E is for Evidence (20 page)

“I don't blame you,” I said. “You can reach me at this number if you need to, and I'll check back with you if I hear anything.” I jotted down Darcy's name and my telephone number.

“I hope nothing's wrong.” This seemed like the first sincere comment she'd made.

“I'm sure not,” I said. Personally, I was betting something had scared the hell out of him and he'd taken off.

She'd had a few minutes now to focus on my brow-less, burned face. “Uh, I hope this doesn't seem rude, but were you in some kind of accident?”

“A gas heater blew up in my face,” I said. She made some sympathetic noises and I hoped the lie wouldn't come back to haunt me. “Well, I'm sorry I had to bother you on a holiday. I'll let you know if we hear from him.” I got up and she rose as well, crossing with me to the front door.

I walked home through streets beginning to darken, though it was not quite 5:00. The winter sun had sunk and the air temperature was dropping with
it. I was exhausted, secretly wishing I could check back into the hospital for the night. Something about the clean white sheets seemed inviting. I was hungry, too, and for once would have welcomed something more nutritious than peanut butter and crackers, which was what I was looking forward to.

Daniel's car was parked at the curb out in front of my apartment. I peered in, half expecting to find him asleep on the back seat. I went in through the gate and around the side of the building to Henry's backyard. Daniel was sitting on the cinder-block wall that separated Henry's lot from our neighbor to the right. Daniel, his elbows on his knees, was blowing a low, mournful tune on an alto harmonica. With the cowboy boots, the jeans, and a blue-denim jacket, he might have been out on the range.

“ 'Bout time you got home,” he remarked. He tucked the harmonica in his pocket and got up.

“I had work to do.”

“You're always working. You should take better care of yourself.”

I unlocked my front door and went in, flipping on the light. I slung my handbag on a chair and sank down on the couch. Daniel moved into my kitchenette and opened the refrigerator.

“Don't you ever grocery-shop?”

“What for? I'm never home.”

“Lord.” He took out a stub of butter, some eggs,
and a packet of cheese so old it looked like dark plastic around the edge. While I watched, he searched my kitchen cabinets, assembling miscellaneous foodstuffs. I slouched down on my spine, leaning my head against the back of the couch with my feet propped up on the ottoman. I was fresh out of snappy talk and I couldn't conjure up a shred of anger. This was a man I'd loved once, and though the feelings were gone, a certain familiarity remained.

“How come this place smells like feet?” he said idly. He was already chopping onions, his fingers nimble. He played piano the same way, with a careless expertise.

“It's my air fern. Somebody gave it to me as a pet.”

He picked up the tag end of a pound of bacon, sniffing suspiciously at the contents. “Stiff as beef jerky.”

“Lasts longer that way,” I said.

He shrugged and extracted the three remaining pieces of bacon, which he dropped into the skillet with a clinking sound. “God, one thing about giving up dope, food never has tasted right,” he said. “Smoke dope, you're always eating the best meal you ever had. Helps when you're broke or on the road.”

“You really gave up the hard stuff?”

“ 'Fraid so,” he said. “Gave up cigarettes, gave up coffee. I do drink a beer now and then, though I notice you don't have any. I used to go to AA meetings
five times a week, but that talk of a higher power got to me in the end. There isn't any power higher than heroin, you can take my word for it.”

I could feel myself drifting off. He was humming to himself, a melody dimly remembered, that blended with the scent of bacon and eggs. What could smell better than supper being cooked by someone else?

He shook me gently and I woke to find an omelet on a warmed plate being placed in my lap. I roused myself, suddenly famished again.

Daniel sat cross-legged on the floor, forking up eggs while he talked. “Who lives in the house?”

“My landlord, Henry Pitts. He's off in Michigan.”

“You got something goin' with him?”

I paused between bites. “The man is eighty-one.”

“He have a piano?”

“Actually, I think he does. An upright, probably out of tune. His wife used to play.”

“I'd like to try it, if there's a way to get in. You think he'd care?”

“Not at all. I've got a key. You mean tonight?”

