We Begin at the End

by Chris Whitaker

  “Yes.”

  She handed over the ticket.

  “Where do I go from there?”

  “You want the quickest or the cheapest?”

  “Do I look like I got money?”

  A frown, then another look at the screen. “Cheapest seats I got is Denver. Then Grand Junction, on to LA. Long way, girl. Still a lot of money.”

  Duchess left the bus station. She had seventeen dollars, a bag with two guns, a little food and a change of clothes.

  Outside a bar named O’Sullivan’s she found a payphone, picked up the receiver but realized she did not have anyone to call. She wanted to speak to Robin, not even speak, just listen to him while he slept. She wanted to kiss his head and pull him close, sleep with her arm around him.

  She found a park, a cluster of trees and a playground. She slipped into the woodland and lay back on the grass. In her bag she found a sweater and spread it over herself.

  At an hour when the town still slept she hiked the half mile, each step heavy, leaden, every muscle resisting.

  The motel was quiet, not even a clerk, not anyone at all. BIG SKY sign, COLOR TVS, VACANCY. She walked along the lot, family cars in front of each door, a cluster of trees that rose high above the low roof of dark tile. Drapes over the glass, she moved to the door with the Bronco in front. Calgary plates. Hank and Busy, their window wide open, that was them, unworried.

  She laid her bag down and took the gun from it. And then she said a silent prayer as she climbed through and into their bedroom.

  A shape that was Hank, sheet covering, dead to the world, a day of hiking would do that. Just enough light to make her way to the chair, where his pants lay. She fished the pocket, found a wallet, a photo of smiling children inside. She could not swallow as she slipped the bills from inside, could not breathe because her chest ached.

  And then she saw Busy, eyes open and sad. Duchess reached behind and felt the gun tucked into her jeans. The old lady said nothing.

  Duchess was broken as she left.

  It was her job to remind them, to let them know the world was not good.

  42

  WALK SAT IN A RENTAL at the end of Highwood Drive.

  A line of single-family houses, big, expensive, German cars on every drive. He wore his uniform though sunk low in his seat. Beside him, empty coffee cups, no food. He’d made the drive, the thousand miles. He thought of flying, facing his fear, but he needed his gun so left that fight for another time.

  The Noble house was empty, Thomas and his family on their annual vacation. Duchess once told him they spent every summer in Myrtle Beach. Walk had given the address to Leah, knew Darke would show up if he thought the trail might lead to Duchess.

  Walk had no newspaper, no book, nothing at all to distract him from the task at hand. An hour back he’d popped a couple of pills, the muscle pain was bad, the convulsing, the need to just lie back and let it ride over him.

  This would be his last job as a cop, the last hurrah in decades of nothing. He gave no thought to Martha, to Vincent and the unfurling mess in the Cape; this was for the Radley children, he would keep them safe, he would do it for Star and for Hal. He did not know how close Darke was when he called Leah back, but guessed he was near Montana. Duchess, the tape, it was Darke’s last chance to save his crumbling empire.

  Walk felt the tired like a warm blanket on the coldest night, heavy on him, pulling him deeper, his eyes heavy. The pills, drowsiness was one of the blessed side-effects, he reasoned he hadn’t slept well in a year so there was no danger of it finding him now. Still, he yawned once, then, slowly, he closed his eyes.

  Thomas Noble was lying on his bed watching the television when the power cut.

  He stood, silent, nothing but the sounds of the house, the clock in the hallway, the steady hum of the boiler. He stood, took a step and stumbled over his bag, packed, ready. His parents had dropped him at camp, same every summer; they lived it up by the beach while he made sand art and tie-dyed T-shirts eight miles from his own house. He’d snuck out after dark, hiked it back, cut through woodland into his yard and found the spare key in the garage. It would hit the fan in the morning, by then he’d be on his way to California. Trailing her. Helping her.

