The Ethical Assassin: A Novel (22 page)

“So, what are you saying? That our food supply is tainted and no one knows but you?”

“Lots of people know, but people don’t worry about it because they are told everything is fine. But the statistics are staggering. Seventy percent of the antibiotics we use go into livestock—meat and dairy animals that people end up consuming. Most of the population is walking around with low dosages of antibiotics in them, allowing bacteria to evolve into antibiotic-resistant strains. Even if I didn’t care how the animals are treated, I would still have to worry about the plague that’s coming to wipe us all out.”

“I don’t believe it,” I said. “If it were really that dangerous, then wouldn’t someone do something about it?”

“Things don’t work that way. Money greases the wheels. If there were a plague and it were linked back to factory farming, then someone would do something about it. Until that happens, too many people are making too much money. Our senators and representatives from farm states say that there’s no evidence that intensive farming hurts anyone. Meanwhile, they’re taking zillions of dollars of campaign contributions from these giant agribusinesses that destroy family farms and replace them with Nazi monstrosities.”

“It can’t be that bad,” I said.

“It’s amazing. You’re like a walking poster child for ideology. How can it not be that bad? You are looking right at it. It
is
that bad. And if your own eyes don’t convince you, how can you ever be convinced of anything ever except what you already believe?”

I had no answer.

“Look,” he continued, “even if you have no sympathy for the suffering of the animals, even if you’re too shortsighted to care about the long-term health risks of tainted meat, then think about this: There are consequences, terrible, human consequences, soul-crushing consequences, from being asked to not think about something as basic as our own survival because big corporations need to keep up their bottom lines.”

It was a good point, and I didn’t have a response. “Let’s get out of here.”

Outside, even in the midst of all that stench, I didn’t feel like moving. We stood in the clearing while I stared at the building in numb disbelief.

“Imagine what you’ve just seen,” Melford said, “only multiply it by millions. Billions. It makes you wonder, doesn’t it.”

“Makes me wonder what?” I asked. My voice sounded hollow.

“If it is ever ethical to sacrifice human life for the sake of animal life.”

Even in the face of what I’d witnessed, I didn’t hesitate. “No,” I said.

“Are you sure? Let me ask you something. Say you come upon a woman being raped. The only way to save her from rape is to kill her attacker. Is killing him the right thing to do?”

“If I had no other choice, of course.”

“Why? Why is that morally acceptable?”

“Because I value the right of a woman to escape rape over the right of a rapist to live.”

“Good answer. But what about the right of an animal to escape torture? You don’t value that right over the right of a torturer to achieve pleasure or profit?”

“No. Look, what goes on in there is terrible, Melford. I would never say otherwise. But there is still a basic divide between people and animals.”

“Because animals have a lesser sense of themselves?”

“That’s right.”

“And what about a severely retarded person—one who, as far as we know, is not any more aware than a monkey? Does he only have the rights of a monkey?”

“Of course not. He’s still a human being.”

“And receives the rights thereof, yes? The umbrella that includes the imagined or the typical person must also include the lowest of us. Is that it?”

“Yeah,” I said. “That’s it.”

“But is that umbrella natural and right and just, or is it just what we tell ourselves for our ethical and economic and sensual convenience? Why shouldn’t that umbrella include all creatures who are capable of feelings and emotions? If it’s wrong to torture a pig, then it’s wrong. To say that it is no longer wrong when it’s lucrative—because we want valuable exports and cheap meat at the supermarket—is insane. Ethics cannot be bound up with profit. It’s like permitting contract killing while making murders of passion illegal. Is cruelty motivated by capital less evil than other kinds of cruelty?”

“I understand what you’re saying, but you can’t convince me that there’s no hierarchy. Animals might feel emotions, but they don’t write books or compose music. We have imagination and creativity, and that means human life is always more valuable than animal life.”

“Always? Let’s say there’s a dog, a heroic dog. A dog who has saved the lives of countless people through acts of bravery. Maybe a firehouse dog who rescues babies from a fire. And let’s say there is a convict on death row, one you know is guilty of horrible murders. He’s escaped on the eve of his execution and he’s taken the dog hostage. The next morning, the authorities discover his hideout. They know they can recapture him, but in doing so, the dog will surely be killed. Or they can have a sniper take out the convict and save the dog’s life. What’s more important, the convict who has killed numerous people and who would already be dead had he not escaped, or the dog, who has only done good?”

“Come on. It’s an extreme case,” I said.

“Agreed. It’s the most extreme case I could devise on short notice. Now answer the question.”

“You save the man,” I told him, not entirely convinced I believe it. “Once you go down the road you’re talking about, it’s a slippery slope.”

“So human life, no matter how evil, must always take precedence over animal life, no matter how exalted?”

