The Killing Hour

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

The problem with sleep is you never quite know whether the nightmares are real. Bad things are happening. People are dying and I’m the reason, and I can’t seem to wake myself. The sad part is that this is no dream.

I sit up and stare at my bedroom wall where a few slivers of sun rise slowly toward the ceiling. I try to shake the tiredness off, but it begs me to stay. My sunglasses have fallen off and are resting on the floor. I use my T-shirt to wipe away sweat that’s layered across my body. I glance at my buzzing alarm clock and the red numbers say it’s time to go to work.

The tiredness fades as I dress in my fatigue gear, but the nightmare remains. I put on my vest and load up the pockets. A quick scan in the mirror to make sure everything looks okay tells me nothing is okay. If I show up dressed as G.I. Joe he’s going to know something’s up. Getting the fatigues is turning out to have been a dumb idea. I strip back down and dress more casually. The night is warm, but I put on a jacket to conceal my gun, and anyway, it’ll be cold up on the pier. I tuck the Swiss Army knife into my jacket pocket. I drag the money from the ceiling and rest it on the living room table.

Our meeting is over two hours away so I get something to eat. I grab a packet of instant pasta from the cupboard. Just add water and a microwave and eight minutes of my time, which I use up unloading and then reloading the gun over and over just to make sure the bullets are still in there. I dish out the pasta and sit down at the table in the silence of my house and slowly eat it, thinking of dead men walking toward gas chambers after their last meal. Maybe I should have cooked something better. A roast dinner, or I could have ordered pizza or Chinese. The pasta tastes okay, but I think with my current appetite even a gourmet meal would taste bland. I dump the dishes in the sink and I’m about to wash them when I realize it’s pointless. I could be dead by tomorrow. The confidence I had at the beginning of the day when I arranged to have my back door fixed has gone the way of the dinosaur.

When there is an hour to go, I grab the gun and slip it inside my jacket, sliding the magazine in next to it. I take a handful of extra bullets and drop them into a different pocket. They click against each other as I walk. I probably won’t need the extras. If I can’t kill him with the first seventeen shots there won’t be much hope of killing him with the following seventeen. I grab the rest of my gear, which consists of the binoculars I bought yesterday and now also a flashlight, some rope, and Landry’s handcuffs. I hold the handcuffs and stare at them for a few seconds, putting them into context, the context being I was wearing these when I thought I was going to die. I picture Detective Inspector Bill Landry’s corpse turning gray in the river. He’s probably turning a color I don’t ever want to see. Something between white and purple. His eyes are open and milky white as the sun beats down on him. His skin will be slipping off, his body bloating, the insects will be. .

I can feel my pasta starting to move in my stomach.

Time to move.

I load the money into a dark blue canvas bag, which I put into the back of the car. I leave for New Brighton a little earlier than I needed to, so I drive a little slower. The sky is clouding over and I can’t see any stars, can’t see the moon. I park right opposite the pier. I watch my watch for a while. Then I grab the canvas bag and the rest of my gear, and head back up the sandy steps. The day has gotten colder than I thought it would. The wind is stronger. It feels like there’s a storm coming.

The library is closed, the lights off. There are a few fishermen still on the pier, the same kind of guys I saw earlier today, some of them drinking beer, some of them drinking out of bottles with paper bags around them, all of them smelling like cigarettes and fish guts. I walk among them, making eye contact, strolling boldly. They look at me and look away. They can feel, as I do, the change within me, and they sense this the same way a dog senses fear. I stand at the end of the pier and gaze out at the water. It’s rougher than it was this afternoon and the vibrations through the concrete are stronger. The air tastes of salt. I turn my back to the water and lean against the rail. Beware: Action Man is here.

The guys with the fishing poles are in the process of packing up. The way the weather is changing, they’re probably thinking the same thing I’m thinking, that within the hour the skies are going to open. There are others on the beach still walking, most of them with dogs, but they’re moving quickly now, some of them even breaking into slow jogs. Across the road cars are starting to pull away. The day is over for all these people.

I rest against the railing and stare out at the lights of the city. They represent life and activity-and so much ignorance. The pier is empty now and this suits me fine. It will also suit Cyris.

I push off from the railing and walk back halfway to the start of the pier. I stop at a garbage bin a hundred yards away from the library. I stuff the rope and flashlight into it, loading them onto half a dead fish. I keep the gun in my pocket. The wind is making my eyes water. I stay by the bin and I wait and I watch the road.

The killing hour is coming early tonight.