In the seventh a gust of fog-laden wind made his teeth chatter loud enough for Doris to hear. She snuggled closer. “Are you really that cold?” she asked.
“Well, my nose quit running ten minutes ago and now I’ve got icicles hanging out of it.”
“I’ll bet I can warm you up.”
“Nothing could right now except a hot shower.”
“I know a better way than that.”
“What way?”
Her hand slid along his thigh, stroked tight into his crotch.
“Hey! What’re you doing?”
“What does it feel like I’m doing?”
“Cut it out, Dorrie.”
“Why? Don’t you like that?”
“You know I like it. But we’re not home.”
“No kidding.”
“I mean this is a public place. …”
“And we’re under a blanket and nobody’s near.”
He tried to push her hand away. She resisted. She’d worked her mitten off; he felt her slim fingers tugging, heard the faint rasp of his zipper. The fingers insinuated themselves inside, icy cold, making him jump when they touched bare flesh.
“Mmm, that’s one place you’re warm.”
“Dorrie …”
“How about if I get right down there under the blanket and really make you warm?”
“No.”
“Hand or mouth, big guy, your choice.”
“No!”
Her breathing had quickened; it was warm and feather soft against his ear. In the privacy of their apartment, that would have excited him. In the privacy of their apartment, the touch and manipulation of her hand would have given him an immediate erection. Here, there was not even a stirring in his loins. He felt nothing except nervous embarrassment. He tried again to dislodge her fingers, his gaze jerking up and down, from side to side.
“Dorrie, for God’s sake …”
“What’s the matter?”
He heard himself say, “TV cameras.”
“What?”
“Game’s being televised back in Houston. There’re cameras all over the stadium.”
“So what? They’re focused on the field, not on us.”
“Sometimes they pan around the stands, you know that. One of them might be on us right now … all those people out there watching …”
“Jesus,” she said.
“When we get home … can’t you wait until then?”
She drew away from him, removing her hand at the same time. “I doubt I’ll be in the mood when we get home,” she said. “You just took me right out of it. I was getting pretty horny, too.”
“A public place, a baseball stadium …”
“That’s what made me so horny.”
“I don’t understand that.”
“No, I guess you don’t. Not you, Jimmy.”
“What does that mean?”
She wouldn’t tell him then; she sat stiffly for the rest of the game, staring at the field, not saying a word. It wasn’t until later, in the car on the way across the Bay Bridge, that she told him.
“The trouble with you, Jimmy,” she said, “is that you’re afraid to take risks. Any kind of risk. You want everything to be nice and safe.”
“That’s not true. …”
“It’s true, all right. No chances, no risks—not even little ones like tonight, the kind that make life more interesting, give it an edge. A safe life is a dull life, you know? I don’t think people were meant to live that way.”
You want everything to be nice and safe. No chances, no risks—not even little ones. A safe life is a dull life, Jimmy.
He hadn’t understood then, or in all the years afterward. But he understood now, here in this motel room in Beulah, Nevada. What Doris had said to him that night was part of the reason—perhaps the main reason—she’d begun the affair with the prelaw track star and then put an end to their marriage. It was also the reason he was a lonely man. And the reason there was so little substance in his life … his nice, safe, dull, empty life. And at least part of the reason for the compulsion, the rebellion that had taken root and was growing inside him.
The time had come to take risks.
The time had come for his life to have edges, even if he ended up hurting himself on one.
11
HE WAS ON his way to the Goldtown Café, walking as he had the previous morning, when the car drifted over alongside. He didn’t hear it at first because of the wind, still blowing in dry, humming gusts; didn’t see it because he had his head ducked down to keep the blown grit out of his eyes. The sound of its horn—a single sharp toot—made him aware of it angling into the curb in front of him. Blue-and-white cruiser with flasher panels on the roof and a sheriff’s emblem on the door.
He stopped, still hunched against the wind. The man who rose up out of the driver’s side was big and bulky in his khaki uniform. He motioned Messenger over to the cruiser, said when he got there, “Mr. Messenger? I’m Sheriff Espinosa, Ben Espinosa. Like to talk to you for a minute.”
“All right.”
“Talk better in the car, out of this wind. Slide in.”
Messenger slid in. The cruiser’s interior smelled of sweat, leather, gun oil, and a sweetish pipe tobacco. The tobacco aroma came off Sheriff Espinosa as well; a blackened pipe bowl was visible under a shirt pocket flap, like a Cyclopean rodent peering out. He was in his mid-thirties, high-cheekboned, flat-eyed. The clipped mustache he wore lay like a black anthracite bar across his upper lip. The flat eyes were steady, measuring. He didn’t offer to shake hands.
Messenger said, “I was planning to pay you a visit later this morning.”
“That right?” There was no particular inflection to the words, but Messenger sensed a hostile undertone just the same. “Why didn’t you pay your visit yesterday?”
“I didn’t see any official urgency, Sheriff.”
