True Evil

Tarver smiled. 'I'm already rich, Andrew.'

Rusk said nothing, but he was on surer ground here. Dr. Tarver had earned millions from their association, but the pathologist had already spent much of his money. His private research work ate up capital at a staggering rate. Rusk wasn't sure what he was working on, but whatever it was, Rusk couldn't see the point-unless it had nothing to do with money. He knew that Tarver had once been fired by a pharmaceutical company for some sexual impropriety, and this had deprived him of the fruits of whatever research he had done for them. Maybe Tarver's goal was to prove to those people that they'd made the worst mistake of their lives. All this went though Rusk's mind in a matter of seconds, and only at a shallowest level of thought, for the core of his mind was focused on the question What's in that Nike bag? He had been watching the bag for twenty seconds now, and he was almost positive that it was moving.

'Do you want to see?' Tarver asked.

Rusk shook his head. With Eldon Tarver, there was no telling what was in the bag. A poisonous snake? A fucking Gila monster? God only knew. 'We need to talk about something else.'

'What's that, Andrew?'

'My safety.'

A new watchfulness came into Tarver's eyes. 'Yes?'

'I knew today would upset you. Especially the stuff about Morse.'

'And?'

'Because of that, I felt I had to take steps to protect myself.'

The doctor's eyelids dropped like those of some South American lizard sunning itself on a stucco wall. 'What did you do, Andrew?'

'Take it easy, Eldon. All I did was make a simple and absolutely safe arrangement whereby if I don't do a certain thing every day, certain events will be set in motion.' Rusk heard his voice quavering, but he had to go on. If he didn't, he'd never get it out. 'Events which would insure you going to prison for multiple murder.'

A strange light had come into the half-lidded eyes. 'Don't tell me that you left some sort of confession with your attorney? Or put something in a safe-deposit box somewhere?'

'No, no, it's much more discreet than that! And much more reliable.'

'What if you happen to die accidentally?'

'You'll have a couple of days to get out of the country. No more, though. And that's not so bad. We're already set up like kings. You'd just be leaving a little earlier, that's all. The bottom line is this: you can't kill me and stay in America. But why would you want to kill me? I'm making you more money than you could get any other way.'

Tarver was breathing in long, rhythmic respirations. 'That's not true. Your idea of wealth is very provincial, Andrew. The profits from my research will dwarf what we've earned. I consider our little operations piecework, like a student cutting lawns during medical school.'

For some reason this irritated Rusk, who believed what they were doing to be a revolutionary business. But he didn't argue the point. He was still looking at the bag. There was definitely something alive in it.

'I need to get back to the city,' he said.

Tarver reached down and unzipped the Nike bag. 'Your idea of a city is provincial also. Jackson, Mississippi…my God.'

As Rusk edged away from the fire, something black and yellow emerged from the opened zipper of the bag. It looked like a lizard's head. A black lizard with a yellow band across its head. Too small for a Gila monster, he thought, unless it's a baby.

'Before you go,' said Dr. Tarver, 'tell me about the woman.'

'The woman?' Rusk echoed, for some reason thinking of Janice and her muscular thighs.

'Alex Morse.'

'Oh. She was a hostage negotiator for the Bureau. The best they had, until she fucked up.'

'What was the nature of her mistake?'

'She let her emotions override her logic.'

'A common pitfall.' With an almost balletic fluidity, Tarver reached behind the black and yellow head and lifted a brilliantly colored snake from the bag.

Oh, shit…

The narrow, brightly banded tail was twenty inches long, and it coiled around Tarver's arm as though around the trunk of some pale, hairy tree. Rusk stared at the alternating bands: red, yellow, black; red, yellow, black-

His blood pressure dropped so rapidly that he thought he might faint. It was a goddamned coral snake. A stone-fucking killer! Unless, unless…there was a king snake that looked almost exactly like the coral. The scarlet king snake! He remembered a story about some guys scaring the piss out of a pledge with one during Hell Week. He tried to remember the rhyme he'd learned as a Boy Scout: Red over yellow…kill a fellow? Was that it? Red over black, friend to Jack? If he was right, then Eldon Tarver was holding a goddamn coral snake in his hand as casually as Rusk would hold a kitten.

'Where did you get that fucking thing?' Rusk asked in a quavering voice.

'I found him this morning. He's a shy fellow, like all his kind.'

'He came right on out of that bag when you opened it.'

Tarver smiled. 'I think he wanted to warm himself in the sun. He's cold-blooded, remember?'

Just like you, you crazy motherfucker.

'Is Agent Morse married?' Tarver asked.

'Never.'

'Interesting. Children?'

'Just the nephew, Fennell's boy.'

'Are they close?'

'Very.'

Dr. Tarver seemed lost in thought.

He's a rough old cob, Rusk thought. Not freakishly ugly-except for the birthmark- but repulsive in small ways. He had big pores, for one thing. If you looked closely at his face, it was like looking onto a landscape of holes, like interior lining on the roof of an old Volkswagen. And he was pale the whole year round, as though the relentless Mississippi sun had no effect on him.

'Oh, one more thing,' Rusk said. 'I've got a potential client tomorrow. This guy is a total redneck, but there's nothing provincial about his bank account. And I know for a fact that he hates his wife. She might consult one of the local divorce sharks any day now, but Lisa tells me she hasn't yet. Any reason I shouldn't pitch him if he looks likely?'

'Greedy boy. What's the potential take?'

'We could each clear a million, I think.'

Dr. Tarver held the snake's head mere inches from his eyes. 'Really?'

'Hell, yes. It would cost him ten times that to get divorced.'

'Then do it.'

'No worries about Braid?'

Tarver shook his head. 'Forget Braid. Focus on your sales presentation. That's your gift, Andrew. Sales.'

Rusk laughed genuinely this time, partly because it was true, and partly because Tarver's last remark indicated that the doctor saw a future for him-one that did not include the coral snake coiled around his forearm. Rusk wondered absently if William Braid had a blind date with that snake, but the truth was, he didn't want to know. Snakes gave him the fucking willies, if he was honest about it. Even from a distance. 'I really need to go.'

Tarver smiled. 'Say good-bye to my little friend.'

Rusk shook his head. 'No thanks.'

'Take some tenderloin with you. For your ride back.'