I heard an effortful sound behind me.
We all turned around.
Petey had crept in and was sitting cross-legged on the floor next to Gina's bunk in his flat hat. His mouth was hanging open, and his hands clutched and unclutched in front of his belly as they did when he was trying to figure out something. His brain was working ferociously.
His mouth snapped shut, his lips a rosy downcurve. He seemed to have to either pee or tell me something, some information he desperately wanted to express, but clearly, he didn't know how.
"You guys," he said pleadingly. "You guys."
"What is it, honey?"
George asked, "Are we not getting something?"
Petey nodded vigorously but made only a distressed squeak.
We stood there looking at him.
"What, honey?" I said again.
Suddenly his eyes flashed. "Wait a minute!" he shouted. "Where's my pencils, where's my pencils?" He jumped up as Gina gave a sigh, her eyelids fluttering.
Alger knelt to her.
"Her pulse is weak."
"Oh, God." I jumped to her side and took her clammy hand.
Kenner and George stood motionless.
"Come on, Mom!" called Petey, stampeding out the door.
"Go," said George.
I thought Gina made the slightest of nods.
So I followed my wild boy through the sleet, the icy wetness collecting on his hat and running off in a little flume behind him.
Something had to be carried through.
But what?
He skidded on the steps of Kitchen Cabin. Inside, dripping all over, he ripped open his sketch pad so hurriedly that he tore some pages out, scattering them on the floor. He took up his cross-legged position, dumped out his rainbow of pencils, selected the plain Ticonderoga stub that Daniel had given him, and began to draw. He sketched a few strokes, then lifted his chin, eyes closed, to visualize, then went back to it.
I glanced at the scattered sheets. One picture caught my attention like a fishhook to the eye. I picked it up.
A drawing of a gray-haired man in a tan shirt or jacket, with a mulberry-colored splotch on his face, standing in some bushes.
"Who is this?"
He glanced up in irritation. "I don't know." Skritch, skritch went his pencil.
"But honey."
"It's a guy I saw around here with my telescope. Give me, it's not done yet."
"Is this the picture you didn't want to show me before?"
"Yeah."
"How come?"
"The bushes still don't look right."
"When did you see this man?"
"A bunch of times! He was standing right there, I thought you guys saw him too, I thought you knew who he was."
"Did he talk to you? Honey—"
"Don't bother me for a minute, Mom!"
I put the drawing of the man with the mark on his face inside my jacket and ran to Badger Cabin.
Chapter 30 – A Dead Man's Last Defense
The guys were hanging in sort of suspended animation: a four-way impasse. George and Alger weren't going to let Kenner at Joey, and I think George was trying to figure out a way to isolate Kenner to better get to the bottom of this Joey-vs.-Lance thing.
Gina's eyes were open now, watching steadily—and she looked somehow...stronger. I'd thought she was dying; was she dying?
As much as I wanted to simply comfort her, I felt compelled to be part of this crazy situation with the men.
"Look at this." I displayed the picture.
Alger spoke immediately. "Hey, that's Truck Boyd. That's your dad, Joey, scar on his face and all. I saw him hiking around here last week. He was up along the Quilmash. Not far from—" He broke off, thinking.
All this thinking going on.
Slowly, Alger said, "You and him are the best trackers in the county. Kind of a coincidence that..." He trailed off.
I cast a fearful glance at Gina, who watched, her bum shoulder swaddled, the bruise on her cheek deepening. She was covered with my sky-blue sleeping bag, her massive mane flowing back like spilled silk.
At home she liked to use a real tortoiseshell comb that had come from Gramma Gladys's dresser top. "You girls go ahead and take that stuff now," Gramma Gladys had told us as she lay dying of liver cancer, her ice-blue eyes gleaming with secrets until the end.
Had Daniel made it to his car yet? I pictured him striding through the forest. Go, Daniel, go.
"Boyd?" said George. "Petey drew that?"
"Yes."
"Boyd?" he said again. "Is Truck a nickname?"
The answer came from Joey Preston. "Yeah." Slow and resigned. "His name is Gilbert Boyd. He's my father. I got my stepdad's last name."
