The Edge of Reason

by Melinda Snodgrass

  Grenier’s eyebrows lifted in delighted surprise. “Oh, really?”

  With his left hand Richard removed the badge from his inside breast pocket and flipped open the leather case. With his right hand he pulled the warrant out of his coat pocket and opened it with a snap of the wrist.

  “I’m here to arrest Douglas Andresson and return him to New Mexico for trial. I’m also arresting you for aiding and abetting a felon in contravention of his parole agreement and assisting in his flight to avoid prosecution. Add to that harboring a fugitive.”

  For a long moment Grenier just stared at him, then he threw back his head and laughed, roaring out his amusement. When he finally stopped, Grenier mopped at his streaming eyes. “Are you completely out of your mind?”

  But Grenier was keeping well beyond Richard’s reach, and Richard knew he was going to have to force the issue.

  “I’m Mark Grenier. I pray with presidents, and make and break political candidates. One heartfelt plea on my network and I can raise five million dollars in a day. An outraged commentary can bring a network to its knees.”

  “And you bring monsters into our world,” Richard said.

  “They were already here. Since we developed a cerebral cortex they’ve been here. A million years of human evolution and they’re still here. Kenntnis hasn’t defeated them yet. You can’t win and I don’t back losers. When the gates finally open I won’t be one of the cattle.”

  “No, you’ll be a sonderkommando for the human race,” Richard said. “Well, someone has to stop you.” And Richard reached into the holster at the small of his back and pulled out the hilt.

  Panic replaced contempt, and Grenier retreated behind his desk, yelling, “Doug, Bruce, Willie, get in here now!”

  A door on the side of the living room opened. Two big men, one black and one white, charged through, followed by Doug Andresson.

  “Get that away from him!”

  Richard lifted his right hand toward the hilt, but a shovel-sized hand slammed against his wrist. His fingers went numb. He dropped the hilt. The black man slapped him along the side of the head, setting his ears to ringing. Then he was firmly gripped between them.

  Andresson, grinning happily, removed the Firestar from Richard’s shoulder holster, then gave him a rough, ball-grabbing pat down. “Like that, don’t you, sweetie?” Andresson said.

  “Doug,” Grenier snapped out. “Leave that to Bruce and Willie. Get the sword.”

  Andresson picked up the hilt and walked over to Grenier. He pushed it at Grenier, who flinched back. “Want to inspect it?”

  “Go. Work with it.”

  “What do you want us to do with him, sir?” the white goon asked.

  “Lock him up downstairs.”

  “He’s a cop, sir,” Willie said.

  “Who is well out of his jurisdiction, and who threatened me.”

  The two big men hustled him toward the door. Richard, feet barely touching the floor, had a moment of panic. He quelled it and forced himself to call back over his shoulder, “I guess this means you’re resisting arrest?”

  Chapter TWENTY-EIGHT

  Even through the surgical mask Angela could smell the burned yeast smell of cutting bone. The saw clawed through the sternum of the body on the metal autopsy table. The wide curving light above the table threw everything into harsh relief.

  Eighties rock ’n’ roll blared from the radio, and the bone saw howled. Sometimes Angela imagined that the bones themselves were screaming. The voice of the receptionist came over the intercom, barely audible above the other racket.

  “Angie, Lieutenant Weber is here. He wants to see you right away. Says it’s urgent.”

  Angela turned off the saw and handed it to her assistant. “Get him open. I’ll only be a minute.”

  She stripped off her gloves, gown and mask and dumped them in the waste receptacle.

  Weber waited in the front office. “I’m in the middle of an autopsy,” Angela said.

  In answer he held out a piece of paper. It weighed heavy in the hand, fine stationery, cream colored, swirling with watermarks. Words flowed across the page, small and precise, with that strange vertical shape of a left-handed writer.

  “This arrived this morning by Federal Express,” Weber said as Angela began to read.

  Dear Damon,

  I know that certain revelations have caused an estrangement between us. I’m sorry for that, and believe me when I say I understand, and I don’t blame you. But I also believe that you are a good and honorable man which is why I’m writing to you now.

