Icarus. (52 page)

"Remember," he breathed. "The name… not your name…"

"I changed my name," Grace said. The crying had stopped and she was calm. The sobs seemed to have exhausted her. "After she died, you can't imagine what it was like. The police cleared me, I was innocent, they understood what happened, that it was an accident, but everyone else – the kids in my school, Kara's parents; oh, God, Kara's parents, they lived on the block and it was so horrible… It was in all the papers, on TV… People thought I killed my best friend so I could be a goddamn cheerleader. My parents had to move, my father quit his job, I left school… You can't imagine. So I changed my name."

Grace Lerner. That was the name. He remembered: Grace Lerner!

"No one ever knew. When I moved into the city, I was Grace Childress; that was my mother's maiden name. No one knew who I was and I could go back to being a normal person. I never told anyone. Until Kid. We used to talk about everything and I trusted him, and you can't imagine the burden of carrying it around with me, no one knowing, so it just came out one day. I told him the whole story. I guess that's when he changed my nickname from the Rookie," she said. "That prick."

He could see her clenching the knife. As she talked, her grip got tighter and tighter.

"Afterward, I hated that I told him. Sometimes I couldn't sleep, knowing that someone knew."

Jack looked up. Saw a movement behind her. He couldn't believe what he was seeing, thought maybe he was hallucinating. But it was real, all right. It was amazingly, blessedly real. Keep her talking, he thought. Keep her talking now, just a few seconds more…

"That's why you killed him," he said.

She looked stunned. Shocked that he had said it out loud. "No." She shook her head violently. "Is that what you think?" When he nodded, she said, "No! It just meant he could talk to me. It's why he came and told me what he told me. How afraid he was. He trusted me because he knew I'd trusted him. The way I'm trusting you now. I just want you to understand why I didn't call the police. I was with him the night he died. I left my party to go there. I'm the woman you've been looking for. But I left before anything happened. I did, Jack, you've got to believe me. I left, but later I came back to tell him I'd made a mistake, that it was all over, for real this time, but when I got there he was dead. I saw him on the street and… I couldn't tell you. I knew you were looking for me but I couldn't tell you. Or that sergeant. I couldn't face more publicity, I couldn't imagine living through that again. But I didn't kill anyone."

"Dom's knife," Jack said.

"I told you. I found it in the kitchen! I don't understand what-"

But Jack didn't wait to find out what she didn't understand. He looked behind her and said, "Get Dom's knife."

She whirled and Bryan was right behind her now, he'd crept up on her, so light on his feet, and he grabbed her wrist. Jack heard the crack and Grace's quick scream, and Bryan had the knife. He'd taken it away from her. Held it in front of him, an expression of wonder on his face.

"She killed him," Jack said. "She killed Kid and the others."

"No!" Grace screamed. "You can't think that! Jack, after last night, you can't think that!"

Jack stumbled forward, away from the wall. He grabbed hold of the table and the world stopped spinning around him. He felt the pull of the wall recede and Grace's story began to echo now inside him. He saw the look of pain deep in her eyes as she held her broken wrist. He saw the look of fear as she stared at Bryan behind her. Jack started to take a step toward Bryan, to thank him, but he stopped short. Looked up and said to Kid's friend, in a voice that was low and terrible, "How did you get in here?"

"It's time for our session," Bryan said. "Did you forget?"

"I didn't ask that," Jack said. "I asked how you got into my apartment."

Bryan didn't answer at first. Then slowly, oh so slowly, he said, "I let myself in."

It was as if ice water were running through Jack's veins. He could feel the chill devour his entire body. "And how did you do that?" he asked.

Bryan answered as if he were talking to a simpleton. "With my key."

"What key?"

"The one I took," Bryan said. "The one I took off the black lady."

"Mattie," Jack said.

"That's right," Bryan nodded. "I used it before, you know. Came in from the garage. That time I tried to warn you, when I wrote on the wall. You didn't know I used it, though. I was smart that day. I broke the glass so you'd think I came in from the balcony."

Grace moaned, a low, barely audible expression of pain. All of the color had drained from her face.

