Last Man Standing

by David Baldacci

  “Are you okay?” he asked Claire.

  She nodded, then sat up and started crying. Web hugged her and then looked over and saw that Billy Canfield had shuffled over to a dark mass and then dropped to his knees. Web rose, and went over to him and looked at where Gwen lay on the ground, her chest covered by a pool of blood where at least one of Strait’s shots had hit its mark. She looked up at them both, her breath coming in painful gasps. Web dropped to his knees, ripped open her shirt and saw the wound. He slowly covered her chest back up and looked at her. His expression obviously told her the truth.

  She gripped his hand. “I’m so scared, Web.”

  Web knelt down closer as Billy just squatted there, staring at his dying wife.

  “You’re not alone, Gwen.” That was all he could think to say. He wanted to hate this woman for what she had done to him, to Teddy Riner and all the rest. But he couldn’t. And it wasn’t just because she had saved his life, and Claire’s and Kevin’s. It was because Web didn’t know what he would have done had he been in the woman’s shoes, with all that rage and hatred building up over the years. Maybe he would have done the same; he just hoped not.

  “I’m not scared of dying, Web. I’m scared I won’t see David.” Blood dribbled from her mouth and her words were a little garbled, but Web understood her.

  Heaven and hell; that was it? With maybe purgatory not even an option.

  Her eyes were starting to lose focus and Web could feel her grip loosening.

  “David,” she said weakly. “David.” She looked to the sky. “Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned . . .” Her voice trailed off and she started sobbing.

  Web assumed the woman would have crawled to her little chapel if she’d had the strength. He looked around for something, anything. And then it appeared in the form of Paul Romano walking stiffly over to them. He had driven off in the truck that had been hooked to the trailer by the pool, flat tires and all, thanks to Web.

  Web rushed over to him, looked at his bloody leg. “You okay?”

  “Just a scratch. Thanks for asking.”

  “Paulie, can you take Gwen’s Last Confession?”

  “What?”

  Web pointed to where Gwen lay in the grass. “Gwen’s dying. I want you to hear her Last Confession.”

  Romano took a step back. “Are you nuts? Do I look like a priest?”

  “She’s dying, Paulie, she won’t know. She believes she’s going to hell and she won’t see her son.”

  “This is the same woman who masterminded wiping out Charlie Team and you want me to forgive her too for all the stuff she’s done?”

  “Yes, it’s important.”

  “No way am I doing that.”

  “Come on, Romano, it won’t kill you.”

  Romano looked to the sky for an instant. “How do you know?” “Paulie, please, I know I have no right to ask you, but please, there’s not much time. It’s the right thing to do.” He added in desperation, “God will understand.”

  The men stared at each other for a long moment and then Romano shook his head, limped over and knelt down beside Gwen. He took her hand in his, made the sign of the cross over her and asked her if she wanted to make her Last Confession. In weakening tones she said she did.

  Finished, Romano rose and stepped away.

  Web again knelt down beside Gwen. Her eyes were starting to glaze over, but for a brief moment she was able to focus on him and even gave him a weak smile as though to thank him, as with each breath she pumped more blood out of her body. The resemblance to the wound that had claimed her son was striking.

  She clutched Web’s hand with renewed strength and mouthed the words, “I’m so sorry, Web, can you forgive me?”

  Web looked at the beautiful eyes that were growing dimmer by the second. In those eyes and the woman’s features he saw a different image, that of a young boy who had trusted Web and who had then been failed by him.

  “I forgive you,” he said to the dying woman, and he hoped that somewhere, somehow, David Canfield was doing the same for him.

  With that, Web stepped back and passed her hand over to Billy, who took it and knelt down beside his wife. Web watched as the chest rose and fell with greater and greater speed, and then, finally, it just stopped and the hand went limp. As Billy quietly sobbed over the body of his wife, Web helped Claire stand, put his arm under Romano to assist him, and the three started to walk off together.

  The shotgun blast made them all jump. When they turned around, Billy was just then walking away from Strait’s body, a curl of smoke rising from his shotgun.

  56

  For the next few days, the police and the FBI had poured all over East Winds, collecting evidence, wrapping up bodies and generally trying to figure everything out, although that, under even the best circumstances, would take some time. On a very somber note, the body of the boy who had been substituted for Kevin in the alley had been found in a grave deep in the woods at East Winds. They boy had been identified as a runaway from Ohio who had somehow had the great misfortune to run into Nemo Strait and Clyde Macy, no doubt with promises of some fast money.

  As Web walked over the grounds, he could only shake his head at how quickly the pastoral setting of the farm had turned into a battlefield. Bates had cut short his vacation and was now here overseeing things. Romano was in the hospital getting his leg wound treated, but the bullet had hit neither bone nor major artery and the doctors predicted a quick and full recovery for someone as fit as Paul Romano. However, Web was certain that Angie was giving her husband a really hard time about almost getting killed. No doubt if someone was going to do Romano in, she wanted the honors.

