by John Smolens
The girl was holding his hand, which seemed odd but he didn’t mind. She was pretty. She couldn’t stop crying, and finally she leaned down and kissed him on the mouth. He could taste the salt of her tears.
Other people came into the room—two older women in uniforms like the mother’s, followed by a man in a white smock, who shone a small flashlight in his eyes. The tag on the man’s smock said Dr. V. J. Singh. He asked, “How do you feel, Martin?”
He wanted to answer. He tried to open his mouth. There seemed a great distance between what was in his mind and what he could do. Their faces changed. They all began to look somber, like the mother. The girl stopped crying and now she looked alarmed. The mother finally took her out the door.
Dr. Singh leaned down close to his face and said, “Martin. Martin, can you hear me? Can you say anything? Can you blink and give me some response so I know you understand me?” The doctor watched him for a long time, then said, “All right, let’s try again later after you’ve rested.” He and the other women left the room.
He wished someone would do something about the light in the ceiling. Turn it off. Take it away. Make it stop hurting his head. Finally, he closed his eyes and returned to the dark.
“I’M ALL RIGHT NOW,” Hannah said.
Her mother sat across from her in the hospital cafeteria. “You were nearly hysterical. Take these. They’ll help.” She placed two pills next to Hannah’s glass of apple juice.
“What’s the matter with him? Do they know? Can they do anything?”
“It may be a temporary condition,” her mother said. “It’s not uncommon for people to not remember too much.”
“When will you know if it’s not temporary?”
“Take those, Hannah, please.”
Hannah picked up the pills. “Will these put me to sleep?”
“No. Though when you go to sleep, they should help you stay asleep. I’m through with my shift in an hour and we’ll drive home and get you to bed.”
“I want to go back to our house, Martin’s and my house.”
Her mother dropped her chin that quarter-inch that said no. “I think it best you stay with me for the time being. Really.”
AFTER A PHONE CONVERSATION with Hannah’s mother, Pearly stayed another night at the house. Suzanne was accustomed to telling people just enough to let them fill in the blanks. She said there were complications; that Martin appeared to have suffered some memory loss. She said that Hannah was upset and she was going to stay with her for a while. On the phone Pearly felt as if he and Suzanne were forming an alliance. Clearly, it was difficult for her—Pearly could hear the tinkling of ice in a glass throughout the phone call—because this situation involved her daughter. He assured Suzanne that he would look after the house for as long as necessary. Suzanne appreciated that, thinking that it would help her convince Hannah to stay with her. Pearly didn’t mention to Suzanne that in the morning he had to go to the police station for questioning. Buzz Gagnon had called and he suggested that he bring his lawyer too. That would just further upset Hannah.
He met Owen III outside town hall at nine Saturday morning. It was a small brick building, and when Pearly was young, he and other kids used to hang out in front of it because for them it was the center of the world. They would sometimes put one hand on the flagpole, close their eyes, and run around it as fast as possible, until they became dizzy and fell on top of one another, laughing, in the grass, or, for much of the year, in the snow. Lying on their backs, they’d stare up at the flag at the top of the pole, waiting for the dizziness to go away. There was a faint, not unpleasant nausea, much like you experience on a carnival ride. Above them, the red, white, and blue American flag appeared a bright rent in the sky, the pole seemed to be circling, teetering as though it might fall over at any moment, and, best of all, the earth beneath them seemed to be moving, spinning slowly. It was a remarkable sensation, and it was accompanied by the realization that they were on a planet called Earth, which was not stationary but hurtling through space. When the dizzy feeling began to subside, they’d get up, their steps still a little uncertain, place a hand on the pole, and circle it again, yelling with delight.
The cracked cement pad and the metal cylinder that used to support the flagpole were still in the ground. Owen and Pearly stood over the support. There was something shiny at the bottom of the collar, so Pearly reached two feet down inside the rusted cylinder and removed a Labatt Blue beer can.