  I need your help, and if any trace of affection or friendship still remains for me I hope you will respond.

  Mark Grenier is a murderer and has attempted murder time and time again. His latest victim was my mother, driven to suicide by one of his people. And I can’t prove any of it. I have to bring down both him and his organization and I have to use reason’s tools, not mythic weapons to do it.

  The best I have is his involvement with Andresson, removing him first from New Mexico and then from Texas. I convinced Jennifer Salisbury to have a warrant issued. A weak reed that will never survive judicial review, but it’s enough to get me into his compound.

  By the time you read this I will have gone to Virginia to serve the warrant and make my arrests. I’m counting on Grenier being unable to resist the chance to obtain the sword. Everything that’s been done to me and mine has been done in an effort to get me to turn over the sword. Since bribes and intimidation haven’t worked I think he’ll resort to force.

  Remember, Grenier has his own paladin in Andresson. They want the sword. That need will overrun any caution. So while the other charges—aiding, abetting and harboring a fugitive, may be bullshit—imprisoning a police offer most definitely is not.

  I will try to hang on until you come … .

  I hope you will come.

  Your friend,

  Richard

  “Oh fuck,” said Angela, and shoved the letter back into Weber’s hands.

  Boot heels clattered as she ran for the doors. She hit the bar with both hands, sending the door flying open, and went plunging out into the parking lot.

  Weber, in close pursuit, called, “Wait. Where are you going?”

  “To Kenntnis.”

  “Why him?”

  “He’s got a plane.” Angela looked back at him. “You are coming, aren’t you?”

  Weber looked down at the letter still clutched in his hand. He set off toward his car with fast long strides that had Angela running to keep up.

  “Who the devil are you? Why the hell are you interfering in my son’s life? And what in God’s name is this?”

  The hilt landed in the center of Kenntnis’s granite desk and gave its bell-like cry. Robert Oort jumped and retreated a few steps as the perfect overtones echoed and reechoed through the room then slowly faded. Oort stared at the hilt with the air of man for whom the rules had changed, the situation had become confusing, a man who resented the hell out of it.

  Kenntnis also felt as if the ground had shifted when the hilt came out. He had been surprised but unperturbed to hear that Judge Robert Oort waited downstairs. Kenntnis assumed that Richard had tried to communicate something of his new understanding to his father, and now it was up to Kenntnis to make it explicable. The sight of the sword changed all that.

  Resting his fists on the desk, Kenntnis levered himself to his feet and inclined his head to the judge. “I am Kenntnis. How do you do?”

  “Not well,” snapped Oort.

  “Neither do I, now,” Kenntnis said. He picked up the hilt. “How did you come by this?”

  “My son left it for me, along with a first-class plane ticket to Albuquerque, and this … this … gibberish.” Oort handed over a folded piece of paper. Kenntnis unfolded it and read,

  Dear Papa,

  So by now you’ve found this object and the first-class ticket on the red-eye out of Logan to Albuquerque. And you’ve dismissed this as ravings by your gri
eving weakling of a son.

  Don’t.

  This thing that I’ve left for you is of incalculable value. It would be impossible for me to explain its powers and purpose in a letter. Kenntnis will explain it all to you just like he did for me. Just believe me when I say it holds back the darkness, and many people’s fates, not the least of them mine, hinge on its safe return to its creator. I think Kenntnis made it; at any rate he is certainly its custodian.

  Thanks to Kenntnis I’ve realized that I’m not weak. And now I’m going to prove it to you by bringing Mama’s murderers to justice. They manipulated her into suicide, trying to force me to give them this thing. Obviously I can’t have it when I confront them.

  I know I’ve been a disappointment to you. Kenntnis says it’s your problem, not mine, but it still affects me and makes it hard for me to ask this favor of you now. But I must. I know your character—your honor, integrity and sense of duty. Despite our differences I trust you. I’m begging you, take this object to New Mexico and return it to Kenntnis at Lumina Enterprises.

  Papa, guard this thing with your life. Tell no one you have it, and give it into no one’s keeping except Kenntnis’s. Please do this for me.

