Cicero's Dead (25 page)

“No, Mother!”

Arnold, his face contorted with desperate rage, charged,
slamming her to the ground. Instantly he was on top of her, slapping her face
and head with both hands. To my amazement, a lean elderly figure emerged from
the back door, Mr. Clipper. He was no longer in the wheelchair. Instead, he was
walking with reasonable balance, aiming a gun more or less at Arnold.

“Stop! Now!”

Arnold just kept hitting his mother; the steady
slap slap slap cutting through the air. Mr. Clipper’s bullet slammed into the
dirt near Arnold, who looked up at his father, bewildered. He got to his feet,
reached into the pocket of his overalls and extracted his pistol.

Mr. Clipper aimed at me, but I fired first,
hitting him in the face. His head jerked back as blood and gore exploded out
the back of his head. His body hesitated and collapsed to the ground.

“Father!” Arnold screamed.

Tears flooded down his face and slowly,
deliberately, he aimed his gun at me. Although I wanted nothing better than to
snap the son-of-a-bitch, I shot him in the shoulder. He dropped the gun, but
didn’t call out or say a word. I didn’t see Mrs. Clipper get to her knees,
picking up her pistol, but I heard the CRACK as she fired. Only it wasn’t hers.
It was Tony’s and his bullet hit her center mass. She must’ve been made out of
rock because like her son, she didn’t make a sound, or drop the gun, or fall to
the ground. Instead, she aimed at Tony as he came across the lawn in the law
enforcement attack position.

“Police! Drop the gun!”

Mrs. Clipper smiled a mouthful of blood and took
careful aim. Tony fired three more rounds. The police issue bullets punched
though her, spraying blood out of her back. She was dead before she hit the
ground.

Arnold screamed his rage and charged me. I could
have shot him but I wanted something much more close and personal. I tossed my
gun away, stepped forward and dropped down, sweeping his feet out from under
him. He crashed to the grass and I was all over him, punching as fast and as
hard as I could. I beat him for all of the pain, blood, death and misery he had
caused. Maybe he felt he deserved it; he stopped resisting and smiled up at me
as I beat him bloody.

“That’s enough, Nick! Stop!” yelled Tony, pulling
me off.

I sat on the grass, blood and teeth around me, one
of which, an eyetooth, was stuck in my hand. I pulled it out and threw it at
Arnold’s face.

Tony snapped the cuffs on him, although it was
pointless as he was all but comatose. I went over to Jade, who was unconscious,
but still alive.

“I’ll call it in,” said Tony, getting on his cell.

I held her and looked over at Richie, but he was
stone dead. During the melee, I had forgotten about the dog. Someone’s stray
bullet had apparently found it and it too now lay on the grass. I tried to
breathe slowly, but my cracked ribs hurt like hell and I could barely take in
air. In a stand of tall trees in a neighbor’s garden, a lone, enormous crow
settled onto a branch, warily eyeing the carnage. It jerked its head sideways,
looked directly at me and shook its head in mock disapproval. “Shit,” I
thought. “Shit, shit, shit.” Then I shut my eyes, wishing I’d never have to
open them.

Jade was kind enough to send me a bonus check for
another hundred grand. I split it 50-50 with Bobby and put my half into our
daughter’s college fund. The dead bikers had been wanted felons and since I
have a bounty hunter’s license, Tony, with the able help of Bill Boxer, was
able to eventually negotiate a deal for me with the District Attorney’s office.
Some kind of bogus misdemeanor conviction. No time and a year of probation, and
just to rub it in, 50 hours of community service picking up the trash alongside
the freeway with the orange jacket crew. The cops still hated my guts and every
now and then would haul me in on some phony charge, just because they could. I
understood and kept my big mouth shut and later rather than sooner, they ended
up with a sort of grudging respect for me.

Brad moved up to San Francisco and Bobby went back
to his goats. I go over there same as always, and every time I see his goats, I
can’t help thinking about the hog farm. Cassady used some of the hundred grand
from Halladay to buy new French doors, which made her very happy for a while.
Bur neither she nor I could forget and we finally sold our house and moved
across the hill to Avocado Heights.

They say that time heals all wounds and that sleep
knits up the raveled sleeve of care and I hope they’re right. But sometimes I
can’t feel anything at all. And other times I feel things no man should ever
feel. But most of the time I feel all right, as if some things just are and
other things have to be. Once in a while, Cassady insists we look in on Jade.
She’s about as bad off as you might expect. Maybe worse.

Richie and Cicero are buried side-by-side in
Forest Lawn. One day driving by on 134, I stopped in and paid my respects. I
don’t really care about Cicero but for some reason I wish I’d gotten to know
Richie a little better. Maybe because deep down I think he could have been a
good man.

In my darkest moments, I curse the day I met James
Halladay. He was not a good man. Arnold Clipper was even worse.

When I think about it, I know that I really tried to
do the right thing. We all did -- Bobby, me, good old Brad, who from what I
hear is still on the wagon, and of course the actor, Ron Cera. I keep telling
myself that I owe his mother a visit. I even went so far as to locate her on
Merlin one night when I couldn’t sleep. But I haven’t been out to see her yet.
Maybe it’s because every time I think I’m ready to go my mind drifts back to
the sight of Ron’s severed head, lying there on Towne Street, staring out
blindly at nothing.