THE STRANGER CARDS

NIK VINCENT

 

 

Nik’s story is a superb little thriller, and I very much recommend that you pay attention to the cards and where they fall. Here a man is played, though it takes him a fair while before he realizes just what sort of game he’s in.

 

 

“GOOD AFTERNOON, SIR. I’m Benedict Abernathy.”

“Junior?” Gough asked, picking up a playing card and turning it face up into the stack in his hand.

“The fourth,” said Abernathy.

“East coast name,” Gough said, picking up another card from the broken circle on the table in front of him. He made it look effortless, even with his hands manacled.

“Originally,” said Abernathy.

“School?” Gough asked, taking another card.

“Stanford Law.”

“Need a new deck,” Gough said.

Abernathy hadn’t yet sat. His attaché case was still in his hand. His Armani suit was pristine apart from the wrinkles behind the knees from the drive from his office in San Francisco to San Quentin. Abernathy looked at the circle of cards with one card at its centre. They were old, greasy and dog-eared with crease marks.

Gough never stopped playing.

“We should go over the details of your appeal,” said Abernathy.

Gough picked up the centre card.

“We’re done here,” he said.

“There’s a very limited window of opportunity,” said Abernathy.

“Just bring the deck,” Gough said.

He turned another card into his hand. It was a king. He gathered the remaining cards and pushed them into their ragged box.

“Guard?” he called.

 

 

JAMES GOUGH WAS convicted of killing twenty-seven men in seventeen states. The only connection between the killings was the weapon and the way it was used. The locations appeared to be random. The victims were not known to their killer. They did not have jobs or family circumstances in common, or race, age, religion or sexual orientation. They did not share hobbies, education or political affiliations.

James Gough was convicted after being apprehended in the act of slaughtering his final victim by police officer brothers living in the neighbouring apartment.

 

 

“WHAT DO I do?” Abernathy asked his senior partner at Hatch, Willow and Lombard.

“It’s a twenty year old case,” said Marilyn Cusack. “Gough’s getting the injection. This is pro forma, pro bono stuff.”

“I have to do something,” said Abernathy. “It’s his final appeal.”

“You’re an idealist, Ben. So what did the client ask you to do?” asked Marilyn.

“He asked me to bring him a deck of cards,” said Abernathy.

“Then show a little humanity,” said Marilyn. “Jeez, Ben. How hard is that? He didn’t ask you to save his life. He asked you for a deck of cards.”

Abernathy dropped his head.

“You should be ashamed,” said Marilyn. “Get the man a deck of cards, Ben, and while you’re at it, grow a set.”

“Are you dismissing me, Ms Cusack?”

“Not quite,” said Marilyn, taking her jacket from its hanger. “First, I’m buying you a drink. It’ll be the first of many before this is over. He plays solitaire?”

“Not the conventional version. He picks cards from a circle. A four then a ten, a five, eight, king, seven, eight, ten, two, nine, jack, king. Then he stopped. He boxed the remaining cards.”

Marilyn smiled.

“You don’t have to impress me with your eidetic memory,” she said.

“You know there’s no such thing,” said Abernathy. “At least, you lose it if you don’t use it. It’s just an old habit.”

“An old habit that got you a 4.0 grade point average, top of your class at Stanford Law, and this case.”

“So I get to be responsible for sending Gough to his death,” said Abernathy.

“He killed twenty-seven people,” said Marilyn.

“And I can’t stop his execution,” said Abernathy. “But I can give him a deck of cards.”

“It’s what he wants,” said Marilyn. “By the way, it sounds like he was playing Clock Solitaire, a kid’s game.”

 

 

“Benedict Abernathy the fourth,” said Gough.

“Sir,” said Abernathy.

The old playing cards were arranged on the table. Abernathy put his attaché case on the aluminium chair and opened it. He took out a deck of cards. They had been unsealed and checked by a correctional officer, but were otherwise brand new. They were premium casino quality.

He handed the deck to Gough.

Gough took the box and put it on the table. He continued to play his game.

“You can call me Jimmy,” he said.

There were only three piles in the circle when Gough turned over the king. He stopped, gathered the remaining cards and boxed them. He placed the battered box on Abernathy’s side of the table.

“Fair exchange,” he said. “You should play a round or two. Settles the mind.”

“I don’t know Clock Solitaire,” said Abernathy. “We need to talk about the appeal.”

