The Angel Maker

by Ridley Pearson

  He could hear the radio through the closed door. The news. The weather. More rain. They couldn’t take any more rain. The flooding was as bad as it had ever been. Suicide rate was up: bungie jumping off Aurora Bridge, without the bungie cords.

  He looked around for something to do. Lately, Miles, this woman, and The Big Joke had been his whole life. Now he found himself thinking about Cindy Chapman and Daphne Matthews.

  Maybe he’d try to talk her into this in the morning. Maybe he would admit to a promise already made. Maybe Cindy Chapman was an isolated case. Maybe there wasn’t some guy out there carving up runaways after all. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

  He went to the bedroom door and opened it cautiously. “Mind if I join you?”

  She was on the bed, her jeans unbuttoned. She shrugged. “More rain,” she said, as if nothing had come before.

  “Yeah, I heard.”

  She patted the comforter beside her. He knew that look. Forgiving. Cautiously optimistic. He loved her for it.

  Boldt stepped inside, kicking off his shoes, and shut the door.

  8

  A hundred yards down the dark, narrow, overgrown lane, Elden Tegg encountered a truck blocking his way. A huge man with an untrimmed beard asked him his name, checked his driver’s license, consulted a list, and finally backed out of the way, allowing him to pass.

  He drove under a canopy formed by the limbs of trees. The road was all mud and leaves. He parked the Trooper amid a group of battered pickup trucks and hurried through the rain toward the large barn. A yellow light escaped the slats in the wood. He pulled open the door and stepped inside.

  He smelled cigarettes, hay, manure and musty, rotting wood. He smelled a metallic, salty odor as well, one that as a veterinarian he knew only too well: animal blood. He stepped into shadow and studied the scene before him.

  The fighting ring, a wooden box ten-feet square, had been hastily constructed out of gray barn wood. It occupied an area in the middle of the wide dirt aisle between the stalls. A hayloft, cloaked in darkness, loomed above them. The building’s only light came from a single bare bulb suspended directly above the center of the ring. It cast harsh shadows on the rough faces of the nearly twenty men in attendance.

  This scene repulsed him. Pitting dogs to the death. He repaired life; he did not waste it.

  A head in the crowd turned and faced him. The same man from earlier in the day, Donnie Maybeck. His gold Rolex winked at Tegg as it caught the light. He approached Tegg with an exaggerated stride. He smiled, flashing his ragged gray-brown teeth at Tegg like an old whore lifting her skirt at a would-be John.

  “Are we set?” Tegg asked.

  “Everything’s cool.” He indicated the loft with a nod. “But before we get to that, we gotta do Felix.”

  Spurred by an act of local government that amounted to canine genocide for all pit bulls, Tegg had rescued Felix and others from certain death in favor of lives devoted to science and research. These dogs—his creations, in a way—were now hidden out at Tegg’s farm, where he maintained a surgical research laboratory. As much as Tegg hated the idea, the only way to fully test the success of the latest surgery was to fight this dog in the ring. Although Maybeck had assured him that there was always someone “competent” on hand to sew up any inflicted wounds—a so-called needle man—Tegg did not want anybody else doctoring the dog. Besides, he thought, this dog’s insides would only confuse another vet, and raise suspicions about Tegg’s practices.

  “I’m not here to fight him, only to provide medical attention if he needs it,” Tegg reminded.

  “He’s up next,” Maybeck explained. “Up against Stormin’ Norman. You understand. Norman ain’t lost no fight in six go’s. But I’m gonna need your help, Doc. You’re the only one can handle him.”

  “Where is he?” Tegg asked.

  Donnie Maybeck led him to a cream-colored airline travel cage perched high on a hay bale. The animal inside bared its razor-sharp teeth and growled ferociously at Donnie, who grinned back with his own ragged teeth, pressing his face close to the grid of bars on the door, teasing the dog with a growl. The pit bull charged the door so strongly that the cage nearly slid off the bale.

  “Don’t taunt him,” Tegg protested. At the sound of Tegg’s voice, the dog’s behavior reversed. It quieted and pushed its wet nose tightly into the bars of the cage toward Tegg.

  “See? This here is your dog, Doc. You’re the one who saved him—and he knows it. You gotta help me do this.”

