Calumet City (28 page)

Tracy and Bob and his light are gone. Something’s moving low in the dark, changing the shadows just beyond the fence. I squint as my heart ramps, can’t see, and run uphill. Roland’s house stops me. It will have a special room. Roland isn’t on his porch kneading his cotton briefs; the door’s open; hungry. The room will have special tools, special toys.

My foot won’t step up onto the porch; I force it, then the other. The wood planks creak, announcing I’m here. The open door sucks me across the threshold. Inside, it’s, it’s…I can’t feel him. Or smell him.
Oh, man, that’s good
. So good I’m dizzy. But it’s wrong; he should be all over me, making me puke. And he isn’t. Tracy and Bob are at a stack of boxes. I stay statue-still, wearing the room, waiting for it to smother me.

C’mon, motherfucker. Come and get me…If you can…
I sound fourteen in my head, not armed and dangerous.

I look left, then right and fight the memories I invited. This place isn’t a black castle, it’s just walls. Windows. Furniture. Be a cop.
Kill the motherfucker
.

Roland didn’t live here.
What?
If he did, where is he? I don’t feel it, him, at all—

"Look at this."

I snap sideways but don’t shoot Tracy. She’s looking at Bob and doesn’t see me do it. Bob is in front of an open file cabinet. His flashlight’s shining on a page he holds above a box of dumped papers.

Tracy says, "Patti, c’mere" without looking behind her.

I force my feet to move. From behind her shoulder I peek. Bob’s whiskey hand is wobbling the beam. The page is typewritten. Below it on the floor is another page, handwriting, a child’s or a lunatic’s:

The Cradle Will Fall.
The Cradle Will Fall
The Cradle Will Fall

"Oh my god," my knees buckle and I grab for the page. "A bassinet is a cradle."

Tracy sees the page and grabs for my arm. "Easy, Patti."

I speed-add dates, times…

"If Roland knew, he would’ve gone there right after they ran out of here."

Bob says, "Knew what? Who?" He shines his light on the handwriting. "What?"

Tracy holds my arm tight and smiles into a lie. "Bob, honey, we’re partners, right?" She touches his upper arm—one hand now on each of us. "The Chicago job’s yours after we put this story together, done deal, but we have to do it my way."

Bob doesn’t look trusting or horny. He checks me, but I’m mostly shadows. I start to relax; Tracy’s right, if this meant what I thought it did—that Roland knew about Le Bassinet ten days ago—John would already be dead. But how do you
know
John isn’t dead? You haven’t seen him. That stumbles me back into a chair, screeching the legs on the plank floor. All three of us jerk at the noise and Bob splashes me with light.

I straighten. "Sorry. Must be the…hell, I don’t know what it is. I’m fine."

Bob looks at me, then begins a house-layout explanation speaking slower than necessary. He has new respect for my lack of self-control. Bob highlights with his light beam, pointing around the room, down a short hall, and out a window. "Bedroom’s back there; two of ’em. Sheriff found papers on the original owner’s son, Triple A’s son, the one who wandered from the flock and was lost up in Idaho."

"Meaning what?"

"Dope. While on the revival road, the reverend’s son fell victim to illicit narcotics and the company of women, women of low virtue. His return was heralded as biblical—the black sheep returning,"

"What kind of dope?"

Bob says, "C
¹⁰
H
¹⁵
N," like I would my star number.

I stare. Bob takes way too long to realize I’m waiting for the English version.

"Methamphetamine hydrochloride. Arizona’s cash crop. One of our sheriffs said there was a period, not too long ago, where they thought His Pentecostal Ranch might be brewing crystal meth. For sale. Big with the Indians and PI Delmont Chukut." Bob raises his chin toward the reservation. "Not so much now."

Well, there it is—Gypsy Vikings, Pancake the meth chemist, and an
Arizona-Idaho whiteboy buying torches
at the Cassarane Bar. I already know the answer but ask anyway. "What’s his name, the son?"

"Balanter Joseph Allen, son of the right Reverend A. A. Allen."

Idaho Joe.
A fifth grader would’ve had that the first time Bob mentioned Idaho. So Idaho Joe blew out of here with Roland…one big happy fucking horror family.

Tracy asks, "What about his father, Triple A?"

Bob says, "Not a word in years. No IRS filings; no Medicare claims; no credit cards; no telephone. Not-a-peep."

"He’s dead," I say.