I shrugged, playing at an apathy I didn’t feel, didn’t come close to feeling. The truth was, I had no answer to his line of questioning, and it bothered me. If Melford was right, then there were no absolutes, not like I’d always believed, and it put me in an ethical free fall. The example
was
extreme, and I understood that was Melford’s point. I wasn’t willing to admit that you probably save the dog, however, since that meant that the question was no longer black and white, but a matter of degree. It wasn’t if you value human life over animal, but when and under what conditions. “I don’t know. Can we go now?”

“Yeah, head over to the car. I haven’t quite figured out how I’m going to save these pigs, but in the meantime, I need to feed and water them. It will only take a few minutes.”

“You want help?”

“Nah, don’t worry about it.”

I did worry about it, but I obeyed, because with Melford it was my lot to obey. So I put my head down and shuffled toward the car, trying to blank my mind, trying to think of nothing at all rather than think about those pigs with their ugly red tumors and the hollow looks in their eyes. I couldn’t make my mind go blank, though. Instead, I thought of Karen and Bastard, cold and dead and wide-eyed.

When I was halfway to the car, I looked up from my miserable reverie. Something must have attracted my attention, and when I peered in the glaring afternoon, with everything hazy from the sun blasting the land with oven-hot intensity, I saw something that made me freeze with terror. A cop car was pulling onto the grounds and pivoting right at me, as if it were lining me up to run me over. There could be no doubt. Whoever was behind the wheel had seen me.

I craned my neck in search of Melford, but there was no sign of him. The cop probably hadn’t seen him, either. As far as he knew, I was there all alone.

I recognized the cop at once. It was the guy from the dark Ford outside Bastard and Karen’s trailer, the guy who had helped the Gambler move the body. The police chief of Meadowbrook Grove.

Chapter 22

T
HE COP STEPPED OUT
of his car, shut the door, and leaned back against it. If he’d been a smoker, he’d have lit up. The car was clean; I noticed it right away. It looked newly washed, the kind of car you wouldn’t mind leaning against.

He waved me over as if we were old friends, and I obeyed the command. I wanted to run, figured I probably ought to run, but I knew I wasn’t ready for an instant metamorphosis from working teen to outlaw. Besides, Melford was nearby, and I figured I was probably safer with him lurking somewhere around here than I would be running through the trees with a cop of pretty questionable ethics on my tail.

I walked over slowly, trying to keep my head up, to smile, to look as though I’d done nothing wrong. I’d learned that much from Melford. Act like everything is cool, and maybe everything will be cool. Of course, Melford was also willing to start shooting people in the head if things ended up leaning toward the not cool.

“Good afternoon, Officer,” I said.

“Well, now,” the cop said. “If it ain’t the encyclopedia salesman. You sell any encyclopedias to them pigs?” He grinned, showing me his twisted teeth.

I recalled that I had never told the cop what I’d been selling. “I never thought to try,” I said. “I was getting out of the heat in those trees, and sort of wandered around and came out here. I was curious about what this place was, the smell and all that, so I thought I’d look around. Am I trespassing or something?”

The cop, Jim Doe by Melford’s account, squinted at me. He rubbed at his nose, and his fingernail clawed for one unconscious instant at a hard booger encrusted at the tip of his nostril. “What the hell you doing wandering in the woods when you’re supposed to be selling books? Your boss gonna like that?”

“It’s a long day,” I said. “I wanted to take some downtime before heading back on the road. You can understand the value of resting a bit before hard work, I’m sure, Officer.”

“I don’t see how trespassing on a hog lot is downtime,” he said. “In fact, it seems to me that what you were doing was breaking the law. Not a whole lot else besides, either.”

“I’m sorry, but I didn’t see any signs telling me I couldn’t be here.”

“I guess you didn’t see that big yellow sign saying
NO TRESPASSING,
did you? Didn’t see that gate that keeps folks out?”

“I came through the woods,” I said, not knowing if such a thing were possible. “Anyhow, I was just leaving. I think you can understand my mistake, can’t you?”

The sales technique didn’t seem to be doing the trick. “I’d better look around to make sure you didn’t fuck anything up. Then I’m going to take you to jail on trespassing charges.” He stepped toward me. “Now turn around and face the car. Hold your hands behind your back.”

“I don’t think this is really necessary,” I said. My voice wavered as panic began to set in.

Doe grabbed my shoulders, digging into the flesh hard enough to bruise. He twisted me around and shoved me into the side of the cruiser. If I had not yanked my neck back, my head would have slammed against the passenger-side window, and for a dizzying moment I thought I would fall down. Somehow I managed to maintain my balance, but Doe gave my head a shove, and my nose hit the window hard. The blood began to trickle out of one of my nostrils.

