The Right Madness

by James Crumley

  And I did. I had no choice that afternoon. Even though, standing among the bright, clean tourist throng, I felt like one of the turkey buzzards that lived in the abandoned steam-rig oil well derrick in the cotton field behind the shack where I had grown up, mostly. They were dark birds covered with old blood, new vomit, and rotting roadkill guts. Sometimes in the night, when my father was off into his own madness and my mother was too deep into the vodka to notice, I slept rolled in a quilt under the stars in the backyard. Before I slept, I listened to the mockingbird who had fallen in love with long distance. From her nest in the salt cedars along the road, she hooted like a passing freight long into the shining midnights. But sometimes, too, I could hear the gabble of the vultures as they ate their carrion meals over and over again into the dark of the moon.

  When we got back to the hotel, I saw Lorna briefly on the way to my room only because Mac insisted that I should say hello. She looked as fresh as a rose blooming in a spring shower, a flower with a death beetle hidden so deep in the blossom that it only showed in the soft quiver of her throat.

  Afterward, I walked up to Belltown, had a plate of pasta at the bar of the Queen City, then drank myself into the sort of stupor that ensured I would miss my flight the next morning and spend the day drifting between Salt Lake and hell.

  I went back to work, slowly, and Mac and I avoided each other as if we were guilty conspirators in some heinous crime. I thought of him often in the early evenings as he sat on the veranda with a large Scotch and a cigar watching his small herd of deer, probably speaking to them more politely than I had. But I made no effort to contact him as I continued my search, which felt like a hunt for an unused heroin needle in a South Central alley. Nothing worked, though, and I felt as if I had worn out all my options, so I made up my mind, then called Whit at her office to let her know that I would be sleeping in the rent car for a few days.

  “Serious surveillance, huh?”

  “Dead serious,” I said.

  “Is this nightmare ever going to end?”

  “I don’t know, love. I’m not even sure it’s my nightmare,” I admitted. “Whatever, I’ll be back among the living in three or four days. Then I’ll fly out for a long visit. We’ll sit down and work something out.”

  “I certainly hope so,” she said. “You haven’t been here much when you’re here.”

  I apologized, then went out to the topless bar.

  For three days I stuck to Sheila Miller like a cocklebur on a longhaired dog. I haunted The Phone Booth, both inside and in the parking lot. I wandered around the neighborhood where she worked at a group home. As far as I could tell, she treated her clients with a great deal more smiling respect than she did the customers at the topless joint. I parked outside her trailer house and watched her help her daughter with homework, interrupted by the occasional fight—with Marcy sneaking away in the station wagon one afternoon—but nobody interesting ever visited and nothing untoward happened. I even followed her on her paper route two mornings. I couldn’t figure out when the woman slept. As far as I knew, Sheila Miller, part-time topless dancer and hooker, was one of the most decent, hardworking persons I had ever trailed.

  I was about to give up and bother somebody else, but that last morning, a Thursday, I followed her to Mac’s office, then parked behind her old Chevy station wagon. I thought I’d catch a short nap, but I collapsed into dead sleep and didn’t wake until ten. Sheila Miller’s old car was still there, though. I was halfway up the walk to the back door when muffled but clearly horrified screams leaked out of it. I didn’t pause. I had a copy of the key but couldn’t find it quickly enough. It took five or six kicks to break the lock out of the door frame. When I crashed inside, Mac’s secretary stood in the opposite doorway, shrieking like a madwoman. The office was a shambles, the aftermath of a bar fight or a grenade explosion. Sheila Miller’s naked body lay on the couch. She would never have to worry about her face again. It had been beaten into a bloody pulp. After the first glance, I didn’t look back. Mac’s favorite softball bat lay bloodstained on the floor beside her. And Mac was nowhere to be found.

  EIGHT

  LORNA HAD A block on her telephone at the Surry Park, a block that the desk clerk wouldn’t let me budge no matter what I tried, and when she didn’t return my calls, I finally decided to grab a quick flight to Seattle to tell her in person. Ron Musslewhite caught me on the cell when I changed planes in Spokane. His news wasn’t all that good. Johnny Raymond had just called to tell him that the Washington State Patrol had found Lorna’s car in the lot at the trail leading to the edge of the world—Cape Flattery, the very northwestern tip of the continental United States. The interior of the roadster was covered with blood, especially the driver’s seat. A pile of bloody clothes and shoes, presumed to be Mac’s, had been found at the end of the trail where it overlooked the Pacific. Because Raymond had issued an APB for the car, the WSP office had impounded the car.

