Badlands

TWO HOURS LATER Joseph Edmund Swa

Swa

When he was a child of six, a woman in Galveston—an aging circus acrobat with flame-red tresses and ill-fitting teeth, the portly doye

Swa

This evening Faerwood was ominously quiet. For the moment.

At eight o’clock he prepared himself a modest di

For dessert he allowed himself a thin slice of a devilish chocolate ganache he had picked up on a whim from Miel Patisserie on Seventeenth Street.

As he savored the cake, he thought about Katja. She did not look healthy. He fed her very well, of course, bathed her, smoothed her skin with the finest emollients money could buy, met all her needs religiously. And yet she looked sallow, resigned, older.

When he finished the cake, he crossed the great room to the kitchen, placed his dish and fork in the sink, then returned. He selected an LP from the shelf, started the turntable, carefully placed the needle. Soon, the strains of Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro filled the room. He always played “Dove sono” when things were about to change.

Before he reached the stairs, the voice thundered up from somewhere deep inside him.

“Joseph.”

Swa

“Where dwells the effect, Joseph?”

“The effect is in the mind, sir.”

“And the method?”

For a few agonizing moments, Swa

“Joseph?”

It came to him. “The method is in the soul.”

A few moments later, fully returned to the moment, he checked the quality of his breath, the order of his hair, the knot in his tie. He took a few seconds, then climbed the stairs, hesitating briefly on each tread. When he reached the second floor he walked down the hallway, drew the key from his vest pocket, then unlocked and opened the door to Katja’s room.

She was sitting on the bed, staring out the barred window, her thin legs dangling over the side. She was growing so pale. Her eyes were blank and vacant, her wrists and arms were stick thin. She wore a pale blue nightdress. Her feet were bare.

Swa

“Good evening, my love,” he said.

She slowly turned her head. She parted her dry lips, but said nothing.

Swa

The lunch sat untouched.

“You haven’t eaten,” he said.

For a few moments Katja just stared, as if she did not recognize him. For a further moment he thought she had not even heard him. It got that way near the end. The dreamy look, the soiled sheets, the stuttering. Then, weakly, she said: “I want to go home.”

“Home?” He tried to say this as i

Katja stared at him, through him, her face a blank, gessoed canvas. “It’s… it’s my…”

He sat on the bed, next to her. “Your parents? Your family?”

Katja just nodded, slowly. There was none of the vibrancy he had seen that first day, none of zest. On that day she had been a whirlpool of teenaged energy, ready for any challenge, any idea.

He took her hand in his. Her palm felt like desiccated parchment.

“But I am taking care of you now, dearest.” He reached out, gently stroked her hair. It felt damp and greasy between his fingers. Earlier in the day he had reminded himself to give her a bath. Now there hardly seemed any point. He removed a handkerchief from his pocket, wiped his fingers.

She nodded weakly.

“Think of it, Katja. Of all the people in your life, all your family and friends, have I not been the kindest? I read to you, I feed you, I paint your toenails your favorite color.”

The truth was, it was his favorite color. Persimmon.

Katja looked toward the window, at the shafts of frail sunlight. She remained silent.

“Drink some tea,” he said. “You will feel much better.” He stood, crossed the room, lifted the insulated pitcher, poured a cup of tea. It was still warm. He dropped into it a sugar cube. He returned to the bed, sat, stirring, the sound of sterling silver on bone china circling the room.

He got Katja’s attention, lifted the cup to her lips. She took a small sip. He dabbed her mouth with a linen napkin.

“You’re taking care of me,” she said.

Poor Katja. He had tried with her. He had tried so hard with them all.

“Come with me, love.” He put the cup and saucer down on the nightstand, extended a hand.

“Where are we going?” she asked.

“Somewhere safe.”

Swa

Katja stood, shaking, her thin legs not quite supporting her. Joseph Swa

“Are you taking me home?” she asked.

He looked into her eyes. He found no trace of the firebrand he had met in the park, the young woman who had so willingly accepted his aid and comfort. All without thanks.

Moments later, they descended the stairway. Mozart filled the house. Three floors below the magic box awaited.

“Yes,” Swa

TEN

KEVIN BYRNE SAT across from the Denison apartments. The top floor of the building, the side facing Locust Street, was smoke blackened, charred. Gnarled ebony fingers caressed the brick façade. The air on the entire block was still dense with carbon.

Byrne was exhausted, but exhaustion was an old friend. He glanced at his watch: 2:15 AM.