Dead and Gone

by Andrew Vachss

  I told him that Gem had reached out to a bunch of websites, trying to send a message. That pushed one of his switches:

  “The Internet? You think there’s no pattern there? That’s what they think—they’re so sure it’s all unregulated anarchy. But every single keystroke is recorded, somewhere. Their sex lives, their financial records, their circle of contacts. It’s the ultimate wiretap.”

  “Sure, but there must be gazillions of data-bits out there. Who could possibly go through it all and—?”

  “You construct a screening device,” Lune said, patiently. “It only looks for certain words, or phrases, or even numbers. Then you tighten the mesh with combinations, until only what you want to track comes through. It’s not so difficult. All it takes is resources.”

  “So the government—?”

  “There is no ‘government,’ Burke. There are only institutions. Agencies. The permanent ones.”

  Lune tapped a few keys, pointed an immaculate fingernail at his computer screen. “You know what that is?” he asked me, as what looked like a string of auction bids popped into focus.

  “A bunch of dope dealers talking in code?”

  “No. It’s the IRS.”

  “Huh? I don’t get it.”

  “It’s a pattern,” he said, spinning on his chair to face me. “You know all this talk about America’s ‘underground cash economy’?”

  “It’s not just talk.”

  “Exactly! It’s authenticated fact. And that’s where the real money is. Not in cocaine cartels or topless clubs; it’s in flea markets, garage sales, all the ‘hobbyist’ stuff that’s being trafficked back and forth every second.”

  “Flea markets? How much could—?”

  “You have to watch the patterns,” he said, reciting his mantra. He turned back to the screen, beckoning me to look over his shoulder. “Look! Here’s one, right there on the screen. He’s selling a signed copy of a first-edition book by … Martha Grimes. See it?”

  “Sure. The highest bidder is … forty-five bucks so far, right?”

  “Right. And what this guy—I mean the seller, okay?—what he did was, he bought maybe twenty copies of that book when it was remaindered. You know, you’ve seen the tables where they sell them in bookstores, haven’t you?”

  “Yeah,” I said, knowing that everybody pays, and that the currency I needed to pay Lune’s tolls was patience.

  “First, you have to understand that all books get remaindered. It doesn’t matter if they sell a million copies, there’s always some left over. Well, the publisher isn’t going to throw them away, so they sell them, in bulk, very cheaply. A book you spent twenty-five dollars on when it was new, a couple of years later, you’ll see it for a dollar ninety-eight.”

  “Yeah …?”

  “Now the guy has all these books, so he waits until this Martha Grimes is doing a book-signing someplace. Then he ambushes her, gets her to sign as many copies as he can get away with. Some writers will just do it, some will limit the number of copies. But this … merchant, his story is always what a huge fan he is and how he’s going to give the books away to all his friends as Christmas gifts or for their birthdays or something. See?”

  “I … guess so. But …”

  “Look at the pattern, Burke. Come on. This guy buys a book for, say, less than two dollars. He gets it signed. Then he sells it for forty-five dollars on this Internet auction site. Do you think, for one single solitary second, that he declares that profit as income?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Good. Now multiply by … oh, ten million transactions per year.”

  “Are you serious?”

  Not a brilliant question to ask Lune. “Come closer,” he said, pulling back from the screen so I could do it. “Take a look as I scroll through for you. See how every single seller and every single buyer has to provide information just to participate? Their e-mail, a credit card, a street address … a ton of authentic data. What you see here is the clearest, cleanest audit trail that any IRS agent could ever dream of.”

  “Damn!”

  “Sure. All they have to do is watch. That is, if they didn’t set up the site themselves—there’s so many of them, now.”

  “What a sting that would be. Jesus.”

  “Net people aren’t the only ones. But they’re certainly the easiest. You know those scams where they tell you you’ve just ‘won’ something? If you use the mail, the return will be very low. But on the Net … My goodness, Burke, even the best browsers are free. You can get a free e-mail address from too many places to count. And never mind all those free downloads! Do you think those outfits that give away all this ‘free’ Net stuff aren’t turning around and selling your address to all kinds of people compiling their own sucker lists?”

