The Knowland Retribution

by Richard Greener

“Why, no sir. It is truly afternoon. Twenty minutes after twelve noon.” By the sound of her voice Walter could tell she was smiling.

  “You know, you’re right,” he said, realizing where he was. “I just got off a plane from Chicago and I’m still on Central time.”

  “Well, welcome to Atlanta and the Eastern time zone.”

  “Thanks. Can I speak with Isobel Gitlin, please?”

  “I’ll put you right through.”

  “Very nice,” thought Walter, “no ‘whose calling’ or ‘what company are you with’ or, the most hated of all demands, ‘may I tell her what this is in reference to?’”

  “Hello,” said Isobel.

  “Hello.”

  “Walter! Where are you?” He told her he was at the airport, changing planes in Atlanta on his way home. His flight to St. Thomas didn’t leave until five fifteen. Could they meet for lunch somewhere?

  “You want real food, or bar food?”

  “Bar food is fine with me,” he said.

  “Good,” she said. “Me too.” Isobel gave him directions to Manuel’s Bar on Highland Avenue. “Tell the cab driver to get off at the Presidential Parkway, otherwise you’ll end up in Chattanooga. It’s a great bar. You’ll love it.” The cab ride, she told him, won’t be more than twenty minutes. “I’ll be there, waiting.”

  Isobel was right. Less than a half hour later Walter saw her standing in front of Manuel’s. He reached out to hug her and she kissed him just the way she had at the Hilton on Sixth Avenue. Once inside, Walter could see that the founder, Manuel Maloof, was something of a local personality. A large painting of Manuel hung over the bar. The walls were covered with old photographs, nearly all of them showing Manuel with some entertainer, politician, or sports celebrity. Walter recognized many of them, and those he didn’t know looked just like the ones he did. Jimmy Carter was there. Bill Clinton with dark hair and Bill Clinton with gray hair. Andrew Young. Hank Aaron, Frank Sinatra, and Carol Channing. There was one with LBJ and another that looked like young Manuel and a young Elvis Presley.

  “This guy, Manuel, still alive?”

  “I don’t think so,” she said. “I’m still new here.”

  They sat at a table in the front room just off the bar, the nonsmoking section of what Walter agreed looked like a terrific neighborhood establishment.

  “You live nearby?” he asked.

  “Not too far. I’m in a condo until I get myself settled. I think I’m going to buy a house in a neighborhood called Inman Park.” Walter never did well at these kinds of conversations. He had no idea where or what Inman Park was, and, except for the fact that Isobel might buy a house there, no interest in finding out or being told. They started going through all the uncomfortable questions with all the meaningless answers. She asked where he was coming from? Did he have a good flight? Was he happy to be getting back to St. John? How was his health? Was he hungry? He asked if she liked Atlanta. Where the Center’s offices were? Was the weather more enjoyable than the winter in New York? All the crap, and it continued even after their food arrived. Finally, he said, “Isobel, no more bullshit. This is going to drive me fucking nuts. How are you? Really?”

  “Fine. I’m f-fine.” It wasn’t what he was looking for. Her eyes had no sparkle, her smile, such as it was, lacked the warmth he’d come to treasure, and her manner made no offer of intimacy. He reached out across the table to hold her hand.

  “Is there someplace we can go. I don’t have to be back at the airport—”

  “No. No, I can’t. I’ve got to get back to the office.”

  “What for?”

  “This is a real job, Walter. I’m not running around chasing Leonard Martin anymore. And I’m not ducking photographers from the Post or the Daily News. No one in Atlanta knows who I am. Isn’t that wonderful?” The food ran out before the small talk.

  “I should be home by ten,” he said. “I’ll call you tonight.”

  “You don’t have to do that. I’m not even sure—”

  “When are you coming to St. John?” Walter asked. Now it was Isobel who leaned across the table to take Walter’s hand. They sat beneath a photo of a middle-aged Manuel and two other men of the same age. All three stood next to Arnold Palmer. They were smiling. Arnold was young, in his prime, lean and fit, had dark hair, and a cigarette in one hand.

