Comeback (Gun Pedersen Book 1)

by L. L. Enger

  “Hedman, right?”

  Larry’s eyes said yes.

  “Don’t worry about Hedman right now, Larry. Worry about me.”

  Larry nodded slowly, then went into the office. He came back promptly with a manila folder. Gun took a pen from his pocket and copied Rutherford’s address on a scrap of paper from his wallet. “Thanks, Larry,” he said. “You’ve done the right thing.”

  Larry was sitting again, and nearly finished with another beer. The energy had drained from his face.

  “What do you know about Rutherford?” asked Gun. “What did Hedman say?”

  “Hedman said he was a partner of some kind who needed to keep a low profile. That’s it. Zippo. I don’t know shit about the guy. Not a piss-poor thing.”

  21

  It was four o’clock that afternoon when Gun eased the pickup into the shade outside Jack Be Nimble’s and tapped a Let’s Go on the horn. He could still taste the Prince Albert tobacco in his mouth from the cigarette he’d smoked while talking to Mazy on the phone three hours ago. She’d called just as he was about to leave for Minneapolis. Now he’d wait until tomorrow— until after Tig Larson’s funeral—to go visit Rutherford.

  Jack stepped outside, pulled the oak door shut behind him and checked to be sure it was locked. Out from behind his bar Jack looked even shorter than his five-three and less like a stone Roman than a shaved bear with perfect posture. A poorly shaved bear. His arms were black and his curly chest hair reached halfway up his neck and ended in a crooked razor line.

  He climbed into the truck and slammed the door. “You didn’t say much, Gun,” he said. He held his chin down against his chest. It was his way of frowning.

  “She didn’t say much either. Just that she had some news for me. Good news. And that I should come out for a visit because she wanted to tell me in person.”

  “Something about the land, I suppose.”

  “That wouldn’t be good news, would it?”

  Jack shook his head. “I’m not sure why you want me along on this deal,” he said.

  “I want you along because I don’t trust my own judgment,” Gun said. “About Mazy, and the Hedman kid. Finally I get a chance to see them together, and I want to read things right. Trouble is, I might see only what I want to see. I’m counting on you to be more objective.”

  “Don’t know if I can be.”

  “Try.”

  At the edge of the Hedman land Gun and Jack found the iron gate open and unguarded. Jack said, “I’m sure they only do this for relatives.”

  Lyle Hedman was waiting on the front step of his grass-roofed house. He was standing in a relaxed slouch, his thumbs in the belt loops of his tan, creased trousers, his shapeless face bright with self-satisfaction. Gun and Jack left the truck beside one of the unlit gas torches and walked over to him.

  “Nice of you to come, Gun. And you brought a friend.” Hedman stepped forward and shook Gun’s hand, then Jack’s. “Jack LaSalle,” Hedman said. “I don’t forget names or faces.”

  “Lyle Hedman,” said Jack. “Neither do I.”

  Hedman laughed and gave Jack a friendly slap on the shoulder. Then he whistled, and Reuben came loping up from the lake. The dog’s reddish-brown hair was flattened with water. He shook himself at a safe distance before padding over to his master. “Good boy, Reuben,” Hedman said. Reuben whined. He rolled his yellow eyes up at Gun and shot lake water out his nose.

  “Where’s Mazy?” Gun said.

  “She’ll be along shortly. Prettying herself up, I imagine.” Hedman curled his tongue down over his bottom lip. “I think maybe she and Geoff have been upstairs, napping.” He shook his head the way people do when they’re remembering the old days, and chuckled. “Come on, let’s go ‘round back to the gazebo.”

  Gun and Jack followed Hedman and Reuben. The gazebo wasn’t a gazebo at all, but a green safari tent the size of a two-car garage. Two of its walls were canvas, the other two mosquito netting. Inside was an aluminum camp table. Scattered around were half a dozen director’s chairs in green, red, and yellow. A sterling ice bucket on the table held a long-necked bottle of champagne. Gun thought, This doesn’t look good at all.

  “Pull up a seat,” Hedman said.

  The men arranged themselves in a generous triangle. A woman came in with a tray of champagne glasses. “Thanks, Mona,” said Lyle. “I’ll pour.” Mona left, and Hedman stood to take care of the champagne. Before he’d finished filling the glasses, Lyle’s wife and Geoff and Mazy came out the back door of the lodge and walked toward the tent.

