Clifford Sykes, Jr. sat on the edge of his desk as I told him everything I knew about David Raines and Ralph DePaul. I detected a certain pleasure in his eyes when I was talking about Raines. Raines had never made his contempt for “the hillbilly” a secret. But the pleasure became sadness when I told him about his friend DePaul. His jaw muscle worked and he smoked in a chain.
We’d been at it for half an hour. He’d told Marjorie he wouldn’t be taking any calls, and he yelled at anybody foolish enough to knock on his door.
“Lou and Ralph. They were my friends.”
He slid off the desk and rubbed his butt. Apparently it had gone to sleep. Then he walked behind his desk and sat down. The news had shocked him into humility. He hadn’t yet called me a shithead or an asswipe, two of his more recent names for me. But then I hadn’t insulted him either.
“Lou helped build this town. He employed a hell of a lot of people and he was always behind making things better. He had that foundation and it donated a lot of money. Hell, Lou built that swimming pool for those colored kids just last year.” He was talking to himself. He was still trying to convince himself that this was real. “And poor Ralph’s wife. She’s real high-strung and she’s had a lot of health problems. This sure won’t be good for her. This is the kind of thing that can kill people.” I remembered her scream as I stood on the DePaul drive earlier. The terrible grief of it. “Him and that damned gambling. I warned him about it. He used to sneak off to the Quad Cities. Friend of mine spotted him over there several times. I brought it up to Ralph, and he promised me he wouldn’t do it any more. He lied. And he just got in deeper.”
He leaned back in his chair. He chewed on the inside of his cheek, and then he said: “If all this is true, McCain-and it probably is-that still leaves us with two murders.” Despite the air conditioning, his tan khaki shirt was spotted with sweat. “Somebody who wanted to pay them back for being involved in that fire.”
“That’s how I read it.”
“You got any ideas?”
I swallowed a smile. I imagined Judge Whitney’s face when I told her that he’d actually asked my opinion. The old judge would have ordered up a bottle of the best. The new judge would just sip her ginger ale.
I lied, because I felt as if I’d done all the work so far and I wanted to finish it off myself. “Not really. Just possibilities.”
“What kind of possibilities?”
“Just ideas that I still need to think through.”
The way he looked at me, I knew he would soon be calling me names again. “You’re hiding something.”
“I’m really not, Chief. I just need time to think my ideas through.”
“That’s the trouble with you, McCain. All talk and no action.”
Let’s see, I’d brought him Raines and DePaul while he’d brought nobody. Most of the time I would have defended myself, but now all I wanted was to leave. “I’m just trying to take my time with things.”
“What’ll they do to Ralph?”
“If he cooperates right now, that’ll help. Hell, Chief, your cousin’s the district attorney. You can put in a good word for Ralph.”
“Yeah, he’s my cousin all right, but we had this family reunion out to the park last weekend and I guess I kind of called him a cheat. You know, at cards? I had a few too many beers, I’ll admit that, and he was whopping me every hand, so I shot my mouth off. My wife, she made me call him the next day and apologize. The jerk.”
“He wouldn’t accept your apology?”
“He called me a clown.”
“That’s too bad.”
“‘Clown’ is worse than ‘cheat,’ isn’t it?” But he didn’t wait for an answer. “I guess I can always ask my dad to talk to him about Ralph. He’s scared of Dad just like everybody else.”
He was so damned dopey, I sort of liked him for a fleeting moment. I used his funk to say, “I need to be going, Chief.”
He waved me off. “I suppose Raines’ll bring in some hotshot from Chicago for his lawyer.”
“Probably.”
And then he brought me back to reality. He smiled like a plump idiot baby and said, “Nobody’d want some dipshit lawyer like you, that’s for sure.”
All the way down the hall, as I headed for the front door, I could hear him laughing.
As soon as I opened the outer door to my office, I heard their voices. Jamie and Wendy. I got myself a Pepsi from the machine I shared with the store up front and then strolled into my office. I say strolled because the heat had started to slow me down considerably. I didn’t mind the moisture in my shorts all that much, but the sweat on the bottoms of my feet bothered me. I felt as if I was walking on sponges.
I walked over and kissed Wendy on the top of her head; then I went to my desk, dropped into my chair, and let the rumbling window air conditioner work its noisy miracle. I rolled the Pepsi bottle back and forth over my forehead.
“You look tired, Mr. C.”
All I could manage was a grunt in response.
“Jamie and I were just saying you work too hard.”
Another grunt.
“That’s why I stopped in, Sam. How about grilling some shrimp and eating some potato salad I made? That’s my specialty. Then a relaxing evening on my veranda, where it’s cool as soon as the sun starts to go down.”
“He’ll never be able to say no to that, Mrs. Bennett.”
“Oh, you never know about Sam, Jamie. He might tell me that he’s too busy.”
“But Mr. C needs some time off and this sounds really good.”
