The Blackguard

By Ben Garrido

A fast, minimalist novel filled with cutting irony and dark humor, The Blackguard is a world both alien and uncomfortably familiar. Gripping, unsentimental and disturbing, Garrido's story will ask how much you really care about your roots.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ben Garrido
• Release date: Apr 14, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311517630

Ben Garrido

Ben Garrido is the author of the novels The Blackguard (available in June) and The Potency (available in July), in addition to the upcoming novel The Book of Joshua. In addition, he writes award winning journalism for the Reno News and Review, Chico News and Review and others, and lectures on second language acquisition at Mokwon University in South Korea. He writes on subjects including language, fiction, adventure and logic. Raised in Reno, Nevada, he now divides his time between South Korea and the United States.

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The Blackguard

A Novel in Four Parts

By Ben Garrido

The first of Ben Garrido's three novels about broken identity, The Blackguard follows young engineer Marcus Hunyadi as he tries to separate Nevada’s ancient and isolated town of Enclave from its immense natural resources, protect a child of tainted blood, and attain the power he craves.

A fast, minimalist novel filled with cutting irony and dark humor, The Blackguard is a world both alien and uncomfortably familiar. Gripping, unsentimental and disturbing, Garrido's story will ask how much you really care about your roots.

A Lucky Bat Book

LBB_copyrightsmall

The Blackguard

Copyright © 2014 by Ben Garrido

All rights reserved, which includes the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever except as provided by the U.S. Copyright Law.

Cover Design by Guilherme Gustavo Condeixa

Published by Lucky Bat Books

Discover other titles by the author at www.bengarrido.com

Smashwords Edition License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with other people, please purchase additional copies. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com for your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Author’s Note

Dear Reader,

Have you ever come across a really good scene and wanted to know where the author got the idea? Have you ever gotten the sense that there’s a symbol or reference you’re missing? I certainly have, which is why I’ve always enjoyed footnotes in books and why I’ve included virtual footnotes in your copy of The Blackguard.

Keep your eyes peeled for little numbers within the text in this book. If you click on these links, your e-reader will take you to relevant commentary, trivia, explanation and meta-critique on my website. While you will not need to follow these links at any point, and indeed, you may wish to ignore them until you’ve finished your first read through, I hope they might enhance your enjoyment of my book should you desire a deeper engagement with Marcus, Zitkala-sa and Enclave.

Thanks for choosing The Blackguard,

Ben Garrido

Table of Contents

Author’s Note

Chapter 1

Part I

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Part II

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Part III

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Part IV

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Chapter 1

In the Beginning

I walked through the automatic glass doors etched General Buildable. The secretary nodded as usual. I went to the elevator in a manner identical to my normal routine but instead of pressing the plastic number three, I ran my fingers over the cold aluminum button inscribed twelve.1

The elevator doors opened and I stepped onto carpet so thick it gave my stride a bounce. I shook out my hands, concentrated on lowering my heart rate and spoke aloud.

I belong here. I belong here. I am not in over my head.

Another secretary, much younger and considerably more voluptuous, saw me and stepped out from behind her black marble desk. She put her hand on my wrist and motioned for me to follow. We came to an aluminum and cherry wood door of the type important people use to intimidate passersby. The secretary opened it and presented me to the executives waiting inside.

Mr. Marcus Hunyadi.

The executives stood as if greeting a judge or foreign dignitary and not some junior project manager three quarters of the way down the corporate pay scale. I looked out over the industrial titans running General Buildable and smiled at their banality. Some flaccid with age, some puckered in their carefully manicured bitterness, some staring out from conspicuously empty eyes. My doubts evaporated as I read their engraved nameplates and smelled the megabucks Italian coffee. An older black gentleman, one Vice President for Market Research Leonard Fitzgerald, motioned that I should sit down.

I suppose you know nothing about the town of Enclave, Nevada? The hairy man sitting behind a John Baker name tag asked.

I’ve not heard of it.

I like to think of it as a time capsule, full of people who haven’t changed very much since the time of Magellan. Most of the townspeople have no contact with the outside world, and the few that do venture out don’t leave their homes more than once or twice a year. They do not like visitors. Our man in the Department of Transportation very nearly got himself lynched when he approached them for the first time. They’re definitely primitives.1

Listening to a man with a $6000 suit and professionally trimmed nose hair talk about primitives brought to mind Marie Antoinette, Farah Pahlavi and Colonel Gadaffi – the sorts of people primitives have a habit of dismembering.

What does General buildable want with these people? I asked.

Anfernee Boldin, the vice president for development, cut Baker off before he could continue.

They are primitives who happen to live over the largest untapped aquifer in the Western United States.

I nodded slowly.

Then the contract is ready?

