Pat smiled back at him. “You and every other preacher on TV.”
“Can’t speak for all of them but, yeah, it’s an exceedingly profitable business,” said Trinity. “Anyway, Danny walked out on me barely in his teens…and I suppose I gave him every reason to.”
“You two seem to be gettin’ along OK.”
“It’s good to have him home,” Trinity said. “But I don’t want to rush things with him, you know?” He sipped some coffee.
“Ah, I get it. You want me to tell you about Honduras.”
Trinity nodded.
“Just remember,” said Pat, “there’s three sides to every story: yours, mine, and the truth. I can only give you mine.”
“I’d be much obliged.”
Pat sipped some coffee. As he spoke, his eyes became unfocused, looking back in time. “My client was an economics professor, running for the Honduran National Congress. An anti-corruption do-gooder campaigning on electoral reform.” He smiled. “My kind of guy. His popularity was growing fast, he was a threat to the status quo. He had supporters everywhere, and word leaked out to us that Battalion 3-16—that’s the CIA-trained Gestapo down there—was planning to cancel his ticket while he slept. I drove him up to a small mountain village where the local priest, Father Pedro, was a supporter. One of those political priests, you know, the liberation theology guys, but he wasn’t a Marxist like some of them. He just thought Jesus meant it when he instructed us to feed the hungry and care for the sick and visit the imprisoned. Anyway, Father Pedro was brave, he walked the walk, ya know? He hid us in the basement of his church as a couple jeeps pulled into town, six soldiers hopped out and started interrogating the locals. The padre told them we’d stopped to eat a meal, and then we’d left heading north. But somebody must’ve talked, ’cause they posted a few soldiers outside the church, front and back, round the clock.” He shook his head at the memory. “The longer we hid in that basement, the more frustrated the goon squad outside got, but there was no way to slip past them. The military in El Salvador had murdered a couple of political agitator priests, and it was easy to believe the practice might be spreading.”
From a dog bed on the floor, Edgar let out a melodramatic sigh.
“You said it, partner,” Pat said to the dog.
“I think I see how Daniel got involved,” nudged Trinity. “You couldn’t get out, so you figured to bring the world to you. Fastest way is to run a con. Some kind of fake miracle to get the world’s attention.”
“No flies on you,” said Pat. “Father Pedro put the word out, and one by one the village patriarchs came by, and he told them the plan. Next thing you know, old ladies and men are coming to church with various maladies.”
“Spontaneous healings! A classic,” said Trinity, “never gets old.”
Pat nodded. “They confess their sins to Father Pedro, tell him their ailments, and emerge from the confession booth babbling excitedly about how they felt electricity running through their bodies when Pedro forgave their sins. Their various maladies miraculously vanished. It got the Vatican’s attention all right. Within forty-eight hours, Daniel arrived to investigate.”
“Danny’d never fall for that scam,” Trinity said.
“He didn’t, he was on to us right away. But Father Pedro brought him down to the basement and explained the situation. Daniel wouldn’t certify a fake miracle, but he offered to conduct the investigation in slow motion, buy us some time. Once the news crews arrived, I’d be able to get the professor out. The goon squad would just have to pick another time to try and ice the guy.”
“Sounds like a good plan.”
“It was the best we had. But it didn’t work. The bad guys realized time was no longer on their side, and they made their assault late that night. Daniel was in the basement with me and the professor, and the basement was one large room with a staircase at either end. We heard the spray of automatic gunfire upstairs. I couldn’t cover both stairwells myself, and the professor’s brain was short-circuiting—he was rigid with fear, completely frozen. I shoved a pistol in Daniel’s hand, and we each killed three soldiers as they came blazing down the stairs.”
“Jesus.”
“Yeah.” Pat smiled grimly. “And the capper to the story, the real kick in the head…the professor dropped dead of a massive heart attack while we were saving his life.”
“God does have a sense of humor,” said Trinity.
“God needs one,” said Pat. “Father Pedro was upstairs, dead at the altar. They’d cut him in half. We’d just killed six soldiers, and I was known as the professor’s bodyguard. Daniel gave me a priest’s uniform, and we drove cross-country to Guatemala, where he arranged a private plane to get us stateside.”
“That’s a hell of a story.”
“A day at the office. Like you said, I kill people for a living.” Pat drank some coffee. “Daniel had never killed anyone, so it was…it was an adjustment for him. But I tell you, he kept his shit together like a pro.”
Daniel woke with a start, a rough hand clasped over his mouth.
“We gotta move, brother,” Pat whispered in his ear. “Visitors on the way.” Daniel sat up as Pat woke Tim Trinity. “You guys get dressed, meet me in the kitchen. Leave the lights off.” He disappeared into the darkened hallway.
Daniel and Trinity scrambled into their clothes and made their way to the kitchen by the dim blue light of dawn filtering through the windows. Pat stood at the kitchen table, shoving items into a backpack. He wore a pistol on his belt, an assault rifle slung over one shoulder. Edgar stood at attention by his side.
“I don’t hear anyone,” said Trinity.
“Motion detector at the end of the road,” said Pat. “They’ll be here in a minute.” He zipped up the backpack, tossed it to Daniel, and led them to the back door. “Wait for me in the boat, I gotta set the system.” He left them there and headed for the front entrance hall.
Trinity snapped his fingers. “Shit. Be right back.” He started back toward the bedrooms. “Gotta get my Bible.”
“Leave it,” Daniel called after him, “I’ll buy you a new one.” Trinity didn’t stop, but he was back quickly, blue Bible in hand.
They ran down to the dock and Trinity scrambled into the airboat. Daniel tossed him the backpack, then unwound the line from the cleat and held the boat in place. He could now hear a vehicle crunching along the gravel road on the other side of the house.
Pat emerged from the house, Edgar at his side. He paused to lock the door, then jogged down to the boat, picking up a long aluminum pole beside the dock. “Hop in,” he said, and Edgar jumped into the boat, followed by Daniel and Pat.
Pat used the long pole like a Venetian gondolier, pushing them silently through the water, down to the end of the spit and around, staying close to cypress trees with roots that rose from the water like skinny legs with bulbous arthritic knees. Spanish moss hung down from the branches just above their heads.
“Eyes upward, Tim,” said Pat. “You’re on snake watch.”
“Got it,” said Trinity.
Daniel resisted the urge to look up as well. He shot a quick glance back from his position in the bow, just to satisfy himself that his uncle was scanning the branches, and then focused his attention forward.
A car’s engine shut off and its doors went:
They crouched low as Pat moved the airboat forward slowly, careful to avoid bumping the aluminum hull against a tree. They were within earshot; such a mistake would be fatal.
The man standing by the Suburban lit a cigarette.
