Truth Like the Sun

by Jim Lynch

  “That’s what y’all are supposed to say. You got a smoke?”

  Her son walked up next to the bed and pointed at an old black-and-white of a boy about his age. “That’s you,” he said, his voice a small bell. “Isn’t it?”

  He studied Elias. “Aren’t you observant?” he said, then turned to her. “When you got something that’s worth good money, you don’t just give it away. Least that’s how I was raised. You came a stretch to see me. If it’s that important to you, it’s gotta be worth something.”

  Her patience was a punctured balloon. “I drove across the state because Mr. Yates assured me you’d be willing and ready to talk, and that you’d have documents to back up whatever you said. If you can’t or won’t, or if you’re expecting to get paid, we won’t waste any more—”

  “Your generation doesn’t bother with small talk, does it?” he interrupted. “Think I’ve got visitors rolling in here telling me about their vacations and bowling teams? Think there’s a whole lot of friends and family checking up on Uncle Denny?”

  Helen glanced at the clock next to the bed and inhaled. “You’re lucky you’ve got air-conditioning,” she said slowly. “Still pushing ninety out there.”

  He stared over her head at his television and what sounded like Wheel of Fortune.

  “What’s your roommate like when he’s awake?” she asked. When he didn’t respond, she followed his eyes and saw Vanna cheerfully turning letters on the screen. “I’ve been researching the ’sixty-two fair,” she said. “Hard to imagine what that must’ve felt like. You were there, right? What do you remember about it?”

  The sun dropped low enough to blast through the window and blind him. She stepped over and closed the filthy curtains, launching thousands of twirling dust motes into thin bars of light.

  “Benny Goodman, eating crab at the Needle, all sorts of stuff,” he said. “And the girls.” Most of the teeth were missing in his jack-o’-lantern smile. “Gracie Hansen’s girls. ‘Paradise’ something or other. Went several times. They were seven feet tall and kicking their legs. And that Gracie had a real personality on her. She toured the science exhibits and told the newspapers, ‘It’s great, but science will never replace sex and cotton candy.’ ” He strangled on his laughter again, and his voice took a moment to clear. “Elias,” he finally said, “open this drawer here.”

  The boy looked at his mother and then back at the old man, who was tapping the bedside table with a yellowed fingernail. “See if you can find a small gold key in there.”

  After his mother nodded, he opened the drawer and felt blindly beneath papers, finding a paper clip, a penny, some toothpicks, an orange earplug.

  “Closer to the front corner, son.”

  Seconds later, Elias smiled triumphantly at the little key in his fingers.

  “There you go. Now stick it in the little lock on the top left of that file cabinet there and turn it this way till the button pops out.”

  The old man stared at Helen, puckered, then mimed smoking. She shook her head. He shut his eyes and waited until he heard the lock pop. “Now pull open the bottom drawer and bring me the envelopes with the blue rubber bands around them.”

  Helen resisted helping as Eli widened his base, bent his knees, slid the drawer out and pawed delicately through the files before slowly removing a bound brick of weathered envelopes and carrying it like an altar boy to the bed. Carmichael thanked him, then started tugging feebly on bands. Helen again wanted to help, but didn’t dare risk distracting him. He finally removed one. Elias set the key on the bedside table and clasped his hands in front of him, awaiting his next assignment. The second band took longer, but finally a dozen brittle envelopes tumbled free into the old man’s lap.

  “PARK HERE,” Roger told Annie once he spotted the sanctimonious Prius with its Eco-Warrior, Pollution Isn’t Pro-life and Nader for Prez bumper stickers. He reached for his cane and stepped gingerly onto his bum ankle and out into the downpour. His aching hip accompanied his throbbing ankle as he groaned up the narrow flight of stone steps. With no bell in sight he rapped on the door. A light was on inside and he heard movement, though it was hard to be sure with the rain pounding maple leaves and asphalt shingles and gurgling in the gutters.

  Agitated now, he whacked the door solidly with the cane handle three times, harder than he intended to, his breath ragged, his indignation snowballing. What had Yates ever done that wasn’t spiteful? Roger struck the door even harder. “Donald!” he shouted. “It’s me—Lucifer!” He glanced at the numbers above the entrance again, then noticed the touring bicycle suspended from the porch ceiling. Another facet of Donald Yates’s sanctimony—staying in impeccable shape in his mid-seventies while reducing his carbon footprint.

