by Jeff Povey
Tony instantly knows where this is heading. “We’ve said all we’re gonna say on that subject.”
“Just hear me out, Mr. Curtis.”
Tony claps his hands over his ears and hums to himself so he doesn’t have to listen. His fingers leave barbecue sauce prints all over the side of his head. Cher is determined to ride this one out and raises her voice.
“I vote we send a message to him.”
The other members all look at Cher, and none of them like what she is saying. We have had this debate over and over, and it seems that Cher won’t rest until she wins it.
“We’ve asked everyone else. It’s only fair that we ask him. Come on, we’ve put this off for three years now.”
“Who are you talking about?” Betty’s soft voice breaks through, and I look at her as she scans the members hopefully for an answer. No one seems prepared to say anything.
Tony stops humming, takes his hands away from his ears, and scoops up a pile of peas from James’s plate. He crams them into his mouth, spilling more than a few of them, and everyone waits for his next utterance. Finally he gives a great big reluctant sigh.
“Tell her, Burt.”
This really bugs me. Can’t Tony see he’s just playing up to Burt’s constant need to take center stage? I dive in before Burt can open his mouth. “We’re talking about the Kentucky Killer, Betty.”
“Oh my. . . .” Betty’s hand goes instinctively to her mouth as her eyes bulge in their sockets.
I smile secretly at Burt’s teacherly look of annoyance. That’ll teach him.
Did I say teach him? The gags just keep on coming.
“The Kentucky Killer. Oh my. . . .” Betty breathes in deeply.
And rightly so.
Because the Kentucky Killer is absolutely the number one skiller of all time. A living legend. The serial killer they all want to be. World-famous and with more kills than the entire Club combined. He is a total god when it comes to the slaughter of innocents, and his presence would really put the Club on the serial-killing map.
“Oh my,” Betty repeats.
Later I feign an attack of food poisoning, which is easy for anyone to believe when they’ve had the dubious pleasure of dining here. That way, I leave the bar and grill before everyone else, and when no one is looking I climb into the trunk of William’s car, finding, to my delight, that it isn’t half as cramped as I thought it would be—but that it also smells like a cat’s been living in there.
It is past midnight, and a full moon tries to break through the ominous-looking clouds overhead. The only sunrise William is going to see again is when I pour a gallon of gas down his throat and then set fire to it. William has done something similar to nine people and three guide dogs. The press have dubbed him the “Supernova Slayer,” and the television psychiatrist became very animated about religious connections and the fire that purifies the soul. I just think William is a pyromaniac with a terrific tan. His two published reference books are really the same book written in different styles. The first is a thinly disguised denial of God posing as a study into the life-giving power of the sun. The second is also a disguised denial of God but contains cave drawings of big-chinned apemen bowing to the sun. According to William, the sun is God and God is the sun. His third factually based work was never published. Probably on grounds of self-plagiarism.
I peer out of the hole I secretly drilled a few days ago in his trunk and watch as William appears in the doorway to the bar and grill. He stands with Richard and Cher, and they are saying their good-byes.
My plan—which I didn’t bother writing up—seemed to appease Agent Wade, and his whole demeanor brightened when I told him how brilliant and inspired it was. He wanted to know more, but I told him to wait and see; I could tell he was like a kid waiting for Christmas, but no amount of begging to know what the plan was made me tell him.
“Mr. Holden, Mr. Burton, I’ll see you when I see you.” I watch Cher give them both a Hollywood-style kiss on either cheek.
I note that she has never done this to me, but I for one really don’t like that sort of empty affectation, and I think she knows this.
Cher walks off, high heels clicking on the damp sidewalk.
“Bye, Cher.”
“Yeah, you be sure and drive careful, hon.”
Will and Richard stop long enough to watch Cher get into and start up her sleek, low-slung sedan. They wave as Cher drives past, giving them a friendly beep. After that they start heading toward Will’s car.