Owen sang, “Oh, Can-a-da!”
Pearly dropped the can in the trash barrel by the front doors of town hall. Inside, they walked down the dark corridor, passed the city clerk’s office, and entered the door of the police department. Buzz Gagnon was sitting on the corner of the desk behind the gate, and Frank Colby stood in the open side door, which led to the parking lot.
Buzz motioned for them to come through the gate and sit in the two straight-back wooden chairs in front of the desk. He was in uniform; Frank Colby was not—today he wore a white short-sleeve shirt. No palm trees or tropical sunsets.
Owen nodded toward Frank. “He here in an official capacity?”
Buzz folded his arms over his belly. “No. That a problem?”
“He shouldn’t be here,” Owen said.
Buzz sighed, and Frank took his weight off the doorjamb and walked outside.
“No,” Pearly said to Owen. “He can stay.”
Owen shrugged.
“Come on back, Frank,” Buzz said. Frank returned and settled himself in the doorway.
“Okay,” Buzz said. “Is everybody happy? Anybody need to use the bathroom before we start?”
“Knock it off,” Owen said, “and get to it.”
Buzz raised a hand to his face and felt the tip of his nose a moment. “Fine. Let’s start with Pearly’s story. You said you went to Superior Gas and Lube looking for Martin because he was looking for Sean.”
“Right,” Pearly said.
“How’d you know that?”
“Told you, Hannah called me.”
“Hannah called you.” Buzz stopped stroking his nose, as though to indicate that this was an important point.
“Right,” Pearly said. “When I got to the station, Arnie was closing up. I asked him where Sean had gone. He said he’d just taken off in his truck. I drove all the way around Shore Road but didn’t see anything, until I circled back up to Martin’s house, where I found Martin lying in the driveway, his head bleeding badly.”
“And where was Hannah?” Buzz asked.
“In the house,” Pearly said. “Well, in the house until I knocked on the front door, and then she came out and saw him.”
“What was she wearing? You remember what she was wearing?”
“A bathrobe,” Pearly said. “She was wearing her bathrobe.”
“Okay, then what?” Buzz asked.
“Then we called for the ambulance.”
Buzz just sat there on the edge of his desk. Frank had turned so his back was against the doorjamb. He was gazing out at the parking lot as though he was expecting someone.
Owen said, “You have anything that contradicts that?”
Buzz picked up a sheet of paper from his desk. “We found Martin’s car in the woods not far from the gas station.” He paused as though this in itself was a significant point.
Finally, Owen said, “So? That’s where Martin left it.”
“I’m not so sure that Martin drove it there,” Buzz said.
“Well, who did?” Owen asked.
“I’m not sure,” Buzz said.
Owen started to get out of his chair, which creaked loudly. “When you’re sure, let us know. This isn’t—”
“I’m not sure whether Pearly drove Martin’s car, or Hannah drove it.”
Owen settled back in the chair. “Ahhh. You have a theory.”
“I have a theory,” Buzz said. “Want to hear it?”
Owen crossed his legs and made himself comfortable.
“I think Hannah or Pearly drove Martin
’s car over and left it in the woods by the gas station so it would appear that Martin had gone looking for Sean. My guess is that Hannah drove the car and Pearly followed her in his truck so he could take her back to the house. Also, because I called Arnie and he confirmed that Pearly did stop at the station in his truck, asking where Sean had gone.” Buzz held up the sheet of paper as proof, then dropped it on his desk. “There’s all sorts of evidence that both Hannah and Pearly had been in that Mercedes—”
“Christ, Buzz,” Owen said, “nobody’s denying that they’d ever been in that old car! I’ve seen both of them in it many times.”
“As I said, it’s a theory.”
“So what’s the rest of it?” Pearly asked. “What happened to Martin? What did I do?”
