The Bullet Catch

by John Gaspard

  “He could have figured it out.”

  “Oh, nonsense. Howard Washburn couldn’t figure out a three-piece jigsaw puzzle. And I suppose you thought Sylvia was going to figure it out as well?”

  “Well, once she saw me, she instantly figured it out.”

  “And why did she see you?”

  Dylan lowered his head.

  “Because you went to her house,” Trish answered for him. “And why did you go to her house?”

  Again Dylan was silent, although just the slightest hint of a grin started to break through.

  “One more for the road? How was it you put it?”

  “Once more for old time’s sake.” He gave this response his best ‘aw shucks’ charm, but it was evident Trish wasn’t buying it.

  “Idiot. Complete idiot.” She looked at me and I was sort of surprised she remembered I was still in the room. “Eli, what did the police call Dylan’s death?”

  My mind was whirling, but somehow I was able to pull an answer out of the maelstrom in my head. “A mugging that didn’t look like a mugging,” I said.

  “And they would have left it at that,” she said, moving back toward Dylan with such ferocity he took two awkward steps backward. And keep in mind, this was a guy with a gun in his hand.

  “But then,” she continued, “you had to add a suicide that didn’t look like a suicide and a drowning that didn’t look like a drowning.” She got up in his face for a long moment, then shook her head and walked away again. “Idiot,” she mumbled.

  There was a long, tense pause. I don’t know why I did it, but I decided to add my two cents to the discussion.

  “My Uncle Harry has a saying,” I said quietly. They both turned and looked at me, probably surprised I was entering into the fray. “He says it to magicians all the time, particularly ones who try to hide things the audience isn’t even looking for. This is the expression: ‘Don’t run if no one is chasing you.’” I let the words hang in the air.

  “But I didn’t run,” Dylan began, but Trish cut him off sharply.

  “You were dead. The police were buying it. Or they were buying it enough. You didn’t need to kill anyone else.”

  “Oh,” he said quietly, apparently beginning to understand. I looked at them, in an apparent standoff, and then something dawned on me. It occurred to me it was in my best interest to get out of that apartment as quickly as possible.

  “So,” I said, repositioning myself on a couch that provided about as much stability as an under-filled waterbed, “You two are getting on a plane?”

  “That was the plan,” Trish said. “The insurance money has come through, so we can pay back Dylan’s, um, employer.”

  “Mr. Lime?”

  Trish couldn’t hide a grimace. “I believe we’re talking about the same person. We don’t say his actual name around here, so sure, we can call him Mr. Lime.”

  “Why did Dylan owe him money?” I knew it wasn’t really my business, but I wanted to get all the elements of the story before whatever was going to happen happened.

  “That’s a good question. Why did you owe him money?” Trish asked, turning to Dylan. He glared at her but didn’t answer, so Trish turned back to me.

  “Gambling. Gambling with a psychopath’s money. I don’t recommend it.” She ran a quick hand through her hair and scanned the apartment. “So now we’re in a position to get him off our backs for good, leaving us free and clear,” Trish said.

  “Well, I’d hate for you to miss your plane on my account,” I said, trying to get up out of the couch as casually as possible. The couch was not providing any help in my effort. “You probably have more packing to do, so I’ll just skedaddle and get out of your way.” I was pretty sure I had never used the word skedaddle before in my life, but was hoping I might still have many opportunities to use it in the future. If I had one.

  “I’m sorry, Eli, but that’s not going to work.” Trish said, and then she gave me a hard look. “First, explain to me why you’re involved in all this?” she asked, sounding more than a little annoyed.

  “Me?”

  “Yes, you.”

  “I was trying to help you,” I said lamely.

  “Really. You were trying to help me.” Her voice had taken on a scary, cold edge. “At what point did I ask for your help?”

  I thought back over our various conversations. I shook my head. “You didn’t.”

  “No, I didn’t.” She turned back toward the kitchen island, grabbed the wine bottle and added more wine to her glass. “Jesus, it never ends with you guys, does it? All through high school, it’s ‘Trish, can I help you with this?’ and ‘Trish, can I help you with that?’ If I wanted your help, believe me, I would have asked for it.”

  “But you kept talking to me about it,” I protested. “You called me and had coffee with me and asked me to go with you to the police station.” I was having a little trouble grasping her sudden anger with me of all people.

  “Think it through, Eli. Your ex-wife is with the DA’s office. I was looking for information. That should be clear by now.” She took another sip of wine, shaking her head in disgust. “What is it with you guys when you’re face-to-face with a pretty woman? Trust me, every encounter with an attractive woman is not a come-on.”

  “He was coming on to you?” Dylan sounded more surprised than angry.

  “No more than everyone else,” she said. “Now we just need to figure out what to do with him.” She threw a look at Dylan, who snapped to attention and turned the gun in my direction.

  “Trish, I don’t need to tell anyone anything about what we’ve discussed here tonight,” I began, aiming for a casual attitude and falling short.

  Trish cut me off. “No, Eli. We can’t take that chance. You weren’t a loose end until my brilliant husband walked into the room, but you’re clearly a liability now. And one that needs to be disposed of.”

