by L. L. Enger
If one murder wasn’t adequate, maybe four will do. But I doubt it. Last night Harold Ibbins—former roommate of Moses Gates—and his wife, Mary, were found dead at their West Palm Beach home. Authorities have evidence aplenty to suggest he was murdered. Police say Gates is not a suspect. Maybe events of the last several days suggest that professional athletes in this country are not bound by the same legal limits as the rest of us ...
Gun didn’t bother finishing. Faust was the kind of journalist who’d traded favors for so many years that he probably sat down at his typewriter with a little box of IOUs. For reasons Gun didn’t know, he’d attached himself to Moses Gates—those years ago in Minneapolis—like a tick on a heat-stricken dog.
Soon after the death of Ferdie Millevich, Faust had written several columns painting Gates as the obvious suspect, a violent man bent on doing Ferdie harm. Faust’s language was pejorative, played to the crowd. A clubhouse scuffle between Ferdie and Gates, for example, he’d called, “an unprovoked feral attack” on Gates s part. Yet the players who were there had told Gun it was little more than a shoving match.
But there was another reason Gun didn’t have time for Faust’s opinions. Several years after the Gates-Millevich hoopla, Faust was getting his teeth into Gun’s own hide, calling him “a black shadow on our children’s desire for an American hero.” He’d also written that Gun “was as good as a murderer.” All right, Gun accepted both judgments, that wasn’t the issue. But coming from Faust, his own mistakes and tragedy sounded like forgettable soap opera, bad comedy. Pedersen Plays Longball with Starlet While Wife Dies in Pursuit, or something just as bad.
Abruptly, Gun stood and went to the phone. As he spoke to the operator, then placed the credit card call, he tried to remember Faust’s voice. Tried to remember it exactly. Smooth, full-throated, vowelly, like a small-time radio personality, is how it came to him.
The phone was ringing now. Twice, three times. Come on, pick it up. Take your fingers off the keyboard and pick up the damn phone.
Five rings. Six. Come on, I want you on the line.
“Hello?”
Gun smiled.
“Hello? Who is this?” Yes, just the way he’d remembered, but with a bit more honey.
“Tell me,” said Gun. “What do you think Billy Apple learned that Moses might have killed him for?”
“I didn’t tell that bastard a thing. “Faust’s quick answer came as such a surprise all Gun could think to say was, ‘This is Gun Pedersen.” Then the line clicked and Faust was gone.
Gun drove directly to the airport and boarded a noon flight for winter.
21
As the plane began its descent somewhere over southern Wisconsin—probably not far from where Amanda’s flight had gone down’—the captain of the DC-10 came over the intercom with good news. The temperature at the Minneapolis-Si. Paul International airport was minus twelve degrees Fahrenheit. The passengers moaned. Gun wished he’d thought to bring at least a sweatshirt. He was wearing light cotton pants, a V-neck T-shirt, and no socks between his feet and Pony runners.
He hired an airport limousine to drive him into downtown Minneapolis and drop him at the Eddie Bauer store in the Foshay Tower, the city’s oldest and humblest skyscraper, dwarfed as it was by the lofty glass and mirror buildings. Gun had always been of the mind that a building should look like a building, and pretty as these new ones were, he couldn’t help but think of them as a kind of architectural lie, ever vulnerable to the next big windstorm.
The coat he bought was the warmest he could find. The most goose down—quality goose down—you’ll ever see in a single garment anywhere,” is how the saleswoman described it. It was red lightweight canvas with a tunnel hood rimmed with coyote fur, and it came down to Gun’s knees. He also bought a black watch cap, a pair of lined calfskin gloves, wool trousers, a flannel shirt and lace-up half-boots made of softened bullhide. He paid for it all, then walked into a changing room at the back of the store and put it all on. There wasn’t any reason to be cold if you didn’t have to be.
Across town, in the lobby of the big gray stone newspaper building, he asked at the information desk where he’d find Neil Faust. The receptionist blinked her large green eyes at the green computer screen and said Neil Faust wasn’t in today. Her hair was cropped close to her head and she wore earrings that would put most infant mobiles to shame.
