The Faceless One (33 page)

Jimmy turned to face him, and saw a young man dressed in the khaki shorts and shirt of a zoo official. The young man blanched at the sight of blood on Jimmy’s chest.

“Oh Jesus,” the young man said, “I’ll get a first-aid kit.” He stole one look at the exhibit, probably convinced that Jimmy had hurt some of his animals, then ran out. Jimmy saw him pull a radio off his belt as he left.

Jimmy turned back to Dabo Muu. The tank was once again undamaged, and the alligator lay motionless underwater. His eyes were closed, and there was no sign of the necklace he had worn.

“Thank you,” said Jimmy. The alligator did not reply. Jimmy hurried out, not wanting to have to answer any awkward questions. His long gray hair and slightly Asian features would make him easy to spot, even if he did find a shirt to cover himself. He would have to retrace his steps and climb back over the fence, hopefully evading the zoo staff.

He easily returned the way he came, pleased his sense of direction was still strong. The maintenance man had moved on to another area of the path, and so he was able to climb up the little hill without being spotted. He heard no sound of commotion but was sure his presence had been reported.

Climbing over the fence was easier now that he wasn’t in such a hurry. He was pleased that the pain in his hip had not returned. As he scaled the fence, he heard voices in the distance, agitated and growing louder. Even if they stopped him for trespassing, the chances of their arresting him were slight. The wounds on his chest he could blame on the sharp tines of the chain-link fence. They might send him to a hospital, but no one would hold him. Still, it would delay him, and that was something he might not be able to afford. He lowered himself down the fence and walked casually to the road.

George was waiting for him, and Jimmy was glad to see his old friend. George was stricken when he saw Jimmy’s chest.

“Great God Almighty, what’d they do to you?”

“Later … right now we …” Jimmy stumbled, suddenly overcome with fatigue. George rushed to him, catching him before he fell to the pavement.

George helped him into the car, not sure what to do. “I think you need to go to the Emergency Room.”

Jimmy shook his head and grabbed George’s arm. His grip was surprisingly strong.

“No, just get me back to the motel.”

George drove as quickly as the speed limit would allow, hoping Jimmy would have some kind of Tlingit medicine waiting back at the motel.

They reached the motel, and George was able to help Jimmy in without being seen by the cleaning staff.

Jimmy fell onto the bed. He knew he should be preparing for battle, but he felt like he was as insubstantial and fragile as the ashes from his fire.

Sleep, Mouse
.

“Have to prepare,” Jimmy said, his eyes already closing. George broke out into gooseflesh, because he had an idea Jimmy was not talking to him.

You have taken in much Magic, Mouse—you must rest
.

Jimmy forced his eyes open. “George,” he croaked.

“Right here, Injun Joe,” George said, trying to be brave.

“Have to rest … Check the papers—look for anything about a killer named the Taxidermist.”

George wasn’t happy with this, but nodded.

Jimmy smiled, then fell into a sleep that was very near death.

George looked at him, wondering if his inaction would cost his best friend his life. Maybe he should call the hospital …

George felt a gentle hand on his shoulder, and a sweet voice whispered in his ear.

“It’s all right, George, let him sleep.”

He turned around and looked, but there was no one there. That was fine, he knew Maddy’s voice, even after all these years.

Taking care to be quiet, he left and went to get breakfast and some newspapers.

Back at the zoo, the story of the “bleeding homeless man” made the rounds of the park, traveling from keepers of reptiles to keepers of mammals to the gift shop in less than two hours, but since no animals were injured or property damaged, the tale was soon forgotten.

Except by the animals, of course.

Stan Roberts, formerly of the NYPD, felt like hammered shit.

Whatever the Big Boss was, he was definitely having a deleterious effect on Stan. His vision kept blurring, and his skin felt loose, like his bones had shrunk inside it. All of his joints ached, and he saw in the rearview mirror that there were open sores on his cheeks and forehead. His hair looked dull, lifeless, the matted crepe hair of a Halloween mask.

No doubt about it, the Big Boss was sucking the life out of him.

