The Triggerman's Dance

by T. Jefferson Parker

  “Do you hunt Anza Valley a lot?” he asks John.

  “The last ten seasons, anyway.”

  “Ever try that meadow out by Copper Saddle, where the old water tank is?”

  “There’s a nice little covey in there.”

  “So it’s you picking over my quail! Funny we’ve never run into each other.”

  “Big desert, Mr. Holt. I usually hunt early, then get out.”

  “Those labradors take the heat okay?”

  “Well, they’re not designed for it. They go through five gallons of water on a hot morning.”

  “Why not hunt springers?”

  “Labradors have the kind of character I get along with.”

  Valerie joined in then, with words of warning. “Dad, don’t try to convert a dog man. It’s more personal than religion or politics—you taught me that.”

  Holt smiles, reaches out and touches his daughter’s cheek. “What were you doing with that heroic German shepherd yesterday? And don’t tell me you taught him how to flush quail.”

  “Well, someone did, sir. He was on them all spring and summer, so I gave him a try opening day.”

  “I’ll be damned. He looked purebred.”

  “I’d say.”

  “Who’d let a thousand-dollar dog just wander off?”

  “People aren’t always bright.”

  Holt beholds John and sips his wine. “Poor boy.”

  To conclude dinner Holt stands and offers a toast to the new Holt Men. It is brief and alludes to the fact that Holt considers Holt Men extensions of himself. He then offers a toast to John Menden, “a good shot and a good man and a good stroke of luck. An honorary Holt Man,” he says to polite applause.

  “Hey Vann,” yells Sexton, “Get him a little orange and black costume to wear!”

  Uncertain laughter follows.

  After dinner Holt offers John a tour of the Big House. Drinks in hand, they wander the first floor rooms—living, entertainment, den, guest and gun rooms—in which Holt does not seem particularly interested. Then they climb a wide wooden stairway with rough-hewn banisters and leather-capped railings, to the second floor. Here, Holt explains, are the bedroom suites—his wife’s, his daughter’s, his own and an extra. He hesitates for a moment and John awaits some further elucidation, but Holt merely crosses the tiled landing and continues up the stairs to the third story. Holt shows him the library, a colossal room lined with bookshelves and furnished with very old leather sofas and rawhide chairs. Mission-era trunks serve as tables. Two large French doors open to a balcony and observation deck. Behind a heavy oak door along one wall is Holt’s office. He makes them fresh drinks, very strong, from a small bar that swings up from what John thought was a steamer trunk. John looks at the fireplace, a generous cavern overhung by an adobe-and-timber mantle, with nineteenth century wrought iron tools hung from stout dowels protruding from the hearth facade. He notes the smell of leather and fire, cigar smoke and the pages of old books. He thinks that this is the best smelling room he’s ever been in.

  “I like this room a lot,” he says.

  “My favorite. Here, let’s get an overview.”

  From the balcony they climb a flight of outdoor stairs to the platform of the observation deck. John can see the northern shore of the lake, the hillsides of Liberty Ridge, the ocean, the chaparral and a distant section of luminous freeway to the east, and the dark carpet of orange trees spreading north toward the heart of the county.

  “Try the telescope.”

  John trains the instrument first on the lake, then on the back of the cottage in which he spent the night, then swings it west to reveal a silver Pacific.

  “Do you have strong eyes?” Holt asks.

  “I’m lucky that way. Why?”

  “Curious. Envious, maybe.”

  “You’ve got a lot here to be envious of, Mr. Holt. I’ve never seen a place like this.”

  “Have you seen the grounds, the groves?”

  “Just from a distance.”

  “Maybe you’ll get a closer look sometime.”

  “What are all the buildings for?”

  “Executives. Staff for the house and grounds. Citrus workers live in the cottages down where the groves start, but you can’t see those from here.”

  “I didn’t know you owned Liberty Operations.”

  Holt nods.

  “Are you an investigator, then, a private policeman?”

  Holt chuckles. “Of sorts. What I really do is just make people feel safe.”

  Ever make Rebecca Harris feel safe?

