by Tim Downs
“If this is not about money,” she said cautiously, “then why do you want to finish this investigation? You never wanted to start this in the first place—so why do you want to continue now?”
“I have my reasons. The only thing that matters to you is that I’m willing to continue. A more important question—and one that may have a direct bearing on this case—is why you want to continue.”
“I didn’t say I did.”
He said nothing in response, but slowly raised one eyebrow; it arched up from behind his glasses like a cat rising from sleep. He leaned forward until his elbows rested on his knees.
“What I want to know,” he said slowly, “what I need to know—is why this is so important to you. Why do you have to know what happened to Jim McAllister?”
For an instant the elusive eyes came almost to rest on hers. The sudden intensity of his gaze startled her, and she rose so quickly from her chair that she sent it clattering across the linoleum floor. She turned and started for the door—then stopped. A full minute later, without turning, she began to speak.
“My father died when I was seven. For my sixth birthday, he gave me a beautiful sweater. It meant everything to me, especially … after. One day the sweater just disappeared. Gone. I looked all over town for it. Did I lose it? Was it stolen? I asked everyone I knew, and a lot of people I didn’t. You know, I never found it. Never,” she said with a shrug. “At first, all I wanted was the sweater back. But the more I searched for it, the more I just wanted to know what happened to it. By the end, I think I would have given up the sweater itself if only I could know.”
“So this is all about a sweater.”
Kathryn wheeled and glared at him. She gave her chair an angry shove and it rocketed across the floor toward Nick. He stopped it with his foot, nudged it a few feet away, and motioned for her to sit down. She stood silently for a moment, carefully weighing the potential benefits versus the definite risks of continuing her story.
She straddled the chair and slowly sat down again.
“I told you that the three of us grew up here—Jimmy, Peter, and me.” She paused. “There was a fourth. His name was Andy.”
“Ah,” he said, recalling Mr. Schroeder’s inquiry that afternoon. “That would be Andy whose ‘body has never been recovered.’”
“You don’t miss much.”
“That’s what people pay me for.”
“The three of them were like brothers—too much like brothers. It was always who is the fastest, who is the toughest, who is the best. If one of them went out for football, all of them had to go out for football. And then it was who is the captain, who scores the touchdown, who is first-string.” She shook her head. “You know how boys can be.”
“I’m familiar with the species.”
“They competed for everything.”
“Including you?”
Her face reddened slightly but she made no reply. “About ten years ago they all took a drive up to Fort Bragg together—that’s where the 82d Airborne is based. One of them decided to sign up and—”
“I’ve got the picture.”
“Andy and Jimmy were assigned to one unit, Peter to another. In the spring of 1990 things were heating up in the Persian Gulf and the U.S. was starting its buildup of forces. The boys got the word that the 82nd Airborne might be deployed to Saudi Arabia—”
“And Andy decided to make sure the cow was tied up before he left the barn,” Nick broke in, “as they say in Holcum County.”
“We were married in July. Three weeks later they were called up. Andy …” She stopped. She couldn’t stand to look at Nick any longer. Even if he really needed to know, she couldn’t bear to tell the rest of the story to those eyes—eyes that would flit and hover over her words but never care enough to land on any of them.
“Andy was apparently killed in action near Al Salman Airbase in Iraq.”
“Apparently killed?”
“Remember Vietnam? By the time it was all over, there were more than eighteen hundred MIAs. It was an unbelievable mess—mothers waiting to hear about their sons, kids praying for Daddy to come home. It’s still going on today, thirty-five years later. After Vietnam the Defense Department said ‘never again.’ They started collecting a DNA sample from every soldier. Now if they find nothing but a finger on the battlefield, they still know it’s you. No more eternally grieving mothers, no more Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.”
She glanced up to check for telltale signs of inattention or indifference, anything that would give her an excuse to protest and bring her story to a premature end. But Nick sat transfixed, waiting patiently for her to continue.
