by Rod Reynolds
I told myself to pull back the reins. It was no more than an hour since I’d learned of his death, and already I’d come up with two theories for why it wasn’t an accident. I thought about it another way. Could be my first instincts were right – that Robinson was working against me and had brought me here on behalf of whoever was calling his tune. If that was the case, maybe the fire was just what it seemed – a nasty accident that played in my favour and saved me from the trap. If that was so, the smart thing to do was to hightail it back to California.
Still, I was torn. My gut said Robinson wouldn’t set me up like that. And besides, if that was his aim, it meant the timing of the fire that killed him was a coincidence – and I always had a hard time with coincidences. And that was to say nothing of all the clandestine bullshit he’d been pulling – the fake name, hiding from me, all of it.
By the time I reached the Arlington, the doubt was nagging at me bad. I decided to make a different call first – to Sid Hansen, one of the sub-editors I’d known at the Texarkana Chronicle, to get the skinny on Robinson’s recent past. It was a risk having anyone in Texarkana know I was back in Arkansas, but given the situation, it felt like a shortcut worth taking.
The operator couldn’t get a circuit to the Chronicle at first, so I waited in the booth, looking around the grand lobby of the hotel. The centre of the room was filled with guests taking breakfast, most every table occupied. I looked from one to the next, seeing sharp suits and gleaming shoes – money in every seat. As my eyes flitted around the scene, three men passed through, heading towards the street. The one in the middle caught my eye – something familiar about him. He was short and slightly built, wearing a newsboy cap that partly obscured his face, and a suit that was cut baggy. I couldn’t put a make on him, and he went out the doors before I could get a better look. I wondered if it was a face I knew from Texarkana. The thought made my pulse trip.
I was still staring towards the exit when the operator called back. I waited for the connection, and then Hansen’s voice came on strong over the newsroom hum.
‘Chronicle, Sid Hansen.’
‘It’s Charlie Yates, Sid.’
He gave a little whistle. ‘Not a voice I was expecting to hear from again. The operator said this call’s coming from Hot Springs – the hell are you doing there?’
Seemed like he didn’t know that’s where Robinson had been. ‘I came to meet Jimmy Robinson. He told me he was working a story here and needed my help.’
‘Jimmy? What story?’
‘That’s what I was hoping you could tell me.’
He grunted. ‘Beats me. Jimmy took off a few weeks back. Said he had family business needed taking care of. I ain’t heard from him since. You best tell him the bosses are fixing to serve him his papers— Wait, why ain’t he told you all this?’
I took a breath. ‘Sid, Jimmy’s dead. The room he was staying in caught fire three nights ago, before I got here. I’m sorry.’
He started to say something, couldn’t get anything out. Finally he said, ‘A fire? You mean like an accident?’
‘That’s what they’re saying here. Passed out and dropped his cigarette.’
‘What? Why the hell ain’t no one called?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘What about the police? The coroner . . .’ His voice broke.
I said nothing, but his question made me think. The saloon owner, Tucker, would have identified him to the authorities as Jimmy Clark – but what about his papers? Robinson must have carried some identification with him. Unless the fire claimed it all. ‘I’m sorry, Sid. Truly.’
He sighed and said something that sounded like goddammit, Jimmy, under his breath, then fell silent. When he spoke again at last, his voice was fractured. ‘Where’s his body at? What condition?’
‘I don’t know, I just found out an hour ago. First thing I did was call you.’ I waited, hearing voices in the background on his end, then said, ‘I don’t like the way it looks – that’s why I’m calling. You have any clue what made him come here like that?’
‘What do you mean the way it looks?’
‘The whole picture is off. Him coming here, calling me out of the blue, the fire. I just want to be sure.’
He lowered his voice. ‘What are you saying, goddammit? You think someone killed him?’
‘Hold on, I’m not saying anything right now; I’m just asking questions. Same thing Jimmy would do in my shoes.’
‘Ain’t my recollection that you two were friends. You got no right to talk like you know what he’d do.’
