‘Yeah, right, I did.’
‘I haven’t looked at it yet. What about?’
‘To see if you knew anybody called Randy Wells.’
‘Sure. A long time ago in New York.’ She laughed. ‘We used to call him Elephant.’
‘Jesus Christ. How well did you know him?’
‘We were never really tight, but we both hung out with the same people. What about him?’
‘Steve Anderson’s wife told me Randy is Steve’s friend. Friend and confidant, supposedly.’
Chico had been following the blonde for a couple of hours, and now dusk was setting in. It hadn’t been all that strenuous, really. She’d gone over to the Dudley Coffee Company and sat in a corner, drinking coffee. Chico bought himself a plain coffee Americano and sat in another corner, at a table surrounded by tourists.
He’d told Melody he was going out for an hour or so. She would be worried he might have been identified, arrested. Nothing he could do about that. He didn’t have a cellphone; they’d taken it from him at the jail. For a while he was caught up in the hum of people talking, the vibration of the whole outside world.
Then the blonde looked at her watch, stood up.
Chico stood up too, watched her go out the door. He waited a bit, then went out too. It must be getting on towards dinner time if you were an early diner. What time was it, exactly? He didn’t have a watch. He’d always scorned watches, being an artist. I have my own time, he’d say.
Stupid punk kid.
The blonde went up the street and made a turn. Then another turn. Where was she going? The Co-op? It was about to close, if it wasn’t closed already. But then she stopped, stood in a doorway just down the street. Waiting, it looked like. For what? For who?
Chico stopped too, stood behind a tree.
The door of the Co-op opened and Windsong came out with someone he didn’t know but he’d seen around, new in town: Kate, that was her name. Kate. Kate was the one Melody told him about – she was in the photograph with the woman who was murdered. Carrie. Carrie Cooper. The news had made it sound like Carrie might have said something to Kate connected to the murders, but it hadn’t panned out.
Oh, no, Chico thought. Shit. What if she had told Kate something and only the blonde knew it? The blonde who’d been buying him drinks at the St Elmo Bar.
Windsong and Kate walked to a truck parked just down the street and got in. He watched it as it lurched down the street and made a turn.
Then Posey came out – Chico knew Posey pretty well, actually. They’d always gotten along. He was glad he wasn’t visible, just in case she might recognize him. Posey came out with Ryan, the manager. The blonde stepped out from the doorway and walked towards them.
They spoke.
Chico heard a name on the breeze. Dakota. He knew Dakota, another artist. She lived over on Yucca Street. Posey waved her hands. The blonde waved hers. Ryan pointed in the direction of Windsong’s truck. The blonde turned away and strode down the street away from where Chico was hiding.
Ryan got in a car.
Chico remembered something, then something else. In fact, a lot of things were starting to come together.
Posey was alone now.
Chico stepped out from behind the tree.
Kate locked the doors and the windows, turned off the lights and in the dark in the living room she called Mandy in New York City, realizing as it rang that it was past ten o’clock there.
‘Hello?’
‘Mandy,’ she said.
‘Yes? Kate, what’s going on?’
‘Randy. Randy Wells. Remember him?’
‘Sure. Elephant. Actually, he’s lost a lot of weight. He looks pretty good now. So, what about him?’
‘I haven’t seen him for years and years, but he’s connected somehow to this whole Ellen thing.’
‘Randy? I don’t think so. I mean, why? He was always a goof, but never – you know, mean.’
‘Not directly connected, maybe, but someone he knows is. Someone called Steve. Steve Anderson.’
‘Steve Anderson. But you know him, Kate. That’s Buzzie. Buzzie Anderson.’
‘No kidding. Buzzie.’ Kate sat down abruptly on the couch. ‘His real name was Steve?’
‘Yes. I think he even kind of had a thing for you, back then.’
‘We went on a date once. It wasn’t much fun.’
‘When did you see him last?’
