“It seems to me you’ve got all manner of miscreants holed up here. Any one of them seems capable of that kind of cruelty. Maybe even Spiro.” Dietrich fans his hands dramatically like he’s telling a ghost story at a campfire and Spiro is the mythical beast.
“We’ve gone eight years in the Blinds without any sort of trouble.”
“And yet that seems to be coming to an end.” Dietrich leans forward and sets his own mug on the coffee table. “The Blinds? Why does everyone keep calling this place that? I thought it was called Caesar salad or something.”
“Caesura. The Blinds is just a nickname we original residents came up with. You know—blind leading the blind, that kind of thing. And when there’s trouble here, in the Blinds, we know how to take care of our own.”
Dietrich seems curious to hear what comes next. “How so?”
“As I like to say, these gates only open one way. So, if anyone has trouble integrating into the community, we send them right back out into the arms of the waiting world. Which, for most people here, is not a fate that ends too well for them. Especially people with bad things in their pasts.”
Dietrich considers this solemnly, then leans forward again and picks up his mug. He points to the lingering moisture ring. “Coasters,” he says.
“I’m sorry?”
“I looked everywhere, Sheriff, but I couldn’t seem to find any. You’d think they’d anticipate that kind of thing.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” says Cooper.
“And I will thank you for your visit and see you to the door.” Dietrich puts his hands on his knees and stands with a smile. “I do appreciate you coming by. And as to those mutts,” says Dietrich, “if I were you, I’d be less concerned with how this all began than with how it’s going to end.”
“And how’s it going to end?”
“Bang, whimper—how does that old expression go?” says Dietrich. “Either way, I sure can’t wait to find out.” He reaches out to shake Cooper’s hand.
Cooper takes it, then leans in ever so slightly, holding Dietrich’s hand tight. “You may be a crack shot, Dick, but don’t forget, I’ve still got the gun.” He releases Dietrich’s hand and gives him a nod. “You have a good day now.” He turns to the door.
And at that moment, good goddamn, Cooper really wishes he wore a hat.
From the window, Dietrich watches him go. Disappearing again down the dusty road to whatever it is he does all day. Tin-star sheriff. I could break that badge in my teeth, Dietrich thinks, then chuckles.
Maybe this whole thing will be a little bit of fun after all.
It felt good to shoot those coydogs, he can’t lie. Moving targets, obscured by flame. Good practice. Stay sharp.
And those wild bastard beasts were never meant for this world.
Felt good to shoot them.
Felt even better to set them on fire in the first place.
He wants to say he never set an animal on fire before but that’s not true. There was that time in the desert, with the dogs, the wild ones, the ones that haunted the platoon’s camp, searching after scraps.
Stupid towelhead dogs too dumb to run.
See, but that’s the kind of shit that gets you kicked out of the military.
That, and other kinds of shit.
Bad things.
Out in the desert. So many dunes. So much time spent sitting around and waiting.
So many bad memories. A lifetime’s worth.
Damnatio memorae, he thinks.
The waiting around is making him itchy here, too, despite his diversions, but at least he’s only got to wait another day or two at most.
Until then: Be patient.
Keep busy.
Get creative.
As he holds the curtain open, he looks at his arm and all the silent faces tattooed up and down his skin. He wants to ask them for their thoughts, but he knows they’ll just stare back up at him, mute and reverent. Thankful, even.
Same for the ones on his chest. Even the three new ones on the small of his back, still bandaged and healing.
Dietrich remembers Cooper’s face again, so serious, pulling him close. Whispering his empty words.
Then compares that face to one of the new tattoos freshly etched on his back.
Turns out it’s a pretty good likeness, he thinks, as he lets the curtain drop.
15.
BETTE BURR SITS in her nearly empty bungalow. She slept well and woke up early, folded her pajamas neatly, and got dressed and sat at the table with her manila envelope set squarely in front of her. She has two empty suitcases piled up in one corner of the kitchen, both of which she brought with her to maintain the illusion that she’d be staying here for life when, in fact, she expects to be here three days, tops. It’s been two days already.
