“How?”
“It’s all about creating the right incentives.”
***
Carl had just returned to the Cascadian’s headquarters when he saw Kaylyn leaving the newsroom. He stopped to admire her. She was wearing a sky-blue skirt and white blouse, but strutted in an officious manner, snapping at one of the reporters when he told her he was still working on his story. She nagged at him about when he was going to get it done.
Carl grimaced as the reporter groveled and begged for more time as though afraid of upsetting her. Or maybe he was just trying to keep her in front of him, where he could admire her figure, no matter how well she had it concealed. The modesty of her attire seemed to make her even more provocative.
She saw Carl and paused, as if to say something. A scowl appeared.
“Are you going to be late with your story, too?” she asked.
“Come back at deadline and find out.”
She shook her head. “You men and your ways. I don’t get it.”
“Better get it while the getting is good.”
She reorganized the papers in her arms and stormed past him, elbowing him in the ribs. He rubbed them and grimaced, but couldn’t help smiling. A punch in the face or slap across the cheek meant he had gone too far. A light jab to the gut meant he gone just as she secretly wanted him to go.
Back in the newsroom, Carl and the rest of the reporters were called into the conference room down the hallway. They gathered inside and took their seats. Childs entered with a military cadence to his step, his hands behind his back. He had the posture of a Prussian general, but the demeanor changed when he saw how it was causing them to think he was overstating his case.
“Norton and I just met about the drones,” he said. “I can’t tell you much. There’s what’s in the paper and what got left out. A lot got left out.”
“Why?” Duong asked.
“One of the problems is we don’t want the feds to know everything we know. In other words, we don’t want them to be aware of everything we know about them. If they do, they’ll change their policy guidelines. We don’t want that.”
He put his hands on his belt. “We’re going to hash out specific rules, but the first one is that all cars are going to be equipped with radios. We’ll have specific channels that you will communicate on with us. We’re also working on a codebook. It will be changed every month, though we’ll have certain phrases that will remain regardless. The priority is to maintain our anonymity insofar as the feds are concerned. We don’t care if the locals know who we are, but we don’t want the feds to be aware. So far, the ISA’s presence is minimal and mainly confined to areas where the police have total control. Their agents aren’t the concern. That’s why we’re worried about the drones. They can do the work without putting their men at risk.”
“What’s Norton’s plan?” Fred asked as he stepped into the room, taking off his cowboy hat.
“We’re reaching out to get the necessary technology to block the drones’ facial identification software. Most of us are in their database, which means if they get a scan of our faces they will know who we are. They can compile a list of who works for whom and where they travel. Our thought is that they intend to use the drones to help them coordinate raids. However, the drone bill had language inserted into it while passing through a committee that maintains the ban on weaponized drones, so they don’t pose a direct threat to us.”
“That ban won’t remain in place for long,” Fred predicted. “The amendment was inserted just to appease a few politicians who were uneasy about the bill. Now that they have this passed, they’ll just amend it later as part of some funding bill. You can count on it.”
“You may be right. Be that as it may, we’ll deal with it when it happens. Right now, we need to get you all prepared. In the meantime, we have a few new rules. All of you will wear some sort of hat while you go out.”
The men looked around at the individual next to them, then at Childs.
“What kind of hat?” Fred asked, holding his up in the air. “This ain’t good enough?”
“It’s fine. Just wear something. Make it respectable, though. We do have a reputation to keep.”
“And what reputation is that?” Fred quipped. “I have all sorts of reputations, but not sure if they’re the ones ol’ Norton wants for us.”
Childs held a straight face. Jokes and sarcasm either went over his head or he let it roll over his shoulder.
“Just remember to be precautious,” he said. “This isn’t anything new, but it does pay to remind you from time to time, and many of you may not be aware of how easily the drones can identify you.”
“Any idea when they’ll be deployed.”
“Yeah, today. The first test run is tonight. They want to check out the city in the dark and see how well their night vision lenses operate. I have a feeling they’ll do fine, but let’s make sure that they don’t nail one of you, shall we?”
“You really think hats are going to fool drones?” Ian asked, his arms crossed in skepticism.
“No. But they’ll do for now. We’re working on it from our end.”
***
“You know what we need? A patron saint of some kind,” Ian said after they were done singing another round of “The Coasts of High Barbary” at the Fighting Sailor.
There more girls than usual that night. Carl easily plucked two out of the crowd, both short and petite. He brought them to his usual booth, allowing them to sit on his left and right. Tom had no girl with him. He saw a regular girl, but didn’t like bringing her to the pub.
“But I thought we got all the saints,” Fred replied. “We don’t need just one when we got the whole lot of ‘em.”
“That’s the thing, though. We need one that looks out for us specifically.”
“How about St. Jude?” said Donovan, the bartender.
“What’s his specialty?” Tom asked.
“He’s the patron saint of lost causes,” Fred remarked. “Not exactly who I’d choose.”
