The Godless One (26 page)

Because you have enough
weaponry to arm a platoon buried in your panels,
Knucklehead
.

In his email, Ari had specified a
departure time of eight in the morning. Barring the unexpected and
the unwanted, Abu Jasim should by now be out of Quebec and in
Upstate New York, barreling down I-87.

Ari’s formidable mountain of patience
was much eroded after a year of dangerous uncertainty. Impatiently,
he reviewed the remaining 171 images on the memory stick. He tagged
six more insurgents (‘bad guys’ in the CENTOM lexicon) and then
closed down the computer.

He felt a little better after a shave
and shower. After dressing, he pulled on a quilted jacket that he
had purchased on the way home from the Methodist church the day
before and went for a tour outside.

The frigid James looked abandoned. He
saw no birds, not even geese. Even the most foolhardy kayakers
stayed off the river when it was in this kind of mood, flooding and
cold, an uninviting douche. The water had risen halfway to his
gazebo. Much further, and Ari would have to think about relocating
his hidden cache of guns.

The snow had almost completely melted,
leaving his lawn mushy. Runnels of soggy leaves mixed with sand
slowed to a sludge in the street. The bleakness suited him. An
assassin would find him ready and willing. But he doubted his
enemies had tracked him down to his lair. Given time, of course,
they would. Unless he could track them down, first. Yet habit
dictated prudence. He crossed Beach Court Lane and entered the
woods. Stepping over fallen trees and slushy detritus, his new
Nikes were soon slathered in mud. After a half hour he emerged into
the field that ran down to the Pony Pasture, having found no
evidence that anyone had explored the area for a clear line of fire
at his house. Thinking to limber up both his mind and body, he
began to jog along River Road, only to slip and fall on a patch of
ice. At any other time he would have hopped up and kept going. Now
he lay still on the chilly ground, not even swearing, thinking of
unanticipated vulnerabilities. No one had driven or walked past him
by the time he grabbed hold of one of the wooden barriers lining
the road and hauled himself to his feet. It was a work day and the
neighborhood was practically deserted.

This did not bode well for the evening
jog that was pre-planned and unavoidable. The ground was not
jogger-friendly, or even otter-friendly, and the lowering clouds
made no promise of improvement. He tried to sketch out alternate
routes in his mind, but most involved sidewalks that were even
icier than the roads. He limped back home, not bothering to explore
the woods bordering the Nottoway and Mackensie properties. He
entered through the front door and left a trail of muddy footprints
on his way to the garage. There, he took his new universal garage
door remote and pressed the flat button. Instead of the comforting
clank of the overhead motor, he heard only the echo of his own
breathing. He pressed again, and again. He was about to smash the
device against the wall when a thought came to him. He slid open
the hatch on the back of the remote and stared at the empty
compartment.

He had not thought to buy
batteries.

This did not entirely displease him. He
now had something useful to do. He doubted he could exhaust the
next six hours hunting for a pair of Double AA's, which were
available at practically every store between the Atlantic and the
Pacific, but it was a start.

He did not bother changing. He had
learned that most Americans did not dress to go shopping. In fact,
it sometimes seemed to him that most people favored Funk and
Grunge. With a careless toss against fashion, he manually opened
his door and drove to the nearest drug store. He quickly found the
batteries, but discovered that, in his indifferent haste, he had
forgotten his wallet.

He gave up his idea of going furniture
hunting and went home. It would be a late night, so he tried to
take a nap. It was futile. He was sorry now that he had not waited
long enough at the library to accept Lynn Gillespie's gift of books
by current Iraqi novelists. He switched the computer back on and
did some research on historical events in which he had participated
or seen from up close. He learned little new, but once again he was
startled by how events, both great and small, were encapsulated in
the same dreary format: beginning, middle, end. 'Saddam Hussein was
born in Al-Awja 1937. He rose to power. He fell from power. The
End.' You might as well leave it at that.

