Blood on the Leaves Read online

  He unscrewed the top and poured some liquor into a paper cup. He swirled it around and searched for any residue that might cling to the side of the container, providing him with an alcohol-etched road map or sorcerer’s vision of the future. Unlike the tossing of chicken bones or the reading of palms, this ancestral potion left behind no clues. He ceased the experiment and creased the cup, returning the useless liquid to its genie’s prison. It would have to wait for the time when its power could be called upon by more accommodating, if not desperate, hands.

  He walked quietly down the hallway, past two walls filled with family pictures arranged and maintained by his wife. He’d never believed in such sentimental displays, choosing instead to keep his treasures and important memories in his heart, where he’d visit without notice or fear of interruption. He cracked open the door of his daughter’s bedroom and peeked inside, finding Angela sound asleep, protected by her favorite dolls. They were relaxing on a quilt blanket, which always managed to stay in place no matter how restless her sleep. At eleven going on thirty-four, she’d break some man’s heart one day, he knew, because, as her mother constantly reminded her, she’d broken everything else.

  He closed the door and took a few steps to Christopher’s room. He walked immediately to the bed and picked up the blanket that had fallen to the floor. He untwisted his son’s legs, which, as usual, had managed to become entwined in the sheets. He carefully straightened his child’s left arm, half of which appeared mangled behind the headboard, then freed the other half, buried underneath the pillow. This was accomplished without either waking up the nine-year-old or dislocating the boy’s shoulder.

  He neatly placed the top sheet over his son, then followed with the blanket, which he folded back halfway. He crossed to the window and adjusted the drapes, allowing air and moonlight into the room. By the time he turned around, his son had once again knocked the blanket onto the floor. Reynolds left it there, believing some idiosyncrasies should be respected.

  He’d tried to convince his wife of that notion to no avail. She also obstinately disagreed with him regarding theories of discipline; she believed in it, while he didn’t. She subscribed to the primitive adage that saying no once in a while produced healthier children. Reynolds believed in giving them everything they wanted, whenever they wanted it. He saw no reason to deny their requests. They’d have plenty of occasions to be disappointed when they were adults.

  It remained one of the few things they fought about. She called him a “pushover.” He claimed she exercised control for the sake of exercising control. She felt moderation was good. He argued excess was better. She wanted to hold back. He sought to give his children what he never had: a father unafraid to say yes.

  He kissed Christopher on the cheek and left wishing his son better dreams than the one that forced him to walk the corridors of his home at four A.M., chasing away ghosts. His mission took him to the back porch, where he walked past the chairs with the soft round cushions and sat on the wooden steps. There was something reassuring about resting on a surface that offered the option of moving up or down.

  This was his absolutely favorite space in the house, maybe in the world. A porch epitomized the midpoint between home and everything else—the place where one step in either direction took you closer or farther away from the people you most loved. He’d made a pledge with each member of his family that no one ever violated: Never, under any circumstances, were arguments permissible on this patch of neutral territory. Conflicts could be resolved or continued inside the house or outside, near some mutually agreed-upon area of the yard. The porch, though, stayed off limits to any hostility. This part of their home they designated “the womb.” You could enter or exit with impunity. And Reynolds made an interesting discovery: Once you created a free zone devoid of disagreement, differences didn’t last very long anywhere else.

  He listened to the sounds just beyond the darkness and inhaled the night air. The mingled scents of freshly mowed grass, bittersweet lilac, and vine-ripened tomatoes soothed him. He had once thought of himself as a city boy who would buy his vegetables wrapped in cellophane, from an all-night supermarket that served cappuccino and fresh croissants. Then he put his hands into the earth and gave birth to a garden. Shortly thereafter, he quit purchasing his drinks from an imported machine in exchange for watching his children compete for the right to make him hot cocoa. Well, usually hot, sometimes boiling, occasionally thick—but it always, always caused him to smile. Six heaping tablespoons of anything would do that, especially when the main ingredient was love.

  He watched the moon disappear behind a cloud just as the porch light came on. “You usually do this when the jury’s out.” Cheryl had a comforting voice, but it didn’t eliminate his need to be held. She took a seat next to him and stroked his arm.

  He smiled. “Maybe I’m waiting for you to reach a verdict on Matheson.”

  “I don’t see anything wrong in what’s he doing,” she said. “I think he should teach the course. It’s the only way this place will ever heal.”

  “Murder’s a strange method of curing a disease,” he said.

  “It’s not his fault if some nutcase took the information and went off the deep end. It’s like blaming violence on television.”

  “You blame violence on television all the time.”

  “We aren’t having that discussion now, so I’m not obligated to be consistent.” She avoided his look of disbelief.

  “How much do you know about him?”

  “What everybody else knows. He’s handsome. Intelligent. Passionate. Successful. Did I say handsome?” she teased.

  “He sent his regards.”

  “Really?” she said with interest.

  “Actually, it was his love.”

  “How considerate.” Her voice sounded overly pleased.

  “Now I know why I’ve never liked him.” He looked away from her and sulked.

  She put her arm around his waist. “You don’t get along because he’s too much like you.”

  “I prosecute people who break the law. He encourages folks to commit murder.”