No, Baker said. There’s not going to be a contract this time around. Our man Carl Garrison from DOT stumbled over Enclave and its water completely by accident. He thinks he’s earned greater compensation than the state of Nevada would normally give a civil engineer so he came to us instead.

So this is illegal? I asked.

Boldin answered.

I would prefer we not use the word illegal. We need somebody with a lot of guts to lead this operation.. Think you’re up to it?

You aren’t scaring me, if that’s what you mean.

I then deduced why they had chosen me over the other engineers. Single, childless men with shallow connections to their employers were both more adaptable and more disposable than the alternatives—good thinking if I’m honest. Baker interrupted my thoughts.1

Nobody is going to jail.

By that I assumed he meant the other board members and I have done extensive ass covering in case you fuck up.

He continued. We’ve got a good plan. Garrison is going back to Enclave tomorrow. He’s going to pay their leaders $1,500,000 to let General Buildable in. By General Buildable, I mean you, of course. After that, we’ll send you in with another $600,000 to actually build the bridge.

Why do we need a bridge?

Mostly we want to make it look like Enclave was trying to contact the outside world on their own, Baker said. We do need a way to get trucks and buses across the gorge, but that’s secondary.

I poured myself a cup of water and spun the wet glass on the marble conference table. I imagined them fretting for their trust funds and wondering whether or not another couple million bucks was worth the scandal. These pampered, limp dick, chardonnay-sipping, trophy wife gathering poodle fuckers needed me because they didn’t have enough courage to make their own goddamn money. Boldin finally spoke.

Make it look local and rustic and like something they’d do by themselves. It’ll be easier on everybody if the world thinks Enclave wants out of its box.

So I take it the savages don’t want out of their box?

They value their privacy, Boldin said.

I said I understood. It would be a shame to put gentlemen and ladies at risk.

Baker pretended to miss my contempt.

That’s all you have to do, he said. A year or so after you finish the bridge and go home DOT will complete their road to Enclave. Everyone can be astonished when they find a happy local population, a nice causeway right into town and billions of gallons of fresh water in the aquifer. We dig the wells and construct the pipes and buy up the water rights. Then General Buildable will kick back 20% of the profits to Garrison and give you half a million dollars for your trouble. If you’ll just sign these documents – a confidentiality agreement and some miscellaneous papers regarding our seed money, we can send you on your way.

I scratched the short hairs on my chin and thought about the meaning of $500,000. A small yacht, two brand new Ferraris, or a nice house. I smirked at the Armani-clad cowards before me, looked briefly at my feet and agreed to their terms.

It was not more than a week before I first laid eyes on Enclave.

Part I

Chapter 2

Daniel, wherein the prophet foretells destruction.

I drove my 4x4 truck to the top of the ridge overlooking Enclave’s western edge, engaged park and stepped out. When I turned off the truck engine I noticed the sound of rattling generators and saw the reddish smoke indicative of ancient diesel engines. I saw men on farms tending to their grains and watched a boy killing a rabbit in the fields. The red and gray volcanic ash beneath my feet crunched with each step.

Okay, time to think about the rustics. What sorts of things would they like to see in a foreigner? Hominess? Mellowness? Righteousness? Silence? I decided on a combination of non-threatening and enigmatic. I grabbed some hair wax from the truck and gave myself one of those dopey cowlicks over my forehead. I scrunched up a flannel, collared shirt so it would look worn in and changed out of my pin stripped polo. I turned the collar up on the right side and folded it down on the left. Construction gloves—those would make me look both blue collar and goofy. Then I had to get in character.2

Laid back people didn’t get lynched very often so I’d go with a mellow vibe. Pretend you’re one of the guys and that you gave a shit about farmer Bob’s fertilizing strategies. Pretend to enjoy professional wrestling and domestic beer but pretend not to notice the women folk. Blend, melt, go home and cash your check.

I got back in the truck and drove slowly into town. I passed two farms and one heavily scarred man who didn’t seem to like my cowlick. I headed towards the two story wooden home opposite a mill and tiny shop because it was the largest building I could see. Another man with scars saw me, then another. I stopped when scarred man number four, perhaps fifty years old with broad shoulders and male pattern baldness, walked to the truck door and pointed his shotgun at my head.

You lost?

I couldn’t believe this man intended to give me directions and so I tried a diversion.

I brought money. Let me show you.

Is you stupid or deaf? Did you come here on purpose?

I wanted to say something clever or sarcastic—something to cut this inbred shit kicker’s metaphorical legs off—but then I saw the shotgun shell’s red plastic sphincter down the barrel and couldn’t muster the courage. Instead I decided on a show of meekness.2

Yes, I, yes I came here to see you.

You Carl’s friend?

The first man I’d seen, probably in his late twenties with long brown hair and a stringy goatee, came to the other door and stuck his head in through the window. I ignored him and focused on the one with the gun.