  “I showed you how to work the collar. What kind of fool can’t work a shock collar? You can push a button, can’t you?” It was a rare display of spleen for Tegg, a terrible sign of weakness. He regretted it immediately. Maybeck did not take well to denigrating comments about his intelligence or lack thereof.

  Maybeck’s eyes hardened. “I don’t want to use no collar before the fight. It might weaken him, and I would hate to lose him.”

  The idea that Felix might lose cut Tegg to the quick. Maybeck was right—this was no time to shock the dog.

  Tegg kept the shock collar’s remote device in hand as he led Felix from the cage, leashed him, and led him toward the ring. To Tegg’s delight, Felix behaved impeccably under escort. Maybeck followed, but at a distance.

  Once alongside the ring, Tegg cradled Felix in his arms and removed the shock collar. Felix’s opponent, Stormin’ Norman, waited in the far corner. Around his throat he carried a dozen healed scars of a warrior.

  A three-hundred-pound man with a beard of barbed wire peered out from beneath a John Deere farmer’s cap and declared solemnly, “To the death.”

  The announcement sobered and silenced the spectators. The rain drummed on the roof. The air went electric with anticipation. Felix fixed his attention on his opponent. “I can’t do this,” Tegg told Maybeck. “Even in the name of research.”

  He was spared any such decision. As the other dog was released, Felix broke loose and dove into the ring. The dogs exploded at one another. A roar went up from the crowd. Tegg withdrew to the shadows.

  He suddenly felt as if he was being watched. He looked around. No one. Again he scanned the barn’s interior and again could identify no one interested in him. Then he looked up into the hayloft.

  There in the soft shadows stood a man dressed in a business suit, his full attention focused on Tegg, who recognized him immediately as Wong Kei, an infamous Seattle mob boss. His face was constantly in the news. Though this was a different face tonight: pale skin stretched tightly across sharp bones. Hard, spiritless eyes. A man desperately sad.

  An explosion of applause from the audience signaled the end of the fight.

  Maybeck tugged on Tegg’s arm and pulled him toward the ring. Felix was circling the bloodied corpse of his failed opponent. “Not a scratch on him, Doc. You understand? He dropped Norman like he was a toy poodle. Norman! Not a scratch! You’re a fucking genius, Doc. A real fucking genius.”

  Expressionless, disgusted, Tegg collected the dog and returned him to the travel cage. Tegg glanced up into the loft. He told Maybeck, “I’ll see him now.”

  By the time they reached the hayloft via a set of rickety stairs, and Tegg had submitted himself to a frisk search by one of Wong Kei’s two stocky bodyguards, another contest had begun below. There were no introductions; a man of Wong Kei’s reputation needed none. In and out of the courts—always acquitted. They sat opposite each other on hay bales. Maybeck and the bodyguards remained standing.

  Wong Kei got to the point. “My wife is fifty-seven years old. She is suffering from unstable angina that will shortly claim her life if nothing is done. She had her first myocardial infarction two years ago. As I am sure you are aware,” he said venomously, “heart transplants are refused to anyone over the age of fifty-five. My wife’s case is made worse by both a rare blood type—AB-negative—and the fact that she’s an extremely small woman.

  “I arranged a ‘private’ transplant surgeon some time ago. A man willing to help. He’s out of Vancouver. He atte
mpted to locate an unregistered donor heart but to date has been unsuccessful. He recommended I contact your associate. I understand you have found him a kidney from time to time. I must admit that I am not terribly comfortable turning to a veterinarian for a human heart. That is one of the reasons I wanted this meeting: to meet you.” He paused as the crowd below erupted in cheers.

  “I make no promises,” Tegg stated.

  “I have done my homework,” the Asian said. “I would not be here had I not. As a veterinarian you have few equals.”

  “In a situation such as your wife’s—one of life and death—time is the real enemy. Time forces certain decisions. I’m perfectly aware of that. How long does your wife have?” he asked, taking charge. But time wasn’t Tegg’s real enemy. Internally, a dialogue of a different sort began: Now that the opportunity had presented itself, how far would he go to erase a mistake he had made nearly twenty years earlier? Could he knowingly sacrifice a human being?

  “She will be strong enough to move in a few days.”

