Personal Effects: Dark Art Read online

Daniel’s face twisted into a snarl. He plucked the cig from his mouth and pitched it to the hardwood floor, mashing it with his work boot. His voice was cold now.

  “He left the next day. Fucking coward left his eighteen-year-old son with a paid-up house, a shitload in the bank and a letter on the kitchen table. Says he’s a ‘death-bringer,’ he’s cursed, seein’ things—a giant, living Inkstain sliding across the walls. ‘Unholy retribution,’ he says, some convoluted monster-movie bullshit, and he’s leavin’ to save my life, not coming back, and I shouldn’t look for him.”

  He threw his can of Coors at the fireplace. I flinched. The can bounced off the hearth, spraying foam and beer onto the floor.

  “And by fuck, I didn’t.”

  I looked up from the mess to Daniel’s face. Four arrests in as many years, I recalled. Two for assault. I had to tread carefully now.

  “What … What did you think of that?” I asked.

  His bloodshot eyes locked with mine. The music filled the silence.

  “About. What.”

  “About what he said in the letter.”

  Daniel Drake stood now, towering above me, his body swaying. His face had gone blank, impassive. Just like his father’s.

  “My girlfriend’s head was cut clean off her shoulders,” he said. “I swallowed so much of her blood that day, I can still taste it. Mister, I believed every word.”

  I didn’t need the drunk to walk me to the car—and frankly, after the spook story I’d just heard, I didn’t want him to. But Daniel Drake insisted, and so we trudged through his slop-soaked front yard toward the Saturn. I tapped the remote entry button in my hand, and the doors unlocked.

  “Nice car,” he commented. “Yours?”

  “It’s a friend’s.”

  He nodded to his blue, battered pickup truck. Behind the shitheap’s cracked windshield was a faded, handwritten FOR SALE sign.

  “Everyone needs wheels. Got a guy comin’ tomorrow to see it. It’s yours for two hundred now, if you wannit.” He snorted through his nostrils, sucking phlegm into his mouth. He swayed, spat and smiled. “Cash or check, it all spends the same.”

  I opened the car door and smiled back.

  “I’m good. Listen, I really appreciate you talking to me. It’s been really helpful.”

  “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure,” he said.

  I extended my hand again. This time, he shook it. His calloused palm squeezed far harder than I liked.

  He leaned toward me. The air turned rancid as he spoke.

  “Mister, you’re not trying to cure him, are you? Make him see again?”

  “I … I don’t think he wants that,” I said. “I just want to do my job.”

  Daniel’s green eyes probed mine. “What’s dead’s buried. You’d be right to leave it alone.”

  I can’t leave it alone.

  “Thanks again,” I said, and climbed inside the car. My feet found the clutch and brake pedals. I switched on the ignition. The Saturn purred.

  Being inside was literally a breath of fresh air. I leaned my face toward the cartoon pine tree dangling from the rearview mirror, and inhaled. I suddenly felt as if I were in a Glade commercial: Fresh forest scent! Ahhhhhh!

  Ah.

  I looked at the dashboard. There, in its center, was my iPod. My brain made the cross-reference: Richard Drake, the song he played at The Brink, Russia, the classical music streaming from Daniel Drake’s boombox. If there was anyone who might know …

  “Daniel!” I called, rolling down the window. “Daniel, one quick question!”

  The man turned in the yard, spat again, and walked back to the car. Goddamn, he was burly. He slapped his hands onto his knees and peered into the car. He flashed me his brown teeth, gleeful.

  “Changed your mind about the Chevy, huh?” he said. I shook my head.

  “Actually, it’s about your dad. I heard the music inside, and it made me think of something. Your dad played this, on a piano. Does it mean anything to you?”

  I tapped the iPod. The opening high notes of “Night On Bald Mountain” were playing now, leaves scattering in the wind—

  “NO!” he screamed. “NO NO NONONONONO! Heard it enough then, still hear it in my fucking sleep! Turn it OFF! Turn it OFF, you motherfucker!”

  “Wait, just—”

  His hands were inside the car now, his scarred, crimson face an inch from my ear. His fingers tore at my face. I felt blood surge down my cheek.

  “OFF, YOU MOTHERFUCKER!”