  “Something for nothing, huh?”

  “Some ‘nothing.’ Every time you use that ‘free’ stuff, you’re making a perfect record. Of yourself. Every place you go, every site you check out, everything you buy on-line. Think about it.”

  I did think about it. How Lune had tapped into that bizarre borderland where the Möbius strip crosses over itself. The one sure nexus between the hyper-right and the ultra-left: fear of government intrusion into their lives. That strange place where people who want to smoke marijuana in peace make common cause with the people who want to carry concealed automatic weapons. They share one great, unifying fear. It’s called Registration.

  “Christ! I’m glad I don’t have one,” I told him.

  “One what?”

  “Computer.”

  “You don’t have a computer?”

  “Nope.”

  Those big liquid-topaz eyes that had charmed hookers a million years ago filled with pity. I could read his thoughts like they were printed on his forehead: “And people think I’m crazy!”

  In bed that night, Gem reached for me. It was no good. I kept seeing that Indian, scratching his dog behind its ears, talking to it in a language only the two of them understood. He’d want his partner to die in battle, too. I knew that. But I didn’t have centuries of tribal tradition to comfort me. I knew Pansy wasn’t in some fucking Happy Hunting Ground.

  “You are so big,” Gem whispered from between my legs.

  “You are one sweet bitch.” I chuckled.

  She came up on her elbows. “Are you laughing at me?”

  “No, little girl. I was being … grateful to you, I guess. Some women, all they live for is to chop a man’s cojones. If not off, at least down to size. You, all you can think about is building me up.”

  “So you are saying I am lying?” she asked, crawling closer to my face.

  “Not lying, honey. Let’s say … exaggerating. And it’s very—”

  She interrupted me with a slap to the right side of my face. My blind side. I never saw it coming—maybe because it was the last damn thing I expected. It wasn’t a hard slap, but it got my attention. Her eyes were flaming. “I do not lie!” she whispered, harsh in the darkness. “You are not fully … engorged, are you?”

  “Hell, no. Every time that window—”

  “Yes! But even partially, you are … It is obvious that when you … when you are completely yourself, you would be huge.”

  “Gem …”

  “But you think that will never be again, don’t you?”

  I took a deep breath. Let it out. Tried to think about it. Couldn’t. “Yeah,” is all I said.

  “So what?” she countered.

  “Huh?”

  “It would not matter.”

  “But if—”

  “You are a fool, Burke. Give me your hand.”

  I did it, not even trying to guess this woman anymore. She guided it between her legs.

  “You see?” she said. “I am … embarrassed at how wet you make me. This never happened to me before. Look,” she said softly, “even here …,” pulling my hand down. The insides of her thighs were slick with estro-juice.

  “That’s just because—”

  �
��I will not listen to any of your stupid man’s explanations. You do not understand, even when I show you the truth.”

  “Gem … Look, I wasn’t …”

  “Last night, after you fell asleep, I put your thumb in my mouth. I love to do that with you—I don’t know why. I thought it would help me sleep, like a child’s pacifier. But do you know what happened?”

  “What?”

  “I had an orgasm. So deep I can still feel it.”

  “Great. So even if my cock flops, so long as my goddamn thumb holds out—”

  I was ready for her slap this time, but I didn’t move to block it. It was a lot harder than the first. Then she jumped up, grabbed one of my sweatshirts, pulled it over her head, and walked out the door.

  It was very late when she came back inside. I was half asleep, but snapped awake as soon as I heard the door. She pulled off the sweatshirt and climbed into bed next to me.

  “I apologize,” she said.

  “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “I did not say anything wrong. But I should not have slapped you.”

  “It’s all right.”

  “No, it is not. Would you slap me?”

  “No.”