  I told him I was going to need some help getting to Lorna’s room, and I asked him to call the desk at the hotel to see if he couldn’t get me past the clerk. “Or anybody who can get me past the desk clerks there,” I said. “They’re tougher than your Aunt Edith.”

  “My Aunt Edith teaches Sunday school in Ponca City,” he said, then apologized. “I’m sorry, man. I’m sittin’ here in Mickey’s suckin’ a double Turkey rocks in the morning. This shit is making me crazier than a hoot owl. I can’t believe Mac would … Well, you believe the same thing, don’t you?”

  “Right,” I said. “I’ve got a can of snoose in my pocket if I can’t get to Seattle without a nicotine fix.”

  “Call me when you get back,” he said.

  “If I get back,” I said. “If …”

  The FBI agent caught my elbow just as I leaned on the counter and asked for the hotel’s manager. He looked about sixteen with his sheared light red curls, pug nose, freckles, and an all-American gap-toothed grin, but his tailored dark-blue suit, white shirt, and rep tie shouted FBI. As did his warm, dry handshake. He had the thick neck, deep chest, and bulky shoulders of a serious weight lifter, so bulky he had to wear a cross-draw belt holster on his slim hips. He moved with a runner’s easy grace.

  “Mr. Sughrue, I assume?” he said. “I’m Special Agent Charles Cunningham. My partner’s inside the office clearing things with the manager.” His voice was as fresh and youthful as his face. I kept expecting it to crack like an adolescent’s.

  “I hope he has better luck than I did,” I admitted.

  “She,” Cunningham said, “she. Agent Morrow usually gets her way.”

  Agent Morrow came out of the office with a thin, dapper man in tow. The hotel manager, I assumed. The woman could have towed a freighter. She was built like a tug. She must have been on the verge of minimum height and maximum weight for that height, with a body as square as a ton of bricks set on the legs of a power lifter. Even her plain, unadorned face was square, framed by short black hair brushed back in an almost military fashion. When I shook her hand, I could feel the thick callus that covered her palms.

  “Agent Pamela Morrow,” she said. “You must be Chauncey Wayne Sughrue.”

  “CW,” I said. “I’m a friend of the family and a legal representative of Dr. MacKinderick’s lawyer. What’s the FBI doing here?”

  “I know who you are,” she said sharply as she led us to the elevator. “In fact, Mr. Sughrue, I know everything about you.” Then the four of us stepped into the elevator, as she continued, “I’ve seen your army records—for some reason the record of your court-martial was sealed then destroyed in the interest of national security—and the records of your years of service in the late sixties and early seventies with the Department of Defense Intelligence Agency. Also, your name pops up in some interesting DEA files.”

  “That’s wonderful,” I said as the elevator lifted to the top floor of the hotel. “So you must also know that I’ve never been convicted of anything, lady. Maybe you know one other important thing?”

 
; “What’s that?”

  “The hotel manager’s name,” I said. “We haven’t been introduced.”

  “Folger,” the thin man said nervously. When I shook his hand, it was as cold and slick as a deep-water eel.

  “I assume Mrs. MacKinderick is still in her room,” I said, and he nodded sadly.

  Cunningham answered for him, “As far as the hotel knows, she’s been in her room for the last few days. Hasn’t left once. Telephoned out for food and drink. Hasn’t let the maid in to service the room, either.”

  “Thanks,” I said to the big kid.

  When the elevator doors opened, I motioned for Morrow to exit first. She shouldered the manager aside and headed down the hall. We followed at a respectful distance to Lorna’s suite door. She ignored the do not disturb sign and pounded on the door with that insistent knock that only a cop can muster. After a few moments, we heard Lorna’s frail voice through the door, telling us to get the hell away from the door.

  “FBI, Mrs. MacKinderick,” Morrow boomed in a voice so powerful that the rock would have rolled aside even without the password.

