The Best Revenge

by Stephen White

  “You know. The guy. Our ten-minutes guy. He got out.”

  “Out of . . . the room?”

  “Yes. Out of the room. Things are a mess and I need your help, Kelda. I really need your help.”

  “What do you need?” She felt surprisingly calm. Her heart was lingering on the fact that both Ira and Tom Clone were alive.

  “Come get me,” Ira pleaded.

  “Where are you?”

  “Up near Ward, on the Peak to Peak. I have a cabin up there I never told you about.”

  “That’s the room where you were . . .” She swallowed. “You know . . . alone with him?”

  “Yes. That’s the room. It’s close to the room. The room is actually outside. It’s complicated, Kelda.”

  “But you’re at your cabin?”

  “No, no. I’m in the woods. I’m afraid they’re watching the cabin. I’m sure they’re watching the cabin. They disabled my car.”

  “Who were the two guys with the guns?”

  “I don’t know. They just showed up behind me and a minute later one of them started shooting.”

  “Did they see you?”

  “Not my face. But they saw my cabin, and my car.”

  “And the car?”

  “Dead.”

  “The . . . guy? He got away?”

  “I’m pretty sure he did. Either that or the other two guys who showed up have him. That’s possible. I don’t know.”

  “Does the guy know who you are?”

  “No. I’ve been careful.”

  Yeah, right,she thought. “What do they look like? The two guys with the guns?”

  “I barely saw them. It was getting dark and it was raining. Everything happened real fast. White guys. Not young.”

  “Cops?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  “Did they identify themselves as police officers, Ira?”

  Kelda noted hesitation before he said, “No.”

  “No?”

  “No.”

  She immediately reasoned that if the two guys were cops, Ira wouldn’t tell her. He’d be worried that she would be even more reluctant to get further involved in his predicament.

  “Ira, tell me something. Did you have anything to do with what happened to . . . the guy’s grandfather?”

  She felt Ira’s second hesitation like a flash of agony up her legs.

  “He walked in on me. I didn’t mean to . . .”

  “Ira, tell me how to find you.”

  “I didn’t want to hurt the old guy. You believe me?”

  “Tell me how to find you.”

  “Do you know how to get to Brainard Lake? It’s in the Indian Peaks above the Peak to Peak.”

  “I’ve been there once, I think. Camping.”

  “Well, you have to get to Ward, first. Then here’s what I need you to do.” He gave her directions and concluded with, “You have your gun?”

  “You know I do. Ira, you need to do something for me, too.”

  “Anything.”

  “While I’m on my way up there, you need to figure out what comes next, okay? I don’t know what you’ve done. So, you need to decide the next step.”

  “I can do that. You know I can. I love you, babe.”

  She folded the phone and pulled out herPierson Guides atlas. A quick glance at the map told her she could take either Left Hand Canyon or Boulder Canyon up the mountains to Ward. Left Hand was more direct and probably had less traffic. But she knew the Boulder Canyon road.

  Kelda had never taken the road up Left Hand and she didn’t trust Maria’s car, so she pulled left on Broadway in the direction of Canyon Boulevard and the entrance to Boulder Canyon.

  She was stopped at a red light at Pine Street when her phone rang a second time. She figured it was Ira calling again and answered without checking the ID screen.

  A frantic voice said, “Kelda, it’s ’e! To’. Hel’ ’e! ’lease hel’ ’e! Can you hel’ ’e?”

  CHAPTER 53

  After I confessed to Lauren that I was making a house call, I fumbled with my files, dropped my car keys, and then momentarily couldn’t find my cell phone in the clutter on my desk. The cherry red cast on my arm seemed to be mocking me, and I dreaded the prospect of trying to drive the curves of Boulder Canyon with one hand.Two hands and my new Mini—sure. The prospect brought a smile. Briefly.

