Looking for Rachel Wallace s-6

by Robert B. Parker

  3

  “Okay,” I said, “tell me about the death threats.”

  “I’ve always gotten hate mail. But recently I have gotten some phonecalls.”

  “How recently?”

  “As soon as the bound galleys went out.”

  “What are bound galleys? And who do they go out to?”

  Ticknor spoke. “Once a manuscript is set in type, a few copies are run off to be proofread by both author and copy editor. These are called galley proofs.”

  “I know that part,” I said. “What about the bound ones going out?”

  “Galleys normally come in long sheets, three pages or so to the sheet. For reviewers and people from whom we might wish to get a favorable quote for promotional purposes, we cut the galleys and bind them in cheap cardboard covers and send them out.” Ticknor seemed more at ease now, with the third martini half inside him. I was still fighting off the peanuts.

  “You have a list of people to whom you send these?”

  Ticknor nodded. “I can get it to you tomorrow.”

  “Okay. Now, after the galleys went out, came the phone-calls. Tell me about them.”

  She was eating her martini olive. Her teeth were small and even and looked well cared-for. “A man’s voice,” she said. “He called me a dyke, ‘a fucking dyke,’ as I recall. And told me if that book was published, I’d be dead the day it hit the streets.”

  “Books don’t hit the streets,” I said. “Newspapers do. The idiot can’t get his cliches straight.”

  “There has been a call like that every day for the last week.”

  “Always say the same thing?”

  “Not word for word, but approximately. The substance is always that I’ll die if the book is published.”

  “Same voice all the time?”

  “No.”

  “That’s too bad.”

  Ticknor said, “Why?”

  “Makes it seem less like a single cuckoo getting his rocks off on the phone,” I said. “I assume you’ve rejected the idea of withdrawing the book.”

  Rachel Wallace said, “Absolutely.”

  Ticknor said, “We suggested that. We said we’d not hold her to the contract.”

  “You also mentioned returning the advance,” Rachel Wallace said.

  “We run a business, Rachel.”

  “So do I,” she said. “My business is with women’s rights and with gay liberation and with writing.” She looked at me. “I cannot let them frighten me. I cannot let them stifle me. Do you understand that?”

  I said yes.

  “That’s your job,” she said. “To see that I’m allowed to speak.”

  “What is there in the new book,” I said, “that would cause people to kill you?”

  “It began as a book about sexual prejudice. Discrimination in the job market against women, gay people, and specifically gay women. But it has expanded. Sexual prejudice goes hand in hand with other forms of corruption. Violation of the equal employment laws is often accompanied by violation of other laws. Bribery, kickbacks, racket tie-ins. I have named names as I found them. A lot of people will be hurt by my book. All of them deserve it.”

  “Corporations,” Ticknor said, “local government agencies, politicians, city hall, the Roman Catholic Church. She has taken on a lot of the local power structure.”

  “Is it all Greater Boston?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I use it as a microcosm. Rather than trying to generalize about the nation, I study one large city very closely. Synecdoche, the rhetoricians would call it.”

  “Yeah,” I said, “I bet they would.”

  “So,” Ticknor said, “you see there are plenty of potential villains.”

  “May I have a copy of the book to read?”

  “I brought one along,” Ticknor said. He took his briefcase off the floor, opened it, and took out a book with a green dust jacket. The title, in salmon letters, took up most of the front. Rachel Wallace’s picture took up most of the back. “Just out,” Ticknor said.

  “I’ll read it tonight,” I said. “When do I report for work?”

  “Right now,” Rachel Wallace said. “You are here. You are armed. And quite frankly I have been frightened. I won’t be deflected. But I am frightened.”

  “What are your plans for today?” I said.

  “We shall have perhaps three more drinks here, then you and I shall go to dinner. After dinner I shall go to my room and work until midnight. At midnight I shall go to bed. Once I am in my room with the door locked, I should think you could leave. The security here is quite good, I’m sure. At the slightest rustle outside my door I will call the hotel security number without a qualm.”

