Текст книги "Foodchain"

Автор книги: Jeff Jacobson

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FOODCHAIN

A Novel

Jeff Jacobson

Antenna Books

Brooklyn, NY

FOODCHAIN. Copyright © 2010 by Jeff Jacobson. All rights reserved. Published in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

A different version of the first chapter previously appeared in F Magazine, published by Columbia College in Chicago.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Jacobson, Jeff (Jeffory)

              Foodchain / Jeff Jacobson

                            p.   cm.

ISBN: 978-1-62306-041-1

1. Hunters—Fiction.  2. Vendetta—Fiction.  3. Ranchers—Fiction.  4. Exotic animals—Fiction.  5. California, Northern—Fiction

I. Title

Originally published by Five Star, March 2010 in conjunction with Tekno Books and Ed Gorman

Antenna Books ebook edition, December 2015

www.antennabooks.com

For Dad

DAY ONE

 

In the sudden silence that filled the trunk after the engine died, Frank heard strange cries and howls. The other guy locked in with him started whimpering again. Frank got the feeling that the guy, a little man with a billion freckles, had been out here before, but the guy hadn’t said much, just sobbed damn near the whole ride. Frank fought the urge to kick him to shut him up.

They’d been in the trunk of the long black car for hours and when it was finally opened, the light from four piss-yellow floodlights made Frank squint. Empty cages and bare concrete slabs surrounded a gravel parking lot, as if a primitive roadside zoo had been abandoned halfway through construction.

Sergio and Giulio, the quiet gentlemen who drove the car, stepped away from the trunk and jerked their heads. Frank and Red climbed out awkwardly; their hands were bound with plastic zip-ties. Frank wore a short sleeve button-up shirt, boxers, and one sock. The gravel felt warm under his bare foot.

Red recognized the place and made a hurt sound through gritted teeth. He said, “Please. Just listen to me. I’ll pay Mr. Castellari. I’ll pay, okay? Please. I’ve stashed enough money away—you need to listen to me.”

It didn’t look like the quiet gentlemen were listening. Frank didn’t know if they were related to Castellari in some way, maybe his nephews, or God forbid, his sons. They looked like him, no necks, not really, just muscle; the bottom of their ears damn near brushed the shoulders of their black suits. But unlike Castellari, Frank didn’t think they wouldn’t change their expressions if he set their black hair on fire. No anger. No impatience. No joy, either. No nothing. It was as if all their emotions had been sucked out by an especially enthusiastic abortionist who had jammed his hollow knife into the back of their skulls and vacuumed out all feeling. They marched Frank and Red into the dead zoo, following a line of flickering floodlights.

Red sniffled harder, breathing in hushed, staccato hisses. “You gotta listen to me. Please. Please. I’ll take you right to it. All you gotta do is drive there, you understand? Please.” The pleading broke down into sobs, tears, and mucus dripping onto his stomach and the plastic cuffs.

Sergio pulled out a tiny cell phone, extended one stubby finger the size of a plump hot dog and hit a button. Frank wondered how he managed to hit just one button, considering the size of that finger. Giulio jangled the keys in the left pocket of his suit and checked his watch.

“We’re here,” Sergio said, in a clear, polite voice, his first words all day. He nodded, and held the phone out to Frank.

That’s when Frank realized that he was a dead man. This was a goodbye call.

If tonight was simply a warning, then Enzo Castellari would have waited. He would have left Frank wondering what the hell was going to happen all the way out here, out in the middle of nowhere with all the weird animal howls. Castellari wouldn’t call, he wouldn’t say anything. He’d just let Frank sweat it out, scare the shit out of himself, all on his own. Then, after seeing something, a demonstration, maybe something having to do with the other poor bastard stuck in the trunk, and after Frank got so scared he was ready to piss himself, then Castellari would talk to him.

But to talk to Frank before he even had a chance to see what could happen, before his imagination had a chance to run screaming into the night…Frank knew his time was up. Castellari simply wanted the satisfaction of saying goodbye. So Frank gingerly took the phone with the heavy realization that no matter what Castellari said, no matter what kind of salvation was promised, every word was a lie.

