Darkscope

by J. Carson Black

  He leaned closer and aimed a kiss at her mouth. Chelsea pulled away, her skin crawling. She wondered how she could ever have spent a large chunk of her life wanting him.

  His lips hardened into a line. “What’s the matter, Chelsea?” he asked. “Have you gone over to the other side? Do you like women now?”

  Chelsea’s hand whipped out before she knew what she was doing. The slap cracked through the Sunday morning stillness. Jason grinned. “I guess I forgot all about your temper.” He stroked his red cheek.

  I’m sorry,” Chelsea said. “I shouldn’t have done that, but I’m tired . . . I have a lot of work to do. This whole thing is pointless. Please—”

  This time Jason’s arms closed around her like a vise. His mouth came down on hers like a rubber stamp. “I love you,” he mumbled against her hair. “Chelsea, I love you so much.”

  Chelsea managed to push him away and dodged through the door, slamming and locking it.

  “Chelsea,” Jason called. “Open the door.”

  “Go away,” Chelsea said, heart thumping wildly.

  “I’m not finished with you.” Jason’s voice sounded ugly. “You’ll see I’m not, you smart-ass rich bitch. You’ll see.”

  Chelsea watched from the window as Jason strode angrily to his car and drove away.

  Chelsea locked her doors that night, cursing herself for not taking Gary’s advice and putting in deadbolts. Every little noise made her jump.

  The following day she walked down to the drugstore to pick up the photographs, unconsciously looking for Jason’s rented car in the tourist district.

  Maybe he had given up and gone home.

  Chelsea picked up the photographs, resisting the urge to look at them immediately.

  Once she got home, she sat down at the kitchen table and spread them out, and thought again how like Tarot cards they were.

  She recognized the house right away. White-faced block, a wood-shingled hip roof. The house on Highway 90 near the San Pedro River. The car, too, looked familiar. She could make out a few letters on the side of the hood: P . . . A . . . K . . . D. Packard. The car she’d encountered just a few hours ago on the road from Sierra Vista. Only this car gleamed in the moonlight—brand, spanking new.

  Although the photographs were dark, Chelsea could make out the young woman standing in the doorway of the house. Kathy.

  There she was, walking away from the camera, laughing. A couple of shots of her standing by a wall. A photograph of a young man, covering his head with a coat, flashing the victory sign and waving a bottle of whiskey. One blurry photo of the same man, his back to the camera. Chelsea had an idea who he was.

  Two shots would remain indelibly printed into Chelsea’s mind. Kathy, her back flattened against the wall, looking like a cornered animal, staring at something beyond the picture frame. And the other photograph, taken from an odd angle as if the camera had fallen. Kathy lay on the floor, her eyes open in death. Blood pooled in the wound on her forehead. A man, fuzzy and indistinct because of his closeness to the camera, leaned toward her.

  The man’s hand was in clear view. He wore a ring on the third finger of his right hand. A distinctive ring, probably one of a kind. Two lions, entwined, holding a dark-green stone between them—But I knew it all along, didn’t I? I knew Uncle Bob had to have a reason to lie. I knew it because he had to have known Kathy if she’d been John’s lover. And now he smells like death, and that isn’t just a coincidence—It was Uncle Bob’s ring.

  INTERLUDE

  June 1942

  The gray Packard doused its lights and descended the last gentle slope before Tombstone, Arizona.

  A handful of twinkling lights glittered in the town, but the low mountains edging the desert were dark and silently watching.

  The car turned off the highway just short of Tombstone and cut across the desert, dust funneling behind it, to stop near a low, knobby hill.

  Two men emerged. The older man with the military bearing was used to power. It was apparent in the quick, efficient way he moved, the set of his jaw, how he wore his suit. His eyes were gray, like smooth, water-worn stones. Even in the darkness they gleamed with the feral light of a man accustomed to winning.

  The younger man walked around the car, his movements jerky and aimless. Tears ran down his face.

  “Quit sniveling, for God’s sake, and get over here!” the older man commanded. He opened the trunk of the Packard and reached inside.

