Roy blinked at the lightning flash, struggling to believe he was watching Paul Constantine follow Frank Ledger toward the Fisherman’s Inn. He stood in an alley bordering the square, absently counting as the rain began to fall. Had they formed an alliance? Did Ledger have something on Paul?
The thunderclap stopped his counting at three.
Ledger, Paul, and oddly, the little girl he’d met in the woods outside of Bracken, entered the Fisherman’s Inn and disappeared. There had been no gun at Paul’s back. It was as if Ledger had Paul leashed like a dog.
Roy swallowed back bile. His old friend was apparently no friend at all, but a man concerned solely with returning him to prison, or worse.
The rain came quickly. The remaining people in the square scattered with hunched backs and newspapers over their heads, protecting themselves as though the water were acid. The square was cleared in the space of a minute.
At first Roy found it hard to make his feet move. He stared at the Fisherman’s Inn in a daze. He imagined Paul in there, laughing and drinking with an outlaw as though they were old friends. The vision hit him in an unmarked place, a hollow in his chest that had, until now, gone undiscovered in his life. His breathing hitched. He forced a few deep breaths to bring back order.
If this was Paul’s play, he thought, then so be it. He’d burn them both down when the time came.
He left the alley and edged along the building fronts, avoiding the Fisherman’s. He didn’t bother with the signboard as he passed it; the bright red placard shone like a beacon, and he already knew the way to Lincoln Park.
The rain grew heavier as he moved up Pine Street. The sky hovered lowly. He had the road to himself. He was sure the windows above held ghostly faces looking out at the rain, possibly looking down at a gator man walking their street. Let them look, he thought. He took off his hat to reveal the diamond scales on his bald head. He turned up his face and opened his mouth to take in some of the cold drops. Let them whisper and point and gawk. Let them tell stories of the thing they saw walking in the rain.
34
Frank Ledger moved into a booth against the inn’s front window. Sandy slid in opposite him. The glass was streaked with rain. It made the outside world look broken. Ledger took off his bowler hat and placed it on the table before him. There were a few patrons scattered about in booths and on stools, all proper types—quiet and nonthreatening.
Upon inspecting Frank Ledger, two men downed their drinks, tipped their hats to the bartender, and left.
Paul checked the barroom for a wanted poster, but found none. He guessed the men didn’t know Ledger personally, but he counted them as particularly observant for getting out.
Paul went to the bar. The bartender had more hair on his face than on his head, and even there it was only whiskers. His shirt was white and his apron straps sunk into his shoulders as though, over time, they’d grown into his skin. A cocktail stick moved around in his mouth. He toweled a shot glass and eyed Frank Ledger with distaste as Paul approached.
“How’s the food here?” Paul said.
The bartender nodded toward Frank Ledger. In a low voice, he said, “Friend of yours?”
“Yes,” Paul said. His own voice sounded harder than he might have intended. Frank Ledger was no friend of his, yet the bartender’s demeanor irked him.
“Eyes here,” Paul said. He snapped his fingers before the bartender’s face.
The bartender looked Paul up and down. “What’ll you have?”
“Two whiskeys”, Paul said. And then, “Milk?”
“Surely,” the bartender said.
“And what’s on the menu?”
“Beef stew.”
“Three.”
The bartender nodded. He threw the towel over his shoulder and set the glass on the bar top. He produced a whiskey bottle and a second glass. “You’re Cajun,” he said, pouring the shots.
“I am,” Paul said.
“I know some of your people,” the bartender said, his voice once again low, “and I trust them. I’d usually let you start a tab, but…” His eyes shot to Ledger and back.
“He’s no threat to you,” Paul said, unsure if what he was saying was true.
“Just the same, there’ll be no tab.”
Paul leaned forward and let his hat fall into his hands. He pulled out the coin bag and paid the bartender more than the whiskey, milk, and stew could possibly have cost. He picked up the two glasses. “Send two more whiskeys out with the stew.”
