“Their mother is dead.”
“Jesus, Walk.” She dragged a hand through her hair. Thin wrists, veins standing proud. “You gonna make this harder than it needs to be. You got the man already, right?”
“You didn’t think to ask where Darke really was that night.”
She tipped her head back, mouth a little open as she blew the smoke away.
“Did you at least get security?”
“I don’t know what you mean.” She met his eye with tears in hers.
“I could call you in, make you testify. You know what the penalty is for perjury?” Maybe he could prove Darke had lied, but it didn’t mean shit, not really, not without so much more.
She closed her eyes. “There’s no family. Just me and the girls. No one else at all.”
He would not tear a mother from her children. The toll was too great. He knew that from talking to Hal and watching Duchess and Robin.
“I need something. A favor. It could come to nothing, but I need it.”
She did not ask what, just nodded once.
He reached forward and touched her hand, and she grasped his tight, like she did not want to let go, like she could wring the absolution from it.
31
SHE SLEPT THE SHALLOWEST OF sleeps each night, so was on her feet quick and pulling on a sweater and jeans when she heard the tapping. Robin slept deeply beside, curled fetal the way he used to in the family room at Vancour Hill Hospital.
At the window she held up a finger, found her sneakers and crept down the stairs and out into the cold night.
He wore a scarf and woollen hat, his bike propped by the gate.
“Shit, Thomas Noble. That was Mary Lou’s window you were tossing stones at.”
“Sorry.”
“How far did you ride?”
“I left at dinner, told my mom I was sleeping over at a friend’s.”
“You don’t have friends.”
“I’ve started hanging out with Walt Gurney.”
“That kid with the eye?”
“It’s only contagious if you touch it.”
He wore a coat so thick it was like his body was wrapped with tires.
They moved down into the long yard. Behind bare trees was a small fishpond. Robin had sat there an hour before Mrs. Price told him it was not stocked.
They sat together on a stone bench beneath a half-moon and bright nests of starlight.
“You should really wear regular gloves. Not even Robin wears mittens.”
Thomas Noble reached across and took her hand and blew onto it, then braced himself but she said nothing.
“You were in the newspaper. All that stuff that happened. I kept the cuttings.”
“I saw it all.”
“I wish you were coming back to school.”
A look toward the sleeping house, the neighbors’ beside. Wake up, go to work and pay bills. Take vacations. They worried about pensions and P.T.A. meetings, which car to buy next and where to spend Christmas.
“I liked Hal. I know he was scary and all that but I liked him just the same. I’m real sorry for you, Duchess.”
She balled snow in her hand till her bones ached. “I’m figuring out my next move. Take it back to breathing. I can’t fuck up, I know that much. The girl, Mary Lou … I’d like to behead that motherfucker.”
Thomas Noble pulled his hat low over his ears.
“I need to get back to Cape Haven. I made a promise to Robin, that I’d find us a home for good this time. It’s all that matters to him.”
“I asked my mother if you could come live with us but—”
She waved him off, gave him an out. “The way she is with the mailman you’ll likely have a sibling soon enough.”
He frowned.
“I don’t need anyone … but my brother, he’s just a baby really. You think there’s such a thing as a truly selfless act, Thomas Noble?”
“Sure. You coming to the winter dance with me.”
She smiled.
“I like winter most. Out of all the seasons, and I think we have more than most in Montana.”
“Why?”
He raised his bad hand, the mitten covering it totally.
“That’s why you wear mittens.”
“Yes.”
“There was an outlaw, William Dangs, and he was a crack shot badass that held up three banks before they got him. He had one arm, at the shoulder, whole thing gone.”
“Serious?”
“Yes.” Right then she was glad he did not know her tells.
She began to shiver.
He took off his coat and slipped it round her shoulders.
He began to shiver.
“They might send us someplace far. If we get anyone at all, could be anywhere in the whole country.”
“I’ll ride there. Doesn’t matter where.”
“I don’t need anyone.”
“I know. You’re the toughest girl I ever met. And the prettiest. And I know you’ll probably hit me but I think my world is infinitely better because you’re in it. Before it was just kids that laughed, pointed, whispered. But not now. And I know—”
She kissed him then. Her first kiss, and his. His lips were cold, his nose cold on her cheek. He was too startled to kiss her back. She broke it and turned back to the frozen pond.
“Shut up,” she said.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were going to.”
They breathed mist.
“Hal said we begin at the end.”
“So where are we now?”
“I’m not sure it matters.”
“Wherever it is, I hope we can stay here a little longer.”
They held hands a while, then stood and walked back down the yard, spring buried so deep. In the house was her suitcase and her brother and she had nothing else in the world. She could not decide if that made her free or so terribly cursed.
Thomas Noble pulled his bicycle from the gate and dusted snow from the saddle.
“How did you find me?” she said, as she handed his coat back.
“My mother was talking to your case worker.”
“Right.”
He climbed on the bike.
“Hey. Why did you come here tonight?”
“I wanted to see you.”
“And? I can read you. Tell me.”
“I’m looking for him. Darke. Every day after school I ride to the Radley farm and walk the woodland.”
