With an Extreme Burning

by Bill Pronzini

  Fire. Burning. They hadn't just died in the crash … there'd been a fire, hadn't there? An explosion and a fire?

  Soon, Francesca. But not too soon. The hottest fires burn slow. One fire burns out another's burning, one pain is lessen'd by another's anguish.

  But it wasn't our fault. We weren't even directly involved. It was the driver of the van, not Katy. We never saw the victims, I don't even remember their names. The highway patrol up there never contacted any of us afterward. We never heard from anybody in Oregon. Who'd want to harm us because of that?

  Dix said, “I don't have any idea either. But it's the first possibility that makes any sense at all.” He began to pace the living room in quick, agitated strides. Watching him, Cecca had the unsettling sensation that Katy's “Blue Time” painting was watching him, too, from the wall above. That somehow Katy herself was in the room with them.

  “Pelican Bay,” he said. “So that's what Eileen meant.”

  “Meant when?”

  “When I saw her yesterday. She mumbled something that sounded like ‘pellagrin day.’ Tell Cecca, she said. But I dismissed it, forgot about it; I thought it was a babble phrase. Christ, I should have remembered it was the name of that town.”

  “How could you, after four years? Katy didn't talk about that night, did she?”

  “Not after she told me what happened when she first got back, no.”

  “None of us talked about it,” Cecca said. “We wanted to forget it—everything about that night.”

  “I still should have made the connection.”

  “So should I, and much sooner, if you want to play that game. When I first heard about Katy, I thought, God, how awful she should die in a car accident after avoiding the one in Oregon. Eileen mentioned it, too, more than once. But the fact is, it happened four years ago, hundreds of miles from here, and we were only peripherally involved. Until now there was nothing to make either of us connect that with what's been going on here. The only reason Eileen did was whatever Katy said to her.”

  “You're right.” He scrubbed at his face with a heavy hand. “Trophy,” he said then, “some kind of trophy. What kind?”

  “I don't have a clue.”

  “And what would a trophy have to do with Pelican Bay?”

  She shook her head.

  Dix stopped pacing, came back to where she stood. “Can you remember the details of the accident up there? I mean everything before, during, and after.”

  “Most of them, if I have to.”

  “You have to. Katy's account was sketchy.”

  “Let me sit down first.”

  She curled up on a corner of the couch, her legs tucked under her. Her mind didn't want to open up to that June night four years before. She had to make an effort of will to force the memories into clear focus.

  “All right,” she said, and took a breath, and said, “We were well up the Oregon coast, taking our time, playing tourist. I was in pretty rough shape when we left here, all wrung out over Chet, but by then—five or six days into the trip—I'd regained some perspective and I was actually having a good time. That day, a Tuesday or maybe a Wednesday, we spent shopping in Lincoln City. Katy and I wanted to stay the night there, but somebody in one of the shops told Eileen Pelican Bay had more atmosphere … you know, it's a little fishing village. And it was only a few more miles up the coast. So we drove up and took rooms in a beachside motel. The woman at the motel said the best place to eat was a restaurant a mile or so north of town … Crabpot, I think it was called. We were hungry, so we decided on an early dinner. Thank God we didn't drink much. One glass of wine apiece was all.”

  “The accident happened as you were leaving the parking lot?”

  “That's right.”

  “And Katy was driving.”

  “Yes. I was in the front seat with her and Eileen was in back. It was raining, one of those thick, misty rains, and just dark. Visibility was practically zero. You could see bright lights—headlights—at a distance but not much else. There were headlights approaching in both lanes, far enough away for Katy to safely make the turn across into the southbound lane. It just didn't look like there was a closer car in that lane. A car was behind us, people leaving the restaurant like we were, and the driver said he thought the lane was clear, too, that he'd have pulled out just as Katy did if he'd been ahead of us.”

  “But it wasn't clear,” Dix said.

