The Book With No Name

by AnonYMous

  ‘I sure do, Ms Price.’

  Jensen pulled out a wallet from the inside pocket of his blazer. He extracted a library card and driver’s licence from it and handed them to the librarian, who was now looking disgruntled again. She snatched them away, studied them for less than a second and then dropped them back on the counter.

  ‘Funny,’ she said. ‘Aside from being black, you look nothing like Denzel Washington.’

  Her manner implied that she too had seen Man On Fire and that she knew Jensen was lying about who he was. Even so, he mused, why should a librarian be so suspicious of a man who could prove who he was? Maybe he needed to stop using the name John Creasy. It would be a pity because he rather liked it, but if a librarian could see through his fake identification, then any criminal genius could certainly do so.

  ‘So what do you know of this book?’ he asked again.

  ‘Nothing,’ she replied. She had traded her sour look for a smug smile. ‘Except that a lady named Annabel de Frugyn took it out recently.’

  ‘You said you know almost all the customers, right? Me apart, that is.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So can you tell me where Annabel de Frugyn lives?’

  ‘Her address isn’t listed.’

  ‘I didn’t ask if it was listed,’ Jensen’s voice suddenly acquired a more authoritative tone. ‘I asked if you knew where she lived.’

  ‘She’s a gypsy. She doesn’t live anywhere.’

  ‘And you loan books to someone with no address?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I can.’ She held his gaze, her face expressionless.

  Jensen leaned forward and placed both hands on the reception desk. He brought his face close enough to Ulrika Price’s to make it clear that he was trying to intimidate her.

  ‘Take a guess at where I might find her,’ he said coolly. ‘Her life is in danger. If I don’t find her and she’s murdered, I’m going to hold you responsible.’

  ‘You’re a cop, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes. I am. And it’s your public duty as an upstanding librarian in this shitty town to help me out. Now where can I find Annabel de Frugyn?’

  ‘She lives in a trailer, but she never stays in the same place two nights running. That’s all I know.’

  ‘That’s all you know?’ Jensen was sceptical, and it showed.

  ‘Well, not quite,’ sighed Ms Price. Then she took a deep breath and said, ‘There is something else that you might be interested in.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Another man came in asking about her and the book this morning.’

  ‘What man? What did he look like?’

  Ulrika Price suddenly seemed to become distressed. She even shivered slightly. Her cold stare and air of absolute rectitude had evaporated.

  ‘It was him. The man with no face.’

  ‘No face? What the f— … What do you mean, no face? Was he wearing a mask, or what?’

  ‘He never shows his face,’ she answered, very softly. Her voice was trembling and her eyes began to well up. Jensen began to feel slightly guilty for having tried to intimidate her and moved his head back a little to give her more space. ‘It was the hooded man,’ she went on. ‘We’ve not seen him in Santa Mondega since just before the last eclipse. Now he’s been in here twice.’

  ‘What hooded man? Was it the Bourbon Kid? You’ve heard of the Bourbon Kid, right?’ His excitement was palpable.

  ‘Yes, I’ve heard of him. Everyone has. But like I said, I never saw this man’s face so I couldn’t tell you if it was him or not. Not that I ever saw … that other man’s face.’

  Jensen began to drum his fingers on the counter. This was something he often did when thinking on his feet. The drumming set a tempo that somehow made his mind sharper. It was time to step up the pace of the questioning.

  ‘Okay, okay. So what did you tell this hooded man?’ he asked, with considerable urgency.

  ‘I did something a little bit stupid.’ Again the low, soft voice.

  ‘What do you mean? What did you do?’ Get a goddam move on, he thought to himself.

  ‘I gave him an address for Annabel de Frugyn.’

  ‘But you just said she didn’t have an address.’

  ‘She doesn’t. I gave him the address of a local gang boss. A man named El Santino.’

  ‘El Santino? I don’t understand. Why would you want to do that?’

  ‘Because if this hooded man is the Bourbon Kid, then he killed my husband five years ago. I figured if I sent him to El Santino’s house they might get into a fight. El Santino is the only man who could kill the Bourbon Kid. If he did, then I’d have revenge for what he took from me five years ago.’