  It’s only a block from my office on Walnut Street to Canyon Boulevard. Nine blocks past downtown the boulevard narrows to two lanes and quickly begins to adopt the contour of the curvy, steep mountain passage that is Boulder Canyon. Just before I reached the mouth of the canyon, I reconsidered my impulsive plan. I turned off onto Pearl Street so I could make a phone call. In the best of circumstances, I’m not the most coordinated human being in the Western Hemisphere. With the cast on my arm, the odds of my successfully juggling a cell phone while driving with my knees through Boulder Canyon were on the low side. Anyway, the cell reception in the confines of the canyon was miserable.

  “Diane,” I said after the call clicked through. “It’s Alan.” Diane Estevez wasn’t just a wonderful friend and a good business partner. She was a heck of a clinical psychologist. I valued her counsel.

  “You’re breaking up,” she whined.

  On the negative side, she wasn’t always the most patient person I knew.

  “I’m not surprised. I’m up at Eben Fine Park. I need some advice.”

  “Sure, here’s some advice: Don’t try to make cell phone calls from mountain canyons. It doesn’t work.”

  “Thanks. This is serious, okay? I need some consultation from you. You have a second?”

  “I’m busy trying to decide what kind of takeout I want Raoul to pick up for dinner. What’s up?”

  “A patient just called me and said that he’s been hurt by . . . some people . . . you know, injured—that kind of hurt—and he says that he’s still in danger from them and he wants me to come get him. He’s up in the mountains, way up in the mountains, like near Ward. A guy who’s helping him confirms that he’s in bad shape. The thing is that my patient’s telling me that some of the people who are after him are the police, so I can’t call the cops for help.”

  “How the hell do you get in situations like this, Alan? I swear, I don’t know anyone else—”

  “Diane, that’s not helpful. Please be helpful. I know you have it in you.”

  “Is he paranoid?”

  “Fearful. Let’s say fearful. But he has some reasons to be fearful. His circumstances are very unusual.”

  “Psychological reasons? Or practical reasons?”

  “Both.”

  She made an I-don’t-believe-what-I’m-hearing kind of noise before she asked, “Does he have any reason to try to get you mixed up in something crazy? Think about this one before you answer.”

  I hesitated. “Kind of.”

  I could hear her mumble, “Shit.” After an audible exhale she asked, “Is he in imminent danger?”

  “All the evidence I have says yes, he probably is.”

  “Why can’t this guy who’s helping him take him someplace safe?”

  “He doesn’t have a car.”

  “You want advice? Here’s advice: Call the police. Don’t go up there. Don’t do it, Alan. The presence of imminent danger gives you the freedom to do what you need to do regarding confidentiality.”

  “That’s what I thought you’d say.”

  “You’re not going to listen to me, are you? You have a baby, Alan. Alan! Don’t even—”

  “I’m thinking.”

  “You’re breaking up on me. Don’t go. I swear I’ll—”

  A burned-out therapist, one who didn’t care, would have eagerly heeded Diane’s caution.

  I didn’t want to be that therapist, the one who didn’t care.

  Each recent morning as I climbed out of bed, I’d been more and more terrified of being that therapist.

  The connection to Diane was crappy, but not so crappy that I couldn’t have continued
the conversation. I closed the phone anyway. Seconds later, I reopened it and speed-dialed Sam Purdy at home.

  His wife heard something in my tone and handed the phone immediately to Sam.

  “Yeah,” he said.

  “I found Tom Clone, Sam. Or he found me.”

  His voice flat as a good pool table, he replied, “Cool. The good news is that you win the scavenger hunt; the bad news is that the prize fund is empty. Why are you calling me? You want to gloat? You know you’re not going to tell me where Clone is. But do tell him this for me when you see him, would you? If he wants his little motorbike back, he’s probably going to have to come down and fill out some paperwork. Tell him it should take about a week.”

  “Sam, I’m calling because I need your help with something . . . goofy.” “Goofy” was Sam’s Minnesota word. It seemed apropos to the current situation.

  It took me a couple of minutes to explain about Tom Clone’s phone call from Boca’s cabin. Sam was especially interested in the part about the fear lessons and the bees and the snakes and the napalm. He asked quite a few questions that I couldn’t answer to his satisfaction.

  One of them was “And he’s absolutely sure cops are involved in this torture?”

