something moved inside me. It felt strange, and it felt good. Where the freezer had been, there was suddenly this wave of warmth, an open oven. I had never really felt that before. I didn’t know exactly what it was. You know what I did, Hap?”
“No.”
“I went ahead and killed my man. Then I went home to my parents. I hadn’t seen them in years, and I shot them both with a twelve-gauge pump shotgun with remarkably smooth action. A Remington, to be exact, and if I were still in the business, it’s a tool I would highly recommend.”
I felt the hackles move on the back of my neck. I made sure I had a good hold on the revolver under my shirt.
“Very methodically I shot them, making sure they knew it was me doing it. I went down to Mexico and stayed there for a while, on The Farm, but the law never put anything together. The shotgun was cold. The crime was spur-of-the-moment. Nothing was taken and I moved on immediately. A fine method of operation I might suggest if you should ever suddenly decide to be a serial killer.”
“Well, I am still trying to put a career together, so I’ll keep that in mind.”
“They were my parents, Hap. They were Red’s parents, and they had sold him to the circus. Me, they had raised me with some kindness and respect, but I hated them. I knew when I saw that redheaded kid being chased and hurt that I hated them. It was because of Red that I hated them. They had sold him with no more hesitation than they might a pup from a litter, and they had gotten away with it. Somehow none of this had meant a thing to me before. Red had meant nothing to me, but that day I had a sort of epiphany. I sought Red out.
“It was quite easy to track him down. I went to the circus and bought Red back.”
“I thought there was a fight.”
“Red tells people that. I think it makes him feel less like a piece of meat to have someone fighting over him. Buying him back is only a little better than selling him. There was no fight. In fact, he could have left at any time. He just didn’t have any place to go. I could have taken him away without money crossing palms, but I wanted to keep Gonzolos happy about the arrangement. I didn’t want to draw any unnecessary attention to myself or Red. You’ve got to consider the business I was in.”
“Red claims an elephant rolled over on the owner. Any truth to that?”
“I don’t know. It could have happened. Red likes to put frills on his life. I don’t blame him. It hasn’t been a very special life. I took Red into business with me. He had the mind for it. He had been used for years, so now he was willing to use others. He was a natural, as I had been. Then one day, in Galveston, it became necessary to nail a young girl’s hand to a boat paddle to make her father pay a debt, and in that moment, I had another feeling. I don’t know how better to describe it. In the girl’s eyes I saw myself mirrored, and somehow, where before I had been able to see people like paper cutouts, this time I could see this was a living, breathing child, and when she screamed it was more than a sound. Something snapped inside me.
“I just walked off. Went into hiding. The Bandito Supremes sent men after me. I killed them. Finally we reached a kind of peace. I got religion, but religion worked only for a short time. It allowed me to say, ‘Yes, I have done these horrible things, but now I am saved in Christ, and I am a good man now, and I’m leading others to salvation.’ Then, one night, like tonight, I looked up at the stars and knew in that moment there was nothing out there. Just like that it came to me. There’s no God. There are just stars. And the stars are nothing more than dying lights, and between them is dead darkness. From time to time I still try and believe in God. I use his name. But now I know there’s nothing there, and I can’t hide behind God. I know who and what I am and it’s very hard to face. And Red. He’s like I used to be.
“It’s strange really. Sometimes I look at a tree, or a bush, or whatever, and I see it for what it is. Something dying. Everything that lives is just something dying. It’s not a wonderful revelation. I no longer feel the need to bathe or to even clean my surroundings. I want them as foul as I feel. Does that make sense to you?”
“I suppose,” I said.
“I am bathed not in the blood of Christ, but in the darkness of lost revelations. A pompous way of saying there is nothing to my life but emptiness. Do you ever feel that way?”
“Sometimes,” I said. “But it passes. As Leonard has pointed out, I’m like the guy goes out in the yard and steps in a pile of horse shit, and where he or someone else would say, goddamn, I’ve stepped in horse shit, me, I’m looking for the pony.”
Silence for a while. Then: “What I will do,” Herman said, “is I’ll take you to find this girl. I’ll help you find her and take her away.”
“Brett will appreciate that,” I said.
“I will appreciate it myself,” Herman said. “Perhaps I’m no less selfish than before. I’m not doing this for Brett. Or you. Or even to save my little brother. I’m doing it for me.”
20
Next morning I rode with Herman in his truck to drop his prairie dogs at his distributor’s ranch. Money changed hands, the dogs were unloaded, and we drove back.
When we got to the church and parked, we saw Brett out back of the place running a water hose over her naked body. In the rosy morning sunlight, her wet red hair cascading over her pale freckled shoulders, the thin line of fiery hair on her pubic mound, her breasts swaying as she bent beneath the water hose, I had a feeling I had just glimpsed what heaven must offer twenty-four hours a day. With maybe a fifteen-minute break for some kind of tonic.
With the water running hard, Brett hadn’t noticed us. She swished, turned and bent and showed us her bottom, then turned and saw us. She frowned, shrugged her shoulders and went back to it.
We just sat in the truck, not knowing what to do. Finally, I opened the door and got out and Herman did the same. We walked around to the front of the church.
Herman said, “I just remembered why I like women.”
“Yep,” I said. “Me too.”
