“Tell me. What did they pay you for this gig? I got to confess, they didn’t exactly go deep inside their jackets for me, if you know what I mean.”
“My agent handled the negotiations, and my accountant dealt with the contracts. I think I signed something a few months ago. Who has time for that kind of thing?”
“Agent, huh? Where do you get one of those?”
California Boy grinned, and Farrengalli didn’t like those even, sparkling teeth. They were the kind of teeth that, back in the Bronx, he would want to put a fist “I thought you were on television already,” McKay said. “I saw one of the network commercials.”
“Yeah, they put me on TV. Wasn’t so bad. Catered meals from McDonald’s during the breaks.”
“McDonald’s, huh?” McKay put the harmonica to his lips again, this time teasing out a couple of high notes.
Farrengalli licked at the rim of the flask, numbing his tongue with the dregs. “Three meals a day. Same as a prisoner.”
McKay leaned toward the dying campfire and blew into the harmonica. He played an up-and-down scale that had a country-bluegrass flavor, the volume baffled so as not to wake the campers. The melody was familiar, but one you had to hear a couple of times to place.
Farrengalli lowered the flask and blinked, wood smoke in his eyes. “Hey, I know that song.”
McKay waited through the four beats of silence and repeated the riff.
Farrengalli snapped his fingers and joined in on the last few notes in an off-key bass. “Wha-wha-wha. Like in the movie.”
Deliverance. The Burt Reynolds movie where the guys on the canoe trip get stalked by hillbillies. And Ned Beatty takes it up the rear while squealing like a pig. No wonder Biker Boy liked the song so much. And, Farrengalli had to admit, it was kind of clever, since McKay was on a white-water trip, too.
You got a purty mouth, Farrengalli wanted to say. But your teeth are too sharp.
McKay did his own call-and-answer on the harmonica, while Farrengalli stomped his foot against a log. The harmonica now pierced the night, and Farrengalli looked into the surrounding woods, wondering what might be out there watching them. Even a hillbilly wouldn’t be stupid enough to hang out in the middle of nowhere without a good reason. There were easier places to hunt and fish, and the pickings were slim if all you wanted was some corn-hole action. One thing for sure, McKay wouldn’t be any competition for Dove Krueger’s sweet spot, though the woman had probably gone ga-ga over those blue eyes. Girls always fell for the fags, for all the good it did them.
McKay was in the middle of the tune, the point where a bluegrass band would be rollicking along on banjo, guitar, and stand-up bass, when Bowie stuck his head out of his tent. “Hey!”
McKay stopped playing, and the sudden stillness was a stark contrast, with only the steady rumble of the falls to break the silence.
“I don’t care if you guys want to stay up all night, but let the rest of us sleep,’ Bowie said. “Somebody’s got to be worth a damn tomorrow, or we won’t make the first head wall.”
“Okay, Chief,” McKay said. “Whatever you say.”
Farrengalli didn’t even look at the guide, keeping his face to the fire. After Bowie ducked back inside, McKay returned the harmonica to his fanny pack.
“What do you make of him?” Farrengalli asked.
“He acts like he knows what he’s doing.”
“Comes off like a hard ass to me. The kind of pushy that hides being afraid.”
“He has a good reputation, and he used to run this river when he was younger.”
“That’s what I’m saying. He’s not so young anymore. He’s got at least eight and maybe ten years on the rest of us.”
McKay shrugged, a swishy, effeminate gesture that didn’t fit his muscular shoulders. “Experience takes time. At least one of us knows what he’s doing.”
“Sure, but I’m going to keep on eye on him. I don’t trust him. I got the feeling he’ll fold when the pressure’s on.”
“Maybe there won’t be any pressure.”
Farrengalli tapped a drumroll on his flask. “Oh, there’s going to be pressure, all right. From inside and outside.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Don’t worry about it, Golden Boy. Just watch your own neck, that’s what I’m saying. When it comes down to it, we’re all on our own.”
McKay stood and kicked a smoldering log into the deep red embers. “Yeah, whatever. This isn’t a reality show, man. This is reality. See you in the morning.”
Farrengalli shook the empty flask as McKay left the fire, wishing there was enough whiskey to slosh around. A final swallow would have set his head right. He’d wondered if the fag would hit on him. His kind sometimes did, and Farrengalli never got upset about it. It was kind of flattering, in a way. Why wouldn’t they dig the same thing the chicks did?
No big deal. The important thing was that Vincent Stefano Farrengalli had outlasted McKay and the others. He would perform better than them, and on less sleep. He would finish first no matter what. He stared into the deep red eye of the fire for a few minutes before turning in himself.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Jim Castle was completely lost. The trails had turned him around, and though he could hear the water rushing through the deep groove of the gorge, he wasn’t sure how he could reach it. Once, he’d broken into a clearing that had turned out to be the stone face of a cliff edge. The Unegama River ran a hundred feet below, winding a silvery path toward an eventual, unseen ocean.
At that point, the gorge was the length of two football fields across. According to Derek Samford’s maps, this western side of the river was wilder, steeper, rockier, and more dangerous. There were only a few main trails, and they were so rarely traveled that it was easy to branch off into an animal path or a washed-out section that suggested an established route. Especially when walking by the light of a quarter moon that was often veiled by low gray clouds.
Castle was afraid to use the flashlight. He told himself it was because Goodall would see his approach and either sneak into the woods until Castle passed or else ambush him. But, in truth, he was afraid of attracting the thing that had taken Samford.
It wasn’t a thing. It wasn’t a bird-beast or a man-bat or an escaped extra from the set of Hellraiser. It was a hallucination, clear as day.
If Samford were still around- if it was a hallucination, how do you explain what happened to your partner? — he would undoubtedly have attributed Castle’s delusion to exhaustion, stress, and the trauma of having nearly been blown to bits or buried alive. That’s exactly how Samford would size it up, including the tricky little part where Samford himself was dangled in the air like frankfurters on a string. The Rook was a behavioral psychologist-or had been-and could make sense of such perverted stimuli. Castle, though, could only pretend it hadn’t happened.
While knowing it had.
And the rustling in the treetops can’t be just the wind.
The sound seemed to follow him, though he was constantly changing pace, one moment dragging his feet, the next breaking into a half jog, hoping to put more distance between himself and the hole in the ground, where the mountain had given way and opened onto a dark, cold space that might have been sealed off for aeons. He thought of his feet dangling in that emptiness, of the soft scratching against his boots. Maybe the thing that took The Rook had been released from some primal prison by the bomb blast.
A species that was probably blind and at home in the eternal dark. But that made no sense, either. Nature wouldn’t have given such a creature wings, and what kind of food would it have found?
A hallucination was much more comforting than its possible reality. Castle could accept a crack-up. Like taking a bullet for the team, it was an occupational hazard. More than one agent had been released from active duty and turned out to pasture at the funny farm after a harrowing hostage situation or a shoot-out. All the training in the world couldn’t totally remove the vulnerability that was hidden inside all humans.