Tailed (9 page)

“Didn't know that. I always assumed it was sort of…” I wanted to say “a goof” but finished with “…playacting.”

“Lucha libre
is many things. It is tradition, it is drama, it is acrobatics, it is comedy, it is allegory, it is gladiators. You know, the most famous
luchadores
have passed their masks from one generation to the next. There are even mask matches, in which the winner unmasks the loser, revealing his face for the first time and taking away his fighting spirit, his
lucha
soul, right before your eyes!”

“Really?” On the screen, a wrestler in a sparkly yellow cape and green mask with rubber devil horns leapt from the ropes, flew ten feet in the air, and landed on his opponent.

“You know, in my younger days,” Vargas began, puffing out his chest, “I was a
luchadore. El Gallo de Muerte
. Then I hurt my back. So I stole paintings instead.”

“Of course.” Great. I was lodging with the Chicken of Death.

“Here!” He bounced out of his seat and set upon a shelf of dusty VHS tapes. He yanked one out and shoved it into a vintage Goldstar tape player. The TV went blue for a second, and then a slightly blurry brown-and-white image popped onto the screen—we were midtape, in the middle of some hot wrestling action from back when TVs had horizontal control knobs.

“You see?” Vargas tapped the screen. “This is me, in a match against
Pepino Malo
.”

I watched the wobbly image of a man in white with a coxcomb on his masked head battle some guy in a dark outfit with what looked like pickle imprints on his leotard.

“Watch! Right here is where I—
El Gallo de Muerte
—perform my very own special takedown. It was mine, I invented it!”

The blurry image of the chicken man leapt across the stage, his legs scissoring midair so that they pincered the pickle man and drove him to the mat. The crowd roared, and Vargas's chest inflated with pride.

I took a sip of beer and said, “Wow. That's something, all right. What do you call that move?”

“El Huevo Podrido!”
He said this like he was announcing the arrival of a famous matador.

“My Spanish is a little rusty. I know it means something about eggs…”

“The Rotten Egg!”

I took another sip of beer, and it went down hard. The Chicken of Death lays the Rotten Egg? Does it get any more absurd? I felt like laughing for the first time in a week.

Vargas's reverie was mercifully short: “I must go make sure the tortillas don't burn. Put yourself at home, I will return.” He popped out the tape and our regularly scheduled program of masked marvels continued.

So I was left alone in Vargas's abode. Instead of watching the bizarre spectacle of cheesy superheroes doing jumping bean imitations, I took a tour. It was an efficiency apartment, with a small kitchenette off the TV room, and a side room containing an overly ornate bed that looked like a miniature galleon. Everything was dark and accented with red in the old Spanish style. The room looked like it had last been redone in the eighties, with cheap wood paneling and discount black lacquer furniture with lots of chrome. On a side table were a number of faded framed photos of Vargas as
El Gallo de Muerte
. His white cape was sculpted to look like wings, and his white mask had a yellow beak and red coxcomb. Somehow I had a feeling that even if he hadn't hurt his back the Chicken of Death wasn't going to be the next big thing in Guadalajara. In several of the photos, he was posed in the ring, holding trophies and flanked by buxom bikinied faux blondes with octopus hair. You know, hair so blown out that it looked like it might just reach out and strangle someone.

There were also a few Goya prints hung on the wall, framed in heavy wood like portholes from the armada. But I soon lost interest in my surroundings, my mind sinking into the depths of my predicament.

I hoped Angie was OK. What with having the FBI question her, she was probably worried sick about me. Well, at least my situation wasn't going to bollix her plans to go to the Couture show in Chicago. I guessed I shouldn't worry too much. Nicholas would reassure her, and if the FBI was lurking around, the murderer would probably stay away. I had no reason to think the killer would go after her, but I wasn't sure of anything.

Then there was Fowler. I'd given both the FBI
and
him the slip.
Let him try to find me here.

