The eary morning sky was an outrageous shade of deep blue. The air was crisp and breezy, filled with ever present birdsong, as Charles passed through the long stand of trees which served as windbreak and borderland between Dayborn and Owltown. He made his way along the well-worn path to join up with a paved road curving into Owltown’s small commercial district.
This main street was lined with simple structures, one and two levels of weathered gray board. Though obviously decades old, they had the temporary character of hastily constructed carnival booths. The telephone poles and streetlamps had a greater sense of permanence. A neon sign in every third storefront window advertised liquor by the shot or the quart.
A car sped by, whipping up trash and dust in its wake. Bottles lay against the curbs; some were shattered, and one was still grasped in the hand of a slumbering drunk. Half of him lay on the walkway, and the rest of him sprawled in the street. Aromas of stale whiskey and vomit hung cloudlike over the man’s body. He snored contentedly as Charles passed him by.
A woman was coming toward him, hobbling as if one leg might be a good three inches shorter than the other. And now Charles could see that it was, for she held a broken shoe in her hand and limped along on one bare foot and one stiletto heel. Her brassy hair had the texture of slept-in cotton candy, and the dress of dark blue sequins threw off a million brilliant sparks of sunlight. She had wept her mascara into a raccoon’s mask.
He was about to ask her if he could help, putting out one hand to hail her when a car pulled to the curb beside him, and a familiar voice commanded, “Don’t touch anything in Owltown, Mr. Butler. You don’t know where it’s been.”
The weeping woman turned abruptly to face the car marked with the official star and legend of the sheriff’s office. Her face was in a panic as she hurried down the street, moving faster now that she had lost her one good shoe in a race to be gone.
The car’s curbside door opened in invitation, and Charles got into the front seat with Tom Jessop. The interior smelled of aftershave and cigarettes. The dashboard was a clutter of loose papers, envelopes and handwritten notes on napkins and matchbook covers. “Good morning,” said Charles.
The sheriff touched the brim of his brown Stetson in a return salutation. “Where you headed, Mr. Butler?”
“I’m hoping to get out to the fairgrounds before the tent goes up.” And he also hoped the sheriff had no time-consuming business with him. Charles had waited all his adult life for this event.
“Yeah, that tent raising is a rare sight.” The sheriff put the car in gear and they glided away from the curb. “You get a great view of the lower bayou from the horseshoe bend. The Lauries cleared that bend by fire – killed every root system on the near shore.”
“Not very sound ecology. Wouldn’t that tend to speed up the erosion of the land?”
“Yeah.” The sheriff smiled. “One day, all of Owltown will be under water. It may take the better part of a century, but I’m a patient man.” And his patience was evident in the slow crawl of the car.
“I take it you don’t care much for Owltown.”
‘Let me give you the tour, and we’ll see how well you like this place.“ They stopped at a cross street. The sheriff pointed to a line of gray shacks along an unpaved road. ”You go that way, and you can see something real nasty at the peep shows.“ He turned to the rear-window view of the road already traveled. ”Go back that way, and you can buy drink, drugs and a woman at the same establishment – one-stop shopping.“ The car began to crawl again. ”When I was a kid, we didn’t have all those good things – there was nothing out here but Ed Laurie’s bar and a pack of owls.“
They proceeded down the main street, and Charles observed more signs of liquor for sale. “I wouldn’t have thought a place this size could support so many bars.”
“Those’re all New Church hospitality houses,” said the sheriff. “There’s not one liquor license in the pack. No money changes hands, no tax revenues. But you need a church voucher to get a drink”
The sheriff slowed the car to a roll and pointed out a two-story house on the left side of the street. “That’s a real landmark there – Ed Laurie’s old bar. Thirty years ago, the only Lauries in this parish all lived on the second floor.”
It was like the other buildings, naked wood and spare in form, but older than the rest. The sunporch roof sagged in an evil smile, and bright-glowing beer logos blinked on and off in the window. And now Charles noticed the relative quiet. He could hear the noise of distant car engines, but no birds. He had become accustomed to their music everywhere he went. Apparently, birds did not sing in Owltown.
