Pulse

by Edna Buchanan

  He tried to change his appearance. Shed his jacket and peeled off the sweater he had bought at Sears. He pulled on a hooded navy blue sweatshirt he had in the car and put on his sunglasses.

  She walked the decks, upper and lower. She drew him like a magnet. He found it difficult to think of anything else, to take his eyes off her. Each time she passed, he hunched over the rail as though intent on the rocky points, sheltered coves, beaches and shorelines along a string of evergreen jewels. They made two, then three stops. One seemed to be a busy fishing village with gulls swarming the skies overlooking the harbor. The birds were leaner and more angular than South Florida seagulls. Denise made no move to disembark. He watched her with a sense of longing, on the top deck now, one booted foot up on a low railing, her hair streaming like a banner in the wind.

  Was she going all the way to British Columbia?

  Then he saw her on the move, headed for the Range

  Rover. He climbed into the rental and hid behind the newspaper. The next stop was a small island with a narrow road and rocky shore, a tiny grocery at the landing the only sign of inhabitants.

  He waited until after she drove down the ramp, then suddenly signaled that he was disembarking as well. “Sorry, I must have dozed,” he apologized to an annoyed crew member. The Range Rover had already disappeared down the road. It should be no trouble to find in a place this size, Frank thought. The ferry back to Seattle would be in an hour, he was told, but would only stop if he hoisted the signal flag at the dock.

  He took the rutted road slowly, eyes sweeping the brown-green landscape. He thought he saw a bald eagle, but didn’t even turn his head. He was after a rarer sighting. There seemed to be only three or four rustic houses on the island. Summer places, he supposed. Smoke spiraled from the chimney of only one. The Range Rover was parked out front. He drove on about a half mile, then left the car at the side of the road and made his way back on foot. The ground was wet and slippery and he was glad he had worn athletic shoes and warm socks. The house was surrounded by madrona trees. He knew that the truth he sought was inside.

  Trembling in the chill, he wondered how long he would have to wait. He did not dare approach the house in daylight. He heard voices and crouched. The front door had opened. A woman called out, her words friendly but questioning. He could not quite make them out. A man stepped onto the porch and glanced about. He wore jeans and a flannel shirt. He picked up an armload of firewood from a stack near the door, then carried it inside. He wore his hair longer and had grown a beard, but there was no doubt. It was Daniel Alexander.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  He dashed back to the car wanting to shout to the world that he was right, had been right all along. “We did it!” he muttered. “We did it!” He had to get the police, call the Miami detectives, prove to Kathleen and the girls that he was not crazy. He was right!

  The island seemed deserted. He rushed to the small grocery to use the phone. The door was locked; the sign in the window said it was only open two mornings a week until spring.

  He hoisted the flag at the landing and waited impatiently until he saw the ferry’s slow approach in the distance. Once aboard, he nearly wept out of sheer relief. It was over. There would be answers now to all the questions. He tried to organize his thoughts, planning how to clearly explain everythingto the local police. He had to tell Rory first; she had to go to the police with him.

  First off the ferry, he fought the impulse to find a phone. This had to be face-to-face. Then he could tell the world, but first he had to be sure that it would listen.

  He practically sprinted through the hotel lobby. Thank God she was waiting, pacing their room.

  “Where were you?” She sounded annoyed. “I thought we were supposed to meet … Ohmigod.” She saw his face. “You found her!”

  He stood mute, unable to speak for a moment, scarcely able to breathe. “Both of them. Daniel is with her. Daniel is alive.”

  She reacted as though he had slapped her. Then she stared, shaking her head. “You know that can’t be true. Why are you saying it? It’s not true. It can’t be.”

  He told her about Denise, the ferry, the island, the man on the porch.

  “It’s not true!”

  “Rory, I’m sorry. They almost pulled it off. Thank God we came.”

  She kept staring, apparently in shock. “Get your coat,” he said. “We’re going to the police. They have to be picked up before they can get away.”

  “I have to see him,” she said softly. “I have to see him with my own eyes.”

