He sipped her coffee. She had laced it with brandy. In the kitchen, he washed out both cups, then turned out the lights and let himself out of the house.
He had taken advantage of her enough already tonight.
Chapter Ten
DIGGER’S LOG:
Tape Recording Number Three, 3:30, Saturday A and M, Julian Burroughs in the matter of Vernon Gillette and his wife, Casey Jones.
If anybody asks me what college I went to, from now on I’m going to tell them I went to Saturday A and M. I never get a good night’s sleep. I think that this is what is really wrong with me. I’m always tired. If that’s so, why can’t I fall asleep when I try to?
All right, Marla Manning was Vern Gillette’s little piece on the side. I like him better already because it’s nice, first of all, to know that Superman had a hole in his sock, and, second, that he had some taste. Marla is all right and Vern couldn’t be that bad because she fell in love with him and she didn’t fall in love with me, and women always fall in love with me. I don’t think she fell in love with me.
I’ve got to thank that simp, Cody Lord, for sending me to Orleans. Of course it was him. Who else knew that I might have some interest in a Vernon Gillette girl friend. How like him to do it anonymously. But if he thought it was going to nail down the murder theory, he’s wrong. I don’t pick Marla as a murderer. But there were those two unmade beds in the cabin. Was Marla in one of them? I couldn’t find out. Not yet, anyway.
I’ve got to remember now, she thinks my name is Walt Brackler. Why do I do that? It’s strange how in moments of psychological stress, I take refuge in my insanity.
Marla is, in fits and starts, on Tapes Three and Four, now added to my permanent library of nice people who have known me.
She said something interesting, that Gillette had started out cozy and warm with Lucius Belton and then their relationship cooled. I’ve got to ask The Old Man about that today in, God, nine more hours when I meet with him.
Expenses since the last time I lied. Sixty dollars for drinks with Marla Manning. Why do I always meet women who drink?
And why didn’t Koko call?
Chapter Eleven
As Digger got out of his car in the almost-empty parking lot of Lucius Belton and Sons, a uniformed guard approached him.
"Mr. Burroughs," he said.
"Yes."
"Would you follow me?"
"Sure. How’d you know it was me?"
"I had your license plate numbers. They checked."
Sure, they had his license plate, Digger thought. And probably his age, weight, school records, dental charts and personal habits. Lucius Belton didn’t go places in half steps.
"In the name of Lucius, the Sons and the Belton Works, amen," Digger muttered.
Inside a low building set back from the parking lot, Digger was handed over to a well-dressed young man with "executive assistant" stamped all over him.
"Burroughs?" the man said. His smile was all teeth and his clothes all neat creases.
"Good guess," Digger said.
"You’re expected. I’m Johnson, Mr. Belton’s assistant."
"Of course you are."
"Please follow me." He led the way down a long hall lined with expensive ugly oil paintings of rich, ugly men. Were these the Beltons?
"These paintings," Digger said.
"Yes, sir?" said Johnson, stopping short.
"It looks like a set for a Vincent Price movie."
Johnson cleared his throat. "You seem to have an active sense of humor," he said.
"I’m actually a stand-up comic," Digger said. "I’m only working for the insurance company on the side until my career takes off."
"I see," said Johnson seriously. "Actually Mr. Belton is not keen on active senses of humor. You might think about keeping yours in check while you are in the presence."
"The presence"? Did he really say that, Digger wondered.
"Of course," Digger said. "Somber will be the order of the day. I can really do somber. Once you learn to fake sincerity, everything else is easy. But you would know that, wouldn’t you?"
Johnson led him past a secretary with no redeeming qualities and tapped lightly on a heavy oak door. He opened the door and said, "Mr. Burroughs, sir," then stood aside so Digger could enter. When Digger was inside the room, the door closed silently behind him.
