by Ed Gorman
“Bullshit I was lying.”
“It means you’ve been going all over town telling people you slept with her when you didn’t.”
“The hell if I didn’t sleep with her.”
“Well, the machine says otherwise.”
“The machine is stupid.”
Now I played outraged prosecutor. I jumped up and went over to him as he started to get up. I shoved him back into his chair.
“You’re lying, aren’t you?”
“What the hell are you gettin’ so hopped up about?” He looked intimidated. Pretty, he might be; tough, he wasn’t.
“Because you shouldn’t say things that aren’t the truth.”
“She’s nobody. Who gives a shit?”
I walked to the desk. Pointed to the phone.
“You know who I’m going to call?”
“Who?”
“Cliff Sykes.”
“The police chief?”
“Yeah.”
“For what?”
“To tell him about the Harrison Auto Parts robbery.”
“Tell him what?”
“That you were the one who did it.”
“Bullshit I did it.”
“Bullshit you didn’t. Frankie Hayes told me all about it. He’s a client of mine and he tells me everything.”
“That little prick.”
“So you tell me the truth about Linda Granger or I call Cliffie and tell him what you and Frankie did.
Frankie’s underage. They’ll try him as a juvenile. But for you this could be real bad. First time you do a serious crime, and you screw it up and get caught.”
He slouched back insolently in his chair and sighed. “All right, so I didn’t screw her. So what?”
“But you’ve been telling people you screwed her.”
“So I exaggerated a little. Big deal. Every guy exaggerates.”
I sat on the edge of my desk, like Perry Mason does on Saturday night. “What happened that night?”
The deep sigh again. “Some bare tit. A little dry humping. And then she was crying and wailing about how much she missed Jeff and how she’d only come over to make him jealous. Then she puked all over my couch and I threw her in my bed so she could sleep it off. Bitch slept till practically eleven the next morning. She didn’t even help me clean up the couch. Said she was too hung over and in too much trouble with her folks.”
“Bare tit and a little dry humping and that was it?”
“That was it.” Then: “Frankie really told you about the Harrison job?”
I shook my head. “No, but it sure sounded like you two. I just took my best guess.”
Then the closet door burst open.
Jeff went right over to O’Donlon. “You ruined her reputation with a lie, you bastard!”
“What the hell were you doin’ in the closet?”
Then Linda came out. She too went for O’Donlon and slapped him hard across the face.
“That’s for calling me a nobody!”
I could see Jeff was about to swing on him so I stepped between them.
“I want t’take him outside.”
“Forget it, Jeff. You got what you want.”
Linda put her arm through his. Pulled him away from O’Donlon. “Thanks, McCain.”
“My pleasure.”
“I really owe you one,” Jeff said.
“I didn’t even get my picture taken,” O’Donlon said.
I made O’Donlon leave first.
While they waited, Jeff said, “I’m sorry, Linda. I would’ve married you anyway.
I really would’ve.”
He said it magnanimously, which was a mistake.
“Don’t do me any favors,” she said.
He looked at me, then back at her. “I love you, Linda. And I want to marry you.” This time it came from the heart.
And then they were kissing and I was trying not to pay any attention.
When I said good-bye to them I planned to go home, open a can of Falstaff, pick up a paperback, and relax. I’d earned a good rest and I planned to take it.
Nineteen
I was just locking the door when I heard a car sweep up behind me in the two-car parking space.
A voice behind me said, “Hold it right there, counselor.”
Cliffie.
I came down the stairs. Turned my collar up. There was a mist that would soon be rain. Cold drops of it pattered in the leaves. The air smelled fresh and clean. There was an odd, quiet excitement about the first true night of fall. Time to haul out my bunny jammies with the feet in them. I already had a Captain Video notebook, why the hell not go all the way?
“You hear the news?” he asked. He’d left his motor running, lights on. He was silhouetted in the beams. The motor, which needed a tune-up, throbbed. I smelled car oil and gasoline.
“What news?”
He shook his head. “The sumbitch did it, all right.”
“I’m not following you.”
“Keys. You said he did it and he did.
Judge Whitney is probably sitting out in her mansion right now, gloating.”
Which she probably was, in fact.
“You interrogate him?”
“Not hardly,” he said. “Nobody’ll be puttin’ that head back together. Not even the funeral-home fellas.”
“What’re you talking about?”
“He blew his damned head off is what I’m talkin’ about.”
“When was this?”
“One of my men found him about an hour ago.
In the park. Down near the boat dock.
He’d put a gun in his mouth. I seen it myself.
A stinkin’ mess is what it is.”
“Oh, God.”
“What’s that for? He killed them people, didn’t he? Even left a note sayin’ he did.”
“He was a decent guy.”
“Yeah, McCain. Most decent guys I know go around killin’ people.”
“So he’s in the morgue?”
“Yeah. Novotny’s comin’ over after supper to do the autopsy.” He laughed. “Way that sumbitch eats, might be tomorrow by the time he gets there.”
I felt empty. “Guess I’ll go home.”
“I just wanted to warn you about next time.”
