It was hot in Cul-De-Sac, fat black flies buzzing around like August not April. Growler had taken his shirt off and being bare to waist showed how well muscled he had become in prison … his skin pale as if never touched by the sun, very little body hair, a scattering of pimples across his upper back, on his left shoulder a tattoo of a cartoon character, the Tasmanian Devil, and on his right bicep a heart with a crack in it and tears leaking out. He walked around the room scratching at his upper arms like he had a rash, he would repeatedly smooth back his black hair with both hands then obsessively wipe at his mouth and nose as if he thought they were still powdered white. He stopped in front of a kneeling Paul Milton. “St. Paul the one they crucified upside down?”
“No,” Milton said, “that was St. Peter.”
“What?”
Milton didn’t repeat it or try to look up, he didn’t want to see Satan’s eyes staring at him or see those big teeth either.
“What did you say?” Growler demanded.
“St. Peter.”
He heard it that time, Growler laughing and then hugging himself like he was suddenly cold in spite of the room’s stifling heat. He returned to pacing and scratching at his arms … he was seriously wired as if the cocaine had been a live electric cord shoved up his nose into his brain. He stopped long enough to kick Annie’s husband in the ass.
An easy target because Paul was buck naked on his knees, forehead forced to the floor, wrists pulled back and tied to his ankles, bare ass up … a contortion of supplication and humiliation and aching vulnerability.
“I know you got that goddamn elephant,” Growler said. “You double-crossed me just like everybody else, didn’t you, St. Paul … didn’t you?”
“St. Paul was betrayed by a coppersmith.”
“What?” With Milton’s face shoved to the floor, Growler had a hard time understanding him.
“St. Paul from the Bible, he was betrayed by a coppersmith.”
“Did you say coppersmith?” Growler leaned down to listen.
“Yes.”
“I got backstabbed by my best friend who’s a sculptor, who works in metal … how’s that for a coincidence?”
“St. Paul was beheaded.”
“No way!” Growler was surprised, genuinely delighted by this information.
“His head bounced three times.”
“Get out of here!”
“And a fountain appeared at each of those three spots.”
“I’ll be damned.”
“Yes you will.”
Growler straightened up.
“I didn’t take your elephant,” Milton told him. “I was with you when we opened the shaft.”
“Yeah and you were snooping around three weeks before I got here … you think I didn’t notice how you’d been tearing into things, lifting floorboards and—Did you find any photographs?”
Paul said something Growler didn’t understand.
“Listen to me asshole … hey.” He nudged Paul with his boot and spoke in a more conciliatory voice. “If you found those pictures I might let you keep the elephant.”
Paul began reciting the Lord’s Prayer.
Growler kicked him in the ass again. “You lied to me about having a wife … everybody lying to me, lying about me, lies, lies, lies.” And kicked him again.
Paul grunted, that last kick really hurt. “I didn’t lie about Annie, I just didn’t mention her.”
“What?”
He didn’t bother repeating the distinction.
“You found the elephant, called your wife up here, gave it to her, that’s why she ran out last night … taking the elephant with her.”
“No.”
Growler came around by Paul’s bowed head. “Where is she?”
“I don’t know.”
“You were planning to meet her someplace, have a good laugh how you pulled one over on Old Scratch.”
“Satan.”
“Where’s your wife!” He began rubbing his face again, felt close to tears … so frustrating, so goddamn infuriating, that beetle in his brain, everyone betraying him. “After I find Kenny Norton and Elizabeth, your wife’s next on the list. I’ll bugger her little ass until—”
“Get thee behind me Satan.”
Growler heard that and it made him laugh. “Good idea,” he said walking behind Milton and straddling his legs.
Paul was praying hard.
“Give you a taste of what Old Scratch has in store for Mrs. Milton.”
Paul’s prayers were interrupted by the sound of a belt being undone.