That he might live through this no longer seemed an option. That he might live long enough to fuck over the Big Boss might still be possible.

He patted the gun in his waistband.

“Gotta be careful, Richie, don’t wanna overplay my hand. Poker face, goddammit, poker face!” He was talking to himself a lot now, and part of him worried he might tip off the Big Boss that he was not just a courier. He was an assassin. He was a bomb in a Christmas gift, a missile directed into an enemy stronghold. He, ladies and gentlemen, was the fucking Trojan horse.

Stan cleared his throat and spit, the wad of phlegm tainted crimson by bright blood. The wad was caught by his car’s slipstream and whisked away.

It was just before 11:00
P.M
. when he crossed the border into Arizona. He figured he had about eight hours to go. At least, that’s what the map seemed to indicate. It was difficult to tell with it going in and out of focus. The towns he passed were now just an Impressionist’s blur of color and vague shapes, their names barely glimpsed and promptly forgotten. Somewhere he had switched cars again and was surprised to find himself in a battered Olds Cutlass. Where was his nice new car? This one smelled like cigarettes and bleach. Stan decided it was unimportant. He headed west, ever west, and followed the counsel of the maps and his own instincts.

In this fogbound state of mind, he struggled to maintain his wits. He had to retain some autonomy if he was going to give Richie’s death any meaning. And his own, he guessed. Had there been someone else? He seemed to recall a heart-shaped tattoo, but the image was unclear. Perhaps he had dreamed it. He had killed men in the course of his job, three in all, but none of those deaths had been accompanied by the screams that still echoed inside his head from the heart-shaped tattoo. He prayed he had made it up, but a slithering whisper deep in his mind chided him for being so foolish.

When the flashing lights appeared in his rearview, he didn’t even register them. A short whoop of a siren followed, punctuating the morning stillness with its clarion call. He looked in the rearview and felt a great sadness. After so many years of upholding the law, here he was once again breaking it. He began to cry because he knew what he must do, and he had wanted to save the bullets he had (three? four?) to kill the servant of the Big Boss, the one who could drown, and was therefore mortal.

Stan pulled over, his tires crunching in bright sand of ochre and rust. The sky was golden on the horizon, the sun just beginning to chase away the last of the stars. He rolled down the window, and the desert air was crisp and sweet. In other circumstances, it would be a morning to make one feel good to be alive.

Stan wiped his eyes as the state trooper approached. The man wore sunglasses, which seemed silly just before dawn. The trooper’s right hand rested easily on his gun.

An idea came to Stan, then, and he wondered why he hadn’t thought of it before.

If he were arrested, they would impound the car. If he told them a bomb was hidden in the package bound for L.A., they would blow it up rather than risk trying to defuse it. The Big Boss would punish him, but its plans would be undone. It was elegant and simple. It would work.

The trooper, whose name tag read
GAHAN
, bent to look into Stan’s eyes. His nose wrinkled slightly. Stan knew he reeked and knew that it would also help his story.

“Good morning, sir. Do you know why I stopped you?”

Stan thought about it, trying to recall the laws concerning motor vehicles and which ones he might have broken. For some reason, all he could recall were rules pertaining to passing on mountain roads. Those didn’t seem applicable here. He shook his head.

“You were weaving just outside of Redman and crossed the double yellow line several times.”

“That’s bad,” Stan agreed.

“Sir, have you been drinking?”

“Just some water, but I don’t remember when.”

“Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to get out of the car.”

Stan looked at him and smiled. It was his first genuine smile in days.

“I have a bomb in the car, and I killed a tattoo.”

The trooper backed up slightly and began to reach for his gun.

take it

Gahan, not used to voices in his head, looked around for the source of words that had sounded in his skull.

the package

He realized two things simultaneously: One, the voice was in his head but not of his
imagination, and two, he desperately wanted to look at the package inside the car. He drew his gun, keeping it trained on Stan.

shoot him

It was tempting. Shooting this foul-smelling derelict seemed like a great idea, but he had to get a look at that package first.

shoot him now

Gahan kept his gun on the filthy man. He could always shoot him later, even if the man ran. He was a good shot.

