The Sapphire Express

by J. Max Cromwell

  “Absolutely, of course,” he said and ran to the kitchen like someone had lit his ass on fire.

  In about four minutes, I was standing outside Johnny D’s with a bag of wonderful European goodies in a white plastic bag. The wheels of murder had been set in motion, once again, and there was no power in the world that could stop me. The garbageman was a dead man walking.

  I drove home and lay down on the young kings, thinking about my new mission and wondering how many people were contemplating a homicide at that very moment. It was a little unnerving to realize that the garbageman had no idea that while he was enjoying his carefree lunch on his patio, some stranger was finalizing a wicked plan to put him in an oblong box. I figured that none of us could ever be sure that there wasn’t a beast of a man lying in his bed somewhere there and thinking about paying us a deadly visit.

  I sincerely hoped that I would survive my mission because I knew that self-made millionaires were tough sons of bitches, and they never capitulated without a fight. Giving up simply wasn’t in their DNA, and they could never be underestimated, no matter how big or small they were. I was, however, fairly confident that a new oblong box would soon get a brand-new occupant, and that I was going to replicate the success I had experienced with the consultant. I was a calculating and intelligent enemy, after all, and I had all the necessary tools at my disposal to be victorious and bring some hard justice to the ugly world where evil so often treaded on the weak with impunity.

  I perfected my plan during the following days and visited Home Depot a couple of times. I prepared the Econoline carefully and built a new oblong box for the garbageman and made sure that complacency didn’t step in and try to mess with my diligence. I had been successful once, but that didn’t mean that humility and attention to every single detail had lost any of their importance.

  The box turned out even better than the first one, and I named it Larry Number 2 after my cousin Larry’s son, Larry. He didn’t call his son Larry Number 2, but I added the number because I thought that it was just so goddamn confusing when the son and his father had the same name. I sometimes wondered why my cousin hadn’t even bothered to add the word “junior” after the name, but I figured that maybe it would have ruined the beautiful simplicity of the name Larry.

  Regardless of the name, the box was the most important item on my list, and I took a deep breath when I closed the lid and lifted the box into the Econoline. Then I took a quick urine break and started cleaning my guns and knives and made sure that the Cheetah was ready to take another bite of wicked flesh. After that was done, I studied the map carefully and memorized the route to the target’s house. Everything needed to be absolutely perfect because I had a strange feeling that the new mission was going to be much more dangerous than the previous one. Boy, was I right about that.

  The preparations went smoothly, and I found no flaws in any of my equipment. The Sig Sauer was ready to go, and the machete and the field skinner were sharper than the Grim Reaper’s scythe. The only thing left to do was to maneuver my mind into the exact right place and get ready to take a man’s life again. The mental game was, after all, much more important than the guns and knives because only a strong-minded master could unleash their deadly force.

  I put all the equipment in the Econoline and locked the doors carefully. Then I sat in my backyard for nine hours, visualizing the upcoming horror show and pushing my brain to its limits. I tweaked the plan whenever I noticed a weakness in it and didn’t stop until I was able to see myself howling victoriously at a fresh grave under the midnight moon. I wasn’t going to accept anything but total victory.

  The king was finally placed in check, and I decided to drive to the coast at first light. I had no reason to postpone my mission and keep polishing a plan that was already shinier than the Queen’s favorite Dubonnet glass. The process had also been extremely taxing mentally, and my brain was pleading for mercy. It was, therefore, only fair that I rewarded it with eight slices of perfectly grilled bacon and four sixteen-ounce Pabst Blue Ribbons. I wanted to show that little convoluted organ that hard work did pay dividends, even if it was liquid and greasy as hell.

  I slept well that night, but not as well as I had slept before I kidnapped the consultant. I wasn’t sure why, but my nerves started to show signs of life, and when I woke up in the morning, I felt that confusing urge to clean again. It was all so goddamn weird because my house was already absolutely spotless, and it smelled like Mr. Clean himself was living there with his neat-freak wife. But I still wanted to clean more and more, clean like crazy.

