Two Trains Running

“But, boss,” the man next to him said, “I don’t feel right letting you just walk in by yourself.”

“It’s the right play,” Dioguardi said, self-possessed. “If he brought me out here to hit me, he could do it just as easy with you in the room. That’s not Beaumont’s style. Only thing I’m worried about is maybe someone putting something in the car, so it’s better you stay with it.”

Dioguardi got out, took the cashmere topcoat the other man in the back seat handed over, and slipped into it.

“Lead on,” he said to Luther.

The slack-mouthed man walked off, Dioguardi in his wake.

“This isn’t where I went the last time,” Dioguardi said, as they approached the weathered wood outbuilding.

Luther opened the door without answering, and ushered Dioguardi inside.

“What is this, a garage?”

“Come on,” Luther told him.

Dioguardi entered the meeting room. Beaumont wheeled himself over to the door, offering his hand. Dioguardi grasped it firmly, eager to test his strength against the man everyone said had once been the best arm-wrestler in the whole county. But Beaumont’s grip wasn’t a challenge.

“Thanks for coming,” the man in the wheelchair said. “Sorry, we’re in the middle of remodeling the whole place…” His gesture took in the entire room. The sawhorse-supported desk was covered with a large sheet of white butcher paper, as were a side table and the broad wooden arms on three identical lounge chairs. “Take his coat, Luther.”

Dioguardi did not hesitate, shrugging out of his cashmere overcoat as casually as if he were in a nightclub. Wants to see if I’m packing, he thought, not realizing that Luther had already registered his lack of a weapon.

“We’re fixing the place up,” Beaumont said, as he wheeled himself behind the makeshift desk. “When it’s done, it’s going to be connected to the main house. Like an extension. Only it’s going to be just for me. My den, like. Will you have something to eat?” he said, pointing to the side table, heavily laden with a selection of cold cuts and breads. “Luther can make you any sandwich you want.”

“That’s a beautiful spread there,” Dioguardi said, taking a seat. “But I had an early supper before I came out. Wouldn’t mind a drink, though.”

“Name your poison.”

“I’m a scotch-rocks man.”

“Luther,” Beaumont said.

While Luther was preparing the drink, Dioguardi took out a cigarette. Luther stopped working on the drink and rushed over to Dioguardi’s chair, a lighter in his hand. Dioguardi waved him off. “I got it, pal,” he said.

Beaumont wheeled himself from behind the desk, until he was facing Dioguardi’s chair. “I’ll have one, too,” he said to Luther, resting his hands on the flat arms of his wheelchair, palms-down. Dioguardi unconsciously imitated the gesture.

“I appreciate you coming all the way out here,” Beaumont said, holding up his glass.

“Well, I admit, you got me curious,” Dioguardi said, again unconsciously imitating his host’s gesture. “I thought I was the one giving you the news. About me pulling up stakes. I meant that, by the way. Then you say ‘partners,’ and that kind of knocked me back on my pins. I thought you wanted this whole thing for yourself.”

“If you reach for too much, you sometimes end up with nothing.”

“I heard you were a blunt man, Beaumont.”

“Fair enough,” Beaumont said, smiling slightly. “I understand you made a deal with… some people. They want what I have… what I can do, anyway. And, me, I want you and me to stop warring over what’s mine in the first place.”

“Yeah. And so? I already said I was going to-”

“Oh, I think you’re going, all right. I believe you. What I’m worried about is you coming back.”

“I’m not-”

“Wait,” Beaumont said, holding up his hand in a “stop” gesture. “Just let me finish. The way I have it doped out is like this: I can do what the politicians call ‘deliver the district.’ Only I can deliver a lot more than that. In a lot bigger area than you might think. That’s what the people who came to you want from me. And they’ll get it. In exchange, I’m supposed to have this whole territory for myself. Like I used to have, before you started making your moves.”

Beaumont shifted position in his chair, paused for a second, then continued. “Okay, let’s say the election’s over. Before, I was gold. Now I’m a piece of Kleenex. They used me for what I was good for, and now they can throw me in the trash. If you decided to come back, they wouldn’t stand in your way.

“Now, I know what you’re going to say,” Beaumont said, holding up one finger in a “pause” gesture. “Why should you come back? It’d be over a year that you’d be gone, and you’d be starting from scratch. But I’m thinking there might be one good reason you’d come back to Locke City. A very good reason.”

“What would that be?” Dioguardi asked, his voice low and relaxed. He took a sip of his drink, every movement conveying that he was in no hurry.

“A good reason would be if we were partners,” Beaumont said. “The future for men like us, it isn’t in gang wars, it’s in… cooperation. You use only your own people in your business; I use only mine. That’s good in some ways. You know a man, you know his family, where he comes from, you can trust him, right? But it’s also a limitation. If we don’t learn to work together, we don’t get the chance to grow.”

“What kind of growth are you thinking of?” Dioguardi said, affecting mild interest.

“Drugs,” Beaumont said, leaning forward, gripping the arms of his wheelchair, his iron eyes locked on Dioguardi’s. “There’s a fortune to be made. In the big cities, people are already making it. Locke City’s like a… smaller example, that’s all. I’ve got the network in place here. Men on the street, friends on the force, judges, politicians-everything. But what I don’t have is product. It’s your people who control that. You can get a steady, safe supply into the country. I want you and me to go into business, Sal.”

“Starting when?” Dioguardi said. He expanded his chest and moved his shoulders in Beaumont’s direction. He blinked, and his eyes snapped from bored to predatory.

“After this whole thing is over. It doesn’t matter where you’re going, you’ll be someplace where you can put the whole thing together. At your end. And I’ll be doing the same thing at mine.”

“We don’t do business with-”

“Yes, you do,” Beaumont interrupted. “At some level, you have to, am I right? They sell drugs in the colored sections of every big city, don’t they? I mean, it’s coloreds themselves who are selling it. Come on.”

“That’s different,” Dioguardi disclaimed. “We’re not partners with niggers. It’s like we’re wholesalers and they’re retailers, is all.”

“Times are changing,” Beaumont said. “You can be a spectator, or you can be a player. All I’m saying is, think about it. You don’t have to give me an answer now.”

Dioguardi sat back in his chair, tapping the fingers of his right hand on the armrest. “Tell me something,” he said. “It doesn’t matter anymore, I just want to know. Was it you who did Little Nicky? And Tony and Lorenzo?”

“Me?” Beaumont said. “I thought it was you.”

“Me?”

“Yeah. Lorenzo Gagnatella was talking to the law. I thought you knew.”

“I still don’t know,” Dioguardi said, his voice tightening. “How’d you find out something like that?”

“I told you, I’ve got a lot of friends on the force. You don’t believe me, ask-”

“I know you got friends around here, Beaumont. A lot of friends.”

“And I’d like you to be one of them,” Beaumont said, finishing off his drink.

1959 October 09 Friday 16:13

“You want me to go over it again?” Dett asked.

“I’ve got it,” Harley said, trying to imitate the same utter absence of emotion exuded by the man next to him. Freezing cold, but burn you bad if you touch it, Harley thought. Like that dry ice they use in freight cars. His mind replayed his last meeting with Royal Beaumont: You’re going along because I want you to learn from this man, Harley. Learn what you’re going to need to know-what I can’t teach you myself, anymore. This guy, he’s the best there is. But he’s not one of us; he’s a hired gun. After this is over, he’s leaving. You, you’re coming back.

“You don’t think there should be more of us?” Harley asked.

