by S. J. Rozan
"I'm sorry," she began.
"No." I cut her off. "You haven't got anything to apologize for. I'd expect you to be upset and I don't blame you for being upset with me. I haven't done you a hell of a lot of good."
She sat on the step above mine, stared into the distance. "I'm frightened." They didn't sound like words she was used to. "What's happening, Bill? Is it—am I a target for somebody?"
Admitting she was scared gave me an opening I wouldn't get again, for one of those ideas I knew she'd hate. "Eve, there's something I want you to do. Hear me out before you decide."
Her crystal eyes were uneasy. "What is it?"
"I don't want you to be alone for a while. I want to bring someone up to stay with you."
She looked at me blankly for a moment; then, unexpectedly, she laughed. "You have to be crazy," she said. "I'm the person with two names, for God's sake. I'm an eccentric recluse. I'm a hermit. I'm the person who'll do anything to protect her privacy, even hire a private detective!" She laughed again.
"No," I said. "Eva Nouvel is all those things. Eve Colgate is a farmer. She's the least sentimental person I've ever met. She makes decisions and doesn't look back. And she's scared."
The laugh had subsided into a smile; now the smile faded. She looked away. "I don't want this," she said.
"I know you don't."
We watched the forsythia sway with the wind. She said, "You don't think it's vandalism. You don't think it's coincidence."
"No, and you don't either."
"No." She tried a small smile. "But I was hoping you did."
"If there hadn't been a murder," I said, "if Mark Sanderson's daughter hadn't been fencing your things from a truck that rolled over the ravine last night, if everybody I met weren't so anxious to get his hands on Jimmy Antonelli, then I'd say sure. I'd say someone stole the paintings, then got curious about where they came from. They came back to have a look. Maybe they were drunk or stoned and found they could make a hell of a mess and were just getting into it when I came around." I lit another cigarette, cupping it against the wind. "And maybe that's what happened. Maybe the only thing that's tying all these things together in my head is my inability to mind my own business." I turned, faced her. "I don't think so, but of course I wouldn't. Make your own decision; but I can tell you it will affect what I do from now on."
"How do you mean?"
"If you don't let me get you some protection, I'll spend a lot more time and energy keeping an eye on you, and concentrating on the people I think might be a threat to you. That might not be the same thing as solving your case, or figuring out what the hell is going on around here."
"What if I don't want an eye kept on me?"
"Fire me."
That one dropped to the ground between us.
"Maybe the police will figure out what's going on," she said.
"Maybe they will. But they'll only figure out what they need to know to solve the crime they know about."
"You would feel more free to act," she said slowly, "if I had a baby-sitter?"
"Bodyguard."
"I can't even bring myself to say that. It's so ridiculous."
I didn't answer that. She thought silent thoughts and I smoked and the forsythia danced.
"Who?" she asked me finally.
"Lydia."
"That same detective? The one who snooped into Ulrich's accounts? Living in my house?"
"She's good," I said. "She's done this kind of thing before. She can stay by your side and keep out of your way at the same time. You'll like her."
"I don't think so."
"Eve, remember, when she checked out Sternhagen, she didn't know who my client was. She still doesn't."
"You didn't tell her?"
"No. I told her the client had lost six uncatalogued Eva Nouvels. That's all she had to go on. She was trying everything she could think of, and your gallery was a smart idea."
She stood, hands in her back pockets, and paced. Stopping, she said, "How long?"
"I don't know. I hope not long. I can't tell, Eve."
She paced some more, but not much. "All right," she finally said. "All right. Because I am scared. And because you didn't tell her who your client was."
"Good. Let's call her now."
She hesitated. "I've lived alone for thirty years. Now you want me to have someone with me twenty-four hours a day. I won't be good at it."
"Lydia will."
We went back inside. Eve lit the fire in the stove, put on water for coffee. I dialed Lydia's number. I said a prayer, keeping in mind the danger of answered prayers, and when the phone was picked up I got what I'd prayed for: it wasn't the machine and it wasn't her mother.