“Yeah,” Frank said.

“Hello Frank.” Castellari’s voice was smooth, polished; it slithered into Frank’s right eardrum, curling itself up and making itself at home. “I imagine right now you’re a little…worried. Wondering where you are and all. That’s understandable.”

Frank didn’t answer right away, just waited until it became apparent that Castellari wasn’t going to say anything until he acknowledged the question. Or was it a statement? Frank wasn’t sure. So he just said, “Yeah.”

“Take a good look at the man with you. Take a good look.”

Frank shifted the phone slightly, tilting it away from his ear, and hit the volume button with his pinkie. The voice continued, getting just loud enough to catch Red’s attention. Red stopped sniffling, his eyes meeting Frank’s and getting bigger by the second.

Castellari said, “There’s a man who can make numbers dance and sing, make no mistake. No matter how foul my financial excrement smelled, this man could sift those numbers through that magnificent, devious brain of his and it would always come up smelling like roses. Always.” A plastic sigh, full of resignation. “Trouble is, this man apparently felt I wasn’t valuing his services…appropriately. So, while it was true that he could make the numbers dance and sing, they were still out of tune.”

Castellari was always a melodramatic sonofabitch, but Frank made sure Red was getting it. And boy oh boy, he was getting it, all right. He’d frozen altogether, staring at Frank, at Frank’s right hand, at the phone.

“Now, this man was warned. Make no mistake about this. He was given every opportunity to rectify the musical numbers. But some men simply do not listen, no matter how loudly you speak, no matter how much effort you put into…impressing upon them the significance of the matter. I trust you’re listening, Frank?”

“Yeah.”

“This man has been in your shoes. He’s been here before. He knows what awaits him.” Castellari took a deep, patient breath, enjoying himself. “This man has seen God. He’s seen God, up close and personal. Unfortunately, this man was not…impressed with God.” Castellari paused. “Few men need to see God twice.”

Air hissed out of Red’s nose like it was escaping a tiny hole in a balloon.

“So. Now you’re in the position of trying to understand the significance of this matter. You watch and try to learn something. Are you listening, Frank?”

Frank didn’t say anything. Let the sonofabitch wait this one out. “Okay, Frank. Okay.” It took him a while to realize that Castellari had hung up.

* * * * *

They passed rows of dead carnival rides. Tangled metal, twisted spires, and dusty bench seats with safety bars stuck upright were collected together in a spiderweb of gathering shadows and faded colors that seemed to suck the light out of the air instead of reflecting it. Frank recognized a few rides from his childhood. The Whizzer. The Tilt-A-Whirl. The Mangler. The Ferris wheels looked like giant wagon wheels, leaning against each other, remnants of failed pioneer trips to the promised land of California.

A flashlight flickered over Frank and Red; another man was waiting for them. Folds of pale, hairy flesh spilled out from around a leather apron and erupted around his chin. Tiny dull eyes gazed out from between snarled eyebrows and blackheads. Loose rubber boots rose almost to his knees. A metal tube dangled from his belt. He carried the flashlight in his right hand and a large plastic bucket in his left. The bucket was full of fresh bones. Plenty of gristle. Chunks of meat, some covered in gray fur, swimming in blood.

They walked. The zookeeper led the way, picking his way through rows of cages, sweeping his flashlight back and forth in the dusty air. Many of the cages were secured on flatbed truck trailers. Animals started to appear. Most were dead. There were a lot of big cats. A lion sprawled on his side, all four legs splayed away from his swollen stomach. A dead leopard, his head wedged between two bars. Flies crawled over its gray tongue. The flashlight kept checking cage locks and doors, nailing cringing animals into corners, scattering the black shadows under the flatbeds.

They passed a cage that ran the length of a flatbed. A huge animal stood motionless inside. Four ancient, sagging pillars rose into shoulders that crested at nearly six feet tall. The creature was over thirteen feet long, covered in a heavy, wrinkled gray skin that seemed at least twice as big as the bones underneath. It reminded Frank of a horse, with a long, sloping skull that tapered down to a rounded snout. Black eyes reflected the flashlight. Two flat, smooth spots, like stumps of trees, dominated the top of its nose.

