Lizard Men of Los Angeles | Page 5

Rosenberg's robe.
"What's going on?" Mildred cried.
"Open those glass doors, Mrs. Lockhart, if you please," Cairo said with icy calm.
"Helllllllp...meeeeeeee..." Rosenberg howled, as the first tiny flames began to flicker at the back of his head, like an infernal halo. The very air around him had begun to warp from the intense heat that poured off his body.
Cairo reached one hand toward Rosenberg, then snatched it back. There now seemed to be a fire deep inside Rosenberg's chest, like the glow inside a piece of charcoal whose surface has turned to ash. In fact, Rosenberg's skin had begun to flutter away in small, gray sheets.
Mrs. Lockhart wrestled open one of the massive glass doors and stood aside as Cairo snatched a Navajo rug from the tile floor and, using it as a shield, attempted to wrap it around Rosenberg's body. At that instant Rosenberg burst into flames as hot as those in a crematorium. The blanket was consumed instantly and Cairo fell back with his hands before his face.
When he got to his feet, nothing remained of Emil Rosenberg but a pile of ashes and one charred gray foot.
*
A policeman burst through the door with a revolver in his hand. "What's going on here?" He glanced nervously around the room. "Where's Mr. Rosenberg? And what's that smell?"
Cairo faced him, his eyes intent. He held up his right hand, middle finger bent and held by the thumb, the remaining fingers extended. "Listen to my voice," Cairo intoned. "There is nothing wrong here. You will give us the keys to your patrol car. You will walk us to the car and explain to the others that I am a high-ranking member of the Los Angeles police department."
The policeman's eyes clouded over and his brow furrowed as if he were studying a complex mathematical formula. "Nothing's wrong here. You can put your badge away, sir. My car is right outside."
Mildred looked at Mrs. Lockhart in amazement. "How did he do that?"
"A very great deal of self-confidence," Mrs. Lockhart replied. "Don't dawdle."
The officer escorted them to his car and waved to them from the driveway as Mrs. Lockhart expertly backed the long, black automobile, lights still flashing, into the street. Cairo turned to Mildred, who sat wide-eyed in the back. "First we need directions to Galt's apartment," he said. "Then I want you to finish telling me about the tunnels."
The night was dark and cool and the stars burned fiercely overhead as Mrs. Lockhart drove toward the city. Mildred's face, in the starlight, showed a mixture of fear and excitement, innocence and cupidity. "Mr. Shufelt, see, he had this idea about a lost city under Los Angeles. He thought there was gold down there, big tablets of it--I guess like Moses had, only gold. He said he had maps that he made with what he called his Radio X-Ray. It just looked like a fancy dowsing rod to me, but what do I know? He drilled a big hole on Fort Moore Hill this spring trying to find it."
"I assume he was unsuccessful," Cairo said. "Otherwise it would have been in every newspaper in the civilized world."
"Bruno says he did find it."
"Then perhaps we should be talking to this Shufelt instead of Galt."
"I don't think even Brother Perdurabo could talk to Mr. Shufelt now."
"Are you saying he's dead?"
"The city gave up drilling, see, on account of being scared the hole was going to cave in, even though Mr. Shufelt said they were almost through. So Bruno and Mr. Shufelt went out there one night and Bruno lowered him into the hole with his Radio X-Ray machine and a pickax. Bruno stayed up top to watch for cops and all, and after three or four hours Mr. Shufelt said he found something. Then Bruno heard Mr. Shufelt say something like, 'Oh my God, they're alive!' Then there was this awful noise that Bruno said was like bones going through a grinder and the bottom part of the tunnel fell in. By the time Bruno could get down there, there was a hundred tons of rock where Mr. Shufelt had been."
"Did Bruno go to the police?"
The girl nodded. "He says they didn't believe him. They thought it was just a trick so they'd let Bruno and Mr. Shufelt start drilling again."
"Do you have any idea what Mr. Shufelt might have meant when he said, 'They're alive?'"
"Bruno thought he knew. He thought--"
"Yes?"
She looked out the window, then back into Cairo's eyes. "He thought it was the lizard men."
*
"See," Mildred explained, the words rushing out now in a torrent, "the tunnels are all supposed to connect together in the shape of this giant lizard. The head is up by Chinatown and the tail is down by the Central Library. There's some kind of Indian legend about it. It was