Huckleberry Fiend

by Julie Smith

  Sardis said, very softly, “What about Edwin Lemon?”

  He was standing with his back towards us, and now he swung around. “Edwin… who’s that?” But his face said he knew.

  “Tom,” said Sardis, “you’ll feel a lot better if you tell us about it.”

  He sat back down and stared at us, his face as long as a horse’s, all the fight gone out of him. A tear rolled out of each eye and began to make its unhindered way down his craggy face. And then he doubled over sobbing. We sat in silence until he spoke again.

  “I guess I knew I’d tell you as soon as I saw you this morning. I can’t live like this any more. There’s no point in it. All I do is drink until I don’t feel so miserable any more, and then I sober up and I feel miserable again. But I’ve got to know who I’m talking to. Who are you two, anyway?”

  “We’re trying to find the manuscript and return it to its rightful owner.”

  “Did Lemon steal it? He said he found it, but I never did believe him.”

  “He stole it. We’re pretty sure he did, anyhow. What was your connection with him?”

  “Met him at library conventions. Didn’t know him too well, but he seemed interested in Mark Twain. Not that he knew too much about him, but he liked to talk about him. So we kept in touch a little bit, and last time I saw him I told him I was moving out here. I mean next-to-last time. He just turned up one day, very excited, with that manuscript. Said he was taking it to Cal, but wanted me to see it. Frankly, I think he was so damned excited he just wanted to show it to somebody. But he said he thought I might like to buy it. Said he was going to get it authenticated, then sell it at auction. Wanted me to know about it. I would have given my right leg to get that thing. I don’t think you could possibly have any idea how much I wanted it. I couldn’t stand the idea of him leaving with it, even though he promised I’d be invited to bid.

  “So I talked him into sticking around a couple days. This was before I’d built the museum, and I had room for a guest. All I had in mind, I swear to God, was having that thing in my house for a day or two. Well, I took him all around, to Reno and everything— you know the Washoe County Library? Not exactly a tourist attraction, but it ought to be; looks like an indoor garden. He liked that, of course. And we went to Tahoe and all. Then one night when we were drunk and driving back here, I pulled over at a vista point and we got out to look, and he made a pass at me. So I hit him. Well, like I said, we were drunk, and he hit back. Started screaming something about if I wasn’t interested, why was I teasing him? I didn’t even know he was gay, or I never would have. But I wasn’t thinking that then. All I was thinking was this guy had a hell of a nerve accepting my hospitality and then trying to make me, and then yelling at me. He was a little guy, a lot smaller than me. I guess I hit him too hard; I don’t know. His head came down on the pavement— and he died.”

  For a moment, the remorse was gone, and he tried out on Sardis and me the argument he’d undoubtedly used on himself for the last decade: “I didn’t mean to kill him. It was an accident.” He looked so clear-eyed and hopeful when he said it, you could almost imagine he believed it.

  I hoped he would stay in this strange, detached state— it was probably shock— for a little while longer. “What,” I said, “did you do with the body?”

  “I came home, got a shovel, drove out to the middle of nowhere and buried him that night. Burned all his clothes and papers, but kept the manuscript.”

  “And his car,” said Sardis. “Why’d you keep that?” The lemon-yellow Datsun! That’s what the old wreck outside was. I’d never even noticed, and all this time I’d been putting Sardis’s brilliant deductions down to intuition.

  “The car?” said Tom. “I don’t know. I guess I didn’t know what else to do with it. Seemed safer to keep it than let it be found somewhere.”

  And it certainly had been— for ten years, at any rate.

  “I think we ought to go and talk to the sheriff or whatever you have here— do you feel up to it?”

  “May as well— can’t very well light out for the Territory.” He tried to smile as he said it, but it didn’t really work.

  It was all going to come out now. With Tom Sawyer arrested, there’d be no way to keep a lid on it any longer. Sardis and I would be questioned and we had to keep Booker’s name out of it. Fortunately, I’d already laid the groundwork— albeit unwittingly. I hoped Tom wouldn’t take it too hard.