So far, nothing. But that’s okay. She’s got another day.
She’ll go, and knock, and wait. Again.
Expecting no answer. Again.
No sign of life even. Except that he took the note. That’s something. And, if he still won’t answer his door today, she’ll show him the photo.
She empties her manila envelope onto the kitchen table. A large glossy photo slides out, along with a small Polaroid.
The large photo is a portrait of her father, smiling, handsome, taken in his younger days. She sees herself in him, a little, even though she never knew him. In the eyes, maybe.
She checks the second photo, the Polaroid, to confirm if the resemblance is real.
It’s a snapshot of the two of them, standing side by side, in a modest house in Hawaii. Her father stands with his arm uneasily around her shoulders, a head taller than she is. He’s smiling, or trying to. An oxygen tube snakes up from a tank on the floor beside him, draped over his ears and plugged into his nose, keeping him alive. He looks emaciated, diminished—a sunken husk that hardly resembles the robust man in the first photo.
The first photo. The one she brought for William Wayne.
The second photo is hers. The only one she has of them together.
It was taken the day he gave her his message to deliver. Now all she has to do is find Wayne and deliver it. Assuming Wayne even remembers who her father was.
That’s what the first photo is for. To see if Wayne remembers.
Today, she intends to find out.
Fran walks into the library as soon as it opens in the morning, dragging Isaac behind her. She’s not letting Isaac out of her sight today, or ever again, not after what happened last night. The whole town is talking about it. She didn’t see any of it go down. She ran back to her house, with all the shouting and screaming and gunfire behind her, and she ran up the steps of the porch and into the house and into his room and found him curled up on the bed. She’d left him alone—just for a moment, but she left him alone.
That’s not going to happen again.
And this morning, first thing, she decided to head to the library. After spending the night soothing Isaac back to sleep, then lying restless and helpless in her own bed for hours, she felt like she had to do something today. She’s not convinced that the book Cooper recommended to her will hold any answers, but she’s certainly willing to look. Guidance. Advice. Wisdom. Something.
Isaac trails her grudgingly into the library, clutching his toy race car, and plants himself on the floor among the shelves of books. As libraries go, it’s a makeshift affair: just a storefront on the main thoroughfare, just down the street from the Laundromat. Yet it’s surprisingly well stocked, the rows of shelves jammed with a wide range of books. The Institute seems to be committed to giving the residents this one amenity, at least. Fran knows. She spends a lot of time here. She feels like she’s read every book in here, twice.
As Fran walks in, Marilyn’s threading the new shipment of local papers onto the long wooden poles that serve as reading spines and which allow her to hang the papers, like inky laundry, on a wooden rack. Marilyn keeps the place admirably tidy and well ordered. She’s in her mid-fifties, with a
matronly air, and a meticulously maintained bouffant hairstyle that can’t have been fashionable at any point during her lifetime. She’s pleasant and helpful and perfectly harmless, which leads Fran to wonder frequently what exactly Marilyn did, or saw, to wind up here in the Blinds. If Fran had to peg anyone here as an innocent, she’d probably pick Marilyn Roosevelt. But, no doubt, Marilyn has her secrets, like everyone, even from herself.
Marilyn shakes her head with neighborly concern. “Quite a commotion last night.”
Fran ignores the prompt and gets right to business. “I’m looking for a book—it’s called Raising Icarus. It’s a book about parenting.”
Marilyn laughs. “Did Sheriff Cooper recommend it? I’m sure we have a copy—parenting books aren’t in such hot demand around here.” Marilyn turns to the old-fashioned card catalog on her desk, pulling out the narrow drawers and riffling through hand-lettered index cards. She pulls a card out. “Here we go—it’s filed under Social Sciences. The call number is on the card.” She hands the hand-lettered index card over to Fran; it’s got the call number up top, followed by the title, author, and a long sequence of numbers on the bottom.