There was only a moment to process this pain before the next wave began. Doe slapped the cuffs down on my left wrist and then the right. The cold clamping of metal cut into me, and then a curious combination of sharp, tearing pain and a growing numbness shot up my arms.

Another claw on my shoulder, and I was spinning around again to face Doe.

“These cuffs are too tight,” I gasped. “You’re cutting off my circulation.”

“Shut your fucking hole.” Doe punched me in the stomach.

The air went out of me, and I bent over and let out an
oof
but then straightened myself up. Vegetable lo mein churned in my stomach. As much as it hurt, I knew that Doe had pulled his punch, and I knew I didn’t want to taste the real thing.

“Now,” Doe said, “you cut out the bullshit and tell me what you’re doing here.”

“I told you,” I said, wincing at how feeble I sounded. Blood trickled out of my nose and into my mouth. A
whoosh
ing noise roared in my ears.

“You haven’t told me shit. You keep showing up in the most fuck-all places, boy, and your story about wandering onto this property ain’t going to convince me of nothing.”

“Am I under arrest?”

“You ain’t that lucky.” Doe opened the door to the backseat. He shoved me inside, making sure to knock my head against the roof on the way in. “You’re going to sit in here while I go look around to see if I can tell what you were up to. You better hope I don’t find nothing, either, or you may be getting a better look at that there shithole.” He gestured toward the waste lagoon and then shoved the door shut.

I wasn’t going to cry, despite the watering of my eyes and the growing mass in my throat. This wasn’t Kevin Oswald from gym class knocking me hard in the locker room so I fell backward over the bench and smashed my head into Teddy Abbott’s locker. This was a cop clearly operating outside the law, possibly guilty of murder, who was intent on doing something really terrible to me. I concentrated on licking away the salty blood that trickled slowly out of my nose and settled on my upper lip.

I tried to wiggle, but it hurt too much, and my hands felt like overfilled hot-water bottles, ready to burst. I wondered if the cuffs were going to do any permanent damage, and I wondered if permanent damage was even something I needed to be concerned about. Just what were the chances that I would have the opportunity, say, ten years from now, to rub my wrists and think that the old cuff injury was acting up again?

Where the hell was Melford? Surely he would take a little time off from tending to the livestock to come back to rescue me. Melford would not be intimidated by a little thing like going up against a policeman. He had removed himself from the ideological state apparatus, or so he claimed, so he would have no compunction about sneaking up on a cop and bashing in his head. That’s what I was hoping, because I also had to wonder if Melford would take advantage of the opportunity and leave me holding the bag for everything that had happened.

I looked out the window and saw Doe walking slowly, legs wide like an old-time cowboy, toward the barn. Was Melford still in there, making clucking noises while casting hog chow to diseased pigs? Or was he at that moment planning a covert attack? Had he covered himself with leaves and twigs and taken a slow crawl along the ground so he could leap up and slit the cop’s throat?

I didn’t want to be party to another murder, particularly a policeman’s murder. Though I was now well convinced that Doe was the kind of guy who needed killing, the kind of person I would gladly sacrifice to save a dog of even moderate bravery, I still had more significant qualms about murder than Melford did. I sure as hell didn’t want to be a fugitive from a cop killing. Doe could be a baby raper, but if he was killed, every cop in the world would pursue the murderer with unceasing rage.

All of that became irrelevant, because just then I saw another cop car coming down the dirt road and out of the thick of pine trees. That meant Melford was now outnumbered. Doe had backup, and the cops back at their station knew about the call. If something happened to these guys, we would be world-class fugitives.

Then I noticed something about the second cop car. It wasn’t navy blue like Doe’s; it was brown. Instead of
CITY OF MEADOWBROOK GROVE
along the side, it had
GROVE COUNTY SHERIFF’S DEPARTMENT
. I glanced over at Jim Doe, who had also turned to look at the car, and even from the distance I could see him mouth a single syllable. It looked a lot like “Shit.”

Doe started power-walking back to his car, one arm swinging hard, one hand pressed to the crown of his hat to keep it from falling off. The brown sheriff’s department car pulled directly in front of Doe’s, and a woman came out, dressed in an unflattering brown uniform.

It was hard to say what might have been flattering on her. She wasn’t ugly, but she was stocky and rugged, with a mannish build and a slightly flattened-looking face. Her short, walnut-brown hair was pulled back into a sensible ponytail—the sort that wouldn’t get in your face while hopping fences and darting into alleys in pursuit of bad guys.

She glanced at Doe and then into the back of Doe’s car, making eye contact with me for a moment. She then reached into her own car to pull out her radio mike.

“Hold up there,” I could hear Doe say, though his voice was muted by the glass of the car. With one hand still on his hat, he speed-waddled toward her. “Let’s just hold up a second.”