Lucius Belton was sitting behind a desk between two banks of long windows in the far corner of the room. He was absolutely bald, but it was not the bald head of someone who shaved his scalp under the mistaken impression that it made him look better. Belton’s baldness had the look of being caused by terminal eczema. His face was fleshless, almost as if skin had been stretched drum-head tight over his skull. His nose was a large, sharp protrusion from between sunken cheeks, and his thin lips were exactly the same pasty color as the rest of his face. His eyes were pale and watery inside deep sockets, and when his lips drew back to speak, Digger could see that he had long, narrow, yellowed teeth with spaces between them. Digger could not remember ever seeing anything or anyone uglier, outside of something kept in a jar on a laboratory shelf.
Belton stood up when Digger approached the desk. He moved stiffly, as if his spinal column were made of glass and he had to be extra careful not to chip it.
Through his shirt, Digger turned on his tape recorder.
"Good to see you, Burroughs," Belton said in that thin, high-pitched snarl of a voice.
"I’m glad you’re happy," Digger said. "Does this mean you won’t try to have me arrested again?"
"Sit down," Belton said and pointed to a chair. He made no effort to shake hands, and as Digger sat down, he looked around the room. The walls were devoid of all decoration. They were dark, dead oak, much like their inhabitant, Digger thought.
"I already apologized for the zealousness of Deputy Harker," Belton said sharply. "I only apologize once."
"That must make it tough on the world if you fuck up twice," Digger said.
Belton cleared his throat. Just like his executive assistant, Digger thought. Maybe everybody in Belton, PA, cleared their throats a lot. Living on soot might make it an essential survival skill. Not that there was any soot inside this office. Digger felt the chill of built-in air conditioning pumping clean, cold air into the office.
"You have been asking questions about the death of my friend and employee, Vernon Gillette," Belton said.
"That is correct."
"Do you mind if I ask why?"
"Do you mind if I don’t answer?" Digger said.
"Why is that?"
"My business is between Mrs. Gillette and my insurance company. I don’t see that you have any involvement in it at all," Digger said.
"I paid the premiums on that insurance," Belton said. He seemed suddenly to realize he was still standing behind his desk, holding on to it tightly with blue-tinged fingers, and he sat down slowly. "I think I have a right to make sure that your insurance company is acting properly."
Digger thought about that for a moment and thought also that he wanted Lucius Belton to talk, so he nodded and said, "Perhaps you’re right about that."
Belton nodded back, as if to say, yes, of course, he was right; he was always right, and it was the shame of lesser human beings that they didn’t always seem to understand that point.
"Is there some difficulty about your company paying off on the policy?"
"Have you spoken to Mrs. Gillette since her husband died?" Digger asked.
"Not directly. I saw her at the funeral, of course, and offered to help her in any way I could. She didn’t ask for anything, so I haven’t talked to her. Why is that pertinent?"
"Because Mrs. Gillette refuses to take our million dollars. She insists that Gillette died of a heart attack, not in an accident."
"But it was an accident," Belton said. "Surely she must—"
"Do you know the lady?" Digger interrupted.
"Yes."
"Then you know there is nothing ‘surely’ ab
out anything that touches her."
"I suppose you’re right, Mr. Burroughs. It’s too bad, though, isn’t it? I asked the police to be very thorough. Vern’s death was an accident. That lady is due one million dollars."
"You know that and my company knows that," Digger said.
"And do you know that?" Digger thought that Belton was sharp. He had caught the slight omission in Digger’s voice.
"I did when I arrived here," Digger said. "Now I’m not so sure."
"Why is that, Mr. Burroughs?"
"Some things just don’t add up to an accident, Mr. Belton."
"What do they add up to?"
"I don’t know yet," Digger said.
"Give me an example of what doesn’t add up," Belton said.
"Why did you have a big policy on Gillette’s life? You don’t have one for your other executives."