Frank realized that he was looking at an old rhinoceros, standing ankle deep in its own shit. Its horns had been cut off. Flies, sluggish in the cool air, covered the entire cage like a buzzing black blanket.

A tiger paced incessantly along thin bars, rumbling low in his throat. Several lionesses lay in separate corners of one large cage, tails flicking at sluggish flies. At the sight of the zookeeper and the bucket, they pulled themselves to their feet and snarled. It sounded like old muscle car engines, old 454 V-8s, sounds that made your teeth vibrate and shake your fillings loose.

The entire zoo erupted in more snarls, howls, screeches. It was feeding time and everybody was hungry; but Frank knew this went beyond simple hunger. He could count ribs on nearly every animal; they were slowly starving to death. This was where circuses came to die, where animals too old, too tired, too unpredictable, finished their lives, in a carnival junkyard, refugees from dying traveling zoos, unprepared private owners, and cancelled casino shows. It was a waiting room for the damned, as if hell was simply too full at the moment.

The zookeeper strolled from cage to cage, reaching into the bucket and tossing scraps of bloody meat through the bars. Frank recognized leg muscles, paws, and other pieces of dogs from the meat in the bucket. The cats pounced instantly, growling, snarling, snatching the chunks, ripping the morsels away from each other.

They reached the last cage in the row. It held a huge male lion, nearly ten feet long. He jammed his massive snout against the cage door, straining the thin bailing wire that had been twisted around the bars, securing the door. A very deep, very drawn sigh hushed out from his chest. He tilted his head and roared, shaking the matted mane and exposing teeth bigger than the quiet gentlemen’s fingers. The sound reminded Frank of a jet taking off. The roar held enough authority to quiet the rest of the zoo, at least for a few seconds.

Frank noticed the zookeeper didn’t get too close while tossing the meat into the cages. He may have been fat and lazy, but he wasn’t stupid. Frank took a long, hard look at the bailing wire holding the door shut. It looked like it had been there for a long time; most of the wire had rusted together.

The zookeeper pulled a greyhound’s head out of the bucket, holding onto the slim ear. He tossed the skull into the cage. The lion seized and cracked the greyhound’s skull between those giant teeth. It sounded like small branches being snapped for kindling.

Red started crying again, really sobbing. His nose dribbled more mucus, then suddenly erupted with blood. The thick liquid bubbled out of his nostrils, sheeting his upper lip in crimson snot, and kept spilling down, across his bottom lip and over his chin. Frank wondered if the accountant had discovered the wonderful world of cocaine; if so, that might explain Castellari’s financial concerns. Frank almost felt sorry for the guy.

The zookeeper looked at Red like he’d just scraped a plump white bug out from under his toenail with a pocketknife. He snorted, coughed up a thick ball of phlegm and stuck it in his bottom lip, saving it for later. He grinned. “Didn’t think you would be back. Thought you were smarter.”

Mucus bubbles swelled in Red’s nostrils and popped. “Hey,” Red croaked. “Hey. You guys listening? I can make you rich. Rich. Oh Jesus, I’ve got so much money stashed away, you have no idea. Please. Just listen to me. Please.”

Frank tried to tune out Red’s bleating and focus on the quiet gentlemen. Overpowering them was out of the question. They just stood there like goddamn Buddhist statues. Although these guys were about as Asian as John Wayne when he pretended to be Genghis Khan in that movie where he’d worn some kind of goofy wig and heavy goop over his eyes to make him look Oriental. Frank wondered if they were anywhere near where they made that movie, because it had been filmed a tad too close to a nuclear test site, and as it turned out, as the whole cast, the whole crew, everybody really, had grown themselves nasty, awful lively cases of cancer, just like Frank’s Mom, who in the end couldn’t do a whole hell of a lot more than bark sticky clots of blood out of her charbroiled lungs onto wadded balls of Kleenex as he helped her apply lipstick even as her wig slid off and—FUCKING CHRIST—

Frank bit the side of his tongue. Not too hard. Just enough to draw blood. Just enough to snap things back into focus. The fear had his mind on the run; it kept racing, looping, straying back into tangents, slipping back into his past. He shifted gears, skipping down through the spinning teeth in his mind, and tried to focus on the moment.