Frank Ledger stared through the rain-spattered glass. His fingers drummed the table before him. Paul set one glass between Ledger’s splayed hands and slid into the booth next to Sandy.
Ledger looked down at the whiskey. His shoulder and head twitched like the muscles themselves held a bad memory of drinking. He shook his head and returned to staring out the window.
Sandy reached for the shot glass.
Paul slapped her hand lightly, looked down at her like she’d lost her mind.
The little girl shrugged.
Paul downed his shot and silently cursed his luck. He hoped the whiskey would loosen Ledger up, possibly tire him, but it appeared he’d have to work through his plan without such help. At the thought, he took Ledger’s shot and downed it, as well. The whiskey burned beautifully. It tasted of smoke and wood and earth. It quelled his wild stomach.
A woman emerged from the back room. She had blonde hair and was as big as a Viking. Her chest was like a shelf above a green apron. Her long hair was braided behind her head, and the braid swung back and forth as she walked. Her tray balanced a glass of milk and three brown bowls with handles on the sides, their contents steaming. As she moved toward the booth the bartender poured two more shots and set them on the bar top. The woman snatched them up with one hand and placed them on her tray without slowing down. “Three stews and two whiskeys?”
Paul nodded.
The woman plopped down a stew in front of each of them. She clacked down the shots dead center on the table, and then lightly set the milk in front of Sandy before she headed back toward the kitchen.
Paul looked down at the stew. Brown liquid held up a glistening layer of rendered fat. Small potatoes and carrots broke the surface, along with some beef and what looked like sausage. There were no spoons. Paul gripped the bowl’s handle and drank quickly, gulping chunks as they came to his lips. He barely bothered to chew. The broth was salty with a hint of peppers.
When Paul put the bowl back down it was half empty. He wiped his lips with the back of hand. Young Sandy had apparently matched his fervor; her bowl was half empty, as well.
Frank Ledger hadn’t yet touched his food. He looked at the stew like it was a bowl of vomit. He lifted his right hand and watched it for a moment. It continued to tremble, maybe more than out in the street. He picked up the bowl and took two medium-sized sips. He then slid the bowl down to the far end of the table.
The man refused anything that might cause contentment or the satisfaction of an urge, Paul thought. It seemed his trembling hand told him how much food was required to keep him going, and he went to the task of eating as though it were an annoyance.
Paul slurped down the rest of his stew in another long session. Sandy did the same. When she was done she slid her bowl aside and pulled her milk closer. Paul picked up Ledger’s nearly full bowl and slid his and Sandy’s empty bowls beneath. He drank a third shot and set aside the empty glass. His stomach felt stretched and full. His throat was hot and his head was clear. He steepled his hands before his mouth and breathed in and out through his nose. His right leg bounced involuntarily, like a dog’s tail.
Frank Ledger turned his sleepless eyes away from the window. Paul saw torture in them. This man had never been allowed peace. Any moment of contentment or rest, possibly since birth, had taken him to a dark place. A place where his body betrayed him and left him frothing like an animal in a humiliating state of weakness. It was no wonder he avoided pleasure like it was disease, and that he sought out
the bitter and painful things in life. Pain was the only state of being where this man was in control.
Paul said, “I want to tell you a story.”
35
Roy stood at the fairground’s edge. The circus tents looked dreary and lopsided in the dusk. The place was all mud and sadness, and it was nearly deserted under the pissing sky. Some boys braved the downpour, trudging up the midway toward the sideshow tents. Likely they’d had their hearts set on this event for weeks. No rainstorm could stop them from going home with honey-coated stomachs and empty pockets.
Roy drew sideways behind the grandstands and food huts. He stepped around the circles of light shed by the hanging oil lamps. Steam rose from their metal lids and glass sides. There were a few outside talkers still making a go of it. One made a half-hearted attempt at the passing boys.
“Want to see a show?” the talker said.
The kids shrugged.
“Aw, to Hell with ya,” the talker said. He picked up his podium and disappeared into his tent. The remaining talkers followed his lead, and soon, save for the boys, the midway was empty.
