Peacemakers (Peacemaker Origins Book 1) (16 page)

The judge reached into the bag once more.  He pulled out a stick of dynamite and a crumbled piece of paper and put them on the table.  “We found hand-drawn schematics and dynamite to blow the vault with Mr. Jardin’s belongings.  First-degree murder and conspiracy will put you away for a lifetime, Mr. Pascal.”  The judge clasped his hands in his lap.

“That’s quite the fabrication you have concocted, your honor.”

The judge nodded his head.  “Thank you.”

“Too bad no one will believe it.”

“Oh? And why not?  After all, I even have a fingerprint specialist from Atlanta coming down to verify your prints on this stick of dynamite”

“My father will ensure that I have the best lawyers available to prove my innocence, and no jury anywhere will believe that a Pascal would need to rob a bank.”

The judge sighed deeply.  “Yes, but while we are on the topic of family finances . . .” He reached in his inner jacket pocket and unfolded a parchment littered with official seals.  “Official copies of this letter have been dispatched to every major bank in the region.  It cuts you off from your—or rather your father’s—trust.  I am afraid you are broke and alone, Mr. Pascal, by written order of your own father.”

“Impossible!  My father would never sign it; he
couldn’t
sign it!”

The judge perused the document.  “My mistake. It was signed by the new administer of the Pascal estate, your brother, William Henri Pascal Jr.  By the way, I hear he may be Louisiana’s newest congressmen.  That is exciting.  Doesn’t’ surprise me that he would want to keep his derelict brother out of sight for a while.” The judge slipped the parchment through the iron bars and it drifted slowly, silently to the ground.  “Like I said.  Broke.  And alone.”

Wage gritted his teeth.  His mind and heart raced.  His fists clenched.  He was unsure of what to believe now.

“I thought that might get your attention.  Now, Mr. Pascal, let me present the alternative to your predicament.  I would like you to work for me.”  The judge reached inside his inner pocket once again and pulled out a round stone with curious etchings on it.  “You have seen this before, haven’t you?  You took it off Mr. Jonathan Hamilton nearly three months ago.”

Wage remained silent.

“I have reason to believe you exchanged it with a man called Mr. Jade for an undisclosed amount of money.  I want to know who Mr. Jade is, where he is, who he works for. I want to know his friends, his business associates, and why, why,
why
he wanted that stone.”

Wage turned his head away.  “He’s just some opium peddler.  He didn’t say why he wanted it.  It was just a job that paid.”

“You don’t need a paying job, Mr. Pascal, not when you have a family fortune.  Or should I say,
had
a family fortune.”

“Not everything is about money, your honor.”

“In all my time on this earth, I can assure you that phrase is only uttered by those who have it.  But it does not matter whether you act for financial gain, or for charitable causes, or even to satisfy some twisted urge you have; my offer is as follows:  Join me.  Tell me everything you know about Mr. Jade.  Help me seek him out.  If you are amenable to this, I will grant you your freedom.”

“Work for you?” Wage asked.  “Are you serious?”

“I am,” the judge replied. 

“Who exactly do you work for, your honor?”

“An organization older than you can imagine, Mr. Pascal.  One that is more powerful than any you will find on any stock exchange, I assure you.”

“So powerful you can’t find one little old Chinaman?  So powerful you need my help?”

“You are a hired gun, Mr. Pascal. What difference does it make who hires you?  I assure you, our organization could use a man like you.  We pay well, and for somebody with your skill sets, we even have room for advancement.”

There was a long, uncomfortable silence.  Wage continued to look away at the small, high window. The sunlight was fading.

“One question,” Wage asked.

“Yes?” Judge Delacroix replied.

“Do I have to wear one of them stones?”

“Unfortunately, yes.  It is a requirement at first.”

Wage turned his head back toward the judge.  “Then I will take your fancy stone . . .”

“Excellent choice, Mr. Pascal.”

“ . . . and shove it right up your ass.”  Wage smiled.

The honorable E.J. Delacroix rose from his seat, placed the stone back in his inner jacket pocket, and closed his folder.  “I will derive no pleasure in presiding over your trial,” he said.  “I will personally oversee the filing of charges in the morning and see to it you never see the light of day.”

“Why not just kill me then, Eric?”

“For now, killing you would bring about far more attention than is necessary.  But believe me, your expiration will be soon enough.”  The judge walked away and whistled for the deputy.

“We’re all expiring!” Wage yelled. “Some of us just doin’ it a little faster than others!”

Deputy Leblanc walked back into view.  He started to gather up all the evidence left on the table. 

