The Innocent Have Nothing to Fear

by Stuart Stevens

  The army didn’t know what to do with them after that, but they didn’t want to pick a fight with a governor’s son. So they just looked the other way and called it a “training accident.” Afterward, while Tyler was still going through the first of a dozen operations, their little group started to fall apart. Only crazy Tommy still talked about trying to get hired as a mercenary. The rest were like kids who were playing Cowboys and Indians and one day somebody put in real bullets and arrows and scared the crap out of everybody. Somerfield got out of the military and went to work for his dad. Tyler did his strip club/security service gig. They drifted apart, like any other group of guys who were close in the military or college and swore they’d always be close but, of course, it didn’t end up that way. It never did. They still loved the same music.

  “Then about six months ago, I’m at the club, and fucking Tommy Mayfield walks in. Back from the dead,” Tyler said, and looked at me. “Just like you, big brother who isn’t a brother. And just like you, he was all jacked up about Armstrong George. All this shit about how he could be president and we had to help him.”

  “Help?” I asked. “By doing what?”

  Tyler held up his hand. He was going to tell this in his own time. “You think I’m batshit crazy—don’t try to fucking deny it—but let me tell you, Tommy Mayfield was really batshit crazy. I play it up because it freaks people out and gives me an edge and maybe I am a little wacked. But he was loony tunes. Said he was trying to get in touch with Somerfield and couldn’t reach him. Wanted me to help. I bought him a lap dance and told him to relax and chill out. When he left, I called Somerfield and told him Tommy was fucking crazy and out there looking for him.”

  “You called Somerfield?” I said. “You had his number?”

  Tyler looked at me, head cocked with a flash of anger in his eyes. “A guy fucks up and blows you up, the least he can do is call back. And Somerfield isn’t a bad dude. Just weak. He told me he’d look out for Tommy. That was it. I figured Tommy was off being crazy Tommy until he called me a few days before you came to see me. Told me he was going to help Armstrong. Just watch.”

  “Before the first bomb,” I said.

  “Yep.”

  “So what the fuck did you do?” Jessie demanded. “Just sit back and wait for it to happen?”

  “Fuck you,” Tyler said tiredly. “I didn’t know what he’d do.”

  “Until he did it,” I said. “Then you could have gone to the cops.”

  “I didn’t know for sure.”

  “But you know now?” Jessie laughed. “Gimme a fucking break.”

  “It was the song. He posted it.”

  Tyler pulled out his phone and brought up a website: ConfederateDead.com. “It’s the site we had for the band. We would post tracks and lyrics we were working with. It was linked to a Dropbox account to back everything up. Tommy posted this a couple of days ago. It was laid down at one of the gigs we played at some shitkicker club. I never liked this mix but it was the version he loved.” He tapped his phone:

  Racial pride ain’t no racist hate.

  Cops beat down, no it’s not too late.

  On the news, in the streets,

  Doin’ it right, still take heat.

  Point a finger,

  Truth don’t matter,

  Got a gun.

  Get it done.

  Whole world’s gone crazy.

  We’re losin power but it just won’t last.

  Screw bodycam. Change is comin and it’s comin fast.

  Babies in the crib

  lyin in wait.

  grow up to game the system,

  But it ain’t too late.

  Clock strikes. Time ticks.

  Hold on. Don’t quit.

  Turn back time to when America was goin’ strong.

  Keep the faith. Do what’s right because it’s all gone wrong.

  Our walk, long walk. Our fight.

  Get yourself straight. Get it right.

  We’re losin power but it just won’t last.

  Screw bodycam. Change is comin and it’s comin fast.

  “Jesus Christ,” Jessie yelled, grabbing Tyler’s phone. “That is the worst piece of shit.”

  Tyler laughed but looked almost hurt. “That was our best song. Everybody loved it. ‘Death Sunrise.’ I love that name.”

  “Tyler,” Jessie said, “trust me. This song is why you are in the tittie bar business and not a famous rock star.”

