Close to the Bone

by William G. Tapply

  “All right. I checked the calendar. The first four calls were all made on a Sunday afternoon. See, it gives the date and time.”

  “And?”

  “And the other two were the following morning. And guess what else?”

  “Julie—”

  “Okay. They’re all real estate places.”

  I remembered how Alex had pored over the real estate classifieds in the Sunday Globe. I imagined Paul Cizek doing the same thing. “Peculiar,” I said. “He’d already rented the place on Plum Island. What’s he calling real estate firms for?”

  “Well, I don’t know,” she said. “But I did find out that all these places are in Keene, New Hampshire. Except this number, the one he called three times. That’s in Jefferson.”

  I nodded. “Okay.”

  “He made the first call that Tuesday. Then one on Wednesday and the last one on Thursday.”

  “Did you call it?”

  “Of course. I said to myself, I bet this is also a real estate firm. Guess what?”

  “Julie, for Christ sake, stop asking me to guess.”

  “I’m not asking you to guess. I’m just building the suspense.”

  “Consider it built. What’d you find out?”

  “It’s not a real estate firm.”

  I shrugged. “I don’t get it.”

  “But it is a woman with a place to rent. And guess what?”

  “Listen—”

  “Sorry,” she said. “The place has been rented.”

  “Could you find out when it was rented?”

  “Yep.”

  “Sometime shortly after Paul Cizek called for the third time?”

  “Bingo,” she said with a snap of her fingers. “It’s a summer place on a little lake. Very isolated. It’s the only place on this lake. Comes with a rowboat, no outboard motor. Not winterized. She rents it monthly or for the season. May through September. Sleeps four comfortably. A couple of rollaway cots so you can squeeze in six. A nice little place for a couple or a small family to get away from it all. There’s bass in the lake and a little swimming beach. Just four-fifty a month or two thousand for the whole season. That sounds pretty cheap to me.”

  “You learned all that?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “You’re amazing.”

  “I know. I even found out where the place is located. Jefferson, New Hampshire, is about a half hour northeast of Keene. I told her that it sounded like just what we were looking for and we might want to rent it, but she said it was taken for the entire season, so I said we might be interested for next year, and she said why didn’t we take a drive up there, check it out, and then we could call her back. She gave me directions. She said she didn’t think the man who was staying there now would mind.”

  “A man is staying there now?”

  “That’s what she said.”

  “Jesus,” I whispered.

  20

  KEENE IS TUCKED IN the southwest corner of New Hampshire about equidistant from the borders of Vermont and Massachusetts. I’d been through it a few times, always on my way somewhere else, and I remembered it as a pretty little community, which, at around twenty thousand people, made it one of the most populous in the state. I figured the state college there inflated the population figure. When I checked the road map, I saw that no significant highway passed very close to Keene.

  I located Jefferson an inch or so northeast of Keene. No red line on the map passed through it.

  I left the office at four on Wednesday, went back to my apartment, changed into comfortable clothes, and joined the daily exodus from Boston at around a quarter of five. I slid a tape of Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony into my cassette. It kept me company through all the traffic on Storrow Drive and Route 2 and ended around the time I reached the rotary in Concord. The Emperor Concerto took me from there to Keene, and I thanked Beethoven for the diversion.

  The directions Julie had taken from the woman on the telephone were precise, and twenty minutes later I found the dirt driveway on the right, four-tenths of a mile past the barn with the rusty tin roof. It was marked by a slab of wood nailed to a pine tree with GALLAGHER hand-painted on it.

  I turned onto the roadway, stopped, and got out of the car. The driveway sloped downhill through a meadow for a couple hundred yards, then disappeared into a pine grove. I could see the late-afternoon sunlight glinting off a ribbon of water beyond the pines.

  I keep binoculars in the trunk of my car. I fetched them, then rested my elbows on the hood and scanned the place. I saw the outline of a cottage through the trees. Nothing else. No sign of movement or life.