“Do you know how many MIAs there were in the Persian Gulf? None. Zero. But what they don’t tell you is that there were thirteen soldiers who just disappeared. Oh, they know what happened to them—so they say. A Tomcat missed the net and rolled off the flight deck, there was a direct bomb hit, that sort of thing. So they came up with a new category to cover those situations: ‘Killed in action, body not recovered.’”
“Andy?”
“He was lucky thirteen—only they had no explanation for Andy. No missing Tomcat, no witnesses to the bomb blast—nothing. All they could tell me is that they were advancing on Al Salman and Andy got ahead of the rest of the unit—probably trying to be the first one there.” She tried to force a smile. “Just before nightfall there was a firestorm with the airbase, and Andy got cut off. When the smoke cleared at daybreak, no Andy. No Andy anywhere.”
With these words Kathryn dropped her face into her hands and began to sob softly.
“I’m … sorry,” Nick fumbled. The impotent words fell and echoed like marbles on a slate floor. “Was there a search? Were there no … diplomatic channels?”
“It was a little awkward to say to Iraq, ‘Can you help us find one of our soldiers?’ when they lost a hundred thousand of their own.” Kathryn carefully wiped under her eyes with both hands. “So what am I, Dr. Polchak? A widow or a lady in waiting? I’ve spent eight years wondering. You want to know what’s worse than grieving for a dead husband? Not knowing whether to grieve or not. Living every day of your life with an open wound.”
She rubbed her eyes hard with both fists now—forget the mascara. She sat silently, staring at the floor, floating in a sea of numbness and exhaustion.
“I can’t get my sweater back,” she said quietly, “but I’d give anything in the world—anything—just to know what happened to it. When Jimmy died, I said ‘never again.’ I want to know how he died, Dr. Polchak. I want to know why he died. I have to know.”
Kathryn picked up the check still lying on the floor between them. She opened it and smoothed it out on the table beside them.
“Five thousand dollars is an incredible fee for a single day’s work. My offer still stands; take it now and we’ll put an end to this. Of course, if you do, you’ll miss out on the other fifteen.”
“And if I do,” Nick returned, “then you’ll never know. We can stop now, Mrs. Guilford, but there’s only one way to put an end to it.”
For the first time that day Kathryn smiled. “I was hoping you’d say that.”
One of these, okay, Ed?”
Sheriff Peter St. Clair leaned across the bar and pointed to a red and gold plastic tap handle.
“You off duty yet, Pete?” a voice called out from behind him. “We can’t have the law weavin’ all over the road, y’know.”
“Somebody’s stickin’ his nose where it don’t belong,” the sheriff called back.
He turned to see three grinning hunters seated at their regular table just below the ceiling-mount TV at the Buck Stop Bar and Grill.
“Speakin’ of which,” the sheriff said with a nod, “you boys might be interested to know that the investigation into Jimmy’s death isn’t over after all.”
“Not over? How so?”
Pete picked up his glass and stepped slowly to their table. He reached up and clicked off the TV, drew out a chair with his toe, and
settled himself across from them. He studied each of the hunters in turn.
“You boys heard about this Bug Man character? Down from NC State. Here to do research at the County Extension Station over near Sandridge.”
“We heard.” Denny snickered. “We heard he tried to swipe a body off old man Schroeder! What was that all about?”
The sheriff wasn’t smiling. “Seems he’s been hired to look into Jimmy’s death. Thought it might interest you boys—especially you.”
Ronny straightened. “Why us?”
“ ’Cause you’re the ones found the body,” Pete shrugged. “Naturally, that makes you suspects.”
No one was smiling now.
“I knew it,” Denny groaned. “I told you we should keep our noses out of it. Just walk away and let somebody else report it, I said.”
“Oh, shut up!” Wayne barked back.
“You … you don’t believe we had anything to do with it?”
Pete shook his head. “Not me—but then, I’m not the one doing the investigating.”
