Gateways, page 25
“You report it to the cops?”
“No. Why?”
“Because your rig might have been involved in a hit and run.”
His eyes narrowed. “You a cop or something?”
“Nope. Just an interested party.” He saw the questioning look on the trucker’s face. “My dad’s car took a wallop early Tuesday morning.”
“He okay?”
“Luckily, yeah.”
“Good.” He hauled himself into the cab. “Because I can’t hang around for no investigation. I ain’t running or nothing, but I got a schedule to keep.”
“I hear you,” Jack said.
He thought about stopping him but decided against it. If his story was true—and Jack sensed it was—what good would it do? If he hadn’t reported his truck stolen, Jack could call Hernandez and the Novaton cops would pick him up.
Of course, the reported theft could have been a cover, but Jack doubted that.
As the cab door slammed shut, Jack said, “What’re you hauling?”
“Sand.”
“Where to?”
“North Jersey.”
Jersey? Jersey was loaded with sand.
“What the hell for?”
The driver shrugged. “I don’t set up the jobs or choose the loads; I just get it where it wants to go.”
Then Jack remembered Luke saying something about Semelee sucking all the sand out of the cenote and selling it. Could this be…?
“Where’d you get the sand?”
Another shrug. “It got boated in from somewheres in the swamp. That’s all I know.”
With that he threw the truck into first and headed for the exit.
Jack watched him go. He made a mental note of the company name. Wm. Blagden & Sons. He might look them up when he got back north, maybe find out who’d hired them. Shipping sand from a Florida nexus point to New Jersey…he couldn’t imagine the reason, but it couldn’t be good.
He started back toward his car. At least now he knew what had hit his father’s Marquis. And he had a pretty good idea who had been driving it.
But he still didn’t know why. Had a pretty good idea about that too, and hoped to nail that down this afternoon.
8
By the time Jack reached Gateways South he’d stopped at a local hardware store for a roll of duct tape, then called the Novaton Police where he reached Anita Nesbitt. After a quick check she told him that, yes, on Tuesday morning a dump truck had been reported stolen during the night and was found shortly thereafter.
Okay. So Wm. Blagden & Sons, Inc., was covered.
Jack parked in the cul-de-sac and hurried into his father’s place.
His father was watching TV. Classic ESPN was running the 1980 Wimbledon slugfest between Borg and McEnroe. McEnroe was screaming at himself for missing a bullet passing shot.
He looked up at Jack and grinned. “Right about now I bet McEnroe wishes Borg had never been Bjorn.”
Normally Jack would have groaned, but a bad pun was a good sign. His father loved puns. He was getting back to normal.
He looked down at Jack’s muddy sneakers and still-wet jeans. “What happened to you?”
“Took a little boat trip.”
“You went boating? Why didn’t you tell me? I would have—”
“It wasn’t exactly a pleasure trip. Look, Dad, do you remember seeing a little black shell in your hospital room?”
He frowned. “No. When would this have been?”
“I found it the day before you woke up. It was black, oblong, had a little hole drilled in the hinge.”
Please remember. Please…
Dad was shaking his head. “Sorry. Never saw anything like that.”
Jack suppressed a groan. He’d have to try the hospital next.
Hospital…Jack remembered the plastic bag of sundries that Anya had thrown together as his father was signing himself out. He knew it wasn’t in his car. Had he brought it in?
“Did you see a bag of goodies from the hospital? You know, toothpaste, mouthwash—”
“Oh, that. I threw it out.”
“You didn’t see a shell in there?”
“I didn’t really look. I mean, I glanced inside but I don’t use any of those brands so I tossed it out.”
Maybe…maybe…Jack didn’t want to get his hopes up.
“Where? In the kitchen?”
“Well, yes, at first. But this morning I tossed the kitchen bag into the can out back. Look, what’s so important—?”
Jack didn’t wait for him to finish. He dashed outside and around to the back porch. The green plastic garbage can sat to the left on a small concrete slab. Just his luck, Friday would be garbage pickup day and the shell—if it was in there—was on its way to the county dump.
But no. The can was empty except for one white plastic bag. Jack untied the top and poked around until he found the bag from the hospital. He yanked it out and pawed through the sample-size toiletries. He sent out a silent prayer to the patron saint of garbage that he’d find the shell within, but it wasn’t looking good…
And then he reached the bottom and felt something hard and rough edged. He pulled it out—
“Yes!”
He had it. Now Carl could come home. But first Jack had to arrange an exchange. He shook his head. A shell for a human being…what kind of a deal was that?
What had Semelee told him to do? Stand outside his father’s house and announce that he’d found it. Riiiight. But she’d said she’d hear him, and she probably could. Jack’s Doubting Thomas days were over. Anything goes.
“Okay,” he said aloud, feeling foolish but forcing himself to go on. “I’ve found the shell. Did you catch that? I’ve found it. Tell me how we make the trade.”
Now what? He supposed he’d have to wait until Semelee got in touch with him.
Pocketing the shell, he turned and found Dad staring at him through the back porch jalousies. He wore the same perplexed expression as when Jack had unpacked those stuffed animals from Abe. Maybe more perplexed this time.