  “Fuck off!” Lorna screamed.

  Agent Morrow turned to Folger. “Open it,” she ordered.

  “Maybe if you won’t tell me why you’re here,” I said, “you might show me a warrant or something like it,” I said. Morrow looked at me as if I were something dirty on one of her shining low-heeled pumps.

  “Open the door,” she ordered again.

  “You might want to wait a moment,” I told the manager, then pulled out my cell phone and started dialing.

  “Who are you calling?” Folger asked nervously, the card key in his hand.

  “A friend of mine at the P-I,” I said. “It might make an interesting newspaper item that a hotel with your reputation let the FBI into a room without a legal right.”

  Folger glanced at Agent Morrow.

  “Do it,” she said.

  “Do you have any reason to believe a crime is being committed?” I asked Folger. “Or that Mrs. MacKinderick is in any danger?”

  “Only in danger of breaking our single-person room service record,” Folger said, almost giggling.

  “We’re going to interrogate that woman,” Agent Morrow said.

  “After I’ve told Mrs. MacKinderick that her husband is missing,” I said, “and she recovers, I’ll give you a call. Then you can talk to her.”

  Morrow raised her hand to knock again. I touched her hard shoulder. “Touch me again, Sughrue,” she said, “and Agent Cunningham will take you down.”

  “I’m sure he can,” I said. “But, believe me, my lawyer can kick your lawyer’s ass. So let’s do this the easy way.”

  “Agent Morrow,” Cunningham said quietly as he handed me his card. “He does have a point. Let’s do it the easy way, okay?”

  Morrow looked betrayed, but she gave up and stalked down the hallway back toward the elevator. Cunningham gave me a sick grin, then followed her.

  Folger sighed, “Good luck,” then handed me the card key. I opened the door a crack and shouted, “Lorna! It’s CW! We’ve got to talk.”

  After a bit, Lorna’s face appeared at the crack, her eye smudged with sleep, her hair flying every which way. She was obviously naked beneath one of the hotel’s robes—one of her rosebud nipples peeked at me. “What?” she sniffled. “What the hell is going on?”

  “I told you,” I said. “I’ve got to talk to you.”

  “Oh, hell,” she muttered. “Let me get some clothes on.” Then she disappeared, leaving the door slightly ajar.

  The living room was empty when I stepped inside. The bedroom was in an upstairs loft. I heard the televison click on to CNN, then the shower started, but neither sound covered the hissing bundle of whispers. I stepped over to the coffee table, which had been hastily and badly cleared, opened the small drawer in the center of the table, and wasn’t surprised to find a silver straw, razor, and snuff box, and a small smudged mirror. The snuff box contained a goodly portion of great cocaine. Or so the small taste I touched to my tongue told me. I set everything back on the coffee table, then opened the drapes and a window. Not to enjoy the view of the bay but to smoke. The coke had numbed my mouth all the way to the back of my tongue.

  I dug a quick Scotch out of the service bar and sucked that down along with four cigarettes before Lorna came down the stairs, her wet hair snugged to her head. She was wearing jeans and a sweatshirt—designer jeans and a cashmere sweatshirt—with thick-soled flip-flops.

  “Honey,” she said lightly. “I do believe this is a nonsmoking suite.”

  “Nonsnorting, too?” I said, which she answered with a small squeal. “I’ll go down to the courtyard for a moment,” I said. “You better tell your friend to get the hell out of here—”

  “Did Mac send you to spy on me, you son of a bitch?” she interrupted.

  “If I have to go up to get your friend,” I said, “he won’t like the way he lands when I throw him out. So fucking do it, lady.”

  Then I walked carefully out of the room without breaking anything. Made it all the way to the lobby without breaking anything, too. I didn’t even speak loudly to Folger when he came up to me.

  “Is there a problem with Dr. MacKinderick’s room?” he asked. “I don’t think we’ve ever had the FBI here before. Well, perhaps once before.”

  “Everything’s fine, sir,” I said in my best official voice. “There’s been an accident, and I just have to talk to Mrs. MacKinderick. No problem at all. Nothing to worry about. Mrs. MacKinderick is just composing herself.” Then I added, “It would be a great help if I had a copy of her telephone calls and messages, sir.”

