Kiss Them Goodbye

by Joseph Eastburn

  Until now. Finally someone had heard him.

  He walked from the window to the door of the assistant headmaster’s office. He turned the brass knob on the door but it was yanked inward. Goodson was awkwardly filling the entire width of the door opening. Ballard stepped back, startled. Goodson dropped his eyes, bustled through the doorway, and lumbered down the hall. He looked back over his shoulder once. Ballard stared after him, noticing how Goodson’s thighs were so large they rubbed against each other and made the sound of a whisk broom, a sound that could still be heard faintly even after Goodson turned the corner.

  From inside, Ms. Hall called, “Are you coming inside, Mr. Ballard, or not?” The boy closed the door behind him as he stepped onto the carpet inside the room. “Mr. Allington is expecting you,” she said stiffly.

  Once Ballard was ushered into the inner office, he heard the door close behind him. The motion of the door also made a sound that seemed to seal the room off, as if it were vacuum-packed. On the other side of the room, staring down, hardly breathing, was Allington. Without looking up, he spoke.

  “You may sit down, Cary.”

  “Thank you, sir.” Ballard slipped onto a dark green leather chair edged with brass studs.

  Allington finished scratching across a sheet of paper that Ballard could tell, by the sound, was the school white bond. He placed an old-fashioned fountain pen in its holder, then screwed the top on the inkwell with his thumb and index finger. His eyes looked up, and as he peered from under his bushy eyebrows, Ballard thought he saw a frown. “Do you know who I’m writing to?”

  “No, sir.”

  Allington picked up the sheet so it reflected the light from the windows. “I’m writing to the officer in charge of the state police station, a Captain Weathers.” Ballard did not respond. “Would you like to read this letter, Cary?”

  “Why should I, sir?”

  At that point, Allington stood up. He smiled at Ballard, a little sadly. “Because it concerns you, young man.”

  “In what way, sir?”

  “In a way that surprises me, Cary. You see, the headmaster has asked me to act as liaison to the police in this investigation.”

  “Oh.” The boy looked around the room. He tugged at his collar.

  Allington laid the sheet of paper neatly on the blotter. He walked around and leaned against the front of his desk. “First, suppose you tell me how you came to be rushing down the back stairway of Ardsley last week, the morning Crawford was murdered?”

  “Because of a lack of air, sir.”

  “A lack of air?”

  “When I saw Crawford’s body, I—I felt I couldn’t breathe, sir. I had to take a walk.”

  “You had to take a walk. I see. Where was your tie?”

  “I don’t know, sir,” Ballard began to stammer. “That is, I don’t . . . uh, remember having my tie with me.”

  “I heard it was found wrapped around Crawford’s neck.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I had to talk to Captain Weathers today, as I mentioned. Surely you know your tie was the one found around the deceased’s neck.”

  “No, sir!”

  Allington stared at Ballard in disbelief. “Weren’t you questioned?”

  “Yes.”

  “By whom?”

  “Lieutenant Fowler.”

  “Didn’t he inform you that you were a suspect?”

  “No. I mean, I always feel like a suspect, but he hasn’t said I was one.”

  Allington was staring. “Why do you always feel like a suspect?”

  Ballard looked down. “I always feel like I’m guilty, even when I’m not.”

  “Have your sessions with Dr. Clarence been helping you?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Do you remember what happened to the white gloves you were issued at the chapel opening day?”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “I wish you did, for your sake.”

  Ballard felt the skin in his face tingle as a wave of needle points worked its way instantly across his forehead, and down the back of his neck. “Oh my God—”

  “What is it?” Allington said, suddenly concerned, taking a step forward. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes, sir, just—a little shocked. I thought they were in the coat in my closet.”

  “I wish they were.” He dislodged his oxfords from the fringe of the Oriental rug and walked back, his heals squeaking. He reached down and pulled the white gloves out of his desk drawer. “Are these the gloves?” he said.

