by Land, Jon
Cort Wesley was seated on the front porch swing, shotgun lying over his lap, when Caitlin headed up the walk from her SUV.
“Didn’t know if you’d be coming by tonight, Ranger,” he said, letting himself smile.
She sat down next to him, feeling the swing rock slightly before Cort Wesley’s feet stilled it. “The way things are, where else would I want to be?”
“How are things?”
She sighed deeply and rested her head against his shoulder, feeling the strength and power of his muscles. “Got on that flight this morning at six a.m. with no sleep at all. I’m flat exhausted.”
“I got enough caffeine in my system to make a lawn mower run.”
Caitlin eased herself off him. “What’s wrong, Cort Wesley?”
“Isn’t the obvious enough?”
“I always feel your muscles relax when I press up against you. Not tonight.”
He kept his eyes fixed forward. “I did some checking.”
“Into what?”
Looking at her now. “Whatever it was I did to make someone go after my boys that way.”
Caitlin felt herself stiffen. “You gonna tell me what you found out?”
“This isn’t about me. It isn’t about you either.”
She reached out for his shoulder, her touch only making the muscles more rigid. “Then who is it about?”
“The boys’ mother, Maura Torres.”
30
SAN ANTONIO
Guillermo Paz climbed the steps of the McKinney Humanities Building on the campus of the University of Texas San Antonio checking his watch to make sure he wasn’t late. There was an evening class that covered the work of Friedrich Nietzsche, the scheduled start time making him think it would be composed mostly of adults in the continuing education program.
Turned out he couldn’t have been more wrong.
Paz squeezed himself into yet another tiny desk in the rear and watched the classroom quickly fill around him with kids who looked no older than the outlaw Cort Wesley Masters’s oldest boy. He checked out a dry erase board that filled out the whole of the front wall and saw “Freshman Introduction to German Philosophy” written there.
Oops, Paz thought.
Still, he hoped to attain some enlightenment anyway from a middle-aged professor wearing a corduroy jacket with patches on the elbows and a shock of wild gray hair. The professor stuck an unlit pipe in his mouth, only to remove it when his gaze fell on the seven-foot freshman seated at a desk that looked miniaturized in comparison to his bulk. The professor, whose name according to the dry erase board was Litsky, seemed about to speak, then changed his mind and stuck the unlit pipe back into his mouth.
Paz aimed his gaze at the door, prepared to make a graceful exit, until Professor Litsky opened the class with, “What do we know about Friedrich Nietzsche?”
That was it. Hooked now, Paz resigned himself to staying while committed to remaining as scarce as possible this time. No more outbursts or incidents requiring calls to security like the night before across town. Litsky looked like a man who knew his shit, guaranteeing Paz a better experience than the last one. In any event, it had to be better than what he was getting from the priests who’d been hearing his confessions for five years now while offering him nothing more than the penance he wasn’t seeking.
Litsky continued to look around the room in search of a raised hand. Finding none, he spoke himself.
“Allow me to start, then. Nietzsche purported to have been greatly influenced by the writings of Arthur Schopenhauer, whose outlook on life was relentlessly pessimistic.”
At last, Paz thought, leaning forward.
“But to consider his own writings to be on the level of Schopenhauer’s, to even consider Nietzsche a philosopher at all, is an absurdity.”
Uh-oh …
“Nietzsche is among the most well known and least effective of the German philosophers. He hid behind diatribes that were more like slogans without holding any real meaning. He spoke to a lost generation and continues to speak to those who are similarly lost and looking to rationalize the corruption of their own souls.”
Paz managed to hold his tongue.
“Even his famed concept of the Übermensch, the notion of a superman, makes no sense and holds no ethical, spiritual, moral, or psychological value. The celebration of his writings is nothing more than a fraud perpetrated on all of us who know better.”
Paz could hold his tongue no longer. “What is great in man is that he is a bridge and not an end.”
“Excuse me?” Litsky asked, pretending to spot Paz for the first time.
