A Cold Day in Paradise (Alex McKnight Mysteries)

by Steve Hamilton

  “For the sake of argument,” I said, “let’s say I have.”

  “Okay, but whatever it is, it gives you something. Whether it’s a drink or a pill or a bet. It gives you a certain kind of feeling. You know what I mean? It’s a feeling that you can’t get anywhere else. And eventually you get to the point where you know it’s starting to hurt you, but you still have to have that feeling. For me, it’s the feeling of having something at risk. That ball is spinning in the roulette wheel. Or the dealer is showing a six and I’ve got eleven. It’s like a bolt of electricity right through me, Alex. And believe me, there is nothing else that makes me feel that way. There is nothing that can take its place.”

  “I understand that much, Edwin. I know it’s an addiction like any other kind of addiction.”

  “Okay, so let’s say you’re an alcoholic. And instead of going right into your twelve-step program, you try something else first. Let’s say that instead of trying to give up alcohol altogether, you just try to cut down on it, you know, so you can get a handle on it. So say instead of drinking whiskey, you just drink beer.”

  “Sounds like you’d be fooling yourself,” I said.

  “You’re probably right,” he said. “But that was my idea, you see? I thought if I could cut down on my gambling, then I could deal with it.”

  “I don’t follow.”

  “Alex, it’s not the winning that gets you. It’s the anticipation. It’s not knowing if you’re going to win or lose. That’s how you get that feeling. So what I figured is, if I bet on football games, I could stretch out that anticipation. Instead of having to play a hand of blackjack again and again to keep that feeling going, all I had to do was bet on one football game and then just sit on that one bet all week long. Like I was nursing one beer for days at a time.”

  “Edwin, for God’s sake.”

  “I’m just telling you what I was thinking, Alex. The football lines come out on Monday morning. So I get a bet down right away, and it’s just like taking that little hit. As long as it was enough money to matter a little bit. Like five hundred dollars, usually. Maybe a thousand. It’s all I would need. I could relax all week long.”

  “So how long have you been doing this?”

  “Couple months,” he said. “Just since football season started. I was doing pretty well, too. Until that stupid Brigham Young game. Can you believe it, they were up twenty points with two minutes to go. Twenty points! And then they give up two garbage touchdowns. I was giving seven, so I lose by a point. Those Mormons, they can’t play defense, that’s my problem.”

  “A Mormon football team can’t play defense? You think that’s your problem?”

  “I was just kidding, Alex. I know what my problem is. Seeing that dead guy was a wake-up call for me. That could be me some day if I don’t clean up my act.” He took a long swallow from his drink and leaned back in his chair.

  “So what are you saying?”

  “I’m saying that I’m through with gambling. Forever. I mean it this time.”

  “Would you like to make a bet on that?” I said.

  He laughed.

  “Gamblers Anonymous,” I said. “They’re in the book.”

  “You’re right,” he said. “I’m calling them tomorrow.”

  “Okay.”

  “No, I mean it,” he said. “I’m really going to call them.”

  “Okay.”

  “I’m going home now, Alex. I’m going home to my wife.”

  “Edwin,” I said. “If you walk out of this door and go to the casino, I will find you and I will kill you with my bare hands.”

  “I’m going home, Alex. I promise.”

  “Then go already.”

  “Thank you, Alex. Let me pick up your check.”

  “You don’t need to do that.”

  “I want to.”

  “Just go.”

  “I want to buy you dinner.”

  “Out!”

  “I’m going to buy you dinner. You can’t stop me.” He went up to the bar and put a few bills in Jackie’s hand, pointing back at me. And then with a wave he was out the door.

  I couldn’t stop myself from smiling. There was something about the man, I just couldn’t bring myself to hate him. In a way, he was just like my old partner, Franklin. Edwin was barely five foot four, shaped like a pickle barrel, as white as a man can be, richer than hell, and a compulsive gambler. Whereas Franklin was a good six five, two-forty at least, an ex-football player, black, and as strapped for cash as any other working cop in Detroit. And he wouldn’t even put five bucks in the weekly pool. But somehow, to me, the two of them were exactly alike.

