Faustus Resurrectus (26 page)

He dialed the restaurant. When the hostess answered, he cut off her greeting. “Jen, it’s Donovan. Let me talk to Corey, quick.”

He came on a second later. “
Donovan? What’s going on? Where are you? You were supposed to work tonight.
”

“I can’t go into details right now. Is that blonde girl still there? The one who said Joann sent her?”

“
Uhhh, let me see.
” Donovan heard him ask in a voice muffled by a hand over the receiver. “
Yeah, she’s at the bar, trying to talk to people. She’s kind of weird.
”

“Keep her there! I’ll be right up!”

Corey was taken aback by his urgency. “
Okay, sure. Don’t sweat it.
”

Donovan hung up.
What now?
Try Frank.

As before, it rang twice and went to voicemail. This time, though, it said:

“This is Fullam. I don’t care what you do.”

The “s” in “this” had an almost imperceptible slur. Donovan’s lips pursed but he said nothing, left no message. As he debated his next move the shelter door opened, allowing out a waft of warmth and light buoyed by laughter. Father Carroll emerged with a nun, presumably the one who ran the shelter. She was younger than Donovan would have expected, her pale Irish complexion looking even fairer framed by her dark habit.

“Thank you, Sister,” Father Carroll said as he approached. “And this is my friend Donovan. Donovan, this is Sister Mary Faith.”

“Nice to meet you.” He grabbed the priest’s arm. “We have to talk.”

The nun stopped him. “Mister Graham, I’m so sorry for your trouble. It’s a difficult situation, but I hope you understand, not everyone in need is a criminal.” She took his hand in both of hers, her faint Old Country brogue soothing. “If there’s anything I can do—”

“Thank you, sister. I appreciate your sympathy.”

She shrugged and indicated back towards the doorway. “I’m afraid there isn’t much here tonight. None of the more…challenging guests we get have been around. As far as where they might be, no one can agree on what they may have heard. The only common thread is, a lot of people seem to have gone to Central Park today.”

“Thank you for your help.”

Sensing his urgency, she let him go. As she turned away, Father Carroll nodded at the cell phone in his hand. “Trying to reach Francis again?”

“Yeah. Still no go.
But
—I got a call from Corey at Polaris. Some blonde girl came in looking for me, said Joann sent her. I called back, she’s still there. I’m going up to see what’s happening. You’ve got to find Frank.”

“You don’t think Chief Yarborough will listen if you go to him with this?”

“I wouldn’t know where to find him, and if I did I have no idea how to approach him. Frank is our best chance to get the cops involved.”

“Where do you suggest I look?”

“He changed his voicemail message sometime today, and he sounded a little drunk. Try Ninth Avenue. The bars along there are close to Midtown North. I’ll meet you at my place as soon as I can.”

Father Carroll clasped his hand. “Good luck. Godspeed.”

***

Standing in the kitchen annex to the dining hall, Valdes pulled back the curtain separating him from the mob. He nodded at what he saw—the word he’d had his people spread had been best received by feral predators from the fringes of society. He watched them shamble in, sullen eyes hot with anger or glazed by instability. A lust for violence hung in the air, stirred and strengthened by the alcohol and drugs he’d had distributed along with the food.

Perfect.

“Thy charges grow spirited and restless,” Faustus warned from behind him. “Wilst thy tongue maintain control o’er them?”

“I won’t have to, not for long. People like this, you give them an enemy and the rest comes naturally.”

“Once didst thou promote charity
over
cynicism,
nein
?” Faustus regarded him with thinly disguised disdain. “And now thou art absent all feeling for those souls led astray.”

“You can’t be ‘led astray’ to your destiny.”

“The ‘destiny’ of others, it seems, serveth
thine
interests well. Thou claimeth these people as brethren, yet it is thy machinations which casteth them into damnation. Thy machinations,” his voice softened, “and the hand of Faustus.”

“You think I’m casting them into damnation? Have you taken a look at them? These people are
already
damned. They can’t take care of themselves. They’re helpless in the face of modern society. They
need
me.”

“For what, pray? Struggle, challenge; these are hallmarks of life. The responsibility God hath given each for his own life requireth we judge and make correct choices. In this way do we learn and fulfill our purpose. To act differently resulteth in fallen souls, as,” he grimaced, “Faustus doth demonstrate. In God’s Universe it can be no other way.”