“What we’re going to do, it’s like an operation, in a hospital,” Dett said. “Every man’s got his job. Too many men, they just get in each other’s way. And it’s much easier for two guys to disappear than a whole mob.”

“What if he pulls up in front?”

“From where we’re going to be sitting, we can see whichever way he goes.”

“But if he goes in the front, that’s right on the street,” Harley persisted. “People passing by…”

“So they’ll tell the cops they saw two men,” Dett said, unconcerned. “Once we pull those stockings over our faces, put the hats on our heads and the gloves on our hands, nobody’ll even be able to tell if we’re black or white, never mind describe us. This car was stolen from a parking lot-the owner won’t even know it’s missing for a couple of hours, yet. And the plates on it come right out of the junkyard-you cut them in half, then you solder a little seam up the back, make one plate out of two. Anyone grabs the number, all that’ll do is confuse the cops more.”

“But we don’t have the letter yet.”

“That’s not our job. If it doesn’t get here before they do, the whole thing’s off.”

“Give Jody a five-minute head-start and he’ll beat them here by a half-hour. He’s not good for much else, but he can drive better than a stock-car racer.”

“We’ll see soon enough,” Dett said.

1959 October 09 Friday 16:41

“Like to show you around, if you’ve got the time,” Beaumont said. “You’ve got to walk out, anyway.”

“Sure,” Dioguardi replied.

Luther handed the mob boss his coat, draped a blanket over Beaumont’s shoulders, and piloted the wheelchair back through the garage, Dioguardi following.

As they started to stroll the grounds, Cynthia entered the room where they had met. She was nude, wearing only a pair of white gloves and a surgical mask.

Cynthia stripped the butcher paper from the right arm of the chair Dioguardi had occupied, and carried it over to the desk. There she laid out a bottle of white paste, a small brush, and a pair of scissors. Seating herself, she trimmed the butcher paper, using a sheet of typing paper as a template. Then she carefully opened a manila folder, laying it flat on the desktop. Quick, quick! she commanded herself, fingers flying.

One by one, she pasted words cut from the Locke City Compass onto the butcher paper.

We have the boy

we Just want a faVor

Put ad in the Compass PERSONALS

John Please call DIAnne

put in A phone number

WE will CALL you

NO cops or it is OVER

She folded the paper neatly, and placed it inside a stamped envelope, already addressed with letters and numbers cut from the same newspaper. Careful, now… She sealed the envelope, using a dampened sponge. Then she reached for the telephone.

1959 October 09 Friday 16:59

A beige ’57 Plymouth two-door sedan tore across the back roads behind the Beaumont estate in what looked like one continuous controlled slide. The driver was a young man with a bullet-shaped head and jug ears. His small mouth was exaggerated by pursed lips, as if he were getting ready to whistle. His hands were light and assured on the wheel, carving corners like a surgeon’s scalpel.

The Plymouth fishtailed slightly as it merged with the highway. The driver picked up cover behind a highballing semi, checked his rearview mirror, slipped into the passing lane, spotted a clot of cars ahead, and fed the Plymouth more gas.

No tickets! played across the screen of his mind, as he smoothly took the exit marked LOCKE CITY, his eyes burning evangelically.

1959 October 09 Friday 17:11

“How’d it go, boss?” the man seated next to Dioguardi in the back seat asked.

“You know what, Carmine? I think he’s all done.”

“Beaumont? You’ve got to be kidding. He’s been the man around here for-”

“He’s not the same. Not the same at all. I braced him about the guys we lost. I was watching his eyes when I did it. I can tell when a man’s lying to me. And he wasn’t.”

“You mean it wasn’t his boys who-?”

“No. That’s what he said, and I believed him. In fact, he said he thought we did that.”

“What?”

“Yeah. Beaumont, he said that Lorenzo had been talking to the feds.”

“That’s a lot of-”

“Don’t be so sure,” Dioguardi said. “Because I’m not. You know what convinced me? He never even asked about that collector of his, Hacker.”

“That’s ’cause, the way we did it, he couldn’t know if Hacker just took off with the loot. That’s one body that’s never going to be found, so he’ll never know. Not for sure.”

“Right. And that’s why we did it that way, remember? If we left him in the street, like a message, there wouldn’t have been any doubt. Now they can never know the truth, just guess at it. But there was something else, too, Carmine. He wants to go partners.”

“Let us in?”

“Not that,” Dioguardi said. “He wants to keep everything here for himself. But he wants to go into the dope business. And he wants us to be the suppliers.”

“But if we’re pulling out…”

“He thinks we’re coming back. After the elections. He didn’t say it out loud, but that’s what he was thinking. So he figures, he makes a deal with us-for the dope, I mean-there’s no reason for us to come back here, see? Not when we’d be making more by staying away.”

“Yeah. I guess. But… I don’t know, boss.”

“I do,” Dioguardi said, confidently. “Beaumont’s a big fish in a little pond. And he knows, if we wanted to, we could put enough men together to pave him over like a fucking parking lot. He’s just trying to survive. He can’t blast us out, so he makes a deal for us to leave peaceful. And he can’t keep us out, so he makes another deal, so we stay away. You see what I’m saying?”

“Yeah. I’m just not so-”

“You’ll see, Carmine. A couple of years from now, we’ll be making more money out of this burg than we ever could’ve by taking it over.”

1959 October 09 Friday 17:40

The beige Plymouth pulled to the curb. The driver exited, and started walking. When he spotted the stolen Dodge, he changed course, so that he was approaching it from the front.

“That’s Jody!” Harley said. He reached his hand out the side window and waved a signal.

The driver climbed in behind Dett and Harley. He reached into his jacket, extracted an envelope, and handed it to Dett.

“You remembered,” Harley said, approvingly, noting the driver’s gloved hand.

“I remember everything,” the driver said. His voice was high and thin, but as steady as his hands. “When you get out, I’ll be right behind you. Whichever way you go, front or back, I’ll be there.”

“We don’t need a getaway man,” Harley said. “This car we’re in, it can’t be traced.”

“Then leave it where it is,” the driver said. “They won’t be able to trace the one I’ve got, either. And if something goes wrong, they’ll never catch it. I’ll get you to the switch car in the garage, and then I’ll take off. Let the cops chase me, they think they have a chance.”

“We can handle it,” Harley said.

“I’m in,” the driver said, gripping the back of the front seat with both hands. “If you don’t want me to drive you, I’ll be the crash car.”

The men in the front seat were silent, staring out the windshield.

“I’m bound to do it,” the driver said. “I got to be in on this.”

“Why?” Dett asked, coldly.

“He’s Jody Hacker,” Harley explained. “It was his brother Dioguardi’s men killed.”

“My big brother,” the driver said. “I know some people say he just run off, with the money. They don’t say it to me, but I know they say it, some of them. Mr. Beaumont, he never thought that of my brother, never. He told me my time would come. And this here is it.”

“You drive,” Dett said.

1959 October 09 Friday 17:53

The dark blue Cadillac sedan turned the corner, picked up by three pairs of eyes.

“Going around back,” Harley said. “They’ll have to circle the block first.”

The driver was already out the back door.

“He’ll be there?” Dett asked.

“Jody? Bet your life.”

“Let’s go, then,” Dett said. “Drive over and park as close to the front of the joint as you can, and we’ll walk from there.”

Harley started the car. “I can’t see any empty space,” he said, anxiously.

“Double-park,” Dett told him.

Harley pulled up so they were partially blocking two other cars at the curb. He looked over at Dett. “Okay?”

“Yeah,” Dett said. He reached into the satchel on the floor between his legs and threw a switch. “We’ve got five minutes.”

