by Erik Carter
Papà nodded. “A man has to prove himself. Wouldn’t you agree?”
His father had asked him a question, but it wasn’t really a question. Marco had to reply in the affirmative. He had to lower himself, in front of all the other men.
“Yes, sir.”
Marco shrunk back in his seat and looked forward, keeping his attention squarely on the glass of water on the table in front of him, not looking at any of the others. But he could still feel their stares. He’d been so prideful. And now the other men were savoring the reversal.
Marco would go along with his father’s wishes for the operation. But he was going to prove himself in his own way.
Once his plan came to fruition.
Chapter Eighteen
Jane woke up screaming. A deep, piercing, and resonant scream.
The man had visited again, straddling her, hands upon her, stealing her breath.
She gasped, taking in big lungfuls of air.
Her telephone rang. Mrs. Wang.
Jane picked up the receiver, lifted it a couple inches off the cradle, and dropped it back down.
Not today.
She took a few deep breaths, cleared her head, and regained her bearings. It was daytime. Afternoon. Sunlight snuck into the room around the edges of the drapes hanging from her window. She was seated at her desk, still in her waitress uniform and apron. She’d fallen asleep again. This had been happening a lot lately. Her sleep quality had been poor, and she’d found herself dozing off here and there. At the most random times. Even at work.
And the sleep paralysis had been getting more frequent.
She stood up and reached into the pocket of her apron, took out a handful of ones and some change. She untied the apron and tossed it on the bed then knelt down and unlocked the small safe beneath her bed, put the money inside. She returned to her desk, dropping heavily into the chair. She’d only been home for a couple minutes before she evidently passed out. This was after she’d immediately sat at her desk and gotten right back to her investigation, trying to find her brother.
She shook the sleep out of her face and returned to what she’d been looking at. That morning’s newspapers were spread out on the desk. Each of them had breaking reports of the early-morning attack her brother had committed at Side Pocket Pool Hall. All the articles focused on the fact that both places John had struck since his escape were reputed Alfonsi establishments: a bank the night before and a bar that morning. The top headline on the newspaper in the center of the desk read, Mob War Imminent?
Each of the newspapers had different photos of the pool hall crime scene, pictures obviously taken from a cordoned-off front entrance. Naturally, the images were from different angles, and each one gave a slightly different glimpse into the scene.
Jane noticed something in one of the photos. Writing. On the front of the bar. It was the same style of writing as the message that her brother had left at the bank he robbed eight months ago.
Her heart raced with excitement at this smallest glimpse of her brother. But she couldn’t immediately tell what the message said. She leaned in close to the image.
The photo showed only part of the message. Two lines, both cut off on the right. The top line said, NEXT, A STRIKE, and the bottom line read, ERASED FRO. Clearly that last word was from, cut off.
This was all part of a longer message. She flipped through the other newspapers, trying to get a better angle. One of them showed only the word NEXT, another showed none of the message at all. The fourth paper was more revealing, giving her another two-line glimpse at the message: OR THOSE on the top and HISTORY on the bottom.
She quickly shifted through the materials on her desk and found a notepad and a pencil. Her brother had left two lines of text, and his message now appeared as puzzle pieces in the various newspaper images.
Jane just had to put the pieces back together.
She scribbled down the two fragmented messages, side by side, and came up with:
OR THOSE NEXT, A STRIKE
HISTORY ERASED FROM
Nonsensical.
She reversed the order, wrote it down.
NEXT, A STRIKE OR THOSE
ERASED FROM HISTORY
She thought this through. Next, a strike or those erased from history? It made a bit more sense than the first arrangement. Maybe her brother was saying that he was either going to strike again or ... or ... something about changing history?
No. It made no sense. There must have been more to the message that wasn’t revealed in the snippets within the photographs.
Damn!
She rifled through the newspapers again. And she saw that the image with OR THOSE had been clipped close to the edge of that first word.
It wasn’t OR. It was FOR.
She added an F to her note.
NEXT, A STRIKE FOR THOSE
ERASED FROM HISTORY
She said it out loud “Next a strike for those erased from history…”
And then she remembered something John had shown her months earlier, back in Kansas.
Jane stepped out of her car and took the small path to her house. The large trees that grew in her yard kept it shady and cool, and the house itself was a beautiful little thing—cottage-style with cute landscaping and stone siding. It looked like something out of a fairytale, something from Wizard of Oz. She loved it.
She entered and found John sitting at the table. Historical documents were spread before him.
She smiled.
But then Rebecca started speaking.
Whenever her brother became Rebecca, she always found it slightly unsettling. Rebecca was a 52-year-old black woman from Mississippi, a retired schoolteacher. It was John’s only alter who was non-white, the only one who was female, and the only one with an accent. It was a combination that somehow felt more foreign than his other alters, and hearing Rebecca’s voice brought Jane’s good mood down a tad.
“Why, hey there, Miss Jane,” Rebecca said in that thick Southern accent. “Good day at the school?”
