I said, “This is not a shitty thing to do. It’s a good thing to do.”
“Shove it, Mallory, what does an only child know about it, anyway? And a white one at that.”
“Prejudice rears her not-so-ugly head. Gimme back my beer.”
“I drank it all.”
I got up and went after another Pabst. When I came back she was leaning forward, her long-nailed fingers barely caressing the receiver. She caught me watching her, and jerked back. I filled her glass and sat back down beside her. I leaned back and drained the bottle and several long minutes went by and I said, “Go ahead and call.”
“I been thinking.”
“Great. Fine.”
“You think Harold killed this Janet.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You said that this Janet… what was her last name?”
“Taber.”
“That this Janet Taber had her neck broken. That the accident was staged and somebody broke her neck.”
“That’s not the same thing as saying your brother killed her.”
“You implied that my brother could do it.”
“Well he probably could, if he was in the mood. One-handed. With or without eyepatch.”
“You’re such a son of a bitch, Mallory. Don’t you know what this means, what you’re asking?”
“Only you know that, Rita.”
“Mallory. Mal.”
“What?”
“I don’t know. I just don’t.”
“Rita. Look at it this way. Suppose your brother did kill somebody. Wouldn’t you say something should be done about it?”
“It would depend who he killed, and why.”
“How about a woman. An unhappy young woman.”
“Stop, you’re making me cry. Tell me about the kid with heart trouble again, why don’t you?”
“Okay, all right. No more hard sell.”
“Why do you have to use me? Why can’t you just go up to old man Norman’s place yourself?”
“We went over that.”
“Go over it again.”
“Norman’s property is fenced off. Private property, right? If your brother runs into me up there, a trespasser, after what I did to him the other day, there’s not going to be enough left of me to put in a shoe box. Also, if what was left of me was turned over to Sheriff Brennan, he’d have a fine old time roasting whatever there was left to roast.”
“I’m supposed to be a buffer between you and Harold.”
“I was hoping you would be, yes. And you can get us officially past the gate up the hill.”
“But when I call I’m not to tell Harold I’m bringing you.”
“No. We’ll surprise him and make his day. What do you say?”
“I don’t know.”
“Damn!”
“It’s not an easy thing for me.”
“Well, think it over some more, that’s all I ask. You decide against it, I’ll drive you back up to Rock Island whenever you say.”
She looked at me, her eyes soft under the long lashes. She touched my cheek and I started feeling like the manipulating bastard I was. I slid my arm in around her waist and kissed her neck and said, my lips against her ear, “Look, forget it, forget it. I’ll do it some other way, or maybe I won’t do it at all.” And I meant it.
“But that’s not right, either…. Mal?”
“Yeah?”
“Will you promise me something?”
“Sure.”
“You’ll keep an open mind-you won’t prejudge anything.”
I kissed her ear. “I’ll go farther than that. No matter what it turns out your big black one-eyed brother did, I don’t care if he eats babies and runs down old ladies, no matter what, I’ll check with you and get permission before I make any move.”
“If I say no cops?”
“Then no cops.”
She slipped out of my arms and put her hand on the receiver again and said, “Thanks, Mal.”
“Thank you, Rita.”
She turned back to the phone under her fingertips and it rang and she jumped.
Then it rang again and she smiled and laughed nervously and I did, too. She picked up the receiver and handed it to me.
“Mal?”
It was John’s voice.
I said, “How was Lori’s turkey?”
“I’m in the middle of a slice of it right now,” he said. “I sneaked in here to call you. I been checking off and on all afternoon, to see if you were back from the Cities yet. How’d it go?”
“Not bad. Wait’ll you see what I brought back with me.”
Rita elbowed me, but in a nice way.
John said, “Listen, I got to get back to the table before certain parties get wise. I know you were trying to corner Brennan last night and this morning-well, now’s your chance. He’s stuffing his face right now, and if you hurry over here you’ll be able to catch him.”
“Be right over.” I slammed the receiver into the hook.
Rita’s eyes said, “What?”
I said, “The town sheriff’s finally available.”
“You gonna go talk to him?”
“Yeah. You want to wait here for me?”
She nodded, eyes wide.
“This’ll give you some time to think about that phone call.”
“Okay, Mal.”
“More beer in the fridge. But don’t get bombed, I heard how you people get when you get bombed. Or is that Indians?”
“Mal.”
“Yeah?”
“I’ll have the call made by the time you get back. Either that or I’ll be ready to go home.”
I nodded. “Either way, kid,” I said, and stroked her shoulder, got up, grabbed my jacket and headed out to the Rambler.
SEVENTEEN
Brennan choked on a bite of pumpkin pie when he saw me come in. He was the only one left sitting at the table eating; John and Lori’s husband Frank were sitting on the floor in the far left-hand corner of the room watching yet another football game. John looked up as I entered and started to rise, but I motioned at him to stay put. Lori pulled out one of the empty chairs at the table and told me to sit. I did, and she brought me a big slice of pie with a heap of whipped cream on it.
