The Triggerman Dance

by T. Jefferson Parker

"Nobody in particular."

  "Nobody even unparticular, from what I've gathered. How were you managing the urges, Johnny? Just Rosy Palm and her five sisters?"

  Suddenly, John's head cleared. The ringing was still there, but he felt his sense of balance return, settling under him like a trusted old horse.

  "None of your business."

  He swiveled to look back, but Partch and Snakey still sat on the couch, two giants lost in cushions. Fargo was laughing.

  "You're right, Johnny—that's not my business. Where'd you get that dog?"

  "Dog?"

  "Rusty, the hero."

  "He showed up at the club one day."

  "A purebred, attack-trained German shepherd just wandered up to your trailer one day and asked for a Milk Bone?"

  "He was a mess. Half-starved, no collar. My labs came close to killing him."

  "When?"

  "Last spring."

  "So you took him in?"

  "That's what I did."

  "Funny."

  John said nothing. The siren scream in his ear was coming and going now—a piercing whine followed by a pressured silence.

  "Funny that nobody in Anza Valley ever saw you with that dog. A truckful of dogs, but no German shepherd."

  John shrugged off the unobservant Anza public.

  "Maybe you could explain why," said Fargo.

  "He liked the trailer. He was territorial and a little mean. He wasn't the best around-town dog."

  "But he was a good enough retriever to take out hunting on opening day?"

  "Yes, he was."

  "But how did you know he could hunt, if you hadn't had him out in bird season?"

  "He was always after the quail around the trailer. It was easy to see he was birdy. Opening day, I wanted to give him a try, that's all."

  "How'd he do?"

  "Well."

  "How many birds you get?"

  "The limit. Ten."

  "Why weren't they in your truck at Olie's?"

  "I'd gone back home to drop them off."

  "So you could shoot ten more."

  "Right."

  "Kind of a scofflaw for such an upstanding citizen, aren't you?"

  "I figure there's guys out there who don't get any birds at all. It works out."

  "You could have had fifty birds back in the trailer and we'll never know, since it burned down."

  "I had ten."

  "Maybe you didn't have any. Maybe you weren't hunting that day at all. You can't really prove it, can you?"

  John straightened in his chair and glanced back again al Snakey and Partch.

  "You know, Fargo, if you want to get direct answers here, you can ask direct questions. I've got no idea what you suspect me of. But we could save a lot of small talk and popped eardrums if you'd just come out with it. I hardly talked to Rebecca Harris I took in a stray dog. I got ten quail opening day, helped Mr. Holt out of a bad situation. What in hell do you want?"

  Fargo considered.

  "I just want to like you, John."

  Fargo laughed then, his rodentine teeth flashing behind the thick broom of mustache. "How come you quit your job with the Journal? You took a pay cut of sixty percent to move out of Laguna Beach and into a trailer. That makes no sense to me. Make sense to me, John. Let me like you."

  John turned to look at the big boys, then back to Fargo.

  When Fargo leans on you, it means that Holt has things to hide. When Fargo leans on you, it might mean Holt has something in mind. But just remember, you are innocent. You have your limits. You are ready, willing and able to simply walk.

  "I've had enough," he said.

  "Enough of what?" Fargo looked genuinely puzzled.

  "Enough of you. I'm going to go back to the cottage, write Mr. Holt a thank you note, get in my truck with my dogs, and drive off. I don't need you, Fargo. I don't need the headbangers sitting behind me. I sure don't need Vann Holt."

  "Awww. Have I hurt your feelings? Need mommy?" The smile again, all the latent cruelty showing through.

  "Let's go outside and fight."

  "You're getting kind of personal now."

  John stood, wavered a little, then felt two heavy hands on his shoulders, pressing him back into the chair.

  "I'm just trying to do my job, John. Anyone who spends time around Mr. Holt has to be cleared. I'm in the process of clearing you. Lighten up. It's a nice day out. You and Mr. Holt can talk. You can make your mysterious little eyes at Valerie again. The world is good. So just stay the fuck put and give me reasons for Mr. Holt to keep you on Liberty Ridge."

  "I don't want to stay on Liberty Ridge."

  "What you want isn't up to you. It's up to Mr. Holt. Besides, the keys to your truck are in my safe, along with your wallet, pistol, shotgun ammunition, knife and telephone pager. You can't walk far—there's a gate house on the road with my men in it, and a charged fence around the perimeter of the land."

  "Why?"

  "Liberty Ridge is kind of a cross between Club Med and Tombstone, Arizona. You check your guns with the Sheriff and you don't need any money because all the fun is free. It's for security. Liberty Ridge is security. The name Liberty Operations means security. And I'm not about to risk it on some clown driving around with a truckful of guns, now am I?"

  "So, why did you quit the Journal job?"

  "I was burned out and sick of people."

  "Run out of story ideas?"

  "Just about."

  "Why didn't you rent out the Laguna house?"

