Worse Angels

by Laird Barron

  “There’s a movie like that already.”

  “Magical indigenous blood flows in your veins, right? Which means you got access to the Aboriginal Dreamtime, or whatever islanders call it.”

  “Wrong landmass; wrong culture. It becomes clear that you’ve lost the plot.” Sweat trickled down my jaw and under the collar of my nightshirt. Adeyemi wasn’t capable of offending my delicate sensibilities. I couldn’t deny that his words struck a chord of unease. Even a stab in the dark finds its target occasionally.

  “Get a picture in your head. I’m chilling in a deserted rec room in my bathrobe. The Rockford Files is on pause on the flat screen and I’m chowing Italian ice cream. A junkyard dog attorney is sitting across the table. He’s also chowing on Italian ice cream. My shit is together, Coleridge. Don’t ever doubt it. Where are we on the case?”

  I didn’t care if he had a team of attorneys eating ice cream with him under a cone of silence; I provided an edited-for-television account of my adventures that was essentially identical to the written report I’d turned in, except with more expletives. Considering his status as a prisoner of the federal government, I assumed the conversation was being recorded and transcribed in real time.

  “I have to warn you, somebody is trying to wave me off,” I said in conclusion.

  “Man, that’s a lot of beating around the bush,” he said.

  “It’s a big bush. Your attorney and I should get together. We meet in person, I can be more forthcoming.”

  “Your sitrep nixed accidental death for Sean. You aren’t one hundred percent sold on suicide. That’s ominous, ain’t it? Off the record, have you ruled out murder?”

  “No.”

  “Goddamn it,” he said.

  “Do you want me to proceed?”

  “I’m having second thoughts. Getting fond of you, Coleridge. You push any harder, these people will react. You bebop back to Horseheads, into their yard, they’ll sic the whole kennel on you. We both know you’ll have to go back if you mean to finish this thing.” He was quiet for a moment. “Yeah, I want you to proceed. Proceed until your nerve breaks or the wheels fly off the wagon.”

  “Roger, wilco. I’m going to wait a couple of weeks, maybe a month. Let the situation blow over.”

  “Need cash? I’ll get you cash.”

  “Cash is always welcome. A flak jacket might be better.”

  “Valley’s rough.”

  “It is.”

  “Even in the best of times, the area isn’t always hospitable.” His tone was sober, devoid of the machismo and mockery he typically wore like armor. Flat and resigned, like his sister. “Horseheads is a shadow world.” He waited a beat. “Do you understand? The Valley itself is the reason I tucked tail and fled right out of school. I didn’t even accompany Redlick on the rare occasion he made a detour to the ol’ plantation. Anywhere else on the planet, I was in his hip pocket. Not the Valley. Fuck the Valley.”

  “Why?”

  “Scenic beauty. Rustic charm. All that happy horseshit is a façade. Tell me your skin didn’t crawl. It’s got—”

  “An aura,” I said.

  “An aura, exactly. Make the hair on the back of your neck stand up. Everybody gets used to that feeling and stops noticing. In the city you acclimate to traffic noise, or drunks shouting when the bars close. I didn’t stop noticing. The woods scared me spitless. The churches. The patriarchal families. Wackos in the hills.”

  “You’re good with patriarchs,” I said. “You didn’t even give a damn about your own nephew’s death until Redlick handed you your walking papers. Suddenly, family became important.”

  “You and I both have a track record of not giving a shit,” he said. “There was a time I counted Gerry Redlick as family. That overrode my common sense.”

  “A lucrative business arrangement is what overrode your scruples.”

  “Same as you and the Outfit. We eventually realized the error of our ways, didn’t we?”

  “We should probably speak for ourselves,” I said.

  Adeyemi chuckled as if he was tightening the cuffs on a perp he really, really disliked.

  “A wise man sees into the darkness and perceives the true shape of things. I’ve had time to go over every conversation, every eavesdropped comment. My cop brain is reengaged. Whatever this is in Horseheads, it’s bigger than my nephew. Visa fraud on some daunting scale. Money laundering. That valley is bad juju and it brings out the worst in people.”

  “Your cop brain chiming in?”

  “Cursed, haunted, whatever label you want to slap on. The natives were aware. Double for the miserable fucks who tried to build the collider. RG, Zircon, Sword Enterprises, the whole bunch.”