"You probably have found out by now that I thought Vern would eventually take over the company. When I hired him, I was the last of the Beltons and, as you can guess, my health is none too good. I negotiated the insurance with him as a fringe benefit. He wanted to be sure that his wife and daughter would be cared for if anything should happen to him."
"And something did happen to him," Digger said. "At the time of his death, was that still your plan? To have him succeed you as president?"
"Yes. Why do you ask?"
"Because I had heard that somehow your relationship with Gillette had cooled off after he came here."
Belton hesitated. "All right. It was Mrs. Gillette, Louise. My wife, Amanda, doesn’t like her. Right from the start, she didn’t like her. Mrs. Gillette is, well, a strange person. The child, Ardath, is a delight, but Louise…well, you’ve met her. I guess I don’t have to tell you."
"Whoooo, whooo," Digger said, imitating a locomotive.
"Exactly. She is strange and Amanda didn’t like her strangeness."
"So what did that have to do with Gillette?" Digger asked.
"It was difficult to be social friends with them because of Louise and my wife. So I sort of stopped inviting the Gillettes over. Probably I shouldn’t have done that, Mr. Burroughs, but I love my wife very much. Anyway, I kept very close to Vern around here. He was in my office much of the time."
"Were there any other women in Gillette’s life?" Digger asked.
He could see Belton bristle. "No. And I think I would have known."
"Why would you have known?" Digger asked. "People cheat all the time."
"This is a small town," Belton said. "People talk."
"Yes, they do," Digger agreed amiably. "Why did you sic the cops on me?"
"That was a misunderstanding."
"That misunderstanding nearly got me shot. I’d like to know what caused that misunderstanding," Digger said.
"I had heard you were around town."
"From whom?"
"That isn’t important," Belton said.
"It is to me," Digger said. "I want to know who to cross off the guest list for my next fox hunt."
"I heard it from more than one person," Belton said. "You don’t exactly come quietly in the night."
Digger thought that meant Ben Spears and somebody else. Probably Cody Lord. Or Dr. Leonardo. Somebody who told somebody, who told somebody else.
"Let it pass," Digger said. "Why the cops?"
"I thought you might try to harass me and my family."
"I’m sure it’s the first thing on the mind of every insurance investigator who comes to town," Digger said.
"You have to understand, Mr. Burroughs. I am a very wealthy man. My wife and I are new parents. She worries, perhaps inordinately, that someone will try to kidnap our baby."
Digger nodded.
"So I asked the police to keep an eye on you and not let you annoy my family. That deputy, what is his name?"
"Hog," Digger said.
"Harker. Yes, he stopped you near my house. He shouldn’t have done that."
"Why did you want to meet with me today?" Digger said.
"To apologize and explain my actions. To ask you how long you are going to be in Belton."
"I don’t know yet."
"You were going to tell me why you thought Vern’s death might not be accidental," Belton said.
"It’s just an instinct I have in these things," Digger said.
"Your instinct’s wrong here," Belton said. "Vern’s death was an accident. Heart attack! He was in perfect health. Absolutely perfect."
"Those aren’t the only two alternatives," Digger said.
"Oh? What others are there?"
"Suicide," Digger said mildly. "Murder."
Belton looked disgusted and shook his head. Digger half-expected it to fall off.
"That’s ridiculous," Belton said. "It was an accident, pure and simple."
"I’ll leave when I’m sure of that," Digger said.
"Accident. Accidents can happen to anyone," Belton said. He looked sharply at Digger as if to make sure that the insurance man had understood him.
"You said you had a new son," Digger said. "Then who are the sons in Lucius Belton and Sons?"
"That Lucius Belton was my father. There were four of us sons. I’m the last alive. I was the last Belton until my son, Lucius the third, was born."
"Well, congratulations on your fatherhood," Digger said as he rose from his chair.
"Thank you," Belton said. He rose too. "I wish you could resolve this matter quickly without causing too much disruption."
"I’d like to. I’d like to put it all behind me too," Digger said.