Roy moved unseen until he came to the midway’s end. Across the path he found the red and white stripes of Jack McLean’s tent. Mud spattered the lower sides, but the top was still clean and bright, shiny from the downpour. The tent stood out in contrast to the dark forest beyond. Out front were all the banners, their easel boards slick and darkened by the weather.
As Roy read each banner, he felt more at ease. The scents he found in the evening air unlocked memories. Familiarity flooded his system. He saw visions of each performer’s face, both when they were themselves and when they were angered freaks above him, brutalizing him. Both visions resonated. Both reassured him he was home.
Scales, the Amazing Lizard.
The cover-up was well done. To the inexperienced eye it would seem Amazing had always been there, but Roy could see the slight discoloration of paint beneath the word, the thinness of the letters crammed into the space where it once read Crying.
Jack McLean’s podium was empty. Roy frowned. McLean would have been out there. He would stand out front until the very last rube staggered by, come Hell or this selfsame high water.
Roy watched the boys approach. They seemed interested in the banners, but it would take some doing to bring them in. As in all the big cities, the kids here were either of great privilege or of the penniless masses. These boys were clearly of the former. Their clothes were wet, but being well made they kept their shape and color. Their hats discarded the rain as though they were made from duck backs. There was no doubt these boys had coins to spend, but they’d part with them only if the temptation was unbearable.
A voice was heard. Roy recognized it as Jack McLean’s, as if the man was speaking to the kids from within Roy’s own imagination. “Boys, boys, boys,” the voice said. Each word was drawn out slowly with space between. The talker’s tone was deep, but maybe not so deep as Roy thought it should be. Strange, he thought, how could his own memory betray him?
A figure emerged from the darkness of Jack McLean’s tent, showing Roy that the voice had not been imagined, but it was the voice of the show’s new outside talker. The talker’s head was turned down so that the top hat’s brim masked his face. His jacket was red and his pants and boots were black. As he moved toward the podium he spun the riding crop deftly around a white-gloved finger. He was lean, and he walked with a cat’s grace.
This man could not be Samson. He was half Samson’s size, if that. Roy imagined Cecil Darton’s face below the hat’s brim, but the voice didn’t quite match. It was deep, yes, but a forced deep. There was effort in it.
“How brave you truly are,” the talker said. His head was still down and his face still in shadow, and yet the kids were aware they were being addressed. “How brave to be out here in such harsh elements.” He waved an upturned hand through the rain.
Roy smiled at the professionalism. The talker’s approach was simple and effective. One could spend a lifetime honing such a skill. A young talker would start out poorly, cramming too many words into his speech. thinking, much like with his own manhood, size and length would prove impressive. Over time a talker would learn that less could be more. He’d learn that correctly chosen words aimed at just the right trigger would draw crowds to the tent like sin draws souls to Hell. This talker’s skill was honed to a blade’s edge. He must have mentored beneath Jack McLean himself.
But if it wasn’t Samson, and if it wasn’t Cecil Darton, then who?
The talker’s head tilted back to answer Roy’s question. Beneath the top hat’s brim was Jesse’s beautiful face.
“But are you brave enough?” Jesse said to the boys. She stopped twirling the riding crop and in one smooth turn used it to pull back the tent’s opening, just a sliver. She raised an eyebrow to the boys, knowing she had them, and that no more words were required. Her beauty was the reveal, hidden from view until it was time to strike. It was the neatest trick Roy had ever seen. McLean may have spoken to morbid fascination, but Jesse spoke directly to lust. The boys practically ripped off their pants as they went for their coins, and Roy found himself touching his hat, searching for a coin bag that he’d left lying in the sand beneath the surface of lake Michigan.
The boys were whisked into the tent, and Jesse was left alone at the podium. She tucked away her riding crop and looked up the midway. No one else was coming. The night air was cold and she was wet. Thinking she was unwatched, she rubbed her arms and allowed a shiver. She moved back the podium and made her way around back.
