by Greg Iles
“Somebody trying to call you?” Pearlie asks. “I hate them phones.”
“Someone’s about to.”
The phone rings on cue.
“Tell me,” I answer.
“The shit’s hit the fan,” says Sean. “A little after eleven, we got an anonymous call telling us to check an apartment in Kenner. The caller said Malik rented it under an alias. We got a warrant and went there with some Jefferson Parish detectives. The landlord ID’d Malik from a photo, and we went in.”
“What did you find?”
“A lot of video equipment, for one thing. Pro quality stuff, and a computer rigged for digital film production.”
Video equipment? “What else?”
“We found the murder weapon, Cat.”
My throat tightens. “What?”
“Thirty-two-caliber Charter Arms revolver. The handgun that killed our five victims. It had the serial number filed off. We’re going to try to bring it out with acid, but we don’t know anything yet.”
“Did you arrest Malik for murder?”
“Yeah. Got him at his home.”
“He resist?”
“No. Went like a lamb. And no Hollywood Walk this time. We booked him and took him to the CLU through the garage.”
“Jesus. Who do you think the tipper was?”
“We don’t know. Maybe one of Malik’s patients? A girl he took to that apartment?”
“Or a guy,” I suggest.
“The caller was female. Anyway, Malik was already so high profile because of the contempt story that we had to go ahead with his arraignment. The DA argued for no bail, but the judge set one anyway. A million bucks.”
“Can he pay that?”
“Probably. He’s got a house across the lake he could put up as surety. He was in Central Lockup, but they just moved him to the parish prison.”
The anonymous tip about the location of the murder weapon bothers me. It was too easy. “Sean, do you really think Malik is the killer?”
“I’m a lot more convinced than I was yesterday. I just found out that ten days after Malik got back from Vietnam, his father was badly beaten. Spent two months in the hospital, and he never looked the same again.”
“Did Malik’s father ID his assailant?”
“Said he didn’t see anything. It happened in his home, but nothing was stolen.”
“Did Malik have an alibi?”
“Nobody even asked him for one. This was Columbus, Mississippi, not Berkeley, California. Malik was a hero, just home from the war. What did he have to be pissed about?”
As I consider this, Billy Neal walks into my field of vision, just below Pearlie’s porch. “Dr. Kirkland wants to see you,” he says, though I’m obviously using the phone. “He told me to bring you to the study.”
“Tell him I’ll see him later. I have somewhere to go first.”
“What?” says Sean.
A strange smile distorts Billy Neal’s mouth. “The island, you mean?”
“Sean, let me call you back.” I put the phone in my pocket and address the driver. “Have you been eavesdropping here?”
Neal ignores the question. “He’s waiting for you now. He doesn’t like to wait.”
I turn to Pearlie. “What’s going on? What is it about the island that nobody wants me to know?”
Pearlie gets up from her rocker and gives me a hug. “It’s not my place, baby. Go talk to your granddaddy. If you still want to go down to the island after that, maybe I’ll go with you.” She steps to the porch rail and gives Billy Neal a withering glare. “Get out of my sight, trash.”
The driver laughs, a brittle sound that makes me think of a boy I once saw torturing a cat in a sandbox.
Pearlie turns and goes into her house without another word.
“Your grandfather’s waiting,” Neal says again.
“Tell him I’ll be there in a minute.”
“He said I should bring you.”
“Listen, asshole, you keep standing there, you’ll be waiting all day.”
Billy Neal gives me his crooked smile. “I wouldn’t mind that. You ain’t half bad to look at.”
The door behind me bangs open, and Pearlie walks out carrying a rifle. Her eyes are squinted nearly shut and her jaw is set tight. “Get away from here, trash,” she says in a menacing voice.
“That’s a pellet gun,” says Neal, his smile broadening. “An air rifle.”