Most online articles
affirmed that Saddam had lost touch with reality. The American
military analysts concluded that was one of the main reasons the
Iraqi Army was defeated so handily. Ari found it hard to ignore
reality. When he touched a cat, it was a cat.
What were you touching, Saddam, when you placed your hand on
the lion’s head
?

He cleaned off his new shoes, knowing
full well that this evening, within twenty yards from his door,
they would be encrusted all over again. 'The shoes got dirty. The
shoes were cleaned. The shoes got dirty again. The End.'

At four-thirty he was startled to see
that it was growing dark. The clouds and the season were combining
for an early nightfall. He slid on his shoes, all the while cursing
his negligence. He could have bought a flashlight in the time he
had frittered away. He could have even bought batteries for it. As
it was, he would arrive early at the rendezvous and be forced to
wait in the dark. He took out a plastic shopping bag and scooped
five handfuls of cat food into it. No sense letting it go to
waste.

He would be warm while jogging, but he
was bound to start freezing while standing in the dark. It was too
bad he did not trust his cell phone. Abu Jasim could have called
before leaving Montreal, letting him know if he was running late or
(far less likely) leaving early. If he was delayed, Ari's wait
might prove long indeed.

Locking his front door behind him, he
set off down the lawn and up the lane. He saw no strange cars
parked on the block, no human shadows lurking in the woods. Within
thirty seconds he was on River Road, his eyes peeled for patches of
ice. By the time he paused to cross Westover the darkness was
already growing oppressive. Rush hour was in full swing and he was
dazzled by a long row of headlights. Seeing a gap, he darted
across, the cat food shushing inside his plastic bag.

He was feeling better than he had the
day before, when he had collapsed in an exhausted heap at
Manchester Docks. He was more relaxed, now that he was well away
from his house, the most likely spot for an ambush. He would have
felt better still had he skipped that half bottle of Jack Daniels
the night before. But it was thanks to the whiskey that he had
gotten as much sleep as he had.

His eyes streamed tears in the cold.
Within a few miles he was already searching for the hot, pulsing
coal within him that had fueled his days and weeks of exhaustion in
the past. To his intense satisfaction (and relief), he found the
glowing source, the part of him that said, ‘You’re alive,
Ghaith—let’s keep it that way.’ When alone, it was the closest he
came to spiritual uplift. He considered it pure physiology, and did
not dwell much on it. A gift from his body, and that was that.
Though pummeled by apprehension, a bit bothered in the knee and
nagged by the weather, he could have felt worse.

Once past Belvedere, he prudently
slowed to a brisk walk. Streetlights illuminated the small road
that ran behind the Manchester banking institutions facing the
river, but water had already begun to freeze on the embankment. He
avoided the flood wall, whose concrete walkway was no doubt slick
with black ice. The detour cost him a half hour, but when he
reached the landing there were still ninety minutes to kill—if Abu
Jasim was running on schedule. But this was not as onerous as it
might have been. Ari had come prepared to entertain
himself.

The landing was revealed in fragments
of light from the Canal Walk and the adjoining Rockett’s Landing
condos across the river—where, a tourist pamphlet had informed him,
Abraham Lincoln came ashore when he redeemed Richmond from the
Confederacy. Light also reflected off the river, making the
splotchy illumination waver with uncertainty. Ari felt as though he
had walked into an experiment designed to demonstrate wave/particle
duality. There were no vehicles slouching in the parking lot slush,
although a pair of tracks indicated someone had recently attempted
a visit.

The semi-truck-sized pile of rubble was
further back, away from the light, but its broken white concrete
was visible from the Manchester Docks entrance. Walking towards it,
Ari began shaking his bag.

"Here kitty!" he called out. "I'll bet
your nice lady didn't feed you tonight. No one wants to come here
in this weather."

Shadows skittered across the rubble and
vanished in black crevices.

"Here kitty! I hope you are warm in
your little concrete shitholes. But it's dinner time now! Eat!
Yum!"