The sheriff stopped the car in front of the bar. “That’s where Babe got his start when he was five years old. He was called Baby Laurie then. His daddy would sit him on top of the jukebox so the boy could preach scripture, and worse. If you wanted live theater, you went to Ed’s bar to see who Baby Laurie was gonna hex that night.”
“Hex? Are we talking about voodoo?”
“Nothing that sophisticated, Mr. Butler. But the little bastard was real good at predictions. If he said your wife would have a stillborn child, she might accidentally connect with a baseball bat in the gut before she come to term. ‘Course you could ask Baby Laurie to pray you and yours away from the wrath of the Lord. And if you made a contribution to the ministry, then lo and behold, your baby would be born alive.”
“A protection racket? So the father was – ”
“Or one of Babe’s big brothers did the work. The other boys were full-grown by then. Their father was the most hated man in St. Jude Parish. If Ed hadn’t died of a drunk’s liver, eventually we would’ve found him floating face down in the bayou. And don’t you know, Babe was just the image of his father.”
“So you’re saying there’s more than a few people who wanted to see Babe dead?”
But the sheriff said nothing at all as he set the car in motion once more. Either the man was evading the question, or he simply didn’t care who killed Babe Laurie.
“Sheriff, you said Babe’s brothers were full-grown when he was five. But that was thirty years ago. Surely Malcolm couldn’t be much over thirty.”
“Malcolm is fifty-one. Just a few years younger than I am.” Charles stared at the lines and jowls of the sheriff’s face, and the graying hair that Malcolm didn’t have. This was not possible. He couldn’t have been so far from the mark in -
“Malcolm is a strange one,” said the sheriff. “He encourages rumors that he’s even older. Makes people think he’s onto a secret, and maybe he is.” But Jessop’s tone lacked conviction and bordered on sarcasm. “Years back, Babe and Malcolm looked almost like twins. But when Babe died at thirty-six, he looked ten years older. Could be Malcolm used his brother like that magic portrait of Dorian Gray’s. Babe becomes debauched, and Malcolm stays young forever.”
Charles was still stunned by the age factor, but the sheriff misunderstood the surprise in his eyes.
“Don’t get excited, Mr. Butler. I’m sure I got that literary reference off the back of one of my bubble gum cards.”
“I remember bubble gum,” said Charles, not missing a beat, not rising to the bait. “It was wonderful. Do they still make it?”
“Why you poor ignorant man.” Jessop pointed to the glove compartment. “In there. Help yourself.”
Charles opened the small door in the dashboard, and a pile of card-size packets spilled out with the rich timeless smell of gum and an Officer Friendly logo printed on the wrappers.
“I give them out to the kids.” Sheriff Jessop pulled a few packets from the pile that Charles was stuffing back into the glove compartment.
“So Babe was debauched?” The landscape crawled by the car window, and Charles looked at his watch. Still lots of time. “Not leading the exemplary life of an evangelist?”
“Babe was no saint – that’s a fact. These past few years, he was stoned on drugs or drink every time I saw him. That sorry, diseased son of a bitch.”
“Diseased?”
“You bet. Every last soul in Dayborn remembers his party at the Dayborn Bar and Grill. It was his nineteenth birthday, but the Lauries were really celebrating Babe’s first case of the clap. That VD party was a legend. It went on for three days.” He put his hand into the pile of clutter on the dashboard and extricated a folded sheaf of papers bearing today’s date and the seal of a medical examiner. He handed it to Charles. “Cut to the second page, top of the sheet.”
Charles scanned the lines. According to the autopsy report, Babe Laurie had died in an advanced stage of venereal disease. Various drugs and alcohol were listed in the contents of the stomach. Charles turned to the sheriff, who was nodding, saying, “Yeah, he was diseased all right.”
Approaching the fairgrounds, they traveled by a cluster of trailers. Men in sleeveless T-shirts were standing in groups, drinking beer for their breakfast. Now a shoving match ensued and one man hit the ground in a hurry. He was kicked in the ribs by another man, and the content of a beer can was poured over the fallen man’s prone body. But the sheriff seemed not to care about this infraction of the law against assaulting one’s fellow citizen.