"Oh," Lydia said coolly, once she knew it was me. "Hello. I wasn't expecting you to call until later. I got Velez, but he's only just started. Should I call him and call you back? In case he has something already?"
"No, that's not why I called."
"Why did you?"
"There's trouble up here, and I need help. Can you come?"
The ice in her voice thawed a little, probably in spite of herself. "What do you mean, trouble?" she asked cautiously. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine, but things are getting rough. I need someone to stay with the client."
"A baby-sitter?"
"Bodyguard."
Her voice almost smiled. "The client's right there with you, huh?"
"Yes."
She hesitated. "When would I start? Right away?"
"Yes."
She was silent. An image focused itself in my mind, Lydia in her back-room Chinatown office, cloudy light drifting in the pebbled glass window. Maybe she was looking at one of the pictures on her wall as she thought; maybe the one I'd given her for Christmas, a shadowy, somber photograph of a city street at night, the buildings dark, the people gone.
"I know you're pissed off," I said. "We can talk about it when you get here. I need you, Lydia."
More silence; then, briskly, "I'll have to organize my mother, and I'll have to rent a car. I could leave by two. For how long?"
"I don't know."
"How do I get there?"
I gave her directions.
"How long will it take me?"
"About four hours, the way you drive."
"How about the way you drive?"
"Two and a half."
"I'll see you at four-thirty."
"Lydia—"
"This isn't just a ploy to get me up there where it's rustic and isolated and romantic?"
The unexpectedness of that question stopped me, made me laugh. "If I thought that would work I'd have tried it long ago."
"You've tried everything else."
"Nice of you to notice."
"See you later."
"Lydia?"
"Umm?"
"It's been rough. It could get rougher."
"Promises, promises," she said in her sweetest tone, and hung up.
Eve brought the mugs to the counter by the phone, filled them.
"Do you want something to eat?"
"No, thanks. I'm not hungry."
"You haven't eaten since dinner last night."
"I'll get something later." I drank my coffee slowly, savoring it.
"She wasn't frightened?" Eve asked. "When you told her it was dangerous?"
"No," I said. "She liked it."
We leaned on opposite sides of the kitchen counter, finishing the coffee. She looked at me over her mug, said nothing, hid her thoughts.
I took my rig from where I'd dropped it on the cedar chest, slung it over my shoulder. I was loading up my pockets with what she'd taken out of them when the phone rang.
"Hello?" she said into the receiver; then, "Yes, in fact, he is. Are you all right?"
I stopped what I was doing, listened.
"All right," she said, half smiling. "I should have known better than to ask. Hold on." She held the receiver out to me. "It's Tony. He's looking for you."
I grabbed it. "T
ony? Something wrong?"
"How the hell do I know?" Tony's voice growled out of the phone. "I'm just the messenger boy. You okay?"
"Yeah. Shouldn't I be?"
"You sound lousy."
"Thanks. What's up?"
"Your buddy Sanderson called here lookin' for you. He got kinda steamed when I said you wasn't here drinkin' at ten in the mornin'."
"He has no sense of humor. Did he say what he wanted?"
"No. Place was empty anyhow, so I closed up an' went over to your place, but you wasn't there, either. So I figured I'd check around. Nothin' else to do. Hope I didn't interrupt nothin'."
"You didn't. Thanks, Tony. Anything else new?"
"Not a goddamn thing."
"How're you holding up?"
"Great," he grunted. "Just goddamn great."
"Tony," I said, "You don't know where Frank Grice lives in Cobleskill, do you?"
"How the hell would I know that?"
"Didn't think so. Listen, I'll see you tonight, okay?"
"Yeah, whatever. What do I tell Sanderson if he calls again?"
"Tell him I'll call him when I have something to say."
"You gonna tell me what that means?" "No."
"Ah, to hell with it, an' you too. An' Sanderson."
