The Devil in the Valley Page 2

Go look.

  Taft left the porch and went to the barn where he kept his truck. In a couple of minutes, he was back.

  “I asked you for four new tires,” he told Dangerfield. “That’s not four new tires. That’s a whole new truck.”

  Happy birthday, Chief.

  “You didn’t get me what I asked for, though, did you?”

  Dangerfield sighed. Am I going to have trouble with you, Chief? he asked. Alright. Okay. Suit yourself. You’ve got your old wreck back, new treads all around. You want to go see?

  “No.”

  Go ahead. Don’t take my word. Check it out. See for yourself.

  “No need.”

  Then you believe I can do what I say I can?

  “Yes.”

  You ready to do business, then?

  “Maybe.”

  No maybe, Chief. Yes or no.

  “Come on,” said Taft. “What do you take me for? We still don’t have a deal, do we? Not yet. We have half a deal. I get whatever I want. You give me your famous Talents. I use them. That’s your part. I still don’t know what my part is.”

  I think you do, Chief. I think you know damned full well.

  Taft took a moment. He nodded. Then he said, “It’s like a contract, right?”

  It’s not like a contract. It is a contract. Oh, boy, is it a contract.

  “And when it’s up, then you come for me and I have to go with you?”

  Right.

  “And until then, you fetch me what I ask for. What I want, you supply, whatever it is, you get it. You serve me.”

  Absolutely.

  “And that contract, our contract?” Taft went on, “for your service? It runs for how long? Twenty-some years, I think, right?”

  Where do you get that idea?

  “My reading,” said Taft.

  Dangerfield rocked right back in his chair, with a whoop of laughter. Pitching forward, he slapped his knees.

  Oh, Chiefy, Chiefy, he laughed. Your what? Your reading? You old English Major, you! What is it you’re giving me, here? You’re giving me Christopher Marlowe, aren’t you? ‘Four and twenty years being expired, the articles above written inviolate, etcetera, etcetera, grant full power to carry, etcetera, body and soul, flesh, blood, and goods into their habitation wheresoever.’ Hah. You crack me up, Chief.

  “What’s so funny?”

  You are. You’re living in the Middle Ages. Your friend Marlowe’s been dead for four hundred years, and between ourselves he didn’t have a lot on the ball when he walked among us. Second- or third-chop poet? Some kind of a half-assed spy? Killed in a bar fight? What an adolescent! In fact, he’s mainly spread a lot of misinformation and done a lot of harm. The world has changed, you know. It moves a little faster than it did when Good Queen Bess was in the chair. We’re not mortgage bankers, Chief. We’re strictly short-term. Think of us as payday lenders.

  “How long, then?” Taft asked him.

  I can get you six months.

  “Six months?”

  I might be able to stretch it to seven, said Dangerfield. I’ll have to see. I don’t write the contracts, you know.

  “Who does?”

  The Legal Department, of course. Plus, the big man. The CEO. My boss. My superior. I have to get him to sign off for anything over six months. I can probably get you the seven, though. The big man’s got a soft heart. He shouldn’t have one, but he does.

  “Seven months,” said Taft. “Til October.”

  We’ll say Columbus Day. It’s a good contract, Chief. It means you won’t have to miss the foliage.

  But even now Taft wasn’t quite there. He looked at Dangerfield. “What I don’t understand,” he said, “is you. How is it you’re here at all? I didn’t ask for you.”

  Didn’t you, Chief? What about plot—and its lack? What about feeling stuck? What about that train, that Dark Wood? You cried out, Chief. We heard you.

  “We?”

  My firm.

  “You mean there are more of you?”

  Oh, absolutely. We’re a major firm. We’re big. Resources? We’ve got them. As for your own situation? Dangerfield shrugged. We know these things. It’s what we do.

  “But how?” asked Taft.

  We mark the sparrow’s fall, Chief.

  “Alright, but why the secrecy?” Taft asked him. “If I’m with you, I’m alone. If I’m talking to you, I’m talking to myself. Nobody’s to know anything about you, about our … arrangement. Everybody’s in the dark. Eli, everybody. Why?”

  Standards, Chief. Quality control. Listen, if people knew about the deal you’re going to make—the upside, the Talents, the rest—the whole world would be breaking down our door. We’d be swamped. Service would suffer. We need to keep out the riffraff.