  His heart beat fast, he placed a hand on it and tried to calm.He listened but heard nothing, felt dumb for getting freaked out by the dark. He walked to the window and saw the neighboring homes lit, the porch lights burning. He knew where the box was, what to do when the power tripped.

  He made it to the stairs when he heard the glass break.

  He froze then, rooted to the spot, unable to move a muscle.

  He heard the lock turn, the door open.

  The crunch of steps on glass.

  He knew his father kept a gun and that it was locked in his office. He also knew he would not have the courage to aim it or fire it, not even with two good hands.

  Steps again, hard on the kitchen floor then soft on the carpeted hall. He wanted to cry out, announce himself because half the fear was in going unnoticed. A nice house on a nice street, his mother had jewelry, the kind of showy pieces that might’ve been noticed.

  He took a breath and moved fast, treading on the outer edges of the stairs, from the top floor to the middle and into his parents’ bedroom. He reached for the phone on the nightstand.

  No tone.

  He ran to the window, thought of yelling but heard steps again, closer this time, at the foot of the stairs. His mind worked fast, he looked at the drop, reasoned he’d break a leg, at least.

  He spun, looked around, saw a gap beneath the bed, knew there was space in the closet, settled for the guest bedroom and moved fast.

  Shadow on the stairs. He did not look back until he made it, slipped behind the door and pressed himself flat to the wall. He wanted to cry, fought hard not to, thought maybe whoever it was would think the house empty, take what they needed and leave.

  “Thomas.”

  He closed his eyes.

  “I know you’re here. I’ve been watching from the woods. You tell me what I need to know and I’ll leave you be. I give you my word.”

  He wanted to call out, to ask what the man wanted and then give him whatever it was, right away, no arguing. And then the man called out again, and Thomas Noble felt his blood chill.

  “Duchess Radley.”

  The guy with the Escalade. Darke.

  Thomas Noble looked around wildly, saw nothing he could use, nothing heavy or sharp, nothing that could buy him precious seconds. Darke would find him now.

  He thought of Duchess, of the first time he’d seen her and what she had been through, their first dance and the time she’d kissed him. He thought of his perfect home and loving parents, and where she was now, alone on the road, a gun in her bag and the courage to use it. He hadn’t been able to help her. But now he could, he could prove himself. He could be an outlaw too.

  He watched the shape step through the door, big like a fucking monster, and as it neared Thomas Noble took a deep breath and launched himself through the darkness.

  Gunshot.

  Walk woke, jumped from the car and took off into a run.

  Broken glass, open door, he barreled through, gun trained out, room to room. He moved up the stairs.

  The kid was on the floor, backed up to the wall, knees against his chest.

  “You hurt?”

  He shook his head. Above was torn drywall, half the ceiling gone, a warning shot.

  “Where is he?”

  “Back door.”

  Walk ran down the stairs. He saw the fencing at the end of the grass, jumped it and found himself in the woodland behind. He followed a loose trail, gun out in front as moonlight fell in silver shards that cut their way through thick growth.

  “Darke,” he yelled, heard nothing so kept running.

  He moved through towering trees.

  And then, ahead, he caught sight of the shape, by a tree, moving slow.

  Walk raised his gun.

  H
e stood, feet apart, hands locked.

  He fired once.

  The big shape fell.

  He moved on, slow.

  By the time he made it to him Darke had propped himself back against a tree. Nothing in his hands, Walk saw the gun a couple of feet from him, bent and picked it up.

  Darke breathed hard. Shoulder wound, painful enough but he’d live.

  Walk listened out, heard nothing. The neighbors would call the cops soon enough.

  At that moment Walk did not feel the twitches in his body, just focused solely on the job. His job, his place. He was not yet ready to give either up.

  “Didn’t think you had it in you.”

  “You want to get this done, Darke?”

  “Sure, Chief Walker.” His voice was calm, no emotion, despite the end coming at him.

  “You’ve been holing up all this time.”

  “Healing up. There’s people, I owe them. They aren’t going away. You ever been shot, Walk? Twice for me now.”

  “I’ve got questions.”

