American Craftsmen (11 page)

“Whoever they are, don’t let them kill you. I release you from your oath to me. Use the craft. Get them.” Hutchinson started to fade.

“Hutch, don’t go!” But she was gone.

Don’t let them kill you.
I spoke to the empty air: “How the hell am I going to do that?”

PART III

THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF MORTON

But evil things, in robes of sorrow,
Assailed the monarch’s high estate;
(Ah, let us mourn, for never morrow Shall dawn upon him, desolate!)
And, round about his home, the glory
That blushed and bloomed
Is but a dim-remembered story
Of the old time entombed.

—Edgar Allan Poe

He perceived this man fighting a last struggle, the struggle of one whose legs are grasped by demons. It was a ghastly battle.

—Stephen Crane

I see in him outrageous strength, with an inscrutable malice sinewing it.

—Herman Melville

CHAPTER

SEVEN

In H-ring, Michael Endicott was worried. The general would be here soon. Endicott looked up again at his portrait of Abram, envying his ancestor’s certainty. Just yesterday, as ordered, he had picked a fight with a decorated and unstable veteran of America’s secret wars. Not very Christian or honorable, but dutiful.

But that dubious action wasn’t what worried Endicott. He still didn’t know where the AWOL Colonel Hutchinson had gone. He had first noted her absence midmorning when he had wanted to confront her about Morton’s firing range visit and his predawn phone call (which he had ordered routed to his personal line). Hutch wasn’t answering her cell or home lines. Spiritual ops didn’t take unannounced sick days.

Though only hours old, Hutch’s sudden disappearance felt connected to the troubles in the House of Morton. Endicott had ordered the three Gideons to break off from Morton surveillance and find her. The Gideons were the best at tracking craft prey, but Endicott didn’t enjoy thinking that way of Hutch.

With a regulation knock, the general entered. He had let his full head of hair go silver. In an age of plastic people, Endicott’s father had the face of a gray wolf sculpted in granite. The general preferred to keep his own office free from intrusion, friend or foe, so he sacrificed protocol to meet Endicott here.

“I completed my mission, sir,” said Endicott. “I pissed Morton off. Baited him, pushed every pagan button. Threw in some obvious spirit compulsion. He didn’t bite. He didn’t even really threaten me, just gave me some crap about the house.”

“That house is threat enough,” said the general.

“I’ve heard the legends,” said Endicott. “Like distilled Poe and Hawthorne.”

“You’ve spoken with him since,” noted the general.

“He asked to leave town. I said no. He wanted to speak with Colonel Hutchinson. He made another vague threat.”

“What’s his real reason for leaving?” asked the general.

“From what I heard at the nuthouse, he may think someone is pursuing him,” said Endicott. “He may suspect that Sphinx is a mole. His fear may be baseless, but nonetheless sincere. His family has a history of paranoia, followed by violence, so we can expect trouble.”

“And you?” asked the general.

“Sir?”

“Scared?”

“Sir, if a Morton is really frightened, that makes me nervous. But Sphinx?” Endicott shook his head.

“The Mortons are subtle,” said the general. “They’ve even made you doubt your mission.”

Endicott decided he needed to argue once more with his father’s obsession to be effective. “Sir, why are we pushing Morton like this?”

“He’s with the Left-Hand Mortons,” said the general, with a new flat certainty in his voice.

“That branch died out in the 1800s, sir.”

“‘Died out’ is a gentle and inaccurate way of putting it,” said the general. “The Families under Abram exterminated any of the Left Hand they could find. But not before the Left Hand had killed more than a few Family members, and more than a few Endicotts. And not before some of the evil escaped.”

“Sir, that was a long time ago,” said Endicott.

“Time doesn’t matter to the Left-Hand Mortons. They have an ambiguous relationship with death,” said the general. “They think long-term. Very long-term.”

The general’s use of the present tense chilled Endicott.

But then the general repeated his skewed version of craft history. “Left-Hand elements were active during the Civil War. We have evidence from our Latter-day friends that survivors of the Morton Left Hand, including a common-law couple, moved west, where they could be as violently perverse as their natures desired. With the First World War, they had room to hide in our ranks again. And Captain Morton’s own father demonstrated a strong reversion to type.”

