Brambleman (36 page)

He felt his neck again and put his hand in
front of his face. He’d either been hit with birdshot or a piece of
glass. It wasn’t bleeding much, but it stung. Only a scratch,
Charlie told himself. Only a scratch. He checked the mirror. No
sign anyone was following him. He’d gotten away. He would live to
tell the tale. He’d have to swear out a warrant on the old bastard
for aggravated assault. This would bolster the book’s credibility,
and more importantly, get the asshole arrested. Charlie wouldn’t
mind if the old bastard died in jail.

“That is one serious motherfucking footnote!”
he yelled, holding his neck and checking his mirror one last time,
just to make sure that old pickup wasn’t barreling after him.

Charlie hit the highway and sped out of
Forsyth, bleeding
and
laughing. Beside him, the spittle
glistened with promise in the late afternoon sun.

* * *

DNA Testing Lab, located in a small strip
center near Northlake Mall, looked like a cross between a copy shop
and a medical clinic. A few minutes before closing, Charlie walked
in wearing duct tape on his neck and placed his clipboard with the
bespittled cover on the counter. He perused the pricing sheet,
wishing he could simply opt for the Personal Satisfaction package,
but knowing he had to spring for the more expensive Court
Admissible deal.
Do it up right. Gift wrap the package
.

When the young black technician wearing a
white lab coat turned around to serve him, she did a double take.
“You’re hurt. We’re not a clinic. You should—”

“I know,” Charlie said. “It’s just a scratch.
I’ll patch it up better in a minute. First things first.”

He pointed to the clipboard. She grimaced in
distaste.

“It’s saliva,” he said. “Manspit.” Then,
because he couldn’t resist, he added, “Spitacular.”

“How long ago did this happen?”

“A little less than an hour.”

“No. That.” She jabbed her finger at the
photo.

“Oh. Seventy years.”

“Did somebody spit on the picture?”

“He was aiming at me,” Charlie said.

“Uh-uh.” The technician’s castor-oil grimace
was so severe it was almost comical. “I don’t want to know. Do you
have a match for this sample?”

“I’ll have to bring it in later.”

“Any other testing you want done today?”

Charlie looked over his shoulder at the van
and wondered if he could get the finger tested, then decided
against it. A historian’s artifact could be a lab technician’s 911
call. Besides, if his theory was correct, John Riggins was related
to no one he knew, since Minerva was an only child. And he didn’t
want to pay to find out that Riggins’s closest relative was a
pickle.

The technician took the sample. “I guess
there’s enough,” she said.

After learning that the results would be
available five days after he brought in a comparison sample,
Charlie paid the technician and returned to the van. The vehicle
looked like it had been involved in a drive-by, with pellet marks
peppering the tailgate. He counted eight new holes in the back of
the driver’s seat. He was lucky he’d only been hit by a single
pellet. If Pappy had been a few seconds quicker, used buckshot, or
Charlie had been just a bit slower, he and his van would be
spending the night at the bottom of Lake Lanier. “Helluva
contract,” he muttered.

Now all he had to do was convince Minerva to
help prove her father was a white rapist. He debated driving over
to her house, but that would have to wait. There was too much else
to do. Even though Trouble had that
No Cops
rule, Charlie
needed to drive back to Cumming and swear out warrants, for the
record and the story. First, he needed to patch the rear window to
decrease the chance of getting pulled over by police.

As the sun was setting, he drove to a nearby
office complex and circled around behind the buildings. Next to a
Dumpster, he found a large corrugated box. Working in the glow of a
yellow security light, he pulled a utility knife and duct tape from
his tool box and cut a patch of cardboard. Then he fastened it over
the shattered rear window. In the process, he cut himself on
crumbled safety glass. He used several bandages from his first-aid
kit to dress his newest oopsies, then repatched his gunshot injury,
a flesh wound that had already stopped bleeding.

Then he remembered Kathleen.
Oh, yeah.
That
. He should have been back at Bayard Terrace an hour ago.
He pulled out his cellphone and tried to call her, but her phone
was out of service.

That was creepy.
Just like before
.