  And now I was screaming, no words, just screaming. My right hand slammed onto the gearshift and thrust backward, putting the car into reverse. Foot off the brake, hitting the gas. The car lurched, but didn’t move.

  No

  —music thundering in the car, a lunatic roaring in my ear—fucking

  —TURN IT OFF, his boots thumping against the car door now—way.

  My hand found the parking brake and slapped it down. The Saturn roared, spraying mud into the sky as its front-wheel drive let loose.

  Daniel Drake screamed at me past my windshield … and now, as I twisted the wheel, heaving the car into an ungainly one-eighty, he was in the rearview mirror, chasing me, growing smaller and smaller.

  17

  The shakes terrorized me for the first half-hour of my drive south. Eventual destination: The Brink. I recalled Malcolm’s pep talk in the library yesterday, about learning to pitch and walking through earthquakes. As I eyed the scratch on my cheek from Daniel Drake’s attack, Malcolm’s optimistic sermon rang hollow.

  I was running on four hours of sleep and adrenaline, wracked with an ever-present full-body tremor. Screw baseball and pitching. The earth beneath me was pitching; I couldn’t find the ball anymore.

  I was ravenous for normalcy. As soon as Daniel Drake’s home vanished from the rearview, I called Rachael. The cell flashed a mocking “NO SIGNAL” message. I cursed and drove on, slick with fright and sweat.

  I said nothing. I tried not to think.

  As I neared Claytonville once more, my cell phone played its skeleton song. Reception, finally. I checked the screen, saw a new voice mail message and dialed in.

  “Welcome up, bro,” Lucas’ recording said. I smiled at his upbeat voice, the youthful exuberance. It was rejuvenating.

  “Me and your girl are catchin’ big fish on the ’net,” he continued. “Think we found something about that Alexandrov dude, you know, ‘Comrade Dog Tags.’ You’ll want to hear it. Call when you can, meep-meep.”

  I dialed his number. Lucas picked up on the first ring, and put me on speakerphone.

  “Goddamn, I’m happy to hear you guys,” I said. “My powwow with Daniel Drake went into ‘X-Files’ territory. I think I need a new pair of shorts.”

  Rachael’s voice purred in my ear. “There’s a clean pair of panties in the glove box.”

  “Really?”

  She laughed. “No. You okay?”

  “Getting there,” I said. “Everyone gets a 101 in the twisted history of the Drake clan when I get home tonight. What’s Alexandrov’s story?”

  “You’re gonna love this,” Lucas said.

  “Here’s the deal,” Rachael said. “Core information about Drake, we don’t have. Stuff like his DOB, real tax and property records, bio. But we do have lots of peripheral info: the dates on the lockbox CIA letters, the Soviet connection via the dog tags, the name ‘Alexandrov,’ that stuff. If wasn’t much, but it was enough to eventually get us to a website called ‘YoureNotMeantToKnowThis.com.’”

  “Subtle,” I said.

  “Actually, it’s fairly off the beaten path,” she replied. “Not a lot of people frequent it; it’s not mentioned in any of the conspiracy subculture websites I started with. That’s what we’re talking about here, Z. Tinfoil hat territory. It’s run by some anonymous guy. I tried tracking him down, but there was no useful registrant information on the website address. So this is fourth-hand information, understand.”

  “Rumorville,” Lucas chime
d in. “They’ve got a mill there.”

  “You’re a dork,” Rachael said.

  “I prefer ‘dweek.’”

  I rolled my eyes, grinning. Grateful.

  “So you’re at this site,” I said. “What happens next?”

  “This place specializes in U.S. intelligence community coverups,” Rachael said, “or so they say. There’s a post about the sad, sad story of Piotyr Alexandrov—though the guy sounded like a Grade-A asshole.”

  “Foolbiscuit.”

  “Shut up, Luc,” she said. “According to this, Alexandrov was once a high-ranking Soviet Spetsnaz officer. These Spetsnaz guys were hardcore special forces, Z, bred to be bad. Anyways, it looks like our comrade got into the black market weapons business after the collapse of Communism. Remember the stories coming out of Russia ten, fifteen years ago?”

  “Not really,” I admitted. “That was high school. Too busy reading comics and listening to Alanis Morissette to care.”