  Jensen stepped back from the desk. This woman really had caught him on the hop. The meddlesome bitch. She had given him some useful information, but now he had to figure out what to do with it all. First thing would be to get hold of Somers and concoct a plan together. He had one last question for Ulrika Price, though.

  ‘You said this hooded man had been in twice, right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What happened the time before?’

  ‘It was a couple of weeks ago. It cleared everyone out in a second. Everyone was scared. Only the staff stayed in here. He came up to my desk and asked me to let him use my computer.’

  ‘And you let him … right?’

  ‘Well, what else could I do? I was petrified.’

  ‘So what did he use the computer for?’

  ‘He was only on it for a minute. He wrote down a list of names and then he was gone.’

  ‘Did you see the list of names?’

  The librarian sniffed, as if the tears that were glistening in the corners of her eyes were close to getting the better of her.

  ‘No, but when he’d gone I checked what he’d been looking at. He’d been checking out the names of all the people who had read the book without a name.’

  This was all starting to make sense to Miles Jensen. The Kid had found the names of all the people who had read the book and set about killing them, although it still didn’t explain the deaths of the Garcias. Or Elvis, come to that. But he now had another question.

  ‘Ms Price. Did you know a couple name of Thomas and Audrey Garcia?’

  Ulrika nodded and sniffed a little more. ‘Yes, Audrey used to come in here sometimes. She never took any books out, but she did read them on the premises. I believe she read the book with no name once a few months ago.’

  ‘I see. Did you tell the hooded man this?’

  ‘No, I didn’t tell him anything.’

  ‘Okay. Thank you, Ms Price,’ said Jensen picking up, the John Creasy ID papers and putting them back in his inside pocket. ‘Listen, my real name is Miles Jensen. Detective Jensen.’ He produced his badge and showed it to her, before continuing, ‘If you should happen to remember anything else you think I should know, no matter how trivial it might seem, you call me at the Santa Mondega Police Headquarters. If I’m not around, ask for a detective name of Archibald Somers.’

  Ulrika Price raised her eyebrow again. ‘Archie Somers? Is he back on the force?’

  ‘Yeah, kind of. You know him?’

  ‘Of course I do. That man made a total mess of the whole investigation into the Bourbon Kid murders. He’s the reason they never found my husband’s killer.’

  ‘I’ll find your husband’s killer, Ms Price. Fact is, Archie Somers has been a big help. He knows a lot of the history of this case. Rest assured though, I’m in charge. It won’t get messed up this time.’

  Ulrika smiled as if reassured by Jensen’s confidence in his own ability.

  ‘Thank you,’ she whispered.

  ‘No problem. You take care now, Ms Price.’

  Jensen made his way out of the library, deep in thought. While he was walking through the front doors and back on to the street, Ulrika Price was picking up her desk phone and making a call. The phone rang only once before it was answered with
the single word ‘Hello.’

  ‘Hi, it’s Ulrika at the library … Miles Jensen has just been in … Yes, I told him exactly what you told me to tell him … Yes, exactly.’

  Thirty-Four

  ‘Peto! Wake up! Wake up, it’s me, Kyle. Are you okay?’

  ‘What happened? Oh, my head. Ow!’

  Peto could feel his head pounding as if he had been hit by a train. Where the hell was he, though? All he could see was Kyle’s face above him in the middle of a clear white sky. It felt like he’d been laid out on some grass. But why? And how did he get here?

  ‘You got beaten in the first round, just like we planned,’ said Kyle, grinning down at him. ‘You didn’t do a very good job of making it look real, though. You could at least have hit him a couple of times before going down.’

  ‘Huh? What?’

  ‘Come on, Peto. Stop fooling around. You were supposed to be pretending during the fight, not afterwards. No one’s watching now.’

  ‘Kyle, where am I?’

  ‘We’re outside, with the doctors.’

  Peto twisted his head to the left. An ambulance was parked a few feet away, with a doctor in a white coat and wearing a stethoscope around his neck leaning against the back of it, smiling at him. Peto’s whole body felt like a dead weight and he wasn’t sure he would be able to move if he tried. He could smell the fresh air and he could see he was lying on some thin grass on sandy ground outside a large tent, but the events leading up to how he got there were still a little hazy. Quite a lot hazy, in fact.