“That’s a quote from Nietzsche. Maybe you need me to interpret it for you, Professor.”
“I’m quite capable of interpreting it for myself, thank you.”
“Then why don’t you for the rest of the students?”
Litsky took a few steps closer to him. “Are you even registered for this class?”
“I’m auditing. The credit means nothing to me, just the experience.”
“What’s that mean exactly?”
Paz realized the eyes of all the freshmen students were now on him, their mouths having collectively dropped at the realization of his presence. “You should know.”
“And why’s that?”
“It’s a paraphrase of more of Nietzsche’s thinking, the concept of translating will into power and the notion of experience for its own sake without specific gain.”
Litsky seemed to ponder that briefly, before realizing the class was no longer looking at him. “What was your name again?”
“The doer is merely a fiction added to the deed.”
“Is that an answer?”
“Don’t you recognize it, Professor? It’s a quote from Nietzsche. If you’re going to put the man down, you should at least have an idea of what he said.”
Some of the other students chuckled. A few slapped their knees, growing more animated in support of Paz. He knew he should have left the classroom then and there, but didn’t.
“For Nietzsche, you see, Professor, the deed was everything. Accomplishment, resolution, achievement. Get it?”
“I believe you’re missing the point.”
“And what point is that?”
“Nietzsche’s very rejection of the commonplace, what normal people call life.”
“See, you just made my point for me.”
“I most certainly did not! And you, sir, do not belong in my classroom!” Litsky charged, finding courage in the certainty Paz would not assault him in front of two dozen witnesses. Probably.
“I’m disappointed,” Paz said, shaking his head. “See, the man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies but also to hate his friends.”
Litsky looked at him questioningly.
“That’s another Nietzsche quote. But you don’t know it because you’re not a man of knowledge, are you?”
“I’m calling security,” Litsky said, fumbling in his jacket pocket for his cell phone. “Class is dismissed.”
But no one moved.
“I said class is—”
“They heard you, Professor,” Paz interrupted. “But it looks like they’re ahead of you on the assignment. See, no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.”
“Hello,” Litsky was saying into his phone, having trouble getting a connection. “Hello!”
“Your students have minds of their own. They think for themselves. Hey, maybe you’re not as bad a teacher as I thought.”
Litsky gave up on the cell phone, glanced toward the door.
“Feel free to dismiss yourself, Professor,” Paz told him. “Or stay for the lesson.”
“Lesson?” Litsky posed in disbelief.
Paz nodded, more dawning on him as his own thoughts unspooled. “Of what Nietzsche really meant by his notion of the Übermensch. He’s trying to show us that for society to be able to live up to its true potential it needs a whole new system of values and beliefs. So I read this
and it’s like the man is talking about me: a superman, whose values change as the world around him changes. This is someone who, by trusting his own intuitive sense of what is good and evil, succeeds better than any other. The key is fluidity—that’s what reading Nietzsche taught me, along with the fact that the world doesn’t change us as much as we change the world. You see what I’m getting at?”
“Sir, I do not!” Litsky insisted, raising his voice to imitate bravado.
But the rest of the students were nodding. “Your class does. I bet they also get the fact that this superman is someone who in discovering himself also discovers that it’s in his best interests to reject any outside notions about values, trusting rather what he finds within himself as the absolute truth. He creates his own good and evil, based on that which helps him to succeed or fail. In this way good is something that helps one to realize his potential and evil is whatever hampers or stands in the way of this effort. You get at least that point?”
“Not in the slightest.”
But the class was nodding again. “I believe your students do, and I haven’t even got to the part about it’s the example of the superman that allows us to see how much is actually attainable in the world. In creating his own system of values, he continually tests himself, always refining those values to be better and better still. In this way the Übermensch rises above the values of the masses until he reaches the top of the food chain and his particular moral superiority becomes the guidelines for the rest of society. Madre de Dios, don’t you get it yet? Don’t you see where I’m going with this?”