  “This is bigger than us, Rory. This is something for the police. They’re murderers.”

  “You never set eyes on Daniel. How can you be so sure it’s him, or even Denise?” Her voice grew louder. “It could be people who look like them. You never saw either one.”

  “I’ve stared at their pictures enough, but even if I hadn’t”—he touched his heart—“I know.”

  She refused to go to the police without first seeing for herself.

  “They may have spotted me,” he argued fiercely. “It’s too risky. What if they see us? They could take off before we get back with the police. We can’t go out there ourselves.”

  “His brains were on my carpet,” she insisted. “His blood was on my hands. Now you say you’ve seen my dead husband? Show me!”

  She was raising her voice. He wanted the police, but not in response to a disturbance call.

  He punched his fist into his palm, exasperated. He needed her help to convince the cops. He had seen them work, encountered their suspicion and bureaucracy. Cops are skeptical by nature. They do not like wild-goose chases or looking foolish. He knew what would happen if he went to them alone. First they would call Miami to check out his credibility. Rory was his credibility. “Okay,” he said, “let’s go. But we have to hurry.”

  She was stone-faced and silent. They walked the deck on the ferry and he bought her a hot chocolate. The late afternoon had grown cooler, but he was hot, seething with anger at all Daniel and Denise had done. A voice inside him rasped, “Kill them. Kill them.”

  The wind had picked up, but they stood in the punishing blasts on the blustery deck as the island slowly came into view. “There it is,” he said.

  “You know what that makes the father of my child if this is true?” Rory said. “You know what that makes my marriage? My entire life?” She looked numb.

  He tried to comfort her, put his arms around her, but she was resolute, as though he had deliberately visited this pain upon her, as though he were at fault.

  The next ferry would be in an hour, the last at eight-thirty p.m., he was told. They needed to hoist the flag.

  “If we don’t get back in a hurry, the police will have to use their own boats,” he fretted to Rory. “Or wait until morning.” He hoisted the flag before they left the landing.

  He pulled off the road before the house was in sight, on the far side of a curve. “We should not be doing this,” he warned sensibly. “What happens if they’re out jogging and we come face-to-face?”

  She fished her lensless spectacles from a pocket, opened the wire frames and put them on. “Daniel would never be in a place like this,” she said accusingly. “You’ve dragged me all the way out here on some fool’s errand.”

  The falling sun caught in the tangled branches of denuded trees as they left the car and walked, skirting the narrow road. Closer to the house, he led her off the road into the cover of woods. The cold seemed to rise from the damp leaves, rocky soil and brambles beneath their feet. Misty fog rolled in off the water. Except for seabirds and the wind, the silence was deafening. The Range Rover had not been moved. He held her hand as they crouched to watch.

  “A perfect hideout,” he whispered.

  Rory didn’t answer, her eyes fixed on the house.

  “We have to get closer,” she said after a long time, “so I can see.”

  “No,” he whispered. Her hand felt like ice. “Maybe we can draw them out somehow.”
<
br />   No need. He heard her sharp intake of breath. A man moved quickly down the front steps and opened the door to the Range Rover. Frank panicked for a moment. If Alexander drove toward the landing, he would see their car.

  A strangled sound came from Rory; he held her as her knees buckled.

  “Daniel,” she breathed, eyes wide. “Daniel!”

  He put his hand over her mouth and forced her to the ground. “Shhhh! Shhhh!” he warned urgently.

  The man appeared to remove something from the glove compartment, swung the door closed and trotted back up into the house where a fire glowed and lights shone warm in the gloom.

  Fearing she would scream, Frank half dragged her back through the woods to the car, stumbling, snapping branches as they forced their way through the brush.

  She panted puffs of frozen breath. “He’s alive! How could he do this to us? That son of a bitch!” she screamed, red in the face, pounding her fists on the hood as he unlocked the car.

  “Get in,” he said sharply. “We’ve got to get out of here and call the cops. We’re lucky he didn’t hear us.”