“Hey, this is unnecessary,” I said.
“You better eat it before Brennan does,” she said. “He’s on his third piece.”
“I all of a sudden lost my appetite,” Brennan said, and got up and went out into the kitchen.
I sat and ate my pie. I didn’t hurry. John came over and I told him about Rita and also about Stefan Norman. Then I thanked Lori for the pie and got up and went after Brennan.
He was sitting at the kitchen table smoking. He was wearing a blue sport shirt and tan slacks and seemed insecure out of uniform.
I sat down by him. “Got something against me, Brennan? I get this weird feeling you been trying to duck me.”
“I got a lot against you,” he said, sucking nervously on his cigarette, “not the least of which is you’re a goddamn pain in the ass.”
“I been trying since last night to see you.”
“I didn’t know that, or I’d come running.”
“You going to tell me about Phil Taber, or do we play games?”
“You’re the one playing games, Mallory. You’re the mystery story writer playing private eye. And you’re going to get your butt burned doing it.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Jesus Christ, Mallory. It’s Thanksgiving, for God’s sake. Can’t a man have some peace Thanksgiving, spend a little time with his relatives and have some peace?”
“Some people get peace imposed on them.”
“They die, you mean. Yeah, that happens to people.”
“Sometimes they get killed.”
“And sometimes they’re in accidents. See? You’re playing games again, Mallory, it’s you who’s playing games.”
“Tell me about Phil Taber.”
“What about him?
He came to town because his wife was dead. He left. What about him?”
“You told John no immediate member of the family was available to okay the autopsy, that you got the court’s permission to do it. Obviously it was Taber’s permission you got, not the court’s.”
Brennan shrugged.
“Why’d you lie to John about it?”
“Because he’d tell you about it. Because he’d tell you about it and you’d go running after this poor guy and hound him in his… his, you know, hour of grief.”
“Hour of grief, hell. I’d find out he was a doper, you mean.”
“That wasn’t it at all.”
“Why didn’t you bust him? You aren’t exactly known for being soft on dopers around here.”
“I won’t claim I didn’t realize he was a user, but he was from out of town, and doing us a favor, and it was a delicate time for him and he was told if he’d stay clean while he was in town and leave by the next morning, there wouldn’t be no trouble.”
Lori came in from the living room, clearing dishes off the table in there, and started stacking them up by the sink. Brennan gave me eye signals to keep my voice down.
I said, “What about Janet Taber’s mother? Mrs. Ferris. And don’t say, ‘What about her?’”
“She was buried yesterday. So was her daughter.”
“Buried?”
“The girl’s husband paid to have them buried out at Greenwood Cemetery. Didn’t have funerals for them, but I understand he laid out quite a sum for having some real nice stones put up for them.”
“Nice stones. Phil Taber arranged all that?”
“He had a lot of money, and he was wearing a nice suit, and he seemed pretty straight, outside of that long hair and the pot smell on him. The nice suit didn’t fool me, though. I knew what he was. He needed a bath.”
“Are you looking into the mother’s death?”
“What do you mean?”
“What I mean is Mrs. Ferris was beaten half to death before she was burned up in that house.”
“That was the girl’s story. Told to you. That makes it hearsay by the time it’s reached my ears.”
“Don’t screw around with me, Brennan. A doctor up at the University Hospital told that to Janet. Check up there and you’ll find out.”
“Why should I? I don’t go nosing for trouble like some people I know. It comes my way, fine, I take care of it, otherwise I leave well enough. Believe you me, I got plenty on my hands just taking care of what comes my way.”
“My God. What about the house? It was arson, wasn’t it?”
“That isn’t the way the fire chief sees it. Chief Nelson and his people looked into it yesterday morning and traced it down to some old papers and rags and cans of old paint out on the back porch. The building was a firetrap, too, one of them old wooden jobs, must’ve been near fifty, hundred years old.”
“Brennan.”
“What?”
“Are you covering up for somebody?”
Brennan bit down on his cigarette and gave me that practiced slow look of his and said, “I’m gonna pretend like you didn’t say that.”
“Then I’ll have to say it again: are you covering up?”
“Before I break you in half, Mallory, how about you tell me just who I’d be covering up for?”
“Simon Norman, maybe. Stefan Norman? Both of ’em?”
“Come off it.”
“You come off it. It’s no secret the Normans controlled local politics for a long time, at least while Richard Norman was alive. Maybe they still do. Norman money, anyway.”
“Don’t you believe them fairy tales. You probably run across that shaggy dog about how old man Norman’s supposed to be back of all the businesses in town. That’s bull, all of it, bull.”
“I saw Phil Taber last night.”
“Good for you.”
“He had five thousand dollars in his billfold.”