George silently took that in. I remembered Lydia at the garage-cum-grocery saying of the broken gas pump, "Truck or Joey could fix it." There was something of significance to George about Joey's dad. "Gilbert Boyd," he said to himself.
Joey went on, "Truck left when I was born, and my mom married Bill Preston. He adopted me, then he died when I was ten. Truck showed up after a while, Mom took him back, and he bought the garage. I'd been Preston too long to change it."
"I see," George said, then muttered something I didn't catch. He was talking about something else entirely, I saw, talking to himself.
Believing, however, that George was really listening to him, Joey bit the cuticle of his thumb, then mused, "Actually, I didn't want to change it, I guess I wanted my father to remember that he'd abandoned me. Just a little somethin' in the background, you know? He tried to work himself back into my life, you know, I don't know what for, really. Try to live his life through mine. He was always on me to do my homework, saying, 'Practice makes perfect.'
"That was something about him: practice. He'd never do anything new just right off the bat; he'd always make a dry run first. Like if he got new fishing tackle, he'd take it out to Lake Quish first, actually put his halibut boat in that dinky little lake and try out the tackle, rig it different ways, run it up and down, before going out to saltwater. Not gonna catch anything in Lake Quish with a halibut rig, I'll tell ya! Not unless the Loch Ness monster's in there!"
Petey burst in. "It's snowing!"
Everybody's heads swiveled. It certainly was snowing, fast-dropping icy flakes swirling in the strong wind. Petey, little California boy, had seen frost and snow once or twice on trips to our ancestral Wisconsin and the mountains in California. He still found it exotic.
The sound in the cabin had changed; now instead of the car wash-like thrumming of the sleet against wood, there was the haunting, spirit-world scouring of wind-driven snow.
Petey handed me his sketch pad.
"I held it upside down through the snow."
I flipped it over to find a (nice dry) sketch.
Hastily done, but unmistakable:
The interior of this cabin, Joey's bunk, Joey asleep in it—muscled pink arms, eyes two tiny crescents—the clump of bloody jeans. The jeans were being held up in one hand by a thin, tall man. The man's other arm was slung tight against his body, and that hand was dropping something small and circular, with a dial and hands, into the pocket.
The object was clearly falling into the pocket, with speed lines trailing it.
The only color in the picture was a fast-scribbled hatching of bright blue on the tall man's jacket.
The drawing had been done from an odd perspective, and I realized Petey had been looking in the window, peering through the fresh-air opening Alger had maintained.
"Oh, my God," I said.
I looked at Kenner, whose face above the collar of his bright-blue jacket had developed exactly the glazed oh, fuck expression you'd expect.
George remarked, "Good picture, Petey."
"It isn't really done," said my boy, scuffing the toe of his wet sneaker on the floor.
"Petey!" I said. "Why didn't you just tell me, why did you go to all the trouble of drawing this?"
He opened his mouth and shouted from the pit of his
tormented little gut, "BECAUSE YOU SAID NOT TO TATTLE!"
All I could say was, "Oh, my God."
He pushed his hat back. "But you didn't say I couldn't draw what I see."
"Oh, my God."
"I thought Mr. de Sauvenard was giving Joey presents. But now I think he tried to make it look like Joey stole that watch."
"Yes," I said. "Yes."
"Besides," added Petey, "it's realer if you draw it."
George asked, "Presents? Did you also see him put money into Joey's wallet?"
Petey glanced worriedly at me.
"It's OK," I said.
He worked his head up and down. "Right after."
"There ya go," I said.
We all stared at Kenner.
He shrugged, trying to appear casual. Then he actually smiled, and it was the exact same smile I'd seen on his face at my apartment when he'd learned from his mom that Lance and Gina had gotten engaged. Slimy, insincere smile.
Kenner knew it wouldn't do to act angry anymore.
"Hey," said Kenner, clinging to one last denial, "kids make up things all the time." He tried for a careless tone.