“Hey!  Leblanc!” Wage said.  The deputy ignored him.  “Leblanc!  Don’t you think my gun should be admitted into evidence, too?  Better take it out of your holster and put it back.”  The deputy continued to ignore him.  Wage looked down at the floor of his cell.  The parchment nullifying his trust fund lay face up.  Wage stood up, a more laboring process than he had anticipated, and grabbed it.  “Hey!  Leblanc!  You might need this, too.” The deputy looked over and saw the important-looking parchment.  He put his hand on the butt of his gun
and stepped toward Wage, who waved the document like a child.  The deputy went to grab it, but Wage being a head taller, raised it up out of his reach.  Leblanc began to turn an angry red and took a step closer. 

Wage dropped the paper and shot his hands through the bars, grabbing Leblanc by his collar.  With all his strength, Wage pulled the deputy as hard as he could against the iron bars.  Leblanc groaned and the iron bars clanged as Wage repeated the process, only this time, when
Ol’ Snapper
was in reach, Wage removed it from the holster at lightning speed.  Wage took a step back, flipped the revolver, and cocked the hammer.  “
Whoooooooo
,” he whispered, before firing the gun from his hip, placing a round in the bewildered deputy’s chest.  Leblanc fell backward, knocking over the table of evidence.  The single dynamite stick rolled along the ground.

The other deputy, the only other one Wage had seen here, ran in with his gun drawn.  With his eyes fixed on the fallen deputy, he never saw Wage in the corner of his cell.  Wage expertly put another two rounds through the space between the iron bars into the other deputy’s chest.  Both deputies were now down.  The other deputy had a key ring on his belt, but try as Wage did, the key to his freedom was just out of reach.  The only thing in reach was the solitary stick of faded, red dynamite.

Wage grabbed it and surveyed his surroundings.  The cell was small, and shooting a stick of dynamite might just blow the cell door open, but it would also obliterate him in the process.  He thought as fast as he could, anticipating some kind of reinforcements at any moment.  He tried using the six-inch barrel of his gun to spear the deputy’s key ring, but they were clasped to his belt, and Wage was unable to get the leverage necessary to drag the turnkey any closer.  He was running out of options.  He took the dynamite and stood it upright on the other side of the cell door near the bottom hinge.  He grabbed his gray wool blanket from his haystack bed and walked to the opposite corner.  Using his teeth and uncut fingernails, he tore away small strips of blanket and quickly shoved them in his ears.  He took what was left of the blanket, crouched down, and covered himself. 

“Here we go!” Wage heard the words echo in his head because his ears were plugged.  He popped his head out and aimed his six-shooter at the small red tower of dynamite.  He pulled the trigger.

A loud echo and then nothing.  He missed.  “Damn!”  The word echoed in his head again.  He readjusted and aimed, knowing he had two shots left.  He clenched his entire body save for one eye.  Slowly he pulled the trigger.

The blast was deafening despite Wage’s precautionary measures.  His whole tiny world seemed to move in slow motion as bits of wood, hay, and anything not tied down became airborne.  The blanket protected him from the flying debris and a waste bucket, but a shockwave of air pinned him against the wall.  For a moment, it felt like all his organs liquefied.  Wage fell over and breathed in the acrid smoke that draped the entire cell.  He coughed uncontrollably before he realized—he was still alive.  Slowly, he got up.  His head was ringing and pounding.  The bottom hinge of his cell door was warped, but still attached.  With a renewed strength, he used both his bare feet to pry an opening barely large enough for him to fit through.  With reptilian-like contortions, he escaped.

He made his way through the smoke.  In his haste, the turnkey deputy had left the last securing door open.  Wage made his way through the secret jail and to the street, where a few people started to gather.  There was no sign of Judge Delacroix.  The unkempt Wage placed his six-shooter with one bullet left in his waistband and began walking barefoot toward the Mississippi River.

Two hours later, he finally arrived at the Dauphin Hotel just west of the French Quarter, their emergency meeting place in New Orleans.  Patrons in the lobby regarded Wage as a soot-stained, disheveled, feral beast dripping Mississippi mud all over the maroon carpet.  He ignored them and made his way to the adjacent bar, where he found Ol’ Bill reading the evening paper at a table by himself.  Wage took the seat across from him, placed his gun on the table, and raised his hand for a drink.  “Bourbon,” he called out.  He couldn’t hear himself at all, only a high-pitched ringing.

Bill folded the paper down and regarded his longtime companion.  Wage couldn’t hear but could read Ol’ Bill’s lips.  “What took you so long?”

