Heirs of Cain by Tom Wallace Page B

I’m not lying. I don’t know where he is. I’ve never even met him. Only talked to him on the phone.”
    The Indian released his grip and pushed Simon hard against the bar. Simon hit the bar, reeled to his left, and tumbled onto the couch. One of the couch’s legs gave way, causing him to roll onto the floor. He quickly righted himself and began rubbing his eyes.
    “Twenty-four hours, fatman; that’s all you’ve got. You don’t find out by then, that pretty little thing upstairs will be a widow this time tomorrow.”
    Simon reached for the silk nightgown, brought it to his face, and gently pressed it against his eyes.
    “Got it?” The Indian stooped down and picked up the revolver. “Got it?”
    “Yeah, yeah, I got it. What do you think—I’m fuckin’ deaf or something?”
    “No, I think you’re an idiot.” The Indian pointed the gun at Simon. “The safety was off. You let me talk you into putting it on.”
    He ejected the magazine clip, emptied the bullets into his hand, cleared the chamber, and tossed the gun onto the floor. It landed with a loud
clunk
.
    “Twenty-four hours, fatman. No more.”
    Nearly ten minutes passed before Simon was able to clear the blurriness from his vision and another ten minutes before he was able to stand. On unsteady legs, he went to the bar, picked up the phone, and began dialing. Things had to be done. Without further delay. That damn Indian had to be eliminated. He was too fuckin’ crazy to deal with.
    Simon continued to rub his eyes, listened to the phone ring, and waited. After half a dozen rings, he heard the cell phone click on.
    “Hello.”
    “Karl?”

“Jesus God, did you see that?”
    “Yeah, I saw.”
    “The look, did you see the look in his eyes?”
    “I saw, I saw. The little dink bastard never knew what
was happening
.”
    “No, not him, not the dink. The captain. Did you see
his eyes while he was wasting the little motherfucker?”
    “No, I wasn
‘
t watching his eyes
. “
    “They were cold, like a cobra. Like a wild animal
.
Scary, man. I
‘
m tellin you, it was spooky.”
    “Forget his eyes, man, did you see that dink’s head tumble
into the river? It hit the water so hard it bounced
. “
    “Look at the captain now
. “
    “Yeah, he
‘
s out there, man, out there in that killer
‘
s zone.”
    “First kill, sir?”
    “Forget it, man, he
‘
s too far out there to hear you. I saw
one other guy with that look, and he sometimes didn
‘
t come
back for hours. He
‘
d stand there, like the captain is now
,
lookin’
down at the victim
‘
s body, studying it, you know
,
like he was sizing it up, analyzing it. It
‘
s almost like he was
lookin’ for ways to kill more swiftly, more efficiently
.”
    “You can’t kill more swiftly or efficiently than he just did
.”
    “No, you
‘
re wrong. Guys like him make killing a game
,
something personal. They
‘
re always lookin’
to find ways to
streamline it, to execute it perfectly. A
‘
masterpiece kill’—that
‘
s what they call it
.”
    “First kill, sir?”
    “I
‘
m tellin’
you to forget it. He
‘
s not hearing you
.”
    “Sir, sir.““Sir, sir.”
    Collins’s eyes snapped open.
    “Sir, would you please fasten your seat belt? We’ll be landing in Evansville in ten minutes.”
    Collins smiled at the flight attendant, yanked his seat to the upright position, and clasped the seat belt buckle together. His head ached; his mouth was as dry as a sand dune. He stared out the window, hypnotized by the setting sun and dreamy from his own fatigue. Closing his eyes, he listened as the plane’s engines groaned their familiar, monotonous tune.
    Seconds later he found himself once again poised on the banks of that muddy river in Nam, kneeling next to a headless corpse, hearing from a distance the whispered voice calling out to him, hearing again—how many times, now?—that singular question, “First kill, sir?” as it pierced the darkness and hung suspended, waiting for an