Espinosa said, “Maybe you didn’t. But I’d’ve liked to hear about Anna Roebuck’s suicide from you, instead of half a dozen locals.”
“My mistake. But it isn’t as if she was a fugitive.”
“Might as well’ve been, disappearing the way she did. It left a bad taste in my mouth.”
“Why is that?”
“Why do you think? The murders were still under investigation. She was still under investigation.”
“Did you warn her about leaving Beulah?”
“No. Too much time had gone by for that.”
“Then she had every right to leave, didn’t she?”
The flat-eyed stare had a little heat in it now; he met it steadily. “What puts you on her side, Mr. Messenger? From what I hear, you claim you hardly knew her out there in Frisco.”
“I saw her often enough. She was in a lot of pain and I don’t think guilt was the cause.”
“You don’t think. Just a gut feeling, then.”
“Just that.”
“You know about the murders before you came here?”
“No, not until yesterday.”
“Anything at all about her past?”
“No.”
“Why come here then? What do you figure to get out of it?”
“Nothing, except my curiosity satisfied.”
“Sure it’s not some of the money you’re after?”
“What money?”
“The insurance money, what was left of it. Fourteen thousand dollars, isn’t it?”
“If you think I’m angling for a reward, you’re wrong. I told Dacy Burgess about the money yesterday because she has a right to know as next of kin. She said she didn’t want any part of it and neither do I.”
“You didn’t tell John T. about the money.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Why not?”
“We didn’t get along very well. And he’s not related to Anna Roebuck except by marriage.”
“Still should have told him. He had to hear it from Dacy later on.”
“And you heard it from him right after that.”
/> Tight ridges of muscle appeared along Espinosa’s jaw. “Tell you something, Mr. Messenger. I don’t think we’re going to get along any better than you and John T.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. I’m not trying to make enemies.”
“No? Well, you’re up to something and I don’t like it. Whatever it is, I don’t like it.”
“Are you going to tell me to get out of town by sundown?”
“You trying to be a smart-ass?”
“No, sir. I just asked a question.”
“You haven’t done anything to make me come down on you. Yet. But I’ll be watching you. The whole town’ll be watching you. If I were you I wouldn’t step out of line. I wouldn’t jaywalk or spit on the sidewalk. Or do too much pissing against the wind.”
“You’ve made yourself clear, Sheriff.”
“Sure hope I have. All right, go on about your business.”
Messenger stood looking after the cruiser as Espinosa wheeled it away. Two warnings in less than eighteen hours. No—the same warning issued twice, in almost the same words. John T. Roebuck not only ran Beulah, it looked as though he had a hand in running the local law as well.
HEADS TURNED WHEN he walked into the crowded Goldtown Café. Eyes stared; voices murmured. There was one vacant booth in the section presided over by Lynette Carey. He sat down there and pretended to read the menu, pretended to ignore the staring eyes even though he could feel them crawling like insects on his skin.
Lynette Carey wasted no time in waiting on him. She was plump-breasted and heavy-hipped in her beige waitress uniform, the strawberry-blond hair teased and sprayed into a style two decades out of fashion. Thirty or so, and pretty enough in a puffy, cynical way. Cornflower-blue eyes were her best feature; he looked for hostility in them and didn’t find any. Just a natural wariness, and a curiosity that was close to being avid.
“What’ll it be?”
“Pancakes and coffee.”
“Juice? Side of ham or bacon?”
“Just pancakes and coffee, Lynette. Lynette Carey, right?”
“How’d you know my last name?”
“Jaime Orozco mentioned it.”
“He did, huh? What’d he say about me?”
“Nothing bad. I guess you know who I am.”
She glanced around at the staring eyes, but not as if they bothered her; she didn’t seem to mind being the center of attention. She leaned a little closer. “Everybody in here except the tourists knows who you are. How come you’re still hanging around town?”
“Some unfinished business.”
“You want my opinion, you’re wasting your time. Anna Roebuck was guilty as hell. Nobody’d have blamed her much if it was just that no-good bastard of a husband she blew away. But little Tess … ah, who could forgive a thing like that?”
“I’d like to talk to you, Lynette. Would you mind?”
“Talk? Isn’t that what we’re doing?”
“I mean in private. Later today.”
“What for?” She was wary again. “Nothing I can tell you.”
“I’d still like to have a talk. I won’t take up much of your time.”
“Well, I don’t know. …”
“I could come to your home, or—”
“No. I don’t know you, mister, and I got a kid of my own.”
“A public place, then. Anywhere you say.”
The tip of her tongue made a slow wet circuit of her lips. “Let me think about it.”
She hadn’t made up her mind yet when she returned with his coffee. When she brought the pancakes she said, “I’m not so sure it’s a good idea to be seen in public with you.” Still on the fence but leaning his way a little.
“You don’t strike me as a person who’s worried by what people think.”
“Well, that’s right, I’m not. They think what they want to anyway.”
“Ten minutes of your time, that’s all.”