  As Web was walking up the drive to the mansion, he saw Bates coming out the front door. Billy Canfield stood on the porch and stared at seemingly nothing. The man had nothing left, Web thought. Bates saw Web and came over.

  “Damn, what a mess,” Bates said.

  “Well, it’s pretty clear now that it was a mess for a long time before this.”

  “Actually, you’re right. We discovered records at Strait’s house and chased down his suppliers. The shot that killed Antoine Peebles was traced to a gun we found on Macy. Ed O’Bannon’s turned up too, in a Dumpster. Same gun killed him. And the rifle Macy was carrying when you shot him, we matched that to the hits on Judge Leadbetter and Chris Miller.”

  “A ballistics hat trick. Don’t you just love it when the pieces start falling into place?”

  “Oh, and we also checked the tape of the shooting in Richmond like you asked us to.”

  Web shot him a glance. “What’d you find?”

  “You were right, there was something there. A phone ringing.”

  “It wasn’t a ringing sound. It was more like a—”

  “A whistle? That’s right. It was a cellular phone. You know, you can do just about any ringing sound you want. This one was a bird whistle. Nobody ever thought much about it before. It’s not like we needed it as evidence to nail Ernie Free.”

  “Whose phone was it?”

  “David Canfield’s. A cell phone his mother had given him in case of emergency.”

  Web looked stunned, even as Bates nodded sadly.

  “It was Gwen calling him. He never answered. Probably the only way she thought she could talk to him at that point. She just picked the worst time to do it. She didn’t know when HRT was going in, of course.”

  “So you think that’s why the phones were the theme with the killings?”

  “Well, we’ll never know for sure, but it looks that way. Maybe she felt since she couldn’t talk to her son, she wanted the phones to be the last things those three guys ever saw. She also left a written statement that exonerated Billy. I guess Gwen was thinking she wouldn’t survive this, and she turned out to be right. We’ve confirmed Billy’s innocence from other sources. And we were also able to nab a few of Strait’s men who weren’t at the farm that night. They spilled their guts.”

  “Good. The man’s suffered enough.”<

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  Bates shook his head. “Those guys confirmed that Gwen wasn’t in on the drug stuff. But I guess she found out later and wanted a cut of it. God, and she looked so normal.”

  “She was normal,” snapped Web. “But what happened to her son just took over her life.” He sighed deeply. “You know, I have every reason to hate the woman, and the only thing I feel is sorry for her. Sorry that she couldn’t have gone on. And part of me is thinking that if I had saved her son, none of this would have happened. That maybe I do a lot more harm than good.”

  “You can’t carry that burden, Web. That’s not fair to you.”

  “Well, life wasn’t very fair to Gwen Canfield, now, was it?”

  The two men walked along.

  “Well, if you want some good news, you’re reinstated with the Bureau, and if you so request, Buck Winters will give you a personal apology. And I’m counting on you so requesting.”

  Web shook his head. “I need some time to think about it, Perce.” “Buck’s apology?”

  “Coming back to the Bureau.”

  Bates gaped at him. “You’re kidding. Come on, Web, you got your whole life tied up in it.”

  “I know, that’s the problem.”

  “Well, take all the time that you want. After all this, the official word at the Bureau is that anything you want, you got.”

  “Gee, that’s really nice of them.”

  “How’s Romano?”

  “Bitching and complaining, so he’s just fine.”

  They stopped and looked back at the mansion, where Billy Canfield was just now turning and going into the house.

  Bates pointed at him. “Now, there’s the guy I really feel sorry for. He’s lost it all.”

  Web nodded in agreement.

  “You remember he said at the party, you keep your enemies out in the open, right where you can see them all the time?” Bates shook his head and looked around. “Well, his enemies were all around him and the poor guy never knew it.’

  “Yeah.”

  “You need a ride back?”

  “I’m gonna hang here awhile longer.”

  Bates and Web shook hands. “Thanks, Web, for everything.” Bates turned and walked off, while Web ambled along. And then he stopped, turned and looked in Bates’s direction and then at the mansion. Web suddenly took off at a dead run to the stone house. He raced through the front door and down the stairs to the lower level, where he made a beeline for Billy’s taxidermy room. It was locked. Web easily broke open the lock, went inside and quickly found what he was searching for. He carried the small jar in one hand and ran over to the gun cabinet. He found and hit the hidden latch and the door swung open. He pulled the flashlight off the wall and went inside. The mannequin peered back at him. Web hung the light on a peg on the wall so that the beam shone on the dummy. He took off the mannequin’s hairpiece and carefully peeled off the whiskers. Next he opened the jar and carefully applied the paint remover to the face. It came off quickly. Web kept working away until the dark skin became white. With the hair and whiskers gone and the original skin color, Web stood back. He had seen the face so many times he would have recognized it in his sleep, and yet the few devices Canfield had used to disguise the face had worked to perfection. The man had been true to his word: He had kept his real enemy right where he could always find him.

