Dead Aim

by Thomas Perry

  A smile raised the corners of his lips, faded, and then returned. “I know that. I’m not sure I can explain why I’m going on with this, because the reason keeps changing. At first I wanted to know what I could have said or done to stop it. I realized—maybe while I was listening to her sister—that it was incredible egotism to think that just by saying some words I could induce a person I’d just met to reverse the biggest decision she had ever made. But it happens. It happens all the time. Somebody on a suicide hotline talks a young woman like her out of it every night.”

  “She has to call the hotline first. They don’t wait until she’s drowned herself, pull her out, and make her come to the phone. Maybe that’s the difference. Or maybe she was nuts. Delusional. Yes, I’m being flippant. I hope you know that if she were here now, I would be the last person you know to say, ‘Who cares?’ But now that it’s over, I have to say, ‘Who still cares?’ because the second that life left her body, all of this became a nonissue. Nothing you do will help her, or anybody else.”

  “You’re not even curious?”

  “Of course I am,” she said. “I’m the biggest gossip in town. You know that. Right now I spend a few minutes of each day spying on the tax attorney who has an office down the hall, because just about every day at lunchtime, a good-looking young guy shows up with take-out food, and she closes the office for an hour and a half. But he doesn’t leave until she reopens at one-thirty. I want to know all about it: who he is, where they met, what they’re doing—specifically and in detail—and how she’s keeping her husband from catching her.” She paused. “See? It’s titillating, it’s interesting, it’s not especially sad, and I don’t have to hire an expensive detective to interpret it for me.”

  He grinned. “You keep returning to the money. You think I’m wasting it, don’t you?”

  “You’re not the only rich client I have, thank God, and you’re not nearly the silliest. Usually, I include you in the other group, the ones I don’t worry about because they still have their first dollar. But right now, you have a certain quality that appeals to the motherly side of my nature, so I’ll give you a motherly lecture. Money can have some traps. It allows people to do surprisingly dumb things without obvious disastrous consequences. That can be a danger. You can get the idea that your money buys you everything you want, and will protect you from anything you don’t want. It can’t always, and when you reach the limit, it can be a nasty shock.”

  “I’m not sure how this applies to me,” said Mallon.

  “I don’t think you can find out everything about another person’s life just by paying a fortune to investigators. And I’m not sure that if you could, it would be a good bargain.”

  “Lydia is an old friend of mine, and I have more money than I need,” he said.

  “You don’t have unlimited time,” she said. “Nobody has. It’s hard for a person who cares about you to see you obsessed with a dead woman.”

  “She wasn’t dead when I met her.” Mallon paid for their dinner, and they walked along the harbor breakwall, watching the last of the boats coming in just after sundown.

  “Is it the boyfriend’s murder that’s keeping you involved?” she asked. “Do you secretly think her death was a murder too?”

  “I don’t know what to think,” Mallon replied. “We know she went to a self-defense school. What for? Lydia thinks she went there to learn how to kill somebody, and then did—that she killed Mark Romano herself.”

  “And then what? Something drove her to suicide?”

  “I don’t know. Guilt, maybe, or regret.” They walked along for a few yards, and he said, “I keep wondering about that self-defense camp. Have you heard of it?”

  “I don’t think so,” she answered. “But you have to remember what kind of place Santa Barbara is. It’s always been a place where rich people came to live after they stopped doing whatever it was that made them rich—sometimes a generation or two after. And it’s drawn more than its share of strange characters of one kind or another, who have something specific in mind, some way of taking advantage of that potential. A friend of mine used to say that there are five thousand living religions, and thirty-eight hundred of them were started within a hundred miles of here. This is also one of the places you come if you want to hold a class in yoga, or start a health-food store, or push some kind of self-improvement. This self-defense school seems to me to fit into that mix—on the fringes, maybe.”

  “I suppose,” he said.

  They walked back to the parking lot, got into Diane’s car, and she drove him to his house. He took his suitcase, leaned in the open window on his side, and said, “Thanks for picking me up, Diane.” Then he added, “And thanks for listening to all this.”

  “Thanks for dinner,” she replied. “If listening helps you get over this, I’ll listen anytime.”

  “It’s not a complete waste. Lydia and I may have solved a murder.”

  “And found a murderer who’s mostly a victim and who is, incidentally, dead.”

  “The truth matters.”

  “Some truths matter more than others. Spend your time thinking about living women. They sometimes repay your interest.” The window on Mallon’s side slid shut, and she drove off into the night.

  Mallon unlocked his front door, turned on the lights, and carried his suitcase up to his bedroom. He began to unpack, hanging up the clean clothes he had packed this morning. He was frustrated. Nobody seemed to understand that what he was looking for made a difference. He was sure that the girl who had been in his house had not been seeing things in a distorted way.

  She had been clear-eyed and sane. Maybe the one who killed Mark Romano had tracked her to his door, taken her out, and shot her. Maybe she had known that Mark Romano should die, had gone out and learned how to kill him, and then done it. And maybe she had discovered something he could not quite know, but suspected: that killing another human being had changed her into someone she did not want to be.

