Murder in the Wings

by Ed Gorman

  "Yeah."

  "You look like you're trying to levitate those playbills," she said.

  I smiled. "Yeah."

  "Why do you keep staring at them?"

  "I suppose because I'm trying to learn something."

  "What?"

  "I don't know."

  She raised one eyebrow—she knows how to do such things. "You wouldn't be holding out on me, would you, Dwyer?"

  "I wish I was."

  "You look sort of cute, with your hair all frizzy from the rain, I mean."

  "Thanks."

  "Hold that thought. I'll be right back." She leaned across to whisper to me. "I'm down to my last Tampax. We'll have to stop at a Seven-Eleven."

  "Hell, we'll just go to your place."

  "If we do, we'll be tempted to sleep, and I can tell from the way you're acting that you don't want to sleep."

  "No, I guess I don't."

  "What're we going to do, then?"

  "See what Evelyn is up to now."

  "Seriously?"

  "Seriously."

  Evelyn's car wasn't in back of the theater, so we drove over by the halfway house. Traffic was thinning. The rain had become a fine mist. Evelyn's car was parked in front of the halfway house, and Evelyn and Keech were sitting in it. We went down the street and parked at the far end where we could see Evelyn but she wouldn't notice us.

  "He was a spooky guy, when you think of it," Donna said as we sat there.

  "Who?"

  "Michael Reeves."

  "Yeah, he was."

  "He even got to Sylvia Ashton. You would think he would have been scared of pushing her over the edge."

  "He thought he was on to something."

  "Like what?"

  "I'm not sure. But I don't think he would have toyed with Sylvia unless he thought he could get something very specific and useful from her."

  For a time we said nothing. We sat and watched the black trees shine with rain.

  There was a moment of light as Keech opened the car door and got out. He waved good-bye to Evelyn and went inside the halfway house. Evelyn pulled away. I waited half a minute and went after her.

  "You have any idea where she's going?"

  "No," I said.

  "Good," Donna said, "it's more fun that way."

  Five minutes later Evelyn pulled up next to a car phone stand. She dropped in her coins, waited for a response, and then began to talk in very animated style. At one point she made a fist and banged the side of her car. Then she calmed down and kept on talking; something seemed to have been resolved. We sat half a block away, in the parking lot of a closed Hardee's, watching. Then she hung up and pulled away, and we went after her.

  She led us through the downtown section, along the river where the most interesting part of the city, the old brick buildings of the original settlement, had given way to tall office buildings that stood half-empty thanks to poor planning.

  At first I had no idea where she was going, but then she started hanging sharp lefts and sharp rights, and gradually I realized that she was taking a circuitous route back to the theater.

  The place was dark and looked almost as if it had been shuttered permanently. Rain made the surface of the parking lot gleam. Evelyn pulled around the corner of the rear entrance and sat there. That surprised me—I had expected her to park and go upstairs. She lived here.

  "Maybe she's going someplace else," Donna said.

  I shrugged. "Hell, I don't know what's going on."

  We sat there five more minutes. The jazz station was doing a mini-Brubeck concert. I hadn't heard Brubeck in years. It was like rediscovering Marc Chagall.

  A figure in a dark coat ran from the shadows of the theater to Evelyn's car and got in very quickly. Then we were off again.

  "Who was it?"

  "I'm not sure," I said.

  Ten minutes later I knew where we were going. The city street gave way to a two-lane highway. All I could see were brown cornfields flashing in the glare of my headlights.

  Evelyn and her passenger were headed for the country, and probably to the cabin where we'd been the day before.

  Chapter 20

  The wind was whipping the trees to the breaking point. Large branches had been ripped out and hurled onto the pavement leading to the cabin road. Half a mile before the entrance to the road I'd cut the headlights so that Evelyn would think the car behind her had turned off.

