“Yes.”
I handed it back to her. “Do you have more?”
She shook her head. “We had. Lots. Big rains came in, and whoosh.” She waved her arms. “Everything wash away,” she said. “Dollies. Toys. Papers.” She pointed to the wax-paper windows. “Rain comes in.”
“Why don’t you put in glass windows?”
She laughed. “Mizz Leiderk says glass, Shirlee. Glass is good. Strong. Try. Jasp say no, no. Jasp likes the air.”
“Mrs. Leidecker sounds like a good friend.”
“Yes.”
“Was … is she Sharon’s friend too?”
“Teacher.” She tapped her forehead. “Real smart.”
“Sharon wanted to be a teacher too,” I said. “She went to school in New York to become a teacher.”
Nod. “Four-set college.”
“Forsythe College?”
Nod. “Far away.”
“After she became a teacher, did she come back here to Willow Glen?”
“No. Too smart. Calfurna.”
“California?”
“Yes. Far away.”
“Did she write you from California?”
Troubled look. I regretted the question.
“Yes.”
“When’s the last time you heard from her?”
She bit her finger, twisted her mouth. “Crismus.”
“Last Christmas?”
“Yes.” Without conviction.
She’d talked about a sixteen-year-old letter as if it had arrived today. Thought California was some distant place. I wondered if she could read, asked her:
“Christmas a long time ago?”
“Yes.”
Something else atop the dresser caught my eye: a corner of blue leatherette under the apple drawings. I pulled it out. A savings passbook from a bank in Yucaipa. She didn’t seem to mind my intrusion. Feeling like a burglar anyway, I opened the book.
Several years’ worth of transactions in an unwavering pattern: $500 cash deposits on the first of each month. Occasional withdrawals. A carry-over balance of $78,000 and some change. The account was in trusteeship for Jasper Ransom and Shirlee Ransom, co-tenants. The trustee, Helen A. Leidecker.
“Money,” said Shirlee. Proud smile.
I put the book back where I’d found it.
“Shirlee, where was Sharon born?”
Look of bafflement.
“Did you give birth to her? Did she come out of your tummy?”
Giggles.
I heard footsteps and turned.
A man came in. He saw me, hitched up his pants, raised his eyebrows, and shuffled over to his wife’s side.
He wasn’t much bigger than she—barely over five feet—and about her age. Balding, with virtually no chin and very large, very soft-looking blue eyes. A fleshy nose tunneled between the eyes, shadowing a protruding upper lip. His mouth hung slightly open. He had only a few, yellowed teeth. An Andy Gump face, coated with fine white hair that resembled soap film. His shoulders so narrow that his short arms seemed to grow out of his neck. His hands dangled at his sides and ended in pudgy hands with splayed fingers. He wore a white T-shirt several sizes too large for him, gray work pants tied with a string around the waist, and high-top sneakers. The pants were pressed. His fly was open.
“Ooh, Jasp,” said Shirlee, hiding her mouth with her hand and pointing.
He looked puzzled. She giggled and pulled up his zipper, patted him playfully on the cheek. He blushed, looked down.
“Hi,” I said, holding out my hand. “My name is Alex.”
He ignored me. Seemed preoccupied with his sneakers.
“Mr. Ransom … Jasper—”
Shirlee broke in. “Don’ hear. Nuthin’. Don’ talk.”
I managed to catch his eye and mouthed the word hello.
Blank stare.
I offered my hand again.
He threw rabbity glances around the room.
I turned to Shirlee. “Could you tell him I’m a friend of Sharon’s?”
She scratched her chin, contemplated, then screamed at him:
“He know Sharon! Sha-ron! Sha-ron!”
The little man’s eyes grew wide, darted away from mine.
“Please tell him I like his drawings, Shirlee.”
“Drawings!” shouted Shirlee. She did a crude pantomime of a moving pencil. “He like draw-wings! Draw-wings!”
Jasper screwed up his face.
“Draw-wings! Silly Jasp!” More pencil movements. She took him by the hand and pointed to the stack of papers on the dresser, then rotated him and pointed to me.
