“Can you keep what I’m about to say quiet?”
“Hm. You’re a friend, not a client. But I suppose so.”
“Okay. I’ve been doing some writing.”
“Instead of art.”
“Yes. A book.”
“Wow. I want to read it! What’s it about?”
He opened his mouth, but nothing came out.
She finally asked, “You still there?”
“Yeah. I’m writing about…Karl.”
“Oh.” A pause. “I haven’t thought about all that in a long time. You know what I remember?”
“What?”
“Those silent meals. Have you ever known such an uptight scene? Thinking about them still gives me a stomach ache.”
No, he hadn’t remembered. Lunch grumbled in his gut. “I know what you mean.”
“The Dining Hall.”
Ray’s breath caught, and he stood and leaned his forehead against the cold window. She’d nailed Karl’s peculiar enunciation, better than Bodine even. Now all the names came back. The Kitchen. The Meeting Hall. The House. Ordinary words transformed by Karl’s skilled tongue so that they hummed with esoteric meaning.
She said, “Sorry. I didn’t mean to freak you out.”
He sat back down. “It’s just that you do his voice so well. Have you heard anything about him?”
“Nothing.”
“And if you haven’t heard…”
“Nobody’s heard.”
“Do you think there’s still a group?”
“It’s hard to imagine there is.”
“Is he even alive?”
She paused. “If he died… someone would have told me.”
It was true. Ray’s gut clenched—he’s alive.
She said, “Why are you writing this book?”
“Money.”
“Which means it’s going to get published.”
“It looks like it.”
“I can see why you want to know if Karl’s still around. As you remember, any of a number of things made him unhappy.” She laughed. “If someone folded his napkin wrong… But revealing his darkest secrets? After him commanding us not to speak? Whew. And I’m speaking as the one who started talking back then.”
“I know. And I’m glad you did. I never would have been able to leave if you didn’t.”
“But that was only to you and a few other friends. Not to the public. Are you sure you’re just doing this for the money?”
Smart Lorraine. “No. I’m… trying to deal with some of what happened too.”
“I’m sure. Which could be a good thing, but also dangerous. And I don’t just mean if Karl finds out.”
“How do you mean?” Her words made him nervous. He stood and rocked from leg to leg in the small room.
“Ray, in my business, in order to get to a better place, sometimes you have to go through a worse place. And it can get… rocky. You never told me what happened, but judging from what I know about others, plus of course Susan…”
He cut her off. “I can handle it. What I’m worried about is Karl. Are you still in touch with anyone from the group?”
Silence. He sat and leaned back on the couch. She said, “Harold’s around.”
“I don’t think I want to talk to him.” There was bad blood, something to do with a gig Harold got the band, and they never got paid. He didn’t like the guy. Or, more importantly, trust him.
She laughed. “You know who I ran into just a couple of years ago? Fred.”
“Jeez. I almost forgot there was a Fred. Almost.”
“He’s as weird as ever. He gave me one of those looks—you remember.”
“Oh, yeah.” The disciple dead-eye, staring right through you.
“And I wondered for a moment if he might not be still involved with Karl. Then I figured—he’s just being Fred. I see clients like him. I think he’s somewhere on the spectrum.”
“Makes sense.” Talking to the guy was a chore. Fred didn’t get the give and take of human interaction. He’d express deeply personal things with all the affect of a robot. He’d blurt out insults to your face like he thought he was only giving you the time of day.
Ray suddenly understood something. He said, “You know when Fred whispered, wagged his finger, bored his eyes into you…”
She laughed.
“He was trying to imitate Karl, probably unconsciously. He was so bad at it that I never got it. Until now.”
“I think you’re right.”
“Can you imagine Karl putting up with him all this time?”
“No. I saw Fred down in Rhinebeck. Maybe he’s living around there. I have to get to a dinner. But great to talk, as always. And good luck with the writing. Tough, isn’t it?”
Ray remembered Lorraine had done a bit of writing herself. Was it tough? Ray hadn’t been doing it long enough to know. “I suppose.”
“And listen, any of that stuff starts getting to you, you can call me. Not on a professional basis, but as a friend.”
“Thanks.”
He hung up. Could he trust her to keep her mouth shut? It was too late now. He had to. He looked out the window. Night had stolen in while he was on the phone. He didn’t want to talk to Fred now any more than he ever had. Didn’t have any other ideas. He found a number down in Hyde Park. He paused. This was a bad idea. His fingers went ahead and dialed.
“Yeah.” No hi.
“It’s Ray. Ray Watts.” He stood and leaned against the wall.
“Yeah.” Flat.
“Am I interrupting your dinner or something?”
“No.”
“How have you been? It’s been a long time.”
“I’m fine.”
Fred didn’t inquire about Ray. He said, “I’m curious. Have you been in touch with Karl?”
“No.”
“Heard anything about him?”
“No.”
Fred hung up.
Ray remained standing. He shook his head violently, shrugged his shoulders and wrung his hands, trying to rid himself of the conversation. He felt the usual awkwardness from talking to Fred, but also the fear that Fred might tell. But tell what? Ray hadn’t said a word about writing. Still, he pictured Fred slinking up to Karl, tattling, trawling for points as they all did.
