The Burning Man (5 page)

The so-called library consisted of two handmade wooden bookshelves containing a one-volume edition of the Oregon Criminal Code, a one-volume edition of the evidence code and a worn set of Oregon Supreme Court and Court of Appeals cases. A high window with thick, escape- proof

was provided by two bulbs that let - enough light into the room. The wire hung hung from the ce ling In wire cages.

Peter sat on a metal folding chair in front of a rickety wooden table with his back to the far wall, waiting to meet his first criminal client. His fingers nervously were drumming a solo on Mammon's case file when the door to the interview room opened. Peter stood. A guard stepped aside and all the light from the hall was obliterated by the man who filled the doorway.

"Knock when you want me, " the guard said. Then, Peter heard the lock on the thick metal door snap shut, trapping him inside the overheated coffin of a room.

Christopher Mammon moved under one of the caged lightbulbs and Peter sucked in a breath. He was used to large men. His father was large, Amos Geary was large.

But Christopher Mammon was bizarre. Curly black hair hung down over his high, flat forehead and cascaded over his massive shoulders. Tufts of hair stuck out of the collar of an orange jail-issue jumpsuit that was stretched taut across his gargantuan chest. The jumpsuit had short sleeves and Peter could see snake and panther tattoos rippling along Mammon's forearms and biceps whenever he moved. About the only parts of Mani-mon that were not grotesquely big were his cold blue eyes, which were narrow and focused like a predator's, and his ears, which were tiny and delicate.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Mammon. I'm Peter Hale, the attorney the court appointed to represent you," Peter said nervously, holding out one of Amos Geary's business cards. The card disappeared in Mammon's hand.

He examined it, then examined Peter.

,If you're my lawyer, why isn't your name on this card?" Marmnn asked in a voice that was velvety smooth and very scary. it was the sort of purr that might issue from a hungry leopard while it was deciding what part of a staked goat to eat first.

"Well, actually, the court appointed Amos Geary.

In fact, I've just started. My cards are on order," Peter He'll represent you, if we go to trial. I work with him.

babbled, managing a tiny smile he hoped would convey his perfect harmlessness and the fact that he should be considered a friend and not dinner.

"I see," Mammon said, returning Peter's smile with an ominous glare.

"Mr. Geary is in Blaine County this afternoon. He wanted me to conduct the first interview. Why don't you sit down and we can get started."

Peter sat on his folding chair and took a pen and pad out of his attach case. Mammon remained standing.

Clara had placed an interview form on the left side of the file. Peter scanned some of the questions on the form, then, without looking up, he said, "There's some background information I'll need. Can you give me your date of birth?"

Marmnlon tilted his head to one side and read the interview form upside down.

"Can I see that?" he asked, pointing at the form.

Peter hesitated, then took the form out of the file and handed it to Mammon. Mammon studied the form for a moment, then slowly ripped it into tiny pieces.

"If Geary's my lawyer I'll talk to Geary and not some flunky."

As Mammon let the pieces of the form flutter from his fingers like a minisnowstorm it suddenly occurred to Peter that he was locked in the interview room and there was only wooden table separating him from a a very dangerous wild animal.

"Yes, well, I'm an experienced attorney and anythin You tell me is confidential. I'll only talk about our contempt to steer his client out of the world of ultraviolet, versation to Mr. Geary)') Peter told Mammon in an at kung fu flicks and graphic slasher movies. t "Just how experienced are You, Peter?" Mammon asked.

"I've been a lawyer for four years."

"And how many criminal cases have you handled P, "Well, none, but, uhm, I have tried many complex legal matters and I .. ."

Mammon held up his hand and Peter stopped talking.

Mammon rested his hands on the table and it buckled.

Then, he leaned across the table until his face was inches from Peter's.

"You just lied to me, didn't you, Peter?"

Peter turned pale. His voice caught in his throat and all he could manage was, -1 ... 1.. ."

Mammon held him with his eyes for a moment. Then he went to the door and pounded on it. The locks snapped open and Mammon walked out of the room. It took a moment for Peter to realize that he was still alive.

