“Damn, boy, you ain’t as smart as I thought you were.”
“Just give me my money. I need to get going.”
The earphones went silent again accept for the sound of footsteps and the informant’s muffled breathing. Bates heard what he thought might be a drawer opening, then more footsteps.
“There it is,” the informant said. “Two grand. Cash.”
His equipment was so good that Bates heard the sound of a heavy envelope landing on a table. A chair leg scraped, and Bates assumed the target was picking up his extortion money.
“It’s all there,” the informant said. “You don’t have to count it.”
“It’d better be,” the target said. “I’ll see you next month. In the meantime, why don’t you move someplace closer to town? I hate driving all the way out here.”
“I’m not moving my operation. For two grand a month, you can afford the gas.”
Bates listened to the footsteps again, then watched as the target walked back out to his car. The target was easily identifiable, as was the number on his license plate. The camera above the table would leave no doubt. Bates allowed himself a smile.
“Gotcha,” he said out loud. “Your ass is mine.”
Friday, October 31
Halloween morning broke dreary and cold, with the wind whipping out of the southwest. A front was moving in, and as I drove to the office I watched the burnt-orange and bloodred leaves cling stubbornly to the branches that served as their lifelines. About two miles from Jonesborough, I noticed something strange to my left. A leafless, dead oak stood naked against the charcoal sky. Perched in its branches were at least two dozen carrion birds, vultures, each the size of a large turkey. As I passed beneath the tree they all took flight at the same time, their huge wings spreading out like giant robotic arms. For the rest of the trip into town, I had the unshakable sensation that they were following me, circling above, flying messengers of death.
I arrived in Jonesborough early and parked in the lot behind the courthouse. I looked up as soon as I got out of the truck and was relieved that the vultures were nowhere in sight. I walked around the courthouse and across Main Street to a small coffee shop.
I’d just started reading the newspaper when I noticed a man walk through the door. He was wearing a long, blue denim coat and a floppy black felt hat and carrying a walking stick with an ornamental carving of a lion’s head at the top. His gray hair cascaded out from beneath the hat to his shoulder blades, and his bushy beard, also gray, nearly covered his face. As soon as he stepped through the door he looked directly at me. I nodded and looked back down at the paper. He shuffled past me to the counter. A couple of minutes later, he was standing over me with a steaming cup of coffee in his left hand.
“Mind if I sit, neighbor?” he said.
There was only one other person in the shop at the time. He could have sat at any of a dozen tables.
“Suit yourself,” I said, and he lowered himself awkwardly into the chair across from me. His nose was crooked and crisscrossed with pink veins. His eyes were small, close-set, and almost black. I folded the newspaper, smiled, and offered my hand.
“Joe Dillard,” I said. His hand was half the size of mine, his fingers rough and callused.
“I know who you are,” he said in a deep, throaty drawl, without returning the smile. “I saw you on the television.”
“Pretty embarrassing,” I said.
He poured some cream into his coffee and began to stir slowly.
“The young lady could be dangerous,” he said.
“Yeah? What makes you say that?”
“Unusual language she was speaking, don’t you think?”
“Was it a language? I thought it was just gibberish.”
He took a sip of coffee. As he set the cup down, he lifted his eyes. They were so dark I couldn’t discern iris from pupil, like two dime-sized, bottomless holes.
“It was a language, and that’s why I’m here, neighbor,” he said. “To warn you.”
“Warn me?”
He leaned forward, his lips tightening over his jagged teeth, and lowered his voice. “The language she was speaking is called Enochian. Some say it’s a language made up by hoaxsters, that it has no real value or power. Others say it’s an ancient language passed down through the pagans, a secret language spoken only by those who worship the lord of darkness.”
“And you know this language?”
He closed his eyes for a moment. “When I was a younger man,” he said.
“So which were you, a hoaxster or a devil worshiper?”
He flinched a little, as though the directness of the question stung him.
“There was a time when I was lost,” he said, “but no more. Do you want to know what she said?”
“Not unless she was confessing to a crime.”
“She was reciting an Enochian passage that I’m sure she found in The Satanic Bible. It’s the only place she could have found those exact words.”
It made sense, since we’d found a copy of The Satanic Bible in Natasha’s bedroom. I sat there stirring my coffee, waiting for him to continue, trying to act as though I wasn’t alarmed.
“She put a curse on you,” he said. “A satanic curse. One that could bring terrible wrath and violence down upon you.”
Wrath and violence, psychics, inverted crosses and bullet holes in the eye. I was beginning to think I might be dreaming all of this. If I was, I wanted to wake up. I kept smiling, choosing my words carefully.
“Even if what you’re saying is true, she doesn’t have any power over me,” I said. “I don’t believe in Satan, and I damned sure don’t believe in curses.”
He shook his head and sighed. “To each his own, but if I were you, I’d take great care until the conflict between you and the girl is resolved.”
“Oh, it’ll be resolved,” I said. “You can bet on that.”
“It would be a mistake to underestimate her.”
I took one last sip of my coffee and stood up.
“You know what?” I said. “I have to go. Thanks for the warning.”
I walked towards the door. Just as I opened it, I heard him say, “Excuse me, Mr. Dillard?”
I stopped and turned back to face him.
“If the curse is real, there’s only one way to break it.”
“What’s that?”
“One of you has to die.”
Jim Beaumont’s motion to suppress all of the evidence we’d gathered against Sam Boyer and Levi Barnett arrived by courier from his office less than an hour after I sat down at my desk. Hugh Dunbar, Levi Barnett’s attorney, had joined the motion, but I knew the work was done by Beaumont. It alleged a variety of violations under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and asked the judge to exclude any and all evidence found as a result of the warrants I’d obtained the night we made the arrests. I’d been expecting the motion, but as I sat leafing through it at my desk, a feeling of uneasiness came over me. Beaumont, whom I knew to be a fine lawyer, got right to the heart of it. The primary question would be: Did the warrant applications, which were largely based on the testimony of Alisha Davis, an informant, set out enough facts to show that the informant had a reliable basis of knowledge? Beaumont argued very persuasively that it did not. If a judge agreed with him-and we were going in front of Judge Glass-we’d lose everything.
As I sat at my desk, rereading the motion for the third time, the telephone rang.
“Have you read my motion?” It was the distinctive baritone of Jim Beaumont. I was immediately suspicious, because I’d watched Beaumont practice criminal defense for years and had talked to him many times. I knew he didn’t trust prosecutors, and I knew he wasn’t the type to call and chat.
“Looking at it now,” I said.