  “He couldn’t possibly want that. His father’s preached against violence his entire life.”

  “His father’s not teaching the course.” He studied her for a moment, then searched for the moon.

  “Can he get into trouble for what he’s doing?” she asked.

  “Not as much as the people on his list.” He hoped the moon wouldn’t fade quite yet.

  She lightly placed her hand on his knee. “What are you going to do?”

  “He agreed to supply us with a complete list of the names he’s going to reveal in the remainder of the course. We’ll notify the people on it along with the local authorities.”

  “You don’t think he’s personally involved, do you? With the murders, I mean.”

  “Not even Vanzant thinks that. But Matheson’s motivated somebody to take justice into their own hands.” He watched the moon peek through one cloud, then hide behind another.

  “You called it ‘justice.’” She leaned against him and closed her eyes. “You may not be as different from Martin as you think.”

  CHAPTER 6

  SHERMAN BANKS HAD sat in the same spot, under the same tree, in between the same bushes, every Tuesday and Friday since hunting season began. But after experiencing a series of intuitions that made the toes on both feet tingle then curl, he’d become absolutely convinced that this night his patience would be rewarded. When he returned home this evening, he’d celebrate his sixty-third year by eating a devil’s-food birthday cake frosted with mocha icing, smoking a hand-rolled cigar with tobacco meticulously soaked in brandy and black licorice, and cooking fresh venison acquired through his unyielding belief in the power of duplicity.

  He lifted his rifle with the same respect he’d give the Holy Grail filled with the blood of his Lord and Savior. He’d never been a deeply religious man, but he prayed on a few special occasions: when he gambled, or hunted, or n
eeded money to buy a young girl’s affection during those fortunate times when his wife trusted him enough to visit overnight at her sister’s.

  He peered down the long barrel of his weapon and felt his manhood stiffen. He gently maneuvered the scope against his eye socket with the precision of a surgeon. He carefully focused on the six-point buck in his crosshairs. Damn, what a beautiful animal, he thought, then decided out of respect to wait until it finished drinking from the stream.

  Sherman had been baptized in that water. He caught his first trout there before he could spell fish, not that he’d necessarily won any spelling contests in the years to follow. He dropped out of school halfway through the sixth grade. That made him two years more educated than his daddy, the wisest man he’d ever known. He believed in education, just didn’t see the need for it to take place in a single classroom over such an extended period of time.

  His trigger finger shook mildly, a sign that age had affected his nerves. The sweat from his forehead dripped onto the stock of the rifle, near the spot where he’d carved his son’s initials. He’d placed them there on the day the child was born, just below the date of the first deer he’d ever killed. His wife objected to the ritual, but he dismissed her with the question: “What does a woman know about the things that make a man proud?”

  The deer quenched its thirst. Its head rose slowly until its face perfectly positioned itself within the center of the glass ring that would first magnify then obliterate its life. If the lens had belonged to a camera rather than a rifle scope, the shot about to be taken would preserve genuine beauty rather than destroy it. But Sherman wasn’t a photographer in search of a memory to frame. He took pride in being a hunter and needed an event to brag about.

  He’d exaggerate the deer’s size and its weight and the angle of the shot. Most important, in the version he’d retell over drinks and a friendly card game, he’d swear the animal had galloped at full speed just before he cut it down, his expert marksmanship surmounting near-impossible odds. Only he and the deer would know the truth: that in an otherwise tranquil night, it had posed innocently for its own destruction.

  The gunshot was louder than Sherman’s rapidly beating heart. Louder than the deer’s sickening thump or the noise of its hind legs kicking and thrashing in the dirt to no avail. Louder than the escaping flight of terrified birds. And louder than the footsteps that followed closely behind.

  Sherman heard nothing as he arose from his hiding place and licked his lower lip. There’d never be a feeling greater than this: He’d killed again, taken yet another life. On a battlefield this made him a hero; out here in the wilderness, it made him a god. He stepped forward and allowed himself the satisfaction of a smile—but it quickly turned to a grimace when a strand of barbed wire sliced into his neck. Unable to breathe, he dropped his rifle and grasped furiously at the gloved hands that worked to tighten the metal noose. As his throat leaked thick blood, he struggled to catch a glimpse of the stranger but saw only the fallen deer, twitching horribly near the water’s edge.

  He thought of his baptism and how he’d been afraid he might drown. He thought of his youth and how it had deserted him without warning. He thought of the birthday cake and how he’d miss the celebration; the cigar and how it would remain unlit; the deer and how he’d never taste the fruit of his labor. He thought of the Scriptures and how you must reap what you sow. And then, as he’d done on other hunts, he thought of the black boy he’d choked to death on a night not unlike this one. How, he marveled, after all these years, had that boy managed to return from the grave to avenge his murder?

  Sherman fought in vain to see the face he believed he’d buried in the abyss. He’d confront his attacker if it was the last thing he did. He fell to his knees and violently threw back his head, knowing full well the action would further expose his neck. This was his only hope of discovering the truth.