  “And tomorrow?”

  “Tomorrow you should meet me at my room at eight o’clock. I have a speech in the morning and an autographing in the afternoon.”

  “I have a date for dinner tonight,” I said. “May I ask her to join us?”

  “You’re not married,” she said.

  “That’s true,” I said.

  “Is this a casual date or is this your person?”

  “It’s my person,” I said.

  Ticknor said, “We can’t cover her expenses, you know.”

  “Oh, damn,” I said.

  “Yes, of course, bring her along. I hope that you don’t plan to cart her everywhere, however. Business and pleasure, you know.”

  “She isn’t someone you cart,” I said. “If she joins us, it will be your good fortune.”

  “I don’t care for your tone, buster,” Rachel Wallace said. “I have a perfectly legitimate concern that you will not be distracted by your lady friend from doing what we pay you to do. If there’s danger, would you look after her first or me.”

  “Her,” I said.

  “Then certainly I can suggest that she not always be with us.”

  “She won’t be,” I said. “I doubt that she could stand it.”

  “Perhaps I shall change my mind about this evening,” Rachel Wallace said.

  “Perhaps I shall change mine, too,” I said.

  Ticknor said, “Wait. Now just wait. I’m sure Rachel meant no harm. Her point is valid. Surely, Spenser, you understand that.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “Dinner this evening, of course, is perfectly understandable,” Ticknor said. “You had a date. You had no way to know that Rachel would require you today. I’m sure Rachel will be happy to have dinner with you both.”

  Rachel Wallace didn’t say anything.

  “Perhaps you could call the lady and ask her to meet you.”

  Rachel Wallace didn’t like Ticknor saying “lady,” but she held back and settled for giving him a disgusted look. Which he missed, or ignored—I couldn’t tell which.

  “Where are we eating?” I said to Rachel.

  “I’d like the best restaurant in town,” she said. “Do you have a. suggestion?”

  “The best restaurant in town is not in town. It’s in Marblehead, place called Rosalie’s.”

  “What’s the cuisine?”

  “Northern Italian Eclectic. A lot of it is just Rosalie’s.”

  “No meatball subs? No pizza?”

  “No.”

  “Do you know this restaurant, John?”

  “I’ve not been out there. I’ve heard that it is excellent.”

  “Very well, we’ll go. Tell your friend that we shall meet her there at seven. I’ll call for reservations.”

  “My friend is named Susan. Susan Silverman.”

  “Fine,” Rachel Wallace said.

  4

  Rosalie’s is in a renovated commercial building in one of the worst sections of Marblehead. But the worst section of Marblehead is upper middle class. The commercial building had probably once manufactured money clips.

  The restaurant is up a flight and inside the door is a small stand-up bar. Susan was at the bar drinking a glass of Chablis and talking to a young man in a corduroy jacket and a plaid shirt. He had a guardsman’s mustache t
wirled upward at the ends. I thought about strangling him with it.

  We paused inside the door for a moment. Susan didn’t see us, and Wallace was looking for the maitre d‘. Susan had on a double-breasted camel’s-hair jacket and matching skirt. Under the jacket was a forest-green shirt open at the throat. She had on high boots that disappeared under the skirt. I always had the sense that when I came upon her suddenly in a slightly unusual setting, a pride of trumpets ought to play alarms and flourishes. I stepped up to the bar next to her and said, “I beg your pardon, but the very sight of you makes my heart sing like an April day on the wings of spring.”

  She turned toward me and smiled and said, “Everyone tells me that.”

  She gestured toward the young man with the guardsman’s mustache. “This is Tom,” she said. And then with the laughing touch of evil in her eyes she said, “Tom was nice enough to buy me a glass of Chablis.”

  I said to Tom, “That’s one.”

  He said, “Excuse me?”

  I said, “It’s the tag line to an old joke. Nice to meet you.”

  “Yeah,” Tom said, “same here.”

