by Ross Thomas
The ceiling joists were covered with pieces of scrap plywood that formed a kind of path. Dill took from a pocket the candle he had found in the kitchen and lit it with a wooden match. He followed the plywood path toward the area of the living-room ceiling. As he crawled along the plywood, he talked silently to the dead Harold Snow: You wouldn’t have lied to me, Harold, would you? No, not you. Never. A thousand dollars for fifteen minutes’ work. So why would you lie to me?
When Dill reached what he guessed was the center of the living-room ceiling, he stopped, held the candle up, and found that Harold Snow hadn’t lied after all. The small voice-activated tape recorder was just where Snow had said it would be. Dill pushed the rewind button, removed the cassette, and put it in a pocket. He left the tape recorder where it was and backed his way along the plywood path to the trap hole. It was much easier going down than coming up. Standing on the kitchen stool once more, he put the trap lid back into place.
After he carried the stool back into the kitchen he stopped and listened. It was not any particular sound that caused him to listen, but the absence of one. He went to the kitchen window and looked out. The view was of the alley, and across it was a backyard that boasted six tall silver poplars. The poplars usually swayed, shivered, and trembled even in the slightest breeze. They were now perfectly still because there was no wind—none at all. Then suddenly it came, down from the north, down from Canada and Montana and the Dakotas. The poplars trembled at first, then swayed, and finally danced madly in the cool hard north wind.
By the time Dill turned off all the lights, made sure the windows were closed, and went down the stairs and out the door, it was 8:33 P.M. and dark. The temperature had dropped 31 degrees in the past thirty-five minutes and was now down to 64. The north wind was beginning to gust. There was the smell of rain. Dill shivered in the sudden chill and found it to be a curious sensation. But then, he thought, so is any cold day in August.
Dill cut diagonally across the old brickyard that had been transformed into a park. Just as he reached the municipal pool where he and Jake Spivey had learned to swim and Dill had taught himself to dive, the rain began—big fat splattering drops that hit the dust and sent up a sweet clean smell. Dill stopped and turned his face up to the rain. The pleasant sensation lasted only a few seconds before the chill set in. Dill hurried through the rain, trotting now. He got wet, then drenched, and by the time he came out of the park near Eighteenth and TR Boulevard, he was soaked, shivering, and wishing it would stop.
There had been a drugstore on the corner of Eighteenth and TR Boulevard for years, Dill recalled. He wondered if it was still there. The King Brothers, he remembered. We Deliver. It had kept its soda fountain even after all the other drugstores got rid of theirs. The King brothers had said they didn’t think a drugstore was really a drugstore without a soda fountain. When Dill came out of the park he spotted the old neon sign with its economical abbreviation: King Bros Drugs. He trotted down the sidewalk and ducked into the store out of the rain.
It was a place that still offered a little of everything and the first purchase Dill made was a bath towel. He used it to dry himself off as he wandered down the aisles looking for a small tape recorder-player. He found one, a Sony Super Walkman, jammed in between the Mr. Coffee cartons and the sets of chrome socket wrenches. Dill took the Sony over to the counter. A man of about sixty stood behind the cash register. Dill thought he might be one of the King brothers, but wasn’t sure, and blamed his faltering memory on approaching senility.
The man took the Sony, looked at its price, nodded his appreciation, and said, “Can’t beat those Japanese,” when Dill handed him a hundred-dollar bill.
The man put the Sony in a sack and slid it across the counter along with ninety-nine cents change. “I put it in an ice-cream sack,” he said. “It’ll keep the rain out.”
“Thanks,” Dill said. “Have you got a pay phone? I need to call a cab.”
“You can call one, but it won’t ever come. Not on a night like this.”
“Then I’ll call somebody else,” Dill said.
“Phone’s right back there,” the man said, nodding toward the rear of the store. He stared at Dill for a moment. “Say, didn’t you used to come in here when you were a kid?—hell, it must be twenty-five, thirty years ago—you and your buddy, who was kinda chubby back then.”