  Isobel said, “Walter, don’t go getting serious on me, alright? It was great, wonderful—I love you dearly—but we each have things we need to do. Don’t we? Places to go. People to meet. We’ll see each other again. We will.” Her smile was breaking his heart.

  “It’s just, I thought—”

  “Don’t. Please don’t.”

  “I love you, Isobel.”

  “Oh, Walter, you don’t. No, you don’t. You think you do, but you don’t. It’s been a long time for you. I know. But you have a life, Walter. We both do. We’ll always be friends and we will see each other again. We will. I promise.”

  “Isobel—”

  “Walter, Walter. Please don’t. Don’t be hurt. I never wanted to hurt you.”

  She was young and he was not. He was experienced, so experienced, and she was not. What was it about her? Time had not dulled all his senses. He’d missed some things, sure, but you always missed some things. You never got it all right. Why had it taken him this long? Why didn’t he want to know? The pain. The pain. It came to him now. It came to him the way it always had, the way it had in Vietnam and Laos and ever since. The unease he sensed when she called him the night she met with Leonard—the feeling that something was missing when he read her article—the shock that went through him when Debra Melissa described the cowboy. It all came to him now like the floodgates had been thrown wide open. He looked at Isobel. Her eyes begged him to be silent, but he said it anyway. “You saw him, didn’t you? You knew all along.”

  “Walter—”

  “No,” he said, looking away, waving her off.

  He finished his drink. Isobel didn’t touch her ice tea. The moment passed, although both knew the memory would last forever. She offered to drive him to the airport, but he said he’d catch a cab. He kissed her on the forehead when they said goodbye. His lips lingered a moment—too long? The scent of her hair caused him to close his eyes. He could tell it was an uncomfortable parting for Isobel. On the plane, he tried to convince himself she meant it when she said, “We will see each other again. We will.” Didn’t he know her? Couldn’t he tell how she felt? Nor could he keep Leonard Martin at bay. He saw the fat, suburban attorney, disheveled and depressed. He saw the lean, trim Michael DelGrazo. He saw the cowboy in Clarksville—saw him in his own cabin. And Isobel knew from the beginning. He had opened the iron gate to his soul and let her in. Knowingly. He had shared with her things he had never shared with anyone. Purposely. He had kept no secrets from her. Gladly. He had loved her not at first sight. She was different, special. He earned this one. He had given himself to her. Completely. And she betrayed him. How had he missed it? There were so many things lately he failed to see, none more painful or more humiliating than this.

  He fell asleep in first class, frightened he might never again run his hand across her bare hips, down her legs, across her knees; never again wake her in the morning, kissing her nipples, watching as she opened her eyes, smiling. In his dream he chased her across an open field. She climbed a flight of marble steps outside a large building, a building with no doors. He struggled to reach her as she stood atop the stairway. He climbed as fast as he could, yet made no progress, got no closer. He had trouble breathing. Then, finally, he was within reach of the top. Just as he was about to touch her, she stepped back out of sight. He crawled the last few steps, then, gasping, he looked up to see the Indian woman, smiling, offering him a pendant. And there was Leonard Martin. Behind him stood a young Vietnamese mother desperately clutching her two children. All three w
ept. Leonard had a rifle in his hands. He lifted the gun, shifting its weight against his shoulder, and pointed it at him. Isobel was nowhere to be seen. Leonard squeezed the trigger. Walter woke up trembling.

