Ghost Story (32 page)

The suggestion had been Ricky Hawthorne's. "I haven't seen her in an age, and I understand she had a stroke some time back, but we might learn something from her. If you're willing to make the journey on a day like this." It was a day when noon was as dark as evening; storms hung over the town, waiting to happen.

"You think there might be some connection between her sister's death and your own problem?"

"There might be," Ricky admitted. "I don't really think so, of course, but it wouldn't do to overlook even these peripheral things. Trust me that there is some relevance, anyhow. We'll have it all out later. Now that you're here, we shouldn't keep you in the dark about anything. Sears might not agree with me, but Lewis probably would." Then Ricky had added wryly, "Besides, it might do you good to get out of Milburn, however briefly."

And that had been true at first. Binghamton, four or five times the size of Milburn, even on a dark, lowering day was another, brighter world: full of traffic, new buildings, young people, the sound of urban life, it was of its decade; it pushed little Milburn back into some novelettish period of Gothic romance. The larger city had made him recognize how enclosed Milburn was, how much an appropriate field for speculation like the Chowder Society's—it was the aspect of the town which had initially reminded him of Dr. Rabbitfoot. It seemed he had become accustomed to this. In Binghamton there was no drone of the macabre, no lurking abnormality to be sniffed out in stories over whiskey and in nightmares by old men.

But on the third floor of the hospital, Milburn held sway. Milburn was in Walt Hardesty's suspicion and nervousness, his rude "What the hell are
you
doing here? You're from town. I've seen you around—I saw you in Humphrey's." Milburn was even in Ned Rowles's lank hair and rumpled suit: at home, Rowles looked conventional and even well dressed; outside, he looked almost rubelike. You noticed that his jacket was too short, his trousers webbed with wrinkles. And Rowles's manner, in Milburn low-key and friendly, here seemed tinged with shyness.

"Just struck me as funny, old Rea going so soon after that Freddy Robinson being found dead. He was out at their place, you know, not more than a week before Rea died."

"How did she die?" Don asked. "And when can we see her sister? Aren't there evening visiting hours?"

"Waiting for a doctor to come out," Rowles said. "As to how she died, I decided not to put that in the paper. You don't need sensationalism to sell papers. But I thought anyone might have heard, around town."

"I've been working most of the time," Don said.

"Ah, a new book. Splendid."

"Is
that
what this guy is?" Hardesty asked. "That's just what we need, a writer. Sweet jumping Jesus. Great I'm gonna be talking to a witness in front of the fearless editor and some writer. And this old dame, how the hell is she going to know who I am, anyhow? How is
she
gonna know I'm sheriff?"

That's what is worrying him, Don thought: he looks like Wyatt Earp because he's so insecure that he wants everybody to know that he wears a badge and carries a gun.

Some of this must have shown on his face, because Hardesty became more aggressive. "Okay, let's have your story. Who sent you here? Why are you in town?"

"He's Edward Wanderley's nephew," Rowles said in a tired voice. "He's doing some work for Sears James and Ricky Hawthorne."

"Jesus, those two," Hardesty moaned. "Did they ask you to come here to see the old lady?"

"Mr. Hawthorne did," Don answered.

"Well I suppose I ought to fall down and pretend I'm a red carpet." Hardesty lit a cigarette, ignoring the no smoking sign at the end of the corridor. "Those two old birds have something up their sleeves. Up their sleeves. Hah! That's rich."

Rowles looked away, obviously embarrassed; Don glanced at him for an explanation.

"Go on, tell him, Fearless. He asked you how she died."

"It's not very appetizing." Rowles, wincing, caught Don's eye.

"He's a big boy. He's built like a running back, ain't he?"

That was another thing about the sheriff: he would always be measuring the size of another man against his own.

"Go on. It's not a goddamned state secret."

"Well." Rowles leaned wearily back against the wall. "She bled to death. Her arms were severed."

"My God," Don said, sickened and sorry that he had come. "Who would ..."

