The Forest Bull (26 page)

             
It took too many minutes to get to the ambulance entrance to Hollywood Memorial, and the staff rushed out even as I rolled to a stop. A whirlwind ensued as Risa and Wally were bustled in through the doors with hectic efficiency. Nurses and doctors fired questions at me and the girls as the triage progressed. No one assumed any dark cause for the wounds; the hurricane raging around us assured that line of questioning would be overlooked. In a matter of seconds, I became superfluous, to be left standing, soaking wet, exhausted, and angry. The white floor was spattered with blood and rainwater, leaving the room in four lines where the gurneys rolled. I was alone in the waiting room. Three televisions overhead showed beautiful newscasters grimly urging residents to stay cowering inside, their practiced tones of concern repeating the same mantra,
get down, get down, get down
. A backdrop of weather radar outlined an enormous pinwheel of colorful violence spinning west over the city. It wobbled like a dizzy child and slowly surged to the edge of the screen.

             
I sat on a frigid plastic chair and hung my head. A murderer, not an avenger. I had become Wrath and I felt the weight of sin’s fingers squeezing me tighter with each gusty sigh.

             
Light, blazing and painful, hit my face from the window of the girls’ hospital room. My beard itched abominably, four days of growth that had seen neither water nor soap. I could smell my own breath, never a good sign. Risa lay supine on the left in her bed, Wally on the right. I had curled like a junkyard dog between them, threatening anyone who even looked in the room without my personal invitation. A rotation of visitors had spelled me for a few moments as I wandered to the cafeteria for a listless bite of food twice each day. Suma, Boon, Pan, even Glen, accompanied by his nearly identical brother Gabriel, who inexplicably sported a British accent, had each done a turn. Angel had visited, too, a glowering hulk who watched every hospital employee with suspicion, only to be spelled often by Liz, who adopted a cracking tone of authority and ordered anyone in scrubs about without a moment to breathe.

             
Slowly, they healed. Risa was the first to sit up, the first to walk. Wally floated in and out of consciousness, her body working hard to throw of the grave slashes that were healing at a rate which puzzled the doctors. I did not invite questions, and, after a day, they stopped asking. When Wally was smiling at me, a sweet, kind look on her face, I knew that I had not lost my family, my partners. I sat on the edge of Risa’s bed, one hand holding hers and the other laying on Wally’s leg. I could breathe again, and that meant I had an errand to run.

             
I kissed Risa lightly, then Wally, and told Boon “No one in or out. And then, the same when they are home. Spare no expense, no feelings, and no chances. I’ll be back in two days.”

             
Risa’s sadness was too great to address. I could not look at her directly. To do so would be to lose my nerve. It was hard enough finding the strength to leave them at all.

             
“Ring? Where are you going?” Wally asked, sleepily, although she knew.

             
I walked to the door, and, without looking back, said “I’m going to return some jewelry.” And, without another word, I left to hail a cab, fat hot tears on my face at what felt like the last betrayal of my life.

I have with me two
gods, Persuasion and Compulsion - Themistocles

The Forest

             
Tadeusz drove without fear. He also drove without brakes because the autumnal scenery blew by in a smear of browns and yellows as his ancient rust bucket of a car banged along a rutted track in a spine-crushing series of skids, stops, and wild accelerations. I had found him by searching on my phone while in a cab to the Fort Lauderdale/Hollywood airport. My simple search of
Guides: Bialowicza: English Speaking
led to a phone call, a hurried negotiation while I purchased my ticket and, thirteen hours later, a hale greeting at the airport before he whisked me, jet lagged and bewildered, towards the looming green of the forest.

             
“This I think is far enough, Ring.” Tadeusz told me, pointing with emphasis at a double row of odd mounds on either side of the track. “That is the edge of the estate. No one will go here, so I will not go here, but if you must be a stupid hero American, then you will go alone, and I will be here, drinking the delicious
Nalewka
my wife has given me for this trip.” He brandished the bottle of herbed liqueur and pointed to the growing gloom. “Not much light left for your walk. You must go.”

