by John Cutter
I’m going to have to tell her…
“When he was dying, I tied off his arm… and…” She didn’t need to know all the details. How Chris had picked up the severed hand and clutched it to him. “As I guess you know, he came home… his body came home… missing a hand.”
“Yes. I assumed it was lost or…”
“No. I wasn’t sure how to tell you about this, so I didn’t say anything. It was torn off in the explosion. He asked me to take the hand, preserve it, bring it here. Bury it under the porch of this cabin.”
Her mouth dropped open. “What? Really?”
“Really. We wrapped it up well as we could, but then PASI took it, said they’d preserve it, get it to the family. They would not release it to me. Friend of mine in PASI said they never turned it over to anyone. It’s taken me all this time to find out what happened to it. Just got hold of it about ten days ago. It was frozen. Their medic, a man named Charlie Ames, kept it in a freezer. It was kind of forgotten. Finally, he got in touch with me, and… it’s a long story. But I have it now, preserved in alcohol. Right here with me.”
She snapped to stare at his backpack. “My son’s hand… is in that backpack?”
Vince winced. Maybe he should have done the burial entirely on the Q.T. But… it didn’t seem right, her not knowing. This was her property. “Yes ma’am. It’s there. It was the last thing he asked me to do. I couldn’t… not do it. I thought I might get it done tonight. I didn’t actually think you’d be here. I thought we’d probably meet at your house tomorrow…”
“You told me you’d get here this evening.” She smiled wanly. “Didn’t mean to ambush you.”
“That’s alright. I understand.”
“Listen — I don’t want to see his hand. You go ahead and pry up the boards out there. There are some tools in that shed out back. Dig a hole and put it down in there, in its plastic bag, and say what you want. I just… can’t be here for that. But if that’s what he wanted…”
“Yes ma’am. I’ll take care of it.”
“You don’t have to yes-ma’am me, Vincent Bellator. There is something you can do for me, though. I don’t know who else to ask. And it’s kind of… a lot. Bobby said don’t trust the local cops. He said at least one of them is in with the Brethren. And I never heard from the feds again. I was thinking maybe you could… I don’t know…”
“Find out what’s become of Bobby?” Vince nodded. “I was going to suggest I might do just that. I’ll need to locate some Germanic Brethren away from their Fortress of Solitude or whatever the hell they call it. Maybe somewhere in town for a start…”
“Thank you for doing this, Vincent. Just see if you can get them to talk to you. I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“Getting hurt isn’t part of my plan.”
“Listen — there’s some fishing tackle in the bedroom closet. Maybe for in the morning. And out behind the cabin, under a tarp, you’ll find Chris’s motorcycle. It’s a Harley trail bike from the 1960s. Chris and Bobby rebuilt it together. Took ’em two years to get the parts. If it doesn’t start, call me, and I’ll pick you up. But Bobby was working on it a couple months ago and he can fix anything. I’ll bet it starts.” She stood up. “Now, I’ll tell you where you might find some of the Germanic Brethren. There’s a place called Tina’s Bar and Grill…”
*
It took Vince about fifteen minutes to get enough boards off the porch, without doing too much damage. He got the folding army surplus camp shovel from his backpack, along with the jar in bubble wrap, and brought them out to the porch. He set the jar carefully aside, lowered the porch lantern into the hole, stepped in after it, and got to work. “Maybe just a couple feet down, Chris,” he said, as he dug. “I figure you want to be up high enough to protect the cabin.” He dug for a while more and then said, “This cabin must’ve meant a lot to you. I guess you and Bobby and your folks were out here for fishing. Maybe felt more like home than the house in town.”
Vince knew that a lot of people would think he sounded crazy, talking to the dead like this. They’d think his errand under the porch was crazy too. But they weren’t professional soldiers. A lot of guys he knew talked to their dead buddies now and then. It seemed to help. And if there was anything you could do to honor a buddy who’d died, you did it.
He got two feet down, and then he tossed the shovel onto the porch, unwrapped the jar, and took one last look at Chris’s hand, with its ragged bit of wrist, floating in medical preservation fluids. The fingers were formed into a fist; the skin now pale blue but otherwise well preserved. There was an Army Rangers ring on it.