  “What if I tell?” Taft asked.

  Be a mistake. A very big mistake. Telling voids the deal. We wouldn’t have a choice, then. We’d have to cut right to the downside. Not a good outcome, especially for you. Bad idea, Chief. Don’t even think of it.

  Taft nodded. “Okay,” he said.

  So? said Dangerfield. Here we are, right? Time to jump, Chief. What do you say? In or out. Up or down. Right here. Right now.

  Taft nodded again. He swallowed. He scratched his head. He looked out over the dooryard. Then he clapped his hands lightly together.

  “Done deal,” he said.

  Attaboy, Chief. You won’t regret it.

  “Seven months,” said Taft. “Columbus Day. Then you come for me, yes? You take me anyplace you want?”

  Not any place, Chief. One place.

  Taft smiled. “The hot place,” he said.

  Hot enough.

  “I’m not worried about that, though,” said Taft. “I worked in Philadelphia for a couple of years. August in Philadelphia? I don’t mind heat.”

  Well, it’s not the heat so much, said Dangerfield. It’s the time. We’re talking Eternity, here, Chief.

  “Not worried about that, either. I can last it. We’re in Vermont, remember? For us, Eternity is another name for March.”

  I like your spirit, Chief.

  “Where do I sign?”

  Oh, you’ve already signed. You signed a few minutes ago, when you lied to your friend.

  “Ah,” said Taft.

  You wouldn’t have a drink in the house? Dangerfield asked him.

  “Got a bottle of Sir Walter’s.”

  What’s that?

  “Scotch whiskey.”

  Never heard of it, said Dangerfield.

  “It’s a small label,” said Taft. “You might call it subpremium.”

  Perfect. What do you say, Chief? Shall we have a drink to our partnership?

  “A drink?” said Taft. “I’m your man.”

  Not yet, but you will be.

  “Come with me,” said Taft. He got to his feet.

  After you, Chief, said Dangerfield, and he let Taft go before him into the house.

  2

  HAPPY THE MAN WHOSE FATHER GOES TO THE DEVIL

  THOSE HAVING BUSINESS WITH LANGDON TAFT TRIED TO get to him by eleven in the morning. For Taft, the clear, bright hours were his best. He felt his momentum build from waking to about eleven. Eleven was when momentum slowed and distraction set in. Distraction, diversion—or the need of them. Or of their substitutes. One substitute in particular. Eleven was when Taft was known to pour his first dram of Sir Walter Scott. An ex-gentleman, ex-teacher, ex-scholar, ex-householder, ex-abstainer, he was retired from many things, indeed from most everything, but not, his friends and neighbors observed, from Sir Walter Scott.

  In fact it was a slander. Taft was not a forenoon drinker. If he was found to be imbibing in the morning, it was not from habit, but because he had forgotten to leave off the night before. So it was, no doubt, on this day, at ten-thirty, when Eli Adams knocked on the door of the room Taft used for a study. Too late.

  “Eli!” cried Taft. “Eli, old sport. Come you in. Sit you down. Have an eye-opener with us.”

  Be careful, wh
ispered Dangerfield. He stood in the shadow behind Taft. Mysteriously, he was attired in a fresh, well-pressed, white lab coat over a crisp blue shirt and a red polka-dot bow tie. A stethoscope hung around his neck, and the left breast pocket of his lab coat was embroidered: MASSACHUSETTS GENERAL HOSPITAL. He might have been a prosperous surgeon. Be careful, he murmured.

  “Us?” Eli asked.

  Taft pushed the Sir Walter’s across the desk toward Eli, pushed a glass after it. “Water?” he asked.

  “Nothing, thanks. Nothing at all. Well, maybe some coffee?”

  “No coffee,” said Taft. “Don’t use it. Don’t keep it in the house. That stuff is bad for you, Eli. Bad. Doctor told me once if he could get his patients to do one thing? For their health? Cut out coffee. That’s right, coffee. Worse than booze, worse than the cigs, worse than dope. Worse than loose women—”

  “Worse than work?”

  “Well, well,” said Taft. “But you get my point. Coffee. Stay clear of coffee, Eli. Sit.”

  Eli took the chair across the desk from Taft.