“Time Patience, he called it, the man who taught me. He was close to death, too,” said Gough. “I’ll show you how.”

“You’re on death row, sir,” said Abernathy. “Time is pressing.”

“Call me Jimmy,” said Gough. “I’ve had my time. Humour me. Let an old man teach you something. Learn some patience. Time Patience.” He chuckled, a soft, warm sound.

Abernathy remembered the shame he’d felt sitting in Marilyn Cusack’s office.

“Show me,” he said.

Gough took the new deck of cards from its box and shuffled them.

“This game’s all about the passing of time,” he began, “and whether it will ever end. Sometimes it do and sometimes it don’t. That’s how he taught me with that very deck.” He gestured at the old cards. “There’s four suits in a deck and thirteen cards in a suit. That’s twelve spots on the clock and time left over for eternity.”

“The centre stack?” asked Abernathy.

“You catch on quick,” said Gough.

He dealt the top four cards.

“First the queen spot,” he said. “That’s north, women, heaven, twelve o’clock.” He dealt the next four cards and put them on the table. “Next comes south at six o’clock.”

“Hell,” said Abernathy.

“Don’t interrupt,” said Gough.

He dealt four more cards and placed them at three o’clock.

“Then east and west for balance.”

He placed the next four cards at nine o’clock.

“Then comes the ace spot, at one o’clock, the queen’s right hand. That’s for parents, for wisdom, for time gone by,” said Gough.

Abernathy wanted to correct him. If the queen was at twelve o’clock then one o’clock was to her left. It was to the player’s right. He said nothing.

Gough continued filling the spaces around the clock.

“Then comes the jack at eleven o’clock, the queen’s left hand. That’s for the kids, for innocence, for time to come,” said Gough.

Four cards remained in Gough’s hands.

“See these four cards?” he asked. “They’re for all eternity. They’re the king cards.”

He placed the stack of four cards in the empty space at the centre of the clock.

“That’s you, the player?” asked Abernathy.

“Lord, no,” said Gough. “They’re the stranger cards. They’re the beginning and the end. It’s what happens in-between what counts. If you pick up the last stranger card and there’s still cards face down, there’s no forever. Play the last stranger card right at the end, that takes you into eternity.”

“So how do we start?” asked Abernathy.

“We start by dipping into all eternity,” said Gough. He picked the top card off the centre stack and turned it into his hand. It was a four. He took a card off the four position on the clock: a queen. He took a card from the twelve position: a nine.

Abernathy watched as the cards piled up in Gough’s hand.

“It’s simple,” he said.

“The best things are,” said Gough. “Birth, love, death. Take the old cards. Play until you reach eternity.”

Gough took the final eternity card from the centre of the clock. It was a two. He continued to play.

“Let me make the best appeal I can for you,” said Abernathy. “Give me something new to work with.”

Gough held up the final king. There were five piles of cards still on the table.

“I’m a dead man,” said Gough. “I don’t remember what I did, nor why. I only know what they told me. Play the game, Benedict Abernathy the fourth. Reach for eternity. See how it feels.”

Abernathy put the ancient deck of cards in his attaché case. He talked as he watched Gough play several more rounds of Time Patience. But none of them played out, and Gough didn’t answer any of his questions.

“You got it?” Gough finally asked.

“I’ve got it, sir,” said Abernathy. He’d got it almost as soon as Gough had begun playing.

“Call me Jimmy,” said Gough. “You sure you got it, now?”

“I’ve got it,” said Abernathy.

“Guard?” said Gough, boxing his new deck of cards.

 

 

ABERNATHY SAT AT his desk waiting for the call. He’d filed the paperwork. And he was sure of the outcome. He waited, a rock in his gut, sweat collecting in the armpits of his Zegna shirt, despite the air conditioning.

He remembered his meetings with Gough. He heard the old man’s words: You should play a round or two. Settles the mind.

Benedict Abernathy opened his desk drawer and took out Gough’s beaten up deck of cards. He took them out of their box and shuffled them. He cleared a space on his desk and began to lay out the cards. As he made the clock, he remembered Gough’s words. Then he began to play.

The first round did not play out, nor the second or third. The games only took a matter of minutes. Abernathy became engrossed. He set the cards out in the same way, every time, replaying Gough’s words. After an hour, the rock in his stomach started to melt.

He began to play slowly, stacking the cards meticulously. He placed the compass cards a little wider than the number cards so that the circle turned into a star. It made it easier to recognise which stack was which when the piles began to disappear. As he slowed down, Abernathy’s eidetic memory kicked in, and he remembered the card sequences of the games.

