GIN AND SIN/WHEELER

GIN AND SIN

A Quantum Tale of the Christ

by

S. D. Wheeler

elvislamour@yahoo.com
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There’s high and there’s high, and to get

really high—I mean so high that you can

walk on water, that high—that’s where

I’m going.

George Harrison
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CHAPTER 1

The gargoyle didn’t appreciate my excuses. I told him they weren’t excuses; it was an

explanation. The problem with explanations is that eventually they sound like excuses,

especially after four gin and tonics. He wasn’t drinking.

When past sins froth up I have a tendency to numb myself with whatever legal or

illegal substance is available at the time and talk about Erica to anyone who will listen.

The gargoyle didn’t seem to mind I was bending his ear, and what a splendid ear it was

too—a pear-shaped appendage with delicately carved veins along its engorged rims. The

ear canal was whorled deep as a Queen Conch shell. His fangs were long and curved, ten

inches if I had to bet. Bugged out eyes flanked a furrowed brow. Absent a prow of nose,

elliptical nostrils were inset between bloated cheeks above his wide open mouth. He

looked more like a monkey than a saber-tooth cat, a result of crossbreeding perhaps.

Mixing a prehistoric tiger with a chimp might get you a gargoyle. He was carved from

mahogany and stained so dark he looked black. He anchored the corner of the bar at

which I was seated, elbow-high, and close enough to pet. The bar had been salvaged

from an 18th century brigantine and was the showpiece in the main salon of a lady with a

pedigree just as buccaneer. In total there were three gargoyles. Curly took center stage

with Larry and Moe stage left and right, respectively.

I was telling Moe how beautiful Erica looked the morning I ruined her life when a

forearm crashed through the stained-glass skylight above me, followed by a howl that

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could have belonged to the mythic creature. The arm flopped about with pornographic

verve while pizza slices of glass hacked the flesh apart. The vital carmine fluid that

keeps a human being above ground and not below it spewed forth like water from a

broken sprinkler head. Another bone chilling cry came from above deck from whoever it

was. Try as he might the shark’s teeth of the shattered Eye of Providence had him in its

jaws and he could not free himself. The battle lost, the limb dangled like a dog’s tongue

on a hot day. The tattoo on the skin told me the arm belonged to Haven Prior. Hap.

By the time I made it topside the bone was visible, the arm nearly sawed through.

Tightly drawn purple filaments of flesh were all that was holding it together. I set aside

the lightweight .38 caliber Protector and reached for Hap’s belt but he was belt-less. I

yanked the string out from my pj’s. I formed a tourniquet, the string broke. I found his

phone and called 911.

I tried to lift his arm out of the blue iris when glass cut the inside of my right hand

and I yelped with pain and yanked back. In the process I heard a thump. His arm came

up easily then—and half as long as it used to be.

I bunched my pants around the stump and used the leggings to tie a better knot.

Hap’s eyes rolled up white and he went into cardiac arrest. CPR. Panic. More CPR. An

absentminded swipe across a sand-dry mouth. Four minutes of terror felt like forty as I

fumbled about beneath the ice-pick wail of police sirens and their blinding bursts of

color. Even in the dim overflow of light spilling up through the skylight I could tell that

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my friend was dead, or damn close to it.

A torch exposed my gape of alarm, my nakedness and the blood across my chin

no doubt sealing in the officer’s mind the spooky illusion that I was a zombie foraging on

a cadaver. He moved the light off me and shined it onto Hap’s distressed features. His

chiseled face, tooled by age and tanned as expensive leather, was now drawn and ashen.

The corners of his mouth were crusty and whitish, his breath sour. His bright blue orbs

had turned milky and were void of self-awareness. He seemed to be dropping through

my arms, as if the closer he drew to death the heavier he became, his spirit being dragged

down through him, not spirited skyward. He struggled to make sound. Once he did he

seemed relieved of some heavy burden, his eyes becoming briefly focused. In fact his

face took on a strange aura of justification as if by his words he was stabbing back at

death because it was stabbing at him. But what he said to me felt fraudulent—an

ominous rejoinder of someone who refused to take responsibility for his actions. “It’s

God’s fault.” The words lugged at the back of his throat coated in smoker’s phlegm so

they came out broken. He said it again. “It’s God’s fault.” Then he lost consciousness.

Two EMTs jumped aboard and hurried by the starboard side torpedo tube, past

the steps that led up to the cockpit and stopped beside the port side machine gun turret.

The first EMT latched onto the grab rail that enclosed the turret and swung onto the day

room cabin roof. He deftly negotiated the skylight and then ducked beneath the metal

support angling to the radar mast. The second EMT passed up the red medical case and

they moved me out of the way to attend to Hap.

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I rolled onto my bare hip and slid off the roof to the port side deck, adjusting my

eye to the darkness while feeling along the toe bar, my left palm gliding lightly over the

safety line as my right throbbed and dripped. I stepped up into the cockpit and passed

through the companionway door which led below deck.

I went into the head and held my hand under the faucet while blood carpet

bombed the sink. I cursed the sting, ruined a towel, and placed a flat square of gauze

across the cut before it reopened and blood seeped up. Blood seeped up anyway and I

added more gauze. The mishmash of medical tape stuck too tightly and disturbed the

circulation in my fingers. To make matters worse, I’d forgotten to add an antibiotic

ointment with a pain reliever.

I pulled on my khakis and a loose linen shirt, found my hat, returned to the galley,

opened Moe’s head and stashed the Protector inside and snapped him shut. Then I went

topside and watched as Hap was loaded into the ambulance. I saw his phone on the deck

and picked it up to call his wife.

“That his cell?” asked the cop. I recognized the voice. Detective, actually. And I

wondered why he was here.

“What are you doing here?”

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“Collecting evidence,” he said, taking possession.

“I need to call Gin,” I said, grabbing back the phone.

“Gin’s dead,” said Tichie. “Hap killed her.”

There was no absorption for something like this. I simply iced over. Whether

anything registered was completely arbitrary. Like Tichie’s hulking partner, Manny,

flanking me. It was as if I’d been sandwiched between Goliath hands. Together they

blocked my view of the two-plus miles of arc lights that marked the Queen Isabella

Memorial Bridge, the causeway that connected Port Isabel to South Padre Island where

the boat upon which I was standing was moored.

Off the corner of Manny’s shoulder I saw a winged chariot flying over the bay.

The Star Flight helicopter would take Hap to the hospital in Brownsville. The ambulance

peeled away in weepy caterwaul to hook up with it. I walked with the officers to their

car. They opened the door for me and they got in front. I rode with them downtown to

the police station, a short trip. South Padre Island is only four miles long. Downtown is

a quarter mile away. In any direction.

I sat alone in the Chief’s office, a cinder block room of such stark discipline it

will probably still be standing long after the fallout has evaporated. Tichie came in with

two small Styrofoam® cups of piping hot coffee followed by Manny who was aiming the

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video monitor on its wheeled base through the door but the wheels weren’t cooperating.

He cursed. Then he yanked on the dolly. The wheels straightened and moved freely

across the putty-color linoleum. I could tell by the odor of the coffee that it was cheap

and bitter.

Detectives Pete Gomez and Manny Genarro. Two mopes with a badge. Manny

was sloppy-spatula-big with acne scars on his face. The tops of his ears were stained

scarlet as if his body temperature was permanently set to boiling. Thought the only good

thing gringos brought to the Valley was Dunkin’ Donuts. Dreamt of being a fisherman.

Didn’t want to fish until he acquired some new-fangled rod and reel called an SX

something-or-other. He was convinced he’d catch a trophy-size spotted sea trout if he

had one. Couldn’t see the point in trying until he did. It was his perfect world. Pete, on

the other hand, was a large easy-going animal with a cultured poise tucked inside his

lanky gait and a shrewd alertness behind dark brown eyes. He was twice the fisherman

Manny aspired to be. Tailored suit. Gold ring in the left earlobe. Horseshoe moustache.

Got stamped mitiche by his father because he was nosy. A good detective usually is.

Manny faced the video screen my way and plugged it in. I’d been invited to this

preview partly out of respect. I owned the saloon where the crime had been committed.

Video surveillance seemed a no-brainer. Sometimes when people drank too much they

did stupid things and tried to deny them. Well, the camera didn’t blink. Tichie and

Manny also knew that Hap and I were friends, so to nullify suspicion it was best they

show me the stupid thing Hap had done. In their minds there was no question.

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After I saw the tape there was no question in my mind either.

Manny pushed the play button and I watched Hap enter through one of the French

doors that opened onto the deck which overlooked the bay. He wore shorts, flip-flops, a

guayabera with a wide leather belt around his midriff, and he was carrying a Thompson

submachine gun. Murder Inc., Margaritaville style. Gin was standing behind the bar.

He raised the gun.

There seemed to be a diminutive pause between the two of them as it was clear

she’d been taken completely by surprise but perhaps he was having second thoughts.

Then, as if proffering tacit approval, her eyes cast heavenward. Right into the camera.

At me.

He fired.

It was like watching a silent film from the twenties. A black-and-white blood

ballet with no musical score. How Gin pitched into the bullets was what I would later

recall; almost like a ballerina who fouled a pirouette before the fusillade overwhelmed

her.

The slugs raked her pretty day dress, shaking her to pieces like a bouquet of black

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roses. Blood splattered with the fury of smashed ink wells. The bar mirror exploded

behind her. Liquor bottles burst with popcorn rage. Huge panes of glass crashed to the

floor taking the serene reflection of the saloon with it, launching biting ruins through the

air which the camera recorded as tiny shards of silver confetti. Then she fell—an

evisceration of soul from body, a chop-shop of gore.

Hap stepped outside and tossed the gun into the water. He rested his hands on the

railing, his head bowed as if he carried the weight of the world between his shoulders.

I noticed movement. Invisible. The trade winds had slipped through the open

door like heavenly spirits to blow some of the death out. Release Gin’s soul. I don’t

know. It’s what it looked like. The wind slapped life into the saloon’s décor, bringing a

swing and a sway to the many bras and panties that hung from the rafters. Battle flags

from drunken dares. My place was the place your mother warned you about. Above the

demolished bar mirror hung the saloon’s neon name and slogan—Skivvies. We’ll show

you ours if you show us yours. It had escaped the blitzkrieg of bullets.

Hap moved back inside and warily returned to the bar. He lifted an unbroken

bottle of liquor, picked up an overturned glass and blew out the bottom. He poured

himself a shot and looked down at Gin’s remains crosshatched in bunny tracks. He raised

his glass as if giving a toast. Delia’s gone. Then he drank.

Manny pushed the pause button

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“Then I guess he came to see you,” said Tichie.

I became acutely aware of pressure. Big men. Small room. The blueprint for

confession. I wiped away a tear. Manny rolled his eyes, hitched his pants. Case closed.

Time to go home. He read my emotion as weakness—men don’t cry in their quiche type

of thing, just in their beer. Or we don’t cry period. Unless your friend murders the love

of your life. Gin was the love of my life. The problem was she was married.

To Hap.

“Where …” I choked on the words. “Where is she?”

“Port Isabel,” said Manny. “Chief won’t pay extra to have her driven to

Brownsville over the weekend. She’ll keep just fine at Roland’s till Monday.”

“Why didn’t he just walk away?” said Tichie. “No one divorces in this country

anymore? Even I know you walk away. And I’m Mexican. We never walk away.”

Again I caught a bandy of their eyes. Like Gin’s death was the joke I didn’t get.

Manny ran a finger across the message board until he came to a business card.

My business card—D. E. Lycan, Discreet Inquiries, email, phone. He took the card down

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and studied it, availing himself a seat on the corner of the Chief’s desk, his heft spreading

in his pants like a sliding layered cake.

“Still doing interviews?”

“Not if I can help it.”

“Doesn’t pay too good I hear.”

“It doesn’t pay at all.”

“Then why do them?”

“Just riding the wave,” I said.

“How ‘bout I ride that wave with you awhile. Be good for the department.”

“Makes no never-mind to me.”

“Made you get these printed.”

“T-shirts are next.”

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“Wanna be a celebrity, huh?”

“Beats workin’.”

“You just got lucky.”

“Well, Lady Luck favors the foolish, I guess.”

She had helped me find a congressman’s daughter who’d disappeared during

spring break (found her in a crack house in Rio Hondo and sort of swooped in). Foolish

me. But got me those fifteen minutes. One of the top twenty YouTube videos of all time

because I was stark naked when I carried her out of the burning trailer. The tabloids had

a field day with pithy titles like “Gallant Gumshoe Goes Full Monty” and “Knight in the

Buff Rescues Damsel in Distress”. I tried to lay low. The world knows what I look like

without my clothes! I had business cards printed the next day.

Manny said, “You in the investigation business or the bar business?”

“A bar is a good place to vet potential clients.”

“Get some booze in them, exploit their weaknesses?”

“That’s my middle name.”

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“What was it last week?”

“Expatriate.”

“You don’t like it here, leave.”

“After you.”

Manny was beginning to boil. Those ears? It was really something to see.

Hard to tell a Mexican in Texas to leave. Especially the Rio Grande Valley. The

Rio Grande Valley is browner than white and always has been. Chances are if I break

down on the side of the road it’ll be a brown who helps me before a white. I got the flat

tires to prove it. Hardest damn workers I’ve ever seen. A courteous capitulation to the

sin in man that dates back to Cain. He toiled in the fields, not Abel. Got sunstroke.

Overreacted. Spilt some blood. Nothing a tequila wouldn’t smooth out. Cain and Abel

weren’t white, by the way.

Tichie stepped between us. “Dial it back, detective.” He looked at me. “Why are

you tied up at Stella’s?”

“Got in late,” I said. “Promised to help with the judging this year.”

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There were three of us set to adjudicate the annual Lady Kingfish Tournament. I

was an alternate, the original judge having been tossed in jail after a routine traffic stop

outside Lufkin where he was recognized as a felon who’d escaped a work-release five

years earlier. I’d been in Corpus Christi when the call came asking me to fill in and

didn’t get back to the island until almost dark. I took the Hellwitch over to Stella’s Sassy

Snapper and put in at her dock, not mine. Ended up drinking too much. Sent the school

teacher home around ten after we’d availed ourselves of every sassy thing we could think

of. She wanted to give up teaching and move aboard. I wasn’t having any of it.

“Anyone we know?” asked Tichie.

“Probably. But I’m not the kind that tells.”

The Lady Kingfish Tournament was a boon to the summer economy because it

was usually too hot to do anything else. Made sense to sweat your sins away on the

water trying to land the big one than staying holed up at home reeling in guilt. But the

Hellwitch was an added attraction and quite unexpected. She was a huge draw all by

herself, especially on Friday nights when she was used in conjunction with the fireworks

to announce the arrival of the weekend. Even during the slow months the fireworks

brought Valley residents to the island to spend their money. Hap’s warship only added to

that revenue.

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She was a PT boat, Elco class, from World War II. PT stood for patrol torpedo.

Hap toured her around the country, touting her as one of the last authentic PT boats in

existence, which wasn’t really true because she’d never been commissioned by the Navy

like Kennedy’s PT 109, so no number was ever issued her. With no number, authenticity

went out the window. But that didn’t bother Hap. For example, no PT boat had ever had

a stained-glass skylight before. That’s something out of a Jules Verne novel. But she

was Hap’s home and the main cabin needed more light. What with a name like Hellwitch

you’d think he’d take all the light he could get, unless he was nursing a hangover.

“Easier to seduce the girls with Cinderella sunbeams, eh?” said Manny.

“What else is a torpedo boat good for nowadays?”

Manny grunted over my narcissism. I wasn’t goading the guy. I was actually a

bit sympathetic. His wife had taken him to the cleaners. He had to work double-shifts

just to cover the alimony check. So he probably didn’t appreciate my shuffling down the

bay road on a pretty morning whistling a happy tune while he awoke with a kink in his

neck after an all-night stakeout in his car outside a condo thought to be a drug drop. He

probably didn’t appreciate my having a different girl on my arm every season, either. On

the island if a love affair lasted six months you got your names burned into the deck over

at Stella’s Sassy Snapper. How odd it was to see the names not matching up to who

finally married who. But it made for bawdy tales between the locals. Most of us have

remained friends over the years.

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Detective Gennaro didn’t appreciate my taking away his car keys one night after

he’d had too much to drink. Now I was in his crosshairs. And I didn’t appreciate it.

Tichie then made the comment that Hap must have had the strength of a cyborg to

break through Lexan. I explained how the protective cover was on order and had not yet

been installed. Hap just went through glass.

The name on the placard on the desk reminded me the Chief should have been

here by now. I looked at my watch and said, “The Chief should have been here by now.”

“Kid had a seizure,” said Manny. “He’s been in Brownsville all night. But he’ll

be here.”

Again I froze. Two shocks back to back. The Chief’s twelve-year-old daughter,

Emma, had been rushed to the hospital. The cancer was zeroing in for the kill. My eyes

swung to the photograph on the Chief’s desk. Emma and he were standing in front of a

sandcastle they had built together during Sand Castle Days. A beautiful girl. Such

promise in her smile, her eyes. But the last time I’d seen her, the cancer had shriveled

her to the kind of stick figure she used to draw when she was seven. The cartoon crayon-

round head with curly lines for hair resembled her deforested head. Nothing of the ample

apple-colored tresses remained, only cranberry strings against a chalk-white cranium that

had almost doubled in size. Her peachy cheeks were gaunt charcoal smears under the

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disease’s artistic flair for the dramatic, and her eyes—once so lovely and blue—were

gumball big implying alarm just by being open. Rough night.

“Don’t go back to the bar,” said Tichie.

“It’s my bar.”

“It’s a crime scene.”

“Which you have on tape,” I said standing. “I promise not to disturb anything.”

“I’ll drive you back to the boat.”

“I’ll walk.”

“It’s a small island and a long walk.”

“I’ll call a cab. Call me a cab, Manny.”

“The Chief’s going to want to talk to you,” he said.

“I’ll be at the bar.” Tichie was about to object. “I’ll go to the boat. Damn.”

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“I’ll drive you,” said Tichie.

My eyes swung back to the video monitor where Gin lay on the floor, spider-

webbed in black, her face turned away, the arm extended with upturned palm. A foul

acid rose in my throat and I forced it back down.

“Guess he found out you were tapping that,” said Manny. By the look on Tichie’s

face he knew I’d been tapping it too. Now I understood the joke. God. You just

couldn’t keep anything a secret on this island. Manny crossed his hamsack arms and

looked at me. “What I don’t get is why he didn’t kill you too.”

I walked out. Tichie was sure to echo that question and pepper me with more on

the drive down to Stella’s. He opened the car door for me. I saw a morning shuttle stop

at the corner and trotted over, jumped aboard and tossed him a lazy salute from the brim

of my Panama.

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CHAPTER 2

But for a pale persimmon smear on the horizon the night held firm its weight across the

world. I stood on the beach looking out over a dark syrupy ocean that didn’t care Gin

was dead or that little Emma was about to be. Apparently God didn’t care either. Two

fathomless forces with indifferent faces. The Greeks and Romans put faces on their

deities to better cope with the arbitrary nature of death in a universe that seemed random.

But the universe isn’t random. Life is a mathematical equation. A while back a

mathematician in particle physics alongside a professor of quantum theory concluded that

the balance between universal forces was so precise, life as we know it could not be

random. It was so fragile as to exist on the tip of a needle, they said. Any impulsive

increase or weakening of the given value assigned to, say, a proton or neutron, could, in

effect, destroy the cosmos in the blink of an eye. If that was true, Gin died for a reason.

Sure she did. Your six plus her nine—that’s about as mathematical as it gets, pal.

Wars have been started over that equation.

Normally I’d agree but Gin and I had been lovers before, and Hap knew this.

Before Hap and Gin I’d never met anyone who practiced an open marriage whereby

promiscuity was sanctioned with no fear of reprisal. Had Hap not approved of my

sleeping with his wife he would have made her shark bait. But he did approve, or had,

having only recently warned me away from her. So I didn’t understand his vexing

utterance: It’s God’s fault. No, man, it’s yours. Maybe our recent two-timing behind his

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back was reason enough to kill her but it didn’t really matter. He was going to do it

anyway—and I knew it was going to happen.

When I first met Gin I was in Belize tracking down an old flame and former

stripper who built sandcastles for a living and went by the quirky moniker “Candy

Castle”. I was intent on rekindling our love affair after I’d received word via email from

my good friend gone bad, Baddog, that Candy still had the hots for me. I was suspect of

the email’s veracity, not because I thought Candy and I didn’t stand a chance of making

another go of it; our previous union had been fruitful. It was Baddog.

Dusty “Baddog” Boyd. He’d discovered opiates after taking a nasty tumble off

the uneven bars while training for the Olympics. Before that happened he was a

handsome, straight-A student from a good Dallas family with no predisposition for drugs.

By some circuitous route he wound up on the island, inking tattoos to make ends meet.

Now, instead of chasing skirt (which was how he got his nickname), he spent his days on

the beach baking like a lobster, impervious to the pain killers roasting his brain or the sun

blistering his skin. The toned athletic body had withered to mange, the million-dollar

smile to pumice. His thick blond hair fell out and his blue eyes turned dirty dishwater

gray. He lived in a trailer in the sand dunes north of town on deserted coastline—the last

refuge for burned-out hippies, would-be authors doing the Walden thing and disillusioned

radicals who would rather bear the elements than pay a light bill. Any charitable

disposition I once entertained regarding him had petrified. Synthetic heroin had turned

him into what the islanders called a “dune goon”.

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After landing at the Belize International Airport, a twin-engine puddle jumper

flew me the last leg of the trip, over to Ambergris Cay, where I learned from a fellow

sandcastle sculptor—none other than Gin herself—that Candy was sightseeing with Hap,

and if there was any hanky-panky going on she’d make sure they both walked the plank

by suppertime. I was invited to watch if I was so inclined. Or just come if I was hungry.

Her smile was dazzling. The sun extracted threads of ruby gold in her rich auburn

locks. Her skin shimmered like freshly smelted copper against an ice-blue bikini, and

when she doffed her sunglasses her radiant green eyes all but erased in my mind the girl I

had come to Belize for.

That afternoon Gin picked me up in front of my motel in a Zodiac equipped with

a 120-horse power outboard. She was still in her bathing suit which hung exhausted from

her power points. Her appearance implied that she had just rolled out of bed and was

ready to roll back in. We pounded the waves with abandon. Her long graceful neck

periscoped the course laid out before us, her crimson mane flapping carefree in the wind.

Her muscular thighs quivered like an anxious colt. Her flesh emitted a moist autumnal

glow and a musky primal scent. Rare was it to find myself beside a wilder mustang.

The Hellwitch rocked on the indigo waters silhouetted against a blazing sky.

Protruding from her deck near the bow were two parallel shafts. Like horns. With the

barrels of her stationary guns aimed vertically in the air the boat resembled the thorny

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head of a slumbering dragon from a child’s picture book.

Captain Haven Prior helped us aboard. He informed me that Candy had accepted

a commission to build a sandcastle in Croatia, of all places. He handed me an envelope

embossed with Ms. Castle’s signature logo—a sandcastle striped in pink candy cane

color. A note in cursive on the envelope read: This is how much you mean to me, Del.

I opened the card. It was blank.

“Was it what you were expecting?” asked Hap.

“Not exactly. But I got the message.”

Gin assured us dinner would be on time and excused herself to the shower.

My first impression of the Hellwitch was complete awe. There was so much

ordinance aboard—working ordinance—that she could start and probably finish any little

war she wanted, especially in Banana Republic waters where drug traffickers were as

thick as pirates used to be. That she had not been impounded by the Belizean authorities

and Hap thrown into jail was due to his attorney, the Most Honorable Sir Godfrey Gray,

who had intimate ties to the Belizean government. Hap was frank in his explanation as to

why he was here: he believed Mayan temples were stargates into the afterlife. Breaching

that barrier, he said, was the last great challenge for man. He told me he funded

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archeological digs worldwide.

He had an interesting accent, a patois inside the patois. I could not quite place it.

Of European ancestry laced with an eloquent inflection from the Southern States. He

fixed me a crisp gin and tonic and gave me the nickel tour.

She was eighty feet long with a twenty-four foot beam. The center console,

housing the helm and radar mast, rose like a small city skyline. We began at the bow

with the long-barrel 37 mm automatic cannon. Its top-mounted circular magazine was

large as a car tire. Next were a pair of .30 caliber Lewis machine guns that had once

belonged to a rum runner who smuggled Canadian whiskey into Chicago for Al Capone.

They sported pan-shape drum magazines on free-swinging tripods. A staple of World

War I they were identifiable by their wide tubular cooling shrouds around the barrels.

Mounted on either side of the chart house were 5-inch-wide spin-stabilized

rockets in six-pack cylindrical configurations. They reminded me of Budweiser tallboys

and could fire salvos up to 5,000 yards. Hap said they proved instrumental in smashing

the Japanese at Tarakan and Borneo.

Perched off the helm like a bird’s nest was the first machine gun turret, housing a

Browning double-barrel .50 caliber on a Scarff-ring mount. Amidships on the port side

was its sister of equal lethal force. Of course I marveled the torpedoes which could be

fired remotely from the bridge, or manually by yanking the lever to the compressed air

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behind the tubes. I asked him why he didn’t use racks to save on weight. He’d invented

a new tube, he said, using space-age technology. The tubes were only half the weight

than the originals as were the torpedoes, the Mark 54 MAKOs used by the Navy. “Folks

want to see them launch from the boat,” he said. “Not just roll in the water off a rack.

That’s no fun.” There were two torpedoes per side, their smooth round faces protruding

from their hi-tech tubes with a sort of laid-back doomsday grin.

I followed him aft, past the tuba-shaped air intake vents and a 81mm mortar to the

transom and the weapon he doted on whose name emulated the one favored by Zeus, the

“Thunderbolt”. Designated an anti-aircraft weapon with the gunner seated on his back

like an astronaut inside a space capsule before launch, the battery of four 20mm cannons

and two .50 caliber machine guns could be easily redirected horizontally to fire a

broadside. But for now the six barrels behind a steel shield were aimed at the heavens,

benign as telescopes.

As we stepped back up to the bridge, I asked about the two eight-foot-high

perpendicular shafts standing parallel on either side of the chart house, the dragon’s

horns.

“This witch has wings,” he said as we descended the steps into the main salon.

Animal skins gave the cabin the feel of an African art gallery. Mementos and

bric-a-brac from the four corners of the globe abounded. The furniture was opulent and

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seemed better suited for the Jungle Room inside Elvis Presley’s home at Graceland than

a seafaring vessel. A bank of computers anchored the chart table—what Captain Nemo

might have constructed had he traded in his pipe organ for an op-center from NASA.

Hap offered me a seat in one of the tall Spanish armchairs at the dining table. The

tablecloth was garlanded in lace, the china heavy and ostentatious. The goblets were of

the finest crystal, their rims reflecting golden stars from the matching gilded candelabras.

Across one wall were antique weapons. As decoration the utilitarian design of a

Glock simply could not compare with the fluid frame of the Royal Navy Sea Service

flintlock pistol with its silver butt-plate in the Baroque style. Or the Thompson

submachine gun Hap alleged Ernest Hemingway brandished from the deck of his fishing

boat when he trolled the Florida Straits looking for Nazi U-boats. Or the .45 Colt Single

Action Army revolver used by Johnny Ringo when he faced down Doc Holliday on the

streets of Tombstone. The gun’s ivory grip was stained dark as tea. Hap had purchased

it at auction at Sotheby’s for $13,000, outbidding a family from San Francisco who, on

the one hand, claimed to be descendents of the famous gunslinger and on the other

wanted nothing at all to do with him, or his legacy, except to bury the only tangible

evidence the outlaw ever existed.

Haven Prior was around sixty, his face burnished by the sun, his hair wavy and

white with dark golden roots. He wore a guayabera and a wide leather belt around his

midriff, held in place by a gold scallop seashell big as a hand. He seemed enamored by

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the scallop design. Its shape was carved into the bulkhead doors. It formed the cornices.

Its pattern adorned the rug beneath our feet and was etched into the dinner plates like a

coat of arms. He had an appetite for history. His tales were strewn with details that gave

credence to his narratives which only made the crab claws, tiki slaw and Johnny cakes

taste more delicious.

“So tell me something about yourself, Mr. Lycan.”

I told him about my bar on South Padre and the black-and-white photographs of

young Navy sailors aboard PT boats that decorated the walls of the saloon. The saloon’s

name came to me after seeing a clothesline of sailors’ laundry hanging between gun

barrels. I told him I’d always been fascinated by the PT but had never been aboard one.

“Until now,” he said.

I raised my wine to his favor. “What are the odds?” That’s when he said I looked

familiar to him. I mentioned the YouTube video and how I’d been made flavor of the

month by the tabloids but that was over now.

“Not many men would have risked their lives like that.”

“I was drinking.”

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“So you didn’t rely on faith to see you through, eh?”

“I was carrying a forty-five. I had some faith in that.”

“And hope that Jesus would protect you as you brought it to bear?”

“I find it difficult to believe in anyone I’ve never shaken hands with even if I’m

under attack by a Flying Scab or a Bloody Claw.”

“Flying Scab? What is that?”

“A Mayan devil. But you’d have known that if you knew anything about the

Mayan afterlife.”

“I see. Well, being cavalier only plays well in a pissing contest. I wasn’t aware

we were having one.” He looked at his wife. “Are we having a pissing contest, dear?”

“He is certainly poking you in the ribs, darling. Is it customary where you come

from, Mr. Lycan, to insult your host at dinner, or has the wine gone to your head?”

“And an excellent wine it is, madam. I meant no disrespect but my gut tells me

I’m here for a reason.”

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“You don’t believe in chance encounters?” asked Hap.

“I don’t believe Croatia has a beach for starters.”

“It does I assure you.”

“Then try this. I know Candy Castle’s handwriting,” I said, withdrawing the note

from my breast pocket. “And this ain’t it.”

Gin and Hap exchanged a rueful look.

“You’re correct,” said Hap. “She was in a hurry. Something of a sense of humor

on that one, eh? She told us all about you. We choose our partners very carefully.”

OK. That did it. “Well, you’re looking in the wrong place, pal. The last time I

was propositioned by a fellow as pretty as you was when I was in Key West. In broad

daylight too. And I didn’t like it one bit.”

He refilled my goblet with wine. I caught a glimpse of the tattoo on his forearm

but could not make out the design. Just a smudge of blue.

“You have nothing to fear from us,” he said. “I misspoke. We choose our guests

very carefully. But you must know that you take your life in your hands when you cross

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the border. You had no trouble doing that for Candy.”

“Mr. Lycan happens upon a couple of pirates like us and thinks his trip’s been in

vain!”

Hap looked at me. “You don’t find us colorful?”

“Oh you’re colorful, all right. But so was this German I met at Sloppy Joe’s.”

“Was he the homosexual who propositioned you?”

“No. He said he had some treasure from the Atocha.”

“The Nuestro de Atocha?”

“Yes.”

“I knew Mel Fisher quiet well,” he said. He looked his wife. “Did I ever tell you

what Mel said to me when I asked him about investing?”

“No, honey. Do tell.”

“Well, we met at this little pub called Captain Tony’s. Now Tony had a lot of salt

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to him—and a little bit of larceny—and he was trying to get me to buy this shark hanging

over a pit just off the bar. Told me it was a work of art when any rummy on a roll could

tell you the taxidermist was drunk when he stuffed it. In comes Mel with his attorney and

they ordered a couple rum and Cokes. Mel only had one, no, maybe two, but he never

had more than that. He said there was no need in ruining a nice buzz with drunkenness. I

have tried to live up to that ideal but I do enjoy my excesses. Anyway, I’d heard about

the loot Mel found on the Spanish galleon and I asked him if I wanted to invest in his

salvage of her, how much would I need? ‘Minimum 50k’, he said. ‘And what would

fifty thousand dollars get me exactly?’ I asked him. He thought for a moment and

reached into his pocket and withdrew a six-inch gold bar about an inch-and-a-half thick.

He put it in his drink and stirred. ‘For fifty thou you get this here swizzle stick.’” Hap

laughed merrily. Even I found the story amusing. “He was a wonderful man, Mr. Lycan.

Gin and I attended the wake at his funeral. So did half of Key West. And we did the

hokey-pokey.” I blinked as if I hadn’t heard him correctly. “We all did. Everyone knew

Mel’s love for that song. As if life should be approached with a child’s wonder.” He

raised his arms over his dinner plate, his wife following suit, and they commenced in

song, acting it out with their hands as the lyrics say. Their enthusiasm was intoxicating

and I joined them and we all ended up laughing loud enough Bonaparte the parrot

squawked. “So tell me about the German, Mr. Lycan.”

“We went to his house on Big Pine Key.”

“Was there treasure?”

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“No.”

“So what did you learn from that excursion?”

“That he was a Nazi and proud of it.”

“Pictures on the wall, eh?”

I nodded.

“Can you describe him?”

“Tall, strong. Chin curtain beard like Abe Lincoln. Killer instinct.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Some people reek of booze. Some of death.”

“Spooked you?”

“He had mad eyes. When he and Igor left the room, I slipped out the back.”

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“Was his friend’s name really Igor?”

“I doubt it. But he looked like an Igor.”

“And what do Igors look like?”

“Henchmen.”

He poked the air with his fork. “So you’re a man who follows his hunches.

Would you say you acted out of fear or because you found him morally reprehensible?”

“Both.”

“What do you think of the death penalty?”

“It’s too lenient.”

To his wife he said, “I think I’m going to like this man.”

Gin smiled and gave me a look as if I was doing well.

“Would you expand on that idea? Just to be clear.”

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I shrugged. “Why send them to the hereafter where there might be forgiveness?

Let them suffer in this world. This is where the crime was committed. Make them live

with it like you have to live with it.”

Dinner continued and Hap spoke of places he’d lived around the world, one of his

favorites being Cuba where the gangster Charlie “Lucky” Luciano at his mansion in

Miramar presented Gin with a pearl-handled .22 as a going away present. He threw me a

wink. “She likes to keep it strapped to her thigh in a garter belt.”

Gin laughed—what a joyful earthy sound. She drank her wine from the fat crystal

goblet. It looked dark as blood. The tale about Cuba was suspect since she’d be as gray

as Hap if she’d known the infamous gangster in Cuba during the heyday of the Havana

Mob. She was half Hap’s age if she was a day and in the stippled candlelight her face

vacillated between innocence and ferocity. She was stunning and her beauty plagued me.

Hap returned to a previous subject, the kind you try to avoid at social occasions.

“So you don’t believe in Jesus because you never met him, is that it?”

I weighed how best to respond. “I don’t know why I have to believe in him. I

adhere to his precepts, I suppose. Most of us do because it’s inborn.”

“What is?”

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“A moral compass.”

“Good morals are not taught?”

“They can be. But I think—generally speaking—a human being understands the

difference between right and wrong from an early age. As if it was programmed into our

DNA. Of course there’s enough evidence out there to suggest just the opposite too.

Violence and bigotry are often the results of lousy parents.”

“Then what of evil?”

“What of it?”

“Do you believe in that?”

Oh boy. “I don’t believe in evil. But a poor upbringing doesn’t explain to

anyone’s satisfaction how an angry teenager can murder a classroom of first-graders.”

“Something made him do it.”

“I don’t know. But some things can’t be explained scientifically.”

“Like Hitler and his Nazis?”

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“Is there a better example of evil incarnate?”

“So you believe in possession.”

“I don’t believe in a damn thing.”

“You believe you have a soul, don’t you?” said Hap chewing his food vigorously.

I sighed with irritation. “Sure.”

“But a soul cannot be explained scientifically, can it?”

“I don’t know. Can it?”

“You would think. The fact is, Mr. Lycan, you can’t see consciousness. You

can’t see love either, for that matter. But you can feel it. You can see its manifestations.

But consciousness, or ‘the soul’, is the root of everything. All the love, all the hate, and

all points in between. But science can’t prove it exists.”

“Why?”

“Because they haven’t found it yet. If they can’t find it they can’t measure it. If

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they can’t measure it they can’t weigh it, and if you can’t weigh something it doesn’t

exist. Like gravity. But gravity exists, doesn’t it?”

“The last I checked.”

“So if the soul is part of the universe which we assume it is because we are part of

the universe and the soul resides inside us, then it would have been detected by now.”

“By what?”

“The electron.”

“What’s an electron? I mean I know but I don’t know.”

“An electron is a subatomic particle that essentially holds everything together.

Honey, fetch me a pen and paper.”

Gin removed herself from the table and stepped up to a cherry wood secretary and

withdrew a pad of paper and pen and handed them to Hap. When she moved the layers

of her diaphanous silk dress fanned out behind her in multicolored waves. Her hair was

partially tied back and swirls cascaded down past her shoulders. Seashell necklaces hung

light as whispers across a deep V-neck, offering her bare breasts some needed modesty.

Simply put she was too casually dressed, if such a thing was even possible in the tropics.

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I was honest to myself about my desire for her (how admirable of me) and to demonstrate

I had any respect at all for marriage vows, I made an effort to keep my eyes off her while

Hap talked. It was not an easy thing to do. As she retook her seat she caught me

checking her out and I was nearly jolted by the electric charge her eyes had on my soul.

Upon whose shoulders does the sin of infidelity lie? On the wife who cheats on

her husband or the devil who seduces her? Hmm. She picked at her dinner, fondling an

ornamental silver talisman about her neck with her seashell charms. It was interesting

because it clashed with her tropical accessories. Looked chubby as a Buddha.

“The electron is one of the building blocks of the universe,” continued Hap. “The

equation that shows how electrons interact with life is pretty simple.” He handed me

what he had been scribbling.

Looked pretty simple to me.

Gin took up her husband’s torch. “But as of today no one has been able to prove

the equation as it relates to consciousness, Mr. Lycan. Yet the last time I looked I

seemed self-aware and, baby, I got soul, so, hey, Electron, bite me.”

Hap croaked with laughter. I wasn’t sure I’d gotten the joke. Or the explanation.

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But her contribution to the conversation was like cold water in the face.

“So if electrons interact with everything,” I said trying to keep up. “They should

interact with the soul but since science has been unable to see it do this, the question is?”

“Do we have one or not?” said Hap and Gin together.

It was almost as if this was a practiced spiel they had performed before.

“It’s an amazing discrepancy in the grand design,” said Hap. “Don’t you think?”

“I never thought about it. Is that why you’re investigating the Mayans? To help

explain the discrepancy?”

“Do you believe in the apocalypse, Mr. Lycan?”

Haven Prior was beginning to piss me off. If he really knew anything at all about

the Mayans then he knew that they didn’t believe in the end of the world; they believed

life was cyclical. When one age ended, another began. There was no ultimate end.

That’s why the world didn’t end in 2012 which, according to many so-called scholars of

the fabled Mayan calendar, was supposed to happen. The world just turned another

revolution, and only time will tell if humanity has entered a new age. But I met his parry

with a thrust. “Pal,” I said. “It’s right around the corner.”

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He beamed at his wife who beamed back. The two of them played off each other

like yin and yang. The truth was I wasn’t sure what I enjoyed more, the food, the

conversation, or the wine. By dinner’s end we had polished off a Château Margaux and

Haut-Brion of vintages too old to be believed. Hap fired up a Montescristo after offering

me one which I declined. I pulled out my pack of Dunhill Lights. While Gin prepared

coffee for us with a French press he pointed out a Remington Army Model 1858 single-

action percussion cap revolver, hanging on the wall between the Ringo gun and a

beautifully engraved Colt Dragoon with a Tiffany grip. He explained how, after having

been separated from his unit in the chaos of battle and running out of ammunition, he’d

found it in the nick of time before facing down a charge by the Third Arkansas up Devil’s

Den at the base of Little Round Top.

“Mars will be served,” said Gin as she handed Hap his cup of coffee.

I was so preoccupied with Gin’s flamboyant beauty his use of the first person to

tell his Civil War story nearly escaped me. “I beg your pardon?”

“That’s what the officer in charge said to his men.” He added sugar to his coffee

with a tiny gold spoon.

“What officer?” I asked accepting my cup from Gin. Her eyes bore right through

me. They were lined in colors so dark she almost looked Egyptian.

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“It happened on the morning of the second day of the engagement,” said Hap.

“July 2, in the Year of Our Lord eighteen-hundred and sixty-three. The 93rd

Pennsylvania took a break by the side of the road to make coffee before entering the

history books at Gettysburg. Their uniforms were caked in so much road dust they

looked like Johnny Rebs. Let me tell you, Mr. Lycan, they were bushed. A thirty mile

march, much of it double-quick. One of the great marches of the war. The arrival of The

Sixth Corps sealed General Lee’s fate. There were just too many of us.

“The morning mist was thick as spit and when the sun came over the tree line it

looked like a fireball. You could hear gunfire to the northwest and the officers were

itching to fight. But, you see, they had ridden all the way. The men had walked. They

needed to rest. Hell, there was time. Lee wouldn’t attack until the afternoon. They

didn’t know that of course but a soldier fighting on an empty stomach is half a soldier.”

He sipped his coffee. “But the officers didn’t care. They kicked over the campfires and

dumped the coffee and ordered the men on, depraved of rest or nourishment. To serve

the God of War.”

“And who was the pissant who gave that order?” I asked.

“Me,” he said.

I wasn’t prepared for vaudeville. I half-expected a rim shot from the drummer

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telling me the joke was over. Gin sipped her coffee with longing eyes for the batty guy at

the end of the table. I felt a need to fill the awkward silence with an innocuous question,

or one that I thought bore no importance.

“So how does one get a nickname like Hap?”

Haven Prior broke the connection with his wife. “It comes from the Greek word

haptein, meaning ‘to touch’. Essentially it means ‘good with your hands’.”

“I guess you’d have to be to keep this old bucket afloat,” I said referring to the

Hellwitch. I sipped the exceptional coffee.

“Whatever my wife touches turns to gold, Mr. Lycan. She prodded me to restore

her. It was hell but she bewitched me into trying. Hence the name.”

“This boat is a floating phallus—.” I nearly choked over that allusion, “—but she

is mine to play with. My husband is the one with magic hands, Mr. Lycan.”

They recommenced a sensual duel with their eyes and completely disregarded me.

“Well,” I said. “I’ve got a friend on the island who’s looking for a good masseuse.”

“Over my dead body,” said Mrs. Prior. “The last time he tried to help it nearly

got him killed.”

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Hap puffed away on his cigar with a grin and adjusted his wide belt to aid in his

digestion. “I just fixed Caesar’s neck once,” he said. “Then I was tagged with it. Also I

was pretty good at lifting a purse.”

“Caesar who?” I asked.

“It was Tiberius, wasn’t it, darling?” said Gin. She looked over at me. “He had

just returned from Capri, you see. His vacation home?” I nodded politely. “Hellus was

so young. And handsome, I might add. The gods favored him.” Her brow knitted and

the tone in her voice soured. “That’s when Lucius really saw you as a threat.”

I briefly considered corking the bottle because I was convinced I had missed

something. Who were Hellus and Lucius?

Hap tapped his cigar on the edge of a crystal ashtray. “We were standing on the

dock in formation when word came down the line he had hurt himself. A neck ailment.

He was being carried in a litter when—.”

“Lucius pushed Hap forward claiming he could fix Caesar’s neck!” said Gin,

ogling me with a look of disbelief.

OK. I really had missed something.

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Hap turned to me. “He was putting me on the spot, you see. If I couldn’t help

there was a pretty good chance I’d be put to death for the inconvenience. But, alas, I did

help and just the opposite happened. I received favor from the emperor and my career

took off.” He paused to reflect. “How is it, I wonder, that some of us turn out good and

some of us just plain bad? You say you don’t believe in evil, Mr. Lycan, yet my friend

seems to embrace all it will allow, and has ever since we were children.”

Again his use of the present tense confused me and I had to interject, “You served

with someone in the army who thinks he lived in the past. Did I get that right?”

“Yes. Lucius. Lucius Flavius Varus.”

“And who were you, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“I am Hellus Arias Apollus,” he said. “First centurion to the ciliarch of the cohorts

under Claudius Lysias.” He noted my lack of understanding. “Ciliarch. Means

‘tribune’. Claudius Lysias was the hegemon.”

“What’s that?”

“Commander. The garrison at the Antonia fortress was under his charge.”

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“That’s who you thought you were in the past life?”

“No, Mr. Lycan. That is who I am in this life.”

The evening had just taken a turn towards the bizarre. I recalled a John Donne

poem I’d read in college entitled Metempsychosis and a line has always stayed with me.

“ . . . he sings of the progress of a deathless soul.” Metempsychosis is the odd belief that

when you die your soul transmigrates into a new body, not as punishment but for new

experiences through the eyes of someone else. The dead can choose to be whoever or

whatever they want—a rock star, a tyrant, a dolphin. The captain of a torpedo boat.

Metempsychosis might be a mental disorder. Skeptics abound when a subject as

grounded as physics is eclipsed by metaphysics. It could be argued that belief in God is a

mental disorder since there is no scientific proof He, She or It exists. Reincarnation and

metempsychosis fall into that category. The recent archeological discovery of a Roman

head with the uncanny likeness of Elvis Presley comes to mind. It is a marble acroterion,

an ornamental flourish found in burial chambers on the corners of sarcophagi. It was

carved sometime in the 2nd century. The snarling lips, aquiline nose and amazing quiff

bear a striking resemblance to the King. Whoever he was likely walked the streets of

ancient Rome and then, assuming metempsychosis has any merit, returned centuries later

with a guitar slung across his hip to shake, rattle and roll and sing of his deathless soul.

I had no way of verifying Hap’s assertion that he was who he claimed to be in this

life or any other. I’d never encountered someone with metempsychosis before. But

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apparently here it was in front of me, bright as a Christmas tree. That did not explain his

wife’s encouraging his escapades at the dinner table, however. But maybe there was an

end-game to her method—courting his delusions in hopes he would snap out of it on his

own. Certainly they had a contingency in case they succumbed to a debilitating disease.

I knew I did. It was called a bullet to the head. So I sympathized with her because surely

she knew her husband was sliding down the shoot to the loony bin.

“The Antonia fortress overlooked the Great Temple,” said Hap. I nodded. “In

Jerusalem?” I nodded again. “Pilate hung shields from its ramparts with the image of

Caesar on them. The Jews threw a fit and complained to the emperor that he was

destroying the sanctity of their religion. Hmph. Pilate is portrayed as a weakling in the

Scriptures. Believe me he was anything but. He was indifferent to the wants of the Jews.

They were a conquered race. He ruled Judea with an iron fist and I respected him for

that. You don’t appease the vanquished. You make them bend to your will.”

Gin suggested we step topside for some fresh air. She grabbed a crystal decanter

of brandy and wiggled it in her hand as if to say it would be worth the trip. I was still

reeling in Hap’s coup de théâtre but as luck would have it the spell had been broken and

the three of us ascended to the deck. Thank God.

From our anchorage we could see the dim lights of the sleepy motels along

Ambergris Cay. The beaches were wisps of white. A gentle breeze rustled the shaggy

hairdos of the tall thin palms. A pink moon hung low in the sky, stars so bright they

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twinkled on the surface of the water. The distant sound of steel drum music drifted

across the water. A sweet scent of jasmine came as quickly as it went, like a nymph,

eclipsing the briny cologne of the sea.

Gin’s serpentine silhouette arched against the Thunderbolt. She hollered

something to the heavens. She seemed defiant against the night, as if she was at war.

Problem was there was nothing to shoot at.

Hap and I made our way towards her. He enjoyed his cigar. He nudged my

elbow and said quietly, “If she says yes, Mr. Lycan, then it’s ok with me.”

I could not make out his face well in the dim light but felt surely that he’d seen

the flush of embarrassment fill my cheeks, exposing my dirty desire for his wife. A clank

startled us and we saw Gin leaning precariously off to the side, ready to take a header into

the water. She raised the bottle and toasted, “Here’s to the top and here’s to the bottom

and here’s to the middle and I hope you get a little.”

“Here here,” said Hap laughing.

She made one final attempt to guzzle before she fell. The bottle splashed into the

ocean. Hap caught her just in time. He hoisted her into his arms and carried her below. I

followed them into a mahogany paneled stateroom with shelves of rare morocco-bound

books and dimly lit niches cradling relics one might find in a museum. To my left was a

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closet door that had been left open. A hint of gardenias. Shalimar, I thought. As

seductive a perfume as a vampire’s kiss. The pole was overloaded with dresses of

excessive lace. A glancing touch across the creamy peach of one revealed a corset of

whalebone sewn inside the fabric. Passementerie jutted from the cuffs and shoulders of

several dark frock coats. Velvet collars and gilded buttons on another. Checkered vests.

A moiré silk waistcoat. With a bowler and top hat on the shelf above, it reminded me of

a costume rack backstage in a theater doing Dickens.

We watched her sleep, her breathing harsh but even.

“Good Christus, she’s beautiful,” he said. I bit my tongue in agreement.

“You will help me, won’t you?”

I intuitively understood to what he was referring and yet her inebriation rang

false. We had all drunk our fill at dinner but I never thought she was out of control.

“Well, just how sober do you think you can get in the Caribbean?”

“Hmm,” he said chewing on the cigar. “Good point. You’ll stay aboard tonight.”

“I’ve got a room at the—.”

“You’ll stay aboard. This way.” He entered a narrow passageway and opened

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another door. “The head is one door down,” he said. “If you get hungry in the middle of

the night, feel free to roam and raid.” His eyes twinkled like an obligate carnivore.

I stepped inside my stateroom. And locked the door.

Some time late, in the still of the night when dreams appear, I felt her silky weight

on top of me. At first I thought she was the spicy-sweet succubus who often comes to

seduce men while they sleep. But this was no dream. I understood the ramifications and

didn’t care. Maybe I had a death wish. She writhed atop me, whipping her locks across

my chest like the ancient harlot who danced for her suitors in nothing but the bangles on

her feet, masking her charms behind a cape of hair, while whirling in the candlelight to

the lively sound of timbrel and drum. So it was that Gin danced for me.

There was no breakfast offered. Hap was in country, she said, exploring another

Mayan ruin. She readied the Zodiac and took me back to my motel. We didn’t kiss,

shake hands or exchange phone numbers. If Gin’s drinking turned her into a slut at the

witching hour, well, that was Hap’s problem, not mine. But I was a little heartsick; she

was the most exciting woman I had ever met.

I boarded the Avianca/Taca 707 to Houston where I would change planes and fly

down to Harlingen and then drive back to South Padre Island. One day she showed up on

my doorstep with a boatload of cash, a drinking problem that was under control thanks to

AA, and a desire to take up with me if I was available (which I was).

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“What about Hap?”

“Hap who?” she said with a laugh.

She slithered by me and took hold my hand and turned me around. In one fell

swoop she had infiltrated and neutralized the almighty man cave. My ego told me I was

in control but I wasn’t. The hook had been set. I just didn’t know it.

She wrapped herself around me. I was about to protest when she pressed her

finger to my lips and said, “This is our time.”

When we kissed she became the purpose to my existence, the rock I could cling to

when the weight of guilt for what I had done to Erica threatened to drown me.

I had a reason to live again.

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CHAPTER 3

I watched the budding sunrise over the Gulf of Mexico lost in that kiss. The itch on my

left forearm was not enough to ruin the memory. I simply pawed the inked

embarrassment with my bandaged hand, a practice I’d seen Hap do a million times. At

least his tattoo had been a work of pride. The eagle, the anchor. The Marines. Now just

a dusty blue blur. Age is like a weed, he told me once. It covers everythin—the arm!

I ran off the beach. By the time I made it to the bay side I was in need of a rest. I

needed to quit smoking. I hurried past the sign to Stella’s Sassy Snapper and made my

way down the dock to the shark-snout silhouette of the Hellwitch. I crossed the deck,

stepped up into the cockpit, and passed through the companionway that led below to the

charthouse and main salon.

The blood smell was foul and tinny. The plum-colored sofa and much of the

carpet was a loss. I couldn’t distinguish blood splatter from cheetah spots. I’d have to

hire the gals over at Little Annie Fannies and pay them double to remove the blood stains

I could see. Hell. Make Hap pay for it. It was his damn boat. I found it lodged between

a hand-carved mahogany baby elephant from Uganda and a stuffed jaguar from Brazil.

Before I lifted the limb I looked up at the broken skylight. I’d had it designed by

an artist friend of mine in Corpus Christi after Gin had convinced Hap the salon was

simply too dark. Hap had liked my idea of the all-seeing eye. Gin wasn’t too thrilled

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about it, though. When I asked her why, she was seated on the couch, flipping through

the pages of a fashion magazine. “Look what I’m wearing,” she said. “I’m in a low-cut

blouse, a high-cut skirt and femdom flip-flops. The last thing I want is some eye looking

down on what I’m thinking about doing to my man over there.”

Hap laughed audibly and I went weak in the knees. What a wicked look she gave

me. I feared she’d expose us for the backstabbing cheats we knew ourselves to be. But

Hap was oblivious to our private foreplay. Gin signed off on the design, and as they

settled into my residence (it was off-season and Skivvies was closed), I took his boat up to

Corpus and had the work done.

The Hellwitch was nothing but a toy that brought in the bucks. A Broadway show

on the 4th of July to remind the world that once upon a time evil existed in battalion

strength. It was called The Third Reich and it metastasized faster than cancer of the

mouth. Like a spilling out of orcs from Middle Earth. But Hitler’s goose-stepping Nazis

were real. The War Department spent millions developing new weapons to defeat him in

the air, on land and at sea. PT boats were a stroke of genius when it came to the war on

the sea. They attacked enemy convoys by stealth, launched their torpedoes and sped

away. Like being bit by a mosquito. The PT squadrons of World War II were so

nicknamed The Mosquito Fleet.

But today PT boats are as rare as telephone booths, or pimply teenagers with the

brains not to text naked pictures of themselves. The Hellwitch may have been burlesque

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but she’d encouraged more than one youth to inquire about the PT’s, which was good.

History should feel alive, not dead. There was enough authenticity aboard her to mollify

the concerns of the progeny whose dads had served on the real thing—dads who were but

acne-faced teenagers themselves, forced to swap dreams of their girls back home with

dreams of how best to serve their Lady of the Sea in hopes she would protect them in

battle against the orcs of World War II.

Hap’s severed arm stood vertical with the palm up as if awaiting pennies from

heaven. I scoured the galley for a cooler, went topside and couldn’t find one there either.

I’d had one on my trip up to Corpus but had inadvertently put my foot through it, sending

cans of cherry cola rolling across the deck. I tossed the scrap overboard. Mr. Litterbug.

I set the arm in the sink and raised the wooden flap to the urethane-lined ice box

countersunk beside the drain board. I lifted out the chilly block, found an ice pick and

attacked it. I centered the limb across a yard’s worth of plastic wrap, slathered it in the

ice, covered it, double-bagged it inside a plastic trash bag and jammed it beneath my arm

like a roll of salami.

I missed a shuttle and had to hoof it, the first actual jogging I’d done since like

forever. As I huffed along I reacquainted myself with some of the intimacy this island

still held for me, swinging my eyes left and right to the old standby establishments that

had been erected long before I ever arrived, and noting how new ground was being

broken on lots many islanders believed were grandfathered by the city to remain in their

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natural state. Unfortunately, we were misinformed. Virgin land was being assaulted by

bulldozer and pile driver, leaving behind a demoralizing taste in my spirit. This terrain

represented the wildness folks came to South Padre Island in search of—not the spring

break kind of wildness, but the raw, undeveloped Mother Nature kind where you could

walk your dog through an open field instead of between vacation rentals on stilts. Sand

dunes covered in prickly pear, sea oats, and blue mistflowers abound, or used to. You

don’t need a crystal ball to see that the wide-open prairie feel of South Padre Island is

coming to an end, for with every lot plowed under in the name of progress goes another

layer of her natural beauty.

By the time I reached the bar the sun was up, throwing long shadows across the

island towards the bay from the hotels and condominiums built along the beach. For the

most part nightlife on South Padre is confined to the bay side. Skivvies anchors a

prominent spot overlooking the bay, down the block from Louie’s Backyard.

I slipped onto the blood-red leather seat of my 1967 Cadillac Eldorado, a

sparkling midnight blue, streamlined and daring, and with her hidden headlights a real

stunner. With a 429 cubic inch engine beneath the hood I had 340 horsepower at my

disposal. The vanity plates read SIN WAGN. She’s as close to a Stutz you can get

without upstaging Elvis Presley. And the only American who owned a Stutz in 1967 was

probably Elvis Presley. I threw her in reverse and shoveled caliche. In my rearview I

saw how the morning light bathed the Spanish stucco walls of my saloon in misty coral,

popping the white timbered accents, giving them a fresh-painted look, while casting

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goofy eye-shadows in the windows that looked as surprised as I did at seeing the yellow

crime tape crisscrossing the front of the building.

The drive down to Brownsville was fraught with fog. I crawled behind a semi

most of the way. The radio said there was a front moving in. As I drove I pondered who

was to blame for forgetting the severed limb. The EMTs? The police? Moi? I scratched

at my tattoo again. Still fresh as breast milk. And sore. I scratched at it anyway. I’m

not a tattoo kind of guy. Back in the day my rebellion against the status quo was hippie

hair. Today’s youth blight their bodies with tattoos. Looks good on them now. Won’t in

thirty years. How it happened that I finally succumbed to the vogue was not ego

driven—stupidity, really—the result of storming the beachhead of a Harlingen hooker, a

dark beauty in a yellow off-the-shoulder dress, whom I had seen when I was having lunch

with my attorney, Erica Ames. And I was still kicking myself over it.

We were discussing a lawsuit against me from a band member who brought his

family to Skivvies to hear him play. His drunken wife stepped off the dock overlooking

the water and broke her arm on a jet ski.

Erica escorted me to the café on the first floor of the glassy four-story building for

a late afternoon lunch. I wanted to drink mine. She apologized for being late. Errand

day, she said. We sat on the outdoor deck. There were no ashtrays. She picked at her

tostada with a matronly concern for my well-being. She was the sort of woman born to

fight battles as if her diapers had come with epaulets. She was smart and charismatic and

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refused too much pancake on her face that would hide the scars she had received when

she went through the windshield after she tried to wrestle the steering wheel away from a

friend who’d had too much to drink. The friend didn’t survive the crash and it was a

miracle Erica had. She still drank and was quite pragmatic about her injuries—bad luck.

She could still rock a bathing suit, albeit a one-piece. She’d had one too many facial

scrubs that were designed to lessen the severity of the scars. Instead, it left her skin with

a bit of a sheen. She had fine long legs and lovely hands. Her eyes were sparkling blue,

her lips almost full enough to be called voluptuous, and today her chrome-black hair was

in a French twist which heightened the grandeur of her porcelain-doll delicacy. An extra

button in her blouse was undone, revealing a provocative bra. This girl cherished

lingerie. Her outfits were not smutty but alluring. When she stepped up to my bed she

exuded a grace that made it almost a shame to undress her. She opened my file and said,

“One more of those, Del, and you’ll be taking a cab back to the island.”

I’d put a hefty dent in my double-tall margarita rocks, no salt, when I became

aware of the chiquita in the yellow dress eyeing me from the bar. Erica didn’t notice, or,

if she had, didn’t care. I pulled out my cigarettes.

“You can’t smoke here,” she said.

I lit one up anyway.

“It’s not that you have a bad case. But you never know what a jury will do.”

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“They want too much. For a broken arm? Gimmie a break.”

“Apparently there was head trauma.”

“When did that happen?”

“When they realized how much money you made last year.” She scooped up my

cars keys. “Are you finished drinking, or do you want me to call you that cab?”

“Don’t you have somewhere to be?”

“As a matter of fact I have a date,” she said, “So I will be unavailable if you

happen to get pulled over for a DUI. Honey, don’t even bother calling.”

I dropped the cigarette into the rita swill. She stuffed her picante-smeared napkin

inside the glass, over the cigarette, and returned it to the bar with her half-eaten lunch. I

saw Chiquita get into a 1966 aqua-sparkle Mustang fastback. I was even more intrigued.

I slipped up beside Erica and alleviated her of my car keys. As is usually the case

in matters concerning love affairs that never quite burn out, we lingered in front of each

other, allowing our bodies too close a proximity, our scents to intermingle. Why hadn’t it

worked out for us? I guess that was what we were both thinking. We’d yielded to each

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other from the very start. We were blazing a trail to the future and we both knew where

we were headed and we were OK with it. We’d not yet made an announcement to friends

and family. We were content to keep exploring. What was the rush? We used to take

long walks on the beach and marvel over each other’s insights about the most trivial of

things. We’d lie awake at night and talk about our place in the universe—something only

teenagers were supposed to do. We’d examine life’s riddles. Where did we come from?

What were we here for? Why did our bodies contain the exact ratio of salt to water that

existed in the oceans? You know. Small stuff.

