Ring. Clay checked the caller ID. Lucy, of course. He was holding the gun in his hand. Not his gun, the cheap pawnshop automatic he'd been firing blindly at the cemetery. He'd wiped the fingerprints off that one and dropped it down a storm drain two blocks from the graveyard. That was a machine, like a toaster or a waffle iron except for its purpose. Not like this gun, Lucy's ancient Navy Colt. This gun was a Sign. Ring He held it up, sighting down the long black barrel at the dirty dishes on the card-table where he ate his meals; the bathroom mirror; the one grimy window over his bed with its view of bricks and fire escape. The gun's etched cylinder gleamed. The gold band around the handle warm against the palm of his hand. The whole thing heavy with meaning. Charged with power. Once before he'd had this feeling. The church checkbook burning in his pocket, inspiration burning in his blood, that heavy sense of premonition jumping like a spark from the check to the cash the teller handed him to the chips at the casino. Ring. Of course later, bewildered and humiliated, he had assumed it was all a Devil's ruse. Got to jail and couldn't eat. Couldn't sleep. Endlessly replaying the lawyer's sarcasm. His parent's shame. And then one night God had come over him like a fever sliding under his flesh until he could feel the light spilling from his eyes, and he realized he had never known God before. All his years of study and reflection so much pride and paper: so many walls between himself at and grace. Only here, alone and broken in the darkness, had he come at last to the Lord. Had he stolen church money at the urging of the Devil, or the Lord? Could the Devil really do anything that God was not the final master of? Clay half-smiled, sliding the Colt's long barrel along his cheek. Of course a clever man could always justify his sins, given time enough and the right temptation, and he was a clever man. Ring . He picked up the phone, seeing Lucy's Uncle dying in the grass, the bitterness in his voice. She's all in now. They're going to kill her. And when Clay asked who, asked why, his only answer: the gun. This gun. This beautiful, ancient, deadly thing. He answered the phone. "Clay? It's Lucy. I just had a visit from the guy who left that message on my machine." "Are you--" "Still breathing, thanks. Look, I had a gun when I went to the cemetery. An old one. I threw it at the guy who killed my uncle. Did you see him take it?" "They're gonna kill her." "Who's? Why?" "The gun." "No," Clay said. He sighted down the gun again, aiming at the man in his bathroom mirror. They were going to kill her if she had the gun, and if he told her where it was, she would come for it. He knew Lucy that well, anyway. The Colt heavier than ever at the end of his arm, charged with premonition, as if it held his destiny chambered in its cylinders. "I'm sorry, Lucy. I'm afraid I never saw a thing."
|