“Chris, I’m doing this crazy shit you asked me to do, and I hope you’re satisfied.” He sighed. “I met your mom. Liked her a lot. I’m gonna do what I can to help her. Hey — she gave me the keys to that Harley you rebuilt. I’ll try not to wreck it. And I’m going to make a promise. The guy who killed you… the head of the outfit that killed you… that guy Lopez? I heard a rumor he’s working in Arizona now. I promise, my brother — I’m going to take him out.”
Vince put the jar into the hole, covered it over, then patted down the little hump in the dirt. He said, “Sua sponte, man.” The Army Rangers motto. Of their own accord. “We took the trail of our own accord, brother. I was proud to walk it with you.”
Then he climbed out and set to work replacing the boards.
*
Vince was up at dawn, prepping coffee on the camp stove, doing push-ups and sit-ups on the ground out front of the cabin while the coffee was perking, watching the sun turn the horizon from gray to rose-blue over the top of the forest.
He drank his coffee while he was getting the tackle organized, finding some fishing flies in a tackle box.
He carried the tackle box and headed west, stepping over Dead Springs Creek. It was so narrow it barely deserved to be called a creek; it was little more than a crooked moss-lined ditch streaming with shallow water. He kept going another half mile. When he reached Chickasaw Creek, he set off upstream till he found a wide, deeper place; a possible fishing hole. It was already jumping with trout.
Vince caught four of them over two hours, then carried them on a line back to the cabin. He cleaned them and fried them for breakfast in a dusting of cornmeal and pepper.
When he’d finished a third cup of coffee, Vince got the detailed area maps from his backpack and sat on the sofa to study them.
He found the place, east of the Talladega National Forest, where the gunfire had likely come from.
The headquarters of the Germanic Brethren.
He remembered the picture Chris had shown him of Bobby Destry. A slim young man with a brave smile and sad gray eyes. Was Bobby there, maybe held a prisoner?
Or — was he dead, and buried somewhere out in the woods?
CHAPTER THREE
A little past nine that evening, Vince showered, shaved, went to the back of the cabin, and started up the old Harley. It sputtered, then rumbled steadily. He smiled at the sound. His old man taught him to ride on a Harley, and he’d given Vince a ’66 Bobcat for his seventeenth birthday. They’d gone for long rides out in the hills. Two men connecting deeply, just riding side by side on the road, never having to say a word.
Vince rode the Harley around the cabin to the road and to the little mountain town of Stonewall. Tina’s Bar and Grill was right where Rose said it would be, set close to a trailer park and half hidden by a screen of pine trees.
He swung the trail bike into the bar’s parking lot. A dozen pickups and SUVs, all of them with huge tires, were parked around the bar, nosed in as if they were feeding. It was dark, the trees and clouds cutting out most of the starlight. A single light-pole shed a sickly yellow glow over the parking lot and one small window with a Jack Daniels sign added a splash of neon blue and rusty red. He could barely make out the flaking old sign for the bar atop the square, flat little building.
Vince parked the Harley behind the bar. He noted a gravel road that passed from the lot to the
trailer park. Someone was riding a dirt bike back thereon dirt tracks behind the trailers. He could hear its engine growling and whining, and he could see the single headlight strobing through the brush. Good to know there was a back way out of here for a bike.
Vince went around the corner of the bar and through the red metal door with its warning about serving minors. Inside, he was struck by the cigarette smoke first. He had grown used to Washington State, where smoking wasn’t allowed in bars. The air was gray with it here.
The bar was mostly taken up by the broad backs of hefty men, with a few women peppered in. The men wore sleeveless t-shirts and football jerseys; the Dallas Cowboys and the Atlanta Falcons and the Crimson Tide. To Vince’s left was an internet-based jukebox playing a Kid Rock song, something about “God knows why”. Pool balls clacked under a cone of light on the other side of the bar. A tall blond woman with big arms and wide shoulders and a mass of curled hair was tending bar at the near end; at the other end an Asian-American kid was bussing. The smell of barbecued ribs was in the air.
