Sarah got to the steps and stopped there.
“Clayton said I could come down. I just need to talk to him a minute,” she said.
Wallace nodded.
“He’s up in the office.”
She walked the steps and Wallace watched her climb. Sarah turned at the door. She was looking out to the front lot. Wallace squinted and leaned forward a little and then sat back.
“She looks like you.”
“That’s what I hear,” Sarah said. “Your boys alright?”
“The boys are good. Smart.”
Sarah smiled.
“I’ll keep an eye on her,” Wallace said.
Sarah went onto the porch and opened the screen door. Behind that a steel security door and it was wide open. The main floor of the house had two large rooms, one of them furnished full with bunks against the wall, what looked like a bathroom entrance. There was no kitchen. Sarah took a step inside.
“Where the other guys at?” she said. “The ones those cars belong to.”
Wallace studied her.
“They’re around here somewheres,” he said.
He nodded toward the house.
“Go on in,” he said.
So she went.
Clayton sat with his hands clasped together atop the desk. He read figures in a ledger. When Sarah came in he leaned back and closed the ledger and pushed it aside and then he motioned to the chair on the other side of the desk.
“You need a drink?” he said. “I don’t know what I’ve got. Don’t get too many visitors out here.”
“It’s okay,” she said. “I’m not staying long.”
He raised his eyebrows, set his hands on his thighs. Even at rest in the house he wore a white dress shirt tucked into dark-blue jeans, not a wrinkle in the fabric.
“Shoot,” he said.
“What did you do to him last night?” she said.
“Pardon?”
“What did you make him do?”
“I can’t make him do anything he doesn’t care to,” Clayton said.
“You’ve known Daniel almost his whole life,” Sarah said. “And Wallace, I don’t know?”
“He was about thirteen.”
“If Dan was your son would you let him be involved in this shit?”
Clayton thought on it some. Shrugged at her.
“He’s not.”
Sarah stared at him a long time. He didn’t speak and he didn’t speak and then reached for a drawer in the desk. Came back with an envelope and dropped it on the desk before her. She didn’t have to open it to know what it was. Or to guess how much you could fit in an envelope like that.
Sarah shook her head once.
“I don’t need your fuckin’ charity,” she said. “I just need him to come home in one piece.
“He’s good at this, Sarah. You should just let him work.”
She stood and took her purse up from the chair. She looked around the room. Old hunting rifles hung in brackets on the one wall. Furniture made from great chunks of driftwood dredged from the bay. Paintings that she knew even he could not afford. Two framed diplomas on the wall nearest to the desk, plain to read from either side. The one from a polytechnic criminology program and the other a certification for risk management. There were no photographs on the wall or the desk and Sarah found that strange. Clayton had brothers and cousins in the region. Some of whom she knew him to be close enough to. He’d been married young to a full-blood Mohawk woman but she’d been gone some twenty years. Killed in her sleep by an aneurysm. No trace of her anywhere.
“Not long and we’ll have enough money,” Sarah said.
“From working with the geriatrics, with the pills and pisspails?”
“I got plans,” she said.
Clayton said okay. He still hadn’t reached for the envelope.
“He’s got a line on how to get the truck rig back,” she said. “It doesn’t matter.”
“You and I both know that he can’t afford a new rig.”
“It ain’t the new rig. He knows the fella who took it.”
Clayton sat up straighter in the chair. He tried to pretend he hadn’t.
“How’s that?” he said.
“You don’t think he’s got people who’ll tell him shit he wants to know? Better than that. People like him. Some’ll talk to him even without threat or coercion. Can you imagine?”
Clayton settled some.
“Well, good,” he said.
Sarah went to the door. Opened it and held the knob but didn’t go.
“The old man would’ve killed you over this shit. Had he lived to see it. You know that, right?” she said.
Clayton nodded.
“Maybe,” he said.
Sarah closed the door behind her and walked the hall. Kept her eyes on the office door. She had to watch her feet as she stepped quick down the winding staircase.
When Sarah came out of the house Wallace’s chair was empty. She could see him standing out in the middle of the lot, watching her truck. Three men were getting into a black sedan. The driver was standing between his car and her truck, talking to Madelyn through the window. He had very blonde hair and an odd way about him. He was handling something as he spoke with the girl. Sarah crossed the lot to Wallace.
“Everything good?” he said.
“Yeah,” she said, but she’d not take her eyes off the blonde man.
“It’s okay,” Wallace said. “He’s Clayton’s nephew.”
Someone called to the driver from inside the car and he turned and spoke at them. He looked back to Madelyn and handed her the thing in his hand. It was the knife she’d bought, drawn full with the hilt toward the girl. Madelyn folded the blade while he watched and he said something else before he got into the car and fired the engine.
“Jesus H. fucking Christ,” Sarah said.
Wallace looked to her.
“Thanks, Wallace,” she said.
“No problem,” he said.
She found the keys and started for the truck. Wallace walked her over.
“Why is it that the main part of that house is all upstairs?” she said as they went. “All the living rooms and the kitchen and everything.”
“Clayton’s idea,” Wallace said. “He says it’s a lot easier just to defend a staircase.”