Endicott had always doubted much of this, particularly regarding Morton’s father, but before Endicott could raise old questions, the general asked, “Where is Colonel Hutchinson?”

“I have the Gideons looking,” said Endicott. “When Morton asked for her, he said we were hiding her.”

The general smiled. “I suspect he knows more than we do. Either he’s recruited her, and she’s gone underground, or she said no, and he disposed of her.”

Despite his anxiety for Hutch, Endicott kept his gaze steady. “Sir, couldn’t the colonel and the captain both be victims of the Left Hand? Maybe they need our help.”

“No,” said the general, again with his new certitude. “Chimera has seen this. This is the year, and the Mortons are the threat.”

“But Sphinx…”

“Is part of the problem,” said the general. “Morton is right about that much. Fortunately, Chimera doesn’t have her biases. Anything else, Major?”

“No, sir.” Endicott had ventured as much of his doubt as appropriate.

The general tapped Endicott’s desk twice in thought. As if in response, there was another knock at Endicott’s door. “Enter,” said the general, as if he were in his own office.

One of the white-coated, quasi mundanes from OTM came in and handed the general a message. OTM technicians always seemed to be buzzing about the general and his office. They were an unremarkable bunch amidst the colorful craft-types, and Endicott only noted this tech because of the intrusion into his space. The tech would have been considered old for his job in the private sector, but maturity was an advantage where absolute discretion was important.

While the general read the message, the technician looked past Endicott at Abram’s portrait. Endicott couldn’t read the tech’s emotion, but he didn’t seem appropriately respectful.

“Please have Chimera tighten control,” said the general to the tech, who thankfully stopped staring at the portrait and departed. The general folded the note and looked at Endicott. “The Left Hand are skilled at hiding whenever the other Families come after them. Morton may even try to flee overseas. We can’t let him out of our sight. My orders remain the same: he’s not to leave Rhode Island. Use any necessary force.”

*   *   *

I drove to see Roman, who was once again slouched outside the office entrance. “
Dobrý den
, pardner. I’ve been expecting you.”

“Why’s that?” I asked.

“You get a gun for a beautiful woman. I think, you’ll both have to leave town soon.”

“You’re a wise man,” I said. “I need two departure packages for Mexico.” My retirement vacation party was next weekend. In my original plan, I would have obtained a similar package to support my threat of postparty flight in order to draw out my enemies. Now, I needed to provide for a very real getaway for Scherie and, if our major opponents didn’t show, myself.

“No problemo, pardner,” said Roman. “For you, ten percent discount.”

“
Spasiba
,” I said. “But I’ll need a car too.”

The smile fled Roman’s face. “What is wrong with the Thunderbird?”

“Nothing,” I said, “other than everyone knows it’s my car. And I need something a little more recent and resilient.”

“Hmmm. This I do not like. Come inside. I show you horses.”

At his desk, Roman displayed computer thumbnails of a stable of laundered cars. “You want something American, yes?”

“Yes,” I said.

“This Corvette?”

“No, this Chevy Malibu.”

Roman sighed. “Very boring.”

I said, “I want the car fueled and parked along the side street near the family mausoleum by next weekend. Leave the keys in a case above the driver’s side front tire. I’ll be sending you some weapons, but any other special forces equipment you can obtain will be appreciated. And I’ll need plenty of ammo.”

“You’re planning a long trip?” asked Roman.

“Very long.” That could be too true.

“I’ll have the car moved in stages.” Roman stared out the dirty window. “You know, friend, someone maybe is watching. Watching now.”

“Everybody is watching. As long as they don’t know the exact details, I’ll be fine.”

“No one knows details. I handle myself, very quiet. But maybe I take a vacation too, yes?”

“You’re a very wise man,” I said. “Just a few days might be good for your health. Go someplace nice. I’ll pay. In advance.”