“I talked to him this morning. And I called here to do it,” Gun said.
“Well, that’s what the message says here.” She focused somewhere south of Gun’s right ear as she spoke, and he lowered his face in that direction in order to make contact with her eyes. She turned back to her computer. “It says here that he’s not in today and doesn’t plan on returning.”
“What do you mean, doesn’t plan on coming back today?”
“Yes.” She tapped the screen.
“What’s his home phone?”
“I don’t know—I mean, I’m sorry but I can’t give that out.”
“Who’s his boss here?”
“I don’t know.” The woman was frowning, pinching the tip of her tongue between her lips.
“What’s your name? Do you know that?”
Her eyes shot up, caught for a moment, retreated. “Audrey Nelson,” she said, and sighed, more tired than angry.
“Audrey, Neil Faust is a sportswriter, right? So tell me, who’s the chief sports editor? Give me that person’s name, then send me to that person’s office. Please, I’m in a hurry.”
She shook her head and her earrings made
noise. “Editors cannot accept visitors without appointments. Would you like me to call him and ask if he’ll see you?”
“I’d love it. Tell him it’s Gun Pedersen.”
Audrey punched one digit on her phone and squeezed the receiver between her ear and shoulder. “Mr. Samson? Someone’s here insisting he needs to see you. Yes ... No ... Gun Pedersen.” She nodded quickly. “All right.” She hung up and told Gun to take the elevator up to the fifth floor, first door on the right.
“What’s Samson’s first name?” Gun asked.
“Morley.”
“Thank you, Audrey.”
The door was a few inches ajar, and a small cardboard sign taped off center to the glass read samson, hand lettered with an ink pen.
“Walk in, if you like.” A deep voice from behind the door made this offer, and Gun accepted. Behind a desk that was more than six feet wide sat a man with a potato-shaped nose and a lipless, coin-slot mouth. He was at the deep end of middle age and the hanging fluorescent light above him highlighted the white in his bramble of red hair. He looked dusty—his hair, his tweed coat, his creased face—like if you clapped his shoulder he’d disappear in a gray cloud.
“Sit down, Mr. Pedersen. I’ve got a kink in my neck, don’t make it worse.” Morley Samson waved at a leather chair and worked at his upper shoulder with his fingers.
“I don’t have time, Morley. And please, call me Gun.” He stepped forward and leaned over the oak desk, letting his weight shift to his fists. Morley Samson just looked at him, self-possessed, eyes smiling a little.
“What do you want with Faust? Come barreling in here like this and a guy might take it as threatening. What’s the problem?”
“He wrote a column I want to talk about with him.”
“About Moses Gates.”
“That’s the one.”
“So what’s wrong with tomorrow?”
“Like I said, I’m in a hurry. All I want is the man’s home phone, his address. He’s writing some strong words about a situation I’m trying to make sense of, and I’d like to know if he can teach me something. People are getting killed down there, and Faust seems to think he knows who’s doing it. I want to know what he knows.”
“Neil’s columns are opinion, you understand. If he knew something concrete he’d go to the people that count. He’s been around, he knows what to do.” Samson leaned back in his chair and his nose twitched, just a hint of nervou
s anger, but it was enough to nudge an old memory.
“Where’ve we met?” Gun asked. He took his fists off the desk and sat down on it, one haunch off, one on.
“I covered the Twins during the sixty-eight season. World Series, too. We spoke a few times. You weren’t much of an interview.”
“You weren’t much of a writer.”
“Thanks.”
Gun said, “Remember that night, I think it was after game three, and you came into that little seafood place on the south side? It wasn’t too late. Kaline and Freehan and I were eating shrimp and watching boxing on TV.”
“Yeah, I remember. I was there with Kate Masters. She was writing for Sports Illustrated.”
“Right,” said Gun.
