Parishioner (31 page)

The third thug looked to be a foreigner, East European, maybe even Russian. His small, dark eyes surveyed the situation with logic that had a whole different alphabet, like Sedra’s log.

“Let’s go,” the Russian said to the redhead.

Before they could move Ecks put a hand on Lenny’s elbow, urging the quaking youth toward his car.

“What if they tell somebody about what you did to Simmons?” Lenny asked as they drove past the guard post of the parking lot.

“What’re they gonna say?” Ecks asked. He was feeling good about the resolution of the face-off. All things considered, he got what he wanted with the least damage done.

“The security staff at Zebra is some crazy motherfuckers,” Lenny said. “They will put a niggah down.”

Ecks smiled at the young white man’s choice of words—and identity. They understood each other in a world that made no sense.

“They don’t know who I am,” Ecks assured his passenger.

“They … they got cameras that take pictures of every license plate come in there. They got a dude at motor vehicles too. He prob’ly already give ’em your address.”

“Not from those plates they won’t,” Ecks promised.

“They know who I am. They know my friends.”

“Those aren’t your friends anymore, Len. Everything you knew is over … over. Those men might as well be looking for a brown-tailed jackrabbit named Lenny up in the Hollywood Hills.”

The man with the penises on his throat giggled, showing yellowed teeth and red gums.

“But there’s people out there after me, man,” he said, losing his tentative hold on mirth. “When they find out I’m gone they gonna be lookin’ hard.”

“Elmer Fudd,” Ecks said.

“What?”

“Huntin’ wabbits.”

Lenny’s hands and legs were in motion, almost as if he were moving through a dense forest rather than sitting in a classic Ford.

“You got the shakes?”

“I could use a drink or something,” Lenny said. “I keep thinking that somethin’s gonna happen. There’s this one dude named Locke that’s mad at me ’cause his sister died. Ellie and me, that’s Locke’s sister, were together for a while and Locke didn’t believe me when I said I didn’t give her the H she OD’d on. That’s the reason I been sleepin’ next to the kitchen. Old Joey let me stay because Locke blames me, but they won’t let him on the premises. Only I’m tired’a sleepin’ next to the garbage and roaches.”

Ecks was ready for this development. He had prepared various methods to quiet down a disturbed mind. He’d brought along a bottle of specially prepared water, and then there was the glove compartment.

“You smoke reefer?” Ecks asked.

“I certainly do. Yes, indeed.”

“Look in the glove box. There’s a blue joint in there.”

The bald youth pulled open the box and came out with a bright blue hand-rolled cigarette. There was a box of matches too. He licked the spliff and then put it between his chapped lips.

“It’s sweet,” he said.

“Flavored paper.”

Lenny lit up and took a deep hit off the joint. Then he held it over toward Ecks.

“I can’t drive when I’m high,” the gangster said. “Just don’t finish it all.”

“This some good shit, brother,” Lenny said.

“Half flowers and the rest gold,” Ecks opined, remembering days that were over and almost gone.

Lenny took another deep hit and said, “Wow, I feel it right over my eyes. Like there was
a cloud up in there and now it’s just bright sun.”

The young man laughed, sat back, and put his foot up on the dashboard.

At least he’d taken off his suede shoes.

At another time Ecks would have complained, but right then he was too deep into the details of his mission.

“How come they didn’t fire you from Zebra?” he asked.

“Tommy Jester,” Lenny said easily. He sank back further into the vinyl.

“Who’s that?”

“VP at Zebra.”

“Why he care about you?”

“Does the sky look pink to you?” Lenny asked.

It didn’t but Ecks said, “A little bit. I think sometimes the air pollution puts colors up there.”

“Yeah. Wow. It’s beautiful.”

“Why does a big man like Tommy care about you?”

Lenny was staring out the window, the joint turning to blue-gray ash between his fingers. Ecks rolled down his window and sniffed the fresh air.

“This shit is strong,” Lenny said. “It’s like I’m lookin’ out at the hills but I’m seein’ across time; it feels like there should be dinosaurs stompin’ around out there.”

“What about Tommy?” Ecks asked again.