Sarah asked no more. She left Wallace at the edge of the lot and he waited while she brought the truck around to leave. Sarah waved and Wallace raised a hand. She drove up the grade and left the grounds with her daughter and long after they were gone the man yet stood there, watching the pass while the daylight crept out.
FIVE
Daniel walked the perimeter of the place with his eyes on the house. Nothing stirred and the drapes were down in the windows of the oddly shaped bungalow. The side panels were stained wood but they’d long lost their colour and begun to curl. Some had fallen. The house was penned in by woods on all sides save for a winding drive that led down to the forest road. Daniel could see clear to distant baywater through a patchy section of the treeline. There were snowmobiles dismantled in the yard and rusting to nought on the tallgrass. Old tow-trailers piled somehow in one corner of the grounds. A makeshift service mechanic’s garage attached to the main part of the house, a sign there that said what they can’t fix can’t be fixed. The garage door had been pulled shut and bolted. No vehicles in the driveway that led to it.
Near a busted tree stump Daniel got to his haunches with a good sightline to the back windows of the house. The decking built there. He waited there long enough to know that if anyone was home they were laid low or sleeping. Then he trod the yard toward the house, light as he could go. He kept an eye on his feet, wary of traps that might’ve been planted there, intentionally or not. Near to the deck there was another big stump with a small woodpile aside it and a
n axe stuck out of the top of the thing. Daniel walked over to it and freed the axe. Felt the heft of it by one hand. He carried it off and climbed the steps slow.
Through little gaps in the curtain he could see some of the house. Living room of antiquated furniture and old heirlooms and photographs, all kept immaculate. No cans or clutter anywhere in the place. He took hold of the sliding-door handle by two fingers and pulled small. It shifted. He stood there a minute and listened to the house. Then he slid the door open and moved through the curtains.
Daniel stood in the dim main room with the axe hung low at his side. He listened and he listened. Scent of dust and dry timber, faint chemical smell that he couldn’t identify. There was a TV in the one corner of the room and a stereo system on the wall to the side of it. All of it turned off, as well as the lamps and ceiling lights. He went through to the kitchen and saw a dishrack empty and bone dry on the sink counter. No kettles or coffee pots. Room by room he walked the house and a strangeness built in him as he went. Clothes hung in the bedroom on a pole fixed into a cutaway in the one wall, a gap in the middle with just empty hangers there. No sign of the man anywhere and Daniel made his way through the house again to be sure. The garage wouldn’t even tell him anything, with the tools racked and some beside snowmobiles and cars, and no way to tell if they were waiting there or left for good. He couldn’t even guess if a vehicle was missing as he’d no way of knowing how many were there to start.
On his way out he stopped again in the kitchen and looked through cupboards and drawers. The fridge was near empty when he opened it, save for a couple bottles of beer and some condiments, freezer full with vacuum-packed meats. Daniel took one of the beers and sat the counter with the axe laid over the sink basins. He turned the cap and drank. When he left the place he closed the glass sliding door over and then the screen door. Down in the yard he raised the axe and drove it back into the stump where he’d found it. He turned to the house again and examined the place. Daniel couldn’t remember opening the screen door so he went up and started sliding it back. Halfway he stopped and leant close, knelt on the decklumber. There was a clean slit through the screenmesh long enough for him to get his hand through and feel the simple latch on the other side. Daniel cleared his hand and turned quick to the yard. Bird cries in the deep wood. After awhile he slid the screen door full open and left the place by a foot trail that led down to the valley and the town proper.
SIX
Daniel hung up the phone and set the receiver down on his kitchen table. He went back outside to the front steps and sat down on the cold concrete and stared out at the dirt road to their house. Old telegraph lines were strung high above, swaying some in the twilight. Frantic shape of a bat flying, hunting mosquitos. A near-full bottle of beer sat on the step beside Daniel and he picked it up and poured it out on the grass. He leaned back with his palms on the stone beside him and there he waited until he saw a speck of light appear way out in the blackness. He watched that light swell and split into two and come down the road twinned, brighter and brighter as they neared.
When the truck pulled into the driveway, Daniel sat there for another few seconds and then he stood up and brushed the grit off of his jeans. The driver door popped and Sarah shoved it open and got out and slung the straps of her purse up over her shoulder. The girl got out on the other side and swatted the door closed. Hustled on toward the house with grocery bags dangling from either hand. She passed without a word and went in. Daniel met his wife at the truck and Sarah handed him one bag and he kept his hand out for more but she’d not give him anything. She reached into the cab again and took out three grocery bags and shoved the door shut with her hip.
“How was it?” he said.
“Long,” she said.
Daniel nodded toward the house.
“What’s her malfunction?” he said.
“Where to start,” Sarah said. “You been home awhile?”
“Yeah,” he said. “I was just sitting out.”
“I didn’t know we’d be gone so long. It got dark in a hurry.”
“That’s alright,” he said.
“How’d it go out in the hills?”
Daniel shook his head no. He reached down and took hold of the bags she had with his free hand. Lifted them and tugged. Finally she gave them up and followed him to the house. She went by him to get the door but she didn’t open it.
