Fire Lake

by Jonathan Valin

  She took the photograph in her left hand and stared at it. Tears ran down her cheeks, spotting the surface of the picture. “Oh, Lonnie,” she said in a tiny voice.

  “Where is he, Leanne?” I said. “Where is Jon?”

  “At the motel,” she whispered.

  Leanne began weeping hysterically, bouncing up and down and clasping herself tightly with both arms, as if she were literally about to fall apart. Levy went over to her, giving me a vicious look as he passed by.

  “It’s all right, honey,” he said, pulling her to him. “You didn’t know.”

  She looked up at him desperately. “I’ve got to get off again, Sy,” she pleaded, her face running tears. “I can’t take it. I can’t! It’s just too horrible.”

  Levy stroked her hair gently. “You need your strength, now, Leanne. You don’t want to go getting high with your folks around.”

  “I have no strength,” she wailed. “They took it all away from me. They took everything I cared for. And now they’ve taken Lonnie too.” She looked over at Karen. “I loved him, Karen. I really loved him.”

  Karen ducked her head. “Oh, Christ,” she said softly.

  I got up from the couch and went over to Levy. “I need your car, Sy,” I said.

  He glared at me. “For why? For more destruction? Isn’t this awful enough?” He looked down at Leanne, who had buried her face in his chest. “Just leave it alone. Let the police handle it.”

  “He’s right, Harry,” Karen said. “It’s over.”

  “The fuck it is,” I said angrily. “He killed your husband, Karen. He killed my friend.”

  “Your friend, Harry?” she said, giving me a long, long look.

  “Yes,” I said. “My friend.” I turned back to Sy. “Give me the keys, old man, or I’ll take them off you.”

  Sy blanched, then reached in his pocket, and handed me the keys.

  Karen started to get up and I shook my head. “No!” I said sharply. “You stay here. Call Al Foster. Tell him to get a warrant and search this place. If Silverstein hasn’t turned it over yet, the crack might still be here.”

  “What about Jordan?” Karen said. “Won’t he be notified? I mean we’re fugitives from him right now.”

  “Just make the call,” I told her.

  44

  I WALKED out of the house into the cold afternoon twilight. The sun was just setting above the oak trees, casting long shadows across the yard and turning the ice on the duck pond bloodred. I got in the Studebaker, started it up, and headed back up the access road to the highway.

  It took me less than ten minutes to get to the motel. The neon sign was on, sputtering feebly in the dusk. I parked by the office and walked over to the bar. There were only a half dozen locals inside—it was too early for the bike crowd.

  I spotted Jon Silverstein immediately. He was sitting by himself in a booth on the left-hand wall. He looked up at me when I came over to him—a smile forming on his long, horsey face—then immediately looked away, as if he could tell from my expression why I’d come. He passed a trembling hand through his curly red hair and stared morbidly at the Rolex on his wrist, as if it were a shiny gold bug crawling up his arm.

  I sat down across from him in the booth. “I’ve come to get you, Jon,” I said. “I need the crack. LeRoi wants it back.”

  A sick smile flitted across Silverstein’s face. He grabbed at it with his right hand, squeezing his lips together until they were a bloodless white. “Who’s LeRoi?” he asked. He wasn’t trying to be cute. It was a real question; but then there was no reason for him to know LeRoi’s name.

  “He’s the guy Lonnie copped the crack from.” I stared at him across the booth table. “You aren’t going to tell me you don’t know anything about the crack, are you, Jon?”

  He didn’t say anything.

  “That was pretty damn cute, what you did. Giving Lonnie two thousand dollars to buy with—just enough to get LeRoi interested. That way, if it didn’t work out, you’d lost nothing. And if it did, you’d paid only two grand for twelve grand’s worth of stuff.”

  Silverstein dropped his hand from his mouth. It hit the table with a thud, like a dropped rock. “What if I said that I don’t know what you’re talking about?”

  “Then I’d say you’re lying,” I said coldly. “You’re involved, Jon. I saw your Jeep parked here on Friday night.”

  “I can explain that!” he said quickly.