  “You’re my best friend, Alex.” Edwin had said that one night, sitting in this very bar. He had just finished his third Manhattan, but I knew it wasn’t the liquor talking. He said it like it meant something, like it was something he had thought about for a long time and had finally worked up the nerve to say.

  Franklin never got the chance to say it himself. Not to my face, anyway. I had to hear it secondhand, after he was gone, when I met his widow. “He used to talk about you all the time,” she said. “All the arguments you used to have about sports. And all the times you helped him, too. He really looked up to you, Mr. McKnight. I know he never would have said so in a million years, but you should know he considered you his best friend.”

  Thinking about Franklin, and then about what happened to him, it took that smile right off my face.

  I WENT HOME. It was another windy night. Before I went to bed I stood in the bathroom and looked at my bottle of pills. You don’t need these, I said to myself. I looked at myself in the mirror. You don’t need these. I rubbed the scars on my shoulder. It doesn’t hurt that much anymore. You don’t need a pill to go to sleep. And if you dream about Franklin, well, you can handle that. It was fourteen years ago.

  I could hear the wind coming through the cracks in the cabin.

  You don’t need them anymore. You are strong enough without them.

  I opened the bottle. And then I closed it again. I put the pills back in the medicine cabinet and turned out the light.

  I slept for a while. And then the phone rang again. I looked at the clock. It was three o’clock.

  I picked up the phone. “Goddamn it, Edwin,” I said. “What is it now?”

  “Good evening, Alex,” a man’s voice said. It was definitely not Edwin. It was a low, hissing voice, almost reptilian.

  “Who is this?”

  “It’s me, Alex? Don’t you know who this is?”

  “Who are you,” I said, “and why are you calling me at three o’clock in the fucking morning?”

  “Did you like it, Alex?”

  “Like what? What are you talking about?”

  “I knew he’d tell you about it, at least, but I can’t believe he actually woke you up and made you drive all the way out there to see it.”

  I felt a burning in my stomach. Concentrate on his voice. Keep your mind clear. Let the face come to you.

  “I can’t tell you how happy it makes me feel, Alex. It makes me feel like we’re connected now. I didn’t know if that would ever happen.”

  I couldn’t place that voice. I had no idea who this person could be.

  “What did you think, Alex? What did you think of my work?”

  “Are you referring to the murder that took place last night?”

  “I wouldn’t call it murder,” he said. “Nobody will miss him. I saw him talking to your friend, you know. They didn’t see me, but I was there. I didn’t like what he was saying to Edwin. He was a very bad man, Alex. So I figured, if I can’t do something good for you yet, at least I can do something good for your friend.”

  “Who are you?”

  “Edwin seems like a very charming little man, Alex. I’ve been watching him. I was a little jealous at first, I have to admit.”

  “Goddamn it, who are you?”

  “I’ll be talking to you, Alex. Sleep tight. It won’t be long now. I’m so glad we’
re finally going to be together.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THE MORNING CAME slowly, darkness giving way to a muted November light, dulled by the perpetually gray clouds and then filtered through the pine trees outside the window. The light found me sitting in my bed, my back set against the rough contour of the log wall, my eyes half open.

  I hadn’t slept since the phone call. After my heart had stopped racing, I had sat down on the bed and gone over every word he had said, every nuance of his voice, and still I could not come up with a face or a name. I finally settled into a sort of exhausted trance, just sitting there, staring at the phone.

  And then it rang. I had never in my life heard a sound as loud. By the time I got my breath back, the phone rang a second time and then a third. I got off the bed and picked up the receiver without saying anything.

  “Hello?”

  I didn’t think it was the same voice. I waited.

  “Hello, Alex?” It sounded like … Uttley?

  “Lane, is that you?”