  “. . . I kind of fell into it. Everyone’s afraid these days and they pay me to make it go away. I fell into a bucket of money, too. To be truthful, though, there was already plenty of that in the family.”

  “Well, you’ve certainly prospered.”

  “Liberty Ridge is a pearl of great price. Most things in life come with a price.”

  John nods and lets the heavy telescope rest on its brass fulcrum.

  “How can I reward you for what you did?”

  “You already have.”

  “I’d be grateful if you would let me buy you a new trailer.”

  “Well, trailers aren’t real expensive, you know. What I mean is, with a few weeks pay I’d have enough for a down payment, so it’s not going to be a—”

  “—What did your last one cost?”

  “Just twenty-five hundred. It was almost twenty-years old, but they made them better back then. Some of them.”

  “Consider it done, then, that your next trailer will be a gift from the Holt family. You will choose it and all the options, of course.”

  “No, really . . . that doesn’t seem right, sir.”

  “What doesn’t seem right? I don’t understand you.”

  John turns to face Holt now, an act of self-confidence and of self-revelation. Holt’s eyes, behind the thick glasses, have an unfiltered, unrestrained voraciousness in them. They look insatiable and incapable of pity, simple organs of procurement. John believes that now is the time to—as Joshua put it—bait the hook. You’ll sense the moment to show him what you keep inside, John.

  You’ll sense the time to let him glimpse something in you that he possesses, too. When you do, give him a clear whiff of himself.

  “Mr. Holt, I just did what I thought was right. To be honest with you, it gave me a chance to be a little hero, which fulfills a nice daydream I’ve had since I was a boy. Every man’s fantasy, to rescue a king and his princess. I got to have a nice dinner and meet some good people. On a less noble note, it gave me a chance to put the fear of God into a bunch of bastards. Felt good. I’ve wondered a couple of times how it would have felt to just gut-shoot that turd and let him bleed to death beside my dog. Truth is, I’m afraid it would have felt a little too good. And I didn’t want to face the paperwork.”

  Holt is silent for a long moment. Then he laughs. “My, oh my, what lurks in the heart of Menden. I understand.”

  “Do you?”

  “Of course. What thinking man wouldn’t?”

  “I can think of quite a few.”

  “So let me ask you—these thinking men you know—would you call them friends, hunt with them, spend time with them, want to know them and their families?”

  “I never have.”

  “Can you respect a man who has no concept of conviction and follow-through?”

  Follow-through, thinks John: one of Josh’s pet phrases. Did Josh imagine it coming from his secret hero?

  “No. I actually can’t. And that’s why, Mr. Holt, for you to buy me a trailer or make some big gesture would make me feel small. I think I’ll just say thank you, no, and leave here tomorrow. I’ll take a sense of having done something decent along with me. It’s a good feeling to have. I hope I don’t seem ungrateful, either. I mean, Valerie must have spent two grand today, just for clothes.”

  Holt considers. “I understand that a gift might seem demeaning to your intentions, but we also have to be practical sometimes. Look
at it this way, too—if you won’t take the trailer, you’re denying me a chance to be generous.”

  “I wouldn’t want to do that, Mr. Holt,” says John, with just a trace of irony in his voice.

  Holt hears it and smiles. “Look. What if you think about it for a few days? During that time, stay here with us. There are a few things you might help me out with.”

  “Like what?”

  “Val could use some help with the dogs. Now that she’s out of school it’s dogs, dogs, dogs. Headed for vet school next fall, probably out of state. So . . . well, anyway, she’s still field-training her pups.”

  John sensed that there was something on Holt’s mind left unsaid. He waited, but Holt was silent.

  “Nice offer, Mr. Holt, but the paycheck calls.”

  “Lane talked to Bruno today. As of yesterday you didn’t have any vacation time coming, but now you’ve got a paid week. Lane helped him see the value of your complete convalescence.”

  “You’re bluffing now.”

  “I don’t bluff. Bruno wants the story filed by tomorrow afternoon. Then you’re free for a vacation. Don’t tell me some R & R on Liberty Ridge would pollute your sense of chivalry, young man.”