  Kenntnis says I don’t have to like you, much less love you. You’ve certainly made it hard for me to, but I’ve decided that I do love you, Papa. I hope someday you’ll love me too.

  Richard

  Kenntnis looked up from the letter and met Robert Oort’s furious blue-eyed gaze. The judge made a gesture of distaste. “Richard has always had a taste for hyperbole and the overly dramatic. So did his mother.” His lips twisted, a complex mix of grief and disgust.

  Kenntnis dropped the letter. The paper fluttered down as broken and ephemeral as the family. “There’s nothing hysterical about this. It’s a masterful job of manipulation. How many times did he refer to me?” He picked up the letter and scanned it again. “Seven times. When he really didn’t need to mention me by name at all. He made this about you and me. You wouldn’t have come here for him, but you’d come here to kick my ass for interfering in his life.” He handed the letter back to the judge.

  “I think you give him too much credit,” came the dismissive response.

  “You really don’t know this kid at all, do you?” Kenntnis asked, disgusted and amazed at the man’s obtuseness.

  “He’s my son. I think I know him better than you,” Oort said.

  “You’d be wrong,” Kenntnis shot back. “So, let’s try another question. Richard’s question. Do you love him?”

  Kenntnis watched the conflicting emotions play in the dark blue eyes. Kenntnis knew the type. Usually male, terrified by emotional displays because they feared the power of their own emotions. Certain if they ever expressed their feelings they would be overpowered by them.

  “I will not discuss any of this.” Oort edged the words with fight. “I came here for some very specific answers.” The letter crumpled as his hand clenched.

  “And you’re going to get some, and probably not like any of them. Now, sit down!” Kenntnis rarely used that voice on humans anymore. It still worked.

  Oort dropped into the big armchair, the same one Richard had selected all those weeks ago. The man gripped the padded leather arms, and looked about as if wondering how he’d come to be there.

  Kenntnis rested a hip on the edge of his desk. “Your son loves you. He won’t permit a word to be said against you, even though you are clearly a son of a bitch and a self-righteous prick. He’s also quite afraid of you because … Did I mention this before? You’re a son of a bitch and a self-righteous prick. So he tries desperately to win your approval, and you piss on him every time.”

  It was clear where Richard got his guts. Oort came out of the chair and stood quivering in front of Kenntnis. “How dare you! I won’t listen to this.” He tried to move around Kenntnis toward the door.

  “Oh, no, no you don’t. I’m just getting started.” Kenntnis placed a hand on Oort’s chest, and pushed him back down into the chair. “First you kill his musical ambitions—”

  “He kept auditioning and auditioning, and never getting hired,” Oort shouted. “I asked how much longer he was going to go on with this, and then he admits to me that he didn’t have the talent to succeed.”

  “So you demanded he quit.”

  “He was drifting,” Oort said.

  “So what? He wasn’t sponging off you, was he?” Kenntnis asked.

  “That’s not the point. It’s not what we do. We work. We’re a family that serves. We gave him every opportunity; foreign travel, private schools, a fine college. He never follows through on anything.” Oort gave Kenntnis a bitter smile. “And what does it say about Richard’s character that he’d meekly quit on my say-so. You make him out to be a paragon. In fact, he’s weak.”

  “Do you like that he’s become a policeman?”

  “No.”

  “Made that pretty clear, have you?” Oort didn’t verbally reply, but the answer was in his face. “Hasn’t quit yet, has he? And by the way, he’s a damn fine policeman.”

  “And now he’s run off to God knows where in pursuit of enemies that don’t exist. My wife committed suicide!” Oort choked, clenched his jaw and looked away. “So he’ll probably lose this job too.”

  “Ah, yes, that other job,” Kenntnis said. “That job that you got him. Let’s talk about that job.” Oort looked up, a sharp glance, for he’d heard the threat purring in Kenntnis’s voice. Then the judge’s eyes were quickly veiled by lowered lashes.

  “You suspected something, didn’t you?” Kenntnis said. “All this bullshit about a random mugging, but the doctors wouldn’t tell you anything about his injuries because Richard wouldn’t let them. Easier to blame Richard, keep thinking of him as a failure. What kept you from finding out? Fear of what you might discover? Or what that discovery might say about your judgment and acuity?”