The rebuke stung because it was true. ‘I didn’t mean anything by it.’ I had my hand up, as if he could see me motioning for him to take it easy. ‘I’m just saying I owe it to Jimmy to figure out what happened.’ I paused, in my head weighing how much was safe to tell him, not knowing whose ears my words might reach. Suddenly Texarkana felt a lot closer; I didn’t mention the dead girls Robinson had spoken about. ‘What about before he left? You know what he was working on the last few months?’
‘The hell should I know?’ He thought about it, maybe taking a second to simmer down. ‘I ain’t know of him doing anything out of the ordinary until he upped and went. He filed everything late, but that was just Jimmy.’ He started talking slower again, the first wave of shock passing. ‘I’ll speak to some people here, see if anyone knows different.’
‘I appreciate it.’ I was about to tell him where I was staying, then thought better of it. ‘I’ll call again in a day or two.’ I rubbed my hand over my face and a different image of Robinson came to me – that stupid grin he wore like a mask. It felt like Hansen and me were the only people knew or cared he was dead, and it didn’t sit right. ‘Sid, did he have any family? I never asked him about that before.’
His voice was hollow, distracted, like he was already making memorial arrangements in his mind. ‘Not much of a one. His folks died years ago, and he ain’t got no brothers. Got a sister somewhere near Wichita, Kansas – I thought that’s where he’d went.’
‘You think maybe someone should call to let her know?’
He took a long breath. ‘I’ll find out her number and see if I can get a hold of her.’
‘If you speak to her, would you give her my condolences?’
‘Yeah. I can do that for you.’
I thanked him and told him I’d be in touch. I placed the receiver back in its cradle. At my remove, it felt as though his reaction was a genuine one. At the same time, that didn’t mean he wouldn’t be straight on the line to whoever might care to know Charlie Yates’s whereabouts.
I looked at my watch, realised it was still too early in California to call Lizzie – and that I wasn’t certain what I was going to say to her any more. I found an empty table near the bar and ordered a cup of coffee, watching the waiters in their black bowties and high-collared white shirts buzzing between tables. My mind jumped back to Clay Tucker earlier that morning. His version of what happened was spare – especially concerning Robinson’s movements and who he’d been talking to. Good lies are peppered with enough detail to give them credibility, so either Tucker really didn’t know anything, or he was a bad liar.
I sifted through what he’d said again and realised that in fact there were two details he’d let slip: that Robinson went to bed with a half-bottle of bonded the night of the fire, and that it wasn’t unusual for him to do so. The only things he’d kicked loose, and they both helped buttress the idea that Robinson drank himself into a stupor, then started the fire that killed him.
A waiter placed my coffee in front of me, the clink of china meeting the wooden tabletop bringing me out of my thoughts. I took a sip, the coffee scalding hot and bitter, and made my mind up. If Robinson’s death was somehow linked to Texarkana, then I was putting myself in danger by staying here. But it also meant I couldn’t just let it go on. I gave myself forty-eight hours to get a lead on what Robinson was doing, and what really happened to him. If I had nothing after that, I’d catch the firs
t flight out of there.
Chapter Three
The sun was still climbing when I left the Arlington, and the morning was fresh. It was at odds with how I felt. Opposite the hotel was an art deco skyscraper, the inscription above the door naming it the Medical Arts Building. Most of the structure was still in shade, but the highest floors caught the sunlight, and the yellow-brown bricks glowed almost white in the glare.
I flagged a cab to the Hot Springs Police Department. I checked my wallet as we rode, aware that I was running short of cash. The Journal gig paid well enough, but nothing like the Examiner had in New York, and the cost of flying to Arkansas had drained my savings. I’d convinced Acheson to let me have a week off to attend to a personal matter out of state, and he agreed on the condition that he didn’t have to pay me. I’d conceded the point so as to forestall too many questions. As I thought about it now, I realised I’d used the exact same pretence as Robinson to excuse my absence; I wondered if we were more alike than I realised and tried not to think that I might be following him down the same path.
