Thirty-Eight

“Do you need a ride home?” Frank asks as he escorts me down to the lobby.

“Thanks, but I have to get to the office. I’ll take a cab.”

Before reentering the tent, Frank takes hold of my arm and squeezes it lightly to make sure he has my full attention.

“Be careful, OK?” he says. “When I finish here, I’m planning to have a talk with Lebed, let him know I’m watching.”

“Think he’ll listen?” I ask.

Frank’s mouth tightens with residual anger. “I’ll make sure.”

After discarding my paper outfit and booties, I exit the building and head in the opposite direction from the bored media scrum awaiting any scrap of news to feed their chirpy breakfast-TV hosts. An enterprising coffee truck provides a convenient distraction as the skeleton crew of cameramen and wannabe broadcasters is lined up for plastic-wrapped pastries and double-doubles with extra double.

I’m not paying attention as I dart past the mouth of the alley, and a leathery palm snakes from the darkness to close over my mouth, instantly muffling my startled scream.

Dragged into the depths, I’m both terrified and pissed. My terror is obvious, but my anger is a white-hot poker as I realize that despite repeated warnings from Frank and Pinch, I’ve still been too cavalier.

“It’s OK,” a hoarse voice whispers. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

I recognize the voice. It belongs to my Good Samaritan.

I bite down on his gloved finger, attempting to pierce the bone.

He yelps and releases me.

“Shit! Didn’t you hear me? I’m no—”

I drop to my haunches and sweep my foot in a wide arc, clipping his ankles and lifting his feet off the ground.

With another curse, he crunches onto his back on the rancid alley floor, and I’m on top of him. By the time his eyes stop rolling, I have my knife out of my boot and against his throat.

“Don’t ever do that again!” I hiss.

“OK, OK.” He holds up his hands. “I surrender.”

“What the hell are you playing at?”

“You wanted to talk.”

“You scared me to death! I thought you were Lebed.”

“S-s-sorry,” he says. “I … I’m not too good around outsiders anymore.”

I climb off his chest and hold out my hand to help him up. He accepts but grips my forearm rather than my hand, forcing me to do the same. He’s awkward rising and I have to put some muscle into it to bring him to his feet.

“Let’s walk,” he says, wiping at his dirty coat and moving deeper into the alley. “I don’t like to stay in one place too long.”

“Why?”

“Same reason you’re scared.”

“The Red Swan?”

He nods.

“Is that why you killed that gunman last night even though I asked you not to? I just saw his body.”

“If I’d let him live, he would’ve come after both of us.” The Samaritan’s eyes glisten with a feral intensity. “I know these animals—you don’t. Not yet. They don’t just hurt people because Lebed tells them to. They enjoy it.” His voice rises in anger. “It gets them fucking hard. If Lebed does grab you, you better be prepared to kill, because he won’t hesitate to do a hell of a lot worse.”

I stop walking and ask, “What did he do to you?”

“I was a journalist, too,” he says. “Not in the spotlight like you. Just on the desk, but still … ” He carefully removes one of his gloves and displays the blackened stumps where his fingers used to be. “This,” he says, “was for writing a cutline that Lebed didn’t like.”

“I heard about that,” I say. “From Victor Hendrickson.”

“Yeah,” the Samaritan sighs. “Red Swan paid him a visit, too.”

“But that was twenty years ago,” I say. “Why are you still hanging around in Lebed’s territory?”

The Samaritan starts walking again. “I’ve been avoiding him for a long time,” he says, “but a friend asked me to be his eyes.”

“His eyes?” I ask.

“Things are changing,” he explains. “My friend can’t stay in the shadows any longer, but he needed me to look out for … ” He hesitates. “That’s why I was outside the tea house when that Russian pig attacked you. I thought that maybe—”

“Maybe I was someone else,” I finish.

He nods sheepishly.

“Who?” I ask, already sensing the answer.

“His daughter,” says the Samaritan. “My friend’s daughter.”

“Joseph Brown’s daughter,” I say. “Bailey Brown.”

The Samaritan nods. “She was never supposed to come back here, to get involved again. Now everything is changing.”

“For better or worse?” I ask.

“That remains to be seen.”

We continue to walk, sticking to the shadows and alleys, scaring the occasional rat and suspicious cat. My Samaritan knows most of the disheveled castaways and junkies who are rising to scrounge breakfast from a bottle, needle, or street kitchen, and he nods to them as we pass.

“How long have you been living on the streets?” I ask.

“I don’t.” He smiles. “These are my work clothes. After Lebed’s men butchered my hands, I went a little crazy. Booze, pills … lots and lots of pills. Thought about joining the thousands who’ve swan dived off the Golden Gate, but I was saved by a smile.”

“A smile?” I ask.

“She’s a redhead, like you, sent from heaven itself. She convinced me I still had value, and we started a street mission together. Then her father died and we used the inheritance to buy a piece of land outside the city. We’re building a community there for those who don’t have a community. Families who’ve fallen on hard times, you know? You’d be shocked how many car windows I knock on to find a family inside with nowhere else to live. This whole country is built on a foundation of broken promises, and we’ve forgotten that we’ll be judged not on how we treat our wealthiest citizens but on how we treat our poorest.”

“And Joe Brown is with you?” I ask.

“I call him Radar.” My Samaritan chuckles. “You know, from that TV show M*A*S*H? If you need something, anything, Radar will find it. I don’t know how he does it.” He winks. “And I don’t pry too closely either. Some things are best kept a mystery.”

“But your mission is religious?” I ask.

“There but for the grace of God,” says my Samaritan.

“And yet you killed that man last night.”

He stops walking and turns to meet my gaze. “I did kill him,” he says matter-of-factly. “I didn’t know I was still holding onto that much anger, but when his throat was in my hands, not even the devil could have pried my fingers loose.” He breaks off eye contact. “Obviously that’s a metaphor; I haven’t had actual fingers for a very long time.”

“And what about Joe?” I ask. “Why did he leave his daughters at the mercy of Lebed?”

He starts walking again. “You’ll need to ask him.”

“I’d like to. So would his daughters. They’re both safe by the way, no thanks to him. Can you arrange a meeting?”

“He’s coming to town.”

“When?”

“Tonight.”

“Will he meet with us?”

My Samaritan points to the mouth of an alley where a stand of cabs is lined up waiting for passengers.

“We’ll be in touch,” he says.

“You better be,” I snap back. “It’s time everyone got some answers.”