  I got back into my car and followed the rutted roadway down to the bottom of the hill. The cottage was tucked into the pines on the right. Vertical, unpainted cedar sides, a brace of big rectangular windows facing the pond, a brick chimney at one end, and an open porch across the front. An old Chevy pickup truck had been backed in behind it.

  I pulled up next to the truck, got out, and stretched my legs. Nobody came out of the cottage to greet me, so I mounted the two steps onto the porch and knocked on the screen door. After a minute or so, I cupped my hands around my eyes and peered in through the screen, but I saw no sign of life.

  “Anybody home?” I called.

  After another minute, I decided nobody was home.

  I wandered down to the pond and stood at the little sand beach. It was no more than fifteen feet wide, and about five feet into the water the sand stopped and the muck bottom began. A minimal swimming beach.

  The sun was sinking toward the hills on the far side of the pond. It ricocheted off the water into my eyes. I used my hand as a visor and scanned the pond. I saw the silhouette of somebody in a rowboat coming around a point on the left, moving slowly toward me parallel to the shore. A long wake trailed out behind the boat on the glassy water.

  I went back to the cottage. There were two sturdy rocking chairs on the porch, and I sat in one of them. The rhythmic clank of oarlocks echoed across the pond. Somewhere a crow cawed, and a chorus of bullfrogs grumped at each other. Swallows swooped over the water. Their wings ticked the surface here and there, leaving rings like rising trout.

  The sound of the oarlocks grew louder, and then the rowboat appeared from around the corner. The bow crunched on the sand beach. Paul Cizek shipped his oars and climbed out. He stood there for a moment, shading his eyes, looking in my direction. Then he walked up to the cottage. He nodded at me. “Brady,” he said. “It’s you.”

  “Hello, Paul.”

  “So you found me.”

  “I guess I did.”

  He shook his head and smiled. He showed me the fly rod he was holding. “I’ve been doing it your way,” he said. “Some nice large-mouths in here.” He leaned the rod against the wall. “Towards evening when it gets shady along the shore, they come to the surface for popping bugs. It’s really a lot of fun.”

  He had bare feet and a half-grown reddish beard with gray streaks around his chin. He wore a pair of denim overalls over a black T-shirt. From behind his beard, he was grinning at me. “Come on in. Let’s have a beer.”

  I got up and followed him inside. The description of the place the woman had given Julie over the phone had been generous. It was a single room with a ladder leading up to half a loft. A galley kitchen at one end, a woodstove at the other. A round table and four wooden chairs sat in front of a window with a view of the pond, and three raggedy sofas—convertibles, I assumed—occupied the rest of it. It was far less messy than the place on Plum Island. I figured Paul hadn’t brought enough stuff with him to make a serious mess of it.

  “Nice,” I said.

  Paul bent to the refrigerator, then turned and handed me a can of Budweiser. “We can sit on the porch,” he said.

  We went back out and sat in the rockers. The sun had sunk behind the trees, and the surface of the pond lay flat and dark.

  “You don’t seem surprised to see me,” I said, watching the birds dart over the water.
/>   “I heard your car coming down the hill. Sound travels clearly over the water. I knew it was somebody.”

  “I rather thought you’d be amazed at my canny detective work,” I said.

  “I give you more credit than that, Brady. You’ve done many cannier things than track me down. After it was too late, I realized I’d left my mail on the table. I figured the longer my body didn’t turn up, the greater the chance that somebody would start snooping. I didn’t think it would be the police. In the absence of a crime, they’d have no reason. It wouldn’t be Olivia’s style. But I know you.”

  “I’m the snoopy type.”

  “Yup. You like to know things.”

  “Well,” I said, “now I know.”

  “If it had to be anybody,” he said, “I’m glad it was you. So what are you going to do about it?”

  “Do? I don’t even know what I know. All I know is, you’re here. You didn’t fall off your boat.” I turned to him. “But you tried to make it look that way.”

  He shrugged.

  “Olivia’s a wreck, you know.”

  “I figured she would be. She’ll get over it.”

  “She’ll be relieved—”

  “No,” he said. “You can’t tell her.”