  Mazy looked all right—but then, she always did. She wasn’t one to show what she was feeling. Gun watched her closely. Her walk seemed normal and she held her chin high, almost defiantly so. She wore Levi’s and a white V-necked T-shirt. As she entered the tent her eyes darted back and forth, from Geoff to his plump mother. Gun stood up. He and Mazy hugged each other. He could feel the tension in her arms and back.

  Mazy said, “How are you, Dad?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “I’m glad you came.” Mazy was holding Gun’s

  hand now, gripping it like she didn’t want to let go. Her eyes were serious. Her voice lacked the huskiness she’d developed as a tomboy and never outgrown. “We’ve got some good news for you, Dad. Geoff and I do.”

  Damn, Gun thought.

  “Here,” said Lyle Hedman, pushing a glass of champagne into Gun’s hand.

  Geoff put his arm around Mazy’s shoulder and guided her away from her father. Hedman Senior handed out champagne. The group stood in a loose circle. Mazy looked at the ground between her feet. Geoff looked grinning at his father.

  “Okay, let’s hear it,” said Lyle Hedman, lifting his glass toward his son. Mrs. Hedman, clutching tightly to her husband’s arm, imitated his movement.

  “Yeah,” said Geoff. He brushed a lock of hair out of his eyes and glanced apprehensively at Gun. “Really, I think Mazy should tell her father. I think that’s what she wants.” He turned to Mazy.

  She lifted her face and met her father’s gaze. “I’m pregnant,” she said.

  Gun thought, The hell you are.

  “Early February it looks like,” Lyle said to Gun. “You’re going to be a grandpa.”

  Geoff threw back his glass of champagne. Mazy looked into hers. Hedman cried, “To a healthy, sturdy, baby boy,” and flourished his. Hedman’s wife took a meek sip, eyes fluttering. Gun and Jack didn’t lift their glasses. They stood with their legs planted firmly apart, bodies tilting stiffly forward like sailors in a gale.

  “Gun, Gun,” Lyle said, spinning a circle in the air with a thin hand, “now is the time to drink to the health of our first grandchild, not the time to think politics or business or any of the—”

  “Let me get one thing straight here,” Gun said, looking at Geoff. “You knew about this and didn’t tell me.”

  Geoff’s Florida tan was turning splotchy. His eyes implored his father for help.

  Lyle Hedman said, “Gun, this isn’t the nineteenth century.”

  “I’m talking to your kid,” Gun said, pointing a finger at Lyle but not taking his eyes from Geoff.

  “Well, ah, yes, Mr. Pedersen,” said Geoff. “You must understand, though, that Mazy and I didn’t want it to be like this, not at all.”

  “Gun,” Lyle said. “They’re old enough to make their own decisions.”

  “And to speak for themselves. I want to hear from Geoff, not you. Straighten me out on something. How do you know Mazy’s pregnant when you only started seeing each other two weeks ago?”

  Geoff shook his head quickly. “We would have liked this to be different, but this is how it turned out. We were seeing each other several months before you knew anything about it, in Minneapolis. Considering your position, it was difficult to say anything.”

  “Dad.” Mazy looked up from the ground. Her voice was back again, husky, almost confident. “Geoff’s telling the truth.” She looked away toward Hambone Bay, large and round and turquo
ise, with a small green island in the center of it. “Dad,” she said, “we want you to know something else. If it’s a boy we’re going to name him Gun.” She kept her eyes on the lake.

  “Now, that sounds like a wonderful idea,” said Lyle. He set down his glass of champagne and made a soundless clap. “Gun Hedman.”

  Jack laughed. Mrs. Hedman let go of her husband’s arm and strode purposefully to Mazy. In a clipped

  monotone she said, “Mazy and I are going to do some shopping this afternoon. We’d better get started.” She took Mazy’s hand. Mazy allowed herself to be led from the tent.

  “Gentlemen, please,” Lyle said. “Sit down. Now that the women are gone, I want to talk a little business. Overdue business. Gun, it’s high time I put your mind at ease about a few things.” Hedman sat down lightly in a green director’s chair. Geoff stood listening in the door of the tent. “Please,” Lyle said, indicating the chairs on either side of him.

