“You know what they say: Cut a tall boofer, he falls like a big tree.”
“I got Mr. Carpet’s number,” said Sonny. “We can get hold of him anytime. Let’s follow the black one and see where he goes.”
NINETEEN
Ben and Renee woke up late on Sunday and spent most of the day indoors, lounging, ordering in, and making love. They watched a Martin Lawrence movie that Renee had brought with her and several innings of a Nationals game on cable. Ben walked her to the parking lot in the early evening and kissed her good-bye through the open window of her Hyundai. They had laughed all day and were right for each other in the bedroom. He was thinking that she might be the one.
Ben went back to his apartment. On his nightstand he found a paperback novel, Blood on the Forge, that he had been struggling with at first but getting into of late. He rubbed his fingers over the handsome cover. To him, it was like touching gold.
He was challenging himself these days to take on reading material that was a bit more difficult. Ben knew who he was and where he wanted to go. He was never going to be accomplished by society’s standards, or rich by anyone’s, but he was comfortable with his limitations. For many, life was about the pursuit of status, but it was not so for him. Ben’s was all about the quest for knowledge, and his vehicle was books.
He thought of work as a means to acquire food and shelter. Friends and Renee kept him socialized and sane. He tried not to stress on his broken childhood or troubled teens, and mostly managed to steer his mind clear of dark places. He was past that, and looked forward to learning something new every day.
Ben sniffed the short-sleeved Timberland button-down he’d worn the night before, decided that it did not stink, and put it on. He went to the front door and took his keys off a peg bar mounted on the wall. He had his cell, his wallet, and his book, which he had slipped into the back pocket of his jeans.
He left the apartment, crossed the street, and walked along a black iron fence. In the apartment house parking lot, from inside an aging sedan, two men watched.
Ben entered the cemetery gate at Rock Creek Church and Webster, walked down the wide road around the church, and took the very narrow road to the Adams Memorial. As it was a weekend, the memorial had visitors, an elderly couple whose car was parked nearby. Ben moved on, finding a spot atop a stone retaining wall near a large pond. He began to read.
Shadows lengthened as the sun dropped. A Hispanic groundsman finished his edging and, his day done, drove a motorized utility cart up the slope toward the physical plant. A little while later, a security car rolled by, and its driver, a middle-aged gentleman who knew Ben on sight, tapped the face of his wristwatch, telling Ben by signal that it would soon be time to go.
Ben waved at him and held up five fingers. The driver nodded and drove on.
Ben stayed longer than he intended. Though the light was dying, he was at a point in the novel that he could not walk away from. In the book, three black brothers, country boys from the South, had come north to work in the steel mills, and now their fates were being laid bare. Ben was transfixed.
An old black car drove slowly down the road. It came to a stop near Ben and sat idling like a crow at rest. Ben looked down at the pages of his book. He looked back at the car. The engine had cut off. A big man with a walrus mustache got out of the driver’s side, and a small man with wiry tattooed arms and a bushy mustache stepped from the passenger side. The big man, wearing a windbreaker and jeans, looked around, saw no one, and walked toward Ben. Ben put the book down and eased off the stone wall. He stood with discomfort, unsure of what to do or where to put his hands.
As the big man neared him, Ben said, “Somethin I can help you with?”
“I sure hope so.” The man drew a semiautomatic pistol from where it was holstered beneath his windbreaker. He pointed the gun at Ben, then waved its barrel toward the old sedan. “In the car.”
“I didn’t do nothin,” said Ben.
“Yes, you did.” He waved the barrel in the same direction once again. “Do what I say. Quick.”
Ben looked around. It was near dark and no one, visitor or employee, was in sight.
The big man locked back the pistol’s hammer. “Run, you got a mind to.”
Ben willed himself to walk toward the vehicle. The man with the gun was behind him as the little man opened the passenger door to let Ben in.
“Up front,” said the big man.
Ben got in and the door shut after him. In his side vision he saw the big man hand the little man the gun. He heard the little man get into the backseat as the other one settled into the driver’s seat.
“Remember this,” said the big man. “My friend will shoot you dead.”
Ben couldn’t speak. He felt the car lurch forward. His fingers dented the red velour seat. They drove slowly through the cemetery, up the hill and around the church. The security vehicle came just as slowly in their direction as the big man deftly went through the gate and pulled out onto Webster Street.
“We just made it,” said the little man.
“Yeah, they’re about to close that gate.” The big man with the high cheekbones looked over at Ben. “What’s your name, fella?”
“Ben.”
“You can call me Sonny.” His smile showed perfect gray teeth.
They drove around without apparent destination until it was full dark. Ben listened to the random, pointless banter between the two men, much of it concerning female singers, the discussion starting with the merits of their talent and quickly veering off toward cup size. The little one smoked and commented frequently on what he saw out the window. The city and its residents did not please him.
Ben tried to think of the reason for his abduction, and he could not. He had no enemies that he knew of. He’d been straight for a long time, and in his recollection had done no one wrong.
The car stank. His abductors had awful body odor, and Ben suspected that he did, too. He had sweated into his shirt.
At several stoplights he considered jumping out of the Mercury but decided against it, fearing that the little one with the stove-in face would shoot him. He would have to sit here and hope that these two would not harm him. There was nothing else he could see to do.
Sonny caught Ben noticing the shamrock tattoo on the crook of his hand, wrapped around the fake-fur- covered steering wheel.
“You dig my ink?” said Sonny.
Ben did not answer.
“C’mon, fella. Ain’t no need to be silent. We gonna converse, eventually.”
They drove south on a downward slope of North Capitol and traveled under the New York Avenue overpass.
“You know what my tattoo is?” said Sonny.
“It’s a four-leaf clover,” said Ben.
“Why don’t no one ever get that?” said the little man.
“It’s a shamrock,” said Sonny. “Means I’m part of a club.”
“He’s talkin about the Aryan Brotherhood,” said the little man.
“Shut up, stupid,” said Sonny. “Let me tell it how I want to.”
“My name is not Stupid.”
“Shut up, Wayne.”
Sonny stopped at the red light on K. A panhandling drunk came across the street from the east corner of North Capitol, out of the shadows of a shuttered church. As he neared the driver’s side of the Marquis, Sonny turned his head to him and said, “Get your dirty ass gone.” The man retreated without a word.
On the green, Sonny turned left onto K Street. They entered an old tunnel with water-stained walls, lit by globe-topped streetlamps. From above, Ben could hear the clomping sound of a train moving on tracks.
“I hope you’re not frightened,” said Sonny.