“This Bug Man,” Ronny repeated. “You said he was hired. Who hired him?”
The sheriff paused. “Kathryn hired him.”
“Kathryn? Your Kathryn?”
“She’s not my Kathryn,” Pete shot back. “And she’s got a right to investigate Jimmy’s death or anything else she wants, as long as she stays within the law. She can waste her money any way she chooses.”
“But—didn’t you tell her how we found him? About the gun and all? And what about Mr. Wilkins? He checked out the whole thing!”
“She knows all about it. She just doesn’t want to believe it. She can’t believe that Jimmy would ever do himself in.”
“Well, we believe it,” Wayne growled. “Seeing is believing.”
“You say this Bug Man is looking for some other explanation?” Ronny asked. “How? What does he do?”
The sheriff slowly rolled the golden liquid around in his glass. “He looks at the bugs,” he said quietly. “He looks at the maggots on the body.”
The three hunters stared at one another in disbelief.
“This is just great,” Wayne moaned. “We stumble onto a dead guy in the middle of nowhere, a mile away from everybody, with his own gun still in his hand—and now a bunch of maggots are somehow gonna prove we did it!”
“Nobody said we did anything,” Denny said with very little assurance.
“Don’t you see what’s happening here?” Wayne glared back at him. “This whole thing could blow up in our faces! You let one of these ‘experts’ loose and there’s no telling what he’ll manufacture! He’s being paid, you know—and by somebody who doesn’t want it to be a suicide! You think he’s going to side with us or with the one who foots the bill?”
The four men sat together in silence.
“Can’t you talk her out of it?” Denny whispered to Pete. “You say, ‘She’s not my Kathryn,’ but that’s not true. Everybody in town knows she’s more yours than anybody else’s. She’ll listen to you.”
Pete pushed his chair back and slowly stood up. He bent over slightly, tucked his thumbs in his belt, and stretched his shirt front tight. “You know Kathryn. She has her own mind about these things.”
He tossed a five-dollar bill on the table and nodded to the bartender as he left. At the doorway he looked back at the hunters one last time—first Denny, then Wayne, then Ronny.
“Somebody ought to have a talk with that Bug Man.”
Kathryn steered her rented Contour once again into the gravel lot in front of the sea green Quonset, which glowed cobalt blue in the first light of day. The air was still heavy with the night’s humidity and the warming hand of the sun had just begun to peel back the thick gauze blankets of morning mist. She rested her head against the steering wheel for a moment. It was much too early to be here, but it had been a long and sleepless night, and she could no longer bear to be alone with her thoughts. She had to go somewhere.
To her left was Dr. Polchak’s rusting relic, but Dr. Tedesco’s Camry was nowhere in sight. It figures, she thought. Dr. Tedesco was probably at home somewhere, sleeping peacefully in neatly ironed percales. Dr. Polchak was probably in the back room curled up in a terrarium with some of his “kids.” She laughed out loud at the thought, a reminder of just how exhausted she really was. It suddenly occurred to her that he must remove those enormous glasses of his to sleep.
She shook off the thought. Images of Dr. Polchak unmasked were too much to bear first thing in the morning.
The screen door was unlocked as she supposed it always was. She knocked; no answer. She cupped her hands and peered inside. The office was empty and silent, except for a constant hum from the banks of fluorescent blue lights.
Kathryn walked around the side of the building and spotted Nick seventy-five yards away, standing in the center of an open pasture that sloped off gradually to the right. He looked up as Kathryn waded toward him through the knee-high grass.
“These are not exactly bankers’ hours,” Nick said, stepping slowly around to the left to reveal a gleaming white monolith jutting out of the purple-green rye like some forgotten monument. It was surrounded by dozens of whizzing, buzzing black-and-gold honeybees.
Even before Kathryn consciously recognized the object, it triggered a memory deep within her. She felt her heart lurch into her throat, and she began to scramble backward through the wet, clinging grass.