The two men got out of the stolen car and walked to the corner. Harley carried a gym bag. Dett’s gloved hands were empty. They turned the corner and started down the alley just as the Cadillac backed into the space always kept vacant for it. Dett’s left hand went into his outside coat pocket, his right reached under his arm. He stepped into his private tunnel, and the world shifted to slow-motion.

The driver of the Cadillac got out, and reached for the handle to the back door. Dett drew his.45 with his left hand and shot him in the spine.

Harley raced toward the rear door of the restaurant.

Dett wrenched open the back door of the Cadillac and emptied both barrels of his sawed-off shotgun into the two men seated there. The explosion was deafening in the enclosed space.

Harley threw the restaurant door open and tossed the gym bag inside.

Dioguardi moaned. Dett shot him in the forehead with his.45. Harley was down on one knee, a pistol in his hand, covering the rear of the restaurant. Dett emptied his.45 into the two men in the back seat, shoved it back into his pocket, and holstered the shotgun, pulling his second pistol loose with his right hand.

Harley held his position, down on one knee, scanning the area, pistol up and ready.

Dett reached toward the blood-and-flesh omelet of what had been Dioguardi’s torso. Not the suit jacket-this was on him before he got hit. His left hand quickly probed the lining of the dead man’s cashmere overcoat… Clean! Dett slipped the letter carefully into the inside pocket, then refolded the overcoat so it lay flat on the seat.

The Plymouth roared up, skidding the last few feet on the brakes. Harley jumped to his feet and ran toward the open rear door. Dett fired three more times as he backed toward the Plymouth. The second he was inside, Jody Hacker stomped the throttle.

As the Plymouth careened around the corner of the alley, the stolen car parked in front of the restaurant exploded.

1959 October 09 Friday 18:28

“Nobody saw a thing, right, Chet?”

“It’s not what you’re thinking, Sherman,” the jowly cop said. “Nobody inside could have seen any of this,” gesturing at the fleshy carnage inside the Cadillac. “The kitchen’s a blast zone. Two dead, body parts all over the place. Looks like the place was bombed. Then you got that car that blew up right in front, too. Nobody was even thinking about back here in the alley.”

“This one got to pull his piece,” Sherman Layne said, pointing to the body next to Dioguardi, “but he never got off a shot. And Sally D., he wasn’t even carrying.”

“Had to be Beaumont,” the jowly cop said. “He’s the only one around here with this kind of muscle. I always thought he was going to get payback for Hacker. That’s how those hillbillies are.”

“Uh-huh,” Sherman Layne grunted. He said nothing about the envelope he had taken from the inside pocket of Dioguardi’s cashmere coat.

“It was a gang hit, all right,” the jowly cop said, in a voice of respect. “A real massacre. Like they used to have in the old days. You think we should go out and talk to Beaumont?”

“Not just yet,” Sherman said. “He’ll have a cast-iron alibi, anyway. There’s something I want to check out first.”

1959 October 09 Friday 18:49

“Mr. Dett? He checked out this morning,” Carl told the big detective. “Earlier than we expected.”

“Did he leave a forwarding address?”

“Let me see… Yes, it’s right here: Star Route 2, Rogersville, Oregon.”

Same as his driver’s license, Sherman thought to himself. And probably just as real. “Have you rented his room yet?”

“Yes, sir. To a Mr.-”

“Never mind,” the big detective said. “I’m sure you give the rooms a thorough cleaning every time a guest checks out. Before you rent them again, I mean?”

“Well, certainly, Detective. This is the Claremont, after all.”

As the two men spoke, another man entered the lobby. A drab, anonymous man, with a prominent harelip-repair scar. He took in the scene at a glance, turned on his heel, and went back out.

1959 October 09 Friday 19:11

“That Buick was returned a couple of days ago,” the car-rental clerk told Sherman Layne.

“Mind if I take a look at it?”

“Soon as it comes back, Detective.”

“Somebody rented it?”

“Half an hour after the guy who had it dropped it off. It was so early, we got two days on it for one. Pretty lucky, huh?”

1959 October 09 Friday 23:13

Why was Dioguardi writing to a man like Ernest Hoffman? Sherman held the envelope carefully, his hands encased in surgical gloves. And what’s with the cutout letters? Looks like a damn ransom note.

Sherman Layne sat for several minutes, watching his options spin like a roulette wheel. Finally, he took a deep breath, reached into his pocket, took out his penknife, and carefully slit open the envelope.

1959 October 10 Saturday 10:10

“It had to be Beaumont, Sean,” Shalare said. “Nobody else had the cause. Or the balls.”

“But why?”

“That’s a puzzler. It could be that he wanted us to know that he’s not going to play.”

“That makes no sense,” the bulky man said, shaking his head. “Beaumont’s not just a bad actor, he’s a slick article, too. If he’s dealing with the other side on the votes thing, he’d want to be saving that for a surprise, not putting up a bloody billboard, wouldn’t he?”

“No. No, he wouldn’t. Any chance this was some of Dioguardi’s own people?”

“A palace coup?”

“No, not his local people. The Mafia boys.”

“That’s not their style, either. Why slaughter so many when they could just ask Dioguardi to come in for a sit-down, and plant him where he landed? All this attention, it’s bad for business. Even those people are smart enough to know that dead meat brings flies.”

“What do we do, then?”

“Beaumont’s the shooter, Mickey. But that doesn’t mean he won’t still come along with us on the big thing. See what you can find out. In the meantime, I’m going to send a man to you, just in case.”

1959 October 10 Saturday 10:13

“Yes, I know, Mr. Hoffman isn’t going to come to the phone for some hick-town cop,” Sherman said, not a trace of sarcasm in his voice. “But you tell him it’s about his grandson, see if he’ll talk to me.”

1959 October 10 Saturday 10:19

“Do you think it will work? All that we did?”

“It’s too late to worry about it, Cyn. It’s done now.”

“And that man, he’s gone?”

“Harley said he dropped him off, and he just walked away.”

“But you know where to reach him. Like you did before.”

“What does it matter, honey? Our dice are already tumbling. All we can do is wait to see what we rolled.”

1959 October 10 Saturday 11:26

“Could I come and see you? Tonight, when you get off work?”

“I wish you would,” Tussy said. “I miss you.”

1959 October 10 Saturday 17:49

Sherman Layne drove for four and a half hours, arriving at the Hoffman mansion a few minutes before his six o’clock appointment.

“This is Mr. Cross,” the old man said, nodding his head in the direction of a nondescript man who stood to Hoffman’s left. “He handles my personal security. I assume you don’t mind if he sits in on our meeting.”

“It’s your meeting, sir,” Sherman said, politely.

“May I see the letter?” Cross asked.

“Yes. But please don’t touch it,” Sherman said, taking a slim cardboard box out of his briefcase. “You understand.”

Cross took the box from Sherman without speaking. He opened it carefully, and read the contents without changing expression.

“It’s a kidnap note,” he said to Hoffman. “Whoever wrote it wasn’t going to send it until they already had the baby.”

“How much were they demanding?” Hoffman asked.

“It says, ‘We just want a favor.’ ”

“What kind of…?” Hoffman turned his gaze to Sherman Layne. “You’re certain this is… was Dioguardi’s work?”

“It was on his body, sir,” Sherman Layne said. “But I wasn’t relying on that alone. We’ve got Dioguardi’s prints on file. We didn’t find them on the envelope-it was absolutely clean-or on the cut-out letters themselves. But the paper it was written on-looks like it came from a butcher shop, so it could have been sitting around in his restaurant-it’s got three separate partials. Not enough to convict him in court, maybe. But good enough for me. Sal Dioguardi wrote that note. Or he handled it, anyway.”

