Red House Blues (26 page)

What have you gotten
yourself into now, Nikos?
Nick could
almost hear his father’s voice. Yes, good question. If he had
called his father when he first got hurt he would already be back
in Napa baking his battered body under the California sun. His
mother would be fussing over him, pouring buckets of avgolemono
soupa down his gullet like a solicitous mama gannet feeding her
chick. But the first day or so he had been mostly unconscious and
later when his brain cells were marginally functioning he decided
not to call. Why worry his parents unnecessarily? He’d fill them in
once he was on his feet.

Then before he can recover this crazy
bruised blond shows up with a cracked-brain story about rampaging
homicidal maniacs and he goes weaker in the knees than he already
was.

She was breathing easily
now, the top of her head snuggled under his chin. No nightmares for
the time being. His leg was throbbing and his ribs felt like broken
glass slicing into his lungs but he didn’t dare move a muscle for
fear of waking her. He shouldn’t have left Madison Health and
Convalescent. Maybe the beauteous and bruised widow Pike wasn’t the
only lunatic. His dad would agree with the assessment.
What, you crazy? Nikos, why you not come
home
and work in the winery? I give you
the winery, you come home. You break your mother’s heart with this
foolishness.
It was always the same, come
home and give up the foolishness.

It wasn’t as if he didn’t like the wine
business. He had grown up in the vineyard and as the only son of
Big George Theophilos the entire extended family expected Nick
would take the reins when his father finally decided to retire.

Nick, however, had taken a wild turn and run
off to San Francisco to enroll in college. To the family it was as
if he had spit on three thousand years of Theophilos tradition
dating back to the vineyards of Alexander the Greek.

To add insult to injury he hadn’t majored in
business administration or even oenology. He was a disappointment
of truly heroic proportions. It wasn’t his mother’s heart that was
broken, it was George’s. In his mother’s eyes he could do no wrong,
though she still held out hope her darling boy would see sense
eventually. As consolation she had his older sisters, Dorothea and
Sophia, to keep her company and supply the grandkids. Both had
married scions of Napa Valley vintner families.

Nick had not intended to hurt them but he
had to follow what he knew to be his true calling. There had been
an ocean of tears when he told them.

What will Suzan say if she
should find out what I do for a living?
The thought sprang fully formed into his mind. She hadn’t as
yet actually asked what he was doing in Seattle. She asked why he
had taken a room in what everyone in the neighborhood called the
Red House, a question that he had deflected by telling her it was
only a temporary solution to his housing needs. Which said next to
nothing about his situation. Eventually if he stuck around, she was
sure to get curious. He wasn’t going to be able lie to her. He
would tell her the whole story and in all probability that would be
the last he ever saw of her. She would lump him in the loser
category along with her no-good junky husband and that would be
that. At the thought of never seeing her again a pain that had
nothing to do with broken bones wormed its way through his gut. He
wanted to hold her in his arms and not let go. It was
suicide.

If he were smart he would part company with
Suzan and her friend as soon as possible before things got any more
awkward than they already were. Not right now though. Right now he
had to think. This wasn’t his fight unless he wanted to make it his
fight. He could walk away at this point, steer clear of the
neighborhood and hope that was enough to get him out of harm’s way.
High-tailing it back to Napa Valley was not presently an option. He
was obligated to finish the job he’d come to Seattle to do. You
didn’t ditch a contract like that.

But the crazy widow didn’t
appear to be easy to dissuade. With or without him she would go
after those cursed notebooks with their amateurish verses and
illegible scrawl. She was a dog with a bone and she was going to
get her pretty neck broken. He couldn’t turn his back on her until
he knew she was safely back in Bellingham.
Sure, you’ll be one hell of a bodyguard. You’re worse off
than she is!

On the up side his leg wasn’t so badly
broken that he couldn’t get around if he had some crutches. He’d
pick up a pair in the morning. Who knows, they might come in handy
as weapons.

Suzan stirred slightly,
emitting a soft sigh.
I am in such
trouble.