"You got me, you know?" Hardesty said. "Maybe your rich friends could give us a hint. But tell me this— who would go around doing operations on livestock, like happened out at Miss Dedham's? And before that, at Norbert Clyde's. And before that, at Elmer Scales's?"

"You think there's one explanation for all of that?" This was, he assumed, what his uncle's friends had asked him to discover.

A nurse went by and scowled at Hardesty, who was shamed into stamping out his cigarette.

"You can go in now," the doctor said, leaving the room.

Hardesty, thrusting forward, was bustlingly untroubled by the patient's gaping mouth and signs of agitation. "I'm the sheriff, Miss Dedham," he said, "Walt Hardesty, the sheriff from over in Milburn?"

Don looked into the flat panic in Nettie Dedham's eye and wished him luck. He turned to the editor.

"I knew she had a stroke," the editor said, "but I didn't know she was as bad as this."

"We didn't meet the other day," Hardesty was saying, "but I talked to your sister. Do you remember? When the horse was killed?"

Nettie Dedham made a rattling sound.

"Is that yes?"

She repeated the sound.

"Good. So you remember, and you know who I am." He sat down and began speaking in a low voice.

"I suppose Rea Dedham could understand her," Rowles said. "Those two were supposed to be beauties, once. I remember my father talking about the Dedham girls. Sears and Ricky would remember."

"I guess they would."

"Now I want to ask you about your sister's death," Hardesty was saying. "It's important that you tell me anything you saw. You say it, and I'll try to understand it. Okay?"

"Gl."

"Do you remember that day?"

"Gl."

"This is impossible," Don whispered to Rowles, who twitched his face and went around to the other side of the bed to look out of the window. The sky was black and neon purple.

"Were you sitting in a position where you could see the stables where your sister's body was found?"

"Gl."

"That's affirmative?"

"Gl!"

"Did you see anybody approach the barn or stables prior to your sister's death?"

"GL!"

"Could you identify that person?" Hardesty was sitting forward at an exaggerated angle. "Say if we brought him here, could you make a noise to say he was the one?"

The old woman made a sound Don eventually recognized as crying. He felt debased by his presence in the room.

"Was that person a young man?"

Another series of strangled noises. Hardesty's excitement was turning into an iron impatience.

"Let's say it was a young man, then. Was it the Hardie boy?"

"Rules of evidence," Rowles muttered to the window.

"Screw the rules of evidence. Was that who it was, Miss Dedham?"

"Glooorgh," moaned the old woman.

"Shit. Do you mean to say no? It wasn't?"

"Glooorgh."

"Could you try to name the person you saw?"

Nettie Dedham was trembling. "Glngr. Ginger." She made an effort which Don could feel in his own muscles.

"Glngr."

"Ah, let's let that go for now. I got a couple more things." He rotated his head to look angrily at Don, who thought he saw embarrassment too on the sheriff's face. Hardesty turned back to the old woman and pitched his voice lower, but Don could still hear.

"I don't suppose you heard any funny noises? Or saw any funny lights or anything?"

The old woman's head wobbled; her eyes darted.

"Any funny noises or lights, Miss Dedham?" Hardesty hated having to ask her this. Ned Rowles and Don shared a glance of puzzled interest.

Hardesty wiped his forehead, giving up. "That's it. It's no good. She thinks she saw something, but who the hell can figure out what it was? I'm getting out of here. You stay or not, do what the hell you like."

Don followed the sheriff out of the room, and paused in the corridor as Hardesty spoke to a doctor. When Rowles emerged, his aging boy's face was pensive and considering.

Hardesty turned from the doctor and glanced at Rowles. "You make any sense out of that?"

"No, Walt. No sense that makes sense."

"You?"

''Nothing," Don said.

"Well, I'll be damned if I'm not going to start believing in spacemen or
vampires
or
something
pretty soon myself," Hardesty said, and went off down the corridor.

Ned Rowles and Don Wanderley followed. When they reached the elevators, Hardesty was standing inside one, stabbing a button. Before Don could reach the elevator, the door had whooshed shut unimpeded by the sheriff, who obviously wanted to escape the other two.