The woman put the mike back. I suspected that it might have been a bad move, but I wasn’t about to start shouting or knocking on the window with my skull. I couldn’t even decide if the presence of this new, potentially uncrooked cop was good news or bad news.

“No need to call in nothing,” Doe said, slightly winded from his jog. He offered a smile certainly meant to be friendly, but it looked grotesque to me. “What’s the hurry, Aimee?”

She glanced at me. I tried to plead with my eyes. “What the fuck is going on here?”

“I don’t like it when a lady swears,” he told her.

“What are you, my minister? I don’t give a rat’s shit bag puss fuck tit what you like. I want to know what’s going on here.”

“Got me a trespasser,” Doe said. “That’s all. Maybe more than one. Still got to check out the grounds. And this here is Meadowbrook Grove’s jurisdiction, not to mention my own personal property. So if you don’t mind staying out of our business, I promise not to stick my nose in yours.” He unveiled another grin. “Nope, I won’t stick nothing in your business.”

She met his gaze. “Jim, you know perfectly well you can’t order a county cop out of a municipality, and if I think you might be up to something, I can have a look around. It’s a little something called ‘probable cause’—a concept pretty well-known among cops. And let me tell you, that sad-looking boy in your car, licking the snotty blood off his face, gives it to me.”

Doe turned away from her, pressed one finger to his left nostril, and blew out a wad of snot onto the ground. “You want to play hardball with me, sugar?”

“What I want is to know what’s going on. So how about you stop jerking me around.”

“Maybe you want to jerk me around a little?” Before the county officer could speak, Doe let out an exasperated sigh and pointed toward the hog lot. “I came to check on my property, and I happened to notice this suspicious-looking fellow prowling around, looking to break in, I guess. What should I have done? Called the police?”

“Yeah.” She nodded. “That’s what you should have done. Get him out of that car.”

“I don’t much like the tone of your voice.”

“You’re not going to like the tone of the county jail, either. Get him out of there.”

He put his hands on his hips. “What crawled up you? Is this because I forgot Jenny’s birthday? Is that what this is about? Because if Pam told you to give me a hard time about that, why, that’s nothing but harassment, is what that is. I might file me a complaint.”

“You don’t want to play it this way.”

“I don’t understand why you folks at County don’t have more respect for your fellow law enforcement officers from other jurisdictions.”

“We have plenty of respect for other law enforcement officers,” she told him. “We just don’t respect you. Get him out of there now, unless you want me to radio for backup. Because if that happens, things are going to get ugly.”

“It got ugly the minute you showed your face,” Doe mumbled.

He opened the door and yanked me out, sending another wave of pain through my arms. “Don’t make me mad,” he whispered, hardly more than a hot breath, into my ear. “Don’t think for a second you’re getting away with anything. I know who you are, boy.”

The other cop gave me an appraising, almost sympathetic, once-over. I couldn’t figure out my move. Cops were no longer my friends, but I had to believe that she would be a better bet than Jim Doe, a better bet by a long stretch. Frankly, at that moment I believed I’d be willing to face charges and trial and testify against Melford if I could get away from Jim Doe. Maybe not very loyal, but I hadn’t seen Melford running to my rescue, and I wouldn’t be involved in any of this if Melford hadn’t killed Bastard and Karen for reasons he still wasn’t talking about.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” swore the county cop, looking at my bloodied nose.

“I found him that way,” Doe said.

She ignored him. “What’s your name, son?” she asked, even though she was still in her twenties, possibly even early twenties, and had no business calling me “son.”

“Lem Altick.” No point in lying when she could, and certainly would, pull my license.

“What were you doing here?”

I told her the same story I’d told Doe, about looking for shade and then just wandering around in the absence of
NO TRESPASSING
signs. It found a more sympathetic audience with her, perhaps because of the blood.

“You resist the man in any way?” She gestured toward Doe with her head.

“No, ma’am. I explained myself like I did with you.”

“Turn around,” she told me.

I did.

“Jesus fuck,” she whispered. “Take those off of him now.”

“I got a right to handcuff a perp.”

“Doe, I’m going to count to three, and if those cuffs aren’t off, then you’re going to be the perp here.”

He grumbled but took out his keys and unlocked the cuffs, getting in a few rough jerks while he fumbled to fit the key in the lock.

“What a bullshit move, putting them on too tight. What, did you knock his head against the door when you put him in the car, too?”

It had been a rhetorical question, but I answered for Doe. “Yes, ma’am, he did. Punched me in the stomach, too.”

“This fucker is lying,” Doe said as the cuffs came off.

I felt a rush of pain as the blood began to flow. It stung horribly, and I winced as my eyes watered, but I was determined to show nothing more than the wincing. I kept my hands behind my back, not wanting to see them until the pain dissipated.