  “I do not mean, would you slap me of your own volition? I understand you would not. That is not you. But … would you slap me if I asked you to?”

  “Gem …”

  “Would you? Please? It would make me feel better.”

  I reached toward her face. She was unflinching, eyes wide. I tangled my left hand in her hair, pulled her across me, and smacked her bottom a couple of times. Harder than she had slapped me.

  When I let go of her hair, she stayed where she was.

  “Gem. If I—”

  “Feel me,” she said, softly.

  I fell asleep with Gem lying across me. And woke up to her mouth on my cock. Full. She pulled away, held my cock in her fist, said, “See, stupid man!,” and climbed on top of me.

  Instead of a gigantic corkboard, Lune now used some sort of projection system—whatever one of his crew typed into the notebook computers they all had on their laps showed up on a broad expanse of pristine white wall. Lune connected to the individual words with some kind of electronic pointer—changing their color and moving them around to construct his patterns.

  Every day, more facts passed their “authentication” test. And the list grew:

  “What’s that all about?” I asked Lune, pointing to a spot on the wall where Nazi Lowriders was displayed in green.

  “Supposedly another hate group,” the Latina answered for him. “But they operate as roving gangs—the Aryans call them ‘street soldiers.’ They’re not into turf at all. They’re younger than most white-supremacist crews, and they tend to focus on blacks, rather than Jews, for as-yet-unknown reasons.”

  “So Inside …?”

  “Yes. They often ally themselves with Chicanos against the blacks,” she finished for me.

  “So how do they connect to …?”

  “They may not,” Heidi put in. “But, even though they wear the kill-tattoos—they use lightning bolts instead of spiderwebs—and do the whole Hitler thing, their raison d’être is drug-dealing. And crystal meth is their product. So, when you look at Ruhr and Timmons …”

  “It’s time to plug in the personals,” Lune announced.

  Nobody said anything. But they were all looking at me.

  “It’s up to you,” Lune said.

  “Take your best shot,” I told them all.

  It took the better part of four full days, and Lune’s crew weren’t nine-to-fivers—every time I looked around, there was still another one I didn’t know. Working. The new wall they created finally got filled. With my life.

  I’d never have thought there was that much to it. And, when they put it all down, I could see there really wasn’t.

  Father unknown. Orphaned-by-abandonment when my teenage mother gave a phony name and then checked out of the hospital ward without me. The whole trail from there. Always dropping, never climbing. Tighter and tighter levels of custody as I aged. Both my long prison jolts—the hijackings and the shootings—and all the short stays in jail. The madness in Biafra. All my scams, hustles, and cons. Kiddie porn that never got delivered. Crates of guns that did.

  I went all the way with them, leaving nothing out except for when I’d been with Lune—that part had to be his call.

  All the way down, trampolining off the Zero itself. Even the kid I’d killed by accident in a gunfight in that basement in the South Bronx. The basement where they were making the kind of movies where the star dies at the end. But that truth had never erased the guilt I’d carried ever since. Other killings—ones I still felt good about. Belle’s daughter-raping father. Strega’s Uncle Julio. Mortay, the karate-freak who wanted a death-match with Max—and got ambushed by me instead. All the things I’d done with Wesley.

  I kept going through the swamp of my life, dredging up memories with every name. So many dead. So many gone. It was like a thirtieth high-school reunion, where everyone looks around to see who’s going to show up this time. Or not.

  I wasn’t proud of what they put up there. But I wasn’t ashamed of it, either. When you make a Child of the Secret, sometimes he comes back “home” for a visit.

  Lune flicked his pointer. One word popped up on the wall, in bright blue letters: Pedophile(s).

  “It’s the single common thread,” Lune said to all of them. “Burke makes his … living in a variety of ways, all of which could motivate enemies to the sort of assassination that was attempted on him. But the resources necessary to orchestrate such an attempt … No, it has to be someone who believes Burke is pursuing him.”

  “Or her,” the Latina added.