  He maneuvered into a U-turn and they careened back down the narrow road in the growing dark. “It must be pitch black out here at night,” he said, reluctant to use the headlights. “I just hope the damn ferry—”

  “He’s alive,” she said. “Then who …” Her look was total bewilderment.

  They bounced around a curve, he hit the brakes and the car skidded sideways. Across the road, blocking the way, was the Range Rover. “How’d he … ?”

  Alexander had obviously taken another route, through the woods or along the stony beach. The Rover looked empty.

  The woods on either side were dark, the fog more dense, light nearly gone.

  “Where are they?” Rory said fearfully.

  “Keep quiet,” he said. “They don’t know me.”

  He got out, eyes straining into the misty shadows. He strode up to the Range Rover, glanced inside. No keys.

  Then, from behind his rental, on the right, a husky figure approached through the murky haze.

  “Hey, there,” Frank called. “This your car? We were trying to get by.”

  “That’s him.” Denise approached from the left rear. “The one who’s been following me all day.” Rory was still huddled in the front seat, in the dark.

  Alexander came closer, boots crunching on the gravelly road. He held a gun in his right hand.

  “You’ve been following my lady. Let’s see some ID, buddy. Now.” He gestured with the weapon.

  “We’ve got one white female in here.” Denise spoke crisply. “Don’t move,” she told Rory. She held a gun as well, and stood pointing it in a police officer’s stance at the passenger-side window.

  Frank fumbled, pretending to look for his wallet.

  Alexander stepped up and studied his face curiously. He reached roughly inside Frank’s jacket and jerked out his billfold.

  He opened it and held it up to the sky’s last light. His eyes widened. “What the hell! This is my driver’s license! Denise, this guy’s carrying my driver’s license!” He looked genuinely bewildered. “Who are you! Where the hell are you from?”

  Denise had Rory out of the car and was frisking her. “Who is she?” Alexander demanded, still pointing his gun at Frank and clutching the wallet.

  “You son of a bitch!” Rory broke away from Denise and rushed at Alexander. “You son of a bitch!”

  “Rory? Rory? Son of a … What are you doing here?” He and Denise looked stunned.

  Swinging wildly, Rory lunged to pound his chest with herfists. He slipped the billfold into his pocket and caught her wrist with one hand, still holding the gun in the other.

  “Rory, don’t,” Frank said. She stopped swinging, taking shuddering breaths, panting, staring at her husband as though he were a ghost.

  “We’ll take them to the house,” Alexander said sharply. “Denise, pull their car off the road. We can come back for it later.”

  Frank and Rory sat in the back of the Rover. Alexander drove. Denise was beside him, swiveled around in her seat, training her gun on them. “I’ll use it,” she warned.

  “I know,” Frank said. Even now her voice thrilled him with a familiar longing.

  “That’s right,” Alexander said. “Don’t hesitate to put ‘em away if you have to, babe.”

  “Why did you do this, Daniel? How could you do this to Billy and me?”

  “Shut up,” Denise said, disgusted.

  “Who was the dead man? Who was he?” Rory demanded.

  Alexander and Denise exchanged glances as they pulled up at the house. They marched Rory and Frank inside at gunpoint.

  The interior was a scene of cozy domesticity, warm colors, a blazing fire, enticing aromas from the kitchen. Frank saw a pair of binoculars on a wooden table near the front window and realized they were probably being watched while they spied on the cabin. Both were ordered to sit on a sofa in the center of the room.

  “Jesus Christ, Rory!” Alexander squinted at his wife in the better light. “What the hell happened to your hair? You look like shit.”

  She removed the glasses and touched her hair selfconsciously. “It’s only temporary.”

  Alexander, a look of disbelief on his face, again studied the driver’s license he thought he had discarded with his past, thousands of miles away.

  “You a cop?”

  Frank shook his head.

  “Well, who the hell are you?” he shouted, patience gone. “What are you doing with my ID, and my wife? How the hell did you get here? How the hell did you find us?”

  “Which one of you killed Harrington? You were about to leave. Where were you going?” Frank asked. He stared curiously at the two people whose crimes had saved his life.

