by John Lutz
“I’d like to talk with Mr. Hart,” Nudger said. “I don’t suppose you’d have a phone number for him among all these communication devices.”
“Oh, gosh no. Nobody here calls Mr. Hart. He calls us, and not very often.”
Nudger made the cat’s ears come to sharper points. That did it. “This big house where Mr. Hart lives, is it right on the river?”
“Yeah. He’s got himself a neat boat, like a cabin cruiser, and his own dock right there in his own back yard.”
“One of those ritzy places off Rogers Road?”
“Nope. His is off Peterson Road. But it’s plenty ritzy. Heck, he could fish from his own dock, only he’s so busy he probably can’t take the time to fish. Isn’t that something? Man’s got everything he wants and can’t enjoy it.”
“Life,” Nudger said, closing and pocketing his notebook.
“Life,” Derek agreed sagely.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Peterson Road ran parallel to the bank not far south of where the Mississippi was joined by the Missouri River. It seemed a peaceful and deserted country lane. The sun-touched plane of the river was barely visible through the trees on Nudger’s left, and only gates to driveways and wooded lots suggested there might be houses along the road.
But houses there were. And expensive ones. Every now and then Nudger glimpsed a wide brick facade, or a vast stretch of slate, gabled roof among the treetops. He’d learned which of the houses belonged to Wayne Hart from the proprietor of a quick-stop market and gas station where Peterson Road began.
Slowing for a squirrel crossing the road, Nudger almost missed the black wrought-iron gate with the numerals 333 welded in the center of its elaborate design. It was on Nudger’s left, the river side of the road. He braked the Granada and pulled to the road’s gravel shoulder about a hundred feet beyond the gate. He finished the Yoo-Hoo chocolate drink he’d bought at the convenience store and tossed the empty bottle onto the car’s floor on the passenger side of the transmission hump. In doing so, he noticed a small paper bag on the floor, then bent over and opened it to see what was inside. He recoiled as he found himself looking at a week-old Dunker Delite he’d accepted from Danny out of compassion, but not eaten. He’d meant to throw the dreadful thing away long ago.
He straightened up and looked around. Maybe he’d throw it away here, along with the empty Yoo-Hoo bottle.
But Nudger decided against that. He wasn’t a litterbug. A sap for pun and jingle, the government’s long ago “Every Litter Bit Hurts” campaign still echoed in his conscience and stayed his hand whenever he impulsively started to throw something from a car window.
A pickup truck sped past going the opposite direction fast enough for its wake of wind to rock the parked Granada. The sound and motion brought Nudger’s mind back to what he really didn’t want to think about. Should he sneak onto the Hart estate, or should he play aboveboard and simply press the intercom button on the box near the gate and ask to see Wayne Hart?
Neither prospect appealed to him. He was not by nature a risktaker. Yet the more dangerous alternative, he decided, might be to make his presence known and alert Hart that he was being investigated. That might be like telling a bear you were entering his den.
So like it or not, it was time to trespass, to sneak and see. This was a part of his job that Nudger and his stomach barely tolerated.
He drove the Granada another hundred feet down the road and parked in the shade of a big maple tree wearing the fresh green leaves of spring. It was noticeably cooler there, and a dense stand of white birch saplings made it difficult to see the car from the road.
Nudger got out and walked over to what should be Hart’s property line and found concealed in the woods a ten-foot high chain-link fence topped with razor wire. Terrific! He hated razor wire; just get near the stuff and you needed stitches.
Walking casually, as if he might be somebody’s gardener—wishing he were somebody’s gardener—he made his way along the fence line back to the wrought-iron gate. Now he noticed a small sign down low on the gate that said GUARDED BY ARMOR ALARM. When he looked up, he could see the taut chain-link stretching away out of sight into the foliage on the other side of the gate.
He returned to his car. So Hart lived surrounded by security. Nudger knew what he had to do, even though he didn’t want to do it. It would require waiting till dark. He cringed. There was a lot of talk about cover of darkness, as if the dark were a security blanket for cowards, but he couldn’t remember the night ever being his friend.