“Tomorrow. I gotta be somewhere in a bit.”

The way the light fell on his face, I could see the lines near his eyes. Daniel had lived hard and he wasn't aging well. He looked haggard, a gauntness beginning to emerge. “I can't believe you're a private detective,” he said. “Seems weird to me.”

“It's not that different from being a cop,” I said. “I'm not part of the bureaucracy, that's all. Don't wear a uniform or punch a time clock. I get paid more, but not as regularly.”

“A bit more dangerous, isn't it? I don't remember anyone ever tried to blow you up back then.”

“Well, they sure tried everything else. Traffic detail, every time you pull someone over, you wonder if the car's stolen, if the driver's got a gun. Domestic violence is worse. People drinking, doing drugs. Half the time they'd just as soon waste you as one another. Knock on the door, you never know what you're dealing with.”

“How'd you get involved in a homicide?”

“It didn't start out like that. You know the family, by the way,” I said.

“I do?”

“The Woods. Remember Bass Wood?”

He hesitated. “Vaguely.”

“His sister Olive is the one who died.”

Daniel set his plate down. “The Kohler woman is
his
sister? I had no idea. What the hell is going on?”

I sketched it out for him, telling him what I knew. If I have a client, I won't talk about a case, but I couldn't see the harm here. Just me. It felt good, giving me a chance to theorize to some extent. Daniel was a good audience, asking just the right questions.
It felt like old times, the good times, when we talked on for hours about whatever suited us.

Finally a silence fell. I was cold and feeling tense. I reached for the quilt and covered my feet. “Why'd you leave me, Daniel? I never have understood.”

He kept his tone light. “It wasn't you, babe. It wasn't anything personal.”

“Was there someone else?”

He shifted uneasily, tapping with the fork on the edge of his dinner plate. He set the utensil aside. He stretched his legs out in front of him and leaned back on his elbows. “I wish I knew what to tell you, Kinsey. It wasn't that I didn't want you. I wanted something else more, that's all.”

“What?”

He scanned my face. “Anything. Everything. Whatever came down the pike.”

“You don't have a conscience, do you?”

He broke off eye contact. “No. That's why we were such a mismatch. I don't have any conscience and you have too much.”

“No, not so. If I had a conscience, I wouldn't tell so many lies.”

“Ah, right. The lies. I remember. That was the one thing we had in common,” he said. His gaze came up to mine. I was chilled by the look in his eyes, clear and empty. I could remember wanting him. I could
remember looking at his face, wondering if there could ever be a man more beautiful. For some reason I never expect the people I know to have any talent or ability. I'd been introduced to Daniel and dismissed him until the moment I heard him play. Then I did a long double-take, astonished, and I was hooked. There just wasn't any place to go from there. Daniel was married to his music, to freedom, to drugs, and briefly, to me. I was about that far down on the list.

I stirred restlessly. A palpable sexual vapor seemed to rise from his skin, drifting across to me like the scent of woodsmoke half a mile away. It's a strange phenomenon, but true, that in sleeping with men, none of the old rules apply to a man you've slept with before. Operant conditioning. The man had trained me well. Even after eight years, he could still do what he did best . . . seduce. I cleared my throat, struggling to break the spell. “What's the story on your therapist?”

“No story. She's a shrink. She thinks she can fix me.”

“And this is part of it? Making peace with me?”

“We all have delusions. That's one of hers.”

“Is she in love with you?”

“I doubt it.”

“Must be early in the game,” I said.

The dimple appeared and a smile flashed across his face, but it was mirthless, evasive, and I wondered if I
hadn't touched on some pain of his. Now, he was the restless one, glancing at his watch.

“I got to get,” he said abruptly. He gathered both plates and the silverware, toting dishes to the kitchen. He'd cleaned up while he cooked, an old habit of his, so he didn't have much to do. By 7:00, he was gone. I heard the thunder and rattle of his car as he started it and pulled away.

The apartment seemed dark. Extraordinarily quiet.