  ‘Is that the tent where the boxing was?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes, but come on,’ said Kyle impatiently. ‘Snap out of it. We’re meeting that nice Rodeo Rex fellow for a drink any time now.’

  ‘Nice fellow? He nearly killed me. The man’s a psycho.’

  Up to this moment it had simply not dawned on Kyle that his Hubal brother might possibly be seriously hurt.

  ‘Huh? Weren’t you faking it, then?’

  ‘Fuck no! Did I look like I was faking it? The guy nearly knocked my fucking head clean off my fucking shoulders. Shit.’ A thought suddenly struck him. ‘Have I still got all my teeth?’

  Kyle was willing to overlook the swearing for a moment while Peto regained his composure.

  ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘Apparently Rex eased off on the punch to make sure he didn’t knock any teeth out. Nice of him, don’t you think?’

  ‘Oh yeah, buy the man a drink. Fucking hell, my fucking head. Fuck.’

  The swearing amnesty was now over. Kyle had tolerated as much of it as he was prepared to. ‘Can you cut out the swearing, please, Peto? I find it rather unnecessary.’

  ‘Fine. Let Rodeo Rex hit you in the fucking head. See how you feel, fuckhead.’

  Peto sat himself bolt upright and glared at the other monk. The sudden movement made him feel a little light-headed, though and he spent the next few seconds blinking for all he was worth. Kyle, although sympathetic to the beating Peto had just taken, was not impressed by his friend’s aggressive demeanour.

  ‘Hey, calm down,’ he ordered.

  ‘I am calm. Do I look calm?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, let’s just assume that I am calm. Okay?’

  ‘Okay.’

  Kyle helped the novice to his feet and spent a few seconds showing him how to walk again. Once Peto’s head had cleared sufficiently they made their way into a large beer tent not far away. Time for a glass of water.

  Thirty-Five

  Rodeo Rex was lapping up the attention of the crowd. They loved him, and he loved them for loving him. In all the excitement and action Sanchez had somehow become his corner man. This was probably the greatest honour that had ever been bestowed upon the bartender. He had known Rex for many years, for the fighter often stopped off at the Tapioca for a drink when he was in town. He was only ever in Santa Mondega for a few weeks at a time, but he really livened things up when he was around. He told great stories that usually involved him beating someone up, or in many cases beating up gangs of thugs to win the heart of some beautiful girl.

  He had just defeated his fourth straight victim after Peto, and it was beginning to look as though no one else was going to challenge him. Sanchez was standing with one foot on the bottom rope of the ring, trying to reach up with his towel to mop the sweat from Rex’s brow as they waited for the next volunteer.

  ‘You come to town just for the fights, or are you here on business?’ he asked, realizing that he was now more out of breath than Rex.

  ‘Business. This is just a quick warm-up for some shit I gotta do later.’

  ‘Killing anyone I should know about?’

  Sanchez didn’t know exactly what Rex did for a living, but it seemed to involve a lot of killing. He was probably a bounty hunter, although from most of his stories it came across that he killed on his own behalf more often than he did for others.

  ‘Even I don’t know who I’m killin’ yet. Still, that only adds to the fun.’ He paused, then looked at the other man and asked, ‘Anythin’ much happened round here lately I ought to know about?’

  Rex was showing no signs of tiredness, despite having fought five bouts inside twenty minutes. He was in good spirits, so it was with great regret that Sanchez recognized he would have to fill him in on some news that was likely to dampen his mood. What Sanchez had to tell him would hit Rex harder than any punch he was likely to be caught with that day. He had to break the news to him that his lifelong friend Elvis wouldn’t be showing his face any time soon. Or ever.

  ‘Look Rex, ain’t no easy way to say this, but I got bad news. Your buddy Elvis rolled a seven yesterday. They found him in a room in an apartment block. Looks like murder.’

  This didn’t so much dampen Rex’s mood, as drown it. His face fell, the smile wiped from it as though by a giant hand. For a second he appeared extremely upset, then there came a brief moment when he looked as though he was waiting for Sanchez to say he’d been kidding. But that moment passed all too quickly.