  Web knew he was looking upon Ernest B. Free for the first time since the shootout in Richmond.

  “You know those I-talians I told you about?”

  Web whipped around and there was Billy Canfield.

  “Those I-talians,” Billy continued, “who’d offer me all that money to move their stolen property? Remember I was telling you about them?”

  “I remember.”

  Canfield seemed to be in a fog. He wasn’t even looking at Web; he was staring at Ernie, maybe admiring his handiwork, Web thought.

  “Well, contrary to what I told you, I accepted one of those offers and did a real good job for them. Then, after what happened to my son and all, they came to me one day about four months ago and offered to do me a favor in appreciation for all my years of loyalty to the family.”

  “Break Ernest Free out of prison and deliver him to you?”

  “See, them I-talians are strong on family, and after what that man did to my son . . .” Billy stopped and rubbed at his eyes. “Anyway, Gwen probably showed you the little building what used to be a Civil War hospital at the farm.”

  “She did.”

  “Well, that’s where I did him. I sent Strait and his men off to pick up some horses and put Gwen on a plane to see her family in Kentucky, so I could work uninterrupted. I used some of the same surgical instruments the folks back in the Civil War did.” He went over and touched Free’s shoulder. “Cut his tongue out first ’cause he was making such a ruckus. I expected that from a little worm like him. Love to make others suffer but can’t take a drop of pain themselves. And then you know what I did?”

  “Tell me.”

  Billy smiled proudly. “I gutted him just the way you would a deer. Cut his balls off first. See, I figured somebody what done something like that to a little boy, he can’t call himself no man, so why would he need any balls? You see my reasoning?”

  Web said nothing, but though Billy did not appear to be armed, Web’s hand slipped to the grip of his pistol. Canfield did not seem to notice, or if he did, he didn’t seem to care.

  He cocked his head and surveyed his work from different angles. “Now, I’m not an educated man or anything, ain’t read many books and such, but it seemed sort of poetic justice, I guess you’d say, that old Ernie B. Free would sit locked in a little room where slaves came through hunting for their freedom. But he ain’t never gonna get his. Freedom, that is. And I’d know right where the son of a bitch was every minute of every day and show people to frighten them, like he was some little carnival freak.” He looked at Web with the expression of a man no longer part of the sane world. “Don’t that seem right to you?”

  Again Web said nothing.

  Billy stared at him and nodded. “I’d do it again, you know. In a minute I would.”

  “Tell me, Billy, what did it feel like, killing a man?”

  Canfield studied him for a very long moment. “It felt like shit.” “Did it take any of the hurt away?”

  “Not a damn drop. And now I got nothing left.” He paused, his lips trembling. “I shut her out of my life, you know. My own wife.

  Drove her to Strait’s bed, ignored her. She knew I knew and I didn’t say nothing about it, and that probably hurt more than if I’d beaten her for it. Right when she needed me most I wasn’t there. Maybe if I had been, she could’ve got herself through this.”

  Web stared at him. “Maybe she could have, Billy. But now we’ll never know.”

  They heard footsteps coming down the stairs and both men walked outside the room. It was Bates. He looked surprised to see Web.

  “I forgot I needed to ask you a few more things, Billy.” Bates looked at Web’s pale face. “Are you okay?” He glanced at the stricken Billy and then back at Web. “What’s going on here?”

  Web looked at Billy and then said to Bates, “Everything’s just fine. Why don’t you ask Billy the questions later? I think he needs some time to himself.” Web looked once more at Canfield, and then he put his arm around Bates and led him up the stairs.

  They had just reached the main floor when they heard the blast. It was the fancy Churchill shotgun.

  Web just knew.

  57

  Web dropped in on Kevin Westbrook two days after Billy Canfield killed himself. The boy was back with Jerome and his granny, thanks to his father. Part of Web hoped Francis “Big F” Westbrook made it to his retirement. At least he had left his son out of it. The grandmother, whose name Web learned was Rosa, was in wonderful spirits and had made them all lunch. As promised, Web had brought back the photo of Kevin and given it to Rosa, returned the sketchbooks Claire had taken previously to Kevin and also had a long talk with Jerome.

  “Never saw the man,” said Jerome of Big F. “One minute Kevin wasn’t here, and now he is.”

  “How’s the big cookie coming?” asked Web.

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