Still, no round played out.

Abernathy began to wonder what the probability was that a round might play out.

He was working out the odds on a legal pad when Marilyn Cusack walked into his office. She did not knock.

It was several seconds before Abernathy realised that someone was standing in the room. He looked up. There was silence between them for a moment.

“The call came in?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said.

“When will they execute him?” he asked.

“May twenty-second at midnight,” said Marilyn.

“I’ll attend,” said Abernathy.

“Of course, Ben,” said Marilyn.

“Thank you,” said Ben.

“Put that away,” said Marilyn. “Come for a drink.”

“Thank you,” said Ben, again.

 

 

ON MAY TWENTY-SECOND 2012, Benedict Abernathy sat in his room at the Best Western in Novato, waiting to drive out to San Quentin for James Gough’s execution.

Marilyn Cusack had insisted that he take time off afterwards to recover. He had made no plans, but he knew he didn’t want to be at the office or at home. He wanted to be somewhere anonymous.

He sat on the bed and took out Gough’s old cards. He hadn’t played since the afternoon the call had come in. It had helped. Abernathy shuffled the cards and began to lay them out, remembering Gough’s words. They came easily to his mind, like a mantra.

This game’s all about the passing of time, and whether it will ever end.

Abernathy played slowly for an hour, as if it was a ritual. He remembered the sequences of the cards that he played. When he played an ace, he thought about his parents, his mentors. He thought about Marilyn Cusack. When he turned up a queen he thought about the girls he’d loved, from Priya Kupertharmal in fifth grade to Beth Geter, who had left for Baltimore three months ago and didn’t want a long distance relationship. When he played a jack he thought of Gerard and Stephanie, his younger siblings, and of Elizabeth, his older sister’s baby.

The kings made him cringe.

9-queen-2-10-ace-4-king... 9-10-ace-7-queen-jack-7-6-king... ace-8-10-6-7-9-jack-9-3-5-5-queen-ace-6... A long run. 8-queen-king... 7-8-2-2-4-4-3-jack-2-10-3-5-8-3-jack... So close.

Benedict Abernathy wondered if he’d make it to the end of the game at last.

4-6-5-king.

The king was his ticket to eternity.

He smiled. He put the cards in their box and dropped it in his attaché case. He checked his watch. There was time to shower and change before the fifteen minute drive to the prison.

 

 

“I NEED A drink,” he said. “It’s all over the internet, TV, everywhere.”

“It’s okay, Ben. It’s the culture we live in.” Marilyn put on her jacket as she spoke, and minutes later they were sitting in the bar.

“It’s a copycat killing, right?” asked Abernathy. “Why not do it the night of the execution? He killed using Gough’s method, in his honour, so why wait?”

“Who knows?” said Marilyn. “Who knows if it was a copycat? The press gets hold of these things and twists them. It could be a coincidence.”

“Maybe the killer couldn’t do it that same night, because he was at the execution,” said Abernathy. “But why San Diego?”

“You can’t torture yourself,” said Marilyn. “You’re not responsible. And, not for nothing, you’re not law enforcement. He’ll be caught and prosecuted to the full extent of the law.”

“Like James Gough was,” said Abernathy.

Marilyn gestured to the bartender.

“Just remember, you’re a defense attorney,” said Marilyn. “You’re one of the good guys.”

“I was there that night,” said Abernathy as the bartender poured more drinks.

“I know, Ben,” said Marilyn. “I can see the effect it’s having on you.”

“No... I mean I was in San Diego the night of the copycat murder,” said Ben. “I left the prison at about one in the morning. I got in my car and I drove all night. I don’t know how, but I ended up in San Diego... At least I woke up there the following day with a sore head and no memory.”

“Huh,” said Marilyn.

“Is that all you can say?” asked Abernathy.

“What do you want me to say, Ben?” asked Marilyn.

“Nothing,” said Ben. “I just want you to get drunk with me.”

“That I can do,” said Marilyn.

 

 

“IT’S GOOD TO have you back,” said Marilyn. It was seven-thirty on Abernathy’s first day in the office after his vacation. “I’m finishing for the day, and I want to catch you up on some things. Buy me a drink.”

“You’re the boss,” said Abernathy.

“Bet your life,” said Marilyn.

“You heard that your copy-cat turned into a serial?” asked Marilyn during their second drink.