At least he had plenty of time to get what he needed. He started the car and pulled back onto Peterson Road.
As it turned out, he didn’t have to rent a boat. Lacy had a friend who owned a canoe.
“We have to paddle at the same time, Nudger!” she whispered to him that night, as they pulled away from the bank half a mile upstream from Wayne Hart’s estate.
The night was sultry and dark and the river sounded immense and powerful. Nudger wished they didn’t have to go so far in the flimsy aluminum canoe, but Lacy assured him it would be safe. He was dressed in a black T-shirt, Levi’s, and dark blue jogging shoes. Lacy had on black slacks, a dark green blouse, and a black beret.
“We look like a couple of wartime commandos,” Lacy said with a grin.
Nudger thought they looked like a couple of French hoodlums. It was the beret.
“Dammit, Nudger, you’re making us go in a circle!”
“You sit up front,” Nudger said, lifting his paddle from the dark water and starting to stand up. “That way I can see when you paddle.”
“My God, Nudger, sit down!”
He sat. Obviously he was ignorant of canoe etiquette.
“You know where we’re going,” Lacy said, “so it’s better if you’re up front. You motion with your head when we’re going to change directions, and I’ll key off you. Paddle three times, then switch sides. If we start paddling together on opposite sides, we should be in synchronization and go in a straight line.”
“The current’s got us anyway,” he said with some trepidation, “moving us downstream.”
“But the canoe’s crosswise to the current, Nudger. That isn’t right. It increases our chances of capsizing.”
That made sense and alarmed Nudger. He dipped his paddle back in the water. “On three,” he said.
He and Lacy finally began paddling in unison. Once he’d worked up the rhythm, the strain felt good in his back and arms, and steering the canoe became easier.
As soon as they moved well out into the river, the current did most of the work and they used the paddles mainly for steering. Nudger’s eyes had adjusted some to the dark. The lights of large houses began gliding past on the right; starboard, he thought smugly. Some of them had wide lawns and lighted docks. They passed a cabin cruiser tied up at one of the docks, then there was a stretch of black shore and another dock with a big boat moored close to it.
“That has to be it,” Nudger said, recognizing the bend in the shore as the same as the bend in Peterson Road near the Hart estate.
Lacy inserted her paddle in the water and used it as a rudder, veering them toward the bank. “I’ll steer, Nudger. Stop paddling and let the river take us there until we get in close.”
As they neared the bank, he saw a glint of moonlight off razor wire and was sure they had the right estate. Beyond the dock, which was dark, glowed rows of windows in a large house whose shape could only be imagined against the black sky. Off to one side of the house, a blue-green swimming pool lay like a glimmering jewel set in the dark hillside.
Lacy guided the canoe in close to the dock, behind the boat. It was a white boat with a dark blue or black stripe along the waterline, and a white-and-blue cabin. Some sort of navigational equipment jutted from the cabin roof and looked as if it should revolve when the boat was underway. An aluminum ladder led from its stern down to a transom, providing a platform for swimmers or sunbathers. BLUE DESTINY was lettered boldly across the stern. Nudger
thought it would be ridiculously easy to board the boat. From inside the hull came a steady humming sound.
“That noise is only the generator,” Lacy said, noticing how he’d leaned to the side and tilted his head toward the hull.
Nudger wondered how she’d learned so much about boats, ships, whatever.
“I used to date a navy man who had a boat,” she said. Reading his mind now as well as his body language. He watched her tie the canoe to the dock with a frayed-looking rope, deftly creating a complicated knot with a few flicks of her wrist. “C’mon, Nudger,” she said, climbing out of the canoe. She seemed to have taken charge of the mission.
He followed her up onto the dock, almost slipping and falling into the lapping dark water. The canoe bumped against the rubber tires lashed to the dock as buffers, making a dull metallic sound that wouldn’t carry far.