I'd been in a bit of a trance since speaking with Nicholas, numbed by exasperation of my circumstance. Me, on the lam. Me, a suspected serial murderer. Me, holed up in a pie shop, waiting for Lord knew what. Amber's next advance, probably. Or a dog bite. I determined that I was just going to tell her to back off. And if that didn't work, I was going to tell Vargas to ask her to back off.

It occurred to me then that all in all I wasn't in such a bad way. My respite at Shelly's would give me an airtight alibi should another big-game hunter wind up a victim of his victims. As long as circumstances didn't put me in the vicinity of the next murder, I was in line to be vindicated as a suspect. I relaxed some, with the help of the beer.

So I was sitting there, staring blankly at the screen full of parading Mexican would-be superheroes, hoping there would be another victim. Not very nice, I know. But what could I do to stop another big-game hunter from biting the dust? And after all, the FBI only needed to use my client list to stake out the potential victims and nab the murderer in the act. A cinch. If I just sat tight long enough, something would give. I hoped.

Now a wrestler in white sparkly tights, his belly sucked in, was striding down a ramp toward the ring, his white cape flapping behind him. The crowd roared louder for him than for any other wrestler who'd approached the ring since I'd been vacantly taking in the spectacle. When he took the stage, two pneumatic octopus blondes latched onto him, and he began shouting into the microphone. Regrettably, my fluency in Spanish ends with
cerveza
and a rudimentary grasp of Latin root words.

Vargas returned with a platter of food, and it wasn't until then that I realized I hadn't eaten all day. The smell of the hot tortillas, chorizo, and cheese suddenly rendered me famished.

“This smells terrific, Vargas, thank you.”

His chest puffed, clearly pleased. “I brought you another beer. The food is spicy, as well as hot.”

He produced two TV trays and set them before the couch.

As I carefully nibbled the edge of my tortilla, hedging against flaying the roof of my mouth, Vargas grunted and pointed at the TV.

“You know Draco?”

“Draco? Nope, I'm afraid I haven't been following Mexican wrestling recently.”

“If you had followed it at all, you would surely know him. Draco is perhaps the most famous
luchadore
in the world. Ten times over. I wrestled him. He will soon pass his mask to his son.”

“Did you win?”

Vargas dipped his head to one side. “I am afraid I did not. But it was an honor to lose to the best. And at his age, he still is in the ring. Not so much anymore, but still, the crowd loves him.”

On the screen, Draco moved to his corner of the ring. Sewn into the back of his cape were the shapes of five silver lizards.

“Why the lizards?” I asked cautiously around a mouthful of pizza.

“He is Draco. The lizard.”

“Yeah, but by the shape of them, those are geckos on his cape…” And the way those five geckos were arranged in a circle looked very similar to the design on Fowler's medallion. I choked a little, coughing nervously. There were geckos and lizards in commercials all over the boob tube, and they didn't have anything to do with serial killings, so why not some wrestler's cape? Sure. Didn't mean it had anything to do with white geckos and dead hunters. Nah. Couldn't be. Not a chance.

Then my appetite hit a brick wall.
EL DRACO BLANCO
flashed on the screen.

“He is magnificent!” Vargas enthused.

Swallowing hard, I dropped my tortilla onto my plate and took a gulp of beer before I asked.

“His name is the White Gecko?”

“Yes, but everybody just knows him as Draco. Is there something wrong with your food?”

This must, I thought, be a bizarre coincidence. I could suddenly picture the dead gecko hanging out of Sprunty's mouth, and it was all I could do to steer away from the memory of his guts spilling out like a bowl of fettuccine bolognaise.

“Garth, are you all right?”

“I…I'll be fine, it's just that…”

On the screen, the producers of the fight were airing a quick retrospective of
El Draco Blanco'
s personal life, in which he was out of costume except for the mask. There were more tenticular blondes, and then there was a brief series of clips that made me knock over my TV tray.

Draco on various hunting trips—kneeling next to a dead oryx, a moose, a bear, then showing off his collection of trophies.