  I washed the kitchen floor, polished the few utensils I had, and wiped the dust off the TV. Then I showered for thirty minutes and rubbed my body with a rough sponge until it broke my skin again and turned the water red. After that, I washed my hands with bleach and slapped myself hard on both cheeks. The forces of depersonalization and derealization were fighting my awareness fiercely, and there was a spidery tension in my neck that completely numbed my scalp. My eyes were itching, and I was absolutely certain that there was a rabid bat stuck in my hair and madly trying to bite its way out. I started shaking my head violently and ran out of the house like I was trapped in a cruel nightmare.

  I found sanctuary inside the sturdy walls of the Econoline and decided to start driving to the coast even if I didn’t even have a shirt or shoes on. It wasn’t part of my plan to leave my house in my goddamn underwear for a truly dangerous mission, but I couldn’t go back inside and see all that filth and let the bloodthirsty bats attack me again. No goddamn way.

  After about seven hours of half-naked driving, I arrived at the coast where the garbageman was spending his last untroubled days alive. I stopped at a little beach café and got a chocolate fudge sundae with pink sprinkles and devoured a cup of delicious she-crab soup like it was my last meal. It was a happy place, and the cashier didn’t even seem to notice that I had hardly any clothes on.

  Then I walked into a quiet surf shop next to the café and bought a pair of cheap sneakers, blue board shorts and a yellow T-shirt that said “I CAN EXPLAIN IT TO YOU, BUT I CAN’T UNDERSTAND IT FOR YOU.” After that, I relaxed in the van for an hour or so and went through the plan in my head for one last time. I double-checked the route to the garbageman’s vacation home and made sure that I was going to the right place. I didn’t want to kidnap the wrong garbageman.

  Everything seemed to be in perfect order, and I started driving toward the doomed house with anticipation boiling in my murderous veins. I was mentally prepared for a successful kidnapping, and I knew that I had to proceed like a machine and subdue any emotions that tried to interfere with the task ahead. I needed to unleash the pragmatic math teacher and spike him with the unforgiving coldness of a killer born from madness and pain.

  I found the small private road leading to the garbageman’s vacation home after about twenty-five minutes of comfortable cruising and stopped the Econoline in front of a golden plaque that was nailed neatly on an old hickory next to the entry gate. The sign looked expensive, and it stated proudly with black engraved letters: “Villa Príncipe.” I knew that Príncipe was an island in West Africa, and it was surely a place that the garbageman would know about. I had no doubt that I had arrived at the right place.

  I parked the Econoline on the side of the country road and jumped into the deliveryman’s uniform. Then I fetched the Condor and the Cheetah from the cargo area and put a pair of latex gloves on. I wiggled my fingers in front of my eyes and looked proudly in the rearview mirror. The deadly deliveryman was dressed to kill, and I started the van with one optimistic twist of the key. It was go time.

  I looked at the golden plaque one more time as I forced the Econoline slowly through the locked gate, and, for some strange reason, anxiety took an unexpected bite out of my imperturbable heart. I guess I was worried because I couldn’t see the house from the entrance road, and I had no idea if the bastard was at home, or if he had company there or a guard dog or something. I started to think that may
be I should have played it 100 percent safe and done some surveillance, but then I slapped myself hard on my right cheek and reminded myself that I was a man with nothing to lose; taking a petty risk like that was just a fun little game that most people could never experience, no matter how much money they paid. I needed to remember that I was the dangerous one, the one in control, and the garbageman was the screaming lamb in a cold cave full of wolves and gleaming eyes.

  The private road was longer than the map had indicated, and I had to drive five long minutes in the middle of a thick, ominous forest until I finally saw the vacation home emerge from the beautiful landscape. Wow. It was truly a magnificent place, and I was sure that the owner of the house wasn’t expecting a guest with a bag full of murderer’s tools and an oblong box called Larry Number 2 in his creepy van.