I looked meaningfully into t
he backseat, where a well-cared-for rifle lay under a blanket. Gleaning my intent, he shook his head. “I cannot let you have that. But this, this is okay.” He handed me a savage-looking hunting knife, honed to a mirror edge. It looked brutal and functional, a mankiller. I took it and thanked him. Its weight comforted me.

             
The door creaked and closed with a bang, and I was surrounded by a forest of such depth and silence that I could not tell I had been caroming through it seconds earlier. No birds called, no wind. Nothing. Just the crunch of my boots over inert leaves as I walked to a paired row of hulking shapes, nearly covered with mosses and grime.

             
Cars
. Two rows of cars, cast aside, forgotten, rusting into the soil. Like cedars lining a levy, they sat, immobile, their state of decay greater as I moved forward towards the location of the lodge, according to Tadeusz’ directions. Here a
Syrena
, tiny and globular, sitting next to a Polish
Kredens
, its entire side stove in from some mysterious disaster. Further along, I passed not two but three of the once-feared Crows, their government plates ripped off by some unseen collector. The majestic remains of a
Zil
limousine lazed on an embankment, state flags that were once brilliantly colored now a faint, bloody pink. It was a parking lot made by something incredibly lethal, filled with the remains of the greedy or the stupid. I was choosing freely to walk towards this unknown killer, but, a knife was in my hand and in the dying light of the primal, filtered sun, I stalked with supreme confidence. The Baron, whether he wished it or not, was about to have a houseguest.

A slight inc
line announced the manor proper, where three oaks large enough to hide a small home squatted imperiously before me. I lay against the nearest, bark as old as time rough against my face, and peered around the massive trunk to select my path.

There was no need for stealth. Only then did a bird call, a laughing, raucous jay, piercing the quiet in the growing dusk. The ruin had
once been magnificent. Even looking at the bones of the home, it was easy to see what was lost. Logs tumbled in upon one another in a jackstraw of abandonment and the ravages of time. Jewel green mosses slowly pulled the remaining height of the structure toward the soft earth, with mushrooms quietly breaking the wood into soil, while spilled slate announced the former shapes of walls, and a wood pen, and perhaps a fire pit.

Gone, and long ago, perhaps centuries. Another fallen house of lies, slowly slipping beneath the verdant waters of the forest, one
wavelike season at a time. I walked forward to where the massive doors had once hung, now only collapsed hints of a stone arch left among the jumble of relics.
Lies
.
What else did I expect?
  Blackness yawned to my left, tucked under the angular remnants of a roof joist made of waist-thick beams, dissolving under the attentions of the weather. I stepped carefully over the fallen majesty of the ceilings that had held the aurochs horns aloft. The hole was lit by the last rays of the weakened fall sunshine, a last hurrah of joy to let my eyes see into the seductively open stairway. Carved from stone, each step angled slightly down and away, a curling invitation glistening with dew and uncertainty. I stepped forward once more as the sun spangled off the jeweled eye of a silver horse, spinning gently in the moist air pushing lightly from the unknown pit. The necklace hung just out of reach. To secure it would mean taking several steps into the dark.
Clever girl, oh very clever, indeed.
I stood erect, backing away silently. The breeze from below carried such a wealth of scents--mosses, time, mystery. And perfume. One perfume I have smelled before and will always remember--and not worn by any human.  Stepping away, I thought I heard her laughter welling up from the depths, mocking me.

Inviting me.

Epilogue I

One Month Later

We healed. We stayed close, fighting the urge to slash at shadows; we learned to sleep again, to live, to find solace in the comfort of one another. We became more of a family and emerged, like a ship fighting through a rogue wave, battered but whole, cleared to go forward.

