"You were never a policeman," she said when I finished my story. "I don't know why, I just expected that you had been a policeman."
"No, never. I don't think I could ever do that."
"Why not?"
"I mean work for anyone again. Anyone except my clients." She let her hand trail down my chest, over my stomach. "Do you have a job?" I asked her.
"I work in a library part-time."
"And that's what you paid me out of?"
"No. He gives me all the money I need. I work so I don't go crazy. Don't worry." She kissed me. "You're not making me poor."
I looked at her. "Will we do this again?"
She gave a shrug, not of indifference, but of uncertainty and a little fear. "I don't know."
"I'll take the case for you. If he's cheating on you, I'll find out."
Her eyes went down over the lengths of our naked bodies, then came back to my face. "Does it really matter now?"
"This is different."
"Yes. It is." We kissed with such hunger that for a moment I thought we might make love again. But she pushed herself to her feet, and dressed quickly. I followed her lead, and soon we were standing at the door. I felt awkward, not knowing what to say. Thank you was what first came to mind, for she had proven to me that I was still capable of making love, but I didn't think it the thing to say under the circumstances, so I just told her I would be in touch with her about her husband, and not to worry.
"Don't you worry either," she said. "About anything. All right?"
"I won't."
She walked out the door and drove away without looking back. Although I talked to her on the phone, and saw her at the hearing where I was a witness, I didn't see her alone again. We didn't need to be alone again. We had helped each other when we needed it, and that was enough.
Ev never learned about Phyllis Brubaker, and I never intend to tell her. It would achieve nothing.
By April, Ev and I were barely speaking to one another. Even Carlie seemed to be avoiding me, though I made it a point to take her places on weekends. Most of the time Ev chose not to come along, and I suspect that it provided her with a safe time to be with Saunderson. One Sunday afternoon when Carlie and I were playing miniature golf at Good's Dairy Barn, she asked me if I was still sick, and I said I was, yes, a little.
"But you're not going to die," she asked, not looking at me.
I didn't want to hurt her, but I didn't want to lie to her either, to give her false hopes so that when the inevitable came, she would feel horribly betrayed. I weighed the alternatives, and felt that it would be better to hurt her a little now, to prepare her for what would surely come. Lying to her would be easier, but it would be the coward's way, leaving my wife to deal with my daughter's pain alone.
"I'm not sure," I said, putting my hand on her shoulder. "The doctors say that . . . I could die."
When she looked at me her face was pale. "When?"
"Well, I don't know. Nobody knows. Maybe not for a year or so, maybe not for a couple years."
Carlie jerked her shoulder away from my hand, threw down her putter, and ran through the gate and to our car, where she sat down against it and began to wail. Sitting down with her, I began to babble about getting better, and maybe everything being all right, and there always being a chance, and on and on.
I don't know to this day why I told her. I like to believe that I was thinking of her best interests, but sometimes I wonder if I did it because I felt her slipping away from me and wanted to bind her to me with pity. I hope to Christ that's not the reason. But whatever the reason, I had done the wrong thing again.
The fact, pure and simple, was that I didn't know how to die. No one had ever taught me. And, as a result, I was fucking it up royally. I often thought that when I first found out about the leukemia, I should have just walked out of the hospital in front of a truck. All over. Accidental. Double indemnity paid off to my family, who would, for the rest of their lives, have remembered dear old Dad, rather than the neurotic fuck who hung around too long. Yeah. And Liz Taylor should have retired when she was still svelte.
Well, that aced it with Carlie and me. The less she had to do with me now the better. I don't think it was that she didn't want to be near a person who was dying. Rather, she was angry with me for telling her about it, and she was angry with me for doing it, as though I had a choice in the matter and had decided to leave her and her mother. It was irrational, but no more irrational than much of my behavior that year. For a few days after that, I toyed with the idea of not showing up for my maintenance therapy, thinking that maybe I'd have a quick remission, and finish everything a lot sooner that way.
