by Billy Wells
"We all had a big laugh at your expense for days, maybe even weeks,” the officer said. “Listen, I knew Mason well, and I'm sorry to say I know he's really dead. You won't believe this, but, about two years ago, he went to Chicago on a new lead he had on the incident at Treasure Trove Zoo. The very day he arrived, a tiger that had escaped from the zoo there attacked and killed him in a park. Can you believe how weird a coincidence that is? And, just like at Mount Glory, the tiger was never found.”
A chill ran up Norma's spine as she digested what the dispatcher had told her.
“Jake Robbins, Mason's partner at the time, is here. Would you like to speak with him?”
Norma hesitated and finally said, "No, not right now. Thanks for the information. I'm sorry to hear about Mason. He was a good cop.” Norma hung up the phone and went to the window overlooking the street below.
“What did he say?” Todd asked.
Norma pulled back the curtain, and, looking down, she saw the red-faced, muscular trainer sitting on a bench across the street staring up at her. He wore a T-shirt with a picture of a Bengal tiger sporting a mouthful of sharp teeth.
When Atlas saw her returning his stare, he lifted his right hand upward and pointed the finger of his imaginary gun in her direction.
Norma retreated inside and closed the curtain. Trying not to appear upset, she decided not to say anything to Todd about Atlas watching their room from below. She knew Todd would call the police if she told him Atlas had followed them back to the hotel.
She went to the minibar, took out two miniature bottles of tequila, and poured both of them into one of the glasses on the credenza. She took a sip and sat down on the sofa. She knew her next course of action could be one of the most important decisions of her life.
She watched her precious children playing a video game nearby on their Xbox, and she took another drink of the tequila. She wished she had some ice, some salt, and a slice of lime, but that was the least of her problems right now. Would Atlas be coming for her at some point now that he knew where she was staying, or was he just trying to put the fear of God in her if she was thinking of calling the police? Why else would he be sitting on a bench directly in front of her room so she could see him? Sitting there made no sense, unless he just hadn’t decided what he wanted to do. After all, he had no way of knowing if she had called the police or not.
She sat still pondering the same questions unanswered from all those years ago. If only she had not gone skating on that Saturday morning, her parents would surely still be alive and enjoying their grandchildren. It’s funny how being at the right place at the right time can place the winning lottery ticket in your hand, and, just as easily, in the next split second, you can turn your head and get creamed by a speeding taxi as you step from the curb.
Life is a series of narrow escapes and random collisions. She recalled falling asleep at the wheel while driving on a two-lane highway in Alabama. She awoke on that night, driving in her subconscious at fifteen miles an hour with twenty cars behind her who couldn’t pass because of the eighteen-wheelers booming by. If she had wandered into the left lane, her life would’ve probably ended that night.
She also recalled what her uncle had told her about her grandfather asking her dear old grandma if anything was coming before he pulled into the road without looking himself. Her uncle in the backseat remembered clearly, she said, “Go ahead,” and Grandpa pulled in front of a dump truck, and three of the four passengers were killed instantly because of that deadly miscommunication. Norma had an eerie feeling in the pit of her stomach as she pondered what to do about Atlas.
From out of nowhere, Todd appeared and began to pace in front of her like a jungle cat in a cage. Finally he stopped short and stood looking at her with a big question-mark expression written all over his face. “Well, you know what has to be done, Norma.”
“It's not that simple, Todd,” Norma said firmly. “Atlas is a mean son of a bitch. He never liked people, only his animals. I don't know if he was responsible for what happened that day or not.”
“You said that Chester was too stupid to plan all that happened … that he had to be doing what someone else told him to do.”
“A lot of scenarios went around in my mind about what happened, but nothing was ever conclusive. All I know is, I don't want to meet Atlas in a dark alley someday, particularly with you and the children. He's a maniac when he gets mad. I saw him take on a man twice his size once, and he made mincemeat out of him. The poor bastard who crossed him was in a wheelchair for almost a year.”
