Put a Lid on It (14 page)

“We're—” Bernie started, but Meehan overrode him, saying, “Thanks. We were beginning to think the place was empty.”

“Couldn't wait to get back, in fact,” the old guy said, turning away, walking into the bungalow, trusting them to follow. “Once the riffraff was gone, that is.” He had a cultured accent, not quite English, with a gravelly voice.

“A lot of them showed up,” Meehan said. He and Bernie entered the bungalow, Bernie stuffing the Connecticut map into his pocket, since somehow the scenario seemed to have changed. Meehan trusted he'd find out what page they were on before too much longer.

The old guy was very tall and lean, and dressed almost completely in white. A white suit, the jacket open over a white shirt open at the collar. Tan Docksiders made for a change of pace. The skin of his face and hands was almost as white as the suit.

By contrast, the bungalow was all dark tones. Indian blankets were thrown over old sofas with wooden arms like paddles. The walls were wood-paneled, with framed Max-field Parrish prints; nymphs and columns, in some alternate-universe Greece.

“Might as well shut that door,” the old guy said, and as Bernie did so, he said, “You boys care for a drink?”

“Sounds good,” Meehan said. Until he figured out what the situation was here, it would probably be a good thing to create a friendly aura.

“I've got rye, and I've got bourbon,” the old guy told them. “Only American whiskies. And Saratoga water, if you want to ruin it. Now
there
was a battle!” he threw in, with a sudden big smile, his eyes sparkling. “What's your preference, fellas?”

“I'll take rye with some Saratoga water,” Meehan said. “It's a little early in the day.” Meaning, before lunch.

“Me, too,” Bernie said.

“Probably wise. Probably wise.”

The old guy opened a big antique mahogany armoire, which had been converted to a bar, complete with sink and tiny refrigerator. Bottles and glasses were on shelves above. Making their drinks, he said, “About the most interesting battle of the war, you want
my
opinion.” He kept stopping in his barman activities to gesture, moving armies with his hands. “Redcoats figured on a three-prong advance, south from Canada, north from New York City, east down the Mohawk valley, planned to split the colonies like a pizza pie, Redcoat forces meet at Albany. The force out of New York City never got there; well, what do you expect from New York City? St. Leger, coming down the Mohawk, got as far as Fort Stanwix, but Benedict Arnold drove him back; that was before Arnold turned yellow. Gentleman Johnny Burgoyne, coming down from the north, captured Fort Ticonderoga, didn't do so well at Bennington, and holed up at Saratoga Springs to lick his wounds. Along came General Horatio Gates, held Burgoyne right there, beat him back, forced him to surrender his whole miserable army. October 17, 1777. First time the Americans showed they could do more than snipe and play the guerrilla. They could win a
battle
. Here you are, boys.”

This was one of those moments when Meehan wished he could have found history interesting, so he'd have something to say right now. But it was the present that had always fully engaged his attention, with both past and future pretty well off his radar screen. So all he could say, when the old guy handed him a tall glass with a red-white-blue design on it to make it look like a Revolutionary War drum, was, “Thanks.”

Bernie also said, “Thanks,” but then he said, “I always read it wasn't that Arnold turned yellow, but that he had enemies in Congress, trumped up those court-martial charges against him.”

“He should have stood there like a man,” the old guy said. He held up his own glass, shorter and fatter than theirs, with LIVE FREE OR DIE on it in black letters (the motto of New Hampshire), in which he was drinking his rye neat, and proposed, “To the Republic.”

“Hear, hear,” Bernie said, and he and Meehan lifted their glasses as well.

Then Meehan sipped, found the combination not bad, but still a little early in the day, while Bernie said, “That battle of Saratoga, the Americans didn't have as good arms as the British, did they?”

Oh, thank you, Bernie, Meehan thought, while the old guy jumped on the question, saying, “You couldn't be more right! Let me show, let me, just take a look at
this!
” and turned away to open an interior door, while Bernie gave Meehan a huge grin and a spread-hands gesture: what could be better than this?

“Come on in here, boys,” the old guy said, switching on the light in the next room.