“What’s this number?” asks Fran.
“That’s the ISBN. Helps you know you’re getting exactly the book you’re looking for.”
Fran smiles and pockets the card, then turns to go scour the shelf. It’s only once she’s found the book that she stops and retrieves the card from her pocket. Something about the sequence of numbers scribbled on it nags at her.
The ISBN is a string of ten seemingly random digits.
She feels a sudden hollowing in her chest as she turns her back to Marilyn and holds the card up next to her wrist.
12500241214911
Fourteen digits on her wrist. Too long.
She’s almost relieved.
She puts the card back in her pocket and admonishes herself for being so dumb as to think she’d stumbled on a clue.
She pulls the book that Cooper recommended from the shelf. It’s a hardcover, with the title, Raising Icarus, written in looping script above a photo of a young boy and his smiling mom. There’s something weirdly familiar about the boy’s eyes—
Then she stops.
Puts her thumb over the digits at the end of her long tattoo. Covering all but ten of them.
She walks back over to Marilyn’s desk, where Marilyn is puttering over her newspapers.
“Would you check another book for me?” says Fran, as calmly as she can. “I don’t know the title. I just have a number for it. Can you do that?”
“The ISBN?” Marilyn says. “Well, for that, I’ll need my books-in-print catalog.” She unshelves an enormous hardcover, the size of an encyclopedia, and opens it. “The Institute sends me these every once in a while. The irony is, it’s so out of date that it’s probably out of print itself.” She chuckles as she flips it open. “I keep telling them we need a computer to look these books up but, you know, prohibitions. All right—what’s the number?”
Fran pulls the index card from her pocket and pretends she’s reading from it, as though she’s scribbled the number down. It doesn’t matter either way, since Marilyn’s back is turned and she’s concentrating on her catalog. Fran holds up the card but recites the first ten numbers from her wrist.
1250024121.
It’s not hard. She knows them by heart.
Fran watches as Marilyn flips through pages.
Waits an excruciating moment.
Then another.
Telling herself this is stupid. This will all be for nothing.
“Yes, here it is,” Marilyn says. “And you’re in luck.” She spins on her swivel chair back toward the card catalog. While Fran waits, she notices that the library has suddenly gone very quiet, and Isaac’s motor-car noises sound very loud, but very far away. She feels her chest constrict.
Marilyn plucks another card from a narrow drawer and holds it aloft triumphantly. She turns in her chair and holds out the card to Fran.
Fran almost doesn’t want to take it, but she takes it. Once she has it, she doesn’t want to read it. But she reads it.
As Consciousness Is Harnessed to Flesh: Journals & Notebooks 1964–1980, by Susan Sontag.
“That’s the one,” Fran says feebly, trying to sound convincing, forcing a smile.
“We have a copy,” says Marilyn. “Should be filed under Biography.”
Fran nods and turns to go search for the book. In truth, neither the title nor the author’s name means anything to her. The title sounds kind of ridiculous, to be honest. But there’s no way this is a coincidence—not all ten digits. She finds the section and runs a fingertip across the spines.
Snowden, Solzhenitsyn, Sontag.
Here it is.
She pulls it from the shelf.
It’s a volume of diaries. She flips through it. There’s a second book, a sequel, with a matching spine, still on the shelf. She pulls that book down, too.
“Certainly looks thought-provoking,” says Marilyn, cheerily, from behind her.
“Something to pass the time,” says Fran, then shoves both books, along with Raising Icarus, under her arm, grabs Isaac’s hand again, and tugs him toward the door.
Cooper watches himself in the mirror as he buttons a fresh new brown uniform shirt. He has five identical brown shirts, all with identical pearl snap buttons, and he tries his best to make sure at least one of them is clean for work every single day. It’s the little things that keep you sane.
He smoothes a hand over the front of the shirt. Good enough. Got to look presentable, especially if you’re going to meet with Dr. Holliday.
