Floater

by Gary Brandner

  • • •

  Brendan’s charter company, Coastaire, flew out of Santa Monica Municipal Airport, but he kept his personal Cessna 310 at Whiteman Air Park in the San Fernando Valley. There was no tower, no red tape, just a compact little field for private pilots.

  The twin-turbo 310 was probably more airplane than he really needed, but Brendan had got a good price on it from Coastaire five years before. He kept the trim little red-and-white plane gassed up and air-ready at all times, so when an impulse hit him to fly to Vegas or Catalina or wherever, he could hop in and go.

  He filed his flight plan at Whiteman at nine-thirty Saturday morning. Shortly before ten he settled behind the wheel, scanned the horizon, and took off into a light easterly breeze.

  CHAPTER 25

  LINDY

  The day was darkening with angry clouds rolling in from the north as Lindy walked through the curving streets of 1950s tract homes known as the Meadow. Like the rest of Wolf River, the Meadow was decaying. Although, at thirty years, it was still one of the newest sections of the town, it had fared worse than others.

  The two- and three-bedroom houses, put up during the boom of the 1950s, lasted about ten years, then began to fall apart. Neglect and the passage of time had taken a toll, and the cheap materials originally used by the developer speeded the deterioration.

  After hearing the news from Merilee Lund that her father was back in Wolf River, Lindy had looked up Wendell Grant in the phone book and found him listed on Lilac Lane, one of the saccharine names given to the streets when they were still paths marked out with colorful flags. She had tried to call, but static on the line kept her from getting through.

  Now, as she stood before the house where her father lived, she was having doubts about coming out here. The look of the house made her groan inwardly.

  The paint was flaking from the clapboard walls, the lawn was unmowed and weedy, one shutter was missing on a front window, and another hung awry from a single hinge. Visible in the garage was the dented rear end of a ten-year-old station wagon.

  Nothing about this pathetic house reminded Lindy of her father. Not the father she remembered.

  She drew a deep breath and walked up the short concrete path to the front door. A three-by-five card tacked over the door was hand-lettered: bell out of order.

  Lindy knocked. She heard movement inside, and the door opened about eight inches. It took her a moment to recognize the pinched, suspicious face that peered out as that of her stepmother. Norma Wirthwein had been a dark, thin girl, pretty and vivacious when Judge Grant married her. Now only the lively brown eyes were unchanged.

  “Yes?”

  Lindy found her voice. “Norma?”

  The woman opened the door wider to look at her. Norma was still thin — painfully so. The cheap print dress hung on her like a badly folded sheet.

  “Well, look what we’ve got here,” she said. “It’s Lindy, isn’t it?”

  Lindy nodded.

  “You know, we never expected to see you back in Wolf River. Nobody did.”

  “Well, here I am.” When Norma said nothing, she went on. “I didn’t know you and my father were back living here.”

  “We didn’t exactly announce it on television. Maybe you didn’t hear about the mess in Madison.”

  “No.”

  “I guess it wasn’t such big news out there in Hollywood, but everybody around here sure heard about it.” Her mouth quirked in a bitter parody of a smile. “I suppose you want to see your father.”

  Lindy began to get irritated. “That’s what I came out here for.”

  “You might as well come in.”

  Lindy followed her stepmother into the living room. There was none of the furniture she remembered from the old Elm Street house. The sofa, chairs, and rickety end tables looked like mismatched Sears Roebuck. The sofa had been recovered in a flowered print that didn’t match anything else in the room. The carpet had a large dark stain near the doorway to the kitchen. The curtains were drawn, leaving the room in gloomy twilight.

  “Wendell!” the woman called. “Somebody to see you.”

  “Who is it?” came a muffled voice from another room.

  “A surprise. Come on out.”

  From out of what Lindy assumed must be the bedroom shuffled a man who superficially resembled her father of twenty years ago. The face was still handsome, though thinner, and he needed a shave. The hair was grayer and poorly cut.