“That’s right.” Pearlie raises the rifle until it’s pointed at his midsection. “I use it to kill the possums that tear up the garbage. But if I shoot you in the balls with it, they gonna swell up like a watermelon, and you ain’t gonna be bothering no womens for a long time.” To emphasize her point, Pearlie puts her eye to the sight and aims the barrel at Neal’s genitals.
The smile vanishes from the driver’s face. “Your day’s coming, nigger.”
“If I tell Dr. Kirkland you bothering his grandbaby, your day’s come and gone, cracker. Get out of here!”
Billy Neal laughs again, then walks slowly back toward Malmaison.
“Why did you do that?” I ask. “I can take care of myself.”
“He’s a bad apple. I don’t know why Dr. Kirkland keeps him around here.”
“He’s a bodyguard, you said the other day.”
Pearlie spits over the rail. “That boy got a law degree, too, from somewhere. You believe that?”
This revelation makes me think of Sean and his night-school law degree. He told me tales of con men and criminals taking the same courses and earning the same degree he did. “I believe it.”
“I think he got something over Dr. Kirkland,” Pearlie says softly.
“What do you mean? Something on him?”
She nods once, firmly.
“What could he have on Grandpapa?”
Pearlie shakes her head, her eyes still on the retreating figure. “His mama used to work for your granddaddy. Secretary or bookkeeper, something. She knew things.”
“What could she know about? Something illegal?”
Pearlie turns to me, her eyes hard. “I don’t know. Dr. Kirkland’s careful with the family business. But it’s got to be something. Your granddaddy wouldn’t let that trash tie his shoes, otherwise.”
Her comment reminds me that my grandfather—a man who places such value on integrity that he closes million-dollar deals with a handshake—has destroyed the careers of several men who crossed him, or who lied to him in business deals. “I wouldn’t want to try to blackmail Grandpapa.”
“Lord knows that’s right. Be like climbing into a bear pit with the bear in it.”
“You stay away from that driver, Pearlie.”
She reaches out and squeezes my wrist. “You, too, baby. Things have changed around here.”
“Have they?” I shake my head. “I don’t think so. I think things were always this way. I was just too young to see it.”
Chapter
25
Grandpapa is waiting for me in his study. He’s sitting in the same leather executive chair he sat in two days ago, when he told me the same old lie about my father’s death. What does he want to tell me now?
He doesn’t speak when I enter. He sits erect in his chair, his left hand cradling a glass of Scotch, his blue eyes looking strangely wet. He’s still wearing his suit and tie, and his tanned skin and silver hair give him the appearance of a veteran Hollywood actor awaiting a scene—not a character actor, but an aging leading man.
“Your driver said you want to talk to me.”
“That’s right,” he says, his voice a commanding blend of baritone and bass. “I need to ask you a question, Catherine. Please sit down.”
Something makes me want to take the initiative away from him. “Why do you keep that lowlife around?”
Grandpapa appears taken off guard. “Who? Billy?”
“Yes. He doesn’t belong here, and you know it.”
Grandpapa looks at the floor and purses his lips, as though reluctant to discuss t
his with me. Then he speaks in a tone of regret. “The casino business isn’t like our other family businesses, Catherine. Las Vegas wears a corporate image nowadays, but the old unsavory practices are still around. The big Nevada boys don’t like competition, and they have quite a stake in Mississippi. I need someone who knows that world inside and out. Billy worked in Las Vegas for twelve years, and he spent three working for an Indian casino in New Mexico. The exact nature of his experience is something into which I don’t delve too deeply. I’m not proud of that, but sometimes to accomplish something good, you have to rub elbows with the devil. That’s the nature of the gambling business.”
“It surprises me to hear you talk that way.”
He shrugs in the chair. “This town is desperate. We can’t afford our high ideals any longer. Please take a seat, dear.”
I sit in a club chair and face him across a Bokhara rug.
“Still off the alcohol?” he asks, motioning toward the sideboard.
“So far, so good.”
“I wish I had your willpower. Must be the diving that gives you the discipline.”
“You said you needed to ask me a question.”