“Stop!” Nick commanded in a low, even voice. “Stay as close as you can”—he raised one arm slowly and pointed to an area to her right—“but stand over there.”
Kathryn stumbled obediently to her right and stood, jerking her head left and right to constantly scan the air around her for any trace of the black pestilence.
“Have you ever heard of honey from a jar?” Her voice trembled.
“Have you ever tried spaghetti sauce from a jar? It’s just not the same.” As he spoke, to Kathryn’s utter horror, he began to carefully remove the cover from the hive.
What is he doing?
He was prying off the lid from Pandora’s box itself, and any moment a swirling black cloud of malevolence would spew out to consume him, then her, and then infest the entire world with its evil. She started to cry out—but to her astonishment, nothing came out of the box at all.
“That’s something you don’t have around here,” Nick said, reaching gently into the hive. “Good spaghetti. Oh, the menu says ‘spaghetti,’ but it’s not. It’s North Carolina spaghetti—noodles and catsup. If you want real spaghetti, you’ve got to come to Pittsburgh.” He carefully grasped the edges of the frame closest to him and lifted it straight up and out, resting it with one hand on the lip of the hive. With his right hand he reached slowly into his pocket and removed a small penknife.
“You know what else you don’t have around here? A good Reuben sandwich. A good Reuben is like a symphony, like a work of art.” With his bare hand he gently brushed back the black mass of bees from the left side of the frame. “You need really lean, tender corned beef from a good Polish deli—not this horse meat you get around here. You need homemade sauerkraut—piles of it—and a really good Russian dressing. Not Thousand Island—Russian.”
With the point of his knife he carefully carved away a piece of comb about an inch square from the upper left corner and set it beside the knife on the lip of the hive. Then he carefully slid the frame firmly back into place.
“Ouch,” he said with no emotion whatsoever. “Now, Shirley, what was that for? That hurt you a lot more than it did me.” He slowly replaced the lid on the hive, being very careful not to trap any bees lingering on the edges.
“There’s a place in Pittsburgh called ‘Poli’s,’” he said, gently wiping a bee from the corner of his mouth. “It’s up north in Squirrel Hill. Now they’ve got a Reuben that melts in your mouth like butter.” He looked dreamily into the sky. “Yes sir. Now that’s a Reuben.”
He picked up the chunk of comb in one hand and set the knife on top of th
e hive with the other. “Clean this up for me, will you, ladies? It’s a bit sticky.” Then he turned toward Kathryn, who was still ashen-faced and trembling.
“I think we’ve got everything we need,” Nick said cheerfully as he passed.
In the lab, Nick removed two cups from the top drawer of a tall file cabinet. “I think this is a morning for Dragon Well Green. The Chinese claim that it banishes fatigue and raises the spirit.” He dangled a tea bag into each cup and reached for the steaming carafe of water on a hot plate atop the cabinet.
“So where do we begin today?” Kathryn asked.
“You begin by going with Teddy,” Nick replied, “to the site where the body was discovered.”
“You’re not coming? Why not?”
“You’ll find Teddy to be very competent at what he does. I have other clients to attend to here. Remember, Mrs. Guilford, I was sent here this summer to do research. I can’t go back to school without my homework, now can I?”
Nick moved briskly about the lab, filling his knapsack once again with empty containers, a Nikon equipped with a macro lens, a microcassette recorder, a small notebook, and various other paraphernalia. Then he headed immediately for the opposite door.
“Now wait a minute,” she called after him as he stepped out on to a small deck area. “I’m paying you twenty thousand dollars to investigate this case for me. That’s a couple of thousand dollars a day. I think I deserve your full time!”
“You’re paying for my full attention,” he said as the door began to swing shut, “not my full time.”
Kathryn was on his heels in an instant, almost running to keep up with his expansive stride. “That’s not good enough,” she said firmly. “Who are these other clients? How many do you have?”
“Right now? Two. But I’m hoping to pick up another one any day now.”