‘Oh, years ago, I think. Actually, for some reason—’
‘What?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Elephant and Buzzie are both on the DVD I sent you.’
‘I know, I know. Thanks, Mandy. Maybe I’ll check it out again.’
She got off the phone. The DVD was still in the player. She turned on the TV, turned on the player and had a sudden thought.
Where was Dakota, anyway?
She texted her. Where r u? Got no immediate answer. She hit play, and the DVD started up. She hit fast forward till she got to the part with Elephant and Buzzie. Paused it.
And remembered where she’d seen Buzzie last.
Chico called Melody around seven thirty.
‘Where are you? I’ve been really worried,’ she said. ‘How did you get a cellphone? It says Posey Prince.’ A twinge of paranoia entered her voice. ‘What are you doing with her phone?’
He explained. He explained as best he could.
‘Oh my God,’ Melody said. ‘Please, please be careful. What should I do? Should I call the police?’
‘So they can take me back to jail? Of course not. Listen, it will be okay. I’m following her to Dakota’s right now. I’m going to play it by ear. Don’t worry.’
‘What do you mean, don’t worry?’ Her voice veered upward. ‘Are you kidding? Hello? Hello?’
But there was nothing but silence.
Melody went to a drawer in the kitchen. She took out the gun that had belonged to a former boyfriend. It was loaded now. Chico had done that. He was so smart sometimes and so stupid other times. It would be a big mistake to be in love with him.
She knew that.
She put the gun in her purse and went out the door.
Chico could see the phoney blonde up ahead of him. She had a gun in that straw tote, Chico would bet on it. Things were getting clearer and clearer now. Maybe he should have had Melody call the police, but what would that do? Why would they believe him? No, he’d just end up back in jail. Something concrete had to happen. But not too concrete. No one should get hurt.
The streets went up and down, treacherous, full of ruts. The blonde strode on – legs of steel, legs like a guy, and as far as he could tell definitely headed for Dakota’s. He knew a short cut. He darted down a side street, came out. Yep, she was still on her way, and now he was slightly ahead.
A weapon. He needed a weapon, just in case. A rock. Or maybe a tree branch, poke her eyes out. No. A rock was better. A big one.
Malcolm was just coming over the divide and into town when his cell chimed again.
Kate.
‘Listen, I figured it out, and it has nothing to do with anything Carrie might have said to me.’ Her voice was breathless, excited. ‘It’s the blonde woman.’
‘What blonde woman?’
‘The one I saw the day of the shootings. When I got out of my car at the High Desert Market. I knew she looked familiar, but I couldn’t place her. So I said to her, “I’m sorry, I’ve forgotten your name.”’
‘And?’
‘She’d dropped her purse. She said that – her voice was kind of husky, but at the time— Anyway, looking back, it wasn’t a woman. It was Buzzie in a blonde wig.’
‘Who the hell is Buzzie?’
‘Steve Anderson. And listen to this – Posey just called me. She’s seen Chico; she let him use her cellphone. Chico asked her where I was going with Windsong, and Posey told him he was dropping me off at Dakota’s.’ She paused. ‘You don’t think Chico—’
‘God damn it,’ said Malcolm, almost shoutin
g now. ‘I don’t know what to think about anything. Don’t go near the doors or windows. Stay down. I’ll be there as fast as I can.’
FORTY-FIVE
Kate looked at the digital clock on Dakota’s microwave. Seven forty-eight. She listened. Heard no noise. Then there was a noise, a snapping sound, a sliding sound. Malcolm said he was coming right away. What if someone – Buzzie? – was really out there and he saw Malcolm and shot him? No, Malcolm was a policeman. He would know how to do things.
Buzzie. God. He was always kind of a dork. She hadn’t known him long, and they had had a date and it was incredibly boring. He’d been kind of rude and resentful afterwards, as if she’d somehow cheated or tricked him.
She heard another snapping noise, this time on the other side of the house.