“Drawings!”
I smiled, said, “They’re beautiful.”
“Uhh.” The sound was low-pitched, guttural, straining. I remembered where I’d heard something like it. Resthaven.
“Draw-wings!” Shirlee was still shouting.
“It’s all right,” I said. “Thank you, Shirlee.”
But by now she was performing from her own script. “Drawings! Go! Go!” She gave his flat buttocks a shove. He trotted out of the shack.
“Jasp’ gofer drawing,” said Shirlee.
“Great. Shirlee, we were talking about where Sharon was born. I asked you if she came out of your tummy.”
“Silly!” She looked down and stretched the fabric of her dress tight over her abdomen. Stroked the soft protrusion. “No baby.”
“Then how did she get to be your little girl?”
The doughy face lit up, eyes brightening with guile.
“A present.”
“Sharon was a present?”
“Yes.”
“From who?”
She shook her head.
“Who gave her to you as a present?”
The headshake grew stronger.
“Why can’t you tell me?”
“Can’t!”
“Why not, Shirlee?”
“Can’t! Secret!”
“Who told you to keep it secret?”
“Can’t! Secret. Seek-rut!”
She was frothing at the mouth, looked ready to cry.
“Okay,” I said. “It’s good to keep a secret if that’s what you promised.”
“Secret.”
“I understand, Shirlee.”
She sniffled, smiled, said, “Uh-oh, water time,” and walked out.
I followed her to the yard. Jasper had just come out of the other shack and was walking toward us clutching several sheets of paper. He saw me and waved them in the air. I walked over and he shoved them at me. More apples.
“Great, Jasper. Beautiful.”
Shirlee said, “Water time,” and glanced at the hose.
Jasper had left the door of the other shack open and I walked in.
A single unpartitioned space. Red carpeting. A bed sat in the center, canopied and covered with lace-edged quilting. The fabric was speckled with green-black mold and rotted through. I touched a piece of lace. It turned to dust between my fingers. The headboard and canopy frame were muddy with oxidation and gave off a bitter odor. Above the bed, hanging from a nail driven crookedly into the drywall, was a framed Beatles poster—a blowup of the “Rubber Soul” album. The glass was streaked and cracked and flyspecked. Against the opposite wall was a chest of drawers covered with more decayed lace, perfume bottles, and glass figurines. I tried to pick up a bottle but it stuck to the lace. A trail of ants streamed over the chest top. Several dead silverfish lay strewn among the bottles.
The drawers were warped and hard to open. The top one was empty, except for more bugs. Same with all the others.
A sound came from the doorway. Shirlee and Jasper were standing there, holding each other, like scared children weathering a storm.
“Her room,” I said. “Just the way she left it.”
Shirlee nodded. Jasper looked at her, imitated her.
I tried to picture Sharon living with them. Being raised by them. Martinis in the sun-room …
I smiled to cover my sadness. They smiled back, also c
overing—a servile anxiety. Waiting for my next command. There was so much I wanted to ask them, but I knew I’d gotten as many answers as I ever would. I saw the fear in their eyes, searched for the right words.
Before I found them the doorway filled with flesh.
He wasn’t much more than a kid—seventeen or eighteen, still peach-fuzzed and baby-faced. But enormous. Six-five, two ninety, perhaps thirty of it baby fat, with pink skin and a short neck broader than his moon face. His hair was cut in a blond crewcut and he was trying, without much success, to grow a mustache. His mouth was tiny and petulant, his eyes half-obscured by rosy cheeks as large and round as softballs. He wore faded jeans and an extra-extra-large black cowboy shirt with white piping and pearl buttons. The sleeves were rolled as far as they could go—midway up pink forearms as thick as my thighs. He stood behind the Ransoms, sweating, giving off heat and a locker-room odor.
“Who’re you?” His voice was nasal, hadn’t totally crossed over to manliness.
“My name’s Alex Delaware. I’m a friend of Sharon Ransom.”
“She doesn’t live here anymore.”
“I know that. I drove up from—”
“He bothering you?” he demanded of Shirlee.
