Name of the Devil by Andrew Mayne Page B

Hawkton and Tixato are linked by anger.
    Patience drops me off at my car by the orphanage. Sister Marta waves to us as she pushes the boy who hugged me on the swing. I wave back and head to my hotel to call Ailes. Hopefully I get a cell phone signal. I’ve been out of range almost since I got here.

13
    B ACK IN THE hotel, I click on my television and don’t like what I see. The Spanish version of CNN is showing the aftermath of the church explosion juxtaposed with images of the sheriff. You don’t need to know Spanish to understand the words “ caníbal ” and “ zombi .”
    It’s futile to point out that technically, the sheriff isn’t a cannibal. He just used his teeth in the attack. Of course, the fact that if he was in the explosion he would be dead by now doesn’t deter the zombie theories. Not that anybody takes them seriously. Scratch that, nobody serious takes them seriously. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people out there that do.
    The television cuts back and forth to clips of helicopters buzzing over the hills of West Virginia, Virginia, Ohio, Maryland and Pennsylvania. Tracking teams with dogs are scouring the ground. Even heat-sensing drones and satellites have been called into the search.
    â€œThis is getting out of hand,” I tell Ailes on my check-in call.
    â€œWait until the details of the satanic symbols gets out. We’re going to move on from half-joking zombie panic to something worse.”
    We saw this happen before, with the case of the Warlock. A case too sensational to be true is irresistible to the media. “And I thought things here were crazy,” I say, dreading the escalation of things.
    â€œAnything come of Dr. Moya?”
    â€œHe says the toxin is from a cave fish. They’re nocturnal and only come out in the moonlight. We’re getting a sample tonight.”
    â€œOf course,” he replies dryly. “What about the mud?”
    â€œOne of his students showed me the area it came from. It’s a shantytown barrio. They collected samples after the last mudslide buried half the village. They’re hoping to find some kind of shrub or tree with deep roots to plant there to keep it from happening again.”
    â€œAnything to suggest how that mud got tracked all the way to West Virginia?”
    â€œTixato has a strong gang presence. Especially in that barrio. It’s X-20 territory. We know they’re involved in cross-border narcotics smuggling. If I was going to hire a killer, that’d be where I’d look.”
    â€œThe Hawkton incident seems a little more sophisticated than a gang-style slaying.”
    â€œTrue. But X-20 has a number of former Mexican Special Forces guys. Our sixth man may have grown up in Tixato, gone off to serve, then come back. I’m sure X-20 pays better. Some of those Mexican troops were involved in Indian scuffles. There are rumors of death squads doing heinous stuff. Nothing that’d be out of place in Hawkton.”
    â€œTrue, but how is our lead suspect, the sheriff, connected to them?”
    â€œDirectly? I don’t know. But Moya told me the chemical we found could cause very violent auditory and visual hallucinations. Somehow there’s a connection. That might explain Jessup’s strange behavior.”
    â€œThe X-20 lead is interesting. It gives us another angle besides looking at locals. Maybe the sheriff did something to piss them off?”
    â€œLike ticketing an X-20 lieutenant?”
    There’s a pause. “Sorry, dealing with another crisis. Maybe.”
    â€œHere’s the thing I’ve been trying to wrap my head around. This . . . whatever isn’t a gang-style killing intended to warn off others. It was about the people who died, not the ones they left behind. They were the target.”
    â€œInteresting perspective. Behavioral analysis has drawn a similar conclusion. If it’s not just the sheriff, we might be