"For sure." Bob says, and nods down the hall toward the endless desert beyond the bedroom window. "For sure."

"Who’d the reverend sell this…establishment to?" I ask.

Bob and Tracy make eyes at each other. Tracy tells him, "I didn’t get that far on the plane. Fell asleep."

Bob shifts to me, stares, but doesn’t answer.

The guy who steps out of the shadows says: "He sold it to you."

   "DO NOT FUCKING MOVE."

The apparition doesn’t. "Hands on your head. Slow." He does. "Turn around. Face the wall." He does. I hard-glance Tracy and Bob, then back to the apparition’s shoulderblades. "Who the fuck are you?"

He takes a breath, making me wait. "Colleague of Bob’s, at the
Sun
."

I keep the Smith aimed at his back and glance down the hall at rooms I can’t see. "That so,
Bob
?"

Bob doesn’t answer, but I can feel him nodding. My voice grinds down to ugly, matching my heart rate and the rooms I can’t see. "Anybody else here, Bob? You and them gonna die if there are."

Tracy says, "Easy, Patti. Easy."

"How ’bout it, Bob? Anybody else?"

"N…no."

I have six bullets, multiple threat locations, and no options. "Bob, if this asshole you hid in the shadows has a gun and a badge, I’m gonna be awful unhappy."

Tracy tries to purr. "E…easy, Patti. Easy."

"Okay, colleague-of-Bob’s, I’m gonna step in behind you and cuff your—" He spins. I fire twice. The room lights up. Wood and plaster splinter. Bob’s partner hits the floor. I stomp him flatter on his stomach and hear his air go, knee his back hard, and aim the Smith at Bob’s face. Bob’s frozen; I fan at the rooms I can’t see—nothing comes—then jam the barrel into the guy’s neck. "It’s cocked, asshole. You decide."

He slow-moves his right hand toward his back pockets. I use my cuffs, ram his arm under my knee, grab the other hand and cuff it too, then stand to wheel on Bob, the dark, and my good friend Tracy Moens, intending to shoot them all one at a time.

Tracy guesses. "C’mon, Patti. Don’t. You’re scaring me."

I jump sideways to keep the hallway in front of me,
"Scaring you?"
then glare Bob into the wall, then back to Tracy. "
You fucking bitch
. What is this?"

"I had no idea. Honest." She grimaces at Bob’s partner rolling over on the floor, "About him…being here. I thought he’d be at the airport. I was about to tell you—"

"Tell me what?"

"Bob’s nervous about…you. Since you’re the real owner of this…place."

Bob is suddenly as far away from me as the wall will allow. I aim the Smith at him and frisk his partner with one hand—a pistol…cuffs, and a star. Phoenix PD. My teeth clamp. "Well,
Bob,
guess you’d better explain your colleague."

Bob is sucking short breaths. I step up off his partner and closer. Bob decides to answer. "I was…ah, worried…You being the owner who bought out—"

"
I don’t own shit
. And I didn’t buy out anyone. And I don’t want to hear that outta your fucking mouth again." Gun-barrel glare. "Who’s your friend?"

"A policeman, that’s all. Please, take it easy. Just here to make sure…you don’t hurt me, us."

I look at the man on the floor. Either a rookie, a drunk like Bob, or he lifted the badge from a real cop’s dresser. I’m going with drunk. Tracy interrupts my assessment.

"Patti, the papers we found say you own it. That’s why we’re here. One of the reasons."

"
I don’t own shit
. How many Patti Blacks do you think live in America?"

Tracy tries hard to look understanding in the flashlight shadows. Bob tries for invisible. I eye the dark hall and rooms beyond, then kneel and strip his partner’s cell phone and wallet. I tell Bob and him to sit facing a post column like it’s a campfire. They do. At my direction Tracy cuffs Bob and his partner to each other using both sets of handcuffs, their arms ringing the pole. A cell phone falls out of Bob’s pocket. Tracy tosses it toward the table where I put his partner’s phone. Both fly off and the cop’s phone shatters. I almost shoot it.

Deep breath. "Here’s the deal, Bob. If there’s anyone else hiding down the hall or in the other buildings, this is your last chance to tell me. I find ’em and live through it, you don’t."

"N-n-nobody else."

