The Eye of the Moon (28 page)

Devon Hart’s evening had been shitty right from the moment the two men dressed in black and wearing balaclavas had walked in, smashing one of the front doors as they did so. He’d been stabbed in the hand by the larger of the two and bullied into giving them the information they required. That wasn’t the worst thing about his evening though, not by a long way.

From the minute he’d witnessed the two intruders carrying out the unconscious body of Patient Number 43 he knew he was going to have to quit his job at the hospital and get as far away from Santa Mondega as possible. That patient was not to be messed with. Everyone in the hospital knew that. All of the other inmates there were either murderers who had pleaded insanity, or crazies predicting the end of the world and trying to ensure it happened. The only likeable patient they had was Casper, better known around the place as ‘Forty-Three’. He was a simpleton, very pleasant and well-mannered, but deeply paranoid and with a mental age of about eight. He was almost certainly the least aggressive of all the patients, but no one would
ever
have messed with him. No matter how mad or disturbed the other inmates were, there was one thing they all knew not to do: upset Casper. Do that, and you got a nocturnal visit and a nasty pummelling from his brother, a man whom no one wanted to fuck with.

Casper’s brother didn’t visit the place often, dropping by maybe once every six or seven weeks. He’d always make sure his younger brother’s stay was paid up a few months in advance, and he’d insist on asking whoever was on reception
whether anyone had upset Casper since his last visit. Because the receptionists were all too scared of him to risk lying about it, they sang like canaries, giving up anyone who’d made off with Casper’s crayons, given him a Chinese burn, or simply just changed the TV channel when he was watching
Sesame Street.
The culprits all paid for their actions and there were no repeat offenders, so generally Casper’s stay at Dr Moland’s Hospital had been quite a pleasant one. But that stay had ended, and as a result Devon Hart’s now had to.

Right now, Hart was sitting in Cubicle 3 of the ground-floor men’s rooms with his head in his hands and his trousers round his ankles. His stomach had been in knots ever since he’d seen Igor and Pedro sling Casper’s body in the back of their camper van. It was now three a.m. His shift had just three more hours to go, and then he was never coming back. He’d made his mind up. Fuck whether he got paid or not, he just wasn’t going to show his face round these parts ever again.

After thirty minutes of trying to take a crap and failing miserably he finally decided he’d had enough. He pulled his pants back up, flushed the toilet and headed to the row of basins to wash his hands.

The mirror above the white plastic washbasin confirmed his deepest fears to him. He looked like shit. He felt like it, too, and not just because he was nursing a ragged hole in his now heavily bandaged hand. Truth was, he’d given Casper up too easily. It was not only that he feared the retribution of the kid’s big brother, either. He would have to live with the knowledge that he’d allowed two obvious thugs to ambush and kidnap a total innocent. That would prey on his conscience for ever.

As he pulled a variety of different grimaces at himself in the long mirror above the basins he tried not to think about what might have happened to Casper. The condensation on the glass seemed to spell out the word ‘Guilty’ right across his forehead.
Guilty
was how he felt. It was hard even to look himself in the eye, and eventually the sight of his reflection looking back and feeling sorry for itself made him feel sick.
His mouth filled with saliva as if he were about to throw up. Suddenly overwhelmed by self-hatred, he spat it at his reflection, the fluid covering much of the pathetic face that was staring back at him.

Devon didn’t have to stare at his reflection for much longer, because as the spittle started to slide down the mirror, the bathroom was suddenly plunged into darkness. It awoke him from his trance-like state and he snapped out of it in an instant.

Power cut? Oh shit,
he thought.
What the fuck else can go wrong tonight?

There wasn’t a glimmer of light anywhere as he staggered, arms out in front of him, towards where he thought the door was. Once he felt the painted wood of the door he swept his hands around until one of them settled on the doorknob, which he turned. The door swung open easily, but he was disappointed to find that the hallway outside was just as dark.

Hart knew there was a flashlight in a drawer in the staff kitchen so he took a left turn into the hallway and walked slowly down it, with one hand on the wall and one out in front of him to keep him from walking into anything. He managed to make it about ten yards down the hallway in the silence and darkness before something sent a shiver down his spine. For a few moments he had been getting a taste of what it was like to be blind, and to some extent deaf. All he had been able to hear were his own quiet footsteps. Then he heard someone else take a step in the corridor behind him. He spun around in panic and called out in the darkness. ‘Hello?’

No answer.

‘Hello,’ he called again, more softly this time. ‘Is someone there?’

Still nothing. Must have imagined it. He turned back and walked on towards the kitchen, pressing his hand hard against the wall to steady himself.

Then he heard it again. Another footstep behind him. He stopped dead, frozen to the spot. And listened. There was definitely someone behind him. He could hear breathing. He
could,
couldn’t he?
Of course he could. Devon Hart knew what breathing sounded like. He held his own breath for a few seconds to be certain it wasn’t himself he could hear.

‘Hello,’ he said again, this time not looking back. ‘Listen, I know there’s someone there. I can hear you.’ Dreading what he might be getting himself into, he turned round again and stared into the dark abyss of the hallway that led back to the reception area.

And then there was light, although only a little. Ten yards in front of him Devon Hart saw a flicker of light. A tiny flame, even, the size of a fingernail on someone’s little finger. It confused him momentarily, before he realized what it was.
A cigarette.
Strangely, though, it appeared to have lit itself.