A moment later another elevator appeared, and the two men stepped inside it. "I've been thinking about what Nettie might have been trying to say," Rowles told him. The doors closed and the elevator smoothly descended. "I promise you, this is crazy."

"I haven't heard anything lately that isn't."

"And you're the man who wrote
The Nightwatcher."

Here we go, Don thought.

Don buttoned up his coat and followed Rowles outside into the parking lot. Though he wore only his suit, Rowles did not appear to notice the cold. "Here, get in my car for a second," the editor said.

Don got into the passenger seat and looked over at Rowles, who was rubbing his forehead with one hand. The editor looked much older in the interior of the car: shadows poured into his wrinkles. " 'Glngr?' Isn't that what she said, that last time? You agree? It was a lot like that anyhow, wasn't it? Now. I never knew him myself, but a long time ago the Dedham girls had a brother, and I guess they talked about him for quite a while after he died ..."

"So what? Do you care? How old are you anyhow, five?"

"Well, he's worried about something. He doesn't look very happy."

"He doesn't look happy," Jim mimicked. "He's old. I mean, what is he, fifty-five? He's got a boring job and an old car and he's too fat and his favorite little boy is going to fly out of the nest in nine or ten months. Just take a look around this town, friend. How many folks do you see with big smiles on their wrinkly old faces? This town is loaded with miserable old suckers. Are you gonna let them run your life?" Jim leaned back on his barstool and smiled at Peter, clearly assuming that the old argument was still persuasive.

Peter felt himself sinking back into uncertainty and ambiguity—these arguments were persuasive. His father's worries were not his: and the issue had never been that he did not love his father, for he did, but merely whether he should always obey his father's infrequent orders—or as Jim put it, "let him run your life."

For had he, after all, done anything truly bad with Jim? Because of Jim's keys, they had not even broken into the church; then they had followed a woman. That was all. Freddy Robinson had died, and that was a shame even if they had not liked him, but nobody was saying that his death had not been natural; he'd had a heart attack, or had fallen down and hurt his head ...

And there had been no little boy on top of the station.

And there had been no little boy sitting on the gravestone.

"I suppose I should be grateful your old man let you come out tonight."

"No, it's not that bad. He just thinks we ought to spend less time together, not that we shouldn't spend any time at all together. I guess he doesn't like me sitting in places like this."

"This? What's wrong with this?" Hardie gestured comically around at the seedy tavern. "Hey, you— Sunshine!" Jim shouted. "This is a hell of a great place, isn't it?" The bartender looked back over his shoulder and grimaced stupidly. "Civilized as shit, Lady Jane. The Duke down there agrees with me. I know what your old man is afraid of. He doesn't want you to get in with the wrong crowd. Well, I am the wrong crowd, that's true. But if I am, then so are you. So the worst has already happened, and as long as you're here, you might as well relax and enjoy it."

If you wrote down the things Hardie said and looked at them afterward, you'd find the errors, but just listening to him talk, you'd be convinced of anything.

"See, what the old boys all think is craziness is just another way of stayin' sane—you live in this town long enough you're in danger of woodworm in the headboard, and you have to keep reminding yourself that the whole world isn't just one big Milburn." He looked over at Peter, sipped his beer and grinned, and Peter saw the fractured light in his eyes and knew, as he had all along, that underneath the "stayin' sane" kind of craziness there was another, real craziness. "Now admit it, Pete." He said, "Aren't there times when you'd like to see the whole damn town go up in flames? The whole thing knocked down and plowed over? It's a ghost town, man. The whole place is full of Rip Van Winkles, it's just one Rip Van Winkle after another, a bunch of weird Rip Van Winkles with vacuums for brains, with a knothead drunk for a sheriff and crummy bars for a social life—"

"What happened to Penny Draeger?" Peter interrupted. "You haven't gone out with her for three weeks."