  “Yes, Alex. Are you all right? Did I wake you?”

  “No,” I said. “I’m fine. I just… I’m fine.”

  “Sorry to call so early,” he said.

  “I was already awake,” I said. “Believe me.”

  “Good, good,” he said. “Say listen, I know this is going to sound strange. I just got into the office here, and I’ve got this phone message. This guy says he’s going to kill me.”

  “Hold on, Lane,” I said. “This is very important. Tell me exactly what he said.”

  “Let’s see, he said that he had one of my business cards, and he didn’t want me talking to his wife anymore, and that if he ever saw me, he would kill me.”

  “What? One of your business cards?”

  “That’s what he said.”

  “He didn’t want you talking to his … oh, wait a minute. I think I might know what that was. When did he leave the message?”

  “I think it was Friday night sometime.”

  “Ah, okay,” I said. I let out a long breath. “I know who that is. You remember I was going to stop by the trailer park to see if I could get some statements on that accident.”

  “Yeah, on the Barnhardt case. With the legs. Jesus, with all the excitement the other night, I forgot all about it. I should have stopped by the hospital, too. See how the poor guy is doing. Goddamn it.”

  “I did talk to one woman who saw the accident. I left your card. That must have been her husband who called you.”

  “Great,” he said. “Killed by a jealous husband, and I never even got to meet her.”

  “He’s probably just thumping his chest. If he was really going to kill you, he would have just come by the office. He has your address, after all.”

  “Jesus,” he said. “Why did I become a lawyer, anyway?”

  “Don’t worry about it,” I said. “It’s nothing.”

  “Are you sure you’re all right? You don’t sound so good.”

  “I’m fine,” I said. “There was just this …” I stopped.

  “What? What is it?”

  “I’ll tell you about it later,” I said. “Listen, I’ll stop by the trailer park on my way over there. I’m sure I can smooth things over.”

  “You’re coming into the office?”

  “Thought I might.” I couldn’t bear the thought of staying here alone today. Just me and the telephone.

  “Good,” he said. “When you’re in town, you can stop by and see Chief Maven. He wants to have a little chat with you.”

  “Great,” I said. My life was getting more interesting by the minute.

  As soon as I hung up, I picked the receiver up again and dialed Edwin. He answered on the fifth ring.

  “Edwin,” I said. “It’s Alex. Is everything okay over there?”

  “Alex? What time is it? What’s going on?”

  “I just wanted to make sure everything was all right.”

  “Alex, I told you I was coming straight home last night. And that’s what I did. I swear.”

  “I believe you, Edwin. That’s not what I mean. I was just wondering if you had gotten any phone calls in the middle of the night.”

  “No, I didn’t. What’s going on?”

  “It’s probably nothing,” I said. There was no sense in scaring him yet. “Right now, I need to know about the bookmaker. Tony Bing was his name, right?”

  “Yes, but why do you have to know about him?”

  “Please, Edwin, you just have to trust me on this one for a little while. When you met with him, was it always at one specific place?”

  “Yeah, there’s this bar in the Soo called the Mariner’s Tavern. That’s where he always was if I needed to see him. But usually, I just talked to him on the phone.”

  “I understand. But when you did see him, it was always there?”

  “Yes, as far as I can remember.”

  “When was the last time you saw him?”

  “Let me see. I guess that would have been last Monday night. I stopped by to give him his money.”

  “Edwin, if you paid the man on Monday, why were you going out to pay him again on Saturday night? And why were you going to his motel room? You just said you only saw him at that bar.”

  “For Christ’s sake, Alex, what’s with the third degree here? I’m not even out of bed yet. The reason I went out to see him on Saturday is because I lost more money, okay? I lost the game on Thursday night. Colorado was just about to score, they had the ball on the five yard line, and then that idiot throws an interception.”

  “Save it, Edwin.”

  “Yeah, I know. Don’t get me started.”

  “So why did you go to his motel room?”

