by Wil Mara
“Ben? You home?”
He slipped inside with Sheila in tow. Then the smell hit them.
“Oh, man,” he said, waving it away from his nose.
“He apparently hasn’t done his laundry in a while.”
“Either that or—oh no!”
Hammond took off running, going from room to room and shouting Burdick’s name while Sheila tried her best to keep up. Finally he reached the den in the back. It had been nice at one time—white brick walls, thick carpet, an expensive home theater system. But like the rest of the property, it exhibited signs of neglect. Dirty plates and empty beer cans were scattered about, and the shades were pulled down. The answering machine by the phone was still blinking from the message Hammond had left on the way over.
Burdick was slumped in the recliner, wearing only gym shorts and a Dallas Cowboys T-shirt. He wasn’t moving.
Hammond knelt down and felt for a pulse.
“Is he—?”
“Yeah, he’s alive. But, whew, does he reek.”
Sheila went to the set of east-facing windows and pulled the shades up, revealing a panoramic view of the expansive backyard and the adjacent woodland beyond. As the room flooded with afternoon light, more details of Burdick’s squalor became visible. There was an ashtray overflowing with cigarette butts on an end table and what appeared to be a petrified coffee spill on the table’s marble surface.
“Cigarettes and coffee?” Sheila whispered. “I thought you said he was a health nut.”
“He is . . . or was. I don’t know—Ben? Hey, Ben. Wake up!”
Hammond shook him, then patted the side of his unshaven face. Burdick groaned as his head rolled about.
“Ben, come on. . . .”
At last the eyes opened, the lids peeling apart the crusted organic seal that had formed along the edges. The scleras were red and watery, veins fleeing in every direction.
“What?” he croaked. “Who’s that?”
“It’s Jason Hammond. Come on, wake up.”
Burdick tried to focus. His eyes shuttered in a mechanical manner. He coughed, sending a blast of whiskey in Hammond’s direction.
“Thanks a million for that, Ben.”
Burdick finally seemed to get a fix on him, a degree of hazy recognition settling in.
Then the change. Even in his diminished state, fear filled his eyes. Burdick tried to move back in the chair as though he thought Hammond had smallpox.
“What do you want?” He said this with more clarity than Hammond would have thought possible.
“Well, I wanted to talk to you about the Kennedy assassin—”
“No, I don’t do anything with that anymore.” Burdick’s head jerked when he noticed Sheila standing there. “Who are you?”
“This is my friend Sheila Baker.”
“Hello, Dr. Burdick,” she said, smiling.
“Yeah, hi. What do you two want?”
“I’m here to talk to you about something concerning the assassination. Something very big. You’ll want to hear this, believe me.”
Burdick shook his head rapidly. “I have nothing to do with it anymore, so no, I don’t want to hear it.”
“What?”
Burdick lifted himself out of the chair, again with greater fluidity than Hammond would have believed. “Just leave me alone,” he said, waving his hand.
“Ben—”
“No, Jason. Absolutely n—”
“Ben, it’s about the Babushka Lady. We found her film, and there’s a guy with a rifle in the storm drain.”
This brought Burdick to a halt, his bare feet squealing on the hardwood floor. When he turned back, there was a glimmer in his eyes that reminded Hammond of the old Ben. At first Hammond thought it was a merge of curiosity and fascination. Then he realized what it really was.
Recognition. He already knows about Storm-Drain Man.
“No. . . . Don’t say any more.”
“Ben—”
“I don’t want to know. I don’t want to know anything!”
Burdick spun and continued on his way, taking a pack of Parliaments from his pocket and placing one between his lips.
Hammond shook his head. “I don’t get this. One day you’re one of the leading authorities on the assassination; the next you’re acting like it never happened. What’s that all about? And for that matter, what’s happened to you? You go from Felix Unger to Oscar Madison overnight?”
Burdick lit the cigarette, listening with as much patience as he could muster. Then he walked over until they were face-to-face.
“Listen to me,” he said calmly, pointing up. Hammond was at least a half foot taller. “I have absolutely nothing to do with Kennedy anymore, okay? I don’t care what evidence you found. I don’t care if the conspirators are sitting in your car, waiting to give a videotaped deposition. I’m through with it.” He started to walk away, then pivoted back. “And as for what’s happened to me, that’s . . . none of your business.”
He turned away fully this time. Hammond went to say more but Sheila cut him off.
“Jason, maybe we should just let him be.”
“Sheila, I don’t—”
“Thank you for seeing us, Dr. Burdick,” she called out. “We appreciate it very much.”
Burdick ignored her and disappeared around a corner.
They were back on the gravel road, about a mile from the highway, when Sheila said, “You shouldn’t have pushed him like that.”
“I saw something in his face when I mentioned Storm-Drain Man. I swear, I think he knows something about it. I just don’t understand him.”
“He’s scared.”
“Scared?”
“Yeah. He’s tormented by something. There’s a dark cloud following him around. It would explain everything—his change in personality, his lack of interest in his work and in his own appearance. I get people in my gyms like that all the time. They’ve had a health scare from their doctor or they’re trying to escape drugs or alcohol. I know the look.”