  He looked at the sky overhead, dark and uninviting. He observed the trees standing in line, their branches reaching out anxiously, seemingly awaiting the chance to strangle him, too. He thrust his arms upward and searched for the face that would have ended the torment and solved the mystery. He managed to clutch it between his hands and, with his final bit of strength, forced the face inches from his own, as it had been on so many drunken, haunted nights before. He recognized the black skin and thought the eyes appeared familiar: unrepentant, unforgiving, but this time, unharmed. Without the blood and terror he’d vividly remembered, it was impossible to identify this face as that of the boy he’d condemned to death.

  In the distance he saw the deer, now motionless, no longer suffering. The animal’s death made him think once again about the black boy’s quiet plea to live. He tried to envision what the boy might have become if fate hadn’t intervened. Foolishly he searched his memory in an effort to recall the boy’s name, then remembered he never knew it. He slumped to the ground. As death overtook Sherman’s body, he realized too late that in his quest to discover who—or what—was exacting vengeance, he’d forgotten to pray.

  The gloved hands relaxed their grip, and the coiled wire unraveled, leaving behind a ghastly red necklace deeply engraved around Sherman’s swollen pink neck. His lifeless eyes remained open but would never see this or any future sunrise. Nor would he hear the twigs that crackled underneath the feet of the retreating stranger, who may not have been a ghost but had left one behind.

  Thirsty, the stranger walked toward the stream and watched the moonlight distort his image shimmering across the water’s surface. He took a drink and created a series of ever-expanding ripples, which allowed him to reevaluate his reflection. No. It wasn’t the light that had distorted him but the journey he’d chosen—a journey where he hoped both saints and sinners would pass each other, judging not lest they be judged.

  CHAPTER 7

  VANZANT ENGAGED IN one of his famous tirades, except this time Reynolds detected something different in his voice. Usually, his boss would sit in his large taxpayer-financed Brazilian leather chair with the rosewood frame and stale cigar smell and simply flail his arms. Everyone in the office had gotten used to his displays of outrage—usually ignited by a desire to blame others for his miscalculations. The more he knew he was wrong, the louder he yelled; the more pronounced his gyrations, the more certain he was that his colleagues knew it as well.

  But this time, his unsteady voice and sweeping gestures exposed something much greater than the desire to conceal fault or redirect blame. His agitation couldn’t be mistaken for anger. This wasn’t indignation rising to the surface—far from it. Fear gripped Vanzant. His level of trepidation couldn’t be camouflaged by any amount of profanity.

  “The son of a bitch published the entire fuckin’ list in the state’s largest black newspaper!” Vanzant waved the newspaper in front of Reynolds. “Why doesn’t he just take out an ad and offer a bounty on every white man over the age of fifty?”

  Reynolds suppressed his desire to smile.

  Vanzant marched to the window and shoved it open. “Lauren, I want you to research recent case law. See if we can pursue an indictment against the paper.”

  “I already checked,” Sinclair replied. “They’re just reporting what Matheson’s teaching and relying on public records to substantiate his claims.”

  “What about the university?” Vanzant asked. “Can’t we maintain they’re using public funds to incite violence?”

  “The university protects academic freedom. The Constitution safeguards freedom of the press.” She waited for the explosion.

  “Freedom, my ass!” he snorted. “This is a death warrant! If he’s not directly inciting violent reprisal, he’s encouraging it.”

  “He’s referring to the men on his list as ‘unpunished alleged murderers and terrorists.’” Sinclair’s voice softened. “That insulates him from civil lawsuits and, for the moment, criminal liability.”

  Vanzant tossed the paper on his desk and knocked over a framed picture of his wife and two daughters. The glass shattered on
to the Oriental carpet. “I want an investigation of each and every student taking Matheson’s class.” He placed both hands on the edge of his desk and squeezed. “I want to know who they live with and who they visit overnight. If they’ve ever been in trouble, I want to be apprised of the date of the problem and the nature and extent of the offense.” He pointed at Sinclair. “Get me a complete list of every organization they’ve ever belonged to.” He rubbed his chin and worked his way toward the base of his neck. “If they’ve used computers at the campus, I want their E-mail confiscated and analyzed.”

  Reynolds wanted to bring this to a halt before any more civil liberties were threatened. “He teaches more than one hundred sixty registered students in four classes. There’s another fifty or so who audit.” He studied Vanzant but saw no indication he’d been dissuaded.

  “It gets worse,” added Sinclair. “He offers a class that meets in the community two nights a week and is open to anyone who wishes to attend. I’m told it’s extremely popular.”

  “Does that fool really want to relive the sixties? ’Cause if he does, he just opened up a can of whoop-ass, and I’m just the man who can close it on him. I damn well promise you that!” Vanzant swiveled out of his chair and strutted across the room. “Let’s put some pressure on the professor. Interview his colleagues, his friends, neighbors. Let’s embarrass him. Hell, let’s treat him like a damn suspect. See if that doesn’t grab his attention!” Vanzant assumed a Napoleonic pose.

  Winslow entered carrying a police report and chewing an apple. “Is there a Sherman Banks on the list?” His question caused Vanzant to rub his eyes.

  Sinclair flipped through a file. When she stopped, Vanzant had worked his way to his temple, which he massaged deeply.