Vince had a weakness for pool, and he gave the tables one longing glance before going to the bar. He found the only open spot. The big lady drifted over, light as a cloud. She wore lime green pants and vest, and a white, frilly blouse, open to display her tanned, sparkle-sprayed cleavage.
Louder than Kid Rock, she said, “What can I get you, little fella?”
Vince grinned. “Miller draft.”
“You got it.”
She brought him the beer and asked, “What’s your name, hon?”
“Vince.”
“I’m Tina. I hear a little Texas in your voice?”
“Ya’ll ain’t wrong.”
She squinched up her lips in pretend disapproval. “We get trouble from Texas all the time! Well you’re in Alabama now, so you behave. I wouldn’t want to have to spank you.”
Vince laughed. “I’ll be good.”
She winked and went to pour someone a Jack.
Vince sipped his beer, looking around as the music changed to Toby Keith. He spotted one of the Brethren almost immediately; the short blond guy, Shaun Adler, now in a black hoodie and jeans, looking sullenly into a tequila sunrise.
On his right was an older, more muscular guy with a blond flattop haircut. He was wearing a cut-off sleeveless shirt, showing his hard belly. He had a cigarette in one hand and an empty glass in front of him that he twirled between two fingers as he muttered something to Shaun. Probably his brother. The older one was sniffling, twitching, talking on and on in the frowning Shaun’s ear.
Meth, Vince figured.
The tweaker brother suddenly slid off his stool and went almost at a run toward the men’s room. Shaun closed his eyes and shook his head.
A heavy-set, bearded man in a cowboy hat came into the bar, looked around, and made a bee-line for Shaun. He was a foot taller than the short militiaman and probably outweighed him twice over. He was pop-eyed, and his bare arms were crawling with tattoos, so many they muddled one another. The big guy sidled up to Shaun and prodded him with a thick stubby finger. Shaun twitched away from him. Cowboy Beard pressed closer, looming over Shaun, and shoved him into the bar, bending near him, snarling something. Shaun shook his head…
And Vince smiled to himself, thinking, This is my chance.
He walked over, stopped just a step away, in time to hear the bearded cowboy say, “Your brother is not going to pay me that money. So you got to do it.”
“I haven’t got it, Rendell!” Shaun said.
“He’s snorted four hundred dollars of my goody-goods up his nose and if I don’t get that money from him, I’ll take it out of your hide, boy—”
Vince tapped Rendell on the shoulder. “Hey.”
Rendell turned and jabbed a stubby finger at Vince. “Hey — back off, this here’s a private conversation!”
Shaun gawped at Vince, his eyes wide. “Uhhh… You?”
Vince said, “Shaun Adler, here, is a personal friend of mine… Rendell.”
Shaun seemed startled by that claim. Just then, as Vince went on, the song finished and another one wasn’t slated to come on. The place went quiet except for a few people murmuring. Vince sensed everyone in the bar was looking their way.
Keeping his tone polite, he went on, “I have this feeling that you’re threatening Shaun. If it weren’t for the fact that the debt in question relates to a poison you’ve been selling his brother, I might just pay it off. But I can’t give any money to a guy like you. So, I’m going to ask you to back off and leave the bar.” Vince smiled. “If you would, Rendell — please.”
Rendell was staring at him as if Vince had spoken in ancient Greek. Then he shook his head in amazement. He turned away, as if he were going to talk to Shaun — but Vince saw the hulking man’s right-hand bunch into a fist, saw the tension in his right arm. The guy was going to try a sucker-punch.
If a hard punch from a man that size landed, it could do Vince some serious damage. But when it came, Vince was already ducking under it.
He jabbed his own right fist up hard into a cluster of nerves on the underside of the bearded cowboy’s shoulder. Rendell yelped, his body swiveling past Vince with the momentum of his failed punch. Vince kicked his right boot into the hollow of Rendell’s knee, making the meth dealer’s leg buckle.
Rendell crashed down, his forehead catching a glancing blow from the edge of the bar, his hat flying off.
Vince took two steps back from the bar and waited for Rendell to get up. Shaking his head like a dog with fleas in his ears, Rendell got ponderously to his feet, then bared his teeth and reached into his coat with his left hand.