  “Listen,” I said. “We’re not exactly working for the owner of the manuscript. Sardis, to tell you the truth, is here as a friend of mine. And I’m working for the San Francisco Chronicle. The owner called us and it sounded like a good story, so we started looking into it.”

  “Oh.”

  “Sorry.”

  “No, I’m glad about it. See, I don’t know if you believe me or not, but I really didn’t kill Rebecca. Oh, God, that’s the last thing I would have done!”

  “I know you didn’t, Tom.” Actually, I was telling the truth. He could have killed Lemon in a way that would let him pretend it was just another boyish adventure— I couldn’t believe he didn’t know the man was gay and hadn’t provoked the pass— but I couldn’t see him shooting Rebecca Thaxton over and over again. Call me naive, but I just didn’t think he’d done it.

  “I want to tell my story to you. I mean, for publication. Everybody’s going to think I killed her. I want to make a public declaration that I didn’t.”

  “I don’t think your lawyer would allow it.”

  “I don’t have a lawyer.”

  “You’re going to.”

  “Look, do me a favor. I’ve already told you the story. You write it up and read it back to me, and if I like it, you can run it. Lawyer be damned.”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  It was a hell of a dilemma. It wasn’t a newspaper’s job to protect an accused murderer if he wanted to give an interview against his lawyer’s advice. On the other hand, I wasn’t really a reporter any more and frankly didn’t want to do anything that would hurt this man. But since I had to pretend to be a reporter to protect Booker, I couldn’t see a way out.

  “Let’s do it now,” I said, “before we go.”

  Tom produced a typewriter and I wrote a story, a sidebar to what would be the main one about Tom’s arrest— someone else could do that one. I wrote about Tom Sawyer’s life, his passion for Mark Twain, his museum, his chance meeting with Rebecca Thaxton, and my two visits with him. I told how he’d shown Rebecca the manuscript, and how he’d not felt his life was worth living after it was stolen. I omitted any reference to his romantic pursuit of Rebecca.

  It wasn’t the story he wanted told, but I couldn’t help it— I didn’t mind writing a yarn that was more or less neutral in tone, but I was damned if I were going to help him lead with his jaw. Finally, he agreed to it. I told him 1 was going to tip the Chronicle about his arrest as soon as Sardis and I had been questioned, but I’d hold the sidebar until Tom talked to his lawyer. I’d get the Chron to send a Reno stringer over in a day or two to make sure he still wanted us to run it.

  “I’ll want to,” he said. “It kind of makes me sound like a character, doesn’t it?”

  CHAPTER 18

  “Joey? You know that manuscript story? It’s breaking.”

  “Yeah?”

  “They just arrested a guy named Tom Sawyer.”

  “Mcdonald, remember what a deadline is? I got no time for practical jokes.”

  “If anybody asks, I’m working for you, okay?”

  “I thought I already said okay.”

  “Well, just in case— here’s what happened. I went to see this guy and he confessed to a ten-year-old murder. That’s when he got the manuscript. Kind of made himself the heir. So naturally I heard his confession, I had to turn him in. But I needed an excuse for being there in the first place, so I just said I was working for you.”

  “Feel free, pal. Any old time. Especially if you get caught robbing a bank or something— just say Joey sent
you.”

  “Listen, I’m telling you— this is a monster. We’re talking the original manuscript of Huckleberry Finn.”

  “So you said before. Did it turn up yet? Then we got a story.”

  “Joey, will you listen? This guy killed another guy for it and hid it for ten years. It was stolen from him shortly after he showed it to the one person besides him who ever saw it.”

  “Who was that?”

  “I thought you’d never ask.”

  “Jeez, Mcdonald, don’t tell me it was you. There’s a limit to how much I can cover for you.”

  “Not me. Rebecca Thaxton.”

  “Suddenly I get the impression this is actually a news tip.”

  “You’ll want to call up to Virginia City. That’s in Storey County, Nevada. And don’t say I never did you any favors.”

  “Hey, wait, Mcdonald— you want to write it?”

  “Hell, no— I’m out of that slimy business.”

  “How about a sidebar?”

  “How much?”

  “Two hundred.”