“How can he harm us if he's in jail?”
“Think, Todd. How many times have you seen a plea bargain on a million TV shows that allows someone to walk who was guilty of the crime? Even if he’s convicted, he won't be in jail forever, unless they can prove the deaths were premeditated.”
A worried look creased Todd’s face, his rock-hard chin softened, and his steadfast resolve started to crumble.
Norma could tell Todd was finally beginning to see the darker picture, and continued, “What if he gets out in five years? What if he isn't even convicted and something happens to Goliath because of us?”
Todd scratched his head and said a lot more meekly, “So you want to let sleeping dogs lie?”
“We're not talking about dogs, Todd. A tiger devoured Mason when he followed a lead on the case to Chicago.”
“What?” he stammered. “Well, let's pack up right now and get the hell back to Mount Glory. I recommend we forget we ever saw the psycho.”
Todd went to the minibar, poured two miniature bottles of Jack Daniel’s into a glass, and took a long pull. His face reddened, and his hand was visibly shaking.
Good old Todd, Norma thought. A real American hero. She rose from the sofa a little unsteady on her feet and moved quickly toward the balcony. Pulling back the curtains a crack, she looked down at the empty bench across the street. Atlas was gone. She felt that cold chill creep up her spine again.
She pulled the drawstring, and the drapes parted in the center. Opening the slider, she stepped quickly onto the balcony. Moving to the railing, she looked up and down the street for Atlas, but he was nowhere in sight.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Todd rise from the sofa and move toward the door to the outside hallway. After a beat, a sudden pang of apprehension gripped her as she turned toward him and saw him mouthing, “Did you call room service?”
She saw a one-armed man in a white uniform pushing a food tray aside, revealing a black gun with an extra long barrel in his only hand. And like something from her worst nightmare, she saw the top of Todd’s head explode in a cloud of blood and gore. Two quick bursts sent her precious Cindy and Aidan to heaven as Atlas moved quickly toward her. This time with no trace of a smile, he lifted his good arm and pointed directly at her nose only ten feet away, the same as he’d done at the zoo and on the bench across the street. But this time, instead of his finger, he was pointing the big black gun with a hole in the barrel the size of Texas.
One shot splattered Norma’s head all over the room.
Atlas remembered how cute Norma had been when she had worked at Treasure Trove Zoo those two summers. Her tight little ass and perky little breasts were legendary, particularly when she wore that heart-shaped lime-colored top.
The gun he'd brought today was even more powerful than the .44 Magnum which Dirty Harry used in the movies and had made a real mess. Using it to kill a human being was like shooting at a rabbit with a bazooka. He’d originally bought it for insurance in case one of the big cats became unruly and got that feral look in their eye. The bullwhip usually kept them in line, but twice it hadn't, and the gun had saved his life. Thank God, he’d never had to use it on Goliath.
He didn't feel rushed since the silencer had deadened the sound of the shots inside the room. He removed the cash from the husband’s wallet and Norma’s purse. He didn’t bother with the credit cards, the jewelry, or the kids’ wallets. He wasn’t a thief.
Suddenly he heard the pitiful cry of a little boy from the next room.
“Mommy, I had an accident.”
Atlas paused in his tracks, wondering who else might be in there. He’d only seen the four of them at the zoo.
He moved stealthily toward the child’s voice with his gun at the ready. In the doorway of the bathroom in the adjoining hallway, a small boy clutched a black-and-orange stuffed tiger. The kid had a chocolate fingerprint on his shirt and a big wet stain on the front of his trousers.
The little boy stared at Atlas’s one muscular arm with a mixture of wonder and surprise in his big innocent brown eyes.
Atlas raised the gun and aimed it at the child’s head, but the little tiger the boy was holding gave him pause. The kid was only three or four. Did he really need to waste him like a bug on the sidewalk? Even a heartless bastard like himself had a limit to his level of unabashed depravity. He doubted the little pip-squeak would remember him at all.