Melody walked up the hill to Dakota’s house, where Chico had told her he was going. Why? Why Dakota’s? Dakota was way too old for him.
She could see Chico just in front of her, under the street light. He was behind a big Chinese elm. Melody made a circle, avoiding him, coming up closer to Dakota’s. But what was that? There was a big blonde woman hunched over by the drainage ditch.
Dakota’s place was dark; it looked like no one was there at all. Melody paused and waited. She had the gun in her hand, and it was loaded. Now she had to figure out what to do next.
Maybe just wait.
And then there was a hush. Kate felt it, inside Dakota’s house, doors and windows closed and locked. A deep hush. Then, faintly, background sounds that would normally be automatically filtered came to the forefront – the distant sound of car engines and truck engines, the hum of people’s voices faraway.
And then Kate’s phone chimed. She jumped. Dakota.
‘Hi,’ Kate said, ‘where are you, anyway?’
‘I got into an argument with this asshole sculptor.’ Dakota laughed. ‘I meant to call you before, but it slipped my mind. I’m just coming up the street.’
‘No,’ said Kate. ‘Wait.’
‘What? My phone’s going out. What did you say?’
Shit. Dakota was just down the street. Kate forgot herself and stepped out on to the porch, then down into the street to look for Dakota. And saw Malcolm’s truck coming her way. Thank God, Malcolm was here. She would be safe. Saved.
Then a blonde woman stepped out from behind a mesquite bush, just a few feet away from her, both hands raised. She was holding a gun.
For a millisecond, everything in the whole world stopped.
Then all hell broke loose.
Gunfire came from two different directions, and a large rock sailed through the air and hit the woman just as she fell. Her blonde hair came off. The roar of a motorcycle came from down the street. Biker Bill rode up, swerved, just missing Steve aka Buzzie Anderson as he lay bleeding on the street.
He stopped. ‘What the fucking hell!’ he said.
Malcolm, Chico and Melody all appeared from somewhere. And from down the street came – wow! – Windsong, stopping by to check on her. And Posey! Windsong and Posey. News traveled fast in a small town.
‘Better call an ambulance,’ Malcolm said, ‘though I think he might be dead.’
They stood together, murderers, some of them.
Kate took a deep breath. She looked at Malcolm and Dakota, at Chico and Melody, at Windsong and Posey, at Biker Bill – all these people, just helping one another. What a wonderful world.
FORTY-SIX
Or not murderers, as it turned out. Steve ‘Buzzie’ Anderson did not die of the wounds received that evening in old Dudley on the street in front of the house belonging to Dakota Silverstein. He was transported to the Copper Queen Community Hospital and from there air-evaced to Tucson Medical Center, suffering from a concussion brought on by being hit with the large rock thrown by Gilberto ‘Chico’ Flores and two bullet wounds – one in the right shoulder from a shot fired by Malcolm McGregor, and the other in the left hand from a shot fired by one Melody Young.
As he was recuperating, a Cochise County grand jury found probable cause to charge him with two counts of first-degree homicide for the murders of Wes and Carrie Cooper, as well as several other less serious charges.
All charges against Gilberto ‘Chico’ Flores were dropped, and on the strength of his sold-out show on the Gulch he got a one-man show at a pretty good gallery in Phoenix scheduled for some time in the spring.
As for the rest of them, they continued on, working at restaurants, at food co-ops, in studios, as private investigators for defense attorneys; mourning their former lives, their dead wives and their old selves as they began to create new ones.
‘That song you were singing?’ Malcolm said to Kate as they were having Senegalese peanut soup one day at El Serape restaurant. ‘That your mom used to sing to you? About the little boat?’
‘What about it?’
‘How did it go, in English?’
‘Something like this – Mother, the little boat that goes on water, does it have legs? Of course, my little silly, if it didn’t have legs, it couldn’t go.’
‘Ah.’ Malcolm swallowed a spoonful of delicious peanut soup. ‘Sounds like a poem by Harry Light.’
Empty Houses Page 25