“The letter was addressed to me?” the old man said, his eyes laser-focused under heavy, untrimmed brows.

“Yes, sir.”

“And the envelope, when you found it, it was sealed?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And you opened it…?” the old man said, something undefinable in his voice.

“I had to make a judgment call,” Sherman Layne said, calmly. “I wanted to make sure I was doing right by you, Mr. Hoffman. Which is why I called you privately. My chief doesn’t even know. But this is a murder investigation. I had to look before I acted. And now I’m glad I did.”

“Do you have any suspects? In the Dioguardi homicide, I mean.”

“Suspects, sure. I can almost guarantee you that the Dioguardi killing was the work of Royal Beaumont. They’ve been feuding for a long time. Over territory. Beaumont’s territory, Locke City. Dioguardi was trying to move in. A while back, one of Beaumont’s men disappeared. A man named Hacker. Vanished without a trace. Then one of Dioguardi’s collectors gets himself clubbed on the head and left for dead. After that, two more of his men are gunned down in the street.

“Beaumont’s whole crew are mountain men, Mr. Hoffman. They take a feud to the grave. So, whether it was business or revenge, I couldn’t tell you. But it was Beaumont, you can take that one to the bank.”

“What’s your rank in the department, Detective?” Hoffman asked.

“You just said it, sir. Detective. Detective First Grade, actually. But that’s not a rank, all by itself. I draw a sergeant’s pay, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“And the chief…?”

“Jessup. George Jessup.”

“Yes. Would I be wrong in surmising that he and Mr. Beaumont are good friends?”

“No, sir.”

“All right, Detective. You did me a real service this day. Mr. Cross will show you out.”

1959 October 10 Saturday 18:03

The man with the repaired harelip approached the front desk of the hotel.

“May I help you, sir?” Carl asked.

“No. I can help you. A good friend of yours wanted you to have this,” the man said, holding up an attaché case of black, hand-tooled leather. “A gift.”

“It’s beautiful,” Carl said. “But I don’t know anyone who would want to give me such a-”

“Look inside,” the man said. “When you’re alone. Don’t do it here.”

1959 October 11 Sunday 00:13

“Walker, you’re all dressed up. And I’m…” Tussy made a vague gesture toward her outfit, a lumberjack’s shirt over a pair of jeans. She was barefoot, face freshly scrubbed. “We’re not going out at this hour, are we?”

“No. I’m going away.”

“When will you be-?”

“I won’t be back, Tussy. Not unless… Look, I have to tell you something.”

“What?”

“I have to tell you my story,” Dett said. “You’re the woman I’m supposed to tell it to.”

“You’re scaring me, Walker.”

“You don’t have to be scared of me, Tussy. You’re the only person on earth who never has to be.”

“You’re really… going away?”

“Yes.”

“This story you want to tell me-is it that you’re married, Walker?”

“I don’t have anyone,” he said, very softly. “And I never will. Could I tell you? Please?”

1959 October 11 Sunday 00:28

“I’m not a real-estate man,” Dett said. He was seated on the couch, Tussy a cautious distance from him on the chair. “I think you knew that.”

“I didn’t at first,” Tussy said. “Now I know you must be some kind of a… criminal, Walker. But I don’t care. You can always-”

“Let me just tell you, please,” Dett said. “I… I waited a long time for this, and I need to get it right. The truth. Truth as pure as you. Let me just… talk, all right? When I’m done, you’ll know everything. Please?”

“Go ahead, then,” Tussy said, setting her jaw. She adjusted the lumberjack shirt tightly around her, sitting with her knees together, back straight.

“I was a wild kid,” Dett began. “Always in trouble, for one thing or another. Nothing big, but plenty of it. Mostly because I had a foul temper. When I turned seventeen, I went to prison, for robbing a store. That’s where I learned how to fight. Not like I had before, in a temper. This was the cold way.

“When I got out, I was twenty-one years old, and the war was on. I went in the army. Not to be a hero, or a patriot, or anything. Just to get away from everything I… didn’t have. They were taking anybody then.

“I served in the Pacific.” Tussy’s eyes started to flood. “That wasn’t it,” Dett said, sharply. “I’m sorry, Tussy. I didn’t mean to yell at you. But you need to understand-what happened, it didn’t have anything to do with the war. It was just me, what I did, later. Okay?”

Tussy nodded, lips pressed tightly together.

“When I got out, I was almost twenty-six, and I didn’t know how to do anything. But that’s no excuse, either. I could have gone to school. To college, even. On the GI Bill. I could have gotten a good job, bought a house… I could have been a regular person.”

Tussy opened her mouth to interrupt, but reached for a cigarette instead.

“I just… drifted,” Dett said. “But wherever I went, I was always in the same place. I’d work for a while-there was plenty of jobs: oil fields, timber mills, cotton crops-then I’d just sit around and do nothing. Have a few drinks, get into a fight, spend a couple of nights in jail. Three months on the county farm, once.”

Dett paused, lit a cigarette of his own. “Then I killed a man,” he said. “I didn’t mean to. I’m not saying it was an accident, but I wasn’t thinking about killing him. It was just another fight. If he’d been a white man, my whole life would have been different.”

Tussy squirmed in her seat, as if awaiting a sign from Dett to speak.

“They took me down to the jail,” Dett said. “And that’s when it started. A couple of men came to see me. Government men. I say it was two men, but it could have been one; they were so much alike I couldn’t tell where one started and the other left off.

“They told me I might get off on self-defense, this being Mississippi and all. But I might not, especially with my record. I might spend a long time down at Parchman for what I did. They said everyone was watching now. They meant the whole world. It was right after that boy was killed for whistling at a white woman. They said the law might have to make an example of me. I was scared.

“Then they said there was a way I could make it right. They could fix things so I wouldn’t have to go to prison, fix it so nobody would even be mad about it. And what they wanted in exchange, they just wanted me to join the Klan.”

Dett took a deep drag of his cigarette, closed his eyes for a split second, then went on. “See, I was a natural, Tussy. Anybody checking me out, they’d find I was in prison before. The Klan wouldn’t care about that, the government men told me. What they’d care about was that I went to prison by myself. I never told who else was in on that robbery with me. So it was like a good mark on my record. And being in the army, overseas, that was a good thing, too. It showed I could… do stuff, they said.

“But the best thing, that was me killing that man. They said the Klan was mostly loudmouths. Brave when they were burning a cross, but just bullies, hiding behind sheets. You know, scared to fight a man fair. But me, I had done that. ‘You killed a nigger,’ one of them said. ‘In hand-to-hand combat. For the Klan, that’s a better medal than any you could get from Uncle Sam.’

“I would be like a federal agent, they said. I’d have to use my eyes and ears, and make reports to them. They said the Klan was a danger to America. A subversive organization, they called it. I would be like a spy, for the government. When I found out the names of the people who were doing the lynchings and burnings and bombings, I’d tell the FBI-that’s what they said they were, the FBI-and they’d move in and clean things up. Because it was for damn sure the local cops were never going to.

“They said I might have to commit crimes, just to prove I was a good Klansman, but that would be okay because I was working undercover. I’d get a full pardon when I was done, for everything.”

Dett stubbed out his cigarette. “I’m not sure why I did it,” he said. “Not even now. I could say I wanted to do something good. For America, like they said. I could say I felt guilty about killing that man. I could say I didn’t want to go to prison. I could even say I wanted the money-they paid me, just like a salary-but that would just be… saying things. Because I really don’t know.