Abernathy looked at her.

“It seems to be local, though.”

“San Diego?” asked Abernathy.

“California,” said Marilyn. “It hasn’t hit the press, yet. There was a fatal stabbing in Arcadia. It looked domestic, but some bright spark made a connection to the San Diego murder.”

“How did you find out?” asked Abernathy.

“You don’t get to be senior partner at a law firm with offices in five cities without making a few contacts,” said Marilyn.

There was a long pause.

Marilyn caught Abernathy’s eye.

“No,” he finally said.

“You okay, Ben?” asked Marilyn.

“Just tired,” said Ben. “When was the murder?”

“June twenty-eighth. I’m surprised you didn’t hear about it. You were in Los Angeles, right?”

“Visiting my sister,” said Ben. “Maybe thirty minutes from Arcadia. I didn’t hear.”

“I guess not,” said Marilyn.

 

 

HE’S FOLLOWING ME around. It’s not a coincidence. Someone knows I let Gough die, and he’s following me around. I was the attorney of record, Gough’s last hope. I got him executed. It’s retribution, and now people are dying because of me.

The killer was at the execution. He followed me to San Diego. He knew I was in Los Angeles, so he picked a target close by.

Benedict Abernathy rehearsed what he would say. He thought about saying it to Marilyn Cusack. She might understand. He could get the list of witnesses at the execution. But what if it wasn’t a witness? What if it was one of the picketers standing outside San Quentin with a placard? Was there a list of those people too?

It was too out there. It sounded ridiculous in his mind. If he said the words out loud... He was an attorney. He was very junior. He had a career path mapped out. He’d get fired.

He’d wait. There’d be another murder, maybe in San Francisco.

There was nothing.

He scoured the press for news of murders, of stabbings. He looked at all the local news feeds for California. He made contacts in the homicide division. Nothing matched Gough’s M.O.

 

 

BENEDICT ABERNATHY’S HEAD buzzed. He felt nervous and twitchy. It was the same feeling he’d had when he’d woken up in San Diego. The same feeling when he’d got home from staying with his sister in Los Angeles.

He showered and dressed. He thought the blackouts had stopped. He thought they were stress related, because of Gough, the execution. That was three, four months ago. He tried to remember what he’d done over the weekend. It was a blank. He checked his phone. It was switched off. When he turned it on there were texts and messages. He’d missed the Giants/Dodgers game on Saturday. Hell! How did that happen? He loved baseball, and rarely missed a home game. He didn’t even know the score. He’d also missed taking the Fillimore Art Walk with Penny on Sunday, yesterday, and she was pissed.

Two days. I lost two whole days.

 

 

“YOUR COPYCAT JUST went national,” said Marilyn Cusack.

“What?” asked Abernathy.

They were back in the bar. He hadn’t wanted to come, but when she’d seen the look on his face Marilyn had insisted. It had been a long day, making calls, excusing his absence from the game to his buddies, sucking up to Penny. Mostly he felt relief.

He was only half-listening to Marilyn. He was watching the news scroll along the bottom of the screen on the tv above the bar.

MAN SLAIN IN COPYCAT HOME INVASION MURDER IN ROCKY FORD COLORADO SUNDAY...

Then the screen changed to show a young woman reporter standing in front of police tape at a city apartment building.

“Can you turn up the volume?” Abernathy asked the bartender.

“Twice married father of one, Spencer Hackford was slain in his home right behind me, here in Rocky Ford. His father Stanley Hackford and son Elliot were visiting Colorado Springs during yesterday afternoon when the home invasion took place. They discovered the body of Spencer Hackford and raised the alarm. This is the third murder bearing the hallmark of serial killer James Gough, executed at San Quentin on May 22nd.”

Queen, queen, jack, ace, king. Abernathy shook the thought out of his mind. He’d never seen those cards come up in that order in any of James Gough’s rounds of Time Patience, or any of his own. It was just the mention of his client’s name, and the buzzy feeling in his head.

“Turn it off, please,” said Marilyn.

“This wouldn’t be happening if I’d got the sentence commuted,” said Abernathy.

“Sure it would,” said Marilyn. “This shit always happens. The man’s a psychopath. You think he wouldn’t be killing anyway?”

 

 

MAY 23, SAN Diego CA.

June 28, Arcadia CA.

September 9, Rocky Ford CO.