It took Charlie a half hour to drive to
Bayard Terrace, where he found, to his horror, that both Atlanta
police and Angela were on the scene. One patrol car sat in the
street and another in Kathleen’s driveway. Neighbors stood on the
sidewalk, talking amongst themselves. Charlie parked on the street
and rushed up to the young couple who lived next door.

“What happened?” he asked.

“Somebody broke in again,” the wife said,
shaking her head.

Charlie silently cursed himself. This was his
fault for not returning straight to Bayard Terrace.

“I heard Kathleen yell,” the woman said. “And
I saw somebody in that room.” She pointed toward Talton’s study. “I
knew it wasn’t you, because it was a short person. Wearing a ski
mask. So I called 911 and then I yelled out the window. I think I
scared him.”

“Young or old, fat or thin?”

“Normal. I couldn’t tell the age.”

Not Momo, then. Maybe they hired someone.

“He was gone when the police arrived,” she
added.

“When did they get here?”

Husband and wife exchanged glances. “Ten
minutes ago, maybe,” she said.

“Have you seen her?”

“No. We didn’t go in. We weren’t sure they
were gone.”

“I’m going to check on her.”

Charlie rushed up the sidewalk. A black cop
pushed against his chest when he tried to enter the house. “You
family?”

“I live here. I’m her caretaker.”

“Not anymore,” said a voice from the bedroom.
Angela came out glaring. “They bound her up with duct tape and
strapped her to a chair. She nearly had a heart attack! If that
wasn’t enough, she said this has happened before. And you didn’t
report it! Is that true?”

“Uh …”

“She hasn’t been taking her meds,
either.”

“Is she all right?”

“No thanks to you, she is.”

“I know who’s behind this,” he offered. “It’s
about the book.”

“It’s definitely about you,” Angela said. She
turned her back on him and returned to her mother’s side. Charlie
found himself talking to Officer Tanner. He breathlessly told the
officer what he knew—some of it anyway. Enough to point a finger at
the Cutchinses—without mentioning the finger, of course. That was
his, all his. But he did happen to mention the shooting. Tanner
said a detective would talk with him.

Charlie tried again to see Kathleen, but
Angela wouldn’t let him near her. After a short and heated
argument, she told him to pack his things and get out. “You’re
fired!” she said.

“I couldn’t smite him!” Kathleen cried out
from her bedroom. “It wouldn’t work.”

He saw no point in arguing. Angela didn’t
know about
American Monster
, and Kathleen didn’t understand
its heavy familial implications, since he’d never told her about
them. So much the better. Charlie handed Angela his key and went
into the study. The manuscript of
Thoracic Park
—his decoy
novel—seemed to be the only thing missing, since all his papers
were in his van or the safety box. He didn’t tell police about the
theft of 350 sheets of paper. He just wanted to get out of there
and swear out warrants in Forsyth.

Charlie bagged the few possessions he kept in
the study and grabbed the printer, then went downstairs and began
hauling stuff out of the basement. There was one tricky moment,
when he snuck out the dungeon’s back door with the contract vat,
something that would be extremely difficult to explain to police.
It had filled to the top, so it was very heavy. He carried it
gingerly to the van and put it behind the back seat, managing to do
so without spilling any blood.

By then, the neighbors had drifted away. The
officers stayed inside the house. Feeling more like a perpetrator
than a victim, Charlie left without talking to an investigator. As
he drove away, he noticed a black car following him. The detective?
Not likely. Charlie zoomed through a red light, barely avoiding a
T-bone crash, rounded a corner, took a left, a right, and then
pulled into an empty driveway. After waiting ten minutes, he left
the neighborhood via a back way. While he was driving along
Briarcliff, his cellphone rang. The call was coming from the place
he had once called home.

“Hello,” he said uncertainly, having deep
misgivings about talking to anyone right then, especially a
varmint.

“I heard you went up to Pappy’s.” Susan’s
tone was hard as rock.

“That’s true.”

“Mom said you broke into his house and
threatened him, and you’re going to spread lies about him if he
doesn’t give you a bunch of money. She says you heard about the
deal on his farm, and you’re trying to get a cut.”

“That’s what she’d say.”

“Are you?” she demanded.