  “This come from the senator?” I said. “The two of you had many a midnight confab about cabbages and kings and particle physics, did you not? Or did it come from Mandibole? He regards the unusual qualities of the Valley and her denizens as a net positive.”

  My comment wasn’t as sarcastic as my tone indicated. The moment superstition overwhelms a skeptic is a rare and breathtaking event. Adeyemi’s words and my own reactions nudged me toward a realization. Some of us who live past a certain age push through cynicism and into a black dreamland that is the negative of a child’s wonder. Even old corrupt cops and semi-reformed hitmen.

  “It came to me via osmosis,” he said. “I could’ve listened to the same tapes you have. Who gives a shit? I know what I know, and what I know is the billionaire club chose the spot with great specificity. Gerry holds a wacky point of view when it comes to man’s place in the cosmos. Wackier than I ever realized, maybe. Once he mentioned how we were all happier before the advent of industry. How we were safer when we were playing with sticks and trying to figure out fire.”

  I didn’t want him to elaborate. He elaborated.

  “He didn’t confide in me his master plan. What I deduced? The richies were burying that supercollider in the Valley for the same fucked-up reason the Mesoamericans built ziggurats to align with celestial bodies. They didn’t care diddly about measuring tiny particles or mass production of radioisotopes. There won’t be a sane explanation at the bottom of the rabbit hole. This is about blood, not science.”

  Blood, not science.

  That last bit knocked over a domino in a chain of loosely organized suspicions strung across my waking thoughts, down into my subconscious. What if this was about superstition and not passion or materialism? I almost hoped the authorities were tuned in to this back-and-forth. I sardonically chuckled to consider the transcript getting passed around a briefing room full of starched shirts and constricted worldviews.

  After we hung up, amusement faded fast, leaving a chilly unease that gnawed at me like rats.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  The day after Valentine’s Day, I saddled Lionel with a list of minor surveillance jobs. Two cases of spousal infidelity and an insurance scam. He’d snap photos of the subjects in compromising positions, show those photos to soon-to-be-aggrieved parties, and deposit the fat checks. These were perfect errands he could run between pitching horse manure and repairing the farm tractor at Hawk Mountain now that his collarbone had healed.

  Meanwhile, I packed a suitcase for a trip west to interview Drs. Campbell and Ryoko. Linda Flanagan hadn’t seen fit to return Ted’s twice-weekly calls. The widow’s family claimed to be in sporadic touch. None had spoken to her since Christmas. Since she and the doctors resided in the same time zone, I decided to make a pilgrimage to the mountain, so to speak.

  Over recent days, I’d put myself into a criminal frame of mind. The Mares of Thrace and the Redlicks hovered at the top of my suspect list, which skewed the question of motive into unknown territory. These people were twisted. Their motive could be almost anything.

  Less glamorous, yet statistically probable, was a crime driven by either passion or money. At great effort, I’d loc
ated a recent photo of Sean Pruitt’s former schoolmate and work colleague, Danny Buckhalter. Damned if he wasn’t a spitting image of one of the guys who’d jumped me in Horseheads; the ducktail haircut dude who’d split while I tuned up his friends. Buckhalter, or Slick, as I’d dubbed him, was a member of the Mares of Thrace and Sean’s acquaintance since childhood. This led to the Lovers’ Triangle Theory: Buckhalter and Linda Flanagan conspired to murder Sean Pruitt for the insurance money. Who was to say she hadn’t taken a shine to Buckhalter at one of their get-togethers? While Sean was barbecuing, wifey and work buddy might’ve made eyes. Later, the cheating hearts hook up at a motel and hatch a plan that involves a million dollars in corporate payola. One dark night, Sean Pruitt and Buckhalter are at Shaft 40, smoking dope, roughhousing. Buckhalter pushes him and earns a cut of the corporate payout down the line after the dust settles. Buckhalter’s lack of profile suggested he was lying low in the hills, possibly canoodling with his equally scarce girlfriend, the Widow Pruitt.

  Oh, baby, it fit nicely, satisfying motives of passion and greed simultaneously.