Charles unwrapped the packet in his hand and released the spicy aroma of bubble gum. He discarded the baseball trading card and held the bright piece of gum to his nose, seriously assessing the bouquet. It even smelled pink. When he popped it into his mouth, the taste evoked a flood of memories. That summer on the road with Cousin Max, bubble gum had been a staple of his diet.
Before they pulled into the parking lot, he had outdone himself by blowing a larger bubble than the sheriff could manage with twice the chewy pink waddage. Then Charles did a bit of showboating by blowing a bubble within a bubble. The grand finale was a resounding pop, and the sheriff took his hands off the wheel to applaud.
The car rolled to a stop in a dirt parking lot, and the two men sat companionably for a few minutes of highly competitive chewing and bubble blowing.
“You know, Sheriff,” Pop. “I haven’t seen a single child in Owltown.”
Pop. “The families with kids live in Dayborn. Most of this roadie trash around here is drunks, junkies, hookers and the odd pervert – the staff and clientele of the Owltown business district.”
Pop. “How many Lauries are there?”
“With cousins, second cousins, and relations by marriage? I guess a few hundred people. When the family business got too big for Mal and his brothers to manage it, they brought in relatives from Texas and the Carolinas. Now the whole pack of them work for the New Church.”
Pop. Pop.
“How does a church support so many people?”
“When the tent show’s touring up north in the Bible Belt, they pull in at least thirty grand on a bad night. The Lauries who stay behind in Owltown make even more money running the mail order business.”
Charles aborted a bubble. “Mail order religion?”
Pop. “Oh, yeah. For a five-dollar donation you can have an envelope full of dirt from the Holy Land. I’m afraid I crunched up a lot of that holy dirt when I pulled into this parking lot.”
Pop. “God forgives you,” said Charles. “How much for a piece of the true cross?”
“Twenty dollars. However, those sawdust shavings are laminated in a strip of plastic. You can use them to mark your favorite scripture in the autographed Bible.”
Pop. “Autographed by…?”
“The authors, all twelve of ‘em.”
Charles’s last bubble died in a smile. The sheriff had produced the lesser pops but the better punch line. Then Charles was appalled to learn that the sheriff was not joking. There were twelve apostles on the New Church governing board, and the text of the Bible had been substantially rewritten.
As he opened the passenger door of the car, the sheriff leaned toward him and said, “I’m gonna send my deputy back here to pick you up when you’re done. I’m not being pushy, Mr. Butler, I’m just real concerned for your health. So you won’t mind that?”
“Not at all. I appreciate the concern.” And he meant that, for they had just been bonded by gum, hadn’t they?
“Have a nice visit,” said Jessop, “but don’t stray off the fairgrounds. That’s just a friendly caution.”
Charles stepped out of the car and walked over the open field beyond the parking lot, past the blights of vans and trucks, trailers and food stands. When he stood at the center of the denuded horseshoe bend, he had a spectacular view of cypress trees and their mirror reflections lining the far shore of the bayou. A snowy egret took flight in the distance, escaping the noise which was growing in volume as the grounds filled with workers shouting and barking commands.
His eyes followed the flight of the bird. Its wings spread on the air and long legs flowed back from white feathers. The sun dappled the bayou in a bright band of sparkling lights. A fish broke through still water near a string of trap lines extending out from the bank. Scales shining like silver, it rose out of the bayou as though to fly free. At the end of the tether of hook and line, it fell back into a foam of splashing water.
Charles turned his attention to the metal shafts erected in the middle of the field. Each tall pole waved a bright red banner, and long ropes trailed down to the ground. The tallest would be the center pole of the great canvas tent, which now lay in a huge flat circle spread out at his feet. Its circumference would make a fair-size dog track.
Off to one side of the bend, a sudden burst of a cappella music came from a gospel choir in blue jeans. A woman with a baton stood before the group and waved their voices up and down with a flick of her wrist. Suddenly, she broke off the rehearsal to shout obscenities at a man passing close by with a boom box blaring rock music. There were hollered conversations all around him as men converged on the massive circle of canvas.
He had come just in time. The tent was going up, being hoisted on the ropes, rising before his eyes and blotting out the sky. Each time he blinked, it morphed into some new shape, sharply pointing at the center and more points at the outer rim, as the material, anchored in metal rings, was drawn up the length of the poles. All around the vast circle, men hauled on the lines, and the pulleys squealed. The canvas was alive in the wind, whipping and bucking against the ropes, stressed and straining, finally rearing up into the familiar form of a gigantic circus tent. Atop the poles, the red banners snapped in the breeze and then stuck straight out in forked tongues.