  “Come on. I get upwards of that for one of my novels.”

  “I’ll get back to you, okay? Let me assess this thing.”

  “Okay. Just remember— the whole thing started with a Chronicle investigation. When Clarence Jones called.”

  “Oh, yeah, the Mississippi guy. The only thing is, he’ll deny it— due to the fact that he didn’t call.”

  “So what? He can’t get hurt. And I can.”

  “Don’t tempt me, Mcdonald.”

  “You know you love me.”

  “I hate to ask this, but are you involved in something shady?”

  “Of course not— merely protecting my sources.”

  “I thought you were out of this slimy business.”

  “Technically, yes, but I’ve got ink in my veins.”

  “I’ll be in touch.”

  Fortunately, I knew someone at Rebecca Thaxton’s station— Susanna Flores, producer of a show called “Bay Currents.” She hadn’t worked directly with Rebecca, but I thought she could help me get what I needed.

  Susanna’s office was several floors up, and the Embarcadero Freeway was just outside her window— maybe forty feet away at eye level. It always made me slightly dizzy just to visit her, but she was one of my favorite women in San Francisco— short, round, very soft, as smart as six or eight people combined, and a fan of mine from my reporting days. She gave me a nice kiss, sat me down, and asked what she could do for me.

  “Did you know Rebecca Thaxton?”

  “A little bit. Since we weren’t on the same show our paths didn’t cross much. But I thought she was lovely.”

  “Me too. I think her murder had something to do with a thing I’m working on.”

  “Working on how?” Susanna might look soft, but she was still a journalist. She had a way of getting right down to things.

  “Unfortunately, that’s the dicey part. I’m sort of working for the Chronicle.”

  “Oh.”

  “But not really. Someone hired me to find something. But I needed a cover story so I said I was working for the Chronicle. And then I sort of got roped into doing a freelance piece that I haven’t decided whether to sell them or not. But I probably will, so it will look to everyone as if I really am working for them.”

  She looked puzzled.

  “But I’m really not.”

  “So you think it would be okay to ask me a few questions concerning Rebecca, because you’re not really in competition with us for the story.”

  “Uh-huh. Besides the piece I may sell, which your guys couldn’t get anyway, because I already got it exclusively, I won’t do anything else on this. Honest.”

  “If I can help you, do you think it might lead to solving Rebecca’s murder?”

  “I most certainly hope so.”

  “Oh, what the hell— what do you want?”

  “A look at her Rolodex.”

  “The police probably took that.”

  “Maybe someone copied it first or something— you could make an argument that it’s the station’s property.”

  “I’ll be right back.”

  She came back smiling, bearing the thing itself. “Her boss hid it.”

  “My God— didn’t he want the case solved?”

  “Oh, he eventually gave the cops a list of the names in it. I don’t think it helped, though. You’ll notice they didn’t solve it.”

  “Haven’t yet.” And I started going through it, starting with “A” for Alexander. But Beverly was no more there than Isami, Herb Wolf, Russell Kittrell, or Linda McCormick. Rick Debay was, though, and so was Pamela Temby.

  Rebecca had probably interviewed Temby, but I didn’t want to risk asking. And, much as I liked Susanna, I certainly wasn’t going to give her any ideas about Rick Debay. The Tom Sawyer story— with its mention of the manuscript— would probably already be coming over the wire.

  It was after five now, and I didn’t know how to get Rick Debay at home. Come to think of it, I wouldn’t have known what to ask him. But I had to move fast. Once the story broke, I wouldn’t be investigating alone. There was still one suspect I hadn’t met— the best one we had— and I’d thought of a way to approach him. I dialed Russ Kittrell.

  The voice that answered was so cultured I figured it must be Kittrell’s butler.

  “Mr. Kittrell, please.”

  “This is he.”

  “This is a Mark Twain fan. I’m sorry you lost your manuscript.”

  “Who are you?”

  “I think I might be able to get it back for you.”

  “Are you the chap who was here the other night, by any chance?”

  “Let’s just say I heard about it through the grapevine. Would you like to talk about it?”

  “As a matter of fact, I rather think I would. Where are you?”