“You crushed Martin’s skull. With some blunt object—I don’t know what—which we’ll probably never find. You did it right there in his driveway.” Pearly was about to speak, but Buzz held up his hand. “Now, I don’t know whether it was something you and Hannah planned in advance—frankly, I tend to think not. I think Martin found out about you two—”
“What about us two?” Pearly nearly shouted.
“—and you and he got into an argument right there outside the house. This is a matter of domestic discord, pure and simple, a crime of passion, as they say. You got in a fight over a girl. And we know she’s a girl worth getting into a fight over.” Buzz glanced toward Frank, who was still surveying the parking lot. “At some point,” Buzz continued, “you hit Martin or he fell or something—but suddenly it went too far, and there he was, lying in a pool of blood in the driveway. Then you—you and Hannah—set it up so that it would look like Sean had done it.”
“I’m forty-four,” Pearly said. “She’s—”
“I know what she is,” Buzz said. “I got eyes, too.”
“So that’s it, we tried to frame Sean?” Pearly said.
Buzz nodded.
Owen nodded also. “I gotcha. No one saw Martin and Sean together that night.”
“No one,” Buzz said.
“So it had to be Pearly and Hannah,” Owen said.
“You got a better theory?” Buzz asked.
Owen uncrossed his legs. “You have evidence? Enough to hold Pearly?”
Buzz placed a hand on the sheet of paper on his desk. “We got hair. Pearly’s and Hannah’s. We got fingerprints. We got some of Pearly’s tools in the backseat and trunk.”
“What you got is evidence that they’d been in the car sometime,” Owen said.
Buzz nodded. “I hear you.” He got up off his desk.
Owen was getting out of his chair, but Pearly couldn’t move. “That’s it?” he said.
“For now,” Buzz said. He walked around his desk and sat in his swivel chair, which rocked back under his weight.
Pearly managed to stand up. He’d spent so many nights there in the police station that the idea that he was being let go made him uncertain, nervous—it made him feel guilty, more so than if they had walked him down the hall to the bench in the back room that he knew so well. Setting him free seemed the worst thing that could happen.
“There’s one more thing.” Buzz was staring at Pearly’s feet.
“What?” Pearly asked.
“Mind if I have a look at those?”
“What, my boots?”
“The soles.” Pearly began to lift one leg, but Buzz said, “I’d prefer it if you’d take them off.”
Pearly sat down in the chair again. He untied his work boots slowly. He was waiting for Owen to object, but then he realized that would probably only make it worse. When he had both boots off his feet, he picked them up with one hand and looked at the soles. They were badly worn. There was a small nail embedded in one heel. There was a reddish-black stain on the right instep. He handed the boots to Buzz.
“There was blood in the driveway,” Pearly said. “I’m surprised I didn’t get more on these. You know, you try not to stand in a man’s blood when it’s on the ground, but it’s not easy to do at night.”
“I believe you,” Buzz said.
Owen said, “It’s just like the car, it still won’t mean anything.”
“You mind if I keep these?” Buzz asked.
“Nope,” Pearly said. “Help yourself.”
He got up and started for the side door. It felt odd, embarrassing, to be walking out of the police station in just his socks. Frank moved out of the doorway to let them pass. He wouldn’t look at them.
When they were outside in the parking lot, they saw Hannah and her mother coming up the sidewalk toward the front entrance of town hall. Pearly took a step in their direction, but Owen caught his upper arm and said, “No you don’t.”
21
SEAN RECOGNIZED THE HORN. He went out the apartment door and stood in the sun on the landing. His father was sitting behind the wheel of his van.
“Come down here,” he said. It was the same voice he used from the top of the basement stairs when he wanted to summon Sean up to the kitchen. “We’re going for a ride.”
Sean went down the stairs and got in the van. “Where?” There was a six-pack of Bush beer on the floor, and two empty cans rattled about his sneakers.
His father didn’t say anything. He put the van in gear and pulled out into the street. They didn’t speak all the way down Shore Road. The silence was working on Sean. The back of his T-shirt was sticky and clung to the seat. When Petit Marais came into view, his father parked in the first turnout.