But I didn't. And the reason I didn't was because it looked at last as though I might have something to live for after all, at least a bit longer than I'd intended.
Mid-April I'd gotten an easy assignment to do a background check on a corporate research scientist whose company suspected him of selling formulas to a competitor. The guy kept monklike hours, and his lights were usually off by ten-thirty or so, getting me home in time for the WGAL news at eleven.
Ev was curled up and working on lesson plans in the big padded rocker in the rec room when I got home. The news had just started, and we said hello and exchanged a few polite observations on the day. Then the typical silence set in, and I got a beer from the refrigerator and sat on the couch.
There were the usual stories on the state and local level, and then the weatherman came on and did his thing. The last story of the half hour was always of the human interest or entertainment variety, and tonight it concerned a benefit concert held earlier that evening for the Fulton Opera House, a gorgeous and lovingly restored theatre down on Prince Street that seemed to always need money. John Darrenkamp, a velvet-voiced Met baritone who was one of the city's favorite sons, had sung, and they showed a clip of him doing something from Madame Butterfly. I'd heard him several times in the free summer concerts out at Long's Park, and thought he was terrific, so I took my attention off the newspaper and watched the story.
After the clip of Darrenkamp singing, there was a mini-interview with the head of the Fulton Foundation, and a shot of all the rich folks who could afford fifty bucks a seat leaving the theatre. And there, right in the middle of all those wealthy, healthy people, was my old friend, Carlton Runnells.
The camera zoomed in on him, and an unseen voice asked him how he liked the performance. "I thought it was simply wonderful," he said heartily. "Just magnificent," he added, in case anyone didn't know the word wonderful, I suppose. He looked full-fleshed and ruddy in the TV lights' harsh glare. There was not a trace of gauntness or pallor.
The son of a bitch was blooming with health. Breath escaped me in a sharp hiss, and Ev looked up. "Mac?" she said. "What is it?"
I kept watching the screen. Runnells was smiling even more broadly, as a woman with blue hair and an honest-to-God tiara pushed her way into the frame and began speaking.
"Mac?"
Runnells looked to his right, and his head jerked back slightly in an attitude of pleased surprise. Then he moved out of frame, leaving the woman with the blue hair alone.
"Hey? . . ."
I looked at Ev, not recognizing her.
"You just see a ghost or what?"
My head felt stuffed with possible answers, only one of which made any sense. He had skinned me. The bastard had taken me over as easily as a Manhattan Three-card Monte dealer could sucker an Iowa high-school sophomore.
"Yeah," I told Ev. "That's just what I saw. A ghost."
That night I slept lousy. I kept thinking about it all night long, and knew I was right. At seven in the morning I called Ravenwood, not giving a good goddam who I woke up. It turned out to be Michael Eshleman, as I'd suspected it would be. He sounded sleepy, as I'd also suspected. Christ, I was one helluva detective, wasn't I? I told him who I was, and that I wanted to talk to Runnells.
"Holy shit, man, it's seven in the fucking morning, I can't wake him now . .
."
"Wake him, Michael."
"Fuck you, man, he didn't get to bed till like four. I ain't even sure I could wake him if I tried."
"Michael, if you can't wake him, I'll bet you twenty to life the police can."
"Huh?"
"The police, Michael. The people I'm going to leave your boss's wakeup call with if you don't roust the cocksucker and get him on the phone."
That set Michael back a bit. Finally he said, "Hold on. I'll get him." Funny what a little blue-coated persuasion can do.
When Runnells came on the line, his voice was roughened by sleep, but he still sounded alert. I'd have been fucking alert too. "Hello, Mr. McKain. This is Carlton Runnells."
"It sure is," I agreed. "In the flesh. In the healthy, unsullied flesh too. You looked good on the news."
He yawned, and cleared his throat. "So they used it, eh? Unfortunately I didn't see it. Was at a little party afterward."
"Why aren't you dead, Runnells?"
