by Jack Grochot
“Dad,” said Kelly. “It took me a while and some help from an old mentor of mine, but I think I’ve finally put the pieces together. Mr. Strong’s murder had its roots in the 70s even before his marriage to Mrs. Strong.”
As Kelly spoke, Russell Strong crouched in front of his mother, his head almost in her lap.
“Wealthy David Strong and brilliant Mason Mitchell started a munitions company just as the Vietnam War heated up. Things between the friends were solid, except for one thorn—both men loved the same woman.”
Beth Strong let out a muffled sob as Russell stroked her silver hair.
“When we first talked with Mrs. Strong, I sensed some tension when she mentioned those early years and Mitchell.”
Matt Locke shifted his weight. “But how did that lead—”
“It was during our chat with Anton Spasky that the picture started to clear for me. In fact, after talking with Mr. Spasky, I went home and pulled out one of my favorite Holmes collections—the original 24 stories from The Strand Magazine.”
“Look, Kelly,” Matt said, “I know that sometimes you channel the Great Detective to help you with mysteries, but…”
“With Spasky’s account of Mason Mitchell’s death, I couldn’t help but see some parallels between this situation and the one in Holmes’ ‘Adventure of the Crooked Man.’ In Doyle’s story, an army sergeant sends one of his men on a suicide mission in order to eliminate him as a rival for the love of a beautiful woman.”
“Sounds like another episode in the Biblical David’s life,” said Matt Locke. “I remember the story of his sending Uriah off to be killed so that he could have Uriah’s wife, Bathsheba.”
“Your memory is good, Dad,” said Kelly. “In fact, Doyle alluded to that Biblical tale in his story.”
With that, Beth Strong collapsed into her son’s arms, sobbing uncontrollably.
“Earlier,” continued Kelly, “Mrs. Strong said that Mitchell died in Thailand, doubtless what David Strong had told her all those years ago.”
Matt Locke frowned. “But Spasky said he was killed in Cambodia, a place hostile to Americans.”
“And Russell heard that contradictory information,” said Kelly. “My guess is he told his mother about Strong’s earlier dangerous dealings in order to get her to talk Strong into nixing what Spasky called another dangerous deal with Hazelwood, a deal Russell proved to be against.”
Russell Strong pulled away from his mother. “Chief Locke, your daughter should go into fiction writing rather than newscasting. What a story. Now, I must insist that you leave.”
Matt Locke stood his ground. “Your mother doesn’t seem to think Kelly’s spinning a yarn.”
“And there’s more to this true story, isn’t there, Mrs. Strong?” said Kelly.
Beth Strong rose to her feet, trying hard to compose herself. “Russell, the lies end here. For thirty-eight years, this family has rested on untruths, and I say it ends—today.”
“Mother, please,” said Russell Strong.
“When Russell told me about Mason and Cambodia, everything became clear. David sent his best friend to Southeast Asia to die. Then the door opened for him to once again pursue me. Yes, David knew that as long as Mason was alive, my heart belonged to him.”
“But there was something he didn’t know, never knew even when he died,” said Kelly.
Beth Strong grabbed her son. “Everybody wondered why I agreed to marry David so soon after Mason’s death and the grief it caused.”
“Russell is Mason’s son,” said Kelly.
“We were in love, even though we had no real plans for marriage,” said Beth Strong. “David never knew. I had to make him believe Russell was his in order to protect a piece of Mason. Even though our marriage was loveless, I had to keep up appearances.”
Kelly realized that Beth Strong’s deception was made easier back then since DNA testing was not yet available. “And Russell never knew,” said Kelly, “until your conversation about Cambodia and Mason Mitchell’s death.”
Beth Strong drew in a deep breath. “I was so hurt, so angry. David caused Mason’s death, then lied to me all these years.”
Kelly looked at her dad. “When Russell learned the truth of his parentage, he went into a rage. The man he looked up to all these years had in effect murdered his real father. And how appropriate to use a piece of the factory Strong and Mitchell built as the weapon of his revenge. The dying clue suggests that Russell didn’t reveal what he knew and that David Strong died believing his killer was the son he loved.”
