Falling Down

by David Cole

  Ken pulled over at a four-way stop, but motioned me to stay on the bike as he straddled the tank and anchored both boots on the shoulder of the road. He checked his cell phone, read off three text messages.

  “We’re looking for a barn,” he said. “You watch the left, I’ll watch the right, it’s supposed to be set back a hundred yards from the road. Probably a dirt track to the barn, past a single-story, flat-roofed house.”

  “Wait,” I said. “Before we get there. I don’t know what to expect.”

  “Expect the worst,” he said finally.

  Two miles later, I grabbed his shoulder, pointed to the house. Light sparkled in the distance, some of it from vehicle headlights. Passing the house in low gear, it looked typical of neighborhood houses in South Tucson, well landscaped and maintained over the forty or fifty years since it was built. No derelict cars or stuffed furniture baby toys lying haphazardly on a sandy front yard. Not that that’s typical of poorer neighborhoods, but I’d passed a lot of that random style of living while driving through South Tucson.

  The house was surrounded by tall and well-tended trees of all kinds. Palo verde, hackberry, a few mesquite, the house itself partially shadowed from the road by ten-foot-high oleander bushes. Sixty yards ahead, we saw the barn. An ancient RED MAN TOBACCO sign painted on the front side, almost erased by decades of wind and rain. Ken stopped the bike between a Mercedes and a Beemer, let me get off, and parked.

  Rusted pickups, a dozen motorcycles, two RV vans, five travel trailers, lots of brand-new SUVs of all makes, many expensive.

  “I thought this was a redneck thing,” I said.

  “Lots of money wagered in there, by all kinds of people. Just getting inside is expensive. The handlers usually pay three to five hundred dollars for each cock they enter.”

  “How do they figure odds? For gambling?”

  “No odds. You’ll hear people shouting out their bets, before the cocks are let loose and all through the match, sometimes people switch their money over to the cock they think is winning. Whoever is promoting this fight is the banker, all bets are with him, he’s the ‘house.’ I’ll follow the money, you shoot video of whatever you think best.”

  “Not the cocks,” I said. “I can’t watch one animal killing another.”

  “One thing,” he said to me. “Remember this one thing. Follow whatever I do. We’re acting, you’ve got to be exactly who you’re supposed to be. We’re at a cockfight, okay? Ever seen a cockfight?”

  “No.”

  “You’re not going to like it. But you can’t look away.”

  “Damn,” I said. “This is going to be hard.”

  “Just remember the only rule in there. You’re acting, you love cockfights. Okay? You geared up?”

  “Once we get to the door, I’ll start the camera, but it won’t run continuously. I’ll have to start and stop for what I think’s most important. I’ve got enough memory and battery power for about twenty minutes of video. Just the picture, I can do a small zoom, but not much. So get us seated as close as possible. So we can video whoever is running the fights.”

  “You ready to start?”

  He wrapped one arm around my waist, high, started the two of us walking to the front doorway where a huge Indian collected money. When the Indian’s eyes turned to us, Ken moved his hand higher to cup my breast and he turned his face to me, lips out, and I kissed him.

  “We’re on,” he said.

  Two men just inside the doorway, wearing headsets. They ran flashlights up and down our faces, just a random thing but enough to terrify me, each man with one hand on his flashlight and the other holding a pistol down at his side. Not at all apologetic, one took out a metal detector and hand-wanded each of us, then looked in my bag, probably checking for cameras or recording devices.

  Ken paid fifty dollars apiece to get us inside. The barn was huge, more of a warehouse, full of cars, pickups, and bikes parked all around the walls, about three vehicles deep. At the center, a rectangle of bleachers, eight rows high, surrounded a cock pit boarded off on all sides by three-foot-high sheets of plywood. The crowd roared, seated and standing on eight rows of graduated aluminum planking. I finally wedged between Ken and a biker wearing a blue denim vest and jeans so worn and faded they were almost white. Laundered, I saw. Ironed and pressed, creases on the sleeves and down each side of the front, the jeans six inches too long and folded back up like John Wayne used to wear them in his westerns. The biker smiled at me, dipped his longneck beer bottle at Ken just as two more fighting cocks were released in the ring.