“My trial only lasted one day. A bunch of colored people testified that they saw the whole thing and the other guy had pulled his knife first. I don’t know if that was true-it all happened so fast-but I know not one of them had been out there in that parking lot. So they were all lying.

“I was found not guilty, and nobody was mad at me, not even the dead man’s own mother. I know that because she said so, right in court. She said her son would get crazy-wild when he was drunk, and that he had been drinking all that day it happened. That was a lie, too. He wasn’t drunk when we fought. Everything was all lies. I never even had to say anything.

“It was that same day, right after it got dark, when the night riders came to where I was staying and took me. The government men were right. The Klan thought I was the greatest man in the world for what I had done.”

Tussy’s green eyes seared into him. Finish it, he ordered himself. Get it done.

“The first time I went riding with them, it was a few nights later. We burned out a family. I don’t know what the man who lived there was supposed to have done. They said he was some kind of agitator.

“I called the number the government men had given me, and I told them everything. Who was there, what they did. They said I was doing a good job, but they were after bigger fish.”

Tussy opened her mouth, caught Dett’s eye, and reached for another cigarette without speaking.

“They were all scared then,” Dett said. “Not the colored people. I mean, I guess they always were, but I wasn’t among them, so I couldn’t say. But the Klan, the people in it, they were scared. Of… the future, I guess. You could feel it coming. It was all in the air. Things were going to change.

“The way one of them explained it to me, it used to be, if you were a colored man who wanted to have a chance, you went north. Lots of them did that. But now the strongest ones weren’t leaving. They were staying. If they got the vote-I don’t mean got the vote; they already had the vote; I mean, if they got to actually vote, cast a ballot-they could be running things in twenty years, that’s what he said.

“Everywhere you looked, you could see it. The way it was told to me, there was a wall between whites and coloreds for a good reason. Like how you have to keep gamecocks away from each other. If that wall came down, we wouldn’t be shaking hands with what was on the other side, we’d be fighting it to the death. Segregation was good for the coloreds, that’s what they all said. It protected them, kept them safe. It was just the outsiders, the people from up north, who stirred everything up.

“And the Jews were behind everything. You couldn’t see them, but they were there. They didn’t care a damn about farming-they needed more and more people to work in their factories. That’s what started it all. The Civil War, I’m talking about. It wasn’t to free the slaves; it was because the Northerners needed people to work in their factories.”

Tussy arched her eyebrows, tilted her head a fraction.

“Did I believe that myself?” Dett answered her unspoken question. “Maybe. It sounded like it made sense, kind of. But I didn’t really pay attention, because I was just there to do a job. But if you’re thinking, Did I ever argue with them?, no. I don’t know if that was because I was working undercover, or because I believed what they said. I didn’t think about it, not then.”

Dett put another cigarette in his mouth, lit it mechanically.

“It was just past ninety days,” he said. “I crossed off each day on my little calendar, just like you do in the county jail. I got to know who every single one of them was. I don’t mean just by face; I knew their names and what they did for a living, even where most of them stayed. I told all of that to the government men. I would just call them and talk, sometimes for a couple of hours. They would ask me questions, but they never told me what to do, exactly. They would just say I was doing good work, and to keep it up.”

Dett suddenly ground out his cigarette and stood up, startling Tussy.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to… I was just…” He quickly sat down again.

“On the ninety-second day, they killed a man,” Dett said, struggling with the words, but determined to go on. “Dragged him out of the shack where he was staying, took him out to a field, and whipped him. I think that was all it was supposed to be, but I… I just don’t know. One of them felt his neck, and he said, ‘This nigger is dead, boys.’ That’s when they got the idea-to string him up over a tree limb, like a lynching.

“In the morning, the word shot around town like a fire spreading. The sheriff went out to the field, and his men cut that colored man down.

“The head man called a meeting for that night. He said we’d have to lay low for a while, until things died down. Some of the other men argued about that. They said we had the niggers on the run now, so we should keep going, but the head man won out.

“I thought I was done then. I told the government men everything. I mean, I was right there. I even… I helped them do it, Tussy. I could say I didn’t know they were going to kill the man, and that would be true. But I can’t say what I would have done if I had known, so it doesn’t mean anything.

“The man on the phone said they had to have my story in person. I drove all the way over to Jackson to see them. There were a lot of men in the room they took me to. I showed them where it happened-they had a map of the area that was so big it covered the whole wall-and they had me put different-colored pins all over, everyplace something had happened. The last one, the killing, it got the only red pin.

“Then they made me go over what they called a ‘bracket.’ The twelve hours just before it happened, and the twelve hours after. They wanted to know how many people, how many cars, who spoke first, who made the decision to string the man up after he was dead-everything.

“It took so long that we stopped and had a meal. Sandwiches and coffee they had brought in.

“The more I talked, the better I felt, Tussy. Like I stuck a needle in an infection, and the pus was coming out. The more I told them, it was like the tighter I was squeezing, to get out every last drop, and be clean again.”

“Walker…”

“I have to say it all,” he said, inexorable.

She nodded, reached for still another cigarette. As she did, Fireball strolled into the living room and regarded her appraisingly for a moment before curling up at her feet.

“It was late at night when we finally finished,” Dett said. “And that’s when it happened.”

Dett closed his eyes, concentrated on his breathing.

Tussy watched, the cigarette smoldering in her hand.

“They told me I wasn’t done,” Dett said. His voice was thin, as if short on oxygen. “What I had given them was a good start, but it wasn’t enough. They had information that the most committed-that was the exact word they used-the most committed members were coming from all over, for one big splash. Alabama, Louisiana, Texas… everywhere. Not just the Klan, either. All kinds of groups. They were going to be making a statement. Do something so big that nobody would even think about trying to register the coloreds to vote, ever again.

“It was going to be a bomb, they said. A bomb big enough to blow up a whole city block. But that was all they knew. They needed me to find out when it was going to be done.

“I was… upset. I told them that wasn’t the deal we made. I thought all the people who had killed that colored man would have to answer for it. That would be like a bomb, too. Only a bomb for good, like the one we dropped on Japan.

“But the government men, you know what they said? They said, first of all, the man who died, it was an accident. I’d even said so myself, that they hadn’t started out to kill him, so what kind of witness would I be? Maybe a few men would go to prison, for a couple of years or so, but that wouldn’t do anything but make them heroes. ‘Just like you were,’ one of them said, pointing his finger at me like a gun.

“So I went back to work. I did everything they said I was supposed to do. That’s funny, huh? You probably don’t know who I mean by ‘they,’ do you, Tussy? Do I mean the government men, or the Klan? I was just thinking, even as I said it, I don’t know myself. Because I did what they both wanted me to do.”

Dett clasped his hands in front of him, took a deep breath, and looked into Tussy’s eyes for a long moment. She stared back, green eyes unblinking.

“I did terrible things, Tussy,” he said. “Not because I lost my temper, not because I was angry. Not even because I was scared, anymore. I did them in cold blood. I knew, when it was all over, I could never come back. I didn’t think about what would happen then. I guess I had a… fantasy, you could call it, about going to work for the government myself, in some other town. You know, being a spy. But, most of the time, I didn’t think about it at all. I just… did things.

“One night, three of them came to where I was staying. Parnell James, William Lee Manderville, and Zeke Pritchard. I remember their names like they’re engraved on my heart. Like someone took a chisel to the stone. They said it was time to ride, and I didn’t ask any questions.