“Yes. This morning you mentioned hiring a professional forensic team to search your old bedroom. For blood and other evidence, you said.”
I nod but say nothing.
“Have you shelved that plan, given what I told you this morning about Luke’s death?”
“No.”
Grandpapa doesn’t react at first. Then he raises his glass and takes a long drink of Scotch, closing his eyes as he swallows. After a few moments, he opens them again and sets the glass on a table beside his chair.
“I can’t let you do that,” he says.
What do you mean? I ask silently. But aloud, I say, “Why not?”
“Because I killed your father, Catherine. I shot Luke.”
The words don’t really register at first. I mean, I hear them. I recognize the order in which they were spoken. But their actual significance doesn’t really sink in.
“I know this is a shock to you,” Grandpapa goes on. “I wish there were some other way to deal with this. That you’d never have to know. But you found that blood, and now there’s no other way to put an end to this. I know you. You’re just like me. You won’t stop until you know the truth. So, I’m going to give it to you.”
“I thought you gave it to me this morning.”
He shifts in his chair. “I lied to you before, darling. We both know that, and you’re probably wondering why you should believe me now. All I can tell you is this: when you hear what I’m about to tell you, you’ll know it’s true. You’ll know it in your bones. And I wish to God it was a different truth.”
“What are you talking about? What is this?”
Grandpapa rubs his tanned face with his right hand, squeezing his jaw. “Catherine, someday you will get old, and you’ll hear from some doctor that you’re going to die. But what you’re about to hear will be worse than that. Part of you is going to die today. I want you to brace yourself.”
My extremities are going cold. I felt a little like this when I saw my home pregnancy test turn pink. A temporary paralysis set in while my mind tried to adapt to the total transformation of my life. I feel that paralysis now, but with it comes a terrible foreboding. A fear that my whole world is about to be sucked inside out by something that’s been kept from me my whole life. And the funny thing is, I’m not surprised at all. It’s like I’ve known this moment was coming since I was a little girl. That one day I would find myself in this room, or a room like it, while someone gave me the terrible secret of why I am the way I am.
“There was no prowler here on the night Luke died,” Grandpapa says. “You already suspect that. That’s why you asked me if Luke committed suicide.”
“Did he?” asks a faint voice that comes from my throat.
“No. I told you, I killed him.”
“But why? Did you argue with him? Was it an accident?”
“No.” Grandpapa squares his shoulders and looks me in the eye. “Two days ago you asked me why I didn’t like Luke. I didn’t tell you the complete truth. Yes, his reaction to his war service bothered me, and the fact that he couldn’t provide for you and your mother didn’t help matters. But from the very beginning, I had a bad feeling about that boy. Something wasn’t right about him. Your mother didn’t see it because she was in love. But I saw it. I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what it was. I just sensed something, as a man, that made me recoil.”
“I can’t stand this. Please just tell me whatever it is.”
“Do you remember that when Luke was having his bad periods—his spells, Pearlie called them—you were the only person he’d let near him? The only one he’d let into the barn while he worked?”
“Of course.”
“He spent a lot of time with you, Catherine. You were his connection to the real world. You two had a very unusual relationship. And as time went on, I started to feel that it wasn’t an appropriate relationship.”
The numbness is spreading to my heart. “How do you mean?”
“That night Luke died, I wasn’t reading downstairs. I had turned off all the lights downstairs and pretended to go up to bed, but I didn’t. I’d done this several nights in a row. Luke was supposedly leaving for the island. That night, instead of watching from the window, I went out into the yard with a flashlight and sat on the grass.” Another swig of Scotch. “After about an hour, I saw Luke coming up the hill from the barn. He wasn’t walking like himself. In the dark I actually thought he was a different person. I thought he was a prowler. But it was Luke. He went through the door of your house without making a sound. I circled the house and went to your window. I saw a crack of light as he opened your door. I thought he might be checking on you…but he wasn’t. The door opened and closed quickly, and I knew he’d gone into your room and stayed there.”