“He still is,” Dill said.
“I remember your nose,” the man said. “Haven’t seen you around lately, though. What’d you do, move out of the neighborhood?”
“Moved a little north and east,” Dill said.
The man nodded. “Yeah, a lot of folks are moving out that way.”
Dill dropped a dime into the pay phone and called Anna Maude Singe at her office. She answered on the second ring. He told her where he was stuck and she said she would come get him. Dill’s second call was to Jake Spivey.
After Spivey said hello, Dill said, “It’s on.”
“Clyde say he’d be there?”
“He said he’d think about it.”
“That means he’ll be there. Who else?”
“Just me,” Dill said. “Better make it nine-thirty instead of ten.”
“Well, it’s gonna be one real interesting night,” Spivey said, and hung up.
Dill moved back to the front of the drugstore and took a stool at the soda fountain. He wondered if they still called them soda jerks. Whatever they called them, Dill asked the one behind the counter for a cup of coffee. While he waited, he checked the Sony to see if it had batteries. It didn’t, so he bought some, put them in, inserted the end of the earplug into its proper socket, slipped in the cassette, held the earplug up to his ear, and pressed the play button.
The first thing he heard was “Sixty-nine is very fine, testing, testing. Ten, niner, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, and we’ve got ignition. Testing … testing … testing … and fuck you, Dill.” It was the voice of the dead Harold Snow, sounding very much alive. There was a brief silence. Then Dill heard Tim Dolan’s voice: “Don’t you wanta take your coat off?” And his own reply: “I’m not all that warm.” This was followed by the voice of Harley saying: “Just the three of you?” And again Dill: “Just the three of us.” Thank you, Harold, Dill thought, and pushed the button for stop and then the one for fast forward.
With a judicious amount of backing and filling, Dill soon found the place on the tape he wanted—the one where the conversation between Senator Ramirez and Tim Dolan took place while Dill was walking Clyde Brattle down the stairs of the carriage house. Afterward, Dill could never remember the conversation without one word popping unbidden into his mind: illuminating.
Dolan spoke first: He gone?
Then the senator: Yes.
DOLAN: Jesus.
SENATOR: You understand it now?
DOLAN: Sure I understand it now. A kid could understand it.
SENATOR: I want those four guys, Tim.
DOLAN: Christ, I don’t blame you. You’ll get all the ink for handing Brattle and Spivey over to Justice, and those other four guys will be forever asking how high when you say hop.
SENATOR: There’s Dill though.
DOLAN: You could fire him.
SENATOR: Not smart.
DOLAN: Find him a cushy job in Rome or Paris or somewhere. Make him grateful.
SENATOR: Better. I think I’ll start easing him out tonight. Just follow my lead.
DOLAN: He’s coming back.
SENATOR: Right.
There was the sound of the door being opened and closed and then Dolan asking, “D’you think he swallowed it?” and Dill replying: “Brattle?” After that, Dill pushed the stop button and then the one for rewind. He put the tape recorder and the earplug back into the ice-cream sack. Remembering his coffee, he picked up the cup and tasted it. He’d forgotten the sugar, so he put some in. He sat there at the marble soda-fountain counter, the same counter he had spent hours at as a child, and thought about the hole he had dug for himself. He m
arveled at its depth, and at the slipperiness of its sides, and wondered how he would ever climb out of it.
CHAPTER 36
Back in his room at the Hawkins Hotel, Dill showered and changed into his seersucker jacket and gray pants while Anna Maude Singe listened to the tape on the Sony. The tape was almost over when Dill slipped the jacket on, moved to the writing desk, and started putting coins, keys, airline ticket, and wallet into his pockets. The last item was the .38 revolver. He again shoved it down into his right hip pocket. She watched, but made no comment, and went on listening to the last words on the tape as they came over the earphone. When the words ended, she punched the stop button, then the rewind one, and said, “It’s dynamite.”
“I know.”
“Have you got a copy?”
“No.”
