Death Draws Five

Chapter nine

As it turned out, Barnett was more than happy to see Fortunato and Digger. Fortunato was in fact surprised at how eager he was to see them, as he invited them up to his headquarters after a simple phone call on Digger’s part. Barnett’s penthouse office was located at the top of the Angels’ Bower, at the end of a short corridor guarded by two men in suits and dark glasses. Fortunato didn’t need special power to tell him that they were cops. He’d seen plenty of their type before he’d left the world. Since Barnett was an ex-President, that meant Secret Service. He scanned their minds as Downs gave them their names. They were nats. Competent enough, but nothing more. They knew nothing other than the fact that Barnett was expecting them. Good to know, Fortunato thought, that we aren’t walking into a trap of some kind.

He was still surprised, and a little suspicious, at Barnett’s eagerness to meet with them.

The antechamber to Barnett’s office was like that of many other business offices. The decor lacked the faux Middle East crap that infested the other parts of the Peaceable Kingdom Fortunato had seen. A very decorative blonde sat at the receptionist’s desk. She looked at Fortunato with almost predatory interest and flashed an inviting smile.

“Mr. Fortunato. President Barnett is waiting for you in his office. Please go right in.”

“Fortunato is fine,” he told her. “For future reference.”

“Fortunato.” Her voice caressed his name. Her look promised more.

“Great,” Digger said. “Let’s go.”

The blonde took on an expression of professional regret. “I’m afraid that President Barnett would like to have a few words with Fortunato in private. I’m sure you understand.”

Digger frowned. “Well. Not really. But if I must wait to see the great man, then I must wait.” He perched casually on the corner of the receptionist’s desk. “Have you ever considered a career in modeling?” he asked as Fortunato knocked on the office door.

Fortunato glanced back to see the blonde regard Digger with polite distaste as Barnett called out, “Come in.”

Fortunato entered his office, closing the door behind him. He took a few steps, then stopped, looking all around.

Is everything fake in this place? He was standing in a replica of the White House’s Oval Office, down to the insignia woven into the carpet, the desk, and the draped flags behind it. Sitting at the desk was a handsome, well-preserved man, perhaps in his fifties. Fortunato recognized Barnett, though he had been out of the country during both terms of his presidency. Before his career had turned to politics, Barnett had been a popular conservative evangelical preacher. Fortunato had never been politically active, though he knew that Barnett’s attitude towards wild carders wasn’t exactly benevolent. He could extrapolate further how Barnett felt about mixed-race wild carders who had once pimped women and dealt drugs and were now Buddhist monks.

In the old days Fortunato would have read his mind without a second thought. Now, after the years in the monastery had leeched him of his arrogance and taught him something about humility, he thought about it first, then jumped into his mind anyway. His son’s life was on the line. It wouldn’t have surprised him if Barnett was involved some way in the attempted kidnapping, and this was a sure way to find out. What he read there, though, surprised him.

“Fortunato!” Barnett said, rising from behind his desk and extending his hand. “It’s a pleasure, a real pleasure, to finally meet you.”

Fortunato came forward and guardedly took Barnett’s hand. His handshake was firm and strong. His smile was sincere, as were his words of greeting. Barnett was genuinely glad to see him. “Sit down,” he said.

Fortunato did.

“Drink?” he indicated the cut glass container in easy reach on his desk. “Oh. Can Buddhist monks drink alcohol?”

“Some more than most men,” Fortunato said. “I don’t, however.”

“Fine, fine.” Barnett sat in his own chair and beamed across the desk. “Well. Glad to see that you’ve turned your life around and become a brother of the cloth. So to speak.”

“Forgive me if I seem impatient,” Fortunato said. “But there are some questions I’d like answered.”

“No doubt,” Barnett smiled back. “But couldn’t you read my mind to get your answers?”

I could, Fortunato thought, and I already did, at least partially. “You know that I turned my back on my powers when I left this country.”

“So the story goes,” Barnett said. “But I’ve heard strange things about your recent doings in New York City. People say you came back from the dead and stopped an ace from destroying the Jokertown Clinic. Hell, people are saying you’re still in New York doing all kinds of miracles. Healing the sick. Curing the deaf. Turning baking soda into crack, for all I know.”

“Careful,” Fortunato said. “Your prejudices are showing.”

“Hell, man, the only thing I’m prejudiced against is sin. You know that.”

Fortunato shook his head, as if unconvinced. “Was that your ace who attacked the Jokertown Clinic?”

Barnett laughed out loud. “Is that what you think?”

“I don’t know what to think. All I know is that someone with some very powerful underlings wants me dead, Peregrine dead, and our son dead.”

“That ain’t me,” Barnett said. “That’s the Cardinal’s boys.”