  “Well, it’s tempting.”

  “Settled.”

  Holt extends his hand and John shakes it. His grip is strong, dry and warm. “I was surprised to learn you used to write for the Journal. But when Fargo mentioned it, I remembered your columns. Nice stuff. Very un-Journal.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Do you know Susan Baum?”

  John feels his heart tighten, then speed up.

  “Not well.”

  “In touch with her?”

  “Not really.”

  “Could you be?”

  “I hear she’s kind of in hiding, since the shooting.”

  “That’s what I’ve heard. Guess I would be, too.”

  When John finally returns to his lakeside cottage it is almost midnight. He can see his dogs on the porch, lying next to a chair in which a figure sits, rocking slowly. His heart shifts a little, and the ringing begins in his ears again. Somehow he can remember the smell of Valerie’s perfume, a light, feminine scent that he was not even aware of registering.

  “So, what did you say?” asks Fargo. “Going to stick around?”

  John’s heart tightens again and a cool sweat creeps over his scalp. The dogs knock against his legs. “I said I would.”

  “No big surprise.”

  “Thanks for the vacation time.”

  “That was easy.”

  John steps onto the porch and Lane Fargo stands. In the darkness they face each other.

  “So, Valerie bought you some clothes today.”

  “I guess that’s pretty obvious.”

  “Pretty obvious. You like a little dig now and then, don’t you?”

  “Hard to pass up, sometimes.”

  Fargo nods. “You’re hard to figure.”

  “How so?”

  “I really don’t know yet—you’re a puzzle.”

  “You might be overcomplicating me.”

  “But I might not be. There’s two kinds of people in my world, John-Boy—people I trust and people I hate. On you, the jury’s still out.”

  “Well, thanks for the status report.”

  “Sleep tight.”

  For the next three days John stayed on Liberty Ridge, the rewarded Samaritan, the model guest. He shot pistol and shotgun with Holt and Fargo. He enjoyed Holt’s tales of African safaris. He endured Fargo’s taunts and brooding stares as he outscored Fargo on the sporting clays course.

  The three of them shot Holt Alley three times each, the best score going to Holt—32 proper kills, no innocents and a time of 3:25. John came in last with a 28 in 3:30. Walking away from the building there was a silence during which John knew both Holt and Fargo were wondering how a mediocre pistol shot like him had managed to clip a biker’s shoulder without clipping the girl next to him.

  “Tough course,” he admitted.

  John felt naked and exposed, like a hermit crab scuttling between shells. He tried to forget his purpose. During the hours he spent with Valerie in the meadow behind the Big House he almost managed to succeed. There, they drilled her dogs with dummies and live birds and lead lines while John’s labradors sat enviously in the shade and watched. Boomer just howled sadly.

  John went about the hours as if they were his own and he was an actual man doing actual things. The very forbiddenness of Valerie Holt made him all the more comfortable in her company. He enjoyed her talk, he admired her skills with the dogs, he was surprised by her easy intelligence and her sense of control. He silently noted her beauty and relished the covert glances he could steal. He was thankful for his sunglasses. Only once did she catch him, but she blushed deeply and looked away, catching her boot on a rock. She was so bold at times, he thought, and so timid at others, so graceful, then such a clod. He tried to remember back to being that young.

  He recognized in himself the simple excitement of attraction. How long since he had felt that for Rebecca, and even then, how impacted and joyless.

  For the rest of the afternoon he thought only of Rebecca and the commitment he had made to her, letting the dark aura of her memory enclose his waiting, cunning heart.

  CHAPTER

  NINETEEN

  The first light of the fifth day found John and his three dogs following the west shore of the lake. He carried a big cup of coffee in one hand and in the other a walking stick—a long piece of orangewood he’d found near his cottage. To any observer he would have looked like a man on a morning stroll and nothing more. John had temporarily convinced himself that this was all he was.

  He walked along unhurriedly, waiting for the fuzz of the night’s Scotch to dissipate with the stern clarity of caffeine. He had been pleased to find the bar of the cottage well stocked. The day was cool, but he could tell from the unclouded sky and the dry offshore breeze that the Santa Ana winds were brewing, and it would be hot before nine. The dogs splashed in and out of the lake, chasing each other like puppies.