Then it all went to hell. Neither of us spoke about it. When tragedy befalls two

people like the one that befell us, you don’t. In fact some folks prefer never to see each

other again. Some leave town. We came back together. Professionally. But a great deal

of healing had to take place first. Sometimes at night I relived the horror but I’d become

expert at burying it. I’d buried it so many times it was as if it had never happened. That

was only natural. Sins are personal. They’re nobody’s business. In the back of my mind

I knew I’d have to pay for it one day. I didn’t think about it. I wondered if Erica did.

How couldn’t she? It was my fault.

“I hear you have a new love in your life,” she said.

So the rumor mill stretched all the way to Harlingen. I had a photo of Gin with

me which I had intended to show her. It was really why I had come to see her in the first

place. To ask her about Gin. The lawsuit had been my excuse. But now that the

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opportunity had presented itself I changed my mind. Her approval seemed strained.

Before either of us dared risk more, we exchanged cheek kisses and said goodbye.

I found the Mustang at a run-down mustard-yellow saloon near the airport called

Tuna’s. Some coincidence. My gut talking, really. She’d had a look of devilment in her

eyes for me when she left. And she was Mexican. The most popular Mexican saloon on

this side of town was Tuna’s. I tried to visit whenever I was up this way. Chiquita was

already inside when I braked the Eldorado in a cloud of dust beneath the flickering neon

sign under a darkening sky.

The low-hung ceiling gave the pool hall an unwanted intimacy. A pine odor

fought for dominance over the fragrance of cheap perfume. The furniture was hatchet-

hacked and dipped in black lacquer. Jalapeño accent lights lined the bar mirror—12”

squares of peel-and-paste glass that come in a box at Home Depot. A tapestry portraying

a conquistador astride a stallion bartering with Mayan natives took up most of one wall.

I pulled out my smokes at the bar just as a Mexican bandit squeezed up on either

side of me. They were two heads taller and wider than I was and sported gaudy silver

rings and fake Rolexes. If you’re a gringo you take your life in your hands when you

enter a Mexican bar. Doesn’t matter what side of the border you’re on. I was more than

happy to share. I shook out two cigarettes a piece. They were surprised by this and each

put the extra smoke behind an ear to be smoked later. I used my scrimshaw Zippo and lit

them up. They patted me on the back, took up their pool cues and returned to their game.

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Tejano music blared from an old jukebox in the corner to speakers hidden in the

rafters above the scrappy pool tables. The volume thumped the plank floor beneath my

feet. I called out to the bartender if Tuna was in. She looked like a Rita but they all look

like Ritas. She just drew on a cigarette and looked at me. What elegance a black cocktail

dress affords a woman was completely lost on this one. She had arachnid arms, a

hornet’s nest hairdo and industrial-size breast implants. I slid a ten across the bar. She

nodded to her left. It’s all about the money.

Tuna descended the stairs in front of Chiquita who was lingering midway looking

right at me. His crisp white cowboy shirt emphasized the paunch around his middle. He

was down two hundred pounds but he would never outlive his nickname no matter how

thin he got. Diabetes and a heart attack were the catalysts. He wore tight blue jeans, a

silver rodeo belt buckle and pointy cowboy boots. His pompadour was varnished and his

neck and arms were all tatted up. Some pretty impressive work. He embraced me like

the Prodigal which ensured my safety among the locals. The music stopped and my ears

popped. I nodded towards the sunny gal on the staircase.

“Oh!” laughed Tuna. “She no for you. She no for anyone. She’s a witch.”

“A witch, huh?”

“I bring her up from San Miguel to shoo away the evil spirits.” His good eye

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gleamed. I could never remember which eye was the good one.

“You have evil spirits here?”

“Every bar has evil spirits, my friend. Most homes too. They only want to be

saviors of mankind after a hard day’s work. This is not too much to ask, no? But we are

greedy and ask of them more than they can deliver. They make us into the devils they

used to be.”

“So our heritage comes from a bottle of booze.”

“Without booze we would none of us be born,” said Tuna. “The alcohol spirit

gives the man the confidence to woo the woman and the woman the nerve to submit.”

“And what if the woman is the aggressor?”

His eyes glazed over. It was as if I’d asked him about the state of the economy.

Then he smiled. “We should be so lucky.”

My eyes swung back to the staircase but the witch was gone.

“She is expensive,” said Tuna.

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“I’ve got money.”

“She is dangerous.”

So am I, growled the ever-angry avatar inside my head. (He often sounds like

Johnny Cash.)

Tuna turned to Spiderwoman. “Dos tequilas, por favor.” We sat quietly while

Rita poured. The jukebox started up again. I drank down the liquid courage. It watered

my eyes and instilled an aura of calmness and daring in my brain. I slid off the barstool,

adjusted my hat for action and Tuna said, “I will toast to your death, my friend.”

“I should be so lucky,” I said and headed for the stairs.

The corridor was weakly lit. Red doors. A blade of light spilled across the floor

from a door left ajar. I entered a room shimmering with votive candles and reeking of

incense. An Elvis matador on black velvet hung over the brass bed. Chiquita was

cloaked in shadow behind a blue velvet curtain, her candy-apple thigh poking through a

slit as if teasing me to lick it. Her silk purse hand lifted slowly into the light like the head

of a cobra. She pointed to the bong on the coffee table. Her willowy fingers hovered in

the air, waiting. I’d not jumped at the chance. I sighed. Maybe I did have a death wish.

I sat on her little floral couch, took up the lighter, lifted the water pipe to my lips and got

to work. On the bowl was a sticker that read Pinkie’s Blu, Corpus Christi.

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I awoke in my car the next morning, stripped of my pants, my money and my self-

esteem. Served me right. I couldn’t remember having sex with her and there was a

pretty good chance I didn’t. I drove home to the island. After a shower I still felt the

pain on my forearm. In lieu of sex I’d gotten a tattoo for my trouble and had no memory

of it. It was the face of a wolf. Its design was less illustrative, linear, like a logo on a

letterhead. As I toweled off I noticed a change in the face, as if a code was emerging

inside the drawing like a hidden face in the artwork on an old Santana album. It was a

symbol of some kind. A crescent moon formed the brow over the wolf’s eyes. It rested

atop an elongated triangle, or pyramid, set inside the animal’s face. From the peak of the

triangle running lengthwise down the wolf’s snout was a band that formed a sharp point

just above the nose, like a stake driving home the point. Now, instead of seeing the

picture of a wolf looking back at me, I saw the symbol.

I ran inside the hospital with the salami but I was too late. Surgery had gone well

but there was just too much damage to the muscles to reconnect the arm. So said the

trauma surgeon, the vascular surgeon and the plastic surgeon, all of whom were huddled

around a table in the cafeteria sipping coffee and not too pleased at my presence, my

insistence, and the package I held up with both hands like offering a tithe to the altar. I

left the arm on the table beside their pastries and went to find Hap.

They had moved him from recovery to intensive care, a private room. The

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entrance was a sliding door of tempered glass. He was heavily sedated and being

attended to by several nurses. I didn’t enter. Instead I took up a position across the hall

and watched the other grim scene next door.

Emma lay in a pasty pall. The Chief stood at the edge of the bed, his girlfriend,

Meg, behind him, a statue of fortitude, which contrasted Tuff’s defeated slouch. He

looked thin as a rail. He was still dressed in his uniform, his revolver on his hip. His

eyes were caves over drawn cheeks, the handle in his mustache droopy over a slacked

mouth. He looked down on his little girl with the blankness of a man on the edge of a

precipice anesthetized to the prospect of what a step forward would mean.

Tuff had been chief of police going on ten years. When he was seventeen and

running with a bad crowd in South Boston a Mormon judge gave him a choice: join the

army or do some hard time. Tuff took what he thought would be the easy way out and

joined up. Turned out it was the toughest thing he ever did. By the time he wore civvies

again he’d become a man.

Emma’s mother had died in childbirth. Meg was a mobile home neighbor who

sculpted multi-colored geckos from metal. She had hazel eyes and black hair. She would

have done a backless gown justice on the red carpet had it not been for the vodka and

Oreos which, at the time, had added unflattering tufts to her body that T-shirts and cut-

offs could not hide. When Emma was diagnosed with leukemia Meg took on Emma’s

plight personally. Her twins, Nathan and Jade (Jadey), awoke like tornadoes and only

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stopped when it was bedtime or when they were in Emma’s presence. No one could

explain it but these two eight-year-olds had an intuitive understanding of Emma’s

deteriorating health. When they were with Emma they ceased their mayhem and devoted

a defensive shield around her like centurions guarding the gate. They reconstituted in

Emma the hope to wish upon a star which the radiation had so savagely depleted. So in a

way it was because of Emma’s illness a healing took place. Meg’s. Her quiet resolve to

be a better mother to her own children took root precisely due to the calming effect the

sick child had over her two tornadoes. She cut out the vodka and Oreos. Her attitude

brightened and her regal beauty returned—the strong elegant back resurfacing, rousing

the hammock round breasts into perky alignment over a slimmed-down waist and long

shapely legs. And her eyes regained the rich hue of maple leaves before the first snow.

For the Chief, seeing Emma’s delight when Nathan and Jadey came over became

the magnet that drew him out of the well of his own despair. Before long Tuff and Meg

realized they were better off together than apart, and Emma sanctioned the union. The

old adage that God moves in mysterious ways came into play here—at least that is how I

saw it—except the tellers kept ringing the passing bell alerting all of impending death.

That didn’t bother Emma; she believed she would beat her disease. For someone so

young to have such faith, it felt shameful to think our own lives were too tough to bear.

I recalled the day Nathan and Jadey helped Emma down the uneven hallway from

her bedroom, flanking her like bodyguards against invisible paparazzi. Their hands

rested lightly on her bony hips and they steadied her past the tiny kitchen into the quaint

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dining room to take up defensive positions beneath the dining room table. I could see the

mischievous twinkle of excitement in Emma’s eye. We could all see it. Nathan and

Jadey made Emma commander and kept her intimately apprised of what they learned on

each reconnoiter. Together they whispered in earnestness how best to proceed. The

conditions on the battlefield were dire, they said. They would need to rethink their tactics

and initiate a new strategy if their army stood any chance, any chance at all, of winning

the war. Emma was too weak to slither on her belly as the twins did when out on patrol.

But that did not discourage her from believing that one day she would be strong enough

to join them.

On that particular day Emma found her strength.

After all it was her birthday and it was understood that whatever Emma wanted to

do would be allowed, up to a point. She was a child and children were designed for play,

not for staying in bed. Tuff and Meg had invited a small group of us over to celebrate

and we arrived at the appointed time in that magic hour before sunset at his Port Isabel

home that overlooked a canal. The trailer he’d arrived in twenty years earlier was almost

indistinguishable now. The tires had been replaced by Lego-like cement footings and the

aluminum sides had been covered with lap and gap. Meg’s funky geckos completed the

camouflage. There were so many lizards on the walls and in the crushed-shelled gardens

around the scrub palms that the house became something of a tourist attraction.

Everyone was paired but me because Candy didn’t show. She and Emma were

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supposed to sculpt a sandcastle in a sandbox. The whole island knew it was Emma’s

birthday but the guest list was kept small; too much excitement could overload her. Meg

topped the birthday cake with candles. The Chief and I, beers in hand, slipped through

the sliding screen door off the kitchen and joined the other guests by the dock where his

23’ Haynie was moored.

I noted a mean-eyed cat cross in front of us and hop up onto the picnic table. She

was the mottled color of a bruised peach and her name was Shakira. Despite the loss of

her tail and left hind leg she got around well enough but her face was a crumpled rag of

spitefulness. Then again maybe this was her happy face. I couldn’t tell. She was a cat.

Hap’s guayabera was draped off a chair, his wide leather belt across the picnic

table between the half-empty beer bottles he and Gin had been drinking. The table was

neatly arrayed with placemats and goodies in covered Tupperware. I drank my beer and

off the corner of my eye saw Emma behind the screen. She was standing up by herself,

looking out at the festivities, smiling. The twin tornadoes scampered down the dock in

their bathing suits and threw themselves in the water where Hap and Gin were wading.

They launched a watery broadside at the adults who actively returned fire. I heard a clink

like a bottle overturning but not breaking. No doubt Shakira was making a mess of

Meg’s cheerful table. But my eyes were fixed on the bawdy fun in the water and I heard

Tuff beside me laugh and thought that maybe even he was surprised to hear himself laugh

so well. If laughter was the best medicine there simply needed to be more of it because

he had had his share of illness. He was lost in the sweet amnesty of the water fight.

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Then Emma screamed.

Meg dropped the birthday cake as Emma slid down the wall. The Chief and I ran

across the deck and Tuff opened the screen door to lift his daughter into his arms. We

expected tears and heartbreak. What we got instead was a look of wonder and tears of

joy. It took us a moment to realize this. She was pointing and choking on the word Look.

So we looked and didn’t see anything out of the ordinary except a marvelous-looking cat

sitting on the picnic table looking back at us. Her coat was the color of tangerine with

citrine highlights mixed with fiery topaz. She was fluffy and full with a breast of pure

white and a playful tail. Her tranquil emerald eyes glistened like a yogi in the throes of

super consciousness.

“Shakira!” cried Emma. “Look at Shakira!”

We looked but saw nothing resembling that feline ruin. Tuff lifted Emma and

hurried her off to bed. Hap, Gin and the children approached dripping wet. Meg and I

had no explanation; just that Emma called out to Shakira. Nathan and Jade took off

looking for the runty cat as a dreadful stillness infused the air. We listened to Tuff’s

muffled sobs coming from inside Emma’s bedroom. We knew the party was over. The

silky pussycat with the coat of gold leaped from the table and disappeared around the

corner. As Gin toweled off, Hap lifted his belt and poured spilt beer from the bowl of his

scallop shell belt buckle.

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I found sanctuary in the darkness of Hap’s hospital room but my heart broke for

Tuff. Maybe Hap was on to something when he said, “It’s God’s fault.” What sin had

Emma committed that her insides should be eaten away? I cursed God on Tuff’s behalf.

My energy reserves were depleted. It wasn’t so much the lack of sleep as it was

Gin’s murder piggybacked to my own feelings of guilt over Erica that weighed on me. I

refused to look at Hap for fear of what I might do with the pillow beneath his head.

Before Gin’s death life was a shuffle to work in flip-flops with the proper mental

attitude—If it ain’t fun we ain’t doin’ it. On South Padre Island every day was Saturday.

The tourists were gone. The island was half-asleep even when it was wide awake. I

could barely recall what Hap looked like or his bizarre warship which was fine because

I’d found my soul mate in the embodiment of Gin. Once you find that you toss out the

caution proviso with the bubble wrap. That she was another man’s wife was irrelevant to

me, except the man had returned. Big problem. My eyes swung to that pillow again.

Gin reignited a spark in the cold ashes of my heart. She made the idea of falling

in love feasible again. She was also the first woman since Erica whose desire for sex

matched my yearning for purpose. Our lovemaking transcended into something

metaphysical which only made the physical aspect more erotic. John and Yoko honesty.

So it came as quite a surprise when her search for inner peace through solitary reflection

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eclipsed our shared completeness through horizontal refreshment. When I found her

sitting on the floor in the lotus posture with her eyes closed, meditating, I knew

instinctively her mind was lost in the sort of bliss that would forever trump the kind I

could give her in bed. Man, let me tell you she was gone. I don’t know where she went

or how she got there—this state of heaven or nirvana or whatever they call it—and she

seemed quite cagey about telling me. I took that as an affront and assured her that I

understood a thing or two about transcendental meditation. I just didn’t practice it. Life

was too short to be sitting on the floor in the lotus posture with your eyes closed

contemplating anything, I told her. Her reply was like dousing the flame of a candle with

a snap of a finger. She told me she was practicing the same sort of yoga Jesus practiced.

I scoffed. She was serious. I wasn’t dumb enough to press the issue. I let her believe

what she wanted to believe. I figured the Jesus reference was just a latent flower child

desire from someone who’d heard that the sixties were cool. Anyway I was in no

condition to take up yoga. Not when I had a saloon full of liquor beneath my feet and a

few grams of cocaine hidden in the ceiling above my head. Not when I had her body

between the sheets at night to lose my mind in.

As for her drinking problem she insisted she didn’t have a problem. During our

time together she never lost control as she had that night in Belize. She looked no more

the worse for wear after a night howling at the moon than I did.

Before meeting Gin I was of the opinion the world was a dangerous place. You

just didn’t know who people were anymore. And because of that I hung up my guns and

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went into semi-retirement behind the bar, leaning on my elbow, listening to fish tales.

Occasionally I’d cut a filly from the herd. Young, dumb and willing. I owned the place

so to them I was a rock star. A deft escape to the storage room was silly. That’s what the

youngsters did. I lived upstairs now and had yet met a woman who didn’t want to see the

view from the second floor. But I refused to commit to a relationship whereby my day-

to-day beast could be analyzed. Oh how quickly they turn from confidant to informant.

It’s why so many of us refuse to put a ring on it.

Then Gin walked through my door.

She wanted to use some of the money she’d made with Hap to purchase part of

the business. Like a dowry, she said. In this way her investment in our future would not

be based solely on emotion. She would have a stake which confirmed for me that she and

Hap were through. Caput. History. I felt for the first time in a long time that the stars

were aligning in my favor. But I was suspicious about a business partnership, fearing

that if things didn’t work out I’d still be able to kick her out, if necessary. (Just because

they spread their wings doesn’t mean you leverage the farm. This is ancient wisdom.)

However, I was seriously considering purchasing a ring and kicking ancient wisdom in

the ass. Why not make the commitment? Why not take another chance at love?

So I did.

Now she was dead and her killer was lying in a bed three feet away from me,

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fighting for his life.

Everything was going according to plan.

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CHAPTER 4

Of course in the beginning I didn’t even know there was a plan. Not until I’d been

dragged into it. And by that time it was too late. This is what happened:

One night Gin and I were sitting up in bed, discussing maya, the Hindu word for

duality. Good and evil, hot and cold, up and down, life and death, night and day. These

are examples of maya, which Hindus claim is illusion. In other words there really is no

good and evil, hot and cold, up and down, life and death, or night and day. This duality is

the factory-installed common denominator relegated to the human experience by God to

keep human beings like you and me from focusing our eye on God and finding Him. A

forever test, if you will. And only the great sages have passed that test. The rest of us

just throw up our hands and go to work. The Hindus believe that if you can see through

maya then you can see how Christ saw. If you can conquer maya—which means

shelving the laws of physics—then you can walk on water like he did and raise the dead.

We’d been scratching at the mystery far too long. It was 4 a.m. The coke was

gone, I was spent and I wanted to crash—even though earlier that evening she had hinted

a hallucinogen was in our future. I jeered at the suggestion. Thought she was kidding.

“Where does duality come from?” said Gin shaking her head in frustration. She

rolled off the queen and fired up a joint. This girl was all about excess.

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The part of maya we had been discussing and the one that really irritated her was

the duality of good and evil. I didn’t care anymore. The body—and the brain—can take

only so much abuse. I wanted to pack it in and surrender to the Dream Weaver. Then

she said it, and rather sarcastically, too. “It’s God’s fault.”

“What is?”

“Everything.”

She stomped out. I sighed, threw back the sheet and followed. She paused in the

hallway and took another toke, throwing her head back on her neck, cocking her hand on

her hip, the curvature of her spine like a Saracen blade over a perfectly sculpted tush.

She exhaled a funnel of smoke and then snapped to attention. She was looking at the

wall. At what exactly I wasn’t sure. All that was on the wall where she was standing

was a sconce with a scalloped glass shade. Like a shell. I waited to see what she would

do. She did nothing but lose herself in the soft light that emanated from the lamp.

I stepped up behind her as she intoned the phrase like a regretful refrain, “It’s

God’s fault.” She handed me the slender stalk over her shoulder.

I took a toke and squeezed out my question. “Man has no responsibility?”

“God left us before we left Him.”

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I exhaled a rolling log of smoke. “How do you figure?”

“That whole Adam and Eve thing? Parenting 101. Don’t leave your kids

unattended.”

Hmm. Good point.

“That it?” I was awash in the rush of a strain of marijuana grown outside

McAllen and advertised to blow your top off. It was called Valley Vesuvius.

She turned away from the sconce and draped her arms around my bare hips. She

looked me up and down. “If you tell your kids not to do something you know they’ll do

it anyway. It’s like a dare to them. How is it God didn’t know that?”

“Because He’d never been a parent before?”

“Hah! That’s no excuse.”

“So we’re angry with God. Is that what you’re saying?”

“Everyone is angry with God, Del. It’s what gets us up in the morning.”

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I could see it there, too, the tempest, a burning glaze of resentment. But I had no

idea what it was she resented. The color of her eyes vacillated between the malachite of

the shallows and the deep green just off the shelf. Her stare was distant like a sailor

who’d gone too far out and stayed too long. Oh, Lord, thy sea is so broad and my ship is

so small. She looked up at me. “You think I need therapy, don’t you.” It wasn’t a

question. “Well, I don’t. It’s a struggle but it’s my struggle, not yours. Anyway I’ve had

all the therapy a person can get. I’ve plateaued, as they say. My last doctor told me I

had sociopathic tendencies.”

“How so?”

“I told him I wanted to set him on fire and roll him down a hill.”

We entered the small Tuscany-style kitchen of my residence above the saloon,

naked as Coppertone babies. Our shadows played high and alien-looking across the walls

cast aglow by a ship’s lantern Gin had purchased on the Home Shopping Network.

She began opening the kitchen cabinets, one after the other, looking for

something, cursing all the while, carrying on how she, after having had numerous

arguments with none other than Sigmund Freud himself, understood depression better

than anyone did. She debated as if I wasn’t even there. It was fascinating to watch.

A highlight of her discourse focused on an incident with Sigmund one night in

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1896, when, after drinking too much absinthe, she nearly strangled him to death when he

dismissed her suppositions as sophomoric. She stopped in mid-sentence and with raised

finger declared, “He was patronizing me! Like Schreber!”

I pondered whether the same fate awaited me if I attacked the Freudian slip of her

being alive in 1896 as she claimed. What’s living without a little risk? “You’d be 150

years old now, give or take,” I said. “Assuming you were in your twenties at the time.”

“I’m older than that.”

To demand empirical proof would have been a mistake. She was high. After

awhile we all become walking metaphors for one thing or another.

She opened the last cabinet, let go a yelp of excitement, and withdrew two large

tumblers stenciled with pink flamingos. She then filled a small pot with water, set it on

the stove and turned the temperature high. She opened the refrigerator and asked, “Have

you ever had absinthe, Del?”

Would if I could. The liquor’s name stems from the Greek, apsinthion, which

means “undrinkable” and is distilled from the wormwood plant, yielding the pale green

color of a witch’s brew. As old-fashion as bloomers are to lingerie. But the legend goes

it packed a punch like a hallucinogenic drug. Before I could answer, she tossed off a

ditty, “The wormwood does for cramps what whiskey does for Gramps.”

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As she foraged the fridge she rambled off prescient points of different ages in

which she claimed to have lived. It brought back to memory my diagnosis of Hap’s

mental illness. Apparently it was catching. But I went along for the ride, allowing my

attention to drift out the window across the second-story deck to the causeway whose

distant sweep of arc lights reared over the black bay like the hip of a lolling nude.

I sat on a kitchen barstool. My body was feeding on itself now. I needed to

replenish the lost nutrients with heavy doses of vitamins, laps in the ocean, a steak dinner

and lots of sleep. Or indulge in some other form of false energy that would recharge my

brain and kick-start my libido. Now I realized she hadn’t been kidding. Her drug of

choice was psilocybin mushrooms—Bomba’s secret recipe from his shack in the British

Virgin Islands which she claimed to have stolen. It was the least she could do, she told

me, since she’d left behind more than her bra and panties swinging from his rafters.

She handed me the wine she wanted to drink and then pulled out a Ziploc®

gallon-size bag of bluish stalks and purple buttons. She dropped them into boiling water,

turned off the heat and pushed the pot off the burner to steep. I poured the wine, a bright

Pouilly-Fuissé. I was too old to be doing mushrooms, wasn’t I? I wasn’t a kid anymore.

But maybe that was the allure—to be young again. Not stupid, mind you. Daring.

I slipped my arms around her waist and we swayed gently against each other,

waiting for the concoction to concoct itself. “So what’s the secret?” I asked running the

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palm of my hand slowly up her inner thigh. “Did you add something?” She rested her

head against my shoulder and bit her bottom lip as the thrilling touch of our bodies stoked

fires thought to be out. “Are we gonna drink it straight? I’ve got orange juice.”

“Ah. Well, that would certainly work. Do . . . do that again.” So I did. “Did you

know the French considered it an aphrodisiac?”

“Orange juice?”

“Back in the day.”

“I thought their sunny disposition was a result of wine. I hear they make it.”

“They sure do. Did you know . . . there . . . hmmm.”

“Did I know what?”

“That how to make wine was the secret Eve learned after biting the apple.”

“Really? I thought the secret was how to have sex.”

She turned to face me. “You can’t have sex without wine, dummy.”

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Her rationale seemed to make perfect sense. But most things made sense as

wrecked as I was. My eyes dropped to the silver amulet which she wore on a chain

around her neck, the talisman she’d worn in Belize that I thought looked like a chubby

Buddha. It was an inverted hand with the thumb and pinky pointing outward. The size

of a pillbox. They were quite popular in head shops. Usually there was a large eye in the

palm looking out, but there was no eye here. Gin was never without it. The weird part

was how I’d never bothered to inquire about it, until now.

“What is that?”

She raised both hands to the charm and delicately lifted it for my benefit.

“It’s called a hamesh,” she said, “To ward off the evil eye. Today people call it a

hamsa. The fingers represent the five books of Moses. Or the five senses to praise God.”

Etched into the silver of the hand’s palm was a symbol. A crescent atop a

triangle. Running down the center of the triangle to its base was a stake.

“And that?”

“The sign of Sin,” she said. I wasn’t quite sure how to take that, since we’d been

up all night indulging in it. “The Moon Father.”

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“The what?”

She turned away from me and stirred the mushrooms with a wooden spoon.

“Don’t take this wrong, darlin’. But it looks sort of satanic, if you ask me.”

“It isn’t, I assure you. That would be like saying the caduceus is evil because it

has snakes. The medical community wouldn’t appreciate that very much, even though it

shouldn’t be a medical symbol in the first place.”

“What do you mean?”

“The caduceus is the sign of Hermes, the god of commerce. It has nothing to do

with medicine. That just goes to show how things become distorted over time. People

will believe anything if they hear it long enough. That is how history is rewritten. Half

the things we believe to be true aren’t true at all, but because we grew up hearing the

stories we believe that they are.”

“Example.”

“You said this looked satanic. It’s no more satanic than satan is a proper name.”

“How about another example?”

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She laughed. “No, this is perfect.”

“No. It really isn’t.”

She went on anyway. “The word satan means ‘adversary’. Just a word in ancient

times. Not a proper name at all. It didn’t receive that notoriety until Christians got a hold

of it. They’re the ones who personalized it.”

“Let’s talk football.”

“Hey, you started this.”

“Well, just back up a sec. Didn’t Jesus call it by name? He’s the one who

personalized it when he said, ‘Get thee behind me, Satan.’”

“That’s how it’s written in the Bible, yes, but I’m not at all sure they got that

right. Jesus may very well have called it satan with a small ‘s’ because he didn’t want to

personalize it. I think the scribes got it wrong. I mean Jesus was just doing what a CEO

of a company would do when he fires someone. A good CEO doesn’t take it personally.

He’s just protecting his business, looking at the bottom line. He knows he has the power

to rid his company of someone who is corrupting it, just like Jesus knew he had the

power to exorcize temptation from the mouth of Peter. He saw Peter was in a state of

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agony, being pulled apart by adversarial thoughts, and Jesus shooed them away. You

have to remember who Jesus was, Del.”

“I know who Jesus was, Gin.”

“What I mean is if Jesus was the embodiment of cosmic power, the godhead, then

he was more than capable of not personalizing what everyone seems incapable of doing.

‘It’s not personal, Sonny. It’s strictly business,’” she said, referencing the famous line

from the movie, The Godfather. “Jesus was all about taking care of business—T.C.B.—

just like Elvis was. He knew he was The Man just like Elvis knew he was The Man.

And with a wave of their hands they got after it.”

“After what?”

“Whatever needed getting after.”

“OK,” I said as a surge of adrenalin raised my listless eyes. “Let’s hear it.”

“Well, the origin of the word comes from one of the early Egyptian gods called

Sata, the Great Serpent, who lived inside Mother Earth. He was considered the polar

opposite of the Sun God. At nighttime he came out of his hole and lifted into the sky and

became the moon. That’s when the Egyptians could appreciate it. They said the snake

was foraging among the stars like regular snakes do at night on the ground. They called

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it the Black Sun. There was nothing evil about it, Del. It was just the Sun God’s alter

ego. Even today people kiss and carry on under the moon. Being moonstruck isn’t a bad

thing. Never has been. It’s just romance ringing the dinner bell. Like when Jimmy

Stewart wooed Donna Reed with it in It’s a Wonderful Life. He said he’d throw a lasso

around it for her, if she wanted. Even your fundamentalists can’t call that movie evil.”

“You’d be surprised.”

She laughed and then drifted off. Maybe she was pacing herself. Talk like this

can empty a room fast. But I wasn’t going anywhere. “Some scholars believe the God of

the Hebrews and the Black Sun are the same thing.”

“Come again?”

“The god Moses met on Mount Sinai?”

“OK. What about Him?”

“One minute He claims to be God Almighty. The next He says no one knows His

real name. You got a Bible here?”

“With the way we talk?”

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“Well, you run a bar.”

“Yeah. But that’s downstairs.”

“With the pagans.”

“Exactly.”

“Get it.”

I went into the living room where I had last seen it. It was the size of a small fat

brick. Aged black leather, gilded edges, the King James Version, the words spoken by

Christ in red, my dad’s name stamped in gold on the front. The weight of it always gave

me pause as it ought to if it was as holy as everyone said it was. Something holy should

have some weight to it. Like the Smith and Wesson Model 19 in the walnut case on the

shelf above me. Chambered for .357 Magnum you couldn’t get much holier than that. A

six-shot revolver with a 2” barrel, a blue carbon steel finish and checkered wood stock.

The model that fired the .38 caliber, famously known as a .38 Special, was made popular

by every private eye from Philip Marlowe to Peter Gunn. I opted for the heavier load, the

Magnum. Point that at an intruder and he’d come to Jesus pretty damn quick.

The brick wasn’t with the books of well-worn classics I’d purchased over the

years at thrift shops and bookstores. Paperbacks mostly. The top one hundred, rabbit-

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eared, underlined and scribbled in, which, at least to me, made them more attractive than

the covers of the one hundred greatest works of literature printed by the Franklin Mint.

Their leather bindings come in a variety of colors which make them look a little cheesy.

Leather ought not to be colorized unless you’re playing the country western circuit with

Marty Stuart. Above the books hung a framed print of “Daybreak”, one of my favorite

Maxfield Parrish paintings. There’s a nebulous dreamlike quality to a Parrish; the

subjects and landscapes seem soaked in mist. There’s not a hard line anywhere.

I returned to the kitchen and retook my seat on the barstool.

“Exodus, chapter six, verse three,” she said.

“I’ll take your word for it.” She awaited an explanation. “I couldn’t find it.” She

turned away and I felt like a schmuck. “So how ‘bout them Cowboys?”

“No. We’ll finish what we started. You’re really going to have to take my word

for it. Now the Egyptians had many gods and Egypt was made up of many races. If they

caught you, they assimilated you. Anyway Egyptian Jews had this thing for Mount Sinai

four hundred years before Moses ever climbed it. They were nomads mostly. They had

their own name for the Black Sun. They called it Ab-Sin, which means ‘moon father’.

That may be the name God kept from Moses but it doesn’t really matter because it’s what

the Jews did with the name that gets us to the name, Satan.” She stirred the Copelandia

cocktail and looked at me. “Are we having fun yet?”

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I rolled my eyes.

“What’s the name again?”

“Ab-Sin.”

“Good. You’re paying attention. Ab means father. Sin means moon. The word

sin is Sumerian, actually. From the oldest civilization in history. Sumer. Now look at

the name Abraham. It breaks down to Ab-ram which means ‘high father’. Because

Abraham is considered the father of all nations his name became synonymous with the

father of the moon, Ab-Sin. Mount Sinai literally translates as ‘mountain of the moon’,

so, y’know, do the math.”

“I thought sin was evil.”

“That kind of sin is, sure. But like I said: over time things change. Truth gets

distorted. Words take on different meanings. Sin is a Sumerian word that predates

Judaism. It means moon. Today it means transgression and vice. Look at the word gay.

It’s been around since Chaucer and any innocence it had even back then is dubious. But

the perception that it was innocent is what the old-timers remember. Today it means

what it means. There are folks on Talk Radio who are already calling what happened on

nine-eleven ancient history. And the last time I was in New Orleans John F. Kennedy

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came up in a conversation and the guy next to me said, ‘Who dat?’ People forget, Del.

The world forgets. Anyway, where was I? Oh. OK. So Ab-Sin was a deity. It was

worshipped by the tribes near Mount Sinai, the earliest Jews. The Exodus hadn’t

happened yet. Moses was born in Egypt and he probably worshipped the Moon Father.

Why wouldn’t he? Over time the name for moon father, Ab-Sin, got mixed up with the

Egyptian name for moon snake which was Sata. At nighttime it’s difficult to see. So?”

“It becomes adversarial.”

“Correct. The Jews took this as a sign and the Egyptian moon snake became

synonymous with adversary and that’s where we get the name Satan. See?”

“So do you worship this Ab-Sin character?”

She shrugged—somewhat in the positive. “Old habit.”

“So what’s that make you, a sinner?”

She cocked her hand on her hip and glared at me. “Man, you are high.”

“No higher than you, dollface.”

She looked at the stew in the pot. “Maybe this isn’t such a good idea.”

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“It’s fine,” I said lighting a Dunhill.

She took the cigarette away from me and kissed my eyelids, one after the other.

“Stop. I’m getting dizzy.”

She slapped me across the face.

Whoa.

“Is that better?”

I used the heel of my hand to wipe away a tear. “Yes, actually.”

“Look at me. This is important.”

“Is it? I thought we were having a party.”

“We are. But I want you to see what I have seen.”

“How is that even possible?”

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“Trust me. You trust me, don’t you?”

“Like a politician.”

She gasped. “You are something of a scoundrel, aren’t you?”

“That’s my middle name.”

“I thought your middle name began with an E.”

“I’m an eccentric scoundrel,” I said taking back the cig.

She kissed me on the forehead. “That you are, my love. The truth is we’ll

probably laugh through most of it. It’s just a catalyst. You won’t go to hell or anything

so dramatic.”

“Well, that’s nice to know.”

“If you do I’ll rescue you. I promise.”

I scrubbed out the cigarette. “Let’s get this show on the road.”

She stepped inside my legs and pressed herself up against me and ran her fingers

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through my hair. I felt helpless in that moment but justified in the belief that no man had

ever lived who hadn’t once in his lifetime allowed himself to be so utterly exposed. The

gamble I was taking bearing my throat to this strumpet took a backseat to how I was

bearing my soul. And I think she knew that. Maybe she even appreciated it.

She kissed me tenderly and placed my ear between her breasts where I heard the

tympani of her heart—as mystifying as the drum from a radioactive core. My forearms

hung like lazy belts across her backside. I smelled the musky contradictions of

overheated female. In one light she was delicate as a robin’s egg, in another she

possessed the power to topple kingdoms. I felt as if I was holding something more than

Woman. Something higher up the evolutionary chain. Like a goddess. My heart and

hammer throbbed as one, the latter so surprisingly reinvigorated and unyielding I recalled

the disclaimer for male enhancement products and thought four hours was bush league.

She took a sultry step backwards, tossing down a muss of crimson hair over her

smoldering green eyes. She wanted me to look at her; gaze up and down every velvet

inch of cinnamon cream skin which, unlike me, revealed no tan tine. The lantern’s light

reflected in the polish on her nails as her lithe fingers raked slowly across the wedge of

finely honed mink at the juncture of her sleek thighs, then up across her helmet-hard

tummy to the plush shadows beneath her noble mounds of Gaia whose berry-brown

areolas seemed to be calling out to me I dare you! Her game was how long it would take

before I had to look away. It was like soaking up the sun.

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I grabbed my phone and tapped the camera app. She sighed as if she knew that

trying to fight me over this was a lost cause. It would have been. She struck a pose and I

took the shot. She cupped my cheek. “I want you to listen to my story, Del. Walk down

memory lane with me. See it, feel it, live it. And then we’ll make love. We’ll make love

like we’ve never made love before.” She lifted my chin and I drowned in the fathomless

gulf of her green eyes. “And then I’m going to leave.”

I swayed drunkenly. “Y-you’re going to what?”

She turned away. I grabbed her and she abruptly put the kibosh on my maneuver.

“Sit,” she said.

“You sit.” I kissed her roughly. She grabbed my hair and pulled my head back.

“Ow, ow, OW!”

She let me go but I was determined and reached for her again. She hit me square

in the breastbone. A knuckle-punch. One step down from the lethal Five Point Palm

Exploding Heart Technique used to kill Bill. I crimped in pain and grabbed hold the

counter. She helped me retake my seat. “Am I going to have to tie you down?” She

opened a drawer and withdrew a roll of duct tape and placed it on the counter. “I will,

you know, if you don’t behave.” She waited for me to catch my breath. I nodded,

shamefaced, and she kissed me on the head and turned back to the refrigerator. I can

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appreciate a battle between the sexes if I’m given a heads-up there’s really going to be a

battle. A slap on fanny flesh already a-tingle isn’t out of the ballpark but by her complete

immobilization of me a strange authority emanated from her aura and I found myself

imagining the kinkier aspects of lovemaking. Recently I’d found men’s ties hanging in

the closet. Since I didn’t wear ties anymore I questioned why they were there. Maybe

tonight was the night I’d find out.

She withdrew a pitcher of sugar iced tea from the refrigerator. She strained the

mushroom juice into the tumblers, filling them half way. She then added the tea, the chill

of which tempered the grog’s heat. She handed me my glass and we drank the potion,

belching afterwards, and then ran like teenagers back to the bedroom where we threw

ourselves on the bed and played.

I nearly had her pinned beneath me but she spun out and away and slipped down

my flank, allaying my frustration with her deft touch, rapt by the obelisk, looking at it as

if it was the answer to the world’s problems, or the cause of them.

She swung up and straddled my hips and rocked across me gently. She ran her

fingernails lightly over my chest, bringing coolness to my fevered brow, demanding

nothing from me but the elemental stooge. No further teasing or coaxing was necessary

but she applied some torture anyway because it delighted her. It felt marvelous and

uncomfortable as if I was bound like a slave even though I wasn’t. Bound, that is.

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“Not yet,” she cooed.

Sure. OK. Whatever.

“Y’know it just dawned on me.”

“What?” she said.

“Well, when we first met I thought you said your name was Jen which is short for

Jennifer. So your given name is—.”

“Ginat. Means ‘garden’. It’s Hebrew.”

“You’re Jewish?”

“Who knew?”

Then it happened.

A sound ricocheted between my ears, bong-ng-ng, as if Moe hit Curly over the

head with a cast iron skillet. It was followed by a high-pitched squelch and a wah-yah-

eeeeee squeal like the feedback between an electric guitar and an amplifier. She smiled

down at me as the drug took effect. Her pupils dilated into fat black drops signaling me

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she was lifting off as well. That’s when she enclosed me inside her hot wet folds.

Oh what a witch.

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CHAPTER 5

The bedroom expanded like bubble gum as tingles of bliss swept over me and my desire

for Gin was eclipsed by something new. The bed sheets giggled and the table lamp

unveiled three chimpanzees from beneath its palm frond-shaped shade. They looked at

me and squawked in perfect Edwardian English, “Our boy is in the bits.” The sheets

giggled again. The ceiling fan sprouted navigational lights and tilted into an egg and

sped off through the ceiling, disappearing through the fractal cleavage of deep space.

Gin materialized over me. My ecstasy made we want to cry. I heard her soul

singing. The song of the heart? I could see it—a purple ocean of loopy swells beneath

her crescent smile, perfect except that one front tooth slightly overlapped the other. Her

breasts gave me a big Texas Howdy! and said, We are the beakers of life. Drink and be

renewed. They divided into pairs like tribbles and nurtured me.

Gin and I were locked in a trance. Our oceans merged and we became one

harmonious wave of energy while water nymphs swam alongside us. We had wind in our

sails and we glided across the sea beneath salacious kama sutra clouds, past islands

whose green hills dipped into the water like frightened hippos. The song of the sirens

was sweet to our ears as mermaid tails edged us forward into a gentle rising wave called

Us. We were the ocean, we were the sky and everything that lived was linked to the

tentacle of our consciousness. I could not tell where Gin began and I ended. We were

completely androgynous, immersed in each other’s spirit. That’s what we were! Spirit!

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The sheets of her mystery flittered away like leaves of gold leaf. She pulled back the

shroud to my mystery and saw my sins, my fears and those peculiarities that made me

who I was. She seemed OK with it. I seemed OK with it. I felt accepted.

She beckoned me explore her closer. One sanctum gave way to another. One sky

and one ocean became a richer, fuller sky and ocean. Fantasy and reality swung in and

out like taffy drawn back and forth between tooth and gum.

Beyond, a coastline began to emerge, and when we reached it we sailed through a

delta teeming with wildlife. Herds of ruminants scattered beneath us and phalanxes of

birds took flight. We soared up a winding river rimmed with date palms, past verdant

orchards which gave way to pastel pink and blue plains that stretched to the horizon

where a range of white-capped mountains kissed the sky. Then we dropped like a stone,

long before ascending its lush ridges, and swooped like a hawk over a desolate landscape

of ochre. Jagged crevices dark as coffee snaked between rounded hilltops that resembled

a thousand buried skulls. It was then that I became aware of the skillet-hot sun on my

shoulders. Sensing my distress Gin plunged us into the earth where the coolness of the

shadowy chasm stifled the heat and we winged above a hidden river in sleepy-blue

contentment. We followed the channel, skimming the water’s surface beneath looming

canyon walls wrinkled in layers of vibrant sedimentary rock from centuries past. We

came upon a rose-colored architectural relief cut into the stone. It was anchored by

Corinthian columns with steps leading up to recessed alcoves that led deep inside the

bedrock—perhaps a gateway to an entire city buried intact like a woolly mammoth in the

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ice. Then, quite abruptly, we emerged from the gorge like cannon shot and floated on the

magic carpet softness of each other, high above the desert, enshrouded in love, our senses

ablaze by ancient fires as if we had entered a fable of the Arabian Nights.

In the distance I saw a gilded brick, upended, and gleaming in the sun.

Gin pointed and said, “Jerusalem!”

Herod’s Temple of white marble and gold crowned the city that clung to a

plateau, making it visible for miles to caravans crisscrossing Judea, the land bridge that

connected Egypt and Africa to the south and Persia and the Orient to the east.

I found myself alone, naked as the Terminator after achieving time displacement.

Veils of thermals danced on the horizon. I rose to see Gin in nude glory standing atop a

ridge, her ruby-red hair catching the wind like a cape. She pointed at something behind

me.

“That’s where it all started,” she said.

I turned to see a hill that resembled a well-defined kneecap. Then she vanished,

poof. The sound of her laughter lingered on the winds and I began my trek towards the

kneecap not knowing why.

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I came upon a shadow splayed out before me. I looked to see what was casting it

but there was nothing up above but clear sky. The shadow began to move away in a

scoot, folding and unfolding like a cartoon caterpillar. When it began darting with the

alacrity of an eel along the reefs, I fashioned a horse with no name to keep up with it.

Darkness descended with a wave of a hand. A Jupiter-size moon hung low over

the horizon. Kneecap Hill had taken on the shape of a skull with cave eyes and a broken

smile. The shadow slithered up past the rows of teeth and into a nostril and disappeared.

My inner voice told me to look for another entry point, so I dismounted and

moved through an electrified forest and laterally across giant twinkling boulders. I felt

empowered as Tommy Tactical, only without any weapons. Or clothes.

I came to a small hole in the back of the skull and crawled through, and there

before me in the belly of the cave was a giant of a man, stooped over like Quasimodo,

naked, deformed, primordial. His arms were hulking and simian, his powerful back

divided by a spine with vertebrae that resembled links of heavy chain. His shoulder

blades were twisted triangular outgrowths, like folded panels, hemmed inside tightly

stretched flesh crinkled as dried leather. His distended head resembled fossilized

placenta. From the top of his forehead jutted a pair of upturned tusks, coiled like augers.

He was crouched at the mouth of the cave, a sinister silhouette against the gigantic moon.

Water trickled from a chink in the wall and he quenched his thirst while the

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shadow waited patiently, strangely distinct from the shrouds that cloaked the room. “So

the Word will forfeit the heavenly realms to be baptized in my waters.”

“Yes, my lord,” said the shadow.

“Why would He do this?”

“To have a son.”

Quasimodo thought this over, sipping the water from the palm of his hand.

Finally he nodded, as if he understood the hidden ramifications linked to the mysterious

message, and he said, “So let it be between the sons. And I will baptize His in blood.”

I knew his name and it sure as hell wasn’t Quasimodo! My heart fluttered and

fear twisted my throat. I wanted to run but in my haste I rapped the ceiling of the cave

with my head, the sound of which swung the devil about, his eyes ablaze. He sees me!

Suddenly I was spirited away and wound up beside a lake on the outskirts of a

tiny fishing village. The moon gleamed in the water and salty brine tweaked my nose. I

was far away from where I had just been.

Gin materialized beside me. She touched my arm and pointed to a little girl

foraging through garbage. The moonlight brought out the cerise in the child’s hair. Like

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glowing crinkled wire. I realized I was watching her as a child in this past life.

The horseman’s presence was presaged by the tinkling of tiny bells. Little Ginat

poked her head out from a cranny. She could see nothing of the rider’s face any more

than I could because it was shielded by a veil. The layers of the rider’s outfit floated on

the midnight air and feathery silken drapes cascaded down from a fez-like hat forming a

tent around his shoulders. He was arrayed in bangles that flickered like hammered metal

coins. He extended his hand—a pincer garlanded in rings and bracelets. When he

hoisted Ginat up behind him, I caught the roundness of bosom. The rider was a woman.

“Her name was Medhat,” said Gin. “She was the High Lady of the harem and

Herod’s former mistress. When she wasn’t playing the part of priestess to his nagging

superstitions, she was his chief scout. New recruits had to be prepubescent and unique in

some way. She took me to Herod’s winter palace at Jericho, home of the world’s most

infamous brothel. We were trained like circus animals and highly prized. Boys and girls

alike. She said there was something special about me.”

I joked, drunkenly, “And what, pray tell, was that?”

She leered at my vulgar innuendo and looked back at the hallucination we both

shared. “I had visions. Medhat would discover this shortly. Perhaps she’d had a vision

about me and that’s how she found me. I don’t know. That didn’t mean I would not be a

concubine. Even a priestess can be a whore, Del. A whore to the gods.

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“I blossomed early and Medhat was my personal tutor. I had a gift for picking up

languages. Aramaic was my native tongue, but I already had a firm grasp on Greek.

Roman soldiers were regulars. I could cuss in Latin better than they could.

“She counseled me in the mystical union between a man and a woman. She

taught me about the stars, the universe, and where man came from before there was a

moon. We read Hesiod mostly. Theogony. Do you know what theogony means, Del?”

“Divine genealogy,” I said, noting how the landscape had changed from the

fishing village to the brothel at Jericho, and the little girl was now a young woman.

“Yes,” said Gin. “It records the battles between the gods when they fought

alongside man for control of the world. Similar accounts are found in the writings of the

Hindus and Egyptians. How could all of these civilizations share the same event?”

It was a rhetorical question and based on what I was experiencing I felt woefully

unqualified to venture an answer.

“Del?”

“Hmm?”

“Do you believe gods fought alongside men?”

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“I believed in Santa Claus once. Does that answer your question?”

“Then you don’t believe God needs man to save the world?”

“Honey, all I know about the world is that it turns. And as long as it keeps

turning we get to dance. Let’s dance. I’ll put on some music, OK?”

“You don’t want to see the rest?”

“Pause it.”

She grabbed my arm and pointed at the dream-like diorama. “Watch! Listen!”

I sighed. I really wanted to dance.

Medhat and Ginat lounged on cushions between columns on an open dais while

scantily clad adolescents skipped in, stripped and bathed themselves in pools of clear blue

water. They then prostrated themselves before Ginat to begin the day’s lessons.

“Medhat taught me about my body. In the morning I was bathed in asses’ milk, in

the evening with oil. My hair was combed and set, my nails polished, my eyes lined in

khol. Slaves applied my tattoos with henna. Medhat liked the tone of my skin. Not quite

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olive, more peach. She had the hots for me, I think.”

My eyes fell to the yellow lacquered fingernails of the matriarch as she picked up

an ivory pointer. Across her face hung a veil of the finest tulle and a lotus flower of

mother-of-pearl crowned her forehead. Phallic bangles jangled from her hair and jeweled

necklaces encircled her beefy breasts. Her sexual presence was overwhelming. I

watched her stride back and forth like a schoolmarm as each act was explained and

analyzed, her elegant robes fluid as fairies skimming in the wake of her enthusiasm.

When this was over I would insist Gin tell me what she put in those mushrooms! We

were like gods looking down on the game board. No. It was more than that. It was as if

we were standing inside a hologram, surrounded by an orgy. I’d been on psychedelic

trips before but this was extraordinary!

“I was encouraged to enjoy myself until I understood the technique fully. But

under no circumstances was there to be penetration. Then it was my turn to please.

Medhat taught me well.”

Medhat clapped her hands and the concubines hurried out of the room. With a

flick of her finger she unfastened the broach to Ginat’s tunic. It collapsed in her lap like

a lock of hair, revealing breasts of parfait-perfection imbued in the buttery apricot

splendor of the setting sun. Her irradiated beauty caused me a moment’s dizziness.

She led Ginat by the hand to a pool rimmed in mosaic tile. Medhat disrobed. She

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was white as marble and had it not been for her raven-black hair, she could have been

mistaken for a garden statue among the blue hyacinths and purple irises. Her fingers

lingered over a tray of tear-shaped vials. She chose one with sparkling silver flecks.

Gin pointed out that the oil Medhat was using was myrrh, extracted from the resin

of a dwarf tree found in Yemen, in the mountains of the Hadhramaut. The finest in the

world, she said, and likely the source of the gift brought to the baby Jesus in Bethlehem.

Medhat began with three droplets at the crown of Ginat’s head before applying

the same amount to the palms of her hands. She gently raked the oil through the girl’s

hair and massaged her shoulders, kneading the oil into her pores. She then took a strigil,

a curved blade of bronze, and used it to scrape away the excess oil with the day’s detritus.

The young girl marveled the stars overhead and said, “He is coming.”

“Who is coming, child?”

“The king.”

“How do you know this?”

“He is coming for me. This day.”

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Ginat looked into Medhat’s obsidian eyes and lovingly traced the woman’s

beaked nose with the tip of her finger—a gesture of acceptance to something they both

knew in their hearts was inevitable. Upon seeing King Herod approach Medhat

understood that her newest conscript had been blessed with the power of divination.

Gin leaned close to me and said, “He smelled like death.”

“Perineum gangrene,” I said. “And kidney disease. They called it Herod’s Evil.”

“He was evil, all right,” said Gin.

I heard Medhat whisper in the girl’s ear, “Keep your eyes closed until I say.”

Herod strolled smugly around the bath, the braziers casting pumpkin shadows of

his meaty girth across the marble floor. He watched Medhat work the strigil. He had a

habit of engaging the girls after they reached that certain age.

“When will she be ready?” he said.

“She needs more training before she can give you what you want.”

“She will perform adequately enough.”

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Medhat had not expected that reply and she tensed. When Herod was young

Medhat had taken him as her lover. Herod coveted her above all women, even his wife,

Doris, whom he banished from his kingdom so he could carry on with Medhat. Not

marry her, mind you, just carry on with her. But then he discovered his teenage niece,

Mariamne, called it true love and told Medhat he was going to marry Mariamne and

make her his queen. He made Medhat the High Lady of his harem and gave her a Persian

dagger with an ivory handle shaped like a snake’s head. Its eyes were fashioned from

rubies. Medhat’s first inclination was to use the knife on him but she bowed gracefully

and retired to her quarters, doubting his niece would ever be able to satisfy him. She was

untrained in the arts of love and would most likely just lie there. This proved to be true,

so Herod had her killed. He hid her corpse in their wedding chamber, embalmed in

honey, and diddled it when he could not control his urges. After his necrophilia was

discovered, he had her body thrown into a hole full of spiders and sacrificed three virgins

to the Temple priests as penance. When Medhat learned of this she thanked the gods that

theirs had not been true love.

Seeing him now distressed her. He was dreadfully overweight and his once

lovely hawk-blue eyes were dull with disease. Medhat had been hearing rumors about a

curse in his privates. When he emptied his bladder there was blood.

Herod raised his baton, the signal that instructed Medhat to give him a taste.

Medhat had no choice but to comply. She wedged the strigil behind her fingers and

cupped Ginat’s breasts. Herod preferred breasts which made him a breast man, not a

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thigh man—an oddity since life burst from the thighs. Breasts merely sustained that life.

But they also symbolized fertility and were chiseled into stone to remind man where he

came from. Woman. Breasts are fine for now, she thought. If he wants more, that will

be a problem. When she saw his desire rising beneath his skirt she knew she had one.

She dropped the strigil on the floor. It rattled cavernously between the columns.

She stepped out of the pool to retrieve it, purposely letting it slide from her reach, making

even more racket. She heard him sigh with frustration. She seized the opportunity to

stand before him, shimmering wet, hoping her nakedness might be enough to channel his

thoughts off the girl and onto her; substitute in his mind what it might be like to lie with

his old flame again. She was a magnificent creature with a strong carriage he could use

as a crutch to hold him up as he thrust his rotten thing into her. Then again it might be

better if she was on top. The problem there was her hips were so potent he feared she

would pile-drive him right down through the bed. This woman was at the peak of her

sexual powers.

“May I be frank, my lord?” she said, blocking Herod’s view of Ginat.

“And I’ll be honest?”

The old banter almost brought a smile to Medhat’s face. She dropped her head in

deference, and said, “You don’t want her to just lie there, do you?”

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Herod blushed. She was right of course. That was the last thing he wanted. He’d

learned long ago that a girl under Medhat’s direct supervision became that special gift

dreams were made of, so he didn’t dare ruin the prospect for lack of patience. The

expectant light in his eyes gave way to disappointment and he turned abruptly and walked

away with as much dignity as his three-tiered belly would afford him.

That night Medhat whisked Ginat away. Herod had shown an unusually keen

interest in her. Perhaps he wouldn’t wait after all. Medhat couldn’t take that chance.

She made Ginat drink a tonic. The girl complied, still half-asleep. Then a strapping

eunuch lifted her and followed Medhat to a hidden corridor that brought them to the

outskirts of the citadel. He laid Ginat in a horse-drawn cart and Medhat took up the reins,

cracked the whip and bolted away.

The clearing lay near a river. I assumed it was the Jordan River. There was a ring

of torches, casting amber radiance over the damp tawny ground. Medhat brought Ginat

to the center of the circle and stripped her naked. The drugged girl teetered in place as

Medhat baptized her in oil. The girl shivered. “It tickles,” I heard her say.

Medhat raked her oily digits across Ginat’s tummy, stretching and massaging the

skin as if readying it for some athletic event. “The Center of the Earth resides in

Woman,” she said. “Don’t ever forget that. We didn’t come from Adam’s side. We

were created at his side, as his equal. Woman is the Garden of Life, Ginat. You are the

garden. That is what your name means!” Medhat looked up and saw the morning star

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above a low bank of purple clouds. She greased between the girl’s legs and hastened a

prayer to it, “Oh Phosphorus she is ripe for your seed. Take her and reap your harvest!”

I don’t think Ginat even heard her; she was being swept under by Medhat’s silky

touch. Medhat pulled her hands away and Ginat opened her eyes. She was dizzy and

called out for her mistress but she had vanished. The girl studied the peculiarity of the oil

on her body, glossy as molten gold in the firelight. She waited obediently. A moment

passed. Then another. When she heard the high-pitched growl she froze. With it came a

stench of decomposition so fowl she covered her nose. I even covered mine. Together

we looked for its source and saw the torches inside the circle spit forth the profile of a

man with pointed beauty, piercing cobalt eyes and sensuously molded muscle. Wings

fanned up behind him and then he was gone, poof. In his place stood a shaggy canine

with a bristling tail stiffened high over a bony haunch. Its jowls salivated, exposing

gleaming cuspids sharp and white. It drew its paws beneath its muzzle as if cranking up a

spring and its raptorial eyes set upon her.

It was a scavenger. A feeder of dead meat. A jackal.

She staggered back in fear and the beast attacked.

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CHAPTER 6

“I knew what I carried inside me, Del. It had to be destroyed. But Medhat was always

there watching me as I got bigger. I became belligerent. None of the girls wanted to

spend time with me. I sent many of them away bleeding and bruised. The last one I

stabbed through the heart. I escaped through the sewer system. Once I made it outside

the walls I headed for the monastery by the Dead Sea. I knew the monks would help me.

They were experts in medicine. But I got lost. I was weak. I had no food, no water.”

A sun flash nearly blinded me and I was now looking out across the harsh arid

Judean desert. Atop a hill overlooking a sawtooth valley were two Romans on horseback

spying a disheveled traveler making his way across the treacherous terrain, alone. They

had removed their helmets from the heat of the boilerplate sun and shared a wineskin.

One had blond hair. The other’s was black as pitch.

Gin’s voice reasserted itself. “That’s Hellus there—Hap.”

I studied the blond-haired centurion who was much younger than the man I had

met in Belizean waters aboard a PT boat. He and his partner looked about the same age.

I could see each of them clearly, right down to the stubble on their chins.

“Fool,” said Blacky, wiping the sweat from his face with the hem of his cape.

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“A fool is right in his own eyes,” said Hellus.

“How convenient there’s an axiom to justify it. I assume that is a local rhyme.”

“It comes from Proverbs.”

“And what is that?”

Hellus looked over at his friend with disappointment. “To know the enemy you

must read their stories. Listen to their prophets. Keep your ear to the street.”

“I will keep my ear pressed to the bosom of a harlot, if it’s all the same to you.

Whores talk too, you know. You beat on them long enough.” He drank his wine and

looked back at the ragged drifter. “Fool.”

“You keep drinking and there’ll be two fools in this valley I’ll have to deal with.”

“Who would build a base of operations in this hellish place?”

“Men with ideas but no means.”

“If they have no means where is the threat?”

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“The idea is the threat, Lucius.”

I blinked with surprise. So this was Lucius. Lucius Flavius Varus.

The drifter collapsed and rolled onto his back. When he did I saw what the

Romans saw—the extended belly of a pregnant girl.

“My plan was to abandon the baby after it came,” said Gin. “Let it roast to death

in the sun. But now they were involved. And ruined everything.”

Our chimera changed again. We were now inside a cave overlooking an oasis.

There was a small campfire. I heard the distant roar of a lion. The Romans had hobbled

their horses and stabled them inside the cave. Ginat gritted her teeth beneath another

contraction. Her scream shook my hallucinatory vision like a space wave in the wake of

an exploding star. Even the mossy fern along the cave’s ceiling seemed to quiver beneath

her screams. When the pain receded she muttered an anxious plea for mercy in hectic

staccato. Then she lost consciousness.

“What was that gibberish?” said Lucius.

Hellus prepared a fresh compress. “An appeal to her god, I believe.”

“And which god would that be?”

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Hellus felt her chest. “She has a strong heart. But she is bleeding.”

“Then the child will die inside her.”

“We can cut it out.”

“You can cut it out. I want nothing to do with it.”

“I have seen it done. But I am not a surgeon.”

“So you will kill her taking it. Then what? You will probably drop it. You, my

friend, are not a delicate creature.”

“Nor are you,” said Hellus.

“Rome does not pay me to be. Soldiers cannot afford to be. We are here to rule.”

“It is difficult to rule what you don’t understand.”

“I can’t abide a race that worships a bush. Even if it is ablaze.”

“The smithy honors Vulcan, does he not?” said Hellus wiping the girl’s neck.

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“Do you think he alone can forge fire hot enough to make steel? We are but instruments

of the gods, Lucius. Hers is the Moon Father, if I heard her correctly.”

“And who is that?”

“Sin. That is her god.”

“Then perhaps he heard her.” He drew his sword and offered it to him. “Put the

whore out of her misery.”

“Why do you think she’s a whore?”

“She is marked like one.”

Hellus examined the henna tattoos running up her neck. He’d seen the Vestal

Virgins in no less adornment. “She could be a priestess.”