  "Boy," Donna said, "this is really eerie." And it was. The wind was rocking the car and the branches snapped like bones beneath our wheels. The radio was off so I could concentrate better. For light there was just the green glow of the dash instruments. Donna sat on the edge of her seat, harnessed in her safety belt and gripping the dashboard. In my police days I used to have a partner who rode just like that when we ran the siren.

  "We're going to have to walk from here," I said.

  "Are you serious?"

  "Of course."

  We were down the cabin road, but not close to the house. We couldn't afford to get close—they'd see us for sure.

  "Boy," Donna said. But she got out anyway.

  The walk took ten minutes. We got so wet so fast we didn't care anymore. Donna sneezed once and said, "God, I hope I don't get a cold and have my period at the same time."

  Believe me, I devoutly wished the same thing. Colds made her crabby all by themselves. With her period in the bargain . . .

  Once she stumbled off the road. "Ick," she said, pulling her foot from oozing mud. But beyond that she didn't say anything else. She just got back on the road and trooped right along next to me. She did favor her muddy foot a bit. Like an injury.

  We came up on the west side of the cabin. Downstairs, the windows were yellow rectangles in the murk. We climbed up next to one of the windows and looked inside.

  The woman in the dark coat stood in the middle of the living room as if she were lost. Her coat dripped rain. Her eyes stared fixedly at something I couldn't make out. She made no effort to remove her coat.

  "Sylvia," Donna whispered. "Why would Evelyn bring her out here?"

  I shook my head. I had an idea but I didn't want to say.

  A minute later Evelyn appeared in the middle of the living room. She took her mother's coat, hung it up in a closet, and led her mother over to a divan next to the fireplace. Sylvia sat down, moving mechanically, like a zombie. I thought of the drugs David Ashton had given her earlier.

  "Boy," Donna said, "this just gets weirder and weirder."

  Evelyn disappeared again.

  We stood silently in the whipping wind and soaking rain. The air smelled of damp wood and fetid vegetation from last winter.

  This time when Evelyn reappeared she bore a tea kettle and two delicate little cups. She poured hot tea and handed one cup gently to her mother.

  "I wonder if she'd sell us some," Donna whispered.

  After Evelyn got a fire going, her blonde hair glowing beautifully in the flames from the crumpled newspaper, she went back to the divan and sat down right next to her mother. They said nothing. They just stared straight ahead into the fire. They might have been strangers seated next to each other on a bus.

  Finally, Evelyn spoke.

  "Damn," I said. I pushed myself as close as I could to the window. I even pushed my ear against the cold pane of glass. But I couldn't hear her. All I could do was watch.

  At first Evelyn carried on a one-sided conversation. She spoke emotionally, setting her teacup down and using her hands to gesticulate dramatically, but Sylvia just sat there without responding. She wore a prim white blouse and designer jeans. Her tousled black hair gave her the aspect of a mad and aging princess. If she heard her blonde daughter, she gave no sign.

  Then Evelyn slapped her. A single sharp slap. Her mother's head jerked back. She spilled her tea on her lap. She put her hands to her face and began sobbing. Evelyn stood over her. She was shrieking. For the first time, I could hear her. "Mother, you have to remember what happened that night. They're goin
g to blame you for Michael's murder!"

  But I could see that her mother scarcely understood Evelyn's words and probably didn't even know where she was.

  Then the violent moment subsided. Evelyn went over and knelt at her beautiful mother's knees. She put her head against Sylvia's legs. Absently, Sylvia began to stroke her daughter's hair.

  "Actually, that would make a really sweet photograph," Donna whispered. "It'd make a nice birthday present. They seem to be a family that really needs to be together. Remember what Stephen told us about how David used to be on the road and how it upset Sylvia so much?"

  "Yeah," I said.

  "Chad used to do that to me."

  We were standing out in a bitter night and she was going to make it even more bitter by talking about her ex-husband. "I sorta did the same thing, too. He had this friend named Jay. We used to go out to dinner a lot when Chad was out of town. Until Jay made a pass at me. I never told Chad, though. He would have killed both of us."

  "Why would he kill you if Jay was the one who made the pass?"