“He did?” Brennan sat up, tried to cover his show of surprise by getting rid of his old cigarette and replacing it with a fresh one. “So what?”
“Where would Phil Taber get five thousand dollars?”
“How should I know? I don’t know anything about him. Yesterday was the first and last time I ever seen him and that was for about ten minutes.”
“The Normans could afford something like that, if they were buying him off. What would five thousand be to them? What did Phil Taber tell you in that ten minutes you spent with him? Outside of giving permission for the autopsy.”
“Nothing.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Who cares? Since when are you the cop?”
“Just trying to live up to your sterling example, Brennan.”
“All right, all right, he told me his wife and her mother didn’t get along. That his wife was kind of crazy, she was one of them split personality types, you know? She was all the time beating up on her kid, and on the mother, too.”
“And that’s why you’re not pursuing the angle about the mother being beaten up?”
“That’s as good a reason as any. You want a solution to the big mystery, don’t you? You feel you got to know the truth or you just can’t go on? Try this one out: the little Taber bitch beats her mother up, and then goes out to spend some time with a friend, and while she’s gone a fire starts up accidentally, so when she comes back the house is burning and her mother’s dying, trapped in there and beat up; the girl gets feeling low over what she done, and boozes it up and goes off the cliff.”
“No alcohol in the bloodstream, Brennan, remember?”
“Okay, so she was gonna go out drinking and had the bottle in the car with her. Still indicates the state of mind she was in, right? She was depressed and maybe a little suicidal and she drove off the cliff.”
“And that’s the way you see it?”
“No. I don’t see it no way. I see some dead people, some accident victims, nothing more, nothing less. No foul play apparent. No arson, either. Principal player dead. The end. Case closed.”
“You’re through investigating, then?”
“I never started.”
“She had a kid.”
“Who had a kid?”
“I told you about it before. Janet Taber had a kid. You just said she used to beat her kid, remember? He’s supposed to be in a clinic in the east waiting heart surgery. What about him?”
“He is his father’s concern.”
“Phil Taber, you mean.”
“That’s right. No worse off than a million other kids these days who gotta grow up with freaks for fathers.”
Lori came over from the sink, where she’d been rinsing off dishes, and said, “Mal? Can I talk to you for a moment?”
“Sure.” I looked at Brennan. “Excuse me, Sheriff.”
He puffed at his cigarette, said nothing.
Lori took me into the nursery, which was a small room about the size of a double closet, with blue plaster walls. The lights were off. Her little boy Jeff was sleeping in his crib, so she talked in whispers.
“Excuse me for eavesdropping,” she said, “but I heard what Brennan said about Janet. What he said Phil Taber said about Janet.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. Look I was talking on the phone this morning, with Annie Coe, about Janet….”
“Who’s Annie Coe?”
“Annie Coe’s a girl about my age Janet was hanging around with these months since she moved back to town. She’s divorced and she and Janet had a lot in common. Anyway, she’s the friend Janet was with that night, the night of the fire and everything.”
“And?”
“I don’t need Annie’s word for it to tell you that story about Janet being a split personality is a crock. I knew Janet well enough to peg that one as phony. And what Annie told me backs up my opinion. Annie said Janet and her mother had grown very close these past months. Janet felt her mother had really come through in time of need, you know? And though I never met Mrs. Ferris, Janet’s mother, I know fr
om what Annie said this morning that it’s very unlikely Janet could have beaten up on her.”
“Why’s that, Lori?”
“You were with Janet, you know what she looked like. She wasn’t big. She was almost petite. It must’ve been her father she took after, from what Annie said. What Annie said was, probably the only reason the beating and the fire didn’t kill Mrs. Ferris right away was her size. Only reason she lasted most the night was that she was a big, healthy, fleshy woman. Stood close to six-foot. It’d take somebody good size to beat up that lady….”
EIGHTEEN
There was a moon tonight, or a slice of it, anyway, but it was up under some clouds that were rolling by like dark smoke. Despite the darkness, I could see the Norman house plainly. The grounds directly surrounding it were free of trees and brush and sloped gently, very gently up around the house, which was outlined stark against the sky, sitting back from the edge of a hill that fell sharply to the Mississippi. The river’s waters reflected what light there was back up against the smooth, unpainted cement walls of the Norman house.
It looked like a Moorish fortress or castle, as cut to scale and modified by a would-be Frank Lloyd Wright; something like some of the things put up in the thirties in California towns, only more so, and minus the stucco. The top floor sat on the bottom like a smaller box on a slightly larger one, with a one-story wing on either side; the roof was tower-cut, with fat, stubby turrets on every corner. In its original conception it had been a combination penthouse above and radio station below-the back wall still had the shadow where a giant radio antenna once climbed. The front wall, the face of the house standing watch over the river, had three irregular windows along the bottom floor, like odd teeth, and, on the upper floor, running near the house’s width, a long horizontal window looking out on the river like the viewscreen on a welder’s mask.
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