“Except a priestess knows the secrets for preventing children.”

“So do whores—especially whores. Bring me the kanab. They say it helps.”

“I smoked it.” Hellus threw a scornful look his way. “It’s this damnable heat.

Had I known we were going to be midwives I would have saved some.”

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Hellus stood. Hap. His back ached, his hip creaked. I suffered the same irritation

on occasion. “Is there any wine left or did you drink that too?”

Lucius retrieved the wineskin from his horse. They sat at the mouth of the cave

and watched a waterfall surge from the mountain face into a pool scalded orange by the

setting sun. Once the sunlight was gone the oasis took on a lunar luster.

“There it is again,” said Hellus with a nod to a single star that commanded the

sky. It had pulsating prongs and a moonbeam around it like a celestial moat. “It’s a sign

from the gods.”

“Then let them read it.”

“They’re the ones who sent it.”

Lucius sneered. In the starlight his brooding features resembled flecked stone

bathed in angular shadow. His eyes were deeply set and watched you with the ravenous

candor of a predator. Hellus was no less carnivorous except his sociable nature was

disarming. Lucius was impulsive, even reckless in the subjugation of Rome’s enemies

whereas Hellus preferred to wear them down with politics, subterfuge and attrition.

The scream hit them squarely in the chest and they rushed back inside the cave.

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“Push!” said Hellus.

“No!”

“You have to!”

“Nooo!”

Another contraction took hold of her making it clear that she had no choice in the

matter. Her back arched, her jaw tightened, her fists clenched. The veins in her forehead

protruded like blue worms. It looked as if her belly would pop if a pin was brought to

bear. Nothing about childbirth implied beauty. Especially her screams.

“We’ve got to cut it out.”

“I’m not cutting anything. Unless it’s her throat.” Lucius grabbed the wineskin

and walked out of the cave.

“Lucius. Lucius!” Hellus looked down at the terrified girl.

“You must kill it!” she yelled.

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“What did you say?”

“You must kill it when it comes!”

“Shut up, woman.”

When Lucius heard the scratchy cries of the newborn he double-downed on drink.

He returned to the cave and saw his friend in his bulky armor cradling a bloody bulb.

“I need wine and water,” said Hellus. “And bring me some salt from my ruck.”

Lucius complied but he didn’t like being told what to do. He was surprised the

girl was still alive. Hellus set the baby with the mother and poured wine and water into

the pail. He added some salt and mixed the solution with his fingers. The girl’s raiment

was soaked with blood so he tore off part of his tunic and soaked the cloth with the

solution. He bathed the baby with it as best he could, handed it off to Lucius and fetched

a blanket from his horse. Lucius wasn’t too happy about this. The baby looked angry

and it smelled. Hellus wrapped the blanket around Ginat’s thighs and stuffed the excess

in her groin. He then tore away part of the girl’s dress and wrapped the afterbirth.

“Here,” said Lucius, hoping Hellus would simply accept the responsibility of

taking the baby back.

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“I’ve got to bury this,” said Hellus lifting the waste. “Then we’re going.”

“Where?”

“Jerusalem. I have to make a litter.”

Before Lucius could protest Hellus exited the cave. Lucius cursed the mother.

He cursed the gods. If word ever got out that a soldier such as he had played nurse maid,

well . . . and yet he was not so obtuse to miss the humor of the situation. It may not have

been a pretty baby, but it was faultless.

Having secured the mother and child to the litter the Romans paused to study the

landscape. But for the shadows beneath the camel-hump hills the world was powder

blue. The way north looked passable due to the empyrean light.

“I was lost in the beauty of the firmament,” said Gin looking up at the fabled nova

shining down on our drug-induced delirium. “But then I felt the baby slipping from my

arms. I didn’t have the strength to stop it”—her eyes cold, vengeful, justified—“so let it

return to the shit hole it came from.”

Except Hellus saw what I did: a baby in distress. He leaped from his horse and

rescued the infant before it fell off the litter.

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The girl cried out, “You must kill it!”

“I ought to kill you,” said Hellus.

She slumped back, defeated, and quietly beseeched the gods for a sign. Their

response came in the growling cacophony of approaching thunder. They must be near to

have answered so quickly, she thought, and she prattled off an earnest prayer to them in

hopes they would not judge her too harshly.

Hellus and Lucius also heard the rumble. Nine riders folded out of the blurry

distance in a deluge of commotion, their capes whipping behind them with crescent fury,

their horses thrumming up silver dust across the parched plains, thick as a tidal wave.

They took up position around the pilgrims, surrounding them.

The steeds settled into place, tamping, puffing, their hides agleam in the starlight,

their wild marble eyes beneath armor barding painting them with the malevolence of

meat eaters.

The riders were faceless turbaned sentinels, their eyes bright pinpricks behind the

scarves across their faces. They wore breastplates of bone and curved swords hooked to

wide leather girdles rimmed in onyx. Their shoulders were draped in billowy wraps that

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lifted in the wind like black sails. Then, as if summoned by an unseen sovereign, they

raised their crossbows in unison and pointed their steel-tip arrows down at the Romans.

The center rider raised his hand and cried, “The child is mine!”

Hellus and Lucius bandied an eye for this rider was a woman.

“Had you suffered the travail of this girl you might have some standing here,”

said Hellus. “But you did not.”

“The girl is my property. I have a lien on what comes from her womb.”

“You can plead your case before the prefect.”

“This is not a Roman matter. It is a decision for the king of Judea and as I am his

regent I have authority.” She pointed out Ginat for the bowmen. “Kill her.”

Hellus drew a dagger. “Rescind that order or the boy dies!”

Medhat leaned forward, the shadow across her face beneath her cone-shaped hat

curved sharp as a scythe. Her eyes glistened like volcanic glass. She waved the archers

off. “I am not leaving here without the child.”

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“You have threatened the mother and she is in our charge,” said Hellus. “That

means you have threatened Rome.”

“That was not my intent. I am sure we can resolve this without bloodshed.”

“Then lay down your arms,” said Lucius.

“That is not going to happen.”

“Then your men will carry her,” said Hellus.

“That will keep their hands occupied,” added Lucius.

Medhat admired the deft maneuver but it was the shiny steel blade beneath the

baby’s throat that compelled her to accept their terms.

The brilliance of the eight-pointed brooch lighted their way. Medhat’s men

carried Ginat on their shoulders like pallbearers. Hellus and Lucius pulled their horses

behind them while Medhat cradled the newborn in her arms.

“It is easy to become attached, no?” said Medhat of the child.

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“I’m afraid the mother does not share your sentiment,” said Hellus.

“The child consumes the mother in order to survive. It is the primal act of all

living things. She will recover.”

“You are the matron of the harem?” said Hellus changing the subject.

“I tend to Herod’s personal needs.”

“I hear he counsels with ghosts,” said Lucius.

“I have heard that rumor. He chases the phantoms of his youth.”

“In the flesh of young girls?” said Hellus.

“I have heard that rumor also. A great reward awaits you. You have saved the

Son of the Most High.”

Lucius said, “The most high of what?”

“The heavens, the earth. And everything in between.”

“He’s too ugly for that.”

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Medhat caressed the crown of the baby’s head, blue as an opal in the starlight.

“The curse of all newborns, I’m afraid. Even kings.”

“So Herod has an heir,” said Hellus.

“He is not his son.”

“Then whose son is he?” asked Lucius.

Medhat was reluctant to answer. Hellus said, “Herod will never share his throne.”

“He will serve. As will you,” said Medhat.

“Our allegiance is to Rome.”

“Your allegiance is to the god who made you.”

“Tell us, priestess,” said Lucius availing himself of drink. “What is it about this

country that inspires delusion? Are you people weaned on too much milkwine when you

are young? Nothing retards the spirit like religion. Rome is not a faith. She is a ship that

must be served or she will sink. She gives us purpose. From Hera’s breast comes the

light of the cosmos. From Rome the light the world.”

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“The light of the world, you say?” said Medhat. “Do you even know where light

comes from, centurion? It comes from darkness.” She looked up at the sky, at the

beautiful star, and cast a giant circle with her arm. “If you could gather up all the stars in

the heavens it would be but a fraction of light compared to the amount of darkness that

exists. Light comes from darkness, not darkness from light. It is the foundation of

creation. Darkness is the true face of God. It is your sanctuary. Your friend.”

Lucius belched. “Try walking home at night without a torch and you’ll be cursing

that friend. Especially after a bellyful of wine.”

Hellus let go a hearty laugh and Medhat cringed. She did not take kindly a joke

made at her expense.

“So what god made the light?” said Hellus. “Quickly! Tell me his name that I

might petition favor for my friend!”

Now Lucius laughed and handed the wineskin to Hellus. Medhat allowed the

slight to pass. She looked up at the new star. “The lucem ferre.”

Lucius glanced back at Hellus to see if he had heard her correctly.

“The ‘light bearer’?” inquired Hellus.

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“Lucifer!” answered Medhat, paying homage to the star.

“Never heard of him,” said Hellus.

“Me neither,” said Lucius.

But Ginat had. She cowered beneath the star and the name of the god Medhat

pressured her to worship years ago. Lucifer, the Light Bearer. The angel to whom God

entrusted light to spread across creation.

She turned her head away from the star and saw in the distance riders moving east

along an escarpment, off a parallel course from Medhat’s northern route. They rode

dromedaries that ambled along in long lazy strides. They were unaccompanied by any

caravan or outriders. Who would cross the Wasteland without a patrol on the periphery?

Perhaps they are nomads, she thought. But when starlight picked out a glimmer of gold

on their heads she realized it could not be so. Sheiks were known to wear fancy

headgear; merchants also. Kings certainly. Of course had they been kings they would

have had an entourage. These three rode alone.

Gin and I bathed in the psychedelia of our private Milky Way while her past life

swirled ever so slowly around us or we around it. “I knew Medhat was going to kill me,”

she said. “She didn’t need my milk. The harem had wet-nurses. That I had spawned the

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devil’s child was more than I could bear. I had to do something! But I was powerless.”

Tears filled her eyes for her former self. I watched as the young mother was

carried from the litter into Herod’s palace, Medhat overseeing every aspect of the transfer

and personally taking charge of the baby. Ginat was examined and bathed by midwives.

She was then clothed in linen and carried to bed by a tall, strongly built hairless eunuch.

She slept through the night and well into the next day. She was indifferent to her status

as a new mother. She never once asked about the baby nor did she want to feed it. When

engaged on the subject by the girls in the harem her eyes simply glazed over.

On the third day she was sitting up in bed looking out across an open balcony

when Hellus came to visit. She was absorbed in the view of the city rooftops that

dissolved in the distance beneath a shroud of misty sunlight. When she became alerted to

his presence, he read her anxiety plainly by the way her hands clenched into fists. He

wiped the air in front of his nose, “I have never been able to acclimate myself to the

smell.”

I was unsure to what he was referring until I pinpointed smoke lifting over the

Temple where priests, in lieu of cold hard cash, tithed in flesh. The exhaust of roasted

lamb mixed with sunshine generated the haze over the city which mystified Ginat.

“Do not fear me, girl. How are you feeling?” She did not answer but grimaced as

if to say What do you care? “How long have you been in Herod’s charge?”

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“One day Medhat came. I was very young.”

“And your parents, where are they?”

“I belong to Medhat.” Ginat reached for a date from a bowl and slipped the flesh

between her lips and sucked. “You may sit if you’d like.”

“Do not waste your charms on me. I am not here to be comforted.”

“I have merely asked you to sit.”

“Very well,” said Hellus. “But I have no time for daydreams.”

“But I am what daydreams were made for,” she said. “If you’d like, Medhat will

send me to you after I heal as reward for your service. I will bathe you in the sacrament

of my hair which is soft as a virgin’s thigh.”

“That will not be necessary,” said the Roman.

They watched one another without speaking. I could sense unease in Hellus. The

girl, despite her weaken condition, emitted an analgesic potency akin to morphine and

Hellus was in conflict about this; whether she repulsed him or aroused him, perhaps even

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inspired him. She sucked the date until it was dry and then said, “What am I to you?”

“Nothing,” he said.

“Then why come?”

Hellus shifted in his seat and looked around the room. “Some babes don’t take to

the milk at first—.”

She laughed. “How would you know?” She leaned forward and seethed. “Open

your eyes. They have used you just as they used me.”

“No one has used me, m’lady.”

“And that makes you a fool.”

“How does that make me a fool?”

“Because you believe it. Your ignorance does not absolve you from your sin.”

“When did I sin?”

“When you turned me over to Medhat. Whatever evil is unleashed upon the

world will be on your hands, centurion, not mine. Now leave me.”

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Hellus stood and turned towards the door and then turned back around to face her.

“If what you say is true why did you not open your veins?”

I too thought it a valid question and glanced at Gin who by my inquiring eyes

refused to look at me. Yet she side-stepped up to me and I wrapped my arms around her

like how you pull someone close for reassurance during a horror movie; the touch of our

bodies infusing us with the reinforced understanding that this was all just make believe.

The young girl’s head dropped back against the pillow. She pressed her hands

against her grief-stricken eyes. “I am jealous for my life,” she said, searching the

Roman’s face for sympathy. Before he could soften she heaved her sorrow as if a dam

had burst. He could not abide this and sat beside her and held her frail body close to him.

His brawn nearly erased any sign of her from my sight. When finally she regained some

semblance of composure he let her go and yet she was not so eager to be let go and she

looked up into his eyes and it would have been for Hellus to pull away now but he could

not, for whoever or whatever she was had riveted him and all he wanted now was to kiss

her.

Gin’s voice disrupted my focus and she faced me and I never saw whether Hellus

kissed the girl or not. Gin kissed me instead, not passionately but meaningfully, lightly

on the lips and pressed her cheek against mine and turned me back to our shared

hallucination which was murky and unclear, and she said. “Medhat cast a spell.”

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“Over who?”

My swollen peepers caught Lucius entering Ginat’s room naked as the day he was

born and dripping wet as if the priestess had bewitched him when he was bathing. He

carried Medhat’s dagger in his hand, the one Herod had given her.

Hellus leaped from shadow and grabbed him, friends suddenly enemies in a death

dance, their actions stiff as marionettes until hatred brought on the bloodlust.

They knocked over a brazier and Lucius screamed when his bare flesh made

contact with the burning coals. Hellus pulled him from the embers and rolled him across

the floor, dousing the smoldering skin with his cape.

“This was an omen of what was to befall him, I think,” said Gin. “But I don’t

want to get ahead of myself here. They set out for the mud pits the next day to aid in his

recovery. I watched them ride away. See? That’s me on the rampart.”

I saw her clearly, her small fluid frame draped in silk standing by the crenellated

wall like a fairytale princess. I watched Hap guide his wounded friend by horseback and

they rode south towards the healing muds of Ein Gedi by the Dead Sea.

My vision of this ancient world rose high in the air like a crane shot marking the

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transition between scenes in a movie as another chapter in Gin’s beguiling tale dissolved.

“I knew it was hopeless, Del. It was only a matter of time before Medhat did

away with me. I was of no use to her anymore. I returned to my room and plotted my

escape when I heard angry voices coming from somewhere below me. I peered between

the tapestries and had a clear unobstructed view of Herod’s throne room . . .”

“Do not patronize me, Medhat!” shouted Herod. “Am I so vain I would

challenge the prophets? No! I respect them! I do! I think they can hear my thoughts.

Sometimes I see them. Did I ever tell you that? They live in the shadows. They are the

ones who sent them. I am sure of it.” He raised a critical finger that one of lesser grit

than she would have felt chilling. “And I seek your consul and you have me wait?”

Medhat absorbed his threat and replied, “Who came to you, my lord?”

“I don’t know! They traveled as kings but they had no entourage. No one travels

this land alone.”

“What did they want, exactly?”

“To know where the king of the Jews was to be born. Did you not say my seed

would rout the glory of Moses? That nations would bow to the brightness of my dawn?

Or were you using your charms on me to gain my trust. I was a fool to let you take me to

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the bed!”

Herod consoled himself with wine while Medhat looked out the window at the

new star. She clutched her breast and crooned, “O Lucifer, is this not your holy light?”

She spun about. “What did you tell them?”

“We came to an understanding and I sent them on their way. I summoned you but

you did not come. Now you come with the girl and a babe from the south. Then I

recalled the prophecy. ‘But you, Bethlehem Ephrata, though you are little among the

thousands of Judah, shall bring forth he who is to be ruler of Israel.’”

Medhat intoned the name of the town, disbelieving it, an acidic enunciation.

“This girl. How do I know she is not the mother of this new king? Did you not

pass Bethlehem on your way here? Could that not be enough to fulfill the prophecy?

The light guided you, did it not? It rattles me. It comes and goes when it will. How

many children have been born since it first appeared? How will the kings know to whom

they should pay homage? Will they return and tell me as they promised? I think not.

How then can I pay tribute? Did the star shine for her?”

“The child is no threat to you.”

Herod roared, “Did the star shine for her!”

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“I cannot say, sire. I was not there when she delivered.”

“How then can we know? Tell me true, Medhat. I fear the prophets are listening

to us. The diviners, the necromancers. Those who court the Moon God. And where is

he? Even he has run from the star. Call your priests. Tell them I have gold for them.

Tell them I will tithe a full year’s worth. For the entire Jewish na—Mariamne? Is that

you?”

Herod trembled under his delusions. Medhat moved away from the blue light

shining in through the window—the light she now feared did not belong to her god at all.

She cursed herself and turned to Herod. “You must kill them.”

She shook him out of his despair until he focused on her. She could smell his

rancidness, the dirty mop of beard, the yeasty skin bubbling with subcutaneous sores.

His breath was vinegary and his eyes were pale and frightened.

“Kill who?”

“The babes. And the boys. Yes, kill the boys too. Every boy up to two years.

That is the only way to destroy the star.”

“Y-you want me to kill the children?”

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“Kill them all!”

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CHAPTER 7

“That’s when I saw my chance,” said Gin. “My only problem was Medhat. So I

summoned her. She saw my intent to seduce her. Of course I was too sore to do

anything. I had just given birth. I just needed her to get close to me. I stabbed her. I had

this mad rush of strength and I nearly tore her head off. I made my way to the baby and

took it.” Gin looked over at me. “There was a fire. Did you know that?” I shook my

head. “Strange the history books don’t mention it. Herod came for me. There he is.

See? The snake. When he worked himself into a tizzy he needed a woman to lie with

him. He didn’t care I was just a child.”

Herod moved through Ginat’s room like a wolf spider. He tiptoed up to the bed

and pulled back the covers hoping to view the supple roundness of breast, perhaps a

protruding nipple from beneath her nightwear. That would have been enough to pounce.

He was a breast man. But what he saw instead were the jeweled ruby eyes of the snake

knife smiling beneath Medhat’s death stare. He stumbled back in shock and steadied

himself beside a brazier and tried to catch his breath when Medhat said, “A moment,

please, old king?” His mistress approached him with her arms out from her sides as if

wanting an embrace. But they were backwards, the elbows facing the king, as was her

face, sort of looking at him, cockeyed and hanging between her shoulder blades above the

knife and the blood dripping down her spine. Her fanny cheeks jiggled. “I just need an

adjustment,” she said. Herod hurled the brazier down upon her and she was engulfed in

flames. She spun around, spitting blazing embers from her core like an exploding

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hornet’s nest. The room erupted in flames and Herod ran out screaming, “Fire! Fire!”

Ginat hid behind the barn where Herod’s assassins were sharpening their swords

for their assault on Bethlehem. I watched as she commandeered a horse and rode away.

“I was bleeding terribly,” said Gin. “I had to get to Bethlehem before Herod’s

men. I didn’t care about the consequences. I had given birth to the antichrist. The

screams still haunt me, Del. It was a slaughter.”

I watched as Ginat dismounted with the baby and entered a house as soldiers ran

through the streets butchering the innocent.

“They killed boys and girls. They didn’t care. And it didn’t matter how old they

were, either. I laid the baby on the table and hid. It was crying just like any baby. I

almost . . . no. Then Lucius ran in. I don’t know how he found me. It was clear to me he

was still under Medhat’s spell. But Hap saved me again. They nearly killed each other.

Then Herod’s men broke in and killed the baby and . . . Oh God! The earth began to

shake. The house broke into pieces and the floor came up. These horrible things—

skeletal things—slapped at our feet, trying to grab us. It was terrifying. They grabbed

Lucius by the ankles and Hap did everything he could to hold him. I don’t think they

knew who they had. They would have taken us all if they could. But they took Lucius.

Hap carried me out and laid me down in the street. The town was on fire with dead

children everywhere. We heard Lucius screaming. The earth had spat him back. He was

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burning like a matchstick and Hap tackled him and rolled him in the dirt until the fire was

out. I got up and ran.”

I felt sick to my stomach. Bodies of children were impaled, decapitated, torn

asunder. Bethlehem was burning. Jerusalem was burning. I couldn’t watch any more of

this. I wanted out of this, whatever it was. This high. I wanted to come down.

Gin turned me away from the carnage. Taking shrooms used to make me laugh.

That was half the fun of taking them. But, as with any hallucinogen, there is the risk of

having a bad trip which apparently was what I was having.

“I didn’t see Hap for many years,” said Gin coaxing me back. “I grew up. I ran a

house. It was the only thing I knew. One day Lucius walked in. He recognized me and

took me for his own. I had no choice in the matter. He did things to me, Del . . . never

mind. I guess it was his way of punishing me for what happened to him. Children

taunted him. Soldiering was his life and he’d always believed he was destined for glory.

But it was Hap who made the news. His exploits were becoming the stuff of legend.

Lucius was incensed and he took it out on me. I let him. I think I liked it. I felt I

deserved it. What makes us think like that, Del? One day he beat me so violently I

couldn’t see from all the blood. His jealousy of Hap was eating him up inside. I found

myself on the streets. I wandered down to the river. I saw the man they called the

Baptist. I felt nothing for him and went into the desert to die.

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“I’m not sure how I survived. I found a cave. I don’t know how long I stayed.

Days. Weeks. I lived like an animal. I don’t remember leaving and I found myself by

the river again. I saw the rabbi and followed him. I stayed on the outskirts like a dog.

But I was drawn in. Because I saw what everyone else saw. There is no other way to

explain a broken leg becoming straight again, Del, or a blind man—a man I knew to be

blind—suddenly have his sight. Say what you will. I was there. I saw them for what

they were. They were miracles, plain and simple. The women welcomed me as one of

their own. But my sin was too great.”

“What sin? You killed a demon!”

“I killed the devil’s son!” She was shaking. I wanted to comfort her but didn’t

know how. Together we watched as she burst through a small crowd and prostrated

herself at Jesus’ feet. She sobbed and begged forgiveness. “I bathed his feet with my

tears and dried them with my hair. Then he touched me on the head and I had a reason to

live again. But the story doesn’t end there, my love. Watch.”

So I did.

I saw Hellus’ triumphant entrance into Rome where Caesar crowned him with a

golden laurel and whispered something in his ear.

I saw him return to Jerusalem, a hero.

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“He came back for me,” said Gin. “It took me some time to realize this. It was

not forbidden to marry a Roman. Our culture was rife with political wedlock. It was a

year before I even let him kiss me. We married in secret. He cupped my cheek and said

‘ištî and I cupped his and said ‘îšî . And it was done.”

She looked at me, blushing like a child, and translated the words for my benefit—

“my wife”, “my husband”. I nodded, understanding. So simple. So pure.

“I guess you could say he converted that very night.”

“You Jewish vixen you.”

She smiled. “Well, to bed a Jew is to marry us all. But word got out he was

Roman. He was skeptical of Jesus and everyone was skeptical of him. As for Lucius,

Pilate commissioned him to stamp out the rebels. Many believed their leader was Jesus.

He wasn’t, of course. Jesus preached peace. The zealots wanted war and Lucius quickly

determined there wasn’t a sword between us so he left us alone. For the most part.

“Hellus and I stayed with Jesus. He taught us how to pray. It was so strange at

first, the sitting together with our eyes closed, listening to our hearts beat, the birds in the

air, the rustle of the trees. I’ve never felt such peace. Over time Hap and I could sit for

hours, right alongside the disciples, and soon we were, I’m not sure, some place else,

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some glorious place, Del. Simply glorious. Inside a sound, if you can believe that.

Inside our own heartbeat. That’s what it felt like. Like we were not only listening to the

symphony of creation, we were the symphony, the song itself. And yet . . . ”

We were sitting at the bar now and I couldn’t recall us descending the stairs from

the bedroom. But there we were on our barstools, naked as jaybirds, drinking like fishes

while just over our shoulders lay the drifting sands of ancient times beckoning us return.

My hand was trembling as I took a drag off my cigarette. I was pouring sweat.

Gin’s pupils were big as dimes which meant mine were also. We were still tripping.

Man, were we ever. I watched how an umbrella of fairies misted her in sparkling powder

until she glistened like a golden fleece. I saw how she shivered with melancholy as she

finished her thought, saying something that even she couldn’t believe, “And yet I went

back to Lucius. Can you believe that? After how he treated me? Are we that damaged a

species we seek out ways to hurt ourselves? Why? Because of shame, I think.”

“What did you have to be ashamed about? He nearly beat you to death.”

She looked away and I followed her stare and we were again circling the old dead

past, coasting on the thermals like condors.

The Roman contingent of eighty cavalry entered Jerusalem with crushing force.

Merchants hurried their wares inside the protection of their shops and youngsters darted

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into alleyways lest they be trampled to death by Pontius Pilate and his centuria of heavily

armed men. When he reached the gates of the Antonia fortress, he found Lucius waiting.

It irked Lucius to have to pay tribute to an official of the equestrian order—the

lower rank of governors. Pilate’s contribution to Rome was dubious at best. At least

when Hellus arrived, his value had been earned, paid in full, in blood. They embraced as

brothers and Hellus even gifted his friend the golden laurel Caesar had placed on his head

after he whispered wisdom in his ear and praised him for his service.

With the spring festival of Passover approaching Pilate was required to abandon

his palatial estate in Caesarea, the administrative center of the province, and govern from

Jerusalem which was not at all unwise since the city would be inundated with half a

million Jews there to celebrate. If Lucius and Pilate agreed on anything, it was that the

three thousand soldiers under their command were inadequate for such a mob.

Pilate’s barracuda ogle never ceased to amaze Lucius. Eyes black as a doll’s.

Eyes that missed nothing. Due to a stroke he suffered when he was a boy his face looked

unbalanced. He had a powerful nose over thin slanted lips, a flushed complexion and a

bald head. When he was riled his face calcified, accentuating the malice in his soul.

He washed the trail dust from his face, noting Lucius standing before him. What

caught his eye was the centurion’s sneer at the bar of discoloration on the prefect’s skull.

A birthmark. Embarrassingly noticeable now that he was hairless. It didn’t bother Pilate.

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He considered it a mark from the gods. What bothered him was Lucius’ reaction to it.

He’s one to talk, he thought. One look at him and children run screaming into the night.

“What news of the territory?”

“One of their ringleaders, a man named Barabbas, has been captured.”

Pilate gave this news a moment’s deliberation. “I understand Hellus Apollus has

taken his leave here. You two served together when you were young, is that correct?”

“We were stationed outside Hebron, at the garrison there.”

“Did he aid in this man’s capture?”

“Sire? No. I made the arrest.”

“You would be wise to seek his counsel. He is highly regarded in Rome. I do not

have to tell you what will happen if we don’t break this insurgency. You will reinstate

him on a provisionary basis. I want results.” He studied the desiccated tissue on the

centurion’s face. “Fail me and I will burn the other half.”

Hellus spent his days with Jesus and the disciples near the Galilean lake where

they fished. His successful campaigns against the enemies of Rome had given him the

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necessary influence to leave the military. He took to the fisherman’s trade as if he’d been

weaned on it. He set the nets, maintained the rigging, scraped the hulls and repaired the

sails. He ate with his adoptive family and slept beside them. He traveled with them and

listened to the rabbi’s words which he often ignored because his attention was on Ginat.

But acceptance of a Roman into Jesus’ band of confederates had not been gifted.

Hellus had earned the right to be there. Until Hellus joined the crew no one had been

able to protect the rabbi once the healings began and the crowds became so large. Jesus

grew fatigued as his grace and power were sucked out of him. Like how a bitch lies

exhausted after feeding her pups. His height lessened. The brawn in his shoulders

withered. The color drained from his face; and with it went the glow in his eyes like

headlights dimming from a weak battery. The disciples did not know what to do. But

Hellus saw what was happening. Perhaps it was his indifference to the prospect of death

that induced him to act. As a soldier he’d done battle with Rome’s enemies since he was

a young man. A mob of the overly enthusiastic could be just as dangerous. He used his

arms like battering rams. He knocked people aside. He knocked some right off their

feet. When he reached the rabbi he threw him over his shoulder and carried him to safety

before the people lifted him over their heads and passed him from one to another like a

supplicant in a mosh pit. Because of this the disciples adopted Hellus as one of their

own.

“You know his name wasn’t Jesus, don’t you?”

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“Joshua.”

It was just as well she asked me a question because I think I was really beginning

to lose it. I suppose I felt like the astronauts feel the first time they go into space and

look out the window and see Earth below them and realize it’s not a dream. They are

really there. I was really there, witnessing parts of the past connected to the greatest story

ever told. A fly on the wall, a shadow with eyes.

She kneaded the back of my neck, her nipples poking my back with warmth and

frostiness simultaneously and I was unsure which sensation I preferred, and I said, “In

Hebrew the word is Yehoshuah which means ‘salvation’. Yehoshuah was shortened to

Yeshua. Yeshua ha Notzri. Hmm. Josh of Nazareth? Doesn’t quite have the same ring,

does it?”

“Be respectful. Remember you’re high.”

“Yeah. I am that,” I said.

The softness of her touch, the strength of her hands and then the probing of her

knuckles into the deeper caverns up and down my spine invigorated me in ways that

made we want to fall back as one would into a pool of water, or off a cliff knowing the

loving universe filled with its blanket of stars would break my fall, envelop me and send

me aloft on its cushion of waves to deeper fulfillment.

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I continued my exposition: “For the Scriptures to be enjoyed by the masses, they

needed to be translated from the Hebrew into Greek. Greek was the common language in

the world back then. The language of trade. If you wanted to do business you had to

know Greek. When the scribes came to the name Yehoshuah, they didn’t know what to

do with it since Joshua did not exist in the Greek language. The closest they could come

was Jesus. It’s the Latin form of the Greek. Joshua is a pretty common name. A lot of

Joshuas out there, I would think.”

“A lot of Judases too. Judas is the Hellenized version of the name Judah.”

“Like Judah Ben-Hur?” I said, half-jokingly.

“What else?”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s open mike night.”

“Oh. OK. So the Hebrew Yeshua became the Greek Iesous which turned into the

Latin Iesus.”

“Right. You really do read.”

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Her comment caught me off guard. It prodded me to self-reflect.

Suddenly the mushroom demon, nodding apologetically, drilled a fresh new hole

into the squishy brain pan of my psychedelia and what I saw bubbling up at the bottom

were my sins. The ones I try to keep buried.

Yep. I read. Used to anyway. During Erica’s rehabilitation I read a great deal. It

was the closest I ever came to joining a church. Books helped me escape the reality I had

created for myself. I found everything I needed but what I needed most—forgiveness.

So I took turns sitting in the pews of various denominations because I’d heard I could

find it there. Even though I was skeptical of all things processed, including food for the

soul, I knew I needed something. What I’d done to Erica demanded remittance. And if

my act of contrition didn’t work (and I feared it was just that, an act) I’d give the deacons

the OK to just drown my sorry ass in the baptistery.

During the second year of Erica’s recovery I found myself at a Baptist church on

Christmas Eve. A midnight mass. All the prayer in the world could not change what I

had done to her but at least I wasn’t drinking anymore—well, mostly. I had chosen a

new path for myself even though I still owned a bar. I could play the part of Sam Malone

and stick to drinking tonic and lime while I welcomed everyone to Cheers. Making the

effort to change is what God remembers, not whether you succeed.

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The denomination seemed out of place in the grand old gothic structure. As if the

Baptists had run out all the Catholics. Great bronze hexagonal lanterns hung from the

beamed A-frame ceiling. The pulpit was an up-ended boat shape of expert woodworking.

The sanctuary was decorated with Christmas trees with bows of garland across the altar.

But beneath the triptych of lancet stained-glass windows stood the Ludwig drums,

Yamaha keyboard, Squire Bass and Fender Stratocaster guitars. Gone were the glorious

golden pipes of the Great Organ that had once reached to the sky.

Everyone was dressed to the nines. We sang Christmas carols. The highlight of

the service came when children were ushered forward by their parents to sit at the

pastor’s feet. He sat in a wingback chair, in a suit and tie. Looked like a banker. He

asked the kids what they wanted for Christmas. Some of the answers had us all laughing.

Then he ruined the evening.

The pastor leaned forward as if he was about to divulge a secret and reminded

them that Jesus died for their sins. That was why we celebrated Christmas. Yes, it was

his birthday, he said, but we must remember we were sinners. Sinners all.

I became enraged. Sinners, huh? They’re children, you idiot! Three, four, five

years old. A few terrible twos. A pair of mothers cradling newborns. The only thing

these children had in common was they missed their mother’s milk. They certainly had

no comprehension of death, much less sin. My mood soured and I made a beeline for the

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door.

I blinked away my memory of the botched Christmas Eve service—and Erica.

Gin’s touch had turned cold, or my acceptance of it had.

I slipped off the bar stool and moved behind the bar. When past sins froth up—

when my past sins froth up—I seek shelter in the mechanics of fixing a drink.

After refreshing Gin’s drink I continued my examination of the most cherished

and vilified name in the history of language. Jesus.

“The letter ‘J’ wasn’t invented until the 16th century. As late as the 17th century

the King James Bible was still being printed spelling the name with the Roman ‘I’. By

this time a controversy arose over the proper spelling. But convincing the Church to

change the letter to ‘J’ was like convincing Congress to amend the Constitution—it ain’t

gonna happen.”

“Except it did.”

“Yeah. The problem here was that many traditionalists objected to the change.

And for their dissension they were put to death. Burned at the stake. All over a freaking

letter. That’s coconut crazy, man.”

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We sat on our bar stools in silence staring into the bar mirror beneath the Skivvies

neon sign.

“What I dislike is how the name is used now,” said Gin. “Like a cuss word.”

“Yeah.”

Our bloated eyeballs watched our reflection evaporate in the glass as the ever-

tingling spark of the magic mushrooms reignited a fresh hallucination . . .

Jesus and his small band of expatriates approached from over a rise, walking with

purpose, fanning up road dust. People descended from all sides like ants to a sugar cube.

Again my vision was blocked as if I was being purposely denied access. I half-expected

and got something other than the Byzantine depictions of him in murals down through the

centuries—that of a tall figure with haloed blond hair. It was, however, by his hair I

managed to identify him among the curly black heads of the disciples because the sun

brought out pale whiskey highlights in his tangled titian locks. Like splintered bronze

beams of light on the ocean’s surface at eventide. He had a slight beard beneath high

smooth cheekbones, and despite his relative youth, he exuded the presence of a much

older soul. His teeth were not perfectly straight or dazzling as Hollywood portrays him

but his smile was effortless and inviting. His magnetic gaze was not unlike that of a

movie star on opening night, beaming excitedly from their recessed bunkers beneath a

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pronounced brow. He had a boxer’s nose, a steel worker’s chin, and strong squared-off

chops. He and his disciples were deeply tanned; they from making a living off the sea

and he from years working outside with his dad in the desert regions of Judea, salvaging

acacia trees, an excellent wood ideal for building furniture, or during their pilgrimages

into the Lebanon hills for its fragrant cedar. Such a grind as this resulted in his broad

shoulders and muscular arms. In contrast to the many drawings that show him in flowing

robes, he was dressed in a knee-length tunic, or chiton. Across his shoulders was a thin

woolen cloak that swung behind him. I assumed it was a tallith, a simple Jewish prayer

shawl, but then I noted tassels and a dull indigo stripe along the fringes defining it as a

tzitzith.

“I thought he was taller,” I said.

“No. He was no taller than Peter, actually. Had he been, Judas would not have

needed to identify him with a kiss to the Temple guards when he was arrested.”

I leaned forward to get a better look at his eyes which were a stunning shade of

hazel. What I saw next gave me such a rush Gin steadied me where I sat. There was

something in his eyes. Around the pupils. Like coffee spots. They reminded me of

miniature planets. If Christ bore a birthmark, I’d think they’d have to be in the eyes,

wouldn’t you?

I was fixated on him, or he on me, and I was suddenly sucked inside his gaze . . .

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The love between Hellus and Ginat began to unravel. His amorous overtures

went ignored. Even when they rested for the night she kept him at arm’s length. She

slept with the other women, remaining separate from him, niddah, as if it was her time of

the month. It was almost too easy for Ginat to fashion a plausible tale. How she had

caught him lusting after another woman. Why would she make up such a story if it

wasn’t true? She needed this diversion to maintain her covert foreplay with a new

arrival. At first she was rattled and then she grew excited. Why should the vow of

commitment she took with Hellus prevent her from honoring the desire of another man?

She could easily slake both their lusts. She recognized Lucius despite his disguise. She

didn’t warn the others, didn’t want to, even though she knew he had ulterior motives. He

was there to spy on the rabbi. It seemed as if everyone was spying on the rabbi. What

really thrilled her was the idea he wanted her back.

Then a most unusual thing occurred in Caesarea on the coast overlooking the

Mediterranean.

Jesus had spent the past several days clashing with the hounds of the Sanhedrin.

Also present were rebels who were having a difficult time accepting his turn-the-other-

cheek message. The priests, however, felt vindicated when this so-called Man of Peace

berated his star pupil, Peter. Those who were close enough to hear testified later how the

rabbi seemed to have personalized the word for “adversary”. In effect calling it by name.

As if the enemy of a man’s thoughts could even be such a thing. Hearing this upset the

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priests for they were staunch adherers to the letter of the law. There was no room for

flights of the imagination. Satan was a corruptible force of nature. You didn’t

personalize such things. You just dealt with them. But apparently the rabbi had

personalized it, or so it sounded. The priests did not know what had set him off, nor had

they heard any harsh words preceding the rabbi’s chastisement of the man whom they

understood had once been a Galilean fisherman. Hellus too did not understand the

rabbi’s eruption. At the time he was preoccupied with Ginat who was preoccupied with

Lucius standing nearby. Lucius was careful not to divulge his identity to Hellus and kept

his face covered. But his eyes were clearly on Ginat when they weren’t on Jesus.

When Jesus rebuked Peter, Hellus scanned the faces of the rabbi’s favorite twelve

to gain some insight to what he had missed, and that was when Jesus leveled his gaze

upon him, of all people, and said, “For the Son of man shall join the Father with the

angels and reward every man according to his works. But mark my words and do so

solemnly. For there are some of you who will never die. Not until you see me coming in

my kingdom.” His hot eyes swung off Hellus to Ginat who trembled, and then on to

Lucius who held the rabbi’s scowl for as long as he dared before casting his eyes to the

ground. Jesus then walked away. Lucius folded back into the crowd and Ginat spurned

Hellus as if he were the reason for the rabbi’s outburst.

Ginat was still reeling in the prophetic verse as she sat on a flat stone on the

Mount of Olives overlooking Jerusalem. Seated on the terraced hillside below her feet

were Jesus and the disciples. When she saw Hellus approaching she considered bringing

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up the rabbi’s augury but changed her mind. Best to let what happened in Caesarea stay

in Caesarea.

He sat beside her on the stone. A gentle acceptance and a shared awe rose

between them over what they both knew they were becoming: new creatures in Christ.

Hellus longed for her touch and she seemed in a yearning for his also. But when he

scooted closer to her she scooted away, as if their union was forbidden. He was about to

confront her about her strange behavior when a young boy ran up the hill and knelt before

Ginat and opened his hands. Her face brightened and she gladly accepted the amulet as if

it had been agreed upon before hand. As if she’d ordered it and he was simply the

delivery person. He then took off back down the hill.

“Relation?”

“I may adopt him as the little brother I never had.”

“Or son.”

She was taken aback. “I will never have children,” she said. “After what

happened I can’t believe you could possibly think I would ever want to try.”

“Forgive me. It is easy to forget the past.” He tried to make light of it. “I

suppose that is why stonecutters are in such high demand.” She disapproved of his

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comedy, so he changed the subject. “Tell me about your new acquisition.”

She held up the charm for him to see. “It’s a hamesh,” she said. She described

what the fingers represented. At this time there were no engraved markings on its palm,

no sign of the god Sin. She opened the palm for Hellus to see. It revealed a cavity, just

large enough for tiny Hebrew texts which men wore inside their tefillin, a practice denied

women. Apparently Ginat disagreed with the tradition and was going to use the amulet

as her own personal phylactery. She seemed hesitant to put it on, though. Instead she set

it beside her and focused on the rabbi who was cast in a faint corona from the sunbeams

poking through the trees, the city of Jerusalem sprawled across the plateau behind him.

Of the city Hellus said, “There is a strange light to this place.”

“How do you mean?”

“I am not sure. Like layers. Just beyond what I think I’m seeing. Like a falling

star. You’re sure you saw one but when you look and the sky is empty? Like that.”

“Sounds to me like you’re suffering from a bad case of heat stroke.”

“There is something here. I can feel it.”

“Like a pulse.”

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“Yes.”

“I feel it at night. Something behind the air?”

“Yes!”

She nodded. “For a Roman to feel it is something. After all you’re a pagan.”

“Then we must be related because that’s what we Romans call you Jews.”

She guffawed and gave him a playful rap on the shoulder. She then looked down

the hillside at Jesus. “He is the light you seek, Hellus.”

Before he could respond she was moving away, up the hill. He let her go, not

feeling welcomed enough by her to want to follow. It upset him. They didn’t even live

together. She slept with the other women whom Jesus had welcomed as disciples.

It was almost as if she was reliving her life in Herod’s harem, though the relationship

between the women and Jesus was completely benign—except, perhaps, for the one

whom everyone knew as the Magdalene, the one whom Ginat had the most in common.

She was always at Jesus’ side. Seeing them behave as if they were married unsettled

Hellus because Hellus and Ginat were married and growing farther apart every day.

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When sunbeams shifted overhead and bathed the stone, the amulet shimmered.

Hellus set off after Ginat to return it to her, moving beneath the laden boughs of olive

trees. Their twisted swollen trunks seemed suitable homes for hobgoblins and gnomes.

There were niches and nooks large enough to hide in and it was just such an alcove that

concealed them. They were pawing each other with unbridled passion. Hellus stumbled

back in shock. If Ginat was frightened of Lucius she showed no sign of it here. Their

lust could have started a fire.

He didn’t recall leaving the mount, trekking down its tiered façade and returning

to the city. He didn’t recall how many darkened streets he aimlessly roamed, how many

harlots propositioned him, how many beggars pawed at his feet, how many stinking

faceless forms darted out from the sinister shadows and were summarily beaten back with

his iron fists. He didn’t recall how many foul hole-in-the-walls he visited to drink down

his sorrow before he stumbled across one with a mark above the door that resonated. A

crescent atop a triangle that was split through by a stake.

He made his way up the stairs and came to a rooftop bordered by columns.

Tapestries hung between the columns, flapping lazily in the desert winds. The open-air

tavern was simmering with titillation. The flicker of jewels was all that marked the

shadowy shapes in dishabille which undulated on low couches, enticing Hellus to

investigate further.

A certain refinement existed in the licentiousness as if the sexes preferred the art

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of foreplay to the base animal act itself. Turbaned dignitaries, Jerusalem nobility and

Roman aristocracy tasted each other while exotic dancers swayed to music and hostesses

poured wine and assisted those smoking kanab and hashish with long flaming embers.

Hellus was no sooner settled across a couch than two women in transparent

coverlets embroidered in scrolls of peony greeted him with a silver salver of lilac water to

wash his hands and a goblet of wine to drink. They slipped off his sandals and massaged

his feet. They kneaded his calves and worked up his thighs. A tiny ceramic bowl of

cannabis was pressed to his lips and he inhaled deeply.

A portly man wearing a tiara and a beard flecked with shavings of gold lounged

beside him. He wore scales of silk in honor of Dagon, the fish-god, and more mascara

around his eyes than his female companion, a fine Nubian creature with pearls in her hair.

“You have the wolf in you,” he said to Hellus. “That is what they saw when you

entered. They are always on the lookout for one such as you. Only a wolf can please a

woman in the way she wants most to be pleased. I will never be able to cause such a stir

but I am jolly and women take pleasure in a cheerful soul. Especially one with means.”

Hellus’ drunken depression was stripped away by something more tingling. He

allowed it to take hold of him and he smoked more, for he hoped to become a part of

something larger than himself. He wanted to go somewhere wine could never take him.

The cannabis instilled in him a strange aura of confidence, dispelling the exhaustive

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defeat of losing Ginat. “I am a wolf,” he affirmed.

“It is good a man knows himself. I am Moshiah.” He passed the pipe back to

Hellus. “Let us embark on the search together.”

“I am in search of the gods.”

“There are many gods. Which god exactly? Or are you a Jew?”

“The god Sin. I will prostrate myself before her. I will carry her sigel into battle.

I will hold high her banners. I will worship her above all others if she would but show

herself to me.”

“And why would you do this?”

“Do you know of this god?”

“Everyone here seeks her. She is the Moon Mother whose breast we long to

suckle again. Whose loins we pray will draw us back inside. He is the Moon Father

whose wisdom we try to emulate in this awful world. We are all devotees.”

Moshiah raised his forearm and showed Hellus the symbol tattooed on his arm—

the one Hellus had seen outside the entryway, except the crescent and the triangle were

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flanked by four puffy spiraling horns. Hellus recognized them from his study of Hebrew

mysticism. In the Book of Zechariah. The horns were nicknamed the “Four Craftsmen”.

They represented divine power that would destroy Israel’s enemies. The women

massaging Hellus’ feet then revealed their tattoos. Each depicted the crescent and

triangle amidst camouflage. Butterflies flew around the symbol on the first woman. A

dragon encircled the symbol on the second. Moshiah pointed to the symbol enveloped by

the dragon’s wings. “She has a fiery temperament, thus she decorates her skin with a

dragon that protects the crescent moon up above and the pyramid down below.” He

nodded to the other woman. “This one holds dear the innocence of the heart in her

display of the Cleopatra butterfly, one of nature’s most beautiful. It dances around the

crescent moon like it dances through the heavens.”

“The crescent and the pyramid,” intoned Hellus.

“Yes. The God of Heaven and the God of Earth. It is the same god. A wolf, I

think, would be your signature if you decided to join us. As I said—as you have said—

you are a wolf. Now you must tell me, my friend. Why do you seek our god?”

“Because I am lost and . . . and I so much want to be found.”

When he heard himself say those words he was overcome with grief. Tears

poured from his eyes and the women were duly sympathetic to his torment. They retired

their roles of seduction and came to Hellus’ aid with maternal compassion. Hellus

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sobbed in their arms until he could sob no more.

“First,” said Moshiah. “You must forgive yourself. Our god is the god of

forgiveness. Until you do you are a man with no legs who wants to walk in the light.

That will never happen until you make peace with your adversary.”

“What adversary?”

“Your head is filled with evil thoughts, no? That is the adversary spinning its

web. We allow it too much power in our lives. We need only take a stand against it as

God intended. Bring up thy fist and declare it gone!”

“You said make peace with it.”

“You cannot destroy it. Only God can destroy it. But until He does it is our fight

to win. Or to lose. Human beings have great power. That power resides in the tongue.

Affirm your greatness. Affirm your strength. Affirm your happiness. And the adversary

will have no hold over you.”

Hellus recalled the rabbi rebuking Peter in Caesarea, not with his fist but with his

words; a declaration. A declaration against this thing Moshiah called “adversary” which

was torturing Peter’s mind. Get thee behind me, satan!

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“One day goodness will reign,” said Moshiah. “But there is much work to be

done before that can happen. This is all I meant by ‘making peace with it’. Its true

nature is chaos but mankind’s true nature is peace. Bringing order to chaos, however, is

not always a peaceful process. You are Roman, are you not? Then you know this to be

true.” The Jew brought the pipe back to Hellus’ lips. “Come. Let us make our own

peace. We shall take the trip together. Let us embrace aliyat neshama—the ascension of

the soul. Smoke. Smoke! And let the waters of Shabbos cleanse our spirit.”

Hellus filled his lungs to bursting. He fell back across the pillows, into oblivion.

Meanwhile Ginat was for Lucius everything Medhat had taught her to be. Lucius

was rough, as usual, but the wine in their heads offset the pain of their carnal excess.

They were both riotously drunk when she helped him home, or he helped her. His

garrison quarters with the wet stink awaited him. She would stay with friends in the city.

With a sloppy kiss she sent him on his way. She sashayed down the narrow

corridor, laughing. He was amazed how he could still hunger for her after all they had

done to get their passion for each other out of their system.

He was clumsy in his nightly bedtime ritual. He would have preferred to simply

fall in the cot but the room lacked adequate ventilation and he was already soaked

through with perspiration. He pulled off his stained tunic and his body odor nearly

knocked him over. But the whip across his back took care of that. Then another whip

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slashed him from the opposite side. He fell to his knees and the whips took turns. There

was nowhere to crawl off to so he curled his head between his knees and surrendered to

the beating. When at last the whipping stopped he saw three pairs of sandaled feet. He

then noted the stannic-sweet smell of his blood mixed with the dampness of the floor and

heard the dull chime of metal as wine was poured into a goblet.

“This Barabbas is a beggar,” said Pilate. “He has no means. You can’t fight a

war without funds. Give me the source or Caesar will hear that your duty to him has

been subverted by your infatuation with a whore. You have until I finish my drink.”

Lucius felt the floggers’ presence on either side of him, no doubt ready to resume

the whipping, but he would rather die beneath the lash than yield to the demands of a man

he did not respect. “Where I find comfort is my business,” said Lucius. “And don’t think

for one minute your position with the emperor is any less tenuous than mine. You’re the

one he put in charge of this piss pot. Not me.” His eyes swung over to the golden laurel

Hellus had received from Caesar. He’d had dreams about it. The wreath should have

been conferred upon him, not Hellus. Hellus was weak but lucky. Lucius would lie

awake at night mulling over different scenarios that would thrust him into glory. Bearing

false witness seemed the most promising but the right opportunity had never presented

itself. Now it had. Even if it was an act of desperation Lucius felt he had nothing to lose.

His career was going nowhere. Hellus had achieved the fame and riches that should have

been his. What a coup for him to be the one to expose Caesar’s champion as a traitor.

He looked up at Pilate. “I can give you what you want. But Caesar will not like it.”

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Ginat sat looking at the stars atop the rooftop where she would sleep. She had no

friends who offered sanctuary. That had been a lie. Humanity had disowned her. The

gods had disowned her. She was an orphan to both worlds. Knowing this strengthened

her. She was playing a dangerous game with the Romans and she knew it. The rabbi was

also a part of the plan—the one she could not yet see clearly. She envisioned the forces

of the universe were on a collision course. If that was true she would be there to pick up

the pieces. She was a survivor.

The next morning Hellus found himself with an aching pain in his head and a

burning one on his arm. It took him several moments to recognize what was causing him

such discomfort. He crawled to a nearby table in search of something to drink. The

buffet tables were still ripe with food, despite being a feast for the morning birds. When

the effects of the alcohol lifted his spirits he looked at his arm with a new appreciation.

The tattoo was of a wolf. Many soldiers wore wolf tattoos. He recalled the portly fellow

and his generosity in their discussion of the god Sin. Now Hellus was the bearer of that

god’s mystical mark. The symbol was camouflaged inside the wolf’s face. How clever.

My mind viscerally reflected Gin’s visions.

“When Hap found out about my love for Lucius I thought he was going to kill me.

But he didn’t do anything. What he did do was stalk me. It was frightening. His way of

punishing me without punishing me. He often came to see me at the bar where I worked.

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He returned my necklace and showed me that god-awful tattoo. What did he expect that

would do? Men can be so, I don’t know, needy. There, I said it. He talked about

moving to Rome. I suppose he thought a change would do me good. He could parade

me there like a trophy wife. Really that’s the only reason Lucius wanted me. But Judea

was my home and if he couldn’t accept me there and forgive me—you see that’s it right

there, Del. He just couldn’t forgive me for picking Lucius over him. Lucius suspected

Hap was helping the insurgency. He wasn’t—not overtly anyway. They were sharing

their last meal together when all hell broke loose.”

“They who?”

“Jesus and his disciples. I was standing in the hallway watching them through a

hole in the door.”

“At Mark’s house?”

Gin looked at me. “You mean his mother’s.”

“Right, right.”

“No one knows where the upper room was.”

“Except you.”

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“Well, I was there,” she said with a modest smile. “Mary’s house comes into play

based on a sixth century inscription. But how can you trust something written five

hundred years after the event? Catholics claim it was inside a synagogue which they call

the Cenacle from the Latin word cēnō which means ‘I dine’. Well, we did serve food.

That much is true. But it wasn’t in a synagogue.”

“So where was it?”

“Above a saloon. It was the perfect cover, actually. A place the Temple priests

would never think to look for him. He and his disciples came often but women were

never allowed. Once I found him sitting by himself just listening to the laughter coming

from downstairs. I can’t recall why he was there, or who was in the bar but I do

remember it was a happy occasion. Someone had had a baby and there was a celebration

and I remember Jesus just sitting there with the biggest smile on his face. I asked him if I

could get him anything but Peter shooed me away. I was just doing my job.

“That night, the last one, I was curious. I looked through a hole in the door and

saw Jesus bless the bread and pour the wine and pass it down the table. I think he saw

me, or sensed me. Sort of spooked me and I went back downstairs. When I saw them

leave through the back I returned and brought the dirty dishes down to be washed.

“It was late and we were getting ready to close when Lucius walked in . . . ”

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CHAPTER 8

“Hellus!” said Lucius recognizing him beneath his cloak. “So it’s true. You prefer low

company to the nobility into which you were born. Well, your secret is safe with me.

After all it is a rare thing for a Roman to find comfort in a country that does not

appreciate Rome—lest it abides in the beauty of woman.” He pulled Ginat close. “I like

meat on a woman. Gold wears better on a curve than a rake.” He looked at Hellus.

“What possible reason could compel a man of your stature to associate with rabble?”

“They pour a better drink.”

“Tell me. When Caesar whispered in your ear, what did he say?”

“You know what he said. The same thing he tells anyone who dares outshine

him. ‘Remember, you are mortal.’ Hmph. He overrates his influence in the matter.”

“That he does, Hellus. That he does.” He released Ginat and drank from Hellus’

cup. “If this is what you consider a better drink you need to get back to Rome. My

sources tell me the Nazarene takes a drink here. Is that true? What does he do, turn

posca into Falernian?” Lucius turned to face the crowd in the dimly lit room. “I have

news! Your rabbi was arrested tonight. They say he was betrayed by one of his own.

Hmm. By the look on your faces you already know this.” He pulled a purple purse from

his belt and jangled the coin for all to see. “Allow me to buy a round to lighten the mood.

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Perhaps after a few drinks you will have the courage to declare his innocence, unless

someone wants to declare it now. Anyone? I see. Well then he must be guilty.”

Ginat stepped forward. “The only guilt in him is what he took from us for he is

guiltless. And with that guilt our sin for he is sinless.”

“The only guilt I carry, dear woman, is that I don’t sin enough.” He pushed her

face down across the bar, stepped up behind her and lifted her apron.

Hellus leaped back, his hand on the hilt of his sword. “Release her, Lucius!”

“Are you challenging me, Hap? How unfortunate.” Lucius gave the signal and

the room erupted when soldiers, seated among the locals, revealed themselves. They

surrounded Hellus and disarmed him. Noting the grumblings among the patrons, Lucius

leaned into Hellus and said, “It pains me to think you might be their benefactor.” He

motioned to Ginat. “She’s playing us against each other, you know. She wants to see

which of us is stronger. You don’t really think she’s going to live on the street with the

rabbi, do you? She’s used to the finer things in life. She’s beguiled us both with talk of

miracles. That is what a priestess does. A whore, too, for that matter.” He pointed out

the scars on his face for Ginat. “Tell me, girl, where is my miracle?” He turned back to

Hellus. “The rabbi says embrace your enemy. Should we embrace, Hap?”

“You are my brother, not my enemy.”

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“You left me behind.”

“I saved you.”

“I burned. You did not.” Lucius gave a nod to his men who stretched out Hellus’

arms. Lucius noted the new tattoo but was indifferent to it. “You once said that to know

the enemy we had to read their stories and listen to their prophets. Know something? I

did just that. Let me see. How did the rabbi put it? Ah yes. ‘If they hand offend thee,

cut it off.’”

Ginat screamed as Lucius swung the sword. Hellus’ forearm plunked to the floor

and the wail from his mouth shook the tavern to stillness. Lucius leveled the bloody

blade at the crowd. “A hundred of you cannot equal the virtue of this man! But at least

you know your place. Tonight he forgot his.” To Hellus he said, “Now we’re both

cripples, brother.”

Ginat ran to Hellus. “Help me! Please! Someone! He will bleed to death!”

Lucius gave his consent and several men hurried from their table and lifted Hellus

and leaned him up at the bar. Ginat tried valiantly to stop the bleeding. She wrapped the

severed limb in towels, and to cool his fevered brow she reached into a bucket and

brought him water in a scallop shell. Hellus wailed even louder than he had when he was

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assaulted. Some would say later how they saw a blue light envelope him and then vanish.

He plowed the length of the bar. Customers caught him before he fell down—and then

backed away as if he were a leper. Hellus was bowed at the waist holding his severed

limb. He tentatively moved his fingers to a hand which moments earlier lay beneath a

chair. It was as if he too could not believe what he was seeing. He had been healed!

The color drained from Lucius’ face. “By the gods what sorcery is this?”

He grabbed hold of Hellus for a closer look. There was blood but no wound. He

was speechless and he stumbled backwards, unsure how to behave.

I saw the panic in his eyes as he replayed the event in his mind. I was wringing

my hands with glee. My fantasy had taken a turn for the better with the sort of drama that

could only be appreciated with a bucket of buttery popcorn.

Lucius looked around the room. “The woman! Find her!”

I too had been preoccupied with Hellus and did not see what happened to Ginat.

When Lucius and his men ran upstairs Hellus made his escape, pausing in front of

a table of commoners where he deftly dropped Lucius’ purple purse as a gift to them.

As he exited the saloon, the saloon in which I sat, my saloon, entered complete

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darkness. I could not make out my hand in front of my face.

I called out for Gin but there was no reply. I felt imprisoned but not as frightened

as I had previously because I understood that I was inside a dream.

I heard chains scrape across stone and gagged at the foul stench of human

excrement. I felt for my cigarettes to remove the odor. No sooner had I used the Zippo, a

crouched figure set aflame a candle. His face was as worked-in as a catcher’s mitt. He

crouched beside another man whose back was facing me. I was within a hair’s breadth of

this one, separated by iron bars. His sweaty neck smelled of overripe fruit. His hair was

a hazard of oily cables. His frayed tunic was unable to hide the asphyxiation his muscles

had undergone since his capture, nor the humiliation of lost freedom in the way he held

his head. A man incarcerated is a hopeless stare from inside a bag of bones.

“I will have to put this out,” said Catcher. “I have been in jail before. It is the

light you miss, even more than water. Least now we can see what we look like, eh

Rabbi? Fear is the only darkness. But it runs from the light.”

“Had you any faith you would not need a candle.”

“I have faith, Rabbi,” said the man. “I have faith in my resourcefulness. That is

why we have a candle. I am the one who brought the light. Not you. Do you not think it

odd we share the same cell? That we share the same name? I too am named Jesus. Jesus

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Barabbas, at your service. Could it be that God is trying to teach a lesson here? I think

maybe more for you than me because in this world, Rabbi, pretty words are not enough.

You need men like me. Men willing to be resourceful in order to survive. All you do is

talk. What good is talk against the sword? What good are miracles if you won’t use

them against those who enslave us?”

The rabbi did not reply and Barabbas, fearful for his candle, blew out the flame

and crawled away, the chain around his ankle grazing the stone.