Abernathy started a list. He began to add details. At least he wasn’t being followed. It was a relief. But if he could fit together enough of the details, maybe he could find a pattern. All the victims were men, all married, but the third had been married twice. All had parents still living. Two were fathers of only children.

He went online to find out whatever he could about the victims. He checked their memorial pages, Linked-In, Facebook, YouTube. He Googled them and their families, their colleagues, even the schools they’d attended. He made charts of their birthdays and their parents’ and wives’ and children’s birthdays. He listed the towns they’d lived in, where they were born, their cellphone providers and their death dates. He compared the charts. Nothing fit together.

The details swam in his head constantly.

Time passed. He counted the days. There had been thirty-six days between the first and second murders. Thirty-six days passed. Seventy-three days passed, marking off the time between the second and third murders. One-hundred and nine days passed, marking off the time between the first and third murders. It was the week before Christmas and there hadn’t been a fourth murder.

On December twenty-first at the end of her regular staff meeting, Marilyn Cusack asked Abernathy to stay behind for a few minutes.

“Tell me something about James Gough, something weird or funny from one of your meetings,” she said.

“I’m sorry?” said Abernathy.

“Listen, Ben,” said Marilyn. “I’ve drawn one of the named partners for secret Santa. It’s my worst nightmare. What do you buy Leonard Lombard for Christmas when he can, literally, afford whatever he wants? But he likes stories. Stories and deodands. Do you even know what a deodand is? Except for a high scoring SAT word?”

“It’s an object that causes a person’s death,” said Abernathy.

“Good for you, Mr Eidetic Memory. But I was hoping you could give me a great lawyer story,” said Marilyn. “What about that game Gough played? Did you find out if it was Clock Solitaire?”

“I’ll be right back,” said Abernathy.

He returned two minutes later, and handed Marilyn James Gough’s old deck of cards.

“Give him this,” he said. “It’s the deck of cards Gough played with. It was Clock Solitaire, but he called it Time Patience. He learned it from the man who gave him this deck, and he swapped it for the new deck of casino cards he asked me for.”

“You’re a life saver, Ben. Thank you,” said Marilyn.

“It’s nothing,” said Ben. “I just want to forget about it now.”

“You’re sure you don’t want them as a... keepsake?” asked Marilyn.

“Absolutely sure,” said Abernathy.

 

 

BENEDICT ABERNATHY WOKE up with the weird buzzy feeling in his head. A feeling that he hadn’t had in seven months. He tried to sit up, but his neck and back ached, and he seemed to be wearing shoes. He opened his eyes. He was not lying in his bed at home.

Abernathy scrambled into a sitting position and looked around. He did not know where he was. He was surrounded by people, too many people.

“You okay, dude?” someone asked. He looked like a student... older, maybe a grad student or a drop out.

“No,” said Abernathy.

“Where you headed?” asked the man.

“Why?” asked Abernathy. “Where am I?”

“Wow, dude, you musta been trippin’,” said the man. “You’re in Texas. San Antonio airport. There was a big storm yesterday. No flights in or out.”

The colour drained from Abernathy’s face. He didn’t have any luggage. He searched through his pockets and found a plane ticket for San Francisco, dated April third.

“Today’s the fourth?” he asked.

“All day long,” said the man. He looked over Abernathy’s shoulder. “Hey, San Francisco. Me too. We’re on the same flight. Should be any time now.”

The flight took a little over three and a half hours. The fifteen mile cab ride downtown from the airport took another hour in traffic. Abernathy was disorientated, and exhausted. He needed to go home to shower and change before he could show up at the office. He found his phone. It was turned off. When he turned it on the battery was fully charged, but there were calls and messages dating back three days. Marilyn Cusack’s secretary had called him repeatedly.

The apartment was too quiet, and the effects of his blackout were freaking Abernathy out. He turned on the TV, and went to the bathroom. He stood under the shower for twenty minutes, trying to remember. Nothing.

He pulled a robe on and walked back through the apartment towards the welcome sound of the TV.

“... in San Antonio, yesterday. This is thought to be the fourth of the James Gough copycat murders. Now over to Carey Coulson for the sports news. Carey?”

Abernathy sat heavily on the couch. He reached for the remote and switched to an all-news channel. There it was, scrolling across the bottom of the screen.

FOURTH COPYCAT MURDER IN TEXAS. FIFTY-TWO YEAR OLD WIDOWED FATHER OF TWO KILLED IN HIS SAN ANTONIO HOME, WEDNESDAY.