It’s a big ask. He’s got a little leverage, and a little charm, and he’s hoping, together, that will be enough.
He checks the clock. It’s nearly nine in the morning already.
He looks over at the unfolded fax laying faceup on his dresser.
He should have fed it in the shredder the moment after he first received it. No need to hang on to it—the message isn’t going to change.
But he did hang on to it, maybe because shredding it might give him a moment’s pause, like maybe he’s going to wriggle out of it.
Looking at the dead-eyed mug shot of Gerald Dean.
What did you do, Gerald?
The fax doesn’t say what Gerald did. It just says the same thing it said yesterday.
Tomorrow.
Except now tomorrow is today.
Cooper’s got the fax folded up again and tucked in his breast pocket, just under his star, as he walks down the main strip past the general store. He spots Spiro, who’s out front, in his apron, unpacking the morning’s shipment of supplies. Looks like they got mangoes; Cooper makes a note to grab a few before they get snapped up. He gives Spiro a friendly wave.
Then he sees Fran and Isaac rushing out of the library, just down the block, in a hurry. Fran looks harried, tugging Isaac by the hand. She’s got three books in her other arm. He waves her down.
“Morning, Fran.”
“Hey, Cal,” she says, distracted.
Cooper tousles Isaac’s hair, then looks her over. “Everything okay last night?”
“Yes, in the end. Isaac was home. Scared out of his wits, but okay. Walt Robinson came over later to check in on us. I assume you sent him by. Thank you for that.”
“What happened, Sheriff?” says Isaac. “I heard a gun shooting.”
“Now how do you know what a gun sounds like?” says Cooper.
“From movies.”
“Just an accident,” says Cooper. “It’s taken care of.”
“Morning, Sheriff,” comes a woman’s voice from behind them. Cooper turns and sees it’s Dawes. She’s walking toward them, up bright and early, carrying a cardboard box under her arm.
“You headed to the station?” Cooper says. “I’ll walk with you.”
“No, I’m just getting ready to head off to Abilene.”
“You really got Mallomars in that box?” says Coope
r.
Dawes laughs. To Cooper’s ear, she sounds nervous. “These are just some supplies I asked Spiro to order for me.”
“I bet it’s full of Mallomars, and you just don’t want to share.” Cooper winks at Isaac. “That wouldn’t be very nice, now would it?”
“They’re personal items.”
“Come on, Dawes, are you going to make me confiscate it?”
“They’re”—Dawes leans in—“feminine items.”
“In a Mallomar box?”
Dawes shrugs. The sun to her right now feels hotter than it’s felt in a long time.
“What’s a feminine—” says Isaac.
“I understand, Deputy,” says Cooper. He glances at Fran. “You found the book?”
“Yes, at the library.”
“What’s with the other two?”
“Just something that looked interesting—”
“All those books you have at home,” Cooper says, “I’m surprised you still go searching.”
“Good morning, Sheriff.” Cooper turns at the voice and sees Bette Burr approaching, with an envelope in her hand.
“We’ve got a regular town meeting happening,” he says.
“Just on my way to the commissary to check out the new supplies,” says Burr. “That’s today, right? The new shipment?”
“Sounds like you’re finally figuring out how this place works,” says Cooper. “Any luck with Mr. Wayne?”
“Not yet,” says Burr.
“If you don’t mind,” says Dawes. “I’ve got to get—”
“Of course,” Cooper says. “You’ll be back tonight?”
“Yes, definitely.”
“I want you here by the time I get back from my trip.”
“Understood.”
Cooper turns to Fran. “I may have some news for you later.”
“You know where to find me,” says Fran, who smiles, then tugs at Isaac’s hand.
Cooper gives each of the women a quick nod and, the impromptu meeting implicitly adjourned, the four of them head off on their separate missions: Fran with her son, Bette with her photos, Cooper with his folded fax, and Dawes with her stash of purloined mail and her secret box of bullets.
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