  “Heh. So was I, but my dad’s gig gave me a nose for news. The nineties were awful for Russia. Power vacuums, chaos and corruption abounded. The mob ran the streets. Now according to this site—”

  Lucas: “YoureNotMeantTo—”

  “Goddamn it, hush. He’s been like this all morning, Z. Twitterpated about this spy stuff. Don’t make me pull over this car, Lucas.”

  My brother cackled.

  She sighed. “Okay, so the site says the American government approved of some of this Russian mob activity—even supported it, in back-door dealings. Factions that were willing to push U.S.-friendly agendas were left alone, even assisted.”

  “What kind of agendas?” I asked.

  “Doesn’t say,” she replied. “But our benevolent Uncle Sam frowned greatly upon other factions, like arms dealers. There was a network of these jerks called ‘the cowboys.’ They were ex-military—had access to guns, bullets, bombs and worse. They paid off corrupt officials, stole the weapons and sold them to anyone who had the money.”

  “That’s bad news for a fledgling democracy,” I said.

  “It’s bad news for everybody, Z. They were international exporters. These guys had air fleets. Armed every African civil war in the ’90s, kept Columbian drug cartels well-stocked …”

  Lucas’ voice came on the line. “So here’s where we think your blind guy enters frame. Site says CIA spooks were sent to Russia to track ‘the cowboys’ and find out who was the end-level boss running the operation.”

  “Alexandrov,” I said.

  “Bzzzzzt, nope,” he said. “Lemme finish. The CIA team was lead by a small group of spooks specializing in, ah, ‘infiltration and interrogation.’ The operation was code-named ‘Red Show.’”

  My mind snagged on this. Dominos fell, puzzle pieces clicked.

  “Holy shit,” I said. “That’s what Drake said yesterday. ‘I run the red show, the hellshow.’ And today, Daniel called him a ‘mind-bender,’ something about prisoners.”

  “We just jumped from lukewarm to hot,” Lucas said. “Katabatic. So Alexandrov’s apparently a ‘trusted lieutenant’ in the cowboys’ operation, the right-hand man. Mini-boss. Now this is where our tinfoil types bust out their violins. ‘Did he deserve such inhumane treatment?’ they say.”

  I frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Put it together, bro. Drake and his boys apparently nabbed the dude and interrogated him. Site says that a few days after Alexandrov disappeared, U.S.-friendly Russian mobsters wiped out a cowboy safe house. Ka-boom, Bruckheimer style. They were gunning for the leader.”

  “And?”

  “Fee-ass-co. There weren’t any cowboys to smear. They blew up a house where Alexandrov’s wife and daughter were staying. And our Spetsnaz dude? Fade to black. Never seen again.”

  I remembered the letter from Drake’s lawyer.

  “Because Drake killed him,” I muttered.

  Rachael, now: “Likely, from what we suspect. Now it’s brass tacks time, Z. The sources for this report are very sketchy: innuendo, supposed off-the-record conversations with former collaborators and low-level U.S. intel officers, alleged ‘translated Russian documents.’ There’s not a named source or cited doc in the entire thing. It stinks. But.”

  “But,” I said.

  Lucas made a farting sound.

  “What are you, two?” she said. “Yeah, but. We’ve got enough in the lockbox to put Drake in the CIA, in Russia during the late nineties, and there’s that damning connection to Alexandrov. If what his son said was true—”

  “He hated the guy,” I said. “I don’t think he was lying.”

  “Then the story checks out, as much as it ever will.”

  I nodded. So. This was the information I needed to get past Drake’s smug-faced defense. That day back in Russia, ten years ago—the day he made a terrible wrong turn, a decision that somehow killed Alexandrov and his family—that had sparked his eventual journey to The Brink. This was the pry bar.

  Henry’s voice echoed in my mind.

  He did something unspeakable, unfathomable. Someone wants your blind man to suffer.

  “The Dark Man,” I whispered.

  “What’s that?”

  “I said I’ll be back when I can.” I glanced at a road sign ahead. Twenty miles to the exit that would lead me to Brinkvale, and Drake. I finally began to feel good about this day, confident again. “Today’s the day, I think. Thanks for the data dump; I’ll be home right after work.”

  “Later gator,” Lucas called.

  “Be careful, and cool,” Rachael said. “So long, hottie artist.”