  Dangerfield bent to Taft’s ear. Ask him what he wants, whispered Dangerfield.

  “What can I do for you this morning, old man?” asked Taft.

  “Went by Marcia’s the other day after I left here,” said Eli. “The little boy, you know.”

  “Bobby,” said Taft.

  “Sean. He’s in Mass General. Been there a week.”

  “I don’t like the sound of that.”

  “No,” said Eli. “He has to have surgery before they can start treatments, I guess. They don’t know what to do. Those big-shot doctors, all they get from them is the run-around. Carl hasn’t been working full-time. Marcia cleans, when she can, but she has the baby, too.”

  Taft nodded. He raised his glass and took a sip. “Sure you won’t—uh—,” he said, pointing at the bottle.

  Eli shook his head. “So I told her I’d come see you,” he finished. “She said I wasn’t to.”

  Dangerfield bent to Taft’s ear again. Behind his hand he said softly, Ask him what he thinks you can do. Are you a doctor?

  “I’m sorry for this,” Taft told Eli. “But what is it you think I can do? Am I a doctor?”

  “You know what you are,” Eli told him. “You’re a friend. An old friend. They’ve got the Mass General bills in a stack on top of the TV. Stack’s two inches thick, and they’ve barely started. They’re looking at tens, more likely hundreds of thousands or they lose their kid. Probably lose him anyway, in the end. They know that. They need help. You’re able to help. Well able. And you’re a friend of the family.”

  Not that family, tell him.

  “Not that family,” said Taft.

  “Come on,” said Eli.

  “Come on, yourself, old fellow. You know the history.”

  “History, is right. What is it, thirty years?”

  “We Tafts have long memories.”

  “So what?”

  “So what? She threw me over, old sport.”

  “So what?” Eli asked again. “The little kid in Mass General didn’t throw you over. His mother didn’t throw you over. It was his grandmother did, for Christ’s sake.”

  Behind Taft’s chair, Dangerfield hissed. I bet she wishes she hadn’t, now, he breathed to Taft.

  “I bet she wishes she hadn’t, now,” said Taft.

  “What was that?” asked Eli.

  “I said, I bet—”

  “I heard what you said. Okay, suit yourself. Marcia told me not to come. I’ll be on my way,” said Eli. But he kept his seat.

  “She did?”

  “Said I’d be wasting my time.”

  Taft smiled and shook his head. “But you knew better,” he said.

  “I thought I did.”

  “Relax, old sport,” said Taft. “Come on, take the yardstick out of your rectum and have a boost with us, here.” He pushed the Sir Walter’s further toward Eli.

  Careful.

  “Us?” asked Eli.

  “With me,” said Taft. Eli poured two fingers of Sir Walter’s into the glass and tasted it. He made a face.

  “What’s the matter?” Taft asked him.

  “That’s awful stuff,” said Eli. “All the money you have, you can’t get in a decent brand of Scotch? This tastes like ditch water.”

  “It’s cheap,” said Taft. “We Tafts are a saving people, you know. We’re not Scots for nothing.”

  “Scots?”

  “Lowland Scots. Like our friend.” Taft nodded toward the bottle of Sir Walter’s.

  “I thought you were part of those Tafts that had the President Taft,” said Eli.

  “So we are—at a certain remove. And what were they? Border Scots, all of them.”

  “We’re all Americans, I thought,” said Eli.

  “Don’t go Ellis Island on me, here, old man. Point is, we’re a provident people. That’s why I’m able to help that poor little boy and his mother and his father and his perishing grandmother, God damn her black soul to hell.”

  Hear, hear, murmured Dangerfield.

  “You will help them, then?” Eli asked him.

  “What do you think?”

  “Really help? The whole shot?”

  “The whole shot,” said Taft. “Do this, old boy: go back to Marcia. That two-inch stack of Mass General bills? Tell her to send it to me. Then in future, when more come, she’s not even to open them. Just send them here.”

  “All of them?”

  “All of them. She can forget about them. Her boy will be fine.”

  “I hope so.”

  “I know so.”

  Eli blinked. He laughed. “Well,” he said. “Well, that’s good, then. That’s very good. I don’t know what to say. Thank you. What made you change your mind?”

  “I didn’t change my mind, old sport. I just wanted to run you around a little. Forgive me.”