He paused for a moment. "You're not very charitable, Mr. McKain."
"Okay. Okay then, I apologize. You don't have to be dead, but you damned well ought to be dying."
"A recovery, McKain. A wonderful and miraculous recovery. Praise God."
"You're full of shit, Runnells."
"McKain . . ."
"I'm going to the police."
"Listen to me . . ."
"You conned me, you fucker!"
"I think we'd better talk first before you do anything you might be sorry for."
"We're talking now!"
"I don't mean on the phone."
"Where then?"
"Somewhere. Face-to-face. Calmly and rationally."
I laughed. "This isn't a very rational situation, is it?"
"Would you be afraid to come out here?"
"Why? Your doctor doesn't let you get out?"
"I'm serious. Come out here. Bring a gun if you like. Tell your wife where you're going, if you suspect that I might try to do something to you."
"Oh hell, why would I suspect something like that? Just because I can nail your ass to a murder?"
"I don't think you understand, McKain. I don't have to try and kill you. You can live forever, for all I care. You're already mine."
I didn't say anything for a long time. I couldn't see how he figured it, what he had on me. But the bastard was slick enough not to bluff if he couldn't back it up in some way. Maybe it would be a way I could get around. At any rate, I didn't see what I had to lose by talking. And I wanted to see him again. I wanted to see him and maybe, if he said the slightest thing that I didn't like, to smash his fucking face in.
"I'll be out," I told him, "and someone will know I'm there. I won't be carrying either. So if you try and kill me and want to cop self-defense, you'll be up shit creek." I slammed down the phone, hoping that I shattered his eardrum.
When I went through the kitchen, Ev and Carlie were in the middle of breakfast. "You want something?" Ev asked. I gave a brief shake of my head and kept walking into our bedroom, where I reached high up into the closet, underneath the blankets we never used, and took down my zippered case of pistols.
The .38 was the one I needed, and I loaded it and stuffed it down the front of my pants so that the butt stuck out over my belt top. Good way to blow your balls off, but I didn't much care. I put on my leather jacket and shifted the gun over a little so that it wouldn't be visible with the jacket open. I had no intention of walking into Ravenwood without a weapon, regardless of what I'd told Runnells. Maybe this way he and Mikey would think twice about perforating me before I got a chance to talk.
I came back through the kitchen, and when I saw Ev and Carlie, the thought struck me that I might never see them again, that there might be a shootout at the Ravenwood Corral, and I might damn well lose. But I couldn't say a final good-bye—I felt that I'd done that months ago. So I just kissed each of them on the cheek, said I'd see them tonight, and left. I hadn't had breakfast, but I didn't feel hungry. I felt mad.
There was no one visible when I pulled my car up in front of Runnells's home, and I sat inside the car for a moment, checking the windows and doors, all of which were closed. I looked at the nearby trees too, but saw nothing peculiar. Then the front door opened, and Runnells and Eshleman came out. They were wearing shirts tucked into their pants, and their hands were empty, almost as if they wanted to show me that there was no danger of treachery. Runnells gave a little wave that changed to an inward gesture of invitation. How could I not accept?
I climbed from the car, my jacket zipped, my pistol pushing uncomfortably into my belly. I could get to it fast if I had to. Without a word, I followed the two men into the house, pulling the door closed behind me. We walked to where we had had our first interview, but this time I sat against the window, to keep a clearer eye on Runnells. He sat down near me and turned to Eshleman.
"Michael, would you get us some coffee please?" He looked at me. "I assume you'd care for some?"
"I'll pass."
Runnells smiled. "McKain, you don't suspect us of trying to poison you?"
"I'm already awake enough. Now. What have you got to say?"
"Michael?" He nodded at Eshleman, who went out, closing the door behind him.
"Don't want Dopey to hear?"
"Don't be cruel, McKain. Michael may not be a genius, but he's loyal. He likes me and the life I give him."
"You fuck him?"
"McKain . . ."
"Or he fuck you?"