  Alexander cursed, his face beet red. He lunged forward and jammed the gun in Frank’s face. Rory gasped.

  “I have your heart,” Frank said calmly, “the heart they thought was yours.”

  Alexander’s mouth dropped open. “You’re the guy!” He stepped back, his eyes probing. “You’d never know it. Let me see.” He pointed the gun at Frank’s chest. “Let’s see.”

  Frank pulled up his sweatshirt and the shirt beneath it, revealing his scar. For a moment he thought it might not be there. He was healthy. Daniel Alexander was alive. Everything else had to be a dream.

  “Damn! Denise, take a look at this. What do you know? Ron said that Rory donated my organs.” He laughed. “Look where Nick wound up. Up to this minute, pal, you were the best walking, talking testament that I was dead.”

  “Who is Nick?” Rory pleaded. “Who was that at your desk, with your gun, wearing your wedding ring?”

  Alexander and Denise exchanged an intimate glance.

  “Well,” he said, almost good-naturedly, “I guess you figured out that it wasn’t me. I’d sure as hell like to know how. I never thought you’da caught on in a million years.”

  “It wasn’t me,” Rory’s whispered. “I never would have guessed.”

  Frank’s alarm watch beeped, seven p.m.

  “What the hell is that?” Alexander demanded, edgy, eyes darting around the room.

  “I need my medication, pills, They’re in the car.”

  Alexander sighed. “Denise, go get their car. Take out anything personal, this guy’s pills, the rental papers, any ID, and get rid of them. We can take the plates off and run the car up in the woods later. We’ll be long gone by the time somebody finds it in the spring.

  “No, wait!” He looked thrilled. “I’ve a great idea! They can be us! I love it!” He turned to Denise. “Am I a genius, or what? We leave the Rover, take their rental, turn it back in and take off. The nice young couple who rented this cabin is found after it burns to the ground. Perfect! Doubles our cover. I’m dead again!” His face lit up.

  Denise grinned and nodded.

  “Go get rid of their stuff,” he said, “bring their car, and make sure the flag isn’t up for the ferry. We don’t
need anybody stopping by.”

  Frank’s eyes followed Denise until she closed the door behind her.

  “Don’t you want to ask about Billy?” Rory said quietly.

  “How is he?” Daniel sounded almost casual, slouched into a chair across from them, still pointing the gun their way.

  “Heartbroken about his daddy.”

  “Damn stupid bitch! Look what Mommy has done to him now!” Alexander’s temper flared, launching him to his feet. “You coulda just cashed the insurance check and lived happily ever after, but oh, no, not you. I left you that money,

  Rory. I coulda cashed in that damn policy like everything else, but no, I leave it for you and Billy and whaddaya do? Shit! Now the kid’s an orphan. Just couldn’t let well enough alone, could you?”

  “So you never cared. It was all phony? That last night …”

  “Hell, Rory, that’s not the point.” He shook his head, exasperated, his eyes flicking toward the door Denise had exited. “You were swell, the best, great in the sack, the kid was swell, but Ron and me fell behind in paying the state and county withholding taxes, the figures kept mounting and I realized there is more to life than suburbia and working your ass off for the next twenty-five years. Denise understands that. She’s like me.”

  “That was her boyfriend you left in your place, wasn’t it?” Frank said.

  “Correctimundo.” Alexander glanced out the window, watching for Denise. “Lucky for me she always goes for the same type. First time she saw me she said I reminded her of somebody.”

  “But the fingerprints,” Frank persisted. “They said he had your fingerprints.”

  “Brilliant, huh?” Alexander looked pleased. “That just happened to be Denise’s job. We do it when she’s on duty. She takes the call, fingerprints the corpse at the morgue and switches fingerprint cards. Foolproof.

  “But then dumb bitch here”—he waved the gun at Rory—“comes home early and decides to donate my organs. Did they take ‘em all baby, everything?” He raised an eyebrow suggestively.

  “It would have worked, if it hadn’t been for that,” Frank said.