Gideon's Sword (31 page)

He turned to go and heard a voice. “Just a minute.”

He turned back to find both men with pistols aimed at him. “Give me the rest of your money,” Tall Man said.

Gideon stared. “You robbing me? A customer?”

“You got it, boy.”

Gideon had another two thousand in his pocket. He made a quick decision, pulled out the money, tossed it on the ground. “That’s all of it.”

“Pistol, too.”

“Now, that’s going too far.”

“Then kiss your white ass good-bye.” They both grinned, aiming their guns.

“My
white
ass?” Gideon asked, incredulously. He reached in, removed the pistol, aimed it at the men.

“You’re forgetting it ain’t loaded, you punk-ass bitch.”

“If I give you the gun back, promise to let me go,” Gideon whined, holding it out.

“Sure thing.” Two shit-eating smiles followed this assurance.

Gideon’s hand shook so much they began to laugh. Tall Man reached over to get the pistol and, just at that moment of distraction, Gideon lashed out at Cold Sores, smacking the gun out of his hand while at the same time jamming his foot against the side of his knee and twisting himself out of the way of Tall Man’s line of fire. As Cold Sores went down with a howl, Tall Man fired, and Gideon felt the bullet tug the shoulder of his jacket. With a furious scream he fell on Tall Man. He went down like a rotten tree and Gideon landed on top of him, wresting the gun from him in one violent motion and jamming it in his eye, pressing it hard against the eyeball.

“No, no,
oww!
” the man screamed in pain, trying to twist his head, but the barrel was pressed so hard against his eye, he was forced to stop moving. “Stop, please, oh shit, don’t! My eye!”

Cold Sores was up again, having retrieved his gun. He aimed it at Gideon.

“Drop it or I fire!” Gideon screamed like a lunatic. “And then I’ll kill you!”

“Drop it!” shrieked Tall Man. “Do what he says!”

Cold Sores backed out of the room, limping, not dropping it. Gideon could see he was going to run. Hell, let him go. Cold Sores broke and ran. Gideon could hear his footsteps clattering down the stairs, and then a crash as he fell in panic. More lopsided running and then silence.

“Looks like it’s just us,” said Gideon. He could feel warm blood running down his arm. The bullet had evidently grazed his shoulder. A tuft of material stood out. The actual wound was dead, without feeling.

Tall Man blubbered incoherently. Keeping the barrel pressed hard into his eye socket, rendering him immobile, Gideon felt inside the man’s jacket, removed the money. There was another, much bigger brick of cash in there—at least five thousand. He took that as well, along with a knife. Then, as an afterthought, he ripped the gold jewelry from the man’s neck, yanked off his diamond rings, and took his wallet. Feeling around in the pockets, he collected car keys, house keys, loose change, and half a dozen nine-millimeter rounds that had evidently been removed from the Beretta’s magazine.

He pulled the pistol out of the man’s eye. Tall Man lay on the floor, blubbering like a baby. “Listen to me, Fernando,” said Gideon, looking at the man’s driver’s license. “I’ve got your keys. I know your address. You try any shit and I’m coming to your house and I’m going to kill your family, your dog, your cat, and your goldfish.”

The man let out a wail, covering his face with his hands, rocking on the floor.

As Gideon left the building, he made sure Cold Sores wasn’t lurking around, then began heading for the Grand Concourse subway station. Along the way he dropped the keys, bling, and wallet down a storm drain, keeping the money and guns.

Now he had two pistols. He ducked into a doorway and examined his haul. The second was a Taurus Millennium Pro in .32 ACP caliber with a full magazine. He loaded the 9mm rounds into the magazine of the Beretta, slapped it into place, and tucked both firearms into the rear of his belt. Then he took off his jacket and examined his shoulder. It wasn’t quite as superficial as he’d thought, but it was still only a flesh wound. He put his jacket back on and glanced at his watch. Ten
AM
.

On the way to the subway, he stopped at a drugstore, where he purchased a butterfly bandage and applied it to his shoulder in the restroom. Next, on impulse, he dropped into a variety store, where he bought a notebook, some paper, pens, and a thick manila envelope. Finally, he repaired to a nearby coffee shop to write his last will and testament.

59

T
he coffee shop was a cheerful place, a sturdy holdout against the grime and hopelessness outside. A battleax waitress, at least sixty but spry as a teenager, with bobbing hair and pancake makeup, came bustling over.

“What can I get you, hon?”

She was perfect. For the first time in a long while, Gideon felt an emotion that wasn’t dark. He tried to smile. “Coffee, eggs over easy, bacon, white toast.”

“You got it.”

She went off and he opened the notebook, thinking. There were two things he loved in the world: his fishing cabin in the Jemez Mountains and his Winslow Homer drawing. The drawing would have to go back to the Merton Art Museum in Kittery, Maine, from which he’d appropriated it years before. But the cabin…He wanted to make sure it went to someone who would love it as he did, who would not let it go to wrack and ruin. Or sell it to a developer. Even if he defeated Nodding Crane—and that was a big if—he knew now that he would still be staring death in the face.

The waitress slid his breakfast in front of him. “Writing the great American novel?” she asked.

He gave her his best smile and she went off, pleased. As Gideon contemplated his own mortality—which he’d been doing a lot of lately—he realized he had nobody. He’d spent most of his adult life pushing people away. He had no family, no true friends, and no colleagues he was friendly with from work. The closest thing he had to a pal was Tom O’Brien—but their relationship had always been transactional, and the guy lacked integrity. His only real friend had been a prostitute—and he’d gotten her killed.

“Top off that coffee?” the waitress asked.

“Thanks.”

And then a name came to him. Someone he could trust. Charlie Dajkovic. He hadn’t been in touch with the man since the death of General Tucker. The fellow had spent some time in the hospital, but last Gideon had heard he was recovering nicely. They weren’t friends—not exactly. But he was an honest man, a good man.