Gahan sidled over to the rear, driver-side door and opened it. There was a package on the backseat.

shoot him, then you can look

Nothing doing. He wanted to look at the package first. He picked it up.

you do not obey

Gahan felt a chill pass through him, a sense of cold that became an ache, then agonizing pain. Crying out, he dropped the package back on the car’s seat. He reached for Stan and was terrified to see that ice crystals were erupting from his skin, jagged diamonds of ice surrounded by blood.

Gahan staggered back, his motion hampered by his muscles literally freezing to his bones.

Stan started to open the door. He wanted to help the man or be engulfed in that cooling storm as well.

go

It was the first word the Big Boss had spoken to him. All of its other communication had been in images plucked from his memory, clipped and pasted together like a kidnapper’s note in a B movie.

If he stayed, someone else would take the package. Someone who did not know the Big Boss’s secret. Someone who might not use a gun when the time came. His task was not over. He couldn’t rest, not yet.

Stan put the car into gear as the trooper was transformed into an ice sculpture, a frozen collage of meat and fabric, hair and bone, leather and gunmetal. As he pulled away, the trooper fell and shattered, chunks of him scattering across the road.

Stan looked once into his rearview mirror and saw the patrol car and fragments of the trooper sinking beneath the Arizona sand. Soon there would be no trace of either. The only sign of the Big Boss’s deed was a sort of dark rainbow, its colors grading from cobalt to violet to black.

Stan Roberts cried but found he had more clarity, more strength. The Big Boss wanted
him to make his delivery on time.

It was just after 9:00
A.M
. on Saturday when Esther Nadel stepped out of the Slater home in La Crescenta. She had fed Luthor and Midge, giving them a can of cat food and a good scratching between the ears.

Esther adored the Slaters, especially little Bobby, who reminded her of her grandson Ronnie when he had been a child. She knew Bobby loved her brownies and had left a plate of them in the fridge.

Esther looked at the flower bed, wondering if the plants could take another day of this heat. Probably not. As she went to get the hose, a car came slowly up the driveway, its tires crunching over the gravel. It was a battered Olds Cutlass, covered with dust. Its windshield was almost totally obscured by bug splatters and grit. The car stopped, but the engine continued running.

Esther put the hose down and approached the car, which had New Mexico plates. Perhaps someone was lost and needed directions.

The door opened, and the smell hit her. It was noxious, the fetid odor of excrement and decay, and the rankness of it made Esther feel she might faint.

A man stepped out of the car, his clothes filthy and his face covered with sores, stubble, and food stains. His eyes were half-closed, as if he were drugged or losing consciousness. In his right hand was a UPS box. He held it out to Esther, looking like he might collapse at any moment.

“Are you all right?” she asked, wondering how fast an ambulance could get there and if he was contagious.

“This is for Steven Slater, from his brother.” The man’s hand went behind his back.

“I’m afraid Steven isn’t here.”

The man’s eyes opened wide. He slowly brought his hand back around. It was empty.

“Where is he?”

“Coming back from New York—today, I believe. I’ll make sure he gets it.” Realization hit her, and she stared at him. “Did you say that was from his brother?”

The man began to tremble, and Esther could hear an eerie little whine coming from him, like a teakettle just beginning to boil. They stood there for a long minute, then he nodded
spastically.

“Yes, yes. You give it to Steven Slater. Tell him it’s from his brother, and Stan Roberts wanted him to have it in person. I’m Stan Roberts, not his brother, his brother is dead but still sent that package, so it’s very important very, very important that he have it. I have to go, have to go, have to get Richie and go but I can’t so I’m going.”

The man thrust the package at her, and she took it. Then he got back into the car with surprising speed.

“It’s for him just for him just for him him him.”

He floored the Oldsmobile and slammed it into reverse, sending up a spray of gravel and dust as he backed down the driveway, several of the pebbles bouncing across her new Docksiders.