She winced. “Hullo, Gabe-eel.”
The kid softened his tone, repeated his question as if used to doing so.
Shirlee said, “He like Jasp drawings.”
“Gabriel,” I said, “I’m not out to cause any—”
“I don’t care what you’re out to do. These people are … special. They need to be treated special.”
He lowered an enormous paw onto each of the Ransoms’ shoulders.
I said, “Your mother’s Mrs. Leidecker?”
“What of it?”
“I’d like to speak with her.”
He bunched his shoulders and his eyes became slits. Except for his size it would have seemed comical—a little boy playing at machismo. “What’s my mom got to do with it?”
“She was Sharon’s teacher. I was Sharon’s friend. There are things I’d like to talk to her about. Things that shouldn’t be discussed in present company. I’m sure you know what I mean.”
The look on his face said he knew exactly what I meant.
He moved back from the doorway a bit and said, “Mom doesn’t need any upsetting either.”
“I’ve no intention of upsetting her. Just talking.”
He thought for a while, said, “Okay, mister, I’ll take you to her. But I’ll be there all the time, so don’t be getting any ideas.”
He moved completely out of the doorway. The sunlight returned.
“Come on, you guys,” he told Jasper and Shirlee. “You should get back to those trees, make sure each of them gets a good soak.”
They looked up at him. Jasper handed him a drawing.
He said, “Great, Jasp. I’ll add it to my collection.” Overenunciating. Then the man-child bent low and patted the head of the childish man. Shirlee grabbed his hand and he kissed her lightly on the forehead.
“You take care of yourselves, you hear? Keep watering those trees and soon we’ll have something to pick together, okay? And don’t talk to strangers.”
Shirlee nodded gravely, then clapped her hands and giggled. Jasper smiled and gave him another drawing.
“Thanks again. Keep up the good work, Rembrandt.” To me: “Come on.”
We started to leave. Jasper ran after us, grunting sounds. We stopped. He gave me a drawing, turned away, embarrassed.
I raised his weak chin with my hand, mouthed “Thank you,” overenunciating just as the boy had. Jasper’s grin said he understood. I held out my hand. This time he gave it a weak shake and held on.
“Come on, mister,” said Gabriel. “Leave them be.”
I patted the little man’s hand and pried it loose, followed Gabriel toward the willows, jogging to keep pace. Before stepping under the weeping green branches, I looked back and saw the two of them, hand in hand, standing in the middle of their dirt lot. Staring after us as if we were explorers—conquistadors setting out for some brave new world that they could never hope to see.
Chapter
29
He’d parked a big restored Triumph motorcycle in back of the Seville.
Two helmets, one candy-apple red, the other starred and striped, dangled from the handlebars. He put on the red one, climbed on, and kick-started the bike.
I said, “Who told you I was here? Wendy?”
He ran his hand over his bristle-top and tried to stare me down.
“We take care of each other, mister.”
He gave the bike gas, set off a dust storm in the dry weeds, then did a wheelie and peeled out. I jumped into the Seville, trailed him as quickly as I could, lost sight of him past the abandoned press, but found him a second later, headed back toward the village. I put on speed, caught up. We passed the mailbox that bore his family name, kept going until the schoolhouse, where he decelerated further and signaled right. He shot up the driveway, circled the playground, came to a halt at the schoolhouse steps.
He climbed the stairs, taking three at a time. I followed, noticed a wooden sign near the entrance.
WILLOW GLEN SCHOOL
ESTABLISHED 1938
ONCE PART OF THE BLALOCK RANCH
The letters were rustic and burned into the wood. Same style on the sign marking La Mar Road, a private road in Holmby Hills. As I stopped to take that in, Gabriel made it to the top of the stairs, threw open the door, and let it swing shut behind him. I ran up, caught it, and walked into a big, airy schoolroom that smelled of fingerpaint and pencil shavings. On the brightly painted walls were health and safety posters, crayon drawings. No apples. Blackboards hung on three walls, below Palmer penmanship guides. An American flag dangled over a large, round clock that put the time at 4:40. Facing each blackboard were about ten wooden school desks—the old-fashioned type, with narrow tops and inkwells.
