Full dark,no stars (50 page)

She sighed. I know.

No one could tell me about the license plate of the Suburban seen in Amesbury, but if they had, I imagine it would have been Massachusetts. Or Pennsylvania. Or anything but Maine.

He leaned forward.

This Beadie sent us notes with his victims identification. Taunting us, you know-daring us to catch him. Praps part of him even wanted to be caught.

Perhaps so, Darcy said, although she doubted it.

The notes were printed in block letters. Now people who do that think such printing cant be identified, but most times it can. The similarities show up. I dont suppose you have any of your husbands files, do you?

The ones that havent gone back to his firm have been destroyed. But I imagine theyd have plenty of samples. Accountants never throw out anything.

He sighed. Yuh, but a firm like that, itd take a court order to get anything loose, and to get one Id have to show probable cause. Which I just dont have. Ive got a number of coincidences-although theyre not coincidences in my mind. And Ive got a number of well propinquities, I guess you might call them, but nowhere near enough of them to qualify as circumstantial evidence. So I came to you, Darcy. I thought Id probably be out on my ear by now, but youve been very kind.

She said nothing.

He leaned forward even further, almost hunching over the table now. Like a bird of prey. But hiding not quite out of sight behind the coldness in his eyes was something else. She thought it might be kindness. She prayed it was.

Darcy, was your husband Beadie?

She was aware that he might be recording this conversation; it was certainly not outside the realm of possibility. Instead of speaking, she raised one hand from the table, showing him her pink palm.

For a long time you never knew, did you?

She said nothing. Only looked at him. Looked into him, the way you looked into people you knew well. Only you had to be careful when you did that, because you werent always seeing what you thought you were seeing. She knew that now.

And then you did? One day you did?

Would you like another cup of coffee, Holt?

Half a cup, he said. He sat back up and folded his arms over his thin chest. Mored give me acid indigestion, and I forgot to take my Zantac pill this morning.

I think theres some Prilosec in the upstairs medicine cabinet, she said. It was Bobs. Would you like me to get it?

I wouldnt take anything of his even if I was burning up inside.

All right, she said mildly, and poured him a little more coffee.

Sorry, he said. Sometimes my emotions get the better of me. Those women all those women and the boy, with his whole life ahead of him. Thats worst of all.

Yes, she said, passing him the cup. She noticed how his hand trembled, and thought this was probably his last rodeo, no matter how smart he was and he was fearsomely smart.

A woman who found out what her husband was very late in the game would be in a hard place, Ramsey said.

Yes, I imagine she would be, Darcy said.

Whod believe she could live with a man all those years and never know what he was? Why, shed be like a whatdoyoucallit, the bird that lives in a crocodiles mouth.

According to the story, Darcy said, the crocodile lets that bird live there because it keeps the crocodiles teeth clean. Eats the grain right out from between them. She made pecking motions with the fingers of her right hand. Its probably not true but it is true that I used to drive Bobby to the dentist. Left to himself, hed accidentally-on-purpose forget his appointments. He was such a baby about pain. Her eyes filled unexpectedly with tears. She wiped them away with the heels of her hands, cursing them. This man would not respect tears shed on Robert Andersons account.

Or maybe she was wrong about that. He was smiling and nodding his head. And your kids. Theyd be run over once when the world found out their father was a serial killer and torturer of women. Then run over again when the world decided their mother had been covering up for him. Maybe even helping him, like Myra Hindley helped Ian Brady. Do you know who they were?

No.

Never mind, then. But ask yourself this: what would a woman in a difficult position like that do?

What would you do, Holt?

I dont know. My situations a little different. I may be just an old nag-the oldest horse in the firebarn-but I have a responsibility to the families of those murdered women. They deserve closure.

They deserve it, no question but do they need it?

Robert Shaverstones penis was bitten off, did you know that?

