The Barrens & Others

  *

  Early the next morning I was at the hotel next to my office eating eggs and potatoes. I've never liked eggs and potatoes, but I was there because Elliot was there. I raged silently as I watched him storing up on his nourishment before a busy day of drilling the teeth of my patients.

  I was in a black mood. I had been by his rooming house earlier but had found none of his laundry around. I'd been tempted to break into his quarters but was afraid I'd get caught. I couldn't risk that, with Wyatt still mad at me.

  As I watched him, he stirred his coffee and licked the spoon dry before placing it on the tablecloth. A neat man. A fastidious man. I felt like running over and wringing his –

  The spoon.

  I almost shouted out loud. That's it! The spoon! It had been in his mouth! What contact could be more "close" than being in someone's mouth?

  I waited until he finished his meal and departed, then hurried over to his table, just beating the serving girl to it. She gave me a strange look as I darted in front of her and grabbed his spoon off the tray, but I simply continued on my way without a backward glance, as if this were the most natural thing in the world.

  The hard part was over. I headed across the street to the back rooms at the Forty-Niner. Miss Lily would be waking up just about now. For a nominal fee, she'd help me obtain the second ingredient. This was the easy part.

  *

  "Now what?" I said as I held out the spoon and a small cup of cloudy liquid to Squaw Jones.

  She made no move to take them from me. "You have gold?"

  "Yes." I pulled a leather pouch from my coat pocket. "Sixteen ounces, as agreed."

  I held my breath as she loosened the drawstring and looked inside. My larcenous heart had prevailed on me to cheat her of her payment. No gold for Squaw Jones. Instead I'd made nuggets of lead and coated them with the gold colored material I used for my fake gold fillings. They wouldn't stand close inspection.

  She looked inside, gauged the weight of the bag in her hand, then nodded.

  "Is good." The pouch disappeared inside her serape and then she took the two ingredients from me. "Now this squaw make mix. Doctor Holliday wait outside."

  "What about the third ingredient?"

  She smiled. "Soon, Doctor Holliday. Must be patient."

  I stepped outside her tent. It was difficult to be patient knowing that Dr. Elliot was busy in his office working on my patients while my office door was locked.

  After what seemed like hours, Squaw Jones called me back in. I found her sitting there with a cup of steaming liquid.

  "Now time for third ingredient. The sacrifice."

  "What sort of sacrifice?" I didn't like the sound of this one bit.

  "Small part of you. Something Doctor Holliday will not miss, but something that will not grow back."

  "Wait just a minute!" I said. I'd heard about deals like this where you make a trade for "something you'll never miss" and I didn't want to fall into that trap! "We're not talking about my soul, are we?"

  She laughed. "No! Only small piece of flesh. Token for gods. Dr. Elliot gave finger."

  "How did you know that?"

  "You told this squaw last night."

  "Did I? I don't remember."

  "You did. Doctor Holliday must make same sacrifice if he wish bad medicine go away."

  Something that won't grow back. That left out hair and fingernail clippings. I certainly didn't want to lose a part of a finger – I didn't approve of public deformity.

  "Maybe this isn't such a good idea."

  She shrugged. "Without sacrifice, Dr. Elliot will not feel curse of Unhindered Hands."

  "'Unhindered Hands'? Just what is that?"

  "Like Untethered Tongue. As Doctor Holliday's lips now speak what he wish kept hidden in heart, Doctor Elliot's hands will do things he only wish to do."

  The thought of Dr. Elliot's hands acting upon whatever physical desires occurred to him, to be no more able to restrain his hands than I had been able to restrain my tongue delighted me.

  Then I thought of something neither I nor anyone else would miss –

  "How about my little toe?"

  "It is good," she said.

  "How do we do this?"

  Following her directions, I removed the boot and sock from my left foot and held it over the steaming liquid.

  "Dip toe."

  Feeling like a fool for going through this hocus-, yet hating myself for not having the nerve to call the whole thing off and take my chances with my unruly tongue, I dipped my little toe into the cup.

