Feast Day of Fools (Hackberry Holland 3)

“I don’t call him anything. Others do,” Hackberry said. “You’re a Quaker, right?”

“A man’s religion is a private matter.”

“You deny your faith?” Hackberry said.

“No, sir, I don’t. As you say, I’m a Quaker.”

“And your namesake sailed out on the Flood?”

“Yes, sir, my christened name is Noie. Same spelling as in the King James.”

“Can you tell me, with your background, why in the name of suffering God you hooked up with a man like Jack Collins?”

“Because he befriended me when nobody else did. Because he bound up my wounds and fed and protected me when others passed me by.”

“Do you know how many innocent people have been hurt or killed because they think you have the design for the Predator drone?” Hackberry said.

“I escaped from a bunch of Mexican killers. They’d held me prisoner for weeks. How could I be carrying the design to a Predator drone? How could anyone have ideas that are that stupid?”

“An FBI agent by the name of Ethan Riser called you the modern equivalent of the Holy Grail,” Hackberry said. “The design is in your head. You’re a very valuable man, Mr. Barnum. Ethan Riser could probably explain that to you better than I, except he’s dead. He’s dead because Jack Collins blew his face and skull apart with a Thompson submachine gun. Ethan Riser was a good man and a friend of mine. Have you ever seen anybody machine-gunned, Mr. Barnum?”

“I found out about your friend when it was too late to do anything about it.”

“Are you a deep-plant, sir?” Hackberry said.

“A what?”

“You know what I mean.”

“No, I was about to go public with some information about the numbers of innocent people we’ve killed in the drone program, but I went into the desert first to think about it. That’s when I got kidnapped by Krill and his friends. They found my government ID and a letter from a minister about my concerns over the Predator program, and they thought they’d sell me to Al Qaeda. Then they decided that was too much trouble and they’d sell me to some Mexican gangsters. That was when another fellow and I broke loose.”

“You thought you were going to bring down Al Qaeda by yourself?”

“I was aiming to get some of them, that’s for sure. But I was done helping kill third-world people. I got to say something here. I don’t know everything that goes on in Jack’s head, but somewhere inside him, there’s a better man than the one you see.”

“Keep telling yourself that crap,” Pam said.

“Chief Deputy Tibbs isn’t very objective about Jack, Noie. That’s because he tried to machine-gun her,” Hackberry said.

Noie Barnum looked at her blankly.

“What do you know about Josef Sholokoff?” Hackberry asked.

“I don’t recall anybody by that name.”

“He’s a Russian criminal who wants to sell you to the highest bidder,” Hackberry said. “We think he may have crucified a minister by the name of Cody Daniels. You ever hear of him?”

“No, I haven’t,” Noie said. “A fellow was crucified?”

“You seem blissfully ignorant of all the wreckage swirling around you. Does that bother you at all?” Hackberry said.

“You’re damn right it does. You stop talking to me like that.”

“There’s a ranch about six miles below the four-lane. The south end of the property bleeds into Mexico. I think that’s where y’all were hiding out. Jack is probably long gone, and he’s not driving that Trans Am anymore, either. But I need to know. Is that where y’all were holed up?”

“Ask Jack when you catch him.”

“We don’t abuse prisoners here,” Pam said, stepping closer to Barnum, one finger barely touching his sternum.