  "That's just the way Chad is."

  One more reason to like Chad.

  And then I thought of something—or at least I started to think of something. There was a date on the playbill about David Ashton's road tour. I thought of the date, and then about Evelyn's birthday being today, and about how long Stephen said David's road trips used to be—

  And then I didn't think of anything at all. Because all I had time to do, in response to the sound of snapping in the undergrowth behind me, was turn and see the stock of a Browning hunting rifle come smashing into my face.

  Donna screamed, or at least I think she did, and that was all I remembered.

  Chapter 21

  In my cop days I was knocked out only once. I was in a union bar trying to break up a fight and somebody hit me from behind with a bumper-pool cue. I felt two sensations at once, the shutdown feeling of slipping into unconsciousness, and a terrible arctic cold spreading from my face to the rest of my body. When I came to, I was in an emergency room on a gurney, and I had the impression that my father had visited me. When the intern came up, I said, "Is my dad here?" and he said "I don't think so, sir." Then my wife stepped up and said, apparently in a play for pity on my behalf, "His father is dead." The intern nodded as sagely as he could, as sagely as any twenty-five-year-old snot can.

  When I came to I saw Donna bent over me, her red hair draping her face like a cowl. "Boy, Dwyer, thank God, really, thank God," she said. "I mean, for you being alive and everything."

  Then I felt the goo, right where my hairline has started to recede. At first it felt like paste but of course it was blood and of course it was mine. We were in an attic surrounded by many ancient cardboard boxes and a couple of trunks.

  "Would you do me a favor?"

  "Sure, Dwyer, what?"

  "Put your hand in my back pocket."

  "God, Dwyer, are you joking at a time like this?"

  "Right, Donna, my fucking head feels like somebody dropped a cement block on it and I'm telling fucking jokes."

  "Well, God, you don't have to get so mad. I mean, you've got to admit it's kind of a weird request and all. I mean, right after you regain consciousness."

  "Are you going to do it or not?" I was getting angrier by the moment.

  Beneath her breath, she said, "Boy, what an asshole." Then I threw my weight to the left, lifting my left cheek off the floor, and she squeezed her hand down my pocket and said, "Okay, now I've got my hand in your pocket. What should I do next?"

  "Is there a handkerchief there?"

  "Yeah."

  "Then take it out."

  "All right. I've got your handkerchief out."

  "Good. Now hand it to me."

  "Delighted."

  She gave me the handkerchief and I applied it to where the rifle had connected. Then I started the long and painful process of standing up.

  I had just gotten my right palm flat on the floor for leverage when she said, "He's going to come up here and kill us, Dwyer. That's what he said. David Ashton, I mean."

  "Where are we?"

  "He made me help carry you up to the attic. There's a stairway down, but he's got the door locked at the bottom and there's only the one window, the weird little round one up there."

  "Wonderful."

  "What?"

  "I said wonderful."

  "Oh." She was on her knees next to me. She got her arms under my arms in a kind of hammerlock, and I'll be damned if it didn't help me get to my feet without much trouble.

  I spent two minutes leaning against a dusty wall. I wanted to make sure the dizziness was going to subside at least a bit before I tried walking.

  "Boy, Dwyer, you knew it was Ashton all along, didn't you?"

  I just looked at her. "You're hyperventilating."

  "How can you tell?"

  "Some bastard's down there with a hunting rifle and he's going to come up here and kill us and you're just jabbering away."

  "Well, at least you didn't attribute it to my period."

  "Seriously, will you shut up for a minute and let me think?"

  "I can't help it, Dwyer, I'm scared, and when I'm scared I talk my ass off. I used to drive Chad crazy sometimes."

  "Gosh, that's hard to believe."

  "All right," she said, making a silly little gesture with her fingers and mouth, "it's locked."

  Rain pounded the roof. On the little window it sounded like BBs. I could hear nothing from below. I held out my hand. "How about holding on to me?"

  "Where are we going?"

  "Down the stairs."

  "But the door's locked."