  “How should I know?”

  Allington was touching the edges of the white gloves. “What is this green residue?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Allington scraped the dried mildew with his fingernail. “Where is the other pair, Cary?”

  “I—I don’t know, sir.”

  “Are they in your room?”

  “They must be, sir.”

  “All right,” Allington said, taking a step toward him. “I want you to take a good look at these gloves, go home and get the other pair, and bring them to me.”

  “I can’t see them, sir.”

  “Well, come over here then.”

  Ballard tried to stand, but his legs simply would not move. He tried to raise them, but they felt as though they were asleep. Not wanting to aggravate the master, Ballard attempted to raise himself out of the chair with his arms. His legs gave way.

  He pitched forward onto the rug. It seemed to him as if he was falling, but in a very still way. Skydiving in the fetal position. Suddenly there was more air than he imagined existed. He didn’t remember landing, but he thought he saw the white gloves floating by with a force of their own, guided by a strong hand. The same hand that had broken his fall, letting him slowly, gently down to the floor.

  29

  GREEN’S BAR AND Grill was hardly the kind of place Fowler had expected Muriel Ballard would want to meet. The bar was in a single, white frame house, just off the exit to the interstate. It had frowning green shutters on either side of two long clerestory windows. Next to it, a grocery store, run by the same man, had a sleigh bell nailed to the front door, and it jingled repeatedly as children ran in and out with candy bars.

  Fowler walked inside. The venetian blinds cut the afternoon light into long sections that moved across the faces of the patrons like a ticker tape. Fowler opened the door and stood near the entrance. There was a large kidney-shaped bar around which mostly hunters sat, their colored hats pushed back on their heads.

  One man, astride a barstool to his left, had a lock of loose hair hanging down in front of him. He was listening—as cigarette smoke curled up around him—to a man talking excitedly on the other side of him. The talker looked up. His face, blotched slightly along the cheekbones.

  Fowler heard a hoarse voice from the other side of the bar.

  “Lieutenant?”

  He looked up and saw a tall blond woman, in her late forties, standing at the back of the bar near the cigarette machine. Fowler could see she was wearing a beige sweater dress and heavy makeup, trying, he thought, to hide her wrinkles—of which there were many. When he walked over and shook her warm hand, he noticed an imitation gold bracelet. Her eyes were blue-gray. She had razor-thin lips, a neck that reminded him of a swan, a voice like Bacall.

  “I had to get out. Hope you don’t mind.”

  Fowler saw a cigarette burning in her left hand. “No, this is fine,” he said.

  “I’m glad it suits you,” she said, sitting down, “and if it doesn’t, well . . .” She rolled her eyes up and shrugged.

  Fowler started dragging the barstool over. “As I mentioned on the phone, Mrs.—”

  “Is he in trouble again?”

  Fowler paused, sitting down. An enormous bald bartender ambled over. Muriel jerked her head toward the man behind the bar. “What’ll you have?” she asked.

  “I’ll have a draft.” He glanced at the bartender. “Genny.”

  “Oh, a local boy, huh?” she
said. “Where you from?”

  “Buffalo. Grew up drinking Genesee.” He put a bill on the bar as the large man positioned a mug on a cardboard coaster, took the bill, and leaned toward the register. Fowler cleared his throat as his change was slapped down on the wood. “Mrs. Ballard, you mentioned trouble. Has your son had a problem with discipline?”

  “Oh please,” she said, blowing smoke out. “He tripped his teachers, got in fights, stole things.” Her bass voice dropped. “He’s just—” She waved her hand. “Forget it.”

  Fowler was confused. “Mrs. Ballard?” he said.

  “Call me Muriel.”

  “Mrs. Ballard, your son doesn’t really seem to me like a troublemaker.”

  “Hahaha,” she said.

  “In fact, he seems painfully shy, withdrawn, and . . .”—he searched the striped faces near the window for the word—“defeated.”