  Tyler shrugged. “This was Tommy’s way of saying he was going to fuck things up. I know it was. I know Tommy. It’s how he thinks. The only people who still go on this site are me, Somerfield, and Tommy. We’re the only ones with the password. He’s talking to us. He wants Somerfield to know he’s trying to help his old man.”

  “That’s insane,” Jessie said.

  “But why’d you run here?” I asked. “Why didn’t you just go to the cops?”

  Tyler looked at me like I was drooling. “I run a strip club. I have thugs who work for me we call ‘security contractors.’ I pay off cops, city officials, and every kind of inspector. I was into the big bang-bang stuff in the army and there are emails out there where we were talking shit about going mercenary. I look like a freak. My mother was a fourteen-year-old babysitter and there’s no father listed on my birth certificate. You know that? ‘Father unknown’ is what it says. I checked.”

  I hadn’t known that and was suddenly ashamed that I’d never checked or asked.

  “You know what the fuck would happen to me if I called the cops and said, ‘Hey, this old pal of mine I used to blow shit up with may be blowing up some shit around town but I don’t have anything to do with it’? And say I did tell them, you think they would be any better at finding crazy Tommy than they are at stopping these bombs? You’ve got every kind of cop you ever heard of and a bunch you didn’t know existed in town and they can’t stop Tommy. So no, I didn’t call the cops.”

  Tyler stood up and looked out the cabin window. An NOPD cruiser was driving right toward the boat. He turned around and with one quick move grabbed the shotgun from Jessie. “What the hell?” she yelled, as he spun her around and pulled out the Glock she had stuck in the back of her pants.

  “Jesus,” Tyler said. “You called the cops. That was really goddamn stupid.” Then he relaxed and started to laugh. It was that half-crazed laugh I’d heard in the club the first time I visited him. “It’s our brother,” he said to me. “And that football buddy of his.”

  Tyler opened the door and pointed the shotgun at them.

  “Goddamn it!” Walter shouted.

  Tyler laughed and lowered the gun, and just as he was turning around Jessie kicked him hard in the balls. He doubled over, groaning. Jessie grabbed the shotgun and the Glock. Walter and Paul came on board and looked down into the cabin.

  “Oh Christ,” Paul said. “It’s Annie Oakley again. Every time I see you, you’ve got another gun.” He looked down at Tyler, who was lying on the floor, holding his crotch. “How’s it hanging, bro?” He looked around the boat and whistled. “Sweet. And you never invited me? What the hell happened to family ties?”

  Walter pushed Paul into the cabin and shut the door. “Shut up and listen,” he said. In the distance we could hear a helicopter. “That’s Joey Francis’s boys. They are looking for this guy.” He pointed to Tyler, who was just getting up. “And if we can find this boat, they sure as hell can.”

  “Jesus,” Tyler moaned, then laughed that crazy laugh. “That hurt like a bastard.”

  Walter listened to his police radio through an earpiece. “We really should go. Now.”

  We hurried off the boat. I started to walk back to Jessie’s car. “Hey,” Walter yelled, “in here.” He opened the trunk of his NOPD cruiser and motioned to Tyler and me to get in.

  “Are you kidding?” Tyler asked, but then we heard the helicopter again and we both got in. It was terrible and crowded, and Tyler smelled like fear. I probably did too. I pulled out my phone and dialed Paul in the f
ront seat.

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “Shut up,” he said as we both heard sirens. In a minute the car stopped, and then I heard Joey Francis talking to Walter.

  “Boat’s empty,” Walter said. “Just checked it out.”

  “Did you, now? And you brought your own reporter?”

  Jessie was following in her car.

  “Sure did,” Walter said. “If I busted the bastard, I wanted to get all the credit.”

  Francis laughed. “Honest, at least. What a fucking mess.”

  “Yep.”