*
The officer behind the receiving desk of Hot Springs PD was balding and had a moustache that covered most of his mouth. I told him I was looking for information about a friend who died in the fire at Duke’s and he glanced up at me without lifting his head. He gestured to a pair of wooden chairs against the far wall, one missing its back, and told me to sit while he went to fetch someone. He came back a couple minutes later with a detective who introduced himself as Harlan Layfield.
‘Charlie Yates. I’m here about the man died in the fire three nights ago.’
‘So Browning said. I’m real sorry about that.’
I nodded. ‘Do you happen to know what caused it?’
He linked his fingers together. ‘There ain’t a way to sugar coat it, so I apologise if this seems coarse. Seems the gentleman in question dropped a cigarette in his room – most likely when he fell asleep. What I understand, he was too incapacitated by liquor to wake up, and the smoke suffocated him.’
Corroborating stories. ‘That’s what the owner of the place told me. Are you investigating?’
‘Fire department were on the scene right away, and their report states they satisfied that’s what happened. That being the case, there’s no call for us to get involved. You say you spoke to the owner?’
‘Clay Tucker, yeah.’
‘Well then, there’s not a whole lot more I can tell you. Sorry.’
‘So there are no suspicious circumstances, that’s what you’re saying?’
He tilted his head. ‘That’s right. Why, you know of something we should be aware of?’
I thought about the question, but had nothing of substance to say in response. ‘No. I’m just not sure what my friend was doing here in town.’
‘Most everyone comes here for the baths and the nightlife.’
‘That doesn’t sound like him.’ I rubbed my neck, starting to wonder if I was paranoid, seeing cause and motive where there was only the hand of chance at work. ‘Listen, are you investigating any murders right now?’ His face changed when I said it, like I’d crossed a line. ‘Reason I’m asking is my friend told me he was working a story about three girls that got killed. Figure the least I could do is pick it up for him.’
‘You a reporter, Mr Yates?’
‘That’s right, same as Jimmy.’
‘What outfit?’
‘It’s in California, you wouldn’t have heard of it.’
He looked at me the way a dog sizes up a bone, deciding whether it’s worth chewing on. ‘Sir, this town’s known for relaxation and recuperation, and we real careful to keep it that way. We maybe get two killings in Hot Springs in a bad year, and there ain’t none on the books at the moment. I don’t know what your friend was doing here, but he wasn’t investigating any murders.’
I glanced to one side. ‘Has anyone spoken to his family?’
‘No, sir, they have not. We didn’t know who all to contact. Clay Tucker gave us the deceased’s name, but that was all he had. Any identification Mr Clark was carrying must have burned up in the fire, wasn’t nothing we could find.’ He produced a pencil and notebook. ‘You have the name of a relative you could furnish me with?’
I gave him Hansen’s name at the Chronicle. ‘He’ll be able to put you in touch with the family.’
‘Obliged.’
Hearing the name Clark again tweaked me, and I realised I’d overlooked something. ‘So you haven’t made a formal identification yet.’
Layfield looked at me like I was simple. ‘Clay Tucker confirmed the room was occupied by Mr Clark at the time of the fire. That’ll do it until we can bring his family down here to confirm it for the record.’
‘I’d like to see the body. I can tell you for sure.’
‘Procedure requires a family member—’
‘I know that. But you want to take the risk of bussing in the wrong family? At least I can confirm it’s the man you know as Jimmy Clark.’
He creased his forehead. ‘The way you say that suggests you knew him by some other name.’
‘Let me see him and we’ll talk about it.’
He slipped his notebook back into his top pocket, then tilted his head to look at me. ‘He was in rough shape when they found him . . .’
‘I’ve been around the block.’
He thought about it for a beat, then shrugged. ‘I’ll meet you out front in five minutes.’