She hadnt. Of course she hadnt. She closed her eyes and felt the warm tears trickling through the lashes. Did not suffer my ass, she thought, and if Bob had appeared before her, hands out and begging for mercy, she would have killed him again.

His father knows, Ramsey said. Speaking softly. And he has to live with that knowledge about the child he loved every day.

Im sorry, she whispered. I am so, so sorry.

She felt him take her hand across the table. Didnt mean to upset you.

She flung it off. Of course you did! But do you think I havent been? Do you think I havent been, you you nosy old man?

He chuckled, revealing those sparkling dentures. No. I dont think that at all. Saw it as soon as you opened the door. He paused, then said deliberately: I saw everything.

And what do you see now?

He got up, staggered a little, then found his balance. I see a courageous woman who should be left alone to get after her housework. Not to mention the rest of her life.

She also got up. And the families of the victims? The ones who deserve closure? She paused, not wanting to say the rest. But she had to. This man had fought considerable pain-maybe even excruciating pain-to come here, and now he was giving her a pass. At least, she thought he was. Robert Shaverstones father?

The Shaverstone boy is dead, and his fathers as good as. Ramsey spoke in a calm, assessing tone Darcy recognized. It was a tone Bob used when he knew a client of the firm was about to be hauled before the IRS, and the meeting would go badly. Never takes his mouth off the whiskey bottle from morning til night. Would knowing that his sons killer-his sons mutilator -was dead change that? I dont think so. Would it bring any of the victims back? Nawp. Is the killer burning in the fires of hell for his crimes right now, suffering his own mutilations that will bleed for all of eternity? The Bible says he is. The Old Testament part of it, anyway, and since thats where our laws come from, its good enough for me. Thanks for the coffee. Ill have to stop at every rest area between here and Augusta going back, but it was worth it. You make a good cup.

Walking him to the door, Darcy realized she felt on the right side of the mirror for the first time since she had stumbled over that carton in the garage. It was good to know he had been close to being caught. That he hadnt been as smart as hed assumed he was.

Thank you for coming to visit, she said as he set his hat squarely on his head. She opened the door, letting in a breeze of cold air. She didnt mind. It felt good on her skin. Will I see you again?

Nawp. Im done as of next week. Full retirement. Going to Florida. I wont be there long, according to my doctor.

Im sorry to hear th-

He abruptly pulled her into his arms. They were thin, but sinewy and surprisingly strong. Darcy was startled but not frightened. The brim of his Homburg bumped her temple as he whispered in her ear. You did the right thing.

And kissed her cheek. 20 -

He went slowly and carefully down the path, minding the ice. An old mans walk. He should really have a cane, Darcy thought. He was going around the front of his car, still looking down for ice patches, when she called his name. He turned back, bushy eyebrows raised.

When my husband was a boy, he had a friend who was killed in an accident.

Is that so? The words came out in a puff of winter white.

Yes, Darcy said. You could look up what happened. It was very tragic, even though he wasnt a very nice boy, according to my husband.

No?

No. He was the sort of boy who harbors dangerous fantasies. His name was Brian Delahanty, but when they were kids, Bob called him BD.

Ramsey stood by his car for several seconds, working it through. Then he nodded his head. Thats very interesting. I might have a look at the stories about it on my computer. Or maybe not; it was all a long time ago. Thank you for the coffee.

Thank you for the conversation.

She watched him drive down the street (he drove with the confidence of a much younger man, she noticed-probably because his eyes were still so sharp) and then went inside. She felt younger, lighter. She went to the mirror in the hall. In it she saw nothing but her own reflection, and that was good.

The stories in this book are harsh. You may have found them hard to read in places. If so, be assured that I found them equally hard to write in places. When people ask me about my work, I have developed a habit of skirting the subject with jokes and humorous personal anecdotes (which you cant quite trust; never trust anything a fiction writer says about himself). Its a form of deflection, and a little more diplomatic than the way my Yankee forebears might have answered such questions: Its none of your business, chummy. But beneath the jokes, I take what I do very seriously, and have since I wrote my first novel, The Long Walk, at the age of eighteen.