  A sentiment pleated her top lip. Fowler couldn’t tell if it was anger or sorrow. “Well, it’s sad, really it is.”

  “What happened to him?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He seems, I don’t know, barely able to function.”

  “They contacted me, pal. I didn’t want to send that kid to another boarding school, I’ll tell you that much.”

  Fowler stared at her. “They contacted you—what do you mean?”

  “No sooner was he suspended from Fieldcrest, that admissions director up there sent me a letter requesting I bring Cary for an interview.”

  “Who was that?”

  “I can’t remember his name. He said something about it being an experiment for ‘youths at risk.’ Hah.”

  “You don’t think Cary’s at risk?”

  “Why are you asking—like I don’t know? I mean—what the hell is this all about?” She drank bitterly from the tumbler on the bar.

  Fowler took a sip of his beer. “You’ve read about the killings.”

  “Who hasn’t?”

  “There’s been some unfortunate—let’s call them . . . coincidences.”

  “You don’t think Cary’s involved, do you?”

  “No, but some people do.”

  Muriel Ballard turned openmouthed to face him. “If you think that kid would hurt a flea, you’re . . .” She stopped herself, twisting the corners of her mouth down like a circus mime.

  “Does he have a temper?”

  “Oh, the worst,” she said, waving the air. “Just like his father, the bum. God save his lousy hide.”

  Fowler realized she had waved at the bartender.

  “Jimmy, repair this for me, will ya?” she yelled, handing him the tumbler. It looked like a scotch on the rocks.

  “What’s Cary’s temper like?”

  “Look, mister, if you expect me to talk against my son, just forget it.”

  Nick Fowler adjusted his barstool. “Mrs. Ballard, there is a wealth of detail mounting up against him. He keeps showing up at the wrong time. I’m trying to—”

  “Of course. Story of my life. The poor kid takes after me, always did.”

  “What I’m trying to determine is—”

  “Oh, you want to pin it on me, don’t you?”

  “No, I—”

  “I gave that kid anything he could ever want. I slaved for him, washed for him. You don’t know what the hell I did for him, now do you?”

  “No.”

  The bartender brought the tumbler back. She took it out of his hand and took a gulp. “You crumb, drive all the way up here and accuse me of such a thing.”

  “I didn’t accuse you.”

  “You’re all the same.”

  Fowler wanted to get out of there. Her whiskey voice was grating on his patience. “Yeah, all men are bums, right?”

  Muriel looked up with surprise. “That’s right,” she said.

  “Why? What did your husband do that was so—”

  “Oh, you don’t want to know. You might drop your halo, mister.”

  “Did he run around?”

  She lit a cigarette, blew the smoke up into the air, and answered. “So you want to turn me into a cliché?”

  “You don’t need any help from me.”

  Muriel wheeled at him. He could see that one had stung. “All right,” she said. “Yes. He did run around, okay? Are you happy? He also drank himself half to death and gambled. Anything else, nosy?”

  Fowler laughed in spite of himself. “I’m sorry,” he said. “This must be hard for you.”

  Muriel giggled. She sat up erect on her stool, opened her compact, and checked her makeup. “Oh Christ, I look like hell.”

  “Look okay to me.”

  “Don’t lie.” She stared over at him.

  Fowler looked at her face in the small mirror. “You look good enough to tell me why your son’s so troubled.”

  Muriel turned to him, her eyebrow twitching. “You got a nerve,” she said, snapping the compact closed.

  Fowler frowned. He stood up. “Did Cary hallucinate?”

  “What?”

  “Did he ever see things?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She was looking unsure now.

  “Did he ever say he saw something, a figure of a man, perhaps.”

  “A what?”

  “A big, dark man, in a hat, a scarf pulled over his face.”

  “That was Roy.”

  “What?”