"Give me the knife, Bryan," Jack said calmly. "Why don't you just hand me the knife."

"Oh, no," Bryan said. "It's mine. It belongs to me now. I just left it here by mistake. When I was cleaning up."

Jack didn't understand what Bryan meant. What he did understand, what was very, very clear, was that he was talking to a madman. And he knew he had to stay calm if he wanted to stay alive.

"When were you cleaning up?" he asked gently.

"This morning. Very early this morning. It was very messy. After I was gone I realized I left it on the kitchen counter."

"Can we go in the living room and talk about this?" Jack took a step toward the sliding glass door but Bryan raised the knife, jabbed it menacingly at Jack.

"No," Bryan said. There was no anger in his voice. No tone at all. No emotion. "I'm sorry, Mr. Keller, but you're going to have to stay out here."

Jack tried to keep his tone as even as Bryan's. "I think Grace needs to get to a doctor. Why don't you let me call a doctor and then you and I can stay out here and talk."

Bryan's brow furrowed just a bit. He didn't seem confused, though. He looked slightly offended. "Everyone thinks I'm an idiot," he said. "But I can't be such an idiot, can I? I outsmarted everybody, even you." He looked over at Grace and shook his head. "You think I'm going to let you call somebody?" he said to Jack. "Come on, Mr. Keller, you can do better than that." And as he said those words, Bryan's face lost that blank look. Now he looked deeply angry. Although his voice never wavered, got no louder, his cheeks turned red. The rage in his eyes made them shine like a beacon of hate. "That's what you told him – 'you can do better.'"

"What?" Jack asked. "What are you talking about?"

"'You can do better,' that's what you said. I remember. In the restaurant."

Jack remembered, too. Kid and Bryan around the table at Jack's. Jack telling them their plan wouldn't work. Bryan gently asking questions, Kid urgently telling Bryan that it didn't matter, that Jack was giving them the money.

I think it's a shitty idea for now. For you, Jack had said to Kid. And partly because you can do so much better.

Kid saying: Jack, don't say that, please. The "please" was so urgent, as if he were trying to tell him something crucial.

He was. He was telling Jack not to issue a death sentence.

"It was all about the gym, wasn't it?" Jack said. "It was all about the fucking gym."

"Everyone was always trying to take him away from me," Bryan said, standing on the terrace, the knife held loosely but still pointing straight at Jack. He sounded so sad now, like a petulant child who couldn't comprehend why he was being made to stand in the corner. "But we were gonna be partners. Our whole lives we said we'd be partners. The gym was going to be our place. Why would you wanna split us up?"

"No," Jack said. "That was never the idea. He wasn't going to leave you behind."

"Yes, he was. He was always trying to leave me behind. Even in school. Even in St. John's. I was his best friend. I loved him. I protected him. But he liked somebody better than me. He got another best friend…"

"Jesus," Jack said softly. "The boy on the team. The boy who broke his neck."

"Harvey Wiggins," Bryan said, nodding. "I'm nicer than him, I'm as smart as him. Why wouldn't he like me as much as Harvey?"

"You're the one who hit him. In practice. You broke his neck."

"I had to make Kid understand, didn't I? He thought he liked Harvey better than me."

"That's why he went away. It's why he went to Virginia. He wanted to get away from you."

"He thought I wouldn't find him. But I did. I found him, all right. He was very surprised when I showed up but I think he was happy. I think he was glad to see me."

"Did you go to school there, Bryan? To Virginia State?" Jack could barely get the words out. "Were you on the football team?"

"For half a year. Then my knee got real bad. The coach wouldn't let me play anymore."

"You knew the players, the ones who came to my restaurant."

"They were nice guys," Bryan said. "They were real nice guys."

"You killed them."

"I felt bad about it, Mr. Keller, honest. But I had to. They didn't understand. I made the plan; it was a smart plan, wasn't it? But I only told them half of it. They thought I was just gonna rob the place and they'd make some money. And they were really excited when they heard I got this." Bryan opened the top two buttons of his polo shirt to show Jack what was underneath. Jack moaned when he saw it, closed his eyes, and felt a nauseating bile rise from his stomach up through his throat.