“When I saw the car they had-it was a station wagon, and I knew it wasn’t any of theirs-I knew. Something was going to happen. Something terrible.

“We all had guns. In the back of the wagon, there were chains. Heavy chains, like you’d use to tow a tractor out of the mud. Zeke was driving. I was next to him in the front seat. He said there was this nigger, Lewis, I don’t know if that was his first or his last name, and he was stirring things up bad. Going around with some white boys. Strangers, not from around there. They were night-riding, just like we had been. Visiting the coloreds in their homes. Telling them they all had to register to vote. Signing them up.

“This Lewis, he was a big man, Zeke said. Not big in size, but in power. The coloreds were all getting ready to follow him. They, the other men in the car that night, they had their orders. It was time.

“We rode way out into the country. Lewis was staying in this sharecropper’s shack, on land that wasn’t being worked anymore.

“He was a squatter, they said. Didn’t even have the right to be on the land. ‘We have to sneak up on him,’ Zeke said. ‘Lewis is a real bad nigger, not the kind to just go along and take what’s coming to him, like most of them.’ He had a gun, and he’d use it.

“We got to where he was staying. There was no light on in the cabin. We came at it from the sides. I was the first. Because I knew all about sneaking up in the dark, from the army, is what Zeke told me.

“When Lewis woke up, I was standing over him, with a shotgun aimed right at his face. We chained him up and put him in the back of the wagon. He didn’t fight-it wouldn’t have done him any good-but he didn’t cry or carry on, either, the way some of the others had done.

“Zeke drove us out to a spot they had picked out. They made him walk to a tree, and Parnell took out a rope. Zeke asked Lewis if he had anything to say, and that’s when I knew. That’s when I knew for sure.”

“They were going to murder him?” Tussy blurted out.

“That’s one thing I knew,” Dett said, his voice just above a whisper. “But I knew something else, too. I knew it as sure as I had ever known anything in my life. When it was over, when I told the government men about what happened to Lewis, it still wouldn’t be the end. They’d just send me back. To do more.

“Lewis might have been scared, but you couldn’t see it in his face. He looked… not even angry… more like he was looking down on all of us. Like we were dirt. ‘You can’t stop the train from coming,’ is what he said. And I knew what he meant, even if the others didn’t. I remember thinking, There’s five people, standing out in this field, in the middle of the night. But there’s only one man.

“The moon was shining. Cold light, making us all into ghosts. I had a pistol in my belt. My old army.45. I could feel it against my stomach, pushing at me.

“ ‘You got the sickle, Parnell?’ Zeke said. Then I knew what they were going to do… after they hung him. The shotgun in my hand came up, like it had its own mind. I cut Zeke down. Parnell and William Lee just stood there. Their mouths were open, but nothing came out. I pulled my.45 and shot them both. At that distance, I couldn’t miss.

“Then it was just me and Lewis. I had nothing left. I couldn’t even talk. Like killing those men had taken all I had, and I was done.

“ ‘Get these chains off me,’ Lewis said. I felt like I was moving underwater, so slow and heavy, but I did it.

“ ‘You can’t never go back now,’ he said. ‘Me, neither. They’ll never find me where I’m going. I’m just another nigger, I can disappear. But you, they know you.’

“He walked over to the bodies of the three men, went through their pockets like rolling a drunk. ‘Got almost sixty dollars here,’ he said. ‘You got anything?’ I told him I had about forty on me. I thought he would want that, too, but he just said, ‘Good. We got a little time, not much. Give me a ride to the crossroads; I’ll be all right from there. They probably won’t even start looking until morning, when this trash don’t come home. Got a few hours. They going to expect you to go north, man. But you can’t do that. You going down to Louisiana. To my auntie’s place. It ain’t got no address, but I’m going to tell you how to get there. Tante Verity, she take care of you until you ready to make your move.’

“I was still… not in shock, but stunned, like. Whatever he said, I just nodded ‘okay.’ We got in the station wagon; I drove him to the crossroads, and I never saw him again.”

“Did you go to his aunt’s?” Tussy said.

“I didn’t know what else to do. I just kept driving and driving. I was scared to be in that station wagon, but I was scared to steal another car, too. It was still dark when I got close to where I was supposed to go. I buried the car in the swamp. Just opened all the windows, put it in neutral, dropped a heavy stone on the gas pedal, reached inside, and threw the lever into drive. It disappeared; the swamp swallowed it. Then I started to walk.

“It took a long time. I didn’t have anything to eat. The bugs were fierce, and I was in a panic over everything that moved out there. Like being back overseas. All I had was the landmarks Lewis had given me. But they were good ones.

“Even once it got light out, the swamp was dark. I finally found the house. It was right where Lewis said it would be, and it had the bottle tree outside.”

“What’s a bottle tree?” Tussy said, bending forward to stroke Fireball’s head.

“It’s just a regular tree, with all kinds of bottles attached to the branches. Like fruit. When there’s a breeze, you can hear it tinkle. I’d never seen anything like it.”

Tussy started to speak, then clamped her lips together.

“Tante Verity was an old woman,” Dett said. “Real old, like a hundred, maybe. She was just sitting on her porch, watching me come out of the swamp. I came up to her real slow, so I wouldn’t frighten her. But when I got close, I could see that nothing would ever frighten her. She acted like she was expecting me.

“I told her what happened. From the very beginning, like I just told you. She didn’t say a word, just sat there, rocking in her chair. But I knew she heard me.

“I remember telling her about dropping Lewis at the crossroads, and then I must have passed out. When I came to, I was inside her house, lying in some kind of hammock, with netting over me. The old woman gave me something to drink. It was in a mug, but thick, like stew. I remember it was very hot, burned going down, and then I passed out again.”

Dett got to his feet, rotated his neck, giving off an audible crack. Seeing the expression on Tussy’s face, he returned to the couch.

“I don’t know how long I stayed with Tante Verity-that’s what she told me to call her, too-but every day, I got stronger. And every day, she taught me things.”

“What kind of things?”

“Like roots you can grind up, to keep the inside of your body clean. About the things in the swamp, how you can live among them if you know how to make peace. But, mostly, she taught me what I had to do.

“ ‘Two trains coming, son,’ she said to me. ‘Headed for the junction. You can’t stop either one. But you can slow the dark one down. You can put a log across the tracks, make Satan late enough so that the righteous train gets by clean.’ ”

“What does that mean?” Tussy demanded, her voice caught between anger and dread.

“It means I kill people,” Dett said, dead-voiced. “You can say they’re bad people, but that’s not why I have to do it. Those three men out in that field that night, they were bad men. And whoever sent them there, to do what they meant to do, they’re worse. But the worst of all are the people who sent me there.”

“The FBI?”

“Not even them, Tussy. Not even them. I don’t think I’ll ever know who makes things the way they are. And it doesn’t matter. My job is to roll that log across the tracks in time. It doesn’t matter who hires me, because they’re all guilty or they’re all being used by those who are. It’s like being surrounded. Wherever you shoot, you hit the enemy.”

“You came here, to Locke City, to-?”

“Beaumont hired me,” Dett said. “He wanted something done about Dioguardi. And I did that.”

“You were the one?”

“Yes. And I left things set up so that there may be more. A lot more. What I do is like throwing a rock into a pool. The splash doesn’t matter, only the circles it makes.”

“But Mr. Beaumont isn’t a-”

“Yes he is, Tussy,” Dett said. “He’s just smarter than other men like him. He knows you do better being nice to people than stomping all over them. He owns this town, top to bottom. And what he owns, he can deliver. He brought me in here to make sure he could keep his power. But I never really work for any of them, even though I take their money.”