  The biggest change was in his bearing. Where Judge Grant used to stride into a room and take possession of it, this man entered tentatively, as though fearful he might be ordered back out. His smile had a guilty quaver. He wore a pair of suit pants that needed pressing, and a gray cardigan sweater over a plaid shirt.

  “Lindy? My gosh, it is you, isn’t it?”

  She wanted to say, My God, what’s happened to you? but she held it in.

  “Hello, Daddy.”

  He came forward to embrace her, but as his arms went around her Lindy could feel him looking over her shoulder at his wife, as though for permission. He released Lindy and stepped back. “Gosh, you look wonderful. What brings you back home after all this time?”

  “Daddy, this isn’t my home anymore.”

  He seemed not to hear. “Why didn’t you tell us you were coming?”

  “It was a sudden decision. And I didn’t even know you were living back in Wolf River.”

  His eyes shifted away from hers as the old Judge Grant’s eyes would never have done.

  “I guess we haven’t been very good about writing.” He came back to her. “You didn’t exactly keep in touch either, you know.”

  “No, I suppose I didn’t.”

  An uncomfortable silence grew in the room.

  Norma said, “Maybe I ought to leave you two alone to relive old times.”

  “No, no, dear,” Wendell Grant said quickly. “You don’t have to leave.”

  “I know I don’t have to,” Norma said with peculiar emphasis. “But it will give you a chance to talk about me.”

  Lindy looked at him curiously, but his attention was on his wife, his eyes pleading.

  “I’ve got some shopping to do anyway,” Norma said.

  “Have you got enough money?”

  “Never enough,” Norma said, “but I’ll make do.”

  “Better take an umbrella,” said the judge. “Feels like it’s going to rain.”

  Norma shrugged him off. To Lindy she said, “Nice seeing you,” and went out.

  Wendell Grant clapped his hands together in a charade of heartiness and laughed without feeling. “Well, shall we sit down and have a talk?”

  “I can’t stay long,” Lindy said.

  “Too bad.” He looked around the cheap living room. “It’s not much like the old place, I guess.”

  “No, not much.”

  “When we moved to Madison I sold the Elm Street house and the furniture along with it. It was too big, anyway. And Norma said it was too gloomy and old-fashioned.” Quickly he added, “She was right, of course.”

  “Of course,” Lindy said dryly. Then she could no longer hold it in. “Daddy, what’s happened to you?”

  “Happened?”

  “You’re so … different. Norma said something about a scandal while you were living in Madison.”

  Wendell Grant seemed to grow smaller before his daughter’s eyes. He walked over to the flowered couch and sat down, patting the cushion beside him for her. His face suddenly showed all of his sixty-seven years.

  “There are a couple of things I’ve done in my life that I’m not proud of,” he said. “That was one of them. I was counsel to the legislative highway commission. One of the commissioners got involved in a conflict-of-interest mess. There was a bribery thing involving a construction company, and kickbacks to members of the governor’s staff. Very complicated. And very ugly.”

  “You were involved in that?”

  Slowly he nodded. “I was. It started out just doing a favor for a friend
. Rearranging the names on some corporate documents. I knew it was wrong, but I didn’t think anyone would get hurt. Then it kind of got away from me.”

  “What happened?”

  “There were no indictments or anything. Nobody went to prison. But there were deals made that put some people out of the state government and into retirement. I was one of them. The legal expenses pretty well wiped me out. I was lucky to have Norma. She stood by me through the whole thing.”

  “Wasn’t she the one who pushed you into getting involved in politics in the first place?”

  “I wouldn’t say pushed, exactly. She thought there would be opportunities for us in Madison, and there were, until I messed everything up.”

  “Oh, Daddy.” Lindy stared at her father, more shocked by his feeble acceptance of his fate than she was by the confession.

  “But, hey, we’re doing all right,” he said. “I get a pretty good pension, and Norma does some design work for stores in Milwaukee.”

  “That’s good,” Lindy said dully.

  “Now tell me, what brings you back to town?”