Jack, jack, king, four, three.

Benedict Abernathy shook his head. Cards. Why couldn’t he stop thinking about cards.

7-8-2-2-4-4-3...

Four, three: April third. The date of the murder in San Antonio was four three. The sixth and seventh numbers were the date.

Abernathy slumped on the couch and let his head drop back. He closed his eyes. The sequence of cards from the game of Time Patience he’d played on the day of Gough’s execution began to run through his mind.

9-queen-2-10-ace-4-king.

There was no sixth number. Four numbers. Five digits.

9-10-ace-7-queen-jack-7-6-king.

There was no sixth number, but there was a sixth digit. Six for the month of June.

Ace-8-10-6-7-9-jack-9-3...

The sixth number was nine and the seventh was three. The third murder was committed on September ninth. The sixth and seventh digits were both nines for September ninth.

What do the first five digits mean? What has five digits? Abernathy sat for a moment. Then he got up to find his laptop. His legs felt like jelly, and he couldn’t swallow.

He found his laptop and sat down again. It took three attempts to type, ‘what code has five digits’ into Google. Six of the results on the first page referred to zip codes.

Abernathy tried to breathe. He tried to swallow. He tried to type the first set of five numbers into the search field followed by ‘zip code’. He had to backspace several times before he got it right.

92104 was the zip code for San Diego. 91077 matched Arcadia. 81067 was for Rocky Ford and 78224 was for San Antonio.

Abernathy threw the laptop to one side. It dropped to the floor as he staggered to the bathroom and threw up in the toilet. There was no vomit, only bile and mucus. He hadn’t eaten. He had slept afterwards. He didn’t remember what he’d done or how he’d done it. But he knew.

Benedict Abernathy crawled from the bathroom to his bed, and slept fitfully for a few hours. The buzz in his head was less when he woke. The memory of what he had learned came back fast. Then the card sequence started to play in his mind again.

He got out of bed, and, still dressed in the robe, he found his way back to the couch, grabbing a legal pad and pencil on the way. First he wrote out the card sequence of the single game of Time Patience that he had played out to its conclusion. Then he bracketed and circled the cards he could account for. The first two murders were solved.

He wanted to know everything about the killings in Rocky Ford and San Antonio.

His cellphone began ringing at eight-fifteen. He switched it off, and worked.

Spencer Hackford lived at 35, 56th street, apartment 8. He had been married and divorced twice. He had a son and both of his parents were still living. His father resided at his address. His mother suffered from Alzheimer’s and lived in a residential care home.

He drew too many blanks on the latest murder. It was too soon. He scoured the news channels and the internet, but there was too little information.

Abernathy closed his laptop.

 

 

HE REMEMBERED JAMES Gough’s words, I don’t remember what I did, nor why. I only know what they told me. Play the game, Benedict Abernathy the fourth. Reach for eternity. See how it feels.

Twenty-seven murders. Gough had played the game to its conclusion seven times. Who would the twenty-eighth victim have been? Who had lived when he should have died? Who didn’t get his shot at eternity?

Abernathy opened his laptop and typed ‘James Gough’ into the search field. He would have to wait for more information on his own fourth victim to work out what all the cards meant. And while he waited, he could study Gough’s case. He could work out the card sequences that drove Gough’s killings, and maybe, just maybe he could find the missing stranger.

The cards... Who gave Gough the cards?

Oh my God! Gough’s cards!

Abernathy switched on his cellphone and dialled Marilyn’s direct line at the office.

“Marilyn Cusack,” said Marilyn.

“It’s Ben Abernathy.”

“Where the hell have you been?” asked Marilyn.

“Don’t ask questions,” said Abernathy. “Just tell me, did you give Leonard Lombard Gough’s deck of cards at Christmas?”

“Of course I did. I printed off the instructions for Clock Solitaire from the internet and slipped them in the deck. I wrote on the gift tag, ‘Play James Gough’s game with this killer deck of cards’. He loved it... Are you still there, Abernathy?”

 

 

BENEDICT ABERNATHY HAD killed four times. But it wasn’t him, it was the cards. He knew that if he could learn to live with himself, he would never get caught. He knew that he would never learn to live with himself until he had destroyed Gough’s deck of cards.

Christmas was more than three months ago. Time was wasting.

Abernathy switched off his phone and opened his laptop. He typed ‘Leonard Lombard’ into the Google search field.