Generations in Agony...Texas: Chapter One

1) A confession at Doc’s office… July 1968


“I was sent here to kill you, Doctor.”

“Excuse me?” Thurmond looked up from the patient’s file. A man named Solo Rivera sat humbly across from him. This man, Thurmond knew, had found Charlie, Jesus and the Leigh girl named April out in the desert the month before, when all hell had broken loose in Agony. “What did you just say?”

Solo looked very uncomfortable. His color was off; he appeared a bit gray around the corners of his face as sweat rolled from his temples. Thurmond figured the man to be under some extreme stress, perhaps a blood pressure issue as well.

Solo’s dark eyes met the Doc’s. “Mr. Doyle, in Chicago, he found out you’re here. He sent me to take care of you…see?”

Thurmond’s stomach soured. His hands shook. The past rushed up from a dark, forgotten moment that still played itself out in nightmares. “I wondered how long it might take them. I’d begun to think that I was ancient history.”

Solo shook his head. “People like Doyle never forget.”

The Doc nodded and tried to still his hands. The pen he held over Rivera’s new and mostly empty file clicked as his thumb punched the little silver button again and again, as if it were operating on its own. He thought about the scotch bottle in the bottom drawer. Right now, he could certainly down about half; but he had not touched it since Carla Speck had come into his life.

As he sat with this man, she was out there in the lobby running his business efficiently. Feelings he had long thought dead and left behind in Chicago sprang to life when she walked in to interview for the job. Now, the reason Thurmond had always kept his distance from people sat across from him. Emotions not experienced since a Cook County courtroom twenty-five years ago surged through him; fear gripped every nerve ending. He gulped.

Solo saw the Doctor’s nervousness and reached out, touching him on his knee. The Doc’s leg jerked in reflex. “I’m sorry; I’m not doing this very well,” Solo said. “Relax, Doctor, I’m not going to kill you.”

Thurmond’s sigh stuttered. He wanted to say thank you, but his voice was not currently available.

“I came here to do a job…” Solo continued, pulling back his hand to rest on his own leg. “…but instead, I met my son. I’ve found something that I never thought I’d find: a reason to be human again.”

The Doc let his eyes go over Solo’s face once more. Only then did the resemblance strike him. He swallowed. “You’re Jesus’ father?”

Solo nodded. “So, you see Doctor, for both of us, things have changed.”

Thurmond did not know what to say. Stunned, he stared at the man with his mouth hanging open.

“I killed people for so long, Doctor, I took life as if I were throwing out the trash. Not once in twenty years did I ever loose any sleep over what I did for a living. That has all come to and end.”

“You…” Thurmond sat up, “…just quit?”

“Yes, Doctor. I just quit. Only, I haven’t exactly given notice—if you get my meaning.”

The Doc sat for a moment and thought about it, trying to relax his constricting throat before he spoke again. “I see, I guess that might be a little difficult.”

“Mind if I smoke?” Solo was already reaching for his shirt pocket.

Thurmond moved an ashtray closer, grateful for something else, beside his fear, to focus on. “Only if I can join you.”

“I came here today, not only to tell you this, but to make sure you understand what my decision will mean…” He pointed his smoldering cigarette at Thurmond, then back to himself. “…to us, that is.”

“I can’t even begin to think it out, Mr. Rivera.”

“Call me Solo, please.” Solo held out his hand to shake.

The Doc took it. “Thurmond.”

Solo’s eyes rose in question. “But the information they gave me says your name was something else.”

Thurmond nodded. “Albert Petak.” He looked out the window over Solo’s shoulder. “I haven’t said that name aloud in, well, not since 1943.”

“You should probably not say it again, Thurmond, at least for now.”

A thought occurred to Thurmond. His fear cranked up again, thumping his heart against his chest and drumming in his ears. “But, you said Doyle knows I’m here?”

Solo nodded.

“So, that means…”

“Someone else will be coming. I don’t know when, but soon now I think.”

Thurmond started to bring his smoke to his lips and paused. “Damn, and I thought I was done running from that man.”

“You are. You will stay and continue as you have. I will not allow anything to happen.”

Thinking about what he knew of Doyle made his dread swell, like gas dumped on a brush fire. Thurmond started shaking again. The cigarette between his fingers danced when he attempted another draw. He hated that he had no control over his trepidation. “I can’t just sit here and—”

“That’s the best thing to do.”

“But if you found me, then the next guy will. What then?”

“I will have already found him. Then, he will have a problem.”

The statement made Thurmond look harder at Solo. “What are you going to do? Kill everyone who shows up?” He stabbed his smoke into the ashtray, mashing it repeatedly, using bolts of nervousness to make the action seem normal.

“I’m still thinking about it. This will be working in the opposite direction from my normal methods. But, I have come to realize that I am here for a reason. I know what it will take to deal with it.” Solo shrugged. “It’s the sort of thing I’m good at.”

“But, what about your son? And, CiCi, his mother? Are you going to risk—”

Solo held up a hand. “I know the risks. I know what is worth risking. Those are the things I’ve understood for a very long time.”

“I can’t just let…”

“This town needs you, Doctor. And, I’ve seen you and Charlie’s mother. The way she looks at you tells me all I need to know.”

“Yes, but, we haven’t…”

“Perhaps you will. Wouldn’t you like the chance?”

Thurmond shook his head. “I’m still trying to take all this in, Solo.”

“I couldn’t wait anymore to tell you these things. I’m sorry, but time is getting short now.”

Thurmond’s eyes went wide. “Have you seen anybody that—”

“No, no one as of yet. Fortunately, this town is the perfect place for you to be, and for me to intercept Doyle’s men.”

“But how will you…”

“That is my business, Doctor. I know nothing of how you do your job. I only know my own. But, I need you to be careful. Try not to vary from your routines. At least for a time.”

For several moments Thurmond sat there thinking until another concern percolated up. “Where are you staying?”

“For now, the Motor Lodge up the highway.”

“But that’s fifty miles out of town.”

“I know. It’s not very efficient. But this town doesn’t even have a boarding house, or a room to let.”

Thurmond took a deep breath. “Look, when I first came here I rented a set of rooms from the old doc that first owned this practice. Nice old guy, he never asked questions and the house was so big we never got crowded in there. I took over the house when he passed. It’s an old Prairie-style place. It’s hot, but if they’re coming for me, like you say... Why don’t you just, you know, stay there? Wouldn’t that make it easier?”

It was Solo’s turn to think. Finally he nodded. “That would give us an advantage.”

Thurmond, his hand still shaking a bit, pulled his big ring of keys from his white coat pocket. He removed a key and held it out; embarrassed that Solo could see how nervous he was. “That works the front and back doors—although I haven’t locked them in years.”

“You should from now on, Thurmond. Until this is done with.”

Thurmond nodded. “The F.B.I. found me this practice. Should I call someone there?”

“You have a contact with them?”

“I did. An old guy.” Thurmond shrugged. “Hell, an old number. Haven’t spoken to him in… Jeeze, he’s probably long since retired. Probably dead. He said it was best, at least back then, if information about my whereabouts was kept in the hands of only a couple of agents. I never knew who else knows about it.”

“It’s not the same F.B.I. It may be one of them that found you for Doyle. Perhaps you should wait before calling them. Let’s see what hand we are dealt. But, if Doyle exposes himself, you drop the dime. They want him even more than he wants you.”

“I hoped this was all over, done with, forgotten.”

“Can you forget why you did what you did to Doyle?”

“Never.”

“Would you do it again?”

“As fast as I could blink.”

“So be it.” Solo held out his hand again. Thurmond shook it. It felt cold to the touch.

~