by Ed Gorman
I played my light on what I wanted them to see. "Suddenly, there's a second set of footprints."
"Did somebody else drive in?" Natalie asked.
I trained my light on the long patch of earth behind the end of the car. "No new tire tracks. Just Cronin's."
"But where -?" Dana started to say. Then: "The trunk."
"Exactly."
"He had somebody in the trunk?" Natalie said. "Richard Conners!"
"You said he'd been missing and wasn't sure where he'd been."
Dana said, "But why would Cronin kidnap him?"
"That's what we need to ask him. I think he turned him loose right here. Then Richard walked the rest of the way to your farmhouse."
"But why wouldn't he remember any of this?"
"Shock, trauma, who knows? It happens."
Dana shook her head. "I wonder if anybody told Cronin that kidnapping is a capital offense."
I said, "I'd like to finish talking about Chris."
"Chris is none of your business, McCain."
"Why did you shove her the other day?"
"That's none of your business either."
"It may have something to do with your husband's murder."
"It doesn't." Then, changing the subject again, "How did that stupid school board meeting go tonight, by the way?"
"Cronin didn't show up."
"What?" She looked and sounded genuinely surprised. "After all the hell he's been raising, he didn't show up?" And then an odd look came across her face, as if a remarkable idea had just occurred to her. "I mean, that's strange, isn't it?" But the fire of her initial response was gone. And now there was a sense of agitation about her.
Natalie said, "The police gave me some of my brother's belongings. Would you like to look through them, Sam?"
"Thanks."
We'd left the question of Chris hanging again. Why had Dana shoved her the other day? And why did Dana ease past the subject of Cronin now?
I went back over the tire prints. Cronin had come in here, yanked Conners from the trunk, and sent him staggering on his way home. Conners wouldn't remember any of it. Conners had probably been drugged, and that inevitably involved Natalie's brother, but what had they been after? Did they get it? And if they got it, what and where was it?
In the distance, you could see the lights of town. Nothing made me feel better than coming home late at night from a trip to Cedar Rapids or Iowa City and seeing those lights. It was like one of those science fiction stories where you can travel back in time to a town that hasn't changed from the good old days. Maybe Black River Falls wasn't ideal, but it was still a town of good people with good hearts for the most part, which had made this whole "red scare" thing so difficult for everybody. All you could liken it to was the Civil War where, in places like Missouri and lower Kansas, families split down the middle, one half blue, the other half gray. Nearly a hundred years later, the spiritual wounds of that war were still with us. The wounds of the McCarthy era threatened to last just as long. Some people I liked and admired had said a lot of ignorant and nasty things about some other people I liked and admired.
Dana still looked preoccupied and eager to leave. "Just close the gate behind you, McCain. I need to get back." She swept up on her horse. "It was nice to meet you, Natalie. Despite the circumstances."
And then she was gone, not trying for drama, but how could you miss, all that icy beauty astride a horse in the dead of night?
We watched her ride away until she was lost in the prairie shadows.
"You like her, Sam?"
"Not much."
"Me either. I wanted to feel sorry for her. Because of her husband. But I couldn't quite - I resent strong women. Probably because I've never been very strong."
I laughed. "Kiddo, you're strong enough to chew on barbed wire." I slid my arm around her shoulder and gave her a brotherly kiss on the cheek. "Look at everything you've survived in your life. Not many people have to face up to what you have."
She slid her arm around my waist. "That doesn't make me strong, Sam. It just means that God has blessed me. Or aren't you religious?"
"Most of the time. In my own sort of way."
"Now there's a deep profession of faith."
I looked up at the few stars in the overcast night. The vast loneliness that is the religious impulse - as opposed to the church impulse, which is about social rules - overcame me, and I had a racial memory (probably owing to all the wonderful Edgar Rice Burroughs books I'd read as a kid) of man in his various incarnations - lizardlike, monkeylike, Cro-Magnon - standing here just as I stood here, looking at the same stars, and feeling the same vast loneliness. Millions and millions of years later, and still, for all our inventions, we faced at least once a day that quick inconsolable grief of wondering why we'd been born and what, if anything, it meant. "I want to believe. I really do."
"If I didn't have my faith, I wouldn't have anything."
And then we were making out.
Now, you probably wouldn't think a discussion of faith could lead to making out, but it did. And notice I didn't say "And then we were kissing," because it went way past kissing right into open-mouthed, groin-pressing, hair-raking making out.
It happened just that fast. And God, was she a good kisser! During my short time with her, I'd had the stray sexual thought but then the rational side countered that it was nothing serious because I was too pained about good ol' beautiful Pamela to do anything about stray sexual thoughts.
Boy, was I wrong.
Where we ended up was in the back seat of the ragtop. With the top up. She asked if I had a "thing." I said yes - the emergency thing in my billfold, right next to my photo of John Foster Dulles - and then we were making sweet sad love because that happened to be the mood upon us. Healing love. She was a quiet lover, fragile in some ways, and when we were done she said, "Sometimes I can get pretty wild."
"So can I," I said. "I play the banjo."
She laughed. "While you're making love?"
"Just at the pinnacle moment."