  I shook my head. “Don’t bother. I found Lonnie’s picture inside your glove compartment. How do you explain that?”

  Silverstein smiled his sick smile again. “Lonnie’s picture,” he whispered, as if it were something he’d overlooked.

  “Did you forget you’d left it there, Jon? Or did you just stop caring about what happened to Lonnie Jack?” I stared into his frightened face. “I could almost understand that. The only thing I don’t understand is why you went along with Cal and Norvelle when they decided to kill Claude. Why’d you do that, Jon? Was he going to run away with all of it? Or didn’t you want to sit on the crack either? Did you need a quick fix too? Even if it did mean taking a chance? Even if it did mean murdering Claude and Lonnie?”

  “Was that such a loss—Lonnie?” Silverstein blurted out, his voice shaking angrily. “Does he really mean anything to you—you, who are playing hide-the-salami with his old lady? Do you know what your pal Lonnie did to my wife? Do you know what my marriage has been like? Do you care about what I’ve had to put up with for the last fifteen years because of the nasty little habit he taught her? Do you know the heartbreak? The money it’s cost me? The kids—what they’ve seen with their own eyes?” His voice was choked with rage.

  “So you did this all for Leanne? Is that what you’re telling me?” I reached across the table and snapped the gold band of his Rolex. He jerked his hand away. “C’mon, Jon. Don’t kid a kidder.”

  “I’ve got nothing to say to you.”

  “You’re going to have to talk to the cops,” I said. “They’re on their way now.”

  Silverstein bolted out of the booth, banging his bony knees on the tabletop. I stretched a leg out and tripped him as he ran past me; he sprawled face first on the barroom floor. The bartender came running out from behind the bar with a baseball bat in his hand.

  “You okay, Jon?” he said.

  Silverstein looked up groggily. His nose was bloody from the fall, and he wiped it with his sleeve. “Get rid of him,” he said, glancing at me.

  The bartender started toward me, waving the bat in front of him. But I already had the pistol out. I pointed it at him, gripping the butt in both hands. The bartender took a step back, almost tripping over Silverstein.

  “You want to get killed, buddy?” I said with ice in my voice. “Over that piece of shit on the floor? Because if you don’t drop the bat, that’s what’s going to happen.”

  The bartender thought it over and dropped the bat on the floor, stepping back toward the bar.

  “Get up!” I said to Silverstein.

  He got to his feet slowly, staring at me fearfully. I slid out of the booth, keeping one eye on the bartender and one on Jon Silverstein.

  “Outside,” I said to Silverstein.

  “Where are we going?”

  “To the cops, Jon. They want to talk to you about Lonnie and the crack. They’ll probably want to look into the financing of some of your real estate deals too. You can afford a good lawyer. Better get one.”

  I pushed him toward the door. “This is kidnapping,” he shouted.

  The half-dozen people in the bar were watching us, anyway. But it was a nice touch.

  I shoved him out the door into the lot and dragged him quickly over to the Studebaker. I figured the bartender was probably already calling the county cops, and a couple of patrons were peeking out the door after us. So the car would be easy to spot. Which meant I didn’t have much time.

  “Where are you taking me?” Silverstein said, looking wildly around him.

  “Home, Jon,”
I said, opening the driver’s-side door and pushing him through it. I got in beside him, holding the gun against his ribs.

  “Listen,” he said desperately, “maybe we can talk about this.”

  “Sure we can talk about it.” I smiled. “Just like you talked it over with Lonnie.”

  He groaned. “Look, I’ve still got the crack. That’s what you want, isn’t it? I’ll give it to you, Stoner.”

  I started up the car and pulled out of the lot, speeding off up the highway. In the far distance I could hear police sirens heading toward the motel. We’d be back at the farm before they could talk to the bartender and start after us.

  Silverstein dropped his head to his chest and sobbed with despair. “It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. I swear to you. Doing the deal was Lonnie’s idea, for chrissake. He talked me into this fucking thing, the son of a bitch. I was going to buy a little dope and make a few bucks. He was going to make a little money too—to get him started again, to get him on his feet. How did I know Claude and Norvelle and Cal were going to rip him off? I was going to buy some crack, that’s all I was going to do. Then it just started happening, and I...I couldn’t stop it.”