“The Cardinal’s boys?” Fortunato asked.

Barnett nodded affably. “Pay attention, now,” he said. “The boys after you are the Allumbrados, the Enlightened Ones, as they’re so puffed up with pride to call themselves. It’s an ancient and secret office of the Catholic Church. Goes way back. Has ties to another Holy Office that still exists officially, but hasn’t seen much action lately.”

Fortunato frowned. “The Inquisition?”

“That’s the one,” Barnett nodded. “These Papal boys are run by Cardinal Romulus Contarini. Real nasty stuff, actually. They hire all kinds of criminals and scum. Jokers and aces and real people alike—”

“’Real people’?” Barnett was so smooth that Fortunato had to occasionally remind himself not to forget where the evangelist was really coming from.

Barnett shrugged apologetically. “I don’t like to use the term ‘nats.’ It’s demeaning.”

“Uh-huh.”

“All right,” Barnett said. “Just between us, let’s cut the crap. You know that I’ve preached against the wild card, but it’s the virus I’ve preached against, not its victims. The virus has turned its prey into things both lesser and greater than human. They get my pity, my help, and whatever solace I can give them. But the virus—the virus has caused unimaginable misery in this world and it must inevitably be eradicated.”

“You haven’t changed a bit,” Fortunato said.

Barnett shook his head. “I haven’t. But the world has. There’s no doubt in my mind that the end days are upon us. The signs are all around. Israel. Moral decay. The wild card itself. The downfall of communism.” He paused and looked seriously at Fortunato. “The boy, John Fortune.”

Fortunato looked back just as hard at Barnett. “What about him?”

“He is, without a doubt, Jesus Christ reincarnate. The Second Coming is upon us and the battle of the Millennium is about to start.” Barnett held out his hand, forestalling Fortunato’s incredulous reply. “Now hear me out. I’m not the only one who realizes that John Fortune will play a critical role in the upcoming Struggle. Contarini and his Allumbrados believe this as well. Only, wrong-headed as usual, the damned Papists think he’s the Anti-Christ. They believe that he must die, while I know, I know as well as I know the love of my God, that he must be shielded. He must be sheltered and protected until he realizes his fate and brings about the Kingdom of God on Earth.”

Fortunato, who had edged forward on his seat during Barnett’s speech, sank back in the chair, flabbergasted at the ex-President’s words.

“I know,” Barnett said at the stunned look on Fortunato’s face. “How can they be so wrong? How can they be that stupid? Well, God has, if you forgive the metaphor, thrown us a curve ball on this one. I could hardly suspect myself that He would chose a stained vessel such as Peregrine to be the mother of His Son, but God does work in mysterious ways—”

“Wait a minute,” Fortunato interrupted, unable to contain himself any longer. “What about me?”

“Well, what about you?”

“I was there when he was conceived. I can assure you that this was not a case of virgin birth.”

Barnett shook his head. “We all have a place in God’s plan. Some of us just aren’t aware of what that place is.”

“And some of us,” Fortunato said, “are so certain that they think they can put others in their place.”

“Well, just so. Look. I know you want to help the boy. I want to help the boy. I showed you my hole cards. Time for you to show me yours. Go ahead. Read my mind. I’m not faking it.”

Fortunato smiled like a wolf. “All right,” he admitted. “I already did. That’s the only reason why I’m still sitting here, talking to you.”

“Outstanding!” Barnett beamed. “You know I’m telling the truth then. You know that I’m sincere.” He stood suddenly and went over to a large window over-looking his domain. “C’mere. I want you to see something.”

Fortunato levered himself out of the chair and joined Barnett at the window. He towered over the nat. They stood on the opposite side of many fundamental beliefs. But Fortunato had the distinct impression that Barnett was not only fearless in his presence, he was actually glad of Fortunato’s prowess and was confident that he could turn it to his service. If ego was a wild card power, Fortunato thought, he’d have it in spades.

“Look down there,” Barnett said, pointing to the square below them, pulsing with activity.

“At what?” Fortunato inquired.

“At all of it. Because all of it can be yours.”

Fortunato queried the ex-President with raised eyebrows.

“You want money? It’s there for the taking. You want power? Say the word and your word is law. You want entertainment, excitement? It’s available in infinite varieties in infinite supply. It’ll never run out. You want women?” Barnett winked at him. “We’re grown men here. You like that sweet little blonde thing out there at the reception desk? You can have her. You can have damn near everyone in this place and let me tell you, the infinite variety, the gut-grabbing excitement of that will never run out, my friend.”

Fortunato smiled again. “And in return all you want is my soul?”

Barnett put his hand on Fortunato’s shoulder and laughed aloud. “Your soul? You think I want your soul? Your soul can go to Hell for all I care, and it probably will.” Barnett shook his head, chuckling. “No. I want your help. I want you to join with my little group as we stand against those damned Papists.”