“It was. Very good In fact,” Jane said. “I helped a couple kids get through a little argument. Nothing serious. No one came to me about dead pets, no abusive parents. All in all a pretty pleasant day. You remember what it’s like working at an elementary school, Miss Rebecca.”
Jane was playing along, and though as a mental health counselor she knew it was important for her to take John’s condition seriously, Jane couldn’t help but feel that she was literally playing along. Playtime. Make believe. Because she wondered how in that brain of his could John possibly understand anything about being a woman or being black or being a Southerner or being a teacher.
A smile came to her brother’s face.
“Oh, goodness, yes,” Rebecca replied. “The most rewarding years of my life, sugar.”
Jane nodded and went into the kitchen where she dropped off her bag and put her keys on the small hook by the refrigerator. When she returned to the living room, Jonathan was looking at her, and when he spoke, it was a brother.
“Hey,” he said.
Jane smiled, relieved.
He glanced around with that slightly confused, slightly tired look he had after he’d spent a good deal of time as one of his alters.
“I lost time again,” he said. “Was it Rebecca?”
Jane nodded.
“Thought so.” He leaned over his materials.
She stepped beside him and looked over his shoulder. The collection of books and articles he’d borrowed from the Topeka library was spread out before him, seemingly haphazardly.
“Find anything new about your conspiracy theory?” Jane said. She put a slight emphasis on the word conspiracy. She’d been playfully teasing him about the research he’d been doing.
John smiled. “It’s not some crackpot theory. Check this out.”
Jane leaned over his shoulder. She hugged him as she did so. “What you got?”
She could feel the excited energy flowing through him. This was where Jo
hn was happiest—when he was investigating. He’d wanted to be a reporter or a historian, so doing his amateur historical work was a way that he could feel productive. And it made him happy.
And his being happy made her happy.
John spoke quickly. “This guy, Abe Ruef, controlled all of San Francisco. Eugene Schmitz, the mayor of San Francisco during the earthquake, was his pawn. You know what Schmitz was before becoming mayor? A violinist! No joke. He ran the musicians’ union. That’s how the two of them met. Ruef knew that ‘Handsome Gene’ Schmitz would be an easy puppet.”
Jane picked up the picture of Schmitz. “Ooh, he actually is pretty handsome.”
He really was. Quite dashing. She handed the photo to John and gave him a skeptical look.
“But how would Ruef and Schmitz have covered up the earthquake info?”
“Schmitz created the Committee of 50 on the very day of the earthquake—a group that would immediately come up with plans for disaster recovery. A completely illegal group, I might add. In his defense, he did include rivals, but the total number of dead, 478, was completely bogus.”
Jane shook her head. “It’s common knowledge that most of the deaths and destruction took place from the fires that came after the actual earthquake.”
“Yes, but you’re telling me in a city of 400,000 people and turn-of-the-century building standards, only 478 people died in an earthquake that’s been estimated to be at least 7.9 on the Richter scale? Nah. Get real.”
“How could so many be so easily forgotten?”
Jonathan rummaged through his materials, brought out a photocopy of what looked like census information. “Because a lot of them were viewed as second-class citizens.” He looked at her with intensity and that sparkle he got when he was reaching conclusions. “Because a lot of them were in Chinatown.”
Jane looked for a moment longer at the note she had scratched down.
NEXT, A STRIKE FOR THOSE
ERASED FROM HISTORY
She set the sheet of paper down. She knew where to find her brother.
“Chinatown…”
Chapter Nineteen
A small, scratchy voice spoke in Dale’s ear.
“You’re sure about this, Conley?”
Dale leaned his mouth slightly toward the microphone clipped to his collar.
“Next, a strike for those erased from history. Oh, yes. I’m sure. Chinatown. This is where people were erased from history. All those deaths forgotten.”
Dale was on Grant Avenue in the heart of Chinatown, a couple blocks up from the famous Dragon’s Gate. The sidewalk was filled with people—both local Chinese and tourists—as well as the wares of the various markets. Fruits and vegetables—many of which Dale had never seen—herbs, souvenirs, fish packed in ice. There was a lingering scent of raw seafood in the air and a constant drone of voices. Stringed red lanterns were draped over the street, between the buildings, and the shades on the tops of the lamp posts were shaped a bit like Chinese pagodas.
Dale tried to remain as casual, as inconspicuous as he could while he kept his attention on The Sapphire Dragon, a dim sum restaurant two store fronts up. An Alfonsi front. A block away, he’d positioned Yorke to keep an eye on another Alfonsi-tied restaurant, Emerald Moon.
Dale heard Yorke sigh in his ear. “God, I hope you’re right about this. Beau already distrusts you, and here I am, the screwup, following your lead.”
Dale wished she’d cut the chatter. He brought his mouth closer to his collar again.
“This is it, Yorke. Only two known Alfonsi fronts in Chinatown. Since Felix has somehow mistaken Alfonsi for Ruef, he’ll be attacking one of them.”
“We’ve been here an hour and a half already.”
“And we could be here all day,” Dale said. Yorke was starting to frustrate him. “And— Wait! I see them.”