  CHAPTER 14

  As Stewart Markham walked along the sun-dappled path through the woods above the main lodge into the outer reaches of the self-defense camp, he could hear Coleman’s footsteps behind him. He had met Coleman here over three years ago, on his second stay at the school. Since then, they’d had the sort of relationship he’d had with a number of other men. When they didn’t happen to be around, he never thought about them, and didn’t have any impulse to stay in touch. Now and then one of them might call to mention something like a change of address or, only slightly more often, out of hope that a bout of extreme boredom would be relieved by a little cheerful banter. But whenever they were in the same place at the same time, they were instantly close friends—not merely as close as the last time but even closer, because now the friendship would have been extended by a year or two and by one additional reunion.

  Stewart was forty-two now, and the number of friends who turned up like this had grown large. There were old classmates from Etheridge School in Massachusetts, others he’d known at Princeton. There were not more than two or three from his business career, maybe because Stewart had needed to endure the brokerage, to satisfy his grand father, for only five years before the old man died and could no longer change his will. The people around him in the brokerage had been a mix of women, men too old to share his interests, and foreigners.

  Marshall Coleman, however, was a kindred spirit. Stewart had sensed that almost immediately. Coleman had the friendly ease of manner, the familiar, hearty tone that Stewart had been trained in childhood to recognize. These were the qualities shared by men who had been to the right schools and the right colleges, and had not been suffering outcasts there. But Marshall also had the reserve that had always been the sign in the English-speaking world of people whose families meant something.

  Coleman was strong and in good shape this time. Markham could tell by listening to the quiet evenness of his breathing and the pace of his steps as they climbed the first ridge. Coleman had been a ranked tennis player in college,
so it was no surprise that he still took care of himself. Markham habitually made critical observations of every person he met, and had never found any reason to amend what he had known was true in eighth grade: there were humans, who looked like what they were—straight and strong and healthy and energetic—and there were subhumans, who had started out small and ugly and inferior, and whose innate weakness would, through adulthood, make them degenerate even more. Marshall Coleman was one of the humans. He and Markham could have been mistaken for brothers.

  Markham reached the crest of the ridge, once again heard the sharp crack of a rifle, then silence. He stopped to listen.

  Coleman came up behind him and said, “What do you think? Did that sound like it came from the range?”

  There was another crack. “Got to be. If he was out popping deer or something, he wouldn’t get that many shots.”

  They followed the path over two more low hills, then came up to the range. Parish was wearing shooting glasses with yellow lenses and earphones. He was behind the high wooden shooting bench with a rifle propped on sandbags, staring through the telescopic sight at a target on the five-hundred-yard mark. He made a small adjustment to a thumbscrew on the scope.

  Spangler was up on the raised platform with a big spotting scope on a tripod, staring into the eyepiece at Parish’s target. Parish fired again, then raised the ear protector off his right ear to hear Spangler. “That one’s dead on, Michael. The elevation is perfect for that ammo.” He took his eye away from the eyepiece to look down at Parish and saw Coleman and Markham standing below. He waved his hand at them, and Parish looked over his shoulder. He gently placed the rifle on the felt pad that covered the bench, and turned to shake hands with them.

  His grip was firm, two hard shakes for each of them. Parish’s tanned face wrinkled at the corners of the eyes as he gave them a closed-mouthed smile. “Marshall, Stewart. Good to see you.” He looked up at the platform, where Spangler waited, and called, “Thanks, Paul.” Spangler came down the ladder with the spotter’s scope, folded the tripod, and busied himself putting the pieces of equipment in their carrying cases.

  Parish began walking downrange toward the paper target, waiting for the others to speak.

  “I’m surprised to see you doing that,” said Markham. “I mean, sighting it in yourself.”

  Parish reverted to his pedagogic tone. “Sighting a rifle isn’t just to get the rifle’s sights adjusted to a particular distance. It’s also to improve the shooter. Spangler cares for the weapons his students use on the firing range, and he shoots every day. He can drive nails at two hundred. I’m the one who needs the practice. A good rifle is a reliable device, always the same, clean and flawless like a sword. Achieving a dead aim is a perfection of the eye, the hand, the will.”

  Markham was reminded of why he admired Parish so much: he was the master, but he had a respect for standards that gave him a special humility.

  Coleman’s question was jarring. “Have you thought at all about what we were saying before?”

  Parish kept walking, and he raised both hands a few inches and rocked his head from side to side in a gesture of indecision and frustration. “Of course I’ve thought about it,” he said. “This isn’t like the shoe business. You’re not just customers. When a person has succeeded in passing my course, he’s somebody I’ll listen to. If he’s gone beyond courses, and put what he’s learned into practice on a hunt and never wavered or panicked or lost his nerve, he’s reached a different level.”

  “That’s really good to hear,” said Coleman. “It means a lot.” Markham muttered assent: “Yeah, it does.”

  “So I’ve taken it seriously and thought about it,” Parish continued. “I have questions. If you two want to go on a hunt together, why haven’t you? Why are you here? Do you want me to help you sharpen your skills a bit first? Is the target somebody who is likely to be beyond your capability?”

  Markham said, “That’s part of the problem. We don’t know.”