  I drove the last few yards slowly like a stalking bay cat and felt adrenaline stocking my body and mind with preternatural strength and focus. My heart was pumping like an angry boombox from the crazy eighties, and my face felt hot and tight. I was a little anxious, but my veins were full of courage and anticipation. Those were the emotions I didn’t want to subdue, and I knew that I was ready to kill.

  The vacation home was a beautiful contemporary masterpiece, and it sat atop a high bluff overlooking a peaceful cove teeming with late-summer birds. The place had truly a luxurious feel, and it was evident that the garbageman had dropped at least a couple of million on it. It was an just exquisite home that would have met the expectations of even the most demanding guests, but the only problem was that it was owned by a man who tortured children and dumped toxic barrels on coral reefs. That wicked fact started eating away the beauty of the home pretty fast, and soon the whole place looked ugly and vile.

  There was no car in the driveway, and I parked the Econoline as close to the front door as possible. The terrain was somewhat different than in the suburbs, and I didn’t want to carry the oblong box over roots and rocks. I was a strong man, but that didn’t mean that I wanted to do any unnecessary work. That was especially true when the work involved lifting incapacitated bodies.

  The house looked quiet, and I started to worry that nobody was home. I put the Cheetah in my pocket, secured the machete under the waistband, and covered it with my new T-shirt. I left Larry Number 2 in the van because the stairs leading to the house were surprisingly steep, and I figured that I could lure the garbageman to my van and subdue him there.

  I rang the bell of death four times, but nobody answered the door. Dammit! The mission wasn’t going nearly as smoothly as I had visualized in the safety of my backyard, and I started to get a little discouraged about the whole goddamn thing. I closed my eyes and let my mind cool off before making my next decision. Then I took a deep breath and walked to the terrace door and forced it open with the machete. Too late to turn back now.

  The break-in was easier than I had anticipated, and I stopped on the knotted doormat and waited quietly for thirty seconds—my brain and body ready to react to any unexpected sound or sight. But to my great relief, there was no unpleasant surprise waiting for me, and nothing was beeping or blinking. I was golden, just as Ramses had predicted.

  I stepped into the house and looked around curiously. The living room was professionally decorated, and four panoramic windows offered an unobstructed ocean view to the lucky owner. The place had that luxurious vacation feel that forces any man or woman to relax and grab a vodka martini or a bottle of wine and a good book. It was simply a soothing, serene environment, and I started to let my guard down a little. I put the machete on the kitchen table and began going through the garbageman’s possessions like a greedy private investigator. I wanted to find out a little more about my target and confirm the claim that he was worthy of a forest grave before I would put him in my van.

  I looked through all the rooms and closets downstairs but found nothing interesting. The garbageman seemed to have standard taste, and his house was furnished with ordinary things that any wealthy person would have had in his vacation home. The only remotely curious thing that I discovered was a picture of Mr. Covington wearing a dead boomslang around his neck like it was a piece of fine jewelry. The photo was hanging on the wall above the toilet, and I relieved myself in the bowl as the snake’s lifeless eyes were staring at me like it wanted to bite my goddamn nose off. Then I washed my latex hands and went upstairs to continue my investigation.

  Everything was neat and ordinary there, too, and the space looked like a perfect place for a tired man to retire after a long day of dumping toxic waste into the ocean. There was a floor-to-ceiling stone fireplace in the corner of the master bedroom, and the garbageman had transformed one of the smaller rooms into a nice game room that opened to a beautiful wooden terrace overlooking the cove. The sick bastard even had a small home library that was stocked with old books and paintings, and I decided to sit there for a moment and enjoy the expansive water views while contemplating my next move.

  I glanced around the library and noticed that one of the books in the bookshelf had been pulled halfway out. It seemed somewhat odd, and my curiosity was aroused immediately. I got up and tapped the side of the book gently with my right forefinger. I smiled because my touch confirmed something that my brain already knew: the book was a fake.

  I pulled out about twenty other books, and every single one of them was a fake. I threw them all on the floor and put my hand back on the first book. Then I tilted the hardcover toward me cautiously, and my pulse increased rapidly as the bookshelf opened with a demonic creak and exposed a dark hole that wasn’t meant for uninvited eyes. The smell of evil escaped from the darkness and attacked my lungs like the devil’s breath, and I knew immediately that the room wasn’t a man cave. It was a cave of an actual beast.

