CHAPTER 52

“You really didn’t think I was going to let another son of a bitch blackmail me, did you? I learned my lesson with Stevie. It never stops. You’d just keep coming back. No, this time, I shut it down before it even gets started.”

We were in my Camry. I was driving and Tony sat in the passenger seat, the 1911 automatic trained on me. He’d directed me out of the TSN headquarters at gun point, making sure I brought the backpack and the incriminating evidence with us. His and mine were the only two cars in the parking lot. He made me throw the backpack into his trunk and then waved me over to my car. He had me open the passenger side first, then go around and unlock the driver’s door.

“Now get in real slow, and put both hands on the steering wheel,” he had said. I did so. He slid into the seat beside me. “Start it up and pull out of the lot, then turn right. I’ll tell you where to go. I’ll think you’ll like it,” he then said, and in the glow of the dashboard lights, I could see he was smiling.

We drove in silence for about ten minutes. “Turn here,” he said. “I think it’d be better if we stuck to back roads. There’s really no hurry.”

“Listen, Tony, you shouldn’t do anything too rash. What do you say we just forget about the whole thing?” I pleaded. “I mean, I don’t really need the money. I’ll find a job somewhere. I’ll just leave town, not say a word to anyone.”

“You think you’re getting out of this? After sticking your nose into my business--again? Come on, you should know better than that. This goes way back, and it’s way too personal for me to let you just leave town again.”

“But what about Ferdie Crawford? How do you know I don’t have an envelope all ready to go out to him if anything happened to me tonight? We both know what he’s going to do when he gets it. He’s going to kill you, that’s what,” I said.

Tony laughed. “First of all, you are a terrible liar, Wus--and I will call you Wus. I don’t think there is any envelope waiting to be mailed. Second of all, so what? You call yourself a reporter? It is so goddamn funny how much of this you got wrong. If anybody was to receive the stuff that Stevie dug up, I’d prefer it was old Ferdie.”

“You’re telling me you are not afraid of Ferdie Crawford,” I said.

“See now, right there, you got my relationship with the Crawfords all ass-backward. Sure, Ferdie can be a bit of an ornery old cuss, and I did go to the Crawfords looking for money. But not with my hand out. I went with a plan. Using TSN to ship stolen parts to Europe. I knew about his theft ring, and we had done business before, so that was my idea. Bribing port inspectors. That was me. Connections overseas, again me. Those redneck farm boys could never think this big. They were taking all those risks to steal those parts just to make pennies. I showed them how to make millions. Turn left up ahead.”

I did as he directed. We were driving along typical East Hastings back roads--no shoulders to speak off, winding, lined with trees, boulders, or occasional small creeks. The thought did cross my mind that maybe I could accelerate and swerve into a tree or off the road and have a chance to escape.

Of course, Tony would probably be able to get three or four shots off before we even left the road and, seeing how he was so close, I doubted if any of them would miss. If anyone would walk away, it would most likely be Tony. I just kept driving.

“You know what the problem is, Wus? You know why you got so much wrong? You’re lazy. Pure and simple. You got it into your head that Ferdie Crawford and his family are some big crime syndicate--ruthless, violent, always one step ahead of the law. It just all fell into place that I would be shivering in my boots at the thought of them doing me harm. You know, I should probably be hurt, you underestimating me the way you did. Take a right at the T.”

Again, I did as directed.

“So, you know what you should have been asking yourself once you found out that Stevie had the goods on me? Who could really hurt me? Who did I have to fear the most?” he continued after I turned.

He was right. I did just jump to conclusions. But it was only natural, once I saw the pictures and the smuggling operation came into focus, to assume that Stevie was using the Crawfords to threaten Tony. He really didn’t have enough to go to the police, there was nothing to gain monetarily by doing so, and I did remember that Stevie did nothing if it wouldn’t result in money or getting a woman into bed. He must have been the one who called Hoppy--the day before he was killed--but the money wasn’t there. Who else could it have been?

“I imagine from your silence that you’re trying to work it out. Well, let me give you another little clue. Not only were you underestimating me, you were overestimating your old friend Stevie-boy. You had no idea what a real low-life scum he was. I mean, you actually said to me that despite all his faults, he loved his sister.”

I weighed what he was saying. It didn’t make sense.