  New York

  Tom Maloney walked in the back door. It was an entrance he’d been shown months ago, when the idea of retaining Walter Sherman first came to mind. At the time he considered it no more than another skill available on the open market. True, the market he spoke of wasn’t quite that open, and this particular skill was available only for a handsome price. Nevertheless, Maloney believed that if it existed, it was for sale. “If I want it—it’s mine.” Anything that was for sale could be his. Price was never a factor. How many kings had he ransomed in his day? What he’d acquired was indeed exceptional. “Crack and hack,” it was called. Get in. Get the code. That’s it. Simple? Sure, but close to impossible. Once you beat it, however, it’s over. No one and no place was immune, not even the Caymans. Besides, he’d used it before. He thought it was strange that he’d been inside twice already, once just to read it, and a second time he actually put something in. He’d not taken anything out. Now he was about to use this technology, this mechanism, this mumbo-jumbo magic for the purpose it had been invented. When the message appeared on his computer screen, he didn’t believe it. The chill that ran the full length of his body could have frozen hell. He’d gone to cash his lottery ticket and it was nowhere to be found. He lost it. He looked at the keystroke instructions. Letter by letter he read them half out loud. He canceled out his connection and started all over again from the very beginning. He was not far from turning the computer off and restarting it. He was like a man searching his sock drawer, frantically tearing apart the pockets of a coat he hadn’t worn in years, desperately looking for his missing car keys. He knew they weren’t there, but he couldn’t help himself. The correct home page appeared. He typed his code in the special box, watching the letters and numbers as he pushed them down. They showed up as asterisks on his screen, and so, for no reason at all, he deleted them and did it again. One by one he pushed down on the computer keys until each one could go no farther. Of course the code had been correct the first time. He knew that, but he was no longer in control. Things were speeding up. His heart rate and respiration soared. He struggled to keep his thoughts straight. He began to sweat. He felt sick, lightheaded, about to throw up. The message popped up again: Account Closed.

  St. John

  February is high season. The Caribbean sun blazes from early morning until early evening. For those on the beaches, a sunblock with a number at least as high as thirty is recommended. Lean and pretty young girls in skimpy bikinis, and not a few middle-aged, fat guys in Speedos, seem to be everywhere. Even the rain, which comes down in short, sudden outbursts in the late afternoon, makes the tourists glad they’re not in New England or the Midwest. “We’re not in Kansas anymore,” has been heard more than once on the streets of Cruz Bay. The island is as packed as it ever gets. In addition to the bushwhackers, day-trippers from St. Thomas crowd the shops and bars near the dock in Cruz Bay. St. John’s taxis, pickup trucks with rigged canopies and benches for their riders, drive load after load from the dock to the beaches. The ragged, narrow streets are jammed, and every so often someone from Ohio or Iowa or someplace like that drives the wrong way on a one-way street. Traffic gets snarled, tempers frayed. New Yorkers in new shorts and pastel shirts show their true colors. All the island’s restaurants are full, and for many, getting a table at lunchtime is almost impossible. Later in the evening, when the last ferry has taken the final load back to the rock, things get a little quieter. The best places still manage to turn their tables twice for dinner. A reservation is a necessity. February is a tough time for the locals. Even at Billy’s, some days go by without Ike or Walter making an appearance.

  “There’s two kind of locals,” Ike once said. “February and March.” He wasn’t talking about himself, about the real locals—those who’ve been on St. John for generations, the blacks born and raised there. He meant the newcomers. He was talking about people like Walter and Billy, and whatshisname, the pop singer living on his boat out in the harbor, and all the others who left their roots on the mainland to take up the island life. There were those who came for the lifestyle, flat broke or loaded with all the money they needed, and there were those on the run looking for a place to stop. These were the February people, according to Ike. They could be found eating lunch or dinner at Billy’s alongside the tourists and visitors. Or they might be the ones waiting tables, crewing the charter boats, hanging out on the beach, living on the cheap. Walter was not a February person. “Never was,” said Ike. He was a March person. He tolerated high season, taking comfort in the certainty that it would end, the crowds would lessen, if not leave altogether, and life would return to normal.

  Walter came back from Atlanta and stayed home. It took Clara no time at all to see what happened. She wouldn’t be seeing that girl Isobel around here anymore. She did what she could to care for him, but Clara had no medicine for Walter’s blues. He moped. He sulked. He sat alone on the patio until all hours of the night. He didn’t talk much. Clara told her sister. Her sister told her friends. They told theirs. Before long everyone knew. It’s a small island, and they do know everything. To make matters worse, Walter had that CD Clara had heard a million times, The Best of the Cadillacs. It was a rare day she enjoyed listening to that one. He played that one song, “Gloria,” too many times to Clara’s way of thinking. It was hopeless, she concluded. How could he miss both of them? At the same time? Poor man. His sadness was not a pretty sight. She figured he had to hit the bottom of lonely before he could pick himself up. She prayed it wouldn’t take him long. Ten days into his depression, Clara said she needed to see a sick friend. “I’ll be gone all day,” she said. She gave Walter a list of groceries and household items and asked him to pick them up in Cruz Bay. “I can’t be making you lunch either,” she said. “I won’t be here. You should stop at Billy’s, get something to eat, and see your friends.” She said she’d be back by eight o’clock to make him a late dinner.