Gideon began to write, trying to control the faint shake in his hand. It was not easy. Dajkovic would get the cabin and everything in it, with the exception of the Winslow Homer. He appointed Dajkovic his executor and charged him with returning the drawing (anonymously) to the Merton Art Museum. In life he had escaped all suspicion; he sure as hell didn’t want to be fingered after death.

It didn’t take long to complete the document. As he read it over, his mind drifted to his secret fishing hole on Chihuahueños Creek. It had taken him years of lashing the waters of the creeks that drained the northern Jemez Mountains to find that one place—the most beautiful on earth. After a moment’s consideration, he turned over the letter and drew a map for Dajkovic, showing him how to get there, along with suggestions for what sort of flies to use at what times of the year. That would be his biggest bequest.

He hoped to hell Dajkovic liked to fish.

When he was done, he called the waitress over.

“More coffee?” she asked.

“A favor.”

She immediately brightened.

“This letter,” said Gideon, “is my last will and testament. I need two witnesses.”

“Aw, hon, you can’t be over thirty, what you thinking about that for?” The waitress filled up his mug anyway. “I got thirty years on you and I still ain’t thinking about that.”

“I’ve got a terminal illness.” As soon as he said it, he wondered why in the world he was confiding in this stranger.

The waitress laid a gentle hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry. Nothing’s engraved in stone. Pray to the Lord and he’ll deliver you a miracle.” She turned. “Gloria? Get over here, this gentleman needs our help.”

The shop’s other waitress came over, a chubby girl of perhaps twenty, her face shining with happiness at being of service. Gideon felt moved by these two random strangers with big hearts.

“I’m going to sign this,” Gideon said, “and then I’d like the two of you to witness it and sign your names here, then print them below.”

He signed, they signed, and then, as Gideon rose, the old waitress gave him a spontaneous hug. “Pray to the Lord,” she said. “There’s nothing He can’t do.”

“Thank you so much. You’ve both been really kind.”

They moved away. Gideon wrote a cover note to Eli Glinn, asking him to make sure Dajkovic received the letter; he then sealed it and addressed it to Glinn at Effective Engineering Solutions on Little West 12th Street. He removed the brick of cash he had stolen from the drug dealer, slipped it under his overturned plate, and quickly left the coffee shop.

On his way to the subway he dropped the letter into a mailbox, feeling a huge wave of self-pity at his lonely, screwed-up existence, which was soon to end one way or another. Maybe the waitress was right: he should try prayer. Nothing else had worked in his sorry life.

60

G
ideon took the subway to the end of the line and caught the bus for City Island. By noon he found himself standing outside Murphy’s Bait and Tackle on City Island Avenue, seabirds wheeling overhead. It was hard to believe this sleepy fishing village was part of New York City.

He pushed in to find himself in a narrow shop with glass cases on three sides and a gigantic man in a T-shirt at the far end.

“What can I do for you?” the man boomed out in a genial Bronx accent.

“Are you Murphy?”

“The one and only.”

“I want to rent a boat.”

The rental was quickly arranged, and the man escorted him through the shop to the docks behind. There a dozen open fiberglass skiffs were tied up, each with a six-horsepower outboard, anchor, and gas can.

“Got a storm coming in,” Murphy said as he readied the boat for departure. “Better be back by four.”

“No problem,” Gideon replied as he stowed the fishing rod and bait box he’d purchased as a cover.

A few minutes later he set off, soon passing under the City Island Bridge and entering the open water of Long Island Sound. Hart Island lay about half a mile to the northeast, a long, low mass, indistinct in the haze, dominated by a large smokestack that rose easily a hundred fifty feet into the air. The wind had picked up and the small boat ploughed through the chop, water slapping against the hull. Dark clouds scudded across the sky and gulls rode the air currents, crying loudly.

Gideon consulted the marine chart he had purchased earlier and identified the various landmarks by sight: the Execution Rocks, the Blauzes, Davids Island, High Island, Rat Island. He tried to get a feel for the waypoints of the journey: the next time he came this way it would be dark.

The boat, with its puny engine, moved through the water at a walking pace. Gradually, the island solidified out of the haze.

Almost a mile long, it was covered with a scattering of trees interspersed among clusters of ruined brick buildings. When he was about a hundred yards offshore, he turned the tiller and began making a circuit of the island, examining it with binoculars. The large smokestack rose from a ruined complex on the eastern shore that appeared to have once been a power plant. Reefs and outcroppings were everywhere. Giant, billboard-like signs placed every few hundred yards along the shore warned visitors away:

New York City Correction Department

RESTRICTED AREA

NO Trespassing   NO Docking   NO Anchoring

VIOLATORS WILL BE PROSECUTED

As he reached the northern end of the island, he saw some activity and threw the engine into idle, scrutinizing the scene with his binoculars. Through a screen of oak trees, he could make out a group of convicts in orange jumpsuits laboring in the middle of a field. A backhoe idled nearby. They were unloading pine coffins from the rear of a truck and laying them out beside a freshly dug trench. A group of well-armed corrections officers stood around, watching the activity, gesturing and shouting directions.

Allowing the boat to drift, Gideon continued his observations, occasionally making notes.

Satisfied at last, he fired up the engine again and continued down the western shore of the island. About midway, a long sandy beach came into view, covered with various jetsam, including trash, driftwood, and old boat hulls. The beach ended at a concrete seawall, behind which rose the old power plant complex and the great smokestack. Painted on the brick façade of the main building was a message at least a hundred feet long and thirty feet high:

P R I S O N

K E E P   O F F

He decided to land his boat beside the seawall, next to a salt marsh and beyond a treacherous-looking series of reefs.