“Do we even need a patron saint?” Duong inquired. “What’s the point?”
“Such heathen ignorance is exactly why we need one. Who’s to protect us from your pagan folly?”
“You’re not exactly a puritan yourself,” Carl noted, admiring the girls on his arms. “Nor am I.”
Fred took a shot of whiskey and then spoke as though quoting a poem. “Be neither saints nor heathens, but seek out a place twixt the two, where the glories of heaven and the fires of hell are presented ever so vividly to view.”
“Words to live by?” Tom asked.
“That’s what my father said to me when I signed up for the Corps. He was Marine, meaning he was just as brave, or stupid, as I was. He just had the good sense to be born at the right time.”
“Timing is everything,” Carl said quietly.
His cheeks flushed from half a dozen shots, Fred nudged him as he reached for his next drink. “What about you, eh? Your old man ever tell you something like that?”
Carl grew somber, sending the two girls away to a booth.
“Not like that,” he said quietly.
“Your old man not talk a whole lot?”
“I’d think not.”
“Why not?”
Carl turned his head to the side, his thirst suddenly gone. He set his drink down, checking to see if the girls were still at the booth. They had not moved so much as an inch. They had looked for someone better, knew none would be found. He wouldn’t be alone that night. But he had a feeling he would be lonely, nonetheless.
Fred nudged him again. “Come on, kid. Your old man take a vow of silence, or what?”
“If that’s what you call dying, then yeah, he took a vow of silence.”
The humor in Fred’s face vanished.
“Sorry, kid. I didn’t know.”
“He died when I was a kid.”
Taking out his cigarettes, Carl spun the pack around on the bar counter, humming along with the patrons a
s they burst into another shanty. Fred sang, but quietly. When the song was over, Carl abruptly turned to him.
“I remember the last thing my father told me before he died,” he said. “He looked me right in the eye and said something I’ll never forget. He said, “Son, where you are, I was; where I am, you will be.”
Fred seemed to get it. But he didn’t know how much of the story Carl had left out.
The girls were ecstatic to see Carl come back to the booth. They slide under his arms, their faces beaming as they admired his aloof demeanor. What they didn’t know, however, was that it wasn’t a ruse or deliberate on his part. Even as he held them in his arms and took in their affection, he felt distant. His thoughts still lingered over his father’s final words that to that day he still didn’t fully understand.
When it was time to leave, choosing which girl to take was easy. One of them was too drunk to do anything but stagger out the front door. He took the other girl back to his place, where they wasted little time.
Afterward, he found himself lying in bed, the girl naked beside him. But all he could think of was what he had told Fred. Perhaps he might understand if he heard the whole thing.
He went over to the desk and smoke a cigarette. The girl woke, came over clad in the bed sheets, and took several draws on it as well. She tried to strike up a conversation, but his withdrawn manner made it clear he had nothing to tell her. She kept looking at him like he was angry with her.
Finally, she asked him if he had been satisfied, if she had pleased him. He rattled off a monosyllable answer before headed back to the bed, sliding his revolver underneath his pillow.
He rested his head against it, hoping a night’s rest would excise the thoughts from his mind.
***
A knock at the door brought Carl out of his slumber. He rubbed his eyes and stood up in bed, pushing the girl’s leg off him.
Another knock, this one urgent and solid.
He reached for his revolver from beneath the pillow as he looked over at the door.
“Who is it?”
“It’s Norton. Come on, kid, open up!”
With no time to dress, he threw on an old smoking jacket Usher had given him as he hurried to the door. Norton was in the corridor, accompanied by more of his incognito associates. All were well-armed. As if self-conscious of this fact, Norton waved a hand to the side dismissively.
“No, they’re not here because of you,” he said.
“Well, that’s good. For a moment I thought I got too drunk and forget about something I did yesterday.”
Norton peeked into the room, eyed the girl half-asleep as she rolled around in his bed.
“Who’s she?” he asked.
“No one.”
“Good.”
Norton stepped into the room, calling to the girl. “You have ten seconds to get your things and leave. After that, I’m dragging you out myself.”
His explanation did no good. She covered herself up with the bedsheets. After ten seconds Norton approached her, ripped her off the bed, and escorted her out into the hallway, tossing her clothes and shoes at her as he ordered his men inside the room. The girl was dressing as Norton closed the door and double locked it, waiting until he heard the thud of her footsteps moving across the corridor to the stairway before he faced Carl.
He appeared energetic, but solemn.
“We need to talk.”
Chapter Nine
Carl slipped on his trousers while Norton approached his desk and smiled when he saw some of the books on it. But that short moment of satisfaction didn’t erase his urgent demeanor.
Carl had his overcoat halfway on when Norton grabbed him into the corridor. There was no effort to be discreet as they headed down the stairs and out the front doors. A running vehicle was at the curb, some type of sedan he didn’t recognize. Norton and Carl got inside in the back and the associates took the front seats. The vehicle had a whiff of sulfur and gunpowder.