“Next time?”
“Yeah, next time there’s a murder. I catch you interferin’ with the investigation again, counselor, I’m gonna throw your ass in jail. Get me?”
“Yeah.” I was too drained to argue. “Got it.”
“And remember it.”
“I’ll remember.”
“And tell the Judge. I’ll throw her ass in jail too.”
I could just see Judge Whitney in a cell, running the jail staff into exhaustion with her orders.
He got in the car and drove off.
I couldn’t help it. I felt sorry for Keys. What Cliffie said was indisputably true. Good men don’t go around murdering people. But sometimes bad people are good people too. Or good people can do bad things. Life is like that sometimes.
I took a shortcut home, passing Dick Keys’s car dealership. Life went on. Even on a misty night like this one, people were out looking at the new and used cars. The Edsel was still drawing crowds.
When I saw two of the three service doors open and lights inside, I remembered the spare tire. I really needed to change it.
I wheeled up to one of the open doors and went inside. Only a couple of men were working. A radio was on. Guy Mitchell was “Singing the Blues.” So were we all, pal. Only two of the bays were being used. A large wrench fell to the floor, the clang unnaturally loud.
Henry had his head up under a monster-size Packard of ancient vintage.
“Hi, Henry.”
He brought his head out where I could see it.
“Hey, McCain. You hear about Dick?”
“Yeah.”
Shook his dark head. “Poor bastard.” Then, “Wonder what the missus’ll do. Way she depended on him and all.”
; “Yeah,” I said. “I was wondering about that myself.”
He glanced at the big clock on the wall.
“If I want to get home to a warm meal, I got to get back to work here.”
“I just stopped to pick up my tire.”
“Oh, yeah. Right. I’ll go get it for you.”
He broke into a half run. His mention of a warm meal sounded good. He was back in two minutes. “Here you go.” He rolled it to me.
“I ain’t got the form or anything. You can just stop in tomorrow and pay at the service desk. Just a buck is all. That’s the sixth flat I’ve had to fix because of that damned taillight. Hell, even Mrs. Keys got a flat. It’s back there, too, all ready to go. Well, got to get back at it.” I did remember the mechanic taking a flat tire out of her car trunk the day after the murder, once Henry mentioned it.
I thanked him and left. Pitched the tire in the trunk. Fired up the Ford and headed home.
And about two blocks from my place I remembered something Mrs. Keys had told me: that she’d been helping decorate the showroom until about seven-thirty on the night Susan was killed but had then gone home and stayed there for the rest of the night. If that were the case, how had she managed to get a flat tire from the taillight?
Amy Squires hadn’t had her accident at the dealership that night until two hours later.
The Tudor was dark except for a faint light in a distant room on the ground floor. In the whipping wind and heavy mist, the house looked like a fortress of civilization standing bravely against the chaos of the darkness.
I pulled up to the garage and went up to the front door. I’d forgotten how heavy the shield-shaped knocker was. It pounded twice against the night.
She didn’t come for several minutes, but I could hear somebody moving around so I waited for her. She was in shadow so deep I couldn’t see anything but a faint shape when the door was finally opened. “Hello, Sam.”
“Hi, Mrs. Keys. I just wanted to tell you how sorry I am.”
“I had to take the phone off the hook.
Everyone calling to wish me well and tell me how much they loved him.” Her voice trembled with tears.
“I feel the same way. He was a good man.”
“He certainly was.”
I snapped my fingers. “Say, I was just down at the garage and they told me to tell you your tire is ready.”
“Oh. Yes. The tire. I’d forgotten about it.”
“Seems you ran over that taillight too.”
“Yes, I guess I must have.” She was on autopilot. Not thinking of what she was saying.
“And that’s kinda funny, you know.”
“What is, Sam?”
“That you ran over that taillight before seven-thirty sometime.”
“I guess I’m not following you.”
“Didn’t you tell me the other day that you were down at the dealership till seven-thirty and then you came home for the rest of the night?”
“Gosh, Sam, if you say so.”
“Well, I talked to the woman who broke the taillight, and she didn’t have the accident until around nine-thirty. You see what I’m saying, Mrs. Keys?”
Hesitation. Now she was fully engaged. No more autopilot. Cautious. “No. No, I guess I don’t, Sam.”
“It’s just that it would’ve been hard to get a flat tire when the accident hadn’t even happened yet.”
“And you’re saying what exactly?”
I still couldn’t see her. She was a night being, a disembodied voice.
“I don’t know what I’m saying exactly, Mrs. Keys. I thought maybe you could help me.”
“I’d like you to leave. I don’t think I like you anymore, Sam.”
“He felt so guilty about you,
Mrs. Keys, that you know what I think?”
“I don’t care what you think.” She started to shut the door.
I had to say it fast. “I think you murdered those two people and he covered for you. I think it was the only way he felt he could pay you back for your lives together. He really felt terrible about not loving you, Mrs. Keys.”
The longest silence I could ever remember. The door stopped halfway open. Then: “He really said that to you? About feeling terrible?”