“Later she met this guy from town here and they got hooked up. Professor type of guy. He runs this bookstore in St. Paul now. Anyway, Kate took a job with us, features. She was burned on sports. In fact, she only left us a year ago. Trying to write novels or something, I guess.”
“She’s a classy woman,” Gun said. “My guess is, she’ll do all right. Tell me, what’s her last name now?”
“Burning. They call it Burning Books, see.” Samson shook his head, entertained.
Gun stood up and told the man good-bye.
“So, coming back tomorrow?” Samson asked.
“I don’t think I’ll need to. Thanks for the help.” Gun walked back toward the door.
“What do you mean?”
“Forget it. Do you want it open or shut?”
He found a pay phone on the first floor and let his fingers walk to the Books section of the St. Paul yellow pages. He dialed the number for “Burning Books, St. Paul’s Most Complete Special Service Bookstore.” Kate was there and happy to hear from Gun Pedersen twenty-odd years later. They traded updates and scolded themselves for not getting in touch, living as they had in the same state for so long now. When it was comfortable, Gun asked if she knew Faust’s phone number or address.
“I know he has a home in Robbinsdale, but I couldn’t tell you his number, Gun. Listen, though. If he isn’t at work, chances are you’ll find him at the Hardbody Fitness up on Highway Thirty-nine. He’s over there lifting weights, or pedalling those station-aries every afternoon. Or at least he was last year. Some kind of midlife muscle scare. He looks pretty good, though.”
Gun brought the conversation to a polite close and said he’d stop by the bookstore sometime when he was in town. She said he’d better. Then he called for a cab.
22
He felt like a bear among swans. The place was lined with mirrors and alive with sleek bodies in spandex, their owners jogging, swimming, twisting, and stretching their way toward sleeker bodies in spandex. Almost immediately a woman bounced up to him and asked for directions to Alaska, gave a little tug on the coyote fur. Gun said he’d tell her if she showed him how much she could bench press.
“I’m June,” she said. “Follow me.” She was nice to follow and Gun had to remind himself that places like this made him want to throw up.
They walked—ran, almost—up a flight of stairs, down a corridor overlooking an Olympic-size pool and past a gymnasium where middle-aged men huffed through a basketball drill. Then they were in the weight room and June was on her back at a Universal machine, legs spread, fists wrapped around the rubber grippers of the bench-press bar. She easily pushed it to full extension, let it fall, and repeated the action several times. Sitting up, she said, “One forty-five, I only weigh one ten.” She tested the cut of her teeth with her tongue.
“That’s impressive, June. You’re impressive.”
“I know. You thinking about joining up?”
“Not especially. Should I be?”
“Take your clothes off and let me have a look to see.” Her tongue came out again.
“You qualified to tell?”
“I work here, I’m paid to tell.” Her eyes were nice, though, coffee colored, not as well trained as her mouth. “Hey,” she said, “have a look around, and then if you decide we’ve got what you want, come on down to the desk on the main floor and ask for me, and I’ll sign you up. And you know what else? I’ll initiate you for free, save you three hundred bucks.” June was on her feet, moving away, sticking her tongue out at him.
“Free initiation,” said Gun. “I’ll remember that.”
“Remember me.” June spun on her toes and loped away.
Gun had already unzipped his red parka, but now he removed it and folded it beneath one arm as he walked toward the cluster of men at the back of the mirror-lined weight room. They worked the free weights, middle-aged white men listening to rap music. Real men, you could tell, serious about their business, wearing gray sweatpants and sleeveless, ripped T-shirts. Everybody else in the whole building bid on the shiny body advertisers. All five of the men turned toward Gun as he entered their small domain. None smiled.
“Anybody here know of a guy named Neil Faust?”
“Sure do.” The one that answered sat straddling a curling bench, arms resting on a support pad as he worked a loaded barbell. He was improbably bulky in the shoulders and chest and the veins ran like small garden hoses through his forearms. He wore his black hair in a ponytail and the loose skin on his neck told the truth about his age. Pushing fifty, likely. Same as me, Gun thought.