But for some ambient light I could just make out the shoulder of Jesus. It was the

burning ember off my cigarette that allowed me to see. I felt sick to my stomach and

guilt peeled away my joy like acid sears off a wart. I wanted to place my hand paternally

on his shoulder as if the act alone would make it better for him—no—for me, except that

I knew it was impossible because I was a shadow and he was a hallucination. My ego

wanted to speak to him, tenderly. But it was still ego. My mind swirled with practical

recommendations —advice!—and I didn’t like what I was hearing. It didn’t even sound

like me but I knew that it was. And the voice said, “Don’t do this to yourself, Lord. You

don’t have to do this. You still have power. I know you do. Just concentrate and beam

yourself out of here, will ya? Do you hear me? Can you hear me? Use your

imagination. Listen to your inner voice now. That’s me. I . . . I have come from the

future. I know how that sounds but I am from the future and I’m here to tell you that

your life is more important to me than your death. I have seen the future, Lord, and you

wouldn’t believe how bad it is. No one has faith in anything anymore. You’ve become

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something of a joke, I’m sorry to say. Football is more popular than you are. That’s this

game, see, like our take on gladiators in the arena? Anyway what I mean is your legacy,

man. Technology is our god now. Probably because you never came back like you

promised and because you didn’t come back we have had to deal with these idiots called

ISIS. Before them there was this idiot named Hitler and before him—look, my point is

the world is worse now than it was when you were in it. So do yourself a favor. Tell

them what they want to hear. Play the game and they’ll let you walk. Then do an end-

around and go to Rome and convert Caesar. Think of all the lives you can save. You can

build the Kingdom of God now. You’re here. Why must there be a Second Coming?

You’re here now!”

He dropped his head gravely. Maybe I was getting through. But then the words

he hissed shook me to the marrow: “Get thee behind me, satan.”

I recoiled with horror and he dissolved in front of my eyes. Oh I felt terrible.

How little control any of us have against that little bug inside our brains that makes us do

and say what we shouldn’t do or say. I was intoxicated with shame over the lashing. I’d

deserved it too because my words were self-serving, nothing more.

Then I saw Hellus among zigzagging silhouettes and elongated shadows. He was

moving into the city’s sinister underbelly with its twisted passageways. He held his arm

up against a torch to see that it was still there. All of it. Even the tattoo. Had it been a

blemish perhaps it would have been washed away under the rabbi’s healing power. But

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Hellus had asked Moshiah for it, had pleaded to become a disciple of a sacred order

whose god was named Sin, a god of forgiveness. Just like the one the rabbi spoke about.

And so the tattoo was spared.

Another profile sailed across a screen. Hellus saw it as did I. He bolted ahead

after it and intercepted Ginat at the end of the alley and threw her up against a wall.

She struggled against him. “I won’t be thrown into the street! Lucius was right

about that! I’ll sell it if I have to!”

Hellus patted her down. He found the shell beneath her smock, tucked against her

skin inside her kuttoneth. He slipped it under his girdle and walked away.

“What about this one?” said Ginat. Hellus turned and saw her holding another

shell, almost identical to the one he had confiscated. “Just how long do you think you

will live, Hellus? Age is taking its toll on us both. One day we will die. Do you think

we will be allowed to float to your Elysian isle? No. The devil awaits us for what we did

to him. Or don’t you remember?”

“Lucius was right. The rabbi is just someone to justify your visions so long as it

suits your purpose. Tell me, priestess. What do you see for us?”

“I see the fires of Tartaros. I see us burned over and over. That is what I see.”

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“That is not what the rabbi said.”

“Because you weren’t listening. You were looking at me. You were always

looking at me. He said there will be a weeping and a gnashing of teeth. An eternal

hellfire in the outer darkness awaits those who don’t believe.”

“But we do believe.”

“Do you think the devil has no sway over our souls? We killed his son, Hellus.

Even the rabbi can’t help us in the afterlife.”

“You do not know that.”

“Are you willing to find out? I know I’m not. But look at what we hold in our

hands. We hold the rabbi’s power. Death cannot touch us now. You and I—.”

“You and I? What happened to Lucius?”

“I mean nothing to him. I am a prize to him. I have hurt you. I see that. But we

must protect this. The gods entrusted it to us.”

Hellus did not need persuading. As for Lucius, well, he expected rogue preachers

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to perform some sort of magic. Casting the crazy out of crazy people wasn’t anything

new. It was as humdrum an example of divine power as the curing of arthritis; the only

proof such a healing even took place was the victim’s word. Perhaps had Jesus shape-

shifted into a nine-headed hydra or raised the dead—yes, he’d heard the rumors about

that one, but it was impossible to verify unless he went to Bethany and inquired of the

poor at the almshouse there, something he wasn’t at all interested in doing. Anyway they

could make up any story they wanted to support the new guy. When the new threatens

the old, exaggeration is necessary to ensure it gains a foothold. Tradition does not value

innovation. Jesus was certainly novel, a threat to the old ways, to what had always been.

Whether his teachings could transform the accepted belief system remained to be seen.

They would be passed down to the next generation in the old oral tradition and most

likely watered down. Therefore something was needed to give his words a chance to

establish roots, something capable of changing the hearts of men. Miracles. But Lucius

had been unlucky in that regard for he had never witnessed one. Until the tavern.

Hellus was still reeling in what had happened but he had witnessed miracles

performed by Jesus of Nazareth, Lucius had not. How then could Lucius connect the

dots and reach the conclusion that the vessel from which the rabbi drank had been

imbued with healing power? Hellus understood how Lucius thought. He was more than

skeptical when it came to the gods. “And what if the Jew really is divine, Hellus? What

can anyone do about it? Gods are eccentric by nature, aren’t they? This god prefers to

live in squalor with the dispossessed. Why should that ruffle the feathers of the

established priesthood? I don’t understand the will of the gods any more than they do. If

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the rabbi’s gift for healing can be exploited for the benefit of the army, then I might

pledge fealty. But unless he dons the purple cloak of Rome and joins up, I see no way to

take advantage of these alleged gifts. Pilate will likely deny him a chance to prove

himself because he hates the black magic of the Jews, the slaughtering of lambs to mollify

a faceless god. Here’s something on which he and I agree, Hellus. Do any of us really

believe this mild, mannered carpenter is a superman? Don’t you hear how ludicrous that

sounds? And what guarantee does Pilate have Jesus would heal his soldiers anyway?

The rabbi would heal anyone, if he could, which means he’d heal Rome’s enemies. That

is unacceptable.”

Lucius was right about the priests. They would rather argue amongst themselves

than believe a new covenant was knocking at the door. Stripped of their flowing robes

and woven mantles one would be hard pressed to differentiate them from the homeless

whom they snubbed. The priests were men of prosperity but the subjugated and

oppressed were the aristocracy here and the miracles performed by Jesus were for them.

What angered the priests was the disdain the citizenry had for them; a quiet rebellion had

sprung up, donations were down and a vile joke about the clerics was making the rounds

regarding their unwillingness to accept Jesus for who everyone said he was. It went like

this: “You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink”.

Such dissent did not sway Hellus. He counted himself fortunate to now know

what the gods truly looked like. They were not the muscled megalithic idols of his

boyhood fantasies with thunderbolts for eyes and lightning bolts for hair. They preferred

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the lowly attire of the working class to infiltrate the masses and help the needy and offer

hope. What Hellus had seen in the quiet disposition of Jesus transcended all the riches of

Rome. He could not help but feel as if he and Ginat had been chosen by the same

supernatural forces that had chosen the rabbi. To carry on the work he had started. For

that reason he took a step closer to Ginat and allowed her exotic power to wash over him.

She pressed herself up against him and looked into his eyes. “Let us have faith in

one another again, my love. Kiss me. Kiss me and let us begin anew.”

The name above the door was “AURI DIGITUM”, after the goldsmith who’d

accidentally lost an index finger in the priceless goop. His shop was filled with all

manner of gold, including seashells. While the casting commenced Ginat perused the

wealth. Hellus used his knife and carefully inscribed a symbol in the fresh pouring to

ensure he would be able to identify them among all the others—two bowl-shaped lines

that crossed at one end. Creating an image was completely accidental but now that he

had, he thought it made sense, even though he wasn’t sure why. It looked like a fish.

The smithy’s attraction to the bursting orange glow in his forge rarely equaled his

fascination with the rising sun. He made it a point to be atop his roof each morning to

thank God for the life he’d been given. But on this morning he had missed that sunrise.

Duty (and money) called. He wiped the sweat from his chubby face and took a chair and

availed himself of some honey wine.

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Ginat and Hellus withdrew to a corner and went over the plan again. They were

to meet outside the Jaffa Gate and then travel three days to the port of the same name and

charter a ship that would take them south to Alexandria where they would begin their

new life together. Ginat, however, needed to go home first to get a few things. Hellus

tried to dissuade her from doing this but she was determined. She would rendezvous with

him. She promised. And so she hurried away where within moments she felt as if she

had been set free. Free to live her life as she chose, because for the first time in her life,

she had the power to change her circumstances. She held it close to her skin, tucked

between the folds of her dress, and she would be long gone before Hellus realized she

had absconded with it. She would have preferred to have taken them both but it was a

big enough gamble just to pilfer one of the freshly gilded shells. She replaced it with one

she had taken down off a shelf.

As she moved through the growing crowds of early risers she knew that if Hellus

chose to follow he would eventually lose her. Her understanding of the labyrinth that

was Jerusalem was far better than his was. Especially the Lower City among the working

class, who also happened to be the city’s most resourceful and artistic. The cosmopolitan

heart of the ancient world beat here. The Jerusalem Market. Camel caravans laden with

rare oddities and wealth moved freely up and down the giant thoroughfare that stretched

from one end of the city to the other. The caravans took command of whatever part of

the street that suited them to form a makeshift trading post. Every livelihood imaginable

was represented on this boulevard and in its many side streets. It was the cauldron where

the world’s cultures with their divergent tongues came to buy, sell and trade. The

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precious purple dye found in sea snails off the coast of Tyre was traded to Jerusalem

weavers to color the Roman cape. Dealers from the Orient sold prized silks alongside

wizardly brokers in the healing art of aromatherapy, offering the costliest perfumes and

oils to concubines and embalmers alike. Wine merchants shared space with oil-pressers,

sandal-makers and food vendors. Hair spinning was very popular and spinners were

often summoned to the palaces in the Upper City to braid the hair of Jerusalem nobility.

Ginat paused to bathe in the heady fragrances of incense and myrrh and peruse

tables of jewelry. But when the piquant garlicky aroma of stuffed lamb stomach reached

her nose, she hurried to a food tent where she quenched her appetite with pickled fish

from Haifa Bay and dates from the palm orchards along the banks of Shatt-el-Arab. The

dates were juicy and fat as hens’ eggs. She recalled the old Arab proverb about the dates

from one of Medhat’s clients who hailed from Ur, the birthplace of Abraham, near the

Shatt-el-Arab that was formed at the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. The

date palm prospers best where the waters of hell bathe her roots and the light of heaven

bakes her head. As she ate she kept an eye out for any sign of Hellus. He was not one to

be underestimated and Lucius was certainly searching for both of them. He would find

Hellus and it would go bad for him but Hellus was no longer her problem. Lucius would

post guards at the gates in and out of the city to ensure she could not leave. She

entertained dropping through the sewer system as she’d done in Jericho to escape Medhat

but she wasn’t particularly keen on swimming in a river of animal blood and entrails

from the butchered carcasses sacrificed in the name of God every day on the Great Altar

of Burnt Offering that emptied in the Kidron Valley outside the city walls. Her best

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chance then was to exit the city at the Dung Gate with the garbage; the one gate Lucius’

soldiers would probably remain lax in their duty. But it was through the Kidron Valley

that promised freedom because it was there the lepers bathed in the viscera of the

sacrifices in the benighted belief that what God spit back to mankind might still be

powerful enough to heal them. What she carried inside her robe certainly would but she

had no intention of sharing it. With anyone. If by chance she was spotted no one would

dare chase her through the Kidron. Therefore her escape was assured. And because of

the shell’s restorative properties she harbored no fear of leprosy, if indeed she became

infected.

When she was convinced she was not being shadowed she entered a tanner’s tent

and purchased a sling made famous by the boy who slew the Philistine giant. She

withdrew to a corner of the stall and covertly unveiled the shell and tried to fit it inside

the leather pouch but the pouch was not large enough, only allowing enough room for a

cockeyed corner of the shell to fit. So she wrapped the leather straps of the sling around

the shell forming an X that helped secure its rump inside the pocket. She then slipped the

rest of the sling over her neck like a necklace and stashed the shell beneath her dress.

When she was satisfied it was properly concealed she continued on.

Lucius’ men were waiting for her around the next corner. She put up a plucky

fight but she was knocked across the temple and dragged between sacks of grain, thrown

into a wagon and taken away.

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Hellus was hanging from chains inside a tower of the Antonia fortress when Ginat

was led in. She cried out his name. Lucius seared Hellus’ skin with a white-hot poker

and shouted, “Where is the cup!”

But Hellus would not oblige him.

Lucius plunged the iron back into the coals and repeated his question. This time

to her. She defied him with her silence as her body ignited with radiance from the

morning’s sunbeams filling the window. But the light betrayed the hole in her dress.

Even from behind the blood in his eyes, Hellus saw it. Gold. When Lucius saw it too, he

lunged for her . . .

. . . she couldn’t believe she was falling. Couldn’t believe she’d been so stupid.

All her plans had gone out the window. She had gone out the window. The shock of it

had already passed. She felt freer than she had ever felt before. A bird could not be

much freer. But a bird could fly and she could not. She had one brief recollection of her

parents before she hit. She hadn’t the time to field regrets even though a myriad of

emotions swept through her. Minus the initial shock, there really was no reason to panic

because it would have done no good. She was sure she screamed but the sound was

already lost on the wind, or beneath the wind, or crushed by the force of her descent. She

could not say for sure she did. Scream, that is. But she probably did. And when she

struck the pavement, she detonated. She was now above herself looking down at herself.

There were no boundaries, no body. Only mind. And then she was back—a jarring

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return—and what had launched out of her now settled atop her like a heavy stone. Then

her sky-blue thoughts began to fade until she and darkness were one.

Hellus collapsed in front of her body. Her eyes were fixed open and blank.

Blood trickled from her mouth. Lucius tore the shell from around her neck and filled it

with wine, placed it at her mouth and poured. But nothing happened. He repeated the

procedure but Ginat remained motionless. The regret Lucius evoked hinged on

practicality. “Never have I seen death give up the ghost. Not once he claims it. This

would be useless in battle.” He tossed the shell away.

Just then a commotion broke out beneath the portcullis leading into the castle.

Priests were pushing a man through the gates towards the inner sanctum where Pontius

Pilate held court. “Perhaps the rabbi can help you, Hap. I hear he speaks to ghosts all the

time.” He and his men advanced towards the fracas.

Gin pointed. “See those two—see them? The priests? Hap overheard them say

Pilate was going to send Jesus to Herod Antipas for judgment. He put me in that wagon

there and followed them. He pushed me all the way there in that stupid cart. See?”

Hellus was waiting when the priests and Jesus arrived in front of the palace of

Herod Antipas. He rushed forward, blocking their path with the wheelbarrow which held

Ginat’s broken body.

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“Rabbi!” he shouted. “Lay your hand on her! She believed in you! Speak the

words and she will live again!”

The priests took great offense to this and berated Hellus, but I saw in their faces a

moment’s hesitation. Maybe they were not entirely convinced of their duty. By allowing

Jesus the opportunity to comply with the Roman’s request, perhaps they feared they

might witness the messianic power so many of their congregation claimed he possessed.

Then what would they do? But Jesus did not advance towards Ginat, nor did he raise his

hand in authority, nor did he speak.

“Just speaks the words!” yelled Hellus.

But Jesus remained mute.

The priests tossed Hellus aside and forced Jesus through the gates.

I was rapt with the events until the palpitation. I tried to rub out the pain.

Gin saw my distress and handed me my cocktail but I veered it away. She forced

me to drink so I drank. I feared I’d vomit but I belched instead which released the gas in

my chest.

My eyes watered and she slapped me on the back like a regular Joe.

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I reached for her in hopes to lick her flesh and thank her in other ways too but she

was gone and all I got for my trouble was a whirling wall of splintered wind. I was inside

the cone of a tornado.

I wanted out of this damn high!

The twister flickered away and I emerged from a lake beneath lavender mountains

that were doused in the bleeding white of daybreak, walking on water towards an idyllic

setting of dynamic symmetry. Before me stood two cylindrical columns which I assumed

supported an entablature but I couldn’t be sure because their tops were hidden inside the

crowns of tremendous trees whose leaves were rendered in tranquil tones of green,

magenta and blue. I saw a beauty in a Greek dress stretched out on the floor between the

columns, smiling up at a naked youngster who was leaning over her as if saying, “Are

you going to sleep your life away?” They were cast in the morning sun’s golden rays.

The reclining beauty had been his housekeeper-mistress-model for forty years but his

eleven-year-old daughter, who posed for the naked youth, asked her father not to include

her in the painting (nothing is lost on the precocious eyes of a child, especially infidelity).

To honor his daughter’s wishes, Maxfield Parrish painted in another face over the

lounging body of his mistress. I had walked into “Daybreak” and was not at all surprised.

By the time this mind-bending journey on mushrooms ended I might be walking on the

sun. When the woman and the child saw me they vanished, poof.

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With the mountains and lake behind me I walked out of the painting and entered a

nocturnal forest. I found myself beside a brook shimmering in moonlight beneath the

gigantic silver-gray roof of a tree whose trunk, scarred with the wrinkles of forgotten

epochs, fanned out into chunky twisted boughs.

The tip of a knife pressed beneath my jawbone and a sweaty palm covered my

mouth. “Drop your weapon or I will bleed you like a lamb.”

I raised my empty hands. He broke me down at the knee and kicked me aside. I

curled up by the enormous roots of the tree. He reached for something. His fringed

silhouette glowed in the moonlight, the creek behind him fluid as mercury, the blade of

the knife like a silver tusk jutting from his clenched fist.

“Cover yourself,” he said, throwing me a scratchy shawl.

I slipped the rank afghan over my head, warming to a new reality that by some

quantum hiccup I was no longer a witness to past events but had become a participator in

them. How we understood one another was by itself proof that hallucinations could be

interactive—especially when one’s survival was at stake. Whether I was speaking

Aramaic or he was speaking English didn’t seem to matter much. I think my nakedness

unbalanced him. Only a madman would carry on in such a way, he said. Or a prophet.

“Are you?”

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“Me? A prophet? Not hardly.”

He stepped around the tree where an ox and a cart stood. But for a tendril of

smoke his campfire was nearly out. On the ground before him were various objects laid

bare on a blanket. He dropped to his knees to continue packing.

“I thought you were here to kill me,” he said. “Well, no need. I’m a thorn tree in

a whirlwind but the prophecy had to be fulfilled. Someone had to play the bad guy. It

could have been anyone but it was I. Had I not turned him over he would have failed.

Think of that! Why was he here in the first place? If I’d not acted he’d not have been

arrested. If he’d not been arrested he would not have been tried. If he wasn’t tried he

wouldn’t have been crucified and if he wasn’t crucified . . .” He looked at me. “I am

forgiven because he died. I’m the hero here. But no one will see it that way. I’m

damned to hell for doing what was necessary. I hear their taunts. They mock my name

and I fear it will become synonymous with betrayal, but from my name comes the name

of our very religion! It means to praise! My name means that! Will the world condemn

all Judahs for what I did? Will it condemn Judaism? Only history can vindicate me.

Looking back is the only way to understand how to move forward. I will be vindicated!

They call me a traitor and Peter a rock. Hmph. That’s not what the rabbi said at all.

Jesus wasn’t praising Peter, he was mocking him. He called him a pebble, not a rock.

Because he was weak. He’d succumbed to evil thoughts. Then he scolded James and

John for their holier-than-thou attitude. Sons of thunder, he called them. Boanerges!

Big bags of wind just like the sons of Zeus. But did Jesus mock me? No. Because he

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needed me. His success depended on me committing the despicable act. He chose me.

And he shared it with no one lest I would be hurt, maybe even killed.” He shook his head

to smother his emotions. He wiped his nose on the hem of his shawl. “What fools we are

to honor a God who would murder His own son. To hell with this world. It’s not worth

saving. And he was so lost at the end. Cried out like a child, did you hear? It gave me

chills. My God, my God why have you slaughtered me?”

“Forsaken.”

“A pretty word that. Are you one of those people who refuse to participate when

what you believe is proven false? I prefer to know the truth about things. Even if it’s

ugly.” When I didn’t answer he rose before me, his hand sliding across his belt to the

dagger. “Do you think me dimwitted? I know Psalms as well as anyone. Asabtani

means forsaken. That’s what David said. Not my Lord. My sweet Lord. Eli, Eli, lamah

sabachthani was what he said. What he screamed. Sabachthani means slaughter. He

shouted it out in Hebrew, too. Not Aramaic. He shouted it out in the language of the

angels so God would hear!” He took a step towards me. “Your accent is strange to me.

Where did you say you were from?”

“My mistake. I thought sabachthani was Aramaic.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

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I was unarmed and not overly confident I could take him in a fight. My only

consolation was that this wasn’t real. Knowing this gave me an edge, except I wasn’t

sure where or what the edge was. All I could to do was react until I was swept away into

another delusion.

Or I could tempt the fates.

“What does silver buy nowadays? Is thirty pieces a lot?” I could just make out a

pigeon wing of his face and saw his mouth agape as if he was stunned by my candor.

“Are they saying I did this for profit?”

“Didn’t you?”

“I threw that money at their feet! Do you think any of us needed money? We

were showered with it! Yes, we ministered to the poor but the monies they were saving

to tithe at the Temple they tithed to us, instead. The donations became unwieldy and

Jesus made me the master of coin. I saw what his gifts were worth. We all saw. You

couldn’t put a price on them but people had no other way of showing their appreciation.

It was spontaneous. It was ridiculous. They just threw money at our feet. After awhile

we just let it be. We weren’t in this for money! The rabbi certainly wasn’t. But then it

made sense to us to gather up what we could and use it to help the poor. We just gave it

back, whatever we had.” He tossed his ruck into the wagon and took up a rope and

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lashed it down, tucking the excess cord between bags of dry goods. “I’m an outcast now.

I don’t know what is to become of me.” He stopped his chore, his back to me, and when

I saw his shoulders dip I sensed the threat was about to take palpable shape. He turned

slowly to face me. The knife was in his hand. “You’re a spy.”

“A naked spy. Makes a lot of sense.”

“Except here you are, are you not? You found me. Others have tried. You can

tell them the direction I’m headed. Then they will come after me.”

“I won’t tell a soul.”

“I know you won’t.”

He swung the knife. The second swipe was even closer. On the third I clutched

his wrist and threw him back. He reached for my throat and I blocked his thrust. We

locked arms, the bright blade between us, and even then his face was nothing but shadow.

This was a combat of erosion, a grinding down of strength, but I was more empowered

than he, or thought that I was, because I understood this was an illusion. Except when I

felt the pain after the knife’s tip entered my skin I understood my calling it that didn’t

matter. Be this a dream or an illusion, this was as real as it got.

His iron legs shifted for position and I dug in my heel and slipped my left ankle

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behind his right and toppled him against the sacks of grain. The wagon jutted forward

briefly and I pressed my weight across him and rammed my knee into his groin and he

crumbled. It was a foolish act though because it threw him over at the waist and the knife

scraped off my shoulder. I brought my fist down across his face, repeatedly, giving no

quarter. Again the cart moved forward but I managed to smash his wrist against the

wooden side of the wagon and the knife fell from his hand. His left hand found my

throat. I couldn’t break his hold. My legs began to give way and he had me off balance

and turned me round, and now I was the one with his back splayed across the cart, his

weight atop me, and the heavy wheels moved another foot in the process. He began

strangling me and my only escape was if the beast began walking and the cart gave way

so I could fall to the ground. But the beast did not move.

I punched him in the ribs but he seemed to only grow stronger. I felt something

coarse and thick in my hand and I knotted him in the eye with it. Now with the rope

tightly gripped in my right hand I slammed my arm down across his forearm just enough

to slip off to one side and when I did the cart abruptly jerked forward and he caved at the

knee and his head was waist high and I wrapped the rope around his neck and yanked on

it hard, trying to hurt him. This time the cart kept moving and I lost my footing and fell

while he remained upright, swinging out wide from the wagon, pumping his legs so as

not to fall while trying to undo the knot around his neck. But fall he did and the wheel

rolled over the rope and a metal spur on the axle hooked onto it, drawing it in, winding it

up as if it was a water hose. The tug lurched him onto his tummy and he squirmed and

scooted onto his flank trying to right himself by planting his foot ahead of him and lifting

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himself up. The attempt was a failure and he fell again, his head bouncing up when it hit

the hard scrabble. The turning axle continued to take up the slack and he began to scream

which only inspired the animal to step up the pace. He was being dragged by the neck,

desperately trying to find his legs which could not be gathered beneath him quick enough

to lend a hand. Within another few feet his unbridled shrieks were eclipsed by a brutal

crack. The beast of burden continued on, the body of the betrayer thudding grimly

against the turning wheel.

I stumbled after it, entering a grassy field, but it was too dark to see. I could hear

the creak and scrape of axle against wood and ran forward and tripped over his head. I

got back to my feet and hurried on when I tripped over the rest of him. The cart

disappeared into the night and I sat in the field beside the carcass and the cranium,

breathing hard.

Like most folks I grew up believing guilt had driven him to hang himself from a

tree but according to the fifth book in the New Testament, Acts, he died in a field when

he suffered some sort of blunt-force trauma and his guts spilled out. What say we split

the difference?

I fell on my back and closed my eyes and tried to find my happy place.

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CHAPTER 9

The room spun round and I was back in bed with Gin on top of me skewering the

tumescence beneath her. My eyes remained transfixed on the ceiling and I continued

traveling as Einstein suggested was possible—parallel to the speed of light. I almost

missed her quake entirely. She let out a deep satisfying groan and slumped across my

chest, panting. I returned my attention to the orange clouds which like blood-soaked

arrows raced across the ceiling. Every muscle in my body was on fire. Every neuron in

my brain was flashing. Gin felt warm as freshly made crêpes Suzette. Her hair smelled

of orange blossoms. Her weight was sticky and salacious and I loved it.

But my euphoria burst when I saw the gigantic spiraled horns on the head of

Quasimodo rise up behind her. My eyes swelled with alarm. I tried to warn Gin but my

mouth would not make sound. The devil’s bulk filled the room. The sinewy tendons

against his iron chest moved like baby snakes behind the translucent shell of his skin.

His hands formed gigantic fists over my lover. He could crush her from both sides like

the Incredible Hulk, come down on her back with the torrential force of collapsing twin

towers, or break her in two, suck out her sweet meat, toss her aside and feast his eyes on

the main course lying spread-eagled before him like steamy soft-shelled crab. Me.

I tried to move but my spirit was frozen. Gin lifted her cheek off my chest and

smiled down at me. Then Quasimodo morphed into Hap. He was also smiling. Seeing

both their smiling faces gave me reassurance mixed with embarrassment. Here I was

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lying naked beneath his wife and he seemed OK with that. She produced a tie from

somewhere, then another, and began binding my wrists to the bamboo posts of the

headboard. They had me where they wanted me. I don’t think I could have moved

anyhow. Hap tore off a piece of duct tape and placed it over my mouth. When he

produced a twelve-inch needle I knew I was in trouble.

“This is your initiation, Del,” said Gin. “A sort of baptism, if you will.”

“We’ve had to initiate a few over the years simply because we needed help,” said

Hap. “Of course it took us centuries to admit we needed any.”

“We were afraid the power would be used against us,” said Gin.

“And it has been,” said Hap.

“Yes, it has.” She looked down at me. “I’m sorry. There really is no other way.

You’re our last chance to be free of the devil and the punishment he forces us to bear.

Lifetimes of punishment.”

To Hap’s credit he covered my bandito with the sheet as he took up position. He

braced himself above me, pressing down the needle over my heart. I didn’t even feel it

enter, not directly, because my mind was still awash in the effects of the psychotropic

fungi. But then I did feel something. Like a sharp nip. I began to panic. The thought of

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my imminent death released an endorphin rush inside me that suppressed my onset of

terror. Instead of being scared I was merely startled. I think precisely because I knew

there was nothing I could do about it. Like the time I hit ice in Dallas on I-30 and spun

out. The car was running me. I was not running it. And the ice was running us both. I

saw the cement embankment beneath the overpass approaching and anticipated the sound

of the crash—like the dull thud of falling telephone books. I calculated my chances of

survival at about zero. So this was how I was going to die. Car accident. Wow. I was

calm. Because I knew there was nothing I could do about it. I’d read about this

phenomenon in soldiers bleeding out on the battlefield, or those at the mercy of a crazed

mob of Islamic radicals. According to witnesses they entered a place of serenity over

their imminent death. A samadhi. Their eyes took on an air of acceptance. My eyes

yielded to the same, a smoky-gray consent. Hap and Gin were killing me. In an almost

elegant manner, too. With a stainless steel pointer. It reminded me of a crochet needle.

Hap drove the spear through my chest wall into the trembling red pump. The nip

took on a new dimension that snuffed out my high—a searing sting that cracked the

windshield of my vision and flushed up fluids in my throat which crimped shut like a

bulkhead door. My breathing became strained. When the needle punctured my aorta my

internal organs warred with one another over the lost oxygen. A burst of heat rushed

through me and then just as quickly evaporated as my cerebral cortex began to fail. The

dam inside me gave way to acute hemorrhaging. My sight was arrested by the blur of

impending coma and I slipped over the precipice into hypovolemic shock.

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A deep tightening of my lower intestinal track formed against my spinal column

and the weight of me seemed to double. I was being pulled under be some insuperable

force. Sinking, not lifting. I was being turned into dead weight. Pain never reached its

zenith because my brain was soaked in drugs and couldn’t differentiate the real from the

imaginary. I felt prickly stings all over me, like how your arm feels when it falls asleep.

The brain naturally secretes narcotic compounds when faced with abrupt, irremediable

destruction. It is designed to cushion the blow of sudden trauma. A built-in God pillow,

if you will. Like that calmness that overcame me on I-30 when I knew I was going to

crash. These morphine-like emissions emanate from the pineal gland, the hypothalamus

and the peria-something-or-other gland neurologists call “gray matter”. I guess Hap and

Gin figured I’d need a little more than my brain was able to squirt, hence the

hallucinogen. Violent death is still agonizing and unless you’re knocked completely

unconscious you’re going to feel that bayonet enter your belly, that noose break your

neck, that fiery mar as the machete slashes your skin, the double-drunk punch when your

chest hits the steering wheel with enough force to bend it into the shape of an egg and

your body shudders in the fibrillating throes of multiple organ failure.

They tell me I died on I-30 that day. But by some miracle I came back. I had a

bad feeling that wasn’t going to happen this time. This private party of drugs and alcohol

had been used not only as a distraction to the sensory overload of the horror of my

murder but also as a way to alter my physical and emotional response to the pain of it. If

ever I saw Hap and Gin in the afterlife I’d make a point to thank them.

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My body shook in spasm and involuntarily regurgitated a geyser of blood that

drenched Gin’s face. She maintained her poise, her palms pressed against my skin, as if

she was practicing the healing technique of the Laying of Hands. Or maybe she was just

gauging my body’s loss in temperature. I was cold all over. I was dying. And all I could

think of was Keats:

Darkling I listen; and for many a time

I have been half in love with easeful death,

Called him soft names in many a mused rhyme,

To take into the air my quiet breath;

Now more than ever seems it rich to die,

To cease upon the midnight with no pain . . .

I had read enough about NDEs—near-death experiences—to recognize that I was

in one. Or had crossed further from the “near” part and had entered fully into that void

that is the “death” part. It felt space-less. But unlike that time I died in Dallas of which I

had no memory, this time there really was a tunnel and a white light that was brighter

than white itself at the far end of the spacelessness. I can’t say I felt a whole lotta love

just yet. I assumed that was to come, the closer to the light I got. I did notice that my

feet were wet, however. I looked down and didn’t see my feet but knew that they were

there. What I did see were two rivers of liquefied crystal. They forked into one tributary,

a wide silky thoroughfare that ran towards the heavenly light whose vacillating beams

reminded me of the tentacles of a giant squid but felt soft as Russian sable. Was this

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really happening? Was this real? Or could it be that the lack of oxygen to what was left

of any cognitive function in my brain was playing tricks on my occipital lobe to form the

illusion of a tunnel of light. Either way, I was pretty sure that I was dead. If not legally,

then clinically. Clinical death means there might still be some lingering electrical

discharge going on deep within your brain, even after your heart has stopped. Legal

death means they’re shoveling dirt on your casket.

The tunnel collapsed and the tributaries divided into aisles that fanned out on

either side of me. They converged where the white light pulsated at the center of the

stage. It was as if I was standing in an amphitheater. Then, from the stage, came a rising

translucent wall of white water. It was so beautiful I never thought to get out of the way.

It crashed forward like tumbling dice. There was no sound and I knew that it would be a

pleasant drenching. I don’t know how I knew this but I did, so I simply stood there and

waited to be overrun. I awoke with the memory of a dream that I had danced with a

luminous-blue beauty before she vanished like a promise on prom night, poof.

Hap and Gin were seated on either side of me. Gin was dressed in a shear

Oriental bathrobe. Hap was in his customary garb of sandals, khaki shorts and the

Hemingway shirt. But he wasn’t wearing that fat wide leather belt of his with the scallop

seashell belt buckle. Actually he was cradling the buckle in the palm of his hand. I saw

water in the shell, or what I assumed was water. Very little. A remnant of what had been

there before the shell had been emptied.

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I felt good. Deliciously sober. Full of energy. I got out of bed and dressed in

front of them. I felt no apprehension here even though I was buck naked when I threw

off the sheet. I still had to dress. They just looked at me as if I had awoken from a sleep

apnea experiment. I wondered how it was the two of them were in my bedroom in the

first place. Had something happened that beckoned they shake me from my nightmare?

Had I a nightmare? For some reason I thought that I had. But it dawned on me that this

was the first time I had seen Hap since meeting him in Belize. I slipped on my sandals

and wondered how his being here was going to affect my relationship with his wife.

Hap impressed me as a man back from safari. He was deeply tanned with creases

in his face like burnt bacon. I didn’t feel threatened by him but I wasn’t particularly glad

to see him either. I guess I was in shock that the time had finally come.

“Time to say farewell,” said Hap as I focused on the loveliness that was Gin.

“Sure.”

“No regrets?”

“Well, I was hoping you’d get attacked by pigmies on Pigmy Island and they’d

shrink your head or something.”

He laughed. “That almost happened once. Would you like to hear about it?”

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“Nope.”

“It’s good of you to withdraw so gracefully. Too much of a good thing and all.”

I glanced at Gin who was stone still. I was angry with her. She had seduced me,

said she loved me and then abandoned me. “So she’s done this kind of thing before?”

“We’ve had many lovers. She cares deeply for you.”

I waited for Gin to confirm this but she said nothing.

“But all things come to an end,” he said.

I addressed Gin. “You’re leaving?”

“She’ll leave when you’ve seen what we want you to see,” said Hap.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“An all-nighter usually does it.”

“We just had one—I think.” I was confused. I recalled our lovemaking and our

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existential conversation. But that was about it. I stepped into the bathroom to brush my

teeth. I didn’t feel like I needed a shower. In fact my hair looked freshly shampooed.

“Have another,” I heard Hap say. “And a drink. You deserve it.”

“No thanks,” I said back. In fact I didn’t even want a drink. That’s how good I

felt. But as I began to brush my teeth my eyes started to itch.

“Eat, drink and be merry is what I always say,” hollered Hap from the other room.

I looked closely at my eyes. They were bloodshot. A broken pane of memory—a

bright star, a baby, a slaughter. It made no sense. I wet a towel and cooled the back of

my neck. I wasn’t feeling so good anymore. I stepped out of the bathroom, patting my

eyes with the compress. “That’s what you say, is it?”

“Always. And do it with excess. Excess is the key.”

“It’s also the way to the hospital.”

“What I mean is if you’re going to do something naughty, do it with enthusiasm!”

“Like when I go down on your wife? Because when I do I’m enthusiastic as

hell.”

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His exuberance evaporated like spit on a hotplate. “You can’t protect her.”

A whiff of my armpit, a return to the bathroom. “She on the run from someone?”

“Pretty much.”

“Who’d she cross?” Hap didn’t answer. I stuck my head out of the bathroom and

said, “You may as well tell me so I’ll know who to look for.”

“I doubt you’d recognize him if he were to appear.”

“Who are we talking about?”

“The devil.”

I took his answer in stride; he was being colorful again. I came out of the

bathroom, rolling my armpits with an antiperspirant deodorant. “Who are you?”

He absently scratched the old blurred tattoo on his forearm. “You can still see

her,” he said. “But she’s mine, not yours.”

Gin remained quiet. She didn’t jump up and wrap her arms around me and tell

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Hap she was in love with me. That stuff only happens in the movies. Maybe she felt so

intimidated by his presence she couldn’t move. I was ready to take him on. Slug it out.

Throw ourselves over the banister and crash onto a table, our hands collectively around

each other’s neck. Like John Wayne fighting Forrest Tucker in Chisum.

We traded the evil eye. He folded his arms across his chest, letting go a sigh of

irritation. “Who are you, Mr. Lycan?”

“I asked you first.”

He swelled his barrel chest and grinned. “Why, I’m the Count of St. Germain, if

you really want to know.”

The twinkle in his aura did not go down well with me. Apparently his mental

illness was operating on all cylinders. I did recall the name, however. St. Germain. But

it was linked to a bitter memory.

I tossed the deodorant stick on the bed. He stood up, and with a certain joie de

vie, tossed the water from the scallop shell on the sheets. That surprised me. It seemed

rude. What were we, two adolescents in a dorm room? The evolution of the duel seemed

to have gone backwards. At the very least we could have slapped each other across the

face with gloves before we drew our swords.

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My eyes swung down to the damp gray spot the water had made on the bedsheet.

That’s when I saw the needle. And the blood.

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CHAPTER 10

Hap and Gin sat at the bar like prospective customers watching me tramp back and forth,

waiting, I assumed, for the shock to run its course. Flashes of my death raked across my

mind. Taking on ballast at this point seemed moot since the ethics of decency and fair

play had been smashed against the rocks. I was already in the water, treading badly.

“You said you’d protect me!”

“I showed you what you needed to see,” said Gin.

“What did you do?”

“We brought you back to life.”

“You’re saying that’s my blood up there? What happened? Did I have a seizure

or something? The needle. Did I . . . did I kill myself?”

“It doesn’t matter, does it?” said Gin. “We brought you back.”

I faced the bar mirror and ripped open my shirt and looked for any sign of trauma.

“What did you see?” asked Hap.

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“What did I see? What do you mean?”

“You had to see something. Everyone sees something. A light, maybe?”

Finding no sign I’d succumbed to any physical distress other than a strawberry on

my neck from Gin’s lust, I said, “There was a light. And my feet were wet. There was a

river. No. There were three. Two of them formed a third. I need a drink.”

“It won’t taste good,” warned Gin. “Hap’s wrong about that. A drink is the last

thing you need right now. Take a deep breath. Breathe.”

“I’ll breathe after I have a drink,” I said, pouring myself a shot of Honey Jack. I

threw it down and my stomach rejected it like uncooked chicken. I vomited in the sink. I

retched repeatedly until I thought I’d pass out. Gin rushed behind the bar and held me by

the waist. Her touch was cool on my neck.

How could God forgive me for trying to take my own life? Isn’t suicide a sin?

Catholics think so. But if God gave man free will then he should be free to do with his

life whatever he chooses. That includes suicide. You can’t cherry pick what is and isn’t

OK under the mantle of free will. Either man has it or he doesn’t.

Hot tears flushed my eyes. I sought safety behind my eyelids.

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Then I saw it. The scallop seashell.

I could still taste the metallic tang of Hap’s belt buckle on my lips and the cool

tidal wave of white water as it dashed down my gullet. A breeze swept through me. I

rose from bed, my eyes transfixed on Gin like the monster was transfixed on its creator.

She led me into the bathroom and washed the blood off me in the shower. She bathed me

and shampooed my hair. I stood there, spellbound, as if I were a prince receiving royal

treatment from a slave. Upon my return to the bedroom a fresh sheet feathered down to

greet me. It was Hap covering the blood. Gin helped me into bed and I fell asleep.

When I awoke they were sitting in chairs on either side of the bed. Hap and I traded

harsh words. I saw the murder weapon and the blood ruining the clean sheet. That’s

when I ran out of the apartment, raced down to the saloon and found solace behind the

bar, my own panic room.

I pushed Gin away and stumbled out from behind the bar where I dropped to my

haunches and began to hyperventilate. I wanted to run but saw no use in trying. They

would probably be there waiting for me wherever I went, materializing like ghosts of

Christmas Past. I took a seat at a table but I didn’t want to sit. I began pacing again until

I broke at the knee and fell to the floor. I wiped away the tears and scooted my back up

against the bar. I heard the door to the kitchen open and close, then the clink of ice in a

scoop. Apparently someone was fixing a drink.

I looked up at the ceiling. Hap retook his barstool and regaled me with the rest of

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the story—who he and Gin were and how they came to be—filling in any holes my

hallucination either glossed over or missed altogether. Except it had been more than a

hallucination. I knew that now. The mushroom cocktail wasn’t a Mickey Finn. It had

had the opposite effect and opened my eyes in ways that far exceeded the power of magic

mushrooms. There had to have been something else in the brew—a pharmaceutical of

some kind—which was responsible for giving me such extraordinary insight. Or maybe

that was Gin. She had lived two thousand years. During all that time I am sure she

picked up a thing or two in the sorcery department.

Hap, Gin and Lucius carried the power of Christ like most of us carry change.

They had been spared Satan’s wrath because of that power. And they knew it too. To

ensure a future for themselves they put aside their differences and formed a triumvirate,

and got to work building a new world. They knew the glory of Rome would not last

forever. An authority needed to be established to take its place when she fell, one that

could exploit fear and promise salvation at the same time. Like the Caesars had done. A

hundred years after Jesus died, the Triumvirate met with Ireneaus, the archbishop of

Lyons, to formalize this new authority. The Church. They structured it as a hierarchy

with the pope as Caesar and his bishops, priests and clergy playing the roles of tribunes,

centurions and legionaries, respectively. The most pressing issue was to agree on a canon

of gospels that honored the rabbi and made him assessable but not to the degree an

individual could decide for himself what was best in his walk with God. Only the Church

could make that determination. And there were many gospels out there vying for

recognition. After much debate a Top Ten List was prepared. Four books made the cut.

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By the time the Council of Nicaea convened in 325 A.D. to formally declare Jesus of

Nazareth divine, Christianity had taken a firm hold on the psyche of the human race. For

the next thousand years the Church was a compulsory presence in the courts of all

civilized nations. Its authority had evolved into a world dictatorship. An all-seeing eye.

Hap’s recital helped reconstitute the histories my conscious mind ignored so that I

could remain focused on them during the time of Christ, but my subconscious kept

recording. These other lives played across my mind in a whirligig of soft stained-glass

chapters—vivid, concise montages with supporting characters no less rich and varied

who moved through the narratives like shooting stars. Lucius was often seen with a

funereal figure, a tall lean man, who did his every bidding and called him “Master”.

Then, one day, he too was gone, only to reappear in another century in some other guise.

The Triumvirate forded the trenches of the Middle Ages to the promising shores

of the Renaissance and established a foothold across Europe. They survived the Black

Plague, initiated the Inquisition and funded a number of crusades to the Holy Land. I saw

them hold court with so many kings named Louis that I lost count. Eventually Hap sailed

to the New World to establish himself as a consultant to the thirteen colonies who were

entertaining the idea of making a go of it alone, without England’s help. Lucius was

nearly drowned in the mire of the French Revolution only to rise from the ashes to help

establish the reign of Napoleon. Gin traveled to the Orient and was not seen publicly

again until after the American Civil War where she surfaced on the eastern seaboard and

assumed the role of her mentor, Medhat, and forged alliances with politicos from Boston,

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Philadelphia and New York by offering the finest female company money could buy.

Lucius courted the czar of Russia while Hap went West in search for gold, only to end up

fighting Comanche, Kiowa and Sioux.

The three of them found a way to bury their personal differences as the United

States neared the twentieth century. They had learned that the promises of the papacy

could not alleviate poverty. The world was crying for porridge and the Church said God

would provide. Well, God didn’t provide. The Triumvirate provided. It was money that

made the world go round, not religion; and to that effort they established the Federal

Reserve—what they quaintly called “The God Bank”—with a U.S. senator, a handful of

leading financiers and the Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Treasury Department at their

bunker estate on Jekyll Island in 1910.

I had witnessed major milestones of world history not unlike that fellow with the

apocalyptic eye-opener. He’d also been drugged, but by the salt water he had to resort to

drinking after toiling under the lash and the hot Aegean sun in the stone quarry during his

imprisonment on the Isle of Patmos. John lay inside a cave swamped by delirium. He

shared his visions with a fellow slave named Prochoros who recorded his revelations onto

papyrus. John saw the future; I had seen what had come before. Of the two, mine was

the more terrifying because it had taken tangible shape. Here, inside my saloon on South

Padre Island, were two of the three immortals responsible for creating the world as we

know it today. As immortals go, I suppose they were in effect gods. Gods who looked

pretty damn ordinary and could belly up to the bar like the rest of us.

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As Hap talked I let myself get lost in the sleepy turn of the ceiling fans and the

swaying underwear above me. Panties and bras teased me with invisible longing. There

was an occasional Speedo and Fruit of the Loom brief to confirm we were an equal

opportunity offender. I became preoccupied with a pair of pink and black garters and

tried to decide which color I preferred. Both. Neither. As long as it complimented what

was underneath, I didn’t care. I imagined the war in heaven was probably over flesh.

God used it to clothe the spirit world but when Satan fell in love with himself and refused

to give it back, God stripped him of it and, well, you know the rest of the story. You

can’t blame the angels for wanting form. But God gave form to man. I say we give it

back. Then we’d be free of its weight, its frailty, its propensity for flatulence. I felt my

skepticism returning like the recalcitrant child who realizes he likes being bad. It was the

underwear. Whispering to me like those fallen angels who’d been denied form. And

what they said to me was this: Beware! Anything that comes for free is a lie.

Like a sip from the Holy Grail.

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CHAPTER 11

I stood up from the floor and stretched. I looked out the windows towards Port Isabel,

across the mother bay—the Laguna Madre as it’s labeled on a map. Daylight brought out

the water’s famous margarita-green color and the sky was cloudless. The world had

somehow finished a revolution without me. I’d been under the influence of mushrooms

and had walked the clouds of the afterlife. But now that I was sober again, I didn’t

believe any of that had really happened. Except here was Hellus Arias Apollus sipping a

martini at my bar and I couldn’t rationalize his presence.

The kitchen doors swung open with a bang and out walked Gin. She was holding

a tray over her shoulder. She grabbed a folding stand, snapped it open and set the tray

down upon it. She then proceeded to place a breakfast fit for a king on the table. Ham,

scrambled eggs, link sausage, bacon, muffins, toast, pancakes, fresh blueberries, home

fries, coffee. She took stock of the feast and beamed at me.

When I didn’t sit she cocked her hand on her hip and leered at me as if I was a

sourpuss. She sat beside Hap. They helped themselves to the mighty meal and chatted,

even giggled. My tummy growled and the aromas wore me down and I joined them.

I ate like a bird at first, tentative of how much I could comfortably consume before my

stomach rebelled. But it didn’t. After some coffee I was feeling myself again.

“We’ve run out of time, Del,” said Gin. “Or, maybe moves. Yeah. We’ve run

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out of moves. Sooner or later we knew—at least I did—that I’d have to pay for my sin

against Satan. Best just go to hell and get it over with. He can’t have me for long

because Jesus forgave me. But that doesn’t mean he will honor that. Maybe he has to.

Maybe he doesn’t. Maybe when I get there he’ll pull the rug out from under me and tell

me I’m his forever, even though he insists he won’t.”

“He’s a liar,” said Hap chewing pancake and sausage which he followed with a

hefty portion of potatoes. The man could eat.

“We want you to come get me,” said Gin.

I looked at her. “Come . . . do what?”

“Rescue her,” said Hap. “We’ll have the Hellwitch but I can’t run her alone, not

for something like this. I’ll need help. Backup.”

I lost my appetite. I broke a sweat. I fought to light a cigarette. This fantasy of

theirs of which I’d been duped into believing was over was, in fact, just getting started.

Gin continued her explanation as I stared zombie-like across the table. I think

maybe they realized that news this profound had to be delivered while tending a routine.

Like the scene from the movie Oh God! when George Burns materializes in John

Denver’s bathroom and tells him He’s God and what He wants John to do for Him. John

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is shaving and God tells him to keep shaving so he won’t faint from fright. That’s what

was happening here. The breakfast was my shaving.

“And just how do you expect us to get there?” I asked. Then I intoned, “I can’t

believe I just said that.”

“We’ll take one of the rivers,” said Hap.

“What rivers?”

“The ones you saw. The Greeks say there are three rivers in the afterlife.”

“I’m not going to hell!”

“Everyone goes. Even Jesus went. The question is whether or not you stay.

Anyway the rivers don’t necessarily go there. They fork all through the afterlife. The

Underworld, as the Greeks called it.”

Someone just slap me.

“There are conditions,” said Gin.

“Of course there are.” I flicked a cigarette ash.

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Hap studied me for a moment. “He doesn’t believe.”

Gin touched his hand with reassurance. “Yes, he does, but his mind is telling him

not to. Del. Del, look at me.”

I didn’t want to look at her.

“There really is a spirit world.”

“Which human beings can’t access,” I said. “Check that. I’m human. The jury’s

still out on you guys.”

Gin punched back. “The spirit world and the physical world share the same

door—death. But our sins follow us, Del. Unless we turn to Christ they’ll stay with us

too. That’s why the devil tempted him. As a reminder that there was no escaping his

right to be an influential force in God’s creation.”

“How do we know that? I mean the temptations. Where’s the proof?”

Gin entwined her fingers and with all seriousness she said, “I saw him.”

I was taken aback. Then I recalled her retreat to the desert after the brutal beating

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from Lucius. How she had lived in a cave like an animal. The cave where it all began.

The cave where I had seen Quasimodo. My God! Had she really been there, in hiding,

when the temptations occurred? The war of words between Jesus and Satan is covered in

three of the four gospels. The Gospel of John doesn’t mention it. But whom would Jesus

have told this story to? His disciples? Why? To impress them? Wouldn’t that be like

bragging? Jesus didn’t strike me as someone who’d toot his own horn. He didn’t need to

tell fish tales to impress the ladies. So where did the story come from? What was its

origin? Who was its source? Who was there who actually witnessed Satan tempt Christ

in the wilderness? Gin. She was hiding inside the cave when the confrontation took

place. She was the one who told the story to the disciples and they believed her because,

like Mary Magdalene, she was a disciple.

I moved the conversation along. “So what are these conditions?”

“That’s on a need-to-know basis,” said Hap.

“OK. I need to know. Or you can find someone else. In fact, why don’t you do

that. I want my life back.”

“There must be water,” said Gin quickly, anxious to keep me at the table. “Water

is the source of life.”

“You mean we can’t spelunk to hell? Think we’ll run into Eurydice if we go?”

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“After all we’ve shown him,” said Hap to Gin his eyes fixed onto me. “Do you

have any idea how much the government spends to investigate—and I don’t even want to

use this word—the paranormal? Billions. All of it off the books, too. Why? Because

someone in Washington knows the spirit world is as real as this one. It’s no different

than passing through a wormhole to another part of the galaxy.”

“But space travel is a part of this dimension,” I said. “Not the next. Or wherever

it is we go to when we die.”

“Unless this dimension is all there is.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“All the dimensions imaginable exist in this place we call the Universe. Heaven

and hell surround us already in the good and evil that men do. When we die we don’t go

anywhere, per se. We just experience life from a new perspective. Like how a song

sounds played live and how it sounds in the next room over speakers. It’s still the same

song. You’re just experiencing it from a different reference point.”

“Are you saying there was no beginning?”

“Quantum mechanics suggests—.”

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I stopped him right there. “Hey. Let me tell you what you can do with your

quantum mechanics. Science can’t even agree on what it is. There are a dozen different

versions, the Copenhagen interpretation being the most recognized.”

“Fine. But no one knows for certain if a big bang ever took place. Whether or

not it occurred does not negate the fact that forces inside the fabric of creation exist.”

“Like good and evil.”

“Yes. Science won’t call it that, of course. They call it quanta. It’s the stuff that

actually makes up the fabric of creation and it is in constant flux. As if the Cosmos is in

a war with itself. Science won’t deny this. They simply prefer not to personalize it.”

“But the subatomic particles that make up everything are conscious, Del,” said

Gin. “Intelligence in its purest form.”

“And fighting?”

“There is no such thing as inertia at the subatomic level.”

“No peaceful easy feeling, eh? I thought God was all about that.”

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“Maybe He was,” said Gin. “Once. But that changed when He began to create.

In myth the first thing He created were angels. The first angel was Satan. He did such a

good job sometimes you can’t tell the two apart. There are now two sides to whatever

God is. The good and the bad. The face of light versus the face of darkness. A song of

love or a song of hate. Call God energy if you want. Or quanta. Whatever God is, He is

sharing the same space with a creation of His own making.”

“Fighting for control of it,” said Hap.

“Exactly. God fighting Satan at the subatomic level. Good versus evil. It’s really

that simple, except, of course, it’s not.”

I refreshed my coffee. “Well, it’s tough to get the genie back in the bottle.”

“The ancients knew how to tap into this energy,” said Gin. “Through meditation.

Some have abused its power and have embraced the negative. Others, like Jesus,

absorbed the positive energy and used it to do good. He said we could be like him, if we

wanted. We too can have super consciousness. The Gospel of Philip—.”

“That’s a Gnostic work.”

“Yes, yes it is and it shouldn’t be. Why isn’t it canonical?”

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“Would it matter if it was? Would Christianity have even survived had you guys

not been so ruthless? Will it be here in a hundred years? Not if ISIS has anything to say

about it. Aren’t they doing what early Christians did—bend the knee or lose your head?”

“We thought we’d been spared death for a reason, Del,” said Gin. “Wouldn’t

you? We thought that reason was to establish the Kingdom of God on Earth. To build its

cathedrals in every shape and size across the globe.”

“And enslave mankind?”

“Mankind was already enslaved. By the Roman Empire. The Church was built to

free them.”

“But you guys built the Church and did the same damn thing. What’s that say?”

“That power corrupts,” said Hap. “And absolute power corrupts absolutely. No

one is immune to that axiom, I’m afraid. Not popes, presidents or kings. Not Gin. Not

me. Not even you, Mr. Lycan. Do you attend church?”

“When they start paying taxes like the rest of us I might pop in. Go back a bit.

You mentioned the Gospel of Philip. Why?”

“We know you’re well-read, Del.” Gin nudged Hap with her elbow. “But he

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doesn’t know Dumas very well, does he?” Hap shook his head. The joke was

completely lost on me. “I suppose I mentioned it because—.”

“The Kingdom of God is inside you,” said Hap interrupting. “It’s the pathway to

self-discovery, a transcendence of consciousness. ‘Be not a Christian,’ says Philip. ‘Be a

Christ.’ Learn to be still. There’s your superhero power, Mr. Lycan. It’s not on the

movie screen. Learn how to pray like Jesus prayed and become that superhero.” His

eyes brightened. “Walk on water!”

He reminded me of the oddball genius of a Dali or a Picasso splashing the canvas

with a final brushstroke, saying ¡aquí! ¡esta terminado! Zorro was no less creative.

Only he used a sword. It’s all art. Even if it bleeds. As for superheroes I was compelled

to correct him. “But Peter started to sink,” I said.

“He wasn’t a master yet,” said Gin.

“And you guys are?” I said stabbing at a sausage link that needed to be stabbed at.

“You can tap into the good energy or the bad and use it accordingly,” said Gin.

“That’s free will. It’s a humming sound behind your inner ear. We all have it. We can

all tap it. For doing good.”

“Or doing evil,” said Hap.

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“It’s the sound of God calling us to join Him,” said Gin.

“Why? To help Him fight the battle?”

“We fight it here, Del, or we fight it there,” she said. “Even the Bible pays tribute

to it on the first page in the Book of John. ‘In the beginning was the word, and the word

was with God, and the word was God.’ OK. So God was sound—”.

Hap interrupted again. “Scientists at the Institute of Astronomy at Cambridge

have calculated the frequency of the sound of creation as the note B-flat.”

“B-flat?”

“Yes, Mr. Lycan.”

“So God is singing out of pitch, hmm?”

Hap simply looked at me, chewing. Gin read our cut and thrust as gunfighters

eyeing one another before they drew down. She hurried in, “So in the beginning God

was sound. A hum. Nothing else. Why not just say that then? Because the writers of

those sacred texts fancied themselves poets. Call it The Word if you want. The fact

remains that everything is built upon this vibration. Gravity. Galaxies. Light. Time

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itself. And in the human experience the two forces that make up this sound, this quanta,

this word, have found their greatest manifestation.”

“In man.”

“Right.”

“So we really do have an angel on one shoulder and a little devil on the other.”

“Is everything a joke to you?” said Hap.

“I’m just getting started,” I said reaching for the pancakes. “I’ve got double the

appetite too because I’ve been born again.”

“You can thank Gin for that.”

“So you do the killing and she does the healing, huh? Pass the syrup. You want

my advice? I know a guy who works in the pharmaceutical industry. That’s the Holy

Grail you’ve got around your waist, pal. If we can figure out how to harness its magic,

we can make a pill out of it and sell it on Amazon. Who knows? Maybe we’ll convince

the world God’s not dead after all. Folks need a miracle. But you need a platform. A

Facebook page. Twitter account. Make a video. No one will believe it, of course. Not

until you execute someone on live television and then bring him back. Someone big.

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You’ll need a catchy name. What you’re selling is lightning in a bottle . . . Hey!”

“Mocking us won’t change the facts, Mr. Lycan,” said Hap.

“Deal with it. I’m the one who just died. Except I don’t feel very immortal at the

moment but I must be, right? Until a piano falls on my head or something?” I gave a nod

to his belt which he wore with the same élan Dracula wore a cummerbund. “Are you

willing to let the government run tests on that to analyze its properties?” By the look on

his face I knew that he wasn’t. “That’s what I thought. Oh. I’m sorry. Weren’t there

two cups Jesus drank from? According to the Book of Luke there were.”

Hap’s eyes evoked bitterness. “One was lost to us years ago.”

“Let me guess. It’s stashed in a warehouse with the bodies of little green men.”

“The government doesn’t need my belt to resurrect the dead, Mr. Lycan. It has

already discovered how to breach the afterlife. The program is above top-secret. They

call themselves T.R.I.P. That’s T period, R period—.”

“Then you don’t need me to go get your wife. Send in SEAL Team Six.” I

looked at Gin. “You don’t really believe you’re going to hell, do you?”

“I know I am.”

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I searched her eyes for anything that could tell me she was setting me up like she

had with the mushrooms. Drug me, kill me, then bring me back to life so I’d become a

believer. I ate greedily, my confidence building steam. I addressed Hap. “So if she

sinned against the devil what did you do? Sin against God?”

“What I did some have said was the gravest sin. But it has nothing to do with

what we are discussing here. The question put to you is still open. Gin needs your help.

I need your help. So, what’s it going to be?”

“You said we couldn’t enter the afterlife unless we were on water?”

“There are other conditions that must be met.”

“Like what? Fog and a full moon?”

Gin pressed the palms of her hands to her eyes as if she was exhausted, which I

hoped she was. I hoped I could wear them down. Then maybe they’d leave.

“Take some time,” she said. “We need you. But we can’t force you. You have to

come along willingly.”

“Well, Halloween is just around the corner.”

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Hap reached down to his ankle and brought up a nasty little Ruger .25 and pointed

it between my eyes.

“Hap!” cried Gin. “No!”

“You want a repeat performance, kid?” said Hap. “That what you want?”

He swung the gun off me and placed it at Gin’s temple. She shot up in her chair,

rigid with fear. He had reached his breaking point, which was odd since he had time on

his side. What’s another missed deadline when you’re immortal?

“We need him,” said Gin. “We’ve spent too much time planning this. You don’t

want to ruin this beautiful breakfast, do you, Haven? Hap . . . Hellus.” The sound of his

ancient name evidenced in his eyes. He blinked out of his crazed stupor and retired the

gun and returned to his eggs. No one spoke. By the drawn look on Gin’s face she

needed a drink. So did I. She picked at her breakfast. “I don’t want to know,” she said.

“But I need it sudden. That’s about the only good that comes from a gun. The speed.