  Billy’s was so crowded Walter almost decided to turn around and go someplace else. When Billy saw him he hurried to the end of the bar, moved the last two patrons out, and signaled to Walter his regular place was available. Both seats.

  “Thanks Billy,” he said.

  “Anytime. Anytime, Walter. You doing alright?”

  “Great. Fine.”

  “Hungry? You want something?”

  Walter shrugged. Billy didn’t budge. “A sandwich,” Walter said. “Anything at all will do.”

  Billy said, “Coming up.” He opened a bottle of Diet Coke, placed it on a coaster in front of Walter, and walked back into the kitchen.

  Walter heard the familiar footsteps even in the noisy bar. It was a skill he developed early on. Perhaps it was a talent, something you had or you didn’t. He was never sure. When you’re following someone you can’t always count on being able to see them or look directly at them. Learning to recognize someone by the sound of their footsteps had helped him many times and saved him on more than one occasion. He knew a blind man who said he could hear a friend coming a block away. He wished he were that good. Without looking up, he said, “Sit down, Tom.” Maloney sat on the same barstool he used when they first met, the one next to the fan at the very end of the bar, near the kitchen. Walter looked at him. This time Maloney was comfortably dressed. He wore white pants, a cream-colored, loose-fitting golf shirt, and sandals on his bare feet. His cheeks and forehead were red. “He’s been here at least a few days,” thought Walter. Probably looked for him in Billy’s everyday. Walter’s elbows rested on the bar. He opened both hands and moved his arms out as wide as his elbows would allow. Without saying it, the look on his face asked, “Why? Why are you here? What do you want?”

  Maloney’s rigid shoulders made him appear as if he had no neck at all. His tight-ja
wed anger allowed him to speak only through clenched teeth. He said, “Where is it?” Walter said nothing. “It’s gone, isn’t it?” Maloney asked. “Where’d you put it? Where is it! It’s mine, goddamnit!”

  “Easy, big guy. Remember where you are. Show respect if you want to get some.”

  Tom Maloney may have dressed more comfortably than the last time he was on St. John, but he was definitely agitated. He tapped his feet and licked his lips. Walter sized up his loose-fitting outfit, looking to see if it was possible he might be carrying a weapon. A man with a big gut has a hard time concealing a gun in his waistband. Maloney was unarmed. He was just angry.

  “What’s the problem, Tom? What are you doing here?”

  “The money. The account’s closed.”

  “My account?” He looked at Tom Maloney with contempt. “You’re surprised? What kind of a fool do you take me for? You gave me my exact balance the day we met, remember? When Pitts gave me the briefcase, I realized you didn’t want my money, so I wasn’t worried. Then you deposited quite a lot of money in my account, again getting access without me knowing about it. That’s twice.” Walter looked at him like a stern uncle might a recalcitrant nephew. Billy brought Walter’s sandwich. He recognized Maloney too and spoke right up.

  “Anything else you want, Walter? You need anything, I’m right here.” Billy glared directly at Tom Maloney, then walked away.

  “Lots of people do something once,” Walter said. “Something they shouldn’t. Once is not nice, but understandable. However, anybody who does something twice is telling you something. I can be fooled, but I’m not a fool. There’ll be no third time.”

  He took a big bite of his sandwich. Obviously he couldn’t keep talking with his mouth full. Maloney had already said everything he had to say: “Where’s the money!” Walter swallowed and tried to remove a piece of ham stuck between his teeth with his tongue. “You shouldn’t have hired Wilkes,” he said.