Around Bryan's thick neck was the diamond necklace Jack had bought for Caroline.

"It's beautiful, Mr. Keller," Bryan said. "It's the most beautiful thing I ever saw."

Jack's head rolled back and he heard it plain as day now. The words in the office that terrible night. The crazy words that made no sense. The last words Caroline ever heard: Wooly here… the will is strong… wool candy broken…

"Kid's nickname for you, when you played football," Jack said to Bryan. "He told me what it was. He called you something."

"The Wall," Bryan told him. "I blocked for him. I saved him over and over again. Since we were little boys. So he called me the Wall."

Wooly here… the will is strong… wool candy broken…

He understood now. He was hearing it all for the first time. With no concussion, with no pain distorting the sounds. Oh, God, he could hear it as plain as day.

The Wall is here… The Wall is strong… The Wall can't be broken.

Jack could barely get his next words out.

"You killed my wife," he whispered. "You shot me and you killed my wife."

"I didn't want to hurt you," Bryan said mournfully. "I really like you. But she was trying to take him away, too."

"No," Jack said. "It's not possible."

"He saw her. It was an accident, he wasn't looking for her, but he saw her down there. Right after I found him." Bryan's voice was high-pitched now, the sound of a puppy locked up in a room and left alone for too long. "He told her, Mr. Keller. All about Harvey Wiggins. He said he didn't, but I could tell."

"She didn't do anything," Jack said. "She was just trying to help him. She didn't have to die."

"Yes, she did. She was going to send him away. Far away."

Jack sagged. "To London."

"How was I gonna get to London, Mr. Keller? How was I gonna find him when he was so far away?"

"He knew? Kid knew that you… that you killed her?"

"No. Not then, anyway. But back here, back in New York, he was starting to understand how smart I really was. He was starting to figure it out. I didn't ever want him to know because I wanted him to love me. I was so afraid he might… he might hate me if he found out."

"What was there to figure out, Bryan?"

"That I got the invitations. To your opening. I told Kid I'd leave him alone, let him go where he wanted. I told him I was leaving Virginia 'cause he didn't want me. 'Cause he didn't love me anymore. But I didn't leave. I figured out a better plan. So he couldn't love anyone else, only me."

"You went to my wife."

"She knew about me and she was scared. I told her I'd leave him alone, I'd leave them alone, but she had to help. She couldn't say anything to anyone, 'specially not to Kid. She just had to get me two invitations to your opening. At first she didn't want to do it but I convinced her it was okay. She thought she was being so smart, I could tell. She thought I was gonna rob the place. But that's what I wanted her to think, 'cause I knew she didn't care about money. But I didn't care about money, either, Mr. Keller, I just wanted what was mine. I just wanted Kid to stay with me.

"Bryan," Jack said very slowly and very softly. "Kid had another nickname for you, too, didn't he?"

Bryan nodded. And began pacing. Small fidgety steps that belied the deadly calm of his voice. "I didn't like it, though. It made me angry."

"The Mistake. That's what he called you."

"He told it to me when we were in college. The first time I told him I loved him. He told me that I didn't understand what had happened, I didn't understand anything at all about that night when he cried and I hugged him and I kissed him. He said that everything I knew was just one big mistake. But it wasn't, Mr. Keller. And I proved it wasn't. Over and over again, I proved it."

"When did he know? When did he find out about Caroline?"

"The night he died. He finally asked me."

"And you told him?"

"Oh, no. I told him that no matter what he thought, he couldn't prove it. And I told him he'd better not say anything, either. I said that if he told you, you'd never see him again. I said you'd blame him. And he knew I was right. It's why he couldn't tell you about the woman, either, the English one. He knew you'd hate him."

"What English woman?" Jack asked. "What-"

"That's why he was so wrong," Bryan said, not hearing Jack. Bryan's pacing had brought the two men nearly face-to-face. "I would never hate him. No matter what he did, I couldn't hate him. I loved him. I loved him so, so much. The only people I hated were the ones who tried to take him away from me."