  “Class reunion.”

  Her father’s face darkened. “Your high school class?”

  “That’s right. What’s the matter?”

  “It wasn’t a very happy class.”

  “No, it wasn’t.” She made a decision. “Daddy, there’s something I always wanted to tell you about what happened my last year in high school. Something you may already suspect.”

  He gave her the counterfeit laugh again. “Hey, honey, you were a pretty grown-up girl. Whatever it was, you seem to have gotten over it.”

  “I’m not sure I did,” she said.

  “Hey, this sounds serious.”

  “It is,” she said. “And it’s important. I want to tell you about Frazier Nunley.”

  “No.” He shook his head. “It’s too late to talk about all that old news.”

  “It’s not too late. I think it’s because of Frazier I’m here now.”

  He moved away from her on the couch. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Just let me tell you what happened.”

  Wendell Grant checked his watch. “I wonder what’s keeping Norma.”

  “Daddy, she just left.”

  “I wouldn’t want her to get caught in the storm.”

  He got up and crossed to the front window. There he pulled the curtain aside to peek out. Lindy waited for him to turn back, but he just kept watching the street.

  Finally she said, “You don’t want to hear this, do you?”

  “Hear what, honey?”

  “What I want to tell you about Frazier Nunley. And what happened at that Halloween Ball.”

  “Hey, I’ll talk about anything you want,” Judge Grant said. “I was just wondering if maybe I ought to see if Norma’s all right.”

  Lindy sighed heavily, saddened by the slump of her father’s shoulders. She said, “Never mind, Daddy. I guess I’d better be going.”

  Judge Grant turned from the window. His relief was evident. “Do you have to?”

  “Yes, I think I do. I’m staying at the inn, if you want to call me or anything.”

  “The inn,” he repeated. “Yes, I’ve got that. Hey, it was great seeing you, Lindy.”

  Impulsively she ran into his arms. “You too, Daddy.” She hugged him very hard, and for a moment felt the old strength return to his arms as he hugged her back. Then the station wagon pulled into the driveway and his embrace went limp.

  “Goodbye, Daddy,” Lindy said. She hurried out before she would have to face her stepmother again.

  CHAPTER 26

  ROMAN

  Jim Dancey wiped his hands across the chest of his coveralls, extracted a package of Winstons, and lit one while Roman stood grinding his teeth in an agony of impatience.

  “Can’t tell you what’s wrong with her,” Dancey said through a cloud of cigarette smoke.

  Thunder rumbled somewhere off in the distance. The sound rolled in through the open lubrication bay of the Shell station with a chill draft.

  “What do you mean you can’t tell me?” Roman said.

  “Just what I said. I don’t know what’s wrong. Everything checks out okay. She just won’t go, that’s all.”

  “I didn’t need a freaking mechanic to tell me that.”

  “You think you can fix her, you go ahead.”

  “There must be other mechanics in town,” Roman said. “Who’s a good one?”

  “Lots of good ones. Saturday’s everybody’s busy day. You might have trouble getting her looked at today.”

  Roman’s anger boiled over. “Goddamn it, what kind of a town is this? First the phones are all screwed up, now you tell me I can’t get my car worked on because it’s Saturday.”

  “I got nothing to do with the telephones, mister,” Dancey said.

  “Well, I can’t hang around here and argue with you. Who owns this place? Who’s your boss?”

  “You’re looking at him.”

  Roman could only groan in his frustration.

  Dancey took the cigarette out of his mouth and held it carefully. “Now, mister, I generally try to be patient with people come through here and make fun of our town and the way I do my job, but I got a limit and you just reached it. I think about now you better take your car and get you and it out of my station.”

  “How am I supposed to get the car out of here if it won’t start?”

  “That ain’t my problem. You plan to pay by cash or credit card?”

  “Pay? For what?”

  “For the tow from the inn. For my time. For the boy’s time. For taking up space in my garage.”

  With an effort Roman took hold of himself. “All right, look, Jim, I’m upset, and it’s not your fault. I’m sorry I yelled at you.”