Acting like he thought they were on the move again, Frank took two steps forward and collided with the zookeeper. The fat man flinched, jerked away. The bucket hit the ground and toppled over. Blood and meat spilled out into the dust.

Frank stepped back and mumbled, “Sorry,” aware of the blood seeping into the dirt, watching the lion’s nostrils expand and contract.

The zookeeper shoved him, holding the flashlight against Frank’s throat. The metal tube came out of his belt and made a crackling sound as he held it up to Frank’s face. “Just what exactly is your fucking problem, retard?” he asked. “I’ll fry your brain like goddamn scrambled eggs.”

The lion roared again and slammed into the bars, eyes narrowing into slits, nostrils flaring.

* * * * *

A lone flatbed blocked the path. It looked like some kind of tank, at least thirty feet long and ten feet high. Narrow metal stairs had been secured to the side, rising from the ground and clinging to the side of the tank for about twenty feet before descending back to the ground.

The zookeeper stomped up the stairs; the rusty metal shuddered and groaned. He sidled along the catwalk, flinging the remaining blood in the bucket over the tank. After dropping the bucket next to him, he looked down at the men and said, “Awright then. Make ’em strip. I ain’t fetching any more clothes out this time. It ain’t good for ’em; fucks ’em up .” He shook his chins. “They puke out that shit for days.”

Red dropped to his knees, keening, “Please, please, please,” over and over and over. Blood seeped down from his nose, down his chin, down his shirt. Frank blinked and Sergio had a knife. One moment his hands were empty, the next, he held a wicked looking six-inch blade. It was like a magic trick. Frank wondered if Sergio had learned it from one of the magicians in the casino shows.

Sergio brought the knife down and effortlessly split Red’s shirt in half, from the back of the collar down to the small of his back. Red suddenly found his feet and herked and jerked his way up the stairs.

Sergio reached out and caught the back of Red’s khakis. The knife came down again, splitting the fabric covering Red’s bony ass. Red fell forward, grunting and spitting blood, and crawled out of his shredded pants.

The zookeeper said, “Take off your shoes.”

Giulio stepped closer to Frank, nodding at Frank’s clothes. Frank started to unbutton his shirt. He glanced up over Giulio’s broad shoulder into the pale yellow darkness. Snarls, screeches, and howls echoed off the cages, flatbeds, and carnival rides, but he didn’t hear what he wanted—metal on metal.

Up on the catwalk, the zookeeper said, “Take off them socks.”

“Oh God, please. Just listen to me a minute. Just for a—”

The zookeeper jerked out his cattle prod and cracked it across Red’s forehead. “I said, take off them fuckin’ socks.”

Sergio started up the stairs and Frank hoped the catwalk wouldn’t support their weight. The metal moaned a little, but held. Red curled into a ball, drawing his bony knees up to his pale, hairless chest and covering his head with his freckled arms.

“Jesus humpin’ Christ. You pussy.” The zookeeper thumbed the switch and the cattle prod crackled like bitter laughter. Without hesitation, he jabbed Red just under the armpit. Red flopped and wriggled for several seconds, making “Uhhhh-uhhhh-uhhhh” sounds. A dark stain spread across the front of his white underwear and urine ran across his hip, his thigh. Sergio, apparently familiar with the effects of the prod, held off on grabbing Red until the zookeeper withdrew it. He caught hold of Red’s calf and the six-inch blade snickered through Red’s green sock.

But Red wasn’t giving up easy. He kicked out with other leg and caught Sergio square in the balls. Sergio exhaled harshly, took half a step backward, then leaned back in and slammed the blade into Red’s thigh, driving it deep, all the way to the hilt.

Red’s scream even shocked the monkeys into silence.