“Garth, I will call a doctor! Sit…”

“I don't need a doctor! Oh, jeez…” I looked down at my food spilled on the floor, my beer gushing froth on the carpet, then back up at the screen, which had returned to the ring as an MC with a huge mustache announced the match. “I'm sorry, Vargas, I apologize…”

“You look like you saw a ghost! Sit, tell me, what is wrong?”

“He's called the White Gecko?” I pointed.

“Yes, that is his name.” Vargas pushed me back onto the couch and started taking my pulse.

“And he's a big-game hunter?”

“One of the finest. Your circulation, it is very fast, my friend. Are you sure—”

“I need to tell you something that you must keep in strictest confidence, and then tell me if I'm crazy.”

“Take it easy!”

“Promise?”

“Yes, whatever…”

“The three people that were killed? They were all big-game hunters, and they all were found holding white geckos.”

“I don't understand.”

I repeated myself.

“You must be mistaken.” He shook his head like he had water in his ears.

I locked eyes with him. Vargas suddenly looked grave.

“This is a coincidence.” He almost whispered. “A very big coincidence.”

“Very, very, very big coincidence. Either Draco is next, or he's the murderer, or whoever is doing this is a fan of his.”

“But you do not know Draco.” He scratched his stubble. “You say that all who have died knew you.”

I thought about that a moment. Yes, I'd appraised the collections of the three that had died. But just because the first three were known to me didn't mean the next victim would be. Could my connection to the victims be a coincidence? Yes, and why not? I mean, if somebody was targeting big-game hunters, they'd be as likely to focus on one of my clients as not. Most of these hunters insure their collections, and Wilberforce/Peete was practically the only one that specialized in taxidermy. Perhaps I'd been called out to Sprunty's manse merely as a way to effect the discovery of the body sooner rather than later. I was floundering in doubt, trying to buoy myself with hope.

“Do you know why he has five white geckos on his cape?”

“Of course. His grandfather was part of an organization of big-game hunters called the Order of the White Geckos. It is to honor his very brave ancestors.”

“Vargas, do you still know Draco?”

He was down on the floor with a sponge, mopping up the spilled beer and shoveling my pizza back onto the plate. “Well, many years ago…”

“Could you talk to him?”

He shrugged. “I don't have his number, I do not know how. All my old friends, I have lost touch.”

I looked again at the screen. As the two masked men grunted and growled in the sweaty tango, a crawler scrolled across the bottom of the screen. There were names of cities, and dates.

“Vargas, what's that say on the screen?”

“It is a list of places where the
lucha libre
exhibition is traveling to next.” He went off to the kitchenette to wring out his sponge.

“You mean this isn't taking place in Mexico?”

“No. This is the U.S. tour.”

“What's their next city?”

“I will have to see.”

We sat there in his dark living room intently watching the screen's blue flicker as we waited for the crawler to repeat.

Vargas slapped his knee. “The night after tomorrow.”

“Where?”

“Omaha.”

chapter 12

I
was given the guest bedroom for the night. Guest of Wilco.

“The dog will not bother you,” Vargas assured me as he showed me to the doggie's attic redoubt. “It is his room, but he will share it with a friend of mine.”

The accommodations looked swank enough for the likes of me. There was a queen-sized bed at one end, along with a dresser, bedside table and lamp, and a small four-paned window. At the other end of the attic was a clutter of old trunks and boxes, in front of which sat a well-loved dog bed. In front of that sat Wilco, guarding it like I might opt to bunk there instead. He wagged his tail lazily, averting his eyes as before, a wry smile upon his chops like he was dreaming up some scheme to make a sandwich of my hand in the middle of the night.

The attic was just cooling down from the heat of the day, and I could smell the tar from the shingles.

“Just stay on your side of the room,” Vargas whispered, so the dog wouldn't hear.

“Thanks, Vargas. I appreciate all your help.”

“Think nothing of it.” He closed his eyes and shook his head. “We all need a little help of this kind once in a while.”