A brown Chevette rolled past Dale, and he saw Jonathan Fair in the passenger seat. It pulled into a no-parking zone close to The Sapphire Dragon. Its caution lights began to blink.
“It’s them, Yorke. Fair’s in the passenger seat. And there’s the driver from the bank job. Get your ass over here.”
“On my way.”
Dale leaned forward a bit, looked over his sunglasses, studied the situation intently. He wouldn’t make a move until they did.
“They’re talking. I can see a bit of the driver. His profile.” Dale squinted. “Caucasian. Brown hair. Average build.”
“And they’re still in the car?”
“Affirmative. It appears as though— Hold on, something’s happening. Movement. They’re ... arguing.”
In the car, the conversation had become animated. Both men were clearly shouting. They gestured wildly with their hands.
“What the hell is going on in there?” Dale said.
Chapter Twenty
Jane was so happy she couldn’t contain her smile.
She stood among the crowds on Grant Avenue in Chinatown. She knew that the Alfonsis had little hold on the region because as much as she wanted to erase all memories she had of her father’s “business,” Big Paul had done his best to try to groom her and her twin brother before they broke free from him during college. As such, Jane remembered that Chinatown was Fair turf with only The Sapphire Dragon and Emerald Moon under Alfonsi control. Of the two, The Sapphire Dragon was the most active, a major money-laundering spot just outside the Financial District.
Jane had learned a long time ago that her brother’s alters seemed to have access to John’s breadth of knowledge. John knew where the Alfonsi establishments were located in Chinatown, and since Felix had been attacking solely Alfonsi establishments, Jane had reasoned that this most relevant Alfonsi location in Chinatown would be where Felix would strike.
And she was right.
When the car pulled up outside the restaurant, she saw him through the windshield in the passenger seat.
John.
It was the first time she’d seen him in eight months.
The car had been parked for a couple minutes, as John and the driver sat in deep discussion. Then their conversation quickly took a turn for the worst. Jane watched, stunned, as the two of them began screaming at each other.
And Jane hadn’t a clue who the other man was...
Chapter Twenty-One
Felix looked at the restaurant and back to Mr. Jones, who again sat in the operator’s position behind the steering wheel of the horseless carriage. They were in Chinatown, and though the quake was still fresh, the sidewalks were thick with Chinamen, and the road was very much passable. Most of the buildings, too, were intact. In fact, as he looked at the structures now, they all seemed to be intact. Had he not noticed a toppled building only moments earlier?
Nothing seems right, does it?
That voice again. In his head. His mania.
“Mr. Jones, no,” Felix said. “I refuse to go along with this until you explain to me how this establishment is connected to Abe Ruef.”
Mr. Jones smacked a hand against the flat surface beneath the carriage’s windscreen. The machine shook beneath them.
“I keep telling you, this is connected with Alfonsi. And like I told you at the bar, Alfonsi is in cahoots with Ruef.”
Don’t trust him, the voice said.
“Jones, I do not understand the connection with this Alfonsi character. Why would Abe Ruef work with an Italian? This does not make sense. And I am beginning to think it never will. This is the end of our partnership. I thank you for for your assistance to this point, but I will be completing the mission on my own.”
He unhinged the carriage’s door and put a foot on the sidewalk beyond.
Then Jones’ hand clamped down on his arm.
Chapter Twenty-Two
El Vacío looked down the scope toward the street below, and as Jonathan Fair stepped out of the Chevette, the crosshairs fell right over the target’s back.
He took a slow breath, released it, and tensed his finger over the trigger. Right as he was about to s
queeze, the driver’s hand yanked Fair back into the car. It was a violent movement, and it took El Vacío by surprise.
“Get back here!” the driver screamed.
He’d shouted so loudly that El Vacío could clearly hear each word all the way from his position atop the five-story building across the street, leaning over the parapet with his rifle.
Fair and the driver had argued in the car for several minutes, and El Vacío thought nothing more of it than pre-robbery jitters. Perfectly understandable.
But now, El Vacío realized something.
When the driver had shouted at Fair and yanked him back so violently, a quick rush of analysis swept through El Vacío’s mind. He had done his homework on Jonathan Fair—he never struck a target without doing so—and he’d learned that Fair’s notorious mental issues gave him a number of personalities who could be in control of the man’s body at any given time. One of these personalities was a four-year-old boy. Named Andy.
And if the driver yanked Fair back like that, shouted at him as one would to a child ... could that mean that Fair wasn’t himself right now?
What if he was one of his other personalities?
What if he was Andy?
El Vacío had one rule. One exclusion.
He didn’t kill children.
His youngest target to date had been seventeen years old. She was the daughter of an East German political leader, and she’d had relations with Westerners in Berlin. The whore had gone to a CIA-funded party and willingly ended up as the entertainment. El Vacío didn’t judge his client for having his own child executed. He never judged. Because he was completely impartial—aside from his one rule. No children. And this individual in Berlin, while young, had been no child.
But his current situation was different. If Jonathan Fair truly had different personalities, he could very well be the little boy right now. After all, who would talk to a grown man like that? Yank him by the arm and scream at him?