Norton offered no explanation as they left the neighborhood. Sitting perfectly upright, he had his hands in his lap, uncertainty in his eyes as he looked out the window. His comrades were also closed-lipped, as they had always been.
However, Carl knew for certain he wasn’t in trouble. Norton’s anxiety was directed elsewhere. Everything about him suggested that whatever was about to happen was purely a business ordeal.
“I hope I didn’t disturb anything just now,” Norton said.
“If it’s important, she needed to go.”
Norton chuckled wryly. “I take it she wasn’t your truest love.”
“Nope. Besides, she’ll get over it.”
“I’ve been told she’s not the only female whose company you’ve enjoyed.”
Carl grinned sheepishly. “You don’t approve?”
“I don’t care enough to have an opinion.”
“I appreciate that the women here are agreeable…they seem to actually like us.”
Norton raised an eyebrow. “Isn’t that the point?”
“You would think so. But a lot of girls I used to date weren’t like that. They acted like men had something wrong with them that women needed to fix.”
Flicking lint off his jacket, Norton rolled his eyes. “Drama I’m glad I don’t have to deal with.”
“Ever, or just now?”
He looked over at Carl, silent. The sedan jumped up a bump in the road as they drove over a pile of debris, pushing through an area where the roads had not yet been cleared.
“You’re wondering why I brought you along,” Norton said. “I can tell you this. You might not be needed, but I think you will be. There’s something you might have to do that I wouldn’t ask unless I knew you would do as I order.”
Carl held up his open palm, the thin scar running at a slanted angle where he had had it slashed.
“I took an oath,” he said. “I will not break it.”
Norton seemed pleased. He gave a terse order for the driver to make an unexpected turn in the road. The uneven terrain had them bouncing around in their seat. Carl tried to look out the window, but the tinted windowpanes made it hard to discern anything.
Minutes later they stopped. The others got out and opened the rear doors. On the right was a four-story building. The outer wall was covered with what seemed to be graffiti, but as he got closer he realized they were messages, not of gang names or markings. The generic statements had seemingly little meaning. Perhaps that was the intent.
Norton took the other men aside and quietly conversed with them. They murmured and opened their coats to display their automatic weapons. One of them reached into the vehicle and handed Norton his Tommy gun. He cocked it, set the safety on, and then walked toward the building with Carl beside him. They got to the small loading bay door at the corner, where Norton knocked in a precise sequence.
The bay door flew up as a man emerged at the bottom, waving them in. They bent down and ducked to make it through the narrow opening. There, they got a better look at the man standing between two pallets full of newspapers.
Carl’s guard went up. The man had a treacherous veneer, his voice overly slick.
“Glad you decided to take the offer,” he said. “Any problems getting past the patrols?”
“No,” Norton said. “We followed your instructions.”
“Good. Now, where’s my money?”
Norton lowered his head like a bull about to charge. “We agreed on this already. When you’ve done your part, you’ll get paid. Not a penny before that.”
The man didn’t argue. He led them through a constricted hallway. Carl didn’t like the setup at all. It seemed ripe for an ambush, and his instincts immediately ran to distrust. He wondered why Norton hadn’t had him bring his Tommy gun rather than leave it at hotel room. He still had his .38 special, the cylinder full of hollowed tipped cartridges. In those close quarters, the bullets would put down anyone hit in the center mass.
Taking two turns, the man brought them to a steep flight of stairs. The l
ight coming from fixtures in the ceiling ended there, forcing them to rely on flashlights. Again, Carl anticipated treachery. Norton appeared far more at ease, though something else weighed heavy on his chest as he gently hiked up the wooden steps, taking care not to let the boards creak.
At the top of the stairs they came to a decaying door, the rusted knob hanging by one nail. Pushing something in the top of the door and inspecting the hinges, the man took out a key and unlocked it, pressing against the edge to keep the rusted hinges mute. He had Carl and Norton go in first, then he shut it, locking the door behind them.
Voices echoed down ahead of them in the darkness. The man turned off his flashlight, using a small LED rod to show the way. The voices got louder and louder until Carl could pick up some of their words. They got to the end of the passageway, facing a thin wall. On the other side, the muffled conversation was now distinct and clear.
He suddenly realized it was one of the newspaper editorial boards. Judging by their tones, things weren’t going well for them.
With his hand on the wall, the man looked at Norton for approval and received a brief nod. Turning off the LED stick, he fumbled about with some mechanical lever and shove against it. A section of the wall pushed out like a door. Inside the room beyond the wall, the conversations died.
With his Tommy gun held close to him, Norton ran into the room, screaming at everyone to not move. Chairs fell as men cried out. Norton called for Carl. He came into the room with his revolver held out.
As he had guessed, it was the editorial board for the Tribune. When the chaos ended, they stood in a line against the wall with their hands up.
“Take this,” Norton said as he handed the Tommy gun to Carl. His hands at his side, he approached the Tribune men like a reproachful father disciplining unruly children.
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