"I don't think we have to . . . resort to this."
"What were you going to say—sink to this level? That's a good one."
"You're already on this level, McKain. You're in deep."
"You didn't kill Townes because he gave you AIDS."
"That's true. I don't have cancer any more than you do, McKain."
I almost laughed, but I was too pissed off.
"It was a long shot, but it worked. There wasn't much else I could do, frankly. I didn't think you'd believe me, first of all. And when you did, I thought you'd probably go to the police anyway. But you had more compassion than I gave you credit for, McKain. Good thing for me. Not so good for you."
"I was pretty stupid, wasn't I?"
Runnells shrugged. "You were stupid not to check up, I suppose. AIDS shouldn't hit that fast. If Chris had given it to me, it probably wouldn't have shown itself for a long time—maybe even years. You could've found that out by reading People, for Christ's sake."
"I don't read People."
"Evidently not."
"So why did you kill him?"
"It's a long story, McKain."
"I've got some time."
He grinned. "Me too. A lot of it."
As God is my witness, I wanted to kill him. I wanted to just pull out my gun and fire straight into his mewling, insufferably self-satisfied face and watch it splash apart. But I wanted to know, too. I really wanted to know. "Tell me," I said.
"All right, I will. You can pin one murder on me already, McKain, if you ever want to, which you won't. So it won't do any harm to tell you about another one."
"Another murder?"
"Mmm-hmm. It's nice to be able to talk about it. To be able to tell about what you've accomplished in your life."
Runnells
Chapter 11
A gay acquaintance of his once told Carlton Runnells that he wished Runnells was one of the straights so that he could fuck up their reputation for a change. Runnells laughed, as Runnells laughed at every comment made about him, but he knew his friend meant it.
Still, if someone could have waved a magic wand and made him straight, he would have grabbed the wand and broken it. He liked being gay, liked the dangers and the excitement of it, and most of all he liked the fact that it was, in Lancaster County at least, still not respectable. Had it been accepted as easily as in New York or Provincetown or San Francisco, there would have been no fun in it for Runnells. Because for Runnells, there was no fun in anything that was not mix
ed with vice. Had it become respectable and normal to be gay, he would have found something else to become.
Carlton Runnells had known he was gay since he was in high school. The night before he began classes as an art major at Millersville State Teachers' College, his father, a big, burly man who'd stacked cartons in a shoe factory for twenty years, sat him down and told him that he suspected him of queering around, and that such things were not only wrong, they were evil, like killing people or stealing, and that he'd better not queer around on his father's money, or he'd put his damn self through school.
Carlton Runnells took his father's speech to heart, but hardly in the way the older man would have wished. If, Runnells perversely and delightedly reasoned, being gay was evil, then he was condemned already, for he was gay the way other people had red hair, or a mole on their nose, or ears that stuck out. It was just the way he was. And since he was predestined to be evil, well, what the hell, he might as well go all the way.
So that evening's discussion with his father became, in his memory at least, the epiphany of his life, the moment when Carlton Runnells became amoral. It was a story that he liked to tell frequently, and he did, to every man he slept with, and a few women as well.
It wasn't long before Runnells moved out of his parents' house, from which he'd been commuting, and started to pay his own way through school by working in the dining hall. When he was graduated in 1961, he found a position at a high school in a small town near Lancaster, where he taught grades nine through twelve and designed the sets for the plays and musicals. Though a few male teachers joked about his getting a date for the weekend, he established a reputation as a ladies' man, due to his good looks and courtly manners, and was often found in the company of a husband-seeking teacher a few years out of college and already tired of life in the classroom.
He took one to bed one evening, as much to satisfy his curiosity as to quench any desire. She was the first woman he had slept with, and he found the experience to be not at all unpleasant, and decided from that night on that he must be bisexual, though still preferring men. It was a good thing to know, and he was glad for it. All talents, he thought, were a blessing, and might be used someday to good advantage.
McKain's Dilemma Page 9