"No wonder women are so crazy about you."
"Yes, they are, aren't they?"
When we were dressed again, we stayed in the back seat and she sat on my lap. It felt completely natural and comfortable. Sat on my lap with her arms around my neck, smoking a cigarette and giving me a drag every so often.
She said, "Are you thinking of Pamela?"
"No."
"Liar."
"Well, not very often."
"I ruin all my relationships with jealousy. I'm too possessive."
"That's where the banjo comes in handy."
"The banjo helps with jealousy?"
"Every time you have a jealous thought, you just play."
She laughed. "Will you let me stay with you tonight?"
"I'll have to think it over. Yes," I said. "I've thought it over."
ELEVEN
"Boy, if you thought that one was crazy, listen to this one."
It was 2 a.m. We should've been asleep. We'd stopped at an all-night grocery and bought some hamburger and buns and onions, ketchup and mustard and pickles. She said that making love always made her feel domestic. She also bought a couple of magazines, and that's what we were doing now that we'd eaten and made love a second time - a much more ferocious outing this time - sitting naked in the middle of my bed with two Luckies burning in an ashtray and "Johnny's Greatest Hits" playing low in the background.
She was reading from an "Advice For Teenagers" column, and the exchange was hilarious.
"The name of this one is 'What to Tell Your Teen-Age Daughter About Sex.' You ready, McCain?"
"Ready."
"'Question: Boys say they don't want their wives to be virgins any more. Is virginity out of date? Answer: The sex act is often painful at first and not pleasurable at all. Therefore if you have sexual intercourse at an early age you may be frightened and disgusted by it - and never marry.'"
"Oh, my God," I said, "you'll probably end up a lesbo."
Lesbo was a word you encountered in a lot of Midwood and Beacon paperbacks, the really steamy ones. Lesbo Lust, Lesbo Love, Lesbo Loonies. You know the kind of book. The ones you won't admit you read.
"Here's another good one, McCain. This has very specific advice. 'Question: Is there a perfect good night kiss for teenage girls? Answer: Yes, ten seconds - not too long and not too hard.'"
"I'll refrain from commenting on that not-too-long, not-too-hard thing."
"Oh, listen to this!" She was already laughing even before reading it. "'Question: Is there one type of girl that just about every boy likes? Answer: Yes, indeed. Boys like girls who are peppy and wide awake and who like to have fun.'"
And then the phone rang.
The cats, who'd been sleeping at the foot of the bed, jumped up like a gymnastic team. I had about the same reaction. I'd been so entranced by this sexual advice that the ring scared the hell out of me.
She looked frightened by it. Drew away from it.
I grabbed the receiver. Listened.
Disguised voice. No sex. No accent. No identifiable intonation.
"The old blacksmith barn, McCain. Check it out."
And hung up.
"Who was that?"
"Somebody who's seen a lot of mystery movies."
"What?"
"He or she wants me to check out an old barn on the east edge of town. By the old dam."
"Did the person say why?"
"That's rule number one in mystery movies: Anonymous calls should always be as mysterious as possible."
She stubbed out her cigarette. "Did you ever think somebody might just be having fun?"
"Not after midnight. After midnight you have to get a city permit to fool me."
She said, "Damn."
"What?"
She pointed at her head. "Depression."
"About what?"
"Depression and guilt, actually. The killer combo. My brother's not two days dead, and here I am in somebody's bed. And having a great time."
I stood up and pulled my shirt from the chair where I'd draped it. "C'mon. Depression has a hard time with moving targets."
"We're going to the old barn?"
"Thought we might."
"You're crazy, you know that?" she said.
"Yeah. But at least I'm not depressed."
***
In legend, the first blacksmith in these parts was a Plains Indian said to have mystical powers. It was a nice story, but according to town records the first blacksmith was a guy named Louis J. Nordberg, Jr., who later ran for mayor. If he had mystical powers he kept them to himself. Yet whenever there was a town pageant of any kind, they dragged in this Indian named Night Star, who banged away at his anvil and spoke to ghosts. I guess it was better than Louis J. Nordberg, Jr., at that.
When I was growing up, the blacksmith barn was used for livestock auctions. A couple hundred pickup trucks could be seen surrounding the pens twice a month, and an auctioneer who talked so fast I couldn't understand him strolled around in Western clothes and white Stetson, tilting his microphone like a crooner on Ed Sullivan.
Now it was a huge cattle barn laid out with bleachers and a show pen. The wood had begun to rot, and the smell of decaying timber combined with ghostly traces of dung to create a definitely unwelcome odor. You could still hear the sad, confused animals and the whine of Hank Williams played over the loudspeaker if you were attuned to the paranormal radio station that sometimes plays in my mind.
There were a number of stay out signs posted. The doors were all padlocked sturdily.
"You bring a gun?" Natalie said, clutching my arm, shivering as much because of the creepy barn as because of the chill. There was even some ground fog rolling in. Pretty soon we'd have ourselves a drive-in horror movie.
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because if I bring a gun, somebody's likely to get shot."
"I thought all private eyes carried guns."
"Only the ones in the private eye union. I don't have enough money to join."