Roman nodded. “I see. Then we say good-bye.” We embraced like Slavs. “
Vaya con Dios
.”

“That’s not Russian.”

“No, it’s cowboy,” said Roman. “And it’s what I mean.”

*   *   *

When I returned to the House, I went to the kitchen. Despite some new appliances, it still had the antique dumbwaiters and cramped sense of space of my grandfather’s day. I poured myself a finger of bourbon. “To absent friends.” I raised my glass. “How about it, Hutch? You want vengeance, I’m going to need some help.”

Nothing. Not that I would expect Hutch around the House after she had warned me, as she wasn’t a Morton. I would have to be more forceful. “Colonel Hutchinson, I’m calling you.” I reached out my hand as if through a curtain …

“Shit!” I drew my hand back. Burning, but not heat. Cold. “Hutch?” But no reply. I’d touched the void, the spirit equivalent of hard vacuum. “Oh shit, Hutch, have they gotten you there too?”

Warming my throbbing hand under my armpit, I took my bourbon down into the basement. Could anyone help me? I knew the other family names from Morton lore, but not where they lived now. The code names I had worked with gave no clue to the family identity. They were as goofy as my “Casper” and equally impersonal, once you knew craft was involved. Oz and his witchy friends were popular, as were wizards from Tolkien, Rowling, Bakshi, and King. Stupid—did mafiosi take their nicknames from
The Godfather
? Second thought, maybe they did.

As for the Morton craft bloodline, I might be the last living representative of that legendary lineage. But even if Dad couldn’t come and Grandpa wouldn’t help, I had the other Morton dead. I had the House.

With the House’s help, my party could work as a distraction. All the craft noise of the House and my many guests would make it difficult for Gideons and others to track our exit, if I used the right route.

I stood on an iron plate attached to a long rod that passed through each floor, up to my grandfather’s room, down through the subbasement and below, to ground itself deep into this earth. Here, I could tap into the power of the Morton House and ancestors. I pressed my hand up against an oak beam, and felt the thrum that was nearly, but not quite, in sync with my own pulse. It was the layered telltale of my family’s magic, the time-spanning vibration that was a heart, a steamboat, a train, a car, a plane, a rocket.

“Help me, House,” I said.

We can help.
The voices iced me. They were not the warm collective voice of the orthodox Morton dead that was the House. They were the dungeon voices of those who had attempted to freeze time, whose attempt to snatch immortality had led only to living death. The most powerful ancestors in this House were not my friends. To help me, the Left Hand would require payment. Payment in blood.

We can help,
they cooed again.
Come to the subbasement. And bring your friend.

*   *   *

The next day, when Scherie arrived for another training session, I was ready. I had tucked a sheathed knife in my belt and readied a bit of persuasion craft. Right-Hand Mortons weren’t good at compulsion, but we could give people a sense that life’s wind was blowing a certain direction.

“If you’re serious about training,” I said, “
we need to go to Mexico
. There’s a camp that will give you special ops training. The price is right, and I trust the operators.”

“I can’t afford that right now.”

“That won’t be a problem.”

I showed her the training camp’s papers. Yes, it really existed, and I had prepaid for Scherie’s boot session in case I didn’t make it. Still, crossing the border to a secret place full of armed men might intimidate even her a little. “You can check this out with your father. The thing is, we’ll need to split up and get away without this surveillance following us. What we’re doing is extralegal.”

“They’re not watching me.”

“Don’t count on that. Since I met you, they’ve increased their surveillance. So consider this an entrance examination.”

She nodded at this appeal to her competitive streak, so I continued. “We’ll leave during the party. It’ll be the best time; I can set up all sorts of distractions. Unless I decide it’s safe to go together, you’ll leave first, and I’ll follow. Work out your own route, but don’t tell it to me. We’ll meet in Guadalajara at the Café Madoka a week after the party. If I’m not there, go on to the camp without me—it means I’ve been, um, unavoidably detained.” More likely I was unavoidably dead. But I thought,
Believe
.

“Why are they so interested in you? Is it about one of your missions?” asked Scherie. “The one that made you scream in Farsi?”