  "Enough," she said after a moment. She withdrew the cup and handed me a dirty cloth. "Dry toe."

  I scrutinized my left fifth toe. It looked just like the others, only wet.

  "Something's wrong!" I said. "I thought I was supposed to 'sacrifice' this toe! Nothing happened!"

  "Patience, Doctor Holliday. Patience."

  I was convinced now that I was being hoodwinked. I quickly rubbed my toe dry and rose to my feet.

  "This is a farce! I'm glad I didn't give you any real gold!"

  Her head snapped around. She stared at me. "Gold not real?"

  "No. So you can call off this whole charade."

  "Too late. Medicine is made. Curse begins."

  "But my toe–"

  I looked down at my left foot. There were only four toes. All that remained of my tenth toe was a small pink bulge of fresh scar tissue.

  "Where–?"

  I opened the cloth and there was my toe. As I watched, it fumed and melted into a pink fluid that was absorbed by the cloth. The odor made me want to gag.

  Squaw Jones was pawing through the bag of fake gold nuggets. "Doctor Holliday trick this squaw?"

  "Why not? You're probably the one who got me in this fix in the first place. You're playing both sides of street."

  She approached me, menace in her eyes. I kept watch on her hands, making sure both were in sight. They were: clutching the pouch of fake gold. He face came within inches of mine. She stared at me.

  Then she coughed. Once.

  "Return to your office, Doctor Holliday. Curse of Untethered Tongue is broken; curse of Unhampered Hands begin. Squaw Jones cannot change that now."

  I glanced down at my four-toed foot again and realized I was rapidly becoming a believer. With boot and sock in hand, I hurried from Squaw Jones's tent.

  "But you will pay another way!" she called after me.

  *

  The first patient to show up was Mr. O'Toole. My private name for him was "Mr. O'Stool"–he had a bowel fixation which he blamed on his bad teeth. He spent most office visits describing his movements. He was a bore but he came every two weeks for new filling.

  But I got through the visit with no problem. I'd had an urge to tell him that I thought he was suffering from a fecal impaction that had backed up to his brain but the remark remained within my mind while my mouth offered bland reassurances.

  I drilled his latest imaginary cavity and fairly danced out of the examining room.

  I've done it! I've broken the curse!

  I went to the front window in my waiting room and looked across the street at Dr. Elliot's office. I whispered:

  "I've beaten you, Elliot! Beaten you at your own game!"

  As I watched, I saw Bonnie Pontiac come racing out of Dr. Elliot's office, trying to cover her bobbing, exposed breasts with one hand while holding up her ripped skirt with the other. In close pursuit, with a piece of Bonnie's torn bodice clutched in his teeth, was Dr. Elliot. And right behind the two of them was the widow Porter, swinging her handbag. She caught Dr. Elliot full force in the back of the head with a swing and he went down. Then she stood over him and began pounding him with the bag.

  I watched until Wyatt ran up. He pulled his pistol and just stood there, his eyes captured by the pink-tipped whiteness of Bonnie's breasts. I knew though that as soon as she covered herself, Wyatt would be on Dr. Elliot like a lynch mob. He wasn't going to take at all kindly to someone going aft
er Bonnie Porter before he'd had firsts.

  Poor Dr. Elliot. Couldn't control his hands. Such a shame.

  As I turned away I felt a twinge behind my sternum. I began to cough. I'd never coughed like this before in my life. Spasms racked my chest. I pulled out my handkerchief and buried my face in it, trying to muffle the coughs, perhaps suppress them by trapping them inside. Suddenly I felt something tear free in my chest and fill my throat. I gagged it out.

  Blood stained my handkerchief.

  Hemoptysis – a bloody cough. A sure sign of consumption, or what they were now calling tuberculosis.

  But how could I have tuberculosis? I hadn't been visiting anyone in a sanitarium, and the only people in these parts who had any tuberculosis were...

  ...Indians.

  Squaw Jones had coughed in my face, but only once, and that had been just a few hours ago. I couldn't have developed tuberculosis in that short time. It was impossible.