  “That’s not fair.”

  “Trust me, Brady. It’s fair.”

  “You’ll have to convince me of that, my friend.”

  “It’s really simple. This was the only way I could make a clean break. I tried the Plum Island solution. It didn’t work. I couldn’t get away from anybody or anything. Old man Tarlin had me involved in a bunch of cases that I couldn’t gracefully pull out of. Olivia was hurt and confused. I realized there was no half measure. I had to find a way to start over again.” He sighed. “I told you last winter, Brady. I was heading for a crack-up. Since I’ve been here, I’m a new man. Paul Cizek is dead. I guess this makes no sense to you.”

  “Actually, it does make sense,” I said. “I’ve been thinking of making some changes myself. But I doubt if I’d fake my own death to accomplish it.”

  “Don’t knock it unless you’ve tried it.”

  “You’ve hurt a lot of people,” I said quietly. “There has to be a better way.”

  “You think it’s a cop-out, huh?”

  I nodded. “I guess I do.”

  “Well,” he said, “it’s what I’m doing, and I can’t help what other people think.” He hesitated, then said, “Are the police investigating my—my disappearance?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Not actively, anyway. You’re missing at sea, as far as they’re concerned. Some day your body may wash up somewhere.”

  “Good,” he said. “That’s good.”

  “But I’ve got to tell Olivia, Paul. She’s hurting.”

  He shook his head. “No way. If she knows, she’ll be hurt and confused for the rest of her life. I expect now she’s grieving. Fine. She’ll get over that. I’m dead. Out of her life. It’s done, and it’s final, and she’ll move on.”

  “I’d be irresponsible not to tell her.”

  “You’d violate my trust if you told her. You’re my lawyer.”

  “I’m her lawyer, too.”

  “Since when do you tell one client’s secrets to another client?”

  “You put me in a tough spot,” I said.

  “No. You put yourself in a tough spot by coming up here. As your client, I forbid you from telling anybody what you found out today.”

  “Shit, Paul.”

  “Think about it.”

  “I guess I’ll have to.”

  “All you’ve got to do is forget it and leave me alone. It’s really simple. Consider me dead. Don’t screw things up for me.”

  “It may be simple,” I said, “but it’s not easy.”

  “It is easy. Just don’t do anything.”

  I thought of Alex. She was moving to Maine. I had to decide whether to go with her. “You’re wrong about that,” I said to Paul. “Choosing to do nothing is still a choice. Not telling Olivia would be very hard. It would be lying.”

  “It would be preserving our confidential secret. That’s different.”

  “How about another beer?” I said.

  “Sure.” He got up and went inside, and a moment later he returned. He handed me another Bud. “I generally go to bed when the sun sets,” he said. “I read for awhile. I go to sleep easy, and I sleep soundly, and I wake up with the birds. I put on some coffee and go for a swim, and then I come back and have a mug or two on the porch and watch the sun come up. I’m doing a little writing. Some of my old cases have given me short story ideas. I don’t think they’re very good yet. But I’m practicing. I row around the pond every afternoon. I practice my fly casting, or sometimes I just drift and dangle a worm over the side and catch enough perch and bluegills for a meal. I chop wood. I walk through the woods. Once a week or so I take the truck to the store and get some groceries. Nobody sends me mail. I pay for everything with cash. There’s no telephone or computer or television. Just a little radio that gets a PBS station.” He shrugged. “I’m trying to cut my life closer to the bone, that’s all.”

  “Simplify, simplify,” I said.

  “Thoreau,” he said. “Sure. Old Mister Midlife Crisis himself. I’ve been reading Walden as I sit here listening to the birds and smelling the pines and trying to stop frittering away my life in details. Henry showed us the way.”

  “Hole up in a cabin in the woods.”

  “Why not? That’s what he did. He made a convincing case for it.”

  “Well,” I said, “I do know some things about quiet desperation. I just don’t see how you can run away from it. But if you can carry it off, good luck to you.”