  Darke did not press a hand to the wound, just let the blood run steady down his arms and drip from his fingers.

  “We found Milton. Trawler hooked him.”

  Darke stared up at him.

  Walk continued. “What did he have on you?”

  Darke looked confused, but maybe the wheels were slowly beginning to turn. “He liked to take photographs.”

  Walk nodded to no one but himself.

  “He just wanted a friend, someone to go hunting with. So I went. We’re all looking for angles, Chief Walker. That’s what we do.”

  Walk thought of Martha.

  Darke clenched a fist and the blood ran faster. “This the part where I confess my sins?”

  Distant sirens.

  “I know about Madeline.”

  Darke swallowed then, the first trace of emotion. “She’s fourteen now.”

  “Same age as Duchess Radley.”

  “I didn’t want to come for the girl. I tried every other way.”

  “Hal.”

  “He didn’t give me a chance to speak, just pulled a shotgun.”

  “You’re a murderer.”

  “Just like your friend.”

  Walk took a step back, that dizzying feeling all over again. “Vincent …”

  “Tragedy has a way of making saints out of sinners. Believe me, I know.” Darke gulped air, the pain was sharp. “The boy in there. I didn’t hurt him.”

  “I know.”

  “People see me. The way I look, they think certain thoughts. That’s alright, it helps me get things done.”

  “You murdered Star Radley.”

  “You even believe that anymore, Chief Walker? I asked her for a favor, to talk to Vincent for me, get him to sell up. I only had to mention his name and she lost it, throwing punches. She was wild.”

  “You and Vincent made some kind of deal. You couldn’t see it through. Couldn’t raise the money.”

  “I’m a man of my word. Ask Vincent, he’ll tell you.”

  “You talk like you know him.”

  “Maybe I do. Maybe Star told me things, she liked to drink, drugs, whatever. Confession doesn’t only happen in church.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “Vincent … he’s not who you think he is.”

  Walk watched him, looking for the truth, maybe not wanting to see any of it.

  Darke’s breath grew short then. “I have life insurance. Enough to keep Madeline.”

  “It was always about the money.”

  “They won’t pay out for suicide. Believe me, I checked.”

  “Suicide by cop.”

  “Not if you tell it right.”

  “She doesn’t need you?”

  Darke closed his eyes, then opened them to the pain of it all. “A child is always better with a parent in their life. But the place she’s in. That’s what she needs. That’s all I can give her.”

  “She won’t get better.”

  “They can’t say that for sure. There’s a chance, in time. Miracles happen every day.”

  Walk didn’t know if he really believed that, but guessed it was what kept him going.

  “Shoot me.”

  Walk shook his head slowly.

  “Put my gun in my hand and then shoot me.”

  Walk took a step back.

  The blood still dripped. Darke was too strong, too big and strong.

  “Fucking shoot me. Please. Just fucking shoot me. I killed the old man. I came for the girl. Please.”

  Walk heard noise behind, distant but coming.

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Mercy, Chief. Your God believes in that.”

  Walk shook his head, nothing clear, the right thing, the fair thing. He thought of Madeline, a girl he did not know, and Duchess, a girl he did.

  He took a step toward Darke.

  “Give my girl a chance. You can do that. It’s in you.”

  Walk took another step. “They’ll lock you up.”

  “I’ll get out one day. And then I’ll come for Duchess again. This time it’ll be revenge. Simple. I’ll shoot her.”

  Walk saw through it, too easy.

  “Fuck. Please, Walker. You let the cops take me and my daughter dies. I’m out of money now, I’ve got nothing. The club was all I had. I can’t pay to keep her alive.”

  Walk stood there, the gun so heavy he could barely hold it.

  “You need to wipe your prints off it.” Darke lay his head back against the tree, tears filled his eyes. “There’s a key in my pocket. A lockup outside the Cape. West Gale. There’s things in there I want Madeline to have. It’s important she knows us.”

  Walk just stared.