I locked up. I took a bath, keeping the water away from my burns. I closed myself into the folds of my quilt and turned out the light. Being with him had brought back the pain in fossil form, evidence of ancient emotional life, embedded now in rock. I studied the sensations as I would some extinct subspecies, for the curiosity, if nothing more.

Being married to a doper is as close to loneliness as you can get. Add to that his chronic infidelity and you've got a lot of sleepless nights on your hands. There are certain men who rove, men who prowl the night, who simply don't show up for hours on end. Lying in bed, you tell yourself you're worried that he's wrecked the car again, that he's drunk or in jail. You tell yourself you're worried he's been rolled, mugged, or maimed, that he's overdosed. What really worries you is he might be with someone else. The hours creep by. From time to time, you hear a car approaching, but it's never his. By 4:00
A.M.
, it's a toss-up
which is uppermost in your mind—wishing he would come home or wishing he were dead.

Daniel Wade was the one who taught me how to value solitude. What I endure now doesn't hold a candle to what I endured with him.

 

 

 

 

 

The memorial service for Olive was held at 2:00
P.M.
on Sunday at the Unitarian Church, a spartan ceremony in a setting stripped of excess. Attendance was limited to family and a few close friends. There were lots of flowers, but no casket in evidence. The floors were red tile, glossy and cold. The pews were carved and polished wood, without cushions. The lofty ceiling of the church lent a sense of airiness, but the space was curiously devoid of ornamentation and there were no religious icons at all. Even the stained-glass windows were a plain cream with the barest suggestion of green vines curling around the edges. The Unitarians apparently don't hold with zealousness, piety, confession, penance, or atonement. Jesus and God were never mentioned, nor did the word “amen” cross anybody's lips. Instead of scriptures, there were
readings from Bertrand Russell and Kahlil Gibran. A man with a flute played several mournful classical tunes and ended with a number that sounded suspiciously like “Send In the Clowns.” There was no eulogy, but the minister chatted about Olive in the most conversational of tones, inviting those congregated to stand up and share recollections of her. No one had the nerve. I sat near the back in my all-purpose dress, not wanting to intrude. I noticed that several people nudged one another and turned to look at me, as if I'd achieved celebrity status by being blown up with her. Ebony, Lance, and Bass remained perfectly composed. Ash wept, as did her mother. Terry sat alone in the front row, leaning forward, head in his hands. The whole group didn't occupy more than about the first five rows.

Afterward we assembled in the small garden courtyard outside, where we were served champagne and finger sandwiches. The occasion was polite and circumspect. The afternoon was hot. The sun was bright. The garden itself was gaudy with annuals, gold, orange, purple, and red marching along the white stucco wall that enclosed the churchyard. The stone-and-tile fountain plashed softly, a breeze occasionally blowing spray out onto the surrounding paving stones.

I moved among the mourners, saying little, picking up fragments of conversation. Some were discussing
the stock market, some their recent travels, one the divorce of a mutual acquaintance who'd been married twenty-six years. Of those who thought to talk about Olive Wood Kohler, the themes seemed to be equally divided between conventional sentiment and cattiness.

“. . . he'll never recover from the loss, you know. She was everything to him . . .”

“. . . paid seven thousand dollars for that coat . . .”

“. . . shocked . . . couldn't believe it when Ruth called me . . .”

“. . . poor thing. He worshiped the ground she walked on, though I never could quite see it myself . . .”

“. . . tragedy . . . so young . . .”

“. . . well, I always wondered about that, as narrow as she was through the chest. Who did the work?”

I found Ash sitting on a poured-concrete bench near the chapel door. She looked drawn and pale, her pale-red hair glinting with strands of premature gray. The dress she wore was a dark wool, loosely cut, the short sleeves making her upper arms seem as shapeless as bread dough. In another few years she'd have that matronly look that women sometimes get, rushing into middle age just to get it over with. I sat down beside her. She held out her hand and we sat there together like grade-school kids on a field trip. “Line up in twos and no talking.” Life itself is a peculiar outing.
Sometimes I still feel like I need a note from my mother.