“You don’t need to be killed for it! Christ Almighty! Get back to Austin and wait until they catch him!”
“Go ahead,” Berke said to True. “What else?”
“Then you’re back to the regular schedule: the Red Door in Phoenix on the 8th; the next night Staind Glass in Albuquerque; on the 15th the Lizard Lounge in Dallas; and on the 16th back in Austin at the Vista Futura.” True had realized, after speaking with Roger Chester, that he was facing a massive endeavor in scouting out all these locations and setting up security, much less keeping the mobile teams rolling. City lawyers were not so keen on putting their citizens at risk, the police departments didn’t want to feel they were being pushed around by the FBI, and for the first time today True had heard from the Tucson office the mention of all the money that was sinking into this operation. Though True was the big dog, he was not the only big dog and there were large hands on the leashes. Also today, the large hand on the leash in Tucson had pointed out that, while reports were coming in of Jeremy Pett being sighted in a dozen states including Alaska and Florida, if Pett had any sense of survival he would have headed straight to Mexico while he was so close to the border. Had he made it in soon after his description had gone public? Had he already gone before? The pickup truck’s tag hadn’t been seen on any of the cameras at the border crossings, but a man who wanted to get through could walk it.
Careful with this one, Truitt, the warning had been delivered. This could really blow up in your face.
This road managing job was hard work. He was a detail guy, sure, but planning the gas stops and the meal stops and where the band was going to stay in all those cities, and then putting together the security both outside and inside the clubs and clearing his operation with the local police and mobilizing agents from different field offices…it was tougher than he’d expected.
He wouldn’t be doing this, if he wasn’t—
“How about Pett’s family?” Nomad asked, breaking into True’s thoughts. “His mother and father. Have you checked his house?”
“The first day,” True answered. “We’re watching the house and we got their okay to set up a tap and an intercept. They haven’t heard from their son since the accident in Houston. He briefly visited them before he went back to Iraq. I’ll tell you that Mr. Pett is also a veteran Marine, of the hard-bitten old school, who I am told seems to think his son lacked the toughness to make it a career. Pett’s mother, I also am told, is hardly a presence in the house. The agent who went there described her as ‘trying to make herself invisible’.”
“I think he’s probably gone to Mexico.” Terry finished his stew and put the spoon aside. “I think he’s done what he wanted to do, and he’s gone.”
“You don’t know that!” Chappie said. “I think it’s insane, you putting yourself out there like—” The Clash played their little snippet of ‘London Calling’ again, and Chappie looked at another number she didn’t know on her cellphone screen. “Sitting ducks,” she finished, before she answered. “Hello? Oh, Jesus. Wait a minute.” She asked the gathering if anyone wanted to talk to the National Star.
“Another thing,” True said when Chappie had refused the call. “At your sound check this afternoon—in about ninety minutes from now—there are going to be all sorts of media folks present. Roger Chester clued me in that People magazine is sending a reporter and photographer. The local news will be there. Maybe some other magazines and who knows who else.”
“DJ Talk It Up will be there,” Nomad said. “Trying to get a little piece of Ariel.”
“Who?”
“Don’t mind John,” Ariel advised. “It’s a guy with a podcast. He called this morning.”
“Nobody gets past me.” True’s blue eyes were burning bright. “That’s what I want you to know. I see all credentials and talk to everybody who wants a piece of whomever. Right?”
“You’re the road manager,” Berke said.
“And I thought I used to be fucking crazy,” Chappie muttered into her coffee cup.
True grunted but said nothing more. All this talk about crazy and insane.
He had decided not to tell them the rest of it, either about Connor Addison or the guy with the .22 rifle who’d been captured making his torturous climb up Hell Mountain. No, best not to tell them. He didn’t want anybody to get—what was the term Berke had used?—‘creeped out’.
“I’m going to take a nap for an hour,” True said as he stood up. He took his bowl and glass to the sink, and he realized he was avoiding eye contact with everyone. Then he went directly to the couch in the den, where he had set up his ‘command center’ on the desk next to the computer and wireless cable modem that Floyd Fisk had used.
When the Scumbucket pulled up to the Casbah just before three o’clock with True at the wheel, it was clear the circus had come to town. Satellite trucks bearing TV news logos were nearly blocking Kettner Avenue, and the police were on hand to try to keep everybody moving. The Casbah’s crew helped with unloading the gear. The music room was small—intimate, they would say—and only held about a hundred and thirty or so patrons, but there were at least forty news media people milling around waiting for The Five. The ceiling was low and the stage was backed with a wall of what appeared to True to be black leather seat cushions. He introduced himself to the owner and the manager and talked to them for a few minutes, and then as the equipment was set up on stage True put himself between the band and the media hounds and tried to maintain some order.
Ariel was amazed at this turnout, at the shouting for attention and the glare of the camera lights that followed her as she made her way across the room. Berke didn’t look right or left. Terry ducked his head down, suddenly a lot shyer in a spotlight than he’d ever thought he would be. Nomad just laughed; here were all these cameras grabbing his image for national exposure, and instead of a young long-haired, street-tough Elvis he looked like the loser in a four-man cage fight.
The Casbah’s owner, a bearded man named Tim Mays, got up on stage and told the assembly that they were welcome to do their interviews for one hour—starting now—but after that they had to clear out so the checks could be done and everything prepped for the show tonight.
True was true to his word and started asking to see credentials—business cards, personal identification, whatever—of people lining up for interviews, which seemed to piss some of them off but he couldn’t care less about that; the way he blocked the path to the table where The Five had parked themselves said he was the big dog in this room, and if anybody didn’t like it they might as well pack up their digital capture gear into their black bags—which had to be searched, for the sake of security—and move their asses on out da doah.
The People magazine team, a young Asian-American woman wearing pink eyeglasses and a lanky guy with curly brown hair who carried his expensive Nikon like it was a five-dollar basketball, came on in and set up to do their interview. How does it feel to suddenly be so successful? Now, how long have you guys been together? John, what did you think about when you made that jump? Oh…yeah…you go by the name Nomad, right? Do you guys have any idea how you got on Jeremy Pett’s radar? What about Connor Addison? Tell me a little bit about yourselves, just a brief bio. What’s your plan after this tour is over?
Everybody looked to Nomad for the answer to that one. He said, “We’re working on it.”
“Good luck,” said the People reporter, after the pictures had been taken of The Five on stage against the black cushion background, their faces pressed together as if they were one single entity, their right hands extended, palms out, each five fingers strong. No smiling, exude confidence and toughness, and let your shiner and the fading scratches on your cheek speak to every poor man’s son.