Probably thinks I’m doing drugs.
“Hi, Dad.”
“Are you okay, Jack?”
No, he thought. I’m not. Someday I’d like to be, but at the moment…
“I’m fine.”
His father pushed open the porch door. “Come back in this way. It’s shorter.”
Jack took a step toward the porch, then remembered again that it was Anya who’d packed up the bag. Had she known…?
He glanced toward her place and noticed a figure stretched out on a lounge in the front yard.
“Be with you in a minute,” he said. “I want to say hello to Anya.”
As Jack crossed onto the green grass, Oyv trotted up to meet him, wagging his tail in welcome. The dog escorted him toward Anya, but Jack slowed, letting Oyv pull ahead as he noticed that Anya was topless.
She lay face down on a towel on the lounge cushion, dressed only in lime-colored Bermuda shorts, baking her bare back in the afternoon sun. He was about to turn away when he noticed a pattern of red marks on her exposed skin. He took a step closer and…
Jack bit his upper lip. They looked like burn marks…and crisscrossing her skin between them were thin, angry red lines, as if someone had been stubbing out cigarettes on her back and then whipping her with a fine lash.
Jack wanted to turn away, but couldn’t. He had to stay and stare, horrified, yet fascinated.
Anya’s voice startled him.
“A map of my pain,” she said without looking up. “See what he does to me?”
“Who?”
“You know. The Adversary. The One.”
Oh, yeah. The One…whose True Name Jack wasn’t supposed to know.
“But how? Why?”
“I’ve told you the why: Because I hinder his path. As to the how…he has many ways, and they are all written here, on my back.”
“But how do those burns, those cuts get there?”
“They simply appear. They map his efforts to destroy me.”
Jack shook his head to clear it. “I’m not following. What is he doing to destroy you?”
“Help me with this towel,” she said. “Fold the ends over my back.”
Jack did as she asked, allowing her to wrap the towel around her upper torso as she rose to a sitting position.
“Talk to me,” Jack said.
Anya shook her gray head. “You have your own concerns. Those you should be worrying about. And besides, what can you do to help? Nothing. This I must face on my own.”
“Try me.”
He liked this old lady. He wanted to help her, do something to lighten her load.
“It’s all right, Jack. The sun makes it feel better. The rays don’t heal me, but they lessen the pain.” She rose to her feet. “I’m going in to lie down.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m better than I was this morning and I’ll be even better by tonight.”
“Will you be up for drinks later? We’ll do it at my father’s place this time.”
She shook her head. “Not tonight. But tomorrow definitely.”
Jack watched her and Oyv enter the leafy interior of her house, then, feeling sad and angry and helpless, he turned away.
9
Jack had lounged around with his father, dodging questions about the toys and the shell until his father nodded off in his recliner. An afternoon nap—one of the great pleasures in life. But Jack couldn’t indulge today. He had to wait for word from Semelee.
But that wasn’t the only matter on his afternoon schedule.
He stepped into his father’s bedroom and dialed Ramsey Weldon’s office. He learned from the receptionist that Mr. Weldon was on another line. Would he care to leave a message?
“No. When can I call back?”
“Well, he’ll probably be leaving in a half hour or so.”
Jack thanked her, hung up, then went out to his car.
The duct tape he’d bought earlier sat on the front seat in a flimsy white plastic bag emblazoned with the Novaton Hardware logo. He snatched it up, bag and all. As he was closing the door he spotted an envelope on the floor by the passenger seat. He picked it up and checked the contents.
Carl’s five hundred dollars.
He’d trusted Jack enough to leave it in the car for safekeeping. He’d also trusted Jack to bring him back.
“I’ve got your damn shell,” Jack said aloud. “I’m ready to trade.”
He glanced at his watch. Couldn’t wait around here any longer. He set off on a stroll toward the administration building.
This time he could walk in the open and say hello to passers-by instead of ducking into the bushes every time someone approached. When he reached the parking lot, his heart gave a kick when he didn’t see Weldon’s Crown Imperial, but eased back when he spotted a ’57 DeSoto in Weldon’s space. This guy had some neat cars.
Jack strolled over to it. A four-door Firedome with a glossy turquoise body, white roof and side panels, big chrome bumpers, white-wall tires, and those fins—humongous wedge-shaped projections, each fitted with a vertical row of three rocketlike red lights that made the car look like a spaceship. Jack peered inside. White-and-turquoise upholstery and a dash-mounted rearview mirror.
What was wrong with Detroit—or Japan or Germany, for that matter? Why the hell didn’t they make cars like this anymore?
He hung around the DeSoto, studying it from every angle for what seemed like forever before Weldon showed up. He wore a pale beige silk suit today, so pale it was almost white.
“Another beauty, Mr. Weldon,” he said.
Weldon grinned. “Tom’s son, right? Jack?”
“You’ve got a good memory.”
“And you’ve got excellent taste in cars. How’s your father?”
“Doing great. He came home yesterday.”
Weldon’s cheek twitched. “Really? I had no idea. Why didn’t anyone tell me?”