  “We don’t have time. Just do it, Chief. Give my girl a chance.”

  Walk wiped Darke’s gun, then leaned down and handed it to him.

  Darke winced as he raised it, then aimed wide and pulled the trigger.

  The echo. The ringing in Walk’s ears as he raised his own gun.

  Darke nodded once.

  Walk pulled the trigger.

  43

  DUCHESS PASSED THE FACE OF towns and lonely mountains and a sky at times so blue it brought her home to the endless waters of Cape Haven.

  She rode above the wheel, every bump in her bones, the road laid out like a scar across land her grandfather had once traversed, his only happiness far behind.

  They stopped at towns and people came and went, old men that carried something quiet and forgotten, young men with backpacks and maps and plans, and the couples whose love spilled down the aisle and made Duchess turn her head. The driver, a black man who smiled at her when the bus slept and they were the only people to see a hitchhiker framed by a Colorado sunrise.

  Trucks broken down, hood up and men bent over and in, their women watching the silver pass. Diners and cop cars, Lincolns and a stretch too far from anywhere worth going.

  At Caroga Plain a man with a guitar got on and asked the few if they minded and they all shook their heads so he sang about golden slumbers, his voice rough but something in it stripping the roof from the old bus and letting the stars fall in.

  It was only the night, when the moon emptied into the Artaya Canyon and the driver slowed the bus and dimmed the lights that Duchess allowed herself to think of Robin. It hurt her, not like the kind of sweetheart hurt she read about in the glossy someone had left in the seatback, this was a raw kind of gut your soul pain, so fierce she doubled over and gasped for air, reached into her bag and found her water and took shallow breaths into the bottle. The driver caught her eye, his filled with wasted concern, she would not be alright, nothing about her would ever be alright again.

  She ran out of money someplace outside of Dotsero, bulging hills cratered, a volcano rose, green trees parted for sterile land so red she bent to touch it.

  She found a phonebooth at a truck stop on 70, water rushing on ahead, fighting its way from Rocky Mountains to the spread of Mexico and beyond. She cal
led collect and the operator connected her to a world she felt far from. By grace alone she got Claudette and she fought off talk of coming back and the cops and the trouble. She held on just long enough for Claudette to tell her yeah, he was doing okay. And then Claudette told her to wait and she’d fetch him.

  She hung up when she heard him, and then fell against the brick, a long road from anywhere, too small to be alone, the sky a gathering storm she could not outrun. Her brother saying hello, quiet like he was in on a secret, and her unable to find a word, not a single word to say to him, not even sorry for what she had done and what she would do.

  She spent her last two bucks on milk and a dry bagel.

  She sat there four hours, the sun crawling its arc, the hand of a clock that pushed morning to the blaze of afternoon. In the gas station a woman worked the counter, a magazine hidden behind, her head down and tired. She wore large glasses and had a stain on her shirt. She gave Duchess the key to the restroom, smiled quick as she did, like she knew the crossroads the girl lived at and had seen so many like her before.

  Inside smelled bad, graffiti scrawled on every surface, romantic declarations Tom & Betty-Laurel Fucked Here, numbers to call for a good time. Duchess carefully stripped off her T-shirt and jeans, washed herself with soap she pumped from the dispenser then dried off with paper towels. She splashed icy water onto her face, the tired creeped from her eyes.

  Outside she watched truckers, trying to select the right one based on nothing more than a gut instinct that had not steered her all that well in the past.

  An hour later she settled on a big guy with a plaid shirt and handlebar mustache. He drove a clean rig, the name Annie-Beth on the hood, a heart on either side.

  She approached him and he smiled, took in her wet hair, Stetson, small bag and ninety-pound frame.

  “Where do you need to get?”

  “Maybe Vegas.”

  “Vegas, huh.”

  “Yeah.”

  “You a runaway?”

  “No.”

  “I could get in trouble.”

  “I’m not a runaway. I’m eighteen.”

  He laughed at that.

  “I’m passing Fish Lake.”