John Hum

August 1, 1914

Charity Hospital, East Wing

New Orleans, Louisiana

The walls were a blinding and sanitary white, with a giant brown spot near the ceiling.  As his vision slowly came back into focus, the giant brown spot became a detailed crucifix on the opposite wall, Christ’s copper face half-grimacing with eyes fixed on heaven; the visage of Christ illuminated by sunlight from the windows that indicated either sunrise or sunset.

“Praise be to Jesus.  Glory be to God.  Hosanna in the highest!” exclaimed an older woman in sweat-stained white robes and habit.  She rushed over to him and put a cool hand with swollen joints on his forehead, inspecting him like a nurturing mother soothing a child who just awoke from a nightmare.

“Who . . . Where . . . I . . .” said the patient who lay on the yellowed sheets of a hospital bed.  He looked around, eyes constantly bounding.  Six beds filled the room, but only two were occupied. 

“Be still.  Be calm,” she said, now patting his face with both hands.  “All is well.”

As the patient’s state of sleep dissipated, his confusion grew.  He instinctively tried to raise his left hand but was unable to.  Confusion turned to concern. 

“Be calm, now.  You’ve been sleeping for a while,” the nun said, the deep wrinkles in her face looking as though they were drawn with charcoal.  “Comatose more than two months, don’t you know!”

A sweltering heat baked the room.  Sweat saturated his nappy hair and scraggly beard.  Once again, he tried to lift his predominant arm, but it only fluttered as though the telegraph lines between his brain and arm corroded and could not properly deliver the signal.  Upon closer examination, he noticed that his left arm, compared to his right, had significant atrophy. 

“You have lost quite a bit of weight since you first arrived, which was to be expected, but your arm . . . your arm, I’m afraid we couldn't help.  The doctors were unable to slow the rate of emaciation” the nun said.

The patient tried to speak, but the uncomfortable dryness of his mouth and throat made it difficult.

“Here, child,” she said, as she scurried to the other side of the bed and poured a glass of water.  She grabbed the back of his head and tipped it forward with a calm strength, and with her other she forced water into his mouth.  It hit his throat like a biblical flood.  He coughed for a moment and tried again to move his left hand, this time to cover his mouth. It didn’t move. After the coughing fit passed, she gave him more water.

After a moment, he was able to grasp the glass himself with his only working hand.  Finally, he spoke.  “Where am I?”

“You are in New Orleans—Charity Hospital. You probably don’t remember coming here,” the nun said.

“No.  What happened?”

“Some folks found you in an alley.  Looked as though you were in a nasty fight, it did, with your eyes all swelled up.  You even had a rib near poking out of your skin.  You were in mighty bad shape, I’d say.”

The patient felt his side.  It was still tender.  “Who are you?” he asked.

“I am Sister Silvia.  I have been your caretaker since you arrived.”  She smiled angelically and patted his leg.  “You and I have had nearly every meal together for almost two months.  Spoonful by spoonful, I was able to coax every variety of soup we make here down your gullet.  It’s been just the two of us . . . Well, that is, until
he
arrived.”  She tilted her head toward another sleeping man two beds over.  “Now, I think it’s about time I learned your name, don’t you think?” Sister Silvia said, as she patted his leg again.

“I . . . I’m not sure,” the patient replied.

“Well, that is not uncommon for those that wake up after a long sleep.  It may take time for your memory to come back.  Truth be told, most of the ones they put in here don’t ever wake up. You are a lucky one, blessed by God himself, I’m sure of it.”  She steepled her hands and looked up.

“You don’t know my name?” the patient asked.

“Oh my heavens, no.  You came in with no personal effects, nothing to identify you.  Hospital procedure requires your file to be named John Doe, but . . . the chief physician here lets me change the names slightly.  I named you John Hum.”

“John Hum?” he said with a slight accent.

“Yes.”  She patted his leg once more.  “Late at night, you would hum.  To yourself?  To me?  To God above?  Who knows!  Sometimes, I would hum with you.”  She began humming a tune the patient did not recognize.  She repeated the verse again, humming louder and closing her eyes.  The tune reverberated against the walls and sounded as if for centuries, mothers used the same notes to put their children to sleep.  “Is it bringing back any memories?  No?  Perhaps it will come back to you in time, dear.”

“Who is that?” John Hum asked, nodding toward the other sleeping man.