Another man had come to stand beside him, and when Charles turned, he half expected to see the famed magician, Maximillian Candle. But Cousin Max was long dead, and Charles was staring at Malcolm Laurie, a head smaller than himself. But it occurred to him that this man must also be a conjuror of sorts, for he was experiencing the illusion of falling down into Malcolm’s eyes.
“I thought you might enjoy this, Charles. I’m glad you came.”
So, Malcolm had gone to the trouble to learn his first name, but not asked if he might use it. Though he had always given such permission to anyone who wanted it, he didn’t like the sound of his more familiar name in Malcolm’s mouth. It felt like an intrusion.
A violation?
Augusta, get out of my head.
Charles turned back to the tent. Four men were raising a neon sign by guide wires to suspend it from a tall steel framework. It was a marquee of green glass tubes rising high in the air above them. The capital letters were very large, and Charles was startled by the bluntness of the words: ‘MIRACLES FOR SALE.’
Mallory shook pillow feathers off the blanket and sent them drifting into the corridor outside her cell, where the sheriff was lecturing his new deputy on the fine points of housekeeping and the proper procedure for handling dangerous prisoners.
“Now, at the end of the month, I gotta give you back to the state in the same condition they gave you to me. So follow my orders and stay out of trouble.” The sheriff waved one hand in the air to bat away the feathers from the small storm Mallory had created with her blanket shaking. His mood was worsening by the second.
Good. Mallory sat down on the bed and commenced her daily activity of staring at the opposite wall.
“First, have her put her hands through the bars. Then you cuff the prisoner to the bars before you unlock the door. You got that? And be sure you hang up your gun belt outside the cell.” He pointed to the hooks on the wall.
Mallory had noticed that the sheriff never took his own advice. During all the hours of questioning, pacing up and down her cell while she sat in silence, he had never taken off his gun belt. He had all but waved it in her face. But she had bided her time, waiting for a slip of words to hang him with.
As a small child, she had believed this man was God with a six-shooter. This morning, the man outside her cell was just an ordinary human, sloppier and slower now, falling short of a god in every way. He was even conforming to Louisiana code and carrying a police-issue automatic. However, his deputy had strayed outside the code to pack a.38 revolver. Now that was promising. The ammo would work in her own.357.
“And then,” the sheriff was saying to his new deputy, “you clean all those damn feathers outta that cell. Hear me?”
The deputy took umbrage, dark eyebrows rushing together, lips pouting. Perhaps no one had told her that maid service was part of her job description. All Lilith Beaudare’s words came out in a rush. “I was first in a class of – ”
“Girl, that police academy was nothing more than a glorified kindergarten.” His irritation was showing more, building to a boil.
So the deputy was only a rookie, fresh from a six-week training program which might have taught her how to avoid shooting herself in the foot, but little more than that. Mallory noted another giveaway – the deputy’s belt. It was weighted down with Mace, ammo, flashlight, handcuffs, cell phone, speedloader and a nightstick. This woman was all dressed up for a task-force raid, yet she conveyed the credo of the overly prepared Girl Scout.
Mallory ceased to listen to the argument beyond the door of her cell. She was taking further measurements of Lilith Beaudare, estimating the woman’s height as even with her own. Their build and weight were about the same. Beaudare might be a few years younger. The woman seemed secure in her dark skin, moving with an easy physical confidence of the body – but the sheriff was walking all over her.
“When I come back up here, I don’t want to see one damn feather in that cell.” The sheriff opened a small door to disclose a pantry of shelves bearing cleaning supplies. He pulled out a broom, a dustpan, a cloth and a folded plastic trash bag. He handed off these items to the rookie, who was now subdued by humiliation. “We’ll just see if you can do this one job right before we turn you loose on organized crime.”
Mallory picked up a handful of feathers from the floor, held them to her lips and blew the sheriff a kiss. Two feathers landed in his hair. Others were delicately balanced on his nose and chin. He removed them with great deliberation, pinching them between his fingers and reducing them to strings.