  “Accepted,” Dancey said.

  “If I leave the car here now, and my credit card, will you keep working on it?”

  “Prob’ly won’t do no good. I checked her over, couldn’t find anything wrong.”

  “Just keep checking, okay?” Roman dug the Shell card out of his wallet.

  “No need to leave that,” Dancey told him. “You can pay when you come back.”

  Roman nodded, stuffed the wallet back into his pocket, and left the garage.

  From deep within the complicated electronics that regulated the operation of the Monte Carlo, the Floater watched and laughed his silent laugh.

  • • •

  By the time he got back to the inn, Roman’s mood was darker then ever. The angry-looking clouds that boiled overhead and the damp, oppressive heat added to his frustration. The whole world seemed to be in a conspiracy to prevent him from leaving Wolf River.

  He strode across the lobby and planted both hands on the registration desk. The clerk eyed him warily.

  “Have they fixed the telephones yet?” Roman demanded.

  “The problem’s not here at the inn,” the clerk said. “It’s somewhere in the phone company circuits.”

  “I didn’t ask you where the problem was,” Roman said. “I asked you if it was fixed.”

  “I don’t know, sir,” the clerk said huffily. “Why don’t you try the phone in your room?”

  “Thanks a lot.” Roman spun on his heel and started toward the elevator.

  “Oh, Mr. Dixon,” the clerk called after him.

  “Well?”

  “I sent a visitor up to your room.”

  “You sent what?”

  “A visitor.”

  “You let somebody into my room without an okay from me?” The icy finger of fear prodded his spine.

  “He said it would be all right.”

  “I don’t care what he said. You don’t do that. You don’t send people into somebody else’s room just on their say-so. I’m holding you and this hotel responsible for anything that’s missing.”

  “I don’t think he wanted to steal anything,” the clerk said. “It’s your father.”

  Roman stared at the man for
a moment, then turned and continued silently to the elevator.

  He rode silently and alone to the fourth floor. He hadn’t told anybody he was coming here. Especially not his father. One thing he did not need now was a meeting with the old man.

  Periodically Roman had sent checks to Howard Dixon in care of a Wolf River post office box. The checks had been cashed, endorsed with the old man’s ragged signature, but there had never been an acknowledgment of any kind. That was fine with Roman. He got a Christmas card yearly from Florida, where his mother lived with her new husband, and that was all the contact he wanted with his parents.

  Roman opened the door to his room prepared for anything, but still he recoiled at the appearance of the man who sat in an armchair watching a Cubs game on the television set. Howard Dixon had been a stocky, tough little man, five-feet-eight, but solid, with fierce eyebrows and an uncombable shock of black hair. The man who turned wearily to look at Roman was fat, carelessly fat, the belly spilling out of a T-shirt and over the too-tight khaki trousers. His eyes were watery and apologetic. The few remaining strands of hair lay across a liver-spotted scalp.

  Howard Dixon started to get up, changed his mind, and sagged back into the chair. He gestured at the Jack Daniel’s bottle and the glass on a table at his elbow.

  “Hello, Romey. I helped myself to a drink. Hope you don’t mind.”

  A drink, hell, Roman thought. The old man was shit-faced. He said, “Hello, Pop. How did you find me?”

  “Somebody called me.”

  “Called you?” Roman said quickly. “Who?”

  “I don’t know. Funny kind of voice. Didn’t give a name. Just said your son’s in town. Said I ought to come over and say hello.”

  How come, Roman wondered, the old man’s telephone was the only one in town that worked?

  Howard Dixon belched. He wiped his mouth, and the whiskers rasped against his callused palm.

  “So how you been, Roman?”

  “I’m fine.” Roman could not stop staring at the ruin of a man who was his father. “Pop … you look terrible.”

  “Well, I’ve had my share of troubles.” The loose mouth turned down in a sneer; the watery eyes narrowed. “Your mother left me and run off with that guy from Chicago. You heard about that.”