It's funny, I thought, how lying turns a good-looking person like that so butt-ugly so fast. My stomach oozed downward into my pelvis as I realized how right I'd been all along, ever since I saw Kenner sneak into that cabin. What I hadn't realized then was the extent of his treachery. I thought it was just Gina he'd been after, not figuring that he also wanted to frame Joey for Lance's...murder. Yes, murder, that's what it was. And I hadn't realized he'd already been in that cabin alone, earlier, doing just that.
Observed by my invisible mini Leonardo here.
"Hey, little guy," said Kenner, trying again, squatting to Petey's level. "I like you."
"I don't like you." Petey's eyes were beady.
"That was a fun little game we were playing there, wasn't it?" He reached for Petey's shoulder as if to pat it.
Petey stepped sideways and said out of the corner of his mouth, "I'm not six months old, you know."
My heart surged with as much love and pride as I'd ever felt for him.
Kenner gave up on Petey. I saw his boots start to orient themselves toward the door.
George and Alger were ready for violence. Alger's lanky ponytail had flopped in front of his shoulder; he whipped it back.
I said, "So you had to unwrap the canvas around Lance, then paw through his clothes to find that watch, didn't you? Must have been a pleasant task. One-handed, no less."
Kenner shot me a filthy look.
"In fact, I think I can smell him on you," I pressed.
Kenner swallowed.
"Kenner," said George, "why don't you just get it off your chest? I might be able to help you if—"
He stopped as Kenner reached behind himself and drew a knife from his waistband.
"Get back!" he said, feeling us closing in on him, though none of us had moved.
"I see," said George patiently, unmoved by the sight of the blade.
It was a medium-sized hunter, an expensive-looking knife.
"That's Lance's knife," said George. "I thought about removing it from his belt. But I didn't want to take away a dead man's last defense."
Alger, off to the side near Joey Preston, nodded with guy-spirit.
I said, "Come here, Petey." He ran to me and I held him behind me. I felt his head poking out around my hip. I forced myself to calmness. He could always feel my vibe. Christ almighty, Kenner had had that knife on him a few minutes ago when I stopped him from coming in alone. Rita, said my inner bitch reluctantly, you're better at hand-to-hand than you thought.
"I didn't kill anybody," said Kenner, breathing fast.
"I know you didn't," said George. "Put down the knife."
"He had to have," I contradicted.
"No," said George. "This is getting tiresome."
I hadn't realized how tightly he'd been gathering himself until he sprang at Kenner. He planted one foot on the floor—boom!—then kicked Kenner's knife out of his hand with the other.
Alger scooped up the knife as George grabbed Kenner by the storm flap of his jacket and rammed him against the wall.
"All right, you son of a bitch." George was breathing hard now, his face flushed, neck tendons popping. Sweat glistened on his scalp beneath his umber-colored crew cut.
Kenner was dead-pale. His hand crawled along the wall behind him.
George said, "You came up here three weeks ago and tried to hire Joey Preston to kill your brother, didn't you?" He shouted into Kenner's face, spraying him with drill sergeant-esque spit. Kenner shut his eyes and mouth tight to avoid it. He really did look like a shitless recruit.
He shook his head.
Joey spoke up, "No. George, uh—"
"Shut up," George cut him off. "Kenner, you offered him money—a lot of money to the likes of him—didn't you? More than a hundred thousand, but not more than half a million."
Kenner's eyes flew wide with shock. "How did you find that out? From Leland?"
George smiled not nicely.
"Kenner couldn't have that much money," I said. "He's practically broke; he wanted to make his movie for what, thirty thousand?"
"Oh, Lord," said Joey Preston.
"Yes, he does," said George. "He was broke, but not anymore. He's working a deal with Leland Harris—Bertrice de Sauvenard's most trusted advisor—to siphon cash from Silver Coast and split it. Phony real estate deals. Russian copper."
"What?" I said.
"In fact, your bank account, Kenner, has just under two million in it right now, doesn't it?"
"Fuck you," spat Kenner.
George gave him a shake, jostling his broken arm. "Keep your spit to yourself."
"Ow! Owow!"