‘Hello,’ he called out yet again. Terror was now really beginning to grip him, squeezing the air from his lungs. Someone was there. They had made it known by smoking, but they weren’t speaking. ‘Who
is
that?’ he called out once more, straining his eyes in the hope of seeing a figure behind the tiny glow at the end of the cigarette.

After what seemed like an age, Hart saw the end of the cigarette flare brightly one last time, and then whoever was holding it dropped it to the floor. He stared at it, watching it burn away on the floor, expecting to see it extinguished by the person who had discarded it. But it stayed lit. Then the sound of footsteps came again. His unwelcome visitor began to move towards him, the sound of his boots getting louder and the steps quicker with each passing moment.

Finally the footsteps came to a stop. Devon Hart felt a hand seize him around the throat.

Sanchez was tired of this same old bullshit. Barely a month went by without him being dragged down to police headquarters to look at mugshots of criminals who might be the Bourbon Kid. In the past it had always been the worn-down old cop Archie Somers who had forced him to endure this ritual. The results were always the same; the familiar faces would be brought up on the computer screen. Sanchez knew them all, and none of them was the Bourbon Kid.

On this occasion he had been called in by Detective Hunter, one of the three cops who had visited the Tapioca the day before. With uncharacteristic kindness, Sanchez had brought him a bottle of his finest ‘homebrew’, seeing as how the detective had enjoyed the stuff so much on his recent visit to the bar. Hunter had taken the bottle eagerly, and was now enjoying frequent sips of the dark yellow liquid. He had even succeeded in spilling a few drops on his sweater in his eagerness to get the bottle to his lips.

Sanchez wasn’t sure what irritated him more, being dragged down to look at the same old mugshots, or the fact that Hunter was enjoying drinking this morning’s fresh piss. ‘Look, man, this is a fuckin’ waste o’ my time,’ he sighed. Hunter ignored him, clicking his mouse again to bring another face up on screen.

The interview room they were in was a shithole, to the say the least. It had once been the office that Archie Somers had shared briefly with Miles Jensen before the pair of them had perished in unusual circumstances on the night of the last eclipse. Hunter was sitting behind the desk in front of
the window with the blinds pulled down for maximum interrogation effect. His computer monitor was turned around so that Sanchez, sitting on the other side of the desk, could get a good look at the mugshots coming up in the slideshow. It was obvious even from the bartender’s clothing that he wasn’t into the whole process. His grubby white T-shirt carried a simple logo, its message aimed directly at Hunter. ‘FUCK OFF!’ it read in large black letters.

‘That’s Marcus the Weasel,’ said Sanchez, looking at the latest picture on the screen. ‘He’s fuckin’
dead,
man. Been dead for about a year.
Jesus!
Don’t you ever update these things?’

Hunter clicked the mouse and another photo appeared on screen.

‘Dead.’

And another.

‘Dead.’

And another.

‘Dead,’ said Sanchez again.

‘Bullshit,’ Hunter snapped. ‘That guy was in here last week.’

Sanchez shrugged. ‘If you say so.’

Another mugshot appeared on screen.

‘Dead.’

Hunter released his grip on the mouse and pursed his lips, glaring furiously at Sanchez. ‘Are you saying “dead” for all of them now, just to be annoyin’?’

‘Yep.’

‘You fuckin’ porky prick. You think I enjoy having you waste my time?’

‘Look, buddy,’ said Sanchez leaning across the desk. ‘You’re wasting both our time. There are no fuckin’ pictures of the Bourbon Kid in your database, okay? Never have been. Never will be. I’ve given E-fit descriptions of him to your artists plenty of times.’

‘I’ve seen ’em,’ said Hunter. ‘You’re a real fuckin’ comedian, you know.’

What the detective was referring to was a particularly
annoying habit that Sanchez had. On no fewer than five occasions he had given descriptions to police artists and successfully tricked them into drawing pictures of themselves instead of the Bourbon Kid. It was a lousy gag, but it was the only way to get back at the bastards for repeatedly dragging him down to headquarters. He sat back in the chair and folded his arms. ‘We done?’

‘Nope.’

Hunter flicked another mugshot up on screen. This one grabbed Sanchez’s attention and he leaned forward, unfolding his arms.

‘My God!’ he whispered. ‘It’s
him.
’

Hunter brightened. ‘The Bourbon Kid?’

‘No, my paperboy. That bastard’s been late three times this week.’

‘Right. That does it.’ Hunter roared. ‘I’m going to kill you. I mean it.’ He was just about to lunge across the desk at Sanchez when the door in the wall behind Santa Mondega’s most annoying bartender opened. Michael De La Cruz walked in, wearing a crisp red shirt buttoned to the neck and a pair of smart loose-fitting black pants.

‘Any luck?’ he asked.

‘You kiddin’? This guy’s a fuckin’ joke. He’s not gonna tell us shit.’

De La Cruz grabbed hold of Sanchez’s shoulder and squeezed it tightly. ‘You know the Bourbon Kid is gonna be dropping by your bar again some time soon if we don’t catch him? Only, this time he might not let you live. And as you’re the only person alive who knows what he looks like, technically you’re the only person who can save himself from being killed by him next time he comes in.’

Sanchez turned around to face De La Cruz. ‘Is that supposed to be ironic?’ he asked.

‘No. It
is
ironic.’

‘Look,’ said the bartender, already tired of the conversation. ‘There’s two things in life I never wanna see. And one of them is the whites of that man’s eyes. Not even in a fuckin’ photo.’