Fortunato put his hand on Barnett’s shoulder, and the smile on Barnett’s face slipped a bit as he gripped it hard. The decision came to him, suddenly it seemed, but with all the power of a revelation from God. Once this was over he would return to the monastery and rejoin his brothers on the pathway to enlightenment. But from now on he wouldn’t allow himself to be so single-minded. He would welcome messages, even visits, from the outside world, and perhaps he would someday walk in it again himself. But as nothing more than a father, as part of a family, and as a humble monk.

“That’s fine, then, because I don’t want money. I don’t want power. Not even women. I just want to see the boy, and be sure that he’s safe.”

“Hell, son, that’s easy enough. I could have him here in twenty minutes, if that’s what you want.”

Fortunato frowned. “Why haven’t you brought him in earlier then?”

“Jesus Christ, Fortunato, excuse my French, do you have to read my mind again to figure it out? The battle lines are drawn, son. Armageddon is coming as surely as the dawn, and we’re in the weak position. The enemy is legion. We are few and though our hearts are pure I’ve got more faith in guns and big, strong aces than I do in the virtue of our souls.

“He’s safer where he is now. Sure, the Cardinal has made a couple of lame attempts on him, but my people have done all right so far in thwarting the old Papal ass-kisser. I want John Fortune here only when we’re ready to meet them face to face and kick their sorry butts back to the Vatican.”

“And you think my joining your side will tip the battle?”

Barnett looked at him with a calculating expression. “Once you were the most powerful ace on the face of the Earth. Even that prissy little alien Tachyon thought so. Sure, there were guys around who could twist you into a pretzel. If you’d let them get their hands on you. But there was a time when there was nothing you couldn’t do.” He paused for a moment. “There was a time.”

Fortunato smiled. “I’m back.”

“Are you?” Barnett asked him. “I hope so. I truly hope so.” He went back to his desk, and toggled the intercom on his desk. “Sally Lou, sweetie. Get me Bruckner on the phone. Got a job for him. Thanks, honey.”

“Who’s Bruckner?” Fortunato asked.

Barnett smiled. “He’s the man you want when you have a special delivery that just has to make it through on time.”

Peaceable Kingdom: The Manger

Ray woke up feeling great. He had a touch of indigestion, but that was only to be expected considering the amount he’d wolfed down before staggering back to Jerry’s hotel suite. They had an extra bedroom since they hadn’t called Ackroyd yet, so he hit the sack instead of making his way back to his room in The Angels’ Bower and conked out like a baby who’d just crawled a marathon.

He had no dreams, good or bad, and when he awoke it was with a totally clear head. There was no foggy pot-induced brain-cramping residue. He just felt fit and ready for the day. Ready for just about anything, in fact. He stretched lithely, feeling all his muscles glide smoothly in place, pain free and worry free for the first time in what felt like a long, long time. He went into the living room.

Mushroom Daddy was still snoring on the couch. He watched him for a moment, regarding him like one would a favored dog, thinking that the hippie wasn’t that bad after all. Thinking that somehow this would all work out. Thinking that he’d like to see Angel again, but that would have to wait. He should, he thought, go over to the Bower and see Barnett and find out exactly where she and the kid were.

Behind him, someone cleared their throat. He turned. Jerry and Sascha had come out of their bedroom. Jerry was yawning. Sascha was frowning.

“What,” Sascha asked, “does Barnett have to do with all this?”

Yazoo City, Mississippi

The Angel and John Fortune reached Yazoo City by morning. The land through which they’d driven had changed from mountainous to flat, though the road became older, bumpier, and no easier on the old van. Sometimes the Angel thought it would take a miracle to get them all the way to Branson. Sometimes it seemed that it was only her faith that kept her going on this mad cross country trip, her faith and the eager innocence of the boy Savior sitting next to her, his eagerness for life radiating like heat.

“What’s planted in all those fields?” John Fortune asked as they rolled by mile after mile of flat Mississippi Delta country whose rich brown soil nourished rows of waist high plants.

“Cotton,” the Angel answered briefly. Cotton was still king in Yazoo, as it had been for centuries before her time. As it would be, probably, forever. It was a king she had no love for, nor loyalty to.

They broke through the flat landscape and ascended the rolling hills that hemmed in Yazoo City, seat of Mississippi’s largest county, home to ten thousand citizens. The rest of Yazoo County’s population was scattered in small hamlets and rural enclaves, on farms and plantations, around swamps and along the Yazoo River itself.

“Where’re we going now?” John Fortune inquired patiently. “Are we going to get to Branson soon?”