Litsky could only stand there, his knees beginning to shake.
Paz rose to his full height grinning with his glistening eyes focused squarely on Litsky. A urine stain began spreading down the man’s trousers. Paz started toward him and the urine stain immediately thickened, even as Paz veered toward the door, meeting the captivated stares of as many of the students as he could.
“Funny how you can’t see something that’s been right there in front of your face all along. Me being an Übermensch in the true Nietzsche definition of the word explains just about everything, where I fit into the great cosmic picture. ‘Courageous, untroubled, mocking, and violent—that is what wisdom wants us to be,’ says Nietzsche. Well, I don’t know about wisdom, but I do know that’s what I need to be if I’m going to be successful this time, because ‘it’s the still words which bring the storm.’” Paz reached the door and held his gaze on Litsky one last time. “That storm’s coming, and it’s going to be the worst one I’ve been up against yet. I see that now.”
He started through the door, stopping when Litsky’s next words froze him.
“He who fights monsters should be careful lest he become one himself.”
Paz winked, letting the whole class see him smile thinly. “No worries, Professor, because I’m already there.”
31
SAN ANTONIO
Caitlin held Cort Wesley’s stare until he squeezed his eyes closed and rubbed the lids.
“Who told you that?” she asked him, her words sounding lame.
“It doesn’t matter who told me. All that matters is it’s true.”
“Whoever told you could have been wrong.”
“They’re not wrong, Ranger. I stayed out of my boys’ lives for fourteen years because I didn’t want them dragged into my shit, and now I find out there was a whole other pile of it building.”
“What else?”
“What else what?”
“What else did your source tell you about Maura Torres?”
“Nothing.”
“And that was enough to make you buy into this hook, line, and sinker?”
“Yup. Because it’s the only thing that makes sense.”
Caitlin started to speak, stopped, then started again. “Why don’t you let me check this out?”
“Go ahead. You won’t find a damn thing. Nothing in Maura’s past at all, least not on the surface. Whatever she was involved in, whatever almost got my boys killed, is buried real deep, Ranger.”
“Tell me about Maura Torres, Cort Wesley,” Caitlin said, after a pause dominated by the tree branches scratching at the porch eaves over them.
“There’s nothing to tell.”
“Make believe I’m not a Texas Ranger.”
In spite of himself, Cort Wesley smiled thinly. “That’s goddamn impossible and you know it.”
“Okay, say I am a Texas Ranger and you’re coming in to make out a report, based on some suspicions you’ve got. Guesses, assumptions—not allegations.”
“There’s nothing, Ranger.”
“You’re telling me Maura Torres is pure as the driven snow we almost never see in Texas.”
“I am.”
“Make believe she’s not your boys’ late mother.”
He rose and squeezed the porch railing with both hands, eyeing Caitlin sideways now as she rocked slightly in the swing. “What do you think I been doing out here while I was waiting for you?”
“Thinking about her.”
“Didn’t I just say that?”
“What about her background?”
“We never talked about that much, hers or mine. She was first generation American, born on a farm somewhere in Texas. Her parents came over here as migrant laborers and fought the battle to become citizens. They were sworn in together on the same day. I remember a picture of Maura as a little girl at the courthouse ceremony. She’d raised her right hand in the air too, even though she was already a citizen thanks to birth. I don’t think I’ve ever seen prouder folks in my life.”
“Any other pictures?”
Cort Wesley shook his head. “Not that I’ve ever seen, at least not any from those days.”
Caitlin churned her tongue around the inside of her mouth, which had felt like all the moisture had been sucked out since last night in Providence. “What about that aunt in Arizona?”
“Maura’s older sister,” Cort Wesley recalled.
“Maybe she knows something more.”
“I guess,” Cort Wesley said, looking down.
“You don’t exactly seem enamored by the prospects.”
“To put it mildly, we’ve had our differences. To put it plainly, she hates my guts.”