  He grabbed the head of the cane with his left hand, slid his right palm down to its rubber stopper, then pivoted until his shoulders were perpendicular to the window. “Think you can ruin me, Donald?” he yelled. The backswing was brief, but his pronating wrist gave him all the snap and speed he needed and the old single pane broke almost gratefully, as did the next two, though it wasn’t clear which one triggered the piercing alarm. Too doo! Too doo! Too doo! He waited there, listening, amazed, suddenly unsure whether this was even the right house, feeling strangely exhilarated yet distanced, his body awash in adrenaline and whiskey, the cane warm in his palm.

  Descending the steps was more painful, and his peripheral vision seemed to be shrinking, as if the scenery was about to go black, which made him worry about aneurysms and caused him to hurry. At street level, he saw Annie, her head bobbing behind the wheel, lost in some raucous music she played whenever she was alone in the car. He considered turning the cane on the Prius too, but his anger was already skidding toward embarrassment. He opened the passenger door and ducked inside with a mounting headache. Annie switched off the music and smiled sheepishly before noticing his expression and lowering the window to better hear the home alarm over the rain.

  “All I wanted,” he mumbled, “was to yell at him.”

  DENNY CARMICHAEL examined the envelope closest to him, then looked up. “Now find my reading glasses, son.”

  Elias scanned the room as if he’d get extra points for speed, then hustled around the bed to the windowsill, grabbed the glasses and handed them over. Carmichael put them on, carefully opened the first envelope, pulled out a creased sheet of trifolded stationery and peeled back the top, then grunted and leaned back, his glasses clearly no longer powerful enough. He slowly fit the paper back into the envelope and gently set it at the back of the stack before brooding over God knows what.

  Helen told herself to wait quietly, that old people can’t be rushed. She feigned repose, excused herself to go to the bathroom, filled three plastic cups with water and waited some more, dialing herself calm. “Can you tell us about that time period in Seattle?” she said, passing him a cup. “What was going on with the police and the gambling and all that?”

  Carmichael pulled another envelope loose and went through the same routine.

  “Tell us a story,” Elias said, so sincerely that Carmichael’s smile ruined the vertical creases in his cheeks.

  He opened the next envelope, then began, “I was a policeman in Seattle, and a good one,” he told the boy. “Takes courage to be a good one, you know?”

  “Shoot anybody?” Elias asked.

  “Elias,” Helen scolded.

  “Yes,” Carmichael said, “but I missed.”

  “He shoot first?”

  “Elias, let Mr. Carmichael talk.”

  Carmichael shook his head, the breathing tubes loosening around one ear, tightening around the other. “I didn’t really know Roger Morgan,” he said abruptly. “Met him during the fair like everybody else. Never had anything against him. Still don’t. I held on to all this just to keep my backside covered, for all the good that did me.” His snort turned into a red-faced wheeze. “But I owe a guy who helped me out, see, and he made me promise to pull this crap out if Morgan ever ran for som
ething that mattered. To tell you the truth, though, I think I’m changing my mind.”

  He opened another envelope, the ventilator humming away.

  “See, most of us could barely afford houses. So we were always looking for ways to make a little extra. And it was already in place, see. You worked certain beats, you collected these bonuses. It helped, you know. Could be the difference between renting and buying, or maybe sending a kid to college or not. But then I got promoted to sergeant, and the bonuses kept coming.” He paused, sipped his water, spilling some on his hairless chest and scooting the envelopes farther from the damp spot. He looked at Elias. “Hard to turn down free money, isn’t it?” Elias nodded knowingly, and Carmichael winced at Helen. “Was coming in from everywhere, you know—card rooms, pinballs, punchboards, pull tabs, cathouses. And I was good with numbers, so they had me make sure everybody got the right amount. The beat cop took the first cut, then the sarge in charge, then the assistant chiefs, the prosecutor’s office, then over to city council, see? Patrol paid directly to the mayor’s office, I believe. There were separate payoffs for burglary and narcotics too, as I remember. Vice screwed the pooch, if you ask me, because suddenly liquor and food inspectors and all these other jokers were getting a piece too. Then even people on the outside. A banker, a stockbroker, you name it. And by then it was like a secret Rotary Club or something—we called it the network—and it made sense to invest as a group, you know? So we started getting into all kinds of stuff—gold and silver, racehorses, real estate. We bought land out by Redmond, then someone hooked us up with Malcolm Turner—you’ve heard of him, right?—who at the time was this young world-beater juggling projects and needing capital.”