We? I guess I'd officially entered the realm of the fugitive. Could the membership card and secret handshake be forthcoming?

Vargas put a hand on my shoulder. “And tomorrow, we will speak with your brother about Draco and how we will proceed. Sleep well.”

He clomped down the stairs, but left the door open, which was fine with me. I didn't want to be locked in with Wilco.

I'd taken the precaution of brushing my teeth and washing my face before I came upstairs so as to avoid naughty Amber. I'd heard her return and peeked through the bathroom window as she carted supplies from the back of her pickup toward the yawning yellow light of the kitchen. I figured she might still have designs on yours truly. I didn't know where her room was—there was no evidence in Vargas's place of any female cohabitation. Even in the bathroom, which I gave a careful inspection. That's where the fair sex always leave their mark, prominently or not. But Vargas's bathroom was all male. Scummy soap dish, aftershave, unscented soap, overused toothbrush, tortured tube of toothpaste, both seats up. Any cohabitating male would have been trained out of such barbarities. So I was well satisfied that he and Amber were not an item.

That was good and bad. While it meant Vargas wouldn't throttle me if he found her sneaking up the stairs, it also meant the fear of discovery might not be a deterrent to Amber.

Was I worried about my constancy? My heart, and all the attachments above and below, was fenced off for Angie. But that doesn't mean I enjoy taking pot-shots at would-be poachers. Most men have a natural inclination to please women, and a natural aversion to disappointing them. I hoped to avoid fending Amber off again.

Once I was snug in bed, I tried to read an article in the
New Yorker
about the lost art of Florentine puppetry. But I was too distracted. I missed Angie and wanted to talk to her. I wanted to tell her about all that was going on, share my troubles. That's part and parcel of having a soul mate, a need not only to share the good but the bad.

Then, as if I didn't have enough to worry about, I found myself fretting about adopting a dog. Wasn't Wilco ample proof that some dogs are just bad seeds? I eyed the yellow curl of his body across the room. You get one like that, you can't just return it. You're stuck with it for however long it lives, which could be twenty years or more. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that what put the ache in my belly was the feeling I'd had lo those many moons ago when, at age seven, I found that dog by the railroad tracks.

It was all white fuzz with little black eyes and a black pointed nose. Knowing I wasn't allowed to have a pet, I hid the puppy in the tree house. I brought it scraps, took it for walks on the sly. Nicholas was only five, but even at that age he had the smarts enough to warn me this would be trouble. But Arnold was my puppy, I loved him and I aimed to keep him no matter what. Then came the day that I climbed up into the tree house and found him listless and sick. I was so distraught I took him directly to Gabby, confessed everything, and pleaded for Arnold's life. She said she'd take him to the vet.

And she did. To have him put down.

Later she pointed out that Arnold wasn't so much a dog as an opossum. I'd thought his hairless tail was sort of odd, but when you think about it, opossums don't look that much different than a lot of the ankle nippers out there. How was I to know?

“He was a wild animal and it was illegal to own him, so the vet had to kill him,” Gabby said, adding: “I told you, Garth. No pets. It's bad enough your father lets you boys have a television. But you took in a pet anyway. And in so doing, you killed it.”

So why not get a dog with Angie? Now I could have that little white ball of fuzz with shiny black eyes if I wanted. One that wasn't a rat-tailed marsupial. All I knew was the notion of having a dog made me uneasy.

Turning the light out, I lay there looking at the roof joists, listening to Wilco do his impression of the Three Stooges asleep. Yes, all three. Damn dog was like a calliope of snores, hitting high notes, low notes, and walking bass all at once. I wondered if Wilco would let me put one of those Breathe Right strips on his snout. Not without a midnight snack of finger food, I suspected. But I eventually drifted off, counting the pops and creaks of the wooden roof cooling instead of sheep.

I don't know what time it was when I woke up, but it was still pitch-black except for the starry glow in the window. My arm was curled around something warm. At first I thought it was Angie, and then I thought it was my pillow. But when I snuggled up against it, it snuggled up against me.