“I brought that video with me.” Will pats his pockets, looking for his keys. “That Sixty Minutes show I taped a while back.”
“Aw, gee, that’s terrific of you, Will.”
“I had to get it cleaned up after some punk jimmied the rear door of my car and pissed in it.”
“They did? That’s disgusting.”
“I swear this world is going to the dogs.”
Will still can’t seem to find his keys as he checks through his pockets again. “You don’t get a big mention in the video, but it’s interesting what that TV psychiatrist guy has to say about you.”
“Any photos of me, or closed-circuit footage?”
“None. You’ve been very careful.”
“Still can’t forgive myself for missing it. I had a blood craze on that night. Always seems to come over me when there’s something good on TV.”
They stop right by the trunk, and I go very still. I wonder if they can see my eye staring out of the hole and hope that the moonlight doesn’t catch my pupil and reflect off it.
“I popped it in the trunk in case the pissy punk came back for a crap.”
I freeze instantly. I had been wondering what that sharp edge digging into my ankle was. I feel a swell of panic and can’t seem to catch my breath.
William finds his keys. “Two weeks I’ve been trying to get rid of the stench.”
The keys come out of Will’s pocket, and I swear I now have rigor mortis because my whole body has clenched up so tight that my heart doesn’t seem to be able to manage even a single beat.
Quarterback builder, quarterback builder . . .
How the hell am I going to explain this?
Quarterback builder, quarterback builder . . .
The key slides in.
Richard sniffs loudly, then recoils. “That sure is a putrid punk. . . .”
I rack my brains for a good reason to be in Will’s trunk.
Quarterback builder, quarterback builder . . .
The clouds open and raindrops start pounding on the trunk. They’re deafening me, and I clamp my hands over my ears. How am I meant to think with that racket going on?
Will sighs to himself. “Now the goddamn sky is pissing on us.”
Quarterback builder, quarterback builder . . .
I’ve got it! I was locked in here by some putrid punks having a hoot. Yes! Four big and strong putrid punks dumped me in here, pissed on me, and . . .
. . . I’m a dead man.
Dead as dead gets.
And it’s all down to that bastard Agent Wade hustling me into this.
Bastard!
The lock springs and the trunk is about to swing open when I suddenly hear someone joining Richard and William.
“Excuse me, gentlemen, but does one of you own that Ford over there?”
I know that voice—I’m certain of it.
“The midnight blue one.”
It’s Agent Wade.
“What’s it to you?”
“It’s just that it’s on fire.”
“What!? Jesus shit!”
Right now I think I love Agent Wade.
“Fuck!”
Richard lumbers off immediately, breasts no doubt slapping him in the face as he races over. I can’t see what is going on, but I do hear the sound of Will retrieving a car fire extinguisher from under his driver’s seat and then running over to Richard’s Ford and spraying it.
“Stand back, Rich. You don’t want any of this getting on your suit.
”
I decide to take my chance and start to climb quickly out of the trunk. I get about an inch when Agent Wade suddenly slams the trunk down on my head hard. My head spins as he speaks in a tight and unforgiving whisper.
“Next time, trunk boy, I make the plans.”
William forgets all about the videotape and drives for three hours nonstop. He seems to make a point of running over every hole and rock in the road, and by the time he slows and pulls over, I feel like I’ve been shooting the longest rapids in history. I have now added a serious amount of puke to the overall putrid odor of Will’s car.
William Holden blames the world for everything. He blames it for his lack of hair, his lack of voice, his absolute lack of personality, and he unequivocally blames it for turning him into a merciless killer. I’ve yet to hear any killer openly admit that they did the things they did purely because it cheered them up. Being a bald eight-year-old made William retreat into himself—not far enough, as far as I’m concerned—and he grew up a solitary figure. He initially tried to become a best-selling author—indeed, that is still his most fervent dream—but an alarming lack of talent persuaded him to go into research instead. During his investigations, he stumbled across some pretty weird stuff, and the murders he now commits are actually a homage to the great god Ra. He even has a little mantra he chants every now and then: “Ra-Ra Rarara.” Just think cheerleader.