  “No. Just a few seconds after she made the turn—she was still accelerating—she cried out, something like ‘Oh my God!’ and swung over hard to the right. We were just beyond a turnout on the ocean side; we almost went off the road. The other car, the van came roaring up … only its fog lights on and they were dim. He must have been doing at least sixty.”

  “Almost hit you, Katy said.”

  “Almost. If the northbound lane had been clear, he might have been able to veer around us without going out of control. But by then the lights we'd seen coming that way—two cars—were too close. The only things he could do were to plow into us at full speed or veer into the turnout.”

  “Not much of a choice.”

  “No choice at all. We talked about it afterward. Each of us would've done just what he did.”

  The cut on her palm had started to burn and itch; she rubbed it through the bandage. Dix hadn't asked about the bandage. Even if he had, she wouldn't have told him about the incident with Elliot. Someday she would, but not now. It was no longer important.

  She said, “The turnout was fairly wide, fifty or sixty yards. It overlooked a place called Pelican Point. Steep cliffs, a rocky beach. But he was going too fast. And the highway was too slick and the surface … gravel, but there was mud under it, and deep rain puddles. He couldn't stop, couldn't even slow down. The van kept sliding, fishtailing. The rear end hit the guardrail first and then it … sailed through and dropped out of sight. The crash was awful. We could hear it above the storm, even closed up inside the car.”

  “Did it explode, burn?”

  “It burned, yes; I remember the fireglow. I don't remember an explosion … it was all so confused …”

  “There must have been one,” Dix said grimly. “Gasoline igniting—that would have been what caused the fire.”

  “I guess so.”

  “What did the three of you do?”

  “Just sat there in the car,” Cecca said. “We were all petrified, in a state of shock. It happened so fast. Eileen … she said, ‘I think I wet myself.’ She wasn't kidding. She really did wet herself.”

  “Then what happened?”

  “Two or three other cars stopped. The driver of the one that had been behind us in the parking lot got out and ran over there, too. There wasn't anything they could do. Somebody at the restaurant called the highway patrol. The three of us stayed where we were, waiting, until the officers got there.”

  “There were four people in the van?”

  “An entire family. Two young children.”

  “But they weren't all killed outright.”

  “Three were. The fourth—the driver, I think—was thrown clear. He hadn't been wearing his seat belt. They found him in some rocks partway down the cliff.”

  “Alive?”

  “Yes. Badly injured.”

  “How badly?”

  “I don't know. We never found out. They were still trying to get down to him when the officers let us go back to our motel. We couldn't bear to stay there any longer than we had to.”

  “You said ‘him.’ The father?”

  “Yes.”

  “Katy told me she called the hospital the next morning, before the three of you left Pelican Bay. He was still alive then?”

  “In serious condition. That was all they'd tell her.” Cecca licked dry lips. “One of us should have checked back again later, to find out how he was. But we didn't.”

  “You can't blame yourself for that. You didn't know him and the accident was his fault.”

  “Still, we were responsible. If we hadn't been there, i
f Katy hadn't pulled out when she did …”

  Dix said slowly, “It could be somebody else thought the same thing. Blamed you, the three of you, for the accident.”

  “Revenge after all this time?”

  “It's possible. There could be a valid reason for the four-year time lapse … an incapacitating injury that took that long to heal, for instance.”

  “… The father?”

  “If he lived. Or someone connected to the family. Do you remember their name?”

  “No, it's gone. Completely gone.”

  “Well, we've got to find out. The family name, if the father survived, and what happened to him if he did. There's only one way I can see to do that quickly, and it doesn't involve St. John. We'd have to convince him it was worthwhile and then he'd insist on going through official channels. That could take days.”

  “You mean go to Oregon ourselves.”

  “That's right,” Dix said. “Fly to Portland, rent a car, drive over to the coast. And don't tell anybody we're going. It's a gamble, sure, but it's better than waiting around for the tormentor to make his next move. What do we have to lose except a day and a few hundred dollars?”

  “When? Tonight?”