“Soon,” the Angel assured him. She hadn’t told him about her planned detour. She could barely articulate the reason for it to herself, let alone John Fortune. “I want to stop here first and visit my mother. If that’s okay.”

“Sure.” John Fortune said. He looked out the window, which had been rolled all the way down due to the van’s lack of air-conditioning. “Sure is hot.”

That it is, the Angel thought.

Heat was the most common sensation she recalled when she thought of her childhood. Wet, sticky heat that plastered her blouse to her back as soon as she put it on in the morning. That squeezed beads of sweat through her pores to trickle between her breasts and down her rib cage if she exerted herself the least little bit. Or even if she sat quietly in church while the fans rotated uselessly overhead.

Although miles from the twisting bends of the Mississippi River as it flowed down to the Gulf of Mexico, Yazoo was moist. Alligators still roared in the night in her acres of swamp and the catfish raised in her myriad lakes was an important cash crop. There was more than a touch of the primeval about it. The Angel felt they’d turned back the clock to somewhere to the middle of the last century. Or even the century before that.

“Nice houses,” John Fortune commented as they passed through a high-toned residential area. “Though some could use a new paint job.”

“Old money trying to stretch,” the Angel told him. “It doesn’t go as far as it used to.”

They drove by whitewashed two story homes and entered a part of the town where the houses were smaller and even more in need of paint. The lawns were wilder than the manicured yards of the affluent district, with cars up on blocks and ancient appliances scattered about as if their owners hadn’t enough energy to carry them further. Some—an old wringer washing machine here, and old sink there, even a toilet or two—had been turned into planters brimming with a profusion of flowers of all colors and descriptions, from tiny daisies white, blue, and yellow to columnar hollyhocks thrusting up to Heaven. Other abandoned appliances, especially the ancient refrigerators, were just rusting deathtraps, waiting for some kid to lock themselves in and suffocate.

The Angel took the narrow, twisting lanes automatically, turning without thinking until on the edge of the poorest part of town she drove through an open wrought-iron gate into a tree- shaded park with a scattering of white stones and gray monuments like candy tossed on a gently rolling field of felt. She parked the van and it gratefully shuddered to a well-deserved rest. John Fortune looked at her from the corner of his eye, without turning his head.

“Your mom’s here?” he asked.

“That’s right,” the Angel said. She got out of the van and after a moment he followed her.

It was quiet in the cemetery, and cool. Her mother’s grave was on the side of a hill sheltered by a giant pecan tree that spread its branches above a score of graves like a benediction. The slab was small, and bore only a name and two dates, 1961 - 2001. The Angel stood before it, then sank to her knees in the cool grass, putting her hands on the earth as if to caress that which lay underneath it.

“Hello, Mama,” she said in a low voice. “I’ve come to see you again.” She paused, gathering her thoughts. “I know it’s been a long time since I been able to come by. I know I’ve been out in the world, which you told me was so evil and so dangerous, but there was just nothing here for me. Nothing for me to do, Mama. No way for me to live. You must understand that.”

Her mother had not wanted her to go out into the world. She had told her, over and over again, of its traps and perils. After all, she’d gone out herself and had gotten nothing out of it but a bloated belly and a daughter cursed at a very young age. Probably from the tainted blood of her beastly father, whom she never spoke of. But maybe, just maybe, by the evilness of her own contaminated soul.

“And I’ve been out in the world doing good. Really, I have. I bought someone to see you.” The Angel turned and beckoned to John Fortune, who was standing a respectful half a dozen paces back, watching uncertainly. He came forward as she gestured, and nodded briefly.

“Hello,” he said.

“You’re in Heaven, Mama, so you must know who he is. You must know something of what is planned for us poor sinners on Earth. You—”

“Must know he is the Devil incarnate,” a voice said behind them.

The Angel whirled, instinctively shielding John Fortune with her body. Behind them was an ancient mausoleum. Shimmering upon its cracked stone wall was a circle of darkness, a tear through the fabric of space. Two men and a thing had come through the tear. She recognized the Cardinal. The man with him was restraining something with a collar and leash that might have been human, but walked like a dog on four limbs. That had an inhuman face with deep set eyes and slavering jaws, and a long snout whose damp nostrils quivered as it sucked in great lung-fulls of air and tried to lunge at the Angel and her charge. A third came though the doorway and laughed. He was big and handsome as an angel with golden hair and large blue eyes and a strong, dimpled jaw. The Angel felt her stomach clench. She couldn’t tell if it was with fear, revulsion, or desire.

“I told you Blood would find her eventually,” the Witness said.

Contarini nodded. “Start with the girl. The boy is for later.”

He let go of Blood’s leash and the joker/ace leapt forward on all fours like a hound, drool frothing on his gaping jaws. The Angel tossed a stern, “Stay here,” to John Fortune, and stepped to meet him.