Matt Locke walked toward a slumping Russell Strong as Beth Strong covered her eyes.
XII
Matt Locke flipped the New York strips on the grill as he whistled the theme from The Magnificent Seven, his all-time favorite movie. “Kelly, I can’t tell you how great it felt to move that evidence box to the Closed Case file.”
Kelly was busy setting the table across the patio. “This case was a tough one, and even though we closed it, I can’t help feeling bad, especially for Beth Strong.”
Kelly’s dad stopped whistling. “Relationships between men and women can be touchy. Love, honesty, distrust…all those emotions come into play. It’s always a balancing act, one of give and take.”
As her dad went back to grilling, Kelly thought about her relationship with Paul. Why did she ever think it would work? Compromise was not in Paul’s vocabulary—unless it was defined as “you give me what I want.”
“Too bad Paul couldn’t be with us tonight,” said Matt. “I know he’d love these steaks.”
“Dad,” said Kelly, “Paul’s sort of…out of the picture.”
“Out of the picture?”
“When you read tomorrow’s sports page, look at the box score for the L.A. Dodgers and you’ll see a familiar name. Paul was traded…and he wanted me to go with him to the coast.”
Matt Locke put down his tongs. “And?”
“Well, I’m just not ready for that move geographically or emotionally. Besides, for all his wailing and gnashing of teeth, Mr. Phillips caved on Fira’s demands and upped the terms of my new contract.”
“Sweetheart, you know I want what’s best for you, but you gotta believe I’m one happy guy that you’ll be staying. If you left, who would listen to my stale jokes and help me solve crimes?”
Kelly laughed as she placed a plate of sliced tomatoes on the table.
Suddenly, Matt grew solemn. “Your mother would be so proud of you. She was such an independent soul, and you’re just like her. Kelly, I miss her more every day.”
Kelly walked across the patio and hugged her dad. “Don’t worry; you can’t get rid of me—even if the steaks are burned.”
Matt quickly pulled the smoking slabs of meat from the grill and threw them on a platter. “Oh, before we eat, I want you to see something in today’s paper—front page news about Cotton Hazelwood and that drone deal. The paper’s on the chair.”
Kelly retrieved the newspaper as her dad took the steaks to the table. Something caught her eye in a picture above the fold on the exposed social section. She swallowed hard before heading for the table. “Dad!”
Kelly handed the paper to her dad and pointed at the photo. In the corner of a picture taken at a society ball in Miami stood an elderly brunette woman whose profile revealed a heart-shaped birthmark on her left cheek.
CLOSING THE CIRCLE, by Sergio Gaut vel Hartman
Translated from the Spanish by Lewis Shiner
“Afternoon. Remember me?”
The man interfering with Colonel Iribarren’s walk was short, dark-complexioned, curly-haired, dressed in an aviator’s jacket, canvas pants, and leather boots.
“No,” Iribarren said. “Should I?”
“I think so.” He took a cigarette out of his inside jacket po
cket, and it looked to Iribarren as if he lit it with some kind of magical pass of the same hand. “You killed me.”
Iribarren stopped. Twilight was passing into night. He looked up at the clearing sky and the moon rising between the buildings along the avenue. “Ah, yes. I don’t remember you in particular, but I killed several like you. They don’t usually come back to complain. Are you sure it was me?”
“You that killed me, or you that gave the order?”
“Either one,” Iribarren said casually. Dealing with a pathological liar didn’t seem much worse than some of the other tough situations he’d been in during his long life.
“Maybe you’d remember if I told you my name.”
“I doubt it,” Iribarren said, losing patience.
“In life I was Comandante Sampedro.”
Iribarren took a step to the side, intending to walk around him and not waste any more time. Considering the weirdness of the situation, he thought he’d handled himself well, not giving in to his usual hostility or cynicism. So when this so-called Comandante Sampedro mirrored him and again blocked his way, he’d had enough.