  “I can’t.” The young man sat down on the running board of the car and rested his head on his hands. He was sobbing in earnest now.

  “You can and you will! This is your doing, and I’ll be damned if I’m pulling your chestnuts out of the fire myself!”

  “I’ll turn myself in. I’ll tell the sheriff that I—” The older man crossed over to the boy and slapped him once, hard, with the back of his hand. “You’ll do no such thing! Do you think I’m going to throw away everything I’ve worked for because of this? You’ll do as I tell you!”

  Between them, they carried the sheeted bundle from the car to the hill.

  Halfway up the knob, a gash darkened the earth like a ghastly open wound, and it was here that they would consign the bundle.

  “I didn’t mean to—”

  “Shut up.”

  “Oh God, I can’t—”

  “SHUT UP!”

  They let go of their burden. The sheet unfurled, and the young man thought he saw a hand waving before the bundle was swallowed by the darkness. Dislodged dirt and pebbles rained down. Then, far away, like a rag doll flung carelessly on a carpeted floor, a soft “whump.”

  They returned to the car.

  As the older man put the Packard in gear and swung back toward the highway, he permitted a moment of self-loathing for his part in the night’s events. Certainly this made him as guilty as his son? But there was no going back now, no reason to ruin two lives. A man had to be tough in this world and protect his own. He had a responsibility to the living.

  In the east, over the Dragoon Mountains, the sky lightened to a warm, apricot color. The stars were fading. A soft morning breeze had sprung up.

  It would be a beautiful morning.

  Part Four: The Evil Legacy

  Forty-two

  Yelapa, Mexico

  1980

  Jack stretched out on the canvas deck chair, the warm sand sheathing his feet like luxurious slippers. He did not open his eyes.

  Paradise. That’s what this place was. He pushed his RayBan sunglasses back up to the bridge of his nose, his ears tuned to the gently lapping water.

  He hadn’t worked on his project for days. It was easy to lose all sense of ambition here. The tall palms, the bay with its variegated shades of blue, teal, and green-gold, the brown-skinned village women . . . what a life! Late nights at the cantina where the candlelight yellowed the night and beer and pot and the native drink ricea seemed to flow into one another . . . and days in paradise, sketching the shifting colors of the jungle. A man could live a long time on very little money—a little drug-running here, a few days fishing there. Sooner or later, though, a person had to think about his future.

  He reached down and pulled a bottle of Corona out of the sand. Last night, Remedios had turned her sullen face to him and demanded that he get a job. What good was living with an Americano if he could not give her the good things? He was a lazy son of a bitch.

  Women. Why did he always get tangled up with them? They were his only real weakness. First Marie, now Remedios. He’d have to dump her. Not an easy task with that dried up little fig of a father watching his every move. But Jack was smart; he could extricate himself. Sometimes his rage at Remedios would build up inside, and he thought about taking her out to the jungle and—

  Restraint, Jack ol’ boy. You just have to practice restraint.

  But her words rankled just the same.

  Lazy son of a bitch.

  What did she know about lazy? I’m working, he thought. I’m working damn hard. Thinking is
working. Planning my future.

  And make no bones about it, Remedios had no place in his future.

  Jack shifted on the deck chair and opened his eyes. An old man, bent and brown, poled a canoe over to a large ponga moored in the bay. He reminded Jack of another old man. His “uncle.”

  The old man had wanted revenge; he’d mistakenly thought that Jack would get it for him. But Jack was nothing if not pragmatic. Emotion didn’t enter into his decisions. Money did.

  His mind returned to that first project—the one nearest and dearest to his own heart. One date. All she would give him—the snooty bitch. And then Marie had spoiled his chances forever . . .

  Not forever. Maybe someday he’d get back around to Bachelorette Number One. After all, she needed to learn a lesson. But it would have to be much later, when he was sure things had cooled down. Better to stay away from the States, at least for a while. The police might be looking for him. He couldn’t afford to let injured pride dictate his actions.

  Two days after Marie’s murder, Jack had picked up a paper at the local supermarket. There was a composite drawing of his face on the front page. Someone had seen him after all. He left LA that day and had been in Mexico ever since.