Blood sprung into the air screaming. She met him with a grim scowl, catching him with one hand on his throat and one on his crotch, pivoted, and slammed him to the ground with most of her strength. He hit like a bag of cement tossed from the roof of a five-story building, grunted, and got back to his feet. But he wavered as he came towards her, breathing heavily. The Angel could see that his heart was not in this.

She smiled. Even though he was bigger than her, he was no match for her righteous strength. The only thing that had saved him from the full force of the body slam was the thick sward and soft dirt he’d landed on. Nothing, she thought, could save him from her fists.

He leaped at her again, his powerful haunches launching him like a tiger. This time she met him with a hammering upper cut that spun him end over, sending him flying back in the direction he’d come. Contarini had to dodge his flailing limbs as he flew by.

The Cardinal ground his teeth in rage. “Useless creature,” he spat at the cowering joker who tried, but couldn’t get up. He turned to the Witness. “Take care of her! Teach her a lesson.”

The smiling ace stretched like a cat. His knuckles made crackling sounds as he clenched his hands into fists. He approached slowly, smiling confidently. Smugly, really. He had a reason to be smug, the Angel thought. He was still the most handsome man she had ever seen.

“Remember the lesson I taught you before,” he said as he approached. “Now it goes further.”

The sudden sound of the van’s horn startled them both. The Angel whirled to see John Fortune behind the wheel, a determined expression on his face, leaning on the horn and bouncing up and down on the seat as the van rolled over the bumpy sward, bearing down on them.

The Angel leaped away just as Fortune slammed on the brakes and spun the wheel. The van sideswiped the Witness. He didn’t even try to get out of the way. There was the thud of metal slamming into flesh and the van flung the Witness twenty feet in the air where he hit the spreading branches of the pecan tree that was nodding over the nearby graves. Branches cracked and broke and fell along with the Witness.

John Fortune wrestled the van to a stop and shouted out the driver’s side window, “Get in! Get in!”

The Angel responded to the panic in his voice. Her first thought was to check to see if the Witness was still alive, and if he was, to kick his ass as hard as she could. But she realized John Fortune was right. They had to get out of there. Fast.

The sliding door on the driver’s side was crumpled inward, but was still holding on the frame. That was good. The van engine’s was idling at such a high rate that it was threatening to sputter out at any second. That would be bad. She reached the passenger’s side door and pulled it open. John Fortune floored the gas pedal before her butt hit the seat. The van slewed around crazily for a moment, then the tires gripped the turf and they headed for the unpaved road running though the cemetery.

As the Angel glanced back she saw Cardinal Contarini crouched behind one of the monuments, shaking his first at them and screeching something in Italian. The joker looked up groggily, a blank expression on his inhuman face. The Witness was still laying under the broken tree limbs on her mother’s grave.

That was close, she thought, leaning back in the seat. She looked at the boy who, beyond denial, was her savior. He was concentrating on guiding the van over the winding cemetery lane, but he glanced back at her.

“See,” he said. “I told you I could drive.”

She smiled at him. His smile glowed back at her like the shining sun. They left the cemetery, hitting the city streets. The van rattled along making alarming sounds as John Fortune cruised at a sedate thirty miles an hour. The Angel realized that there was no way it was going to get them to Branson. It would be lucky if it got them beyond the city limits. She guessed that this situation could be classified as an emergency, and she reached for her cell phone. She hit The Hand’s number on the speed dial.

“President Barnett’s of—”

“Sally Lou!” the Angel said, trying hard to control her voice so that John Fortune wouldn’t get more worried than he already was. “Let me speak with President Barnett—fast!”

“He’s in conference now,” she said in the snootily superior voice that she liked to use on the Angel.

“I don’t care if God the Father Himself is in there planning Armageddon with him,” the Angel said in a tone that made John Fortune stare at her in surprise. “Connect me with him. Now.”

Pleased when Sally Lou connected them without another word, she barely gave The Hand the chance to say Hello before she blurted out their situation. He took it like he took everything else. With calmness and poise.

“Can you hold out for twenty minutes, honey?” he asked sedately.

“Twenty minutes? I don’t—”

“You’re going to have to,” he said just as soothingly. “Twenty minutes. That’s all. I promise you.”

The Angel took a deep breath. She had The Hand’s assurance. Though he was just a man like everyone else and a sinner as well, he had never let her down. In any important sense, anyway. “All right,” she said. “Twenty minutes.”

“Twenty minutes,” Barnett confirmed. “Where are you, exactly?”

She told him.

“Fine. Get to the highway. Wait by the Yazoo City on-ramp. Don’t move from that spot. Help is on the way. Gotta go make it happen.”

He hung up. The Angel listened to the dial tone than looked at John Fortune, who was gazing at her with a trusting expression.