Karl whispering, What is it, Fred?
Ray was asking about you.
Was he? Where is Ray?
Ray woke the next morning. He’d been dreaming, the same recurrent one, plus or minus a detail, that he’d been having since he left the group. He switched on lights as he fumbled downstairs. As he made coffee, the dream replayed:
He stands at the edge of a clearing in a wood. Winker, Ethan, Susan and others mill around. He’s steeped in dread. But the other people seem uncharacteristically relaxed. They lazily trim bushes, shoot the shit, something they never did back then. Ray steps from the trees, and one by one they turn toward him and smile. Warm and friendly. Even Bassman’s morose face is smiling.
It’s wrong. None of them ever smiled.
The talking stops. Everyone looks to their right, to a dark opening in a rock, a cave entrance. Karl emerges from it into the sun, like the hermit Saint Anthony in a painting. He approaches Ray, beaming with compassion, his arms outstretched—welcome home! His eyes shine with forgiveness. Ray opens inside, letting the warmth in.
Karl reaches Ray and places a soft palm on his shoulder. He explains in his most eloquent whisper, as only Karl can, how it was all a misunderstanding, how Ray’s leaving is just a small thing that will float away, like a leaf on a stream.
All’s forgiven. But Ray is inching backwards from Karl, across the clearing. Turning and running into the woods, consumed by terrible guilt.
The dream was dissolving, but Ray clung to its remnants, trying to
understand. It always ended with the same feeling: his guilt for leaving the group. For years now he’d believed himself free of Karl. But that was when he was awake. By night the old guy had been regularly visiting, radiating an affection he’d never shown in reality. And the terrible thing was that in these dreams Ray returned it.
Some part of him loved Karl. How could that possibly be, after everything that had happened?
The dream left a smudge on the morning. Lunch made him sleepy. He trudged up to the couch, idly surfed around on the net. He seamlessly transitioned from sitting to lying down, now just get the afghan over his legs.
He woke to the tinkling of glass. Susan. He found the broken window downstairs. He called Bodine, and he found the brick.
Ray was still staring at the brick when Bodine knocked on the back door. Ray laid it on his desk and let him in. Bodine’s Mustang convertible was in the alley, the top down, a piece of plywood perched in the back seat.
In the front of the gallery, they stood before the window. Bodine said, “Kids? The little fuckers ought to be in school.”
Ray didn’t say anything.
Bodine looked at him. “What?”
Ray handed him the brick with the “Lent” side up.
Bodine stared at it. He gazed at Ray, and it took a moment to get the expression, because it was so rare on his friend. Bewildered.
Ray asked, “You recognize it too?”
“That depends. Where’s that laptop?”
“Upstairs. It’s warmer up there. And there’s coffee.” They climbed up to the kitchen, and Ray got the computer. Bodine sat with it as Ray fired up Liz’s espresso machine and stood waiting for it to heat. He was embarrassed by the dirty dishes and sticky counters, but his friend was too busy to notice.
Bodine typed. “This thing was made around 1910 by the Lent Brick Company, a half hour up river from here.”
“So?”
Bodine read, then said, “Brickmaking was big business back then around here. ‘Lent’ was one of 130 companies, each stamping their bricks with their name. Which makes the odds slim that a brick from this particular company would randomly smash your window.”
Ray said, “Why would you remember ‘Lent’ after all this time?”
“I can’t speak for you, but it was spring, if you recall. And I had the heretical thought—with Karl, it’s Lent all year round.”
Ray laughed. “True.”
Bodine said, “Which is why it stuck with me. How’d you remember?”
“Repetition. Ten thousand is a shit ton of bricks.”
“The question is—what the hell was this brick doing coming through your window?”
The computer pinged. They ignored it.
Ray said, “It’s got to have something to do with… the writing.”
“Which is about Karl. What have you done so far?”
“That’s the thing. Precious little. I’m still stuck trying to get in that house.”
Ray ground the beans and was tamping coffee into the filter basket when the computer pinged again. Annoyed, Ray stalked over, grabbed the laptop, and opened his email. He leaned over and read. The subject of the first message was “Maxwell House.” Ray looked at Bodine. “What the hell? You think it’s okay to open it?” Ray pulled his chair around next to Bodine’s, sat and they looked.
Bodine said, “I don’t see any attachments.”
Ray clicked.
Good to the last drop.
Bodine asked, “Some joke. Only the joker is Karl, or somebody that knows what you’re doing.”
The second email had the same subject line as the first. Ray said, “They sent it twice.” He opened the new one. This message was different:
don’t
think
Bodine said, “Fuck me.”
They looked at each other. “Don’t think” was one of Karl’s favorite whispered commands. Despite his growing panic, Ray’s mind still churned on, wondering how he’d never noticed before just how much of Karl’s language was couched in the negative. Don’t. Stop. Never.
A third ping.