"If there’s anything else I need to know, tell me now." I glance at Tracy. "
My friend
and I will steal your Caddy, drive to the airport, and fly home. Six hours from now we’ll call and have you rescued." I small smile at the cop. "
By the locals
so you aren’t embarrassed shitless for losing your weapon. It’ll be on the table. If you don’t tell, I won’t."

Neither man answers. Tracy tries to intervene as their agent. I’d love to shoot her and bury her here. She sees that in my face and stops mid-breath. I look back at the men.

"Talk to me,
Bob
. Any more surprises?" I look down the hall while he shakes his head. "Okay, then, what else are we supposed to see?"

Bob glances at the door and semi-whimpers, "There’s a bottle of Turkey in the trunk. Think I could have that?"

I know the blackout comfort a bottle can bring. "Could happen. If I’m happy after we finish the inspection."
Bottle
and
blackout
hang in my head longer than usual…like a set of crime-scene murder shots in Calumet City—

Oh my God,
have
I been here…too? I stumble into the wall. No way; no way—

Bob starts talking, telling us where to go and what to look for. But I hear
blackout
and
been here before
. I bite my lip until I taste the blood. No way—I haven’t been here. No way—

"Patti?"

I spin with the Smith. Tracy flinches. I fake stable and point at the hallway. Never been here before. Never. Not one fucking time. Tracy’s still staring. I need to get out of this room and point us to the hallway again.

Tracy leads with Bob’s flashlight. Every step is Halloween. There’s two bedrooms, a bathroom, and no basement.

How would I know that? I’ve never been here.

My hand brushes the cop’s pistol in the waistband of my Levi’s, Tracy’s Levi’s actually. She bumps a chair; I taste the dust drifting through her flashlight beam.

All new. Never been here.

Each bedroom yields nothing but high pulse rate and the feeling that this house belonged to someone other than Roland Ganz. The bathroom is the last room; it’s stale and dirty. Two mice are dead in the corner. This building’s clear; I take a long, deep breath and relax my shoulders but not the Smith. "There’s another house somewhere."

Tracy stops her retreat back into first bedroom mid-step. "Another house?"

"Roland isn’t here."

She shines the light near my face but not in it. "Right. We know he isn’t here. He’s in Chicago."

I shake my head, feel my jaw muscles bunch. "This place doesn’t…vibe; it isn’t his."

"How do you know?"

"
How do I know
. I’m a fucking girl.
I know
."

Tracy moves away in the general direction of a bedroom porch door. "You’re right, that’s fine. Fine. Let’s look at the other buildings then."

A thought stops me. I realize I just said I was a girl; in a house they say Roland Ganz owned. Me, a girl. I almost smile and that bumps Tracy into the rear door. She fumbles with the knob behind her and backs outside. And keeps backing until she’s traveled as far into the night as she’s willing to travel without protection.

I step through the dark bedroom and out into moonlight. Tracy has a tough choice—search these buildings alone or with a madwoman who has an ugly history of blackouts. Tracy stays in front with the flashlight; we don’t talk because I’m focused on shooting the next surprise before it surprises me. We find nothing but more dust and decomposed mice—like Bob said we would—and stop under the incomplete broadcast tower, both of us doing slow 360s at the ground and the air immediately above it.

Tracy scans where we’ve just been and semi-whispers, "There’s a boatload of strange here, for sure." She pats the metal, "But this the cops probably missed."

I finish my 360 and don’t feel any safer, hadn’t thought about the tower either, and ask how anyone
could
miss it. Her eyes follow the metal to the sky. "Not physically, they missed it financially. Right here’s where the money is. All of it." She pats again, as if the iron grounds her in more comfortable wavelengths she can understand. "If you intend to run a salvation enterprise—baptism and pilgrimage—it requires distribution. TV. This tower would’ve been like owning a bank."

As she finishes the sentence I hear
PTL Club
on Roland’s Magnavox. It’s twenty-three years ago and Tammy Faye is pleading for money. Roland is…
I have not been here
.

"No way this makes sense." Tracy’s staring at the cables dead on the squishy ground. "This preacher Triple A had the goods and didn’t use it." She’s deep into reporter thoughts and no longer afraid of me or what’s out here in the dark with us, human or otherwise.

"Had this tower but quit before Roland got here, right?"

She nods at my statement, looking around.

"Or maybe…
when
he got here," I add, thinking cop thoughts. Tracy cuts back to me, staring hard, and we both figure it. TV might be money, but it’s also notoriety. And some folks can’t afford notoriety.