“What’s the matter?” she said.
“I don’t know yet,” he said. “Probably nothin’.”
She looked him up and down.
“There’s food in here,” he said. “I don’t know how good it is, and I know for sure it ain’t hot. But you could probably eat it.”
“I’ll be the judge of that,” she said, and pulled the door open. He lingered.
“When d’you work at?” he said.
She kneed him in the asscheek and there he did move. The screen door swung and latched.
“Too soon,” she said. “But we’ve got some time.”
She kissed him at his chin and walked through to the kitchen. Flicked the lights on full and started moving plates about. Madelyn was in there unloading the bags she’d carried. Daniel took one last look at the outer dark and then he followed them inside.
At midnight Daniel sat out on the step again. Sarah had taken the truck hours before and Madelyn had fallen asleep atop her covers with her clothes on and her little TV flickering in the corner of the room. He’d looked in on her three times while he waited. When the car pulled into his driveway he held his index finger up to his lips. The driver nodded. Daniel stood and stepped back into the house.
He came out a few seconds later with his jacket on and the driver of the car got out careful and left the door open.
“Hey Murr,” Daniel said and shook the man’s hand. “Thanks for comin’ by.”
“No worries,” the man said.
“I know it’s twice in one day, but I can’t have those motherfuckers drivin’ out to the house.”
“No way,” Murray said. “I get it.”
The man was in his late fifties and stood about five-foot-eight with thick, salt and pepper hair that could have used a cut some weeks ago. Worn-out jeans and boots on him, button-up plaids over his wide shoulders. Rough brown skin through his cheeks and chin though he’d nothing to shave but the moustache that grew thin at his upper lip.
“There’s a full tank in that old bastard,” he said.
Daniel nodded. He took a long look at the black Monte Carlo, idling on the drive.
“Door’s open,” Daniel said. “And you know the girl won’t wake up to the TV or anything.”
“What do you want me to tell her if she wakes up?”
“Just tell her I’ll be back shortly. And don’t take any shit.”
“And what about your old lady? What does she know?”
Daniel took the keys from Murray.
“That’s a tomorrow problem,” he said. “Today ain’t over yet.”
Murray clapped Daniel on the shoulder hard and then started for the house. Daniel was getting into the car when Murray came tip-toeing back, pointing at something in the car. A six-pack of tallboys were stood on the passenger seat leather. Daniel grabbed it by the rings and handed it over.
“Shit,” Murray said. “Almost blew the whole deal before it got started.”
“I got beer in there,” Daniel said.
“Well, you might not later.”
Daniel closed the door and Murray pushed it snug. He waited there a second with his thumbs hooked under the top of the window frame, fingers flat to the roof.
“Be careful, bud,” Murray said, then he put his hand out again and Daniel took it. The old man seemed like he might pulp Daniel’s fingers. Concern in his dark eyes.
“I’ll be back in a couple hours,” Daniel said.
Murray nodded and let go. He w
ent toward the house and up the steps. Daniel let the gearshift down and backed out of the drive as slow as he could. He waited there in the lane until he saw the door of his house close over and then he crept the car down the road. Seconds gone and he could see the glow of the porch lamp but small in his rearview mirror. There he thumped the gas pedal and the tires threw broken chips of brittle tarmac as he went townward through cold and lightless country.
They were waiting for him this time. Wallace stood beside the windowless black van, sat crooked on an empty concrete lot. Daniel had parked the car a block away and came over on foot. No vehicles passed on the bordering streets and the area was poorly lit. Grid of industrial plazas and storage lockers and low-rent warehouses guarded only by dogs and decoy cameras. They were at the western limits of a suburban boomtown between the northern counties and the city proper, a part of the town that development had skipped over or forgot outright. The lights of the town carpeted a mountain-rise to the east. To the west there were abandoned train tracks aside a rude, skeletal wood and further lay swamp and wildgrass and nothingness.
Daniel stepped light and Wallace didn’t see him until he’d got within twenty feet of the van. Wallace’s hand went into his coat for a second and then came back out. He shook his head, leaned down and put his hands on his knees. When he stood up again Daniel could see the pistols under his jacket, Kevlar strapped loose to his chest over a black T-shirt. The van’s side door had been left open a crack and now Wallace slid it gentle to the side.
Clayton sat on his haunches with two other men that Daniel had seen before and one that he hadn’t. The two men he knew were Mike Moreau and Troy Armstrong, thieves and gun thugs that Clayton hired regular. They had tactical shotguns resting across their knees. Each of them held the pistol grip with their index fingers pressed flat against the trigger guard. The man that Daniel didn’t know had short blonde hair and a scar that ran the length of his scalp and trailed off into his left eyebrow. Wiry man and broad under his bandit blacks and flak jacket. Built much like Clayton, but on a plainly larger frame. His eyes were so pale that they did not seem real. That man had his back against the barrier between the front and rear of the van, his legs laid out full, one crossed one over the other at the ankle. Combat boots under black cargo pants. He stared at Daniel long enough that the other men shuffled in their gear. When Clayton started speaking the man quit it and looked out vacantly at the streets and lots beyond.
In the Cage Page 4