The Nowhere Man

26 Man or Nature

Evan sat on the bed, his wrists cuffed painfully behind him. The flexible baton round had left a red mark the size of a fist in the middle of his chest. He was still having trouble finding oxygen.

And yet René wanted to talk. “My guards seem to have been stricken with an illness. Vomiting, diarrhea, crippling abdominal pain. I don’t suppose you know anything about that.”

“I don’t.”

René nodded as if Evan had confessed. “Your skills are fascinating,” he said. “I want to know more about you.”

Evan managed to get out a few words. “… not … that interesting.”

“You are to me.” René removed a kerchief, wiped his brow. His face was flushed from all the excitement. “What are you?”

“A drug kingpin. An arms dealer.”

“No. You’re more lethal than that. Something doesn’t add up about you. I’ve been thinking about your hobby, killing Contrell. Who does something like that? Who kills a human trafficker for fun?”

Evan did not respond.

“I’d imagine the same kind of person who would poison my guards,” René said. “Dr. Franklin is seeing to the men now.”

Manny and Nando glared at Evan, looking as though they’d like to beat him to death with their shotguns. Manny took a menacing step toward him, but René held up a hand and he halted.

“Those are our hermanos,” Manny snarled.

“No,” René said. “They were my employees. And they failed at their job. Make sure you don’t fail at yours.”

Dex barely had to move for the floorboards to groan beneath him. Manny looked at him, then stepped back into line.

René returned his attention to Evan. “There are two kinds of people in the world. Those who make messes and those who clean them up.”

The handcuffs forced Evan to hunch forward, but he looked up at René through a tangle of hair. “Which kind are you?”

“The third kind, who gets to make the categories.” His eyes gleamed from their burrows in his face. “You made a big mess tonight.”

Evan stared at Manny. “Or cleaned one up.”

Manny slid his tongue across his gold grill as if Evan were something he’d like to eat.

Someone tapped on the door, and then a man with long white hair came in, wearing a pair of tattered scrubs. The doctor hadn’t shaved in a few days; he had the wrecked good looks of an aging surfer who’d lived through one too many tequila sunrises.

“Hi.” Dr. Franklin looked across at Evan. “Oh. Hey.” Then at René. “Talk to you?”

René stepped out into the hall. Hushed murmurs carried back inside, though the words were unintelligible. Nando and Manny glowered at Evan.

It was an uncomfortable few minutes.

Finally René returned. “Six of my guards are in bad shape. Internal bleeding, renal failure. Their kidneys seem to be shut down.”

Manny made a noise between a growl and a cry.

“It is Dr. Franklin’s opinion that they ingested poisonous mushrooms.”

“It’s hard to distinguish them sometimes,” Evan said sympathetically.

“None of them claim to have picked any mushrooms, let alone added them to their chili.”

“If I added mushrooms to chili, I wouldn’t admit it either,” Evan said.

He watched Manny’s jaw tighten and enjoyed it a bit.

René cleared his throat. Evan was surprised to see his brown eyes moisten. “There’s nothing anyone can do,” René said. He added quickly, “And no major medical facilities nearby.”

“Here in Graubünden,” Evan added.

The chocolate eyes sharpened. “That’s right.” René swept a hand over his hair, though no strands were out of place. “They’ll die within days.”

“In excruciating pain.” Evan directed a look at Manny and Nando. “You should put them out of their misery. It’s the only humane thing to do.”

Manny and Nando studied the floorboards, waiting on their orders.

Evan switched his gaze to René. “Dying men drain resources quickly,” he added. “You should consider what’s best for everyone.”

After a moment René gave a little nod. “Do it kindly,” he said.

Manny bared his fourteen-karat teeth at Evan on his way out. And then Evan was alone with René and Dex.

“You’re upset,” Evan said.

“Not for them. For me.”

“Why’s that?”

“We all get sad when someone dies. It reminds one of one’s mortality.”

Jack’s blood-drenched hand trying to stem the arterial spray from his shoulder. The crimson soaked blue flannel mopped around Evan’s fist. Jack’s smile, rare as a rainbow, warming his eyes at the corners.

Evan said, “That’s why you think people get sad?”

“Remember when you first found out about death as a child? I never got over it. I don’t think any of us do. It’s an awful thing, to die. I don’t buy any of the marketing pitches that try to assuage the horror of it. Heroics of war. Drifting off into a blaze of white. The welcoming arms of God.” René’s teeth clenched, a sudden intensity. “I don’t want to,” he said. “And I won’t.”

“You’d be the first.”

His lips pursed, pulled taut. “Remember how long summer used to last when you were a child? An eternity. Everything still in front of you. Life feels … limitless.” He folded his hands at his waist and studied them. “And then one day you see a picture. You’re in your thirties, getting out of a pool in Santorini. And your hair is thinning, so much so that you can see the scalp beneath. It’s been that way for a year, maybe years — how often do you see a photograph of yourself swimming?” His palm rose again, hovering over his thinning hair. He seemed to realize what he was doing and pulled his hand away. “I don’t like limits. Being told what is possible. By man or nature. Just like you.”

“No,” Evan said. “You want to be everything. I want to be one thing well.”

“Then you suffer from a failure of imagination.” René leaned forward, a fall of light illuminating his meaty features, the dried dabs of cover-up, the augmented hairline. “We all want to beat death. It just becomes embarrassing to admit. But think if you could. Control time. If you control time, you control everything.” When he leaned back against the chairless desk, the thick fabric of his suit rippled like spread butter. “Imagine being who you were in your twenties.”

“Like the good book says, ‘You can’t repeat the past.’”

René smiled, showing a gleaming row of beautiful ivory caps. “‘Why of course you can!’”

The cuffs were cutting off the circulation in Evan’s hands. He wondered how long René was going to leave them on.

René produced the skinny bottle and sprayed down the surfaces he’d touched. “Uncuff him and lock him in,” he told Dex. On his way out, he paused before the big man. “No need to be gentle.”

Dex’s softball biceps flexed as he raised his right hand and cupped it over his mouth.

Happy face.