“He said it several times, in fact.”
“I loved him so much, Sam.”
“I know.”
“And when David Squires threatened to tell everybody about the daughter Dick and Susan Squires had… All I had left was my dignity, Sam.” She was just then starting to cry, but it was a hard, dry sound. I suspected she’d been crying most of the day and there wasn’t much left. “I didn’t want to end my life in scandal. People always said he married me for my money. And I suspect he did. But he always made sure I had my dignity. He ran around, but he did it out of town and he never told anybody. I really appreciated that. I really did. And I believe he respected me too.”
“He did.”
“And genuinely liked me.”
“He liked you very much.”
“Maybe if I could’ve given him children-”
I eased open the screen door and took her in my arms. She found a lot more tears than I would’ve thought possible.
I put her on the couch and found a winter coat in the front closet to use as a blanket and then went to the bar and poured us both a Scotch.
My first impulse was to call the Judge and tell her what had happened. But I couldn’t do it. Mrs. Keys needed a good night’s rest.
“Took a lot of strength to get Susan in the trunk and drag Squires out of the cable car,” I said.
She said, “I was always strong for my size athletic.” Then: “Do we have to go right away?”
“Not right away.”
“Are you hungry?”
“Actually, yes, I am.”
“I make a mean breakfast. Not lunch or dinner, but breakfast. How does that sound?”
“Sounds good.”
I sat in the big fashionable kitchen watching her make bacon, eggs, and hash browns. The scents were seductive as hell.
And as she cooked, she talked. “He took much better care of me than he thought, Sam.
He didn’t love me but he respected me and he kept me from being hurt. I know how plain I am. But he was always telling me how attractive I looked.” She glanced at me and smiled.
“He even had me half believing it. He was a very good talker, as you know.”
I set the table in the breakfast nook. She brought over the food and I brought over the coffee.
We sat down and ate.
“I’m not scared,” she said, after we’d forked through our food for a while. “I know I probably should be.”
“You’re a good risk for bail. You won’t be in jail long.”
She looked over at me, and I was reminded again of a Roman sculpture. Dick hadn’t been just flattering her. She really. was an attractive woman. Much more attractive the older she got.
“I’ll be spending the rest of my life in prison, won’t I?”
“I really can’t say.”
“But if you had to bet-”
I shrugged. “I’m not much for betting, I guess.”
“How’s the food?”
“Great.”
“I’m going to give Chalmers and Ellie a lot of money.”
“They’re good people.”
“Yes. As unlikely as it seems, he is in fact a good man. And she’s a great kid.
Dick loved her very much.”
“Yeah, I think he did.”
I poured us some more coffee.
“Would you like to be my lawyer?”
I smiled. “That’s very nice of you. But you need a hotshot.”
“Do you know any hotshots?”
“A good one in Cedar Rapids.”
“Would you be willing to call him before you call Cliffie?”
“I really need to call him after I call Cliffie. To keep things kosher with the law, I mean.”
She had a nice, weary smile.
“Then that’s what we’ll do, isn’t it?” Then: “I’m sorry I killed them, you know. I mean, I’m not really a heartless beast.”
“Gee, really? You had me fooled. I figured you for a heartless beast for sure.”
“They were going to destroy us, Dick and me.”
“There had to be a better way, Mrs.
Keys.”
She was silent.
I looked at her for a long time and said very quietly, “Maybe now I should call Cliffie.”
She looked back at me, andfora moment there I thought she might start crying but she didn’t.
“Yes,” she said. “Maybe now would be a good time to call him, wouldn’t it?”
Twenty
Mary was in the hospital another week, by which time she remembered just about everything, including the sad-but still spooky-sight of Dick Keys trying to work himself up to killing her in the cold cabin where he’d kept her. Once she went home we spent several evenings playing cards and watching Tv together. I was so grateful she was alive and getting well, I didn’t think about Pamela Forrest much, which was good news for everybody. One night, when we were sure her folks were asleep, we really got into some randy sex on the couch in front of the Tv. We knew we didn’t dare risk going all the way there, but we had a lot of fun anyway. It was like being back in high school again and how could you beat that?
Jeff and Linda got married.
Chip O’Donlon got the crap beat out of him by a jealous husband. And the Judge, over the Thanksgiving weekend, flew to New York, where she was a dinner guest at Lenny Bernstein’s place. At Christmastime, one of our sidewalk Santas got arrested for being intoxicated, Old Lady Arness emptied a shotgun into the Nash Rambler belonging to an IRS man who was trying to collect back revenues, and our basketball team came within three points of beating the number-one ranked team in the state.
And then one day I got a perfumed envelope, out of which dropped a wallet-sized color photo of the gorgeous mystery lady: the blond hair, the black head scarf, the black shades, the black Ford.
On the back it said: We’ll meet again someday, McCain.
I sat there and stared at it for a long, long time.
And then I took out my billfold and slipped the photo into one of the plastic windows. Right between the photos of Mary Travers and Pamela Forrest.
I was a blessed man. I was, a truly blessed man.