  “I could shoot him,” Dylan suggested. “I could shoot him right now. The police come, you tell them he broke in and was going to attack you. Self defense. They’d buy that. They’d buy that in a minute.”

  “No, they wouldn’t,” Trish scoffed. “I mean, look at him.”

  I believe she had meant it as a rhetorical command, but that didn’t stop Dylan from giving me the serious once over.

  “Oh, yeah,” he said when he’d finished his assessment. “I see what you mean.”

  “Hang on,” I started, but Trish was already onto the next idea.

  “They wouldn’t believe he had come to attack me,” she said as she crossed the room. “But they might believe he came over to chat and had one of his attacks and jumped off the terrace.” She opened the curtains that covered the sliding glass doors to their balcony.

  Dylan was nodding along with her as she spoke. “That’s right, he’s got that thing, that heights panic thing. That would work.”

  “What?” I looked from Dylan to Trish. “You told him about my panic attacks?” I looked at Trish, genuinely hurt. I‘m sure she could see it in my face.

  “Sorry about that, but you know, there’s hardly ever any secrets between a wife and her husband.”

  “Even a dead husband,” I muttered.

  Trish slid open the balcony doors and then continued to move through the room, opening all the drapes, revealing the expansive and expensive view from the twenty-ninth floor. “Yes, I think I can sell this. It has a ring of plausibility.”

  Despite the situation, I couldn’t help but look out the windows. In fact, my field of vision had narrowed and the windows were really all I could see.

  I couldn’t see the ground directly below, but the view of the top of the Calhoun Beach Manor across the street and the street wending its way around Lake Calhoun told my unconscious all it needed to know: I was up high, up way high, with an open door right in front of me.

  I tried to sl
ip into Dr. Bakke’s breathing lessons, but his words of instruction had flown out of my head. A weakness started to settle into my knees and although I was pretty sure I was breathing, my lungs were starting to become convinced no actual oxygen was entering my body.

  I made a quick inventory of what I had in my pockets, in the hope that I was carrying something that could be fashioned into an impromptu weapon. A deck of cards, a couple trick coins, my car keys, my wallet, my phone and some invisible whiffle dust. Perfect.

  I heard Dylan speak. “How do you want to do this?”

  Trish responded from somewhere behind me. “How do you think? Get him out on the balcony and throw him over the railing.”

  I tried to find some amusement in their continued squabbling, but at the moment my mind and body were occupied with more important issues. I started to back away, not heading toward anything in particular, but instead trying to put some distance between myself and the French doors to the balcony.

  “No so fast, magic man,” I heard Dylan say. “You’re headed the wrong way. Go out onto the balcony.”

  It came out as a whisper, but it was loud enough for them to hear it. I’m sure it surprised them as much as it surprised me. “No.”

  “What?”

  “I’m not going out there. I can’t go out there.” I realized I was talking to myself as much as them, but I didn’t have the energy to stop and explain this. In the back of my mind I heard Dr. Bakke’s voice and what he had said earlier finally made sense: ‘Sometimes our greatest weakness is actually our greatest strength.’ I had a sudden realization. My intense, shattering fear of that balcony was the strongest weapon I had to keep myself from being thrown off of it.

  I felt a sudden jab in the middle of my back, as Dylan prodded me with the gun. “Move,” he said, sounding like the tough guy he had always pretended to be.

  He shoved me with his free hand, propelling me several feet closer to the windows and the open door. This new vantage point gave me a bird’s eye view of the ground twenty-nine stories below. I felt my stomach tighten and the spinning in my head ramped up from thirty-three to seventy-eight rpm. For a moment I was sure I was about to pass out, but then I realized passing out would likely be only a short-term solution and not a good one at that.

  I felt Dylan’s hand on my back, pushing me forward toward the opening. I placed a hand on either side of the doorframe and pushed back. The sweat that had formed on my brow started to trickle down into my eyes. Without an available hand to wipe it away, I resorted to squinting and shaking my head. I positioned my feet against the doorframe as well and for a moment I knew exactly how a recalcitrant cat feels when you try to push it into a pet carrier.

  I could see the railing ahead of me and it looked surprisingly low, making me wonder for an odd instant if it was below code. The sweat cleared out of my eyes for a second and I got a sudden view of the street below. The perverse imp in my brain was suggesting in the strongest possible terms that jumping over the railing was in my best interests, and the pressure Dylan was applying to my back was simply an agreeable chorus to the voice in my head.

  I suddenly realized it was as if the perverse voice had suddenly manifested itself into two-hundred pound brute who was doing his best to get me out onto the balcony and over the railing.

  “How about if I just shoot him and then throw him over the railing?” Dylan huffed behind me.

  “Brilliant,” Trish said. “So I tell the police he shot himself and then jumped over the railing? I don’t think they’re going to buy that.” She reached out her hand toward him. “Give me the gun so you can use both hands.”

  Dylan relaxed his efforts for a second to hand off the gun, allowing me to grab a quick breath. I had barely inhaled when he pushed against me again. I dug my nails into the doorframe. I may have begun to whimper.