  "I thought I might go back someday."

  "Not avoiding memories there, were you? Memories of a love gone bad? Or maybe a love gone dead, like Ms. Harris?"

  He imagined the tall gray blank wall again, curved and surrounding him, the inside of the deep well where nothing ever happened between him and Rebecca.

  "Will you please tell me why I'm supposed to have been in love with her?"

  "Ever meet Joshua Weinstein?"

  John's pulse jumped and he felt his scalp tighten. Joshua had figured very long odds that Holt had linked Rebecca to himself, using the Bureau's influence with the Journal to keep his name out of the paper. "No. I never met Joshua Weinstein."

  "Heard of him?"

  "No."

  "Lying to me, Johnny boy?"

  "Just the truth for you, Fargo."

  "He was Rebecca's fiance."

  "It's beginning to sound to me like you were the one in love with her."

  Fargo smiled. "Impossible, John. I never even met her. I didn't spend eight hours a day in an office just down a hallway from her. I never was very cute, John-Boy, in that gay kind of way you are. Ever suck dick?"

  "Not your business."

  "I'm just curious."

  "No."

  "Ever want to?"

  John stood up again, and again a heavy hand pushed him back into the chair.

  "Anyway," Fargo continued, "Weinstein's a feebie—Orange County office."

  "I never met any of the feebies. I wrote about fishing and hiking."

  "Oh, that's right," said Fargo. "That's right. That clears up a lot of things. Know something? The waitress at Olie's said Weinstein looked familiar. I showed her a picture."

  "Then maybe he was a regular."

  "She said she was pretty sure she saw you talking with him one afternoon. Him and a woman."

  "I've talked with plenty of people in there. Joshua Weinstein is definitely not one of them."

  "If you'd never met him how would you know?"

  "People have things called names."

  "Maybe he used someone else's?"

  "Why?"

  "She couldn't swear, the waitress at Olie's, that is, if it was the guy in the picture or not."

  "That's because she never saw me with him."

  "Coincidence, I guess. Speaking of pictures, I like this one."

  Fargo picked a sheet out of his file and set it, facing John, on the desktop. It was a blown-up version of the photograph taken by the Journal photographer in the
parking lot: Rebecca by the planter in the rain, with the five newspaper employees approaching in varying attitudes of horror. John was in the center, stepping toward her as if all things could be remedied. The rain spills off his fedora and his leather duster is blown by the wind. He looked at the picture but he saw only the gray wall of The Lie.

  "That's you there, isn't it?"

  "Yeah."

  "Look pretty rattled."

  "You would have been, too."

  "How'd you get there so fast?"

  "I was heading for my car. End of the work day."

  "You two have a little rendezvous set up that evening?"

  John said nothing for a moment. He just looked at Fargo and thought how satisfying it would be to slam a shotgun butt into his face.

  "You're boring me," said John.

  "What about Susan Baum? Know her?"

  "Not well. Didn't have the hots for her, either, Fargo. She's more your type."

  Fargo leaned back and offered his rotting smile. "Keep in touch with her, Baum?"

  "No."

  "Like her?"

  John hesitated. "Not really."

  "Too political? Too liberal? Too pushy and self-centered?"

  "We finally agree."

  "Ever argue with her at work?"

  "Nobody at the Journal argued with Susan Baum."

  "She must have hated your outdoor articles."

  "In fact, she did."

  "You two never had a big blowout, then one of those reconciliation’s where you're both so happy you suddenly love each other forever? You know—fight on the playground Monday, best friends Tuesday?"

  "We weren't on a playground."

  "Haven't kept in touch with her since you left?"

  "I don't keep in touch with any of the Journal people."

  "Well, why not? You worked with some of them for almost three years."

  John was silent for a moment. He turned around to look at Snakey and Partch. He could see himself mixing it up with Fargo, but not with either of these two. He wondered if they'd graduated cum laude from the Liberty Ops martial arts program.

  "People move on, Fargo. You've sure got a rudimentary mind."

  "I'm just curious, John-Boy. See, you've been gone six months but you haven't so much as called one of your old drinking buddies? Not one of the butts you chased around on Friday evenings after work when you'd all get boozed up? Seems you just dumped them all for no good reason."

  "I'm slow to make friends."

  "I can see why, John-Boy! What, do you mumble and blush every time someone tries to like you? Or do you act like you're acting now, all defensive?"

  "Um-hm."

  "Just gave them all up, moved away to tumbleweed city to live in an aluminium box. Just found a trained attack dog that saved little Val's life. Just happened to wander by Olie's that day, like you did in the Journal parking lot. Just happened to be packing your piece. Just happened to shoot up a couple of bikers. Funny none of them got a shot off at you. So you go from the skids all the way to Liberty Ridge in one fell swoop, never even losing your hat. You've got good fortune, don't you John-Boy?"

  "It seemed better about twenty minutes ago."