“Help is on the way,” she told him. Though how in the world it would arrive in such a short time was utterly beyond her.

Peaceable Kingdom: The Angels’ Bower

Ray tried to explain his position as they took the escalator down to the elevator bank in the lobby, but Jerry wasn’t in a forgiving mood. Mushroom Daddy listened with amiable interest while Sascha just listened, as usual.

“It’s not like I lied to you,” Ray said. “Or even wanted to lie. You and Ackroyd made some unjustified assumptions the first time you saw me, and went right on assuming from then to now.”

“And you let us,” Jerry pointed out for the fifth or sixth time. “You let us think you and Angel were working for the government.”

Ray shrugged. “There’s no skin off your nose, is there?”

“No skin off my nose?” Jerry said, just this side of outraged. “It’s a lot different thinking that we were going into this with government backing—or at least governmental knowledge and consent—and then discovering that the ‘government’ in this case was Leo Barnett.”

“Hey,” Ray said, “he was the President once, wasn’t he?”

“Was,” Jerry said. “That’s the operative word.”

Ray shrugged. “Look, you’re an ace. If you call changing your face an ace—”

“I do more than change my face,” Jerry said hotly.

“Yeah, okay, whatever. I’m not saying you’re a deuce, exactly. But you know how it is. The life of an ace is complicated. You can’t tell me you’ve never had a secret or two. Especially if your power is changing identities. Hell, your name’s probably not even Creighton.”

That stopped Jerry cold. Ray was right. Righter than he knew. Jerry’s whole existence was based on shifting identities. On lies he constantly told others. And himself. He was never just plain old Jerry Strauss. Most of the time he was someone else. The Projectionist. The Great Ape. Lon Creighton. Jerry Creighton. Alan Ladd. Butcher Dagon. Everybody but Jerry Strauss.

If Ray realized that he scored, he kept quiet about it. They eventually made it to the elevator bank, and Ray punched the button for the penthouse. The boys were on guard in the corridor. They must have received word of some kind of possible attack, because they had their handguns out and leveled as the elevator doors swished open.

“Hey, man,” Daddy said. “That’s so not cool!”

“Relax,” Ray said to both Daddy and the Secret Service men. “It’s me. You’re safe.”

One put up his weapon with an audible sigh, the other was more hard ass about it. “Well, look what the cat dragged in,” he said, pointing the barrel of his gun to the floor, but not holstering it. “Billy Ray. A blind guy. A hippie—”

“Don’t worry,” Ray said. “I’ll tell them not to kick your ass.”

“We’ve got to see Barnett,” Jerry said. “Is he in?”

“He’s already got company,” the armed agent said doubtfully, “but...”

“I’ll vouch for these guys,” Ray said.

“Even the hippie?”

“He’s undercover CIA,” Ray said quietly as he went on by. The others followed him.

Sally Lou was on the phone when they entered the waiting room. She jumped nervously as Ray and the others tramped in.

“Guilty conscious?” Ray asked.

“Why, why ever would I have a guilty conscious?” she asked.

“Just a joke,” he said. “Buzz the big guy. Tell him we’re coming in.”

“He’s with someone—”

“So am I,” Ray said.

Ray led the way. In the office Barnett was behind his desk, beaming. Sitting before the desk frowning was someone Ray hadn’t seen in years. “Fortunato,” he said. He stopped. The others piled up behind him.

“Come in,” Barnett said affably. “You’ve bought some friends, I see. Good, good. We’re just sitting around here chatting, trying to decide who’s gonna go to Yazoo and pick up John Fortune in”—Barnett checked his watch—“just about fifteen minutes from now.” Barnett looked at Fortunato. “Billy Ray would be a good choice, don’t you think?”

Fortunato didn’t look totally convinced, but he nodded nonetheless.

Peaceable Kingdom: The Angels’ Bower, coffee shop

John Nighthawk and his team sat in the hotel coffee shop, enjoying a late breakfast.

Usher had a plate piled high with scrambled eggs, bacon and ham, hash browns, biscuits and gravy, with toast, and a side of pancakes. He was still of an age when he could eat and eat and not put on an ounce. Magda had a cup of grapefruit juice and toast. Dry. She didn’t particularly worry about her weight, but was of an age when she took nothing joyful out of life, and always would be. Nighthawk had his coffee and donuts. He was of an age beyond caring about his weight. It helped that he had an ace’s metabolism.

He scanned the sports page, noting last night’s box scores. He was pleased to see that the Dodgers were doing better. Hanging at about five hundred, Brooklyn still had room to improve, though as a life-long Dodger fan he had little room to complain about the last thirty-five years or so. Still, with Gooden joining Strawberry in retirement two years ago, the last tie to Reiser’s glory years had been cut and they were casting about for a new leader and new team identity. This Reyes kid looked good. His headlong style of play reminded Nighthawk a little of Honus Wagner.