  “Your neighborhood.”

  “Very well. Tosca. How shall I recognize you?”

  “I’ll be the large bearded one in the corduroy sportcoat.”

  “I see.” He sounded as if that was exactly how he thought a thug would look. “Very well, then. Ten minutes?”

  “Splendid.”

  I don’t normally say things like “splendid,” not aloud, anyway, but somehow it seemed appropriate. Tosca did not. First of all, I was disappointed not to be asked up to the manor house, and second, I thought he could at least have suggested the lobby of the Clift, even though it was downtown. Tosca was an old North Beach hangout with opera on the jukebox— dark and red and comfortable, rather Italian even, but not really elegant. I guess I just didn’t measure up.

  Twelve minutes later, I strolled through. The man who hailed me so perfectly matched the telephone voice it was preposterous. He was in his late fifties, I thought, aristocratically thin with iron-gray hair. He could have posed for a brandy ad. Up close, though, the mouth had impatient little lines around it; the eyes looked narrow and snakelike.

  I extended my hand. “I’m Joe Harper; the man who called.”

  “Very cute; like Sarah Williams.”

  “Oh, yes. Miss Williams. I believe you did business with her?”

  “I did. Are you a friend of hers?”

  “Not at all.”

  He looked exasperated. “Then who are you, Mr. Harper?”

  “I can’t tell you that exactly, but I will tell you I’m afraid I lied on the phone. I don’t know where the manuscript is, and wouldn’t be inclined to sell it back to you if I did. First of all, it isn’t mine and it wasn’t Miss Williams’s. I represent the real owner. However, in order to get it back for him, I need information.”

  “And why should I give you any?”

  “Because I might be able to help you. I can’t get the manuscript for you, but I might be able to get your money back.”

  “Really? You’d do that for mere information?”

  “Yes.”

  A waitress came and we each ordered an Irish coffee. Odd drink for the time of day, but the
setting was right for it.

  “The only thing,” I said, “is, first I have to know who you gave it to.”

  He laughed. Laughed long and hard and damned nastily, I thought.

  “It’s kind of embarrassing,” I said, “but I don’t get it.”

  “Tell me more, Mr. Harper. You amuse me.”

  “Maybe I could just juggle for you or something.”

  He ignored the sarcasm. “Please. Tell me.”

  “Very well. At one point it came into my hands— I’m not going to say how, but it did. It was stolen from me and, I believe, sold to you. It’s since been stolen from you. In the meantime I’ve been hired by the original owner to get it back.”

  “What were you doing with it in the first place— when it so mysteriously ‘came into your hands’?”

  “I was asked to find out whether it was genuine.”

  “You’re a Clemens scholar, then?”

  “Not really. Are you?”

  “As a matter of fact I am. I daresay I have one of the largest collections in the world. And I have lots of other things. Things, as a matter of fact, are more or less my life. Things, and music, and literature, and travel. And occasionally women, but to tell you the truth, I prefer things. I have no work, Mr. Harper. Do you?”

  “Of course. Until now, I would have said everyone does.”

  “I’ve tried work, you see, but it never appealed to me. I prefer to experience beauty. And certain other things.”

  “Seamy sex, maybe?” The king-of-culture act was pissing me off.

  He gave me an acknowledging eyebrow lift. “Sometimes. In my younger days. But it’s laughter I meant. Some would say my life, full as it is, is austere as well. You think that yourself, don’t you?”

  “I don’t know enough about it.”

  “You think I’m spiritually dead— a desiccated husk of a human being with no heart and probably no soul.”

  “Aren’t you being a little paranoid?”

  “Not really. Everyone thinks that. My ex-wives; my children; all the nice ladies who ask me to parties to amuse their guests with my ready, if biting, wit.”

  “Actually, I don’t know about your soul, but I haven’t seen the wit yet.”

  “As a matter of fact you won’t. For the moment, you are the wedding guest and I am the ancient mariner. I don’t talk seriously to many people— I rarely want to— but you’re a perfect stranger and not, unless I’m one, a fool. I’m feeling melancholy tonight— and so I shall talk to you.”