  “I can carry it off, Brady. You’re the only one who can spoil it for me.”

  “I’ll think about it,” I said. I gazed at the pond for a few minutes, then said, “Maybe you can answer a question for me.”

  “Maybe,” said Paul.

  “Is it Thomas Gall you’re running from?”

  “Gall?”

  “Don’t pretend you don’t know the name.”

  “Oh, I wasn’t.” He sipped from his beer. I thought he wasn’t going to answer me, but after a long silence, he said, “How’d you find out about Gall?”

  “I didn’t find out anything, really. Just that he’d visited you on Plum Island.”

  “He did,” he said. “We got some things straightened out.”

  “The man threatened to get you.”

  “Well, as you can see, he didn’t.”

  “He threatened me, too,” I said.

  Paul turned to me. “Huh?”

  “A couple nights ago. At your place, when I found your telephone bills.”

  “He was there?”

  I nodded.

  “What’d he do?”

  “He hit me. He grabbed me by the throat. He said if I didn’t leave him alone he’d kill me.” I shrugged. “That’s all.”

  Paul chuckled.

  “That’s funny?” I said.

  “No, not really. I was just thinking. You probably figured Gall had dumped me off my boat. You thought he was a desperate murderer. But, as you can see, he didn’t do anything to me. Don’t be afraid of Gall. He’s all ripped up inside. But I don’t think he’s gonna kill anyone.”

  “He might’ve already,” I said.

  “Huh?”

  “Glen Falconer’s in the hospital.”

  “Falconer? What happened?”

  “Hit and run. He was riding a bicycle.”

  “A bicycle?”

  “Yes. He’d given up driving cars because he couldn’t give up drinking. Someone ran him down last Saturday night. He’s in bad shape.”

  “He was driving his bike while he was drunk?”

  “I guess so.”

  Paul snorted. “That’s pretty fucking funny.”

  “You think so?”

  “Sure. In an ironic sort of way. Another vehicular homicide, DUI. Except now the drunk’s
the victim. And he’s riding a bike.”

  “Irony isn’t always funny,” I said.

  “Valid point,” said Paul. “So you think it was Gall?”

  “It makes sense, doesn’t it?”

  “Maybe it does,” he said. “Still, I wouldn’t worry about Gall. He’s a mess. Anyone would be in his situation. If he ran down Falconer—well, I can see that. But he won’t hurt you.”

  “I’m vastly comforted,” I said.

  We sat in silence. The darkness that had filled the woods was seeping out into the clearing in front of the cottage. After awhile, Paul got up and went inside. He turned on a lamp. Its light filtered out the windows onto the porch. It cast shadows around the cottage and made the sky look black.

  From behind the screen door, he said, “Another beer?”

  “No. I’ve got to drive home.”

  “Why not stay for supper? I’ll fry up some potatoes, open a can of beans.”

  “I’ve got to get going. Thanks anyway.”

  Paul came back out and sat beside me. We were silent for a few minutes, then he said, “What’re you thinking, Brady?”

  I shrugged. “Nothing, really. I guess I’m just glad to know you’re alive.”

  “Yeah, I’m alive.”

  I turned to him. “How are you really, Paul?”

  “I’m healing.” He smiled. “It’s slow. I’m working on it. Good days and not-so-good days. It was good to see you, Brady.”

  “It was good to see you, too,” I said.

  “Don’t come back, though, okay?”

  “I wasn’t planning to.”

  “Nothing personal.”

  “I understand.”

  I got up and went to my car. Paul followed.

  “I almost forgot,” I said. “I’ve got a message for you.”

  “You can’t.” He grinned. “I’m dead.”

  “Eddie Vaccaro says he needs you.”

  “Vaccaro?” He hissed out a quick breath. “I’m not what that son of a bitch needs.”

  “He thinks the Russo family’s got a contract on him. He wants to go into the witness protection program.”

  “Did you advise him to go to the feds?”

  “Of course. But he wants you. You’re the only one he trusts.”

  Paul laughed quickly. “I hope Russo gets him.”