"And the horse he rode in on. See you later."
"Yeah," he said, and hung up.
"What was that about?" Eve asked.
"I'm not sure." I stuffed my cigarettes into my shirt pocket, my wallet into my jacket.
"Where are you going?" she asked.
"I have some things to do. You'll be okay for a while; I don't expect anyone will come back so soon."
"I won't be here long, in any case. Harvey's coming to pick me up in half an hour."
I must have looked blank.
"We're going to Albany to look at farm equipment."
"Oh, milking machines. I remember. You'll be with him all afternoon?"
"Yes."
"That's even better." I zipped my jacket. "Meet us at Antonelli's tonight." "Us?"
"Lydia and me."
"Oh," she said. "Yes, all right." She looked into her coffee; then her crystal eyes met mine with an unexpected swiftness. "Bill?" she said in an unsteady voice. "Who could be doing this to me? Why?"
"I don't know." They were very empty words, but they were what I had. "Maybe," I said, "maybe they're not doing it to you. Maybe you're just in the way. But I don't want you to get hurt."
"The way you did last night, when you were in the way."
"I'm paid for it."
"It's not what I'm paying you for."
"Well, now I'm going to go do what you're paying me for."
I went down the driveway, walking slowly, not stiff anymore but bone-tired. The arched limbs of the chestnuts took me as far as the road, and after that it was spruce and maple and oak, white birch and thin, leggy stands of wild roses, waiting. They lined both sides of 10 as far as the bend, a half mile west, where I'd left my car.
Chapter 14
There was nothing wrong with the car, but I'd never said there was. I pulled onto the road and drove, not fast, not slowly, maybe a little beyond what the road was used to but not beyond what it could easily handle.
I'd lied to Eve. I was starving. But there were some calls I wanted to make and I didn't want to make them from her place, or from Antonelli's. Some things were starting to come together for me, but others weren't, yet, and if there were going to be any surprises I didn't want anyone to be surprised but me.
I had the cell phone with me, but the static, the fading in and out, the disruptions caused by these hills were more than I could face right now. The 7-Eleven down 30 had a pay phone, and it also had food, if you weren't picky. I got turkey and tomato, and a pint of Newman's Own Lemonade to go with it, though I had doubts about that stuff. I'd never seen Paul Newman drinking it.
I sat in my car and ate, Uchida's Mozart in the disc player again. I hadn't touched the piano in two days now and I could feel the rust in my fingers.
The sandwich was finished before Mozart was, but I waited. Then I took the roll of quarters from the well, ripped it open, flipped the first one. It was tails. I flipped it again. Heads. That was better. I pocketed the quarters and headed for the phone.
.The first number I tried was the one Otis had dialed from the green house, and the second was the number of the green house itself, and they both just rang. Either Grice wasn't home or he was too busy to answer the phone. Well, that's what I got for flipping coins. I dialed the state troopers, asked for MacGregor.
"What the hell do you want?" he greeted me.
"Warmth and fellow feeling. I must have the wrong number."
"By a mile."
"Where do I find Frank Grice?"
"You don't find Frank Grice. If I want Frank Grice, I find Frank Grice. Do I want him?"
"I have no idea. Did you test those guns?"
"Yeah." "And?"
"Smith, I told you, stay the hell out of my case."
I eased a cigarette from my shirt pocket. "No, you didn't. You told me not to withhold evidence and not to get in your way."
His voice was impatient. "How do they do this in the big city? They write you a Dear John letter? This is a police investigation and you're included out."
"Actually, it's not. What I want Grice for is something different." So far, I added silently.
"Yeah? What?"
"Tell me about the guns."
"The guns were a washout. Your turn."
My turn. "Mark Sanderson asked me to find his daughter. I think Frank Grice knows where she is." Close enough, I thought, and all true.
Silence. I had an image of MacGregor rubbing tired eyes. Then, "I hear she's with Jimmy Antonelli."