  “He says he’s sure that the two guys who showed up at the end identified themselves as police.”

  “What do you think?”

  Sam, I knew, was asking me about the quality of Tom’s thinking. “Some Park County cops have been hounding him since he got out of prison, Sam. You know, over the Campbell murder.”

  “Why don’t I know about this?”

  “Clone didn’t report it to anyone. Considering the circumstances, he didn’t think anybody would believe him. He was really trying to keep a low profile with law enforcement.”

  “He reported it to you, though, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And in your wisdom, you decided to keep it to yourself?”

  “Sam, please.”

  “Do you believe Clone? Come on. I need something to work with. You’re serving me nothing here.”

  “Some of what he said, yes, I believe him.”

  “And this guy he’s with right now in Ward? He sounded legit?”

  “Yeah. He was coherent, well-spoken. He implied that he had been in the military. I’d say he’s reliable. He said that it looked to him like Tom had been worked over by someone or something.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Clone’s apparently covered with bee stings and smells like gasoline. I can tell you from my brief conversation with him that he can barely talk. He apparently has bee stings on his lips and inside his mouth.”

  “Shit. You said he’s in Ward, right? You ever been to Ward, Alan? It’s like a rest stop on a road trip to Mars.”

  “Yeah, I’ve been to Ward. Last time I was there, I actually found it kind of charming.”

  “You wouldn’t find it charming if you were a cop,” he scoffed. “Where are you right now?”

  “Eben Fine Park. Apparently I’m about to make a rest stop on a road trip to Mars.”

  “And you’re going to take Boulder Canyon?”

  “I was.”

  “Don’t be a fool. Take Lee Hill to Left Hand. Less aggravation, less traffic. Save you ten minutes, easy.”

  “I’m already at the mouth of Boulder Canyon, Sam.”

  “I don’t care. You’ll be behind all the commuters in Boulder Canyon. With your luck you’ll get stuck behind a propane truck, or even worse a septic truck, the entire way up the hill. You don’t want that. I know; I’ve done it. Cut across town on Ninth. You’ll be glad you did.”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “You want me to come with, don’t you?” Sam asked me. It wasn’t really a question, more like an accusation.

  “Yes. I’d be grateful.”

  “Ward’s out of my jurisdiction, Alan. Way out of my jurisdiction. I can’t just sit tall in the saddle and ride right into town with my six-guns blazing.”

  I had no time to savor the image Sam was painting for me. “Just call the sheriff and tell him that you’re following a lead in the assault on Clone’s grandfather. He’ll give you permission to talk to anybody you want in Ward and you know it. He probably won’t even insist on sending a deputy along to babysit you.”

  He harrumphed.

  “The best part is that it’s not even a lie.”

  “If your wife wasn’t an assistant DA, you wouldn’t know any of this, would you? You’re not that smart, you know.”

  He was begging for a wise-ass retort. I declined.

  Sam said, “I need ten minutes here. I want to lay my eyes on my kid and he’s not home from his baseball game yet, but he’s due back soon. I’ll pick you up in what, fifteen minutes, maybe twenty. Or even better, you can just stop here on your way to Lee Hill. You’ll come right by me.”

  I couldn’t shake the intensity of Tom Clone’s desperation from my imagination. “I’m going to head up there now, Sam. I’ll meet you in Ward. That’ll give me a few minutes to prepare Tom for your arrival. You got something to write with? I want to give you the directions to Boca’s cabin.”

  “The guy’s name is Boca? What kind of name is that? What’s his last name?”

  “You want to run his name, don’t you?”

  “Of course I do. I run just about everybody’s name. It’s a hobby of mine.”

  “I don’t have his last name, just Boca. He lives in Ward, Sam, remember.”

  “Right, I forgot. I should just go to NCIC and run ‘Boca in Ward.’ That should work real well. What is ‘Boca’? What kind of name is that?”

  “I don’t know. I think it’s Spanish for ‘mouth.’ “

  “Mouth? Who calls themselves Mouth?”

  “Sam, you want the directions?”