I have little patience with writers who dont take the job seriously, and none at all with those who see the art of story-fiction as essentially worn out. Its not worn out, and its not a literary game. Its one of the vital ways in which we try to make sense of our lives, and the often terrible world we see around us. Its the way we answer the question, How can such things be? Stories suggest that sometimes-not always, but sometimes-theres a reason.

From the start-even before a young man I can now hardly comprehend started writing The Long Walk in his college dormitory room-I felt that the best fiction was both propulsive and assaultive. It gets in your face. Sometimes it shouts in your face. I have no quarrel with literary fiction, which usually concerns itself with extraordinary people in ordinary situations, but as both a reader and a writer, Im much more interested by ordinary people in extraordinary situations. I want to provoke an emotional, even visceral, reaction in my readers. Making them think as they read is not my deal. I put that in italics, because if the tale is good enough and the characters vivid enough, thinking will supplant emotion when the tale has been told and the book set aside (sometimes with relief). I can remember reading George Orwells 1984 at the age of thirteen or so with growing dismay, anger, and outrage, charging through the pages and gobbling up the story as fast as I could, and whats wrong with that? Especially since I continue to think about it to this day when some politician (Im thinking of Sarah Palin and her scurrilous death-panel remarks) has some success in convincing the public that white is really black, or vice-versa.

Heres something else I believe: if youre going into a very dark place-like Wilf Jamess Nebraska farmhouse in 1922-then you should take a bright light, and shine it on everything. If you dont want to see, why in Gods name would you dare the dark at all? The great naturalist writer Frank Norris has always been one of my literary idols, and Ive kept what he said on this subject in mind for over forty years: I never truckled; I never took off my hat to Fashion and held it out for pennies. By God, I told them the truth.

But Steve, you say, youve made a great many pennies during your career, and as for truth thats variable, isnt it? Yes, Ive made a good amount of money writing my stories, but the money was a side effect, never the goal. Writing fiction for money is a mugs game. And sure, truth is in the eye of the beholder. But when it comes to fiction, the writers only responsibility is to look for the truth inside his own heart. It wont always be the readers truth, or the critics truth, but as long as its the writer s truth-as long as he or she doesnt truckle, or hold out his or her hat to Fashion-all is well. For writers who knowingly lie, for those who substitute unbelievable human behavior for the way people really act, I have nothing but contempt. Bad writing is more than a matter of shit syntax and faulty observation; bad writing usually arises from a stubborn refusal to tell stories about what people actually do-to face the fact, let us say, that murderers sometimes help old ladies cross the street.

I have tried my best in Full Dark, No Stars to record what people might do, and how they might behave, under certain dire circumstances. The people in these stories are not without hope, but they acknowledge that even our fondest hopes (and our fondest wishes for our fellowmen and the society in which we live) may sometimes be vain. Often, even. But I think they also say that nobility most fully resides not in success but in trying to do the right thing and that when we fail to do that, or willfully turn away from the challenge, hell follows.

1922 was inspired by a nonfiction book called Wisconsin Death Trip (1973), written by Michael Lesy and featuring photographs taken in the small city of Black River Falls, Wisconsin. I was impressed by the rural isolation of these photographs, and the harshness and deprivation in the faces of many of the subjects. I wanted to get that feeling in my story.

In 2007, while traveling on Interstate 84 to an autographing in western Massachusetts, I stopped at a rest area for a typical Steve King Health Meal: a soda and a candybar. When I came out of the refreshment shack, I saw a woman with a flat tire talking earnestly to a long-haul trucker parked in the next slot. He smiled at her and got out of his rig.

Need any help? I asked.

No, no, I got this, the trucker said.

The lady got her tire changed, Im sure. I got a Three Musketeers and the story idea that eventually became Big Driver.