  “Give us all they got!” he shouted at the ring, settling the bottle at his feet before he stood and yelled, even with the other people yelling and screaming the biker’s voice slicing through the intense noise. “Give us all they got!”

  People in front of me stood up just as I triggered the videocam button, but instead of standing I tried to wiggle sideways to shoot video between the people.

  “Stand up, Laura!” Ken said. Elbow in my ribs. “This is not a tennis match. If you act polite here, you’ll just stick out.”

  Blood squirted straight up from one of the cocks, staining the white feather around his neck. The other cock slashed again, so quickly I didn’t even see the wound, but the bloody cock flew sideways, head mostly severed from the body, feet moving for another twenty seconds. When the fight ended, the winning cock hoisted by his handler, the loser, dead, was carried off unceremoniously. I tried to look away, but Ken jabbed me with his elbow and I shouted and applauded. At one corner of the cockpit, I saw that the fights were being recorded by a digital video camera mounted on a tripod. Diametrically across the pit, another camera. While waiting for the next bout, the two cameras made periodic sweeps of the audience and I saw the camera’s zoom lenses working.

  “The video game,” I said in Ken’s ear. “Here’s where they shoot the digital video that gets processed for the animated video games.”

  I saw one videographer give directions to the other via a headset. Ken nudged me as the promoter of the fight gave directions to the next pair of cock handlers and the videographers.

  “Hoyo,” the promoter shouted to the next pair of men that swiveled themselves over the boards, both men bringing cocks to the center of the pit, allowing the two cocks to swipe beaks against each other. Two other men came into the pit, holding the steel gaffs, even from my seat in the top row I could see the gaffs were nearly four inches long, ending in a sharp steel point. Gaffs were attached to the bone spurs of each cock, and everybody except the handlers left the ring. They knelt to the sandy floor, held out the cocks toward each other, and released them with a flurry of wings and feathers, each bird kicking out, dodging, slicing, pecking once in a while but keeping their strikes moving toward the other cock until one scored a direct blow to the head, instantly killing the other cock. The victor was carried off over his handler’s head, the body of the loser disappearing with his handler to behind the stands.

  “Ésta es la primera lucha semifinal,” the promoter shouted.

  “The first of the semifinal fights,” Ken said to me.

  “De Nogales, el campeón, luchas de Renaldo Roo. Veintiséis como ganador, él les mató todos. Y de Yuma, el desafiador, Arnold el asesino. Diecinueve matanzas.”

  “Champion, twenty-six kills. Challenger, nineteen,” Ken said. “That promoter isn’t speaking very good Spanish. I’m watching him, so get him on video and then record whatever you want.”

  “Para ambos gamecocks. Celebre su fuerza y salude su honor,” the promoter shouted, circling his arms to bring the two cocks and their handlers to the center of the ring. The crowd stood and cheered.

  “Fuerza y honor!” the crowd shouted. The biker beside me shouted, “Strength and honor. Strength and honor.”

  “Las maquinillas de afeitar!” the promoter shouted.

  For this match, the needle-pointed spurs weren’t held up. Instead, I saw what looked like knives, like razors, being strapped to the cocks. I grabbed Ke
n’s arm, tried to stop biting my lower lip, tried to look enthusiastic at the bloody spectacle of a fight that lasted almost nine minutes, the crowd on its feet roaring for one bird or the other, calling out bets of hundreds of dollars, until both cocks collapsed, exhausted, heads moving slowly, warily, and then the challenger cock made a sideways slice and killed the champion.

  After the last fight, the crowd dispersed quickly, the vehicles inside the barn leaving through two side gated doors. A crew began tearing down the bleachers. Ouside, I wanted to follow the main videographer, but Ken just shook his head, knelt beside his Harley as though fixing a part.

