Stephen Hunter - Night of Thunder

“B.J. ain’t no slouch either,” said another. “Remember in 0 and 6, he shot it out with two big black dudes in an alley in St. Louis, and though he got punctured himself, he made sure he’s standing and they’s bagged by the time that fight’s done.”

Several of the wilder Grumleys wanted to lock and load and head out for hot-blooded vengeance that very second.

“We got the machine guns, we can blast the holy Jesus out of that town in a minute and a half. With that big gun we can blow down all their church steeples, we can take that fat sad clown and hang him upside down in burning tar in the town center.”

It was at this time that Vern Pye and Ernie Grumley returned from their melancholy mission, and they got there in time to hear all the talk of rage and vengeance, of burning the flesh of the Grumley killer, of razing the municipality that spawned him, or wreaking biblical vengeance on the transgressors. Through it all handsome Vern kept himself calm. Finally and calmly he spoke.

“Now you listen up, boys. Listen to Vern. I am the oldest and the most experienced. I am maybe the most accomplished. I have three homes, three wives, gals, money in the bank, and know some country-western stars. So let me share some wisdom. May I speak, sir?”

The Reverend considered, then said, “Son Vern, you may speak your piece in the Grumley fashion.”

“Thank you, Reverend. You boys, you’s all a-rage and full of the fires of hatred and vengeance. You want to go in and flatten that place, and teach every last man and woman in it the fear of Grumley justice, and I don’t blame you a bit. But we are men of a certain creed who live by a certain code and have certain responsibilities. That is at our center and is as fierce to us as our Baptist faith and our willingness to shed and spill blood. So I say hold it in, cousins and brothers. Hold it in cold and tight and squeeze it down.

“Now we have a job we’ve contracted to do. We’ve worked hard on it. We’ve prepared and sacrificed. We’ve taken a stranger into our midst-” he indicated Brother Richard, who was slouched beneath his Richard Petty cowboy hat and fake sideburns at the rear of the room-“and let that stranger use his waspish words against us, as if he’s some kind of high and mighty. We do that because it’s part of our contract. We are professionals of a creed, brothers and cousins, and we will be true to that creed. So for now, it is my conclusion there should be no blood spilling, and that clerk should be left alone to enjoy his few minutes of glory.

“But I swear to you, and you know that Grumley to Grumley, Grumley word is holy, I swear to you that when this done finished, then we will get to the bottom of this. We will have a nice long chat with that lucky boy and we will find out what transpired and we will ascertain blame and we will pay out justice, eyeball for eyeball, earhole for earhole, heart for heart. We will inform the world that Grumley blood is too precious to be spilled, and when it is, hell visits in due turn.”

This did not mollify the Grumleys. It was not what they wanted to hear. They turned back to their father and spiritual leader.

“Is that it, Pap? Is that what you want?”

“I have considered. I see deeper into this. It’s not about that clerk. I agree he be no match for any Grumley, much less two. I see another hand at play.”

He paused.

“Who, then, Reverend?” asked Vern. “Who is the master in all this?”

“I think that goddamned old man, that gray-headed fella come in earlier, the father of that gal? You seen that fella? Something ’bout him I didn’t like. No, can’t say I didn’t like him, wasn’t no issue of liking . Was more like, he’s too calm for what he says he was. I shot a coupla clay birds for him and he said, ‘Ow, it’s so loud.’ He said, ‘Aw, I don’t like guns.’ He said that but he’s in my vision when I’m shooting and he didn’t jump none when the gun went off, as if he’d been around the report of a firearm a time or two. And he told me this odd story about how he’d got cut up in Japan, his hip laid open, but there was no point in suing the fellow what cut him, and he told that story, which made no sense without a further explanation, almost for his own private pleasure. He’s takin’ pride in it. He’s taking pleasure in some memory of some event of triumph.”

“He some kind of undercover man, sir? Is that what you’re saying?” a Grumley wondered.

“I don’t know whose agent he is, if he really is that gal’s daddy, or he’s playing a game or what. But I have done this work many a year and have developed a nose for certain things. And I got a peculiar aura off him-it’s what now I see is mankiller’s aura. There are some born to kill with a gun. They have the steel for snuffing out life with a piece of flying lead, don’t feel nothing about it. There was a breed of lawmen like that once, mankilling cops, old timers who weren’t afraid of going to the gun. I didn’t think there’s men around like that no more. Thought the last of them died years ago when they stopped calling killing a man’s job and made it like a sickness, so a man who wins a fair gunfight should feel ashamed and go into a hospital. That’ll drive your mankiller into retirement or the graveyard faster’n anything. That’s the only enemy he can’t never beat, except maybe a Grumley boy. But this old man’s one, you should know his kind has been the kind to hunt our kind since ancient days. Never thought I’d see his like again, thought that breed was vanished from the earth, but I think he’s back and hunting us.”

“So what’ll we do, Reverend?”

“Well, only one thing to do. Now we hunt him. Grumley business come first. Without Grumley, there’s nothing but chaos. Family matters most. So we must hunt and kill this bastard, and I want y’all out on the streets so as to mark him down and then we’ll finish him but good. Maybe we get done in time for the job, maybe we don’t. But Grumley come first.”

Bob realized as he left Lester’s Grocery and the clerk that without his keepers, he now had a free shot to Knoxville, could check on his daughter, talk to his wife, and pick up some firepower. He turned right out of the parking lot, drove up 167, ignoring whatever mysteries lurked behind the locked gates of the Baptist prayer camp, hit 67, and soon crossed from Johnson to Carter County, on the way west to 81, which would take him south.

Immediately it was apparent that Carter was a richer county by far. It had a man-made lake, marinas bobbing with pleasure boats visible even in the dark, bars, restaurants, vacation homes, nightlife. At one point a couple of Carter County sheriff’s cars roared by him, sirens blazing, lights pumping, and now and then a Tennessee Highway Patrol vehicle sped by, all of them clearly headed to the site of the shooting, where that boy had to hold his line for at least a few more days. Maybe when this straightened out, Bob would speak up, explain himself to Detective Thelma Fielding, take the kid off the spot and face what consequences there might be. But it seemed to him that there should be none, besides his leaving the scene of-well, of what? A crime? Not hardly. Fair, straight shooting in defense against armed men who had masks on who were moving aggressively toward him. Pure self-defense if the law was applied right.

Other things on the to-do list. Make sure to check the press accounts and see who these boys were. The second fellow had moved well and intelligently, brought fire, clearly a veteran of previous firefights of one sort or another. A professional, to be sure; he’d have tracks, associations, a record, all that which could tell an interested party a thing or two.