“You and I know it sounds good, but does he know it sounds good?” Wendy looked like a coed in a light-blue blouse, dark-blue culottes, and white tennis shoes.
“I wouldn’t miss it. Thank you very much for the invitation.”
“See,” Jamie said. “I told you.”
An odd smile broke wide on Wendy’s face. “Tell him your news, Jamie.”
“What news?” The artificial air was beginning to chase the sweat from me.
“You know when I asked you for an advance?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well, I started thinking about what you said. And then I started thinking about all the money I’ve already given Turk, Mr. C. And you know what I came up with?”
“No. What?”
“I decided to tell him that I wouldn’t loan him any more money because I was broke myself, always borrowing ahead and everything. And even when he started yelling at me, I didn’t change my mind. I did it just the way Mrs. Bennett told me to.”
“Wendy told you to do it?”
“Yes, Mr. C. We just started talking while we were waiting for you, and I was telling her about Turk and everything, and she said that if he really loved me, he’d get a job and not keep asking me for money. A surfer band from Iowa kind’ve confused her, too, I think. Anyway, she told me just what to say and that’s what I did.” She smiled at Wendy. “It was kind of funny, she was coaching me while I was talking. I had a hard time not laughing.”
“I’m very proud of both of you.”
“And, oh yeah, William Hughes called. He said he’d call you back.”
“Didn’t say what he wanted, though?”
“Huh-uh. He said he was in Cedar Rapids and would call when he got back.”
I sat up straight, set the Pepsi bottle on the desk and said, “How long ago did he call?”
“About two hours ago, I guess.”
Two hours would have given him plenty of time to drive back from Cedar Rapids. I reached in the drawer and retrieved the phone book. Lou Bennett wasn’t listed. But then why would he be? All rich men in small cities are, fairly or unfairly, resented by a share of the populace. Having your number listed would be asking for nuisance calls of all kinds.
Then I realized that the heat really had slowed my thought process. Sitting across from me, and looking quite plucky for all the heat, was Linda Raines’s sister-in-law.
“I’m assuming you know the number of the Bennett estate?”
“Sure.”
I wrote it down as she gave it to me, and then I picked up the receiver and dialed.
The voice I heard on the other end was strained, tight. “This is the Bennett residence.”
“Who’s speaking, please?”
“This is the maid.”
“This is Sam McCain. Is Linda there?”
There was a long pause. “She can’t come to the phone right now. I’m sorry, Mr. McCain.”
“Then how about William Hughes? Is he around?”
Even though I didn’t hear another voice, I pictured somebody coaching her, the way Wendy had coached Jamie. “I’m afraid he’s busy, too.” She paused, and then like an actor who’d suddenly remembered her line she said: “They’re working on plans for the funeral.”
“I see.”
The temptation was to ask if everything was all right, but obviously it wasn’t all right; and if I asked it, I’d only be putting her in more difficulty. “Would you please ask one of them to call me at my office?”
“Yes, of course. Good-bye now.”
“Don’t you want my number?”
This time I did hear another voice. An angry director not happy with how his ingenue was performing.
“Oh, yes, Mr. McCain. I’m sorry. Of course I want your number. What is it, please?”
I gave it to her, but I doubted she wrote it down.
“Please have them call me. It’s important.”
“I will. Good-bye, Mr. McCain.”
After I hung up, I sat there sorting through everything I’d just heard. Something was wrong out at the Bennetts’. Maybe it was just an angry family argument. Maybe Linda and Hughes were going at each other. That’s not uncommon following a death. Old grudges are aired and bitterness thrives. I had a client once who wanted me to sue her sister for belting her in the eye. They’d argued over who had really been their dead daddy’s favorite. I finally talked her out of the suit but lost her as a client.
“What’s wrong, Sam?”
“I’m not sure. The maid sounded as if there was some kind of trouble there. I think somebody was telling her what to say.”
“Linda’s probably hysterical with David in jail. She can be hell on wheels when she’s upset.”
“I like that,” Jamie said, “hell on wheels.”
“By the way, Sam, hell on wheels reminds me. Tomorrow night Cartwright is going to try again. He couldn’t get all those Beatles records burned, so now he’s going to stand on that little bluff out at the lake and throw them into the river.”
I wished I had time to enjoy the image of Cartwright firing the Satan-spawned records into the dark waters, but that would have to wait. The Pepsi and the air conditioning had helped revive me, but not enough for the trip I needed to make now.
“I need to go down the hall.” Jamie knew what I meant. She always said “little girls’ room,” so I decided to euphemize my own duties.
Wendy looked confused.
“He means the little boys’ room,” Jamie said.
“Thank you, Jamie.”
“You’re welcome, Mr. C.”
Wendy found this amusing. She looked even better when she was laughing.