  Folger stepped over to the desk for a moment, then he came back with the printouts. “I know you work for Dr. MacKinderick,” he said. “I found your name in our records. He paid for your room the last time you were here.”

  “Thanks for your help,” I said.

  “I hope everything is all right,” he said softly, like a man who knew it wasn’t.

  “Thanks again,” I said.

  Once outside, I walked over to one of the benches around the hotel’s patio bar, then had a peaceful cigarette. Until I saw Cunningham standing in the shadows of the stairway up to the street. When he saw me see him, he walked over without a greeting.

  “She’s gone for a warrant?” I said, and he just nodded slightly. “But she won’t get it, will she?” I said, and he just shook his head. “I’ll call you tomorrow,” I said.

  “Thank you, sir,” he said, then started back to his niche.

  “What do you bench-press, Charlie?” I asked.

  “You don’t want to know, sir,” he answered, smiling, then walked slowly back to his position.

  As I watched the revolving doors, a tall, skinny young man dressed in black leather, silver earrings, tattoos, and Doc Martens hurried nervously out of one of them. I managed to bump into him. He didn’t seem to have stolen the silverware. I looked him over very carefully. In case Lorna needed an alibi, he probably wouldn’t be too hard to find.

  Back up in the suite, the door was ajar, so I stepped inside. Lorna was sitting on the couch, straw in one hand, the razor in the other, idly chopping two lines, pulling them into a pile, then chopping lines again.

  “What in the livin’ hell is up, CW?” she demanded before I could say a word. “You show up here with the fuckin’ Feds—what am I supposed to think?”

  “I’m sorry to have to give it to you this way, Lorna,” I said. “But your telephone line was blocked, and the desk wouldn’t let me through even when I told them it was an emergency.”

  “It’s a good hotel,” she said, suddenly senseless.

  “And you wouldn’t return any of my messages.”

  “I wasn’t picking up messages,” she said, then leaned over to snort the line. “An emergency?” she said, rubbing at her nose.

  “Mac’s been missing since last Thursday,” I said.

  “Last Thursday?” she said, then
her eyes rolled up in her head, and she fell over on the couch in a dead faint.

  When I checked, she hadn’t swallowed her tongue or stopped breathing, although she seemed to be panting like a tired dog. Her pulse was strong and rapid, but not dangerously so, I guessed. I straightened her on the couch, propped her feet on a couple of cushions piled on the arm of the couch, then found a blanket in the closet to cover her. Within minutes, the panting stopped and the snoring started.

  “Jesus fucking wept,” I said, then looked at her other line. I hadn’t forgotten a thing about the white lady. Once she was in law school, Whitney had made me promise never to do cocaine again. Which wasn’t too hard since I’d always sort of been a dope-smoking fool. I started to dump the rest of Lorna’s stash into the toilet, but decided not to. She was going to wake up to enough loss. I chopped a couple of lines on the back of the upstairs toilet, filled a small bindle, then stuck it in my billfold.

  Then I searched through the bedroom until I found Lorna’s jewelry box. The bedroom looked as if a mad child had moved in with a punk rock band. Stuffed animals occupied every space not covered with party debris. I didn’t know what to think. Except I knew I had to cover Lorna’s ass, so I put the stash, the straw, and the razor into the jewelry box; then I took it down to the desk and had them put it in the hotel safe. Just in case Agent Morrow did get a warrant. Then I went out to talk to Cunningham.

  “She passed out when I told her,” I said, “but she’s sleeping quietly now. I’ll call you when she wakes up, so you can get off your feet for a while.”

  “Not on your life, sir,” he said. “Pammie’s coming to relieve me, so I’d best be here.”

  “Pammie?”

  “Agent Morrow,” he said, blushing.

  “I understand why she has such a hard-on for me, Cunningham, but why does she have such a hard-on for this poor woman?” I said. “She doesn’t even know her. You guys don’t even have a crime yet.”

  “MacKinderick’s name rang some bells in Agent Morrow’s head. Something she heard when she was still in Washington. D.C., that is,” he said. “And Cape Flattery is one hell of a place to jump into the ocean. We can also claim jurisdiction on the Makah reservation.”