  “Bye, geek goddess.”

  They disconnected. I stuffed the phone into my jeans pocket and drove on. For the first time, I felt truly ready to face Richard Drake. I could now help him confront his past. I could help him forgive himself.

  I could help him see.

  18

  The Brink’s elevator lurched, stopping at Level 5. I might have been puffed up by the footwork Rachael, Lucas and I had accomplished today, but I wasn’t stupid. An hour’s worth of rediscovered confidence doesn’t trump a lifetime of nyctophobia.

  I braced myself for the bizarre hallway strobe show.

  The doors groaned open. The lights in max were bright and steady.

  “Miraculous,” I said, smiling. I walked the hall, whistling and singing the walk-off anthem to Hair, the musical: “Let the sun shinnne … . Let the sun shine … The sunnn shine iiiin.”

  Emilio Wallace wasn’t at his post by Room 507’s door. In his stead was Chaz Hoffacker, an impossibly short, unfriendly butterball of a man. He and Emilio were buddies—I assumed it was a watchman thing. I’d tried to befriend Chaz my first week here, but had failed his ironclad compatibility test. He asked me what I thought of Ziggy.

  Not Stardust. Not Marley. “Ziggy,” the newspaper comic.

  He’d kept his distance ever since. It was for the best, really. His affection for “The Family Circus” was equally boundless.

  The man looked up from the comics section of the Journal-Ledger and harrumphed.

  “Hey, Chaz,” I said. “Where’s Emilio?”

  He shrugged.

  “Took a personal day. Said he was overworked, needed some rest. Gig was gettin’ to him. It happens.”

  I felt apprehensive about this. Emilio never took time off, he was a Brinkvale legend for that. Then again, he had looked worn down yesterday. Said he needed sleep.

  Chaz unlocked the door. Room 507 was dark, as always. But the hallway lights were humming, and I was buzzing, let the sun shine in. I wasn’t afraid. I stepped inside and flipped on the light.

  I gasped.

  Richard Drake sat silently in his wooden chair, an impish smirk on his lips. Beyond him, to the left, was something new and wonderful and horrible.

  I gazed, suddenly punch-drunk, at a floor-to-ceiling mural. Its beauty was eclipsed only by its epic chaos. Vibrant, colorful swirls and manic, jagged lines shimmered on the cinderblocks. There was no message
here on this wall, no approximation of form or conscious organization—just zigzags and spirals and broad swooshes. I spotted a scribble-swirl of black up in a far corner, near the ceiling.

  I thought of the children in Drake’s photos—the tot-lot ghouls with the vortex eyes—and shivered.

  The long box of pastels rested neatly on the table, seemingly untouched. My eyes slid to Drake. His grin widened.

  “This is tremendous, Martin,” I said, careful to use his pseudonym and trying not to sound as dumbfounded as I felt. I reached into my pocket and grabbed my cell phone. “I’m going to document this. It’s truly remarkable work, I’m impressed.”

  Drake opened his eyes. I snapped a photo of the wall with my phone’s camera.

  “Would you tell me what it means?” I asked.

  “I would, Mr. Taylor,” Drake replied, “but I can’t.” His voice as smooth and cruel as ever. “Last night, I heard growls, scratches and oily smearings against the stone. It sounded like people fucking. But I did not draw whatever is there. You’ll have to ask the Dark Man what it means.”

  He pointed now, with uncanny precision, to the room’s corner.

  “He signed his work, did he not?”

  I grabbed the room’s other chair and placed it before him. It gave a creaky shriek as I sat.

  “Martin, I admire what you’ve done here,” I said. “It’s breathtaking.”

  “I’m sure it is. It took everything you had not to wail in terror.”

  Two days ago, I would have been alarmed at this “outing” of my fear. But I had a better bead on Richard Drake now. Then, he was an audio engineer, determined to infuriate his therapists. Now, he was a government-trained mindbender, an interrogator, someone who lived to sense weakness and rend wills. I couldn’t match his skill—I wasn’t naive enough to believe that—but I had one important fact on my side.

  “The Dark Man did not draw that,” I said, “because the Dark Man doesn’t exist. We both know that. In fact, we both know I can access the security tape for this room if I wanted, to prove that he didn’t. I’d see you in night-vision footage, working on this art project.”