“Excuse me. Alive or dead, you are holding me up. My family is waiting for me. I don’t know you and I had nothing to do with your death, so I will ask you, politely, to get out of my way.”
“Get out of my way” came out an octave higher than the rest of the sentence. At that moment, the streetlights of the Reconciliation National Park all came on at once. It was like a lightning bolt that refused to fade away.
Iribarren flinched, and Sampedro smiled. Behind Sampedro he could now see a multitude of men and women, children and old people, their faces somber and tense.
“Pick one, Colonel. If you didn’t kill me, I’m sure that you killed some of these people, maybe quite a few of them—though one, just as an example, should suffice, don’t you think?”
Iribarren’s face, pale as the moon, showed that this time Sampedro had gotten through to him. This crowd was calling him to account, him in particular. Dead or alive, there they were. Real or not, there they were. He would not, however, make the obvious excuse that he was only following orders. True to his style, he counterattacked.
“I remember one or two. Somebody named Bernal? Rosa Naranjo, Bernardo Zelinsky, and a boy they used to call Metralla, Marcelo Cardoso. Are they somewhere in there?” He waved his hand at them. “Is that enough for you?”
“They are,” Sampedro said with great seriousness. “Yes, it’s enough.”
Four figures moved out of the crowd to stand on either side of Sampedro. The woman held a little girl by the hand. Zelinsky was a decrepit old man and Metralla and Bernal were barely adolescents.
“Are you the ones I named?” Iribarren said. “I don’t remember your faces.”
“Selective memory,” Sampedro said. “It’s better to forget some things—especially the faces of the people you kill.”
Iribarren was unmoved. “And now? You want revenge?”
The five looked at each other, and finally the woman, Rosa, spoke. “Do you think we wouldn’t do it? We would tear you to pieces without shame or regret. But we can’t. The dead can’t kill.”
“Ah,” Iribarren said. “The dead can’t kill.”
“You’re not afraid?” Bernal asked. Now he seemed to be a calm and ordinary man, not a boy, much less the sort of hallucination that you could squash like a cockroach.
“Afraid of a nightmare?” Iribarren nearly smiled.
“So that’s it,” Sampedro said. “You think you’re dreaming.” He bit his lip; Iribarren guessed he hadn’t counted on having to prove his own existence.
“I’m either dreaming or hallucinating,” Iribarren insisted. “It must have started when you crossed my path, though I don’t seem to remember what happened before that. My memories are quite clear up to a point, then there’s an abyss. But there’s one thing I’m certain of, and that’s that you are all a creation of my mind. You don’t exist.”
“Of your injured mind? Of your sick mind?” Sampedro was lashing out in attempt to get his momentum back, but Iribarren knew himself to be hard, very hard. A phantom of a dead man had no power over him.
“Of my mind.”
“What are you trying to say?” Zelinsky took a step forward and extended one arm. He had enormous hands and could have strangled Iribarren with just one of them. “Do you think you can get out of this by pleading insanity?”
“I don’t believe in ghosts,” Iribarren said. “Nor do I believe in guilt, nor in myths, nor in grief. The one thing I believe in, a little, is death.”
“And that’s why you think you’re dreaming,” Sampedro said.
Iribarren shrugged. “There’s no other explanation. I only have to try and I’ll wake up. I’ve done it before.” He squeezed his eyelids shut, making lines like a musical staff across his forehead, with two or three warts and a scar composing a melody there. But when he opened his eyes again, the scene had not changed. For the first time he felt a little disoriented.
“Distorted or not,” Sampedro said, “the vision persists. So what other explanation is there? What’s left? Maybe something of the abyss, of the black night?”
“I don’t understand what you’re saying. Maybe I’ve fallen into a drug-induced trance. That’s possible. Somebody gave me a drug to force me to live through this experience. But it can’t last forever. It will pass.”