  Muriel scratched her nose, suddenly very lucid. “My husband. That’s the way he dressed. You know, it was kind of cool in the greenhouse, so he had a tendency to catch colds unless he bundled up. No, my husband dressed the way some houses look when people leave their Christmas lights up into February. Roy would still be wearing his coat, hat, and scarf right into spring. I’d say, ‘Roy, it’s April, you idiot.’ He never listened to me.”

  “Roy’s coat was black?”

  “No, forest green, for God’s sake.”

  “When Roy died, did the boy ever . . . see a man dressed like that, but in black?”

  The lines in Muriel’s face seemed about to crack. She started touching her skin, Fowler thought, to push the pieces back in place. Her eyes brimming, she looked perplexed. “Well, now that you mention it, he did say that he thought, wait a minute, yes, he saw something one time.”

  “When?”

  She leaned forward. “I don’t know, was it right after he died, or . . .”

  “Right before?”

  “I don’t know. Sure. Whatever.”

  She picked her purse off the bar, slung it over her shoulder, and faced him.

  Fowler was looking at her. “I didn’t mean to bring back all these memories.”

  “Forget it.” She put on her sunglasses and stood up. “Look, do what you can. I got him into that school. He has to keep himself there.” She looked at him. A smile crept into her features. “See you around, kid.” She swung her hip around the barstool. “Put it on my bill, Jimmy.” She walked swiftly around the bar and pulled the door open. The afternoon light hit her like a flash camera.

  Fowler looked through the blinds. He saw her get into a car and pull out. The bartender sauntered over again. “Anything else?” he said. He had a gruff voice; his thin mustache was lost on a sea of flesh. Fowler was surprised he could talk. Up to now, he had only grunted.

  “No thanks.” Fowler was fumbling in his trousers for a tip.

  “Ah, I heard what Muriel was yammering about.”

  Well, he listened too, Fowler thought. “You did?”

  “It’s none of my business, but she’s been coming in here for years.”

  Fowler nodded. “Yeah?”

  “A lot of people thought it wasn’t exactly kosher the way Roy went out.”

  “Oh, really?”

  “I don’t think she did it. She’s a good lady, but some people, you know, think otherwise.”

  “What do you think?”

  “If she didn’t do it, I don’t know who.”

  “Did her husband have any enemies?”

  “Wh
o doesn’t, know what I’m sayin’? . . . but no. He was all right.”

  “But you think it wasn’t of natural causes.”

  “No way.”

  30

  BALLARD AWOKE, FACEUP, on a gurney in the nurse’s office of the infirmary. He just kept seeing brushstrokes of white on an empty canvas. The strokes of white soon became a nurse’s hat, the canvas, the lapels of her uniform. Ms. Ross bent over him, her soft face carrying a strong pair of hazel eyes. When Ballard blinked toward consciousness, she smiled and smoothed his hair back.

  “We had a bit of a scare, but you’re all right now.”

  “What happened?”

  “I always said they put too much pressure on you boys at this school. It isn’t right. They were going to call that Dr. Clarence in here to have a look at you, but I said, he’s out cold!”

  “I passed out?”

  “It’s stress, that’s what it is, dearie. Too many tests, too many term papers. Why, when I came along, if I didn’t want to go to school, I just took off, never thought twice about it.” She punctuated this thought by adjusting her hat.

  Ballard sat up on the gurney. He felt a little drowsy, but he thought he was all right. “Well, I’d better be going.”

  “Now, just hold your horses. It’s not every day a boy passes out in a master’s office and has to be carried out. What’s the rush?”

  “I have to get back to my dorm.”

  “Why?”

  “To—clean it up. My room, you know.”

  “And what dorm do you live in?”

  “Brookside.”

  Ms. Ross raised her head up and blinked. “Brookside? That’s a good half mile from here. You think I’m going to let you go gallivanting out through those fields, and pass out again? No sir.”

  Ballard leaned forward. “There’s something I have to find, Ms. Ross, really.”

  “It will have to wait.”

  “But how long? I mean, I’ve got to—”