“God’s Universe? I ask again, have you taken a look at them? Even if it is the perspective of some that this is ‘God’s Universe,’ I think our friends,” he gestured, “might have a different point of view.” Valdes remained unperturbed. “I get what you’re trying to do. I thought we’d settled this: I’ve made my decision. If anything, these people are going to ride
my
coattails. They’ll benefit from
my
foresight and planning.”

Faustus said nothing.

“This is all a moot point, anyway, isn’t it? After I’m through, none of this will matter. It’s a do-over for everyone.”

“Suffering of this sort canst never be undone, Valdes. Damnation is subject not to thy whims of what is ‘fair.’”

“I suppose we’ll see soon enough, won’t we?” Valdes turned his attention back to the mob. “But there is something that may be trouble. Our vessel’s fiancé, this Donovan Graham, will probably try to save her. Is there any way to tell if he—or anyone else who might try to stop me—might have infiltrated my little party?”

Faustus stared at him for a long moment, but finally stepped towards the curtain to look.

***

Donovan raced up the FDR Drive, not caring that he lost the blue SUV on the way. He pulled the Vulcan up on the sidewalk in front of Polaris and slammed the kickstand down, then pulled off his helmet as he ran inside.

Henri was waiting. “Donovan, you are not to be here now!” He moved to stand in Donovan’s way. “You must talk to Meghan before you—”

Donovan swept him aside with one arm as he marched to the host stand. Corey waited there with an amused expression. “Nice move.”

“Where is she?”

“Over there. I asked Guzman to buy her a drink.” He read Donovan’s face and grew serious. “Is everything all right?”

Donovan said nothing, already moving towards the end of the bar where a chubby blonde girl sat. She seemed very uncomfortable, constantly touching a patch of bad skin on her cheek she’d tried to cover with makeup. He pushed through the group standing next to her. “Joann sent you?”

She glanced over, startled. “Uh…what?”

“I’m Donovan Graham. I’m Joann’s fiancé. Where is she?”

“I’m Josie. Josie Ludescowicz. They call me Lude.” His directness caused her to shrink in on herself. “Uh, I don’t know. I mean, I know where she was, but…can I talk to you? Miz Clery said I could talk to you about stuff.”

It was with great effort that Donovan calmed himself. He became aware of people watching him, so he took a deep breath and nodded. “All right. Let’s take a ride.”

***

Back at his apartment, he made a show of locking the door behind them. “Safe now. Is Joann all right? Where is she?”

Lude gazed around the living room, guilty and sad, and for an instant Donovan was reminded of a photo of Coletun’s mother Lola. “They’re keeping her in one of the rooms downstairs. Not on the dining hall floor. Below that. I think it used to be an operating room, but there’s nothing in there anymore, just—”

“Operating room? Is she in a hospital?”

“Oh! Uh…I don’t know. I guess it could have been. I think Mister Valdes told me and Dez when we first started living there, but I don’t remember things so good sometimes. It’s why I failed out of school.” She gave a halfhearted shrug. “I guess it’s how I ended up with Dez and them, and Mister Valdes.”

“Where was it? That you ended up?”

“I don’t know. Somewhere near the park.” She squinted at him, twisting her fingers together. Her eyes were wet. “I don’t want to go back. That’s why I left. Miz Clery said I could talk to you about it.”

Donovan held a poker face, desperately needing the information but not wanting to scare her. “Of course you can. But don’t you think it’d be better to go get Joann first? If anything happens to her—”

“Oh, something’s gonna happen to her tonight. Mister Valdes acted like she was the most important part of everything.”

He was barely able to restrain himself from grabbing the girl and shaking the truth out of her. “Where is she?”

“It’s near Central Park, way up there. I used to have to take the subway to get anywhere. Big C broke a hole in the wall in the basement so we could go into the tunnels. It was kind of fun, like exploring caves back home…” She sighed, swiping at the tears that welled in her eyes.

Whatever her role in Joann’s fate, she was a pitiable figure. Donovan steadied his temper and put an arm around her shoulder. She leaned into him, and he felt wetness through his t-shirt to his chest. “I’ll get you someplace safe until this is over. I promise.” She sniffed. “You said Valdes has her in a hospital near Central Park?”

“A really old one. No one uses it anymore. The only doctor there is Doctor Fowlstus.”