  ‘What the fuck? My man Elvis, the King? Dead? How in the fuck did that happen? An’ more to the point, what fuckin’ dead man did it?’

  ‘No one knows who did it. A guy name of Jefe saw his body in a shitty little apartment down town. Stuck to the ceiling like he’d been crucified. Knives all through him. Through his eye sockets, chest …’

  Shit! Sanchez suddenly became aware that he was offering far too much information. Rex might not want to hear the grisly details of the awful fate that had befallen his close friend.

  ‘Yeah, yeah,’ the big man sighed. ‘I get the picture.’ Then he asked, ‘Jefe found him, you say? That’d be Jefe the Mexican bounty hunter, right?’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Sanchez nodding.

  ‘You think he did it?’

  ‘Might have, I guess. He’s a mean sonofabitch.’

  If Jefe had been responsible and Rex were to find out, then even the bounty hunter would be smart enough to leave town without a second’s thought. Rex didn’t need a personal reason to kill someone, but if he had one then that person would be certain to suffer beyond belief. Even someone as hard as Jefe.

  ‘Nobody local would have had the fuckin’ guts to even look at Elvis funny, let alone nail the man to a ceiling,’ Rex snarled, clearly rattled. ‘There anyone else new in town you think might have anything to do with it?’

  ‘You kiddin’? There’s more strangers in town right now than there’s ever been. Those two monks, for a start. That ain’t all, though. There’s a helluva lot more you probably don’t know about.’

  ‘So why don’t you tell me?’

  Sanchez slung his towel over his left shoulder and leant down to pick up a wet sponge from a bucket of water that was sitting by the bottom rope, close to the corner post. He began to squeeze the sponge against Rex’s bulging chest, which was beginning to sweat copiously as his rage at Elvis’s death built up inside him.

  ‘Well, Rex, it’s like this. My brother and his wife were murdered in an
equally sick fashion. I went to visit them the other morning – found ’em on the floor. Stone dead, ’cept they didn’t have an easy dyin’. I was only a couple of minutes away from seein’ the bastard that did it. All I saw was a yellow Cadillac drivin’ off after I found them. That’s about all the clues I’ve got to work on. Elvis was hunting down the driver of the yellow Caddy for me when he … when he died. I guess that means he found the bastard.’

  ‘Someone who drives a yellow Cadillac, huh? An’ they killed Thomas and Audrey, too? Fuck, man, looks like I might be in town longer than I planned.’

  Despite what he’d just had to tell Rex, Sanchez felt a small buzz of excitement. He was impressed that the other man could remember the names of his brother and his wife. What was more significant, though, was that Rex seemed to want to avenge the death of Thomas, Sanchez’s own brother, for God’s sake! This made him feel that his happiness was actually important to Rex. Obviously, Rex’s principal motivation was to avenge the death of Elvis, who had been his best friend in Santa Mondega, but now it was looking as though he saw Sanchez as a friend too. Not just as a bartender.

  Sanchez finished wiping the sweat off Rex and dropped the sponge back into the water bucket. Looking around, he sensed that there wouldn’t be any more volunteers to fight. The crowd had become subdued, and potential challengers were becoming increasingly reluctant to risk being hammered to pulp inside a few minutes. Rex, guessing that he might not have to fight again for a while, grabbed the towel that Sanchez had slung over his shoulder. He used it to dry himself under the armpits and round the back of his neck, as if his adopted cornerman’s efforts had not been up to scratch.

  ‘Anythin’ else I should know, Sanchez?’

  ‘Well, actually, yeah. There is. My brother had a girl called Jessica stayin’ in his attic. Hidden. She’d been in a coma for five years, but seems like she came out of it just before he was killed. She turned up in my bar yesterday. She claims she can’t remember anythin’ about what happened, but she thinks she was there.’

  ‘You sure she didn’t kill Thomas and Audrey?’

  Sanchez had considered this possibility, of course, but Jessica just didn’t seem the murdering type. Besides, she didn’t look strong enough to have carried out such a brutal attack.