“Well, that places her in good company, anyway.”
Cort Wesley mustered a smile and retook his seat on the swing next to Caitlin. “Yours included?”
“Depends on the day.”
“How about the night, Ranger?”
“To know you is to love your boys, Cort Wesley.”
That almost got him to laugh. “Now there’s a backhanded compliment if I ever heard one.”
“You wanna know what I think?”
“Why ask if you’re going to tell me anyway?”
“I think you should let me talk to this aunt, Maura’s sister.”
“She won’t talk to you.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because she hates you about as much as she hates me for helping me keep custody of the boys. Woman’s a bitch. Even Maura couldn’t stand her.”
“Well, last time I checked, Cort Wesley, Arizona had a police department we can ask to talk to Maura’s sister on our behalf.”
“Some things I need to do myself, Ranger.”
Caitlin laid her head against his shoulder. “You want to tell me what else?”
“What else what?”
“What else has got you all tied into knots?”
“All this isn’t enough?”
“There you go,” Caitlin said, rolling her eyes.
Cort Wesley eased himself away from her. “Huh?”
“You get nervous,” Caitlin told him, “you start asking questions. But danger doesn’t get you nervous, anxiety does. Danger just puts you on edge. That’s different.”
“Okay, I’m anxious.”
Caitlin shook her head. “You want to try this again?”
Fidgeting, Cort Wesley rose and moved back to the railing, s
queezing it hard enough to flush his hands with blood. “Cut me a break here,” he said out toward the front lawn, “will you?”
She resisted the temptation to join him by the railing, knew she should’ve left things there but couldn’t help herself. “You can’t talk to me, who can you talk to, Cort Wesley?”
“Ranger, I’m not gonna say this—”
Her phone rang, sparing him the need to finish his statement. Caitlin wasn’t going to answer it at first, then changed her mind when the Caller ID read HEADQUARTERS.
“Checking to see if I’m home safe, Captain?”
“Not exactly, Ranger,” said Tepper. “I hope you’re sitting down.”
“Why?”
“We got tentative IDs on the other kids found in Willow Creek and you’re not gonna believe it.”
32
SAN ANTONIO
Cort Wesley decided to stay out on the porch, standing with his elbows perched on the wooden rail overlooking the front yard, when Caitlin went upstairs to try and sleep. The night was comfortably cool and clear enough to see just about every star in the sky if he’d been looking.
Suddenly, he smelled talcum powder layered thick and heavy to disguise a bad scent like a blanket tossed over a fire to smother it. He looked to his right to see the ghost of old Leroy Epps standing there, his thin, liver-spotted hands squeezing the railing in identical fashion to Cort Wesley’s. His lips were pale pink and crinkled with dryness. The thin light from the overhead fixture’s single low-wattage bug bulb cast his brown skin in a yellowish tint. He smiled when he saw Cort Wesley looking his way.
“’Bout time you noticed me, bubba.”
“How long you been standing there, champ?”
“Far as you’re concerned, since right now.”
“Guess you heard.”
“From where I stand, I hear everything. See it too. You should know that by now. Looks like the merry-go-round’s spinning again.”
“When’s it stop?” Cort Wesley asked his old friend’s ghost.
Leroy Epps had been a lifer in the brutal Huntsville prison known as the Walls, busted for killing a white man in self-defense; it was his friendship and guidance that had gotten Cort Wesley through his years in captivity. The diabetes that would ultimately kill him had turned Leroy’s eyes bloodshot and numbed his limbs years before the sores and infections set in. As a boxer, he’d fought for the middleweight crown on three different occasions, knocked out once and had the belt stolen from him on paid-off judges’ scorecards two other times. He’d died three years into Cort Wesley’s four-year incarceration, but ever since always seemed to show up when needed the most. Whether a ghostly specter or a figment of his imagination, Cort Wesley had given up trying to figure out. Just accepted the fact of his presence and grateful that Leroy kept coming around to help him out of one scrape after another.