“I find your question offensive. Did she tell
you the nature of these so-called lies?”

“She says you stole something, too.”

“
Something
? Ask her what I stole,
Susan. Ask her what I stole.”

“So you did take something.”

“Nothing that belonged to your grandfather.”
He liked his answer, nice and legalistic.

“You’ve been going downhill for over a year,
ever since that thing with the Rebel flag on the Fourth of July.
This grudge you’ve got is
insane
. This is the second time
you’ve been up there, even though you’re not welcome. That’s
stalking
, Charlie. You’re mentally ill! The phone’s been
ringing off the hook! The Atlanta police are looking for you. Hang
on. There’s another call.”

Charlie hummed the
Jeopardy
theme as
he drove, checking the mirror for black cars. Susan came back on
again: “That was the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. An agent
wants to talk to you.”

“I’m sure you gave them my number.”

“I had to. Hang on. Another call.” Click.

Please remain on hold while your life is
destroyed
.

“That was the Forsyth County Sheriff’s
office. They’ve got warrants, plural, out for you.”

“That was quick. Pays to have connections.”
So much for going back to Cumming to swear out one of his own.
Unless
… “I suppose it would be too much to ask if you’d
post bond.”

“I’ll say it is. You’ve turned against my
family. I can’t have that. If you come here, I’ll have to call the
police. I’ll tell you this, too. Stay away from the kids, or I’ll
file charges.”

He didn’t bother to ask “what charges?” He
knew she’d think of something. “How much money are they giving you?
Or do you have to wait for the land sale?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“All right. Détente is done. Just one thing:
Don’t let Beck and Ben near your grandfather ever again. He may be
old, but he’s dangerous.”

“You are so full of shit, Charlie. You’re
going to jail. I hope you rot there.”

Susan hung up. Charlie slammed his phone on
the dashboard. After that, he drove around aimlessly, checking his
mirror to see if he was being followed. He figured Uncle Stanley
had called in the GBI, and they’d triangulate his ass or catch him
using some other nefarious method that involved both technology and
varmintry. When the cellphone rang again, he shut it off.

He traveled on the Perimeter for a few miles,
then exited at Hanover Drive. He didn’t know why he was being drawn
toward Thornbriar, but he turned left at the George Bailey Bridge,
as he now called it, and passed the gutted shell of the Pancake
Hut, where this madness had started. A few blocks away, he stopped
at the Nights Inn. After stomping his cellphone to death in the
seedy motel’s parking lot, he checked into a second-floor room that
smelled of booze and disinfectant. It took him ten trips to haul up
his stuff from the van, which was, due to its cardboard window, no
longer secure. Again, he didn’t spill a drop of blood. Apparently,
it would not abandon him.

He sat down on the bed, rubbed his face, and
reflected on his sorry state. He was on the run, homeless, nearly
broke, and completely screwed, with what was left of John Riggins
as a roommate. He picked up the jar and examined it carefully. Had
to be the man’s middle finger. Charlie bet that raising it in Ike
Cutchins’s face had been the last thing Riggins did on this earth.
He put the jar on the bedside table. It didn’t distress, haunt, or
scare him. Indeed, what was left of Riggins was Charlie’s new best
friend.

He grabbed a towel from the bathroom and
covered up Riggins, to keep him snug. “I’m gonna take care of you
now. Good night, John,” he said, then patted the jar
reassuringly.

When Charlie left the auto body shop, workers
were admiring the shotgun pellet marks on the van’s rear door.
“Check out the roof!” he shouted through cupped hands from the
parking lot.

A few seconds after he reached the curb, a
MARTA bus stopped to pick him up. It dropped him off right at the
motel, too. He wondered: Did he, like Trouble, now have special bus
powers?

Back in his room, Charlie checked first for
his computer under the bed, then for the Mason jar, which he’d
stashed in a duffel. To his great relief, both were still there—as
was the blood vat, hidden in the closet underneath a jacket. He
brewed courtesy coffee, put the laptop on the table, jammed his
knees under it—and then listened to an argument between the
Hispanic prostitute next door and her client, a middle-aged man in
a business suit Charlie had seen slinking up the stairs. After some
bilingual yelling, a door slammed.