  “The sooner the better. It's early enough; we ought to be able to drive to SFO in time to catch one of the last flights out. Stay at a motel near the Portland airport, get an early start in the morning. Are you up to it?”

  “I'll call United while you pack a bag.”

  TWENTY-THREE

  It was raining on the Oregon coast.

  There had been overcast and scattered showers in the Portland area, more of the same on the drive west on Highway 6 in the rented Datsun. The heavy rain started near Tillamook and hammered them in gusty streamers as they headed south on Highway 101. The storm had a wintry feel; its chill penetrated the car, even with the heater on, and numbed Cecca's feet. Neither she nor Dix had thought to check the Oregon weather before leaving Los Alegres, and they were both dressed according to California conditions. The suede jacket and thin sweater and slacks she wore weren't nearly adequate.

  They hadn't said much since leaving the airport motel shortly before nine. There was nothing left to say; they'd picked and probed at it last night on the drive to SFO and throughout the flight, until they had reduced it to raw, bleeding tissue like a wound with the scab torn off.

  The digital dashboard clock read ten-forty when they passed through Neskowin, the little village north of Pelican Bay. The sea was close on their right here, partially obscured by low-hanging clouds and mist: slate-gray, heavy-swelled, the waves throwing up dirty white spume when they battered against the rocky shore. Visibility was poor; most of the daylight had been consumed by the storm, and what light there was had a dusky, nebulous quality. Dix had long ago turned on the headlights, but the beams seemed to deflect off the wall of wetness ahead rather than penetrate it.

  Cecca said, “This is the way it was that night.”

  “Raining like this?”

  “Yes. Clouds down low over the road.”

  “Miserable driving conditions, especially after dark.”

  She nodded. “Even if he'd had his headlights on …”

  “Katy might not have seen them. But the accident would still have been his fault for driving too fast. How much farther to Pelican Point?”

  “It can't be more than a few miles now.”

  It was about four miles. The Crabpot restaurant's big blue and white neon sign, unlit at this early hour, swam up out of the mist ahead; Cecca sat forward as soon as she saw it. “There,” she said, but Dix had seen it, too, and was already tapping the brakes.

  The restaurant and its front and side parking lots looked the same to her as they had four years earlier. The turnout across the highway also looked the same, except that the new guardrail rimming the cliffs edge was larger, sturdier. Slowly, Dix swung in off the highway. The turnout was empty except for them, a flat expanse of rain-puddled gravel glistening blackly where the headlight beams traced over it. He pulled up near the guardrail, at an angle to it. Left the engine running and the lights on, but set the hand brake.

  “I'm getting out for a minute,” he said.

  “Why?”

  He shook his head, as if he wasn't sure himself. Through the rain-streaked glass Cecca watched him walk to the guardrail, lean forward cautiously to peer down the cliff wall. Without making a conscious decision she opened her door and joined him. The wind was abrasively cold, the rain it flung into her face as stinging as thrown sand. She had to squint and shield her eyes to see what lay below.

  The ocean seemed to be boiling. Surf lashed over huge offshore rocks coated with seaweed, over the base of the curving promontory to the south, sliming them all with white froth; inundated smaller inshore rocks and a tiny rind of beach. Jets of spray burst fifteen, twenty feet into the air when big waves surged in. The violence of it made Cecca cringe inside. She shivered and backed up a step.

  Dix put his arm around her shoulders, said something that the wind tore away from her ears. She tugged at his jacket to draw him back to the car. Inside, she turned the heater up as high as it would go; sat hugging her breasts, her hands tucked inside her jacket and under her arms to try to warm them.

  “You should have stayed in the car,” Dix said.

  “I wish I had. What did you say out there?”

  “I said it must be more than a hundred-foot drop. It's a miracle the father wasn't killed, too.”

  She shivered again. “Miracle?” she said.

  He was waiting when Amy came out through Hallam's rear entrance. Sitting on the passenger seat of her car: She must have forgotten to lock that door.