“Sue Ellen?” I said slowly, working it all out. “Stevie was using the threat of Sue Ellen finding out to blackmail you?”

“Bingo. See, he knew that, although Sue Ellen had found it in herself to overlook some of my shortcomings as a husband--and I do admit to occasionally straying from my vows--the one thing she would not accept is my being part of a criminal enterprise and putting our children at risk. He knew that if she found out that she would divorce me in a heartbeat and then...well, let’s just say things could get complicated for me. She’d get half of everything, which would seriously impact my operations at TSN. And, then, I really would have something to fear from Ferdie.”

“I don’t believe it. Stevie had to know what would happen to Sue Ellen if the police ever found out. She’d lose everything,” I said.

Tony laughed. “Are you kidding me? He didn’t give a shit about her. Take a left up ahead then about a hundred yards and we’re there. Things looking familiar?” he asked.

The half moon had slipped behind some clouds, making everything I looked at little more than shapes, but yes, I recognized where I was.

“Stop the car right here,” Tony demanded.

We had come to the river and were about twenty feet away from the bank’s edge. For many nights, years ago, I had sat in bushes across the water, watching and taking photos, as men in overalls attached hoses to nozzles of tanker trucks and emptied the poisons out of the tanks and into the river. We had come to the dump site.

“See? Like I said, poetic justice. I just love it. Here’s where you became such a big man, and here’s where it’s all going to end for you. Here’s where I lost so much and now this is where I’m going to get everything back to the way it should be. And look at that, you’ve got an old friend here to see you off.”

Parked off to the side was a dark blue late model Honda Accord. I hadn’t seen it before, but as the headlights of my Camry reached the car, I wasn’t really surprised to see Danny leaning against the back end of it. He stood up as I pulled to a stop.

“Get out of the car,” Tony said. “We’re going to take a little walk.”

“Come on, Tony. I get it. You won, okay. You won. But if you kill me, you only create more trouble. Ferdie understands that. It’s why he let me live the other night. Told me to leave town, which I will. I promise. Police find a journalist with a bullet in his head, on top of everything else that’s been happening, that’s just going to make things hotter--” I began.

“Oh I’m not going to kill you. You’re going to commit suicide, or at least no one will be able to prove otherwise. I said get out of the car,” Tony said, waving the gun.

And what if I don’t get out, I thought. Then you’ll have to shoot me, won’t you? So much for your staged suicide plans, Mr. Big Shot. No, instead then you’ll probably have to set the car on fire to destroy any evidence, with me in it, either already dead or, even worse, just severely wounded but alive, so that I feel my skin burning and my lungs filling with thick black smoke until I do die. I unbuckled my seat belt and opened my car door.

Danny came over to my car and opened the door fully.

“Hey, Wus. So glad to see you could make it,” he said.

With the interior light now on, I could see Tony clearly. He had a self-satisfied glint in his eyes and that smarmy I-get-everything-I-want smile on his face. The gun in his right hand appeared to have grown a little larger. “Again, just take it nice and slow. We’ve come so far, I’d hate to see anything go wrong now,” he said as he reached across his body with his left hand, undid his seat belt, and opened his door. “When you get out, put your hands flat on the roof of the car.”

Again, I did as I was told. I stretched my arms out onto the roof of the car and inhaled deeply. The smell of honeysuckle filled the air, and, as usual, it was cooler, the air not as heavy, down here by the river. I could hear the water gently rushing over rocks. I looked up to see a few stars visible in the patches of sky not filled with clouds. The moon peeked back out for a moment.

Danny roughly shoved my head down on the top of my car. I was just able to turn my head to avoid having my still-tender nose smash into it.

“You know,” he said. “Even if Tony didn’t need me to drive him back to TSN, I would have begged him to let me watch this. You should have never come back. You should have known this wasn’t gonna end nicely.”

Tony got out of the car and walked around to my side. He handed Danny the gun and spun me around roughly.

“You know, I don’t want you to think I’m rubbing it in, but I’ll tell you even more about how wrong you were about everything, especially Stevie. See, I knew he was working at TSN. I hired him because he said if I didn’t give him a job, he’d tell Sue Ellen all about my extra-marital activities, make things even worse at home than they were.”

“Let me guess. He found out about you and Tina,” I said.