I’ll be dead before I hit the ground, right?” She looked innocent as a child. “You’re

wondering why I’d put myself through such a thing. If I’m forgiven why wouldn’t I want

to launch into the great unknown?” I remained quiet. “Del, what if man really is God’s

greatest creation? The Scriptures speak of another place, a better place, that awaits us but

even Jesus lauded the benefits of sticking around here. The meek shall inherit the earth

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and all that. If death is just the jumping off point before the real story begins, why did

Jesus praise the benefits of this life so much? Think about it. When Christ came back

and showed himself to his disciples, Thomas, Mr. Doubter Himself, thought he was a

ghost, an apparition. But Jesus told him to touch his wounds and know that he was flesh

and bone and—this really gets me—he still wasn’t sure. Then do you know what Jesus

did to drive home the point that he was real? He asked them for something to eat! Now

what ghost would do such a thing?” She began to laugh. The lovely sound of her voice

filtered through the saloon like hand bells chiming a Christmas carol. “But by that act

alone I think Jesus let the cat out of the bag. By resurrecting himself in human form, was

he not praising it as greater than the spirit one? What is spirit anyway? Human existence

is hard—all the hatred, the disease, the wars. But it’s the struggle to overcome these

things that seems paramount to appreciating it in the first place. What spirit would do

that? It knows that it knows so why bother? Therefore how much fun can a spirit really

be? If it can’t have its heart broken, how can it experience love?” She bowed her head.

“‘How else but through a broken heart may Lord Christ enter in?’”

“Oscar Wilde,” I said recognizing the truism.

Hap glanced up at me, and then went back to his food.

Gin said, “So I ask you, Why not live forever? Think of all the things we haven’t

done, all the things we haven’t seen. I’m a victim of great centuries but living through

them was hell. It wasn’t a romance novel, I assure you. I love romance but what I am

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really about, Del—what Hap is really about—is the struggle to make that romance. To

break a sweat. To feel my muscles burn as I cross the finish line. To take a chance. To

risk it all. That is living! If the spirit world is so great, why do the Scriptures promote

the idea that the Kingdom of Heaven will be here? Why move the capital of creation

down to this grim little rock? Unless, like the song says, heaven is a place on earth. If

that is true, then my theory that humanity is God’s greatest creation is the reason it will

be brought here.”

Not an entirely ineffective argument.

I suppose Hap was waiting for me to concur. My silence set him off. He

snatched a table knife and drove it through the top of his hand. Gin screamed and I

leaped back as a speck of blood hit me in the eye. He curled over the knife in agony.

“He doesn’t believe!” he said. “Show him. Show him!”

Gin unhooked his belt. Hap yanked the knife from his hand, the pain blistering

his face. He held his bleeding mitt over his breakfast plate, spewing red over his eggs

like watery ketchup. She poured his martini into the belt buckle, held the shell above the

wound and poured. The skin bubbled with blue iridescence which then disappeared.

There was no sign of the wound he had just engineered. His hand was without fault or

blemish.

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I bowed my head, beaten. There was no out for me here. No reason not to

believe. My mind was clear of any residual effects from the mushrooms because I too

had been healed in the same manner. By the Cup of Christ. A scallop seashell that,

despite its thin veneer of gold, looked no different from the scallop seashells you can buy

for a buck at any souvenir shop from here to Florida. The perfect soap dish or ashtray.

I felt a fresh sting of self-reproach behind my eyes. All doubt had vanished. I

was penitent and contrite. A true believer.

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CHAPTER 12

So we became friends. And for reasons I can’t really explain the pieces fell back into

place. When logic blows a fuse a little faith can go a long way. If I gave this any more

thought I could shut down completely. I felt like I was in a tree with Charles Darwin and

Christopher Hitchens with nothing to defend us from the Komodo dragons below but a

tome by Billy Graham. Human beings are mortal. Does that negate the possibility that

something is not? Have we all retired the lance and steed because windmills aren’t

interesting anymore? The act of childbirth may belong to the natural world but I’ll bet

little can match its wonder in any dimension. So the ideas promulgated by theists and

atheists alike leave me cold. Bible-thumpers refuse to use their God-given brain to think

outside their archaic verse while science denies a self-existent Cause even though they

can’t mathematically prove compassion.

The following weeks felt as if we were lassoed to a dream, performing a lazy

backstroke to anyone who cared to look, finally playing the roles we were meant to play

in the universe. I became a fixture aboard the Hellwitch as if I had come with the

directions. I had my own stateroom and tended the chores necessary to keep the ship

running smoothly. I felt no bitterness towards Hap and he held none for me. We had

shared the carnal fruits of the same woman like two divers sharing the mouthpiece on an

air hose. But no more. Gin was Hap’s girl again. I had to find one of my own.

Nudging me in the back of my mind, however, were two things. There had been

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no mention that Gin’s time was running out. Nor had there been any mention of Lucius

whom I assumed was being immortal on the other side of the world somewhere. Gin

wanted to take the fast lane to death; the penetration of hot missiles through bone and

brain unplugging her almost instantly before her soul released into the ether. It was

certainly more charitable than, say, lethal injection which, according to Hap, was like

slipping into a bath of hydrochloric acid. Shock, he said, was the key to a merciful death.

She would then face her tormentor before Hap and I rode in and—Throw this pelican

across the room because I was still a skeptic. I only believed their sales pitch because of

what I’d seen happen to them 2000 years ago. Yes, in a hallucination, but one that was as

real to me as the healing of the knife wound in Hap’s hand was real. Also I had

experienced death at the hands of Hap when he drove the needle through my heart. I

died. I know I did. And then I was miraculously resurrected. That told me two more

things: if the Holy Grail existed then Jesus wasn’t a myth. If Jesus wasn’t a myth, then

there was a pretty good chance hell wasn’t a myth either. The second insight gave me

pause but I guess you can’t have the good without the bad.

Miraculous resurrection may be the 21st century’s first major hysteria moment

because more and more doctors are coming forth, risking public ridicule and professional

scorn, to speak about the strange phenomenon. Examples of patients dying on the

operating table only to reawaken in the morgue with tags on their toes and the same

account of seeing a light at the end of a tunnel are happening with alarming regularity.

Now comes the tale of the superheated middle-aged man rolled into the ER on a

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stretcher suffering from seizures and an elevated temperature of 103 and still rising.

Finding white powder on his septum the doctors diagnosed he was suffering from cocaine

electrocution. Despite his feverish frenzy he was almost entertaining. His manic rat-a-

tat-tat observations as the nurses cut away his clothes almost had them laughing. A

vicious series of spasms rendered him mute. The doctors administered benzodiazepines

to calm him but his heart was fibrillating as if injected with epinephrine and he showed a

rectal temperature of 108 which meant his liver was likely four degrees higher. An ice

bath was ordered to lower his body temperature before his brain cooked and his liver

failed which would lead to internal bleeding on a massive scale. A stroke put him into a

coma. Three days later he rejoined the living with nearly the same arrogance he had

when they rolled him in, pointing out the historical facts that Sigmund Freud used

cocaine as an antidepressant and Robert Louis Stevenson wrote The Strange Case of Dr.

Jekyll and Mr. Hyde on blow, and in less time than it took Sylvester Stallone to write

Rocky. Great minds have a propensity to overdose on living, I told them. The doctors

then asked me if I saw anything. I asked them what they meant by “saw anything”. I had

died, they told me. Many people say they saw a white light. Had I? All I could

remember was the car spinning out of control and the embankment beneath the overpass

which looked like an overturned tombstone with my name on it. They then told me that I

was high on coke. If the crash hadn’t killed me the drug would have. I told them I was

invincible. They told me to grow up. I assured them I’d consider it.

A drill sergeant nurse seemed all too willing to sock me in the eye for my cavalier

attitude. She then informed me that an attractive nurse, named—hmm, I can’t recall—

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anyway, she, the attractive one, had prayed over me several times when she was on duty.

I told Sarge I would thank her the next time I saw her.

When she came into my room that night to check on me I saw that she carried a

small purple book in one hand. I inquired what it was and she showed it to me. The

Science of Spiritual Affirmation by Carl P. Strump. As I ran my eye over her generous

bosom I told her I didn’t know who that was. She did not seem in the mood to educate

me either. Instead she scolded me, telling me that what I was doing to myself was an

affront to God. Then she turned away to adjust the intravenous drip in my arm.

I focused on her beautifully rounded buttocks and said, “Well, if you’re talking

about the one in the robes and beard I am, as Einstein once said, ‘a deeply religious non-

believer.’” I thought I might get a little laugh out of that. Poking fun at fundamentalists

was almost as much fun as slamming the door in the faces of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

“It’s a sin what you’re doing,” she said.

“I don’t believe in sin. Don’t like the word much, how it sounds. I’ll leave that

subject to those narrow-minded folks who still believe the bribery of an entire species

was achieved by the innocent eating of an apple. A species to which you and I belong, by

the way. Not intimately yet but, hey, the night is young.” Man, she was pretty. But I

was the one in the hospital bed, not her, and I refused to be proselytized to. When she

walked to the door I figured I’d won. You grow up. Stop believing in fairytales.

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That’s when she turned and said, “Your girlfriend is in ICU. In case you’re

interested.”

***

The Hellwitch made all the papers, from McAllen to Houston. She’d been

registered a historical landmark years earlier by the powers that be in Washington D.C.

and had proven herself a big draw in boat parades and 4th of July celebrations all up and

down the eastern seaboard. She’d just never played Texas before. The Coast Guard—

along with two officers from the Naval Air Station in Corpus Christi—ran her through a

rigorous series of trials to ensure the public’s safety. After all she was a gunship and,

unlike most relics, her guns still fired. Blanks, of course, but Hap had influential friends

inside the Beltway who made certain the weapons aboard remained operational.

Though not officially recognized by the Navy she had nevertheless been used as a

rover during World War II, running between Galveston and Tampa on the lookout for

German U-boats. Afterwards the CIA used her as a chase boat behind the yachts of three

presidents before she was moored in a shipyard outside Bayonne, New Jersey and

virtually forgotten. Her engines and torpedoes were removed and her machine guns,

automatic cannons, mortars and rocket launchers were dismantled and sold to surplus

stores as novelties. Her “wings” no one knew what to do with. They had worked like a

charm, too, but only as a prototype; the next generation hydrofoil was on the Navy’s

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drawing board. She was a shell of rotting plywood and three-ply mahogany when Hap

found her, and he spent the next twenty years and a million dollars restoring her.

Of course Hap and Gin were on everyone’s radar. To the island they were new

blood. In a community of just less than three thousand where the neighborhood bar was

something of a cottage industry and everyone pretty much knew everyone else—from

their preferences in the bedroom to the size of their bank accounts—tempers and

jealousies had a tendency to flare. The Hellwitch caused quite a stir, making Hap and

Gin appear more eccentric than was easy to swallow. But they stayed above the fray as

best they could. They gave generously of their time, allowing impromptu tours aboard

their peculiar ship, buying the house a round in whatever tavern they found themselves

in, and even attending city council meetings to get a feel for the island’s inner workings.

Eventually the locals mellowed, yielding to the idea that whatever forces had been

brought to bear to wash them up on these shores were probably similar to what had

driven most of us down here. Sure our pedigree was dubious. South Padre Island was

less an island in the traditional sense and more a sandbar. (The palm trees? They had to

be trucked in from the Valley.) But the weather was fine, the fishing was great and we

didn’t gouge the tourists. Well, we tried not to.

To help smooth their transition into the community they partnered with the city in

their fireworks display held every Friday night to bring in the weekend.

“And here she comes now, folks! Yessireebob! Fifty tons of fast fightin’ fury!”

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It was Jigger Doyle doing the talking in front of a stand-up microphone inside his perch

overlooking the bay. He was a retired electrician who doubled as an auctioneer at estate

sales. With his ten-gallon Stetson and beer belly he would have had no trouble peddling

beef at the Fort Worth Stockyards. His son, Prenty, was thin as a pole and fed him cans

of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer. Jigger wasn’t a sipper, either. He downed those beers as if

they were White Castle sliders. “Ladies and Gents, give it up for the Hellwitch!”

The audience applauded as the warship moved across their line of sight cutting an

envelope of white through the water, its sleek arrowhead silhouette ablaze in bright LED

rope lights Hap called “Santa-sleigh red”.

Throngs of people milled between the bars along the little bayside road.

Shrimpers rubbed elbows with lawyers. The tiers of societal class were temporarily

smoothed out. Everyone was family because everyone was here to see the show.

I held my place aft behind a port side torpedo while Gin straddled the torpedo in

front of me. She wore cut-offs, a bright pink bathing suit top and a straw cowboy hat.

She was hooting and hollering and waving her hat over her head like Slim Pickens riding

the bomb out of the plane in Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove. Hap stood at the helm bathed in

spotlight. Everyone wore a radio headset so we could communicate with each other over

the roar of the Rolls-Royce Proteus diesel engines which sent shivers up my legs and

charged my libido as if I was wading waist-deep in rough swells. Manning the machine

guns was Hap’s answer to the Budweiser Girls—a band of scantily-clad babes in red,

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white and blue bathing suits, doused in Las Vegas showgirl glitter.

“Fire your pretty buns off, ladies!” said Hap via his headset.

The beauties opened up. The bruising staccato elicited frightened “oohs” and

“aahs” from the crowd, many of whom covered their ears.

“Holy Guacamole!” said Jigger over the microphone. “If that don’t blow your

skivvies off, I don’t know what will! Speaking of underwear, folks. After the show, ya’ll

mosey on over to Skivvies and pick yourselves up a pair. Red, white and blue. We’re

running a special tonight. Buy one, get one free. OK, now watch everybody. See that

target out there?”

The target was an anchored float with a huge bull’s eye made of foam and balsa

wood.

Jigger said, “Ya’ll know what the T in PT stands for, doncha? Tor-pe-do! Now

keep your eyes on that target, pardners.”

Hap came about and zeroed in on the bull’s eye float. Gin was now standing

behind her torpedo like I was. She had a job to do and she took it seriously. Hap’s voice

squawked over our radio headsets. “All set back there, boys and girls?”

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“Port side torpedo one manned and ready, sir!” said Gin.

Then I parroted, “Port side torpedo two manned and ready!”

“OK,” said Hap, his arm raised at the ready. “On my mark.” He double-checked

the bearing and dropped the arm in dramatic fashion. “Fire one!” he shouted.

Gin jammed forward the CO² lever and a jet of exhaust exited the vents in the

torpedo tube and the dart jettisoned off the side of the Hellwitch with a violent zip and

splashed into the water, its gyros engaging immediately. Hap re-raised his arm and,

checking his sight line again, yelled, “Fire two!” I pressed on the firing mechanism and

my torpedo launched, brilliant for only a moment like a stock car racing by, except our

fish fanned up wakes of fluorescent green dye as they moved through the black water

allowing the audience the visual hook to remain engaged. The warheads were benign of

course and when the torpedoes hit the target, the bull’s eye detonated in a faux explosion

of red, white and blue paint. Whoop-whoop sirens howled as shafts of fire shot into the

sky while a series of blasts and flares rose in bright sparkling streaks and blossomed into

a thorny headdress of variegated color, teasing all of the bigger fireworks show to come.

“Bull’s eye!” shouted Jigger over the loudspeakers.

Applause and cheers filtered across the bay from the spectators. Hap pitched the

PT boat into a dramatic turn, pushed the throttles forward, and made a run at the crowd.

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Just before he reached the point of no return he heaved to sending up a huge wave from

the boat’s underbelly, wetting down a large portion of the spectators.

Hoots of surprise erupted from the crowd as Jigger joked, “Oops! Did ya’ll forget

to bring your umbrellas?”

The Hellwitch sprinted off in her red glow, leaving behind the pungent smell of

cordite and the echo of detonations. The crowd cheered for the dragon that had just

snorted salty sea spray across them when suddenly the red sparkle that marked her outline

disappeared. All that lay in view of the audience was smoke on the water, the shroud of

night and the yellow lights that outlined the graceful line of the causeway a half mile

away. The expectation of more derring-do was patent. No one dared move. There

simply had to be an encore.

Then Jigger’s voice boomed, “There she is!”

With a stuttering flicker, the red lights came back on pinning the torpedo boat’s

location much closer to shore than when she’d disappeared. Maybe that was simply part

of the trick played on the eye. Either way, the dragon was back, and she looked mean.

She was spewing smoke. Not from her stern but from her sides as if she had nostrils.

Another illusion but it didn’t matter. The Hellwitch was charging the audience again.

Her hot breath left an eerie white curtain behind her. The gunfire was deafening in an

almost beautiful way, the muzzles of her machine guns spitting orange tracer fire in the

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air. She peeled off to another round of applause and returned to the cottony mist like an

eel back to her hole, becoming wholly engulfed by wild scimitar down-drafts of smoke.

“What’s she doing?” spoke Jigger in a deeper tone reminiscent of Vincent Price.

“Where can she be?”

Time seemed to stand still while everyone watched the smoke screen linger. It

took on the presence of a vaporous entity looking back at the spectators. Then a stick

poked out of the smoke. It soared high as a telephone pole. It teetered from side to side,

creaking like an awakening giant. Then a bowsprit emerged. And yardarms and masts.

They cut through the clouds like skeletal bones. Her flags and sails were black. The full

girth of the galleon burst upon the night when rope lights lit her up in blue brilliance.

“Oh no!” gasped Jigger over the loudspeakers. “It’s the Pirate Queen! And she

looks mighty angry! These waters belong to the likes of Jean Lafitte and Captain Kidd!”

As if on cue the red luminous dragon reappeared and the two ships from two different

ages taunted each other. “But you better move on over, Queeny!” shouted Jigger. “Cuz

the Hellwitch don’t take no prisoners!”

Blazing bursts of light broke on and off as gun powder ignited from the Pirate

Queen’s first broadside. Smoke tunnels shot out from the mouths of her cannons. Then

the Hellwitch responded in kind, blow for blow, with her quad-cannon Thunderbolt, her

blistering machine guns and Redeye rockets. Back and forth these two leviathans battled

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as fake fires and explosions abounded. It was a pyrotechnic’s delight and a huge

theatrical success.

***

I thought I’d go for a jog on the beach to see if my rebirth had had any remedial

effects on the lungs I’d been polluting for years with cigarettes. Sure enough I had the

wind of an eighteen-year-old but I wasn’t ready to quit. It would be like giving up pie.

Apparently the Grail was incapable of curing stupidity.

I came across Candy sculpting sand with Baddog. I made small talk with her

while Dusty growled at me from behind his Ray-Bans. He smelled like over-ripened fruit

that needed to be tossed. To his credit he had washed his face and combed what little

hair he had left. He had taken to wearing a gold crucifix around his neck. It was the

large gaudy kind favored by rappers and Catholic priests, both of whom dignify the hood

when sales are down.

“I’m gonna take a dip,” he said to Candy as if my presence was too much for him.

“Take a bar a soap with you,” I said.

There was something strange in his aura, a sort of renewed vitality I couldn’t

quite place. It wasn’t his clenched fist. It had been clenched ever since I showed up. It

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was a firmness in his frame, as if he’d just finished a workout at the gym. He pecked

Candy on the neck and trotted down to the water and dove in.

“He’s looking better. Don’t you think?”

“I hadn’t noticed.”

“I’m helping him with his diet,” she said.

“Oh, is that what it is.”

The two of us stared each other down from behind our sunglasses.

“He find religion or something?” I asked.

“Gin gave it to him. Can you believe that?”

“Just gave it to him, huh?”

“Yeah. She said it belonged to some guy who blessed it a thousand years ago. I

don’t go in for that sort of stuff but it must be true.”

“What must be true?”

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“The power of positive thinking. I mean sometimes it just needs a boost to take

hold. Like when you’re depressed and you buy something you know you can’t afford. It

sort of empowers you. He just started wearing it last week.”

“When his hair comes in, give me a call.”

“You don’t think it’s real, do you?”

“What, his hair?”

“No, silly. The cross.”

“Nah. Gold plate.”

She chuckled, “How do they make gold plate?”

“They don’t. It grows in the forest.”

“Really? Where?”

“Belize. There’s plenty of gold plate down there.”

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Wait for it. But nothing clicked so I let it go. I thought by my mentioning Belize

we could discuss the note she’d left behind with Hap, the blank one, but it completely

escaped her. And with it went any chance for cheap meaningful sex, arguably the best

kind. True, I do like them clueless on occasion but there was something special about

Candy. She’d built her own business, traveled the world performing sandcastle lessons

for beachcombing heads of state and even did a spot on a nationwide morning television

show from the Atlantis resort in Nassau. You couldn’t be as successful as she was and be

an idiot, could you? Not everyone knows where gold plate comes from, you know.

To become a part of her crew you had to take an oath.

Raise your right hand and repeat after me:

I promise to have fun. I promise to play when the work is done. And I promise

not to eat too much candy. Ruins the teeth, she likes to add, smiling with a million watts.

You can put your hand down.

Now you’re an official member of the Candy Castle Sand Sculptors Society.

I really didn’t think she was experimenting with opiates with Baddog. However,

that didn’t explain why she was choosing to hang her shingle beside his either. She knew

he was trailer trash. But we’re all responsible for the choices we make. The sad thing is

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we have to live with the consequences. Let Baddog sit through a slide show of the

sandcastles she built on the sunny beaches of Croatia.

Maybe she realized moving in with him wasn’t such a good idea after all because

she came back to me. Since I’d made no effort to swing her in my direction, I figured the

stars were aligning in my favor again. Just in time too. The natives were banging their

drums trying to figure out exactly what my relationship was with Hap and Gin. But now

with Candy on my arm they concluded things had worked themselves out. Gin moved

back aboard the Hellwitch, Candy moved into my apartment and there was symmetry.

One time I caught a look of irritation from Gin over my doting on her. Who

couldn’t help falling in love with the aquamarine eyes and the long silky Scandinavian

hair which was three blond shades shy of being snow white? Why would Gin be jealous

anyway? She had bedded kings. Candy had bedded rock stars. One cancels out the

other. So, no, I was mistaken about her jealousy. Discord no longer existed in our Eden.

Hap had Gin. I had Candy. And all was right with the world.

Until I saw Candy outside Jake’s with someone new.

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CHAPTER 13

Nothing lasts forever, especially an island love affair, which some bars were using as an

excuse for a betting pool since football season hadn’t started yet. The wager was how

many weeks so-and-so would last with so-and-so. Candy and I were in the pool. At five

to one. Not particularly encouraging.

I was reading a story in the island rag about an athletic store in Brownsville that

had been burglarized. Starr, my hairdresser, was putting the final touches on me when I

caught sight of the black muscle car in front of Jake’s. Camaro or Charger. I couldn’t

tell which. Out stepped Candy with a broad-shouldered blond from Malibu. The car

drove away. By the way they stumbled into each other to get their bearings it was clear

they were three stories higher than a kite can fly. Candy was falling out of her bathing

suit top because Surfer Dude kept tickling her. He had superhero-chiseled arms and six-

pack abs. You could cut tile on his jaw. He wore bright two-tone bathing trunks—lime

and pink—and his legs were bronze and lean. But his flash was misplaced. Spring break

was still a light year away and Baywatch was in syndication. She managed to realign her

tatas before entering the popular watering hole. He hand-combed his frothy mane and

followed.

That afternoon when Hap and Gin asked about Candy’s whereabouts I was

evasive. My hands were covered in Hoppe’s barrel solvent after stripping down the port

side machine gun for cleaning. I smelled like tailpipe. I took off my bandana and wiped

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away the perspiration. It was too hot for being so late in the day but not hotter than

Candy’s love which was air-conditioning some kid half my age with a body like Adonis.

I was on my way below when a mousey fellow in an Izod shirt and tan pants came

aboard. He didn’t ask for permission. He just stepped onto the deck, between the depth

charges, and walked up to me. He wore glasses and was carrying a business envelope.

“Del Lycan?”

“You got him.”

He handed me the envelope. “You’ve just been served.” Then he disembarked.

Gin was reading the summons while Hap fixed me a drink at the gargoyle bar. He

picked up his dollar and bet three sixes. I bet four twos. He called me a liar. I showed

him the twos on my dollar and he cursed. I yanked the bill from his hand. Gin looked up

from the papers. “Losing Candy this morning and facing a lawsuit this afternoon. That’s

like bookends to a real lousy day.”

“I’m beating your husband at poker. It’s a wash.”

Her jaded eye confirmed that she was glad Candy was no longer in the picture.

She had me all to herself again. She set aside the court document and picked up Elle

magazine and flipped the pages while fiddling with the silver hamsa around her neck.

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She was secreting enough estrogen to melt ice. Hap didn’t know we’d started sleeping

together again. I’m not sure he would have cared either. It didn’t feel sinful. I was just

going back for seconds. It never occurred to me that maybe Candy had found out.

About the summons Gin said, “What’s Erica have to say?”

“Dunno,” I said. “How do you know about Erica?”

Hap was fixing himself a drink. “That’s your attorney, right?”

“Yeah. How . . . did I mention her to you?”

Hap shrugged. “You must have. How else would we know?”

“Honey,” said Gin slapping the magazine against the couch. “It’s so dark in this

room I can’t see a thing. We need more light.”

“Don’t see how.”

“Del? Isn’t this room too dark?”

“Sure.”

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She gave me that look that says apply yourself or she’ll turn off the spigot. Men

don’t like that look. I set my drink aside and gave the room a good once over. My eyes

swung high to the graceful curve in the ceiling which was beamed like the master state-

room. “Skylight,” I said.

Gin looked up. Even Hap hadn’t thought of that. His eyes stabbed me as if to say

that my suggestion was going to cause him more pain in his wallet than his neck.

“I know a guy who can do it too,” I said. “In Corpus. I’m thinking stained-glass.

Maybe simulated. Hand-painted to look like stained-glass. We’d have to make a cover

for it, though. Lexan or something just as durable to protect it from the elements.”

“No paint,” said Hap. “If we’re going to do it I want the real thing.”

“Maybe a sun design,” said Gin. “A rose?”

“You want a rose?”

The inked beams of light atop the unfinished pyramid on the back of a dollar bill

showed me the way. “How about the All-Seeing Eye?” I held up the dollar for them to

see. “That’s a classic. And from what I know about you two I’m sure you’re neck-deep

in secret societies somewhere.”

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Hap walked around the couch, studying the ceiling. “I like it.”

“Not an eye!” said Gin.

“Why not?” said I.

“Just look how I’m dressed!” We did. With desire. Hap laughed and I went

weak in the knees. Being spied upon didn’t seem to bother Hap as much as it did Gin.

He was drawn to the idea. It was decided that I’d take the Hellwitch to Corpus Christi to

have the work done which would give me a good excuse to leave the island and deal

privately with Candy’s treachery.

Candy was casing the fridge when I got home, her faultless derrière swinging side

to side to some song in her stoned head. She retrieved a bottle of water, and said, “I’m

moving out.” It sounded like um-moonin-ow.

With a gentle yank she freed the earpods connected to her smartphone. I was

about to speak when she held up her index finger signaling me to wait. Her left cheek

was comically inflated with a golf ball-size jawbreaker. She dropped/spit it into the palm

of her hand and zipped it up in a baggie for later. She smacked her lips and stuck her

tongue out at me, showing a red mark down the middle of it like an Indian war stripe.

“Sorry,” she said uncapping the water and taking a sip. “I’m moving out.”

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“I heard you the first time.”

I stood there waiting for her to make a fool of herself but her eyes were blameless

as a child’s, which told me she wasn’t under the influence of anything.

“Where to?”

“Baddog.”

“You can’t save the world, dollface. Not even your own little piece of it.”

“I saved you,” she said with a leveled eye.

“The glue’s still wet.”

“You’ll be fine.”

“You sound pretty confident about that.”

“I like you, Del, I always have but you’re just too cerebral for me.”

(There’s a ten dollar word.)

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“I thought I was pretty grounded, myself.”

“You still smoke. Nobody smokes anymore. Nobody with half a brain anyway.

You drink too much and you like to do drugs.”

“Not everyday. If it I did, my name would be Baddog, wouldn’t it?”

“He’s gotten himself together.”

“Still digging toilets in the sand, is he?”

“He’s into organic farming.”

“Now I know I won’t try it.”

“It’s done wonders for him. You wouldn’t recognize him. Really.”

“Who were you with at Jakes?”

Her eyes were pinned to the air. “He’s beautiful.”

“Maybe you’re the one doing drugs.”

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“He gave me a worm.”

“I’m sure he’ll give you more than that if you sleep with him.”

“To eat, dummy.”

“Better get used to eating a lot of worms,” I said. “Out where he lives there’s not

much else to eat. Come to think of it I don’t think there are any worms either.”

“I thought it was the Mescal thing. Except I’m not really a tequila girl.”

“I stand corrected. Anyone who can get that worm has my utmost respect.”

“I thought it was a dirty trick until I started feeling good. I mean really good, Del.

I almost fainted. But I’ve never felt so good. I’m like walking in a cloud right now! I’ve

never been so clear-headed. And you should see him. He’s beautiful and I don’t know

how it happened but we were naked in a second and we—.”

“Spare me the details. Look, I don’t know what he gave you but it sounds bad to

me. Who was the guy at Jake’s? I saw you two get out of a black car.”

She giggled that Tony the Tiger thing. Then she did a pirouette in the middle of

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the kitchen floor. She looked like a grown-up Tinkerbell. “It just won’t go away!”

“It always goes away and when it does you’ll crash like the Hindenburg.” She

had a blank look. “The airship? A zeppelin, actually, after the guy who designed her.”

“Oh, you mean Led Zeppelin?”

“Not really, but sure.”

“I don’t understand what all the fuss is about. Stairway to Heaven?”

“You don’t like Stairway to Heaven?”

She rolled her eyes. “Do you have anything sweet?”

“I have to get a shower,” I said walking away.

“I really like you, Del.”

“You know where the door is.”

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CHAPTER 14

I was debating giving Erica a call and setting up an appointment to discuss the lawsuit. I

decided to 86 that idea and pour myself another cup of coffee on the outdoor deck and

continue to surf the Net for a present for Emma’s twelfth birthday. Just as I found it a

double-crested cormorant plummeted from the sky and smashed through the surface of

the water and came up in a wobbly float with breakfast in its mouth, flopping and shiny.

I paid for the gift three times over for guaranteed next day delivery.

I didn’t particularly want to go stag, so I called up Candy. We may have broken

up but Candy loved Emma and was planning to attend her birthday with or without me. I

doubted the Chief would welcome Baddog; he wore his decay like a badge of honor. I

called her several times and left messages but received no reply. As the day drew near I

felt the chivalrous thing to do was to seek her out and wish her well in her new

relationship. If Baddog was a lost soul maybe she was God’s gift to help him with his

addictions. Who was I to say they wouldn’t be a good match? Miracles happen every

day. I should know; I’m the walking dead.

I chanced a drive up miles of empty beach and found Dusty’s trailer. It faced the

ocean, elevated against an enormous sand dune, and was well protected from high tide.

An extension ladder provided access. After finding scant accrual of Candy’s presence, I

descended the ladder.

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My ankles were gripped at the second rung as if by a pair of vices and I fell.

There were three of them; their shadowy bodies beneath the trailer seemed to

twist to life. The crook of an elbow, the rising of a head. It was as if I’d awakened a

giant spider. The face of the one who’d tripped me was wan and withered. He was

toothless and his eyes were bloated and crazed. An acrid chemical odor akin to rotten

eggs and cat urine emanated from him. It was eclipsed by the syrupy stench of ether that

lingers in the air long after the methamphetamine has been cooked. By his bleating it

appeared to me as if he thought I could sate his addiction. I kicked him in the face and

scrambled to the car. The Caddy shook as his brethren threw themselves across the hood

and I was careful not to dig myself a hole in the sand as I shot on out of there.

Two shots of Jack later I was still scraping off dune goon stink. I checked my

messages but there were none from Candy. I sat at my computer. Perhaps it was the

five-to-one odds that had compelled me to install a remote keylogger spy program on her

phone and computer. Now that I couldn’t find her I was glad that I did.

I hacked her email and found three missed appointments with sandcastle-building

clients. Maybe she’d skipped town for a few days with Surfer Dude. Why tell me?

When Emma’s big day arrived I put a bow on the plastic pink flamingo and drove

to Port Isabel only to return alone to my saloon after its traumatic ending.

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Gin called me late but I didn’t take the call. I did not sleep well.

The next morning I called Erica and made an appointment to see her. I was upset.

There was no doubt Hap and Gin were the real deal, their identities nearly blown when

Shakira the cat sipped spilt beer from Hap’s belt buckle. Up until then the testament to

the legitimacy of supernatural forces which Hap and Gin represented was consigned to

me. By accident it had spilled out in front of Emma, drawing her in, and that angered me.

I didn’t dare tell the Chief the runty cat was now a swan any more than I was willing to

divulge my suspicion that I had been swept up into something unholy. That word did not

sit well with me and I strongly doubted it would with him. I needed to confide in

someone what was happening to me.

I retrieved the photo of Gin on my smartphone and cropped out her nakedness. I

then went to the bookcase and took down the gun. Gut instinct told me I’d be better off

with it than without it, if for no other reason than fending off a trip to the psychiatric

ward after I shared my incredible tale with Erica. I considered calling Tichie and leaving

Erica out of it altogether. He could run a background check on Hap and Gin far easier

than Erica could and what he would find would be above board, normal, legal.

“No, Tich. Deep background.”

“How deep we talkin’?”

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See what I mean?

That left Gin’s impending death to consider and whether or not to inform the

Chief of Hap’s intention to murder his wife. He’d ask why. I’d tell him. Then he’d slam

me in the hoosegow and call in the mental health experts. I decided not to tell him. He

had enough on his plate with Emma’s cancer.

I opened the driver’s side door of the Eldorado and pressed the secret knob. A

panel flipped out on the inside of the door. I snapped the Magnum into its holder and

closed the panel. I peeled out of the parking lot, headed for the causeway. I gave Kip a

heads-up. I’d already phoned in the dimensions and the idea for the eye. After I saw

Erica I planned to sail up to see him. He runs Kipling’s Kit and Kaboodle from a fifty-

foot fire boat in Port Aransas. He was more than game. I asked why.

“Are you kidding me, Del?” he giggled in his fifth generation Georgia twang.

“You want a skylight on a PT boat?” At seventy-plus he had more energy than I did and

could work tunnels around an engine better than a rat through an attic. Maybe I’d ask

him what he thought about immortality. When he wasn’t doing the mechanical thing he

did the art thing, from computer graphics to throwing clay. He’d mastered the art of

stained-glass when Nixon was in office.

“Is that going to be a problem?” I asked.

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“How are your martinis?”

That’s what they all drank back then, in the early sixties during the James Bond

craze. Vodka martinis, shaken not stirred. He was standing next to John Stears drinking

one when Stears cut the hole in the roof of the Aston Martin DB-5 for the passenger

ejector seat. Stears was the Special Effects Supervisor on the movie Goldfinger, the third

film made from the Ian Fleming novels about the British spy, 007. Tricking out that car

was one of the highlights of Kip’s professional career. He’d made a few improvements

to my Caddy as well.

I crossed the Queen and motored through Port Isabel and ran the humdrum hike

up Highway 100, past Laguna Heights and then miles of corn fields, until I reached a pair

of gargantuan plaster Queen Conch shells flanking the wide open jaws of a giant shark—

the entrance into the family amusement center of Bobz World which also happened to

mark the city limits of the one-traffic-light town of Los Fresnos.

A little further on I pulled off in front of the shrine Elvis’ old Army buddy, Simon

Vega, built to commemorate their friendship. A replica of the famous musical gates in

front of the mansion in Memphis anchored the front of this modest home. Little

Graceland had regular business hours like most churches, and like most churches it was

closed. But I had no intention of visiting. I just wanted to see who was tailing me.

It matched the muscle car that had dropped off Candy and Surfer Dude in front of

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Jake’s. It shot by me with the tinted menace of a Star Wars TIE Fighter. With any luck

it would pay for its vulgar dispatch; Los Fresnos was speed trap heaven.

I opened the moon roof for some fresh air and continued on, feeling for the quick

release to the Magnum, just in case. Seeing nothing in my rearview, I settled back for the

remaining leg to the expressway where I would turn north for Harlingen.

It would be good to see Erica. It was always good to see her even though I made

excuses not to. In fact I’d been entertaining the idea of finding another attorney. Since it

ended between us she didn’t come down to the island much anymore. It’s normal not to

want to be reminded of a mistake, one that nearly cost us our lives. But neither of us had

been able to sever the cord. Heck, we’d almost married. I saw no reason in reliving the

accident but my inner demons often did when I made the trip to Harlingen to see her.

We were parked on the beach, lying naked inside my Eldorado on a wide expanse

of red leather. Kip had reworked the interior to accommodate the Matt Helm indulgence.

Our red devil masks and costumes lay in a heap on the floor. The Halloween glitter

around her eyes made her look wicked and twice as exciting. We marveled the stars

through the moon roof, listened to the surf and talked about the future. This year we

were to spend Christmas with her parents in Rockwall where she and I would tell them

together. The honeymoon was my Christmas present to her. Two for Paris, first class.

She had always wanted to walk the enchanted streets of St.-Germain-des-Prés, the famed

Paris quarter that inspired artists and writers and political roustabouts back in the

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twenties. Ernest Hemingway held court at Les Deux Magots, Jean-Paul Sartre at the Café

de Flore. She wanted to drink champagne at Flore’s and hot chocolate at Magots’. To

quench her thirst for the macabre she wanted to visit the Prés aux Clercs next to the

abbey of St. Germain. It was there in the grassy field that d’Artagnan of The Three

Musketeers fame drew his foil and slew an ill-tempered man who’d made unwanted

overtures to his wife Charlotte-Anne. I confessed to her I thought d’Artagnan was the

product of fiction. Not at all, she told me. In fact he was the captain of a highly-skilled

group of swordsmen sworn to protect the kings of France who called themselves the

Musketeers. They were the equivalent to today’s secret service. Charles de Batz-

Chastelmore d’Artagnan was killed in combat defending the state in 1673.

Her phone signaled an incoming text.

“Still working, hmm?”

“A girl’s gotta do what a—,” she read the text, then nestled back in my arms and

let go a sigh of satisfaction. “We may be in the money, sonny.”

“Then I can keep the bar, right?”

She gave me a smart pinch. “You get to come home to me every night.”

“Not a bad trade. Tell me you’re representing a ga-zillionaire.”

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“I’m told they have quite a bit of money. I don’t know why they want me. I

don’t specialize in wills and estates but they want me to handle the transaction.”

“Where is it?”

“The island.”

“Someone left them some land, huh?”

“I don’t know the details. Your place came up.”

“My place isn’t for sale. Not until I say ‘I do’. These folks have names?”

“George and Gracie.”

“Cute. Do these folks have names?”

“Seriously. George and Gracie Paulo, or something.” Her hand got busy again

and I lost my train of thought.

She had big news, she told me on the phone. My Christmas present. How big we

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talkin’? I asked her. Big, she said. I told her the trunk and backseat were already filled

with Christmas presents that I’d been buying all week. Some I would have shipped back

to the island to be opened in private (the Victoria’s Secret lingerie I’d purchased for her

fell into this category). The rest were to be opened at her parents’ house on Christmas

morning. I had already been in Dallas for a week shopping for good used restaurant

equipment which I intended to drive back to the island in a rental truck. The walk-in

refrigerator I had at Skivvies was found this way. Dismantled, almost new. Paid four

hundred bucks for it. Now that’s a steal.

She flew up from Harlingen on Southwest and I picked her up at Love Field as

planned—except I was fried to the gills having bumped into an old friend of mine at the

Greenville Avenue Country Club the day before. The GACC wasn’t a country club at all,

just a Mayberry-like house with green shutters on the busy thoroughfare. Behind the

house was a small screened-in swimming pool. The owners designed the interior in

Scottish green with darkly stained waistcoats. Framed photographs of famous golfers

and celebrities hung on the walls above the booths. Rocket had an eight-ball of cocaine.

Erica was due in on an early morning flight, I told him. I couldn’t afford an all-nighter.

And the weather was turning bad. Snowflakes had begun to fall. We were eating burgers

at the bar and I told him when I was finished I intended to camp out in my hotel room.

The bar filled with locals and I was surrounded by holiday cheer and jolly

secretaries thirsty for whiskey and hungry for sex. After a few drinks I was beginning to

fade. I needed to get out of there. I was in the process of calling a cab when Rocket

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elbowed me, and we went into the bathroom and snorted our brains out—a wise decision

because the coke expunged the cloudiness of inebriation with amphetamine properties,

thereby giving me a second chance to leave. But I didn’t leave. Not until very late. I

was having too much fun buying drinks for jolly secretaries. Rocket told me I could

crash at his place. He’d get me up in time to get to the airport. Problem was we never

went to bed. I saw the sun come up and we were both treading water in a sea of alcohol

which diluted the cocaine’s wide-eye vigor of which I was sorely in need of if I was

going to do any driving. I was bleary-eyed and shivering when I went to the rented

Taurus and was more than a little surprised to find that ice had formed on the windshield

and the door handle. I looked around. I was standing in the middle of a flash-frozen

geometric disorder of beautiful crystallized tree limbs and telephone lines. I sat in the car

for ten minutes waiting for the defroster to melt the ice on the windshield. In Texas

you’re more apt to find your chili without beans before you find an ice scraper in your

trunk. I was in desperate need of a boost, so I unfolded the dollar bill I had in my shirt

pocket to retrieve the coke I had stolen from Rocket when he’d gone to the bathroom.

You always have to think ahead. If I was careful I’d still have enough to do another snort

before I picked up Erica. If we pulled off on the way to Rockwall, for, say, a breakfast

burrito, I’d do the rest. At her parents’ house I could feign a queasy stomach from the

burrito and exhaustion from days on the road rummaging for restaurant equipment and

excuse myself to their guest bedroom and crash.

Erica had seen me like this before. I was pretty sure she was going to be pissed

when she saw me like this again. We’d come far enough along in our relationship to

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know our party days were over. It was time to build something.

I was clever with the cover-up—Altoids to freshen my breath, a hot Grande

Mocha from Starbucks to clear my head, a spritz of cologne on me and another on the

passenger seat to help mask the cigarette smoke, her favorite radio station. I gave her

plenty to think about with a passionate kiss when she got in. Our passion helped chase

away the cobwebs but by the time we entered the feeder road onto I-30 they had returned.

She was full of life and talked about how wonderful it was to be spending

Christmas with her parents. And it was snowing! In Dallas! What were the odds?

Perhaps it was my inability to be as lively as she was that dampened her fizz. You can

sense when someone isn’t listening, and the truth is I wasn’t. I was concentrating on not

throwing up on myself. My tummy was a sloshing queasiness from all the alcohol I had

drunk and my head felt as if it had been plugged full of cotton by all the coke I’d snorted.

My eyes burned, my ears rung. I couldn’t hear the radio too well. Nor the question she

asked me that had caused her to turn in her seat. By the way she was looking at me she

had asked it more than once. My unresponsiveness sent up a big red flag.

“Are you high?”

I’m not sure I responded. I saw her mouth moving and her index finger going up

and down like a guillotine blade. I don’t think she knew her seatbelt wasn’t properly

fastened. Funny what you remember. The loopy strap. The succulent roundness of

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breast beneath her wool turtleneck. I don’t recall what she was yelling. Only that she

was yelling.

Then it happened.

We hit some ice and were suddenly airborne, or so it seemed, gliding and

spinning. I turned the wheel in the direction of the skid and did not dare hit the brakes

but it didn’t seem to matter; we only accelerated. And science was dictating how bad it

was going to be. Force equals mass times acceleration—minus one seatbelt.

The cement wall ran up to greet us. Erica screamed. The hood disintegrated.

The windshield exploded in Death Star brilliance. And she was gone.

I convinced myself I could handle her rehabilitation. She could lean on me all she

wanted. She leaned on her parents instead. To this day they won’t talk to me and they

can’t understand why she continues to represent me. They kept her in Dallas where they

believed she’d get better treatment than in the Valley.

After three years of rehab and multiple operations she returned to her practice in

Harlingen. We rekindled our love. But something had died between us and we accepted

the fact that it was no good between us anymore. She would remain my attorney if I

wanted. I wanted. I never did find out what my present was.

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CHAPTER 15

Tuna was tapping on my window. I was in a panic. Not only was I naked from the waist

down with a splitting headache, I’d received some ghastly tattoo on my left forearm

which I only discovered after carefully removing the bandage. It ached like a grease

burn. Looked like one too. I started the engine and that’s when I saw Tuna. Apparently

he’d been trying to get my attention. I yelled at him through the window. “Look at my

arm!” He looked at my arm. I struggled with the door and he pushed me back inside. I

was still reeling in the effects of whatever it was I smoked with Chiquita but I was

fuming. I wanted to hit somebody. Tuna reached in and turned off the ignition.

“I don’t want to hit you, Del,” he said. “But I will if you don’t settle down.”

“Look at my arm!”

“I look at it already. Here your pants.” He dropped them in my lap. “And your

money.” He opened my wallet and showed me the greenbacks.

“You went through my wallet?”

“Count it. You know what you have when you came here? It is that, less what

you pay for your time with the witch.”

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“I carry my money in my pants, not my wallet!”

“Oh.” He returned my money clip. It was empty. “Yes. I go in your pants and

find your money and I put it in your wallet where it should be.”

“When your girls steal—.”

“My girls no steal.”

My head was a leaden sock of wet sand, my eyes fuzzy and prickly. “When girls

do steal, what are they reaching for when they do?”

“Your wallet.”

“Exactly,” I said. “That’s why I keep my money in my front pocket. If they

reach for it there I got a surprise for them.” I started counting. “Who did this to me?”

“She say you ask for it and you pay for it and were laughing.”

“Does it look like I’m laughing?”

“That’s what she say.”

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“Where is she?”

“Where does a witch go when she is finished being a witch? I do not know.”

“I’m coming in.”

“You can come in if you want but she is not there.”

I slumped in the seat. I felt nauseous. I had the shakes. I trundled my hands over

my chest in search of my cigarettes. Tuna drew out a cigarette and lit it for me. It tasted

foul as hog’s breath and I threw it away. He handed me my phone.

“What did she give me?”

“You should know. You smoked it.”

“What’s her name? I want to find her.”

“She has no name. She’s a witch. She comes when she comes.”

“You know the names of your whores, don’t you?”

“Some are whores. Some are not. I know all their names and I will tell you

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something. Had you been with any one of them, they too would have protected you.”

“Protected me?!” I thrust my tattooed arm out at him. “Look at me!”

“I do not know the particulars. You have not answered my question.”

“What question?”

“Why you hurt yourself? I saw Erica the other day. Oh she looks to me very

happy. You look to me very sad. I think I will have her as my attorney. Go home.

Forgive yourself, mi amigo. Erica has.”

He walked back to the saloon, scanning the morning sky for the beauty I couldn’t

see even if I’d had binoculars.

I had just passed Bobz World heading back through Los Fresnos when someone

smashed into me from behind and my forehead hit the steering wheel. The Caddy

lurched forward like a sloppy drunk. I pulled off on the shoulder. In my rearview I saw a

truck do the same. Quarter-size drops of red exploded across my lap. My left arm had

been branded, now I was bleeding from a cut over my right eye. I was tempted to grab

the Magnum and just start shooting. Instead I reached for the glove compartment for

some tissue and my insurance card when I happened to look in the mirror again.

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It was an older model pickup, Chevy or Ford, green and white with rust in the

wheel wells. It had jumbo tires with more tread than the caterpillar track on a tank.

A plume of smoke rose behind it. The bed fishtailed. It was coming back for

more.

I floored the gas pedal and was up to sixty miles per hour in nine seconds. The

truck was lost in road dust but it quickly emerged in the opposite lane, coming up on my

left. I saw a glint off a gun barrel. When I opened her up I felt a swish in the steering

wheel. Her suspension was built for cruising not racing. Her hood rose like a howitzer

shell. I tried to ease her back but that was like pulling in the reins of a horse that’s taken

off. The truck wasn’t going to let me anyway. It was abreast of me now angrily honking

its horn. Again I saw a gun or maybe I just thought I saw one. I kicked the Caddy into

overdrive. My spine racked against the seat. I slung down the road like a slingshot but

the truck’s engine quashed my impression of swiftness, filling the Eldorado’s cabin with

jet-engine racket. Whatever was under its hood humbled my speed. If either of us

touched we’d go airborne. Our engines rumbled like horses’ hoofs. I felt the evil spirit

of Messala bearing down on me. If I could release the gun from inside the door I could

Sam Spade the son of a bitch. But I didn’t dare take my hands off the wheel. A visor of

coldness dropped over my eyes. My mind was blank but for tunnel vision. I wasn’t

breathing. Consequences meant nothing. I was damned if I did and damned if I didn’t.

May as well ride the demon. The air around me peeled back as if I was entering a vortex.

All I saw ahead of me was the steeple of road reaching to the horizon. The truck came up

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beside me leaning in for the kill. And I became a shadow again.

***

Lucius Flavius Varus felt the earthquake like everyone else felt it. He saw the sky

darken in the middle of the day. Then the rain came, with thunder and lightning. The

lightning was especially provocative as it radiated the crown of the hill where the two

thieves and the rabbi hung from crosses, crucified.

To Lucius crucifixion was a necessary mockery of the gods because he was

convinced they themselves were flesh and bone. Since time immemorial their likenesses

had been carved in stone and the stories of how they had fought against each other in the

skies over this part of the world for control of mankind had been passed down among

generations. But the gods had failed to conquer man, which, to Lucius’ way of thinking,

meant that the world belonged to man, and not to the gods. What better way to remind

them that they had better watch their step if ever they chose to meddle in the affairs of

man again than the brutal punishment of crucifixion? Oh how sly they were sending one

of their own in the guise of a shepherd to undermine humanity into believing the world

could be ruled without bloodshed. Peace was achieved through force, period. By the

sword. Not by the spoken word which the rabbi endorsed. Had he been armed, thought

Lucius, he might have escaped arrest! Instead he relied on the power of his words which,

in the end, had no influence over his accusers. In fact his words were what had

condemned him. That’s what Lucius had heard. So who was Yeshua ha Notzri? Jesus of

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Nazareth. The rabbi had drunk from a seashell that restored Hellus’ limb as if no assault

had even occurred. Only a god could imbue a vessel with such curative powers.

Sheets of rain swept the area. Lucius stood inside a niche and watched the Jew’s

body lowered from the cross and waited for the boy to bring him what he had paid for.

The boy was fearless in his act, racing forward with a thick woolen cloak and

snatching the thorny headdress from the mud when it fell off the rabbi’s head as his body

was carried away. He stood before the Roman, panting as hard as he had when he had

stolen the hamsa from a merchant’s display table and delivered it to the pretty lady on the

flat rock on the Mount of Olives that day during the Passover week. Rain pelted his

eager face, poking his eyes and smearing the layers of dirt down his cheeks like running

mascara. His chin was bivouacked with acne but he had a smile full of hope and

promise. He had done his job well and now awaited the centurion to pay him the second

and final installment for his services. This Lucius did and the boy’s eyes grew even

larger as he studied the fat round coin in the palm of his hand.

“Do you believe in miracles?” asked Lucius of the boy.

“Yes, my lord.”

“Good. That will make this easier.”

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Lucius stabbed him. It was a quick, short stroke that caught the boy completely

unawares. The boy dropped to his knees and fell on his back clutching his throat in

terror. His mouth filled with blood.

Lucius unveiled the prickly circlet. He held his cape over it to deflect the rain

from washing away any more of the rabbi’s blood than it had done already. He plucked a

spike from a stalk and leaned over the boy. “Suck on this,” he said. “Careful now. It is

quite sharp.”

The boy could no more suck on the thorn than he could sing an aria. Then, quite

suddenly, Lucius changed his mind. “I have to know,” he said to the boy. The power of

the Grail had failed to free Ginat from the bonds of death. How would the rabbi’s blood

fare if put to the test?

The child’s eyes rolled up white. The gurgling and spasms finally came to an

end. He lay still, flat as an empty sack. Lucius pressed the bloody thorn in between the

boy’s gums and no sooner had he done so a blue light irradiated the air and then vanished

like a firefly. The boy’s lungs filled with air, the wound vanished and he sucked in rain

water mixed with tears. Lucius stood up convinced the rabbi had been a god. The

incident in the tavern would have convinced most men because there was no doubt he

had cut off Hellus’ hand. Everyone saw it. And everyone saw what had happened after

Ginat gave Hellus a sip from the scallop seashell. But the seashell had proven powerless

in the restoration of Ginat after she fell from the tower. Therefore the shell was but a

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precursor to an even greater power: the blood.

The boy cried uncontrollably, clutching at Lucius’ boot, praising Lucius’ name as

if he were a god. In Lucius’ mind he was for not only had he the power to take life, he

could renew it with this mock crown—of thorns, no less—to those he deemed worthy.

He cleaved the boy’s head in two pieces. He then sheathed his sword, wrapped

the bloody bramble in the cloak, and moved into darkness.

In the year since the rabbi’s death Hellus Arias Apollus sought and found purpose

again to his life. In the Roman army. Army life carried with it no delusions unlike the

practice of religion, or falling in love. It was not some vague ideal that would betray its

devotee with false hope. Army life was unforgiving. It demanded concentration, not

daydreams. Rome, as Lucius had once pointed out to Medhat, was a ship in need of

constant care lest she founder. The army was the crew that kept that from happening, the

sails filled, her course true. For Hellus Apollus this was the reason for his existence, an

existence he had carelessly relinquished to a woman who had never loved him in the first

place and to a god whose very reality seemed nothing but a daydream. It was just as well

the rabbi was dead, thought Hellus. Even his disciples had scattered, most likely in fear

of their own lives lest they too be nailed to posts. The gods had forsaken mankind long

before the appearance of the Nazarene. Mankind had dealt with that abandonment by

building the greatest civilization in its history, Rome. Now Hellus had seen the gods

forsake one of their own. The destruction of the rabbi only validated Hellus’ decision to

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rejoin the army. The army promised nothing but what was real. What was real was

oftentimes painful but pain was true. What was unreal was the rabbi’s fantasies of love

and forgiveness, neither of which were true since they were subjective. Love and

forgiveness could not right a ship lacking of ballast any more than it could hold back a

stampede of elephants. Love and forgiveness could not raise the dead.

He braced against the freezing wind from inside his chariot atop Mount Carmel.

His eyes watered. Snowflakes dusted his beard. He looked out over the checkerboard

plains of the Jezreel Valley, indifferent to how close his two white horses stood to the rim

of the precipice. Their hoofs tamped the earth as if signaling they wanted to move back.

Their nostrils snorted puffs of irritation. But Hellus held firm the thick leather reins. He

was at the edge of the world beneath a low gray ceiling of clouds. He wanted the gods to

see him and hear him curse their names. It was their fault Ginat was dead. There was no

bringing her back, and for this he vowed to forever be their enemy.

Lucius pulled his black stallions up beside him. They stood quietly inside their

chariots feeling the hard chill. He admired the gold scallop seashell Hellus wore against

his breastplate. Potent, but its power was limited. Unlike the magic he now possessed.

“Three thousand years of siege and war,” reflected Lucius. Hellus looked over at

him and Lucius smiled. “I told you I was reading. See there? The flat-top of earth? I

understand it was once a great fortress.”

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Hellus looked out at the distant tell. “Megiddo. A chariot city.”

“Impressive.”

“The Jews believe it will be the place for the final battle.”

“Between what armies?”

“Good and evil.”

“Ha! Such a battle I fight every day!”

They withdrew into silence, the wind howling around them. Lucius stood tall and

dark as basalt, embracing the blustery weather while Hellus felt dead inside, indifferent to

the ice forming in the bear fur around his shoulders.

“I didn’t realize you loved her,” said Lucius.

Hellus slew him with his eyes, then calmed and looked back over the valley.

“We are all doomed to the shadow world, my friend. But to build a life and invest

your heart just to lose everything you’ve worked for? Seems like such a waste.”

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Hellus was inclined to agree with that assessment but he remained quiet, absently

fondling the gold seashell against his breastplate, a delinquent act that offended Lucius.

“Wait. You don’t believe she’s alive, do you? That’s like believing the rumors

about the rabbi. He’s alive! He’s alive! This land is the mother of superstition.”

“It appears to have bewitched us both,” said Hellus studying the barbed stems

coiled around Lucius’ left arm. Heavy wool and a leather gauntlet protected the flesh.

Hellus could still see the rabbi’s blood caked on the inch-long spikes.

Lucius raised his thorny arm with authority. “With this we are invincible, Hellus.

Immortal, if we choose to be. The rabbi’s power came from the gods. I concede that.

But we hold that power now. It bonds us.”

Hellus brooded beneath the stormy sky. He had no stomach for such whimsy. He

backed his chariot away just as a blade of sunlight split open the sky and spilled across

the valley floor. “No one lives forever, Lucius.”

Lucius came abreast of him. “I was there! In Caesarea. I was cloaked so you

would not see me. But I heard the rabbi plainly as you. ‘Some here shall not taste of

death’. He was speaking to us, Hellus. He did not want to die in vain. He wanted to

pass his power on. We can direct the path of the future now. We can set right the wrongs

of the world. Come to Rome. We can rule her like brothers. Like Romulus and Remus.”

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“Romulus killed Remus.”

“We will succeed where they failed. We can build a new Rome, Hellus. Take my

hand and let us swear allegiance to one another.”

“Our allegiance is to Caesar.”

“You would betray me to Tiberius?”

“Your ambition has betrayed you—.”

Hellus barely escaped the edge of the blade. It hacked the rim of his chariot,

exploding splinters of wood. He struck Lucius on the chin but it was just a glancing

blow. The next swing of steel sent a cold snap of air up the back of Hellus’ neck.

Hellus drew his weapon but his horses, as if sensing impending doom, dashed

forward and he was suddenly descending the mountain at a frantic pace.

The limestone underbelly of the mountain yielded no cushion to the jarring

vibration that rattled Hellus’ legs and sent a whirling pang of fire up his spine. He used

the tension of the reins to center himself inside the cockpit. He heard the thunder-roll of

Lucius bearing down on him from the left. There was no way to outrun him; his only

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defense was a strong offense, so he swung hard over and their chariots collided, sending

out a screeching din. The thick heavy wheels nearly locked, the hubs scraping, the iron-

rimmed felloes churning up divots of brittle flint and frozen earth. The plunge was rife

with innate difficulty and they hadn’t reached the tree line yet. The charioteers careened

against each other again, each trying to influence the out-of-control plummet in hopes

one would crash before the other. It was everything either rider could do to just hold on.

But it was almost too much energy for the horses to bear; the chariot’s weight like an

avalanche bearing down, forcing them to gallop even faster, their hoofs skidding as they

tried to gain distance from whatever it was that thundered behind them.

The earth gave way naturally which helped Hellus escape to flatter ground, and

just as he banked his horses around he felt the burning spit of a missile tear by him. The

iron tip of Lucius’ spear had missed him by an inch and he slapped his whites into a

gallop and was quickly riding parallel with Lucius. The mountain face took a severe dip

to the tree line but the warriors maintained their dangerous game, taunting one another,

flaunting sword and brooding eye, waiting for the right time when either their momentum

would frame the outcome or one of them would commit before the time was right.

Strangely they moved as one, in a sort of confused pageantry, until the temptation was

too great and their swords clashed in a furious exchange of bright steel. The clanging

distorted with echo when they entered the forest. Branches of laurel and olive broke

across their faces. Conifers and pines rushed by in kinetic fury. They fought relentlessly

until a branch whacked Lucius with such force his sword flew from his hand.

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Hellus let his horses have their heads for they knew instinctively how to navigate

the terrain. He was just about to turn to see where Lucius was when another spear sailed

by, impaling a tree in front of him. He felt Lucius’ presence behind him, could hear him

gaining like barrels tumbling down stairs, the exhaust from the nostrils of Lucius’ horses

so close he could feel the heat. Lucius was trying to “shipwreck” him by running his

horses right up onto his back and crushing him from behind, disintegrating his chariot in

the process. It was a tactic each had seen in the chariot races held at the Circus Maximus

in Rome. The right wheel of Hellus’ chariot caught the incline of a half-buried boulder

nearly causing it to overturn. The cart came down with a smashing jolt that caused

Hellus to veer off course setting Lucius up for destruction in a ravine of rotten timber

straight ahead. His two black steeds leaped the trench. The chariot lifted high in the air

and crashed back to the ground, throwing up a geyser of cold mud and Lucius was nearly

tossed out. Miraculously he held on and righted himself, his sleek raven armor incapable

of masking the flush of terror his near-fatal mishap showed on his face.

Suddenly Hellus was raiding from the right but a copse of trees impeded his

effort. Once again they rode abreast of one another as sunrays sliced through the forest

canopy, splattering the floor in kaleidoscopic light. The rumble of their wheels seemed to

swallow up the light, darkening the path ahead, as if demons were breaking the sky down

with hammers. They weighed what damage if any had been done to either of them;

perhaps even pondering what would happen if they collectively withdrew from the fight.

To live and fight another day. Lucius lashed his mounts. Hellus saw that he was

committed to the end—the end to which also committed him.

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The forest opened abruptly. Lucius charged, flailing his whip. Hellus availed

himself of his own scourge and thrashed him back. The leather tails bit into their faces

with freezing stings. It was Lucius who veered away this time and Hellus moved up

behind him and threw his own spear, nearly taking off his friend’s head. He reached for

another lance when the mountain cat sailed through the air and sunk its claws into the

flank of one of Hellus’ whites and viciously tore off a loaf of flesh with its incisors. The

strident whinny of pain chafed the halls of the forest. Blood spit from the beast’s syrupy

jaws, painting the horse’s hindquarters with sopping red splatter. The lion’s muscles

rippled hideously down its back, its locked legs inflexible as the prongs of an anchor.