  “To Vancouver?”

  “Yes.”

  “Days?”

  “If I put my wife’s life into your hands, I will expect results,” he announced sternly. “If you can’t help me, you must say so now. If it’s a question of money …”

  Tegg waved his hand to stop the man. He did not want Maybeck to hear the amount being offered. A heart was worth no less than five-hundred thousand. If Wong Kei had indeed done his homework, as he claimed, then he knew that much. “I’m sure you’ll be generous,” Tegg said. The money accounted for only a part of his stake in this. There was more to be gained here.

  “Are you interested?”

  “Extremely.”

  “May I count on you?”

  Tegg glanced briefly at Maybeck. The man looked frightened. You didn’t fail a man of Wong Kei’s reputation. The mobster was telling him that much by just the look in his eye. He wanted a commitment.

  Tegg answered, “I will have to do my homework, hmm? We’ll have to see what’s available.” He pointed to a file folder on a bale of hay. “Her records?” Seize control: That’s how you dealt with people like Wong Kei. The Asian passed him the folder.

  “We will begin looking for a donor immediately. How do I reach you?”

  Wong Kei removed a business card, wrote a phone number on the back of it, and handed it to Tegg.

  “You’ll be hearing from me,” Tegg said confidently.

  They didn’t shake hands. Wong Kei rose, crossed the darkened loft and disappeared down the stairs.

  Maybeck sat in the shadow of a post. “We’ll have to zoom the donor to get the heart. Am I right?” Maybeck asked.

  Believing Maybeck was nervous about this, Tegg returned to a justification decided upon many months earlier: “If one human life is sacrificed to save many, then what harm is done? If not one, but four, five, six lives are saved, does this not balance the scales?”

  Maybeck answered, “I just mean in terms of what we gotta do. We go zooming someone, this had better be big money.”

  Reading the file in the limited light, Tegg spoke without looking up, “Check the database for an AB-negative. She’ll have to be small: a hundred pounds tops. All you do is bring me the donor. You’ll be rich after this. Fifty thousand for your part. That’s what you want, isn’t it?”

  Through the cavity in the hayloft came the chorus of barking dogs. Among them, Tegg could hear Felix as clearly as if he alone were barking. Felix’s superiority in the ring confirmed Tegg’s brilliance. There would be more tests, of course; there always were. Life, it seemed, was one long test. Victory came not from a single win but from a series of accomplishments.

  He stopped to take one last look at Donnie Maybeck, who still hadn’t moved. Mention of that number had numbed him. Just right.

  As Tegg descended the stairs, he felt exhilarated. This was his chance to erase the slate, to prove something to himself, to give something back. He intended to make the most of it.

  FRIDAY

  February 3

  9

  Juggling his household chores and his role as Mr. Mom, Boldt visited two area blood banks Friday morning with his son Miles in tow. It was not until the second interview that he learned that the donation of whole blood was strictly voluntary. He had neglected to raise this question at the first location. Plasma centers paid, not blood banks.

  BloodLines Incorporated, Seattle’s only plasma center, occupied the back half of the ground floor of a former First Avenue warehouse which had, years before, been converted into retail space, then a dry cleaner/laundromat. Boldt remembered them both. A uniform rental shop now occupied the half that fronted First Avenue. Mannequins dressed as nurses and security guards stood at inanimate mock attention in the display windows. The entrance to the plasma center was from the side street, up four cement steps, through a set of glass doors stenciled in blue with the name BloodLines as well as a parent corporation, LifeWays Inc.—which in finer print turned out to be a subsidiary of The Atlanta Charter and Group Health Foundation. Boxes inside boxes, a reminder of Liz’s banking world.

  Reception held two orange-vinyl padded benches, each fronted by an oak-veneer coffee table stained with white rings and littered with thumb-worn, outdated copies of People Magazine. A pair of dusty-leafed silk ficus trees stood forlorn in opposing corners. The dirt bucket that held the closest one had been used as an ashtray. A large sign thanked you for not smoking. A Coke machine, its light burned out, hummed from across the expanse of institutional gray carpet. There were several doors leading from this room. The one most often used, Boldt saw—noticing the accumulated dirt around the doorknob—was to the left of reception, a high counter attended by a matronly woman wearing a nurse’s uniform that had probably been rented from next door. Behind her were shelves filled with files, marked with colorful alphabetized index tabs. Her name tag read, Mildred Hatch. She looked tired, suspicious and unhappy. A couple of Gary Larson cartoons were taped up for everyone to see.