Tony laughed. “Oh, man, you can’t get nothing right. Tina was something, back in her day, but her day was a long time ago, at least as far as I was concerned. No, I get bored quickly, see. Funny thing is Sue Ellen already knew about my habits. We had an arrangement. She didn’t do nothing, she kept the kids.”

“Sorry if I’m letting you down,” I said.

“Hear that, Danny? Same old Wus. He’s apologizing to me like he always did--when I’m about to kill him,” Tony said to Danny.

“Yeah, I was always amazed how he was even able to stand up straight, seeing as he never had a spine,” Danny said, laughing.

“No, no. It’s all good,” Tony continued. “You’re just confirming what I’ve always known. Stevie, well, he didn’t know about my arrangement with Sue Ellen, so he started following me around. Guess I could have been more discreet. But see, here’s what I’m telling you. Even a job that he didn’t even have to show up for wasn’t enough for him. He wanted to squeeze me for more. That boy was a piece of work. Okay, let’s start walking, down to the river.”

Danny poked the barrel of the gun sharply into the middle of my back to start me moving.

“I’m gonna stay right here, but don’t try anything. I couldn’t miss you at this distance,” he said. “Wish I could come along, but it will be just as much fun to watch.”

I started off. Guess I was moving a bit too slow for Tony’s liking. He kept pushing every few steps.

“Like I said, he was nothing but a rotten piece of trailer trash. And after all I did for his sister. I don’t know what I was thinking getting involved with those damn hillbillies. Worse thing that ever happened to me, even if she was the sweetest tail in this town when I met her. You know that bitch wouldn’t give it up while we were dating? With her reputation? Just kept teasing me and teasing me until I was about mad and I begged her to marry me just to get in her pants. Do you believe that? Me, taken in by a woman, who growing up, well, indoor plumbing was a luxury.”

“I guess you could say she took you to the cleaners,” I said over my shoulder.

It was weak, real weak, and I hated to think that they may be my last words, but I wanted to shut him up. If these were my last minutes, I didn’t want to think about Stevie, or Sue Ellen, or indoor plumbing. I wanted to think about Jan--about how my time with her may have been too short but it was so very good, how for one brief moment, I was the luckiest man on earth. No matter how it ended, that bastard behind me couldn’t take that away. We reached the edge of the river.

“Okay now, we’re going wade on out into the river. Not too far. I’m going to tell you when to stop, and when I do I want you to get down on your knees.”

The river was really not that deep in many places, and, even as a kid, it was possible here and there to actually wade across it completely. Even after a good rain, it might not be higher than the armpits. It hadn’t rained for a while, so the level was low and the current slow. I walked out until the water was just above my knees.

“Stop there. It’s going to seem like old times, Wus. Remember back in school, a few of us would get you in the bathroom, give you a swirlie, holding your head down in the toilet, flushing it, make you feel like you were drowning. Now it’s time for the real thing. Okay, now get down.”

I had my hands up, the way I’d always seen in movies when a guy is walking at gun point, and began to crouch down, sliding my right leg back, and slowly touching my right knee down. Still very tender, it hurt--a lot--as my knee came into contact with the muddy but rock-and-gravel-strewn river bed. I winced and gritted my teeth tightly. I was damned if I was going to let Tony know I was in pain. Oh yeah, I had my pride.

“Come on. Hurry up,” Tony demanded as I bounced my knee around a bit, trying to find the cushiest spot, or at least the one with the least objects digging into my knee.

I finally did, not a perfect spot, but one that would have to do. Funny in a way that it even mattered, since I had a feeling things would all be over quickly. I moved my left leg back and lowered slowly, a little unsteady. More pain, more trying to find the least agonizing place. Finally, I was on both my knees and the water was at my hips, below my waist.

“Now, on your hands,” he commanded.

I bent forward and reached my hands into the water and down onto to river bed. This didn’t hurt as much because I was able to feel around with my fingers before placing my sore palms down. My face was about two inches from the water’s surface.

“Come on, Tony. No one is going to believe this, me coming all the way out here to kill myself,” I said.

“Are you kidding me? They’re going to wonder what took you so long. Your wife dies. Yeah, I know about that. You lose your job, actually quite a few jobs. You come back here and you’re a suspect in several murders. You got squat for a future. Why wouldn’t you end it all here? It’s--”

“Poetic justice,” I said, interrupting him.