  As soon as he saw her he got out quickly and came toward her, smiling. His car wasn't anywhere around; he must have walked over. There was nobody else in the alley, just the two of them. She almost turned back inside. Instead, she stood nibbling her lower lip, waiting for him. She was glad to see him and yet she wasn't. No matter how desperately she wanted to believe in his innocence, he scared her now almost as much as he attracted her.

  “Hi,” he said. “I was beginning to think old man Hallam was working you overtime.”

  “Um … overtime?”

  “It's quarter past one. Half day on Saturdays, right?”

  “Right. I had some things to finish up.”

  “Well, now you're free for the rest of the weekend. Any plans?”

  “No. No plans.”

  “Not going anywhere with your mom?”

  “No.”

  “Where is she, anyway?”

  “At home, I guess. Or at Better Lands. I don't know.”

  “She isn't either place. Dix Mallory's nowhere to be found either. They go someplace together?”

  “Beats me.”

  “Come on now, Amy. You can tell me.”

  “I really don't know.”

  Which was the truth. Mom had kept her promise to call last night, but she wouldn't say much about Pelican Bay or what she and Dix had decided to do. She'd sounded distracted and in a hurry; she hadn't even mentioned the condoms. “I won't be here tomorrow”—that was all she'd said. It didn't take a genius to figure out they'd gone up to Oregon, to Pelican Bay. Amy was still pissed at being left out, but not pissed enough to do something defiant.

  He said, “You've been staying with your grandparents the past few nights. Why is that, Amy?”

  “They wanted me to,” she lied.

  “It wasn't your mom's idea? So she could be with Dix?”

  “No.”

  He watched her silently. It was like the other day: She couldn't quite meet his eyes. She looked at his mouth instead. His smile had a little quirk in it and she could see the tip of his tongue in one comer.

  When she started to imagine his tongue in her mouth she shook herself and said, “Well, I guess I'd better get going …”

  “Are you in a hurry?”

  “Um, I've got some errands to run.”

  “Errands aren't
urgent. How about going for a ride first?”

  “A ride? With you?”

  He laughed. “Of course with me.”

  “Your car's not here.”

  “You don't mind driving, do you?”

  “No, but— Where?”

  “Not far and not long. We'll be back inside of half an hour.”

  She wanted to; she didn't want to. It was like being pulled from two sides at once, as if she were a rope in a tug-of-war game. She made herself say, “I'd better not.”

  He touched her cheek, stroked it with his knuckles. “Come on, honey,” he said. “Just a short ride. What do you say?”

  Honey. That and his touch almost made her give in. She took a breath and said, “No, I really can't,” and tried to move past him to her car.

  He stopped her with his body and tight fingers on her arm. He was still smiling, but now it was just a mouth smile. His eyes … they'd changed. They'd gotten cold and hard.

  Oh no, she thought, oh no!

  “Give me your keys, Amy. Then get in the car on the passenger side. I'll drive.”

  Sudden fear held her rooted. Behind him Water Street was still empty—there was never anybody around back there. She could hear the hum of traffic on the cross streets, somebody talking loud in one of the adjacent stores, but it was as if the two of them were alone in the middle of a wilderness.

  “Let me go,” she said. “I'll scream,” she said.

  “No you won't,” He unbuttoned the front of his suit coat, pulled one flap aside. “You won't scream and you won't argue.”

  She stared at the gun tucked into the waistband of his slacks.

  “Give me your keys and then get in the car,” he said. “Now there's a good girl.”

  Pelican Bay was like most Oregon coastal towns, loaded with picturesque cottages and beachfront condos and motels and seafood restaurants and native craft shops. The inlet that gave it its name extended under an arched highway bridge, forming a sheltered harbor for a fleet of fishing boats and a handful of weathered fish-processing companies. In the height of the summer season, with the sun shining and tourists swarming around, it probably had a certain charm. Now, seen through the bleak curtain of rain, its streets empty and some of its shops already closed, it had a remote and unwelcoming aspect.