Lilith Beaudare was working hard at holding back a smile. Jessop stared at his deputy until her mouth assumed a more respectful line. “Just get on with the housework, girl.” His feet were heavy on the floorboards as he stomped down the narrow corridor. The door slammed shut behind him.
The deputy leaned the broom against the cell block wall. It was well within Mallory’s reach.
Stupid move, Deputy.
The woman turned to Mallory. “You know why that bastard thinks he can talk to me that way?”
“Because you’re a woman? Or because you’re black? Pick one. I haven’t got all day for this crap.” She reached out through the bars to grasp the broom.
The deputy only watched her do this, unconcerned, not realizing that a broom could be a weapon – if Mallory chose to drive it through the bars and into the deputy’s gut. If she really wanted to do some damage, she could drive the broom handle into the deputy’s throat. It would only take a second. But it was not Lilith Beaudare she wanted to damage.
“It was a mistake to tell him you were at the top of your class,” said Mallory, moving the broom along the floor. “He’s going to gnaw on that for a while, and then sometime after lunch he just might put it all together.” She had fluffed a small pile of feathers up to the bars, and now a sweet light southern drawl crept into her voice. “Hand me that dustpan, will you?”
The deputy’s face was fixed in rapt attention as she surrendered the copper dustpan with its nice sharp corners to tear the flesh of a throat with only minimum force.
Oh, Deputy, you have a lot to learn, and I am going to teach you.
“I know your name can’t be girl.” In fact, she knew that Deputy Beaudare’s middle name was Mary. Most of Mallory’s information came from Jane, who brought her meals three times a day and didn’t mind holding up both ends of a conversation.
She brushed the feathers into the dustpan. And some took flight, escaping between the bars.
“My name is Lilith Beaudare.” And now, unbidden, the deputy also handed over the large green garbage bag, which would fit so nicely over the dark head if Mallory chose to suffocate the life out of this rookie cop.
“Lilith, this is no place for an up-and-comer like you. First in your class? That would have guaranteed you first pick of assignments.” She set the bag and dustpan on the small chest of drawers by her bed. “He’ll have to wonder what you’re doing here in St. Jude, the smallest parish in the state. And the town’s population wouldn’t fill two city blocks of New Orleans.”
“I was born in this town. It makes sense that I – ”
“Well, no it doesn’t. It would make sense for you to get as far away as you could. First in your class? Not small-town material. No, there’s definitely something wrong with this picture.”
Mallory came back to the cell door and got on with the chore of fluffing the feathers along the strip of floor by the bars. “He’ll have to figure you for a liar. Or maybe you’re a screwup, and this is a punishment detail.”
“I am not a – ”
“You could be a plant.” Well, that shut her mouth. “Yeah, that would work.”
Even Jane, of Jane’s Cafe, had found it odd that the state police should send the sheriff a deputy. Tom Jessop had been hiring and training his own people for decades. “You’ve made a lot of mistakes, Lilith. But maybe he’s as dumb as you think he is. Maybe he won’t put it all together… unless somebody puts the idea in his head.”
The woman said nothing. She was only gaping.
Mallory gestured to the stuffed armchair opposite her bed. “Come into my office and pull up a chair. I’m going to fix your life.”
The invitation was delivered so like an order, the rookie nearly followed it. But she stayed the hand that was reaching for the door, the hand with the key. Her arm dropped to her side, and she only stared at her prisoner.
Mallory lowered her eyes in submission. She returned to the bed and knelt down on the floor to move the broom underneath it, stirring a small cloud of feathers into the open. Her back was turned when she heard the clicks of the key working the tumblers of the lock. Footsteps entered the cell, and the door was locked again. When Mallory looked up, the deputy’s hand rested on the gun in her holster.
Perfect.
Mallory gestured to the armchair, inviting her guest to sit down. The deputy remained standing, eyes on the prisoner, as though Mallory might be a viper in striking distance. And she was.
“So he humiliated you.” Mallory turned her attention back to the leathers at the far corner under the bed. The armchair creaked behind her. “I bet he does that a lot.” She turned to see the deputy sitting in the chair, rigid, hands tightly clutching a dustcloth.
