The Autumn Dead (19 page)

"Oh, I thought you were one of the Forester party." His tone implied that I owed him an explanation for not being such.

Damn, I thought. My idea had been to get as close to the cabin as possible and hear what was going on. Standing here talking was bound to get them up from below deck. I wouldn't learn anything at all.

But then I got lucky.

A woman of similar age called to the man from down the dock. He waved to her.

"I'm with maintenance,"
 
I said quickly.

"Oh," he said, "maintenance." He said it as if he knew exactly what I was talking about. I was glad he did. Then, "My wife. She wants me to help her paint the walls. On our houseboat."

I wished he weren't talking so loudly. I wished he would leave.

She called again and he shrugged, as if embarrassed a woman would have such power over a man, and then he left. I stood there counting minutes on my Timex again, waiting for them to burst through the cabin doors and demand to know what I was doing there.

Another three, four minutes went by. And nothing.

I touched my .38 for luck again, then crept over to the far side of the cabin and knelt down and pressed my ear very hard against the thin white wall.

I hoped the next few minutes would prove I would be well rewarded for all my trouble of the past hour or so.

I
knelt to the left of two windows that looked down into the dining area. A single
glimpse had shown me that Forester and Price stood over a chair in which Dave Haskins sat, hands in lap, head down, miserable.

Forester said, "There's one thing the three of us need to do. And that's keep calm."

"Calm, right," Price said. "With this little bastard thinking of going to the police."

In a voice that was almost a sob, Haskins said, "Larry, honest to God, I didn't say I was going to the police, I only said maybe we should."

"Maybe we should? You little candy-ass. Don't you know that would ruin us? Every goddamn one of us."

"Maybe they wouldn't prosecute," Haskins said. He sounded painfully young and naive.

"Right," Price said. "Maybe that fat-ass mayor of ours would give us a medal."

Forester said, "That's enough, Price."

A sullen silence ensued. There was the sound of wind, the aroma of meat cooking on a grill somewhere nearby, laughter warm as the sunlight.

Forester said, "I got another letter today. Just reminding us to be there tomorrow night at ten at Pierce Point."

Another silence. Once, Haskins moaned. Price swore continuously.

"I'll take care of this son of a bitch," Price said.

"You'll calm down and shut your mouth," Forester said. He had one of those tempers you could push a long way but then suddenly no further.

"Two hundred thousand dollars," Price said. "We can't afford it."

"Do we have any choice?" Forester said.

"Oh yes," Price said. "I forgot all about your political ambitions. It'd be worth two hundred thousand to you to ensure that you got a shot at congress next time, wouldn't it?"

Haskins said, "We could go to the police. Tell them what happened. Tell them—"

Forester said, as if to a child, "Dave, try to understand something, will you?"

"All right, Ted."

"It's not so much a question of legal culpability here. It's a question of what would happen to our reputations once it got out. Think it through, Dave. Think of how your wife would feel, or your children, your friends at the office, the people you know at church. Think of how they'd look at you. In their eyes, you'd never be the same again. Every time they saw you, they'd think about it. They might not even mean to. But they would."

Another silence.

Dave Haskins said softly, "You're right, Ted. I wasn't thinking clearly."

"If that goddamn Dwyer hadn't come along the other night at the reunion, I would have beaten it out of her," Price said. "Who she was working with, I mean."

"You sure she was involved in this?" Haskins said. "Somehow—"

Price laughed. All his cynicism was in the sound. "Somehow you don't think she was the kind to get involved in shaking somebody down for money?"

"She wasn't cruel," Haskins said.

"No, she was the next thing to a saint."

"Be quiet," Forester said. "We have to decide what we're going to do about tomorrow night." He paused. "Does everybody have his share ready?"

"I do," Haskins said. He seemed like a good little boy doing just what the teacher wanted him to.

"I don't want to pay it," Price said.

"That wasn't what I asked you, Larry," Forester snapped.

"I asked you if you had your share ready."

Price said, "Yes."

"Then please hand it over."

"What? Why to you?"

"Because I'm the one who'll take it tomorrow night."

"Bullshit."

"Then let's take it to a vote. All right?"

"A vote would be fine with me," Haskins said. He seemed to be in shock.

"All in favor of me taking the money, raise their hands."

"You bastard," Price said. "You know you can bully this little pecker around."

"Do you vote for me?" Forester said.

"Of course I do, Ted."

"Thank you, Dave."

"Assholes."

"I'd like your money," Forester said. "I'd like it now."

A pause. Then Price said, "I don't like this. I don't like this at all and I want to go on record as saying I don't like it." The wind had come up and I was starting to lean in closer, maybe dangerously close, to the window when a voice floated over to me on the air currents.

"Say, are you sure you're with maintenance?"