  He rounded the south shore, then left the lake and struck off down a trail leading into the chaparral. It was already warmer just a hundred yards from the water. On top of a gentle rise, he stopped and looked back toward the lake, then to the training buildings for the Liberty Ops cadets. He could see a pair of them entering the library. Two more, dressed in gis, talking outside the martial arts building. Young men, mid-to-late twenties, mostly white, close-shaven, clean-cut, alert. He watched a helicopter rise from the helipad. It was painted in the same unmistakable orange and black of the Liberty Operations patrol cars, and it looked like a big dragonfly moving up into the sky. A moment later another rose and followed. The Liberty Ops lieutenants going out to check their beats, thought John. Holt Men in the sky.

  Continuing on, he thought of Valerie Anne Holt and the way she looked to him—and at him—at the big dinner. And though his stomach grew warm inside and he heard that faint ringing in his ears, he forced a rational coolness over them and told himself again that any closeness he had with Valerie would be false. He was, in this fabricated world of Joshua Weinstein, her protector. He thought of Lane Fargo, too, and the unabashed hostility the bodyguard had shown him. It was almost comforting to know that Fargo was after him; it defined the threat. Fargo is Holt’s unleashed paranoia, his pit bull. If he comes at you, hold your ground—if he gives you license, take it. He wondered too if Fargo’s interest in Valerie went beyond the professional. He considered whether Valerie might have deeper affections for Lane, and decided not. She seemed too bright a soul to be drawn to Lane Fargo’s dark spirit.

  Most of all, he thought of Vann Holt. A surprising man. John had been prepared for Holt’s confidence and control, the aura of capacity that Josh had described. He had expected the easy command Holt exhibited at Liberty Ridge and the deference of his friends, business partners, guests. He had expected the wealth, the grandness of his home, t
he extravagance of his table. What John had not been ready for was the simple harmony between Holt and his world. John could see nothing of a master’s iron hand, no misshapen power, none of the triumphant strutting of the prosperous. Yes, Vann Holt was the unchallenged king of Liberty Ridge. But his kingdom seemed to project from his imagination, rather than surrender to his ambition. He had dreamed the place, not conquered it; he was its heart, but not its body. They belonged to each other. And while Holt’s lavish generosity surprised John, Joshua had predicted it, counted on it. Once Wayfarer believes he owes you, the sky will be the limit. Decline the sky but accept the Ridge. All we need is your presence at Liberty Ridge. His gratitude will be his Achilles Heel.

  John turned and continued along the trail. For a few hundred yards it was wide and clear, but then the scrub pressed in and choked it down to little more than a game trail winding through brush. It rose steeply and John stopped again at the top, breathing hard, his empty coffee cup dangling from a finger. The dogs snorted up ahead; he could see all three labrador tails—one chocolate, one yellow, one black—protruding from a clump of buckwheat bush. From here, the lake and the buildings of Liberty Ridge were invisible. The first hot gusts of the Santa Ana wind heaved by him, drying the sweat on his temples.

  The trail led him down now, past a stand of eucalyptus trees fragrant in the growing heat. He remembered Joshua’s map, and that the stand was roughly one-third of the distance from the lake to the electric perimeter fence. His next signpost was a mammoth California oak tree, easily two centuries old, he thought, that stood haunted and solitary atop a knoll to his right. A redtail hawk perched near the top paid him no attention at all as he continued down the trail. The next half mile was laborious and uphill; the final half mile an easy coast down to where the trail ended in a clearing, and the clearing ended in the fence. He checked his watch: 17 minutes, two short stops, a steady pace but not a hurried one.

  He called the dogs, walked them across the clearing and made them sit in front of the fence. He took each dog by the collar, pointed at the fence and issued a harsh “No.” The puzzled labs then followed him back into the clearing and sat attentively by as John settled onto a stump, pulled out a cigarette and lit up. When you get to the clearing, take five. See if any shadows fall.