‘He’s a son of a bitch,“ said the deputy, teeth clenched. ”I could write him up for – “
‘No, that’s a bad idea.“ Mallory swept feathers into the dustpan as she went on in an easy tone, low and conspiratorial. ”If you ask someone else to solve your problem, they’ll write you off as a loser. That’s what I’d do.“
Oh, the rookie didn’t like that at all. Well, tough.
“Here’s a better idea,” said Mallory, emptying the dustpan into the green plastic bag. “Be the kind of cop no one would treat that way.” She stood up slowly and swept feathers closer to the armchair. The deputy sat ramrod straight, distrustful in every alerted muscle.
Mallory picked up the dustpan and began to herd the feathers into it. “Shoot better, even if it means putting in overtime and paying for extra practice rounds.” She walked to the window of the cell and ran one finger over the sill, staring distastefully at the dust. “Think better – don’t be in such a damn hurry to get the words out.” Now she strolled back to the deputy’s chair. “You don’t want to open your mouth unless you have something to say, and then you only say something worth listening to.”
The deputy seemed more relaxed now. Her grip on the dustcloth had lightened. Mallory bent down and plucked the cloth from the woman’s hand in a natural, easy movement. She began to rub the surface of the chest of drawers. “Never take crap from anybody. If you take it once, you’ll take it forever. If it means a fight, then fight – even if you know you can’t win.”
Mallory made intense eye contact until the other woman found it uncomfortable and dropped her guard to look at the floor. Mallory walked closer to the deputy’s chair. She bent low, her fair head next to the dark one, so close – sisters now. “Wear the bastard down.” And now she whispered, giving equal weight to every syllable, “Make this your religion.”
Mallory moved quickly to rip the gun from the deputy’s holster. She pressed the muzzle to the woman’s skull. As a throwaway afterthought, she said, “Oh, and there’s nothing quite as stupid as losing your gun to a prisoner.”
Lilith Beaudare showed all the signs of deep embarrassment, but no fear. Mallory liked that – she liked it a lot. This rookie cop had promise. She sat down on the edge of her bed and leaned toward the woman.
“Now I’ll tell you why the sheriff treats you like dirt. It’s because you’re a useless rookie, green as they come.”
And maybe you’re also a spy, Lilith Beaudare. State or federal, I wonder?
“Right now you’re no help to him at all. You’re more likely to get yourself shot.” Mallory held the gun a little higher as a show-and-tell exhibit. “Point taken? Now do you understand your place in the world?”
The deputy nodded.
Mallory turned the gun around and handed it back to her. The deputy only stared at it for a second, as if disbelieving it could be within her reach. Then she accepted it and pointed it at her prisoner.
Mallory ignored the gun barrel leveled at her heart. “School’s out. I fixed your life. I probably saved it – you won’t lose your gun again, will you? You owe me big-time, girl.”
“Deputy Beaudare, to you.”
“Now you’ve got it. Remember, the sheriff thinks you’re worthless. See what you can do to change that.”
Mallory had finally concluded that the new deputy had been planted by the feds, and not the state. It was the delayed fingerprint report that decided her. She had no worries about the serial number on her Smith & Wesson. She had altered that computer entry years ago. But results of the fingerprint search should have come back to Sheriff Jessop long before now.
A homicide case would get a high priority. Just the name Mallory, her age and description would have a large array. But she gave the sheriff credit for coupling ‘Mallory’ with ‘Kathy,’ which narrowed the field. So the feds were holding out on Jessop, but why?
When the sheriff returned, his deputy was once again standing in the corridor beyond the bars, holding on to a plastic bag full of feathers. Tom Jessop cast an approving eye over the tidy cell. “Good job. I guess you’re ready for something a little more challenging. You remember Mr. Butler, don’t you? The giant with the big nose?” The deputy nodded.
“I want you to drive down to the fairgrounds and wait on him till he’s ready to be escorted back to Dayborn. And try not to put any dents in the car. It’s all we got till Travis’s unit is out of the shop.”
When Lilith had quit the cell block, the sheriff turned to Mallory, and she smiled at him. It was her first friendly overture to this man in all the days she had been his prisoner.