  Puncturing that balloon? Logistically, the theory was sexy, and completely wrong. Sean Pruitt had prepared himself for the end. I couldn’t figure a way around his wedding band and the photo. Their existence was the ghostly arrow pointing toward confirmation of the police verdict; suicide and heaps of misery for his family, and for me, the dog chasing his own tail. The “why” of Sean Pruitt’s death, rather than the “how,” had usurped precedence in my theories.

  The rest of the evidence was tantalizing, albeit inconclusive. Sean P’s security clearance would’ve permitted him unfettered access to a jeep and Shaft 40. According to an internal memo, the security camera at the main entrance had malfunctioned the evening of the incident and three of four evenings prior. A second memo further stated that the security system, including CCTV, hadn’t received an upgrade since it was installed and frequently ran dark. This raised the possibly uncharitable point that Sean Pruitt’s friend and fellow security officer definitely knew cameras well enough to sabotage one, or a string of them.

  By now, second on my wish list to a heart-to-heart with Linda Flanagan, I’d become eager to meet the elusive Danny Buckhalter.

  * * *

  ■■■

  I flew to Northern California out of Albany. Business class, thank you, Mr. Adeyemi. Six and a half hours’ flight time was more than my back would happily tolerate in coach. They seated me next to an evangelical preacher with a dirty sense of humor and pristine white sneakers. I remarked that his shoes were Revelation shoes because they were so pale. He laughed and paid for my drink.

  Somewhere over the Midwest I attended the lavatory, then stood for a few moments at the threshold between classes. A passenger in coach, aisle seat, five rows down, triggered my early-warning radar as he returned from a bathroom trip at the opposite end of the plane. His bearing and movement were different from a regular person’s—predators recognize their own kind. He’d made inadvertent eye contact, which caused him to glance away quickly. I chatted with the nearest hostess—who was contractually obligated to pretend an interest in kibitzing with upper-tier patrons—while assessing the man. Lantern-jawed. Long neck and hands. Pale gray long-sleeve dress shirt, chocolate brown tie, gray chinos, and brogues. Ichabod emulated my own ruse and struck up a patently phony conversation with a guy in a Hawaiian shirt in the center seat. Satisfied from Hawaiian Shirt’s body language that the men weren’t together, I palmed my phone and took a picture. Seated again, I ordered a scotch and soda and emailed the images to Lionel and explained I’d originally met Ichabod at the Redlick estate. Lionel replied almost an hour later that yeah, he might be the guy who’d driven the car chasing us in Horseheads. I downed my scotch and ordered another. That did the trick; I relaxed a notch or two beneath “spring-loaded” and dozed. While traveling, never forgo the opportunity to eat, drink, or sleep.

  The plane landed in San Francisco. My layover was an hour and change. I strolled the jam-packed concourse, briefcase in hand, and yes indeed, Ichabod kept pace. He was skilled; one of those ex-spook or FBI agent recruits Bellow mentioned as candidates for the Redlick Group. I wouldn’t have picked him up if I hadn’t known he was there. Mandibole had inducted him into his little cult, which was a chilling detail.

  I bought a soda at a kiosk. He pretended to ponder magazines at a shop across the way. I walked into the men’s room, hoping he’d be stupid enough to follow. He wasn’t. Fine; I urinated in peace.

  Happily, I controlled the field. I exited the main concourse and headed for ground transportation. What could I reasonably assume? Mandibole, and by extension Gerald Redlick and the Redlick Group were supremely interested in my movements. Ichabod might or might not have known about my connecting flight. Either way, unless he was part of a detail and able to execute a handoff, he couldn’t chance me slipping into the city. Which meant he’d be likely to stick close. A nice lady at the information desk relayed the news that all private car services were rerouted inside the domestic parking garage. I checked my watch—a windup—to gauge whether I had time to spar with my shadow. Frankly, there’s always time for yanking the chain of one’s opponents.

  He tailed me into the massive central garage. I feigned answering phone calls, gesturing freely to convey the impression of distractedness. What was his plan were I to climb into a car and zoom into the sunset? Stop me? Too dramatic. Photograph the license plate and report the situation to his handler? More plausible. He’d expected me to either catch a connecting flight or beeline for a taxi. Now he wouldn’t be quite sure where I was headed. Off-balance and off his game. Vulnerable.