Comandante Sampedro snorted. “It’s much worse than you think. No, Colonel, what we’ve built for you is not a nightmare, it’s more like a prison, and you’ll stay there forever. We’ve made sure there’s no escape for you.”
“I will escape,” Iribarren said calmly. “Don’t be stupid. I’ll wake up.” He paused to take out a cigarette. He didn’t know any magic tricks, so he lit it with a match. He blew out a mouthful of smoke and pointed to Sampedro with the cigarette. It shook a little. “I will tell you that I’ve about had it with this dream. You are all dead, and well dead, my men and I made sure of that. So I’m going to charge right through you, and you will all disappear like the smoke from this cigarette.”
“What if we’re not made of fog?” Zelinsky said. “Then you’re in real trouble, aren’t you?”
Iribarren saw that what the dead man said was true; he had to charge into the wall to see what it was made of.
“Why don’t you just accept your fate quietly?” Sampedro said. “Did it never occur to you that you would have to pay for what you did?”
Iribarren did not resist the wave of laughter that rose up within him. “Punishment? Do you think that we did what we did to spend the rest of our lives waiting to be punished? For the very will that gave strength to our hands? We know how to recognize when God is moving through our veins, mixed with our blood. Maybe you didn’t have the will to kill us?”
The frozen scene, with the dead and the killer facing each other like pieces on a chessboard, suddenly came to life. The Reconciliation National Park turned into a barren wasteland of a battlefield. One single throat—the multitude united—howled a pure and piercing scream and Iribarren could not keep himself from shivering.
“No, we didn’t lack the will,” Sampedro said.
“And we don’t lack it now,” said Zelinsky, shaking his fist centimeters from Iribarren’s nose.
Iribarren snapped his eyes open and the dead retreated.
“You’re nothing,” he said. “Smoke, fog, vapor, a condensation of my own doubts. But I will not let myself feel guilty for what I did, for what we did.”
“We’re evenly matched, Iribarren,” said Sampedro, moving back to his former position. “But we have held back a small advantage, microscopic. Do you play chess?”
“Where did that come from? Yes, I play, what of it?”
“You will know, then, that a good player is able to see th
e moves that will lead him to victory even in the heart of the most frozen stalemate. Symmetry and balance.”
“Leave me in peace! Is this your vengeance, keeping me here against my will, tormenting me with riddles and veiled threats?”
Sampedro laughed, and some of the others joined in, without much conviction. “You buy for nothing and want to sell for a fortune. No, Iribarren, it would be too dull for us to settle for having you live through this as no more than a nightmare.”
“It is a nightmare, damn you! I’m going to wake up and all of you will melt into nothing.”
“It’s not a nightmare, Colonel,” said Rosa.
“It’s not a nightmare,” echoed Bernal.
“Are you going to repeat it a thousand times, ‘it’s not a nightmare, it’s not a nightmare,’ do you think that’ll be enough?” A cynical look stained Iribarren’s face. “On top of being dead, you’re all imbeciles. You can’t act this way. I’m a professional, I know what I did was right. I’d do it again. Do you think you’re the only ones with ideals, with values?”
“A minute ago you said you didn’t believe in guilt, or in grief, which made me think you don’t believe in much of anything,” Sampedro said. “Except, a little, in death. You said that yourself, not me. Now you talk about ideals, values…”
“Don’t try to beat me in a battle of dialectics, Sampedro. You’ve made a bad choice of prey. You should go after a jerk like General Pozzi, or Colonel Estevez. You could play with them until you’re sick of them. But not with me. I read, I study. My war against you is not just about defending economic interests. It’s a crusade, Sampedro, and you’ll never beat me this way.”
Sampedro watched his companions and gave them a gesture of approval. But the one who spoke was Zelinsky.
“Be careful what you wish for.”
Iribarren speared Zelinsky with a look. “I hope to wake up and get this over with, that’s what I hope, that you disappear from my horizon. I hope to cross this damned park and get home to my family, to eat dinner, to read a little before bed. Do you envy that? I have it, you lost it. I won. I won, dammit!”