“Could be you’ll find a body.”
“I sure hope so.”
He freewheeled to the end of the Price driveway. She followed him out into the street. Mailboxes neatly lined, each had a family name painted on. Cooper and Lewis and Nelson. Robin liked to read the names, to see himself inside.
“Thomas Noble.”
He stopped, leaned on one foot and looked back over his shoulder.
She raised a hand.
He raised his own.
When she got back to their room she found Robin crying, scooted back against the wall, his head in his hands.
“What is it?”
“Where were you?” he spoke between sobs.
“Thomas Noble came here.”
“The bed.”
She looked over at the balled sheet.
“The bed is wet,” he said, distraught. “I had a dream about that night. I heard things. I heard voices.”
She pulled him close and kissed his head. Then she helped him out of his shorts and T-shirt, put him in the bathtub and washed him.
When she was done she dressed him in clean pajamas and laid him in her bed. He was sleeping by the time she got to work stripping the mattress down.
* * *
Walk lay in his bed wrestling with facts he already knew. Dickie Darke had lied about his alibi the night Star was murdered. Milton had paid him a visit, maybe the two had gone hunting but Walk didn’t buy it. Milton was missing, Walk had stopped by his place and found it in darkness. There was no one he could check in with, no motel or anythi
ng. Milton camped, hunted, moved through the acres in the kind of solitude he couldn’t bear in the Cape.
An hour from dawn he stood and dressed, drank coffee then climbed into the car and drove to Cedar Heights.
No one worked the gatehouse during night hours, so Walk left the cruiser beneath trees that swayed against lightening sky, crossed the driveway and stepped through the smaller gate to the side.
No life in any of the houses, not even the place across the street. He moved without care, head up, no doubt caught on the cameras. He did not know if it was the lack of sleep or the way his body tremored but that morning he did not give a shit for the trouble he was inviting.
He moved down the side of the house, opened the gate and stepped into the yard, and then stalled when he saw it. The back door, a single pane of glass missing, removed with great care, no noise at all. He thought of the men looking for Darke as he reached in and turned the handle.
No sign of anything as he moved through the house, TV off, plastic fruit in the bowl, up the stairs and through the bedrooms, made up like a perfect family had stepped out for an hour so interested parties could get a look at their lives.
He checked beneath the bed, pulled the sheets back and then tossed the pillow to the floor. And then he saw it, far out of place. Right there in the bed, a sweater, small and pink. A girl’s sweater. He thought of bagging it, taking it, and then explaining it to Boyd. He left it, but made a note in his pad so he’d remember.
And then the flash of lights.
He ducked low, moved to the window and heard the car idle. He risked a look, different sedan but same two, the bearded guy rolled the window down, lit by the glow from his cigarette. He stared at the house.
Walk counted off the beats of his heart.
Fifteen minutes till they backed up, turned and slowly rolled away. He got the plates, for what it was worth.
Back in the kitchen he switched on the lights and searched every cupboard.
He almost missed it.
Down on his knees he checked the tiles.
No doubt it was blood.
It took three hours to get a tech van over, and that was all on favor. Tana Legros had been at the end of her shift when he called. Walk had once busted her son smoking weed at a party he broke up on Fallbrook. He’d recognized the kid’s surname and driven him home instead of writing him up. Tana would be grateful till the day she died.
Once Moses arrived at the gatehouse Walk tried to liaise with the guy, but found the easiest way to deal with his questions was to slip him a twenty.
He ventured through to the back where he found the small office. The computer was plastic, hollow, as fake as the ideal.
Tana came, one other guy with her, young and methodical and eager. The guy stood back and raised an eyebrow as Tana lowered her mask. She pointed in the direction of the kitchen, blinds pulled, luminol reagent set the floor aglow.
“Jesus,” Walk said. “Blood?”
“Yes,” Tana said.
“Is that a lot?”
“Yes.”
“Can you run it?”
“You got a warrant to be in here?”
He said nothing.
“Guess I can’t remove this tile then.”
“Sorry.”
“I’ll swab and hold on to it. You give me something more and I’ll work up a profile. Won’t get nowhere if it’s not in the system though.”
He thought of the men after Darke. And then his mind ran to Milton.
He left the cruiser up on the sidewalk, ran across Milton’s front yard and hammered the door.
“Milton,” he yelled, then stepped back into the street and looked at the upstairs windows. He heard a noise behind, turned and saw Brandon Rock watering his grass.
“You seen Milton?”
“Vacation.” Brandon looked like shit, dark glasses, stubble, feathered hair collapsed.
“You alright?”
“Leah didn’t tell you?”
“What?”
“Those two don’t even talk anymore, she probably doesn’t even know,” Brandon slurred it.
“Know what, Brandon?”
“Ed let me go.”
Walk took a step nearer and smelled the booze.
“Me and John and Michael.”
“I’m sorry.”
Brandon waved a hand, turned and walked unsteadily toward his house. “Falling market. Failing economy. Bullshit. Ed ran the place into the ground. Booze, the women. Used to go to The Eight more than me, and I lived in that place.”