Suzan was already dressed when Claire
arrived at their room the next morning. As was Nick, who sat at the
small desk beside the TV table thumbing through a Gideon Bible.

“Hi Claire,” he said, smiling sheepishly.
“Always wanted to know if these were the real thing or if these
Gideon’s were a cult of UFO conspiracy nut cases spreading the word
that only traveling salesmen are going to be beamed up to heaven
when the next comet sweeps by.”

“Like Heavens Gate. Well, is it a real
Bible?” said Claire.

“From what I can see. At least from what I
remember of Sunday school class,” he said. “I’m kind of
disappointed, actually.”

“Don’t pay any attention to Nick. He’s been
weird all morning,” said Suzan, laughing.

“Look who’s talking,” said Claire. “When I
left you two last night you were at each other’s bruised throats.
What’s going on?”

“Suzan and I have decided to attack the
citadel today. We are girding our loins to go into battle. Onward,
the soldiers. Kick the tires, light the fires.”

“What did you do, Suzan, over-medicate the
boy?” said Claire, frowning.

“Something like
that.”
I wished I could stop smiling like
an idiot. Claire is sure to pick up on the afterglow.
Oh well, what the hell, thought Suzan, knowing
how fleeting that feeling can be, how rare, how
priceless.

“What is this about attacking the
citadel?”

“Nick and I have decided since no one of us
can retrieve the notebooks alone, and we don’t have time to wait
until we’re healed, the three of us are going to go over to the
house today, like an invading army.”

“At least if we can convince you to go with
us,” said Nick. “We figure if we run into Ferlin, we can say you’re
helping me pack up my things.”

“What if he decides to shoot first and ask
questions later?”

“How likely is that? I mean, really? If we
catch him off guard we have a good chance. He thinks we’re both out
of commission.”

“Well, you are! Neither of you can walk
across the room unassisted, remember?”

“We are doing better today,” said Suzan.
“And we have to do this before Ferlin notices that the notebooks
are not where he put them. If he hasn’t already. He is sure to
figure out that Nick swiped the packet from him and when he does
he’ll search his room. We have to get there first.”

“If it is gone from where I stashed it,
we’ll know Ferlin beat us to the punch and the notebooks are
toast," said Nick. "He should have destroyed the packet first
thing, but might have figured he could use it as leverage with
somebody. He is a hoarder and an opportunist. The guy never throws
anything away he might have use for later but I don’t think he’ll
take that chance twice. He’ll burn it.”

“I don’t suppose it would do any good for me
to try to argue you two out of this expedition,” said Claire.

“Not a chance,” said Suzan. “But we can’t do
it without you so I hope you’re with us. We’ll get in and out as
fast as we can. Claire, if I don’t do this . . .”

“Yeah I know, you’ll have it hanging over
your head forever,” said Claire. “You really think that all this
bad shit has to do with something Sean wrote in his tatty little
notebooks?”

“As unlikely as it appears on the surface, I
think it’s entirely possible. Don’t you? At any rate it’s all we
have to go on.”

With a heavy sigh she sat down on the end of
the bed.

“Yeah. Have to admit, I can’t see any other
explanation. So, when do you guys want to get going on this fool’s
errand?”

“Early afternoon would be the best time, I
think,” said Nick. “I don’t want to be waking anybody up and nobody
is up before eleven. After noon a few are in class at the
university and Ferlin goes down to that auto body shop of his.
Alexis is usually at the gallery. We definitely don’t want to be
there at night. There’s always someone hanging around at night. So,
I’d say the odds are we’re less likely to run into one of my
housemates if we go in the afternoon.”

“This afternoon?”

“No time like the present,” said Nick.
“Right after we pick up a pair of crutches at the drug store. I
have to be a bit more mobile than I am.”

“Then what? Supposing we get the notebooks,
what happens then?”

“We read them, of course. Together,” said
Suzan. “We try to figure out where the danger is in what Sean
wrote. When we figure it out, we’ll know better what to do.”

“You hope.”

“I hope.”

“Okay, I give up,” said Claire. Turning to
Nick she said, “What changed your mind, though? I’m helping Suzan
because she’s my friend but why should you get involved in
this?”