“Walker-”

“That’s not my name,” Dett said. “I don’t have a name, anymore. Just one I use. Even this face, it’s different from the one I started with. There’s people who can do that. There’s people who can do just about anything, if you pay them.”

“You only… kill white people? Because of what-”

“No,” Dett said, making a harsh sound in his throat. “I kill the people I get paid to kill. You think it’s only whites that run gangs?”

“But if they’re all criminals…” Tussy said, desperately searching.

“I’m not a vigilante,” Dett said. “I’m not out doing justice. I’m just trying to slow that train down. I was given seven years.”

“I don’t understand.”

“When I left, Tante Verity told me my time started in that field, when I killed those three men. And it would run for seven years. By then, the first train would be through the crossroads, no matter what. If I’m not already dead, I can start walking my own road, that’s what she said. I’ll be clean then.”

“That’s not for another-”

“About four years,” Dett said.

“It’s too… horrible,” Tussy said, sobbing.

Dett sat with his fists clenched, unable to look away.

1959 October 11 Sunday 02:21

“Why did you tell me all this, Walker?” Tussy asked, an hour later.

“I had to. Tante Verity told me I could never have a friend, not for seven years. I could never be close to anyone. But she promised I would find a pure woman. And when I did, I could tell her.”

“But how could you possibly-?”

“She said I’d know. And she was right. The second I saw you, I knew.”

“I can’t… It’s like it’s too big to even think about, what you said. That’s really you, Walker? A man who goes around killing people?”

“I have to do it,” Dett said. “I just have to. I did my best to explain, but I know how it sounds. Like I’m insane. Chasing ghosts. Trying to slow down some train. I know. But every word I told you is the truth, Tussy.”

“I…”

“You know it’s true,” Dett said, relentlessly. “You know I’m true, true for you, or you never would have told me what you did. About your… about your life.”

“But… what’s going to happen, Walker?”

“I don’t know.”

“You’re just going to disappear? And then do another…?”

“Yes. Until the time has passed. Or until I get killed.”

“You sound like it doesn’t matter to you at all.”

“It can’t matter, not until the seven years has passed.”

“What are you saying?” she said, struggling with tears.

“I’ll come back then, Tussy. If I’m alive, I’ll come back.”

“For me?”

“If you would have me.”

“How can you even-? I…”

“I’ll just call. On the phone. If you hear my voice, and hang up, I’ll have your answer.”

“Walker…”

“I’m gone, Tussy. If you ever see me again, I won’t be Walker Dett. I’ll be… I’ll be clean. I thought of just… telling you a story. About some secret mission or something. Hoping that you’d wait for me. But if you’re going to have the truth of me when I come back, you had to have the truth of what I am now. What I was before that, too.”

“I can’t…”

“I know,” Dett said. He got to his feet and walked out into the night.

1959 October 11 Sunday 09:30

“Yes. I’ll get him,” Cynthia said.

She handed the phone to Beaumont, mouthing, “It’s him,” as she did so.

Beaumont picked up the receiver, a determined look on his face.

“This is Royal Beaumont,” he said.

1959 October 11 Sunday 13:21

“I thought you said he was going along with everything.”

“That’s what he said,” Lymon answered Shalare. “And I still think he is.”

“You didn’t know he was going to hit Dioguardi?”

“I don’t know who knew that. Sammy didn’t, that’s for sure. And him and me and Faron, we’re the senior men.”

“But it’s that young one, Harley, that you said Beaumont had picked out to be next in line, not any of you, isn’t that right? Isn’t that why you came to us in the first place, Lymon?”

“Yeah. That’s right. Harley’s just a kid, maybe twenty-five. I don’t see why Roy would-”

“Never mind that now. Give me something I can use, Lymon. If Beaumont did it-and I can’t see anyone else-why would he make such a move?”

“For Hacker.”

“Hacker?”

“One of our guys. A collector. He disappeared a while back, and Roy always said it was Dioguardi’s work.”

“Yeah,” Shalare mused. “He’s that kind of man, is he?”

“That’s one of the things that kept us together, all these years. We’re not a gang, we’re more like a… family, maybe. And Roy, he’s the father.”

“And you, Lymon, you’re his brother, then?”

“And my name should be Cain, that’s what you’re saying?” Lymon snarled, his voice thick with fury. “You fucking swore there was to be no blood. I came to you-”

“You came to me to betray your brother,” Shalare said, pronouncing judgment. “And now it’s time for you to fulfill your contract. I want the exact layout of the-”

Lymon lunged for Shalare, an unsheathed hunting knife in his right hand. Shalare took the first thrust on his left forearm and rolled to the floor as he lashed out with his boot. Lymon sidestepped the kick, got in one of his own to the ribs, raised his knife, screamed, “You won’t make dirt of me, you-” And then Brian O’Sullivan had him from behind.

1959 October 11 Sunday 16:22

Mickey Shalare’s white Chrysler slowed at the guardhouse. Seth strolled to the lowered window, shotgun in hand. When he saw Brian O’Sullivan behind the wheel, his face opened in a smile of greeting. A man in the back seat shot Seth in the chest, the silenced pistol inaudible past twenty yards.

As the Chrysler sped forward, four more vehicles followed. Armed men spilled out, shooting.

Return fire from the house sent Shalare’s men running for cover. Two didn’t make it. Brian O’Sullivan leaped from behind the Chrysler and ran to one of the fallen men. Udell cut him down with a single shot to the chest, worked the bolt on his deer rifle, and put another round into the man he had wounded. From his perch on the second floor, Udell calmly scanned the scene, then began firing methodically at the scattered cars, hunting for gas tanks.

Faron slithered around a corner of the stone house, dropped to one knee, and aimed his rifle at a clump of three men crouched behind one of the cars Udell was firing at. The men bolted for a safer spot. Faron dropped the first two; the third made it.

An armored car suddenly roared up to the front door. The small-arms fire from inside the house bounced harmlessly off its reinforced steel plating. A small, runty man with three fingers missing from his right hand jumped out of the driver’s seat and ran back toward Shalare’s men, his body hunched over. “Down!” he screamed.

The truck mushroomed. The entire front of the stone house crumbled, replaced by a wall of fire.

As Shalare’s men charged, Luther walked through the flames, a pistol in each hand, no expression on his slack-mouthed face. The first three men who saw him died.

A shot tore the sleeve of Luther’s gray flannel suit. A pistol dropped from his useless left hand.

“They’re after Roy!” Faron shouted to Luther. “Go back and cover him.”

Luther turned his back on the gunfight and ran through the house. When he got to Beaumont’s office, he yelled, “They’re all around!”

“Come on, Beau,” Cynthia said, calmly. “We have to get to the car.”

“No!” Beaumont said, as Cynthia reached for his wheelchair. “There’s no time to push this goddamned thing out the long way, and it won’t fit through the escape hatch. Go out the back way, like we planned.”

“We can carry you-”

“Not a chance. Luther’s only got one arm. Now, get going!”

“Not without you,” Cynthia said, grimly.

Beaumont turned his iron eyes on his childhood friend. Luther’s beloved gray flannel suit was dark with blood; one arm dangled at his side, useless.

“Stay with her, Luther,” he ordered. “No matter what, understand?”

“Yes, Roy,” the slack-mouthed man said.

“Beau! Come on!” Cynthia pleaded.

“Get out!”

“No!” she cried.

“Yes, honey,” Beaumont said. He took a revolver from his desk drawer. “I love you, Cyn,” he said, stuck the pistol into his mouth, and pulled the trigger. The wall behind him turned red.