Faustus.
After everything, Donovan still had to take a moment to accept what he was hearing. He shook his head. “Is it an old building
in
the park?”

“It’s across the street.” She sniffled again. He handed her a box of tissues. “A bunch of buildings together.”

“East Side or West Side?”

“Uh…Central Park West.”

He went to his office and retrieved Andrew Dolkart’s
Guide to New York City Landmarks
. “Do you have any idea what street?”

“Uh…a hundred and…six. One Hundred Sixth Street!”

Thumbing the pages, he came to the section
59
^th
Street to 110
^th
Street, West Side
. One entry leapt out at him.

New York Cancer Hospital, 32 West 106
^th
Street
.

***

Valdes took the stage at 10:13 p.m. The mob, thoroughly enjoying the cheap liquor and drugs being offered, paid no notice until he took out his revolver and fired two shots up. Nobody panicked—this crowd was well-familiar with gunfire—but it got their attention.

“A long time ago,” he began without preamble, “I hosted events much like this for my job. One of the first things I was taught was that to make an evening truly memorable, you need a gift for the guests. Something personal that will make a statement about the purpose of the evening. Tonight,” he took out a cigarette, “I have something for you all.”

“Pussy!” a drunken, skinny white teen shouted from the front.

Valdes lit up, unoffended and in control. “Better.”

“Really
good
pussy?”

“Even better.” Raucous laughter spread. Valdes was unperturbed. “What
don’t
you have? Don’t say it,” he warned the teen with a good-natured smile. “Looking around, I’d say a lot of you don’t have a steady place to stay, or a stable income, or family to turn to, or many true friends.” A few voices rose in protest. He shook his head twice and held up a restraining hand. “No offense. Understand, I’m not offering pity. I’m no traveling preacher, and this is no soup kitchen party. I’m not here to discuss or condemn whatever you did that put you in your current circumstances. Frankly, I don’t care. The past is no longer my concern, and after tonight, it won’t be your concern either. A home? A job? Friends, family? You may lack them, but does that make you any less worthy a human being? Not to me. There
are
those who would believe that, you may believe that yourselves, but
I
don’t. I believe you have the most important thing, the most
necessary
thing, to get them if you want them. In fact, you can get
whatever
you want, if you want it badly enough. ‘The seeds of godlike power are in us still. Gods are we, bards, saints, heroes, if we will.’” He had a drag off the cigarette. “I’m not offering pity. I’m offering much, much more.”

He exhaled smoke and watched the cloud drift over the mob. As it descended so did his gaze, and he made eye contact with a half-dozen people. None shied away; the sincerity, the
truth
in his voice had every one of them wanting to know more.

“I had a wonderful life—job, wife, money, house—but to get it I was forced to give others power over me. When I became a threat to them, those people used that power. My job? Gone. My wife? Left me. My bank account? Taken by the government. Me? The Danbury Federal Penitentiary became my home.”

Even now he was unable to keep the bitterness entirely from his voice. The crowd heard it and responded, the tone of their rumblings growing uglier. Alcohol, drugs and the paranoia of tightly-packed bodies simmered resentment from their personal experience. Valdes noted this.

“There’s something that they don’t tell you, the people who have things, a secret to their success. Would you like to know what it is?

“Getting what you want…is
easy
.”

He paused for effect, a thin smile beneath the wisp of smoke that curled from his nostrils. The mob growled, restless and caged. On the monitor screen nearest him, a man was viciously stabbed, spilling greasy intestines and a flood of blood.

“It’s easy,” he repeated, “
if
you have focus and desire.

“Focus is tricky. Knowing what you want is probably hardest for most people, but not for all of you.
I
know what you all want. After months,
years
in jail, on the street, pushed around like punks, ignored except when you offend some asshole’s sense of what’s right or wrong, you want to be on top. You want your struggles to
mean
something in the real world. You want the rewards you
deserve
by right of your pain and struggle, rewards that by all rights are yours, rewards they’ve stolen! Because they
have
stolen from you—nobody gets rich or successful on their own! The only way they’ve succeeded is on
your
sweat,
your
blood,
your
hard work! They owe you, but do they care? No! You want to put your foot on the neck of every one of those scumbags and let them know that
you
are in charge of your life, not them. You want to force them to stop denying you what’s rightfully yours, force them to stop blocking your way to everything this world has to offer, force them to make restitution.