Coming to a halt in front of the pile,
he smacked his lips to lure the cats to his chow. He was enormously
gratified when several heads popped up. There might have been even
more of them watching him, but it was too dark to say.

"Fit for a king!" he informed them,
taking out a small handful and placing it at his feet. He drew away
several yards. When none of them accepted the bait, he pulled back
a little further. Finally, a very large tabby ventured away from
the pile towards the food. Other cats hopped up on the rubble,
watching closely.

"Oh, you're a big guy," Ari said
approvingly. "You could beat the shit out of that idiot,
Sphinx."

On hearing the first toothy crunch,
more cats crept forward. Even in the poor light, Ari marveled at
the striking variety of their winter coats. White, black,
tortoiseshell, mackerel tabby, orange tabby, tuxedo, spotted, cow,
mask-and-mantle a multitude of bi-colors. It was only after several
fights broke out that Ari paused in his admiration and stepped
towards them, opening the bag. Most of the cats darted back to the
concrete heap. But a few, including the first big one, drew back
only a short distance.

"Oh, mighty cat. Oh, brave cat. I shall
name you Hector." Ari cast food in a narrow swath, as though
presenting a feast for royalty. Hector came up to stake his claim
to a choice clump, warning several others off with an impressive
scowl. Ari's next toss was wider because the crowd was growing. He
wanted them all to participate in the buffet. But his attention
remained focused on Hector, whose dominance was obvious. He moved
to within two feet of the cat, bearing orange and yellow markings
similar to Sphinx's. Hector hissed, but did not back away. He
hissed again when Ari crouched. Ari made kissing sounds that Hector
did not seem to appreciate. "Oh, you are most certainly a boy cat.
I won't try to kiss you, I swear."

Hector appeared to be a bit tamer than
the others. Or perhaps he was simply more confident of his ability
to deal with human antagonists. Ari's slightest movement caused the
other cats—now congregated into a veritable swarm—to shift away
from him. But Hector squatted in place, curling his tail around his
body as he munched away.

"Wouldn't you like to come home with
me? I have a nice home, much better than that little tart Diane's.
I have a mattress and four walls. Actually, many walls. I have a
basement and four bedrooms! I have plenty of cat food and a kitty
litter...well, I'll buy a new one. And I promise to scoop it with
great regularity. I'll even get you a scratching post, whatever the
hell that is. All you have to do is...be a cat."

Gingerly, he reached out. He was quite
astonished when Hector allowed him to pet his head, although not
without a low growl of warning.

The squish-squish of a jogger drew Ari
away from the cat. A man’s dark outline appeared at the Slave Trail
entrance. Ari’s height, almost Ari’s build—a bit stockier, perhaps.
Twice he slid on ice, but recovered masterfully with moves that
tightened his style. He spotted Ari almost instantly and changed
direction, coming his way. Seeing the newcomer, Hector grew wary
and began to pull back. Without looking at him, Ari ran his index
finger over the cat’s head, calming him. With brief visual detours
he surveyed his surroundings. To his left, five feet away, two
chunks of concrete about the size of baseballs. A tangle of tree
roots, small but noticeable under the slush, around five feet to
his front right. A branch near his foot. Old and soggy but possibly
useful. And there was plenty of loose muck at his feet. This was
all he could see in the semi-darkness. There could have been a
shiny new nickel-plated .38 lying on the ground to his front left,
in the shadow of that tree trunk…that would have been nice. But if
he couldn’t see it, it was worthless.

Ari tried hard to see the man's legs
and feet. As he came up he saw the man's running shoes had very
little mud. He tried to catch a glimpse of the man's calf, but his
dark jogging pants merged with the night.

The man was smiling. Late twenties. Not
self-consumed. A purposeful air that he failed to hide.

"Hell of a night for—"

Ari grabbed the cat by the neck and
threw him at the man's face.

"Eyes, Hector!" he bellowed.