It was my elderly friend. He was down on the pier. I realized quickly enough that I probably appeared, kneeling down as I was, to be burglarizing the boat. He looked suspicious, angry.

He didn't give me time to respond, "'Ted! Ted, are you down there! You'd better get up here!" he called.

I got to my feet, knees cracking and stiff from kneeling, and began hobbling across the deck.

Seeing me move toward him, he took the broom in his hand and held it crosswise, like a martial-arts weapon.

"I'm not going to hurt you," I said. "Just relax, all right?"

I jumped back on the pier, trying to get to my feet as I reached the wood.

Behind me, I heard Larry Price shout, "Hey! Stop!"

The old man put his broom toward me, but I just gently pushed it away. "Just relax and enjoy the day, all right? Don't get mixed up in this."

Price surprised me by doing a dash across the boat and clearing the water and landing on my back. He smelled of sweat and hair spray and heat. He was still strong in the sinewy way of high school days.

"Atta boy!" the old man shouted, as Price threw me to the pier.

Price got his arm around my neck and started to choke me. I hadn't been in this kind of street fight in thirty years. At first I had no idea what to do. He took my hair and slammed my head against the pier once. The old man said, "Kick his butt, Larry! Kick his butt!" And then Price did something foolish, he tried to turn my face toward his so he could hit me dead-on. I surprised him. I got him one clean shot with my elbow in the teeth, and it was enough to make him fall away, and for his open mouth to fill up immediately with thick red blood. I got to my feet and he started to get to his. I kicked him once very hard in the abdomen. He went over backward and sprawled on the pier.

"Hey, that's not fair!" the old man said. To him I was the Mad Russian in some goofy pro wrestling match.

Forester and Haskins were on the deck now and running toward me.

I took off down the pier, running as best I could given knees that were none too good to begin with.

The pier was still packed and it was easy to lose myself among the crowd and find my car and get out of there.

A
t the time we'd agreed to meet, Dr. Glendon Evans opened the door of his condo. I started across the threshold, the pines surrounding his aerie sweet on the dying day. Then I stopped. He had a gun, some kind of Mauser, and he wanted to make sure I saw it.

"Not exactly your style, is it?"

He wore an open white shirt and blue trousers with a brown leather belt and penny loafers without socks. He looked angry and he smelled faintly of bourbon. "I'm not going to take any of your shit, Mr. Dwyer. I'm warning you."

"You really think that's going to help?"

"I've done a little checking on you."

"I'm impressed."

"You used to be a cop."

"I would have been more than happy to tell you that myself."

"Cops have ways of getting people to confess to things they didn't do."

"And you're saying you didn't kill her."

"That's exactly what I'm saying."

"Then there's no reason for the gun."

"Does it make you nervous, Mr. Dwyer?"

"Of course it makes me nervous, Dr. Evans. You're an amateur. Amateurs terrify me."

He glanced down at the weapon in his hand as if it were a growth slowly eating its way up his arm. "I don't suppose I am very good at this sort of thing."

"No," I said, reaching out and gently taking the gun from his hand, "I don't suppose you are."

"I violated half the ethics I'm supposed to believe in."

"You want me to call you names?"

"Maybe I'd feel better if you did, Mr. Dwyer."

This was half an hour later. We sat in the breakfast nook. We were sipping some of his Wild Turkey again. The night sky was purple and starry. Jets rumbled in the gloom above like gods displeased.

"Tell me what happened."

"Drugs," he said. "I gave her drugs."

"How many times?"

"Twice."

I had some more whiskey and just stared at my fists.

"I—I thought it was the only way I could keep her." He shook his head as if it hurt to do so. "I'd never had to deal with anything like it before." He had some whiskey himself. "You know how I told you I rode around in Lincolns growing up?"

I nodded.

"Well, it was the same with women. Never any problem. My color rarely seemed to matter. I just naturally seemed to be attractive to women and I always took that for granted." More whiskey. A sigh half anger, half remorse. "I was a good lover. I know I was. I don't mean in bed necessarily, though even there I always tried to make sure that they had their satisfaction before I took mine." He waved a hand. "I mean I was a good lover in the sense that I tried to be as attentive and sensitive as possible. When things ended, it was always me who ended them, but even then I tried to make it as easy as possible. And it wasn't because I was bored, it was just—I knew there were more things I needed to learn from women. They're the great teachers, you know, women; the best ones are, at any rate."

I laughed. "It's true. But let's not let them know that."

He smiled. "I'm afraid some of them do." Then he went back to frowning. "I'd never had anybody treat me the way Karen did."

"As good and as bad."

"Exactly."

"But it's the bad things you remember, isn't it?"

"That's what's so odd. I know we must have had hundreds of good times—but now I can barely remember any of them."

I was just letting him talk, easing him into his confession. He was eager to give it and I was eager to hear it. We both just kind of had to be in the right emotional spot. I poured him more whiskey.