Free Quick Fixes: Tales of Repairman Jack by F. Paul Wilson Page B

him!”
    Bondy stopped his dance, looked up, and grinned. As he charged, Jack rammed his head backward, smashing the back of his skull into Hank’s nose. Abruptly, he was free. He still held the iron bar, so he angled the blunt end toward Bondy and drove it hard into his solar plexus. The air whooshed out of him and he dropped to his knees with a groan, his face gray green. Even his scalp looked sick.
    Jack glanced up and saw Scar lip crouched at the front of the cage, gripping the bars, its yellow gaze flicking between him and the groaning Bondy, but lingering on Jack, as if it was trying to comprehend what he was doing, and why. Tiny rivulets of dark, almost black blood trailed down its skin.
    Jack flipped the pike a hundred and eighty degrees and pressed the point against Bondy’s chest.
    “ What kind of noise am I going to hear when I poke you with this end?”
    Behind him Hank’s voice, very nasal now, started shouting.
    “ Hey, Rube! Hey, Rube!”
    As Jack was trying to figure out just what that meant, he gave Bondy a poke with the pointed end – not enough to break the skin, but enough to scare him. He howled and fell back on the sawdust, screaming.
    “ Don’t! Don’t!”
    Meanwhile, Hank had kept up his “Hey, Rube!” shouts. As Jack turned to shut him up, he found out what it meant.
    The tent was filling with carny folk. Lots of them, all running his way. In seconds he was surrounded. The workers he could handle, but the freaks, gathered in a crowd like this, in the murky light, in various states of dress, were almost terrifying. Jack was struck by the degree and diversity of their deformities. And none of them looked too friendly.
    Hank was holding his bloody nose, wagging his finger at Jack.
    “ Now you’re gonna get it! Now you’re gonna get it!”
    Bondy seemed to have a sudden infusion of courage. He hauled himself to his feet and started toward Jack.
    “ You goddam sonova–”
    Jack rapped the end of the iron bar across the side of his bald head, staggering him. With an angry murmur, the circle of carny folk abruptly tightened. Jack whirled, spinning the pike around him.
    “ Right,” he said. “Who’s next?”
    He hoped it was a convincing show. He didn’t know what else to do at the moment. The circle tightened further, slowly closing in on him like a noose. Jack searched for a weak spot, preparing to make a run for it. As a last resort, there was always the .45 caliber Semmerling strapped to his forearm.
    Suddenly a deep voice rose above the angry noise of the crowd.
    “ Here, here! What’s going on now?”
    The carny folk quieted immediately, but not before Jack heard a few voices whisper about “the boss” and “Oz.” They parted ranks to make way for a tall, ungainly man, six three at least, lank dark hair, sallow complexioned, his pear shaped body swathed in a huge silk robe embroidered with oriental designs. Although he looked doughy about the middle, the hands that protruded from his sleeves were thin and bony at the wrist. He stopped at the edge on the circle and took in the scene. His expression was slack but his eyes were bright, dark, cold, more alive than the rest of him. Those eyes finally settled on Jack.
    “ Who are you and what are you doing here?”
    “ Protecting your property,” Jack said, gambling.
    “ Oh, really?” The smile was sour, almost cruel. “How magnanimous of you.” Abruptly his expression darkened. “Do not insult my intelligence, sir! I can call the police or we can deal with this in our own way.”
    “ Fine,” Jack said. He threw the pike at the newcomer’s feet. “Maybe I had it wrong. Maybe you pay baldy here to poke holes in your attractions.”
    “ Hey, boss–” Bondy began, but the tall man silenced him with a flick of his hand. He looked down at the pike where sawdust clung the dark fluid coating its point, then up at the rakosh with its dozens of oozing wounds. Color began to darken his cheeks as his head turned slowly toward