  I stepped into the stuffy blackness and turned the lights on. I scanned the room quickly like a wary antelope and took a deep relieved breath when no one attacked me or shot my head off. Then I took a better look and was quite surprised to notice that everything in the room looked fairly ordinary, and there was absolutely nothing terrifying about the garbageman’s cave—at least in plain sight. I had expected to find a cage with a kidnapped girl in it or something even more sinister. I thanked the Lord that I had been wrong about that and closed my eyes for a brief moment. Then I slapped myself hard on my left cheek and went back to work.

  The room was clean and organized, and two expensive-looking silver computers were humming on a black desk like a couple of bored bumblebees. A gigantic TV was mounted on the wall next to a poster of a bald eagle, and there was a mako shark hologram attached to the ceiling that was so realistic that I had to take a step back when I saw it. Two brown La-Z-Boy recliners were placed in front of the TV, and a small table with cup holders separated the comfy giants like a trusted referee. The room was a movie lover’s paradise, but I had a bad feeling that the films that the garbageman was watching in his secret grotto were not made in Hollywood.

  I opened one of the desk drawers and picked up an unmarked DVD from a black storage box that had about twenty other DVDs in it. I put the disc in the DVD player that was inside a small glass cabinet under the TV and pushed play.

  The movie was from Africa, and I soon saw with my own eyes how disgusting and evil the owner of the man cave really was. I pulled the DVD out of the player with shaking hands and put it back in the drawer. Then I walked out of the room and slammed the door shut with furious hands, and when the hollow books began flying in the morbid air, I promised all the innocent girls of the world that the monster was going to die soon.

  I walked downstairs and took a bottle of water from the fridge. Then I sat on a black leather chair and glanced at the machete on the kitchen table. It was time to collect my thoughts and decide what to do next. My mission was not accomplished, and I had to somehow find the rapist and kill him dead.

  As I was starting to enjoy my water and the wonderful seascape, the front door suddenly opened and the garbageman walked in. He saw me immediately and
froze in his tracks like a startled animal and shrieked with a frantic voice, “Who the hell are you? I have a gun, asshole.”

  I looked at him calmly and asked, “Are you Mr. Covington, sir?”

  “Yes, I am. What are you doing in my fucking house?”

  “Sir, I’m from the Franklin County forensics department. The police just left a couple of minutes ago. You probably saw them on your way down. That’s my van out there. There has, unfortunately, been a break-in. Come here, please. I will show you where the burglar got in. You might want to invest in a new lock and a door with vertical reinforcement bars.”

  The garbageman looked at me suspiciously but started walking toward the terrace door slowly. Then he said, “I have the best alarm system money can buy. Why didn’t it alert the cops?”

  “Uh, sir, I don’t know the answer to that question. I’m just a forensics guy,” I said and felt cold shivers running down my spine. “Where is your alarm unit, sir?”

  “It’s right there on the wall,” the garbageman said and pointed at an inconspicuous steel cabinet that was hiding behind a silver coat rack. Then he walked to the cabinet, opened a little door that concealed a keypad and a tiny green light, and said, “It’s a silent alarm.”

  I stared at the green light in disbelief and wondered why I wasn’t already in handcuffs.

  Then the garbageman kicked the coat rack so hard that it fell to the floor and said, “Dammit, I forgot to turn it on. I always turn it on. Jesus Christ! The one time I forget to turn the fucking thing on I get burglarized. This is just great, just great!”

  I realized that I had dodged a giant bullet, or maybe a cannonball, and asked, “Do you have a hidden video surveillance system here, too, sir?”

  “No. I don’t need any extra eyes here.”

  ”OK, good, but please, sir, come here and take a look at your terrace door,” I said as the juices of sweet relief started flowing in my rigid muscles. “It’s pretty badly mangled. My guess is that whoever did this was a professional.”