Walk dragged a trash can over, stood on it, pulled himself over Milton’s side gate and dropped into the backyard, feeling his bones jar as he hit the ground.
He found the key under a false stone. Five years back Milton had taken in a stray, a skinny mongrel that he turned so fat it was put to death a year later. So much meat it went happy. Walk had agreed to feed the thing when Milton’s father passed.
Inside.
He smelled blood right off, guessed Milton secreted the scent wherever he sat. He saw a calendar on the wall, two weeks marked, even had a circle on the day he’d be opening up again.
“Milton,” he called it loud, in case the guy was bathing, the kind of sight that’d chase dreams with nightmare for all eternity.
Nothing in the living room.
He climbed the stairs, tried the guestroom. A mattress on the floor, no sheets. And then he came to the master.
It was neat, thick blanket on the bed, despite the warmth, an old dresser with mirror above, maybe the kind his mother had used. On the wall was the head of a deer, mounted on mahogany, the dead eyes made Walk wonder what kind of man wanted the thing watching over him like that.
There was a bookshelf, heavy with texts on hunting, traps, maps of the wild. Nothing on astronomy.
He walked over to the window, saw the telescope, the Celestron, and ran a finger along the back. The dust was thick, like he hadn’t used the thing in a year.
He leaned down, peered through and took a breath when he found the telescope not angled at the sky but on the house across the street.
On a single window.
The window to Star Radley’s bedroom.
He thought of Milton, always offering help, the Comanche, taking out her trash, giving Duchess cuts of meat to take home. Walk always had him down as good, misunderstood, a little off, but basically a decent man. He cursed under his breath as he began searching through drawers.
He found the suitcase beneath the bed, hauled it out and dumped it on top of the mattress.
Neighborhood Watch. Scrawled in marker pen across the top. There was order inside, the photos cataloged. They numbered in hundreds. Some were Polaroid, some better quality. He picked one up and saw Star in a state of undress, bare chest, just underwear. And that was the theme. In some she was clothed, working the yard, some had Duchess and Robin in view, clear they were not the focus. He turned from the nudes, Star bent over, Star undressing for bed.
“Fucking Milton.”
Some of the shots were old, ten years of watching. He noticed a couple with a guy she was seeing, Walk couldn’t quite recall the name. He guessed Milton hoped to catch them fucking, instead got a series of shots of Star kissing him goodnight then the guy retiring to the living room.
And then he stopped.
The file marked June 14th.
The day Star was murdered.
With a shaking hand he turned the pages, and cursed again when he saw they were blank.
He took a final look around, then called it in. Leah Tallow took it and sounded shocked when he told her.
He’d bring Milton in, just as soon as he found him.
32
THEY SETTLED INTO FRAGMENTED LIFE.
They trailed in silence each morning as Mary Lou and her brother collected friends on the walk to school. The group stared back and whispered and laughed. One time Duchess slipped on the ice, tore her jeans and cut her knee. They did not stop to help. She limped on in quiet, still
holding her brother’s bag as well as her own.
Mrs Price added a plastic sheet to Robin’s bed. It rustled so loud each night he climbed in with Duchess.
They met with two couples.
The first, Mr. and Mrs. Kolene. Duchess knew right off that Shelly had worked hard to get them to the table, the table being a play area in the park on Twin Elms Avenue. Duchess pushed Robin on the swing while the Kolenes and Shelly sat on a park bench, drank a thermos of coffee and stared at them like they were attractions in a petting zoo.
“What the fuck are they looking at? They want us to do tricks or something?”
“Quiet, they might hear.”
Duchess took a tissue from her coat and wiped his nose, then went back to pushing the swing while Shelly smiled at her.
“The dude looks like a librarian.”
“Why?”
“Those glasses. He’s got a sweater with no sleeves. I think they’re too old to have kids naturally and now they want a second shot. Could be problems with his sperm, or maybe she’s barren as the Mojave.”
Robin stared over. “What’s barren?”
“Her parts have died off.”
“She looks alright.”
“I can feel the bitter seeping from her pores. Should’ve frozen her eggs. She won’t love us right.”
“But no one else has come.”
“They will. Shelly said we have to be patient, right.”
He looked down.
“Right?”
“Yeah. I guess.”
“These people, they get tested. Vetted. They take classes so they know how to parent right.”
She pushed him higher, till the chain began to flex and he screamed and laughed. She marveled at his ability to adapt, the way he smiled at Mr. and Mrs. Price so much, just the chance they might return it enough for him.
She worked hard to keep her temper in check now, didn’t say anything when Mary Lou smirked or Henry wouldn’t share his games with Robin. She buried the part of her that thought about Hal and the way he had died, and her mother and the way she had died. She watched old Westerns, read her books, knew that lives could be colored so bold by revenge they ate away all the good a person might have once had.
It was Walk who kept her from doing something foolish, he anchored her to the good, he kept her aimed toward the future instead of the now. Walk reminded her men could be all good. He kept her from marching over to Shelly and the Kolenes and telling them to get the fuck away, that she’d cared for Robin his whole life and didn’t plan on quitting anytime soon.
We Begin at the End Page 23