I was hot, and that meant that the girls were scorched, so I found myself walking to get the car after a recuperative day
at the zoo, where we had walked and eaten and circled about, while pretending that we had chased every spirit and echo from the corners of our minds. The parking lot blazed like an airport tarmac, nearly empty during the peak heat of the day. A lone grandmother braved the heat, fruitlessly waving a brochure at her florid face, sweat beaded on every inch of her skin. She smiled at me in commiseration, the unspoken,
scorcher, ain’t it
unsaid between us, but understood.

It was a small hole
in the concrete, not more than the size of a tennis ball, but it caught her birdlike, ancient ankle perfectly, snapping the bone in a sickening crack that sent her chin first into a graceless arc. The impact made her breath leave in a surprised
oof
as she rolled over, laughing, before I could get to her.

She spit two teeth at my feet, connected with a stringy gobbet of flesh that sent them into a bolo spin to land on my shoe. I
moved quickly to her, reaching for her to help. She slapped my hand, hard and pulled herself to her feet, leaning on her ruined ankle without notice.

“That will be enough touching from you, Ring. You save those hands for your whores.” She smiled, gap toothed and bleeding. I knew. This was no grandmother, not at that second. “My mistress wants to tell you to stop being so fucking
jumpy. Y
ou’re going to ruin the surprise!” She put her hands on her hips, chastising me. “She will call on you soon enough. It’s just that she’s been so
busy
with you and your common-law sluts being laid up and all. Can’t have you out and about when she had business to attend to, right, lover?” She cackled once and spat again, spotting my sock with her bloody saliva. With a series of grotesque cracklings, she walked away, each step making her lean in more pronounced fashion until her shoe ran red from the bone shearing through the remaining papery skin.

I turned to the gates
, where the girls would be waiting. I felt the heat of the macadam, the glare on my face. I thought of the blackness. The laughter.

I thought of revenge.

       Epilogue II

Two Months Later

Herr Kreiger was thrilled to have the collection back in its rightful place, although his professionalism was such that he betrayed nothing to the client. Lovingly, he placed each piece on the velveteen lining of the deposit box, tucked in a specific order according to usefulness, size, gem quality . . . oh, so many variables in the three hundred tiny works of art. Occasionally, he polished an item before returning it to the box, even removing the odd spatter of blood, which hinted at a less than forthright retrieval. The owner was not known as forgiving, and who was he to question the gathering of something so unique? So valuable, in so many ways?

There, the last one. I have always loved that horse, even when I was a boy. How it prances in the silver, its eye daring you to look away!

He cleared his throat in an unobtrusive manner, gesturing respectfully at the heavy lid.

“May I close the box at this time?” His voice was laden with respect, fear. Even awe and love.

A single nod from the client, who picked up gloves made of buttery leather, pulled them on, and then gathered her things. She was close enough to kiss him, and she did, chastely, on the cheek.

“’You have served me very well through both wars,
Dieter. I am not ungrateful. You should be proud of this. So few have met my exacting standards through the years.” She patted his cheek once, the leather faintly touching him and trailing to his neck with an intimacy few people knew he was capable of.

“It is my honor
and my pleasure to serve you in any way that I may, Mother. You need only call, and I am at your service instantly.” He radiated with pride at her compliment and the opportunity to serve at her feet. It was his mission, his instinct, becoming reality, here and now.

“Such a good boy. Yes, I think you shall be rewarded with a position in my next little endeavor. It will require
some preparation on your part. You have, I think, until the summer to be fluent in Creole. Be ready for a move, and have all the resources necessary for the acquisition of property and quiet spaces. If you are not properly ready, I shall be-how did I tell your father after the first war--vexed? Yes, vexed.”

Herr Kreiger paled. His father had died screaming in a rocky room beneath a café, his dying voice saturating the walls even as his blood ran rivulets into a stone
trough. It had not been a swift death, either. Dieter tried, every day, to forget what disappointing his mother could bring to his doorstep.

“I shall be ready, Mother. I promise.” He was earnest, and riddled with horror.

“There’s a good lad. Until we visit New Orleans, then”. Elizabeth walked from the vault, her heels on the carpet leaving no trace of her, save the spindrift of her perfume.