Roy followed.
36
Paul waited for Ledger’s reaction. He expected to be told to keep his mouth shut. At the least he expected a stern look, but Frank Ledger turned his eyes back to the window, blinking his insomniac blink. Paul checked with Sandy. She looked up at him with milk on her upper lip. He tousled her hair before starting his story.
“My grandpap always said you can turn your back on your family, your job, and all of your responsibilities, but you can’t turn your back on your heart, for it turns with you.”
Frank Ledger’s head moved. A tiny nod. The movement was so slight Paul wondered if he imagined it. He pressed on, both legs now bouncing.
“And there was no doubt my grandpap’s heart was set on a whitetail deer by the name of Stygian.
“Now, most people don’t think of deer when they think of the bayou. Instead they think of gators. Always the gators. But make no mistake, the deer are out there, and I should know, for every fall my grandpap and I spent a week hunting them. And every fall, while sitting around the first night’s campfire, my grandpap told me the story of his beloved Stygian.
“As legend had it, Stygian was a massive black stag with antlers so wide you’d swear they were the outstretched limbs of a live oak. A devil, some thought, due to his fabled black fur. Grandpap spoke of red eyes and fire-breath from Hell. Others said he was the king of all deer, an ancient and immortal beast, set on earth to haunt hunters’ dreams. Still others claimed he was a collection of old hunters’ spirits, back for some unexplained vengeance.
“No one was sure what he was, or how he came to be, but they all reckoned he was out there, for each year at least one or two new Stygian stories emerged. Tales told over the orange light of campfires or in the back booths of inns. Tales of a perfect shot missed because the black stag seemed to disappear into the brush,” Paul snapped his fingers, “just before the bullet found its mark.
“Stygian was always one step ahead of them, they said. And always he’d twitch that goddamn white tail at them just before he was gone.”
Frank Ledger nodded again. This time Paul was sure he’d seen it.
“Of all the storytellers,” Paul said, “my grandpap was the worst. He had more Stygian stories than you could count, and with every new season he tempted fate by shaking a fist in the air, saying, ‘This year he’ll be mine.’
“Now, even as a boy, I believed Stygian was a myth.
For Heaven’s sake, a black stag with antlers the size of tree branches? Red eyes and fire-breath? Ridiculous. The whole of it was nothing but drunken lore shared between frustrated hunters and old men. It was a story concocted to keep them in the woods and away from their wives. At least that’s how I felt until the day I saw Stygian, myself.”
Ledger’s eyes turned to find Paul. They stared at each other for a moment before Ledger glanced at Sandy, and then returned his gaze to the window.
“It was a cold, fall morning,” Paul said. “Unseasonably cold for the time of year, and just plain cold for Louisiana, at all. I remember it well because it was the first time I’d ever seen frost. The trees were bare and gray, and the ground was thick with their fallen leaves. Each leaf was frosted in its own unique pattern, and they crackled underfoot like bird bones. Back then we camped in the woods and lived on grandpap’s gruel and coffee for the week, so in the mornings, and with a fire no bigger than the base of a coffee pot, the only way to get warm was to get moving. This day was no exception. We set out in the pitch black before dawn, crunching through the frosted leaves like frozen maroons. It wasn’t long before grandpap called it off. He cursed the frost, saying there was no way we could track anything while making such a racket. He wanted to turn back and wait for the afternoon hunt.
“I told him to go back, but that I would press on. There was something about the cold that drew me forward, something about the sharpness in my throat and the shivering of my hands that appealed to me. It meant there was more at stake, a bigger risk, and this brought a new kind of clarity.”
Ledger was now nodding now, almost continuously. Sandy sipped at her milk, unblinking.
“Now rid of the old man,” Paul said, “I moved slowly through the darkness, carefully picking my steps to make as little noise as possible. It went like this for some time, and after awhile the sun peeked over a ridge. Red and yellow shafts of light split the trees and defrosted the leaves.
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