I am Carl’s friend. He sent me here to give you the rest of the money and to make a bridge.

The younger man spoke.

That a radio you got in this truck?

Yes.

The men nodded to each other. The younger one grabbed my radio antenna and broke it off before explaining the situation.

We got ways here we’re real proud of. They keep us who we are, preserve us from those fuckin’ halfbreeds all ‘round. We like our ways and so we don’t need no radios, no phones or no TVs to fill our heads with nonsense.

I thought of the satellite phone under the seat and hoped the natives wouldn’t find it. I willed myself not to look.

What’s your blood? The older man asked.

"Pardon me?

You a spic or a guinea?

Welsh, both of my parents are Welsh.

A young woman came from behind the two story house and the older man called for her attention.

Where’s Welshland? he asked.

Smug overcame scared for just a second and I rolled my eyes. Thank God nobody saw.

I dunno, but he looks white to me.

The older man lowered his gun and addressed the younger.

Jeremiah, get this Sodomite a room to stay in. He’s prolly tired.

I slept in safety that night and for many nights thereafter. It was not until I’d grown comfortable that the excitement began again.

~*~*~

Jeremiah stopped in front of me and waved.

Marcus, put that shit down and get in my truck.

With Jeremiah, putting shit down and getting in a pickup truck could mean anything from a birthday party to skull fractures. I left the calculator, notebook and briefcase on my front porch and went to him.

What happened?

His 104 facial scars still unsettled me and the refugee-from-Deliverance grooming habits didn’t help either. Still, he seemed to like me.

My sis, her water broke, he said.

Chastity wasn’t supposed to give birth for another five weeks. Jehu, her most recent boyfriend, would worry about his baby if he knew about Chastity’s labor. I hoped he didn’t know.

Are you going to get Wisdom? I asked. We’ll probably need a midwife.

She’s already at the house.

We rattled up the twisty dirt trail leading back into the cottonwood grove where Chastity lived. The narrow road meant the diesel truck’s rear tires ran over the edges of the ditches every time we rounded a corner.

Tiny ass road, Jeremiah said.

I didn’t see anyone else who’d arrived to support the birthing. I wondered if we’d come that quickly or if maybe nobody else cared. The door was unlocked and Wisdom started talking the instant we entered.

Oh my goodness, oh my goodness, thank heavens you’re here. She’s really close and it looks bad and I don’t think we’re going to have time to get her to the disease room in Sodom.

Disease room meant hospital in Enclave-speak. As for Sodom, take a wild guess. That said, their use of the moniker was a lot less condemning than you’d imagine. It was more akin to my saying we’re headed down to the ghetto than and lo, we do descend into the depths of a damnable den of sin the Lord Our Savior will soon destroy in a rain of sulphurous flame. So that was good, I guess.

I took the opportunity to sit down in one of the unsteady cottonwood chairs in Chastity’s front room and oriented myself.2 During my short time in Enclave I’d already moved from lusting after Chastity to hating Chastity to becoming her friendly acquaintance. Instead of the Enclavian ideal of straight brown hair Chastity was blonde and curly. This lowered her status, but as a weird foreigner I was allowed a few eccentricities, like digging pregnant girls.

However different our tastes in women, my new neighbors and I did share a healthy fear for her motives. While most people might as well write their intentions on their foreheads, Chastity instead maintained an aura of transparent innocence while behaving in a manner much more predatory than prayerful.

One story the locals told me had Chastity, then no more than 13, helping out all summer long with an elderly invalid. She told everyone she was doing it to experience real, Christian service and to satisfy the small private school’s requirement for volunteerism. After the old woman died at the end of the summer Chastity had somehow gotten enough silver to buy silk clothes, which in a closed off little place like Enclave, cost about four times what a New Yorker would pay for Gucci. The old woman seemed to have misplaced her jewelry in those last months.

Another story had her dating the one of the town’s least savory young men. Joseph liked to make vagina jokes, to fart on people and to eat his own snot. I have no clue why Chastity had fallen for him to start with. Anyway, Joseph bought a Polaroid from Ruth, the town trader. Soon after that Joseph started passing pictures of Chastity’s privates around to all his idiot friends. Everybody thought she was a slut beforehand, but even so the pictures didn’t help Chastity’s reputation. This betrayal didn’t cause Chastity to break up with Joseph but she did get involved with a meat-head guy named Judah. Joseph found out Chastity was cheating, insulted Judah’s mother and spent a month in Wisdom’s disease room recovering from a dislocated knee, a minor concussion and three broken ribs.

A small, gentle hand came down on my shoulder and returned me to the present.

Marcus sweetie, Wisdom said. Please get me some hot water and towels.

Yeah sure, no problem.

Chastity’s house smelled even if she kept it tidy. It had this sour milk meets oily egg