Peter's only other visit to Whitaker had been spent humiliating and browbeating a local attorney and his client. After the deposition, Peter had celebrated at the Stallion, a bar Popular with the students at Whitaker State, where he met a nurse named Rhonda something whom he fascinated with his descri tion of the devastap tion visited on his adversary. The the'xt morning, Rhonda had written her name and phone number on a piece of a motel stationery before she left for the hospital. Si ince the Stallion provided the only good memory Peter had of Whitaker, it was here that he ran as soon as he escaped the Jail. oing to do?" Peter asked himself, as he "What am I g started on his second Jack Daniel's. He could not endure another encounter with a Mammon-like individual. It was out of the question. But what was his alternative?

Being a lawyer was all Peter knew and no one except Amos Geary would offer him a job after the Elliot fiasco.

Peter longed for his condo, now owned by a Merrill, Lynch exec who had gotten it at a fire-sale price because of Peter's sudden descent into poverty, and his Porsche, I which he had been forced to trade in for a used Subaru.

He wanted a job of which he could be proud. Most of all, he needed to reclaim his dignity. But his material possessions, his job and his dignity had been stripped from him. He was, he thought bitterly, as big a failure as one could become.

"Peter Hale?"

Peter looked up and found a tall, solidly built man in a business suit staring down at him.

"Steve Mancini," the man said. "We went to law school together."

"Right!" Peter said, breaking into a smile.

"Mind if I sit down?" Mancini asked as he slid into the booth across from Peter.

"Hell, no. What are you drinking."

"No, no. It's on me. I'm half owner of this joint."

Mancini signaled for a waitress.

"You live in Whitaker?" Peter asked incredulously, unable to fathom why any sane person would choose to live in a town without one decent clothing store.

"Live here and practice law here. But what are you doing Whitaker? I thought you went to work for your father's firm. Are you out on a case?"

"Uh, yes and no," Peter said, stalling for time. There was no way he was going to tell Mancini the truth, but "There you are," a woman said, and Peter looked over his shoulder into a pair of hazel eyes that had no room for him and were filled with Steve Mancini. Standing next to the beautiful brunette was a rugged-looking man with the broad shoulders and thick forearms of someone who labors for a living. He had curly black hair, a bushy mustache and blue eyes and he was grinning widely at Steve.

Mancini stood and kissed the woman on her cheek.

Then, he took her hand.

"Pete, this is my fiancee, Donna Harmon, and her brother, Gary."

A law school memory of Steve Mancini and a pretty blond wife made Peter frown for a moment, but he caught himself and said, "Hey, congratulations."

"Thank you," Donna answered with a satisfied grin.

"When is the wedding?"

"We're tying the knot in a few weeks," Mancini answered, as he ushered Donna into the booth and sat beside her. Gary slid in next to Peter.

"Do you have the tickets?" Gary asked.

"What tickets?" Mancini asked deadpan.

Gary looked panicky. "My football tickets. The season tickets. You you didn't forget my tickets, did you, Steve?"

"Don't tease him, Steve," Donna said sternly. "Of course, he has them, Gary."

"Here they are, buddy," Mancini said, pulling an envelope out ai his suit jacket.

Gary Harmon's face lit up and he started to grab for the tickets.

"What do you say first, Gary?" Donna asked gently.

Gary looked confused for a second and Peter examined him more closely. The guy looked normal, but he was acting like a kid.

Gary's face suddenly broke into a grin and, he said, "Thanks, Steve."

what could he say?

"Hey, guy, you're welcome."

Gary took the tickets and examined them as if they were a priceless work of art. "So, Pete," Mancini asked, "what brings you to Whitaker?"

Peter had hoped that Mancini had forgotten the question, but the arrival of Donna and Gary Harmon had given him time to invent an answer.

"I'm working for Amos Geary."

"Geary?" The expression on Mancini's face registered disapproval. "I never pictured you as the type to practice small-town law. I thought you were aiming for a partnership in a megafirm."

"Yeah, that's what I thought. I was working in my father's firm in Portland. Hale, Greaves. But I got tired of the rat race and Dad's an old friend of Amos. They played ball together at Oregon State."

Mancini forced a smile and he and Donna congratulated Peter on his new job.

"How did you get to Whitaker?" Peter asked to divert Mancini's attention.

"Didn't you see the trophy case when you walked in?"

"Well, no, I In my senior "Then, check it out when you leave.

year, I quarterbacked the Stallions to the NCAA Divipionsion 11 title, Whitaker State's only national chain ship in any spar ."