“Bring those,” his father said, opening his door.
Sean picked up the beer by its plastic ring and followed his father down a path that led to the water. At the foot of the bluff there was a narrow rock beach cluttered with driftwood. His father sat on a weathered tree trunk. “I want to know what happened.”
His father opened a couple of the beers and handed one to Sean, who remained standing. It seemed as if anytime his father was buying the beer, it wasn’t necessarily to celebrate.
“What what happened?” Sean kept his eyes on the water—a mistake.
“Don’t . . .” His father waited until Sean faced him. “Don’t think about it, just tell me what happened. You thought you could get away with it when you were way over there in Italy, but not this time, not here.” He took a pull on his beer. “I want to hear it in your own words. You know Martin’s in the hospital?”
“I know.”
“You do it?”
Sean nodded.
His father scratched his chin. “With what?”
“A rock.”
“A rock,” his father said. “Why?”
“He threw gas on me, that’s why.”
“Gasoline? Why would he do that?”
“Because he’s an asshole.”
“Why would he do that—what did you do?” his father asked. “There’s that fire at his house. But that can’t be it—that was weeks ago. What else did you do?”
“Nothing, really.” Sean took a long pull on his beer. It had been sitting in the van and could have been colder. The only thing to do was drink it fast before it got any warmer, so he drank it right down. He went over to the tree trunk, dropped the empty can in the sand, and took another beer from the plastic ring. “Nothing that I didn’t do before,” he said.
His father dug a hole with the heel of his shoe and toed the empty can into it. “That girl. Jesus, that’s one dangerous girl. I hope she was worth all this trouble.” Using the side of his shoe, he carefully buried the can with sand.
“Martin had it coming,” Sean said. “I’m telling you, he threw gas in my face, on my clothes, and he pulled out his lighter, but he didn’t have the nerve to light it. What, I’m going to let a guy walk away after that?”
His father didn’t answer right away. “Where’s the rock?”
Sean nodded toward the water.
“What about your clothes? And your truck—you took him back to his house, right?”
Sean almost smiled. Up until that moment he’d been tig
ht with fear, but now he knew there was no need. “Clean. Don’t worry, everything’s clean.”
His father was busy digging another hole in the sand with his shoe. He finished his beer and dropped the can in the hole and plowed sand over it until it disappeared. Then he stood up. “Buzz thinks he has it figured out, which is fine. If he can hang it on that girl and Pearly, nothing would be sweeter. Blankenship’s been getting away with shit around here for years. I hear Martin can’t remember squat. But he comes out of it, that changes everything.”
“I could say I did it in self-defense,” Sean offered.
His father looked directly at him. Despite the sun, he wasn’t wearing his sunglasses, which was unusual. There was no question that he was disgusted by what he saw. “You don’t say a word. To anybody. Understand? Not one fucking word.”
He didn’t wait for Sean to reply but started climbing the path up to the top of the bluff. Sean picked up the remaining cans of beer on the tree trunk and followed him.
PEARLY WAS JUST FALLING ASLEEP on the couch at Martin’s house when the Mercedes pulled into the driveway. Through the open window he watched Hannah get out of the car. She walked around back and came into the kitchen, the screen door clapping behind her.
“You talked to Buzz Gagnon?” she said.
“Just before you.”
“You know what they think?”
“It ain’t pretty.”
“It’s bullshit. They can’t prove it.”
“Maybe not, but we can’t prove what happened, either.” Pearly sat up on the couch. “They kept my boots and they’re sure to find Martin’s blood on the soles. Besides, you know how it works: It’s not a matter of what can be proved but of what people believe.”
Hannah folded her arms. She was dressed as though she were going to church or to visit relatives. Pearly imagined her looking through her old clothes at her mother’s house and coming up with this off-white silk blouse and a gray skirt. “I know,” she whispered.
