Lord of Order by Brett Riley (the reading list book TXT) 📕

Hobbes nodded, and he and Boudreaux spurred their horses and trotted away.

Troy turned Japeth toward Ernie Tetweiller’s place. The day felt hotter already.

6

Troy rode down the Pontchartrain Expressway and through the streets of Metairie. At Tetweiller’s one-story white house on Elgin Street, he hitched Japeth to the post in the front yard. Then he walked up the driveway and knocked on the front door. No one answered, so he knocked harder. Still nothing. He turned the knob. The door was locked.

Back here, Tetweiller called.

In the back yard, the old man sprawled on a blanket in his oak tree’s shade. Landscapers had recently trimmed the grass and the waist-high hedges ringing the house. Nearby lay the old swimming pool, empty and dull gray and cracked. Santonio Ford had offered a dozen times to fill it with soil and plant a small garden, but Tetweiller always refused. He seemed to like the emptiness.

Troy sat, crossed his legs, and wiped his brow with his shirtsleeve.

Tetweiller lay still, eyes closed. Mornin, he said.

Howdy, said Troy. He reached for the ice bucket Tetweiller had set against the tree trunk and removed the bottle of homemade wine chilling there. He shook his head and put the wine back, then selected a sliver of ice and popped it in his mouth. His teeth ached with the cold, but it eased his parched throat.

Tetweiller opened one eye. Help yourself.

I’ll stick with ice. What are you doin out here?

I like to nap in the afternoons.

It’s nine in the mornin.

I ain’t no procrastinator. You think about what I said?

Troy pulled up some grass and let it drift through his fingers. They want a list of all our explosives. And our boats.

Tetweiller sat up and took the bottle from the bucket. He drank long and deep. Holding the bottle in one hand, he drew his knees up and rested his arms on them, grimacing. The two men sat in silence for a while. The temperature was already rising. Birds chirped in the trees. One defecated, the white droppings splattering the ground near Troy’s outstretched hand.

Well, said Tetweiller. You gonna do it?

If we don’t, they’ll execute us right after Stransky.

Givin em somethin and givin em what they asked for ain’t gotta be the same thing.

I’ve been thinkin about that. I got somethin for you to do.

Tetweiller drank again. He grinned at Troy, his eyes already bloodshot. The burst veins on his nose looked like splotches of bad sunburn. A little liquid courage, he said. Tell me.

Troy took another piece of ice. I’m sendin Santonio and LaShanda over here at three this afternoon. We need a plan—materials, execution, getaway routes, the whole shebang.

Tetweiller raised his gray eyebrows. A plan for what?

For Stransky. We need to bust her out and make it look like the Troublers did it.

Tetweiller looked at Troy for a long time. Damn, he said. You ain’t fuckin around. Jack and Gordy know about this?

Not yet. Gordy’s twitchy. I’m not sure he’d believe me if I told him I’m just keepin our options open while we figure things out.

We just caught that bitch.

She’s got an intelligence network we need to access as long as the Crusade’s playin fast and loose with our people’s lives. They say we’ll be guards, but they got no details, and when the brass keep secrets, it ain’t good for those of us in the trenches. Stransky’s pipeline may be all we got.

Tetweiller drank again and belched. I don’t like it much. But I see your point. Still, if Jack and Gordy ain’t on board, we’ll end up in the towers anyway.

I’ll tell em soon. I just want to give Gordy a day or two.

The old man nodded and held the bottle against his forehead. And what if Santonio and LaShanda get twitchy?

If they got doubts, that’s natural. If they start hollerin for help, follow your conscience. Don’t do nothin just for me.

Tetweiller put the bottle back in the bucket and stretched his legs. Hellfire, he muttered.

Troy hung his head and closed his eyes. Sweat rolled down his neck. He wanted nothing more than to lie on the grass beside Tetweiller and sleep, lose himself in darkness and dreams. But he could not. New Orleans and the Crusade, the dual landmarks by which he navigated this world, seemed to be collapsing toward each other, and he had no idea what to do.

Having managed to dodge Jerold Babb on the way up, Troy and Tetweiller stood in front of Stransky’s cell. She sat cross-legged on her bunk. Her greasy hair looked like a fistful of dead snakes. In the stifling heat, her clothing clung to her like a second skin. Cold in the winter, an oven in summer, barely deep enough for the cot and bucket that were the only accommodations prisoners were afforded, the towers were a special kind of hell.

But if the conditions bothered Stransky, she gave no sign. I reckon you boys got some news you can’t quite stomach, she said.

Ain’t nobody said nothin about a Purge, Troy said.

Stransky laughed. Hell. You think they’re just gonna ride in and admit it all? You ain’t in their circle. You’re too provincial.

Troy looked at Tetweiller, who shrugged. I think this salty bitch and Washington wouldn’t know the truth if it bit em on the ass, said the old man.

Fuck off, you old fart, Stransky said, though she sounded almost affectionate. Then she turned to Troy. Those bastards are gonna murder hundreds of thousands of people. Again.

Troy wiped sweat on his shirtsleeve. He opened his canteen and drank. Stransky licked her lips but asked for nothing. You knew about the explosives cache at Loyola, didn’t you? That’s what y’all were after.

Stransky pushed her grimy hair out of her eyes. We need more ordnance if we’re gonna stop their wall.

Why didn’t you just come to us? Troy asked. We wouldn’t have believed you, and you would have ended up here just the same, but your men might still be alive. You