The stench of the animal swept up Hellus’ nostrils; an elemental bloodlust reeking of

decay. Hellus lifted the spear he’d intended to throw at Lucius and took aim on the lion

but the turbulent bumping of the chariot tossed him off balance; more than once he had to

center himself before he could attempt a strike. Inexplicably the lion began snapping its

jaws at the galloping spouse, seemingly confused over which hide to focus on. With all

his might Hellus launched the spear, impaling the lion through its belly, driving the beast

to the ground in a hard tumble. It coiled, rolled and somersaulted, bucking and biting at

the spike running through it.

Hellus saw another lion. It moved with silky speed and jumped onto Lucius and

crushed him from behind. His black chargers gained even more momentum sensing the

flesh eater so close, smelling its feral power, its rancid intent, hearing its scratchy growl.

Lucius was slumped forward over the rim of the cockpit, dangling over the axle and the

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whipping hoofs of his black horses. He was trapped inside the cavity, the weight of the

lion on his back. If he fell forward he would fall beneath the chariot. If he squirmed free

his neck and face would be open to attack. No one could save him now. No one but

Hellus whose mighty arm swooped down like a hawk and cut open the lion’s flank with

his sword. Its entrails spilled out and hit the ground before the lion did. Hellus tried to

manage the black stallions when the unexpected reared high as a giant’s shield, for all

that lay before them was the edge of a cliff and wide open gray sky. Hellus turned his

whites into the blacks, hoping his horses had enough muscle to steer Lucius’ chariot

away from certain doom. Except Lucius was standing now and he grabbed up the reins

and veered his black chargers violently into Hellus’ chariot, ramming his stallions into

the hyper whites who buckled under the pressure, sending Hellus into a narrow

straightaway towards the cliff. Hellus tried to adjust when Lucius struck him with his

whip. The vicious volley unbalanced him and he lost his bearings. He lashed out blindly

at the fiery tails. He saw Lucius pulling away but Hellus had nowhere to pull off to and

over the cliff he went, the sky falling all around him.

***

The corn fields ceased flickering as the hysteria of my quantum break melted

away. I coasted on the brakes. The highway curved past Laguna Heights and opened

onto the last leg into Port Isabel. The chariot chasing me was gone. I’d been spared a

horrible accident and had cheated death again. The world settled around me like a drape,

severing the throat-choking fear from around my neck. Tension gushed from my body

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but my mind was juicing panic. I was pretty sure I had wet myself. Then I felt the

burning throb of the raw artwork and cowered with shame. I had an out so I took it.

I crossed the causeway and drove to Skivvies where I nursed the gash over my

eye, showered, and in the process of toweling off, discovered the strange symbol

embedded inside the face of the wolf tattoo. My foray into the seedy underbelly of lust

and witchcraft came racing back. I cursed my stupidity while I dressed and most likely

would have kept cursing myself had the pre-departure routine to get the Hellwitch

underway not demanded my full attention.

I unplugged the power cord from the dockside junction box and then went below

and checked the bilge for fumes. The power plant used diesel not gasoline but there was

a gasoline turbine for the wings which I had never seen put to use. The old PTs ran on

100 octane aviation fuel. You can bet they took five minutes to blow her out. I had five

minutes. I then made a weather check, went back to the helm, opened the fuel valve and

set the electrical switches. I pushed the ignition button housed beneath a tiny metal hood

about knee-high on the vertical control panel in front of me. I drew out the choke a little

and waited until I saw a flow of water overboard exiting the exhaust line. I threw off the

spring lines but left the bow spring and the forward fender in place. I pulled up the other

fenders and returned to the bridge. I engaged the clutch and shifted into forward very

easy, her engines’ throaty growl squashing the quiet, her big ass swinging into Tompkins

Channel where she’d battled The Pirate Queen. We now faced south towards the bridge.

I ran forward and pulled in the fender and bow line while she drifted monetarily. I would

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have to cross to Port Isabel in the deeper waters near the causeway before turning north

for Corpus. The Hellwitch drew five feet but much of the bay was shallower than that.

The Laguna Madre appeared fathomless but was in fact a sea grass meadow. Just off the

stern I saw a school of reds rooting for crustaceans, causing a stir with their tails in the

water, while silvery combs of minnows teased a beautiful Spanish Mackerel zipping like

liquid lightning after them. Larger fare—flounder, snapper, black drum—were likely to

be found in the grasses closer to the drop-off into the shipping channel. A good thing to

know, lest you make the same mistake I did and stubbornly work the flats expecting a

miracle. You can work them until Rapture and come up empty.

I swiped the sweat from my eyes with my raw forearm and cursed aloud. I dug

through the Styrofoam® cooler and withdrew a cherry cola. With the causeway on my

left, the pilings beneath the bridge guttered by me in slow animation, triggering a

memory flash of the battle between Hellus and Lucius on Mount Carmel. I became faint.

I thought I might pass out when two bottlenose dolphins appeared off my starboard beam

as if the Jolly Mon god had sent smiling angels to help steady me. They flippered into

view once more and then disappeared. I increased speed. Forked golden clouds pointed

the way. The wind in my face cleared my head. The sun cleansed my spirit. Nature was

my redeemer.

Somewhere off to my right lay the dark blue waters of the Gulf of Mexico beyond

the sand dune barrier that would be my docile companion for the next hundred miles. On

my left stood a shaggy wall of palm trees buttressed between oak, cypress and pine. A

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lone hawk swept in graceful arcs above me. A flock of sandhill cranes took flight just as a

white-tailed deer leaped over some salt grass and disappeared in the thicket. It was easy

to imagine the many animals ogling me from inside the wood. The Hellwitch moved

across the water like some prehistoric beast, most likely agitating in them a buried

memory of what their ancestors had probably looked like.

At Port Mansfield a tugboat pushing a string of barges lumbered along, steering

clear of the rock jetty that jutted from the barrier island, while deep sea fishermen

motored their yachts through the Cut to reach the Gulf and waders outside their motels

cast their lines in knee-high water into unseen canals and arroyos.

Before long I was alone again, a singular modern force on a vast thoroughfare that

still looked uncharted. There was nothing around me but the natural world, as pristine as

it probably looked two hundred years ago to seamen whose exploration of these waters

was fraught with disaster, especially in the area around Baffin Bay where natural rock

hazards lay submerged like floating mines. They are reefs actually, a thousand-year-old

consequence of sepulid tube worms that can shear off the bottom of a boat. The rocks

litter the lagoon, poking through the carpet of sea grass. But that doesn’t dissuade the

adventurous angler from wading in the shallows and casting his line, for it is here among

the rocks professional and amateur alike have landed a trophy trout. The fish regurgitate

while they eat, painting a slick for the fishermen to work. It’s an oily emetic that rises to

the surface, can be seen for miles, and, believe it or not, smells like watermelon.

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The Waterway yielded to the immense indigo slate of Corpus Christi Bay. The

Naval Air Station lay on my left and oil rigs rose west of Shamrock Cove. The city

skyline was tucked away just behind the curvature of the earth. In my youth I’d had

many a full moon party on waters such as these, passing the bottle of wine and the fine

Columbian between friends, anchoring off shore some nameless beach and spending the

night. There is nothing quite as lovely as holding someone special beneath the stars with

the gentle smack of the surf rolling in and out, or walking the beach together at sunrise

invigorated by the salty air while black skimmers scurry back and forth and great blue

herons skim the peacock-blue water. I am a coastal soul.

When I reached the traffic along the edge of Port A, the great bay released me

with a warm smile. I saw Kip standing at the bow of the fire boat and he let loose the

high-pressure cannon, sending out a celebratory arc of water like an adolescent mimicking

ejaculation. I blasted my air horn and brought her in easy up alongside and threw the

clutch into neutral. I threw over the fenders and waited until we kissed and took up the

line through the bull nose cleat and threw it up to him. I ran aft, grabbed hold another,

jumped on the dock and pulled her in. When she was secure I went back to the helm and

cut the engines and the Hellwitch settled in like a baby.

After a few beers and a harried retelling of my night at Tuna’s and the duel with

the pickup truck, Kip gave me some pain medication in the form of some hydroponic

homegrown he was farming in the bowels of the fire boat. As he packed the bowl I saw

the sticker again.

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“What’s Pinkie’s Blu?”

“Head shop. Bookstore.” He inhaled deeply.

“I don’t know too many stoners who read.”

“But you know witches.”

“I know one.”

“Well, she’d fit right in at Pinkie’s.”

We went over the particulars for the skylight. He showed me sketches he’d

already completed of the design. But the Lexan would have to be special ordered. I could

leave the boat or bring her back. I opted for the second choice when my phone rang. It

was Erica. I was too ashamed to put her through. What would I say? That while she was

explaining my lawsuit I was secretly lusting after a Mexican hotty in a yellow dress? She

called again and I took it. Spilled.

“Road rage is a serious crime, Del. You should have reported it.”

“I didn’t have time to report it.”

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When I let it slip I’d stopped in to see Tuna she scolded me, pointing out that

carousing with him had set me up for bad luck. I didn’t have the heart to disagree. I

asked about the hearing. She was running her traps and said not to worry.

Later that week I talked to Hap who told me Gin had hired Little Annie Fannies

and was washing down the saloon from top to bottom. I objected, pointing out that the

walls and floors held smoke-stained stories. “Which are staining the underwear yellow, I

hope you know,” he said. That gave me pause. No one wants to be looking up at dirty

laundry, especially underwear. I told him Gin had my permission to do what she felt was

necessary. “Right now she’s in her bleach stage,” said Hap. “And that’s a dangerous

place to be.”

A few stand-by employees were eager to help, including still-spiffy-at-fifty,

Gidget-Bridget. She’d been with me for years. She wore clothes suited for a woman half

her age but her personality offset her poor fashion sense.

I told Hap the work aboard the Hellwitch was coming alone fine and I would be

back in a few days.

I borrowed Kip’s Dodge Ram to find Pinkie’s Blu in hopes I might pick up a scent

of the witch who had tattooed me. Following his directions, I cruised down Mustang

Island to the south side of Corpus Christi, near the north end of Padre Island where I

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found a food truck doing the Mexican thing. The breakfast burrito was large enough for

two and cost less than an Egg McMuffin®. I packed what was left in a bag to eat later

and moseyed down the cracked sidewalk, past cantinas and thrift shops and fresh produce

stands underneath tarps.

I paused at the squared canary rump of an exquisite example of 1930’s motor-

head majesty. A Rolls-Royce Phantom III. Its chesty outline and owl-eye chrome head

lamps afforded it a beastly elegance. The chauffeur’s station was open-roof with the

steering wheel on the right, the way the English drive in Piccadilly. The long weighty

canary-yellow automobile sat outside the store I was looking for.

When I peered through the bay window I saw three black cats with sleepy eyes,

lounging on shelves at different levels. I entered beneath a tinkling of bells, into a forest

of dusty tomes. The bookshelves resembled what my sandwiches looked like when I

made them myself—top-heavy and leaning. A scent of blueberry incense swam up my

nose, married with rich strains of tobacco. There were enough hookahs for sale to start a

commune of truth-seeking tenderfoots in search of the hidden meaning behind Wooly

Bully by Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs. Subjects were handwritten in black Sharpie

upon 3”x5” index cards. Conspiratorial phenomena, mostly. From extraterrestrials and

artificial intelligence to religious round tables and the New World Order. Under the card

for magic was an elegant collection of grimoires, including the Hermetic Order of the

Golden Dawn and The Key of Solomon. There were Kabbalistic secrets here, planetary

magic, rites for summoning angels and demons. I pulled away when I discovered the

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black magic classic entitled Le Grand Grimoire ou Dragon Rouge. According to legend

if ever you wanted to make a deal with the devil, this was the book you’d need. A second

index card beside the title to this section of aged volumes read, Let no one sacrifice his

son or daughter in fire, nor be found to cast spells, practice witchcraft, talk to ghosts or

consult the necromancers. Deuteronomy 18: 10-11. Poor man’s disclaimer.

While faint steel drum music played the pretty refrain of a familiar tune I could

not place I happened to notice gilded letters being highlighted by a sunbeam slicing

through a sliver in the tint sheeting covering the bay window. The letters laced the spine

of a book beneath three larger books. I lifted the three books away to unearth it. The

first was Ray Kurzweil’s The Singularity Is Near, the second The Elegant Universe by

Brian Greene and finally an oversize, intricately tooled copy of The Marriage of Heaven

and Hell by William Blake. The book in question was also cloth. A pale blue color. It

was entitled, Les sects et les sociétés secrètes by Le Coulteux de Canteleu. On the cover

page was the date it was printed, the town it was printed in and the name of the publisher:

1863, Paris, Didier. But it was in French and I didn’t read French, or speak beyond the

stock answer of Je ne sais pas, monsieur. I don’t know, mister. I flipped through the

delicate yellowing pages and stopped when a name beneath a woodcut picture poked me

in the eye. It resonated where it hurt deep inside me for Erica. And then rattled me

because of Hap’s use of it. St. Germain. She had wanted to visit the district on our

honeymoon and Hap had . . . what … picked the name out of the blue? I am not a big

believer in coincidence but there was no other way to explain my discovery of this little

book among the thousands stacked around me. Unless I was being guided by some

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unseen hand. And I’m not a big believer in that either.

I studied the bust, looking for any resemblance to the man I knew as Haven Prior.

But the profile of a somewhat chinless fellow in a powdered wig was anemic and

uninspiring. It could have been a depiction of any one of America’s founding fathers.

“Ah!” came the voice behind me. “Le Comte de Saint-Germain.”

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CHAPTER 16

I turned to face a hooked gentleman with a cane, dressed in crisp slacks and a plaid shirt.

He wore spectacles on a cue ball head that sagged between his shoulders beneath a hump

at the nape of his neck which stretched his shirt out of line. His slippers were crowned

with a crest of arms. He reeked of British Sterling. The ivories were too even to be real.

His handshake was two fingers from an arthritic knob surprisingly strong and

disturbingly smooth. “Xavier Trench,” he said. “But some folks call me Igor.”

“Huh. Didn’t know it was a nickname.”

“It wasn’t—until I began to look like one.” Such a humble-spirited introduction

was difficult not to admire.

“Scheurmann’s disease?” He nodded plaintively. “Had a friend who had it.

More common than you’d think. He drank Bacardi and Coke.”

“And how is it you would remember that?”

“Twenty years playing bartender.”

“I see.”

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“What’s the etymology of the name Igor? Would you happen to know?”

“I believe it’s Scandinavian. From the Norse god, Ing, if I’m not mistaken. I was

actually born outside Oslo. How’s that for chance?”

“Interesting. You don’t sound Danish.”

“My parents moved to England and we settled in Suffolk County outside a little

village called Bury St. Edmund.”

“Well, there you go. Del Lycan.”

“A pleasure to meet you.” He looked at the book that I had inadvertently handed

him. “Are we interested in secret societies or immortality?”

“Is that what he represents?”

“To some, yes. To others, something else entirely. A most mysterious character.

Not really a count at all, I’m afraid. More an enchanter. Quite adept in the dark arts. He

was Illuminati. Did you know that?”

“No.”

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“Also a member of the Rosicrucian Order. He played spy for the king of France

when he wasn’t selling potions to the gullible. He was a vain, conceited cad who liked

kinky sex. And by all accounts was immortal.”

“Did he go by any other name?”

“He had many names. Marquis de Montferrat, Prince Raqoczy, Count Weldon.

But it was fashionable in those days to put on airs if you were wealthy.”

“Or hiding.”

“What makes you think he was hiding?”

“What makes you sure he wasn’t?” He conceded to my supposition with a

conditional nod. “What else can you tell me about him?” He scuffed to the cash register.

“Mr. Trench?” Best let them get to it in their own time. That’s when the famed oils

caught my eye. They faced one another on opposite walls. The Blue Boy by Thomas

Gainsborough and the portrait of Sarah Barrett Moulton by Thomas Lawrence entitled

Pinkie. In many state houses and family homes the paintings are paired as if destiny

demands that they be, but by doing so insinuates a relationship between the children

existed when none ever did. “Pinkie off today?”

“Pinkie’s dead,” he said tossing a furtive glance onto a framed photo of a high

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roller beside Frank Sinatra at a roulette table, circa 1970, maybe? The juxtaposition of

the two Pinkies was completely accidental.

I was about to broach the subject of the witch from Tuna’s when Trench asked me

why the interest in St. Germain.

“Hmm? Oh just curious,” I said, which wasn’t really true. “Killing time.”

He looked at me as if I had said something profound. His blue eyes narrowed and

he echoed, “Killing time. Yes. I suppose that was what he was doing. What we know of

St. Germain is that he was the son of Francis II Rákóczi, the Prince of Transylvania.”

“Transylvania,” I parroted, with about as flat a deadpan as you can imagine.

A papery snarl curled his upper lip which inexplicably resembled the famous one

from the boy from Tupelo. “I suppose that is how the rumor started that he was a

vampire. But he was damaged goods long before that. Damned, actually.”

“What do you mean?”

“His sin is what I mean.”

“What sin would that be?”

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“The legend is he mocked Christ as he carried the cross to Calvary. Spit on him

or cursed him. Told him to hurry along; he could rest when he was dead. There are

many stories. Jesus cursed Germain by denying him rest.”

“You mean death.”

Confirming the book’s price he placed his buckeye knuckles on the register keys.

“Yes. He was cursed to walk the earth for all time.”

“He wasn’t called Germain back then, was he?”

“No one knows who he was. Legend simply calls him The Wandering Jew.”

“I’ve heard of that.”

“Some claim it was a woman. But no one knows. In fact Jesus prophesied it.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“In the Book of Matthew, if memory serves.” He turned away from the cash

register and with both hands pulled down a twenty-pound Bible from a shelf. It was thick

as a loaf of Swedish rye. He probed the gilded pages with his crooked fingers and cut out

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a hefty slice and laid open the book, releasing an odor of moldy leaves and caramelized

sugar. “Ah yes. Here it is. Chapter sixteen, verse twenty-eight.” He read the verse

aloud. “‘Verily, I say to you, there be some standing here which shall not taste of death

till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom.’”

He became absorbed with the words on the page and I with the steel drum music

that played softly as a murmuring between angels.

What a peculiar coincidence that Erica had shown interest in a part of Paris linked

to a man who was one of the world’s greatest sinners. I was embittered to buy the book

now. That we had intended to honeymoon in a spot named after someone who had

cursed Christ made me think our union had been doomed from the start. We just didn’t

know it. “She wanted to go there,” I said.

“Go where?”

“St.-Germain-des-Prés. Do you know it?”

“In Paris? Why, what a lovely place. The buildings haven’t changed in four

hundred years. I had a flat in one of the grand old hotels on the Quai Malaquais

overlooking the Seine. The floors there—they call them Versailles parquet—are still

magnificent. To think King Louis strode across them, or Marie Antoinette, or even

Napoleon himself! I could see the Louvre from my window. Oh the history. It is just

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steps from wherever you stand. I would love to go back.” He pushed down the keys,

ringing up the purchase price, ka-ching. He looked up at the numbers that popped into

the little tollbooth window. “Right.”

They were big numbers for a little book.

“A first edition, you see,” he said pragmatically.

Yeah. I see. I’d been fleeced before but not so sensibly. I was in no mood to get

into an argument with the guy. I spent double that amount on a haircut at Starr’s, but

she’s topless when she cuts hair, so . . .

I reached into my front left pocket and withdrew the silver money clip, slipped

out a hundred dollar bill and handed it to him. He looked at it disapprovingly. He

checked his drawer.

“I must get change,” he said. “Come, if you’d like.”

That sounded a bit strange. He didn’t know me. I could be one of the bad guys.

Hit him over the head, rob him. I glanced behind me. The place was empty except for

the cats. They seemed annoyed with me. Trench exited from behind the counter. I saw a

firearm on the shelf beneath the register. A Sig Sauer P226. Probably the 9mm with the

20 round mag. A lot of firepower for a bookworm. I followed him through a door entry

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that was covered in strings of beads.

The room was bathed in sunlight shining through French doors that opened onto a

small garden with high stone walls. The kitchen was the size of a hotplate. There was a

fat recliner with a bed sheet across it in front of a roll-top desk with pigeon holes teeming

with bills and correspondence. A faint odor of rancid urine tweaked my nose. There was

a small flat-screen TV. No bed, unless it was in the wall. He sat in the recliner which I

suspected was pulling double-duty.

As he counted out the change I noted a small framed picture half-hidden by an

Alpine-illustrated greeting card. The photo was of a Nazi SS officer. Small world.

Nazis in the Keys, Nazis in Texas. Yet the man in the photo did unbalance me.

Something about his eyes, indicative of most Nazis; a proud psychotic gleam. Like the

man I’d met at Sloppy Joe’s who claimed to have treasure from the Spanish galleon

found by Mel Fisher—a man whose name was, let me see, Van Ness. I noticed another

framed photo. A teenage girl dressed for skiing, the real Alps in the picture behind her.

At the bottom of the photo, written in pen, were the words, Love, Blu.

I returned my attention to the soft blue book in my hand, now a possession of

which I was indifferent. Unless I chose to hit Hap over the head with it. He’d

appropriated the name of St. Germain as if it were virtuous! By his own mouth he’d

proclaimed that he had committed a sin against God, a grave sin, the gravest sin. I

couldn’t accept the idea he had done something so egregious and yet what had compelled

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me to Harlingen to confide in Erica about Gin and Hap was based solely on the suspicion

that I was involved in something malevolent. Perhaps evil. Spitting on Jesus on his way

to be crucified would certainly qualify.

“And who is this who wanted to go to Paris, did you say?”

“A friend. She speaks so highly of the place.” I held up my new acquisition.

“Now I have some interesting background info for her. Don’t really want to pop her

balloon but it’s like buying a diamond ring. You don’t want to find out some kid in

Sierra Leone was forced to dig it out of the mud for you.”

“But they are not the same.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“The St. Germain of the Paris arrondissement was a cardinal, and, I’m afraid, not

very immortal since he is buried inside the church there. There is even a Catholic nun, if

memory serves, who is called St. Germain. But I believe you spell her name with an ‘e’

at the end. You have confused the two.” His eyes skirted to the hundred dollar bill on

the desk lying lamblike as a virgin on her wedding night. “Oh dear.”

I saw it too and struggled with the idea of grabbing it and running out. He could

have the frigging book. “How can there be two St. Germains?”

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“I have just given you three.”

“You’re telling me this book has nothing to do with Paris?”

“Hmm. It is a book on Paris you wanted.” He fidgeted in his chair. “But the title

says clearly it is a book about secret societies. Yes, it is in French but . . . ”

I felt my cheeks blooming red but not as red as the colors emanating from a large

photograph hanging on the wall near the doors to the garden. It was paired with a

matching image. Only this was one was in blue. A pair of brains. The photograph on

the left showed the hemispheres of the brain aglow in fiery reds while the brain image in

the photograph on the right was saturated in mercurial blues. Whether it was the subject

matter or how they were presented, seeing them shocked me out of the folly of my

purchase. Beneath the photos stood a half-moon table with three candles and two framed

photographic portraits. The first photograph was of a vibrant, healthy Elvis Presley. The

second was of a youthful Hindu-looking fellow with long dark hair and two doe-like eyes

with large dots of radiance in the pupils. His eyes seemed to look right at me. I couldn’t

see the connection between the King of Rock and Roll and this mystic. I looked back at

the human brains.

Xavier Trench engaged me at that moment.

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“The left shows the normal activity of a brain. Healthy, vibrant. The red is the

blood flow. They were taken with a SPECT camera.” I looked at him. “Single Photon

Emission Computed Temography. Which do you prefer?”

“The blue.”

“That is what everyone says. I wonder why that is? Red is considered a hot

color. You get more reaction in red—the ladies especially.”

We managed a pair of slippery smiles, bonding over the primal pleasure shared by

all men, whatever age. A woman in red. I perused more conspiratorial tomes on shelves

set into the wall beside the photographs. “Do you really believe in all this stuff?”

“A conspiracy only exists where there is no God. That is why God is dead for so

many people. Not because He is, but because people refuse to see the truth which they

themselves buried in order to ask a question.”

“What question?”

“Why? If you must ask such a thing, you lack faith. Instead of enjoying the gift

of life you must know the reason behind it. This is a sin. You want to know what God

knows. Like Satan wanted to know. That is like asking a drop of water to be the ocean.”

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“But the ocean can be a drop of water, can’t it? In that one spec of liquid are the

building blocks of creation.”

“That may be but the purpose of our lives is hidden by a secret. It just so happens

the answer is itself a secret. What does that tell you?”

“We’re not meant to know.”

“Precisely. Which is why we must have faith. We are all lost. But those with

faith are less so, I think. That may be a minor distinction but it is no less profound.”

“Why would God want to hide from His own creation?”

“Why does science refute the possibility there might be a creator?”

“Shame? Science fears it may be fallible because it knows it can’t explain evil.”

“Which means myths and legends may be based in fact.”

“Some, maybe,” I said. “The apple and the Garden is a folktale to show us evil

existed before man.”

“Yet universes can appear spontaneously from nothing. Quantum theory allows

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for this phenomenon, according to Stephen Hawking. Therefore there is no beginning. If

there is no beginning there is no God. If there is no God there is no evil.”

“If quantum theory allows the phenomenon then it is behind the phenomenon.”

“That follows. Which means that whatever we choose to call it—God, quantum

theory or immutable law—universes appear spontaneously from something.”

“Yeah. That works.”

“Therefore whatever evil is was created by the something that already existed. I

don’t like how that sounds anymore than a Catholic would. But there it is.”

“God’s bad self.”

“If you care to put it that way, yes. The other side of the same coin.”

“I’d hate to think my existence was based on a flip of that coin.”

“None of us are in the control we think we are,” he said. “I find it particularly

amusing that atheists believe that they are when they can’t even turn off their own heart.

If you are truly in control of your life you should be able to turn it on and off like a light

switch. But you can’t. You can turn off your mind. You can slow down your heart by

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controlling your breathing but the heart must pump blood or the body will die. So what is

making the heart pump?”

“Energy.”

“Random energy? What sort of energy would knowingly make up the likes of

me, I wonder? Where does this energy come from? Call it whatever you want but it is

sustaining us and we have no choice in the matter. We are here until we are not. Atheists

simply refuse the possibility that there is a backdrop upon which we rest.”

“The secret behind the secret.”

He gave a gentle nod. “I must say, though, that whatever it is must have looked

shiny as a new car for Satan to want to steal it.”

“You ever worry about that Rolls outside suffering the same fate?”

He smiled devilishly, “All the time.” He stuffed the hundred into a cubby hole.

“The Talmud says if the eye could see the demons that people the universe, existence

would be impossible. My advice to you, young man, is be careful what you seek.”

“And what if it’s seeking me?”

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“Then be as Saint Germain and change your name.”

Touché. I looked back at the photographs of the two brains. “So I assume this a

representation of God’s good and bad side?”

“Hindus call that paradox maya.”

I nodded. Yeah, I knew everything I wanted to know about that. The little book

felt weighty in my hand and I was regretting buying it the longer I remained. To refund

or to regift. That was the question. I simply hadn’t asked the right ones. How can you

expect to get the right answers if you don’t ask the right questions? That’s Gumshoe 101.

Of which I had failed miserably. A wiser soul than I would probably take down the

diploma he’d received from the University of Phoenix for completing the on-line course

in private investigation. I felt that a bit harsh.

“It’s the blood,” I said.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Why folks prefer the blue more than the red. They know the red is blood. No

one wants to think about blood, especially their own. Not if they can help it.”

“Right. That makes sense.”

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“So whose brain is it? Einstein’s?”

“Now it couldn’t be his, could it? The technology didn’t exist.”

I should have known that.

“It’s mine. I can’t see myself hanging someone else’s on the wall.”

He began to cough. It was a growl that raised the hairs on the back of my neck

and made me quietly swear I was going to quit smoking. He pawed the air for help and I

got him a glass of water and brought it over to him. He slipped the tiny tab of

nitroglycerin beneath his tongue. Now I really didn’t want a refund, or the burrito,

which, by the look of his skeletal frame, he needed more than I did. I set it inside the

refrigerator. Moments later he was able to sit straighter in his chair. I was about to let

myself out when he asked, “Is that all?”

“Is that all what?”

“Is that all you see in the brains?”

I pointed to the blue brain. “You’re asleep here, right?”

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“No.”

I laughed. “Well, you’re not dead, are you? I mean you look pretty alive to me.”

“I’m not dead.”

“But it’s blue. Did you die on the operating table or something?”

“Had I, do you think anyone would have had the presence of mind to photograph

my brain? Had I been Albert Einstein they would have, but not me. I am ordinary.”

Somehow I doubted that statement. “And, no, the blue is not a massive brain tumor. If it

were we would not be having this conversation.” He stood and I was there at his elbow.

“Thank you. The blue represents my brain in meditation. When I reach samadhi. Self-

realization. Christ Consciousness. It’s the same thing.” He sounded like Gin. “A

neurologist took these. He specializes in bridging the gap between science and religion

by investigating how the brain changes during the spiritual experience.”

“You’re talking prayer.”

“Yes. What happens to the brain when we pray? Well, he’d heard about me and

asked me to go into a meditative state under observation. He wanted to take pictures.”

He pointed to the blue photograph. “That is my mind in a deep meditative state. So

where is the blood? I was quite alive when it was taken, I assure you. I was simply in a

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state of samadhi. The neurologist just looked at me and asked, Where did you go?”

I had thought the same thing when I caught Gin meditating one day. My eyes fell

onto the photograph of Elvis Presley beneath the brain photos. With the candles on either

side of his portrait along with that of the shaman, the arrangement looked like a shrine.

Then I recognized the steel drum tune. Can’t Help Falling in Love.

“Good song.”

“I prefer it to the original,” he said. “I love steel drum music. Very soothing.

Oh, don’t get me wrong I’m a big fan. Knew him, as a matter of fact.”

“You knew Elvis Presley?”

“I did his hair.” He smiled at my surprise. “Someone had to. I tried to get him to

go natural. Chestnut blond, did you know that?” I shook my head. “But he wanted that

Rat Pack look. Pitch black. Every hair in its place. Looked pasted on after awhile,

which, when you think about it, was what happened to him. He had no maneuverability

anymore. No spontaneity, no freedom to blow with the wind. He blew in, didn’t he?”

“Like a hurricane.”

“Yes. Quite.”

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Neither of us spoke; I assumed we were both experiencing a private epiphany of

some sort, the kind when your brain spikes from the meager thirteen percent of its

potential to something equivalent to being struck by lightning. It is in those split-second

moments of clarity, during those heady sparks of inspiration when brainwaves have been

inexplicably ignited by some vibratory—some say divine—force when artists rise from

their beds and paint their masterpieces and scientists return to their blackboards and solve

more of the Great Equation and humanity is nudged another inch forward in its evolution.

My revelation involved reincarnation and karma. One mirrors the other in much

the same way that all dimensions in the universe are affected by the vibration of a single

“string” that when plucked affects every form of energy, simultaneously. The ripple in

the pond effect. Everything is affected by everything else. On every level. The Law of

Cause and Effect seems to be the base common denominator throughout the eleven

dimensions of the cosmos. How we lived in past lives—if karmic reincarnation exists—

dictates how we live now. This could explain why Elvis was the phenomenon that he

was based on the axiom attributed to St. Augustine. “He who sings prays twice.” In past

lives he praised his creator in song and by karmic decree was duly rewarded with twice

the talent and success when he was reincarnated.

“It is difficult to remake yourself,” said Xavier Trench breaking the silence.

“Even if you have the means. Elvis certainly had the means. He could have been

anything he wanted but he was trapped by his own uniqueness. Really, where does one

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go when you reach the top of your profession? The answer he was searching for wasn’t

out there in the world. He had already conquered the world. The answer was within him.

And I helped show him. Through this man.” He pointed at the Hindu person.

“Paramahansa Yogananda.”

“Para-what?”

“Para-ma-hansa. Paramahansa.”

I rolled the name over my mouth. “Paramahansa Yogananda?”

“Yes, very good. He practiced a special kind of yoga, called kriya. He claimed it

was the same yoga Jesus practiced. Elvis wanted to be initiated in the technique and flew

to California to visit the ashram Yogananda established in 1920. It’s a sprawling place

overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Beautiful.” Trench leaned in to me. “Personally I do not

think he is dead at all. I think he is in California studying to be a yogi, a true disciple of

God. That is what I do, you know.” He pointed to a straight back chair. “I sit and close

my eyes and practice the technique. You do not need to bend your body like a pretzel.”

He motioned to his cane. “I really am quite limber, you know. Off day. Attaining a

Christ Consciousness requires two things: concentration and fortitude. That is what

Christ taught his disciples. It has been a secret far too long. In my humble opinion.”

The song filled the space between us, and his eyes glazed over. He stared

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absently, peacefully, at the straight back chair in front of us. I listened also and allowed

the soft, bright rhythmic dingdong of the steel drums to momentarily lift me out of

myself. It would be a sacrilege to speak until the song was finished but Trench’s voice

was smooth, deep, almost a compliment to the notes being played, and he said, “His

auditory modality was beyond this world. A gift from God.” It was as if he could hear

Elvis’ voice on the wind. I just heard steel drum. When the song finished his eyes

remained transfixed onto some invisible space just ahead of him as if he had been lifted

into a transcendental state like Enoch did when he walked with God. And Enoch walked

with God: and he was no more; for God took him. God did not take him physically; He

took him mentally.

Trench’s hand was clasped firming on his cane. He was completely focused,

leaning a bit forward like a Weimaraner pinned on its prey, and I followed his eyes to a

familiar image hanging on the wall above the chair. It was a line drawing of a scallop

seashell, framed under glass. I saw the image again, along the cornices, just like on the

Hellwitch, and then again engrained in the wood on the side of his roll-top desk. This

man was one of Hap and Gin’s initiates!

I wobbled in place. The walls began to close in. I pulled out my phone and

showed him the picture of Gin. “Do you know her?”

What color he’d regained after taking his medication flushed away. His face

twisted with anger and he swung his cane at me. It smashed the glass over the drawing of

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the seashell and the picture fell to the floor. He dropped to his knees, spewing apologies

to it as if it were a living thing.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” I said and pulled up a chair.

He struggled to get up. I offered my hand and he slapped it away. “Sod off!”

“Just tell me how you know her and I’ll be on my way.”

“She betrayed me,” he said weakly. “She betrayed my master.”

“Who was he? Was he a big guy? White hair, blue eyes?”

He shook his head. “She promised to give me a sip, another chance at life. But

she is a liar.” He grabbed my wrist. “Can you get it? I will pay you! I have money!”

“Do you remember her name? What about Gracie? Does that ring a bell?”

“I wish her dead. I so wish her dead.”

His eyes flittered on the brink of unconsciousness. “Was there anyone else with

her?” I gave him a little shake. “Mr. Trench?”

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“There was a woman. You could tell she’d been beautiful. But life is cruel.”

“What do you mean?”

“Makeup can do only so much, you know. But the scars were too deep.”

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CHAPTER 17

My head was spinning. Gin and Erica knew each other! So during all that time I was

with Gin, marveling the similarities she shared with Erica, especially on topics of an

esoteric nature—what was that? Was I being played? Candy thought I was too cerebral.

Erica and Gin had found that one of my endearing qualities. Both women valued my

philosophical approach to the underpinnings of ordinary things, not the least of which

was raising rug rats. After twenty years in the bar business I was ready to try with Erica.

But then the accident happened and she and I went our separate ways. Gin, on the other

hand, was not the mother type which made her more attractive—I could keep the bar. I

wouldn’t say she was the antithesis of Erica just the uninhibited version; the one men

often regret losing when the woman transcends from the carefree why-don’t-we-do-it-in-

the-road mentality to the it’s-time-to-make-a-nest mentality. So, looking at it

philosophically, it seemed unlikely I’d have two bites at relationship rhapsody with two

women as cerebral as I was. Unless I’d been set up to.

What else had I missed? When Erica laughed at my belief that d’Artagnan was a

fictional character and then Gin ribbed Hap at breakfast that I didn’t know Dumas very

well. Alexandre Dumas, author of The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo.

Why would Gin have said that unless she’d learned it from Erica?

Xavier Trench knew Gin as Gracie. Hap and Gin had to be the George and

Gracie Erica had told me about. George and Gracie Paulo. Or was that Apollo? From

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Apollus? That night on the hot red leather seats of my Eldorado Erica had told me my

property was an issue. Why would it be? It had been left to me by my aunt who’d

always envisioned it a book store. The island needed one so badly she said. “Be the

library before the librarians come!” I nodded politely and built a bar instead. But there

was this little problem of back taxes owed on the dilapidated cathouse-looking structure

the will failed to mention. I didn’t have the extra twenty grand. So I did a drug deal. But

no one knew that except Erica and the person with whom I did the deal. Did Gracie

know? Was she using that information against Erica? If so, to what end?

I was being followed. You get a sense for these things. I checked my rearview

again and this time I caught a spangle of sun off silver coins. It was just as well I’d

chosen to take the long way around Corpus to get back to Port A. Traffic does have its

uses and I lost whoever it was by the time I got back to Kip’s.

He had good news. I could be on my way by morning. I told him I was already

gone and proceeded to get the Hellwitch underway. Erica and Gin knew each other! I

simply could not wrap my head around that. That’s when Stella called and wanted my

ETA. She was in a bit of a snit. I accepted the assignment to play a judge at this year’s

Lady Kingfish Tournament, and told her not to worry.

I dug down into the cooler, grabbed a cherry cola and hoisted myself into the

captain’s chair—a sybaritic addition installed by Hap since PT boats didn’t have them. I

pushed the throttles up a bit.

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Two longhorn steers were winding across the sand dunes on my left when Tichie

called. “When you back?”

“When I get there.”

“Candy’s missing.”

“Come again?”

“You guys have words?”

“Nothing unpleasant. She broke up with me. But you already know that.”

“Who for?”

“You already know that, too, Tich. If she’s missing he’s your suspect, not me.”

“He’s the one who reported her missing. You were the last one to see her.”

“How do you know?”

“That’s what he says.”

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“How does he know?”

“According to him she wanted to tell you face to face. Then she was going to

meet him at Kelly’s and go out to his trailer but she never showed. Did she?”

“Did she what?”

“Tell you face to face.”

“I told you she did.”

“And nothing happened?”

“Why would anything happen? We’re adults.”

“Maybe she went with you?”

“What are you saying, Tichie?”

“Candy’s missing.”

“You already said that.”

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“Baddog thinks you did something to her.”

“I did. I showed her how comfortable life was with running water.”

“He’s gunning for you.”

“Then pick him up. I doubt he has a permit. Isn’t he a convicted felon?”

“The prescription was in his name. The DA didn’t have a case.”

“He had three hundred more than he was supposed to. Does intent to distribute

ring a bell?”

“I’m just telling you what I heard.”

“Who told you?”

“Erica.”

“How would Erica know?”

“She represented him.”

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“What?!”

“So Candy’s not with you?”

“Nope.”

“I have to ask you this question, Del.”

“No you don’t but ask anyway.”

“Did you do anything to Candy?”

“No.”

“Did you maybe—did something maybe happen?”

“Did I hit her maybe? Is that the maybe you mean?”

“Yeah.”

“No. I didn’t hit her, Tich. I didn’t roll her up in the carpet. Didn’t wrap an

anchor around her and drop her overboard. I didn’t do anything to her. All right?”

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“All right. You keep a sharp eye.”

“What am I looking for exactly?”

“When was the last time you saw Baddog?”

“I can’t remember.” Which was a lie.

“You wouldn’t recognize him.”

“So I’ve heard. What did he do, shave his head or something?”

“Just the opposite.”

“Look, you need to haul him in. He’s completely retarded now and you know it.

Sweat him. Those pills have fried his brain, man. He’s crazy. He’s the one who did

something to Candy. This is misdirection and you’re too smart to fall for it.”

“We don’t know where he is.”

“He can’t be that hard to find. If he’s not in his trailer he’s on the beach.”

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“He bought a truck, from what I heard.”

“How could he afford to buy a truck?”

“Lives in the dunes. Maybe he found some treasure.”

“Wait a minute. What kind of truck?”

“We’re looking for it right now.”

“What kind of truck, Tichie?”

“Chevy.”

“New?”

“No.”

“What color?”

“Green and white. We’ll find him. Look, we received a report about a truck like

that and a Caddy out on Highway 100.”

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“What did you hear?”

“They were drag racing. That Caddy sounded a lot like yours.” He read my

silence. “I thought you said you hadn’t seen him.”

“I didn’t know he had a green and white truck, if that’s what you mean.”

“So, was that you?”

“He rear-ended me. I didn’t know who it was and he didn’t give me the chance to

find out, either.”

“He obviously thinks you’ve done something to Candy.”

“Well, I haven’t. Is that it?”

“Why were you in Harlingen? You were coming back when you ran in to

Baddog, correct?”

“He ran in to me.”

“OK.”

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“I saw Erica. I’m being sued, or didn’t you know?”

“I hear she’s doing well.”

“She’s always doing well.”

“Bought a car.”

“Did she? Good for her.”

“I could use a new car.”

“Are we done here, Tichie? I think I got a bite.”

“When you back?”

“When I get there.” I hung up and called Tuna.

“Good to hear from you. I am sorry how we left things.”

“Don’t be. But I do have a question for you, Tuna.”

“Let me help you.”

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“Did you see Erica? You said you thought you might want her as your attorney.”

“Yes to both.”

“I hear she’s doing well.”

“You saw her before me. Did she not look like she was doing well?”

“What I mean . . . I heard she bought a new car. Just wondering what she got.”

“Ah! You call me to find out about her car?”

“Yeah. Look, I was thinking of buying her one. As a gesture.”

“Maybe you buy me one? As a gesture?”

“Sure, man. Whatever you want.”

“Can I have your word on that?”

“Absolutely not.” He laughed. “So, did she? Or is that just a rumor?”

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“What kind of car you want to get her?”

“I don’t know. That’s why I called you.”

“Why you think I know what she likes?”

“So you’re telling me she didn’t buy a car. Is that what you’re telling me, Tuna?”

“No. She buy one. A nice black one. Dodge, I think.”

I’d already known the answer. Had feared it. Didn’t want to face it. I slipped

down off the captain’s chair, dazed and confused, and rammed my foot through the

cooler. Icy water and cans of cherry cola spilled out across the deck. I cursed every god

I could think of. I reduced speed and called Erica. She’d been late to our meeting.

Errand day, she’d said. If she was the one in the muscle car tailing me through Los

Fresnos, what were the odds Baddog would be waiting for me on my way back to the

island? My tryst with the witch at Tuna’s could not have been foreseen, could it? Unless

she was a plant. Erica knew of my wandering eye. Was this some sort of payback for all

the screwing around I’d done on her when we were together? Even if that were true she

would not have condoned Baddog’s attempt to drive me into the next world, would she?

I scratched at my new tattoo.

I kicked at the cracked foam until I had most of it cornered and tried Erica a

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second time and again it went to voice mail. I picked up the mess and threw it overboard.

I could not make up my mind what made me angrier—Erica or the whole damn world.

Both resembled a repository of remains. Mine. In the annals of history my name won’t

be remembered, nor where I am put to rest. The only evidence of my existence found by

aliens a thousand years from now will be in the DNA attached to the Styrofoam I just

handled. So it could be argued I wasn’t littering at all. I was merely planting a clue to be

discovered which would suggest that once upon a time a hominid such as D.E. Lycan

walked this earth. Sound logic to be sure. It then begs the question why the National

Funeral Directors Association doesn’t lobby Washington to have coffins manufactured

out of polystyrene instead of metal or wood. Sure, a nice mahogany or walnut would be

nice, but deforesting the world’s natural resources to build a casket is one cruel

oxymoron, friend. And since styrene—the petroleum liquid hydrocarbon used to

construct Styrofoam—has been determined by the EPA to be a human carcinogen and

cancer is going to get most of us anyhow, it seems like a good fit. Fast food has

consumed the world. It seems only fitting that we make our final exit in a to-go box.

The sun was setting behind Port Isabel as I approached the causeway. Stella’s

was on the south side of the bridge near the Coast Guard station so I would need to pass

under her to get there. The sound of the bay was denser here, the air a degree cooler.

Scarves of light reflected across the base of her colossal legs. I am rarely uneasy on the

water but every time I cross beneath the Queen I shiver.

Because of what happened four days after 9/11.

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On Saturday, September 15, between 2:30 and 3 in the morning, a tug named the

Brown Water V, moving a string of barges up the Waterway, drifted out of the channel

and slammed into the causeway’s supporting columns. She brought down three eighty

foot spans. Eight people died while driving home. Dropped into the maw of nonbeing.

At first it was thought the collapse was a prelude to Part Two of Osama bin

Laden’s war on America. South Padre Island was America’s spring break playground

and bin Laden was punishing her for worshipping vacation as a false idol. That was the

booze talking of course and by noon the following day the islanders knew the truth.

The next four months were a curse and a blessing; a blessing because life was

transported to a simpler time when people relied on face-to-face encounters; a curse

because they’d been cut off from the rest of the world. Life in 2001 wasn’t a tweet out.

Facebook didn’t exist. You didn’t need to be a part of the social network to know you

were stranded, but advice, solicited or not, can be something of a life saver when you’re

all alone.

The grocery store shelves emptied. Bottled water became gold. Sanitation was a

big concern. Work commenced from crane barges and continued around the clock.

Ferries from Port Aransas joined local boat owners to get the kids to school and the

parents to work on the mainland. It was difficult to imagine because I wasn’t there when

it happened. The dead were venerated and a small memorial was built in their honor.

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I called Erica one last time from Stella’s with no luck.

The next day the Lady Kingfish Tournament absorbed all my time. After the

winners were announced I hooked up with a Port Isabel school teacher, took her aboard

the Hellwitch and let her have her way with me and sent her home pouting around ten

o’clock.

Sometime after midnight Hap murdered Gin.

My dreams were dreadful. I felt as if I was being hunted. I threw off the sheet

and went to see Larry, Curly and Moe and started drinking. I was on my fourth gin and

tonic when Hap crashed through the skylight. I grabbed the .38 Protector and stumbled

topside in an alcoholic stupor and the sound of Erica’s voice echoing between my ears.

She was screaming out for Jesus just before we crashed.

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CHAPTER 18

I looked out Hap’s hospital window and saw that fog had blanketed the city. I overheard

talk the bridge was closed, the fireworks cancelled. It wouldn’t have mattered much for

Hap; his show business days were over. I heard rustling behind me and turned.

“How long have I been here?”

My eyes swung to his bandaged arm. He didn’t even bother to look. It was as if

he knew what he’d done and didn’t seem very concerned.

“What time is it?”

“Late.”

“I’ve been out all day?”

“And half the night. You want something?”

“Water.”

I drew him some from the tap at the sink and fitted the straw to his mouth. He

noticed his right wrist was handcuffed to the bed railing. He shifted uncomfortably. I

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helped him with the pillows behind him and the automatic button that raised the bed.

“Good?”

“Right as rain,” he said.

A little drink of water and he seemed himself again. Buoyant. Defiant. He had

that crazy look the possessed have who believe they have immutable right on their side to

justify the mass murder of innocents. Had to be the meds. They don’t amputate your

arm and give you an aspirin. Hap’s mind was swimming in a cocktail of painkillers and

mood stabilizers that bathed him in a confederate understanding known only to celestial

beings.

He looked at the window. “What kind of day is it?”

“Crappy.”

“Fog?”

“Like gumbo.”

“We lucked out.”

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“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“He’s calling us.”

“Who?”

“Who do you think?”

My knees buckled. I read his hot-blue eyes and was drawn into his warped sense

of reality.

He actually believed Gin was in hell waiting for us to rescue her. That he had

killed her for good reason. Not because I was sleeping with her again but because she

had to face her tormentor. Up until this moment, despite what I had seen with my own

eyes regarding his immortality, I still didn’t believe. Gin was dead. That’s all I believed.

And he killed her.

“I’ll see to the funeral.”

He shook his head. “Ain’t gonna be one.” He read my discomfort. “Look at you.

I don’t know what’s hanging lower, your head or your dick. I knew you two were back at

it. No need to feel guilty. Let it go. Accept things for what they are.”

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“And how are things, Hap? Really.”

“You knew it was going to happen.”

“Didn’t know when.”

“Neither did Gin. But that’s the way she wanted it. Now we have to go get her.”

I played along. “Yeah? Just gonna walk into hell and walk out, huh? The last I

checked we had blanks in the fifties and fluorescent paint in the fish. We ought to make

quite an impression.”

“Kip took care of it.”

“You know Kip?”

“Only got three done because you were in a hurry to get gone.”

“Three what?”

“He put a hundred pounds of PBX in those Makos. Each. We’re locked and

loaded. If that horny-tailed fruitcake even looks at me cross-eyed, I’ll blow him to

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smithereens.” He shook his head in disgust. “Wow. After everything that’s happened

you still have doubts. You’ve got zero faith, kid. You gotta get me out of here.”

“And just how do you think that’s going to happen? The Chief’s in the next

room. There are cops all over the place.”

“For me?”

“Huh? What?!” It then dawned on me that Hap didn’t know about Emma’s

decline. I filled him in. He seemed to accept it as if that too was part of the plan. The

plan I had completely forgotten about.

“We need two things,” he said. “A diversion and you need to pick this lock.”

I looked for a pen, but it had to be the right sort. I moved carefully outside his

room to the nurse’s station, making sure I kept my back to the darkened room where

Emma was clinging to life. Members of the island’s city council and men and women of

the police force made periodic visits to Emma’s room to commiserate with the Chief and

pay their respects. There wasn’t an officer posted at Hap’s door, nor would there need to

be. He’d just gone through major surgery and was handcuffed to the bed. There were no

pens like the kind I needed, only Bics with a plastic top. I had one in my car, and told

Hap I had to go get it.

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“Don’t forget the belt,” he said.

“What belt?”

“My belt.”

“Your belt’s in my car?”

“I couldn’t risk it being logged in as evidence, now could I?”

I looked at his sawed-off arm bandaged seven ways to Sunday. “You just gonna

grow a new arm?”

“We need a diversion.”

“But how—?”

“Get the damn belt!”

I left the room and skirted the hallway and went through the exit to the stairwell

and down to the first floor.

Outside, a spooky viscous white enveloped me. I had the gnawing suspicion Mr.

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Jordan was nearby with clipboard in hand to vacantly put a check by my name before I

ascended the air-stairs to the plane bound for the heavenly realms. It was about the only

positive thought I could conjure as I made my way through the fog, the singular clop of

my sandals across the pavement reinforcing how alone I was feeling.

I found Hap’s belt on the floor behind the driver’s seat, the pen I needed in the

console.

Tichie and Manny were standing at the foot of Hap’s bed when I returned. They

were prodding him with questions. He was playing a game.

“This isn’t a game, Mr. Prior,” said Tichie.

“Unless you’re making birdies,” he said. “If you’re not then the effort becomes

an exercise in self-abuse. Did you know I have a three handicap?”

“Had,” said Manny. “You’ll be lucky to get a thirteen, assuming you ever get to

play again. Which, by the looks of things, you won’t.”

“We’ll see,” said Hap.

Hap saw me at the door, the belt rolled up in my left hand, hidden behind my

back. “Del, have you been here all this time? These guys were just leaving. Mind if I

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have a private word with my friend?” The detectives didn’t move. “It appears as if you

have me dead to rights, so I don’t know what more you could want. There’s really no

reason for me to be in jail at the moment. I’m fine right here. You can tell the Chief—.”

“You can tell him yourself,” said Tichie, throwing a look at the wide glass door.

In stepped the Chief. I don’t think he even saw me. He looked worn out, small in

his uniform. Grief sheds the pounds faster than jogging. I felt horrible for him. He’d

already been compromised by the weight of his beloved child slipping closer to death.

How he could possibly focus on Hap’s motive for committing murder seemed an

impossible task thrown down by God as some sort of sick joke.

Hap said, “If you want to talk to me I’m over at Del’s place. Or the boat.”

“Can’t be the boat,” said the Chief.

“Perfectly understandable. I can see Mexico from there like Palin can see Russia.

I’m sure the Coast Guard is on alert. So the bar, OK?”

“This is a capital crime. You won’t be at no bar, slamming back a few. You’ll be

in jail where you belong.”

“And risk infection?” said Hap nodding at his bandaged stump. “I think even a

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first year law student could find precedent to convince a judge otherwise.”

“Wanna go back to the scene of the crime, eh?” said Manny. “You’re sick.”

“He has to be arraigned first,” said the Chief.

“Not in Brownsville, I hope,” said Hap. “The crime did take place on the island.

Judge Beeman, is it? I guess he’ll do the honors. Now I might be wrong about that. I

expect to make a few mistakes along the way. I’m not an attorney, you know.”

“Phone’s right next to you,” said Tichie. “Call one up.”

“I’ll be representing myself, thanks.”

Even I felt a need to say something after hearing that.

“Not a good idea,” said the Chief.

“Why?” asked Hap. “Because of the video? It is certainly damning. So what

could an attorney say about it? That it was doctored? That won’t fly. The DA will call

his experts in to confirm it’s real. And I’m here to state—.”

“Stop talking, Hap! Jesus!”

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“Don’t use the Lord’s Name in vain, son.” Hap looked back at the Chief. “I’ll

concede the tape is real and has not been altered in any way. So since that seems to be

the main evidence against me, I’d say my goose is pretty well cooked.”

“So you’re confessing to the crime?” said Tichie.

“Beg pardon?”

“You’re saying you killed her.”

“Oh, no, I’m not saying that at all.”

“Well, Mr. Prior,” said the Chief. “There is no one in that video but you, so it’s

not like you can point a finger and say someone else is to blame.”

“Sure I can. Because someone else is to blame.”

“Yeah? Who?”

“God,” said Hap. “It’s God’s fault Gin’s dead. Not mine.” The silence that

followed only grew louder the longer nobody spoke. Hap, his face flushed with vibrancy,

threw me a wink with his jewel-blue eyes. “And Del here is a witness.”

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“Witness to what?”

“To what I just said. Now I had a dream I said it but, hey, maybe I didn’t. Tell

the truth, Del. I was mad with pain. Crazy—.”

“With guilt,” I said. “You’d just put your hand through a friggin’ window.”

“I know.”

“The hand that killed Gin.”

“Yeah,” he said, nodding soberly. “That ought to come off, don’t you think?

Doesn’t it say that in the Bible somewhere? If thy hand offend thee cut it off?”

“So you did.”

“But I’m right-handed, Del. Not left.” He lifted his right hand as far as he could,

which wasn’t too far because it was cuffed to the railing. He wiggled his pointer finger.

“This is the trigger finger. This is the hand that should’ve come off.”

“You used a machine gun so it don’t matter,” said Manny. “Jurors ain’t stupid.”

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“I just need one to think the devil made me do it.”

“Problem is it looks planned,” said Tichie. “Crimes of passion are impulsive.

You’d have been better off if you hit her over the head with a bottle of scotch.”

“Good point. I suppose it’s how well I play it, right? Sell the sizzle?”

The charade was impressive. An insanity defense was the only way he could win

at trial. Put the blame on God. There’s some sizzle for you. He’d call me as a witness

because I was the first to hear him say, “It’s God’s fault.” Lay the ground work for it

right now, here in the hospital room, by being so forthright—not what a sane man would

do since everyone knows that anything you say can and will be used against you in a

court of law, especially if you say it to a cop. It’s God’s fault. It sounded crazy when he

said it the first time. It sounded even crazier now. But when were we going to trial?

Before or after we went to hell? This was nuts!

“Sorry about your kid, Chief,” said Hap.

Tuff’s face was too injured to register emotion. He left the room. Manny and

Tichie followed him, scowling at me as they passed by. I stepped around Hap’s bed and

handed him the belt. He raised his cuffed wrist. I fumbled with the pen. My fingers

were swollen from the cut I’d received from the broken skylight when I tried to pull out

Hap’s arm. Just trying to bend them sent a wicked pain through me. I broke off the

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metal clip with my teeth but picking a lock was delicate work. I couldn’t find the hole.

Hap’s face went a shade lighter. He began to panic. Then I dropped the clip and I

thought he was going to stroke out.

“Your phone.” I dialed a number for him and held the phone up to his ear. “Get

up here,” he said.

A minute later a familiar face entered. I hadn’t seen him since he tickled Candy

outside Jake’s, but now that he was close I recognized him for who he’d been years ago

before his injury on the uneven bars. I was dumbstruck. Dusty “Baddog” Boyd was in

remarkable physical condition, oozing brawn as if he’d just stepped out of a muscle

magazine. He looked like he wanted to dead press me.

I struck first. “What did you do to Candy!”

His answer was an iron forearm against my neck.

“Dusty!” said Hap. “We don’t have time for this! Uncuff me!”

Baddog let me go and, assessing the situation, grabbed the metal clip, fit it into

the tiny hole and opened the cuffs.

Hap read my skepticism. “He’s one of ours.”

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“Then you don’t need me.”

He handed the belt back to me. “Yes, I do, Del. The girl in the other room does.”

Baddog hoisted Hap off the bed and led him to the door.

“Hap. You’ll never make it.” I held the belt out. “Drink and let’s get outa here.”

“I drink and we don’t have a diversion. We have to get Gin. We have to go now.

But we won’t make it unless you go in there and . . . ”

“And what?”

“You know what.”

“Are you crazy? They’ll kill me!”

“Yeah. Maybe. Maybe not. Think of Gin.”

“Make Baddog do it. You need me on the Hellwitch.”

“Can you carry me down the stairs? I don’t think so. He’s got you beat in the

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muscle department, kid. Now go. We’re running out of time and I’m not feeling good.”

I stepped up to them and whispered, “Just drink and we’ll make a run for it!”

“Listen to me, you little bail jumper, Gin’s burning in hell as we speak!”

“We’ll set off the fire alarm and lose them in the fog.”

“Then you’ll be implicated. We need something to keep them where they are.”

There was no more time for debate. Without a diversion there was no way Hap

was getting out of the hospital. The only type of diversion that would work was to make

the police even more protective of little Emma—draw them in to the hospital, not fan

them out in a city-wide search for us which was what would happen if we set off the fire

alarm, announcing our escape. But I wasn’t an idiot. I had a pretty good idea what

would happen to me if I went into the Chief’s room on the premise that I could heal his

daughter with a sip from a belt buckle.

If Tichie saw me enter he didn’t let on. He and Manny were standing like

remorseful altar boys. Meg was slumped in a chair, looking off in a daze. Tuff was

seated nearest to Emma, looking mean and bitter.

I had a clear shot to the little sink near the head of Emma’s bed. As quietly and

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unobtrusively as I dared I simply availed myself of some tap water. But my hand was

shaking as I held the shell under the tap. Before anyone knew what my intention was I

held the belt buckle within an inch of Emma’s blue lips . . .

The floor came up and hit me. Thick fingers found my neck and hauled me up. I

bucked. I thrashed. The second punch sucked the air out of me. The third one cut my

groin open like a knife. Back-handed slaps rearranged my face piece by bloody piece.

My vision fouled. The blood in my mouth tasted brassy. Bile rose in my craw. If I

retched I could suffocate like Jim Morrison and Jimi Hendrix did at the hands of the CIA,

if you believed that kind of stuff. I was of a mind to believe it, considering my situation.

When a jarring left broke my nose I believed Oswald acted alone and Marilyn died of an

accidental overdose. I believed there was no cure for cancer and our government was

powerless to control the fluctuation in gas prices. When bells bonged between my ears

like a Black Sabbath song, I believed Jesus was an alien, orange was the new black and

the CEOs of non-profit charities were worth their million-dollar salaries. I believed the

News didn’t peddle snake oil for ratings, our military was incapable of stopping 9/11,

America’s wealth wasn’t being siphoned off to foreign countries, a wall across the border

would actually work, Girl Scout cookies were reasonably priced and the Super Bowl was

worth all the hype. I believed all that because my brain was scrambled. It had reached

gimbal lock. The neurons were misfiring. Horizontal was vertical and everything I knew

I didn’t believe I believed. I was seeing double which probably meant concussion. A

few more rounds I’d go vegetable. You don’t mess with the head. I was oblivious of

time and place. I slid down the wall to a woman’s screaming and the harsh din of men

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angry at one another. I was floating. Just outside my body. I didn’t know my name.

Through the corner of one of my black-and-blue eyes I managed to see Hap at the

stairwell.

He was smiling.