  "You forget all the keys I've got."

  "Hey, yeah."

  "'Hey, yeah.' Take my arm, okay?"

  She took my arm. My head hurt and I really needed to pee, and I felt feverish from the pain. The steps seemed twenty feet apart. We moved slowly. I could smell sweat from my own pits, or maybe it was from Donna's pits. We'd spent a long day alternating activity with anxiety, so probably neither of us was up for a fancy dinner party.

  At the bottom of the stairs was a door framed by yellow light from the other side. The door was locked.

  "What're we going to do?" Donna whispered.

  That was when the gunshot came from downstairs.

  "Use one of my basic Boy Scout tools," I said.

  I knelt down and got out my pocket knife and proceeded to have at the door. The house still echoed with the gunshot. My head still hurt from all the abuse of the past day. Donna knelt next to me, looking cute and lost and scared and wet.

  "You going to pick it?"

  "I'm going to try."

  "I thought you did it with credit cards."

  "Some locks you do with credit cards."

  "But this isn't one of them?"

  "Right."

  "It's a good thing you were a cop."

  "Please."

  "What?"

  "Ssshh."

  "Oh, yeah. Right."

  So I started. Various second-story men I'd busted during my days on the force would have paid a great deal of money to see this. A great deal.

  I started sweating, and my headache got worse. I turned the knife right, I turned the knife left, I wiggled, I waggled, I waffled. The mother still wouldn't open.

  Then Donna said, "Maybe you're not doing it hard enough."

  "Donna, believe it or not, I know what I'm doing." I could hear the pissiness in my voice. Pissiness is not my best quality. I tried a patient explanation, but it probably just came out patronizing. "I mean, this isn't a matter of brute force, it's a matter of delicacy. Of finding the tumbler and turning it."

  "God, Dwyer, just jam the darn thing in once. What've we got to lose?"

  So I jammed the darn thing in once, and of course the darn thing (which is to say, the motherfucker) opened right up.

  We knelt there looking at the next room as the door swung open.

  "Now what?" Donna said.


  "Now we sneak down the hall and see what's going on."

  "I'm scared."

  "So am I."

  "Yeah, but you're better at pretending than I am." I put out my hand. She felt it twitch.

  "Boy, Dwyer, you really are scared."

  We left the room on tiptoes and went down a long, dark hall to the top of the stairs. We huddled in the gloom and listened. There was just the rain. I could smell gunpowder.

  "What're we going to do?" she breathed into her cupped hand against my ear.

  "Go downstairs."

  She pantomimed. "Are you crazy?"

  I led the way down. With each step I pictured the layout of the large first level. The open living room. The fireplace. The dining room in the left wing. The kitchen in the right. There had been a screened-in back porch, too.

  I was almost giddy when we reached the bottom. Fright does that to you sometimes. Blood was running into my eyes.

  The living area was well lit and empty. The smell of gunpowder was especially strong there.

  "Did he take them somewhere?"

  I shrugged. She took my hand. We went into the dining room. We found Sylvia Ashton in the corner.

  At first, remembering the gunshot, I thought she was dead. But in the shadows I saw her mad, lovely eyes glint, and as I moved closer, even above the rain, I could hear the soft rhythm of her breathing. Donna knelt on one side of her, I knelt on the other.

  "Where did he take her, Sylvia?"

  She said nothing.

  "She isn't his daughter, is she, Sylvia? She's Stephen Wade's daughter, isn't she?"

  Nothing.

  "That's what you told Michael Reeves when he used Sodium Pentothal on you, wasn't it? That's why David killed him, isn't it?"

  Donna and I looked at each other across Sylvia's tousled dark hair.

  "David knew that your mother would push him out of the family if she ever knew that Evelyn wasn't his child. That's why David had to protect your secret—he'd be penniless, otherwise."

  She raised her head. "He's been a good father to her. Better than Stephen ever would have been."

  Then she began sobbing. She fell into Donna's arms, an eternal child seeking eternal succor.