His cell rang. He flipped it open, listened, and said a few quiet words. He hung up, and looked at his team. “Enjoy your breakfast,” he said. “It starts soon.”

Usher nodded and shoveled half a pancake, loaded with butter and syrup, into his mouth. Magda grinned and started to pray aloud. Nighthawk put the paper down and took a drink of coffee. It was cold. Suddenly, so was he.

Yazoo, Mississippi: the Highway Interchange

The van’s engine chugged like an asthmatic with a smoker’s cough and the door rattled against the frame like a skeleton with rheumatism.

“We’d better stop and switch places,” the Angel.

“Ah,” John Fortune said, “I’m doing okay.”

“Yeah,” the Angel said, “but we’re headed for the highway. I’d better take over. Park it and slide over. Better not turn the ignition off. I don’t know if we could get it started again.”

John Fortune pulled over to the side of the street. He put it in park, and slid over on the seat. The Angel lifted herself up to scoot over him, but suddenly she felt his arms around her, pulling her down to his lap. He kissed her, half on the lips and half on the cheek. His skin was warm, as if he were burning with fever, but dry. He wasn’t sweating.

“John—” she said, pulling away.

“I know, I know. I just couldn’t help myself.”

“Help yourself to a seat over there,” she said, indicating a spot next to the passenger side door. “There’s a time and a place for everything, and this is neither.”

“Will it be time when we get to Branson?” he asked hopefully.

The Angel bit her lip as she pulled away from the curb. He was her Savior, but he was just a boy. A good-looking boy, but a boy. She felt nothing for him but awe coupled with an instinct to guard and protect that was surely maternal in nature. But she couldn’t bring herself to disappoint him completely.

“We’ll see. Things will be hectic when we get there. You’ll be an important figure, with a lot to do.”

“I’ll always have time for you, Angel,” John Fortune said, and she smiled a smile of genuine affection.

They made it back to the highway in minutes. She pulled off to the side of the entrance ramp, turned off the van’s engine, and checked her watch.

“What’s going to happen now?” John Fortune asked.

The Angel shook her head. She was as mystified as he was. But whatever was going to happen, she knew that it had better happen soon. They waited five or six minutes, and then a dark shadow suddenly appeared on the side of the overpass buttress, though there was nothing to cast it.

“Angel—”

She nodded. “I see it.”

The gate had opened again. Blood and his handler came through the hole in the concrete buttress first. The joker ace lifted his head up to the sky, his snout sniffing. Cardinal Contarini followed, as did the Witness. The Angel’s heart sunk further when a squad of well-armed minions a dozen strong followed. They fanned out and slowly approached the van where it sat at on the highway verge.

Contarini smiled, but there was nothing of good will in it. “I told you that we’d be better prepared this time.”

The Angel clenched her teeth and tried the engine. “Don’t flood, don’t flood, please don’t flood,” she pleaded as she pumped the gas pedal.

“Take your foot off the gas and your hands off the wheel,” Contarini ordered, “or we’ll shoot you down right now.” He gestured and his Allumbrados took braced firing positions.

The van’s engine suddenly caught and purred quietly like a cat. The Angel took her hands off the wheel. She could think of only one plan. It wasn’t much of one, but it was the only hope they had.

“John,” she said quietly out of the corner of her mouth, her lips unmoving. “I’m going to floor it on the count of three. I want you to open your door and fall to the ground. Roll. Roll hard and far away.”

“What are you going to do?” the boy asked. For the first time ever she heard fear in his voice.

“What I have to,” the Angel said quietly.

“You’d better get out of that ridiculous vehicle before I count five,” Contarini shouted.

“Angel—”

“Please.” She looked at her Lord. She loved him like she never loved anyone else, with pure, undying affection, and the taste of her failure was bitter in her mouth. “Please, John—”

“One,” Contarini said.

“One,” the Angel whispered.

“Two,” Contarini shouted.

“Two,” the Angel whispered.

John Fortune looked at her, his face fixed with fear, and suddenly his eyes went wide and his arm flew up, pointing back down to the highway.

“Look!” he shouted.

When The Hand had said it would take twenty minutes for help to arrive, it was one of the few times in Angel’s experience that he was wrong. It took eighteen.

The southbound lanes of the highway were empty but for a roaring wind and flashing lights that had no apparent origin. Suddenly, as if it had broken through a landscape-painted canvas, an eighteen-wheeler pulling a silver trailer just appeared as if it had been placed there by the hand of God.

Perhaps it had, the Angel thought.