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CHAPTER 19

Someone was nice enough to see me out. Is that you, Tich? A wheelchair ride to the

sidewalk. Said I might need some stitches. Should probably go to the hospital. Not this

one. He dropped Hap’s rolled-up belt in my lap. “What were you thinking?”

“I dunno. I wasn’t, I guess.”

“She needs more than a kiss from Prince Charming.”

“I’m no Prince Charming.”

“I coulda told you that. What were you doing with the belt?”

“Just something I read. Y’know. Something old, something new.”

“Like a spell?”

“Hell if I know.”

“Where’s your car?”

“Where cars normally are.”

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“You think you can drive?”

“I’ll wing it.”

The Chief exited the doors with Manny in cuffs and brought him over to me.

“That stunt you pulled? Meg wants to charge you with assault. Said you could’ve hurt

Emma. I don’t see how. But you did hurt me. You just got no respect for nothin’. Now

I’ll carry that around with me the rest of my days. Two things, one, you want to press

charges against Manny here? And two, whether you do or not, I’m placing you under

arrest for aiding and abetting.” He looked at Tichie. “His friend, Mr. Prior, is missing.”

My head hung low—not so much from guilt than the fact it was busted. “You make me

sick, Lycan. You know that? Ain’t nothin’ sacred to you. I already put out an all points

on him. He can’t have gone far, and I got friends in Mexico if’n he thinks he can make a

go of it there. You saw the tape so you know he ought to fry for what he did. But now I

hear you were sleeping with her too. Now I’m thinking you and Mr. Prior were in this

thing together, some kind of twisted love triangle, I’m still working it out in my head.

What was he going to be to you, your alibi, and you were going to be his? But you forgot

you wired your place with surveillance and we got the tape that shows he blew her all to

hell. So maybe when I paint the right picture for the DA, he’s going to want to charge

you as an accessory after the fact.” He poked me in the chest. “Yeah.”

His phone rang and I looked at Manny whose head hung low too—not so much

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because it was busted but because he was guilty as sin for pounding the veal out of me. If

I pressed charges I’d own him unless I went down for helping orchestrate Gin’s murder.

I didn’t, of course, but I knew it was going to happen.

“What?!” said the Chief. “Is this some sort of joke?” We all waited for the punch

line. The Chief hung up and appeared confused. He turned to me. “You want to press

charges against Detective Genarro?”

“No.”

He tried to get a read on me. “That was Roland’s Funeral Home. Mrs. Prior’s

body is missing.”

“What do you mean it’s missing?” said Tichie.

He uncuffed Manny. “I don’t know how else I can say it.”

“We got the tape,” said Manny rubbing his wrists.

“You stage this, Lycan?” said the Chief. “Was this all some sort of hoax?”

“A dead body ain’t no hoax, Chief,” said Manny.

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“Except now there ain’t a dead body.” His eyes were still on me. “What were

those? Squibs? You playing Clint Eastwood on us here, son?”

“What’s a squib?” said Manny.

Tichie took it. “That’s how Hollywood simulates gunshot wounds. A little

gunpowder and fake blood. All done by remote control.”

“We dug slugs out of the wall!” said Manny.

The Chief couldn’t work around that one. Still he wasn’t convinced Gin’s death

was for real. You don’t just lose a body. Not in a cupcake community like Port Isabel.

Manny returned with the Chief to Emma’s room. Tichie escorted me to my car. I

wasn’t in much of a hurry because Hap had Baddog, his new initiate, to help him, which

was fine. I always knew Baddog would go to hell. Maybe, with any luck, he’d stay.

The Eldorado was my escape pod out of madness. I couldn’t wait to be gone.

But something about her didn’t look right. She had a lean to her because her right front

tire was flat as a panini. I could tell Tichie wasn’t up to changing a tire. I certainly

wasn’t. He snapped his fingers for the keys.

“I’ll do it later, Tich. Get me home. I need to lie down.”

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He nodded and told me he’d be back in a sec. I leaned against the banged-in

fanny of the car and in my struggle to light a cigarette dropped Hap’s belt. I wanted not

to look at it anyway. I wanted to throw it in the trash, burn it. But I couldn’t quite let go,

so I picked it up. I had seen its power but its power had failed me when I needed it most.

I studied the scallop shell belt buckle. It seemed almost fragile to me, absent of

any pronounced weight, almost feathery, and it was somewhat translucent. I could just

make out the Christian fish-like marking Hellus had scraped into the gold with the tip of

his knife 2000 years ago. The forger couldn’t forget that. The shell hadn’t healed Emma

so that meant Hap had planned to make a fool of me. He was smiling. I was sure of it. I

wanted to take the belt and strangle him with it.

I reconsidered the tire. My car, my responsibility whether I was seeing double or

not. I opened the trunk to get the jack and found Candy’s body wrapped in a plastic tarp

soiled in beach sand, her gin-clear blue eyes opaque in death, looking up at me.

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CHAPTER 20

Tichie pulled up. I tossed the belt in with Candy and slammed the trunk. I made my way

towards his car and then turned around as if I’d forgotten something. Which I had. I

went to the driver’s side door and opened it and, keeping my back towards Tichie to

obstruct his view, I pressed the hidden release and the door panel popped open. But the

Magnum was gone. Now I knew I was being set up. Except no one knew of the secret

holster for my gun in the Cadillac except the fellow who’d installed it, Kip. And besides

Erica no one knew about the drug deal I’d done to pay the back taxes on Skivvies except

the person I did it with, Tichie—and he was a cop so he wasn’t talking.

“Y’know something, Tich?” I said leaning my hand against the roof of his sedan.

“I’m going to go ahead and fix it. I’m feeling better.”

“Just like that? Leave it. We’ll do it later. I gotta come back anyway. You could

put some ice on that eye, lie down. I’ll pick you up and we’ll get’r done.”

“It might not be here later,” I said. “Could get towed. No. You go on.”

I walked back to the Caddy. He turned off his ignition and got out. Damn.

He took the keys from me and put them in the lock. I made a cursory glance

around the parking lot, but because of the fog, I couldn’t see anyone. Which meant no

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one could see me. I jammed my foot into the back of his leg, behind the knee. He

howled in pain and collapsed. I removed his revolver and took the cuffs. I hauled him up

and pushed him to his car and put him in behind the wheel. “Cuff yourself to the wheel

and start the car. Do it!” I went around to the passenger side and got in.

“What’re you doing, Del?”

“Take me to Skivvies. And don’t do anything stupid.”

“You’re the one who’s being stupid.”

“If a call comes in, you’re taking a dinner break. Hey Tich? I know the codes.”

Highway 48 was twenty miles of two-lane driving. The fog only got thicker the

closer we got to the island. There was no way of knowing how far we’d come or how far

we had to go. Worse there were no taillights to follow. To our left somewhere were

miles of sandy flats, to our right the Port of Brownsville, not visible even on a clear day.

I’d dug a deep enough hole for myself kidnapping Tichie so after awhile I saw no

reason not to come clean of the entire mess. “I want to come clean of this whole mess,

Tichie. But there’s really no easy way to do it. I’ve got a story to tell you that you’re not

going to believe. But at least I’ll sleep better knowing I told it.”

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“No one sleeps too well in prison, Del.”

“Yeah. But at least I’ll know what I’m in jail for. And it won’t be for this.”

“This is kidnapping. This you can go to jail for.”

“I know. But what I’ll be charged with will be for what’s in the trunk of my car

back at the hospital. Then they’ll slap kidnapping on top of it for good measure.”

“What’s in your car?”

“I’ll give you three guesses but you’ll only need one.”

He thought for a moment. “Candy?” I nodded. “Del!”

“I didn’t kill her, Pete. If I did, I’d cop to it now, doncha think? I’m kidnapping

you at gunpoint. I figure it’s all downhill from here anyway, so why not cop to it? But,

look, I didn’t kill her. Baddog killed her and put her in my car.”

“Do you know that?”

“No. But who else is there? Cuz it ain’t me.”

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He rubbed his leg and grimaced. “I think you screwed up my knee.”

“Sorry.”

“So what’s this story you wanted to tell me?”

“You’re not going to believe it.”

“Probably, but what else we got to do?”

So I told him. Everything I could remember. The trip on mushrooms, the needle

through my heart, my rebirth, and who Hap and Gin were. By then he had to look over at

me to see if I’d grown two heads. I told him to keep his eyes on the road.

“They’re immortal.” He had to say it aloud to see how it sounded, to see if it

made the story sound more credible, or helped justify the handcuffs. It did neither.

My nose felt like gravely pebbles. “I told you you wouldn’t believe me.”

The bridge was closed. Valley residents who’d made the drive down for the

weekend fireworks had been turned away hours ago. Port Isabel was a ghost town, its

horseshoe of mom-and-pop shops around the hundred-year-old lighthouse lost in the

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ghoulish miasma. Sawhorse barriers with blinking yellow lights blocked the entry onto

the slow-rising artery of the causeway. Two police cruisers were parked in an inverted V

with bubbles flashing.

“Hit your lights, Tichie.”

“Way ahead of you,” he said. “But I’d put away that gun if I were you. And you

better hope whoever it is ain’t mucho curioso.” He rattled the handcuffs.

The troopers didn’t want to jaw and opened the lane and we went on through.

Crossing the Queen was an exercise in the surreal. Our view of the highway

seemed less than a foot. The crook in our necks intensified as we leaned over the dash to

keep a sharper eye, the brakes our only consolation while we imagined the unimaginable.

The hum of the air conditioning and the grind of the road compressed our eardrums. I

began hearing things, or imagined that I was, like pecking beneath the floorboards as if

Hitchcock’s birds were trying to get in. There was nowhere to turn off to and barely a

shoulder if we broke down. The vapor lingered like dragon’s breath. Wisps of fog

swirled around us like slashing spirits. Fantasy faces dissolved and reformed with eerie

grins challenging my reality, as if I had been blindfolded and turned around in place three

times. Mother Nature’s Funhouse. How fragile we are when we can’t find the horizon.

This had Rod Serling written all over it. The trek seemed endless, and then the curtains

parted and we exited the soup to see the towers of the hotels twinkling against a great

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curtain of black. The island appeared immune.

Tichie and I sat in the car in front of Skivvies and watched the fog wall. It looked

close enough to touch and yet far away. I could not make out the end of the dock where

normally the Hellwitch was moored. Anyway she was tied up at Stella’s.

“So what’s the plan?” said Tichie.

I really had no idea. “You better take care of Candy before she starts to attract

animals.”

He jangled the handcuffs. “The key’s in my breast pocket.”

I snapped to and dutifully retrieved the key and unlocked the cuffs and handed

him back his gun. “Kept it on safety.”

“Yeah, I noticed,” he said rubbing his wrists. “But I think you’re going to need it

more than me, except I can’t give it to you. I’d never live it down and nobody would

believe I had given it to you. Your gun’s in the trunk.” We got out together. “Took it

when I got the call about the drag race on Highway 100. Came to talk to you about it but

you were already gone. Saw the bumper. Looked inside. She wasn’t there. So if she’s

there now . . .” He opened the trunk. “The smart play was to dump—.”

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“I didn’t dump her, Tich. I didn’t kill her either but she is very dead.”

“I believe you. My money’s on Baddog too but as far as all that other stuff, I

wouldn’t even know where to start. You have no proof. I suppose I could put a bullet in

you and we could take it from there. Where’s the shell?”

“With Candy.”

He handed me the Magnum. “I better alert the Coast Guard.”

“I don’t think it’s going to help. Not where I’m going.” I checked to see if the

gun was still loaded. It was. “Knew what button to push I see.”

“You know you can’t keep a secret on this island, Del.”

I quieted him with a raised hand. I thought I’d heard something. I looked at the

eerie fortress of fog over the bay when we both heard it. A scream. Then the gurgle of

engines turning over. Tichie reached for the radio mic. I ran towards the dock.

I knew she was there, just couldn’t see her and I was running out of running room.

So I leaped and found I hadn’t needed to. The Hellwitch was barely off her fender. I was

stopped by a rubbery obstruction. It flipped me over backwards. I hit my head on the

deck under Baddog’s safety line. He shook out his arm, releasing the pain of stopping

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me. I lay there looking up at him like an Argonaut beneath the Colossus of Rhodes. He

pressed the heel of his sandal against my wrist until I released the gun. Hap was seated

on a locker, leaning against an air intake vent. Baddog relinquished the gun to him.

The engines grew louder and a moment later the dock fell from view and all that

was visible was an impenetrable fascia of dense swirling white, our running lights haloed

against the mist so I held out little hope the Coast Guard would even be able to see us

much less intercept us from going where we were going. I was still in denial about this

because I was incapable of accepting the preposterous, despite what I had seen. Despite

what I believed. And what did I believe? Did I really believe in heaven and hell? Since

I owed money to folks who had gone in both directions, it remained unclear which deity I

would serve in lieu of reimbursement.

I sensed movement.

I turned to see a graceful shape emerge from the sauna cloudiness that cloaked the

front of the gunship. She moved with the sultry sure-footedness of a cat, the click-clack

of high heels across the deck as precise as a metronome tapping out how many beats I

had left before this world had no more use for me.

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CHAPTER 21

I have always maintained that the legs of Erica Ames were the most beautiful I’d ever

had wrapped around my waist. She was dressed in a mini skirt and a silk bandeau. Her

hair was squeegeed to her neck like motor oil, the poof long gone. She gleamed with

beads of moisture. The dampness sadly accentuated the scars on her shoulders and neck,

turning them gummy candy pink. But I saw through to her real beauty. Sex starts in the

brain, everything else is gravy. She would always be beautiful to me.

“What took you?” she said. It was a rhetorical question which she followed with

a cute gasp, but not as loud as the scream. She was merely teasing me with the sound she

knew I’d heard that got me running. “Thought you were saving me, hmm?”

“Didn’t know it was you. But, yeah, I’m here to save you, if that’s what you

want.”

Hap began to lean. Baddog ran over to him and tilted him straight.

Frothy clouds swam around us the further we penetrated the fogbank, only to

reconfigure into a fresh illusion of enclosure.

I got to my feet and faced Erica. “You look good.”

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“You don’t.”

“I’m all right.”

“Good. Me too. I’ll be feeling even better in a minute.”

“Why is that?”

“I’m due payment for services rendered.”

“And what would those be?”

She shrugged. “I helped with logistics. Made certain introductions. Cleared

obstructions. Paved the way. What competent lawyers do every day.”

“What’s the going rate for something like that?”

“Something worth more than money. A new life. The life you denied me.”

“I carry that damage around me every damn day, Erica. And you know it.”

“Really? Do you have scars too? Lemmie see.” I shrunk inside; my life would

never be, could never be, as damaged as hers. “Y’know what really pisses me off, Del?

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That my flying in wasn’t enticing enough for you to stay sober one lousy night. You had

to impress the homeboys or whoever. Why didn’t you just walk away?”

“Because I’m an idiot.”

“You’re worse than that. You’re an empty, self-centered child who has nothing to

show for himself. What do you have that is so precious? You live alone. You have no

family. All you have is that bar. Who loves you? Not me. Not Gin. I hear even Candy

left you.”

“You can ask Baddog about that.”

“Haven’t seen her,” he said.

“Hell you haven’t seen her.”

“She run?” asked Erica. “Or did you kick her out?”

“Just held the door open.”

“I see. A gentleman. Think she’ll come back?”

“Not in this life.”

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Her eyes diced me up as we glided across the water. “Do you remember what we

talked about that night in the Highlands?”

I feared a memory glitch. Men often suffer from them when asked a direct

question, like When’s our anniversary?

We were lying in front of the fireplace in a mountain cabin in North Carolina, just

outside the Highlands—soaring pines, old money and too many fairways. Outside snow

was falling like a picture postcard. This had been the first time since the accident we had

slept together. She’d been afraid to show me the other scars, the ones easily hidden by

clothing, like the one that ran from the bottom of her neck to the top of her pubic bone.

Her peachy breasts had needed no reconstruction but the rest of her had. Our lovemaking

had been a success largely due to the heat of passion and the cloak of darkness. But now

we were spooning in the firelight.

At first all I saw was the gentle rise of her hipbone, smooth as a velvet rose. But

as I ran my fingers lightly across her flank, creases began to appear. Crimped flesh the

sutures could pull together only so well. I tried to settle my hand somewhere smooth and

unblemished but found it nearly impossible. I laid my arm in front of her in hopes she

would pull it close. And she did.

Her words were haunting. “I think there’s a safeguard to entering heaven.”

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“How do you mean?”

“Those we’ve wronged? They have a say, too.”

“Really? How?”

“Well, first we have to ask Christ to forgive us. Then we have to ask forgiveness

from those we hurt.”

“Sounds fair.”

“But what if someone you’ve wronged is already dead? How do you ask for

forgiveness? And what if when you die they’re not in a forgiving mood? You may end

up floating outside heaven for eternity.”

I rolled that over. It was almost too desperate to contemplate. “And those who

aren’t willing to forgive, where are they? Outside the walls, too?”

“Well, I didn’t say you wouldn’t have company.”

At that moment I knew she was gone to me forever. There would never be

complete forgiveness. How could there be? She had been crippled. I had escaped

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unscathed. Sure, I had died. But I came back and with even more of an attitude than I

had before I left. But which one of us would need to beg forgiveness? Neither of us had

died. I blinked the memory away and refocused on the steamy wet girl standing in front

of me. “I remember everything.”

“So what do you have, Del?”

“Is that what all this is about, Erica?”

“It was part of the deal. But y’know something? I didn’t realize how important it

was until just now. All the things I kept bottled up inside. All those sessions with the

shrinks. I thought I’d gotten it all out. I thought I could move on. I thought I had moved

on. But there was one thing I never did. Not really.”

“What’s that?”

“Face the person who ruined my life. Confront him fully, once and for all. Not

on the phone or in a letter or over a glass of beer and tears in a napkin. Not in front of a

fireplace in nut-bush North Carolina. But here. Now. I wanted to look you in the eye. I

wanted you to look in my eyes and see your reflection. Only then, maybe, just maybe,

you’d see yourself for the spineless son of a bitch you are.”

“I-I’m so sorry, Erica.”

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“I was pregnant!” she screamed.

The roof of my heart caved in. I had never known this. That had to have been

the big news. My Christmas present. And it changed everything. The texture of the

memory which I often manipulated so I could fall asleep would never be malleable again.

It would cling to me forever like a sodden mop, sticky as the Robe of Deianira, and just

as painful. Because it burned. It was designed to. And any attempt by me to remove it

would tear my skin away until it killed me. Like it had Hercules.

“You took that away from me! You took it away from yourself! The chance to

build a life together, to raise a child, to raise a child! The chance to be a family! Our

baby won’t forgive you! Our baby won’t forgive you! Our baby won’t forgive you!”

She kept flailing, kept striking. Blood trickled from my nose, fire from my ear,

grief from my soul. I ached for her and let her wail on me. It was the least I could do.

“All right, that’s enough!” yelled Hap. “Good Christus!”

“No! No!” she hollered. Her palm spanked my temple again. “I want to kill him

for what he did to me!”

Baddog grabbed her by the arm before she could land another.

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“I’m not finished!” she cried.

“Yeah, you are,” said Hap.

“I want more! I want him to suffer like I suffered. Cripple him! Blow his thing

off! That Candy whore will probably thank me.”

“Candy’s dead,” I said. “Baddog killed her.”

“No I didn’t. But I would have. She had cramps from freaking hell and wouldn’t

shut up.”

“So you killed her.”

“Nah. That was Gin.”

“Gin’s dead, you moron.”

“No, I’m not,” said Gin coming down from the bridge. She stepped up to Erica.

“You get it all out of your system, honey? Are you ready to move on with your life

now?” Erica was shaking. Gin waited, annoyed. “How’s our time?” she asked Hap.

But Hap didn’t respond; his stump had sprung a leak. “The time!” He checked a gold

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pocket watch hanging around his neck and shook his head. “Where’s the belt?”

“He had it.”

Gin looked at me with the sort of eyes you only see on a dead person, only twice-

baked. “Let me have it.”

“Left it in the car. Sorry.” The look she gave me could have burned toast. “I

thought you had a date with the devil.”

“I still do,” she said. Her eyes brightened. “You’re still coming, aren’t you?”

“You don’t look like you need rescuing to me.”

“But I will, Del. I will.”

Erica looked at me. “What are you talking about?”

“Do you even know who these people are, Erica?”

“Of course I do. That’s George and that’s Gracie—”.

“Apollo.”

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“Yes. How did you know?”

“Ever ask why they wanted you to confront me here? Couldn’t we have done this

on shore? Should’ve checked your ticket before you boarded this cruise, dollface.

Where we’re going ain’t on a map.” I looked at Gin. “You don’t need her. Let her go.”

“What are you talking about?” Erica turned to Gin. “What’s he talking about?”

“She’s free to go any time she wants,” she said.

The sight of Gin standing in front of me so full of life made me think I’d been

completely snowed. Just not like the Chief suspected. The bullets had been real, all

right. Baddog brought her back. He had used the holy power of Hap’s belt. Hap wasn’t

wearing it when he punched through the skylight. He’d probably given it to Baddog who

snuck inside Roland’s Funeral Home. They escaped together. Baddog stashed the belt in

my car—except the belt that had resurrected Gin had failed to revive Emma because

Manny attacked me before the healing power could reach her mouth. Poor Emma. Gin

hid out on the island while Baddog went to the hospital to collect Hap. Probably had

Candy’s body in the bed of his pickup and picked the lock to my trunk and dropped her

inside. She was an instrument to be used against me, if needed. I’d seen Gin’s jealousy.

Candy was sleeping with me and she was a knockout. Whether or not Gin acted

impulsively in Candy’s death was irrelevant. Candy was expendable.

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Why hadn’t they used their real names with Erica? Haven and Ginat Prior. Was

it deliberate, a joke of some kind to mess with everyone’s head? Or a safeguard to escape

under if their plans seducing me failed. If the authorities were ever called in Erica could

swear under oath she knew them as George and Gracie, not Hap and Gin. But after the

Hellwitch made the papers and the evening news, the three of them were joined at the hip.

Erica would bury their old identities behind attorney-client privilege, protect them in any

way she could because they had the power to heal her—motivation enough to play along.

I studied Gin. “You said you were tired of running.”

Erica looked at Gin. “You’re not wanted for something, are you?”

“You didn’t think to vet them?” I said.

“Why should I? They paid up front.”

“To dig up dirt?”

“Whatever works. I can’t tell you how many times I thought about burning down

that bar of yours myself. Preferably with you in it. But I would be perfectly content to

see it taken away from you. Put you on the street, penniless. How ever did you pay off

those taxes, Del? Perhaps we should give Tichie a call. Maybe he can shed some light.”

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“You didn’t need them to get my attention.”

“I did if it all went south. I’m sure you and Tichie covered your tracks. You

aren’t the first guys to secure financing with drug money. But paying off taxes with it,

well, that’s what the feds live for. Building a case like that would take a lot of time and a

lot of money. And they have both.”

I looked back at Gin. “Need a base of operations, do we?”

“A home would be nice,” she said. “You should be flattered. We can live

anywhere in the world we want. But we prefer this hemisphere. We like the island. We

liked the look of your place. When we want something we get it.”

I let go a sigh. “Let’s get this show on the road.”

Gin scanned the fogbank. “The conditions aren’t quite right. Soon.”

“Always an excuse with you folks. Makes sense. If crossing over was so easy,

we’d all be doing it, right?”

“Do you really want to know what the catalyst is?” I let her talk as I assessed my

chances of taking out Baddog. “Well, a full moon would be nice but I couldn’t tell you

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tonight if there was one. What is necessary is water.”

“Yeah. Heard that,” I said.

“A special kind. One in which someone has died.” Her eyes swung onto Erica

and my face turn a paler shade of gray.

“Lay a hand on her and I’ll kill you.”

Gin laughed. “My! Aren’t we the gallant one! She wants your head on a pike

but you’d take a bullet for her.” She looked at Hap. “Honey? Del Lycan is a

Renaissance man!” She looked back at me. “I told you she could leave.”

I grabbed Gin by the arm. “Then whose death are we talking about?”

“Let go of me or it’ll be yours.”

She was serious and I let her go and she turned to Erica. “I’m afraid we can’t

fulfill the terms of our contract at this time. But we will when we get back.”

“What? No! You promised!”

“I know we promised and we honor our promises. Just ask Dusty. But we don’t

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have it with us and we can’t go get it right now. Dusty will take you ashore in the Zodiac

and then we’ll rendezvous—.”

“You don’t need the shell,” said Erica. “I know what’s inside that thing around

your neck.”

My eyes dropped to the silver hamsa Gin always wore with her, even to bed. On

more than one occasion I almost threw it out the window. It kept bouncing off my nose

while she was bouncing on me. I had a tiny revelation. Up until then I didn’t know what

was in it. It could only be one thing. The barbs from the jujube bush that had been

fashioned into a circlet and placed upon Christ’s head. Soaked in oil and blood for 2000

years they would probably resemble worms. Hap had the Grail. Gin had the Crown.

“You have thorns in that pillbox,” said Erica. “Baddog gave one to Candy. Made

her feel like she could fly. But it really messed with her head since there wasn’t much in

her that needed healing. The bitch was that healthy. Baddog? You said she changed?”

“She was high for days. But then she started to come down. She was like dope

sick. I bought her some Midol and she tried to stab me with a fork. She went cuckoo.

Reminded me how I was on junk.”

Erica stepped up to Gin. “You owe me!” I saw Gin’s jaw grinding, saw her

shields go up, her green eyes turn red. She looked ready to kill. Erica, though, was on a

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roll. “He must’ve really rocked your world, sugar, because he said a freight train could

have gone by and you wouldn’t have heard it.” Now it was Erica’s turn to appraise the

sexual prowess of one Dusty “Baddog” Boyd. “Are you that good?”

“So they tell me.”

“Then I’ll start my new life with you. If you’re game.”

“I was born game.”

Erica looked back at Gin. “When I think of all those operations I went through!

You could have healed me!”

“It would have been premature. We didn’t know if you could help us.”

“You couldn’t have spared me one lousy sip? One little thorn? Is that why you

killed Candy? She wasted one of your precious thorns!”

“She killed her because of Del, you dummy,” said Hap struggling to his feet.

Erica squirmed in place uncertain how she felt about hearing it put that way—at

least that’s how it looked to me. Which told me she still had feelings for me. Or maybe

she was angry anyone would be jealous enough to kill someone who had feelings for me.

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Hap teetered in place and leaned his hand on the vent. “Baddog, take her ashore.

Gin, get me to the helm. It’s time.”

“We had a deal!” yelled Erica. “I want what you promised!”

Erica lunged for the hamsa. Gin stumbled back against Hap.

I saw the gleam of the gun barrel as it was rising.

“Erica!”

I dove for her just as Gin fired.

But I never touched her. She went overboard, dropping fast out of sight.

I hung over the side watching the witchy water racing by beneath me, with a

bullet in my back.

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CHAPTER 22

Gin was screaming orders when a pair of flood lights lit up the fog.

“Ahoy on the boat!” came the command over a loudspeaker.

The left side of me was numb and I was going into shock. Baddog threw me over

his shoulder and carried me to the bridge and dropped me against the bulkhead inside the

cockpit. Hap flogged the wheel with his good arm, turning the big ass of a boat.

Again came the loudspeaker. “This is the Coast Guard! Stop your engines! I

repeat, stop your engines! We’re coming aboard!”

Gin tossed the Magnum on the dash, slipped inside the machine gun turret, racked

the cocking handle to the Browning twin-fifty and fired. The air around me exploded

with deafening fractured gunfire. One of the misty lights burst. Hap pushed the throttles

forward and the boat churned up a guttural growl. The diesels reached their optimum in

moments but Hap wheeled to port, throwing me down on my shoulder as another warning

blared from somewhere in front of us.

Then came shooting. It wasn’t Gin firing at them, it was them firing at us. I

assumed Gin would return fire but she didn’t. Once we’d put some distance between us,

the searchlights on the Coast Guard boats were sucked under by the chowder-thick fog.

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The vociferous bawl of the PT’s screws enveloped me. I felt trapped. Gin

squeezed out of the turret and joined Hap and Baddog at the helm. I watched them facing

forward, the wind in their faces, the milky mantle above us flapping by like banshees on a

terror until a break in the fog came and I saw the lights of the causeway behind us. We

were moving up the Intracoastal, away from it.

A small Coast Guard vessel appeared, coming after us. It seemed inconsequential

until it opened fire, its weaponry anchored at the bow with a solitary figure behind it, the

muzzle sparks flashbulb-bright as the 5-inch missiles whizzed by us with the force of big

trucks passing on the highway. Just one, if it hit, would pass through the plywood shell

of the Hellwitch and not stop until it reached Kansas. The sister vessel joined the pursuit.

I saw the end clearly. There would be a high-speed chase but the maneuverable naval

craft would win the day.

“The time!” I heard Gin yell. “What’s the time!”

Hap yelled back. “Now!”

Time to give up, yes. A wise decision. Maybe they’d come across a lawyer

who’d want to defend them. I knew of one. She was floating somewhere close by. I

wondered what time it was. Late. What day was it? Friday. No. The barstool had

turned another revolution. It was well after midnight. Our speed increased. This made

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no sense to me. Why increase speed if you wanted to surrender?

I lay on my side, bleeding, and watched the white water roil off the fantail, the

striking silhouette of the multi-barrel Thunderbolt passively sitting out the fight. Why?

Gin certainly knew how to operate it. She could leave Hap at the wheel with Baddog, run

aft, strap into the seat, engage the hydraulics, swing down the cannons protruding from

the shield and blow the Coast Guard boats out of the water. But she didn’t do that.

We entered a new valence of fog and after a few moments I realized the Coast

Guard had given up. It was simply too dangerous. I snuggled against the bulkhead, the

vibration of the PT’s engines as soothing as sledding down a rocky slope on a sheet of

plywood. Curious warmth swept over me and then just as curiously vanished. I was

growing cold again, as I had when Hap drove the spike through my heart. But suddenly

the Hellwitch came about and understanding what that meant gave me a shot of adrenalin.

Gin and Hap were heading back towards the Coast Guard and the Coast Guard would be

waiting for them. Then what? Did they really think they could out-fight the modern

Navy in this antiquated war wagon? Did they think they could out-run them to Mexico?

If we pressed on we’d reach the Mansfield Cut that led out into the Gulf. On open sea

we’d have more choices of escape. Why head back south through a gauntlet?

“We’re not going to make it!” hollered Gin. “We’re going to be late!”

“We’re not going to be late!” shouted Hap.

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Late for what? The pain of the gunshot wound raged through me. It was a

through and through. Had it nicked an artery I’d be whiter than Hap. Had it punctured a

lung I wouldn’t have been able to breathe. I glanced at my watch. We’re going to be

late. We’re not going to be late. Which one was it? And what was the occasion?

In my fall the fluorescent dial on my watch had cracked, freezing the arms

between two and three a.m. It was Saturday the 15th of September … an anniversary …

the anniversary when eight people died when the causeway fell.

There it was. Water and death.

Anger stirred inside me. Though I’d been spared the survivor’s guilt so many

probably felt knowing that they could have been the ones who plummeted to their deaths

on that fateful night, I still felt a kinship here. What Hap and Gin were doing felt

offensive to me. Like stealing money from the tip jar. And then getting away with it.

Candy was dead. Erica was presumed to be, assuming the bullet went through me into

her. So if they really could escape to another dimension, they were going to get away

with murder. They had bathed so long in self-righteousness they felt justified in how

they lived. They possessed relics of a supernatural nature. Relics which allowed them to

stack the deck in their favor, skip the consequences of their actions and contrive a Get

Out of Jail Free Card at a moment’s notice. They were transgressors of the natural order,

incapable of the simplest of life’s concerns—politeness. They lacked humility and used

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people as unwitting slaves for their own comfort. I felt I had to stop them.

But something happened that impeded that effort. A sensation beneath me. An

immense surge of power as the gasoline turbine kicked in. The driving pound and thump

of water displacement began to fade as we began to lift—literally lift off the surface of

the water. I heard a strange new engine-like sound, only cleaner, like a waterfall. The

turbine had triggered the water jets and the hull was being raised onto foils, the “wings”

Hap had called them, from their perpendicular shafts on the deck. The horn-like

protrusions were but shells now, the foils inside having lowered like an elevator, taking

on the weight of the ship and lifting her up as if she was light as a feather. The power of

the jets gave the Hellwitch a huge burst of turbo speed. We were airborne. A hydrofoil

flying across the water, headed towards the causeway.

I grabbed hold a handrail and pulled myself up just as gunfire from the Coast

Guard vessels sent fiery orange darts above us. I ducked and we were already past them.

They looked Lilliputian in the massive white wake the water jets produced, keeping us

above it all. Like Gin and Hap seemed to live their lives. Above it all.

I prepared to throw myself at Hap even though I did not know how to disengage

the foils and bring the boat hull-borne again. Still I figured I could do enough damage to

give the authorities time to catch up. But Baddog saw me coming and nixed my attempt,

wrestling me with little effort, putting me in a head lock and forcing me to watch what

they were watching—the approaching causeway rearing up like an arch in a cathedral.

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The last time the 15th coincided with a Saturday was in 2012. Before that, 2007.

Now again, this year. I assumed this was another one of those conditions Gin said was

necessary to successfully jettison into the afterlife. They were waiting for the clock to

strike and the portal to open. It happened just about that way, too, except for the addition

of strange words Hap and Gin began chanting. Like an incantation. Loud too. With

their hands interlocked and raised to the heavens. Eli, Eli, something or other. A foreign

tongue. Or maybe they were speaking in tongues. They heralded their prayers with even

more earnestness as the ship neared the bridge. Before long their words united in a sort

of monotone song, a sound reminiscent of a long note from the base pedal on an organ.

A yoga-like Aum sound. Perhaps even in B-flat. I couldn’t say. They were mimicking

the Voice of God. The Sound of Creation. The Word.

The wall of fog beneath the bridge scintillated with luminosity as if it was being

bombarded by ionizing radiation. Was something aboard the Hellwitch causing the

electromagnetic disturbance? It wasn’t coming from the engine room. I’d have

recognized a superluminal, transgalactic jump drive added to the core, or some organic

crystal pulsing at precisely the required range for the neutron/gamma partiality to turn

steel into stardust, unless it was small as a thumbnail. It had to be Hap and Gin.

Baddog let me go and we both watched the brilliance beneath the bridge become

more agitated. It formed an elliptical pleat that began to spin like a vertical whirlpool. It

glowed ever brighter, as if on fire; as if the weird incantations howled by Hap and Gin

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were the cause of this wonder—the power of the tongue made manifest by two outlaws of

time who, seated at the feet of Christ, had absorbed his secret teachings and were now

exploiting that authority in front of my very eyes. I was humbled and frightened. I tried

to sensibly validate this august freak show but I couldn’t explain it any more than I could

the pompatus of love. The molecules inside my body began trading with the molecules

outside my body. It was as if I was dematerializing. Being beamed up without

permission. I looked over my shoulder and saw how the air around the Hellwitch was

bending in waves of variegated light, forming flickering patterns that converged all the

way back up the Waterway to where we began this hectic race, to our starting point.

From my perspective it looked like a single light source, like the beam of light from a

movie projector. It was as if this light was projecting the Hellwitch and me. I felt

weightless. I recalled Einstein’s claim that matter can’t move at the speed of light. But if

matter was made of light then everything was moving at the speed of light already. We

may feel heavy and bloated but that’s just the illusion of gravity. If we were all made up

of light we were all projections which meant our existence was a movie playing out

across the silver screen of creation. Therefore, moving between dimensions could be

achieved by altering the mind in concert with altering the patterns of light to which we

already belonged—

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CHAPTER 23

We whooshed beneath the bridge. When we shot out the other side there was no Port

Isabel and no South Padre Island. The teleportation was like turning over in bed half-

asleep—part of me was in the world and part of me was in a dream.

Hap drew down the throttles and then disengaged the foils and the Hellwitch came

abreast of the water’s surface. Her hull settled and she held her course, gliding gracefully

as an eel across the gleaming purple tributary.

Above us was a tintype sky that undulated like oil in water. It was as if night and

day were in a duel for dominance. To our left were lush rolling hills dappled by

sunbeams. To our right the land was desolate and scorched beneath a snarling mantle of

wolf-pack gray. It appeared as if this was where we were headed and we eased into a

parallel course along the bank. The sunny shore on the opposite side was engulfed by the

carnivorous firmament overhead. Our choice had released the wolves, so to speak. The

horizon in all directions bled crimson beneath a huge dome of darkness. It was as if we

had descended into a bowl.

Funnel clouds like fluted black goblets held up the ceiling of the sinister sky as

scarlet cables of lightning splintered across the horizon. Shoulders of dusky escarpments

rose like headless sentinels, their breastplates mauled by deep sharp crevices. Colossal

arches of stalagmites encircled an apron of mustard-colored cliffs. The cliffs gave way to

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a glacier black as anthracite coal which fanned out to a range of cocoa mountains with

jagged peaks of radiant orange that reminded me of chocolate Halloween candy corn.

Interspersed with the bosomy mountains stood volcanoes spewing lava so rich it looked

like liquid rubies dripping off an expensive jeweled necklace. There was a seductive

beauty to this place, as if we had entered a church that ministered to giants.

A new base panel and full spinal workup was needed. To repair, improve or just

fix the mistake that was Me. Someone help! Reprogram my neural design and swap out

my chromosomes for something fresh. A mutation of me would be fine. You’ve got my

permission. But do something—anything!—that will get me out of here!

But I had come along willingly. I’d never thought to throw myself overboard

before we made the astral leap. I hadn’t the opportunity after taking the bullet for Erica.

I wanted to wake up. But I knew I was already awake. I also knew I wasn’t dead. I was,

however, absent of pain. I slipped my hand under my shirt. I was no longer bleeding but

the bullet hole remained. I was breathing better through my busted nose. The cut on my

hand had healed. Color had returned to Hap’s face, but his arm was still missing.

When the first bump occurred Gin climbed out of the cockpit and scooted across

the chart house roof. She reached down and unlatched a boat hook. She slipped to the

deck and took a spot near the bow and looked over the side. We all looked and saw a

crooked elbow poking out of the water. Then the egg-shell whiteness of an upturned

plastic bottle appeared. But it was a skull. Another skull surfaced and then another.

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Baddog and I moved off the bridge. We leaned over a torpedo tube and saw yet another

floating skull. Only this one had eyes, or a semblance of such, which looked right at me,

piercing my soul from deep behind its cavernous sockets.

A foul stench of sulfur and rotten meat assaulted my nostrils. The coastline was

obscured by steam and Gin used the boat hook to measure the depth of the water. In a

harsh whisper she alerted Hap and he swung the wheel and we angled away. I saw rocks

protruding from the mist. Huge twisted torsos in natural stone like the unfinished art of a

sculptor. Hap maneuvered the Hellwitch between these gigantic compositions and then

cut the engines and we floated on the tepid surface. The mist lifted and I could see the

shore. It was rippling in a gradual way, discharging saplings of spindly arms and legs

and twisted trunks, seeping, like a wounded cockroach clawing into a corner. Emaciated

faces on tendon-strained necks beneath bald pates; faces with hopeless stares and swollen

tongues and bleeding eyes. This was the beach, a carpet of entwined bodies knotted tight

as thread. The sound of the surf gave way to their moaning. I could see all the way to

the foothills. They too undulated with coupled cadavers, alive and coiled like snakes in a

basket. A land of souls writhing in damnation.

Baddog and I turned abruptly to the thump of duffel bags dropped on deck. Hap

overturned each, spilling out an assortment of athletic gear and several boxes of climbing

boots. He tossed the boxes at our feet. “I hope I got the sizes right. You’ll also need

these.” He dropped crampons beside the boxes. No one said anything about mountain

climbing. “Put them on after you’re ashore.” He picked up a pair of ski poles. “And

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you’ll need these for balance.”

“Not until we have a come-to-Jesus meeting,” I said. The three of them looked at

me as I took my final stand against the rabbit-hole reality I had chosen for myself. “Why

are we here?”

“To rescue someone,” said Hap.

“Who?”

“Lucius,” said Gin.

I’d not heard mention of him in weeks; their cohort in this fraud against natural

law. And I saw no reason to gripe about it now. I’d joined up of my own accord. So I

suppose I was being brave even though my gut told me I was being stupid. I focused on

the immediate. It was the only way to endure. I nodded grimly and began to dress.

Baddog and Gin donned Kevlar vests. There wasn’t one for me. Considering Hap and

Gin’s evident wealth I wondered why it had not translated to our apparel. To, say, tri-

weave fabric dipped in titanium and coated with Nomex beneath hardened dragon-scale

plates. This was a job for Batman. Instead we wore shin and groin protectors, elbow

guards and shoulder pads. We looked like goaltenders for a hockey team that played

football. How Gin could still look sexy in such attire just reinforced the argument that

when God created man, He made up for his mistake with Adam by creating Eve.

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Baddog experimented with several different types of helmets. Being that I was

already in the most dangerous place in creation a helmet did not instill much confidence.

But the cutlasses Hap handed us did. The scabbards hung from leather sashes. The

weapon I was entrusted with was remarkably light, no heavier than a tennis racket, with a

double-edged blade and an intricately tooled half-basket hilt to protect my hand. The

pommel was engraved with the death mask of King Charles I identifying the weapon as a

“mortuary” sword, a cut-and-thrust weapon from the English Civil Wars. The swords

grew in popularity after Charles was beheaded in 1649. It was rumored that Oliver

Cromwell designed the pommel himself to mock the memory of Charles after he was

appointed Lord Protector of the Commonwealth.

From time to time the wooden shell of the Hellwitch erupted into flames. But just

as quickly the conflagration was extinguished as if the boat was replenishing her spirit by

slurping up the fire. She was living up to her name in a most dramatic fashion. The

water bubbled like acid and the air had a corrosive tinge to it but I was not in such

distress that I required a respirator. Still I was sweltering. Baddog and I were both

drinking heavily from our camel packs. Sweat off the tip of my nose sizzled when it hit

the deck. I’d have been cooler in a cauldron of boiling glass.

Hap opened a laptop computer. I couldn’t imagine by what miracle we’d have

reception. I also didn’t understand why he’d not allowed Gin to heal his arm. If inside

her lucky charm were the remains of the Crown of Thorns, why had he not availed

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himself of one? Why make this harrowing journey with a disability?

Baddog hauled the Zodiac into the water. Gin wedged a samurai sword between

her belts and then picked up a Heckler & Koch MP5 SD submachine gun. She handed

Baddog the other one.

“Where’s mine?” I asked just as a slap of metal against metal sounded behind me.

I turned and Hap handed me a machine gun.

The final accessory afforded Baddog and Gin were two squared black garment

bags. Hap slung one across Baddog’s back and the other over Gin’s shoulder. I thought I

recognized the logo for The Sharper Image.

We climbed into the Zodiac and paddled ashore. As we outfitted our boots with

the crampons it seemed absurd to me to think our presence had gone by unnoticed. Gin

took point and with ski poles in hand and spikes on our feet we began to chew out a

workable path towards a rock face of sizzling red sandstone. The bodies we trampled

broke apart like twigs as if we were walking through mangroves. We were under

constant attack. To stop and hack at their whipping limbs would have opened us up to

more peril. The key was to keep moving—to stomp and chomp our way through. The

pleas for clemency after I punctured a skull, poked out an eye, impaled a thigh, squashed

a nose, or crushed a pelvic bone became tiresome. Because they were hollow cries. The

damage we did repaired itself like twisted rubber returning to its original shape, and no

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naughty fellow like me just out for a stroll was going to do any more harm to their ruined

carcasses than what had already been done.

When we cleared the beach, gale force winds arose from nowhere and battered us

all the way to a line of arthritic trees where weeping souls within the branches whipped

across our protective gear and the root systems heckled and hissed. A flurry of branches

seized Baddog. Gin and I drew our swords and severed the limbs around him to the

hitch-pitched squeal of unseen ghouls. A slithering root bit Gin’s ankle and she chopped

it off. The tree lurched at her with a squid-like mouth. I brought the cutlass down across

it and glop gushed across the ground. But then its roots attacked Gin again, coiling her,

invading her, lifting her off the ground until Baddog’s machine gun pummeled its bark,

disemboweling its gut, and freed her from its clutches. The tree dashed into the brush

and Baddog pursued it, still firing.

Gin’s face was wracked with fear, her neck and arms scraped and bruised. I

helped her up. She threw off my arm and took aim at the bank of trees. Baddog

reappeared. Together we leveled our guns on the leafy brethren until they yielded a path

and we moved swiftly through the forest to a canyon lined by gargantuan crystallized

hollows rearing so high as to become lost in the murky gloom in the ceiling of dark sky.

Passage again was fraught with the detritus of bodies wrapped tight as a ball of twine and

we were like cats teasing the strings apart with our ski pole paws; there was no other way

to navigate the terrain.

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The mind seems like a separate entity inside who we think we are; oftentimes it

knows what we need more than we do. Without my permission I began hearing the

synthesized organ of keyboardist Rick Wakeman from the rock group Yes performing in

1974 with the London Symphony Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall his adaptation of

the Jules Verne novel, Journey to the Center of the Earth. Was this a crack in the cage of

my dementia? I truly hoped so. Common sense dictated that I was dreaming. Except my

imagination (again without my permission) posited yet another scheme! That I might be

vicariously trapped inside the head of that most average of GI Joe’s, Joe Bonham, who

returned from war in the Dalton Trumbo book, Johnny Got His Gun, with nothing but his

head. He had no body. He was just a skull with a brain that still functioned. His only

freedom was his imagination. So now I began to imagine that I was the guinea pig in

some nefarious government enterprise where, like Johnny, all that was left of me was my

head on a pillow, except my brain was attached to electrodes that reached high into the

reproductive gonads of H.R. Giger’s xenomorph. That’s how Hollywood would have

handled this. Make the terrifying imagery the hero’s imagination while he undergoes

specious probing by unscrupulous scientists. Hap let it spill during the king’s breakfast

that there was in fact a government-sanctioned ministry exploring the afterlife. What had

he called it? T.R.I.P. Sure. Well, if I survived this ordeal perhaps I could look these

folks up and we could compare notes. I mean if Hap and Gin had participated in this

infringement by way of science, why had we made our astral leap by way of a magic

wand? No hi-tech gadgetry had been activated that catapulted us here, at least none that I

was aware. The only catalyst utilized to achieve this quantum dive was their esoteric

chanting which I assumed was some sort of secret prayer. So, unless I really was just a

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solitary brain lying on a pillow while my neurons were being manipulated by

microscopic beams of light to form the illusion that I was in hell, the only explanation

was that I was really there; and until proven otherwise, magic was the science that had

brought me. Then again maybe I had suffered a stroke or a heart attack of some kind and

had slipped into a coma, and everything I had experienced from the time I met Gin

building a sandcastle in Belize to what I was experiencing now was the result of a

dimethyltryptamine drip through an IV. Like serotonin, it is a monoamine

neurotransmitter that stimulates a sense of well-being in us but is far more psychedelic.

DMT exists everywhere. In mammals. In plants. It is thought to be produced in the

pineal gland and responsible for our life-like dreams during R.E.M. sleep. This most

elusive of all compounds that seemingly comes and goes at will inside our brains has

baffled scientists for years. They have yet been able to successfully isolate it in order to

make a drip (they don’t call it the Spirit Molecule for nothing, you know). I am a rational

creature and like most rational creatures came to the conclusion long ago that the devil

and hell were products of flimflam preachers intent on relieving the impressionable

masses of their money. Anyone willing to forfeit his or her divine gift of reason for the

allegory of eternal damnation in a lake of fire deserves to die broke. I still adhere to that

precept, despite my present circumstances, because I have the power to reason away the

ludicrous and the unbelievable. Except if Gin and Hap were correct and God was at war

at the subatomic level, then what science is witnessing through the electron microscope is

not simply primordial life in flux but the captivity of Universal Mind looking for an

outlet. After the war in heaven, so goes the myth, God “cast down” His first creation; the

aberration who demanded to be Creator. So where did He cast it down to? The physical

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dimension. Where souls can be clothed in flesh, blood and bone. OK. So what form did

it take? Probably something similar to man, God’s proudest achievement as Creator, but

deviant in appearance, deformed; a mockery of that achievement. That of a beast which

resembles a man but has hoofs for feet, horns on its head and a pointy tail. I mean if

we’re talking aberration here, why not look like that? Ask any educated bikini-clad

spring breaker soaking up the rays and she’ll tell you that none of her friends—all of

reasonable intelligence—adheres to the idea that there’s a fiend lurking just below the

sand spilling between their toes ready to do them in at the drop of a hat. Well, I am just

as sensible. Except nothing was sensible to me anymore. Everything I thought made

sense to my reasonable intellect made no sense whatsoever. I was now of the mind that

Dante didn’t just make it all up! I had seen what I thought was the deformity inside a

cave and I tagged him with the name Victor Hugo gave his hunchback because that’s

who he reminded me of, but I was tripping on mushrooms when I did that. Now I feared

that psychedelic trip with Gin was just a scrimmage to better prepare me for the big game

ahead, the one when I would find out what sort of mettle I was made of when I came face

to face with that horned aberration, himself. The King of Hell. Satan.

We came to a ridge overlooking a great pool of black syrup. Its perimeter seemed

solid enough but its center bubbled up like Texas crude. Countless pairs of upturned feet

bobbed in the liquefied portion of the lake, quivering in pain by whatever held their heads

beneath the surface. Gin used her ski pole to poke around the edges. Where it chipped

like ice was where we crossed and, after reaching the far bank, we faced a series of

trenches that resembled the church pew bunker on the 3rd hole at Oakmont Country Club.

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The berms shifted like loose dentures, freeing sprinkles of something like sand. But it

could have been saw dust because there was a friction beneath our feet as if trolls were

toiling with their cutting tools. The inside of the trenches resembled the hulls of ships,

except they were not constructed of timber but of the bodies of naked men and women,

stacked head to toe. The slave traders were now the slaves. They agitated back and forth

like a mechanical grater shredding cheese. It was a rhythmic grinding, purposeful and

slow, and their screams seemed to confirm that some part of them was being grated.

Meting out even more punishment were ghostly demons flogging the damned with fiery

whips. These fiendish imps seemed indifferent to our presence which was fucking fine

with me.

Upon exiting the final trough we entered a clearing of hexagonal shaped stones of

varying heights that rose higher and higher the further on we went. Perhaps this was the

source of the Giant’s Highway in Ireland made famous on the cover of the Led Zeppelin

album, Houses of the Holy. Some of these monuments were several stories high. Others

were tall as skyscrapers. Seated atop the towers were individual souls who at first glance

looked like overseers of a plantation. But upon closer inspection I realized that the stone

had liquefied around them. The souls pinned to the shorter protrusions of rock were

under constant attack by the flailing souls of those we trampled. It was as if the ones on

the bottom were trying desperately to better their station.

We reached a massive, soaring edifice that swung in its footing as if it were

hollow inside, like a Gumby balloon advertising a sale at a used car lot. Its colossal stony

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face resembled a giant sponge. Its lower and middle lobes heaved rhythmically, like

lungs—they were lungs. The stone was breathing. It was alive. This whole place was

alive but with a sort of anti-life. It was certainly as viable as the one to which I was

accustomed and took for granted every day. The gravity here was coated with an inside-

out feel to the air. Its globular density stung my eyes with no-see-um ferocity and chafed

my skin in the nether regions of my body. I would have sold my soul for some talcum

powder. It was almost as if Satan knew of our presence and this electrical discharge, or

whatever it was that caused my skin to crawl, was he reminding me that it was by his

grace we were making any headway at all. I could feel the ominous weight of his hoof

on my neck as clearly as I heard the snap of the whips across the hides of the slavers. I

could not fathom by what rules he was forced to play. I was so conscious of trying not to

think that I may have been subconsciously praying for his forgiveness in hopes he didn’t

detain me on a whim. It seemed like a rational thing to do because I was in his house. If

I called out to Jesus, how would he respond? Would he consider it an affront? Would I

be mocking him? Did he not despise mockery above all else, or was that just a myth?

Our climb up Lung Mountain seemed interminable. The face of the mountain

sported generous warts to grab on to and numerous foot wells so the crampons were

unnecessary. The moans of the damned incarcerated inside the mountain kept us

company as we climbed. Beneath us lay a scorched landscape of steamy gray ash with

boiling red tributaries. It looked like an engorged bloodshot eyeball pierced with needles

of rock at varying heights topped by wailing souls. The towers jutted from the canyon

floor all around us and swayed in the thermals balancing the souls atop them as if they

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were dinner plates waffling precariously atop sticks. I assumed the souls lashed to the

higher towers shouldered less sin than those on the lower ones. But I quickly came off

that when the queasy black sky ruptured, spewing liquid fire down upon them. They

were incinerated in flaming tridents and left to smolder and yet still they lived, still they

howled. As we moved inland from the mountain face and continued our climb skyward,

we sought cover more than once beneath shelves of rock before the furnace up above

opened its mouth. I felt drawn to the punishment these souls had to endure. Their

screams echoed my own. A weird bedevilment filled my eyes—a demented eagerness to

be bathed in the blazes as if I deserved it. Or maybe it was that I believed I could

somehow withstand the heat like the son of Jor-El and flip off the devil with both hands.

Lycan, Lycan, Lycan. This heat was driving me insane!

When we moved into a depression over which hung an enormous cantilevered lip

of stone Gin held up her fist, ordering us to halt. I heard his whimpers of misery and

woe. All I could see of him were his bony knees and wasted calves. His torso was

arched backwards over a sharp boulder. I could not see his head. We had reached the

summit. We had found Lucius.

Gin looked at me and said, “Keep a sharp eye on those clouds!”

I looked up and saw swirling trench coats of gloom.

“How long do we have?” asked Baddog.

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Gin handed him her garment bag. “His sins were great and varied,” she said. “So

too is his punishment. One burn lasts longer than another. The intermissions are the

most difficult. That is when he has time to reflect. Reflection yields to regret. The

punishment begins again. Over and over.”

Baddog took off his bag and pulled out three fire blankets. Gin handed one to me.

“Cover yourself. I’ll be right back.” She dismissed my protest and crawled up to Lucius.

I saw his frail hand grab hold of her. She petted it like a small animal.

Baddog studied the sky and quickly unpacked Gin’s bag and withdrew a

contraption with six black steel legs and a rotor atop each. In its center was a nylon

basket with straps to secure whatever package was laid upon it. It was a rotary-winged

aircraft, a drone. The kind children were finding beneath their Christmas trees with more

regularity. The kind UPS, Federal Express and Walmart were hoping Congress would

turn a blind eye to so they could deliver their packages to households like a stork drops a

baby from its bill. It was fitted with a camera to aid with steering and now I understood

why Hap needed the laptop. For line-of-sight navigation to guide the drone back to the

Hellwitch.

“We can’t carry him,” said Baddog. “He’s chained by the stone.”

“What’s the weight limit of that thing? Fifty pounds?”

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“More or less.”

“Then that won’t carry him either.”

“Not as he is now,” he said. “How he will be. A brain weighs three pounds. A

head with a brain between ten and eleven. And if it’s just charred zits, a whole lot less.”

His knowledge of weights impressed me but that didn’t mean I wouldn’t shoot

him in the face if I had to. Right now I didn’t have to. I looked down at the torrid

landscape. “Count yourself lucky. Not many folks get to see where they’ll end up.”

“Ain’t gonna happen.”

“You really think you’re going to survive this?”

“I had my Wheaties.”

“And how long do you think that’s going to last? Why do you think Gin carries it

with her? Do you really think once is enough? And how many thorns can be left? It’s

been two thousand years, pal. She gave you one. You stole one for Candy and look what

happened to her. You don’t really think they’re going to share, do you?”

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The drone was nearly assembled and he looked at me as if I was dumb as dairy.

“Boy. You really are dumb as dairy, ain’tcha? You think we can just walk right

in here and break someone out? You don’t come here and live to talk about it unless you

have permission from The Man. It’s a trade, dummy.”

“For what?”

“For you. You’re the one they’re trading Lucius for. For what you done.”

“What do you mean? What did I do?”

“Hmph. Play it that way. It won’t help. I look at you and how you are and I say,

yeah, you could be him. Sure you could. Course, I guess we all are in a way.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Sin, man. We’re all guilty of the same one. Not the Adam one, yours.”

“Mine? What sin are we talking about? I’ve committed so many.”

“You think you’re the only one who’s seen stuff? Gin had me tripping my brains

out long before she ever met you. It wasn’t the fall that got me hooked on drugs. It was

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her. She was my sponsor. She paid for my training, my bills, food. When she left I

couldn’t handle it. Then she came back. Now look at me. Look at you! Playing dumb.

You know you were in that crowd. We all were. Not just the Jews. It’s what bonds us. I

don’t know how you got rid of that tattoo without leaving a scar but you won’t be getting

rid of that one. I guarantee it.”

“You tattooed me?”

“I woulda put that needle in your eye.”

“Then who?”

“Doesn’t matter. You’re marked. That’s the important thing. So folks’ll know.”

“Know what?”

He grabbed my arm and nearly slapped me with it. “Who you are!”

His blue eyes throbbed with feral intensity. He had been thoroughly brainwashed.

Gin was his savior now in whose lap he could rest comfortably numb on narcotics and

fairytale promises of immortality. And I recognized something more, something that had

been gnawing at the back of mind: the incident that my brain on Gin’s magic mushrooms

had recorded but had not yet focused on. Not until this very moment. The focus of the

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incident was the tattoo. But it was on someone else’s forearm. Not mine.

I was catapulted back in time to that crowd Baddog hated so much, the one we all

hate. The one shouting obscenities at Jesus as he carried the cross. I was there. But not

as me. As a shadow . . .

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CHAPTER 24

Everyone was focused on the Sacrificial Lamb, particularly Satan whom I recognized

beneath a threadbare shawl standing beside a covered heap that looked familiar. There

was something unnatural in his aura and I’m not at all sure how I was able to pick him

out. But I did. When I sharpened my beam, risking a transcendental connection, I saw

that perverse wonder in his eyes like that of an arsonist or a terrorist witnessing the effect

his ruin has upon the world. I knew it was he, looming over the heap where but for an

exposed hand Ginat’s body lay covered beneath a tarp.

Jesus struggled to maintain his balance beneath the timber, making slow progress

towards the Gennath Gate that opened onto the Hill of the Skull beyond the walls. Then I

saw Hellus. He too was dressed as a commoner, standing at the front of the crowd,

inching forward to get a better look. His eyes were haggard and drained of hope. He

watched the rabbi plod his path to a deserving death. Deserving in Hellus’ mind at least

for he had pleaded with him to revive Ginat but Jesus did nothing. Hellus simply could

not understand why. Had Jesus just laid his hand atop her brow and spoken the words as

he’d done Lazarus, she would have come back to life. The priests escorting Jesus to

Herod Antipas would have seen the miracle and, who knows? They might have released

him, renounced their faith and become disciples themselves. But that didn’t happen.

Hellus watched the rabbi strain beneath the beam. He felt no need to join in the

crowd’s angry protestations because he believed Jesus knew that he was there, reveling in

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his torment. But had he been standing beside Ginat he might have forgone that belief

because her hand moved. She was alive. That’s why Jesus didn’t submit to Hellus’

pleading and bring her back to life. She wasn’t dead in the first place. Even Satan saw

the hand move and because he did he was distracted from the second thing that happened:

Hellus confronted Jesus after he collapsed beneath the wood. He burst through the line of

people to lend a hand. At least that was how it appeared to us watching. But Hellus had

no intention of rendering aid.

“Too heavy for you, Rabbi?” said Hellus. “Speak and it will rise. That’s what

you said, isn’t it? Declare the Word and I could move a mountain? I believed you.

Ginat believed you. But now she’s dead and she will never rise again because you

wouldn’t say anything! I so pray death spares us both just long enough for you to beg my

forgiveness!”

The rabbi looked up at Hellus. The barbed thorns around his wet crest crimped

and pierced the skin sending streaks of blood down his face. His eyes were swollen as

plums, his cheeks drained of color. An inflamed contusion marred his brow after he’d

been struck in the face by a Roman wearing a leather cestus over his hand, leaving behind

a pattern of tiny squared whitish indentations from the shape of the iron studs. Several

teeth were missing. His face was a hemorrhage of despair.

Hellus barely recognized him and for a moment his heart went out to him. But he

quickly quashed that feeling to wallow in his own anguish over the loss of his beloved.

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“Death has heard thy prayer,” said Jesus. “I shall find my rest. But you . . . you

will go on until the last day.”

Romans shoved Hellus to the opposite side of the narrow street where he was

engulfed by irate bystanders. One of the them whipped the back of the condemned man

and ordered him to lift the beam and carry on. But Jesus could not. In frustration the

Roman yanked a man from the crowd and ordered him to carry the beam. This the man

did. Jesus was then prodded with batons of hickory and he continued his fateful trek.