"You’ll be staying then," Belton said.
"Until I’m done."
"Well, who knows?" Belton said with a lipless attempt at a smile. "You might be done sooner than you think."
Chapter Twelve
Digger felt chilled coming out of the Belton plant, so he stopped two blocks away for coffee. The diner was empty and the waitress was homely, so Digger bought a newspaper at the cash register so he could make believe he was reading it and not have to talk to her.
He idly turned the pages of the Belton Bulletin while he sipped his coffee, but his mind wasn’t on the newspaper. He had realized that he was annoying Lucius Belton, but the annoyance seemed now to have grown into a dangerous anger. Why was Belton so upset because Digger was looking into Gillette’s death?
And wasn’t Lucius Belton something to see? If his name had been Lucifer instead of Lucius, it might have been more apt. The face of a death mask; the body of a dried-out seed pod; the voice a cackle that seemed to come from the dark corners of a darker soul. And he had fathered a child?
Which brought up Mrs. Belton. Someone had told him she was young and that immediately put him on edge. He didn’t believe in June-December romances. Scratch a young wife and an old, really old, husband and what you generally found was not love that defied the odds, but monetary arrangements based equally upon female avarice and male stupidity. He put the matter out of his head and concentrated on the Belton Bulletin, which he quickly decided was no better and no worse than any other paper he read.
Digger had once been a regular reader of the newspapers, refusing to start a day without the New York Times lying on the table, in gray splendor, next to his coffee. But as he got older, he began to understand that newspapers never threw out their old stories; they just reran them later on with different names filling in the blanks.
"Left-wing rebels struck today at a government army installation outside the capital city of (fill in one)."
"The nation’s economic indicators moved (up) (down) slightly last month. The announcement from Washington touched off a wave of (buying) (selling) on the New York Stock Exchange."
How had he ever been able to read a newspaper anyway? All that time wasted reading about the world could have been spent changing the world. He saw the waitress hovering over him, ready to snatch his cup as soon as he released it from his fingers.
"Did you know that people who read newspapers never amount to anything?" he t
old her.
She sneered. "I didn’t know it until I saw you reading," she said.
"Very good," he said admiringly. "That’s just one class of people who don’t count. People who smoke pipes don’t amount to anything either."
"My son smokes a pipe."
"Sure he does. And people’s names that begin with P-F. I never met anybody whose name began with P-F who was good for anything. That’s because whenever you talk to a person like that, you never listen to him. You’re only wondering about how he pronounces his name. Imagine his name is P-F-oopler. Do you call him Mr. Poopler or Mr. Foopler? They don’t even know, so how are you supposed to know? The saddest ones of all are the ones who try to pronounce both the P and the F. They sort of say Puh-foopler. Everybody knows that’s ridiculous. How can your name be Puh-foopler?"
"My name is McBride."
"A nice name for a nice lady," Digger said. "If your name were Puh-foopler, you would be on welfare somewhere."
"Welfare? Let me tell you that—"
"Shhhh. Can’t you see I’m reading?" Digger said.
There was a small news item in the paper.
MRS. LUCIUS BELTON
TO DEDICATE GALLERY
Mrs. Lucius Belton will officiate at 2:00 P.M. today at the opening of the new Belton Gallery in the town’s art museum, located on the remodeled second floor of the town library.
All of Belton’s art lovers are invited to attend the ceremony.
Digger glanced at his watch. It was 1:45 P.M.
"Say, where’s the town library?" he asked.
"Six blocks down, turn right, four blocks more on the left," the waitress said. She pointed off in a direction.
"Thank you," Digger said. He paid her for the coffee and paper and left a dollar tip, which earned him a glacial smile that indicated she was more thrilled by his departure than by his dollar.
The newspaper had invited all Belton’s art lovers to attend the ceremonies, and perhaps all of them had shown up.
Nine.
Lucifer's Weekend (Digger) Page 10