“Oh, that there is John Doe.  I don’t know enough about him yet to give him a more fitting name. He joined us about a week ago.  He was found over in Algiers Point, with a head injury, some burns, and a bullet wound in the chest.  Poor thing, he was wearing some kind of uniform, but no one could identify it, not even the local police.  As a matter of fact, no one has even come inquiring about him,” she said.  “Normally somebody follows up with me.” Sister Silvia leaned in closer and whispered, “Maybe I should name him John Snorer.”  She giggled.

“Has anyone inquired about me?”

The nun looked down and shook her head.  “I am afraid not, my dear John Hum.”

“No one?”

“Not a soul, I’m afraid,” the nun replied.

“Am I from here?  Do I have a home I can go to?  Someone?  Anyone?”

“Well,” said Sister Silvia, “now that I’m hearin’ you talk—I thought your voice would be deeper and more Southern, by the way—you don’t sound much like you spent your life in Louisiana, but who knows?  There are so many different looking and sounding people ‘round here.  If I had to guess, you are an Englishman, maybe?  Perhaps one who’s been here a while?”

The patient detected his own slight accent in comparison to Sister Silvia’s.  “English?  Are you sure there was no documents or facts that could help identify me?” The patient looked down at his hospital gown.  “Was I wearing different clothes?”  The questions sounded ridiculous.  How does a grown man not know who he is?  Not have any memories, but still know the names of rudimentary things like beds, windows, and nuns? 

“Well,” the nun said, “you have quite a few . . . marks on your back.  Some of them fresher than others.”

“Marks?”

“Oh, wait here,” she said, straining to get up again.  “It will probably be a while before you can walk, anyway.  Your legs, God bless you, must feel like pins and burning needles.”  She left the ward.  The phrase “burning needles” brought back a flood of emotion that should have been memories, but it only triggered an unholy fire that coursed,
slithered
, through his veins like a serpent of fire. 

Sister Silvia returned with a black suit, black shoes, and two large handheld mirrors; the kind used in child birthing so the mother can see the delivery.  She set the clothes down on one of the empty beds and placed one of the mirrors in his right hand.  She leaned him forward to hold up a mirror to his back.  Through the two mirrors, John Hum gazed upon the horror that was his back, which looked like a butcher’s cutting board etched with tan, pink, and red lines.  There was no real order to the scars, as though it was a butcher’s apprentice who took his time learning and practicing the proper cuts. 

“Good God!” John said.

“I know,” Sister Silvia said.

“Where did they come from?  How did I get them?”

“I’m not sure, but I can tell you where else I have seen them,” she said.

“Where?” he asked, looking at her through the mirror.

“Well, I went on a pilgrimage to the Vatican when I was rather new to the convent; I was just a young woman then.  On the way, we passed through Palencia, Spain, during the Lenten season and saw
Los Hermanos Penitentes
—men who whipped themselves so as to experience the pain that Christ himself suffered.”  She made the sign of the cross.  “Their backs were hideously bloody, they were, but the ones who had spent years doing it, their backs . . . they looked like yours.”

“So I am what?  A priest?  A monk? And I don’t even know Spanish!”

“I would say you are—or were—a flagellant, or . . .” the nun paused and made the sign of the cross again, “. . . or someone who has been subjected to some ungodly torture.  But the fact remains, you
have
lived a life of suffering, John Hum.”

Ironically, he responded with a noise that sounded like “hum” and set down his mirror.  “And you are sure I came to the hospital with nothing?”

“Well, you were wearing that black suit, but it is barely salvageable.  The shoes, they held up better.”

“Can you hand me the shoes?” John asked.  The old nun handed him the black shoes.  The leather was worn and dusty, but meticulously cared for and faintly shined.  If there was any identifying brand, however, it had long since faded away.  He asked for the coat and inspected it as well, the act of inspecting feeling strangely natural.  The coat had no identifying marks, either. It appeared to be custom.

“There is one thing . . .” Sister Silvia said, interrupting his study of the clothes.

“What?” John asked.  The nun was noticeably embarrassed.

“Well, it’s just that—”

“What is it?”

She reached into the inner pocket of his black coat and pulled out a slightly crumbled piece of paper.  She looked around the room to make sure no one was looking.  She straightened the piece of mustard-colored paper and handed it to him.  She blushed.  The patient grabbed it slowly and awkwardly. All his body movements, no matter how slight, still felt foreign.

The picture was a pencil sketch of a naked woman leaning over a chair with a monochrome curl falling in one eye.  The hasty shading gave depth to her perfectly formed breasts and buttocks.  Her face was as stoic as a statue of a Greek goddess.  She was, in a word, breathtaking. 

Underneath the picture read, “25 May ’14, Amber Rose—Winston-Salem, NC.”