  “Eli,” Trish said, her face very near mine, “it will be over in a second, trust me. And, deep down, don’t you really want to jump? I mean, deep down, isn’t that what your mind is telling you to do?”

  I turned and stared at her.

  “What happened to you?” I asked, my voice sounding surprisingly hoarse. “You used to be so nice.”

  “I’m the same girl I’ve always been, Eli. You just never took the time to really look, to really see me.”

  “I see you now,” I whispered.

  She looked into my eyes and I looked into hers and for just a second I could see the fury. I saw the anger and the selfishness and for the first time ever she wasn’t in the least bit pretty or attractive.

  “Yes,” she said, “I believe you do.”

  The sweat was running down my face, my arms were aching and my legs were about to buckle. I looked back at the tempting railing and the street below. I looked at her smiling face and I started to feel tired. So tired. And then I saw the gun in her hand and a small voice in the back of my head started to sing, getting louder and louder.

  “Everybody run,” I sang quietly, remembering Julie Brown’s novelty song from the eighties, “The Homecoming Queen’s got a gun.”

  For some reason, this immediately made me feel a tiny bit better. And I remembered being in the elevator at the hotel and the strange power singing had offered. I kept singing in a hoarse whisper, but switched to a more upbeat number.

  “What’s he singing?” Dylan grunted as he stepped back and then smashed into my back. I gasped for a second, and then returned to singing.

  “Jingle Bells,” Trish said with a derisive tone.

  “It would be weird to kill someone while they’re singing Jingle Bells,” Dylan said. “Make him stop.”

  “This is ridiculous,” Trish hissed, handing Dylan the gun again. “Just knock him out. The head injury will get lost in the shuffle after you throw him over the railing.”

  I was halfway through the first verse, headed toward the chorus, using what little strength I had to keep my body on this side of the doorframe. I turned just in time to see Dylan swinging the butt of gun with great speed and force right toward my forehead.

  Then I heard a gunshot and a moment later everything went black.

  “So this is what it’s like to be dead,” I thought to myself. I had been swallowed into an inky blackness and was just settling into it, luxuriating in the warmth and the calm, when I was abruptly blinded by a white light.

  Frankly, I was surprised. Annoyed by the brightness of the light, sure, but also surprised. I had never counted on an afterlife, so I was happy to discover that, apparently, you didn’t have to believe to ultimately benefit.

  “What’s his name?” an unfamiliar voice said somewhere off in the distance.

  “Eli,” was the answer. There was something recognizable about that voice.

  “Eli, can you hear me?”

  “Humnhpghs,” I said in reply, and then thought I should qualify that. “Yiftysd dugsfud,” I added for good measure.

  “I think he’s starting to come around.”

  I don’t know what I was coming around to or where it was, but I did know the blinding light was adding to a massive headache the started in the back of my head and traveled all the way down to my toes. I was suddenly glad I wasn’t taller, because I figured it would have hurt even more. That’s the way my brain was working.

  “Eli, do you know where you are?”

  The white light mercifully moved away from my eyes, leaving a white trail as it did. The darkness that had enveloped me had morphed into a muddy gray, with tiny spots of white light still burning into my brain.

  “My head hurts,” I managed to say, although the words sounded distant and echoed in my head.

  “I would imagine it does, you got conked pretty hard. Didn’t break the skin, though, but you’re going to have a heck of a bump.”

  The murky gray faded away and was replaced with a young Asian man who was smiling at me just inches from my face. �
��Let’s check those retinas once more,” he said, again shining the white light directly into my eyes.

  “Must we,” I moaned quietly.

  “There we go,” he said, giving each of my eyes a quick flash with the light. “That’s looking closer to normal. I think you’re going to be okay.”

  “Can you tell that to my brain?” I mumbled. “It’s offering a dissenting opinion.”

  The haze that was the sum total of my field of vision started to clear and I realized I was still in Trish’s apartment. Somehow I had gotten to the couch, which as it had done before, was enveloping me deep into the heart of its cavernous cushions.

  Another face appeared in my line of vision and it took at least three seconds for me to place him: Homicide Detective Fred Hutton.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever seen your face this close up,” was all I could think to say. “It’s sort of weird.”

  “It’s no picnic on my end,” he responded. “How are you feeling?”

  “Like Pele just scored a goal with my head.” I squinted, which might have been a mistake, and then I tried to sit up. As before, the couch fought me at every turn.

  “Take it easy,” he said, grabbing my arm and helping me to sit up straight. “We’re in no hurry here. The show’s all over.”

  I slowly took in the room. Trish and Dylan were gone, and in their place were police, both the plain clothes and uniformed variety. They were snapping photos, dusting for prints, looking through drawers and cupboards.

  “What happened?” I looked back at Homicide Detective Fred Hutton. I might have been mistaken, but I think I noticed a look of concern on his face. It vanished as quickly as it had come.

  “You want the long version or the short version?”

  I squinted again and ran a hand across the back of my head, instantly wishing I hadn’t. “I could throw up at any moment,” I said, “So let’s go with the short version.”

  “Dylan Lasalle, who’s not nearly as dead as we thought he was, clocked you on the head and was about to throw you off the balcony.”