"You listen to the wrong little birds."
"That so? What tree do you recommend?"
"The Creekside Tavern."
"Some swell dive."
"Grice owns it. Ginny's been hanging out there lately."
"How do you know this?"
"Jimmy's friends could tell you."
"They haven't yet. Of course that crowd wouldn't tell me it was raining if I was standing there getting soaked."
"So where do I find him?"
"Forget it, Smith. Do yourself a favor. Go home, light a fire, have a drink. Let me play policeman." "Mac—"
"Or do yourself an even bigger favor. Go back to the city."
"Brinkman hinted he'd rather I didn't do that."
"I'll tell him he changed his mind."
"Mac, what the hell's going on?" I moved the phone to my right ear, rolled my left shoulder to ease the ache.
"Nothing's going on, except I've got a rent-a-cop on the phone too dumb to know good advice when he hears it."
"I want to find Ginny Sanderson."
"I'll deal with it."
"How? When? The kid's been missing for three days."
"Depends how you define missing."
"She hasn't been home. Her father doesn't know where she is and he's worried. He's a shit, but he's her father and he's worried. How's that?"
"You know that kid, Smith? You know her father?"
"A little," I offered, ambiguously.
"Well, the kid takes after her mother and her father still hasn't caught on."
"Caught on to what?"
"Christ, where've you been? Lena Sanderson ran around, almost from the day they were married. Everyone knew it but Sanderson. He was the only one surprised when she left him."
"And Ginny s like her mother?"
"We've hauled her in three times since she was thirteen."
"For what?"
"Knowing the wrong people. And this is a kid doesn't live in the county, Smith. She's away at school making trouble there most of the time."
"Not now."
"No, not now."
"What happens when you arrest her?"
"We don't. We learned. We call Sanderson and he comes and gets her and reams us out for holding h
is angel in a nasty place like this. Never mind she's been batting her blue eyes and practically climbing into the uniforms' laps."
"So how come you didn't tell me about her when I described the girl I was looking for?"
"Ginny? That's who that girl was—Ginny Sanderson?"
"Sounds like her."
"Smith—"
"Mac," I interrupted, "did Brinkman tell you he found a nine-millimeter pistol in a Chevy truck that rolled into the gorge last night?"
"Yeah. Yeah, he told me. How the hell do you know?"
"He told me, too. Have you tested it yet?"
"No, I haven't tested it yet. And when I test it, you'll be the last to know."
"Whose was the truck?"
A hesitation; then, in a tired voice, "Jimmy Antonelli's."
I drew a last drag on my cigarette, dropped it, ground it out. "I guess I knew that."
"I guess you did. What else do you know?"
"Not a goddamn thing. Where do I find Frank Grice?"
"Christ, Smith! What the hell's the matter with you? I see you anywhere near Frank Grice, I'll pull you in and stuff you in a hole. Is that clear enough, or you want me to say it some other way?"
"No," I said. "No, I get it."
"Smith," MacGregor said, "this Ginny Sanderson thing isn't the case you came up here to work, is it? You said you came up Sunday night. That kid's only been gone since Monday."
"It's part of it."
"Smith, you'd better—"
I stopped him before he painted us both into a corner. "I told you, Mac, it's not a police matter. I'll call you later, see about that gun. 'Bye."
I hung up, leaned against the scratched glass wall of the phone booth. I spun another quarter in the air, thought about what MacGregor had said.
I'd given him Ginny Sanderson at the Creekside Tavern for free. Underage drinking could close the Creekside down, and the threat of closing down might buy MacGregor something that might help break the Gould case. That, in turn, should have bought me something, but it hadn't.
Cops had a lot of ways of telling you things they wanted you to know.
MacGregor wanted me to know something was going on. Maybe he was getting pressure from above on the Gould murder; maybe it was something else. But what he wanted me to know was that I couldn't count on his help. If I got myself into trouble, even with him, I'd have to get myself out.