  Helen tried to go blank-faced and pretend he was telling her stuff she already knew, but her glittering eyes gave her away to Elias, who looked concerned. “Mom?”

  “Shhh,” she said.

  “First deal we did with Mal was a downtown parking garage, then an apartment building. This was way back near the beginning of his run, see?”

  Helen kept nodding but felt like some organ was about to rupture inside her, so she was committing key points to memory, not risking taking notes. “Did Morgan and Turner receive bonuses too?” she asked casually. “Mr. Yates said Morgan was ‘taking bribes’ during the fair.”

  Carmichael paused, his eyes clenched in recall. “The way I understood it, he was Mal’s inside guy. So, like with that apartment project near the Roanoke on-ramp, Mal told all those homeowners, ‘Look, I’m gambling here. Nobody knows where the freeway’s going, and if your place gets condemned you won’t get half what I’m offering.’ But it wasn’t a gamble. He knew exactly where it was going because Roger was on that state panel. See what I’m saying? And by the time the freeway opened, Mal Turner had the most convenient new apartments around.”

  “How’d you come to know all this?” Helen asked, still too anxious to pull out a notebook, not wanting him to focus on the fact that this wasn’t just a conversation until she found out what was in these envelopes.

  “He bragged about Roger. It was all part of his pitch to get us to put up the cash. Wanted us to know he was in with the guy running the fair.”

  Helen leaned back and exhaled. “That’s all very interesting, but you realize it’s also just talk, sir, and forty-year-old talk.”

  He patted the envelopes.

  Helen hid her skepticism. Documents so rarely tell a story. What most people considered proof was usually thirdhand hearsay and piles of meaningless paper. “So why’re you telling me this? Did Morgan ever do anything to you?”

  “Not a damn thing. Fact is, I hope he becomes mayor. I just owe lots of people lots of things, and as you can tell I don’t have a whole lot left to give.”

  He looked at Helen like he was about to cry, then at Elias. He skipped over three envelopes and held one up. “Give this to your mother.”

  She pulled out the paper and gingerly unfolded it. On faded stationery beneath a masthead reading New Metropolitan Properties, Malcolm Turner, Director, and dated February 7, 1962, she sees the following typed on a manual typewriter:

  Re: Borgata Principals

  Clive Buchanan $20,000

  Dave Beck $25,000

  Denny Carmichael $5,000

  Winston Edgell $10,000

  Stephen T. Long $15,000

  Ross O’Banion $15,000

  Eddie Mills $10,000

  Roger Morgan $15,000

  Jon Reitan $15,000

  “What’s Borgata?” she asked, so she wouldn’t have to keep staring at Morgan’s name and the number next to it.

  “The original name of the Roanoke Apartments.”

  “So Morgan invested in a building,” she said casually. “No law against that. And if the money was dirty, why would anybody put anything on paper?”

  “I think to Mal it was always just money.” He watched her. “Don’t recognize those names, do you?”

  “I grew up in Ohio. Roger knew about all this?”

  He shrugged. “Had to, didn’t he?”

  “Why?”

  “Smart guy. Everyone said so.”

  “Maybe he thought he was just investing in real estate. Who’s to say he—”

  “Maybe.” He stared at her.

  Several minutes of halting conversation later, Helen mustered the courage to ask, “Can I make a quick copy of this?”

  “Sooo,” the old man drawled, “it is worth something.”

  “I think we’ve already discussed that, sir. Can I get a copy?”

  His face drooped into a weary frown.

  “Get Mr. Carmichael some more water, Elias. I’ll be right back.”