"And you and Harris have a deal to get rid of your mother next, don't you? With Lance dead, you'd be the sole heir. Except possibly for Gina, in case they'd gotten married, or even if she was pregnant. Which is what made you come rushing up here as soon as you found out about the engagement—to hunt her down and kill her yourself, because your hired assassin was long gone. Good thing Rita figured that out when she did."
Petey looked up at me. "You saved Aunt Gina."
"Be quiet, honey."
George jostled Kenner again. "How did you get Harris to go along with your plan? What did you have over him?"
Nonspittingly, Kenner repeated, "Fuck you."
"I'm the only reason you're alive, you narcissistic son of a bitch!"
"What do you mean?" Kenner's hand kept crawling along the wall behind him, back and forth, like a white spider.
"Because I left you out of it when I told Ivan Platonov that Harris was planning to screw him!"
Kenner went dead silent, as a person does when absorbing a huge impact.
I didn't quite know what was going on, except that the game, for Kenner, kept changing.
And he skillfully kept adapting.
While he'd been grateful that George and I had fought those wackos in the woods and got him out of there, that rescue, I saw, was nothing to him compared with what George had just told him.
"Oh, Jesus. Oh, Jesus." Kenner looked at George with sudden weak-kneed amazement. I believe there was some unconditional gratitude in there as well, but he was hiding it. "Oh, Jesus. You know about Platonov. When did you find out about Platonov?" Kenner was eyeing George with an amount of respect I'd never seen in him before. And he was curious, and I realized that he now viewed George as something of an equal. Somehow, he now felt safe in George's grip.
Isn't it insane: to be literally rammed up against a wall, your body fucked up, your brother dead (though this makes you happy), your plans unraveling because of the concerted efforts of a team of people who'd just as soon see you in hell—and suddenly feel pretty OK with things?
"All right," said Kenner, reading my mind. "You all think you have the upper hand? No. I have the upper hand."
Having edged out from behind me, at my side now, Petey r
emarked, "But both of his hands are lower than Mr. Rowe's. How—"
I clamped his shoulder.
"Leland Harris," said Kenner, "will soon wind up wishing he were dead a lot sooner than he's going to be. But he'll never give me up."
"Why not?" said George, relaxing his grip to give Kenner enough breath to tell us what he now wanted to tell.
"We both have our needs," he began, enigmatically.
"You feel above the rest of us," said George.
"I am above the rest of you. I'm much more intelligent, and, of course, I'm an artist."
"You're a selfish, greedy bastard."
Kenner laughed dismissively.
"I need what I need. OK. And you know what? My family knew it too. Lance once said he'd do anything for me." He glanced at each of us, meaningfully, in turn. "My mother said the same thing."
My God, I thought, this is what a real live monster looks like. George said, "Get to the point. Your relationship with Harris began when you were in high school. You found out something about him back then, didn't you, something he thought he'd gotten away with?"
"Did my mother tell you about my school project?"
"Yes, but she doesn't know the underlying story."
"Neither did my dad." Kenner cleared his throat, actually smirking with pride. "Here's who you're dealing with. It was way back in high school. I went to my dad's firm and did a project on the company, I researched the financial history and did a report for my class. Dad let me in on the books; I hung out all morning in the file room, looking through all these old transaction ledgers. Leland didn't know about it until lunchtime, then he came charging in to see what I was doing. Nobody else was there. I looked up at him and said, 'I know.'"
"H'h," George grunted. "Your mom remembers that day. She thinks Leland liked you, she thinks he took you under his wing."
"Ha. Of course I couldn't have analyzed every ledger in one morning, and half of it I couldn't understand anyway; it's just that I happened to come across a book that had fourteen pages razored out from 1979. And I wondered why. The ledgers had been bound after they'd been typed. So I traced the carbons." As Kenner talked I could smell and taste those '50s-era offices, Dictabelts still lying around, the air cool, the linoleum floors waxed to a heel-clicking shine beneath the secretaries' feet. Uniform paper coffee cups. Desks with their incandescent gooseneck lamps. The big shots glassed in like sharks in aquariums, their offices carpeted with the latest in stain-resistant synthetics.
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