Cynthia stumbled toward her fallen love.

“Roy said!” Luther yelled. He grabbed Cynthia by the hand and pulled her toward the escape door.

1959 October 11 Sunday 22:12

The field phone sounded in the warehouse.

“Team One,” the man behind the binoculars said.

“Subject RV fifty-six minutes. Behind the abandoned building at 303 Drexel. Copy?”

“Roger.”

1959 October 11 Sunday 23:06

“We’re not done,” Harley said. “Shalare knocked off the roof, but he can’t touch the foundation, like Roy always said.”

“What’s our move?” Sammy asked, his question passing the torch as no ceremony could have.

“For now, we stay low and we wait. We have to see if Shalare already got what he wants. If he just wanted Roy, because of that whole election thing, well, he got that. So he may lay back for a while. But it doesn’t matter. Tomorrow or ten years, he’ll never take what’s ours.”

“That Irish fuck should have finished us when he had the chance,” Udell swore. “Now he’s going to have to deal with some dangerous damn hillbillies.”

“Mountain men,” Harley told him, his voice pulsating with the strength of command. “We’re mountain men.”

1959 October 11 Sunday 23:08

“Sixty yards,” the spotter said, peering through his scope, then glancing at a photo in his right hand. “But that’s not our man.”

“It’s not time yet,” the sniper said, glancing at the luminous dial of his watch.

Mack Dressler came around the corner of the abandoned building, walking toward the figure waiting in the darkness.

“Yes?” the sniper said.

“Confirming… Yes.”

“There’s two, then.”

“We only got orders on-”

“The man said ‘RV,’ right? ‘Rendezvous,’ that’s a meet. More than one.”

As the shadows of the two figures merged, the sniper’s rifle cracked. Mack Dressler dropped. The other man immediately dove for cover, but a second shot caught him between the shoulder blades. Procter reached for his reporter’s pad, Have to write… headlining through his mind. Then the sniper’s next shot spiked his last story.

1959 October 11 Sunday 23:29

“Where are you going at this time of night, Carl?”

“I thought you were asleep, Mother.”

“I suppose I was,” she said from the darkness of her bedroom. “I can’t imagine what would have awakened me-you didn’t make a sound.”

“Go back to sleep, Mother.”

“But you haven’t told me where you’re-”

“I’m going to work,” Carl said. “There’s something I have to do.”

1959 October 11 Sunday 23:31

“This is our time,” Rufus said, urgently. “White men killing each other like it’s a war zone out there.”

“Our time to do what?” Darryl asked. “Lay in the cut?”

“No, brothers,” Rufus said, addressing everyone in the room. “Our time to cut the cord.”

“What’s that mean, Omar?”

“The guns, K-man,” Rufus said. “We got another shipment coming. The biggest one yet. Those crackers we’ve been buying from? They’re the only ones who can connect us to the guns we’ve been sending out to all the units.”

“Gonna kill white men, now’s the time,” Moses said, casting his vote. “Couple more bodies in this town won’t even be noticed, the way things been going.”

“That’s right,” Rufus said. “And I got just the man for the job. Don’t I, Silk?”

1959 October 11 Sunday 23:47

“It’s the Mercedes again,” the spotter said.

“Huh!” the rifleman answered. “You think the other one went in the back way, like before?”

“Let’s go see.”

1959 October 11 Sunday 23:48

“I did not order it,” Wainwright said into the phone. “I did not authorize it. I did not sanction it. I did not know about it.”

“Two men were hit,” a carefully calm voice said. “Do you think it’s possible the target was the other man, not ours?”

“It could be. The other man was one James Hammond Procter. He was a reporter for the local paper.”

“Procter? Do we have a file on him?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And?”

“It’s possible that our man was meeting him for the purpose of… transmitting information.”

“But we don’t know this for sure?”

“No, sir. By the time we… The local police were on the scene very quickly. Whatever was on the person of either man is in their possession now.”

“Do we have someone we can speak to there?”

“I’ll take care of it,” Wainwright said.

1959 October 11 Sunday 23:51

Karl maneuvered his Mercedes behind the building, a flashlight extended in one gloved hand. There! He stopped the car, climbed out, and walked over to a padlocked back door. A thin slice of white showed between his lips. He prowled the back of the building with his flashlight until he found a window along the side.

Karl returned to his car, drove just beneath the window, then climbed lithely onto the roof of the Mercedes. The window glass yielded to his gloved fist.

Inside the building, Karl made his way to the front, found the pulley, and levered the garage door open. Moving quickly, he trotted around to the back, reclaimed his car, and drove it through the opening. Then he pulled the door closed behind him.

Breathing hard, Karl removed his topcoat. Underneath, he was clad in an immaculate brown uniform, with red epaulets and a red stripe down the pants. His jackboots were black mirrors. Around his waist was a heavy leather belt, connected to a matching shoulder strap worn across his chest. The uniform shirt had two armbands, red, with a black swastika in a white circle on each. Karl reached inside his Mercedes and withdrew a uniform cap and a cardboard folder.

He placed the cap on his head and checked his image in the mirror. The sight calmed him, regulating his breathing. He held out one tremorless hand. Hard and true.

Karl gently opened the folder and removed the contents. He carefully arranged the photographs and copies of official documents on the hood of his Mercedes, fussing until the proof, the indisputable proof, that his Führer was a half-Jewish, race-mixing fraud was perfectly aligned.

From the inside pocket of his uniform tunic, Karl took a single sheet of his personal stationery. The words “Blood and Honor” were written in a strong, assured hand.

Karl examined his display with a critical eye. Finally satisfied, he unsnapped the flap of his holster and took out a virginal black Luger.

1959 October 11 Sunday 23:58

“Hoffman’s not happy, Mickey,” the bulky man said.

“I know how to fix that, Sean.”

“Yes? Well, tell us, then.”

“It wasn’t Beaumont who took out Dioguardi,” Shalare said. “It was us, wasn’t it?”

“Aye,” the bulky man said. “That should mend our fences, right enough… if he buys it. But why did we do it, Mickey?”

“Beaumont was playing a double game,” Shalare said, speaking slowly, as if working out a complex problem. “Planning to cross us on the election. Remember, we had his own man, Lymon, working for us. And that part, we can prove. Lymon was an insider. He told us Beaumont was in cahoots with Dioguardi. They were going the other way. It was them or us.”

“Dioguardi’s people, we already talked to them, they’re not a problem,” the bulky man said. “But Beaumont… he may be gone, but there’s plenty of his men still around, Mickey.”

“You forget, Sean. I had the pleasure of dealing with Mr. Royal Beaumont my ownself. The man was a leader-a rock for the others to cleave to. Without him, they’ll just scatter back to the hills they came from.”

“I hope so, with all my heart,” the bulky man said. “Because we still have a job to do here.”

1959 October 12 Monday 00:06

“That was a shot,” the rifleman said.

“You sure?”

“If there’s one sound I know, it’s that.”

“Fuck! This is a sterile zone. We can’t have any police around. We’ll have to wait for one car to leave, then go in and get the body.”

Another shot rang out, clearer than the first.

“I don’t think anyone’s coming out of there,” the rifleman said. “Time for us to break camp.”

1959 October 12 Monday 21:22

“Where you at now?” a harsh voice hissed through a long-distance line.

“What difference does it make?”

“Right. You ever been to Omaha?”

“No.”

“Doesn’t matter,” the voice whispered. “It’s the same everywhere.”

“I know,” the man called Walker Dett said.