Then Frank heard what he’d been waiting for—a distant, twanging, metallic snap. It didn’t look like the zookeeper had heard it. In front of Frank, Giulio allowed a flicker of impatience to flash across his emotionless features. He fixed his dead gaze on Frank and pulled out his own knife. Frank didn’t want to get stuck like Red, so he quickly yanked his shirt off, tearing the buttons over the plastic cuffs. He curled his big toe into the top of his one sock and dragged it off.

Up on the catwalk, Red wouldn’t stop his high-pitched screaming. Sergio plucked the knife out of Red’s thigh and grabbed hold of Red’s bleeding nose with his other hand, pinching the nostrils shut with his huge thumb and forefinger. He held Red’s head very still and wiped the blade clean in the red hair. He cut off the other sock with his newly cleaned blade and sliced Red’s underwear in half at the hip.

Giulio nodded at Frank’s boxers. Frank took a deep breath, slid his boxers down to his ankles, and kept watching the darkness under the cages.

Red managed one more “—please—” before the zookeeper and Sergio lifted his naked, bleeding body and dropped him into the tank with a dull splash.

Above and behind him, Frank heard quick, savage movement. A desperate, gurgled shriek. Brittle leather scraped over wet iron. Water, thick with algae, splashed over the rim, slid down the outside of the tank, and dripped onto the top of his head, trickling down the back of his neck. It felt warm, like a used bath.

The zookeeper and Sergio turned to stare down at Frank. He tried to breathe slow, easy, and found that he couldn’t even take a breath. His exposed balls felt cold and shriveled in the night air. He curled his toes, felt the sand and grit underneath. It was time to make his move. He’d stalled long enough. He had to try something, anything. Trouble was, nothing was coming to him. Nothing was left inside. Nothing except the urge to simply bolt, to spring naked between the cages, to flee shrieking into the night.

But the quiet gentlemen would catch him. And they’d make his death last for days. So he started up the stairs, legs feeling weak, like overcooked spaghetti, head down, hands cupped over his dick and balls. It was a funny time for modesty, but ingrained habits died hard. Giulio followed him up the stairs, snicking the knife away.

The surface of the water seethed and boiled as if it was alive. Frank caught a flash of white, a belly maybe. Whatever it was, it wasn’t Red. A flat, tapered tail slapped the surface with eagerness. Something dark rolled several times and disappeared in the roiling water. Bubbles, silver in the yellow light, popped and fizzed. The zookeeper bent over and banged the cattle prod several times against the side of the tank.

Shadows rose to the surface. They were large, maybe eight, ten feet long and nearly two feet across.

Frank finally realized that the tank was full of alligators.

Freezing terror scrabbled up his spine and sunk its fangs into the bottom of his brain. His knees quivered, threatened to collapse completely. He should have known. Should have known that the tank would be stuffed with some kind of goddamn squirming nightmare. He hated reptiles, alligators especially. Ever since he was a little kid in East Texas, playing on the sloping lawn that dropped abruptly into that black canal.

Frank didn’t trust anything that didn’t generate its own body heat.

A single word, “PLEASE” erupted in his throat like the silver bubbles in the tank and nearly popped in his mouth. But he choked it down. He’d be damned if he started begging now. For a moment, under the gassy, rotten smell of the water, he suddenly smelled his father, the sickly sweet smell of his shaving lotion.

“Go ahead. Shoot me. Get it over with,” he said.

The rubbery folds in the zookeeper’s face split into a smile. “Fine. Shoot him then.”

Sergio shook his head. “We can’t. Mr. Castellari gave specific instructions.”

“Just shoot me. C’mon, you spineless fucks. You fucking wop motherfucking cocksucking—Frank’s voice got high and tight, like an overstrung violin, and he screamed, “Shoot, you greasy motherfucking—”

But instead Sergio and Giulio curled their thick fingers around the muscles above Frank’s elbows, and the sudden sense of being powerless, of being forced, slithered into his mind and squatted above the gleaming fangs of terror, enveloping his consciousness in a white, blurry haze of shock.

