Ace Atkins - Devil’s garden

The entrance gate was open, and they followed the man down a winding path of crushed pebbles. Signs to the lion cages were fashioned from bamboo and oak trees canopied the path, past small red barns and little kiosks that sold postcards and stuffed lions and gum and cigarettes. They were well down the path when they heard the first scream.

“What’s that?”

“The King of the Beasts,” Sam said.

“They keep ’em locked up, don’t they?”

“One would hope.”

There were more screams and roars-definitely roars-and Daisy stepped back from the lead to take a stride beside Sam, too worried to lead but too proud to follow. The trees looked old, spared from the bulldozer and plow, and it all seemed natural and prehistoric in the moonlight.

They stopped and listened for steps but only heard the screams until the screams seemed to be coming from all around them. It was a great ring, a chain-link circle as wide around as a baseball field, at least thirty feet high, with bleachers and long nets strung from what looked like telephone poles.

“Where are they?” she whispered.

“I don’t see ’em.”

“You see him?”

“I don’t,” Sam said.

“This was a goddamn fool thing to do.”

They kept on the path, over a little bamboo bridge and toward a long red barn lit up with tiny white bulbs. Sam nearly ran into Daisy when she stopped and pulled him behind the large trunk of an oak. From the barn, an engine started, and soon another flatbed truck, identical to the one parked in front, came rambling down the path, breezing past their hiding place and slowing to an idle by the giant cage. The headlights lit up the center of the ring, and the long, lean man, Jack Lawrence, unlocked a gate and walked inside. Sam and Daisy stood watching at the narrow spot in the path well back from the idling truck.

They watched Lawrence squat on his haunches and walk backward with the edge of a tarp, the dust and gravel falling away and choking the night air. The beams of the headlights caught the dust as Lawrence emerged into the light and removed one large wooden beam and then another before disappearing for several moments down below and returning with a large crate. They could hear the bottles jostle and rattle against one another as he slid the crate into the truck and went back for more. On his third trip down into the hidden hole, Daisy walked down the path and into the headlight beams and locked the cage door.

Sam followed.

Soon Lawrence emerged with another flat of hooch and walked to the closed doors and looked puzzled, before he saw Daisy and asked, “What gives?”

Daisy twisted her knee inward and removed the pearl-handled.22 and aimed it through a diamond in the chain-link. “Got to hand it you.”

“Who are you?”

“Daisy Simpkins, federal dry agent.”

“This isn’t what you think.”

“What is it?”

“It’s mineral oil,” Lawrence said with a noticeable Australian accent.

“For the animals.”

“Sam, hold ’im.”

Sam walked up to the man, who was still hoisting the crate in his arm, and he pulled a gun and showed it. He winked at Lawrence.

“I didn’t do nothing.”

Sam smiled back.

“Hey,” Lawrence said. “What’s she doing? Hey!”

Sam heard the rusted bars and the metal gates swing open one after another. The cries of the lions had stopped, and as the animals filled the ring through their now-open chutes there was soft, contented purring. Lawrence dropped the hooch. The bottles cracked and broke, and Sam shook his head at the damn shame of it all.

“Keep the gun on him,” Daisy called out.

“Them animals will kill me,” Lawrence said.

He rattled the door and Sam squeezed the padlock with a tight click. The purring became more insistent, and in the headlights Sam noted one male, with a large, regal mane, and three females. The male hung back, his noticeable set of balls moving to and fro, while the females circled the bootlegger.

A long, trailing spot of wetness showed on Lawrence’s trousers.

“Tell us about Frisco,” Daisy said.

“It’s a nice town,” Lawrence said.

Daisy fired off the.22 at his feet. The cats growled.

“I’ll shoot you in the leg, sure as shit,” Daisy said. “You brought the booze to Arbuckle.”

The man held up his hands in the light. The truck continued to idle.

“We met at this garage,” Lawrence said. “This man opened his trunk and we loaded him down. I was paid and the man drove away.”

“Who was it?”

“His name was Hibbard.”

“First name?”

“I don’t know. Jesus, I don’t know.”

“Hibbard,” Daisy repeated. “The stuff you brought matched cases we took out of a joint called the Old Poodle Dog in Frisco. That jackass brandy came in the same bottles. The Scotch was bonded out of Canada.”

“So what?”

“You work for H. F. LaPeer.”

“Never heard of him,” Lawrence said.

“If those big cats smell a little blood, they’re gonna want a taste,” Daisy said.

“You’re crazy.”

“When’s LaPeer’s next shipment?”

One of the female lions sauntered over and ran herself between’s Lawrence’s legs, purring and growling. The male jumped from five feet away, knocking Lawrence flat on his back, his screams not unlike those of a little girl. The male straddled his chest, balls in Lawrence’s face, and yawned. Another female licked at the man’s hand while yet another sniffed at his crotch.

“I can find out.”

“What’s that?”

In a whisper, “I can find out. I can find out. I can find out.”

“And what about the Arbuckle party?”

“It’s all I know. Jesus, God. Holy hell. Mother Mary.”

“What do you think?” Daisy asked.

“I think the man has been properly motivated,” Sam said.

ROSCOE FOUND FREDDIE FISHBACK at the Cocoanut Grove bar at midnight, talking to a barmaid wearing a beaded headdress and veil, a golden bodice, and a long flowing skirt. She was laughing at one of his jokes and Freddie was laughing, too, until he saw the shadow of Roscoe over him and his smile simplified into something more like Freddie, droll and impersonal, and he offered his hand.

Roscoe looked at his hand as if it were a dead mackerel.

Freddie shrugged and puffed on his cigaratte.

The girl in the Arabian getup looked to Roscoe and bit her lip before moving on back down the bar. People were whispering and pointing, and Roscoe didn’t give a good goddamn.

“You look very sharp,” Freddie said, his Romanian accent more pronounced. He wore a tuxedo. He was very dark, with black hair and eyes. The kind of guy with a heavy brow and thick fur on his hands.

“Your housekeeper said you were in New York.”

Freddie took a sip of his cocktail and said, “She was wrong.”

“I got ditched when you stepped off the Harvard,” Roscoe said. “I pulled my Pierce off the ship and waited for you to load your bags.”

“I don’t like to wait. Do you mind, Roscoe? People are staring.”

“You’ll get used to it.”

Freddie turned back to the bar. Roscoe touched his shoulder.

“Don’t be a stupid man,” Freddie said and raised his eyebrows. “The papers?”

Freddie ordered another drink, a cocktail served in a champagne glass with a cherry. “The soldiers made this up during the war,” Freddie said. “Call it a French 75. Like the big guns. How ’bout a drink? We drink and we forget, okay?”

“How ’bout I shove that champagne glass up your ass?”

“Why not a Coke bottle?”

Roscoe gripped Freddie by the front of his tuxedo shirt and twisted him into his face. He ground his teeth so hard, he could hear them grind and pop deep into his jaw.