Hammond rolled this around in his mind. Burdick was a strong-willed, intelligent man, driven and focused and not the type to give up on anything. What could have occurred to cause the changes? Did it have something to do with the assassination? With his book, perhaps?
“If you’re right, then we need to figure out how to help him. Because if we don’t, he can’t help us. And I need his help right now. If anyone knows the identity of the man in the storm drain, it’s him.”
“So what are you going to do?”
Turning the car around, Hammond said, “I have an idea.”
“Jason, you probably shouldn’t.”
“Just trust me.”
Hammond gave the front door a perfunctory rap this time, more in the spirit of a signal than a request. He didn’t bother waiting for a reply before going in.
“Take it easy on him,” Sheila said.
“I will. Ben! Hey!”
There were traces of butane in the air, which he took as a sign that Burdick had recently lit yet another cigarette.
“Ben, I’m back! Could you please—?”
Burdick appeared through the dining room archway ahead. The cigarette was dangling from a corner of his mouth, and a beer bottle hung at an angle from the hand that was slack at his side.
“I thought I asked you to leave,” he said, his eyebrows touching together in irritation.
Hammond moved forward, Sheila whispering more warnings.
“Ben, look, I need your help.” His voice was calm and measured. “We both do.”
“No.”
Hammond took the color printouts from his back pocket and unfolded them. “Who is this guy? Do you have any idea?”
Sheila watched Burdick’s reaction closely. His expression of anger morphed into a blend of rapt fascination and renewed horror.
“Ben, come on, give me something.”
Burdick’s gaze lingered for a moment; then he shook it away. “I’m sorry—I don’t know.”
�
�Ben.”
“I don’t.”
“You’re lying.”
“Jason, I don’t know who that is.”
“Do you at least have an idea who it might be?”
The sheepish little-boy look on his face said it all.
“Tell me,” Hammond said.
“No. I don’t know anything.” He turned and began walking away. “Now please leave.”
“Jason,” Sheila cut in, “let’s go. Come on.”
Hammond followed Burdick instead. “Ben—”
“Jason, just go, okay? Do us both a favor.”
“Help us, please.”
“No, I really can’t get invol—”
“Ben!”
This came out like a thunderclap. Burdick whirled around; Sheila jumped. She realized at that moment that she’d had no previous sense of just how intimidating Hammond could be.
“They’re after us, Ben! I don’t know who, but it’s someone. They were watching this woman’s mother for years, and they blew her house to pieces while trying to kill us. Now, I don’t know what’s happened to you, and at the moment I don’t really care. If you can help us get these people, then you have to do so.”
He held the images out again, and Burdick’s eyes, now red-rimmed with grief, trained on them once more.
“I can’t. I really can’t.” This was delivered in an adolescent murmur, which Sheila found particularly disturbing coming from a grown man.
“Just what is it you’re afraid of, Ben?” Hammond put a hand on his shoulder. “Come on, tell me.”
“No.”
“Has someone contacted you? Have you been threatened?”
“Jason . . .”
“Come back with me.”
“What?”
“To New Hampshire. Come back to the estate with me.”
“What for?”
“Protection.”
“No.”
“Ben, you know Noah and I can protect you. Nothing will happen to you there; you have my word.”
“I . . . I just . . .”
Burdick’s eyes kept shifting between Hammond and the photos. Sheila thought Hammond’s face betrayed a sense of self-disgust, as if he were using them like a piece of meat to lure an animal into a trap.
“We’ll protect you—I promise. Just help us get these people. You’ve spent most of your adult life trying to bring them to justice. Don’t you think it’s time to close the case? Don’t you think they’ve enjoyed their freedom long enough?”
Burdick was fixated on the images now. His breathing was heavier, his eyes filled with reticent fascination. Sheila thought he looked more alert—more with-it—than ever.
He nodded. “All right,” he said in a whisper. “I’ll come.”
“Great. Thank you, Ben. Thank you so much.”
“Let me throw a few things in a bag. I’ll be right down.”
“Okay.”
He was gone no more than five minutes, packing enough for a week and changing into a white button-down shirt, jeans, and leather sandals.
When he returned, Hammond said, “You’re doing the right thing, believe me.”
“Let’s just go. Come on.”
“No problem.”
Burdick opened the front door and set the lock so it would catch upon closing. Then he pushed the screen door out and stepped into the warm spring air.
POP!
They all heard it. Burdick staggered back, clutching his chest, and blood began to flow between his fingers. Hammond caught him under both arms and dragged him in, easing him to the floor. Sheila shut and locked the doors. Peering through the curtained window, she saw exactly whom she expected to see—the man who had tried to kill them the night before was approaching swiftly, rifle in hand. “He’s coming!”
She turned to say more, then lost the words when she saw that Burdick’s white shirt was now soaked red. Sheila knelt and began unbuttoning it, but Burdick pushed her away with what little strength he had left.
“Leave it,” he said, then turned his head and coughed spasmodically. A flame of blood streaked onto the worn hardwood. “It’s better for me like this.”