Gun, Vince thought — and as he formed the thought he spun on his left foot, kicked out with his right, cracking it into Rendell’s right elbow as he drew the gun.
“Ahh, shit!” Rendell yowled as the gun went flying to clatter across the floor.
Vince got both feet on the ground — and Rendell lunged for him. Easily sidestepping the heavier man, Vince let the lunge go by, and Rendell ended flat on his belly, gasping for air.
The bar erupted into hoots of laughter and shouts of “Whoa, Rendell!” and “Watch where you’re going, Rendell!”
Vince turned, moved a little closer to Rendell, and waited, letting the bearded cowboy get to his feet.
Vince set himself. Rendell cocked his left arm for a round-house punch — and Vince stepped in, exploded a Krav Maga straight-arm hammerfist, blur-fast, into Rendell’s chin. Hard.
Rendell’s head rocked back and he staggered, spun — and fell flat on his back. The wooden boards shivered with the impact.
Some in the crowd clapped at that. Evidently Rendell was not a popular guy.
Vince walked over to the .38 revolver on the floor. He picked it up and went to the bar. Men stepped quickly out of his way as he asked Tina, “Can I have a glass of water, please?”
She stared at him a moment, then nodded briskly and brought him a glass of water.
“Thanks.” Vince took the glass in his left hand, carried it to Rendell and poured it on the drug dealer’s face.
Rendell sputtered and flailed his arms, then looked wildly around. “Whuh? Where?”
“Rendell…” Vince pointed the gun at the dealer’s face. “Sit up.”
Staring at the gun, blood drooling from the corner of his mouth, Rendell sat up.
Keeping the gun trained on Rendell, Vince squatted down and said, in a whisper, “If you want another shot at me, go to the place Dead Springs Trail runs into Chickasaw Creek and look for me on the stream up north a little. Bring your friends. I’ll be fishing there tomorrow morning. About eight.”
Then Vince stood up and said, loud enough that the others could hear, “Get up, Rendell, get your hat, and get out of here.” He lowered the gun. “Drive away. When I leave, I’ll give your gun to Tina. She can do whatever she wants with it.”
Rendell licked blood from his lips, then got laboriously to his feet. He opened his mouth to utter some fac
e-saving threat, but Vince shook his head and pointed the gun at Rendell’s face. “Save your breath. Get your hat and go.”
Rendell’s shoulders sagged. He hobbled past Vince, picked up his hat, and walked with all the dignity he could muster out of the bar.
The crowd started buzzing. Vince heard a woman say, “I called the sheriff, Tina.”
Vince went to the window, squinted past the neon sign, and watched Rendell climb into a big white Ford pickup and drive off, its giant tires spinning gravel into the air.
Shaun stepped up beside Vince. “I guess I should thank you. He’d probably have busted me up.” He glanced over at his brother who was coming out of the restroom, looking around in confusion.
“My pleasure.” Vince took a pen and a little tablet of notepaper from his inside coat pocket. “I don’t like drug dealers.” He wrote a number down. “Here’s my cell number. Call me, you want to talk. I might want to help you some more. You and your friends. Didn’t feel good about having to rough you up — and bust up your weapons. I apologize for that.” He handed Shaun the slip of paper and then walked over to the bar, pushing the revolver across it toward Tina.
“I thought I told you what’d happen if you got into trouble here,” she said, shaking her head and chuckling.
“You’ll have to catch me first,” Vince said. It was his turn to wink. Then he put a ten-dollar bill on the counter, waved, and went hurriedly to the door.
He heard the police siren coming as he climbed on the Harley. He started it but switched off the headlight and rode it quickly down the gravel road, into the trailer park and onto the trails behind. He thought it wise to steer clear of the local cops, even when he was in the right. He could glimpse their flashing red and blue lights between the trees and trailers as they pulled into the bar’s parking lot.
As soon as he was screened by the trees, he switched on the headlight and worked south along the dirt-bike trails. A quarter mile onward, he found a trail onto the highway.
*
Bobby Destry was trying to figure out how he’d come to be in this damp concrete cell.