He wore the startled look of sudden recognition, and then his face relaxed. “Now that’s my Kathy.” He said it softly. It was almost a sigh.
And Mallory was still smiling when she said, “Step into my office, Sheriff. Pull up a chair.”
“Oh, the sign,” said Malcolm Laurie, waving it off as though Charles had simply misunderstood the message of miracles for sale. Or perhaps it was a typographical error in four-foot block letters. “It’s a commercial world, isn’t it, Charles? I have to relate to my flock any way I can.” The smile of the charming boy was back.
“So you don’t actually sell the miracles?”
“Oh, sure I do. People don’t trust what they don’t pay for. They’re more inclined to believe in things that cost hard cash. In my line of work, belief is ninety percent of the job. Hell, it is the job. If Christ came back today and gave His Sermon on the Mount for free, who would turn out for the show?”
“I believe that sermon was catered with magical loaves and fish to feed the multitude,” Charles countered. “I’d turn out for that.”
“Hey, Mal!” A man with a clipboard was coming toward them. He had the same general features as Malcolm, except for his eyes, which were small and dark. This man was being introduced to him as Fred Laurie. While Malcolm attended to the clipboard, Charles was distracted by the sight of the sheriff’s car pulling into the parking lot. The promised escort had arrived, and he should be saying goodbye to Malcolm soon.
When Fred Laurie had left them, he asked, “What sort of miracles do you sell, Malcolm?”
“Whatever you’re in the market for.”
Over the head of the smaller man, Charles saw Lilith Beaudare alight from the car and look around. Now she had picked him out of the crowd, an easy feat; he was the only person of abnormal height and wearing a three-piece suit. As she was striding across the field, a drunk stumbled into her path and engaged her in conversation. A group of people passed in front of Charles and blocked her from his view. “Suppose I bought a miracle that would let me get away with murder?”
Malcolm’s smile hovered in the zone of bemusement. His eyes flickered with the bright work of running calculations and taking measurements. “Every miracle comes with a caution and a guarantee. The scales of heaven and hell are balanced, and every destructive act exacts a terrible price. So you may decide you don’t want that kind of miracle.”
Now it was Charles who was confused. Was Malcolm taking the literal meaning of getting away with murder? Was this a more common request than he had supposed?
The small group of people passed on. Lilith was visible once more, and in heated conversation. The drunk looked rather pleased with himself, and even more pleased with her.
“What if that’s the only miracle I want to buy?” Charles continued to watch over Lilith as the drunk was moving closer to her. But she was smiling at the reeling man, and so Charles saw no cause for alarm. He turned back to face Malcolm, and reiterated, “Would you sell me that miracle?”
“Yes, but it would cost you dearly.” There was a silence now. Perhaps the salesman of miracles was gearing up for the barter, only waiting on Charles to ask the price so the dickering could begin. But Charles remained silent.
“My guarantees are good as gold,” said Malcolm. “Written in the name of the Lord.”
Charles smiled at the tie of gold and religion which rather neatly summed up the core philosophy of the New Church – payment first, rapture later.
‘But, as I recall, Charles, I already offered you one miracle for free. Have you lost faith in that one – maybe because you didn’t have to pay for it?“
Charles ceased to smile, for now the game had become more intricate. He could no longer hazard a guess at this man’s strategy.
He looked beyond Malcolm to the unexpected sight of the drunk railing at the feet of the young deputy. Now the man was rolling on the grass, tears streaming down his face, as the deputy knelt beside him, forcing his hands behind his back and cuffing him. A much bigger man was standing over them, screaming at her, “That was a damn kidney punch. You punched him when his back was turned!” The drunk’s large champion raised his hands in angry balled fists.
Those fists came down to his sides very quickly, as the deputy rose to her feet in one graceful and fluid motion, her hand lightly touching on the handle of her holstered gun. The trio was too far away for Charles to hear what was not hollered, but the big man raised one hand in the calming gesture of Okay, enough said. He then backed away from the deputy with both his hands splayed out to say, Hey, no harm done. Obviously, he had decided that Lilith’s hitting the drunk when his back was turned was not such a criminal offense after all.