“No, Dr. Burdick. We have to—”
“Get Superman,” he told her between hitched breaths. “Downstairs.”
“What?”
“The Superman . . . Hurry. . . .”
“He’s talking about his Pez dispensers,” Hammond said.
Burdick’s head rolled again and his eyes slid partly shut in a grimly mechanical manner. Then he lay still.
“Oh no. No, please . . .” Sheila brushed the hair from his face. “No . . .”
Hammond knelt beside her. “We have to get moving,” he said. He set a hand on Burdick’s chest, closed his eyes, and mumbled something in Latin. It took no more than a few seconds.
They ran to the back of the house, into the den where they had first found him. There was a plain white door in one corner, next to a recessed bookcase.
“That’s it over there,” Hammond said. Two more shots echoed from the front as the assassin blew through the locks. Sheila surprised herself by not screaming out this time. I’m getting used to this, she thought. That can’t be good.
They took the steps quickly but quietly. Like the rest of the house, the basement’s former glory was still discernible in spite of years of disregard. Three baskets of dirty laundry sat on a tan-felted pool table. Several large boxes bearing the SMU logo were piled on the bar alongside more empty booze bottles and overwhelmed ashtrays. And the textured, cream-colored carpeting was in desperate need of a good shampooing.
Along the wall adjacent to the bar was a series of long shelves. Standing in neat rows on each, like lines of soldiers awaiting inspection, were hundreds of colorful Pez dispensers. There were characters from all points around the cultural spectrum, from movie and television icons to sports stars and historical figures.
They scanned the collection like a pair of confused androids, their heads moving about crazily.
“Where is it? Where is it?”
“There,” Sheila said, pointing to the lower left-hand corner. The cartridge was bright blue with an armless bust of Superman on top. Hammond grabbed it and pushed the top back with his thumb.
“Oh, wow.”
“What?”
Hammond held the contents out for her to see—hidden in the cartridge was a USB flash drive.
Before she had a chance to comment, another muffled report came from upstairs.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” he said, tucking the dispenser and its precious cargo in his pocket. “Come on.”
There was a ground-level window above the washing machine. Hammond tried the latch, but it had been painted over too many times and wouldn’t budge. When Sheila heard hurried footsteps pass directly overhead, she felt nauseous.
“Jason . . .”
“In there,” he whispered, nodding toward a door on the other side of the pool table. Behind it was a small utility area with a slop sink, water heater, and furnace. There was a second window over the sink, but its latch was also the victim of too many lazy painters.
Hammond spotted a cobwebbed broom in the shadows. He grabbed it and climbed into the sink.
“What are you doing?”
“Since our options are obviously quite limited, I’m resorting to extreme force,” he said. He aimed the butt end of the broom handle at the latch and began striking it in short jabs.
“Jason! The noise!”
“I know. I’m trying to be as quiet as possible.” The latch broke free after a few more shots, and the window came up with a squeal. “Okay, ladies fir—”
Hammond’s smile vanished when they both heard a second squeal—the door at the top of the stairs opening.
Birk still had not heard anything, but he saw the door in the den and had to check it out.
He took the first step carefully, setting his foot down at the extreme edge, where it was least likely to creak. He paused to listen and heard nothing
. Part of him didn’t believe they were down there, that this was a waste of precious time. Another part, however—the methodical part that had been rammed into place by his masters all those years ago—led him forward.
Hammond was listening closely, Sheila watching him. Finally he got out of the sink and took her by the hand, leading her to the darkened side of the long room, stopping midway to loosen the bare bulb that hung from the ceiling. When they crouched behind the furnace, he whispered, “Breathe through your nose as calmly as you can.” Then he readied both hands on the broom and waited.
A feeling of unreality washed over Sheila. She knew she was frightened, but the fear seemed far away somehow, like a tiny boat moving along a distant horizon. What was inside mostly was nothingness, a bloodless cold that made her feel more machinelike than human. At the same time, she seemed to have a greater awareness of her surroundings than she could ever remember. Every sense was on some kind of physiological high alert. She could hear the man’s footsteps as if through headphones. She could smell every dust mote on the floor, every drop of stray heating oil that had dried around the furnace’s aging fixtures. She had never known such perception.
When the man opened the utility room door and peered around the corner, Sheila’s sensation of surrealism deepened. It was like watching events unfold through a pool of water. The man felt for the light switch and gently lifted it. When the bulb failed to ignite, his eyes went up to it suspiciously, then down again. He took a tentative step into the room, and Sheila saw that he was holding the rifle. The one he used to kill Dr. Burdick. The barrel was matte black with a silencer screwed onto the end, and he was holding the weapon low, with the butt against his hip. Death was no more than twenty feet away now. He took another step forward, then paused to listen. The next few seconds were the longest of Sheila’s life. To combat the terror that was at last beginning to flow along her every nerve, she tried to focus on Jason’s advice—“Breathe through your nose as calmly as you can.”
After an eternity, the man back-stepped out of the room.
They remained in their crouched positions and listened as he surveyed the rest of basement, then crept back up the stairs.
“I think I just died inside,” Sheila said hoarsely as all emotion returned in a wave.