"Tell about the run, Steve," Gary begged, leaning forward eagerly.

"You've heard this story a million times," Dorma chided her brother.

"But I haven't," Peter said, hoping that Mancini would not press him further on his reason for being in Whitaker if he could keep him talking football.

"Looks like you're overruled," Mancini laughed. He ut his arm around Donna and leaned back in the p booth.

"It was the fourth quarter. Texas A&I had a three point lead and we were backed up on our own six with less than a minute on the clock. I was supposed to hand off to Rick Sandusky, but the son of a bitch slipped. I turned back toward the line, only to be confronted by three of the biggest human beings I have ever seen. Their eyes were redrimmed, steam was coming out of their nostrils and I could see that they were dying to commit an act of extreme violence on yours truly. That's when I was inspired to make one of the greatest runs in football history. You can find a wall-size photo of me in the Whitaker gym galloping the last ten yards before the end zone. In this town, Pete, I'm an immortal.

After graduation, most of the class gravitated to the big city, but people remember me here. I've got a great practice, I'm big in the Chamber of Commerce and," Mancini added, puffing up his chest, "my ship may soon be sailing into the dock."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. Bend has the track on the next Winter Olympics and I'm involved with some guys who are building condos just fifteen minutes away from Mount Bachelor."

"How long have you been in town?" Donna asked.

Peter decided that Steve's fiance was every bit as good-looking as the wife he remembered.

"This is my second day," he said.

"Have you found a place to live?"

Peter shook his head. "I'm still at the Riverview Motel."

"We can't have that," Donna said, turning to her fianc. "Can't you help him, Steve?"

"I think so. I own a few rental properties near the college, if you're interested."

"I've got my own house," Gary said proudly.

"You shouldn't interrupt, Gary," Donna reprimanded her brother gently. "Peter and Steve are talking."

Gary stopped smiling. "I'm sorry," he apologized, looking down at the table.

it suddenly dawned on Peter that Gary Harmon was retarded. Peter shifted a little toward the wall. Gary looked harmless enough, but Peter had still not recovered fully from his encounter with Christopher Mammon and he felt uncomfortable sitting so close to a person whose behavior he could not predict.

"Gary just moved into his own home and he's work ising as a janitor at the college," Donna explained. "He's very excited. It's his first job." -oh, yeah," Peter said, trying to be sociable. "Do you like your job?"

Gary frowned and considered his answer. "It's hard, but Mr. Ness says I'm doing good. He says I work real hard."

"Well, that's great," Peter answered lamely, at a loss for anything else to say.

"I think I might have a place for you," Mancini said.

"It's furnished and only three quarters of a mile from town, not too far from my house."

Mancini took out a business card and wrote an address on the back. Donna looked at her watch.

"We'd better go. Mom's expecting us."

"It was good seeing you," Mancini told Peter. "Give me a call after you look at the house. I'll take you out to lunch and give you the lowdown on Whitaker. And, since you'll be living here, I'll send you an invite to the wedding."

Mancini followed Donna and her brother out of the bar and Peter ordered a pitcher of beer and a burger with everything. He felt a little better. At least he knew someone in town. Peter remembered Steve Mancini as a real party animal. If there was anything going on in this hopeless burg, he would know about it.

When Peter finished eating, he suddenly remembered the last name of the nurse he had spent the evening with the last time he had been in Whitaker. It was Kates.

Rhonda Kates. He decided to go back to the motel and give her a call.

On the way out of the Stallion, Peter looked in the trophy case. There was Mancini's helmet and cleats, a program from the championship game and a photo of Mancini's famous run. Fame and fortune, Peter thought wistfully. Steve Mancini certainly seemed to have it all.

Chapter FIVE.

At six-thirty on Friday morning of his second week in town, Peter awoke in the house he was renting from Steve Mancini, then ran four miles through the quiet streets of Whitaker. The houses Peter passed were not split levels or indistinguishable tract homes. They were old, wood frame houses with gables and front porches that stood in yards rimmed by white picket fences where swings hung from the thick, gnarled limbs of ancient oaks. In the half light of early morning it was easy to imagine the glow behind the curtained windows was cast by an oil lamp and that the rickety garage doors would open wide, barn style, to reveal a horse and buggy.