Will pulls over, and when I smell gasoline I realize he has stopped to refuel. I listen hard, trying to make out everything that is going on outside. Will dumps the fuel pump in the car, scratches himself, gives a few bars of his Ra-Ra mantra, and then, after jingling some loose change in his pocket, he walks off, probably to the men’s room. He has left the gas pump sticking out of the petrol cap, and I want to tell him how dangerous that is.
I slip the catch of the trunk, and after checking out of the hole I made, I slowly open the trunk and look around. A four-wheel truck is pulling away and nearly crashes when the driver glances down and sees me emerging from the trunk. I quickly hide my face and wait for the four-wheel to skid back onto the highway and nearly cause a major pile-up—then jump out. I can barely bring myself to look at the mess I’ve made in the trunk, but Will’s videocassette needs serious cleaning, that’s for sure.
I gather myself, grab a few handfuls of the pale blue paper towels they considerately leave for drivers by the gas pumps, and wipe my clothes and face with them. As I do, I walk round to the front of Will’s car and am leaning on his hood when he returns. He is naturally surprised to see me and is slightly put out by the amount of dry sick sticking to my clothes and hair.
“Hi, Will. . . .”
“Douglas!?”
“Excuse the vomit.”
Will’s eyes fall to my stained clothes. “You look terrible. What did you eat back there?”
Will knows I don’t own a car and is probably trying to figure out how I managed to jog so far—and so fast.
I point to the sky. “Did you know it was a full moon tonight?”
“I, uh . . . I can’t say I noticed.” There is a querying look in William’s eye.
“Look. Up there. See it?”
William is looking increasingly uncomfortable.
“A full moon.” I look in supposed awe at the moon and find to my disappointment that it is completely obscured from view.
William doesn’t bother looking. He is too busy staring at me—and wondering.
“Are you feeling okay, Douglas?”
I can see he is nervous. Not as nervous as some of his victims, but just a little on the edgy side. Will’s kills—my phrase, not his; maybe I should take up writing novels—have all happened at night, and I have come to the conclusion that Will is trying to make it sunny by putting on his fireball act.
“I’m fine, Will. Absolutely triple A-OK.”
“How did you get out here?”
“I was in the trunk of your car.” There is no real point in lying to him. Besides, the look on his face, a real look of absolute and utter noncomprehension, is worth all the honesty in the world.
“Listen, if you’d wanted a lift, all you needed to do was say.”
“That’s very kind of you, Will.”
He’s making small talk to try to buy himself time. In his mind, there is a dim light going on. He searches for the meaning behind the light, and I realize he is trying that old favorite—putting two and two together. I can almost see the slow grinding of his calculations. First there were a lot of killers, now there aren’t so many. He looks up, and I know he’s made the connection. He’s not a published author for nothing.
“You little punk!”
His hands are around my throat before I’ve got time to react. I realize the pummeling I have had in the trunk has slowed me down and I am not at my best. I gag as I feel the life being squeezed out of me.
“No-good little piece of shit!”
He is surprisingly strong for a hairless man, and as I find myself starting to black out, I do something I haven’t done since I was a kid: I jab my thumbnails straight into Will’s bulging eyeballs. He squeals, his grip eases, and I head-butt him as hard as I can across the bridge of his nose. As the stunned Will staggers back, I grab the gas pump and ram it into his mouth, clamping it there while I dump half a gallon of super-unleaded into him. His panicked eyes bulge when he sees my silver-plated cigarette lighter snap on.
“Ra-ra Rarara.”
It is over in seconds, and I nearly get a tan from the sunburst. To be fair, there isn’t a great deal of suffering, but I can always lie to Agent Wade about that.
I then turn and run. By my reckoning, I’ve got maybe eighty miles to cover. That’s almost three marathons.