*
The Gresham Funeral Home was on Central, a couple blocks south of Bathhouse Row. The drive there only took a few minutes. Layfield parked out front, giving me the side-eye as he did. ‘How’d you come to know Mr Clark?’
‘We worked together one time.’
‘In California?’
‘Texarkana.’
He set the parking brake. ‘And now he’s brought you out here on account of these supposed dead girls.’
I nodded.
‘But you don’t have no names or nothing about them, that it?’
‘That’s it. He wanted to tell me about it in person. You’re sure you can’t think what it would pertain to?’
He shook his head and looked down at his hands. ‘I ain’t wanna talk ill of the dead, but he must have got his wires crossed somewhere along the way.’ He popped his door and climbed out, and I did the same. He looked at me across the car roof. ‘What you said before about his name – you care to elaborate yet?’
It felt like I was betraying Robinson’s trust to tell it, but I weighed that against the confusion and false hope it could cause Robinson’s sister when Layfield made the call to her. ‘His name was Robinson. Jimmy Robinson. He was from Texarkana.’
He tipped his hat to signal thanks and led me across the sidewalk up to the entrance to the building. He was small for a cop – a full head shorter than me, and barely medium build. He took clipped steps as he walked, his jacket snagging on his holster with every pace. He must have called ahead because when he opened the door, the undertaker was waiting inside the small hallway.
He offered his hand and introduced himself as Mr Gresham. ‘My condolences. I’ve prepared Mr Clark as best I can.’
Gresham led us through the home to a small room in the rear. The temperature was appreciably lower inside there, and the mortuary refrigerators droned like wasps. There was a metal table in the centre of the room, a white sheet covering the body. Gresham positioned himself on the far side of it, but Layfield hung back by the doorway. The temperature dulled it, but the smell was unavoidable: burnt flesh and smoke. Or maybe it was in my mind. Gresham looked at me, holding the corners of the sheet, waiting; I nodded and he drew it back as far as the shoulders.
Any hope of a mix-up vanished. I swallowed hard and held it to stop my stomach from turning inside out. The skin on his face was blackened and charred, mottled in places with patches of pink and red. His teeth were strangely prominent, his lips shrivelled or burned away – a death grin that was a cruel reminder of the one he wore in l
ife. His hair was all but gone. Despite the damage, I was in no doubt it was Robinson.
I looked away. Gresham replaced the sheet and I stepped outside and took three deep breaths, trying to purge my lungs. Layfield followed me out and came around so he was stood in front of me. ‘Fire’s always the worst. You want some water?’
I shook my head.
‘Can I take it that’s your man?’
‘Yes.’
Layfield took his hat off and stared at his feet like he didn’t know what else to say. I couldn’t get the smell out of my nose and mouth. I felt the anger stirring inside me – the idea someone might have done that and skated on it. I looked back and nodded to Gresham and headed out through the building again, Layfield trailing behind me.
When we were back on the sidewalk, he said, ‘You need a ride somewhere?’
I shook my head, still dazed.
‘What’s your plan now?’
I looked along the street, squinting. ‘I don’t know yet.’
He offered his hand. ‘Well, you think of anything else you need, be sure to come by again.’
I took a look at his face and the offer seemed sincere. We shook and he walked back to his car.
I stood on the sidewalk, gasoline fumes dislodging the smell at last, trying to make sense of it all. No murders on the books, Layfield said – so what the hell was Robinson doing here? I wondered if his story had been a pack of lies; no dead girls, just a tale to bait me with. I remembered the familiar face I’d spotted in the lobby of the Arlington, the man in the newsboy cap – wondered if he was a part of it somehow. If I was in danger. I didn’t want to believe it of Robinson.
Certain facts were at odds with that theory. There was no identification found in his room – no papers, no driver’s licence, no press card. It was plausible that the fire could have claimed it all, but wasn’t it just as likely Robinson had ditched it sometime beforehand? It jibed with him staying under a false name – trying to pass himself off as someone else. Why bother with all that just to get at me? The better explanation was that he was trying to hide from someone.