Who was the person who confronted Christ? What had he said? Ginat’s proof of

life had distracted Satan and he became enraged that he’d missed the encounter. It would

be a century before the rumors started; rumors that someone had taunted Christ on the

way to Golgotha, had spit on him and chided him in some way. Satan wasn’t sure if such

a thing had even happened because he didn’t see it. But when new-arriving souls who’d

been damned to hell for making fun of the less fortunate begged for mercy, they argued

that what they had done wasn’t as bad as what that Jew had done to Jesus. “Which Jew

would that be?” inquired Satan. But no one knew his identity.

Satan would forever recall that day. It was impossible to identify the person in

the tattered shawl as he vanished into the crowd. All he saw—in the briefest capture of

his photographic eye—was a tattoo of a wolf on the person’s forearm. A tattoo Satan

was well familiar since the wolf was so revered in Roman culture. The person could not

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have been a Jew because Jews despised dogs, descendents of the wolf. Wolves ran in

packs and fed on dead bodies. No self-respecting Jew would desecrate himself with a

wolf tattoo. But a Roman would. The Roman race descended from a she-wolf that

nursed Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome.

Except this tattoo was different.

There was a symbol embedded in the wolf’s face. A symbol Satan was also

familiar, one that had held sway over him for millennia, and he whipped into frothy anger

whenever he thought about it.

The sign of Sin.

Not the kind of sin he would one day find associated with his own name, even

synonymous with it. But the God Moses worshipped. Ab-Sin. The Moon Father. The

one who gave him the Ten Laws on the Moon Mountain. Just another name to Satan,

Sin, for it still represented the God he refused to honor; the one true God whom the Jews

now called Yahweh and the Egyptians called the Sun God. In several hundred years a

new name would be bestowed upon him. A Christian name. Jehovah.

I looked back into Baddog’s crazy eyes and then glanced at the tattoo on my arm.

He tested the rotors with a palm pilot. “After you die you stand before Satan

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before you move on to wherever. Even Jesus stood before him cuz Satan was the first.

Gotta honor that. Guess he had to get his lick in. The only soul he ain’t licked is yours.

Cuz you ain’t died yet. Ever. Jesus cursed you to wander the earth for all time. Old

Horny don’t even know who you are, man. He feels cheated. Well, I ain’t gonna deny

him a chance to take a bite out of your ass. Gin ain’t gonna deny him that.”

This was a brilliant plan. For if all Satan had to go by was a tattoo and I was the

one wearing it, then I had to be the person who censured Christ two thousand years ago.

Anything I said in my own defense would be ignored. I could hear myself screaming I’ve

been framed! I’ve been framed! The devil, smiling with crocodile eyes, would dismiss

this outright. “Now what are the odds of that happening, Mr. Lycan?”

This was a brilliant plan, indeed. Erica and Gin had set me up with the witch in

the yellow dress. Sometime after I smoked the purple haze I was tattooed. Had Tuna

been in on it? I couldn’t be sure. It didn’t matter much now. But how much satisfaction

would Erica have really gleaned from my being marred like that? Gin had not confided

in her its meaning, or Hap’s true identity. Nor had she told her about our intention to

catapult into the afterlife. Maybe the tattoo was just the sort of scar Erica could justify

and still be able to sleep at night.

It all became clear.

Hap had punched through the skylight for a reason. To cut off his arm. The arm

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with the tattoo that would have identified him not as a former marine, but as former

sinner. The greatest sinner. The Wandering Jew. It wasn’t an accident. Even though the

delineation was missing, the chiaroscuro between skin and ink long since faded, Hap

feared it might still set off a ping of recall in Satan’s eye. And he could not risk that

happening.

I looked at Baddog and shouted, “I’ve never had a tattoo in my life!”

Baddog smiled cruelly. “Well, you have one now.”

“It’s not me, Baddog! It wasn’t me!”

“Yeah it was. Gin brought me back for a reason. She gave me a purpose in life.

Helping send you to hell where you belong.”

“They’re lying to you, you idiot!”

“They’re not lying to me, they saved me. Look at me. I was lost. Now I’m

found. You’re the one who’s lost, Del. They’ve been looking for you for years.

Centuries, they told me. And here you are, hiding in plain sight on South Padre.”

I saw it was impossible to reason with him. My eyes fell to the weapon he

cradled. He chuckled. “You don’t really think they’d give you a loaded gun, do you?”

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I had nothing to lose and maybe everything to gain. I aimed the gun at him and squeezed

the trigger. Click. He laughed. “My turn?” The muzzle bore down on me. I saw no

reason to close my eyes. He dropped his aim and snickered. I felt the heat of betrayal

flush my cheeks. It was hotter than the heat around me, almost chilly.

“It could have been anyone, Baddog, don’t you see that? They could have picked

you but they picked me.”

“They picked you because they found you. Big difference.”

I tried to protest again but he was unwavering. He’d done his research, you see.

Told me I’d had many names in 2000 years. Matathias. Ahasuerus. Zarathustra the

Shadow. St. Germain. Joannes Buttadeus. Isaac Laquedem. The Armenians called me

Cartaphilus. He told me how I’d tried everything I could think of to regain God’s favor

in hopes He would forgive me for what I did to His son. How I had dedicated myself to

the spread of His Word around the globe. Even as late as the twentieth century he said

there had been sightings of me. Like Elvis sightings. Stories about me tramping like a

homeless person through the snow-covered streets of lavish neighborhoods bathed in

holiday lights. I would rap the heavy brass knockers on the big doors of those luxurious

homes and, holding up a craggy copy of the Bible, ask, “Have you heard the Good

News?” And those big doors slammed in my face.

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“Ha!” said Baddog. “You know those folks are going to hell.”

“Dusty.”

“I’d always thought that was a spook story for little kids, y’know? The Tale of

the Wandering Jew. But it ain’t. It’s you. You spit on Jesus. I oughta just shoot you

right now. You get to live on while the rest of us die. Well, you’ll live on, all right.

Right here where you belong.”

“Hey, jock itch, do I even look Jewish to you? No. Cuz I ain’t. I bleed like

everybody else and when it’s my time I’ll die like everybody else too.” I poked my head

over the shelf and saw Gin making her way back to us. “You believe whatever that

peanut brain of yours tells you to, but as soon as she doesn’t need you anymore, you’re

dead. Mark my words, you stupid oat.”

Gin edged beneath the rock. I lunged at her. Baddog lunged at us both, pulling

the blankets over us just as a torrential lance of fire dropped from the sky with the force

of a fist. The flaming trident speared Lucius on the stone. His screams keened high as a

scalded cat. The fire then receded into the clouds and all that remained was acrid smoke

and the putrid odor of burned flesh.

Gin shoved herself away from me and crawled back up to the summit. Baddog

poked me hard with the machine gun and we followed.

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Lucius was a deposit of char, his flesh and innards in heaps of smoldering ash

inside a skeletal frame. His skull looked brittle as Chinese rice paper. His jaw shivered

and his teeth clacked. When his eyes opened, nausea shot to the back of my throat. They

were helpless engorged orbs of terror, jaundiced with milky irises and smeared pupils.

Gin used her gloved hands and carefully removed the skull and placed it in the

drone’s basket. She fumbled with the straps, crisscrossing them across his forehead.

Baddog started the engine with the palm pilot. The rotors whirred into a frenzy.

Gin drew a Very pistol and fired a flare into the sky. It exploded in blue sparklers

alerting Hap to be ready to assume control.

Baddog aimed the remote at the drone and used his thumbs on the tiny keyboard

to initiate commands.

I watched, dumbfounded, as the spidery shape lifted off the ground and flew the

skull off the mountain.

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CHAPTER 25

The Hellwitch was further off shore than where we’d left her but I could still make out

Hap on deck. He was standing at the transom with a boat hook reaching for a stick of

shiny bamboo. It was Lucius. Apparently his body had redeveloped before he’d reached

the boat and his weight—all ninety-plus pounds of it—fouled the drone and both dropped

from the sky. Hap used his good arm and hoisted him aboard.

Perhaps it was Gin’s smile that disarmed me. As if she was forgiving me for

attacking her, conceding that had the roles been reversed she’d have done the same thing.

Now she knew that I knew. She groined me savagely. I bowled over but pulled her

down with me. I had her pinned with my knee when skeletal fingers punched up through

the sand and tried to grab us and pull us under. Baddog greased the beach with gunfire

before bashing me in the head with the butt of his weapon and bringing on the stars.

I awoke on the hot deck of the Hellwitch. Hap lifted me to a sitting position

against the starboard side torpedo. He slipped the cutlass from around my neck and took

back the machine gun.

“You might want to take a look at that,” I said. “It’s on the frits.”

He smiled, substituting the empty clip for a live one. He held the gun out for

Baddog who appropriated it and set it down against the bulkhead.

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“Looks like everyone’s taking a piece out of you today,” said Hap.

My eyes fell to his stump. The bandage was no longer present and the folded lip

of stapled skin resembled boiled tongue.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“What are you sorry about?”

“That I didn’t let you bleed to death.”

“Sure. That one I’ll give you. But you had no chance. I won’t say you were the

toughest mark we ever had but you were certainly entertaining.”

“That’s my middle name.”

Across from me lay Lucius, glassy as a mud snake, his raw pink belly pumping

spastically beneath a gleaming bluish hide. Gin cradled his head in her lap. She bathed

him with fresh water and what water he drank had a tendency to come right back up. His

eyes were lost inside his emaciated features and his teeth rattled with the chill of being so

burned the memory of it made him shake.

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“So you’re trading me for him,” I said. “Well, I’m a helluva catch, all right. Side

by side you can’t tell us apart. Except I haven’t murdered anyone or crucified anyone. I

haven’t raped anyone or cut off someone’s hand for spite. I don’t hurt children. Now,

having said that, there are parallel universes. I’m just saying I have no memory of doing

such things. So, excluding my overall lazy nature and my penchant for self-abuse, my

sins don’t come anywhere close to his. No way.”

“Sin is like art, Mr. Lycan. It’s subjective. Take Gin, for example. Her sin

against the devil—and I’m not at all sure it was a sin in the first place—was defensible.

Otherwise Jesus would not have forgiven her.”

“Yeah? And what about yours?”

“Mine?” He nodded at my tattoo. “Possession is nine-tenths of the law.”

I saw no reason to bellyache. I had nothing to barter. All I could do was try to

keep his mind off the immediate. Keep him engaged until something clicked in my

favor. I needed time and I refused to believe that time had run out. He had my Magnum

tucked in his waistband. That was my only play.

“So I’m the lottery winner, eh?” I said.

“No. I am.”

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“Congratulations. But why me? I mean since we’re bonding.”

“Because you’re as cynical as I am. Because in 2000 years since Christ died,

nothing has changed. The powerful still exploit the powerless so you’ve given up.

You’re dead inside. You seek life in drugs and alcohol. You seek purpose in science and

religion and reject them both because their common interest is greed. Greed for

recognition. And that really bothers you. You surround yourself with people but you’re

all alone. Believe me, I know how that feels. You want to let people in but you don’t

know how. And you’re not at all sure it’s the wise thing to do because you don’t know if

you can trust them. I understand perfectly. Your fortress of solitude is behind the bar.

You like that barrier that separates you from your customers. That bar top is like a moat.

It keeps you just out of reach from the world at large. It did make you an easy target,

though. We could study you at our leisure. We employed many people. Some seduced

you when you thought you were seducing them. They reported back to us. We had many

entry points into your psyche. But then there was your car accident in Dallas and we had

to put off our plans. One thing we have always had is time. We really weren’t sure we’d

use you but guilt is the easiest emotion to exploit and you were carrying a ton of it. You

lived within a reasonable distance of a tragedy that happened on water and Gin found you

attractive so we decided you’d be our guy. Your lack of commitment was something else

we could use. Oh, you’ll show up when there’s work to be done but you let someone else

do the heavy lifting. I do believe you would have committed yourself to Gin, though.

Yes. I can’t blame you there. Whom you should have committed yourself to was Erica.

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Erica was everything a man could want in a woman and you blew it. That makes you an

idiot and deserving of punishment.

“You love to debate. Even if the truth is staring you in the face. You’ll debate a

guy at the bar even when you know he’s right and you’re wrong. That’s vanity. Like

that policeman, Manny? Didn’t think I knew about that, huh? He talks a big talk. So

what? Let him. But you wouldn’t. Yeah, he may have been wrong but you embarrassed

him. That makes you vain and rude. Guess what? So is the devil. His entire existence

is based on staring truth in the face and not accepting it. He’d rather debate it. You two

will get along fabulously. Except you’ll lose. Even when you’re right he’ll make it

sound like you’re wrong. Still, watching the two of you go at it really would be

entertaining!”

His analysis went down like a jagged little pill but I fired back anyway:

“Well, let me leave you with this thought before you throw me overboard or do

whatever it is you’re going to do with me. I’m going to talk my fool head off. And since

I’ll be here until the cows come home, eventually it’s going to occur to someone that I

just might be telling the truth. Which means you’ll never get the peace you wanted.

You’ll never find rest. You aren’t supposed to!”

He slapped me across the face just as Lucius screamed violently as if he’d just

awoken from a nightmare that still had hold of him.

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“Good Christus!” said Hap. “Fix him, Gin! What are you waiting for?”

I saw in her face a look of complete shock, as if she’d forgotten. She cursed

herself and lifted her hand to her throat and gasped. She spanked her chest. “The hamsa!

It’s gone!”

Hap dropped over me with his fist aimed for my eye. “Where is it?”

I grabbed for the Magnum. He head-butted me before I had it. He twirled it in

his hand like a gunslinger. He felt his forehead. “Now we’re both bleeding.” He patted

me down, but he didn’t find it. Because I didn’t have it.

“I got it,” said Baddog, dangling the hamsa between his fingers. He held the

Heckler & Koch loosely aimed at whoever needed to be aimed at. I was becoming more

impressed with him as the day wore on.

“Oh Dusty!” said Gin. “You’re a life saver!”

“Nah. This is, though. Think I’ll just hold on to it until we get back. Got two

little stinkers left in it. One for me and one for you. No point wasting one on him.”

Hap and Gin exchanged a look and Gin scooted out from beneath Lucius. “I’m

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glad you have that, Dusty. Keep it. You deserve it. But let me by. I have more below.”

“You got more?”

“Of course she does,” I said.

“Play nice, won’t you, Del?” said Gin with a wicked gleam in her eye.

I looked at Hap. “You’re the one getting played here, pal. You’re the mark.” He

let out a laugh but his eyes registered a modicum of uncertainty. “The guy who cast the

shells. The first one. Gold Finger. Remember him? He had shells just like yours. But

you marked yours with the sign of the fish so you could tell them apart. Or did you do

that because you didn’t trust pretty green eyes over there? She was going to leave you.

Probably for Lucius. Take the shell and leave you standing at the Jaffa Gate like a fool.

But she didn’t know you marked them. Gold cools quickly. You switched them out

because you knew she was going to steal it. She grabbed the wrong one. That’s why it

didn’t heal her. Would have. She wasn’t dead. Broken back probably. Didn’t matter.

She grabbed the wrong one anyway. You didn’t trust her. Have you ever trusted her? In

two thousand years? Y’know some folks are always looking for a weakness to exploit in

others. That’s just how they’re wired. That’s your wife.”

“Honey,” said Gin. “Would you please put a bullet in Mr. Lycan’s head?”

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“It’ll be a pleasure,” said Hap pointing the Magnum at my face.

“And she was right about the cave,” I said bracing my back against the torpedo

tube. “It did start there. After Lucius nearly beat her to death she had no reason to live.

She went back to the desert to die. She found a cave. Turns out Jesus found the same

one. Satan appeared and tempted him three times. But he wasn’t buying and left. But

then he heard something and guess what?” My eyes swung back to Gin. “He found you.

You got balls, honey. I’ll give you that. Maybe you made the noise so he would find

you. No one wanted you. Maybe he did, huh? Let me guess. You told him who you

were. The mother of his child. The child you had killed. Big gamble there but you had

nothing to lose. You convinced him you were worthy of the deal he offered Christ.

You’d serve him and be his little spy. For what exactly? I’m thinking for any sign Jesus

might be coming back. Am I warm? What do you do? Report to him directly? And in

exchange for information, everything you touch turns to gold?”

“Are you going to shoot him, Hap, or must I?”

He cocked the hammer. “When you see Judas, give him my regards.”

The crack was a cross between a backfire and a baseball bat. Everyone flinched

but Baddog. He just coughed up blood. The hamsa shot from his hand and slid across

the deck. Gin dodged his falling body. The second bullet hit Gin between the left collar

bone and breast. She plopped down in shock as if poked with a cattle prod. Only then

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did she touch herself and marvel the Kevlar.

“Master!” cried Xavier Trench. He managed two wobbly steps off the bridge in

Lucius’ direction before Hap had the presence of mind to fire.

I should have let him too but I bulled forward instead and took him down like a

linebacker. We rolled across the deck. We both had hold of the gun. He tried to scissor

me with his legs and use his weight against me. I elbowed him in the mouth.

I saw the hamsa gleaming like a silver ingot.

He straddled me and struck me across the face. He took aim between my eyes

when Trench shot his ear off. The bullet spun him off me and I grabbed for the gun.

Trench dropped his aim onto Gin and shot her through the throat.

“Nooo!” cried Hap.

The barrel swung towards us again and I rolled away just as Trench fired,

splintering the deck violently. I slapped up against a locker, turned onto my belly, braced

both hands around the grip and pulled the trigger. The bullet caught the hunchback high

by the shoulder and hurled him back against the bulkhead. He raised his gun and I fired

again. He dropped badly and managed to pull himself up to his knees and I put another

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into him. It curled him over at the waist. By some colossal strength of will he rose one

last time and screamed out in tremendous pain. It sounded like a curse to the heavens for

his head was raised, but he did not shake his fist at the sky; his hands were clutching his

belly. He shuddered in that peculiar way that told him it was over. Then he fell forward

and went still, his fanny in the air like a man kissing a prayer rug, the defect on his back

resembling a heavy stone that had been dropped on him, obscuring his face in shadow.

I ran to Gin. She was gargling blood. Her eyes fell onto the hamsa lying on the

deck. I picked it up and she shook her head. “Oh. Now you want to die. Sorry, dollface.

You got a date with the Cameron County DA for killing Candy and I’m going to make

sure you pay for it in the real world.”

I opened the silver top and saw the twin curlicues. She groaned with objection

but my fingers were already inside her mouth, mashing the gummy fossil beneath her

tongue, feeling the graininess of it dissolve like cheap aspirin, and in that moment it was

as if I’d poked my fingers into an electrical wall socket. I felt a tingle in my groin as a

sinewy blue light swept across Gin with a laser-like scan. She arched upwards, her

breasts strong pyramidal shapes before my eyes. She shook spastically and then slumped

to the deck. The blue light disappeared and her neck wound vanished. She clawed across

the deck towards Lucius. I let her. She wasn’t going anywhere.

My eyes fell onto the body of Xavier Trench. He’d seemed so frail but proved to

have amazing staying power. How those two silver coins in my rearview managed to

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beat me back to Kip’s just told me he knew the ins and outs of Corpus better than I did. I

would have just as soon let him avenge himself by killing Gin but Gin was mine now.

The hot steel of Baddog’s machine gun pressed against the base of my neck.

“Drop it,” said Hap. I let the Magnum fall and he picked it up. “Stand up.” I

stood and faced him. His eyes fell to the hamsa in my hand. “Now feed him.”

“They’re going to betray you. She went to him, not you.”

“We’ve been betraying each other for two thousand years. It’s become something

of a family tradition.”

“Yeah, well, that might be fine upstairs but not down here. I mean whose idea

was this anyway? In the beginning. It was Gin’s, right? You thought it funny at first but

she’s persistent and clever. Probably took years of subtle innuendo and midnight

whispers in your ear before it finally took hold in your mind that this could work. I got

news for you. The devil’s not an idiot. She cut a deal with him in the cave to be his little

spy and guess what? She’s been spying on you. And now she’s got you here and—.”

He rapped me on the temple with the gun barrel. “Shut up.”

“She cut a deal! I’m telling you!”

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“I said shut up.”

I didn’t have a choice. I handed Gin the hamsa. Hap cringed in pain from the

loss of his ear. He watched Gin open the amulet.

“Is it true?” he asked.

“I had to make you believe it was,” said Gin. “Satan has always known who you

were, honey. Del’s right. He’s not an idiot. But he couldn’t come get you. Jesus saw to

that. You can’t die so you’d have to come here willingly. Del’s right about the other too.

It took years planting the seed in your head until you thought the idea was yours.” She

looked at me. “How long have you known? Or did you have an epiphany?”

“Just doing the math.”

Hap looked at Gin. “Did you ever love me?”

“Darling,” she said turning smoothly as a snake. “It was always Lucius.”

I saw Trench’s gun in her hand. A sneaky grab. She shot Hap in the chest. The

bullet punched him back hard. Before he could right himself, she shot him twice more,

center mass, and over he went. She turned the gun on me and I froze. She dropped her

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aim and turned her attention to Lucius where a warm blue glow worked itself out from

the center of his body, spreading in all directions like a twinkling blanket of blue-white

stars before vanishing completely, poof. He raised himself in regal splendor like Adam

from clay. He was a marvelous specimen and so well-proportioned, it was a fellow like

this Michelangelo imagined when he chiseled his David from a chunk of flawed marble.

But I saw no flaw here, not even a scratch. He and Gin embraced. He pranced the deck,

indifferent to his nakedness. Gin’s eyes raked him hungrily. But their reverie was short-

lived when the ram horns sounded.

The alarms were deep, dreadful blasts. Baritone Valkyries. A chorus of tubas,

thunderous and heavy. Even the surface of the water shook. The landmass from the

beach to the glacier rippled like a throw rug across the floor until avalanches of the

damned tumbled towards the shoreline like disturbed fire ants and formed a giant log of

insectile horror. The shock on Gin’s face was almost worth the price of admission.

We had a deal!

Here’s what you can do with that deal, lady.

Hap was right; you are a liar.

Hap is mine now, and soon you will be too.

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Thousands of mewling spidersouls scurried in chaos across the beach with the

scent of fresh meat.

“We need to leave,” said Lucius.

“Think we can just moon walk our way out, hmm?”

The Roman’s orbs pierced me with darts of fire and it was only then that I

recognized him as the Nazi I had met at Sloppy Joe’s in Key West, the tall bearded man

with mad eyes who allegedly had Atocha treasure at his house on Big Pine Key. The

same man in the Nazi uniform in the photograph I had seen at Pinkie’s Blu. Van Ness.

Lucius Van Ness. He grabbed my throat just as Gin let go a howl of sorrow. Hap’s body

was being flung in the air by the mob of arachnids. The devils would bring to bear on

him what had been brought to bear on them, over and over, forever. I was astonished by

Gin’s heartbreak. She was the one responsible for creating the tragedy!

The bow of the Hellwitch faced the shore. Instinct compelled Lucius to act. He

leaped for the launching lever to one of the two portside torpedoes and pushed down the

plunger. The torpedo spit from its tube and spiraled through the water with deadly intent.

Each of us strained to see. Each of us understood Hap’s punishment was more

than anyone could bear. Had Jesus cursed him to receive such penalty, well, OK. The

punishment would have fit the crime. But Christ didn’t sentence him to this. He hadn’t

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even sentenced Hap to hell. He had sentenced him to a life of aimless wandering.

When the torpedo hit the wading skeletons, we’d hope the explosion would at

least put Hap out of his misery and take a thousand souls with him. But the detonation

sent up color instead—a flourishing bloom of red, white and blue. It was the torpedo Kip

had failed to arm because I was in a hurry to leave Corpus. Sparkling, screeching silver

flutes crowned by swirling swizzles soared into the sky and the damned looked up with

wonder. Gin looked back at us and then up in wonderment too. She braced her arms

with a two-handed grip around the P226 and fired over our heads. The bullets burst the

spidersoul perched above us on the radar mast. She fired again until it lost its hold and

fell into the water. I ran up to the bridge just as Gin let loose with a second round of

gunfire shattering two spidersouls rising over the bow.

Lucius and Gin were both firing now, over the side. Spindly bodies bunched in

floating raft formations leaped like frogs and launched themselves at the boat. I started

the engines and brought her about just as Lucius jumped into the seat of the Thunderbolt.

He engaged the guns from their vertical position, leveling them horizontally and

dispensed a broadside at the shoreline. The air exploded with violent friction as the four

barrels pumped blistering cannon fire in rapid tandem, trying to destroy the bridge hell’s

minions were building of themselves to reach us.

The sea was crawling with insects.

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I leaped into the turret, racked the slide of the Browning and opened up. The

twin-fifties sent a hailstorm of death across the water.

Gin hollered my name.

I swung the guns on their Scarff-ring and fired over her head, spraying hot

parallel columns, crushing the bugs in starbursts of boggy blood.

Gin turned towards me.

I caught the terror in her eyes.

She aimed her gun at me and fired.

A squelch of pain behind me punctured my eardrums. It fell just off my shoulder,

amidships—a twisted, deformed wasted mass whose blade-arms continued swinging until

Gin dropped it with three shots to the head.

I swung the guns forward and saw demons reaching over the foredeck with their

toothpick arms. My thumbs pressed down on the firing paddle and I drenched them with

lead, ripping apart a good portion of the bow of the Hellwitch when I did.

Gin’s scream scraped my soul.

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I spun round and saw Lucius drop at her side. She’d been sliced open. He

emptied Trench’s gun and threw it aside and grabbed a machine gun.

Then there was silence.

I could hear the devils assembling from beyond the veils of gun smoke. If they

caught us none of us would ever leave this place. In that moment I thought of Erica. I

deserved this. I had crippled her. I should burn for it. We would all of us be burning in

short order if we couldn’t figure a way out of this mess. And we couldn’t because there

was no way out. And that’s when my greedy nature hitched onto Gin’s. She was a

survivor of so many deaths. Whether she would ever accept responsibility for betraying

Hap was beside the point—as worthless as the guilt I felt for what I had done to Erica.

She clenched Lucius’ arm and nodded in the direction of the portside torpedo.

She threw her gaze up at me and I read her intent. I pointed the smoking barrels of the

twin-fifties at one of the happy faces of the starboard side torpedoes. Three torpedoes.

Three of us. Exercising free will made us victors, not victims. Our only chance of

escape was death, an inversion of it anyway. That was the thinking. The question was

whether or not one’s intent at death had any influence on the trajectory of the soul once it

was released. As the Beatles sang, “… the love you take is equal to the love you make.”

That probably holds true for hate as well. The law of cause and effect. Simple but

effective. No one wants to learn there is nothing after we die. Perhaps it’s a progression.

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The Scriptures state there are many levels to heaven. In my Father’s house are many

mansions. Probably holds true the other way, too. I’d ask Trench if I could. Where’d his

soul get off to? Was there really death in the afterlife? Was he now on the shoreline

playing Spiderman, or awaiting passage to some other astral reality? Could he be back in

his bookstore in Corpus Christi, napping in his recliner, dreaming of strolling across

Versailles parquet with the great princess who, upon hearing of the hunger plaguing her

citizens, laughed, “Qu’ils mangent de la brioche.” and then popped a kumquat in her

mouth? I had no proof Trench was safe and at home. But it made it easier to deal with

my impending demise believing that he was. There was no way to know for sure what

would happen until the deed was done.

I looked back at Gin. There was something else in her eye. Something familiar

that instilled confidence. It was that same damn twinkle of justification I had seen in

Hap’s eyes after he punched through the skylight, the one telling me who should really be

held responsible for this fubar’d fandango. All is vanity, says the Bible. I suppose when

taken literally one could argue: Yes, Virginia, it really is God’s fault.

Gin and Lucius took aim on their torpedoes. I took aim on mine.

The Hellwitch was overrun with spiders.

We fired together.

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CHAPTER 26

Tichie told me Manny found me washed up on the beach. He’d been out scanning for

lost loot with his metal detector, trying to earn enough money to buy the SX 3000, the

Excalibur of fishing rods. I told Tichie there was no such thing—except maybe a

Harrington. Since Manny was the one who found me I donated a sawbuck to the cause.

I stayed away from the bar. I rented a bungalow on the beach. Even Tichie

couldn’t get a sensible story out of me. When I talked it sounded nasty. Crazy. I finally

told him I’d keep the door unlocked for the guys in the white coats. He didn’t want that.

He took it upon himself to check in on me regularly. Hap and Gin were still on his radar.

That confirmed to me they had been real. There was no sign of them or their nefarious

warship. He told me the Coast Guard had pulled Erica from the water. She was fine.

On more than one occasion Tichie found me sobbing in a corner. I drank to

forget. But that just made me remember more. I was up to a fifth a day. It never

occurred to me I had a problem. It’s the furthest thing from an alcoholic’s mind.

Tichie took me to a meeting. He’d been a closet alcoholic for years and never

once, in all the time I’d known him, had he drank. I’d never noticed his private battle

because I was too self-involved. He gave me a copy of the AA bible, the book given to

everyone in the program. It was simply entitled Alcoholics Anonymous. Members of AA

call it the “Big Book”. I assured him I’d flip through it after I finished the six-pack.

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The best day I had was when the Chief and Meg came by to visit. With Emma.

She was healthy and vital. Beautiful. Taller than I remembered. On the cusp of

womanhood with an inquisitive, yet exceedingly calm stare. Almost knowing in ways

you would not think a twelve-year-old would know but somehow they do. Thanks to

technology, I suppose. I was still in my underwear with a Hawaiian shirt laid open past

my navel, week-old stubble, bleary eyes and long greasy hair. She put her arms around

me and gave me a hug. I bubbled with tears. A drop of wonder from the belt buckle had

penetrated her death-blue lips. I’d thought it a decoy. But by the way the Chief held it in

his hands I now knew that it wasn’t.

The fusty smell of stale beer, cannabis and a sink full of dirty dishes caused Meg

to cover her nose. I smelled rank. The invisible horned friend on my shoulder urged me

to yield to the bath of self-destruction. Meg gave the Chief a surreptitious nod telling

him they’d wait in the car. She stepped over the spilled trash can, her hand in Emma’s.

Emma beamed back at me in such a way that said “great party!” Then they left.

Tuff helped me back to the couch as if I was an invalid, stepping over an empty

bra and an empty pizza box before kicking away an empty bottle of wine. He handed me

Hap’s folded belt. I handed it right back to him and told him to keep it. He tried to say

something. We looked at one another. I couldn’t have agreed with him more.

He adjusted the gun belt on his bony hips and began a stroll around the room. I

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grabbed the bottle and drank. Then I shuddered. Had I known I was going to have

company . . . He was standing at the kitchen counter examining the powdery white

import I’d forgot to snort because I was too drunk to care. I sighed heavily and brought

my wrists together, ready to offer them up.

“Why did you cut off Manny?”

“What?”

“You took away his keys. Cut him off. He mock your daddy’s name or

something? If’n he’d done that to me I would’ve socked him.”

“You fish, Chief?”

He saw it clearly now. “Aw gee.”

“Yeah. Looking back, though, I sort of regret it.”

“Why? A man shouldn’t talk the talk if he ain’t walked the walk. Manny ain’t no

fisherman.”

“I think he was trying to impress a lady.”

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The two of us just let that hang in the air. It’s perhaps the only time a man ought

to talk. And whatever kind of talk he wants, too. The fairer sex demands it, I think.

Truth or fiction they want to believe in something larger than themselves. If only for a

night. And if by your words she takes you to her bed and whispers sweet nothings in

your ear, you might become a believer too. It’s what makes the world go round.

He could see it weighing on me. What would it have really cost me to let Manny

shine? I should have let him talk his fool head off but instead I shut him down,

embarrassed him and took away his car keys.

Tuff ended his cursory examination. He looked at the belt in his hands. It had

been mighty good to him. Hard to let go something that good. But he’d had his shining

moment. How do you spell temptation? T-R-O-U-B-L-E. He set the belt on the coffee

table in front of me. “Think we could pray a bit?”

“I’ll pass, if it’s all the same to you. I’m under attack. Best keep my head down.”

“Believers in spiritual law are always under attack, kid. Because we’re the last

line of defense.”

That hit me between the eyes. I guess I was a believer. In some sense anyway.

Probably always had been. Certainly in the ideal of defending something worth

defending. The trick is figuring out what that is. The Church had its chance and screwed

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the pooch. Sexual assault, illegal solicitation, fraud, embezzlement, racketeering. People

have turned away from the Church because of the Church. Just like they’ve turned their

backs on Congress.

The Chief reached behind him and pulled the gun from the small of his back and

set it beside Hap’s belt. I’d not seen it there tucked inside his utility belt beneath his

shirt. It was good to see him filling out a little since his sudden weight loss during

Emma’s illness. His uniform still looked two sizes too big on him, though.

I recognized the dark tea-stained grip and the scarred nickel-plated finish of the

pistol. The Colt Peacemaker that had belonged to the gunman who, at this very moment,

was probably riding with the ghost riders in the sky, chasing the devil’s herd. The

desperado history had elevated to myth. The one who quoted Shakespeare before he

pulled the trigger. The Fastest Gun in the West. Except there is not one recorded

gunfight between him and anyone in any newspapers of the day. There is only one

encounter cited in the Tombstone Epitaph which alludes to what might have been had a

peppy deputy not intervened and ruined Doc Holliday’s chance to prove he was faster on

the draw. It was well-known Holliday scoffed at the gunman’s sobriquet “King of the

Cowboys”, and he resented how folks feared the gunslinger more than they feared John

Wesley Hardin or Billy the Kid. Historians call the botched face-off The Greatest

Gunfight That Never Happened. The fact was the varmint was a drunkard and was most

likely the assassin who shot Morgan Earp in the back while he was playing billiards.

Here before me lay the six-gun of the infamous outlaw Johnny Ringo.

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“Manny found it on the beach next to you,” said Tuff.

I lifted the piece and its weight felt intimidating and I put it right back down.

“Strap it to your thigh, if you want,” he said.

“Are the police really ready to see dimwits shoot it out in the street?”

“No. But I have always been a man of faith. And thanks to you—” throwing his

eyes to Hap’s belt “—I now know there really is a war on this planet between the forces

of good and the forces of evil. If you’d feel more comfortable I could deputize you.”

“You really think evil has its eye on this sandbar?”

“It’s got its eye on everything.”

“Nothing we can do about it.”

“Maybe. All I’m saying is my jurisdiction ends at the bridge. But I fish with the

sheriff. He can deputize you. Cameron County needs all the help it can get.”

“You’re serious.”

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“Damn right I’m serious.”

“Whatever is happening is way over our heads, Chief. It’s a losing proposition no

matter how you look at it. We’re on the Titanic, man, and we’re going down. My advice

is we all start drinking heavily.”

I reached for the bottle and he yanked it from my hand. “Not without a fight,

Lycan.”

“Fight what?” I yelled in desperation. I was at my wits’ end. I just didn’t care

anymore. “What happened to me was a fluke, OK? You can’t wage a war against

something you can’t see!”

“You saw more than most. There has to be a reason.”

“Why? Why does there have to be a reason? We’re just pawns on the game

board. Our lives are insignificant. We mean nothing.”

“You don’t really believe that.”

“What does it matter what I believe? Angels, demons—it’s all the same. They’re

part of another dimension and sometimes their crap runs off into this one. No bomb or

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bullet can destroy evil, man.”

“Probably not. But that doesn’t explain why humanity hasn’t been put on the

back burner, either. We’re still the main course and it appears we always have been.

Explain that to me, Mister Smarty Pants. Whatever war is being waged out there seems

in direct proportion to what is happening down here. Which means we’re all warriors in

one way or another. Maybe you’ve been chosen to fight it in the trenches.”

“Don’t even go there.”

“I would think that after what you saw you would be the last one I’d need to

convince. You want to beat evil, you got to fight dirty. Sure, it’s invisible. But maybe it

knows it can’t remain that way if it really wants to rule this planet.”

“You’re starting to sound like a comic book.”

“And you’re starting to piss me off.”

His hand had fallen to the grip of his revolver. I had completely misread him.

Fury had tightened his face.

“You think I can just sit back and grow old now, Lycan? You think every time I

let my little girl out of my sight I don’t think some thing or some one isn’t out there just

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waiting to hurt her again? You saved her but now she’s on the radar because of how you

saved her. Do you really think I can ever look at my life again or her life or your life or

anyone’s life and not believe? I can’t. I won’t!”

I needed to diffuse the situation as quickly as possible and the only way to do that

was to apologize. Which I did. But it did little good. His back molars were working

overtime. He stepped away and looked out a sliver between the drapes to some distant

blue. I didn’t dare speak. Finally he said, “I was there in ’91. At Luby’s Cafeteria. I’d

just taken a bite of their famous pecan pie when the truck came in. Like a bomb.

Knocked me to the floor. He got out and started shooting. Didn’t use no assault rifle

neither. Two handguns. A Ruger P89 and a Glock 17. Both nine millimeter. He was

methodical. Wounded twenty-seven. Killed twenty-three. Most of them women. Hated

women. Called them vipers. Ten in the back of the head, execution style. Took him

seconds to reload and he was shooting again. I had me a Smith and Wesson semi-auto in

the car. Little good it did me. It was against the law to carry in Texas back then. Ann

Richards saw to that. George W. Bush ran against her on that and became the governor

because of it. Too bad. I always liked Ann. But she was wrong on that deal. Outside

school shootings the Luby’s Cafeteria shooting was the deadliest mass killing in America

until Orlando.”

“You mean Vegas.”

“We’re not gonna talk about Vegas,” he said, standing rigid as a general in front

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of the troops. “I can only speak to Luby’s because I was there. I don’t care what the

doctors say. You can’t trace what the man did back to his momma not giving him

enough hugs. Doesn’t matter what his reasons were. It could be any reason. It rained

when the weatherman said it wouldn’t. Chemical imbalance? Horse pucky. Maybe he

was ripe for manipulation. Weak-minded. But even if he was there are many weak-

minded folks and they don’t go out and commit murder because they had a bad day. No.

This was something else. Don’t tell me evil can’t take human form, Del. I saw it first

hand.” He lit himself a cigarette and exhaled a tunnel of exhaust. Sunlight bleeding

through the drapes crystallized a smoky shroud around him, casting him in a sort of

Merlin-esque aura. “But it’s far worse today than it’s ever been. The shrinks’ll tell you

it all stems from hatred; that education is the cure-all. No need to hate when you

understand. Then they’ll understand us and we’ll understand them and we’ll all sing

kumbaya around the campfire.” He looked at me. “Ain’t gonna happen. Not with ISIS it

ain’t. Fact is, kid, this world is the devil’s domain. Don’t go trusting any sonovabitch

out there telling you peace is at hand, cuz it ain’t, and it never will be. Not until the sky

lights up at midnight and the Heavenly Host bathes this fat blue ball with great balls of

fire to burn off the old and bring in the new. Until that happens, it’s men like you and me

who gotta maintain the peace. And if that peace is threatened you hunt the threat and put

it down. Just like you do a rabid dog. So why don’t you sweep this self-pity shit out the

door. It’s time to suit up.”

He yanked open the drapes. The sun’s bright blades dissolved the sucking fiend

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on my shoulder. I covered my eyes and felt the boiling flush of tears. Would this

nightmare never end? I was a shaking panic. He opened the sliding glass door and the

island’s lungs sucked out the air conditioning, and with it went the chill of terror that had

been eating away at my bones. The sound of the waves stirred me. The way I had been

living the past couple of weeks, locked away drinking—hell, I could have been in

Cleveland. But I was on one of the most beautiful islands in the Americas, and in that

moment I felt an ocean breeze waft over me. In one fell swoop it shattered the fear and

loathing I had for myself which the alcohol only reinforced. It felt like an invisible slap

in the face from some higher power, saying, Let Me carry the weight for you.

I wiped the cold smelly snot from my face and focused on Hap’s gold seashell

belt buckle and Johnny Ringo’s gun. Yeah, maybe the Chief was right. Maybe it was

time. Time to hang up the weeping banjo of my despair. Pour out the booze. Shower.

Shave. Do the sit-ups. Take the jog. Fetch the valise from the attic, blow off the dust.

Strap on the fancy two-gun rig and stand alongside Josey Wales and rain down some

hellfire. Two black hats tall against the sun. All we know is the difference between right

and wrong and we act accordingly. That is our religion. We are champions of the weak;

defenders of whatever is noble, whatever is just; whatever is lovely, admirable and moral.

The Chief placed his hand on my shoulder. He got down on his knees. I had no

ego to bruise here so I slid off the couch and joined him and we said the Lord’s Prayer.

Afterwards I felt the Chief’s eyes on me. Ringo’s too, from somewhere. His gun

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seemed to be calling out to me, telling me I was going to need all the help I could get.

Black Hat Evil was more likely to shoot me in the back than face me down in the street

for a fair fight. Maybe whoever carried the gun into battle had a supernatural edge. I

mean what a dichotomy it was to accept such a notorious weapon owned by someone

who coveted wickedness and use it as an instrument against that very force. Life is filled

with logical incongruities.

“You got a Bible?” asked the Chief.

“Why? To stop a bullet?”

“To slap you upside the head.”

“Don’t need a book to do that. Just look around.”

He did just that, focusing on yet another bra half-hidden beneath a pillow and by

the looks of it a larger cup size than the previous one.

“I do have a Bible. I mean I did. Can’t find the sucker.”

“Then you best get with the program,” he said with a flat slap against his holster.

I felt like the guy who’d been drafted but was OK with it because he had

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nowhere else to go.

I picked up the gun.

Del Lycan, spiritual gunfighter.

Hmm.

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CHAPTER 27

“Where’s Gin!”

“I-I don’t know! I sweAARRR!”

I pulled the barrel of the six-gun out of his mouth. I considered my options and

was about to shove the gun back in when the Aztec patterns up and down his neck gave

me pause. I extended my forearm to exhibit the wolf tattoo. “Did you do this to me?”

Tuna spit out a piece of tooth. “I bloodied you. Now you have bloodied me. But

at least you were laugh—.”

The barrel caught him smartly across the jaw and he crashed to the floor.

“You do good work,” I said. Then I walked out.

I gave the keys to the bar to Gidget-Bridget and went north and enrolled in a

survival school to sweat out the toxins. It was brutal. I could have availed myself of the

healing power of the Grail but didn’t believe I deserved it. What I believed I deserved

was self-flagellation. Also I feared that if I drank from the holy source I might lose the

tattoo on my arm. I didn’t want to lose it. Unlike Hellus I had not asked for it. I wanted

the tattoo as a reminder of the evil that had been done to me.

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At the camp I was stripped of my emotional crutches. No television was allowed.

No cell phones. In the second week, after the burn in my muscles subsided and I was no

longer awaking from nightmares in a sweaty malaise, I rediscovered my self-respect and

began to build on it. There were no informal circles with strangers to share my angst,

only camo-clothed professionals who transformed into Olympians when I was with them

in the gym, on the hiking trails, or jogging around the lakes where the brisk pine air

burned my lungs and strengthened my heart. My diet was rabbit food and lean red meat.

I began to write. Everything I could remember, from the time I’d met Gin and finding

fame on YouTube to reminiscing about my childhood. I wrote day and night in grade

school booklets with wide blue lines and black-and-white speckled covers. One journal

turned into two, two into four, four into six. When finally my chicken scratch made

mention of the dichotomy of astral transcendence, trying to fuse classical physics with

quantum theory like mixing oil with water and demanding they merge!— I was ready to

face the world again, and fight. I put down the pencil because I had come to the

realization that some things were, by design, meant to remain a mystery. The secret

behind the secret prefers it that way.

To ensure my authority over my affinity for booze and drugs and to keep me from

sliding back into depression, I re-enrolled in the camp for another six weeks.

One day I borrowed a camp truck and drove into town. The chains around the

tires chewed through a fresh layer of snow that had fallen overnight. I parked in front of

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the small general store and went inside. There was a Christmas tree in the corner,

twinkling. The smell of leather and horse manure was eclipsed by the fragrance of

cinnamon and apples coming from the back where “mom” was baking. I asked “pop” to

see the SX 3000 and he took it down from the shelf and handed it to me. Looked like a

curved bowling pin, shiny blue and small enough to fit inside a cardboard tube. With one

flick of the wrist it extended like magic. “The trout jump all over it,” he told me. I paid

for it with the shipping costs, and enclosed a note to Manny.

Merry Christmas, Detective.

Signed, Scrooge.

Upon returning to camp and entering my tiny yellow pine room with the single

dresser, single desk and chair and single bed—the bed clothes so tightly drawn you could

bounce a penny—I found the business card on the pillow instead of a chocolate mint.

(There were never any chocolate mints).

I picked up the card. It read T.R.I.P. That’s all it said. I sensed a presence

nearby. It felt sinister and more real than I imagined Hap, Gin and Lucius ever were.

Then I thought that maybe it was Hap, Gin and Lucius who were responsible for the card.

My gut told me it was from them. Something Hap had alluded to over the king’s

breakfast when he asked me if I had any idea how much the government spent

investigating the paranormal. The afterlife would certainly fall under that category. It’s

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the trip of all trips. But maybe my mind was playing tricks on me. Maybe this was a test

to trip up my mind. There was no phone number or web address on the card. If this was

some kind of overture to gain my forgiveness it wasn’t going to happen. They had made

me a patsy for a crime they committed. My intention was to purge every trace of them

from my memory. Every scar. But that was easier said than done. I had recently begun

substituting Hap’s excited utterance, “Good Christus!” in lieu of using the Lord’s name in

vain. Or just cussing. And I really liked to cuss.

Then there was the problem of justifying the presence of one Xavier Trench. The

first word out of his mouth after he shot Baddog was Master. Was he the henchman who

followed Luicus around in past lives, the one I’d seen with the German on Big Pine Key?

He was younger then, perhaps forty, with long wine-dark hair, the Dave Grohl mop; a

looming pirate moving with the intensity of a bull dog to the Admiral Benbow Inn. In

Corpus he’d claimed Gin had betrayed Lucius but she risked everything to rescue him

from the Underworld for some arcane reason I would probably never know. The years

had not been kind. His deterioration had been swift, his gift of immortality, I suppose,

having run its course. Forgetting for a moment the deformity in his neck, his face was

classically sculpted and he possessed that famous snarl of a smile. Scrape away the liver

spots and wrinkles and put him in a wig with a dramatic quiff, he might convince the

blue-hairs down at the beauty parlor. Spooky head-scratcher that it was, Xavier Trench

could be what the aged rock-and-roller—whose name may be inspired by the Old English

word Eall-wīs meaning “all-wise”—might have looked like had he not died in 1977 in

front of his toilet with his nose in the carpet and his ass up as if he was mooning the angel

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of death. And unless he’d undergone nasal surgery and studied with a voice coach, he’d

never have been able to master a British accent. Whoever he was his bones were

probably the garnish in some boiling bouillabaisse twenty thousand leagues beneath my

feet. I shot him in hell so logic dictated that he’d still be there.

Except everything I’d experienced had defied logic, hadn’t it?

I then recalled the acroterion, the marble ornament on a stone casket from ancient

Rome found by archeologists. Aha! He may have been the model who posed for the

sculptor, a doppelganger of the man whom today we call “the King”. Rumor has it we all

have a double; someone who could pass as a twin living on the other side of the world.

Or even something more mystical—the transmigration of the soul—which you prove

while rummaging through the antique shop and uncovering a spitting image of yourself in

a tintype taken a hundred years before you were even born. I wonder what his

contribution to Roman society had been. Had he been a singer of songs like David had

been to Saul? The guitar would not be invented until the 15th century. Quite small with

only four strings. Looked like a ukulele. Of course my supposition did not constitute

proof but I hadn’t proof of anything, really, had I? Certainly nothing empirical. If the

Mayans were right and there really was no end; that death was just a reshuffling of the

cards, an illusion, and we go on, most of the world’s population embraces that idea in one

form or another already, whether science can prove it or not. Let’s just hope that in that

reshuffle, you’ll be spared the walk I took with Hap, Gin and Baddog to rescue Lucius.

I’d like to believe the place I went to was nothing more than the imaginary product of

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repressed memory from prepubescent brainwashing orchestrated by fire-and-brimstone

preachers whom I’d been exposed to when Mom hauled me by the hand to the circus tent.

Anyway, what say we just shelve this little fable, skip the rendezvous at Starbucks, find

ourselves a jukebox in some rundown diner and play Elvis Presley records. Yes? No?

I’d lie awake at night and study the T.R.I.P. card.

T.R.I.P.

What could it stand for? If Hap was serious and the government really had found

a way to journey to the afterlife and return, what would be the purpose of doing such a

thing? The answer came quickly enough.

To retrieve what was lost.

As in retrieving those who thought they had gotten away with it, whatever it was.

Like getting away with murder. So many do. By committing suicide before they pay for

their crime. So the “T” could stand for tracking. As in tracking someone down. The

“R” for revenge. Maybe recovery. The “I”—aw, this was nuts.

I reached to turn out the light but something wouldn’t let me.

I thought, OK, how would you, if you could? The Universe is made of sound. So

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the “R” could stand for resonance? The “I” for … let me see … interface. Maybe. The

“T” for transport, transcendental . . . and the “P” … polarity? As in trapping the escaped

energy—the soul—between two points, a positive and a negative, like a storage battery or

a magnet. I felt a sudden kinship with the Ghostbusters. I was certainly cerebral enough

to join that gang but I wondered if I had the necessary sense of humor.

Had science discovered the soul? Could they measure it now and define its

parameters? Assuming the breakthrough had been achieved, what then? How could you

track down a soul? I flipped the card between my fingertips and then it hit me. If human

beings can be identified by fingerprints, did the soul also carry a signature? Do our souls

have fingerprints?

My final day at the camp held no fanfare. I was treated politely and driven into

Darby beneath a panorama of blue Montana sky to make my connection with a shuttle

that would take me to the airport in Missoula. I considered whether or not my life was in

danger. Whoever T.R.I.P. was had tracked me here. If it was the three musketeers who

had affected the course of world history, they could have stamped me like a bug at any

time. But they didn’t. Because I had something they wanted.

When I finally made it back to the island some of my friends didn’t recognize me.

They said my aura was too bright. They needed sunglasses just to look at me. I wanted

nothing to do with Skivvies. I was too restless to lean on my elbow and listen to fish

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tales. I had my new attorney draw up the papers and I passed the torch to Gidget-Bridget.

After the signing she wanted to toast but I declined. She nodded at her new addition to

the bar staff. It just showed up one day. Flew right in and seemed quite content on

sticking around. “This bar needs a mascot,” she said. “It’ll bring good luck.”

I smiled, even though I wasn’t so sure. She thought she’d name him Pepper. I

suggested Bonaparte. She said she’d consider it. It was time for me to move on.

I found Erica in Austin. By her pronounced belly it was clear she had moved on

too. He was also an attorney and had a six-year-old. They had purchased a hundred-

year-old house with dormers, gingerbread trim and a wide plank porch in the downtown

area where the affluent renovated hundred-year-old houses, lunched at the Four Seasons,

shopped at the artsy boutiques along lower Congress Avenue and returned at sunset to

watch the bats fly out from beneath the bridge.

I watched them stroll, hand in hand, down the wide boulevard where trees with

holiday lights stretched all the way to the capitol building that sublimely anchored the far

end, bathed in soft radiance. Austin had been trying to redeem herself ever since she tore

down the Armadillo and made it into a parking lot. Said it looked dirty. Maybe it did.

Austin wasn’t a soulless city. She just liked her soul with a clean shirt on a Saturday

night. That wasn’t too much to ask. And politeness. Be polite or leave. Great bumper

sticker. They approached the ticket window to the State Theater, a grand old movie

palace. It was showing The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence with John Wayne and James

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Stewart. Erica Ames, mother-to-be, with her new family. Family. It all comes back to

that. Being a part of something larger than ourselves. What Erica tried to teach me and I

refused to hear choosing instead to surround myself with myself. God. What a sin.

They entered the theater just as a tall figure emerged from under the marquee. He

wore a bowler and used his folded umbrella as a cane. A dapper gent. It was the perfect

finish to what, I think, could only be described as a comedy of the absurd. A divine

comedy, if you will, but still quite unreasonable.

I parked off Sixth Street. The night was comfortable with low humidity. I tossed

the seersucker over my shoulder, tipped the Panama back on my head and began walking.

Within moments I was engulfed in dread. I couldn’t explain it, only to say it wrapped

around me like a pair of dark wings and I found myself casing the shadows for anything

that looked out of the ordinary, any sign of danger. Paranoia strikes deep when faced

with alien scenarios and there was nothing quite as alien than the idea that the existence

of man was the most important cog inside this vast mechanism we call the Universe, for

to corrupt us could be what brings it all to an end. Of course that sounds ridiculous. But

how does science purge an infectious disease? Not that people are such a thing, but what

gets evil up in the morning is its hatred of God for allowing humanity to thrive. Its

validation for its own existence rests in finding ways to destroy the self-determining,

flesh-wearing souls. To develop a cure for a disease science finds the host of said disease

to access its antibodies and create an antiserum. Accepting then that the explosive energy

at the subatomic level which science calls quanta is something conscious and actually

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warring with itself and that homo sapiens are the physical manifestation of this energy,

and assuming that whatever higher evolutionary species exist in the cosmos originated

from that corporeal creation, then it is not inconceivable to think that in order to destroy

those higher evolutionary species and render creation as a whole useless to intelligent

life, evil would need to destroy the host of that intelligent life.

Man.

With that thought in mind I shuddered to a stop. I had forgotten to arm myself.

Ringo’s gun rested inside the hidden panel of the Eldorado. Knowing this did not bode

well for my mind which was still somewhat fragile despite the healing I’d undergone in

Montana. I could easily work myself into a tizzy and get sick on the sidewalk. Surely

there existed in this quantum war a pause button to suspend hostilities so a simple guy

like me could grab a bite to eat without feeling as if his life was in jeopardy.

A brushstroke of wind swiped my shoulder. A wisp of pale whiskey highlights in

my peripheral vision.

I turned but the sidewalk was clear. Hmph. Nothing to get all excited about. Just

an impression. Something behind the air like Hellus had felt. But it calmed me and my

faith in things unseen secured a foothold.

Stars were just beginning to show in the evening’s fading blush. In a few hours

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downtown would be swarming with college kids hungry for live jazz, reggae, and rock.

The dinner crowd owned the street now—professionals and crackerjacks making their

way through life building something. Together.

I was envious of what Erica had. What did I have? I was the one walking alone.

Still I remained optimistic, recalling with a smile the fellow in the funny hat with the

umbrella, and looking upon a relic from the past standing completely out of place in

today’s modern world. It was as if the city—now a hub for the hi-tech industry—was

paying tribute to the hi-tech of yesteryear. The placard over the accordion door read,

“The Last Telephone Booth”. Austin had a sense of humor.

Beneath the streetlight sat a homeless man mooching from a bottle in a brown

bag. The light turned green and the wet pavement glossed over like liquid Kryptonite. I

caught a spicy-sweet aroma from a nearby restaurant. Its windows glistened with festive

light and sounds of mirth squeaked from its opening doors. I paused to soak up the

pleasantry when a four-headed cluster of well-fed folk emerged from the restaurant and

moved towards me like a rolling pin. When I tried to move out of the way I felt a

presence behind me. Both ships passed me by at the same time, almost crushing me

between them. The draper tipped his derby in apology, his umbrella tapping the

sidewalk. Another comical display fashioning itself for my entertainment and I figured it

was probably time to get to safer ground and avail myself of some of the eclectic food

Austin was known for, arguably as good as New Orleans.

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But all that changed when I smelled the thrilling fragrance of Shalimar waft off

the shoulder of the Englishman—and felt the burning acid rise up my calf.

My throat constricted. I couldn’t breathe.

I pounded over to the homeless guy and grabbed his bottle and fell into the phone

booth like an upended mattress, my elbow spider-webbing the glass panel when it struck.

The tramp pulled at my feet, snarling. The leg that had been stabbed in the

manner notoriously attributed to the KGB during the Cold War was too sore to lift and

kick him in the face. The poison was most likely designed to kill me within a minute.

I saw stars. A metallic foulness inched up my throat. My heart thumped out of

control. My breathing grew labored. I tore open my shirt. Spasms hindered my ability

to steady the bottle and when Gin took it away, I knew that I was doomed.

She scooped the scallop shell from around my neck. “You’re not going to die,

Del,” she said, “We just needed to slow you down a bit.”

She wore a curly black wig beneath her hat, baggy trousers, a tuxedo coat with

tails and a bow tie. Her eyes were theatrically lined, her cheeks rounded in pink, her

mouth painted with pouting lips. I was looking at the face of Betty Boop.

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Lucius was classically attired in threads from Savile Row. He wore a Van Dyke,

a bowler and also carried an umbrella. “We just wanted what was ours,” he said. Gin

handed him the shell. He slipped it into his breast pocket.

She leaned down and kissed me on the forehead. “Don’t be too hard on yourself,

honey. We all know who’s to blame.” She dropped the bottle in my lap. “Drinks are on

me!”

She joined Lucius and I watched them move down the sidewalk, twirling their

umbrellas like disciples of Charlie Chaplin. I wished a street cleaner would come by and

shatter their pompous veneer with dirty water but they got away, as bad guys usually do.

The old drunk was quick with the snatch and crawled across the sidewalk and

drank from his bottle.

I found feeling again in my legs and pulled up beside him and we sat quietly,

watching the activity on Sixth Street.

The odor off him was wet street and beer swill. He wore a torn t-shirt, baggy

trousers and a fleece-lined hoody wrapped in a knot around his waist. His sneakers were

worn down to the bone. His ruddy face, smeared with the charcoal offal of the city, was

hidden beneath a crinkled gray beard. His hands were gnarled roots of filth and his

fingernails were cracked. I pledged to myself I would help him.

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“Hand me my hat there, will you?”

He leaned over and grabbed the Panama off the sidewalk. When he did I

recognized the tattoo on his arm and my vow of charity went right out the window. It

was Hap. Hellus Arias Apollus. The Wandering Jew. I suppose his escape from hell

was achieved by divine edict, or something, in order to continue serving out the sentence

conferred on him eons ago by Christ. That of a roving soul with no place to rest. I was

of a mind to grab his head and smash it against the curb for what he had done to me but I

was in no mood for smashing heads. Anyway by the look of him life was doing a better

job at beating him down than I ever could. I wondered if he recognized me but by his

empty stare it was clear to me that he didn’t. There was something else I recognized—

the missing small fat brick in the palm of his hand. I could see the chipped gilded letters

of my dad’s name gleaming in the streetlight, the black leather cover worn down by time.

It almost looked welded to his skin. I thanked him for the hat.

Perhaps it was his nature as a bum to offer another bum a sip. Then again maybe

he was just being polite. But I didn’t drink. He fidgeted in place, anxious for the bottle

back and another snort. His decrepit condition tugged at my heart strings. I could not in

good conscience refuse him kindness but I had an agenda which, if followed, would make

me a target. I certainly didn’t have to follow it. The war between good and evil would

be fought regardless. Whether or not I chose to play an active role in its outcome was a

matter of free will. And therein was the loophole of all loopholes: I didn’t have to

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participate. I could cuddle up beside Little Annie Fannie and watch the end of the world

play itself out on the flat-screen TV from the comfort of a big wide sofa. Or I could suit

up like the Chief hoped I would and run out onto the field. If I was really committed to

lend a hand in the Battle for Evermore, having an immortal fighting alongside me

certainly couldn’t hurt. But I had a lousy track record. I had not been a good steward of

the gifts bestowed me. I had pretty much abused every good thing that had come my

way, be it friends, family, or fortune. Baddog was right. We were all in that crowd that

horrible day, angry because our lives were not our own. Something was sustaining us

like Trench told me in Corpus Christi, keeping us alive, whether we wanted to be alive or

not. Alive for one purpose and one purpose only. To pick a side. To serve somebody, as

Bob Dylan once sang—the devil or the Lord. It was the choice all men and women have

had to make since the beginning of time. There was no getting around that hard-boiled

fact. I’d already begun that journey but had been rash with Tuna and had underestimated

Gin and Lucius, thereby bringing into question my ability to protect the magic they

sought to take. In the future I would have to be smarter and I was not at all sure healing

Hap was living up to that ideal. If I did, it would be my Rubicon after which there would

be no turning back. Because by bringing him back would certainly bring her back. The

safe move was to just walk away, disappear, but something wouldn’t let me. A desire

consumed me. A burning one. I wanted to wring Gin’s neck.

I set the bottle aside and slipped the feather-light mollusk out from the hidden

sleeve inside the crown of my hat and held it in the palm of my hand. The streetlights

shimmered along its golden scalloped edge and reflected in Hap’s astonished eyes.

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I lifted the bottle. “So what are we drinking?”

“It tastes like rusty nails but gets the job done.”

“Well,” I said, pouring some liquor into the shell. “I bet I can make it taste like a

million bucks.”

END

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