And just as the two quiet gentlemen started to tilt Frank forward, forcing him to topple face first into the alligator tank, just as all the strength left his knees and he felt his own warm, humiliating piss run down the inside of his left leg, just as the zookeeper played his flashlight over the rolling black water, catching the awful black eyes of the alligators, the lion leapt.

* * * * *

Later, Frank could only guess that the lion had been driven into a frenzy by the smell of the blood and raw greyhound meat in the dust, maddeningly just out of reach, and had somehow forced its cage door open just enough to slip out. After gulping down the few pieces and licking up Red’s vomit, he must have followed the drops of nose blood and the pure, uncut scent of panic, obeying the oldest instinct of all, older than fear.

Hunger.

Frank sensed, rather than heard, the roar behind him, felt the impact of the lion hit the catwalk like a five hundred pound wrecking ball. The lion came down hard on Sergio, claws slicing through the tasteful suit like a plow breaking through the last frost of winter.

Frank grabbed Giulio’s left wrist with both hands as he fell forward and pulled the heavy, quiet gentleman down. They toppled into the tank together, Frank fumbling for the car keys in Giulio’s suit pocket. Frank’s bare feet hit the slimy bottom and he instantly kicked out, driving his heels into Giulio’s chest, pushing himself back towards the catwalk. He heard nothing but a rush of bubbles and the thin, staccato beat of his own heart.

The lion’s back feet, claws outstretched like lethal grappling hooks, caught the bottom rung of the railing. As the front legs bounced off the catwalk, the ungodly massive shoulders rolled with the impact. The back legs tensed, pulling the giant cat backwards. Sergio dropped to his knees, his eyes popping open as shock ratcheted into his soul.

The zookeeper stumbled away, fumbling with the cattle prod, and fell backwards down the stairs.

Sergio managed to get his .38 clear of the holster just as the lion’s front left paw swung through the air like a scythe and sent the quiet gentleman’s arm, fingers still clenched around the taped gun handle, sailing out over Frank and the alligator tank. The arm spun, spitting a fine mist of blood into a rainbow above the black water and yellow light. The hand muscles twitched and the gun flinched, firing a round into the night sky.

The lion rolled his back hips over the railing with a fluidity that matched the surface of the water and stalked forward, inch-long splintered claws slipping into the gaps in the steel mesh.

Sergio took one solid, confident step forward. In his mind, he raised the .38 and squeezed off three quick shots.

The lion struck faster than a rattlesnake, clapping his great stretched paws on Sergio’s shoulders and crunching his skull between his jaws like a hammer under a walnut. The cat shook his head once, twice, and raggedly ripped Sergio’s head off.

Down in the tank, Frank gathered his legs under his chest and shoved down as hard as he could manage, throwing himself onto the catwalk, just under the flicking tail. The steel mesh chewed into his chest like a cheese grater, but he thrust his elbows down, pulling himself out of the water.

Sergio’s headless, one-armed body sank to its knees, as if he had finally given up completely, and toppled backwards, bounced down the stairs and landed heavily on top of the zookeeper, who was scrabbling away when the limp sack of bones and flesh slammed him into the dirt.

Frank rolled under the bottom rung of the railing as two quick explosions shattered the water’s surface. Frank didn’t know if Giulio was shooting at him, the lion, or the alligators; he didn’t care. His bare feet hit the dust and he broke out into a flat-out run, ignoring the sharp edges of gravel, cuffed hands swinging, elbows flailing in the cool night air.

The lion shivered, shaking his head, crunching those giant teeth together. The pieces of skull cracked into splintered fragments, dribbling blood over the black lips and tawny fur of his bottom jaw. Elegant drops clung to the long, thick whiskers like heavy dew on a spiderweb. The tufted tail flicked happily back and forth. The taste of blood had jump-started his other senses; smells suddenly gained new dimensions of texture. Every sound became crisp, clear. Even the quick snick-snick of the .38 being cocked.

Frank ran. Behind him, gunfire popped. The lion roared.

The shooting lasted for a long time and as the thunderous, almost numbing sound of gunfire continued to ring in Giulio and the zookeeper’s ears, neither heard the engine of the long black car start as Frank stomped on the gas, plowed through the front gate, and shot into the night.