  Gun and Jack stayed on their feet. Hedman coughed, then whistled for Reuben, who’d been lying in the shade just outside the tent.

  Hedman crossed his legs. “I’ll come right to the point, Gun. First, I couldn’t be more pleased that Geoff got such a fine wife, though I can see you’re less than enthusiastic about the match. Okay. Second, things couldn’t have worked out better regarding Loon Country. Mazy was quite happy to offer her land for the project. In fact, it was her idea, not mine. She wants to see the economy thrive here in Stony, and she wants her children to be financially secure. She’s really a very bright girl.”

  Gun said, “You said you’d get to the point.”

  Lyle bowed his head slightly. “Here it is. Mazy wanted to ensure that you wouldn’t be adversely affected by this thing. She insisted that your cabin and the forestland surrounding it be fenced off to guarantee you won’t be bothered. You’ll have two hundred and fifty feet of lakeshore and plenty of woods. It’s all arranged.”

  “Plenty?” Gun said. “How much is that?”

  “Ten acres.”

  Jack said, “Hey, that’s great. You’re coming out ahead on this deal, Gun. You get to keep your cabin, and if you ever get tired of being out there all by

  yourself on that big plot of land, you can just walk across your backyard and check into the Radisson Stony for a weekend, take in a nightclub act.”

  In the truck Jack said, “She was nervous, sure, but what can you expect. I think she’s doing one hell of an acting job. If you ask me, the whole troop of them was acting. I’d just like to know what they’re holding over her head.”

  “Use your imagination.” Gun shifted down and turned the Ford into Jack’s parking lot. He turned off the engine, which made its usual kicking departure. “I’ve always been able to see through her before,” he said. “Or thought so.”

  Jack opened the passenger door. “Another thing. Hedman’s got the land he wanted, right? So if this thing’s a charade, why keep it up? You can bet he’s had Mazy sign the papers. How long are they going to make her play the game?”

  “Simple enough. They make her play along until after the referendum Tuesday. If she’s playing.”

  “What about after that?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Then we better move before Tuesday.”

  “We will.”

  22

  “I want to see Jim,” Gun said. The woman behind the glass window was half hidden by a glossy philoden-dron vine.

  “Dr. Samuelson, you mean.”

  “His name’s Jim.” Gun reached through the window and held the vine aside in order to get a better look at the person he was talking to. He didn’t know her. She had gray hair piled up on her head like a corn shock. Her eyes were huge behind thick lenses. Her white name tag said edna.

  “Yes, well, Dr. Samuelson’s not here,” she said.

  “Where is he?”

  “And he won’t be back until . . . let’s see”—she reached for a black notebook and riffled through it—”until July fifteenth. He’s in Europe, you see.”

  “I’ll bet he just left too.”

  “As a matter of fact, yesterday.”

  “Of course,” said Gun. Damn convenient. “Look, I need a favor, okay?”

  Edna’s eyes blinked carefully, like the eyes of a serious fish.

  “I want you to check your files for me,” Gun said. “Last week Samuelson examined my daughter. Mazy Pedersen . . . Hedman.”

  “I know who you are,” Edna said with a formal nod.

  “I want to see that report.”

  Edna touched her fingertips to the top of her gray cone of hair, as if to be sure it hadn’t toppled over. “I’m sorry, but I simply can’t do that.”

  Gun was still holding the green vine out of Edna’s face. He said, “It’s important that I see that report. If it makes any difference, I’ve known Jim, Dr. Samuelson, for a long time. He wouldn’t say no.”

  “With all due respect, Mr. Pedersen, it’s not my decision. It’s policy.”

  “Tell me,” Gun said, making an effort to modulate his voice, “is there any way I could contact Samuelson? By phone, today?”

  Edna shook her round face from side to side. “Not by phone. But there’s a forwarding address.”

  “No,” Gun said, and he let the vine drop back in front of Edna’s face. As he turned to go he caught sight of a small orange dot. He leaned down toward the window for a closer look. Sure enough, affixed to a brown purse that was hanging on a chair to Edna’s right was an orange button that said vote no on loon country.