Behind me, the garage explodes with a deafening roar, and when I look back I see a garage attendant staggering around, engulfed in flames. I wince and call out, “Whoops. . . .” But he doesn’t hear me as my voice is lost in another deafening explosion.
In my hand I clutch a memento—something I swiped from Will’s glove compartment several days earlier. I don’t really know what I’m going to do with a pair of false eyebrows, but I’m sort of hoping they’ll come in useful around Halloween.
THE LIST
AGENT WADE pulls up beside a plastic Hannibal Hanimal—a seven-foot-tall wolverine with a big canine-toothed smile. We’re in a new drive-in burger joint, and the windshield wipers are on fast speed as the rain lashes down. Agent Wade risks being drowned as he leans out the window and talks into the intercom installed in the wolverine’s chest.
“Gimme two specials . . . but make one a vegetarian.”
“I’m not vegetarian.”
Agent Wade regards me, frowns. “Yeah, you are. I saw the documentary on Grandson.”
“I’m not Grandson, remember?”
Agent Wade considers this for a moment. “Right. . . .” Then he speaks into the intercom again. “Hold the vegetarian. Apparently I’m sitting with a doppelgänger.” Agent Wade laughs to himself at this.
I turn away, watch the rain for a moment.
Agent Wade eventually leans back in the car and gives the plastic wolverine a thoughtful glance. “If that was real, I’d have to shoot it.”
“Yeah?”
“Animals that big are a threat to national security.”
I study him for a moment. “Listen, I never got the chance to say this, but thanks for the assist the other night.”
Agent Wade gives me a dismissive look. “With a plan like that, you needed all the help you could get.”
As we sit in the car eating our Hannibal Hanimal specials, which I paid for, Agent Wade gazes at the plastic Hanimals that litter the drive-in burger joint. Together with three more wolverines, there are four grizzlies, four leopards, three gorillas, five alligators, and what I think are a cluster of snapping turtles.
Agent Wade studies an angry grizzly rearing up in front of the car. “We should have gone to KFC. Portions are bigger.”
Agent Wade then unfolds
a typed page, and as I catch a glimpse of it, I realize it is a list of all the Club members. Agent Wade pulls out a pencil and flamboyantly puts a line through William Holden’s name. Nothing is said, but there is a mutual feeling of accomplishment. I notice that Agent Wade has even put the list in alphabetical order, and I feel I have let him down badly by starting halfway down the page.
TALLULAH BANKHEAD
RICHARD BURTON
CHER
TONY CURTIS
DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS JR.
BETTY GRABLE
WILLIAM HOLDEN
BURT LANCASTER
JAMES MASON
CHUCK NORRIS
As I study the page, I become a little alarmed.
“Uh, I don’t think I should be on the list. I’m not a serial killer.”
Agent Wade looks at me. “You’re not?”
“No.”
“But I thought . . . ?”
“Of course I’m not.” I give Agent Wade an indignant look.
He pauses before giving me a brief and uneasy smile. “Whatever you say, Doug.” He puts a big thick line through my name. “My mistake.”
TALLULAH BANKHEAD
RICHARD BURTON
CHER
TONY CURTIS
DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS JR.
BETTY GRABLE
WILLIAM HOLDEN
BURT LANCASTER
JAMES MASON
CHUCK NORRIS
We eat the rest of the meal in silence, the rain refusing to let up even for an instant. The plastic Hanimals get soaked, and one of the leopards short-circuits, sparking and fizzing before smoke starts pouring out of its mouth. Agent Wade was right—we should have gone to KFC.
As he slurps his milk shake he looks at me, weighing me up in a slightly unnerving fashion. I’m glad when he finally speaks.
“So, how come you’re still alive to tell the tale? I’d have thought the Club would’ve cottoned on to you by now.”
“Oh . . . I’m a pretty clever guy.”
“You are?”
“Like you need to ask. . . .” We share a knowing smile.
He holds my look. “Tell me all the same.”