“I’m wondering where to find him. Somebody suggested here.”
“What’s your name?”
“Pedersen.”
“Well, Mr. Pedersen, I’m here to tell you Mr. Faust doesn’t want to see you. He seems to think you’re a man with a grudge, and he says in his business there’re way too many grudges coming his way. So you can just give me a message, all right? And then leave.” He cocked his head toward his friends, who smiled to themselves as they strained against their steel.
“You know where he is?” Gun asked.
“Course I do.” The man stood now, straddling the bench. He was quite a bit shorter than Gun, probably six feet, but wider by a long margin. Went about two-sixty. “And you know what? I don’t mean to tell you.” He reached out with a toe of his sneaker and nudged up the volume dial of the boom-box sitting on the floor, then rocked his head a little to the rap beat and lifted his eyebrows. “Well?” he said.
Gun didn’t say a word or move. He could tell he didn’t have to with this guy.
“If you’re gonna just stand there, you might as well be doing something.” The man hoisted the curling bar to his chest, went to a palms-down grip with a snap of the wrists and let fly with a grunt. The momentum and weight carried Gun backward but he found his balance, juggling the bar to a comfortable place in his hands, then stepped forward and made as if to replace the thing in the Y-shaped supports of the bench. Instead, at the last instant he snapped the bar to his chest and thrust it straight into the weight lifter’s unprepared gut. The man made a sound that no culture in the world could mistake for language and he sat down hard on the bench, the barbell coming to rest on his thighs. He pawed at his midsection, his face stuck in a pain-grin. Gun bent down and yanked up one end of the bench, tipping it and the man backward onto the padded floor. The guy sprawled belly up, inertia sending the chrome-plated bar climbing up his chest, one cluster of circular weights resting on the floor to his left, the other bobbing in the air to his right.
Gun kicked the bench out of his way and checked on the man’s friends, who watched but showed no signs of interfering. He knelt at the man’s head and looked at him upside down. He repositioned the bar so it pinned him down by the neck. “Don’t keep me any longer,” he said.
The man couldn’t find his voice, but he still didn’t look cooperative. There was a lot of mad in his eyes.
“So far all you’ve seen is defense, pal, and I don’t think you’re up for the other side of my game,” said Gun.
The man sucked air, coughed, and sucked again. He shook his head and reached for his throat, apparently checking the condition of his breathing and talking apparatus. He blinked water from his
eyes.
“Where is Faust?” Gun said. Feeling eyes, he looked up and saw a crowd gathering at the other end of the weight room where it gave into the corridor.
“Jack Knife Lake.” The man’s voice was rough and splintery. He coughed again.
“He got a cabin there?”
“Yeah, but I think it’s the fish house where he’s at.”
“You think?”
“The fish house, yes.” The guy tried to push the bar away from his neck but Gun didn’t let him. “He drove up this afternoon, early. Said he’d be there a while. You’d be coming.”
“Which end of the lake. Upper or lower?”
“No idea, really. I don’t know. I told you everything, all right? Now let me the hell up.” He coughed again, so hard his thighs lifted off the floor. Gun freed him from the bar, then looked at the other lifters, who were going about their business of getting strong like office workers being observed by the boss.
Gun picked up his red parka and walked out
through the gathered crowd of taut flesh. One pair of eyes caught his attention, dark and wrinkled with excitement.
“Hey.”
He nodded and moved past her.
“You come back, anytime,” June said.
23
There was a Perkins across the street, and Gun used the pay phone located in its frigid entry, right next to the door. People were coming and going—it was the dinner hour—and the cold wind stiffened his fingers as he dug the credit card from his wallet and placed the call to Stony. Jack Be Nimble’s Bar and Grill. No answer. He blew into his hands and tried the Stony Journal.
Carol picked up the phone in the middle of the first ring, her voice all journalist. Then she heard who it was and the edge fell away. Gun’s insides warmed, then tingled with shame, remembering Diane Apple and the moves she made without even trying. Even wrapped up tight in grief.