Rough Draft

by James W. Hall

  Hannah lay on the carpet, sleeping and awake. Watching as the stumpy legs of the marine sagged, and the man tottered briefly and dropped like a thick tree in the open forest, slamming into the rug, rolling a half turn till he came face-to-face with Hannah. Neither of them able to move. Neither able to speak. A half foot from her face, the marine’s eyes were open but they were losing hold. Losing the light, the gloss.

  Hannah lay there and watched the meanness leak from his eyes until they were calm, then more than calm—utterly, completely neutral.

  THIRTY-TWO

  “Christ, Hal, the woman was in my apartment She knows who I am, where I live, everything.”

  They were parked in front of a pawnshop, a block down on Flagler from the Desert Rose apartments. Misty was still out of breath from jogging all the way from her apartment. Hal stared out the windshield at the traffic.

  “None of that matters, Misty.”

  “Sure it fucking matters. She knows my name, she knows your name. We’re fucked. We’re totally fucked.”

  “She’s the one that’s fucked, Misty.”

  “Jesus, Hal. I shot Claude McElroy, I shot the fucking apartment manager in the chest. I’m sure he’s dead.”

  “That bothers you?”

  “Bothers me? Christ, I killed three people today. Three people, Hal.”

  “Yeah, three is a lot for one day. Most I’ve ever done is two.”

  Hal steered the Taurus into a parking lot a block down Flagler. Found a parking space facing the street so he could see Hannah when she drove past.

  “Christ, my picture’s going to be on the evening news. The police are going to be looking for me. I’m going to jail, Hal.”

  “They’ve been chasing me for ten years. Police, FBI, DEA, Interpol. It doesn’t matter, Misty. We’ll have the money in our hands soon and we’ll disappear. We’re not going to be caught.”

  “We gotta get the hell out of here right now. Forget the money, just make a run for it.”

  Randall was sitting in the backseat beside Misty. He was staring ahead, not moving, not speaking. Just an eye blink now and then.

  “It’s all right,” Hal said. “We’re almost done. We’ll get the money, then we’ll go somewhere, a vacation. Just you and me. We’ll stay in a motel, watch all the pay-per-view movies we want, order room service. It’ll be good.”

  Misty leaned forward over the seat.

  “Steal the money? Is that what you’re saying? Just take it and run off?”

  Hal looked out at the busy street, at all the Cuban stores, some with little windows opening onto the sidewalk where people bought coffee in tiny paper cups, then stood around drinking them.

  “It’s your old man’s money,” Hal said. “It’s only fair you should get it, like an inheritance or something. That money is more yours than anybody else’s. All you’ve been through.”

  Misty stared out her window for a moment. Billboards in Spanish. Street signs with the names of Cuban generals she’d never heard of. Her home had been hijacked by foreigners. She didn’t have a job, didn’t speak the local language. Nothing keeping her in Miami. She drew some air into her lungs. Feeling giddy. Feeling like one of those bugs, a cicada, it steps out of its skin, leaves it behind on the branch, a little transparent crust, its old self.

  “That’s good, Hal,” she said. “An inheritance. That’s a good way of looking at it.”

  “I’m ready to retire,” Hal said. “I believe I’m ready to have some fun.”

  “Are you sure? Steal the money?”

  “You think you could show me how to do that, Misty? Have some fun?”

  She rested a hand on his shoulder. Felt the electric buzz of his flesh.

  “Sure, Hal,” she said, a smile cracking through. “It’s not like I’m an expert on the subject, but I’d be willing to give it my best shot.”

  Hannah stumbled back to the Porsche. Her ears were ringing, her bowels had turned to jelly, and everywhere she turned she saw triple images haloed in green fire.

  She took the surface streets south. Hitting the beginning of rush hour, a slow, torturous journey. At a red light in South Miami she fumbled in her purse and took out her cell phone, but then sat with it in her lap unable to think of anyone to call for help. Not Sheffield, not Dan Romano, not Gisela.

  She snapped the phone shut and laid it on the passenger seat. She steered the car with the excruciating focus of the deeply inebriated. A sticky sheen of blood covered her neck. Blood matted her hair and more blood was spattered on the front of her blouse. But by the time she’d pulled into her driveway, the ache behind her eyes had subsided to merely a thunderous roar and now she was only seeing double. She would live.

  In her study, she took out a legal pad and a pen and began to scribble the words she’d been composing in her head. The way she wanted this to end.

  She read the words over, crossed out a few, inserted others. Writing not for payment, or self-fulfillment, or some idiotic literary ambition, but for a purpose beyond any she’d ever imagined. To save the only life that mattered.

  Every skill she’d learned these last five years, the smoke-and-mirror tricks of language, creating the seductive semblance of truth, mattered not at all. This one had to be absolutely real. This one had to work. First time, only time.

  Hannah mumbled the speech to herself and corrected a word or two. When it sounded right, she dialed Stevie Brockman’s number and the boy answered on the first ring.