  “Alex, the man called me on Saturday. At home. He said he wanted the money that day. I told him I had a party that evening, and that I wouldn’t be able to get away. So he said I better drop it off at his motel room after the party, or he would never handle any more of my action. Okay?”

  “I thought you said you were only betting five hundred or a thousand at a time. It sounds like you lost five thousand on that one game.”

  “You’re busting my balls, Alex.”

  “Sorry, Edwin. I can’t help it.”

  “What’s the matter with you, anyway? Why are you asking me all these questions? You’re worse than Chief Maven.”

  “Don’t worry about him,” I said. “I’ll put in a good word for you when I see him today.”

  “Oh God. He wants to see you?”

  “Yeah, and I don’t think he’s going to ask me to the prom.”

  I heard Sylvia’s voice in the background, so I said goodbye and hung up. I woke up every other morning thinking I still might not be over her. I didn’t want to picture her lying there in bed next to him. Or standing next to the bed, putting her clothes on.

  I put myself together and got out of there. While I was driving, I went over it again. He said he saw Edwin and the bookmaker at a bar, so it made sense to stop at the Mariner’s Tavern, see if anyone saw anything suspicious. It was unlikely, but worth checking out. Aside from that, what do I do? Tell the police about it? I couldn’t picture myself telling this story to Chief Maven, but he was the logical choice.

  But first, I had this other stupid thing to take care of. I swung into the town of Rosedale and found the trailer park again. The capsized trailer was still there, untouched. A couple of the local women stood in the road, steaming mugs in their hands. They were staring at the trailer and then when I drove by in my truck, they stared at me. First a trailer tips over, now a strange man drives by. What was this neighborhood coming to?

  The woman I had talked to lived two doors down. I pulled into the little driveway and got out of the truck, waving to the two women in the road. They looked away. When I knocked on the door, I didn’t hear anything. I knocked again, louder.

  “Who is it?” It was a man’s voice from within.

  “My name is Alex McNight. I’m a private investigator.”

  �
��What do you want?”

  “I work for Lane Uttley. I was here on Saturday. I spoke to your wife.”

  “What were you doing bothering my wife?”

  “I was just asking her a couple of questions about the trailer accident over here. Will you please open this door and talk to me?”

  There was a small rectangular window in the door. I saw the man peek at me and then disappear. I heard his wife yelling at him, and then his own yelling in return. One thing for sure, this man was not the man who had called me the night before. He was a harmless lughead doing his overprotective husband routine, just like I told Uttley. I was about to knock on the door again when suddenly it opened.

  The man had a rifle. He leveled it right at my chest. “Get the fuck out of here right now before I blow a hole right through you.”

  It came back. As strong as the night before, when I was standing in that motel room. That day in Detroit. The gun pointed at me. I cannot stop him. He will shoot us, Franklin first and then me.

  I took a step backward and fell. Stairs. I fell down some stairs. I’m on the ground. Get up and get out of here. I couldn’t move. I felt like I was up to my neck in wet cement.

  Franklin next to me on the floor. He is dying. All that blood.

  “Get going!” the man said. “If you ever come around here bothering my wife again, I’ll kill you! I promise you that, mister!”

  Get in the truck. I got myself off the ground, remembered how to walk. Get in the truck. I fumbled with the door, opened it finally. Keys. I need keys. They were in my hand already. Which key goes in the ignition? I tried one, then another. Finally, I put the right key in, started the truck. I put it in reverse and punched it, almost backing right across the street into another trailer. I tried to put it into drive, but the engine just raced. It’s in neutral. I couldn’t breathe. Put it in drive. Why can’t I breathe? The two women in the road scattered like pigeons as I finally found a gear and then barreled past them.

  When I was a few miles out of town, I stopped the truck. I sat there on the side of the road, both hands gripping the steering wheel. What in God’s name is wrong with you? Relax. Just relax. I made myself take a deep breath and then another.