“Nah, more like the circle of life,” he answered as he came up quickly on my right, stepped forward with his left leg, grabbed my hair on the back of my head with his left hand, and violently pushed my face down into the water.

I was unprepared and my mouth was open as I went under. Water rushed into my mouth and I swallowed some into my lungs. My arms groped about on the river’s floor and I tried to push my head up but it seemed like Tony had his full weight pushing down on me through his left arm. I was coughing water out and swallowing more in at the same time.

He pulled my head up out of the water. I coughed out water and gasped for air. He still had me by the hair and leaned down, bringing his mouth close to my ear. I could feel his hot breath on my face. “Just like school, still such a wus,” he said and then he pushed my head under again.

He was right. I was--am--a wus, and maybe it was just as well that this is where everything should end. There was nothing for me. I closed my eyes, just let go.

Then I heard it--a voice, faint, ‘Live.’

I shook my head, or rather tried to. Tony had a tight grip on my hair and was pushing down hard. I heard the voice again, louder. ‘Live.’

Jan? No, it was my voice, clear and commanding. ‘Live.’

I opened my eyes. I couldn’t see a thing in the murky river water. I felt around with my left hand. I found a rock about the size of my palm. It was stuck in the muddy bottom. I twisted it, and it came loose. I went down onto my forearms and I could tell that I had brought Tony, still pressing down and clinging tightly to my hair, forward, a little off-balance as I did so. I reached around with my right arm and hooked it around his left calf then pulled it forward as I pushed up from the river bottom with my left hand. My head came out of the water and I could tell Tony was falling backward.

I continued up, was upright on both knees, and raised my right arm as high as I could, still keeping a tight grip of Tony’s lower leg in the crook of my elbow. I felt Tony tumbling behind me, saw his left leg point up to the sky, heard him begin to curse, “Son of a--” and then there was a splash.

I spun and landed on top of him, my right elbow crashing hard into his chest, pushing his shoulders and head under the water, the weight of my entire body upon him. I pushed up and away from him with my right forearm, straddling him at his thighs as I rose up. Glancing quickly at the river bank, I saw Danny raising the gun. He couldn’t shoot though, because he might hit Tony if he did.

I got a handful of Tony’s shirt with my right hand and pulled his head up out of the water as I crashed down at his face with the rock I still held in my left hand.

The water lessened the impact of my blow, but it still landed solidly against the right side of his face. I heard him grunt. I pulled his head up higher and struck again. This time, I could feel a crunch beneath my blow--a cheek bone, maybe his nose. His head flopped back. I pulled him up higher out of the river, raised my left hand up as high as I could, and--

Someone grabbed my left arm, was pulling me away from Tony, off of him. Then someone else grabbed me at the right shoulder, under my armpit, and pulled me back. I let go of Tony. He flopped back into the river.

“That’s enough. We need him alive,” I heard from my left. A woman’s voice. I recognized it. It was Chief Roark. I was pulled upright, out of the water. I heard splashing as a few more individuals rushed through the water to pull Tony up--police officers, two of them, though I couldn’t tell if they were state or East Hastings.

“Damn, Byrne. You were going to kill him, weren’t you?”

The voice came from my right. I turned my head to identify the speaker. It was Captain Winters.

“Maybe,” I said weakly. I was breathing hard.

“Well, you can drop the rock, now,” Chief Roark said.

I did so and heard it splash as it landed back in the river. She and Captain Winters placed my arms around each of their necks and led me out to the river bank and up onto the shore.

I saw that two other police officers were standing, holding Danny. Roark and Winters led me past him, spun me around, and leaned me against the front hood of my car, each now holding an arm. As they let go, someone came and wrapped a blanket around my shoulder.

Chief Roark lifted the front of my polo shirt up to my neck, revealing a small recording device that was taped to my body.

“Damn, this thing’s all shot to shit,” she said as she tore the wire off my chest, “but we got what we needed.”

“Yeah, well, you sure took your time coming to help me,” I said.

“We wanted to make sure he actually was going to kill you,” Winters said, “make our case even stronger.”

I didn’t care if he was telling the truth or not. I let the blanket fall from my shoulders and walked over to Danny. He had a confused, scared look on his face. I reared back and punched him squarely in the face. His knees buckled.

Damn, it hurt, but, in truth, nothing ever hurt so good.