If he had, Doyle, Jack, Innes, Presto, Stern, and Walks Alone would have made their way to the Chicago train station and purchased their one-way tickets to Phoenix with even greater urgency.
The night before, while visiting the dream again, Walks Alone had been able to distinguish one of the faces of the other three figures that had joined them underground:
An Asian man, who held in his hands a flaming sword.
By the time Dante Scruggs knitted his savaged wits back into something close to working order, he realized he was riding a train. A private compartment, daylight outside the windows, moving through open countryside; farms, fields of wheat. Three other men sitting with him, dressed in suits, vaguely recognizable: He'd seen them all in Frederick's offices the night before.
The men who'd hurt him.
They watched Dante closely as he came around, with interest but without emotion or friendliness. The three looked different from one another but seemed the same in behavior, gesture, each of them pulled taut as a bowstring, containing a violence that threatened to spill over at the slightest provocation. Dante understood what that feeling was all about.
"What time is it?" asked Dante.
The three men stared at him; finally one of them pointed to the watch pocket of his vest.
Looking down at himself, Dante realized he was similarly dressed, like a traveling businessman. Dante put a hand into his own vest pocket, pulled out a watch, and opened it.
Two-fifteen.
He replaced the watch. Felt a dull throbbing on the inside of his left arm, then, remembering the brand they'd inflicted on him there, decided not to touch the area or draw their attention to it. Who knew what else they might do to him?
Why couldn't he remember anything after the searing pain of those moments? Their hands holding him down; Frederick's lace looming over his, speaking softly, hypnotically. He had obviously blacked out but more than twelve hours had passed since then. Had they given him some kind of drug that erased everything else from his mind?
He wanted to ask a hundred questions, but fear kept him quiet. Something else rose up unexpectedly: a feeling of kinship with these men. Dante had seen the marks on their arms; obviously they'd all experienced what he'd gone through last night—the suffering and terror of that nightmarish initiation. It united them in a way that meant more than friendship; he didn't need friends, never had.
Fellowship, that was something else again.
What had Frederick said to him?
An army. These were soldiers, as he had been once and was now again.
Fighting men. The idea grew on him.
What had he hated about the regular army, anyway? The small talk, petty complaints, and laziness of the average volunteer, their stupidity and lack of discipline. Any behavior that distracted from what he saw as their primary business: killing.
That didn't seem to be a problem with these men. Dante felt himself relax. Maybe Frederick was right. Maybe he did fit right in.
The door opened; the two men nearest to it got up and went outside, as Frederick entered and took a seat directly across from Dante. At the sight of Frederick's handsome smiling face, Dante tensed up again, his heart raced, his palms went moist.
"How are you feeling?" asked Frederick warmly.
"Okay," said Dante. "Real good."
"Any discomfort?"
Dante shook his head.
"Any ... second thoughts?"
"No, sir."
Frederick stared at him until Dante had to look away. Frederick put a friendly hand on his knee, rubbed it intimately. Dante blushed, looked up at him, and grinned.
"You'll do just fine," said Frederick. "With your background, the training shouldn't prove difficult."
"Training?"
"Shouldn't take long, either. You've been a leader of men before. You may even be officer material."
"Whatever you say."
Frederick leaned back and studied him. "Hungry, Mr.Scruggs?"
"Yes, sir," said Dante, realizing. "Real hungry."
Frederick gestured; the man remaining in the compartment pulled down a wicker basket from the luggage rack, set it on the seat beside Dante, and snapped it open, revealing a mouthwatering selection of sandwiches, fruit, and beverages.
"We are careful about what we eat," said Frederick. "Good food. Nutritious and well balanced. No liquor is allowed."
"I don't drink, anyway," said Dante.
"That's fine. An army travels on its stomach, isn't that right, Mr. Scruggs? Help yourself."
Dante could hardly recall ever feeling so ravenous; he devoured three sandwiches and two bottles of ginger ale without saying a word, wiping his mouth across the sleeve of his new jacket, shameless as a starving dog. Frederick leaned back in his seat, folded his hands neatly, and watched Dante eat, a sly smile playing across his strong features.
As Dante finished eating and let out a resounding belch, at a signal from Frederick the third man replaced the basket in the rack and left the compartment. Frederick delicately held out a napkin; Dante stared at it for a moment before realizing what this was, then took it and cleaned off his dripping mouth and chin.
"Are you curious about the group you've become part of, Mr. Scruggs?" asked Frederick, with that teasing smile again.
"I figure my job is," said Dante, pausing to bring up another burp, "do what I'm told and don't ask questions."
"Good. For instance, you do not need to know what we call ourselves, because it is not a question you will ever be required to answer."
Dante nodded.
"You will never be told anything unless we determine that you need to know it. Do you know where we are going now?''
"West somewhere," said Dante with a shrug, observing the position of the sun out the window.
"Quite perceptive; but beyond that, do you care where you are going?"
"No, sir."
"We are great believers in discipline, Mr. Scruggs. Discipline of behavior; discipline of the self. It is essential to our work that people should not take any notice of us. Imagine, for example, that a job you were involved with required you to dine in a fancy restaurant and it was important for you to blend seamlessly into that crowd."
"Okay."
Frederick leaned forward and whispered, "Do you think that would be possible, Mr. Scruggs, if you were to exhibit the table manners of a pig rolling around in its own shit?"
Dante felt the blood drain from his face; Frederick still smiled at him.
"No, sir."
"This is why we learn to train our minds; and why we believe every personal failing must be so severely punished. this is how we learn."
Sweat trickled down the back of Dante's neck. Frederick reached over and patted Dante's leg.
"Don't look so worried, Mr. Scruggs. I hadn't made you aware of our standards and you were so very hungry. But having had this conversation, I won't expect to see such a disgusting display from you ever again. Will I?"
"No, sir."
Frederick gave Dante's thigh a reassuring squeeze and leaned back.
"We recognize that each of our men is uniquely qualified In do our work, and if he pleases us, he should be uniquely rewarded. You have developed your own particular interests in life, Mr. Scruggs, apart from ours; we feel that if you have fulfilled our needs to a high level of satisfaction, we should in turn provide you with an opportunity to satisfy yours."
"Okay." What did he mean?
"Do not be deceived; this generosity springs from a selfish foundation: It has been our experience that giving a man what he wants when he pleases us will only provoke him to work that much harder in the future. It is an investment. Do you follow me?"
"I'm not sure."
"An example would be in order. Let's imagine that we have given you a difficult assignment to complete and you have performed it flawlessly. What might you expect from us in return?"