  Only a few vehicles left, the promoter finally walked out and headed toward a Porsche SUV. Ken motioned for me to get on the Harley, he kick-started it, we moved slowly across the parking lot toward the Porsche, and just as we came alongside the promoter, Ken threw out an arm and knocked him to the ground. Ken quickly stopped the Harley, killed the engine, and jumped off, motioning for me to steady the bike while he sat astride the promoter and punched him twice in the jaw.

  “In the saddlebag,” Ken said. “In the right saddlebag, some duct tape.”

  I threw the roll to him, Ken duct-taping the promoter’s mouth shut and then flopping him on his stomach and taping his hands together. Taking the Porsche’s keys, Ken toggled the alarm system off and swung the promoter into the back seat.

  “Get in,” he shouted to me, and we drove away into the desert.

  25

  The middle of nowhere, completely off-road in the desert. Promoter conscious in the back seat, lying still, eyes on us calmly. Ken motioned me to get outside, came around the front of the Porsche to talk.

  “What you’re going to see now,” he said. Sheet metal hood tinking as it cooled, the night air intolerably humid and hot, sweat all over my body.

  “Yes?”

  “I’ve got to do something, with this guy, something I haven’t done in years. I’ve got to make him afraid for his life, I’ve got to make him truly fear me, truly believe that I am the wrath of the Lord. But. Laura. Remember that what you’ll see me do and say will not be me.”

  “All right.”

  “I used to be that kind of man,” Ken said. “Let’s just hope I remember what to do. But you, don’t say or do anything, okay?”

  “Sure, okay.”

  Around to his side of the Porsche SUV, yanking open the back door and pulling the man out, both Ken’s hands on the man’s belt buckle, dumping him crudely on the caliche. Ken took out a pocketknife, opened a blade, cut away the duct tape from the man’s mouth, ripping out several chunks of blond hair caught in the tape. Rolling the man over, he flicked a wallet out of the man’s back pocket, then cut the tape off his hands.

  Ken knelt, pulling out a huge chrome-plated .357 revolver.

  “Nice rodeo buckle you’re wearing there,” Ken said.

  He bent over, hands on knees, focused on the silver buckle about the size of a salad plate.

  “Broncs? Calgary? I can’t quite read that, son. Take off your belt, I want to read what’s on the buckle, I’ve got to take it in front of the headlights, so I can see what you rode to win that thing.”

  “Fuck you,” the man said.

  “Who is this jag-off?” Ken said. I’d opened his wallet, held a flashlight so Ken could read the name on the driver’s license.

  “Max Cady,” Ken said. “Hello, Mr. Max Cady.”

  “He’s not Max Cady,” I said. Giggling, nervous, but it was still funny. “Oops.” I’d already forgotten I wasn’t supposed to say anything, but Ken didn’t mind, eyebrows cocked into question marks, eyes cutting between me and Cady.

  “You’re not Robert Mitchum,” I said.

  The man’s face immobile.

  “You’re not Robert De Niro, either.”

  A tiny smile on his lips, if the flashlight wasn’t right on his face I wouldn’t have seen it.

  “So who’s the real Max Cady?” Ken said.

  “It’s a part in a movie,” I said. “Cape Fear. A sociopath is released from prison and terrifies the lawyer who sent him there.”

  “Let’s have that belt, Max,” Ken said.

  “Not takin’ my pants off,” Cady said.

  “Just the belt.”

  “Not lettin’ my pants down, I don’t do that except for ladies.” He turned to me. “’Less you want to see my bidness? I’ll untuck it for you.”

  Ken swept the cowboy hat off Cady’s head, stood back. “Just a moment,” he said. Pulled me aside, back a few steps. “What I’m going to do next, Laura. It’s just acting, remember, you’ve got to play your part.”

  “Acting, what do you mean, acting?”

  “Don’t you believe for a minute that what you’re going to see me do is in any way the real me. Just a piece of acting, here.” He turned back to Cady. “Now, bud, let’s start the ball.”

  “Not takin’ my pants down for you, homo.”

  Ken leisurely stretched out his hand with the .357, whacked Cady on the right elbow. “The belt first. That’s for your attitude. Then we’ll get to the questions. Now, this is the sticky part.”

  “Ask what you want. Let’s get done with this, I’ve got two women to see.”