  “Funny you should call,” he said. “I just finished rereading First Light. I thought I should give it another look after meeting you. And I’m glad I did. It’s better than I remembered. Much better.”

  She thanked him, then asked if he still thought he could break into J. J. Fielding’s site.

  “No problemo.”

  “Good,” she said, then told him what she wanted him to do. She read from her legal pad, dictated it carefully, then had Stevie read it back to her, word for word.

  “Okay,” he said. “Should I start right now?”

  “Right now,” she said. “This is life or death, Stevie. This has to work.”

  “It’s all life or death with me, everything I do. That’s how I look at it.”

  She was quiet, nothing left to say.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “Shouldn’t take but half an hour at the most. After you left I penetrated the site, installed a trapdoor. I can return any time, do whatever I want. I was just waiting for your call. I wanted to talk to you again. I enjoyed our conversation.”

  She thanked him again, then both of them fell silent. She listened to the rustling static.

  “Are you all right, Hannah? You don’t sound good.”

  “I’m going to be fine, Stevie. If this works, I’ll be just fine.”

  After she hung up, Hannah sat for a while trying to breathe. Every inhalation drove a spike through the lid of her skull, every exhalation wrenched the spike out. She blinked and blinked again, but her study wall wouldn’t stop quivering.

  She got up, stripped off her bloody clothes and left them in a heap in the bathroom. She showered in arduous slow motion, changed into shorts and a white T-shirt. She went into the kitchen and loaded a sandwich bag with ice cubes and held it to the knot on her head. The throb had faded but her vision was still blurry.

  She opened her purse and took out Ed Keller’s .357 Smith & Wesson and carried it into Randall’s bedroom and set it beside the keyboard.

  She sat for a few moments, inhaling her son’s musky, talcum odor. The scent ached in the back of her throat. She wiped the blur from her eyes, set the bag of ice aside, and moved her hand to Randall’s mouse.

  A moment later she was looking at J. J. Fielding in his hospital bed. He was cranked up to a sitting position and was staring sightlessly into the camera. His lips were barely moving. She rolled the volume knob higher and settled back in the chair.

  “I made mistakes,” he murmured. “I injured the people I loved. I’ve been selfish and stupid and I acted o
ut of cowardice when I abandoned my family. I am not worthy of forgiveness, but I still plead that you will find it in your heart to forgive me.”

  He paused for breath and reached over for his water glass. He puckered his lips around the straw and sucked some fluid into his mouth. It seemed to require a monumental effort. He sputtered, coughed, wiped his lips with his hand, then set the glass back on the table. His voice was feeble, his face more shrunken than it had been only a few hours earlier. The hard shape of his skull was rising to the surface.

  Hannah checked the time. It was half past six, over forty-five minutes since she’d called Stevie. Something was wrong. J. J. Fielding was still rambling. Still mumbling his melancholy, useless confession.

  The old man picked up a washcloth from the side table and mopped his face, then let it drop to the sheets. Every motion seemed to punish him further. He was panting. His face was twisted. It appeared that at any moment J. J. Fielding might sink into unconsciousness, start his inevitable slide toward oblivion. And the moment that happened, her plan would be worthless. He had to be talking. He had to be moving his lips.

  “What’s he saying now?”

  “Just more blather,” said Misty.

  They were parked in a vacant lot one street over from Hannah Keller’s house. Tucked in among the pine trees, facing the street so they could see her if she drove past, on her way to meet J. J. Fielding. In the backseat, Misty had the portable computer on her lap.

  “Still babbling about how fucking sorry he is,” she said. “Whoop-de-doo. Like anybody cares.”

  Randall was staring at the back of Hal’s head. Not a word since she’d spoken to him on the dock at the marina that morning.

  Looking off into never-never land. Sailing away into some dead, airless space where nothing moved. Misty knew about that place. She’d been there plenty of times herself. Back when her father left. Back when he disappeared without a kiss good-bye, a note, a letter. She knew that look of Randall’s. She knew it from the inside out.

  “Tell us an animal story, Hal.”

  He turned in the seat and looked at Misty. His dark eyes were smiling.

  “An animal story?”

  “Yeah, you know, something to perk the kid up. One of those things about bees or whatever.”

  “Okay,” he said. “I know one about a spider.”

  “You hear that, Randall? A story about a spider.”

  “It’s called the Lasiodora,” Hal said, “and it comes from Brazil.”

  Misty looked at Randall. It was hard to tell for sure, but the boy seemed to be listening.

  “Go on, Hal. What about the spider?”

  “Well, its venom is so powerful the Lasiodora will even attack poisonous snakes. The spider climbs onto a python’s head or a rattlesnake and bites it, then it hangs on through all the whipping and shaking, till the poison kills the snake. After the snake’s dead, the spider pumps more chemicals into it, stuff so strong it dissolves the snake from head to tail, turning its insides to Jell-O. Then the spider wriggles into the snake’s mouth and sucks the dead body dry.”

