Wilson, Paul - The Tomb (Repairman Jack)

He kept seeing that frail old lady fading into the hospital bed, barely able to speak because of the beating she’d received at this creep's hands. A dark place was opening up inside him.

Careful!

He needed Patch conscious.

"Awright! Lemme think!"

Jack managed a slow, deep breath. Then another.

"Think. You've got thirty seconds."

It didn't take that long.

"I thought it was silver. But when I got it under a light I saw it wasn't."

"You want me to believe you didn't even try to get a few bucks for it?"

"I...I didn't like it."

Jack hesitated, not sure of how to take that.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I didn't like it, man. Something about it didn't feel right. I just threw it in some bushes."

"No bushes around here."

Patch flinched. "Are too! Two blocks down!"

Jack yanked him to his feet. "Show me."

Patch was right. Between West End and Twelfth Avenues, where Fifty-eighth Street slopes down toward the Hudson River, sat a small clump of privet hedge, the kind Jack had spent many a Saturday morning as a kid trimming in front of his parents' home in Jersey.

With Patch lying face down on the pavement by his feet, Jack reached into the bushes. A little rummaging around among the gum wrappers, used tissues, decaying leaves, and other less easily identifiable refuse produced the necklace.

Jack looked at it as it gleamed dully in the glow from a nearby streetlight.

I've done it! Goddamnit, I've done it!

He hefted it in his palm. Heavy. Had to be uncomfortable to wear. Why did Kusum want it back so badly? As he held it in his hand he began to understand what Patch had said to him about it not feeling right. It didn't feel right. He found it hard to describe the sensation more clearly than that.

Crazy, he thought. This thing's nothing more than sculptured iron and a couple of topazlike stones.

Yet he could barely resist the primitive urge to hurl the necklace across the street and run the other way.

"You gonna let me go now?" Patch said, rising to his feet.

His left hand was a dusky, mottled blue now, swollen to nearly twice its normal size He cradled it gingerly against his chest.

Jack held up the necklace. "This is what you beat up an old lady for?" he said in a low voice, feeling the rage pushing toward the surface. "She's all busted up in a hospital bed now because you wanted to rip this off, and then you threw it away."

"Look, man!" Patch said, pointing his good hand at Jack. "You've got it wrong—"

Jack saw the hand gesturing in the air two feet in front of him and the rage suddenly exploded. Without warning, he swung the sap hard against Patch's right hand. As before, crunch and a howl of pain.

As Patch sank to his knees, moaning, Jack walked past him back toward West End Avenue.

"Let's see you roll an old lady now, tough guy."

The darkness within him began to retreat. Without looking back, he started toward the more populated sections of town. The necklace tingled uncomfortably against the inside of his palm.

He wasn't far from the hospital. He broke into a run. He wanted to be rid of this thing as soon as possible.

20

The end was near.

Kusum had sent the private duty nurse out into the hall and now stood alone at the head of the bed holding the withered hand in his. Anger had receded, as had frustration and bitterness. Not gone, simply tucked away until they would be needed, leaving a void within him.

The futility of it all. All those years of life canceled by a moment of viciousness.

He could not dredge up a shred of hope of seeing the necklace returned before the end. No one could find it in time, not even the highly recommended Repairman Jack. If it was in her karma to die without the necklace, then Kusum would have to accept it. At least he had the satisfaction of knowing he had done everything in his power to retrieve it.

A knock at the door. The private duty nurse stuck her head in. "Mr. Bahkti?"

He repressed the urge to scream. It would feel so good to scream at someone.

"I told you I wished to be alone in here."

"I know. But there's a man out here. He insisted I give you this." She held out her hand. "Said you were expecting it."

Kusum stepped toward the door. He could not imagine...

Something dangled from her hand. It looked like—it wasn't possible!

He snatched the necklace from her fingers.

It's true! It's real! He found it!

Kusum wanted to sing out his joy, to dance with the startled nurse. Instead, he pushed her out the door and rushed to the bedside. The clasp was broken, so he wrapped the necklace about the throat of the nearly lifeless form there.

"It's all right now!" he whispered in their native tongue.

"You're going to be all right!"

He stepped into the hall and saw the private duty nurse.

"Where is he?"

She pointed down the hall. "At the nursing station. He's not even supposed to be on the floor, but he was very insistent. "

I'm sure he was. Kusum pointed toward the room. "See to her."

Then he hurried down the hall.

He found Jack dressed in ragged shorts and mismatched shirts—he had seen better dressed stall attendants at the Calcutta bazaar—leaning against the counter at the nursing station, arguing with a burly head nurse who turned to Kusum as he approached.

"Mr. Bahkti, you are allowed on the floor because of your grandmother's critical condition. But that doesn't mean you can have your friends wandering in and out at all hours of the night!"

Kusum barely looked at her. "We will be but a minute. Go on about your business."

He turned to Jack. He looked hot and tired and sweaty. Oh, for two arms to properly embrace this man, even though he probably smells like everyone else in this country of beef eaters. Certainly an extraordinary man. Thank Kali for extraordinary men, no matter what their race or dietary habits.

"I assume I made it in time?" Jack said.

"Yes. Just in time. She will be well now."

The American's brow furrowed. "It's going to patch her up?"

"No, of course not. But knowing it has been returned will help her up here." He tapped his forefinger against his temple. "For here is where all healing resides."

"Sure," Jack said, his expression hiding none of his skepticism. "Anything you say."

"I suppose you wish the rest of your fee."

Jack nodded. "Sounds good to me."

He pulled the thick envelope from his tunic and thrust it at Jack. Despite his prior conviction of the impossibility of his ever seeing the stolen necklace again, Kusum had kept the packet with him as a gesture of hope and of faith in the goddess he prayed to.

"I wish it were more. I don't know how to thank you enough. Words cannot express how much—"

"It's okay," Jack said quickly. Kusum's outpouring of gratitude seemed to embarrass him.

Kusum, too, was taken aback by the intensity of the emotions within him. He had given up hope. He had asked this man, a stranger, to perform an impossible task, and it had been done! He detested emotional displays, but his customary control over his feelings had slipped since the nurse placed the necklace in his hand.

"Where did you find it?"

"I found the guy who stole it and convinced him to take me to it."

Kusum felt his fist clench and the muscles at the back of his neck bunch involuntarily. "Did you kill him as I asked?"

Jack shook his head. "Nope. Told you I wouldn't. But he won't be punching out old ladies for some time. Don't worry. He's been paid back in kind. I fixed it."

Kusum nodded silently, hiding the storm of hatred raging across his mind. Mere pain was not enough—not nearly enough. The man responsible here must pay with his life.

"Very well, Mr. Jack. My family and I owe you a debt of gratitude. If there is ever anything you need that is in my power to secure for you, any goal that is in my power to achieve, you have merely to ask. All efforts within the realm of human possibility" —he could not repress a smile here— “and perhaps even beyond, will be expended on your behalf.”