It was highballing maybe a hundred miles an hour and it hardly slowed down as it took the Yazoo City exit. It was upon them like an angry behemoth before they even realized it, flashing past the van in a New York minute. She saw a heavy-set man with a cigar clenched between his teeth and a cap on his head behind the wheel, which was on the wrong side of the cab, and she saw Billy Ray grinning like an idiot next to him and then they went by.

Contarini screamed like a woman. Blood pulled away from his handler and was running like a dog from the highway. The Witness stood mute and astonished as it barreled down upon them and Contarini shouted, “Shoot you fools, shoot!” and automatic gunfire split the morning like continuous rolls of thunder, only to whine and ping against the glass and grill of the cab’s front.

The Allumbrados scattered at the last moment as the driver downshifted and fought the wheel with consummate skill, throwing the truck into a skid that swung the trailer among the gunmen, tossing bodies like tenpins. Only a few escaped. Before the truck came to a screeching halt in a swirling cloud of dust the passenger side door opened and Billy Ray was among them.

The Angel blinked. He moved like a dancer, but his graceful steps brought pain and destruction to his partners in the bloody ballet. He struck with hands and feet, elbows, knees, and head. A single blow to each opponent. That was all it took. Some tried to shoot, but they missed him. Some tried to run, but they weren’t fast enough. Contarini was among the first to go down. The Witness the last. He towered over Ray like a giant. He swung his powerful right arm at Ray, but it moved as if in slow motion. Ray dropped to the ground. He put all his weight on one leg, doubled under him, and lashed out with the other. His foot caught the Witness on the right knee cap and the Witness screamed like a horse with a broken leg, and went down rolling in the dust clutching his leg and shrieking.

“It’s only a dislocated patella, pussy,” the Angel heard Ray sneer.

“Wow...” John Fortune said.

The Angel woke from her trance. “Come on!”

She threw open the door and grabbed John Fortune’s arm and hauled him after her, half dragging him as she ran towards the waiting truck, passing bodies, groaning and silent, that littered the ground. The Witness watched her go with his face clenched in pain. He mouthed gibberish at her and tried to crawl toward her and John, but suddenly Ray was between them.

“Back off, asshole,” he said, and the Witness stopped, groveling in the dust.

Ray looked up at her and she saw his face gleaming like a saint’s in an ancient icon.

“Ray—” she said, and before she knew what she was doing, she’d grabbed his shoulders and pulled him to her and covered his mouth with hers. He returned her kiss with equal fervor until the driver shouted out from the cab, “Time enough for that later. We’d best be getting on,” and he gunned his engine for emphasis. He had an English accent.

Ray broke the kiss and looked at her with startled eyes. She looked away, blushing at her terrible boldness. She didn’t know what had gotten into her, but she did know that she’d savor the memory of that kiss for a long time.

“Come on, come on, I ain’t got all night. Manchester United’s on the telly in”—the driver checked the wristwatch on his beefy, hairy forearm—“half an hour and I got a ways to travel to get home.”

The Angel jumped into the cab after John Fortune, and the wheels started rolling as Ray leaped up and slammed the door shut.

“Scoot over,” the trucker said. “There’s room for all.” He concentrated on negotiating the downhill ramp back to the highway and had his rig going eighty by the time they hit the main road again.

He glanced over at the Angel and John Fortune, grinning around his foul-smelling cigar. “I’m John Bruckner,” he said by way of introduction, “Order of the Silver Helix and freelance lorry driver. The call me the Highwayman. I bet you thought we were in for it when those yobbos started shooting?” He patted the dashboard lovingly. “Nah. Not to worry. This is my special rig. All tricked out for those ‘difficult’ deliveries. Hang on, now,” he warned.

The Angel was too dazed to comment as the speedometer crept up to one twenty and then passed it effortlessly.

“Here comes the short cut,” Bruckner called out, and everything shimmered and they were suddenly someplace else

The landscape through which they passed was bizarre. The color of the ground, the quality of the light, the very angles of the cliff-faces and rock formations they flew by were utterly alien. When she saw some of the rocks move as if they were living things, she had to look away. The Angel glanced up at the sky. The sun was green.

“It’s kind of freaky,” Billy Ray said in a low voice, “but don’t worry. Bruckner will get us through.” His hand rested lightly on her left thigh. She put her own down on his, not to remove it, but to enjoy its warmth. Ray smiled crookedly. There was blood on his face, possibly his. She touched his cheek, wiping it away. She laughed.

“What?” Ray asked, frowning.

The Angel shook her head. “I—” It was hard to explain. She gestured all around, at the bizarre landscape, at her companions. “I haven’t felt so good in a long time,” she finally said. “Have I gone crazy?”

Billy Ray grinned. “You think I’m qualified to pass judgement on someone else’s sanity? Me?”

“We’ll see,” she promised.