I’m dreaming. If I can wake myself up, I won’t have to hear this. But I can’t wake up. I keep sitting motionless, and my grandfather keeps talking.
“I slipped inside the house. Gwen’s door was open, but she was sound asleep. Then I opened your door and clicked on my flashlight.”
“No,” I whisper. “Don’t.”
“Luke was in the bed with you, Catherine. I hoped it was some kind of psychological dependency, something like that. That he needed to get into bed with you to be able to sleep. But it wasn’t that. When I yanked back the covers—”
“Don’t!”
“He wasn’t wearing pants, Catherine. And your gown was pushed up to your chest.”
I’m shaking my head like a child trying to reverse time: to bring back a dog that was run over by a car or a parent who was just lowered into the earth. But it does no good.
Grandpapa stands and looks at the French windows, his voice rising with emotion. “He was molesting you, Catherine. Before I could say anything, he jumped up and started trying to explain himself. That it wasn’t what it looked like. But there was no denying the state he was in. I grabbed his arm and yanked him toward the door. He went crazy. He started hitting me.” Grandpapa turns to me, his eyes bright. “Luke was so passive most of the time, it took me completely by surprise. But he could be savage when he wanted to be. He wouldn’t have survived the war without that capacity for violence.”
Grandpapa stops three feet away from me, looking down from what seems an enormous height. “I wanted to get you out of there, but he’d hit me several times and showed no sign of stopping. I remembered the rifle that hung over the fireplace in the den. I ran out and grabbed it, chambered a round, and went back in to get you.
“Luke was in the corner by the closet, down on his knees. Your bed was empty. I knew you must be terrified, and I figured you’d tried to escape through that closet. Back then it didn’t have a back wall. It was like the old country places, where adjoining bedroom closets are actually the same space. Anyway, I told Luke to get away from you and stand up. When he didn’
t, I walked over with the rifle and told him to get the hell off my property and never come back.”
Grandpapa shakes his head, his eyes cloudy with memory. “Maybe it was the sight of the gun that did it. Or maybe he couldn’t deal with the idea that he was going to be exposed. But he attacked me again. He came up out of that corner like a wild animal. I pulled the trigger out of pure reflex.” Grandpapa’s hand actually jerks when he says this. “You know the rest. The round hit Luke in the chest, and he died quickly.”
The silence in the study is absolute. Then, out of the vacuum that is me at this moment, a question rises. “Did I see it happen?”
“I don’t know, baby. When I got to the closet, you weren’t there. You must have crawled through to your mother’s bedroom. I suspect you tried to wake her up but couldn’t do it. Do you remember any of this?”
“Maybe that,” I whisper. “Trying to wake Mom up. But maybe it wasn’t that night, I don’t know. I think that happened a lot back then.”
“But you remember nothing of the abuse?”
I shake my head with robotic precision.
“I thought not. But you’ve never recovered from it, just the same. It’s haunted you your whole life. I’ve watched you all these years, wishing I could do something for you. But I couldn’t see what. I didn’t see how telling you this about your father could help you. They say the truth shall set you free, but I’m not so sure. If you hadn’t found that blood in your room, I doubt I’d ever have told this thing.”
He goes to the sideboard, pours a nearly full glass of vodka, and holds it out to me. The vodka might as well be water. I’m so anesthetized by shock that even my craving for alcohol is gone.
“Take it,” he says. “Do you good.”
No, it won’t, I say silently. It’ll hurt me. It’ll poison my baby.
“What are you thinking, Catherine?”
I don’t speak. I’m not sharing my only pure secret with anyone.
“I’m not sure what to do now,” he says. “You’ve had problems with depression in the past, and I was damn little help to you. I was from the old school. If I couldn’t palpate it, irradiate it, amputate it, or resect it, it wasn’t a problem. I know different now. I worry that telling you this could trigger a major depressive episode. Are you still taking SSRIs for that?”