“Let’s hope there’s no one home,” Nudger said. What he wanted was to get into Wayne Hart’s house, then search for some connection between Hart and the deaths of Brad Millman and Lois Brown.
“We’ll know soon,” Lacy said, staying low as she went up rough wooden steps made from railroad ties, then started up the dark slope of lawn toward the house.
Nudger followed her. He was suddenly aware that crickets had been chirping, and now were silent. The smell of freshly mown grass mingled with the smell of the river. His stomach moved.
“What if there are dogs?” he asked. “We should have brought some meat to throw to them.”
Lacy didn’t answer, staring straight ahead at the lights of the house.
“You didn’t think about dogs, did you?” Nudger persisted. “If you had, you would have brought something.”
“I brought you,” she snarled back at him.
The plong! of a diving board and the sound of a splash made them both freeze in the night.
Nudger looked beyond Lacy at a young girl or small woman in a one-piece black swimming suit pulling herself up out of the pool. She leaned forward and shook water from her long blonde hair. “The pool,” he whispered to Lacy.
“I see.”
They moved closer cautiously and saw by the reflected light from the pool that the swimmer was very young, maybe prepubescent. She wasn’t alone. Sprawled in a lounge chair was a fat man with thick graying hair. His eyes were closed and his bare chest was rising and falling slowly in sleep. His right hand held an empty glass. He wasn’t wearing swimming trunks.
“Look at that ape!” Lacy said. “With that kid running around! ”
“I doubt if it’s his daughter,” Nudger said.
Lacy hissed. “Why, that bastard!”
“Maybe she’s older than she looks.”
“Idiot!” Lacy snapped.
“We don’t know her age.” Nudger had seen forty-year-old women who could look like teenagers from a distance. “And there’s nothing we can do about it now anyway. And he hasn’t actually done anything to her. Maybe he’s a nudist or something. Maybe she actually is his daughter. Let’s concentrate on the house.”
“You’re kidding yourself, Nudger.”
Reluctantly, they moved to the left, toward what appeared to be illuminated French doors that led inside from a stone patio. There were chairs on the patio, and a table with an umbrella sprouting from it. Next to the patio was a statue of what appeared to be a woman astride a horse.
As they drew closer to the house, Nudger saw that it was a vast affair with a many-gabled tile roof and ivy growing up two walls of an alcove. There were canvas awnings over the windows, their white trim dancing gently in the breeze. A curved walk lined with flowers led away from the patio to a garden and greenhouse. What Nudger had at first assumed was a smaller, guest house, about a hundred yards to the side of the main house, now appeared to be a three-car garage, perhaps with living quarters above it.
“Too bright there,” Nudger said, pointing toward the French doors. He and Lacy moved toward a dark window surrounded by shrubbery. “Remember the Armor Alarm company,” he said softly.
“The window’s not wired,” Lacy said. “See if it’s locked.”
Nudger tried the window and couldn’t raise it.
Lacy picked up a stone and smashed the glass up near the latch.
“Watch the noise!” Nudger whispered.
“Noise isn’t something you can watch, Nudger. Anyway, they can’t hear anything from the pool.”
“Maybe there’s somebody else in the house.”
“Servants?” Lacy asked, as if she’d just thought of the possibility.
Nudger nodded. Quietly, he unlocked the window without cutting his hand on a glass shard, then raised the lower section. It went up quietly and without resistance.
He climbed inside first, then helped Lacy in.
They were standing on soft carpet in a room illuminated by moonlight sifting in through the window.
Nudger watched Lacy cross the room toward the door. She closed it softly, then worked the wall switch.
The room sprang alive with light.
“Hey!” Nudger said.
“They can’t see the window from the pool,” Lacy assured him.
Hoping she was right, he looked around. They were in a large den with darkly paneled walls and royal blue carpet. Over a stone mantle a stuffed swordfish mounted on wood was posed in an eternal leap. What appeared to be a genuine sea anchor was leaning against the wall nearby. The furniture was teak and oak and cream-colored leather and shouted money. In front of a long leather sofa was a marble-topped table with magazines fanned out on it. On the other three walls were rows of paintings, most of them of young women or girls posed nude but not erotically.