  “Yes,” Lune said. “Certainly. Our own research indicates that Burke’s reputation is … mixed. Some see him as a mercenary. Others as a hired killer. There are even those who believe him to be some sort of private investigator. But most know him professionally as a contraband-dealer. The one unifying thread on which we can rely is … Aydah?”

  Aydah, a tall, slender black woman, got to her feet to speak. “In New York,” she said, in a faint French accent, “when it comes to pedophiles, Mr. Burke is considered a homicidal maniac. An irrational, dangerous individual who is blamed—or, depending on the source, credited—with virtually every type of violence against them—assaults, murders, arsons, explosions.”

  “Personality as perceived?” a guy from the far corner asked. He was white, medium-height, slim build—a good-looking kid with very close-cropped hair.

  “Single most distinguishing characteristic is pathological vengefulness,” she answered him.

  “Thank you, Aydah,” Lune said formally.

  “But the operation itself,” an Asian kid with cold eyes offered, “… the way it was coordinated, the assassins were certainly professionals. So it isn’t just a question of money, then. Whoever hired them had to know where to find them.”

  “That’s right, Minh,” Heidi said, “and you can’t just find a contract killer in the Soldier of Fortune want ads anymore.”

  “Maybe the connect is to Timmons and Ruhr,” Aydah said.

  “That doesn’t authenticate,” the Latina argued. “Those white supremacists aren’t even good at killing, never mind gunfighting. It smells more like the government.”

  “Oh, they’re real experts, all right,” Aydah shot back.

  Lune held up his hand for silence.

  “Burke, it’s your time now,” he said. “You have to sit down and start making out a list. It doesn’t matter how long it is, but it has to be as complete as you can possibly make it.”

  “A list of …”

  “Pedophiles who might want revenge for something you did. Or who might have had reason to believe you were hunting them.”

  “That could be any—”

  “You’re safe here,” Lune said. “Take all the time you need.”

  I knew better than to do that kind
of work without a break. Your body gets tired, it moves slower. But when your mind gets tired, it turns on you.

  There was a heavyweight-championship fight on the giant-screen TV they had in one of the common rooms. Not many were watching: the white kid with the close-cropped haircut, the Asian they had called Minh, the Indian, the Latina, and a couple of others.

  “Clint,” the white kid said to me, holding out his hand for me to shake. “This is my partner, Minh.”

  I shook both their hands—they were the first ones I’d met there who offered them.

  The fight was pitiful. One boxer spent most of each round leaning against the ropes like a wino using a wall to prop himself up. The other guy slapped at him as if he were trying to keep flies off a corpse.

  “If I hit a guy like that on the street in front of a dozen witnesses, I wouldn’t even get arrested,” I said.

  Clint laughed, offered me a high-five.

  The Indian nodded a silent agreement.

  The Latina glared at me.

  Since neither of the boxers dropped dead of a heart attack, the decision went to the judges. I didn’t wait around for it.

  I kept working on my list, following Lune’s parameters: they had to be either wanting revenge, or fearing it.

  The first category was much longer than the second. The people I would have wanted to hurt the most—the ones who had hurt me so much when I was little—I didn’t know most of their names, much less where to find them. They wouldn’t even know I was alive.

  Anyway, they would know what the dumb-fuck government doesn’t. Most of us, damn near all of us, we don’t turn on the ones who hurt us. No, we turn on ourselves, mostly. Or on you.

  And then you say we were born bad.

  You and Hitler. Yeah, you don’t like the comparison? Then, while we’re doing time for what was done to us, don’t fucking tell us, “It’s all in the genes,” okay?

  Just thinking about it made the back of my neck burn. A guy goes to work and spends the day kissing the boss’s ass. So he goes home and kicks his wife’s. Makes him feel like a man. We know what he is. A lowlife coward. But a kid who finally can’t take it anymore and kills the people—you call them “parents”—who’ve been torturing him forever, he’s the one you send to prison.