  “Walter, look, if you’re fucking with me, just remember I can fuck you worse. Okay? And don’t associate with known gambling degenerates. It’s bad for the department’s reputation.”

  “Good to see you too,” Paul said.

  In a minute we were moving. “Tyler,” I whispered, and then I realized that he was snoring. Snoring. The guy was asleep. I tried to count back how many hours it had been since I’d been the campaign manager for the vice president of the United States. Now I was in the trunk of a cop car with my strange quasi-brother, on the run from the FBI. It had been humiliating with Sandra, but this was far worse.

  The car stopped, and the trunk opened. Paul looked down at us. “Is he really asleep?” He laughed, shaking Tyler, who woke with a start. “Easy, tiger.”

  I crawled out of the trunk and looked around. We were parked in a small garage. Just as I was about to ask where we were, Tobias Green opened the door that led into the house. “First time I ever was glad to see a police car at my house. Come on in.”

  Tobias’s house was a cross between a mid-seventies bachelor pad and a civil rights museum.

  “Good God,” Jessie said. “That’s a disco ball.” She jumped up and touched the silver ball. “This is like Barry White’s love nest.”

  “Barry was here more than once,” Tobias said. “I introduced him to some fine local talent.”

  “Is he kidding?” Jessie asked me.

  Tyler was the last one to come in from the garage. When Tobias saw him he smiled and moved straight to him and wrapped him in a big hug. I could see Tyler’s confused look over Tobias’s bony shoulder. Tobias held Tyler at arm’s length and said, “It’s really good to see you, Tyler. I want you to know something. Your father was a great man. He wasn’t a perfect man, but he was a great man.”

  Tyler looked confused, then his face softened. “Yeah, well, thanks.”

  “I’ve got an idea,” I said. “This Confederate Dead site, you can post to it, right?”

  Tyler nodded.

  “And you think your pal Tommy is checking it?”

  “Who’s Tommy?” Walter asked.

  “Oh God,” Jessie moaned. “You have any beer?” she asked Tobias.

  “A pretty girl asks for a beer in this house, she—”

  “Oh Jesus fuck,” Jessie said, “just get me a beer. Please.”

  “He’s checking the site. I know he is,” Tyler said.

  “So you send him a message. But do it as Somerfield. Tell him he wants to meet him. Tell him that you told him what he was doing and he wants to meet.”

  Tyler thought for a moment. “I could do that. He’d do anything to see Somerfield.” He nodded his head. “It’s not stupid,” he said, and pulled out his phone.

  While Jessie sat at Tobias’s kitchen counter drinking beer and trying to explain to Walter, Paul, and Tobias what Tyler had told us about Tommy, Tyler signed on to the Confederate Dead site. He left a message for Tommy that read, “Zolly, cavalry still rides. Bless you. Meet at Founders House to talk next raid? Mosby.”

  “Zolly, Mosby? Founders House?” I asked.

  Tyler looked embarrassed, which was a strange thing for him. “We all took names of Confederate cavalry generals. Tommy is Felix Zollicoffer. Somerfield is John Mosby. I’m Jeb—Jeb Stuart. It’s stupid, I know.” He sighed. “Founders House is—”

  “Beauvoir,” I said. “Jeff Davis’s house.”

  Tyler nodded. “Did you ever play Dungeons and Dragons?” he asked.

  “God no.”

  “We had our own world like that but with the Confederacy.” He thought for a moment. “Stupid.”

  It took half an hour for Tommy—Zolly—to reply. While we were waiting, I watched the news of the convention. It was humiliating to be reduced to getting news like a regular civilian. The convention had called a suspension for a day after the car bombing at the motel. More delegates were leaving town. I knew that Eddie would be going crazy trying to track which delegates were leaving, who the alternates were, and what it would do to our hard count. His hard count. The official delegate count for Vice President Hilda Smith, which now most definitely was not our hard count. It was another perfect Armstrong George moment. He was promising that his New Bill of Rights would protect Americans and that a strong leader would guarantee the first right: the right of personal safety. He blamed the bombing on “terrorists who threaten our democracy and are opposed to my strong stance against the criminals and illegals in our society.” That he didn’t have any particular evidence for this didn’t seem to bother anyone.