  Parish reached the five-hundred-yard mark and stepped to the post where his target hung. “You don’t?”

  “No,” said Coleman. “This time it’s not that there’s somebody either of us hates and needs to kill. It’s not a personal thing. This time it’s …” He glanced at Markham.

  Markham said, “It’s not about the target now. It’s about us. It’s about how we go about it, how we can improve ourselves, how we react to the pressure and the risk.”

  Parish turned to examine them. “Sport,” he pronounced. “It’s a sport hunt.”

  “I guess you could say that,” Coleman admitted uncomfortably.

  “I can understand that,” Parish said. When he noticed the relief on their faces as they glanced at each other, he said, “It’s something I respect. The rule for a target here is that the client wants to kill him. I don’t judge whether or not the target deserves it. I don’t shoot a deer because the deer deserves to be shot. I do it because I want to. Have you picked the target?”

  “No,” said Coleman.

  “Why not?”

  “We thought maybe it would be best if you did it. That way, it would be more of a test, a challenge: the professional hunter chooses, and you take the game you get.”

  Parish took the paper target off the post, held it up to let the others see the pattern of holes around the bull’s-eye. “See, the first one was way up here, the second down here. I overcompensated for the distance by raising it before the shot even missed, and then did it again in the other direction. Then the wind kicked up, and the shots drifted to the right. I had to teach myself how much to adjust for it at that range with the new rifle.”

  Coleman and Markham looked at the pattern of bullet holes with unfeigned admiration. Markham said, “But then you drilled it. The rest are all in the black, over and over.”

  “Yes,” said Parish evenly. “It’s a good rifle, made to do that. The rifle is always the same. It’s the shooter who changes.” He folded the paper and stuck it into his back pocket, took another from the wooden box at the side of the range, and pushed it onto the post so the nails went through it. Then he walked off the range and up the bank of the dry riverbed. “What kind of hunt do you two want? You said it was for the risk and action. Do you want a target that might shoot back, or a harmless one that’s going to be in a difficult spot for hunting? If I’m going to plan your hunt, I’ll need to know.”

  Markham hesitated. He had not anticipated the question, so he had to evaluate its terms. He had pictured the adventure as the two of them—Markham and Coleman—killing someone in plain sight, in a city. He and Coleman would be walking down a crowded street in a place like New York, and the prey would be ahead of them. Maybe the guy would start down the steps to a subway station, and as soon as he was below street level they would drop him and go back up, maybe looking down at the fallen man with distaste, as though he were an unconscious drunk. Maybe they would do it in an elevator in a big office building.

  But Coleman answered eagerly, “One that might shoot back. We’re looking for a challenge.”

  It was too late. Markham could not contradict him once it had been said. His fantasy had been the challenge of doing it in a public place; the risk had been in being seen. What he had relished was fooling both the target and the bystanders, and getting away with it. Never had he imagined placing himself in a position to be shot at. It was a new idea. He tried to envision such a thing, but it brought him no pleasure. Things had gone so slowly until now—the long, deliberate walk across the ranch, then waiting for Parish to give them his attention—but he sensed that a crucial part of the conversation had just come and gone, and what had been pronounced was irrevocable. His heart beat faster, and his breaths were shallow.

  Parish was walking on a path now, and Coleman was beside him. The path was unfamiliar and it was too narrow to walk three abreast, so Markham had to hang back alone. He heard Parish say, “I’ll have to give this some more thought.” Then, a few steps up the first hill, he said, “No. No
, I don’t. I have a perfect target for this kind of hunt.” He turned his head to look at Coleman, then turned his torso far enough to bring Markham into view. “You two did well enough in classes and on your first hunts, so I don’t have any doubts about your knowledge. But have you stayed sharp?”

  Coleman grinned and nodded emphatically. “Always.”

  Markham tried to formulate a way of amending the impression that Coleman’s brusque overconfidence had left. He wasn’t soft and flabby, but he did not think he was what Parish meant by sharp.

  Parish said, “Good. Then we’ll get started right away. I’ll pick a tracker and a scout today. Anybody you’d especially like to work with?”

  “Maybe Spangler?” Markham suggested quickly. He hoped the others did not suspect his reason for the choice, but Parish glanced at him and gave his thought a generous interpretation.

  “It’s possible he would be best. Having Spangler gives you an advantage in a firefight.”

  What Markham had been thinking was that Spangler looked formidable enough so that he probably would draw most of an opponent’s fire, leaving Markham a bit safer. He began to feel better.

  “But it might be better to have someone who won’t make the target suspicious,” said Parish, “somebody who can keep you out of a firefight until you’re ready to open up. We’ll have to talk it over.”

  CHAPTER 15

  Markham sat in the back row of the theater, staring at the movie without comprehension. It was as though he were not in Los Angeles but on an airplane, watching the movie without headphones. The actress who was on the screen eighty percent of the time was one who had been in many movies he had seen, and in this one she had already shown the camera all of the expressions her face would make. She and the lead actor had moved more quickly and abruptly at the beginning, but now they often lingered in the same frame for a while, so he assumed they’d discovered the reason why they had been put in this story together.