David Corbett - The Devil’s Redhead

Abatangelo had met Waxman during the Oregon trial, which the reporter came north to cover for the local alternative press- the “rad rags.” Alone among the reporters in the courtroom, Waxman refused to feed at the government trough, befriending the defense team instead. Tipped to Tony Cohn’s plan of attack on the informant, he detailed every squirm, every backstep, every lie as it came out on the stand. He followed up with the agents, gave them a chance to hang themselves in private interviews, then pronounced them corrupt bunglers in print. When his stories got picked up by the newswires, he got blackballed from the U.S. Attorney’s office. Local narcs, tipped by the feds, searched his hotel room for drugs.

He returned to the Bay Area after the trial equipped with a sterling new vision of himself. He began talking book projects, courting publishers, naming the editors he’d met or intended to meet. The books never quite materialized. His articles grew repetitious and sparse, he gained a reputation for slant. He started to drink a bit too hard. In the past few years he’d managed to beg his way back from limbo, taking stringer work, puff pieces, anything.

Since his release from prison, Abatangelo had come across Waxman’s by-line a half dozen times or so. There were indications Waxman was hitting his stride again. Though something less than pulsating, his most recent pieces did reveal a little of the old spine. By and large they focused on the radical right, the militia movement, the so-called tax revolt. Waxman brought a feverish devotion to his subjects, his prose teemed with drum-poundings and evocations of doom. All things considered- particularly the botched attempt to bring Cohn on board- Abatangelo found Waxman ripe with potential.

He pulled up a chair and sat down without a word. Waxman stopped reading and looked up, blinking in mild astonishment. Abatangelo extended his hand. “Maybe you remember me,” he said. “Dan Abatangelo. Ten years ago, you covered my trial, a federal CCE bit, up in Oregon.”

Waxman frowned, blinked, then it registered. His eyes flared and he offered an expansive smile. “A decorated veteran of our fabled War on Drugs,” he intoned, reaching out to take Abatangelo’s hand, shaking it avidly. “Ten years, it’s been that long?”

“Got raised a few weeks ago.”

Waxman blew out a gusty sigh and shook his head. “Fucking atrocity what they did to men like you. Marijuana. Christ. And for what? To let the real gangsters take over.”

Abatangelo nodded toward the ransacked envelopes and letters spread out across the tabletop. “Catching up with your admirers?”

Waxman laughed acidly, picked up one letter and tossed it onto a pile of others, as though into a fire. “I wrote a piece last week, about this Christian telethon that took place down around San Diego. They were raising money for their school board candidates, the usual Creationist mob, with some militia kooks thrown in for good measure. There were protestors outside, and this being the north end of the county, this drew out the neo-Nazis, skinheads, and just floor-model rednecks. Armed and ready for the Great Uprising. Fucking melee. I titled the piece ‘A Catfight for Christ’ and said it was a pretty good preview of the next Republican Convention.” He gestured toward his mail. “This stuff’s been sailing in by the truckload ever since.”

Abatangelo turned one letter around, read a little. “Any death threats?”

Waxman looked off with a sort of dreamy smugness. “Nothing so glamorous.” He rolled his glass across his chest and, feigning a grand manner, intoned, “ ‘You spent hack. Take it to the tabs, Jew.’ ”

Abatangelo pushed the letter away. “Tabloids take this kind of thing?”

Waxman waved the question off. “The best of the bunch, or the worst, take your pick, accused me of”- Waxman snapped his fingers- “how did he put it- ’hand-feeding the paranoid delusions of a disturbed and gullible minority.’ ”

It seemed strangely apropos that Waxman would have memorized the invective. “They mean liberals,” Abatangelo guessed.

Waxman gestured for the waitress and when she arrived he handed her a ten, telling her, “Given the crowd, why not bring me two, dear, save you a second trip.” The waitress turned to Abatangelo then and he noticed the weary eyes, the cheerless smile, the heavy rouge. The kind of woman Shel feared becoming, he thought. He ordered Myers neat with a water back, and once she was gone, Waxman said, “So what brings you to this particular watering hole? Lost?”

Abatangelo withdrew his photographs of Shel and set them on the table. Waxman eyed the packet warily.

“Take a look, Wax. Let me tell you a story.”

Waxman reluctantly reached out, collected the plasticine envelope and bent back the fold. He fished the pictures out and sighed, turning them right side up. He made it seem a monstrous chore.

“This is your sort of story, Wax. I’ve been following your work since I got out, and when this thing came my way, your name was the first that came to mind.” He checked Waxman’s eyes for suspicion. “Christians scare me too, Wax. And yet, when all’s said and done, they aren’t half as scary as some of their friends.”

Waxman punctuated his review of the photographs with a laborious sigh. Abatangelo leaned closer.

“I was in the tank ten years. When I first got in, the Aryans were cartoons. A sideshow in the yard. But over time, you know? They held their little conclaves. They went to school, they studied the IRA and the Whitecaps, they read The Turner Diaries and Mein Kampf . They sent their converts out into the world. There’s your shock troops, Wax. How many militia contingents are there in this state, couple dozen? In every goddamn one, I promise, there’s at least one guy who got indoctrinated doing hard time. And he’ll be the one everybody listens to when it comes time to talk methods.”

The waitress returned with their drinks. Abatangelo waited till she was gone before resuming. “People in this country think drugs, Wax, they think bangers. Spades, pachucos. It’s bullshit. The white underground, the militias, without crank they’re nothing but a rumor. Crystal’s how they bankroll their ordnance. Which brings us to the pictures you’ve been looking at. You remember the face, right?”

Waxman glanced down at the photographs of Shel he was holding. He nodded.

“She only did three and change, wandered around for four years, then bumped into your average cranker. Some garden variety mutt, low chump on the totem pole, didn’t-know-what-I-was-getting-into sort of guy. The gang he ran with, based out in east CoCo County, they were heavy folks. Biker equivalent of Blut und Ehre . Pushing meth in the Delta, had the market to themselves. Then the Mexicans showed up. Boom, it’s war. And this little mutt, his mother was Chicano I guess, he had sympathies, he got greedy, whatever the reason, he tried to play it both ways. Now he’s in a spot. A spot where he’s had to kill to get back into good graces.”

He paused to judge the effect he was making. Waxman refused to look at him.

“You heard about the Briscoe family, bigwigs up in Lodi. Lost a pair of twins. Whacked. Guess who: same guy we’re talking about here. Same guy who did what you’re looking at.” He picked up one of the photographs and flicked it with his finger. “You’re going to hear word in the next day or two of some shoot-’em-up over in the Delta, too. Some kind of gunfight gone wrong. Again, guess who. Think like a prosecutor, Wax. Start with the little guy, the mutt who did this. Snap that link, then move up the chain. You’ll have the story of your career.” Abatangelo put the picture back down. “I’ve got some other pictures, too. One of a sixteen-wheeler rolling out of a compound at midnight from the property where these guys operate. What do you think the driver was carrying, Wax? Maybe we should trace the license, go ask him.”