“Holy…” I recoiled and almost knocked over the lamp while turning it on.

Pale brown eyes fluttered in the glare of the light, my bedmate gazing up at me furtively.

“Look,” I began, “this is not going to work. I know this is your place, but I have to insist that you leave.”

Wilco set his head back down and sighed sleepily. I didn't know whether to try to push him out of the bed or not. Well, I reckoned if he stayed on his side of the bed, he could remain. It had cooled down quite a bit (the attic was plainly not insulated), and the extra warmth was welcome. And frankly, I was too exhausted to care. As long as he didn't start farting, I wasn't going to risk an altercation. Dog farts are a line in the sand.

Great. Imagine Angie and me sharing a bed with a dog. Take a guess who'd get the small slice of the mattress pie in that scenario? I had to fight for half the bed as it was.

The next time I awoke, the gray of dawn was chilling the window. I realized what had woken me. Wilco was pressed up against my back, infringing on my side of the bed. You know, the way dogs slowly drive their bodies like a wedge between you and the mattress until you find yourself on the floor, the canine splayed across the bed like the Queen of Sheba in her barge.

I groused and started to shove Wilco back to his side with my butt. He growled. But what was he going to do, eat my spine? I drove him back farther. Damn, that dog was heavy. Then I felt his teeth gently bite my ear. I briefly considered abandoning ship and curling up in his dog bed.

But then the dog spoke, an imposter in my midst.

“Harder, baby…”

I flipped over faster than a burger on a Saturday night grill.

“Jesus, Amber…what are you doing here?”

She just smiled and hooked her arms around my neck, which I promptly removed. As I did so, I had an eyeful of her charms. She was stark naked. Stark? That word did not apply. Her copious black hair was down and spilling all over the pillow. A pair of comely round orbs emerged from the sheets.

“Look,” I began, “this is not going to work. I know this is your place, but I have to insist that you leave.” That little speech didn't work any better on her than it had on Wilco. In fact, she did the exact same thing the hound had, settling down with a sleepy sigh.

There are those who will tell you that a man's fidelity is no stronger than a trailer park in the path of opportunity's tornado. I consider myself very fortunate for having found refuge in the bunker of devotion. Fidelity is a conscious act and thus reversible; devotion visceral and thus involuntary. I'm not inhuman—libido's centaur did indeed caper about, playing his dissolute lute. But one can listen to the centaur's song without humming along.

I rolled out of the bed and pulled on my chinos. My teeth were chattering from the cold.

“What a shame,” Amber purred. “Much warmer under the covers.”

I heard someone coming up the stairs, and snatched up my shirt in my hurry to dress.

“Don't worry, baby, that's just Wilco,” Amber purred teasingly. “He went out for a pee. Now would you get back in here and let me rock your world?”

“Amber, you're a very nice girl—woman—and all, very attractive, but really…”

My attention was drawn to the doorway, suddenly filled by the shadow of a man.

I heard Amber inhale with surprise.

Though my instinct was to put wings to my feet, I was a statue. Mercury buttoning his shirt. Curiously, though, the shape didn't betray Vargas's deportment. Amber's boyfriend? I sensed that whoever stood there was likewise frozen in place with surprise, taking in the scene.

There was nothing to do but hold our collective breaths until the figure spoke. But he didn't speak. He whistled a familiar sliding crescendo of astonishment.

Then he spoke.

“Could this be my straight-arrow brother? In a love nest?”

“Damn it all.” Amber groaned. “You scared the hell out of us, Nicholas.”

“Hi, Amber.” He strode into the room, bent down, and gave her a kiss. Even at that hour he was wearing one of his tweed suits. I could just make out his sardonic eyes turning my way. “Helloooo, Garth.”

Those who have no siblings have been spared the joy of perpetual brinkmanship.

I'd just been brinked. Then he said:

“We're going to Omaha.”