A partners’ desk faced all three seating groups. A fair-haired woman holding a pencil sat behind it. Gabriel stood over her, whispering. When he saw me, he straightened and cleared his throat. The woman put the pencil down and looked up.
She appeared to be in her early forties, with short wavy hair and broad, square shoulders. She wore a short-sleeved white blouse. Her arms were tan, fleshy, ending in dainty, long-nailed hands.
Gabriel whispered something to her.
I said, “Hello,” and came closer.
She stood. Six feet or close to it, and older than a first impression suggested—late forties or early fifties. The white blouse was tucked into a knee-length brown linen skirt. She had heavy breasts, a thin, almost pinched waist that accentuated the breadth of her shoulders. Beneath the tan was a bed of ruddiness—a suggestion of the same coral tone that blanketed her son like some perpetual sunburn. She had a long, pleasant face enhanced by carefully applied makeup, full lips, and large, luminous, amber eyes. Her nose was prominent, her chin cleft and firmly set. An open face, strong and weathered.
“Hello,” she said, without warmth. “What can I do for you, sir?”
“I wanted to talk about Sharon Ransom. I’m Alex Delaware.”
Hearing my name changed her. She said, “Oh,” in a weaker voice.
“Mom,” said Gabriel, taking her arm.
“It’s all right, honey. Go back to the house and let me talk to this man.”
“No way, Mom. We don’t know him.”
“It’s all right, Gabe.”
“Mo-om.”
“Gabriel, if I tell you it’s all right, then it’s all right. Now kindly get back to the house and attend to your chores. The old Spartans back of the pumpkin patch need pruning. There’s still plenty of corn to husk, and the pumpkin vines need tying.”
He grunted, gave me the evil eye.
“Go, Gabey,” she said.
He removed his hand from her arm, shot me another glare, then pulled out his key ring and stomped out, muttering.
“Thank you, hone
y,” she called out just before the door closed.
When he was gone, she said, “We lost Mr. Leidecker last spring. Since then, Gabe’s been trying to replace his dad and I’m afraid he’s grown overly protective.”
“A good son,” I said.
“A wonderful one. But he’s still just a child. The first time people meet him, they’re overwhelmed by his size. They don’t realize that he’s only sixteen. I didn’t hear his bike start. Did you?”
“No.”
She walked to a window and yelled down: “I said back home, Gabriel Leidecker. Get those vines propped up by the time I get back or it’s curtains for you, kid.”
Protest noises floated up from below. She stood in the window, hands on hips. “Such a baby,” she said with affection. “Probably my fault—I was much harder on his brothers.”
“How many children do you have?”
“Five. Five boys. All married and gone except for Gabey. Subconsciously I probably want to keep him immature.”
She shouted, “Scoot!” and waved out the window. The rumble of the Triumph filtered up to us.
When the silence returned, she shook my hand and said, “I’m Helen Leidecker. Forgive me for not greeting you properly. Gabe didn’t tell me who you were or what you were about. Just that some city stranger was snooping around the Ransoms’ place and wanting to talk to me.” She pointed to the school desks. “If you don’t mind one of those, please sit down.”
“Brings back memories,” I said, squeezing behind a front-row seat.
“Oh, really? Did you attend a school like this?”
“We had more than one room, but the setting was similar.”
“Where was that, Dr. Delaware?”
Dr. Delaware. I hadn’t given her my title. “Missouri.”
“A midwesterner,” she said. “I’m originally from New York. If someone had told me I’d end up in a sleepy little hamlet like Willow Glen, I’d have thought it hilarious.”
“Where in New York?”
“Long Island. The Hamptons—not the wealthy part. My people serviced the idle rich.”
She went back behind her desk and sat.
“If you’re thirsty,” she said, “there’s a cooler full of drinks around back, but I’m afraid all we’ve got is milk, chocolate milk, or orange drink.” She smiled, got younger again. “I’ve repeated that so many times it’s etched indelibly into my brain.”
Four Classic Alex Delaware Thrillers 4-Book Bundle Page 34