Vasquez touched his arm. It startled him: Vasquez ordinarily avoided physical contact.
“May I have him for a minute?”
Jan smiled. “Of course.”
“A word, if you don’t mind.” And Vasquez went toward the French doors.
Outside the house he followed Vasquez across the driveway. Vasquez kept walking until he reached the paddock fence. He hooked his elbows on it and craned his head back to peer at the sky. It was cool but not cold; a few clouds scudded across the stars and there was a three-quarter moon on the rise, its shadow-pittings startlingly visible. “Quite a beautiful evening. That’s fitting, I think.”
“Yes.” Mathieson was mystified.
“Something I’ve been meaning to ask you.”
“Go ahead. Ask.”
“I fail to understand why you chose not to inform any of us that the doses you were administering to Mrs. Pastor were not the real drug.”
“If I could convince you three then I could convince Pastor. It had to be absolutely believable. There couldn’t be any doubt in his mind that I was capable of it.”
“But you weren’t capable of it. He knows that now.”
“No. I’d have done it if I’d had to. I didn’t have to. Pastor understands that.”
Vasquez said, “Then that explains it.”
“Explains what?”
“The thing that’s troubling you. You’d have done it if you’d had to—that’s what you just told me. You’ve discovered what you’re capable of. It alarms you.”
“Maybe.”
“Mr. Mathieson. Fred, if I may. You were a good man when you began this. You’ve made yourself into something of a sinner—you’ve committed offenses against your own moral code. Extortion, fraud, blackmail, kidnapping, dire threats. But insofar as I can see you’ve done irreparable damage to no one. Those who’ve been damaged—like Gillespie and Ramiro—have done the harm to themselves. All you did was trigger their fears.”
“Is this the Confessional?”
“At this moment from the look of you and from the sound of your voice I should say you’re not merely a preternaturally weary man; you’re a man experiencing a profound emptiness—a sense of guilt and anticlimax. You feel you may have destroyed yourself along with your enemy—you may have brought yourself down nearly to his level in your search for retribution and freedom from the enslavement of fear.”
Mathieson rested his forearm along the top of the fence. “You enjoy exposition too much,” he murmured. “Have you ever had an unexpressed thought?”
“You need reassurance. You feel everything is a shambles. You’ve won what ought to be a victory and yet you’re uncertain. You’re concerned about your marriage. All the things you’ve put out of your mind during the past months. Your future weighs on you. You can’t picture yourself going back to an office and dickering over meaningless details in dispassionate contracts. You can’t picture yourself living a quiet life of contentment in a suburban house with two cars and swimming pool and boredom heavy on your hands.”
“This mind-reading act—what are you using? Palmistry or a crystal ball?”
“Neither. Let’s try cards. Let’s put them face up on the table. I believe you’re missing a vital discovery.”
“Am I.”
“You feel you’ve a burnt-out life—that anything henceforth must be anticlimax.”
“Go on.”
“You’ve given up your soul for freedom, in a sense. To regain your soul—your raison d’être—it’s my feeling you have no choice but to put your freedom back on the line.”
“What?”
“Nothing less will satisfy your need to justify your continued existence.”
Mathieson watched him with passionate desperation. “Tell me …”
“You’ve tasted the hunt,” Vasquez said. “Haven’t you?”
He stood up straighter. “I’m beginning to see.”
“You’ve savored the chase.” Vasquez’s voice dropped with a resolute intensity. “You’ll be satisfied with nothing else, ever again. You’ve trapped yourself—an exquisite trap. You may hate it. But you’ve demonstrated the most incredible talent for the chase that it’s ever been my experience to observe. You’re a master. You’re the best hunter I’ve ever met. And you do not kill. You’re unique.”
Mathieson inhaled until his chest was filled. He threw his head back and emptied it out. The oxygen made him giddy. He watched a cloud put a brief haze around the moon. “What’s your offer, Diego?”
“There are other Frank Pastors. For you and for me.”
“Yes.”
“Full partnership,” Vasquez said.
He was looking up toward the house. He saw the French doors open, saw Jan’s inquiring silhouette.
Vasquez said, “Salvation for both of us—that’s what it could be.”
Mathieson pushed himself away from the fence and began to walk up toward the house. In the doorway Jan’s silhouette turned—she’d spotted him. He walked toward her.
Behind him Vasquez spoke quietly. “What will it be, then?”
“I don’t know.”
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook onscreen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
copyright © 1977 by Brian Garfield
cover design by Mumtaz Mustafa
This edition published in 2011 by MysteriousPress.com/Open Road Integrated Media
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