  “Gonna be like strip poker,” Ken said. “You shuck off a question, you shuck off part of your clothes. You answer a question, you give me an answer I’d really put in the church poor box, you get to put something back on. Start with the belt. Get it off.”

  Cady removed his belt, held it out.

  “Just drop it,” Ken said. “Now. You got the rules? Only two answers possible to my questions. The right answer, or take off more clothes. First question. Who do you work for?”

  “Nobody.”

  “You don’t believe me, son. You’re not really afraid of me, right?”

  “I know who you are,” Cady said. “You’re that has-been cop. You used to work Vice, but you were a total fuckup. People saw you coming along, they didn’t move away, they just laughed at your ass.”

  “Ezekiel,” Ken said. “The Book of Ezekiel. Chapter twenty-five, verse seventeen. You can look it up, it’s in the Bible.”

  “Ah,” Cady said. “Now, that’s real sweet. You’re gonna preach on me, you’re gonna save my soul.”

  “‘The path of the righteous man,’” Ken said, “‘is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he, who in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother’s keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who would attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee.’”

  “That’s just from some stupid movie,” Cady said. “And you aren’t even a nigger, saying that dumb shit.”

  “Sit down,” Ken said. Voice dropping at least four notes. “Pull off a boot.”

  Cady didn’t protest, his face a mask. He leaned against the Porsche, slid down with his back against it, and tugged off his right boot.

  “Twelve-inch alligator tops,” Ken said. “From Paul Bond. Now, that’s truly the finest boot made. Myself, I’ve just got some standard lizardskin boots. Handmade, sure. But not so fancy as alligator. Too bad, looks like your feet are a couple sizes smaller than mine. Let’s try that question again. Who do you work for?”

  “Myself.” Cady’s face totally blank, as though he were concentrating on something entirely remote, like playing solitaire on a computer.

  “The other boot.”

  Once it was off, Ken reached down, handed both boots to me with his pocketknife.

  “Slash his boot tops.”

  I stabbed through the alligator skin, ripping long swaths through each boot.

  “Now,” Ken said. “I’ve just called some honest-to-God Jesus fire down on your boots. Next wrong answer, that Jesus fire lightning bolt comes right out of this .357, comes right down on your ba
lls. So. There’s no mistake here, you know what I’ll do. Tell you what, though. We’ll let that question slide awhile. Who do you work for, we’ll come back to that. Who was the person who shot the video?”

  For the first time, Cady looked surprised, his head bobbing from Ken to me and back to Ken.

  “Deb,” he said. “Deb. I don’t know her last name.”

  “Deb No Last Name. Does she work for you?”

  “No. I arrange the fights, she turns up with her crew. I never see pictures.”

  “So do you both work for the same person?”

  “No. Yeah. I guess so.”

  “And that person’s name?” Ken said.

  “I don’t know, honest to Christ, I don’t know.”

  “Okay. Where do the fighting cocks come from?”

  “All over, man, that’s easy. The champion cocks come up from Sonora.”

  “Okay, third and last time. Somebody arranges all this, somebody further up the food chain from you. So, who is it?”

  Cady didn’t answer, Ken fired his .357 a foot away from and alongside Cady’s head, black goo trickling out the left ear.

  “Goddamn!” Cady said.

  “You beginning to see a pattern in my questions?” Ken said.

  “I’m just somebody in the food chain,” Cady said. “I get cell phone instructions from somebody I’ve never met. He tells me where and when, I hire a crew and run the matches. But I can’t give you no names, man.”

  Ken fired again, alongside the other ear. Blood trickled from the ear and the promoter wiped at it, groggy, wincing.

  “Why are you so interested in cockfights anyway?” he said. “The real money is in the dogs.”

  “You stage dogfights?”

  “No. Somebody else does that.”

  “Back to names,” Ken said. “Is it the same person?”

  “Do you work for the maras?” I said.

  “Oh, man. Oh, Christ, man.” Cady blanched in terror. “Come on, man! I’m not saying anything more.”

  “The videotapes,” I said. “What happens with the videotapes?”