Jim hunched over the bar and wrapped his hand around his beerglass.
"One.
She heard I took that Mostyn dame out, so she got pissed off at me.
Two.
Her parents, old Rollie and Irmengard, heard that she went out a couple of times with the late F. Robinson. So they grounded her. She never told me about that, you know? Good thing she didn't. I would have grounded her, all right."

"Do you think she went out with him because you took that woman to Humphrey's?"

"How the hell do I know why she does things, man? Do you see a sequence there, my boy?"

"Don't you?" It was sometimes safer to give Jim's questions back to him.

"Hell." He bent all the way forward and lay his shaggy head on the wet wood of the bar. "All these women are mysteries to me." He was speaking softly, as if regretfully, but Peter saw his eyes gleaming between his lashes and knew it was an act. "Yeah. Well you might have a point. There might be a sequence there after all, Clarabelle. There just might be. And if there is, then that Anna dame besides not giving me any herself after teasing me along, also screwed up the sex life I had. In fact, if you look at it that way, you could definitely say that she owes me a few." He rolled his head a quarter turn up on the bar, and his eyes gleamed at Peter. "Which had occurred to me, to tell you the truth." He sat there, bent over, his head like a separate object on the bar, grinning maniacally up at Peter. "Yes, it had, old pal."

Peter swallowed.

Jim straightened up and knocked on the bar. "Two more flagons here, Sunshine."

"What do you want to do?" Peter asked, knowing that he would inevitably be carried along with it, and looked through the tavern's greasy windows at a pane of darkness flecked with white.

"Let's see. What do I want to do?" Jim mused, and Peter realized sickeningly that Jim had known all along what he wanted to do, and that inviting him out for a beer was only the first moment of the plan; he'd been steered into this conversation as surely as he'd been driven out into the country, and all of it, "another way of stayin' sane" and the ghost town business, was enumerated on a list somewhere in Hardie's mind. "What do I want to do?" He cocked his head. "Even this palace gets a little boring after a flagon or six, so I guess going back to dear little Milburn would be pleasant. Yes, I think we'll definitely be going back to dear little Milburn."

"Let's stay away from her," Peter said.

Jim ignored this. "You know, our dear lovely sexy friend moved out of the hotel two weeks ago. Oh, she is missed. She is
missed,
Pete. I miss seeing that great ass going up the stairs. I miss those eyes flashing in the corridors. I miss her empty suitcase. I miss her amazing body. And I'm sure you know where she went."

"My father arranged the mortgage.
His
house." Peter nodded more vigorously than he needed to, and realized he was getting drunk again.

"Your old man's a useful old gnome, isn't he?" Jim asked, smiling pleasantly. "Innkeeper!" He banged on the bar. "Give my friend and myself a couple of shots of your best bourbon." The bartender resentfully poured out shots of the same brand that Jim had stolen. "Now, back to the point. Our friend who is so sincerely missed moves out of our excellent hotel and into Robinson's house. Now isn't that a curious sort of coincidence? I suppose that you and I, Clarabelle, are the only two people in the world who know that it is a coincidence. Because we're the only people who knew she was out at the station when old Freddy passed."

"His heart," Peter muttered.

"Oh, she does get you in the heart. She gets you by the heart and the balls. But funny though, isn't it? Freddy falls down onto the tracks—did I say falls? No:
floats.
I saw it, remember. He floats down onto the tracks like he's made out of tissue paper. Then she gets all hot to own his house. Is that also one, old buddy? Do you see a sequence there too, Clarabelle?"

"No," he whispered.

"Now, Pete, that's not how you got early admission to Cornhole U. Use those powerful brain cells, baby." He put his hand on Peter's back and leaned toward him, breathing the clear odor of alcohol into Peter's face. "Our sexy friend wants something in that house. Just think of her in there. Man, I'm curious, aren't you? That sexy lady moving around in Freddy's old house— what's she looking for? Money? Jewelry? Dope? Well, who knows? But she's looking for something. Moving that sexy frame of hers around those rooms, checking everything out ... that'd be a sight to see, wouldn't it?"

"I can't," Peter said. The bourbon moved in his guts like oil.

"I think," said Jim, "that we will begin to move toward our transportation."