  The desk nurse set the phone down reluctantly and looked up at Helen, who was acting as pleasantly as she could with all her adrenals firing. “Could I ask you to make a copy of this for me?”

  “Staff only.”

  “I’m happy to pay.”

  The lady glared at her. “Good for you.”

  “Please. A dollar?”

  “Didn’t I just tell you?”

  “Five dollars?”

  The nurse glanced at the list of names, then back at Helen as if she was nuts. “For one copy?”

  “And fax it too, please, to this number.”

  The woman looked at the number. “Fax and copy?”

  “Yes. Will ten dollars cover that, ma’am?”

  Afterward, Helen slipped outside and called Bill Steele to alert him to the fax and to let him know that Malcolm Turner was suddenly cropping up in her research as well.

  As the excitement built in his voice, she felt herself losing control of her story, which shortened her breath and made it hard to listen when he read back the names like a strung-out cop discussing suspects.

  “Fuggin’ A,” he said several times.

  “I’ll call you,” she finally said, “once we’re outta here.”

  “We?”

  “Elias.”

  “Who?”

  “My son.”

  “Right. Lordy.”

  That he was out of her sight and unattended gave her a panicky quiver, and she started running down the hall before hanging up.

  HE HEARD THE BELL, then the door swinging open and Teddy shouting, “Roger?”

  “In the bathroom!”

  “Please tell me Annie misunderstood what happened this afternoon,” Teddy yelled after clomping across the living room.

  “You get me a beer?”

  “What did you do?”

  “You getting me a beer or not?”

  “What the hell? You in the tub?”

  “Yup.”

  Teddy shuffled into the bathroom across the moist tiles, set a can of Rainier on the tub, averted his eyes, snapped one open for himself, then lowered the toilet lid and sat down with a groan. “You trying to sabotage your own campaign?” he asked calmly. “Is that our new strategy?”

  Roger raised his beer toward Teddy, who still wouldn’t look at him. “Actually, just trying to
soak my ankle and hip a bit here, old man.”

  “Jesus,” Teddy said. “I’m raising Cain at the P-I while you’re out committing misdemeanors.”

  “The son of a bitch has been bragging so much about how he’s gonna knock me out that even Clint Rohrbacher heard about it. You remember Yates, don’t you?”

  “No.”

  “Well, he’s a miserable old attorney who’s telling any reporter who’ll listen that I’m the worst thing that’s ever happened to this city.”

  “Think a misdemeanor’s gonna look pretty good right now?” Teddy asked after a long swallow. “Think that’ll give you a boost?”

  “If it goes public, we’ll laugh and call it the silliest accusation we’ve heard to date. Right?”

  “Sully put the fear of God in them today. You should’ve seen their faces when he started listing her libel suits.”

  “What exactly are we so worried about anyway? What are we hiding?”

  “You’d know better than me.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “What you see as just life might not play that well outside your peer group.”

  “That I drink too much? That I’ve chased women, had kids out of wedlock or gambled too much? That I’m a dumb investor? That I have lunch with Republicans on occasion?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Yeah to what?”

  “All of it.”

  “Have you noticed how well we’re doing, my friend?”

  “Yeah and it’s not because of your irreverence, your comic timing or the full life you’ve supposedly lived.”

  “Then why?”

  “Because you’re the goddamn father of the fair, because you’re Mr. Seattle.”

  “I see, the nostalgia candidate.”

  “Exactly.”

  “You’re killing me. Tell me, how is it that you’ve turned into the world’s most timid campaign adviser?”

  Teddy wiped his face. “Hanging around you is hard on the nerves.”

  Roger set the beer in the soap rack and sank lower in the tub. “Maybe so.”

  “Just win, and then you can do whatever the hell you want. But win first.” He tilted the can and guzzled, his Adam’s apple jumping. Then he sheepishly raised his chin and glanced into the mirror. “I used to be over six-two, Rog. A less honest man would have called himself six-three. Now I’m barely five-eleven. I weigh what I did when I was in high school. I avoid mirrors these days and shave in the shower,” he mumbled, rubbing sections of whiskers he’d missed, “which has its downsides, in case you hadn’t noticed.”