  I glanced out the window again. Wyatt was leading Dr. Elliot off toward the jail, and being none too gentle about it. In the crowd that had gathered, all heads were turned to watch them go. All except one. Squaw Jones was there, staring directly at me.

  I coughed again.

  foreword to "Slasher"

  This one's for Joe Lansdale.

  Mainly because I borrowed one of the plot elements from his novel, Cold in July. If you've never read Cold in July, do so immediately. It's a bloody, funny, sad, scary moral pretzel of a novel that will keep you flipping pages until three in the morning. As soon as I finished reading it I called Joe to tell him what a great job he'd done. The only thing I wanted to know was where all the exclamation points had gone. I couldn't find a single one in the entire book. Joe said they're not necessary in a properly written scene. I begged to differ.

  Thus began the ongoing Wilson Lansdale Exclamation Point Debate. I admit I've used too many in the past, and as a result of the debate I've cut way back. I've got them under control now. [But Joe...a character screaming at the top of his lungs in red faced rage deserves at least one (!), don't you think?]

  Next he'll be dumping question marks.

  But back to "Slasher." I liked Cold in July so much that when Ed Gorman and Marty Greenberg requested a story for Stalkers II (eventually published as Predators), I borrowed a piece of the Cold in July set up – the idea of a killer being kept in protective custody because he's a witness in an important case – and took off from there.

  "Slasher" is a twisted little piece of fiction without the slightest hint of the supernatural. As such it wound up in The Year's 25 Finest Crime and Mystery Stories.

  The perfect kind of story to dedicate to Joe R. Lansdale.

  SLASHER

  I saved the rage.

  I let them bury my grief with Jessica. It cocooned her in her coffin, cushioned her, pillowed her head. There it would stay, doing what little it could to protect her from the cold, the damp, the conqueror worm.

  But I saved the rage. I nurtured it. I honed it until its edge was fine and tough and sharp. Sharp enough to one day cut through the darkness encrusting my soul.

  Martha was on the far side of the grave, supported by her mother and father and two brothers – Jessie's grandparents and uncles. I stood alone on my side. A few friends from the office were there, standing behind me, but they weren't really with me. I was alone, in every sense of the word.

  I stared at the top of the tiny coffin that had remained closed during the wake and the funeral mass because of the mutilated state of the little body within. I watched it disappear by tiny increments beneath a growing tangle of color as sobbing mourners each took a turn at tossing a flower on it. Jessica, my Jessica. Only five years old, cut to ribbons by some filthy rotten stinking lousy–

  "Bastard!"

  The grating voice wrenched my gaze away from the coffin. I knew that voice. Oh, how I knew that voice. I looked up and met Martha's hate-filled eyes. Her face was pale and drawn, her cheeks were black with eyeliner that had flowed with her tears. Her blond hair was masked by her black hat and veil.

  "It's your fault! She's dead because of you! You had her only every other weekend and you couldn't even pay attention to her! It should be you in there!"

  "Easy, Martha," one of her brothers told her in a low voice. "You'll only upset yourself more."

  But I could see it in his eyes, too – in everybody's eyes. They all agreed with her. Even I agreed with her.

  "No!" she screamed, shaking off her brother's hand and pointing at me. "You were a lousy husband and a lousier father. And now Jessie's dead because of you! You!"

  Then she broke down into uncontrollable sobbing and was led off by her parents and brothers. Embarrassed, the rest of the mourners began to drift away, leaving me alone with my dead Jessie. Alone with my rage. Alone with my guilt.

  I hadn't been the best father in the world. But who could be? Either you don't give them enough love or you over-indulge them. You can't seem to win. But I do admit that there were too many times when something else seemed more important than being with Jessie, some deal, some account that needed attention right away, so Jessie could wait. I'd make it up to her later – that was the promise. I'd play catch-up next week. But there wouldn't be any later. No more next weeks for Jessica Santos. No catching up on the hugs and the playing and the I-love-yous.

  If only...

  If only I hadn't left her on the curb to go get her that goddam ice cream cone.