“He used to come over to Manly and Loretta’s and fuck me in the garage,” the dreamer murmured. “But he wasn’t like everybody else. He brought me little trinkets and sweets. He always kissed me on the forehead when he’d go. And then, even when I was too old, he’d call now and then to see how I was doin’. When I was eighteen he made Manly let me go. Tommy’s all right. I …”

At that moment Lenny O drifted off into unconsciousness. The marijuana in the cigarette wasn’t really that strong, but the concentrated synthetic opiate the paper was doused in had an especially powerful kick.

Ecks pulled to the curb, plucked the dead roach from between Lenny’s fingers, and let the boy’s seat all the way back. Then he headed for the Farmers’ Market on the other side of the hill.

Before he’d made it over the canyon his phone sounded. He didn’t expect to answer but when he saw who it was he changed his mind.

“Yeah, Bennie?” he said.

“Don’t meet that guy at the Farmers’ Market,” she said, almost shouting. “Call him and tell him to meet you someplace else.”

“I don’t have his number.”

“Then send somebody else from Frank’s to help you. Send ten people.”

“Why?”

“Just do it.”

“No.”

“You have to.”

“Again, Bennie—why?”

“I went to Henry Marcus’s surf shop.”

“And?”

“The police were there. He’s dead.”

“Dead how?”

“Killed. Murdered.”

“And does that have something to do with you, Benol?”

“I honestly don’t know. I mean, I didn’t tell him about where Henry was until after the murder. But maybe he did it anyway.”

“Who?”

“I can’t tell you that, Mr. Noland.”

“We need to meet, girl.”

“You need to make sure that the boy is safe.”

“Tomorrow morning around ten at the Waffle House on La Brea down near Venice. You meet me and I’ll take care of this problem here.”

“Okay. Fine.”

“What are you up to, Bennie?”

“I’ll meet you tomorrow at ten,” she said and then hung up.

Theodore “Toy” Meacham hailed from the Midwest but for most of his life he worked as a clandestine agent in major cities and important towns around the world. It was his job to identify and eliminate threats to the American people. For decades he believed that he was a patriot protecting the shores of the United States from those who detested freedom and liberty.

Technically, he worked for a covert subdivision of an independent mercenary operation, but he was aware that the orders he took came from the highest echelons of the United States armed services, the Pentagon, and even, from time to time, the White House itself.

Toy was well versed in firearms and explosives, poisons, bloodletting, and threats of all kinds. He tried to keep collateral damage down to a minimum but understood that sometimes a few innocent lives might have to be shattered or lost for the well-being of the American body politic and therefore the people.

As a rule Toy worked alone. He’d receive a three-line mission statement from an envelope or the lips of some envoy who knew the right cryptogram; then he’d use money that appeared magically and employ his wiles to obtain the results requested.

Toy was a genius at creating catastrophe. Complex designs appeared in his mind while he stalked his victims. Over breakfast he’d deduce the clearest path to nullifying persons, installations, networks, even whole institutions.

He once identified the local director of a clandestine government operation in Mumbai that posed a threat to certain business interests that were essential to American security in Pakistan. He then murdered the daughter of a regional crime family boss, throwing the blame on the targeted director.

Staying in a small French hotel, reading in the daily papers how his plan was developing, Toy unconsciously began to use his genius to decipher what he was doing and what he’d done.

Ahmed al-Bira
, one article read,
father of three, was gunned down at the New Town Marketplace while holding a melon and asking the price
.

Something about that sentence tipped over an intricately curving concatenation of dominoes that, it seemed, Toy had been setting up for more than forty years.

The price of a melon
, Toy remembered whispering. The whisper echoed until it was like a scream.

Instantly, miraculously Toy understood that he’d become a mad bomber, an anarchist bent only on destruction—or maybe a smart bomb that had drifted off course while his distracted masters profited and laughed.

Meacham knew about Father Frank. He’d come across the name while following Lester Stein, a professor who, as he researched Russian literature, had begun to pass along data that could have been seen as a danger to national security.

Lester had been a member of a nameless congregation on the coast a hundred miles north of LA.

Unexpectedly, to everyone but Toy, the professor died of a heart attack. The clandestine agent hadn’t reported the existence of Frank or his church mainly because there was no system set up for him to report anything. He was a tool, not intelligence. He existed to serve—or rather, mete out.