  I dallied and phoned Lionel. After a quick rundown he promised to drop everything and keep a discreet eye on Meg and Devlin. Delia’s cryptic prediction that no one connected to Redlick would come after me or mine in the Hudson Valley was reassuring as far as it went. An ex-hitter turned private eye is expected to undergo hazards to his health. I was fair game for kidnapping, shooting, or getting run over in a parking garage. Conversely, messing around with innocent civilians tempted the fates and risked drawing heat that corporations, shadowy or not, preferred to avoid. Meg and the boy were, in my estimation, ninety-nine percent safe. One percent represents too great a number when it’s our beloveds. I was relieved that Lionel would assume the role of watchdog.

  Foot traffic thinned as I crossed the garage and turned a corner and saw a bank of elevators opposite a descending stairwell. The stairs were blocked with construction cones and a sign: CLOSED FOR MAINTENANCE. My shadow would be forced into his second fateful decision of the past few minutes—let me go, or sprint to catch up and join me on an elevator, hoping I wouldn’t make him in his fancy suit. He sprinted. The soft thump of his footfalls drew near, then slowed. If anybody stepped off the elevators, I’d smile and nod and abort the plan. But the timing was perfect.

  Ichabod moved into view. I snatched at his necktie. His face contorted in horror. He was damned fast, slapping my arm and darting away with a yelp. Well and good, except I’m damned fast too and he committed a tactical error in raising his hands defensively instead of making like a jackrabbit.

  My initial intent was to give him some lumps and send him home, tail tucked. Matters escalated the moment we locked horns, unfortunately. The primary rule for a street fight isn’t much different than military or police doctrine: During combat, you don’t try to match a foe’s skill or aggression; you respond to resistance with overwhelming force. I lunged, grasped his belt and yanked, pivoting. He flew past me, an astronaut tumbling in zero g, hit the landing on his ass, and caromed off the far wall. Should’ve been game over right there. It wasn’t. He went ragdoll-limp like someone who’s trained in judo or jujitsu. That was fine. I bounded down the steps and clobbered him with my briefcase as he struggled into a crouch. The man deserved his props; he slipped the worst of my overhand smash, rolled to his left, got his palms on the floor for levera
ge, and scuttled backward like an acrobat down another flight onto the next landing. Dimmer here, lit by emergency amber fluorescent strips, and more intimate, removed from the view of passersby. I closed with him on the fourth or fifth step, drove the briefcase edge-first into his midsection, and when he parried it aside, punched it at his neck. He twisted his body out of line, caught my wrist, and wrenched downward with all his weight, performing a deep knee bend. I knew that trick and what it meant for my spine. I went slack with the momentum, dropping to a knee, and lost the briefcase. We remained tangled for a moment, awkwardly counterbalanced. He was well-groomed and smelled of cologne and adrenaline. Roughly my height, rawboned, muscular, and desperate. Even so, I out-massed him by forty or fifty pounds, which, all else being equal, was an insurmountable advantage. Ichabod obviously understood that the physics of our contest were unfavorable to his survival, because he released my wrist, clasped his hands together, and hammered my nose, then my jaw on the return stroke. It hurt. It also pissed me off. Blood rushed down the back of my throat. Blood doesn’t taste like much of anything if you’re preoccupied with not getting hit in the mouth again. It burns like a real dry vodka. I raised my arms in an X and blocked the next swing. Red light flooded my vision. The light of fury and murder. The light that increases my power threefold and strips my Homo sapiens mind to its scales and fangs. He leaned backward and snap-kicked me in the head as I began to rise. I rotated and instead of knocking my eye out of my skull, his foot glanced off my temple. When I simultaneously whipped my fist up and under his chin for what I intended to be, in that instant of berserker rage, an internal decapitation on par with car crash whiplash trauma, the blow struck his rib cage. Bones caved under my knuckles. My fingers opened into claws, seeking to dig inward after his spine, but he’d already accelerated away. The force of the impact catapulted him off the steps. Less of a ragdoll this time, and more of a gangling dummy full of sand and flailing helplessly. Ichabod slammed into the wall, bounced laterally, cradling his busted ribs. He passed his right hand over his face, fingers splayed, pressing in with the heel of his hand. He was the same, except different, after the pass. Pale, red-lipped, diabolical. He raised himself fully upright, ribs forgotten; laughed and growled deep in his chest; and lurched through a big metal emergency exit door. The door clanged shut behind him.