  “You been with us before?” she asked. She was apparently used to a regular clientele. Boldt’s face didn’t jog her memory.

  “I’d like to speak to someone in administration, if I may.” Miles nearly got his hand on one of the cartoons. Boldt arranged himself to prevent another attempt.

  “Concerning?”

  “One of your donors.”

  “Not possible. That’s strictly confidential information. Can’t help you.” She pointed out a paragraph on a photocopied flyer, a stack of which waited to the right of a computer terminal.

  Boldt explained, “I’m not trying to find out who the person is. I already know that. I just need a few questions answered. Someone in administration, if you please.”

  “I don’t please. Not easily,” she warned. She found a pen. “Your name?” He told her. “Your company?”

  Boldt said, “Seattle Police Department.”

  It shocked her. She flushed. “Why didn’t you say so?” she asked angrily.

  “I was hoping I wouldn’t have to.”

  “The baby threw me off,” she explained. “You always lug her around?”

  “Him,” Boldt corrected.

  She looked closely at Miles for the first time. Briefly, she softened. He knew in an instant that she didn’t have any kids; and by her ring finger, no husband either. “Name of the donor?” she asked.

  “That’s strictly confidential,” Boldt said.

  Her eyes flashed cold like green glass marbles. She had plucked her eyebrows thin and bleached the hair above her lip. A real beauty. She had missed with her eye shadow.

  “Cynthia Chapman,” Boldt told her. “The donor’s name is Cynthia Chapman.” She consulted her terminal, striking the keyboard with blunt, stubby fingers. When she paused, there was something in her eyes that confirmed she had found the name.

  “She’s in there?” Boldt asked, his heart racing.

  The woman didn’t answer. She picked up the phone and spoke too softly for Boldt to hea
r. By the time she started her third call he said, “Today, if possible.”

  A street person entered, a bum in his mid-fifties, although a quick glance and the clothes might have fooled you. Not quite pressed but not all that wrinkled. Not exactly clean-shaven but not disgusting by any means. It was his worn-heeled, unpolished shoes that gave him away. That and the pungent scent of a cheap after-shave which attempted to cover a week without a shower. Boldt watched as this man located the clipboard and ran the attached pen through the multiple-choice boxes with the practiced efficiency of a regular. The man knew the routine. He signed it, handed it to Miss Mildred Hatch, and headed for the Coke machine. Blood sugar, Boldt thought. They drink the pops to keep from getting light-headed. He seemed a man more accustomed to Muscatel. He headed over to the orange seats and a back issue of People.

  Boldt wondered how they guaranteed a clean blood supply. Then he took one of the flyers and read, while Miss Hatch continued her two jobs simultaneously, the phone pasted in the crook of her neck, the bum’s application form being studied box-by-box, answer-by-answer. The blood was thoroughly tested for drugs, alcohol and AIDS, the flyer explained, a process that took four to seven days. Donors were personally interviewed each time they gave blood. By signing the form you were verifying your personal activities, sexual preferences and your working knowledge of the condition of your blood. Anyone caught lying would be permanently refused acceptance by any branch of BloodLines. The plasma was paid for only after it had cleared the testing labs. They paid fifteen dollars a pint. You could donate every forty-eight hours but no more than three times a week. It seemed impossible. “How can a person give blood three times a week?” he blurted out.

  Without looking up from her terminal, Mildred Hatch answered automatically, “We don’t take your blood, only the plasma. The red blood cells are returned to you during the process. The plasma is removed by a centrifuge. Your body replaces the plasma within twenty-four hours.” She glanced at him then, as if to say, “Don’t you know anything?” Boldt folded up the flyer and slipped it in behind Miles, who chose that moment to become vocal. Boldt found himself bouncing around the room in an effort to settle the boy down, the waiting donor’s attention fixed on him in a puzzled expression. Embarrassed, Boldt found the Men’s Room and prepared Miles a bottle. Little murmurs of satisfaction, little slurps of joy.