  The maitre d‘, in a dark velvet three-piece suit, was standing with Rachel Wallace. I said, “Bring your wine and come along.”

  She smiled at Tom and we stepped over to Wallace. “Rachel Wallace,” I said, “Susan Silverman.”

  Susan put out her hand. “Hi, Rachel,” she said. “I think your books are wonderful.”

  Wallace smiled, took her hand, and said, “Thank you. Nice to meet you.”

  The maitre d‘ led us to our table, put the menus in front of us, and said, “I’ll have someone right over to take your cocktail order.”

  I sat across from Susan, with Rachel Wallace on my left. She was a pleasant-looking woman, but next to Susan she looked as if she’d been washed in too much bleach. She was a tough, intelligent national figure, but next to Susan I felt sorry for her. On the other hand I felt sorry for all women next to Susan.

  Rachel said, “Tell me about Spenser. Have you known him long?”

  “I met him in 1973,” Susan said, “but I’ve known him forever.”

  “It only seems like forever,” I said, “when I’m talking.”

  Rachel ignored me. “And what is he like?”

  “He’s like he seems,” Susan said. The waitress came and took our cocktail order.

  “No, I mean in detail, what is he like? I am perhaps dependent on him to protect my life. I need to know about him.”

  “I don’t like to say this in front of him, but for that you could have no one better.”

  “Or as good,” I said.

  “You’ve got to overcome this compulsion to understate your virtues,” Susan said. “You’re too self-effacing.”

  “Can he suspend his distaste for radical feminism enough to protect me properly?”

  Susan looked at me and widened her eyes. “Hadn’t you better answer that, snookie?” she said.

  “You’re begging the question, I think. We haven’t established my distaste for radical feminism. We haven’t even in fact established that you are a radical feminist.”

  “I have learned,” Rachel Wallace said, “to assume a distaste for radical feminism. I rarely err in that.”

  “Probably right,” I said.

  “He’s quite a pain in the ass, sometimes,” Susan said. “He knows you want him to reassure you and he won’t. But I will. He doesn’t much care about radical feminism one way or the other. But if he says he’ll protect you, he will.”

  “I’m not being a pain in the ass,” I said. “Saying I have no distaste for her won’t reassure her. Or it shouldn’t. There’s no way to prove anything to her until something happens. Words don’t do it.”

  “Words can,” Susan said. “And tone of voice. You’re just so goddamned autonomous that you won’t explain yourself to anybody.”

  The waitress came back with wine for Susan and Beck’s beer for me, and another martini for Rachel Wallace. The five she’d had this afternoon seemed to have had no effect on her.

  “Maybe I shouldn’t cart her around everyplace,” I said to Rachel.

  “Machismo,” Rachel said. “The machismo code. He’s locked into it, and he can’t explain himself, or apologize, or cry probably, or show emotion.”

  “I throw up good, though. And I will in a minute.”

  Wallace’s head snapped around at me. Her face was harsh and tight. Susan patted her arm. “Give him time,” she said. “He grows on you. He’s hard to classify. But he’ll look out for you. And he’ll care what happens to you. And he’ll keep you out of harm’s way.” Susan sipped her wine. “He really will,” she said to Rachel Wallace.

  “And you,” Rachel said, “does he look out for you?”

  “We look out for each other,” Susan said. “I’m doing it now.”

  Rachel Wallace smiled, her face loosened. “Yes,” she said. “You are, aren’t you?”

  The waitress came again, and we ordered dinner.

  I was having a nice time eating Rosalie’s cream of carrot soup when Rachel Wallace said, “John tells me you used to be a prizefighter.”

  I nodded. I had a sense where the discussion would lead.

  “And you were in combat in Korea?”

  I nodded again.

  “And you were a policeman?”

  Another nod.

  “And now you do this.”

  It was a statement. No nod required.

  “Why did you stop fighting?”

  “I had plateaued,” I said.

  “Were you not a good fighter?”