In the john, I took off my shirt and proceeded to the tiny sink. I ran cold water, grabbed three paper towels, and started washing my upper body. Then I stuck my head under the faucet and began scooping cold water on my head. Two doors down, I could get a cup of atomic coffee. It didn’t taste very good, but one cup could keep you awake for as long as a month.
I combed my hair, leaving it wet. I reached across to the peg where I kept an extra shirt. This was a short-sleeved blue JCPenney button-down.
When I walked back into my office, Jamie was on the phone. It was a Turk call. She had that look. There was a Turk call expression for happy and a Turk call expression for sad and a Turk call expression for mad. This one was sad. “I told you, Turk. I still love you, but I just can’t give you any more money. You need to get a job. And I shouldn’t be wasting Mr. C’s time by talking about this at the office. Now I need to go.”
After she hung up, she breathed deeply, made fists of her small hands, and said, “Was that all right, Mrs. Bennett?”
“Perfect. And will you please call me Wendy? You’re driving me nuts with that ‘Mrs. Bennett’ business. I feel old enough already.”
“Well, you’re not that old. I’ll bet you’re not even forty yet.”
Now it was my turn to be amused. Wendy was six months younger than I was, which meant she was twenty-eight. Jamie had no concept of peoples’ ages. She once guessed my age and put it at forty-six.
“I’m actually forty-three, Jamie.”
“You are? Well, you’ve held up very well. Wouldn’t you say so, Mr. C?”
“Remarkably well.”
Then I needed to fortify myself. I have a drawer gun and a glove compartment gun. I decided on the Smith amp; Wesson. 38 I keep in the office. I can hide it better in my clothes. “Now I have to leave.”
“Am I supposed to pretend I didn’t see you shove a gun in your back pocket?” Wendy did not sound happy.
“You did. And it’s nothing to worry about. Just a precaution.”
“Don’t worry,” Jamie said. “He takes guns out a lot of the time. He knows what he’s doing.”
Wendy’s mouth was tight, her gaze disapproving. “I’m not much for guns, Sam.”
“You know what?” Now I sounded a bit irritated myself. “Neither am I. Now c’mon, I’ll walk out with you.”
Before leaving, Wendy walked over to Jamie and took one of her hands and said, “I gave you my phone number. You call me whenever you want to talk. This won’t be easy for you, Jamie. But you’ve got to do it.”
“I know you’re right-Wendy. It’s just so hard when I think about all the fun we’ve-” She was starting to cry.
Wendy kissed her on the cheek. “You’re a lot stronger than you think you are, Jamie. And remember to call me when you need some moral support.”
Tears gleaming in her eyes, Jamie nodded, then turned away from us so she could cry in private.
Outside, as we walked to our respective cars, Wendy said, “She’s so pretty and so sweet.”
“Even though she thinks you’re forty?”
“I didn’t say she was brilliant. But I like her. She’s kind of downhome folks.”
“Thanks for helping her. I’ve been trying for years to get her to stand up for herself-you managed to do it the first time out.”
“He was just taking such advantage of her.”
We were at her shiny black Chevrolet Impala. She poked me in the stomach. “I take it you’re going out to Lou’s place.”
“Uh-huh. Something’s wrong.”
“Marilyn’s almost always very pleasant. They had to go through a number of maids before they found her.”
“You’re making my point. She didn’t sound pleasant at all. She sounded scared.”
“I wonder if William’s there. He wouldn’t let anything happen.”
“The maid said he was, but I don’t know if that’s the truth.”
She touched my arm. “I hate to say this, but why not call Cliffie and let him take care of it?”
I kissed her gently on the mouth. “I don’t blame you for hating to say that. I’d be ashamed to say it.”
Another poke in the stomach. “My he-man. And not a brain in his head.”
She slid her arm around me, two sweaty, lonely, even desperate people. When I was with her, I felt good, safe in some way. She told me she felt the same way. We both agreed this didn’t mean we’d be going out all the time. But then we both agreed that it didn’t not mean we’d be going out all the time, either. I guess if you wait long enough, those cheerleaders come through for you after all. Last night we’d gone all the way to third base; and lying there afterward, sharing a cigarette, I realized how much I just plain liked her. The pain of her divorce and loneliness had changed her. She was no longer the belle of the ball, because the ball had ended; the fiddlers had fled.
She walked me over to my car and saw me safely seated. “You think you’ll ever give this convertible up?”
“Please. Not ‘convertible.’ Ragtop.”
“Oh, I see, just like in all those Henry Gregor Felsen novels my brother used to read. My brother always wanted to have my father drive him to Des Moines to meet him.” Felsen wrote teen novels for boys. Most of them involved cool cars. They were among the most popular books in American libraries.
I started the car. “I wanted to do the same thing. Maybe I still will someday.”
I backed out, beeped the horn when I’d gotten the car turned around.
She waved good-bye and damn, that felt good. I gave her a little Lone Ranger wave of my own and sped off.