  “Nothing to forgive,” said Eli. “I’ll go to Marcia’s right now. Well, I might have another drink before I go.”

  “Help yourself,” said Taft.

  “I might even buy you a bottle of something good.”

  “Don’t bother, old boy. After about the first half a glass, quality doesn’t matter much. He’ll tell you the same,” he turned his head slightly to glance up at Dangerfield.

  “Who will?” asked Eli.

  Careful, whispered Dangerfield.

  • • •

  When Eli Adams had left, Dangerfield slipped around Taft’s desk and took the chair where the visitor had sat. He arranged his lab coat over his knees. He shook his head. I told you and told you, Chief, he said. You need to be a little careful.

  “Careful?” Taft asked.

  Discreet. You can’t just bring me into the conversation. Not with outsiders. You know this.

  “Eli’s not an outsider.”

  Everybody’s an outsider now, Chief. Remember that. Don’t blow our deal because you have a couple of pops for breakfast and start loving your neighbor.

  “Eli doesn’t care about our deal. He’s a friend.”

  Dream on, Chief. Friends? There are no friends. Never were. Never will be. There’s only the deal. Remember that. But we won’t argue. On the plus side, you played him very well. You had him going there for a minute, yes, you did. He thought you weren’t going to unbelt for him.

  “No,” said Taft. “He knew I would. He knew from the start. He wouldn’t have come if he hadn’t known.”

  He looked like he didn’t know. He said he didn’t know.

  “He was pretending.”

  Why would he do that?

  “For fun,” said Taft. “I told you: he’s a friend.”

  Dangerfield shrugged. If you say so, Chief. But why did you, anyway?

  “Why did I help them? Why would I not?” asked Taft. “They’re my neighbors. They’re good people.”

  What about the one who threw you over?

  “Mollie? She’s an old lady. She was something in her day. Our day. Really something. Big blue eye
s. Big—you know. But now she looks like a dumptruck. You heard Eli. She’s a grandmother.”

  She still threw you over, though, didn’t she?

  “It wasn’t Mollie, it was her parents,” said Taft. “Didn’t approve of me. Can you believe it? Molly was willing. I think. Anyway, I don’t hold a grudge.”

  The hell you don’t, said Dangerfield. And why not? If you’ve got a good grudge, don’t waste it. Hold it. Hold it tight. My advice.

  But Taft shook his head. “Besides,” he went on, “you heard him. The little boy’s going to die.”

  So what do you care if he does?

  “Very well. What would you do?”

  Let him die. Look, he’ll die someday, anyway. Not my problem. Not yours. Shit happens. Keep the money.

  “Keep the money?”

  Bingo, Chief.

  “Keep the money, and do what with it?” Taft demanded. “What would you do? You won’t help Marcia and Carl and Sean. You won’t pay the doctors. What would you do?”

  Oh, I don’t know. Anything. Have fun. Travel. Not like you, anyway. All you do is sit here.

  “What if I do? Did you really think when I signed on that I was going to go in for fancy cars, boats, houses? Racehorses? Sea cruises? Football teams?”

  Why not?

  “The trouble with you,” Taft told Dangerfield, “is you’ve got no education. You’ve got no class.”

  Not like you, you mean. You’re a regular aristocrat, aren’t you? I wonder, though, Chief. I know something about aristocrats. I’ve done business with thousands of them. You don’t look like one. You don’t act like one. Your pal Eli thinks you’re so rich. Are you?

  Taft smiled. “Around here, if your tractor’s paid off, you’re rich,” he said.

  My point, Chief.

  “To be sure, I’m luckier than most. I have a cushion.”

  A cushion, said Dangerfield. Good thing, too, since I’m guessing you never were much of an earner. Am I right?

  “You’re not wrong.”

  What about that cushion, then?

  “Started with Grandad,” said Taft. “Grandad wasn’t a big man. Had a hardware store in the next town up the line here. Sold harness to farmers. But he was a careful man, a prudent man, and Dad was his only child. He meant that Dad should have opportunities. Dad went to the town academy, but then Grandad sent him to Harvard. He meant Dad should make useful friends. After that, he put him into a law office in Brattleboro. No law school. You learned the way you’d learn a trade, in an apprenticeship.”