  “I was good. I was not great. Being a good fighter is no life. Only, great ones lead a life worth too much. It’s not that clean a business, either.”

  “Did you tire of the violence?”

  “Not in the ring,” I said.

  “You didn’t mind beating someone bloody.”

  “He volunteered. The gloves are padded. It’s not pacifism, but if it’s violence, it is controlled and regulated and patterned. I never hurt anyone badly. I never got badly hurt.”

  “Your nose has obviously been broken.”

  “Many times,” I said. “But that’s sort of minor. It hurts, but it’s not serious.”

  “And you’ve killed people.”

  “Yes.”

  “Not just in the army.”

  “No.”

  “What kind of a person does that?” she said.

  Susan was looking very closely at some of the decor in Rosalie’s. “That is a magnificent old icechest,” she said. “Look at the brass hinges.”

  “Don’t change the subject for him,” Rachel Wallace said. “Let him answer.”

  She spoke a little sharply for my taste. But if there was anything sure on this earth, it was that Susan could take care of herself. She was hard to overpower.

  “Actually,” she said, “I was changing the subject for me. You’d be surprised at how many times I’ve heard this conversation.”

  “You mean we are boring you.”

  Susan smiled at her. “A tweak,” she said.

  “I bore a lot of people,” Rachel said. “I don’t mind. I’m willing to be boring to find out what I wish to know.”

  The waitress brought me veal Giorgio. I ate a bite.

  “What is it you want to know?”

  “Why you engage in things that are violent and dangerous.”

  I sipped half a glass of beer. I took another bite of veal. “Well,” I said, “the violence is a kind of side-effect, I think. I have always wanted to live life on my own terms. And I have always tried to do what I can do. I am good at certain kinds of things; I have tried to go in that direction.”

  “The answer doesn’t satisfy me,” Rachel said.

  “It doesn’t have to. It satisfies me.”

  “What he won’t say,” Susan said, “and what he may not even admit to himself is that he’d like to be Sir Gawain. He was born five hundred years too late. If you understand that, you
understand most of what you are asking.”

  “Six hundred years,” I said.

  5

  We got through the rest of dinner. Susan asked Rachel about her books and her work, and that got her off me and onto something she liked much better. Susan is good at that. After dinner I had to drive Rachel back to the Ritz. I said goodbye to Susan in the bank parking lot behind Rosalie’s where we’d parked.

  “Don’t be mean to her,” Susan said softly. “She’s scared to death, and she’s badly ill at ease with you and with her fear.”

  “I don’t blame her for being scared,” I said. “But it’s not my fault.”

  From the front seat of my car Rachel said, “Spenser, I have work to do.”

  “Jesus Christ,” I said to Susan.

  “She’s scared,” Susan said. “It makes her bitchy. Think how you’d feel if she were your only protection.”

  I gave Susan a pat on the fanny, decided a kiss would be hokey, and opened the door for her before she climbed into her MG. I was delighted. She’d gotten rid of the Nova. She was not Chevy. She was sports car.

  Through the open window Susan said, “You held the door just to spite her.”

  “Yeah, baby, but I’m going home with her.”

  Susan slid into gear and wheeled the sports car out of the lot. I got in beside Rachel and started up my car.

  “For heaven’s sake, what year is this car?” Rachel said.

  “1968,” I said. “I’d buy a new one, but they don’t make convertibles anymore.” Maybe I should get a sports car. Was I old Chevy?

  “Susan is a very attractive person,” Rachel said.

  “That’s true,” I said.

  “It makes me think better of you that she likes you.”

  “That gets me by in a lot of places,” I said.

  “Your affection for each other shows.”

  I nodded.

  “It is not my kind of love, but I can respond to it in others. You are lucky to have a relationship as vital as that.”

  “That’s true, too,” I said.

  “You don’t like me.”

  I shrugged.

  “You don’t,” she said.

  “It’s irrelevant,” I said.

  “You don’t like me, and you don’t like what I stand for.”

  “What is it you stand for?” I said.