoned his daughter Danaë in a tall bronze tower, forbidding her from any contact with the outside world. However, the king of gods, Zeus, fell in love with Danaë’s beauty. Zeus transformed into a shower of gold, entered Danaë’s bedchamber through the top of the tower, and fathered Perseus with her.