“I don’t think anyone else knows.” Jack ran his fingers lightly along the DeSoto’s right front fender. “Say, would you mind giving me a little ride in this baby?”
Weldon shook his head. “I’d love to, but I’ve got to get straight home.”
Jack opened the door and slipped into the passenger seat. “That’s okay. Just drive me to the front gate and I’ll walk back. I need the exercise.”
Weldon didn’t look happy about it, but Jack hadn’t left him much choice.
The interior was like a furnace. Jack cranked down his window as Weldon fired her up and backed out of his space.
“Smooth ride,” Jack said once they were rolling.
“Torsion-Air suspension.”
Jack watched him closely as he asked the next question. “You ever hear of a woman named Semelee?”
Weldon’s hands tightened on the steering wheel, whitening the knuckles. His right cheek twitched as it had before.
“No, can’t say as I have. Is she one of our residents?”
“Nope. Too young for Gateways. Lives out in the Glades with a bunch of funny looking guys. She’s got this snow white hair. You’d remember her if you ever met her. You sure you don’t know her?”
Weldon looked ready to jump out of his skin and his forehead was beaded with sweat. It was hot in the car, but not that hot.
“Quite sure,” he said.
“You’re sure you’re sure?”
“Yes! How many times do I have to tell you that?” He began to brake. “Well, here’s the gate. I hope you enjoyed—”
“Keep driving.”
“I told you. I have to—”
Jack pulled out the Glock and held it in his lap, pointed in the general direction of Weldon’s gut.
“You’ll be in a world of gut-shot hurt if this happens to go off. Think Reservoir Dogs. So keep driving. We haven’t finished our chat. Smile and wave to the nice guard. That’s right. Now…let’s head out to where my father had his accident.”
“Where’s that?” Now Weldon was really sweating.
“You don’t know? Pemberton and South Road.”
“But there’s nothing out there.”
“I know.”
“This is illegal, this is carjacking, it’s kidnapping, it’s—”
“It’s happening. Relax. Don’t fight it and we’ll have a nice ride.”
“If you want the car, take it.”
“I don’t want the car.”
“Then…then why are you doing this?”
Jack let him stew in his juices for a while before responding.
“Just wanted to ask you what you know about people who’ve been dying at Gateways South.” Weldon opened his mouth to reply but Jack held up a hand to stop him. “I don’t want to hear any bullshit about them being elderly and what can you expect. I’m talking about three spouseless people in excellent health—your own doctor said so—who’ve suffered death by mishap over the past nine months. At a rate of one every three months. I’m sure you know their names: Adele Borger, Joseph Leo, and Edward Neusner.”
Weldon had turned pale. He looked as if he might be getting sick.
“Of course I know their names. Those were terrible tragedies.”
“My father would have made number four, and right on schedule. Know anything about that, Mr. Weldon?”
“No, of course not. How could I?”
That did it. Jack looked around, saw no other cars in sight. This was as good a place as any.
He made Weldon pull over, then he got out and made him slide to the passenger side—easy with the bench seat.
“Now, put your hands behind your back.”
“W-w-what are you going to do?”
“I’m g-g-gonna tape your wrists together.”
“No!”
Jack grabbed a handful of Weldon’s longish dark hair. “Look. We can do this the easy way—which is you doing what I tell you—or the hard way, which means I have to shoot you in the hip or through the thigh or something equally messy and bloody and keep on doing that until you cooperate. Me, I don’t like getting splattered with blood. The stains are almost impossible to get out. So I prefer neat and easy to messy and bloody. How about you?”
Weldon sobbed and put his hands behind his back.
Jack duct taped his wrists together, then his knees, then his ankles. That done, he took over the driver seat and put the DeSoto back in motion. He pointed it toward town and kept hammering at Weldon about the three dead folks, his father, and Semelee. Weldon kept stonewalling him. Finally Jack pulled up before the locked gates to the limestone quarry.
“So,” he said. “You don’t know nuttin’ ’bout nuttin’, is that it?”
“Please. I don’t. Really. You’ve got to believe me.”
Jack didn’t.
“This is going to hurt me almost as much as it hurts you.”
With that he gunned the DeSoto and rammed it against the gates. Weldon cried out as the chain snapped and the gates flew back.
“The bumpers! The chrome!”
Jack turned the car left onto the steep grade of the narrow road that ran down into the pit. A rough limestone wall loomed to his left. He didn’t want to do it—he hated himself for doing it—but forced his hands to turn the steering wheel and drag the left side of the car against the stone.
“My God, no!” Weldon cried.
“Sorry.” And he was.
As they reached the bottom of the quarry Jack didn’t quite make the turn, ramming the front end into an outcropping of stone. The impact stopped the car short, hurling Weldon off the seat and into the dashboard. Without a seat belt or his hands to protect him, he hit hard, then flopped back against the seat.
“Whoa,” Jack said. “That must have hurt. But probably just a fraction of what my father felt when that truck clocked his car out on South Road.” He looked around. “Let’s see. We’ve remodeled the left side, let’s see what we can do with the right.”
Between getting a taste of what his dad had gone through that night and realizing what he was doing to this beautiful, classic, innocent car, Jack was having trouble keeping his tone light.