“You should have copies made.”
“I’ll let Spivey do that.”
“You’re giving it to him?”
“I think so.”
She nodded slowly. “Then you’ve made a pretty big choice, haven’t you?”
“Have I?”
“Sure. You’ve had to choose between your friend and your government, and you’ve chosen your friend.”
“That’s not a very big choice,” Dill said. “That’s hardly any choice at all.”
He picked up the phone and dialed information. When the operator finally came on—after a recorded voice first counseled him to consult the directory—Dill asked for the home number of John Strucker, the chief of detectives. The information operator told him a few seconds later that no such number was listed. Dill hung up.
“Unlisted?” Singe said.
He nodded.
“Let me try.” She took an address book from her purse, flipped through it, found a number, and dialed it. When the call was answered, she said, “Mike?” and when Mike said yes, she said This is Anna Maude. They chatted for a few moments and then she said she needed to get in touch with John Strucker at home. Mike apparently had the number handy, because she wrote it down on the back of a hotel envelope she took from the desk. She then thanked Mike, said goodbye, and hung up.
“Who’s Mike?” Dill asked.
“Mike Geary as in AP Geary.”
“The one you used to go to the Press Club with.”
“Right.”
“I’m jealous,” Dill said as he picked up the phone and dialed the number she had written on the envelope.
“No, you’re not,” she said.
The phone rang three times and was answered by a woman’s voice. Dill assumed it was Dora Lee Strucker, the rich wife. Dill identified himself, apologized for calling so late, and asked if he could speak to her husband. She said it was nice to hear from Dill at any time and that Johnny would take the call in the study.
Strucker came on with a noncommittal “Yes.”
“How would you like to collar Clyde Brattle?”
“Brattle, huh?”
“Brattle.”
Strucker sighed. It was the most sepulchral Strucker sigh Dill had heard yet. “From Kansas City?” Strucker answered, almost as if he were hoping Dill would say, No, this particular Brattle is from Sacramento or Buffalo or Des Moines.
“From Kansas City,” Dill said. “Originally.”
“Where?” Strucker said.
Dill gave him Anna Maude Singe’s apartment number and address.
“When?”
“Ten sharp.”
“Ten, huh?”
“Ten.”
“I’ll think about it,” Strucker said, and hung up. It wasn’t quite the reaction Dill had been expecting. By rights, he thought, Strucker should have jumped at it. Unless, of course, he needed to check with someone else. Dill dialed Strucker’s number again. It was busy. He cut the connection and dialed Jake Spivey’s number. It, too, was busy. Dill put the phone down slowly. They could be talking to each other, he told himself, or to any of a million other people.
“You look funny,” Singe said.
“Do I?”
“You look like he said no.”
“He said he’d think about it.”
“That’s not what a cop’s supposed to say. He’s supposed to say, Stall Brattle till I get there and don’t let him out of your sight—or something like that.”
“Unless he …” Dill let the thought die because it was only half-born and extremely ugly, even grotesque.
“Unless he what?” Singe demanded.
“He already knew Brattle would be there.”
Her eyes opened very wide and Dill again noticed how pretty they were. Concern makes them even darker, he thought. Almost true violet.
“If he knew about Brattle before you called,” she said, “that means somebody’s about to get shafted. You, probably.”
“Maybe,” Dill said. “Maybe not.”
It was then that the new fight began. Anna Maude Singe insisted on going with Dill. He refused. She asserted it was her goddamned apartment and she could go there any goddamned time she pleased. Dill replied she goddamned sure wasn’t coming with him. She threatened to phone the Senator and tell him about the tape. Dill offered her the phone. She took it, dialed 0, and asked for Senator Ramirez’s room. Dill snatched the phone from her and slammed it down. A few moments later they reached the compromise: she would come along, but she wouldn’t go inside. Instead, she would wait in Dill’s car and watch who went in and came out. She said she thought that sounded goddamned silly. Dill said if he didn’t come out in an hour, it wouldn’t be goddamned silly, it would be a goddamned shame. She wanted to know what she was expected to do if he didn’t come out in an hour. He told her she should call someone, but when she asked who, he said he didn’t know. Someone. They left it at that.