  Oort jerked to his feet and pushed past Kenntnis, seeking open air and relief from Kenntnis’s accusatory presence. Kenntnis didn’t give him any respite. He closed in once more. “Let me tell you what Richard suffered at the hands of your good friend.”

  And he did. Holding back nothing. Softening none of the ugly details. Oort ended up hunched over the desk palms flat against the granite, relying on the stone to keep him upright.

  “For four years your son has carried this secret, and a crushing load of guilt and shame. Never telling anyone. Until me. I held him while he cried. It should have been you, but he couldn’t tell you. Not because he thought it would lower him in your estimation. He knows where he stands with you—the failure, the disappointment, the weakling. He kept it from you because he didn’t want to hurt you!” Kenntnis swept up the letter, smoothed out the creases and glanced through it again.

  “You don’t deserve this boy! Despite everything he still turns to you as the person he most trusts in the world. Though you sure as hell don’t deserve it. If he says he’s gone to bring your wife’s killers to justice—”

  The office doors flew open and Angela and Weber charged in. Kenntnis looked from the letter clutched in the policeman’s hand and back down to the one he held.

  “Richard’s gone after Grenier,” Angela panted.

  “We need your plane,” Weber said, then hurriedly added, “Please.”

  “They’ve got the sword,” Angela concluded in a tone fraught with dismay.

  Kenntnis reached around Oort and held up the hilt. “No. No, they don’t.”

  “Sword?” came faintly from the judge.

  Weber raised his eyebrows and pointed at Oort. “Richard’s father,” said Kenntnis shortly as he headed for the door.

  “Don’t we owe him an explanation?” Weber asked.

  “No. He hasn’t earned one yet.”

  “Sword?”

  Richard wasn’t certain how long he’d been in the basement cell since Willie had helped himself to Richard’s watch and the family signet ring. It was silly, given his overall predicament, but worry
over how his father would react to that loss was his foremost thought. The ring had been given to every Oort son on his twentieth birthday since 1797. Now he had lost it.

  Four concrete walls surrounded him. One was pierced with a heavy metal door. Despite his fear and tension, hunger gnawed at Richard’s belly, and his tongue felt swollen from thirst.

  Underfoot was more concrete with a six-inch drain set in the middle of the floor. Overhead a high wattage bulb burned behind a wire grate. The light reflecting off the white-gray walls made his eyes water and his head ache. There wasn’t a stick of furniture or any sort of sanitary facility. Eventually he urinated down the drain.

  They had taken his suit coat and emptied his pants pockets. It was cold in just his shirtsleeves, and the hard floor made his seat bones ache. Richard stood and walked in brisk circles, trying to beat back the damp chill.

  He wondered how long he had been locked up. Hours certainly. A day? He couldn’t tell. And a larger problem loomed. He was a police officer being held against his will, but right now it was his word against an internationally famous evangelical minister that the imprisonment had occurred. He needed more.

  A key rattled in the lock. The door opened and Bruce entered. Richard thought he came alone, but Andresson stepped out from behind Bruce’s camouflaging bulk. Andresson’s full underlip protruded in a childlike pout, but the eyes were mean. Richard watched the hilt flip back and forth as Andresson tossed it from hand to hand.

  Andresson closed to within inches. His breath was hot, rank and sour on Richard’s face. “How the fuck do you make it work?” He shook the hilt. “Mark and me have been tryin’ and tryin’, and now he’s checking out some books, and maybe he’s even gonna talk to the faces, but I figured, what the fuck, I got you.”

  The door stood open behind Andresson. It seemed in character to make a break for it. Richard used his shoulder to shove Andresson aside, and bolted through the door. Stiff muscles seemed to crack as he barreled into a run. Glancing over he saw the keys hanging in the lock. Stunned by their stupidity, Richard began to swing the door closed, other hand grabbing for the keys. Even if he succeeded in locking them in, Richard didn’t figure he’d get out of the house much less the compound.