  “Edna,” Gun said. His face was right up to the window opening.

  She looked up from an appointment calendar and pulled back, startled.

  “It’s wrong to follow policy sometimes,” Gun said. “Would it help if I told you that this has to do with the

  Loon Country mess? Please let me see the file on my daughter.”

  Edna touched her fingers to her hair again and hummed a short low pitch, her lips pressed tight. Then she stood and went to a row of gray file cabinets.

  Samuelson’s report verified Mazy’s claim. Pregnant. Gun wasn’t surprised. Do it right or not at all, he thought.

  “Thanks,” he said, returning the file to Edna. “One other question. Do you have any idea when Dr. Samuelson made his vacation plans?”

  Edna shrugged. “He and Mrs. Samuelson go every year about now. Have for a long time. Most people know that.”

  “Do they use a travel agent?”

  “Fredericks, I believe.”

  By the time Gun reached Fredericks Travel it was five o’clock. The office had closed early. Gun drove home and phoned Paul Fredericks at the golf club. Samuelson had made his plans early. Six months early.

  Which didn’t mean much, Gun told himself. He was sitting at the table, smoking. None of it really meant anything. For Lyle it would have been a matter of talking things over with Samuelson, making an offer as sweet as was necessary, and promising the good doctor that Mazy would later claim to have miscarried. The doctor’s reputation would remain untarnished, and he’d be able to spend an extra week or two on the Riviera. No one the wiser. At least that’s how Gun preferred to think it must be. “None of it means a thing,” he said to the kitchen table.

  He put out his cigarette in the square glass ashtray. Then on impulse he stood up and went into the spare bedroom, took down an unopened bottle of Johnnie

  Walker Red Label and walked down to the lake. He untied the Alumacraft and stepped in.

  The surface of the water was smooth, and Gun followed an imaginary line across the width of the lake, past the four cluster islands straight toward the inlet, the mouth of Woman River. He followed the center of the narrow river for a mile, passing beneath the lake road and coming eventually to a second bridge. He ran the bow up onto a low grassy bank and took a small pair of battered binoculars from his tackle box. He climbed out of the boat and up the grade to the roadbed and walked to the middle of the bridge.

  Ahead of him the river widened i
nto a sprawling marsh: hundreds of acres of rushes and cattails, dun-colored mostly, but starting to brighten here and there with new shoots of green. The main channel of the river wound through the marsh like a string of bright blue yarn.

  Through the binoculars Gun spotted it right away— the dark brown hump rising several feet above the tops of the rushes. It was a good half mile away and probably a couple hundred yards from the main waterway. There were other muskrat houses in the swamp, thousands of them, but this one was by far the largest. For some reason that Gun didn’t understand, the little animals chose to build their palace in the same exact spot every year, without fail. Gun had driven by every summer to check.

  He returned to the boat and motored upriver half a mile. He cut the engine. Using an oar he poled the Alumacraft straight into the heavy marsh. In some places the water was four or five feet deep and had a solid bottom. In others it was shallower, but had a bottom so soft and boggy he was able to drive the long oar right up to its handle. The rushes were thick everywhere. It was slow travel.

  The sun was nearly gone when he finally ran out of water. The dark mound was still twenty yards off and he couldn’t pole the boat any closer. With the bottle of scotch in one hand, Gun lifted his right foot out of the boat and tested the surface of the bog. It felt solid enough to walk on. He swung his other leg over the side and let his full weight come down. The crust gave way. Gun fell against the bow of the boat and the bottle cracked on the gunwale.

  “Aw, damn,” he said. The amber liquid streamed from a crack that jagged down the glass, neck to base. He lifted the bottle and shattered it against the aluminum hull. He pulled one foot out of the muck and took a long high step away from the boat. The smell of rotting swamp stung his nostrils. The bog gasped and sucked at his feet.

  In twenty slow steps Gun was sitting on the firm lodge of reeds and mud and cattails. He watched the light fall low in the sky, then seep down behind the dark hills to the west.

  Next morning he watched the sun come around again. It was the second sunrise he’d watched from this spot, and it wasn’t as spectacular as the first. Ten years ago he’d been less sober, and the glaring colors had looked deeper than blood.