  No use thinking about that. Right now he had to concentrate on the subject at hand.

  The “subject at hand” was named Elena Velasquez. Her father owned a sugar cane plantation—the third richest plantation in Mexico. He and his daughter summered in Puerto Vallarta; the paper had announced their arrival last week. Jack had heard she was plain, although he hadn’t seen a picture. All the better. She would depend on him, adore him, need him.

  If Jack had his way, he wouldn’t have to resort to drug-running anymore. Already he was in trouble with a few people; already he needed the money that Elena Velasquez would gladly give him for love.

  He could pay off Serrano and forget about looking over his shoulder every day of his life.

  He stretched like a cat, sipped his Corona, and planned his meeting with the sugar-cane heiress.

  Forty-three

  “Bob McCord. Serving Arizona for a Lifetime,” the announcer boomed. A tanned, healthy Bob McCord walked through an enthusiastic crowd of well-wishers. Shirt-sleeves rolled up, he pressed the flesh.

  Chelsea’s finger found the remote button, and the TV screen went dark.

  Was Bob a statesman or a murderer? That particular tennis match had been going back and forth across her head all night long.

  Wouldn’t it be great if she could find an explanation to make all her suspicions blow away like dust? And maybe she could, except for one niggling little bit of knowledge: Kathy’s ghost wanted Uncle Bob. Kathy believed he had killed her.

  And she used me to find him.

  Outside, the night closed in.

  Forty-four

  Bob McCord tried to keep up the usual good-natured banter, tried to smile at all the people who came up to congratulate him on his campaign, but he couldn’t tear his thoughts away from the newspaper article.

  “You’re a shoo-in, Bob,” “Corkie” Bashkun said, clapping Bob on the shoulder. “Nothing can stop you now,”

  Bob would not be drawn out. “Time will tell. I won’t celebrate until the last returns are in on election day.”

  Frank Reyes, spokesman for the C.M. Tunney Corporation, announced today that the clean-up of the Tombstone Rose Mine will begin as early as Monday.

  The words burned in Bob’s mind as he went through the motions of greeting the patrons of the Tucson for Teens Ball. He laughed at several unfunny jokes, gave advice on certain stocks, accepted compliments, and elaborated his position on every possible issue—all the time wishing he could return to his house on Woodland Road, lock himself in his study, and read that article again. Maybe it was a different mine. There were a lot of mines around Tombstone. But he knew—with a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach—he knew.

  As Bob sat at the table nearest the dais, his gaze swept the room, registering the snowy tablecloths, the crystal, the elaborate place settings. He had always enjoyed events like this, always liked being the center of attention. But now all he could think of was that night so long ago when he and his father . . .

  In his mind he heard his father’s voice on the phone. “Stay where you are. I’ll meet you.” Bob thought that Lucas sounded more indignant than anything else. Another little mess to clean up. As if the whole thing were nothing more than a social gaffe—one that could endanger Lucas’s reputation. Never mind the girl, the blood running out of her in a sticky pool. . .

  Bob looked down at his plate—the usual fare for a hundred-dollar-a-plate dinner: salad, boeuf bourgignon, broccoli in cheese sauce, wild rice. Normally he enjoyed the food, but his appetite had dropped off recently. He was thin enough that people were beginning to look at him a second time, wondering if he might be ill.

  Who could guess what was really on his mind? Bob McCord: philanthropist, businessman, statesman, soon-to-be-governor. Killer.

  Lately his dreams had taken an even darker turn. Now he was afraid to fell asleep.

  The dream was always the same. He saw Kathy’s corpse coming across the moonlit cactus garden, her leg swinging out in a horrible, clumsy arc. The wound in her head was a dark, clotted hole. She grinned at him, reaching out a hand festooned with cobwebs.

  He hadn’t slept in days.

  Add to that the article in the Arizona Daily Star. The chance that the mining company would stumble across Kathy was remote—he knew that—but the cold needle of fear remained, throbbing in his stomach.