She smiled suddenly. She had a nice smile, broad and sunny; it smoothed away most of the cynicism. “Tell you what. I get off work at four and I like a cold beer afterward. Over at the Saddle Bar in the next block, usually.”
“What kind of beer do you drink?”
“Heineken draft, unless I’m buying my own.”
“I’ll have one waiting for you.”
HE HAD HIS first look at Buster as he drove into the Burgess ranch yard. Seventy-five pounds of snarling black and brown, tied to a long chain that allowed the animal to roam from the barn around in the front of the house. He didn’t know much about dog breeds but he thought that this one might be a rottweiler or a rottweiler mix.
Buster hurled himself at the end of the chain, barking furiously, as Messenger parked twenty yards out of range. Fangs and flying slobber glistened in the harsh sunlight. There was no other sign of life, and no sign of the canvas-topped Jeep. He stepped out into a sudden gust of wind that spun grit into his eyes. He had to duck his head and rub hard to clear them. The wind seemed to be behaving oddly out here today: It gusted so sharply for short periods that he’d seen half a dozen dust devils swirling across the desert plain, then stopping with the same suddenness, as if someone had turned off a wind machine, and a dead calm prevailed until the next flurry. It was a phenomenon that would take some getting used to.
Squinting, he saw that Lonnie Burgess had emerged from a shed attached to the barn. A long, metallic object hung from one hand. As Lonnie closed the distance between them, yelling at Buster to shut up and settle down, Messenger recognized the object as a wrench spotted with grease. Grease also streaked the boy’s hands, arms, and the coveralls he wore.
The dog subsided into a series of whines and yelps, sat back on its haunches, and grew silent when Lonnie reached down to rough its ears and scruff. But Messenger could see the animal quivering as it watched Lonnie move away. He had no doubt that at any threat to its people, the rottweiler had the strength to break loose from the chain and the nature to tear out an enemy’s throat.
“You again,” Lonnie said, but there was no animosity in his tone or expression. Matter-of-fact and reserved, nothing more.
“Me again.”
“Bought yourself some clothes.”
“How do I look?”
“Like a city man in Western duds.”
“That’s what I was afraid of. Is your mother here?”
“Out mending fence.”
“Some job in this wind and heat.”
“Well, I would’ve done it but the damn pickup quit running again. I’m better with motors than she is.” He shrugged and then spat into the dirt. “Trucks and fences,” he said. “Always something.”
“Don’t you go to school?”
“Not this term. Maybe next, if Ma has her way.”
“What grade are you in?”
“Junior. She wants me to graduate, go on down to UNLV.”
“But you don’t care?”
“I care, sure. I always wanted to study veterinary medicine.”
“Why don’t you?”
Lonnie shrugged again. “No money for it. And no time. There’s too much to do here.”
“Does seem like you could use some help.”
“Can’t afford that either, right now. Not with the tight new BLM quotas.”
“Bureau of Land Management. Right?”
“Right. They own most of our grazing land; we lease it from them. They tell us how many cows we can run, how long they can stay on public land, how many new calves we can add each year.”
“Ecological reasons?”
“Too many wildlife species headed for extinction on account of livestock grazing on public land—that’s what they say. So they regulate the number of cows on a parcel by how much grazing they figure the land will support, no input from us. Shit, this is sagebrush desert. Cattle couldn’t do any real ecological damage in country like this if every rancher out here ran five times as many head.”
“The BLM must know what it’s doing.”
“That’s what you think.
” Sore subject; Lonnie changed it with a question: “So what do you want this time?”
“Want?”
“With my ma.”
“A little more talk, that’s all. I guess she told you about our conversation yesterday.”
“She told me,” Lonnie said. “You got her all lathered again before you left.”
“I didn’t mean to. That’s another reason I’m here: I want to apologize to her.”
“Yeah, well, the best way you can do that is to go away and leave us alone. We got enough grief to deal with.”
“Adding to your grief is the last thing I want, Lonnie.”
“Maybe so, but it’s what you’re doing. She killed them. Why do you want to make out she didn’t?”
“What makes you so sure your aunt was guilty?”
“She’s the only one who had enough cause to do it. My uncle deserved killing, he sure as hell did, but she didn’t have to hurt Tess, too. It wasn’t Tess’s fault.”
“What wasn’t Tess’s fault?”
“That she had a son of a bitch for a father.”
“You hated him,” Messenger said. “Why? All the women he cheated with?”
“That’s one reason.”
“What’s another?”
“I don’t want to talk about him. He’s dead. They’re all dead now and Ma and me just want to forget about it. Why don’t you let us do that, huh?”
Messenger let the question pass. How do you explain a need and a conviction like his to a fifteen-year-old? He couldn’t explain it even to himself.
He said, “Where’s she mending fence, Lonnie?”
“Old mine road.”
“Where’s that?”
“West. First left up toward the hills.”
“The road to the Bootstrap Mine? Where your aunt hunted for gold?”
“Not enough gold left in that mine to fill two of your teeth.”
“But she did go prospecting there. She could’ve been there the day of the murders, just as she said.”
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