  “Sure,” I said. “You couldn’t help driving Lonnie to his death.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he shouted. “I didn’t do anything but drive him over to Norvelle’s house. He called me from your place on Friday night, and I picked him up outside the apartment. I offered to take him to the bus station, but he wanted to talk to Norvelle first. He said he might call me again later. I just took him where he wanted to go. I hated the son of a bitch, but I didn’t want him dead.”

  “Maybe just a little?” I said, glancing at him.

  He shook his head savagely. “No! I’m not going to lie to you and pretend I’m sorry Lonnie’s gone. But I didn’t plan it that way. I swear to God I didn’t.” His face lit up, as if he’d had a brainstorm. “Why the hell do you think I kept the photograph? I found it on the floor of the Jeep after I drove Lonnie over to Norvelle’s. I kept it in the car, thinking Lonnie’d pick it up later that night. After I dropped him off I went to the bar and poured myself a few drinks. Got kind of wasted. I guess the photograph slipped my mind.” He looked at me beseechingly. “Do you think I would have kept that thing around if I’d known what was going to happen?”

  “And I suppose you had nothing to do with killing Claude either?”

  “Norvelle and Cal killed Claude,” he said. “I didn’t know they were going to do it. Claude...he had the stuff hidden someplace. He wouldn’t tell any of us where it was. He wanted to sit on it for a while. At least that’s what he said. It made no difference to me if he sat on it—what could I do about it anyway? But Norvelle and Cal wanted to complete the deal right away. They needed the cash right away.” He eyed me with wounded helplessness, like a kid, who’d gone along with the bigger kids and found himself in trouble. “I couldn’t just give them the money without the goods, could I? I mean, that’s not businesslike.”

  I laughed dully. “Is that what you told them?” His face turned red. “I didn’t know they would kill Claude. How could I know that? Nobody was supposed to get hurt, I’m telling you. It was a business deal.” He sobbed again hoarsely. “It was supposed to be like the old days,” Silverstein whispered. “No one was going to get hurt.”

  45

  IT WAS almost fully dark when I pulled into the farmyard. I parked behind the Buick and yanked Silverstein out of the car. He looked completely depleted, as if he’d lost all his strength once I’d put the gun on him. He’d picked the wrong line of work, I thought. He wasn’t tough enough to be a drug dealer. At least, not for the kind of deal he’d gotten himself involved in. Maybe he’d told me the truth in the car. Maybe he’d just gotten in over his head and couldn’t figure how to get out again. Or maybe he’d seen the chance to get even with Lonnie, and stood back and let things happen. His grudge against Lonnie didn’t change anything. It just made the past few days seem more terrible, more inevitable. Like everyone else, Silverstein had gotten caught up in Lonnie Jackowski’s life, on Lonnie’s last ride to Fire Lake.

  I stared at the swart farmhouse, glowing yellow at every window in the dusk. It looked like a bastion of warmth and life in the frozen, purpling fields around it. But it was dead inside there too. For a moment, in the rapidly fading light, I felt as if the whole damn country were dying of the same fucking disease. A disease that had started out as something almost like innocent fun, in a time full of promise and good fellowship. For a second I just wanted it to be that way again—the way it had been, for a moment, with Karen and me.

  But that was over too, I thought. What had happened to Lonnie had ended it. Instead of freeing us, his death had left us full of guilts and angers. It had left us alone again, as if all we’d ever shared had been him.

  “C’mon,” I said heavily, pushing Silverstein toward the door.

  He stared at me hopelessly. “I can’t face them,” he said, seeing his whole life draining away in the dark. “How can I face them? And Leanne?” His voice broke.

  “C’mon, Jon,” I said. “I’ve got to go in there too.”

  He glanced at me uncertainly, then walked up to the porch and opened the door. I followed him in.

  The whole group was gathered in the living room—Leanne, her mother and father, Karen, Sy. It looked as if Leanne and her father had been fighting with each other again. They were standing on opposite sides of the room, glaring at each other. The mother was standing in between, like a referee.