“Whoever tampered with the Vespa - probably
our pal Ferlin - took that decision out of my hands, right?” he
said, closing the Bible. “So, let’s get some breakfast. I think I
can manage to hobble down to your car. Denny’s is down the
street?”

“End of the block.”

“Great. Denny’s two meals in a row.” said
Suzan. “After we eat, how do we kill time until we make our assault
on the house, Nick?”

“I don’t know about you, but I could use
another nap and a shower. If I can get some help with the shower
part,” he said, sending a smile at Suzan.

“I think that could be arranged.”

“Hmm,” said Claire.

Fir Street at 3 pm was awash with inactivity
except for a trio of Black kids cutting through the property toward
Yesler on their way, judging by their languid progress down the
block, to somewhere they didn’t want to be. Claire pulled the blue
Ford up to the curb opposite the house behind a primer-covered van
with two flat tires.

“Now what, Nick?” she asked.

“We wait and watch for a few minutes. Ferlin
won’t know your car but he’s a suspicious man. If he is inside and
sees us watching the house he is likely to come out to see what
we’re up to. If he comes out, we don’t stick around.”

“I don’t know about this whole idea, you
guys. Now that we’re here I have a really bad feeling about going
in.”

“It will just take a minute when we finally
get in. Just up the stairs, grab the notebooks, then out.”

“Sounds easy enough except the getting up
the stairs part. You’re not good on those crutches yet. Lots of
things sound easy until the shit hits the fan.”

“Maybe one of you should stay in the car as
a lookout to call us on the cell phone if someone shows up,”
offered Nick.

“Won’t work,” said Claire. “I’m the only one
fit enough to get up the stairs without help, what with you
clunking along on those crutches. That leaves Suzan in the car. .
.”

“And I am not about to stay behind in the
car,” Suzan finished her thought.

“Didn’t figure you would. Okay, we all go or
no one goes.”

The house, squatting under an overcast sky
looked as if it were also waiting to see what happened, its black
windows studying them with dispassionate interest. What had Sean
thought of the place? wondered Suzan. Had it been nothing more than
a place to crash so he wouldn’t have to sleep in a doorway in
Pioneer Square? Had it been a refuge and comfort?

It occurred to her, not for the first time,
that she had no idea how his mind had worked. He had seemed to have
such a bright future when they were first married. She grieved for
such a tragic loss of potential. There was no time to let her mind
wander down that path. There was one final act to perform for Sean
and for herself.

“Nothing. Place is dead as Elvis,” said
Claire.

“Yeah. I think we should get at it if we are
going to do it,” said Nick.

“Are you sure you are up for it?” asked
Suzan. “Don’t be a hero if you are in pain.”

“I’m fine. Let’s just get the notebooks,” he
said. “I’ll think about regretting it later when we are far away
from this neighborhood.”

“So, do we go in the back way, Nick, or the
front door? What do you think?”

“It’s a coin flip either way, but I’d say
the front door makes it less likely we’ll run into Ferlin.”

“Right, front door it is. Hope you
remembered the key.”

“Half the time they leave it unlocked, but I
do have the key if we need it.”

Still, they hesitated, none of them eager to
leave the car. Suzan felt as if she was about to jump off a diving
board into the deep end of the Arctic Ocean. Anything could happen.
Close to the surface of her thoughts was that they might be about
to face off against a killer.

Claire was the first to get out of the car,
closing the driver’s side door quietly behind her. Next, Suzan
helped Nick out of the car and they crossed the street to the walk
leading to the front porch. He stumbled on the first step, almost
taking Suzan with him over the railing as he struggled to regain
his balance. She grabbed him under the arm to steady him. This
wasn’t starting out well but they had already come too far to
retreat.

“Hand me the key,” Claire whispered to Nick
as they reached the battered entry door.

Nick dug his key ring out of his jeans
pocket, singled out one of the keys and handed it to Claire. She
fitted it into the lock below the door handle, turned it one way
and slowly rotated the knob.