  Bob licked his lips. He needed to eat. He speared the salad again. The stuff was as tasteless as cardboard, but he forced himself to chew and swallow. The woman beside him asked him how his campaign was going.

  He gave one of his standard replies; something about his opponent outspending him three to one.

  Bob’s mind wandered to the newspaper article. He wished he could get away and think.

  “. . . suppose you will stay for the ball?”

  Bob touched the napkin to his lips. “I doubt it. I have to be up early.” He sounded brusque even to his own ears.

  The room seemed to close in. Babbling voices intruded on his thoughts, growing louder and louder. The room had become very bright. He closed his eyes, fighting nausea.

  “So how’s that beautiful great-niece of yours?” the man on his right asked.

  What was his name? He had contributed heavily to Bob’s campaign. “She’s fine. Enjoying Bisbee and her new teaching position at the college,” he replied. Myslicki? Meslovich? What was his goddamn name? His head was throbbing; heat ripped up through his neck to burn his ears.

  The clean-up will begin as early as Monday. So soon. So damned soon!

  They’re opening the Tombstone Rose, and what they’ll find, oh God, what they’ll find—

  He thought he just might be able to eat a little of the rice, but that was it. He lifted the fork to his mouth, trying to blot out the thoughts that bombarded him, his eyes fixed on his plate.

  That was when he saw the wild rice move.

  The dry, brown husks started to crawl. Like bugs, their brittle shells wobbling as they negotiated piles of rice, sliced almonds, raisins.

  He stopped chewing, the mouthful of rice a wet ball in his mouth, and watched the seething bugs. Bugs burrowing into piles of rice; bugs nesting; bugs waddling and falling on their backs, legs jerking spasmodically.

  Then he felt the prickle on the back of his tongue, and another between his teeth and gum. His eyes widened as he realized that the bugs were in his mouth! Bob clapped the napkin to his mouth and spat, feeling the little bodies squirming.

  Sure that they were all out of his mouth, he bit down. A dry husk cracked between his teeth. Sickened, he spat again, afraid to look into the pulpy napkin.

  “Is something wrong? Are you all right?” The woman’s voice dripped with false concern. A trail of bugle beads formed an “S” on the shoulder of her black dress. The p
earls at her throat had to be real. She looked like your everyday society matron, except that when she spoke, bugs gushed from her mouth and ran down her chin.

  “Bob? You’re not having a heart attack, are you?” she cried, spewing out more bugs. One crawled up into her nostril. Another burrowed into the indented place between her nose and lip. “Harry, what’s wrong?” She asked the man next to her as her lip split open and a worm wiggled out. “Bob? We’d better get him to a doctor.”

  By now the mass of bugs had covered the women’s entire face—shiny, dark, a mask of glittering movement.

  Bob rose from the table, knocking the crystal water glass over onto the white linen tablecloth. He crashed out of the room, the richly carpeted floor swaying under his feet. He reached the men’s room, jammed his hand on the Cold faucet, ducked his head into the basin. The water rushed into his mouth. He rinsed and spat repeatedly, wet his face, then sat down in a stall, shaking.

  Jerry Cochran came in. “Bob, old boy, what happened?”

  Bob wiped his face with a shaking hand. “Nothing. Really. I just felt a little sick.”

  Harry patted his shoulder. “Sounds like nothing to fool around with. Could be the heart. You’d better call Dr. Stern.” Bob nodded weakly.

  He didn’t think Dr. Stern could help him.

  Forty-five

  Green fields, tinged flaxen by fall, stretched to die river. Tattered leaves hung on the cottonwoods like bits of yellow-green paper clinging to the bones of a hundred broken fans. At the end of the dirt road, the house huddled near an enormous cottonwood tree in the last bloom of color before winter.

  Ben and Chelsea walked down a rutted dirt road toward the house. Air inversion had imbued the cloudless sky with a hazy quality; shapes in the distance appeared fuzzy and dark.

  “You’re sure this is the house?” Ben said.

  “It’s the only house around here.” Chelsea was glad Ben was back, glad to be taking some kind of action at last.