Lilith Beaudare was smiling as she entered the sheriff’s office with her prisoner. She had safely delivered Charles Butler to his hotel in the square, and also bagged this fine, but highly intoxicated trophy. The drunk seemed a bit too docile, though. Perhaps she had punched him too hard. She did wish he would show a bit more life, a little more angry resistance to make a better impression on the sheriff.
She bundled the drunk up the stairs, gripping him by one arm, as much in an effort to keep him from falling down as to direct his steps. When they were through the door and standing in front of the first holding unit, she was searching her pocket for her key ring when she glanced into the middle cell.
Mallory was gone.
The sheriff was standing at the back of the closed cell with an empty holster. He was staring out the bars of the window, hands in his pants pockets, his head angled to watch the foot traffic at the mouth of the alley. He was within easy hailing distance of help, yet not calling out.
Of course not. Neither had Lilith called out when it had been her turn to lose a gun.
Now the sheriff turned and saw her standing there, gripping what he could see of an arm in a red shirt. Lilith looked back at her prisoner. The drunk had seen nothing of the sheriff yet. The man’s unfocused eyes were cast up to the ceiling, perhaps looking there for flights of angels to carry him home. She pushed the drunk back to the door at the end of the cell block.
“I’m gonna let you go with a warning this time.” She uncuffed him and shook him roughly by the shoulders. “Are you listening to me?” She opened the door and motioned him through it. “Go!” She watched his stumbling, half-falling progress down the stairs, and when he hit bottom, she called after him, “Don’t steal anything on the way out!”
She returned to the middle cell and unlocked the door, resisting the urge to say something sarcastic. Don’t be in a hurry to get the words out. She suppressed a smile as she looked down to the sheriff’s empty holster.
His face reddened and his hand moved quickly to cover the leather as though she had caught him naked. “We don’t need to mention this to anybody, do we, girl?
“Girl?”
“Lilith,” he corrected himself.
“Deputy,” she said, in the manner of striking a bargain.
He nodded and the deal was sealed. She opened the door. He passed into the narrow corridor, as Lilith studied the cell’s lock. “Now, how do you suppose she got out? Oh, wait. I see it now.”
He looked down as she pointed to the lock.
“You know, Sheriff, that piece of junk must be as old as the building. It’s a damn antique, isn’t it? Pity the parish didn’t increase your budget this year. You might’ve had that replaced.”
Lilith hit the lock once with her nightstick, but it held. She hit it a second time and put some muscle behind it. The old lock began to give.
The sheriff wore the ghost of a smile.
“Damn penny-pinching fools,” said Lilith, as she continued to hammer away at the rusted metal. “I’d really make those bastards burn for this, if I were you.”
The sheriff’s smile was wider now, and Deputy Beaudare took that to mean that he had finally found her useful.
There was only one other possibility – he might be laughing at her.
He did clap her warmly on the back, in the way that men congratulate one another, but she was still unsure of him as they descended the stairs. He disappeared into his office and emerged a few minutes later with another gun in his holster. Through the open door, she saw the credenza behind the desk was missing the black leather duffel bag. So now the escaped prisoner had two guns, the sheriff’s 9mm automatic and the.357 revolver.
“I’m going after her,” said the sheriff, almost to the door. “I want you to stay close to that phone in case I need you, all right?” And then he was gone, and the door swung shut behind him.
She sat down at her desk and resumed her job of watching a phone that never rang. Nothing had changed.
Lilith powered up the computer. At the C prompt, she prepared to enter a code, but the machine was writing its own commands. Sitting at the edge of her chair, she watched the unfolding notice of a message in a newly created private file which awaited the deputy’s personal password. She entered her password at the next prompt, and her message appeared. By the opening salutation, she knew whose work this was. How long had it taken Mallory to figure out that the password was WOLF?
Dear Rookie,
Not in your best interests if I get caught. I’ll tell the sheriff what you really are. And, Rookie, you don’t even know the whole answer to that one. I’ll call when I want you.
Lilith felt the touch of ice running along her back, fingering her spine from the inside of her skin. As she was deleting Mallory’s memo from hell, she glanced down at the disk pack on the desk. The cellophane wrapper had been sealed this morning, but now it was split open and the box was missing two computer disks. So the escapee had taken time from her busy jailbreak-morning to download the files.