  "Funny that biker you shot didn't require any medical attention. Looked to me like you blew his ball and socket in half. No gunshot wounds treated that day in Riverside County—no shoulder wounds, that is. Your victim must have guzzled whiskey, bit a bullet and had a redhead named Kitty or Cora Lee pull out that slug with her teeth."

  "If I were him, I'd have dodged the doctors, too."

  Fargo put the photograph and legal pad back in the folder and closed the cover. He looked at John a little gloomily now, his smile suspended somewhere back in his dark and hostile face.

  "Oh, it's all innocent enough, John—I know it is. No, it's really truly heroic. It all fits. A place for everything and everything in its place. I just worry too much. I imagine things. I always wonder why people arrive and depart, why they do what they do. Hey, I'm head of security for the head of a security company. So I'm secure. I'm so secure I see a plot every time the sun comes up. It's just my nature. With Mr. Holt due to leave tomorrow, I thought it would be prudent to get a fix on you. No good having a person of low moral character lurking around here, what with young Valerie so fresh and trusting. Yeah, conspiracies everywhere—that's what I'm paid to see. And to be truthful, it's really kind of a fun way to live."

  "Thanks for having my eardrum smashed."

  "Just a little pop, John. You won't even remember it twenty years from now."

  "Can I go?"

  "Of course you can. I'm sorry if any of this got a little heavy for you. Hey, can I tell you something in confidence? I mean, really top secret confidential? A couple of years ago Mr. Holt hired a supervisor for one of the software companies we guard. He was a good super—kept his guards happy and alert and honest. But a year later our company got killed on a bid by a competitor using an awfully darn familiar RAM alignment. It took us almost three months to nail that super for passing the design. But we did. Oh yes, we did."

  Fargo slipped the folder into the desk drawer, shrugging.

  "So you're good at what you do," said John.

  A little smirk again from Fargo, his eyes deepset but alive with light. "The point I'm trying to make isn't that we caught the scumbucket. That's a given. We're not good. We're the best. We're the best fuckin' private security people on earth and we know it. Naw, it wasn't that we caught him. We could have caught that greedy dipshit in our sleep. It's how we handled him. That's the part I'll always be proud of."

  Fargo locked the desk drawer and stood.

  "Well, I give up. How did you handle him?"

  "He went somewhere with Snakey, and Snakey came back."

  "That's it?"

  "For right now. Have a good day, John-Boy. Keep your dick in your pants when Val's around. I think I'm beginning to like you."

  CHAPTER 22

  The next day John stands at the front door of the Big House, looking through the glass into the entryway beyond. He opens the door quietly, pushes it an inch or two and leaves it ajar. His heart is pounding against his shirt, wobbling the penlight in his pocket, and his ear throbs slowly from the impact of Snakey's open hand.

  "Hello?" he calls tentatively. "Valerie?"

  Just one hour ago he saw Holt's Hughes 500 lift into the sky, shivered by the diminishing gusts of the Santa Ana winds. Holt, Fargo and Titisi were on board, and the Messingers.

  John can hear the short chips of Valerie's whistle from the meadow down by the lake. He has agreed to meet her there at three o'clock to help train the dogs. It is a quarter to three now. He had gone to the house to see if he might make a quick phone call to Bruno at the Anza Valley News, to see if any changes are needed on the article. He had already mentioned to Valerie and Mr. Holt that he wanted to do this.

  He pushes open the door, steps inside, and shuts it. The foyer is cool and he can smell the aroma of old wood, candles and adobe. His leather-soled boots are quiet on the tiles as he walks toward the kitchen.

  "Valerie? Valerie, are you here?" Then, louder, "Valerie?"

  He stands in the kitchen and looks at the phone, thinking 3-9-9. He picks up the handset, hears the dial tone, then pushes the "off" button. Holding the phone before him like some kind of insulting household mystery, he walks to the stairs, then climbs quickly up to the third floor.

  He enters Holt's library, again calling for Valerie. Outside, the sun is just past its zenith and the tall windows gather the light and hoard it down into the room. He looks up toward the shelves of books and watches the dust motes lifting in the hard, specific light. He takes twelve steps to cross the room and let himself into Vann Holt's inner office. He leaves the door open. He stands before the huge mahogany desk like a man waiting to be asked to sit. Then he takes a deep breath, walks around the desk and settles into the comfortable chair behind it. He puts the phone on the wood, noting the way the finish shines between the mahogany and th
e plastic unit, separating them like a sheet of glass. He studies the material on the desk top: in and out boxes (both empty); a telephone and fax machine; a blotter (fresh page, clean); a short crystal canister containing ten freshly sharpened pencils (points up); a computer and keyboard; a simple office-issue desk calendar turned to today's date (Wednesday, October 19); a clean crystal ashtray with the image of a flying pheasant etched onto the bottom; a framed picture of the Holt family taken perhaps ten years ago.