  “Wow,” Misty said. “Now there’s a cheery one.”

  “It’s a David and Goliath story.”

  “What?”

  “Doesn’t matter how little you are, or how weak,” Hal said. “If your juice is strong enough, you’ll win.”

  Hal turned in his seat and looked at Misty. Then he turned further and examined Randall. The boy’s eyes were open but that was the only way you’d know he was still alive.

  “We need to get rid of the kid,” Hal said.

  “Get rid of him?”

  “Somebody drives by, a neighbor or something, they might recognize him. He’s trouble. He could get us caught, Misty. We need to get rid of him.”

  “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

  Hal met her eyes and nodded.

  “Hey, he’s just a kid.”

  “A kid who could get us in trouble. Spoil everything.”

  “Jesus, Hal. Doing away with a kid, that could be very bad karma. You and me, we’re at the beginning of a relationship. It could be like a dark stain on things. We’d be haunted by it.”

  “It’s got to be done.”

  Hal opened the door and got out. He waited till a car had passed by on the street, then tugged open Randall’s door and hauled the boy into the vacant lot and dragged him over into the tall grass behind the car.

  Misty jumped out and hustled back there. Hal was hidden behind the trunk of one of the oaks. He had his hands around Randall’s throat and was beginning to squeeze. The kid wasn’t resisting.

  “Wait a minute, Hal. Wait a goddamn minute.”

  She slapped him on the shoulder and his hands relaxed on Randall’s throat.

  “Look, we might need him,” she said. “We might want to show him to his mother once, let her know for sure we have him. He didn’t say a word to her on the phone, she might not even believe it’s true he’s been kidnapped.”

  Randall’s eyes were closed. His face was red, and there was the bluish-yellow beginning of a bruise at his throat.

  Hal looked at Misty, then looked back at the boy. Hal’s face was bland. He wasn’t mad or worried or anything. Like some kind of Zen master, peaceful and far away.

  “Okay,” he said. “But he has to lie down on the floor in the back. And if he makes a noise, he’s finished. You got that, kid? One noise, you’re gone.”

  Randall just kept looking off at the horizon. Dusk was settling in, lights coming on in the houses nearby. A mosquito whined at her ear.

  They walked back to the car and Randall got into the back and lay facedown on the floor.

  Misty got in front with Hal and set the computer in her lap.

  “What’s your father doing now?”

  She watched the screen for a few seconds.

  “Still yammering,” she said. “Jesus Christ, that’s got to be the sorriest man who was ever born.”

  Hal smiled.

  “Not half as sorry as he’s going to be.”

  With Fielding’s site running in the background, Hannah navigated through Randall’s computer and located again those protected E-mail files from Dad.

  She double-clicked the first one and the gray password protection box appeared. She typed in the word Pardner but didn’t hit the enter button. She sat there and looked at the seven letters filling the box.

  She made a silent pact with God. If he granted her this one, she vowed to radically change her life. She would shut off her computer, exit her fabricated world, and force Randall to do the same. All he’d been doing was copying her. Losing himself in his own electronic universe, cutting himself off from the complications of the real one. Just as she had done, Randall had tried to flee the troubling emotions, entering a place he could control and define. It was a sickness. It was a paltry, synthetic substitute. By God, she would do better, if he would only grant her this one prayer.

  She took a careful breath and let it go. Nearby on the desk, Spunky rustled the shredded paper.

  Hannah tapped the enter key.

  And the E-mail file opened. Thank God, thank God.

  Dearest Randall, my son:

  I found your Web site today and was so excited I had to E-mail you. I know it has been a long time since I wrote you or spoke to you, but I’m sure you understand how hard it is to speak freely with you since your mother hates me so. I was hoping we might correspond in this manner. If this interests you, please let me know. Of course, please don’t mention this to your mother.

  Your loving father.

  Hannah sat staring at the screen. Her vision was clear, her breath was coming clean and painlessly. After a moment she closed the file and used the same password to open the next one.

  Dearest Randall:

  It was so wonderful to hear from you by E-mail. Yes, I have been living in Oslo these last few years. I am working at a university teaching mathematics. I miss you very much and think of you every day. And yes, I hav
e a picture of you, but not a recent one. Maybe you can E-mail me something that was taken lately. I’m sure you’re a big strong, handsome boy by now. Your loving father.

  She read a half dozen more, the same short, businesslike notes. But with a new subject emerging. Norway. What a beautiful country it was. How clean and orderly it was. And how much Pieter loved his son, how he yearned to have him by his side. And as always a reminder to Randall to destroy these E-mail notes so his mother would never learn of the bond growing between father and son.

  Randall quickly tired of the exchange. In one of his recent notes, he wrote:

  I’m sorry, Dad, but please stop writing me. I love you but I don’t want to do this anymore.

  And Pieter’s reply was bitterly direct. The loathsome man she’d married.