This email seemed to be blank. Ray scrolled down, impatient as the scroll bar slowly crawled down the screen. He was about to give up when the words appeared:
never speak about what we do
stop writing
Ray said, “The brick came from The House. From…Karl.”
Bodine hit the scroll bar. “Hold on. There’s more.”
Karl Maxwell was the front man for Blues Revolution. They were part of….
Ray said, “I wrote that. They crossed it out. How did they get it?”
“A lot of questions here. First, how’d they get your email address? And a physical address, to deliver that brick?”
“And how do they know I’m writing?”
Bodine shook his head. “Did you call Lorraine?”
“Yeah.”
“You told her you were writing?”
“Uh-huh. But she swore she’d keep it confidential, like I was one of her clients.”
“You trust her?”
“I think so.”
“You need to call her back and ask if she told anyone.”
“Okay.” That was going to be fun. Ray’s voice took on a chill. “Susan. She has something to do with this.”
“You just showed me her obituary. What—her ghost flew up from Jersey and tossed a brick through your window?”
“I know. It’s crazy, but it was seeing that news about her that triggered the writing.”
Ray got up, finished making the coffee, brought it to the table, and sat.
Bodine said, “You didn’t install that software I told you to, did you?”
Ray gave Bodine a guilty look.
“I warned you about mysterious white vans out on the street. They can suck the bits right off your hard drive”—Bodine pointed to the computer—“as easy as an anteater at an ant fest.”
“I haven’t seen anything like that.” But Ray was picturing a blizzard of ghostly atoms of information, the air swirling with teeny scraps of notepaper and Post-its and random letters, phantom figures chasing after them with nets, grinning. “I’m not getting it. Karl sending someone out with a bunch of high-tech equipment? Karl hated technology. He didn’t even believe in electricity.”
“Well, somebody does. What if Karl’s got some minion doing this for him? He certainly had no trouble getting us to do loads of shit for him.” Bodine clicked around. “Here’s where these emails came from: [email protected].”
He typed some, then said, “As I suspected. It’s a nonsense address. They’re using anonymous remailers. Even if they were sending it from right up the street they could have routed it to Bangkok, then Brazil, then up to Kazakhstan—twice around the world. It would be hard to trace.”
“Really. You couldn’t trace it?”
Bodine shook his head, “It would take weeks. Well, at least we can plug the leak. I’m installing some serious security software.”
“Don’t you need to go home to do that?”
“I’ll download it.”
Ray brought their cups to the sink and rinsed them. When he returned to the table Bodine handed him the computer.
“Here you are. Locked tighter than the Muscle Shoals rhythm section. Still, you tell me if you notice any vans lurking.”
“How serious do you think they are about stopping me?”
“Assuming it’s Karl, I can see him showing up and browbeating the fuck out of you. But something… violent would be beneath him.”
“That brick was violent.”
“Somewhere on the spectrum of violence. They didn’t burn your house down.”
“And if it’s not Karl, but someone he’s handed it off to?”
“That’s scarier. Somebody else might get a little overzeal
ous.”
“Jeez.”
“At least with that new software they won’t know you’re writing.” Bodine stood. “I must get back to it. Let’s patch up that window. You wouldn’t want to scare off all those customers.”
Ray snorted.
They got the plywood up.
Ray said, “Thanks.”
“Any time. Though hopefully there won’t be a next.”
Bodine left. Ray sat in his chair, stared at the plywood. Somebody knew where he was, had demanded he stop writing. This time the brick had broken his window. Next time… he could just picture them, sneaking up behind him on the street. Or breaking in here at night when he was in an absinthe stupor, creeping up to the couch and bashing his brains in.
The next morning, Ray sat in the kitchen drinking coffee and tried to face his mess. Everybody was demanding something from him. For Liz, it was the mortgage. For Lou, a book. The brick-thrower insisted that he stop writing.
Or else.
It was impossible, and all the caffeine did was get his fingers back to their bad habits—drumming on the table and shredding napkins. If he could only write, he’d stop worrying about all this stuff. Because when he was working, in the flow, everything else disappeared.
Even before yesterday’s email had explicitly commanded him to stop writing, the old taboo about speaking had him stuck outside Karl’s door. No way he was trying to get in there. Not today. But his hands needed to write.
When he’d written about Susan, she’d come back to life, back when it was good between them. It had been good with Liz once too. He brought the laptop up to the couch.
I was an hour into my first real gallery show in Soho, my cheeks aching from too much smiling, my nerves jangling up a storm despite the Pinot Grigio I kept sucking down. I saw her first. She stood in profile, facing one of my pieces on its pedestal. It was the best thing I had on display. She had taste.
She was tall, with wavy reddish-brown hair, pretty in a severe way. She wore a long black dress and string of shiny pearls that said money. As she stared at my piece, a private smile stole onto her face. I felt immensely flattered. The expression didn’t match those clothes. It moved up into her eyes, which moistened with a look of wonder. The contradiction between those clothes and that look put a hitch in my breath, propelling me across the room, past my usual shyness.
Never Speak: A Mystery Thriller (The Murderous Arts Series) Page 8