Blood of Cain

29

It was on our walk back to the parking lot when I heard a voice that stopped me in my tracks. “Lemme guess your age and weight,” said the man. “Nobody can beat the Guesser. How about you, young lady? Bet I can guess your weight to within one pound and your age to the exact year.”

I could hear some teenagers laughing, the conversation fun, challenging each other. “Nick, let’s see what’s on the other side of the Shoot-O-Rama, I heard a familiar voice.”

We walked around the arcade and watched as a dwarf sat on a three-legged stool, wireless microphone in one hand, a large weighing scale to the right of his stool. A half dozen high school students stood near him, watching as he sized up a large man and said, “Sir, I bet you are two hundred five pounds, including the weight of those brogan boots you’re wearing, and they haven’t gone out of style since their introduction in the Civil War.”

The man laughed, and looked at his girlfriend next to him. He turned back to the dwarf and said, “You’re good.”

The little man leaned forward in a short bow. “Okay, pilgrim, stand on the great revealer called a scale.”

The man stepped on the scale and the needle swept past the two-hundred mark for a second, and then pointed to 206. The man shook his head and smiled. “All right, how old do you think I am?”

“Old enough to know better.” The dwarf held his hands like he was looking into an invisible window. “I can see back to your birth. You were born thirty-seven years ago.”

The man’s mouth dropped, eyebrows arching. “That’s damn good.”

“Tell the crowd your age?”

“I’m thirty-seven, turning thirty-eight next week.”

“But that doesn’t count right now. Thank you, sir. Next person for the Guesser, step right up here.”

The man grinned and pulled a baseball cap back on his head and walked away with his girlfriend, both laughing. The teenagers drifted off, chasing toward the Toboggan Run ride. The dwarf turned to Nick and me. “Aren’t you a tall one? Bet I can guess your weight, height and age.”

“I bet I can guess your name … Isaac Solminski.”

He looked at me, eyes widening, smile growing. He tilted his head. “That’s impressive.” His falsetto voice rose slightly. “However, I recognize your voice, too, Mr. O’Brien. And your friend is …”

“I’m Nick. You’ll never guess my age ‘cause Greeks age differently than most of the world. I’m a two-thousand-year old optical illusion.”

“I like your friend, Mr. O’Brien. He doesn’t look a day over forty-four.”

Nick grinned. “Something’s wrong here. Nobody ever gets my age on the nose. Either I’ve aged a hellava lot in the last two days, or you’re really good.”

“It’s the latter.”

I watched Solminski click off the switch on the microphone. I said, “Courtney trusted you enough to tell you about my birthmark. Did she tell you how she knew, who told her? Your answer is very important.”

“She told me exactly what I relayed to you on the phone.”

“Where is she?”

“I couldn’t say for sure.”

“You’re a good guesser but a bad liar. I’m the only one looking for her who actually believes she’s not a killer. I need to find her first.”

“I wish I could help you, but to help you would only hurt Courtney. But I can say …” He paused and looked beyond my left shoulder, his eyes cautious, locking on to something behind me. He set the microphone on a corner of his stool. “If I were to venture another guess about you both, I’d say you’re being watched, no you’re being followed.”

I looked up at a slight reflection off the round glass face on the scale. I could see two men standing in the midway, their body language in surveillance mode, standing out in a crowd of moving people. “Is it Carlos Bandini?”

“No. It’s some guys who work for him. Why are they tailing you two?”

“You know a guy named Randal Barnes and one called Smitty?”

“Smitty is Tyler Smith. Barnes works directly for Bandini.”

“Barnes and Smitty were drinking in a bar, someone overheard them saying Lonnie was a drug mule for the Bandini family. I wanted to give Barnes the opportunity to tell me how Courtney wasn’t involved.”

“Why would he do that?”

“Because if he wasn’t involved in the Bandini drug enterprise, he might be willing to tell me just enough to take any potential heat off him. But now I know his job description is beyond only working as a ride operator. Smitty was Lonnie’s friend. I strongly encouraged him to call the same detective who spoke with you the day you called me, Detective Grant. Smitty can vouch that Courtney Burke had nothing to do with Lonnie’s murder.”

“But will he? I’ve worked carnivals, circuses, and sideshows when it was politically correct to pay money to point, stare, and laugh at what were called freaks of nature. The real freaks aren’t created by nature. Greed is the mother of most spiritual mutants. Evil is their father. Mr. O’Brien, the Bandinis aren’t freaks of nature, they’re products of gluttony. After you and Nick leave, I will be questioned by them. When this season ends, I’m hanging it up. You’d best be going now.”

“Before I leave, tell me, do you know where I can find Courtney?”

“No.”

I watched him for a moment. “I think you know. And you believe that by not telling me, she will be better for it. She won’t. That’s no guess. It’s a fact. You have my number. If you change your mind, call me. If you hear from Courtney, have her call me.”

Nick and I left and walked toward the midway, the two men following us trying to blend into the crowd. I glanced at the House of Mirrors and caught a quick reflection of the Guesser still sitting on his stool, watching us leave. For an instant, he resembled a character from a Lewis Carroll book, Tweedledee or was it Tweedledum? All I could remember from Through the Looking Glass was something about how a large black crow swooped down on the little men.

Even through the noise from the midway, somewhere near the vanishing point of my perception, I thought I heard the mocking cries of a crow.