Atlas returned the gun to its place behind his back in his belt, made his way to the door, and slowly opened it. Peering into the hall, he saw nothing but a cart of bed sheets outside one of the rooms. He removed the sign Service Requested from the inside of the door handle and placed it on the handle outside.
Eventually someone would see the sign and find the kid if he hadn't fallen from the balcony by then. Atlas thought about putting some sheets over the dead bodies, for the kid's sake, but decided not to take the time. He removed his room service uniform top and stuffed it inside his flannel shirt. Rechecking the hall and still seeing no one, he closed the door and headed for the elevators.
* * *
Twenty years later Atlas was a bitter man. Life had been hard after Goliath died long ago. He sorely missed him, but Samson, one of his cubs, had grown to full size and looked exactly like his dear old dad.
Atlas continued to have run-ins with his superiors and had lost quite a few jobs in recent years. He hoped he could hold on to his current job without clobbering his boss until he was ready to leave. He only had a few months to go. As soon as he received his first Social Security check from Uncle Sam, he planned to retire as caretaker for the big cats at Zingling Brothers Traveling Show.
Since Atlas had been around animals all his life, he thought he’d spend his golden years following the caravan from town to town. At least he would until the wheels of his motor home fell off or he became senile, whichever came first. As long as he could be close to Samson, he could be reasonably content. He had saved his money, and it took very little to buy food and put clothes on his back. Gas for the motor home was his biggest expense.
Standing in the long line to fill out papers to collect his Social Security had taken its toll on him today. He was exhausted, so he decided to go to bed early.
It was summer, and since the air-conditioning in his motor home was barely working, he chose to sleep in one of the tents tonight. On most nights, the occasional growling of the tigers didn't usually keep him from falling asleep. But, tonight, the cats were raising such a ruckus, sleep did not come easily.
About midnight, something aroused Atlas from a light snore. It was dark, and, at first, he couldn’t sense anything out of the ordinary. He sat up in his cot and listened.
The cats were silent in their cages. Apparently they hadn't awakened him as he had first thought.
Peering into the darkness, he saw a shadow move across the dull glow from the one streetlight on a pole outside his tent. “Who's there?” he called out. “What do you want?”
His question was answered by a heavy dose of electricity to his midsection, which made the world that was already dark dissolve into total blackness. He heard a triumphant voice announce in his ear, “I’m your worst nightmare, asshole.”
When Atlas awoke, sometime later, he found himself gagged and bound to the bars on the outside of the fifth tiger cage in a row of five cages. There were only four tigers in the show, and this fifth cage, closest to his tent, was empty.
His head was swimming as he slowly regained consciousness. The flashlight that lay propped against a section of bars allowed him to see the enormous amount of duct tape wrapped in circles about his body, securing him to the cage.
Someone had positioned a sheet of plywood with three circular openings against the other side of the bars, and had placed his one arm and two legs through them so they dangled inside the cage. His body was bound to the bars so tightly with duct tape he couldn’t move them, much less withdraw them. The rest of his body remained protected by the thick plywood.
It didn’t take a genius to surmise what the perpetrator had planned for him later that night. Samson always loved a meaty snack, no matter what time of day or night it was. Atlas assumed the numbskull, who had devised this insidious plot, thought he would go through life as a paraplegic after his limbs were bitten off. In reality Atlas knew he would bleed out and be dead in seconds.
Atlas wasn’t bouncing up and down in celebration that his demise would be quick, but he took comfort that he would not end up like the man he’d seen in Vegas between the Imperial Palace and the Holiday Casino many years ago. That poor devil rolled around on a board with wheels, selling pencils, with no arms and legs, on days so hot, an egg would fry on the sidewalk.
“Hey, Atlas, you had a nice nap,” said the stranger.
His upbeat yuppie voice reminded Atlas of a politician.
“My plane is leaving for Newark in three hours, and I'm glad we could have this little talk before I go.”
“Other than a birdbrain, who are you?”