It was still raining when they pulled up across the street from the Van Buren Towers in Dill’s rented Ford. He suddenly realized he always thought of the apartment building as the Old Folks Home first, and then consciously translated that into its proper name. The rain was steady and unrelenting and, like all steady and unrelenting things, boring. Dill found a parking space directly across from the apartment-building entrance, but Anna Maude Singe said, “You can’t get this thing in there.”
“Watch,” said Dill, who prided himself on his ability to jockey large cars into impossible places. He parked the Ford with dispatch and even with a bit of a flourish. When done, there was only six inches or so of space left at either end of the car. Singe remained unimpressed. “What if I have to get out of here in a hurry?” she asked.
“I guess you can’t,” he said.
She looked at her watch. “Nine twenty-five.”
“I’d better go.”
“Have you got a raincoat?”
“No.”
“You ought to have a raincoat.”
“Well, I don’t.”
She frowned. “I don’t want you to go in there.”
“Why not?”
“Aw, for God’s sake, guess.”
He smiled and put an arm around her and gently pulled her toward him. She went willingly. They kissed a long and somehow anxious kiss and when it was over she sat back and examined him thoughtfully.
“I don’t know, Dill,” she said.
“What?”
“Maybe I am your sweetie after all.”
Carrying the Sony player-recorder in its King Brothers ice-cream bag, Dill ran across the street through the rain and into the Van Buren Towers. In the lobby he discovered he had got damp, but not wet. He rode the lone elevator up to the fifth floor, walked down the corridor, unlocked Anna Maude Singe’s apartment door, and went in. After switching on two lamps, he looked at his watch and saw it was 9:29. He started toward the bathroom, but stopped to give the Maxfield Parrish print a brief inspection. He again concluded the two figures in the print were girls.
In the bathroom, he used a towel to dry off his hands, face, and copper-colored hair. He looked in the mirror and saw a trace of lipstick on his mouth. He scrubbed it off with the towel, staring at h
is reflection. You look tired, old, scared, and your nose is too big, he told himself, and went back into the living room.
He was examining the Maxfield Parrish print again when he heard the knock. He went to the door, opened it, and Jake Spivey came in, wearing a Burberry trenchcoat.
“Jesus, Jake, you look like something right out of Foreign Intrigue.”
“No, I don’t,” Spivey said. “I look like a fat guy in a trenchcoat, and the only thing that looks dumber’s a sow in a white shirt. But Daffy bought it for me and well, what the hell, it was raining, so I wore the fucker.”
Spivey was already unbuttoning the wet trenchcoat and turning to give the living room an inspection. “Damned if this don’t look like nineteen-forty-something-or-other. She wasn’t on this floor, was she?”
“Who?”
“Aunt Louise. You remember Jack Sackett’s Aunt Louise.”
“I remember.”
Spivey closed his eyes and smiled. “July 19, 1959. About two-thirty in the afternoon.” He opened his eyes, still smiling. “I can remember all that but I can’t remember what floor she was on.”
“The fourth,” Dill said, suddenly remembering. “Number four-two-eight.”
Spivey nodded. “Believe you’re right.” He held up the wet trenchcoat. “What d’you want me to do with this?”
Dill took the coat and said he would hang it up behind the bathroom door. When he came back, Spivey was seated on the couch staring at the Parrish print. Dill asked him if he wanted a drink. Spivey shook his head and said, “Liquor and Clyde Brattle don’t mix.” He turned from the print to Dill. “Clyde sound like he’s willing to cut a deal?”
“He might—depending on what you’ve got to offer.”
“I’ve been thinking about that, Pick, and I haven’t got a whole hell of a lot. What I’ve got might get Clyde twenty-five years, but, shit, what’s twenty-five years when you’re looking a hundred in the face?”