There was a boarded-up window that kids had pried open. The board came loose the moment I touched it. This told me that the kids of Black River Falls are as indomitable as ever, God love them. Crawl in and out of the barn but always put the board back in place so that it looks closed up. And people wondered where our future political leaders were coming from.
Inside, the wet-timber old-cow-dung smell was even worse. It had the same suffocating effect of being in a small closet filled with mothballs.
I'll spare you the tour we took. Nothing. The smells got worse. She clutched my arm tighter. We kissed a couple of times. And then I excused myself to do something people rarely do in mysteries when they're single-mindedly looking for clues: I stopped to take a leak. That's something you don't see very much of in Agatha Christie.
When we resumed our nothing search, I remembered the auctioneer's booth up in the corner. It was like the broadcaster's booth at a stadium. The auctioneer sat up there with his Pepsi and his Pall Malls and commented on all the beautiful animals being led into the pen.
The booth itself was the size of a prison cell. The auctioneer sat on one of three folding chairs at a booth-long counter for his microphone and made his announcements. On the wall, a ten-year-old poster announced the fact that on June 30, 1949, Mr. Roy Rogers and his horse Trigger would be appearing right here for the delight and wonderment of the entire family. I remembered that afternoon. I'd had a hell of a time until Trigger had a herculean bowel movement just when Roy was making him show off a little. That's the nice thing movies have over reality; you can always do another take. Most of our lives are in dire need of another take.
The booth had been used recently. Natalie pointed out a Pepsi bottle with the new Pepsi logo; I pointed out Cavalier cigarette butts in an ancient ashtray. The tobacco was still fresh. And then, as I played my light over the wall, we both saw it: blood spatters.
Richard Conners staggering out of the foggy night, not knowing where he'd been the past forty-eight hours. A head wound of some kind, blood all over his scalp.
A crime scene. That's what we were looking at. A man had been kidnapped and brought here. But why? I was able to answer that question a few minutes later when, crawling around on the floor with my flashlight, I saw a small plastic cap. I wasn't sure what it was. I showed it to Natalie.
"That's the protective cap they put on a hypodermic needle."
I'd handled it as carefully as possible, so as to get no prints on it. I wrapped it carefully in my handkerchief and put it in the pocket of my jacket.
"That's funny," she said.
"What is?"
"The hypodermic needle. In the stuff your police chief gave back to me - of my brother's, I mean - there was a small bottle of some kind of chemical."
Conners's missing forty-eight hours was starting to take shape.
"Let's take a look at that bottle."
"That's what I was thinking," she said.
On the way back to town, she lit a cigarette and asked if I'd turn up the radio. "Save the Last Dance for Me" was on.
"That's how I want my life to end," she said.
"How?"
"Dancing in the arms of my one true love and then sort of just fading up to heaven. You know, the way June Allyson and Van Johnson would in a musical." She paused. "The last dance. The very last dance. Russian girls are romantic. That's one thing not even the communists could take away from us."
"Not that they didn't try."
***
"Oh, yes," she said sadly. "Not that they didn't try."
A squad car was parked outside the motel office. I could see the one and only Deputy Roger Weed inside, talking to the desk clerk. The clerk looked nervous. Roger just looked stupid. It was an expression he'd mastered. Roger had his notebook out and was writing in it with a ballpoint he had to keep shaking to get ink. I half expected him to take out his police revolver and shoot it for loitering.
"I wonder what's going on," Natalie
said.
"Hopefully, nothing that involves us. Let's go to your room."
She was at the end. Several cars had red-white-and-blue Nixon bumper stickers. He'd spent a lot of time in the state lately. The next presidential race, in 1960, would probably be Nixon versus Hubert Humphrey. The only possible dark horse was Lyndon Johnson from Texas. It would be a pretty boring election.
We parked and went to the door. Somebody was moving around inside. I shushed her and pushed her gently away. I wasn't sure what kind of reception I'd be getting when I knocked.
I was thinking how lonesome my Smith & Wesson must be, sitting at home night after night. I hadn't been kidding Natalie. I left it home because just about every time I took it along, somebody got shot. Fortunately, so far it hadn't been me.
I was just about to knock when the door opened.
He said, "What the hell you doing here, McCain?"
His name was Chilly Swacka, another one of Cliffie's minions. He was different from the others because his IQ exceeded his age and he was taking police courses at the U of I. He was the night deputy, all dry-cleaned khaki uniform, Zachary Scott mustache, and too-knowing eyes.
"The room belongs to a friend of mine," I said.
"Yeah? Who?"
Natalie stepped forward. "Me."
Swacka was suitably impressed. He got his nickname, by the way, from jumping bare-ass naked into the river on a dare one February morning when he was a kid. "Very pretty."
"Thank you," I said.
"He always this funny?" Swacka said.
"Twenty-four hours a day." Then, trying to look behind, around, and through him: "What happened in this room, officer?"
"Somebody tossed it. And the man in the room next door heard all the commotion and called the desk. Any idea what they might be looking for?"
"No."
I was beginning to wish I'd copyrighted the word tossed. It sure was getting a workout.
"You can look around if you want." He stepped back and let her pass. I heard her moan when she got inside.