The man ignored the remark and shot back, “Duh. Try to think of someone who might hold a grudge against you for something you did about twenty years ago. I’ll give you three guesses, and the first two don’t count.” The man chuckled annoyingly at his delivery of the cliché.
Atlas glared at the shadow on the wall and tried not to snivel.
The stranger continued, “I don’t think you’ll recognize my name, but I'm Brian Blaine. You slaughtered my mother, my father, my brother, and my sister when I was four years old. Does this ring any bells?”
Atlas’s mind drifted back in time. He saw the little boy, who had pissed himself, with the stuffed tiger, calling for his mommie. Atlas had often wondered if he would regret not wasting the kid that day. It just goes to show you, he thought, sometimes it doesn’t pay to be nice. If he had blown the kid’s brains out, he wouldn't be in this predicament now.
“Look, I remember what you’re talking about. I read about it in the papers. But what makes you think I did it? No one ever proved I was involved with the events at the zoo or the murder of your family. You must have been in diapers twenty years ago. Don’t tell me you remember a face you saw one time way back then.”
“You’re right,” Brian said with the gusto of a master of ceremonies on a TV quiz show. “I don’t remember the face of the man at all.”
“See! I told you. Turn me loose. I’m innocent, I tell you.”
“Not so fast, Atlas. I don’t remember the face, that’s true. I was too busy staring at the man’s missing left arm. I’d never seen a man with only one arm, and I couldn’t take my eyes off the stump just hanging there. Do you know anyone who fits that description? Oh … what d’ya know?… You don’t have a left arm either, do you?”
The man in the shadows began to laugh hysterically as if he had just heard the funniest joke of his life. Then he announced grandly, “I’m the judge, jury, and—well, not exactly—the executioner, and I find you guilty as charged.” He whacked Atlas across his shiny head with an ax handle and then laughed even louder when he saw a knot rising on Atlas’s scalp.
Brian continued, “It took me a long time to even try to deal with the trauma of seeing all the people I loved lying in pools of blood with half their heads missing. It’s something you don’t forget easily, even at that age.”
“It must have been terrible,” Atlas wheezed with a sneer. “Poor baby.”
“And, as I got older, the night
mares grew even worse when I began to comprehend the savagery of what you did without a shred of remorse. You killed four human beings in a matter of seconds, as if you were stepping on a few ants on the sidewalk.”
“I couldn’t stay. The police could have arrived at any second,” Atlas explained matter-of-factly to Brian’s deaf ears.
“And after the shrink finally released me from the mental ward, it took a long time to track you down. I visited every zoo, circus, carnival, and freak show in the country until finally, last week, I found this two-bit shit hole they call a traveling show. What a joke. When I saw that big tiger on the billboard named Samson, I knew you’d be here.”
“Hey, don’t I get any credit for not wasting you? After all, if I’d pulled the trigger then, I’d be enjoying my Social Security checks next month.”
Brian swung the ax handle again in disgust, sending one of Atlas’s front teeth flying from his mouth.
“Aren’t you going to plead for your life? Aren’t you going to tell me that you’re sorry, and how you’ve asked God to forgive you? I sure would like to hear a little groveling before I leave.”
“I wouldn’t give you the satisfaction,” Atlas said with a sneer. “You’re going to kill me no matter what I say. Stop talking me to death and get on with it.”
“Too bad. I really thought I would hear you beg,” Brian replied, moving into the light and giving him another hard whack across the head.
Atlas absorbed the blow defiantly, but, when he saw the wild look in Brian’s eyes and now a knife in his hand, he gasped. “You’re crazy, aren’t you?”
“I guess so, and, if I am, you’re to blame, asshole.”
Brian reached through the bars, and, closing his eyes, he slit Atlas’s right arm with a long swipe of his knife.
The brutish killer grimaced but didn’t cry out in pain.
Brian did the same to both legs and felt all the wounds to make sure the blood was flowing freely. “I wish I could stay, but the sight of blood makes me queasy.”