  “You bastard!” Leanne said when Jon walked through the door.

  Everyone in the room turned to look at him, and at me.

  “Leanne,” Silverstein said weakly.

  She glared at him, her face burning with anger. “You killed him!”

  “I didn’t!” Silverstein cried. “They killed him—Norvelle and Cal.”

  I glanced at Karen. She dropped her head and covered her eyes with both hands.

  “You let them do it,” Leanne shouted. “You wanted them to kill him. Because I cared for him. Because he meant something to me. Something you could never mean.”

  Her words struck Silverstein like a blow. He staggered where he stood.

  “You’re stoned again,” her father shouted at her. “Listen to you talk. You worthless junkie. That’s your husband. You’re supposed to cleave to him.”

  “He killed Lonnie!” she said, turning to Gearheart with a wild look on her beautiful face.

  She wasn’t in control of herself anymore. The smack and the trauma of Lonnie’s death had simply unhinged her.

  “He deserved killing,” Gearheart shouted. “He’s the one who got you hooked on that stuff in the first place!”

  Leanne groaned. “You never understood him. Or me. You’ve never understood anything. You vicious old bastard.”

  “Leanne!” her mother shouted. “That’s your father.”

  “He’s nothing!” Leanne screamed, starting toward Gearheart.

  Levy tried to grab her by the arm, but she shook him off. As soon as Leanne got within arm’s reach, Gearheart slapped her hard with his right hand. Leanne staggered backward with a groan. Jon Silverstein rushed toward her, from where he’d been standing by the open door. He reached out to her, but Leanne recoiled from his touch—shrieking and slapping at him with both hands.

  “Get away from me!” she screamed. “Get away!”

  Outside, I heard a car pull up in the yard. I glanced out the open door. It was a gray Ford—a cop car. Al Foster stepped out of one door. Jordan stepped out of the other. In spite of what Karen had said, I hadn’t figured on Jordan’s showing up. But I guessed Al hadn’t had a choice. I guessed I hadn’t left him one. They both started walking toward the house.

  Leanne screamed again—at the top of her lungs. “Bastards!”

  Both of the cops started running.

  “I’m going to kill you!” Leanne said to her father. She reached for the gun rac
k and pulled a shotgun off the wall.

  “Leanne!” her mother screamed.

  Silverstein, Karen, and Levy wrestled with Leanne, trying to get the gun away from her. Gearheart just stood there, staring at his daughter with horror. The cops were through the door by then.

  When Jordan saw the shotgun in Leanne’s hand, he pulled out his service pistol.

  “Don’t!” I shouted at him, and made a grab for the gun. Jordan whipped the pistol across my face, knocking me to the floor. Al made a grab for the gun, too, but Jordan shoved him away.

  Everyone in the living room looked toward the door. Silverstein saw the pistol, let go of his wife, and retreated toward the wall. Without him holding her, Leanne easily broke loose from Karen and Levy. She took two steps across the room, holding the shotgun in her hands—a wild, unknowing look on her face.

  Jordan shot her—twice—sending her flying against the far wall beside her husband. She hit the wall hard and sank to the floor. The shotgun fell out of her hands and landed on the rug at her feet.

  For a moment nobody said anything. And then it was chaos. Everyone crying and shouting at once.

  I sat there on the floor, staring at Leanne Silverstein’s bloody body, and didn’t feel like getting up again.

  46

  AFTER LEANNE’S death, Silverstein confessed to everything. He couldn’t stop confessing, the poor son of a bitch. The cops found the crack where he said it would be—upstairs in the bedroom closet of the farmhouse. Jordan promptly busted LeRoi and his boys; and Cal and Renee were tracked down in a Florida motel. I testified against all of them at the trial. A shooting board was convened on the Leanne Silverstein killing. I testified at the board too. In spite of all I could do, they ruled the shooting a justifiable homicide and Jordan walked.

  But the trial and the shooting board were months later. That night, after the coroner had come and gone, Levy drove us back to Cross Lane. We picked up the Pinto and I took Karen to the airport.