And here it was. A squarish room completely lined with glass-fronted cabinets containing guns: Kentucky rifles, flintlock muskets, musketoons, breech-loading rifles, carbines, and on shorter shelves a variety of pistols, revolvers, and derringers. The cabinets were gleaming fine wood, and just under the glass of the door fronting each was a discreet brass plate:
COLLECTION OF CLENDON BURNSTONE IV
. Which must be the old guy. Clendon Burnstone IV.

Clendon Burnstone IV launched into a whole song and dance about his collection, which Bernie encouraged with the occasional intelligent (apparently) question, while Meehan cased the joint. He had never had the burglee give him a guided tour before, and he found it making him just a bit giddy. Time to bring himself back to earth by recalling one of the most important of the ten thousand rules: If it sounds too good to be true, it is.

Well, whatever the problem was going to be down the line, at this moment there was nothing for Meehan to do but drink in the site of the crime. The door to this room was metal, skillfully painted to look like panelled wood, and it contained three bolt locks. He really couldn't get a good look at the walls, covered as they were by the cabinets, but he suspected they'd be as tough as the door. The floor was a black rubberized material, soft underfoot but no doubt laid on top of concrete. The ceiling was a kind of translucent cream-colored plastic, with lighting behind it that diffused evenly over the room; it too would be fortified against unwanted entry.

The cabinets themselves stood just off the floor, suggesting they might be on casters; the only good news so far. Since the collection occasionally toured, and since each cabinet bore that identifying brass plate, it made sense for there to be casters down there, so it would be easier to move the heavy cabinets around.

Each cabinet door had its own elaborate-looking lock, but none of those mattered. Get into this room with a hammer, that glass was history.

Finally, Burnstone's lecture on his guns and the battles they'd lent themselves to came to an end, and he ushered them back to the front room, shutting but not locking the door, smiling and nodding at Bernie's expressions of delight, preening a little. “I am proud of all that,” he admitted. “For one thing, I'm keeping those guns here in America, where they belong.”

“That's right,” Bernie said. “Do you ever show the collection?”

“Oh, from time to time,” Burnstone said, “given the right venue, somewhere decent, where American values are still understood. Richmond, say, possibly Boston. Not one of those kike towns like New York.”

“No, I see that,” Bernie said.

“I offered it to you fellas, you know,” Burnstone said. “Mix it in with a candidate appearance. An
important
candidate appearance.”

“Naturally,” Bernie said, while Meehan thought, that's who we're supposed to be. People from the campaign committee. Not the CC, Jeffords and Benjamin and all those, but the campaign committee on the Other Side, whatever letters they've made up to describe themselves. Maybe COP; Committee to Oust the President.

“I don't see anything wrong,” Burnstone went on, “with injecting a little patriotism into this campaign.
Show
the flag! Remind those mouth-breathers out there,
their
freedom was bought with the blood of patriots!”

“Exactly,” Bernie said.

Burnstone shook his head. “But I know how it is, it's all focus groups now, find out what the people want to hear, then say it to them. God forbid you should let your own true feelings show. It's still hard for me to believe, you run an entire presidential election without anybody actually
saying
anything, afraid no matter what they say it'll cost them votes. Well, maybe they're right. Winning's what it's all about, anyway.”

“You're right, there,” Bernie said.

But, Meehan thought, if he thinks we're from COP, coming to debrief him after the weekend rally, that means
somebody
from COP is headed this way. Which means it would be a good idea to get out of here before the real campaigners show up, because it would be a bad idea to let Clendon Burnstone IV and the Other Side suspect there might be predators in the neighborhood.

“We've taken enough of your time,” Meehan said, putting down his unfinished drink. “We really appreciate you showing us your collection, but we ought to get out of here, leave you in peace.”

“Well, I was happy to do what I could,” Burnstone told them, as he escorted them to the door. “We are coming down to the wire here.”

“Yes, we are,” Meehan agreed.

“Just a few short weeks, the election will be upon us,” Burnstone said, “and by God, I
need
our side to win!”

“Absolutely,” Bernie said.

Burnstone opened the bungalow door, accompanied them outside. “Not so much the presidency,” he said, “that's just a figurehead, but I need a few fellas in Congress ready to get
my
bill passed.”