  We'd been watching the Fourth of July fireworks down at the harborfront. Jessie was thrilled and fascinated by the bright flashes blooming and booming in the sky. She'd wanted an ice cream, and being a divorced daddy who didn't get to see her very often, I couldn't say no. So I carried her back to the push cart vendor near the entrance to Crosby's Marina. She couldn't see the fireworks from the end of the line so I let her stand back by the curb to watch while I queued up. While she kept her eyes on the sky, I kept an eye on her all the time I was on line. I wasn't worried about someone grabbing her – the thought never entered my mind. I just didn't want her wandering into the street for an even better view. The only time I looked away was when I placed the order and paid the guy.

  When I turned around, a cone in each hand, Jessie was gone.

  No one had seen anything. For two days the police and a horde of volunteers combed all of Monroe and most of northern Nassau county. They found her – what was left of her – on the edge of old man Haskins' marshes.

  A manhunt was still on for the killer, but with each passing day, the trail got colder.

  So now I stood by my Jessica's grave under the obscenely bright sun, sweating in my dark suit as I fought my guilt and nurtured my hate, praying for the day they caught the scum who had slashed my Jessica to ribbons. I renewed the vow I had made before – the guy was never going to get to trial. I would find a way to get to him while he was out on bail, or even in jail, if it came to that, and I would do to him what he'd done to my Jessica. And then I would dare the courts to find a jury that would convict me.

  When everyone was gone, I said my final good-bye to Jessie. I'd wanted to erect a huge angelic monument to her, but Tall Oaks didn't allow that sort of thing. A little plaque would have to suffice. It didn't seem right.

  As I turned to go, I noticed a man leaning against a tree a hundred feet or so away. He was watching me. As I started down the grassy slope, he began walking, too. Our paths intersected at my car.

  "Mr. Santos?" he said.

  I turned. He was a big man, six-two at least, mid-forties, maybe two-fifty, with most of it settled around his gut. He wore a white shirt under a rumpled gray suit. His thinning brown hair was slick with sweat. I looked at him but said nothing. If he was another reporter–

  "I'm Gerald Caskie, FBI. Can we talk a minute?"

  "You found him?" I said, my spirits readying for a leap. I stepped closer and grabbed two fistfuls of his suit jacket. "You've got him?"

  He pulled his jacket free of my grasp.

  "W
e can talk in my car. It's cooler."

  I followed about fifty yards along the curving asphalt path to where a monotone Ford two-door sedan waited in the shade of one of the cemetery's eponymous trees. The motor was running. He indicated the passenger side. I joined him in the front seat of the Ford. The air conditioner was blasting. It was freezing inside.

  "That's better," he said, adjusting one of the vents to blow directly on his face.

  "All right," I said, unable to contain my impatience any longer. "We're here. Tell me: Do you have him?"

  He looked at me with basset hound brown eyes.

  "What I'm about to tell you is off the record, agreed?"

  "What are you–?"

  "Agreed? You must never reveal what I'm about to tell you. Do I have your word as a man that what I tell you will never go beyond this car?"

  "No. I have to know what it's about, first."

  He shifted in his seat and put the Ford in gear.

  "Forget it. I'll drive you back to your car.

  "No. Wait. All right. I promise. But enough with the games, already."

  He threw the gearshift back into Park.

  "This isn't a game, Mr. Santos. I could lose my job, even be brought up on criminal charges for what I'm going to tell you. And if you do try to spill it, I'll deny we've ever met."

  "What is it, goddam it?"

  "We know who killed your daughter."

  The words hit me like a sledge to the gut. I felt almost sick with relief.

  "Have you got him? Have you arrested him?"

  "No. And we won't be. Not for some time to come."

  It took a while for the words to sink in, probably because my mind didn't want to accept them. But when it did, I was ready to go for his throat. I reined in my fury, however. I didn't want to get hit with assault and battery on a Federal officer. At least not yet.

  "You'd better explain that," I said in a voice that was barely above a whisper.

  "The killer is presently a protected witness in an immensely important federal trial. Can't be touched until all the testimony is in and we get our conviction."