  I called Paul Hendricks on his cell. “Jesus, is this the dead man talking?” he said when he answered.

  “And like a dead man, I want this OTR, good?” I knew he’d agree to off the record. He might even stick to it, though that was always a crapshoot.

  “From the grave,” he said. “What you got?”

  I told him that I’d heard he was going to report that some of the delegates loyal to Hilda Smith were thinking about defecting to Armstrong George, and I’d been checking around and didn’t think there was anything to it. Not a word of that was true, but I knew how he would play it.

  “I’ve been working on that,” he said coyly. “You really don’t think there’s anything to it?”

  “It’s bullshit,” I said. “Their biggest complaint was that Eddie wasn’t calling them back and stroking them enough, but I told them to give the guy a break, he was swamped.”

  “Got it,” Hendricks said. “Don’t suppose you want to give me some names of who was calling you?” I named two delegate chairmen who I knew hated Hendricks and would never talk to him. “So look, J.D., what’s the story with you? All kinds of rumors going around. Why don’t you give it to me and let me break it with your side of the story?”

  “Let’s just say I had an issue with some stuff in the campaign. So we parted ways. Complicated. But I’ll make a deal. Don’t do anything, and when it’s time I’ll give you the exclusive. Cool?”

  He snapped at that like a starving man offered bread. Just like I knew he would.

  Within five minutes, Paul Hendricks was reporting that he had confirmation from party chairmen loyal to Vice President Hilda Smith that they were facing defections. Among the problems was lack of response from Eddie Basha, the new acting campaign manager for the vice president. It was exactly what I knew he would do. Fuck you, Eddie Basha.

  The message came in from “Zolly” asking if “Mosby” could meet tomorrow at the Founders House at the usual time. Tyler wrote back as Mosby that he would be there.

  “The usual time?” I asked.

  “That’s nine twenty-four in the morning. When Pickett launched his charge. We used to text each other at that exact time on July Fourth every year.”

  “You got to be fucking kidding me,” Jessie said. Tyler shrugged.

  “You really think he will show?” Walter asked.

  “He’ll be there,” Tyler said.

  “You remember our deal,” Walter said to me.

  “What deal?” Jessie and Tyler asked together.

  I waved it off. “Walter wants credit for any arrests. Don’t you need to bring in some help?”

  “It’s called backup,” Jessie said.

  “Is she always such a bitch?” Tyler asked.

  “Pretty much,” Jessie answered.

  “We’re talking one crazy guy?” Walter said. “No, I think I can handle it.” />
  Tyler asked, “What will happen to Tommy?”

  “Tyler,” Tobias said in his deepest voice, “he needs help. This acting out is a cry for help.”

  “Acting out?” Jessie said. “Acting out is when you get stoned on your class trip. This is a whole level above ‘acting out.’ ”

  Tobias looked at Jessie, smiling broadly. “You are a magnificent creature.”

  “Oh God,” Jessie said. “Now it’s the Wild Kingdom.”

  Chapter Ten

  I’D DRIVEN PAST BEAUVOIR, a big white house facing the Gulf, hundreds of times, but I’d never been inside. “This place really means something to you?” I asked Tyler when we were driving over early the next morning. It was just the two of us in Tobias’s old Lincoln Continental. It drove like a boat floating on air. It took a full half turn of the steering wheel to get any response, but it was comfortable like a deep-cushioned couch.

  “Can you imagine a bigger fuck-you to the government than seceding and starting your own country? That’s why we love it. It’s not all that slavery bullshit. It’s just the balls to walk away and say you won’t put up with the bullshit any longer. You spend some time in the army and that has a lot of appeal. Just the biggest screw-the-system protest in the history of the country.”