  “Listen, I won’t be long here,” Sam said when I’d given him the route to Boca’s cabin. “Simon’s due home any minute from his baseball game. I’d rather you wait for me or come by here and get me. You know if you go up there by yourself, you’re going to—”

  “I’m going to what, Sam?”

  “You know, Alan.”

  “What?”

  “You’re going to get in trouble. People will get shot. Bombs will go off. Plagues will start. Something. It’s a karma thing with you.”

  I couldn’t argue with him. My track record where mayhem was concerned wasn’t exemplary. “To be honest, Sam, I’d rather not go at all, but I think I have to. It’s the right thing to do. I’ll see you in Ward.”

  “I didn’t think you’d wait for me.”

  “You’re a good man for doing this, Sam Purdy.”

  “No,” he said. “What I am is a moron.”

  I took Sam’s advice and backtracked across town on Ninth Street, passing within a couple of blocks of Sam’s house. I was tempted to stop, but I didn’t.

  As he predicted, there was almost no traffic as I climbed on Lee Hill Road. Thirty minutes and three thousand plus feet of altitude later, Kelda James ordered me to my knees.

  CHAPTER 54

  After she lowered her gun and permitted me to get up from the ground, I followed Kelda’s car as she drove the final few minutes to Boca’s cabin, which was near Left Hand Creek down an unmarked dirt lane off the main road to Brainard Lake.

  Neither Kelda nor I was driving a vehicle suitable for maneuvering up the steep, rutted, rock-pitted passage that Boca probably called his “driveway,” so we parked at the bottom and hiked the last fifty yards or so up to the cabin. Although the trees at this altitude tended to be stunted by the arid, harsh climate, the pine forest was surprisingly thick, the sky was frosted with stars, and the air was so clean it tingled. I thought,This must be why people live up here. As we neared the front door of the neat frame cabin, my lungs were aching from the brief climb, as though my body was intent on reminding me that the difference between the east and west boundaries of Boulder County was, vertically at least, over a half a mile.

  Kelda wasn’t as
winded as I was. But I thought she was limping. Between gasping inhalations I asked, “How are your legs?”

  She shook her head, opened her mouth to speak, and then allowed her lips to close back together. After a quick breath, she said, “My legs hurt. It doesn’t mean I’m going to sit down. It doesn’t mean I’m going to go home. They hurt. They usually hurt. Let’s go get Tom.”

  “Okay,” I said, digesting her animosity. I was closest to the cabin, so I pounded on the door with the side of my fist.

  A stunningly handsome black man answered the door. His upper cheeks were peppered with faint freckles, and his dark eyes expressed an inner warmth that seemed to surround him with a glow. He held out his hand and said, “Hello, I’m Boca. Won’t you please come in? You must be the doctor.” He looked past me out the door. “And you must be the FBI agent. Tom told me about both of you.”

  Kelda said, “Nice to meet you.” Something about him—his beauty? his eyes? his manner?—had softened her like room temperature softens butter.

  I added, “It’s a pleasure. We’re very grateful for all you’ve done to help Tom.” I took the man’s right hand with my left. He glanced briefly at my cast. My breathing was almost back to normal.

  “I didn’t do anything but offer a man in need some courtesy. May I see some identification from the two of you? Please don’t be offended.”

  Kelda’s FBI badge was a better statement than my driver’s license, but both sufficed. Boca required reading glasses to check the fine print. The glasses were hung on a chain around his thick neck. After he was satisfied with our ID, he said, “Thank you. But I’m afraid Tom’s gone.”

  It was Kelda who said, “What?” It was part exclamation, part resignation. She hadn’t expected this part of her evening to go smoothly.

  Boca fingered the graying hair on the side of his head and spent a moment examining Kelda and me as though he was trying to decide whether he could really trust us. Although he’d invited us into his cabin, he hadn’t removed his significant mass from the doorway. “A man came to my door about five minutes ago. When I stepped outside to speak with the gentleman, Tom decided it was a good idea to go out the back window.”

  “Did the man introduce himself?”

  “No, he did not.”