“These are genuine oils,” Lacy said, moving close and staring at a painting of a pale young woman stepping gingerly out of a large brass bathtub. On a hook nearby hung a white tutu and ballet shoes.
“This is a genuine Degas, Nudger! Worth a fortune.”
“I had no idea you knew about art,” he said.
“I was once involved in an ... er, art scam case.”
“Legally involved?”
She gazed around her, ignoring his question. “All this stuff is worth a fortune.”
“Hart’s rich, Lacy,” he reminded her. “He’s a collector.”
What really interested Nudger was a large polished wood desk in a corner. He moved toward it, leaving Lacy to admire Hart’s art collection.
When he was five feet away from the desk an alarm began to screech.
“Pressure plate!” Lacy said. “You must have stepped on a damned pressure plate!”
Dogs began to bark. They sounded like big dogs.
Nudger was already moving toward the window.
He didn’t remember actually diving through the open window, but there he was, lying on the lawn, one foot in a bush whose branches were scratching his ankle above his sock.
He saw Lacy scramble out through the window. She almost landed directly on him, stepping on his arm as they both struggled to their feet.
Then they were both running down the slope of lawn toward the dock. Nudger glanced back and saw that all the lights were glowing in the house. And there were outside lights. He could see several figures moving around near the stone patio.
“Stay low! They haven’t seen us!” Lacy whispered.
Cover of darkness! Cover of darkness! Nudger kept repeating to himself as they half ran, half rolled down the sloping lawn toward the steps to the dock.
When they were almost there, Nudger allowed himself to believe they might make it.
Then he heard a snarl and something clamped around the heel of his shoe.
He twisted around and saw a large black Doberman pinscher glaring at him, its long white teeth sunk into his shoe, somehow missing flesh and bone.
There was a soft pop and hiss. The dog released its grip and began wheezing, spinning in a circle.
“Pepper spray,” Lacy said, holding up a small aerosol can. The nightmare dog continued to whirl like a puppy chasing its t
ail.
They clattered into the canoe. Nudger couldn’t believe no one would hear them.
Lacy unhitched the rope from the dock and picked up a paddle.
This time they worked in perfect unison from their first strokes, moving out into the river and the night, feeling the current take them.
Lights winked on around the dock, inside the boat. Flashlight beams probed out above the black water, but none of them were strong enough to pierce the darkness for any distance.
A motor turned over then steadied out to a deep hum.
“They’re coming after us with the boat!” Lacy said.
“Paddle toward shore!” Nudger told her, his eyes fixed on a dark mass of branches near water level. “We’ll get lost in those trees!”
The river was high enough from the spring rains to have reached the middle limbs of the trees, whose leafy branches seemed to embrace the canoe, scraping noisily along its aluminum sides. Nudger prayed the shrill, hollow sound wouldn’t carry.
Gripping branches for leverage, he and Lacy pulled and paddled the canoe farther into the backwater until they were near shore.
When they thought they were well concealed, they sat very still.
The sound of a boat’s motor came nearer ... faded ... came nearer again. Nudger thought he saw the beam of a searchlight playing over the river. Once he was sure he heard men’s voices.
Then the sound of the boat receded and he could hear only the lapping of water around the limbs and trunks of the trees, up against the sides of the canoe.
Lacy used her paddle, and Nudger clutched branches hand over hand, and they worked the canoe to river’s edge. Then they climbed out, waded through water only a few inches deep, and wrestled the canoe up onto dry land.
Incredibly, Lacy was gasping and giggling at the same time. “Jesus, wasn’t that fun!” she said, almost choking. “Great, great fun, Nudger!”
“You’re crazy!”
“Could be. What a rush!”
Nudger’s knees were watery. He felt as if he’d just stepped ashore after the Battle of Midway.
“Let’s get out of here,” he said.