“That's what we're working on,” Bernie assured him.

Speaking confidentially, Burnstone said, “That's the only reason I'm lending myself to all this, you know. For the quid pro quo.” He shook his head, heavy with his burdens. “Mingling with the lower orders,” he said. “What I normally do with the great unwashed is mostly leave them to themselves. Unwashed they most certainly are, but what makes them great I will never understand.” With a wave of a bony hand and an amiable smile, he said, “Nice to have this chat.”

28

A
S THEY STEPPED
away from the bungalow, Meehan looked over toward the guest house, and said, out of the corner of his mouth, “Pipe that.”

What they hadn't been able to see while walking toward the bungalow were the three cars parked in a blacktop area behind the guest house. One was a black Daimler, one an orange Honda Civic, one a green Chevy Celebrity.

“Him, and staff,” Bernie suggested.

They walked on, rounding the guest house, aware now that there must be people in there. Meehan said, “I think he's living in the guest house. Suppose the staff lives in?”

“The man's eighty, he doesn't want to be out here by himself.”

“I don't want him out here at all,” Meehan said.

They followed Burnstone Trail back to the main house, where Meehan said, “I just want to take a look.”

“Me, too.”

They went up on the porch and looked in windows at mounds of furniture covered by white sheets. Then they went back to the trail and continued on away from there, Meehan saying, “The big house is too big for him, living alone. So he's in the little house, with a couple staff. So how come he doesn't have a family? How come there's no Clendon Burnstone V?”

“Maybe four was enough,” Bernie said.

They walked on, the house receding behind them, and Meehan said, “I don't see how we do it with him in the guest house.”

“It's a problem,” Bernie agreed.

“It's a problem of noise, mostly,” Meehan said. “We can't do the job without backing a truck up to the place, and you can't tiptoe a truck.” (Not one of the ten thousand rules, just an observation.)

“You can't hide a truck anywhere around here either,” Bernie said, “on all these empty roads. You know, to stake the place out and wait for him to leave.”

“If he's even gonna leave,” Meehan said. “On the other hand, I don't like confrontation.”

“I know what you mean,” Bernie agreed. “But it's true, every once in a while, the only way to get from here to there is tie up a householder.”

Meehan shook his head. “I'd like to find another way.”

“I've seen that collection now,” Bernie said, “and I want it. And I want to take it away from
him
.”

“I know.”

Bernie frowned. “But, you know,” he said, “I didn't see the other part. This package of yours.”

“Oh, it'll be there,” Meehan said. “I noticed, some of those cabinets had little drawers.”

“For bullets,” Bernie said, “flintlocks, gunpowder pouches, things like that. He said so.”

“The package'll be in there, too,” Meehan said, and saw a car coming down the road toward them, a maroon Cadillac Seville. “Gotta deflect these guys,” Meehan said, and held up a hand.

There were two men in the Cad, stout, florid-faced, in suits and ties. They stopped, and the driver buttoned his window down, and Meehan leaned close to say, “You fellas from the Committee?”

“That's us,” said the driver. “Owen Grassmore, and this is Herb Greedly.”

“Fred Leeman,” Meehan said, pointing at himself, “and this is Dave Harkin.”

“How'd you do,” everybody said.

Meehan said, “We were just up there to talk about the band. They think they might have left a banjo behind.”

“It's amazing,” Grassmore said, “how often that happens.”

“And if you'll take a piece of advice,” Meehan said, “you won't go see the old man, not today.”

Grassmore looked confused. “We're supposed to pay a courtesy call, thank the man for the use of the property.”

“I understand that,” Meehan said, “but right now he's hopping mad.”

Bernie added, “Talking about riffraff, mouth-breathers, all over his property.”

“Oh, God,” Grassmore said, “I've seen him when he's like that.”

“The great unwashed,” Meehan said. “He'll calm down after a while, but at this point, you remind him of the rally, you'll just make things worse. Like we did.”

Greedly, the other one, leaned over to say, “That's one miserable old man, you want my opinion.”

“I agree completely,” Meehan told him.

“If the son of a bitch didn't have four hundred million dollars,” Greedly said, “nobody on this earth would talk to him.”